Becoming Human

The time is almost here. In just a few hours, the door to the Divine will swing open and God and all of heaven will burst into the world. If you stop and listen, just for a moment, you can hear the eternal harps in the distance as they approach our lives. Oh, sure, it's happened before. But can't you feel it? Doors opening, light flooding in, the earth filled with a new vision of peace eternal. Maybe, just maybe, tonight will be different.

The child in the manger is, of course, no ordinary child, but God Incarnate, the Word made flesh. God took the form of a human--just an ordinary human--a human like you and me--and was born and dwelt with us--still Divine, but in every way human (because you see God in all of God's wisdom and all of God's mystery can do that!) This Holy Incarnation was not meant to show us how to be Divine but, rather, how to be human. We see ourselves as "only human", as if that excuses us from being who God called us to be. But the point is that God calls us to be human, made in the image of God (not like God, but in the image--a reflection of God, Incarnate). Jesus the Christ was born human so that we would know what being human means. And when, like Jesus, we become fully human, our hearts are filled with compassion, connecting us to one another; our eyes are filled with a vision of what God made this world to be; and our lives become holy as they are shaped in the image of God Incarnate. And we, even as humans, can reach out and touch the Divine now that God has burst forth into this world.

On the eve of Christ's birth, let us open our lives to receive this holy child and open our hearts and our eyes that we might finally know what we are called to become--human, made in the image of God, a reflection and an incarnation of God here on earth. This Christmas, let Christ be born in us. This Christmas, let us become fully human.

O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us, we pray;

Cast out our sin, and enter in, be born in us today.

We hear the Christmas angels the great glad tidings tell;

O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!

(Phillips Brooks)

The time is almost here. The door is opening and we see heaven beginning to pour in. Go forth and become human, become who God called you to be.

Grace and Peace on this Night of Nights,
Shelli

Becoming Mystery

The way that God comes into our being is not something for which we can plan or project. Think about it--what if rather than always falling on December 25th, Christmas Day came on different days each year and we weren't told until after the day that it had happened? How would you prepare for it then? Because, really, that's the way the first Christmas happened. What if, in the midst of your preparing and your becoming, the time was once again fulfilled, whether or not you were ready? The way that God comes is a mystery, a time fulfilled rather than a time scheduled.

And this day before the eve of Christ's coming finds us on a threshold between darkness and light, between human and divine, between reality and mystery. As we approach Bethlehem, tired from our journey, there are great hoards around us preparing to be counted. It is dusty and crowded and unwelcoming and we are tired of fighting the journey. But there, there in the north, are the quiet stirrings of a door that is beginning to open, a door through which heaven will pour and through which our humanity will somehow mysteriously taste and experience the Divine. How is this happening? "Because," as St. John Chrysostom said, "God is now on earth, and [humanity] in heaven; on every side all things commingle. [God] has come on earth, while being fully in heaven; and while complete in heaven, he is without diminution on earth...Though being the unchanging Word, he became flesh that he might dwell amongst us." [i]

The time is approaching when it will be fulfilled. And the only way for us to enter it is to become mystery and count ourselves among those who reside on that threshold between our lives as they are and the mystery that God holds for us.

Go humbly, humble are the skies,

And low and large and fierce the Star;

So very near the Manger lies

That we may travel far.
(G.K. Chesterton)

So go forth and become mystery!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli


[i] St. John Chrysostom, from "The Mystery", in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas (Plough Publishing)

Becoming Light

In these last days of Advent, we experience both excitement and panic as we prepare for Christmas Day. But, again, Advent is meant to be more than just a precursor to Christmas Day. This is the time of preparation for Jesus' coming, of course. But that means that it is also our time to become--become the one who receives God into our lives. The Gospel According to John begins with images of Christ as light coming into the world, enlightening all of the darkness on the earth until it is no more. And we, as children of the light, receive that light.

But what does that mean to receive light? We know that looking directly at light is uncomfortable and, at times, downright dangerous. Our eyes are not meant to look directly at something so bright. The light, then, is not merely something at which we look. That is not light's purpose; otherwise it would be nothing more than a pretty decoration. The purpose of light is to illumine the darkness. We are not called to look at it, but to enter it. And in entering it, we become it, we become a reflection of that light for the world. It doesn't take much--after all, one tiny light can wipe out absolute darkness--one light--your light. But the lights of many of us is what makes the world so bright. Jesus came as the light and calls us to become that light.

So go forth and become light!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

Becoming Christmas

The hours are ticking by. Christmas is almost here. I've finished the last of the wrapping, although the decorating that I've planned never got done. And I have LOTS of baking and cooking that needs to happen before the big day. I will say, though, that I'm having a wonderful and blessed Advent. I have walked through the waiting, the preparation, and the receiving. Oh, it won't be perfect, but it will be. That's what's important. And now...these last few days...these are the days when we become--become mystery...become real...become human--these are the days when we become Christmas.

What does that mean--to become Christmas? Doesn't Christmas happen all on its own? But, think about it, God did not come for God's own edification; God did not come to give us some sort of excuse to once again bask in the commercializing of our lives; and God did not come to give us a holiday. No, the point is that God came and in it we become--we become who God calls us to be. We become Christmas--the Christ Mass, the living embodiment of Christ.

Christmas is about openness and receiving; Christmas is about freedom and giving; and Christmas is about love--of Christ, of each other, and of ourselves. Christmas is about finding our way. As a people, we wandered in the desert for years looking for our way; we listened to prophets and kings who told us where to go; and we waited for someone to give us a nudge in the right direction. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. This is the moment for which we have waited. But it is not about the moment. One cannot take the image of the nativity and freeze it in time. Because there is so much more to do--after all, we have to become Christmas!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

God-Bearing

I am fascinated by the image of Mary in the Christmas story. I actually think that we Protestants underestimate her a bit. The Roman Catholics do a much better job of practicing a certain reverence toward Mary, the Mother of God. But those of the Orthodox tradition do it best. She is the subject of icons and other incredible images. She has hymns and liturgies and whole worship emphases. The Greek transliteration for Mary is Theotokos. In English, we just sort of loosely translate it as Mary, The Mother of God. But the literal interpretation of the title is "God-bearer". What an incredible thing! What does it mean to be a "God-bearer"?

In our Western thinking, we either sort of accept the whole Virgin Birth phenomenon as part of our faith understanding or we fight it tooth and nail. To be honest, I guess I don't get wrapped up in the whole thing. I mean...think about it...if you woke up tomorrow and there was proof that the whole virgin birth thing happened, what would it do to your image of God? And, conversely, if you woke up and some well-learned person had determined that there was proof beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus was NOT born of a literal virgin, what would it do to your image of God? For me, nothing either way. God still came in the most mysterious and miraculous way. More importantly, God came. God came and burst forth into our humanity in a way that we never could have imagined. And God still came and opened the door that we might glimpse the eternal. Isn't that enough?

But whether or not Mary was a literal virgin, whether or not God somehow bypassed the whole law of human conception and whether or not we can really explain what happened, God came. And Mary agreed beyond a shadow of a doubt to become a womb for God, to become a God-bearer. For me, the point is not the virgin birth itself; it is rather that God came to someone who was virgin--pure, not violated by pre-conceptions, not influenced by something that came before, open to receiving. Mary, the God-bearer, showed us what it means to bear God. It means to become virgin. It means to become a womb. It means to be ready to receive Christ in the purest form. From that standpoint, aren't we all called to be "God-bearers"?

So go forth and be a womb, be a God-bearer.

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

What Do You Want for Christmas?

"What do you want for Christmas?" When I was little, that was a big question. What do I want for Christmas? In the weeks before, I would painstakenly look at every TV commercial and every toy catalog that I could find so I would know the answer. And then we would go to the department store and stand in line to see Santa so that I could be sure and tell him what I wanted for Christmas. (Of course, everyone knew that the department store Santa was only a helper--after all, the REAL Santa was up at the North Pole directing things.) I was truthfully a little afraid of Santa. You had to step up to this massive Santa-throne and then sit on this strange man's lap. He was always a little sweaty too. (But, of course, I guess if you had to wear a heavy fuzzy suit, big boots, fake beard, and sit under the photographer's light for all those hours in the muggy Houston December, you'd be sweaty too!) But, the important thing was that Christmas morning, I would wake up and there it would be--the thing I wanted most, the thing my heart desired, the thing without which I thought I could not live--there it was under the tree!

As an adult, most of us don't know how to answer that question. What do I WANT? Well, truthfully, I hadn't really thought about it. I guess whatever you want to give me. Sure, there are things I'd like; a repaired and healthy economy so that everyone had a job would be nice; or, if you're really asking, how about peace on earth? How about no hunger or homelessness? How about an innate respect for each other's lives? How about everyone being aloud to do and be what God calls them to? Yeah...those would make nice gifts. But, sadly, they probably won't be under the tree on Christmas morning. I think back to my childhood. It seemed that all I had to do was desire something in my deepest being and it would be there.

Why CAN'T we do that as adults? What do you desire in the deepest part of your being? It's God. Deep in us, past all of the greed and fear and prejudices and pre-conceived notions in our lives, is a deep and abiding desire for God. And interestingly enough, when we desire God, God comes. There it is--the thing I want the most, the thing my heart desires, the thing without which I cannot live--God comes when we desire God. Won't Christmas morning be a glorious thing?

So go forth and desire God!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

Free to Receive

The first step in being ready to receive is to open oneself to what is being given. This means that we have to prepare ourselves, ridding ourselves of our pre-conceived illusions of what we are going to get. Freeing ourselves to receive is a way of entering a true Sabbath, a resting, a pure openness to receive what one is blessed to receive. It probably seems odd to talk about Sabbath rest in the middle of Advent. But the Sabbath in its purest sense is but a taste of the world to come. So what, then, are we looking toward in this Advent season? The Advent season is a looking toward the ultimate Sabbath, the coming of God into Creation as it enters its very fullness, its very perfection, the very essence of what it is supposed to be.

The birth of Christ was the beginning, a taste of the world to come, the point at which we realized that the world was not meant to look like what we had planned. Our Advent journey prepares us to rebirth Christ in our own lives, it prepares us to taste once again what is to come, and to inch that much closer to the world that God envisions. But to do that we have to rid ourselves of our own illusions, we have to enter a Sabbath way of thinking, a Sabbath way of receiving God in whatever way God chooses to come. If we are not open to God's coming, if we are not purely and wholly free of ourselves and ready to receive God into our lives, we will be looking for God to come into that place for which we have so carefully prepared and made ready and God, in perfect God-wisdom, will instead come through the back door of our hearts and settle in the dark grottos of our lives where only those who are poor in Spirit and humble in life and who crave the light with all their being will see. So, open your life to all of your life, because that is when God comes.

So go forth and be free to receive!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

A Receiving Spirit

So how do you foster a receiving spirit in this Season of Giving? By nature, our consumer-driven society are not ordinarily givers--at least not in the true sense. Oh, don't get me wrong...all of us give to that small number of carefully-picked non-profits (including our church) each year. And this is definitely the season that our charitable giving jumps way up. Perhaps it's the little bit of Santa in all of us; perhaps it's the colder weather that makes us realize how fortunate we are to be warm and dry and comfortable and nested in the midst of those who love us when there are those that are cold and alone living right there with us; and (let's face it) perhaps it's part of our year-end tax planning--whatever it is that drives us to give, we'll take it!

So, once again, how do you foster a receiving spirit in this Season of Giving? If you're really honest with yourself, giving is easier than receiving. Giving means that you are the one in control. Giving means that you are the one choosing what, how much, and even whether or not to give at all. But how well do we receive? How well do we let someone else choose the wrong style of decorative item for our home, spend way too much (or way too little) for our taste, or give a gift that we were not expecting and for which we had no reciprocating item to give. I've gotten better at that. I give what I can. Others do too! Things don't have to even out. Give them that--that is a gift too!

Truthfully, this is the most incredible gift of this season--the lesson of receiving. Bishop William Willimon says that "This strange story tells us how to be receivers. The first word of the church, a people born out of so odd a nativity is that we are receivers before we are givers. Discipleship teaches us the art of seeing our lives as gifts. That's tough, because I would rather see myself as a giver. I want power--to stand on my own, take charge, set things to right, perhaps to help those who have nothing. I don't like picturing myself as dependent, needy, empty-handed."[i] But, once again, wasn't that how God came that night--dependent, needy, empty-handed? God came as a helpless, vulnerable baby to show us how to receive what the world offers and when we enter that paradoxical mystery, we will find and receive what God offers.

So go forth and receive in humility and vulnerability and immense grace! That is the greatest gift you can give!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

[i] William Willimon, "The God We Hardly Knew", in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, (Plough Publishing, 2001), Dec. 14.

Children Do Christmas Well

Children do Christmas well. Maybe it's the toys; maybe it's Santa; maybe it's the fantastical images of sugarplums, eight tiny reindeer, and a little drummer boy dancing in their heads. But I think it's something more. I think it has more to do with receiving. By that, I don't mean WHAT they get, but rather HOW they get.

I remember going to my Grandmother and Granddaddy's on Christmas Eve. It was wonderful--lots of food, lots of people, and LOTS of gifts. But my favorite (believe it or not) was leaving--getting in the car with new gifts in tow and setting out from home. It was always late at night, usually freezing cold, and the short 7-mile drive was magical. There was the radio tower that we passed with the red light on top. Surely, I thought, that was Rudolph. There was the prospect of lots of neat gifts. But, more than anything, there was an expectancy that hung in the air. It was all but palpable, as if the cool, fog settling over the Texas prairie somehow shrouded what was to come until Christmas morning. I think as a child I somehow juxtaposed the stories of Baby Jesus and Santa and let my mind wander into visions of a manger awash in starlight surrounded by gifts from the jolly man in the red suit. That's OK. The point was that I was expecting something. I KNEW something wonderful was going to happen. And I was ready for whatever it was. I was ready to receive whatever I was given.

Children carry no baggage or lists. They have no pre-conceived notions of what Christmas should be. They're not worried about whether or not they have all the groceries or all the right gifts for everyone. They're not worried about wrapping the gifts. Children KNOW that you will love what they give you, because that is the way they receive things. Maybe that's why God burst forth into humanity in the rather unlikely guise of a child. God didn't come as a prince or a king with set ways of being addressed and set rules of being received. God came as a child, offering nothing but Godself and, as a child, showed us how to receive what is given. In this case, it was a child who needed help in a helpless situation. And in that God showed us how to receive from others. Because, after all, children do Christmas well!

Go forth with the heart of a child and receive the child!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

This Season of Receiving

Wait, that's not right...this is the season of Giving! This is the season when our consumer-driven society steps back if only for a moment and gives to someone else--family members, those less-fortunate, or a carefully chosen charity with whose principles and actions we agree. There...that feels good, doesn't it? Tis the season! But the Season of Receiving? After all, this season is not supposed to be about us, is it?

Well, my friends, what do you think this season is about, then? "...And they shall name him Emmanuel, which means 'God is with us.'" Advent is the Season of Receiving, the season of opening ourselves enough to see what God's coming into our lives means. God is with US! God is not standing on the threshold of our lives waiting for the timing to be right. God is not "up there" waiting for us to get it right. And God is not restricted to a lowly manger waiting for us to find our way there. In God's wisdom, the bursting forth of the Divine into humanity did not wait for an invitation, did not question whether or not there was perhaps a more appropriate time, and did not wait for us to get ourselves together. God came and comes and comes and comes. God is here! God is WITH us! God is with US! This is our Season of Receiving. "Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word."

So go forth and receive!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

ADVENT 4B: God-Bearer

Ramblings on this week's Lectionary readings...

During Advent, the Lectionary invites us to read some familiar texts, texts that many of us could almost recite from memory. But if we think that it is just a repetition of the same things as last year, we are very mistaken. We are different; the world is different. And God calls us to walk a little bit farther in the journey, even if it's only a tiny step closer than last year. God calls us to open our lives to receive. God calls us to open our lives to become God-bearers.

2 Samuel 7: 1-16
In the early nomadic times of the Hebrew people, the tent and the tabernacle was that place where, according to the Faith, the Lord resided. It was the appointed place of the Lord. This was the way that God reminded the people that they were not alone. Even though the Lord's people, as they lived through exile and their nomadic beginnings, moved about, they knew that God was with them--residing in a place of honor, a place specifically appointed for the Presence of the Lord, a special place that bore God. This was the place that held the mystery that was God. And now the Lord is speaking of a new time to come. Finally, the people will be settled, planted by the Lord in a new place and, still, the Lord will reside with them, making a house, a place of permanence, a place of glory, a new place of God-bearing.

Romans 16: 25-27
So many Christmases ago, God burst forth into humanity just as God promised. The mystery of God so long shrouded in tabernacles and temples was finally made known in a way that the only response one can make, the only way one can understand is through faith. God is still mystery but where before the mystery was cloaked in secrecy, now the mystery is clothed in faith.

Luke 1: 26-38
"Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you." The announcement has been made and heard. The Lord is coming. The Lord who has always been with the people, whether borne in a traveling tabernacle or a house of glory, is now making Godself known in a new way. A humble and uncomplicated young girl will conceive. Her womb will become the tabernacle of God. Alfred Delp said "that God became a mother's son; that there could be a woman walking the earth whose womb was consecrated to be the holy temple and tabernacle of God--that is actually earth's perfection and the fulfillment of its expectations."(i)

God came not to reside in a tabernacle or a temple but, finally, in humanity itself. We are all called to become that womb, that bearer of God. We are all called to be God's sanctuary here on earth. There is still wonder and awe and mystery when it comes to God's Presence. But the mystery is now ours to bear and through which to journey.

So go forth and receive the One that you will bear!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

(i) Alfred Delp, "The Shaking Reality of Advent", in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, (Plough Publishing)

Prepare to Be Surprised

I am a planner. I am a planner of the worst possible kind. Not only do I make lists; I have lists that I should make on my lists! And this season is one of the worst when it comes to planning. There is so much that needs to be done! Will I get it all done? You know as well as I do that part of the reason that we make lists is so that we won't be surprised. We won't be surprised by forgetting to purchase a gift for someone. We won't be surprised by not having the necessary ingredients for that special holiday dish. (Yes, last year, I left the croissants that I needed for my holiday bread pudding at my house in the freezer. Have you ever tried to make bread pudding without the bread? I just wasn't fully prepared so I spent Christmas afternoon running from store to store trying to find someone that was open--and found the store AND the croissants. Whew!) Being surprised is never a good thing, right?

Unless it's Advent! Isn't that what we're working up toward--being surpised? The coming of Christ was planned and anticipated--for centuries. The plan was this: God in all of God's mighty power would burst forth into the world laying all of our enemies to waste, subduing the powers that be as the winner of a mighty struggle, and taking over the rule of the major cities. Those who followed God would finally be on the winning side. And those who opposed God would be left in ruins. God would be in charge, finally!

And then God surprised us all, sneaking in the back door of a stable or through the darkness and dampness of a grotto, coming quietly in the midst of the great count of citizens, politics and earthly powers in their finest hour, and then...in case we had other plans...coming as a helpless, vulnerable baby born to unknown parents who were only in Bethlehem to be counted. And the surprise of all surprises: those who opposed God were given yet another invitation to God's promises and God's hope. You see, God surprised us on that first Christmas. Isn't that enough for you to prepare to be surpised this year. Things do not go according to our well-laid plans. Thanks be to God!

So go forth and prepare to be surprised!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

Embracing This Act of Preparation

Our culture tells us to "be prepared" from the time we are children. Even the Gospels hold stories and parables warning against unpreparedness. And in this season, in particular, the threat of being "unprepared" on Christmas morning--without the required number of gifts perfectly wrapped and under the tree, without all of the groceries to make what is certainly an over-abundance of food and treats, and without the house filled with tasteful decorations worthy of a spread in Martha Stewart's Living--drives most of us who are level-headed throughout the other eleven months of the year into a certain frenzy of fearful shopping and wrapping, as if the Christ Child will not come if we do not trim that last hearth.

But think about what the Gospel is trying to say to us. Jesus never claims that perfection must be met to enter the Kingdom of God. God does not call us to be perfect; God calls us to "go on toward perfection" in a never-ending journey of pursuit that brings us nearer and nearer to the heart of God. It is not an "either-or" phenomenon that leaves us "in" or "out" but rather a walk of preparation throughout one's life. Jesus' admonitions to us to "be prepared" did not imply that we would not enter the Kingdom if we were not fully prepared but, rather, that journeying through the preparation itself would enable us to encounter the holy, the sacred, a glimpse of the incredible things to come even now. It does not have to be perfectly in order; it is the journey toward it that brings us closer to God. That is what Advent is about.

So go forth and prepare just for the act of preparing!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

Preparation as Imagination

This Advent season is full of talk about preparations. So, for what are you preparing? For what are you spending these 32 days making ready?

We 21st century journeyers struggle with the unknown, with just leaving things to chance, with admitting that perhaps there are those aspects of our journey that are not for us to know now. That is what Advent does for us...it points us toward mystery. Some would equate that to nothingness or, perhaps, even to darkness--unknown, foreboding, maybe even a little dangerous. But God came and comes over and over again. I think that God's coming does not, much to some of our chagrin, bring with it the surety that we might like. God's coming instead opens the door to our imagination.

God says...walk with me awhile my child and look...look far beyond where you can see...listen far beyond where you can hear...journey far beyond where you think belong...and there, there I will be, and there will be the Creation that I have created for you. Imagination is not some childhood phenonemon that we are meant to lose as we mature. It is part of us and it mature with us. A mature imagination has no limits to what it can envision; it has no boundaries to what it can do. A mature imagination steps beyond reason and intellect, not leaving them behind, but sweeping them up into a new image, a new Creation, the place to which God leads us. Envision it...and then as you are preparing to meet the Christ child once again, imagine what that new world looks like and begin sowing the seeds that it hands you. For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations. (Isaiah 61:11)

So go forth and imagine!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Illumination (A Mid-Week Homily)

IlluminationLectionary Text: John 1: 6-8, 19-28

I love Christmas lights. When I was little, my family would pick at least one night right before or immediately after Christmas and drive around and look at the Christmas lights. Later, as a young adult, I several times drove my Grandmother around to look at them. My Grandmother Reue seemed to have as much of the childlike appreciation of the lights that I had always had. Many of us are like that. There’s something about Christmas lights—full of wonder and awe, a sort of call to the season for us. These lights are comfortable for us. They are reassuring. From a practical standpoint, they’re virtually useless. But you know as well as I do that they are a sign of the season.

The Gospel passage that we read for this week uses that image of light also. For the writer of The Gospel According to John, the Logos was the light of humanity, the true light. There are no announcements here of Jesus’ coming and there is no birth story. But this is essentially the equivalent: the coming of Jesus, the Incarnation, is the coming of the true light, which enlightens everyone and illumines everything. But where the writers of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke use an angel to proclaim Christ’s coming, this writer uses John the Baptist. Now whatever you have to say about this camel hair-wearing, locust-eating, wilderness wanderer, he took his job seriously. John understood himself as called by God to point to the light as well as to that which is illuminated by the light. He didn’t get lost, as many do, in the rhetoric about Christ as the light without realizing the purpose of the light itself. And sometimes John’s words were not very popular. He went around like some wild man in the wilderness preaching repentance, preaching that we needed to change, preaching about the one who was coming after him, preaching about the light that was just around the bend, a light such that we had not seen. “John,” we want to say, “Shhhh!...you’ll wake the baby.”

That’s where we want to be—at the manger, kneeling before our Lord, basking in the illumination of the star above, and yet we still want to hold onto those shadows in our life. For there is familiarity; there is safety; there is that which we can control, there is that place to which we can retreat when life is just too hard. And the light…We would rather the light be allowed to remain in our thinking depicted as a warm and comfortable place to be. Just let us sit here awhile with this sleeping baby, the Christ child, there in the manger while the North Star dances overhead. This is a sign of the season!

But John the Baptist was right. This light is not a twinkling, intermittent light like those that light our houses this season. This is not a warm, glowing, candle-lit light that makes us feel comfortable even as we sit in its shadows. And it’s closer to us than any star in the universe. This light is different. This light is so big and so bright and so powerful that sometimes it hurts to look at it. Sometimes it is just too painful. This light is so pervasive and so encompassing, that it casts no shadows. The light of Christ, this light to which John pointed, is not a warm glow but is rather a radical illumination of everything around it. Because you see, Christ did not come into the world just to be our personal guiding light so that we could see where to go on this journey. The Christ light is also a light that shows us what needs to be done while we’re on that journey. Christoph Frederick Blumhardt says that “a light has a purpose; a light ought to shine into our lives so that we can see what needs to be done and set our hand to it and clean it up.”[i] That is the Light of Christ.

Yes, it’s uncomfortable. Yes, it will show us things that we’d rather not see, things with which we’d rather not have to deal. I’ll make a confession here. You can tell when I get too busy in my life by looking at my house. Right now, my house is atrocious. If you walked into it, you would experience the worst housekeeping that you can possibly imagine. In my kitchen, I have these really bright overhead canister lights. I also have these wonderful, warm, under-cabinet lights that I absolutely love. I realized the other night that I like my kitchen better right now at night when I turn off the canister lights and turn on those under-cabinet lights. They are beautiful as they reflect off the granite and project a warm, delicate glow to the kitchen. But the real reason is because with them, the kitchen looks clean. How easy it is just to forget about those things we need to do when we can’t see them!

The Christ light is not a warm, delicate light. The Christ light is this incredibly bright, all-encompassing light that enables us to see the world differently. It is a light that illumines not only the present, but also the future. The Spiritual Masters would refer to this illumination as a type of liminality, a way of existing in two worlds, betwixt and between. We are standing in the world in which we live, but the light is illumining the world to come. And when we learn how to see with that light, the world in which we live will look different. We will finally see that some of this is just not right. We can then no longer close our eyes to what the light has shown us. It will be impossible. Because, for us, all the shadows will finally once and for all be exposed. We will no longer be able to live with hunger and homelessness, with destruction of people’s lives and waste of our planet, with violence and war, or with the exclusion of any of God’s children from the light. The light in our lives will find those things not just sad, but unacceptable, inexcusable, incapable of being.

How, then, do we prepare ourselves to look at this light. How do we turn our eyes, so shielded by all the shadows of this world and look at that bright illuminating light without it being uncomfortable for us? Well, you know as well as I do that the way to prepare yourself to look at light is to look at light. And as uncomfortable as that may be, there is no other way. In her book, Lighted Windows, Margaret Silf tells the story of when her daughter was born and how one of the first problems that they encountered was light. She said that “to make sure that [our daughter] would always experience the presence of a gentle, comforting light if she awoke during the night, we installed a little lamp close to the nursery door. It also meant that if she cried we could grope our way to her even in a half-asleep state.”[ii] But they soon realized that even the little nursery light burned their eyes, especially after the third or fourth time they went into the nursery during the night, groggy from sleep with eyes burning. “So,” she says, “we went to the local electrical shop to ask whether they had any bulbs lower than 15 watts!” “It’s strange,” she comments, “how light that is so needful for growth and life can also be so hurtful when we are unprepared for it.”[iii]

In this Advent season, the way that we prepare ourselves for the coming of the Light is by looking at that light. That is why God came and burst forth into our humanness—to show us what full illumination looks like and to call us into the light. Do you remember that bumper sticker a couple of years ago? I haven’t seen it in awhile. “God is coming…look busy.” It’s funny but it’s wrong. God is here…get busy. God has come. The baby IS awake and now it’s our turn to wake up, rub our sleep-filled, groggy eyes, and with every intentional part of our being, look into the light and see what we are called to do. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory...full of grace and truth. THAT is the sign of the season—all of Creation in full illumination so that we may get a glimpse of what is to come.

In the Name of the One who said “Let There Be Light” and then brought the light to earth that we might see the world the way it was created to be. Amen.

So, go and be light!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

[i] Christoph Friederich Blumhardt, “Action in Waiting”, in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, (Farmington, PA: Plough Publishing, 2001), 11/24.
[ii] Margaret Silf, Lighted Windows: Advent Reflections for a World in Waiting, (Nashville, TN: Upper Room Books, 2004.), 101.

[iii] Ibid

Making Room

In my somewhat arduous journey into full-time pastoral ministry from a fairly lucrative career as an accountant, I have changed homes twice. Now, to some, that may not sound like a big deal. But I grew up in a family that almost never moved, with the exception of our moving into a new house when I was in Kindergarten that was a whole two streets and two blocks from the first house. (We haven't come that far, I guess!) But each time I moved these last years, I had to shift and actually get rid of some things. This last move was one from a parsonage that was WAY too big for me (even living WITH the 122-lb Black Lab) to a small, 1920's cottage in one of Houston's oldest neighborhoods. My only choice was to downsize.

I have realized that downsizing is a spiritual experience. Downsizing is about making room; it is about making things fit into a life that is different; and it is about finding yourself having to very intentionally cast away those things that you do not need. And what I found was that there are really not THAT many things that I need (contrary to what I thought before). In fact, if one is serious about downsizing, one will even make room for future things that mean something! Making room means that you find what is the most important in your life and you make room for it, perhaps by ridding yourself of things that have cluttered your pathway before.

This season of Advent, too, is about making room. It is about preparing for Christ's coming into your life by clearing space and ridding yourself of things that clutter and distract. It is about emotionally downsizing so that you can spiritually fill up. What do you need to do to make room this Advent? After all, it would be a shame if the Christ child had to sleep on a fold-out sofa! Don't you think God's coming calls for something more permanent in your life?

So go forth and make room!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

This Season of Preparing

Advent is a season of preparation, a season of making-ready. But lest we get lost in the frenzied shuffle of tree-trimming and gift-buying, cookie-baking and party-planning, present-wrapping and card-mailing, we need to remember that those things are not all Advent preparation is. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "We have become so accustomed to the idea of divine love and of God's coming at Christmas that we no longer feel the shiver of fear that God's coming should arouse in us...The coming of God is truly not only glad tidings, but first of all frightening news for everyone who has a conscience." (1) After all, what is it for which we are preparing? My friends, we are only preparing for the changing of everything that we know. That's all.

God did not come into the world to simply validate what we were doing with our lives. The Christ child was not born so that we could continue to live as we have. The Spirit did not ascend to us and say "Great job, people...keep it up! Way to go! Rah...rah...rah!" You and I both know that's not the way it happened. Frightening news? You bet. We are not called in this season to prepare to dress up our lives in their best finery so that we can be presented to God. (No need...God is here!) No, we are called in this season to prepare to change. And that should be frightening to anyone who really bothers to think about it if only for a split second. Because you see, so long ago, "the true light, which enlightens everyone, [came] into the world." And if we prepare ourselves to open our eyes, if we prepare ourselves to live our lives focused on that light, if we prepare our hearts to know and speak the truth in love, then we cannot help but be changed. And that IS frightening news but it is also oh, so glorious!

So go forth and prepare to be changed!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli



(1) From "The Coming of Jesus in our Midst", by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, (Plough Publishing)

ADVENT 3B: Anointed to This Messy Work

Some ramblings on this week's Lectionary readings...

During Advent, the Lectionary invites us to read some familiar texts, texts that many of us could almost recite from memory. But if we think that it is just a repetition of the same things as last year, we are very mistaken. We are different; the world is different. And God calls us to walk a little bit farther in the journey, even if it's only a tiny step closer than last year.

Isaiah 61: 1-11
So what does it mean to have the Spirit of the Lord upon me, to be anointed by the Lord, as the servant is here? This is a pretty tall order--to be sent to build up, raise up, and repair. After all, things were pretty much a mess. So we look to the servant to fix things, to make life well again. But, there, as early as verse 3, the pronouns begin to change. The single servant becomes a "they", those who are fitted with a mantle of praise. A mantle is something that covers or envelops. In essence, that "anointing" to do the Lord's work has been passed on and "they" have inherited the covenant. And all those who come after the servant--generations and generations of descendents--are the "they". We are the "they", those with the Spirit of the Lord upon us, those anointed, those sent to build up, raise up, and repair. This is a pretty tall order. After all, things are pretty much a mess. What are we waiting for? Yes, being anointed by God's Spirit is messy work. It's a good thing we don't have to do it alone!

1 Thessalonians 5: 16-24
That's what it says here...we are not alone! As it says at the beginning, there are those who labor among us; after all, remember, we are the COMMUNITY of faith. It is together that we build up, raise up, and repair. Here, we are admonished to be careful about not quenching the Spirit. For ourselves, that means to attend to our own spiritual life through prayer and thanksgiving and remembering who and whose we are. But I think this also warns us against quenching the Spirit of our fellow laborers. We are not all the same. We come from different pasts and we journey by way of different futures. It is the diversity within our community that anoints with God's Spirit. And while it is sometimes much more comfortable to march in ranks of sameness, with our collective voices drowning out those who do not speak the way we do, that "rank and file" mentality makes is difficult for God to come into our midst. Because the God of peace is wanting to "sanctify us entirely", our bodies, our minds, our souls, our community, the world. That is this building up, raising up, and repairing to which we are called. But how can we see that if we only open our eyes to our own needs and our own way of thinking?

John 1: 6-28
Whatever you have to say about John the Baptist (after all, it is hard for some of us to identify with a camel's hair-wearing, locust-eating, loud-mouthed wilderness wanderer screaming at everyone to repent!), he took his job seriously. He understood that he was called by God to point to the light as well as that which is illuminated by the light. In other words, he did not get lost in rhetoric about Jesus as the light without realizing the purpose of the light itself. And that is probably what makes us so uncomfortable with John. We would rather the light be allowed to remain in our thinking depicted as a warm and comfortable place to be. We would rather live under the notion that Jesus' light is just for us so that we can see our way to God. We would rather bask in its illumination without looking at what it now enables us to see in a different light. But, as our Lectionary readings imply today, it is not really about us! That light that came into the world came not only to show us where to go; it also came to show us what needs to be done. Remember, we are anointed, filled with God's Spirit, now basking in the Light of Christ. And we can no longer close our eyes to what the light has shown us. We can no longer close our eyes to hunger and homelessness, to destruction and waste, to violence and war, or to exclusion of any of God's laborers from the work to which they are called. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory...full of grace and truth.

So, go and build up, raise up, and repair!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli

Waiting to Be-Come

Most of us are so busy trying to become something that we often forget to be. God calls us to be--to be open, to be compassionate, to be ready, to be salt, to be light, to be for one another what Christ is for us. And while we are growing into our being, we are called to wait. When we are ready, when we are receptive, God will come and we will then become. So, once again, waiting is not passive. Waiting is not just sitting around until the world changes. Waiting is our time of being--just being with God. It is God's coming into our lives that sparks our becoming.

So wait this season with purpose and intentional being. Be open to being and you will be open to God's coming. And when God comes into our being, we become what we are fully meant to be. So, be salt; be light; be who God calls you to be. And wait. O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, Come that I may be-come.

So go forth and be!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Journeying through Waiting

Perhaps the reason that we experience such difficulty with this act of waiting is that we have mistaken its meaning. For many of us, waiting means stopping, standing still, even retreating from the "goings on" of life. It often is misconstrued as doing nothing. But while our waiting often looks like that on the outside, I am realizing that active waiting is a journey in and of itself.

Think about this...things that involve transformation--growth, healing, acceptance, even, as we wait in this season of Advent, birth--also involve waiting. It does not mean that nothing is happening; it just means that we are not fully in control of where we are going and how it will all end up. The journey through waiting, then, is definitely ours to walk. The point is that, finally, someone else is leading the way. We just have to open ourselves to the possibility that we might end up in a different place altogether. We just have to open ourselves to the very real possibility that God will come in a way that we have neither planned or expected and do things that we can't even fathom.

Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. (Isaiah 40: 4-5, NRSV)

So, go forth and wait!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

This Season of Waiting

I must confess that I do not wait well. Waiting involves stopping, looking, and listening actively to the silence of one's life. But often I want so badly to fill it with something "constructive", to spend time doing something active. In fact, Henri Nouwen wrote that "for many people, waiting is an awful desert between where they are and where they want to go."

Advent is the season of waiting. This, though, is not the same as a season of rest. This is not a season for doing nothing. This is instead a season for actively partipating as the world waits for the coming of God. It is a season for waiting not for what we have planned, not even for what we know, but for that which is unimagineable, unintelligible, and unlike anything that we have ever known. Experience has shown us that God comes into our lives in ways and times that we do not expect. The point is, though, that God is really already there--we just have to learn to wait long enough for our lives to open up enough to see what God is already showing us--Emmanuel, God with us. This is the season to go forth and wait!

Grace and Peace,
Shelli