Gratitude -
1. Dwight - moving toward lay Dominican
2. Donovan's blog
3. Brandon's ordination
4. Cleaning out and throwing away
5. The gift of CHANGE!
“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; REPENT (change your mind) and believe in the gospel.” Mark 1:15
“Your old life is dead. Your new life, which is your real life – even though invisible to spectators – is with Christ in God. He is your life. Col. 3:3
Some of us enter the Thanksgiving season with sadness. We may have lost significant people in our lives. Grandpa will not be sitting at the head of the table to carve the turkey. Aunt Elizabeth’s disease finally took its toll and she will not be with the children and grandchildren for this annual family gathering. Some families may have lost younger members too – a child, a spouse, maybe a sibling…
Loss takes many forms. It might be health which may entail chronic physical pain. A host of people in America have lost jobs. Due to economic stressors others have lost their homes over the past twelve months. Some have experienced ‘natural’ disasters forcing them from home and livelihood.
In the midst of all this loss can we say any of this is ‘gift’?
Several years ago I was introduced to the idea of ‘Cradle Episcopalians’ – meaning the person was born and reared in that particular denomination. I sorta chuckled and with some degree of pride thought to myself how thankful I was I had not been ‘born’ into any church. I was a Baptist and at the ripe old age of 11, I had made my own decision regarding church membership.
As ludicrous as this might sound to me today there was a time when I had to change my understanding of just what a free choice I had made. In all actuality I too was born on a denominational pew like most others attending church. My pew just happened to be a Baptist pew and it was the only faith tradition I had ever known. So the thought of making my own decision regarding church membership was almost laughable. I chose to be Baptist in large part because that was where my parents attended and I wanted to ‘belong’ too.
Now as an adult I find I am called to change (to die) to lots of old understandings. In her recent book “An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith,” Barbara Brown Taylor talks about the benefits of going through loss. She suggest that we stick to predictable routes through life, preferring what is efficient and safe to that which is dangerous, unknown or wild.
“And yet,” she writes, “if someone asked us to pinpoint the times in our lives that changed us for the better, a lot of those times would be wilderness times.” She cites times like divorce, a move, illness or a career change as times when change (death) forces us to put on new glasses; to see though different lens.
Recently my journey has begun to shift and I have been challenged to consider other ways of looking into the Mystery we call GOD.
As we enter these two special seasons of the year – one secular and the other very sacred territory – I invite all of us to embrace this time as seasons for change to happen. Some new considerations might cause us to die to some items in our life that may have served their function. Maybe it is time to let them go. Stand and risk a new idea, a new way of being embraced by the Mystery and possibly a GOOD NEWS way of seeing things might arrive as a gift. It will not be easy. But it will be a gift if we dare to follow!
AMEN
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