9-11-20 - The Way of Love In Challenging Times

You can listen to this reflection here.  My congregations will be delving into the Way of Love this fall. Most weeks the gospel readings will differ from the Common Lectionary. So on Fridays this season, Water Daily will focus on the Way of Love topic for the week – today that is adopting a spiritual rule of life.

The Way of Love is an approach to intentional Christian living conceived by the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Reverend Michael Curry. Anyone who has ever heard him speak knows how joyfully he expresses the love at the heart of our Good News. He developed this set of “spiritual practices for a Jesus-focused life” in response to a growing sense that many Episcopalians had yet to experience God’s love for themselves; as he has said, “You can’t give away what you don’t have.”

The Way of Love – seven spiritual practices, each honed to one word – is what monastics call a rule of life, a plan for how one will focus and grow spiritually. A rule of life, which can be corporate (as in the Rule of St. Benedict) or individual, allows us to be intentional about our spiritual lives, rather than drifting. Just as we benefit more from exercise that is planned, so that in a given week our whole bodies get a workout; just as we eat more healthfully when we plan our meals; just as we work more productively when we set goals and plan tasks – so it is with the life of the spirit. We grow more loving as we cultivate habits of the heart that open us to the love and power of God.

We need to know, to receive, and to channel that power and love more than ever. With our nation and world – even creation itself – in crisis; with so much that was familiar now turned topsy turvy; with so many people in extreme need, we need a lively faith, a robust faith, an increased capacity to love. I’m calling this series “The Way of Love In Challenging Times.” It is for times such as these that we tune our spiritual muscles.

Some of the practices contained in the Way of Love– Turn, Learn, Pray, Bless - can be embraced daily. Some, like Worship and Rest, may become part of a Christian’s weekly rhythm. The remaining one, Go, might be lived daily or weekly, or involve travel or major life changes. Together, they help us maintain a balance between interior spirituality and external mission, and focus us on following Jesus.

Jesus has not stopped leading us. Jesus has not stopped loving us. No matter how hard things get, we are invited to rest on that great promise which St. Paul articulated: For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38-39).

I hope you will take on the Way of Lovethis season; sharpen a practice you’ve already developed, maybe try on a new one. God has much healing work to do through us, and God needs us rested and ready, rooted in love, grounded in peace, powered by the Spirit, poised for action.

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