You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
We have been exploring an extraordinary story of transformation this week in the tale of Jesus’ encounter with a notorious sinner. Zacchaeus made his living off the misery of others. As the chief tax collector in a major town, he sat atop a pyramid of greed, extortion and violence. Yet Jesus offered him forgiveness, and Zacchaeus responded in astonishing ways.
He revealed a spiritual openness when he clambered up a tree to get a better view of Jesus. He wasn’t willing to come close, but he wanted to see. And Jesus met that opening with an invitation to fellowship, and an acceptance which prompted a further opening in Zacchaeus. He didn’t just repent by halves – he went the whole distance: Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” Then Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”’
Zacchaeus certainly was lost, spiritually speaking. He was tightly bound by his self-saving strategies, his allegiance to money and power. Yet he was not beyond the reach of God’s grace. As one thing loosened when he climbed that tree, more space was made, and that unlocked his repentance, which made more space for forgiveness. Soon the whole tightly bound system unraveled and even his change was loosed, as he offered half his wealth and more to transform the lives of the poor.
Jesus said to his followers, “Whatever you bind on earth is bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth is loosed in heaven.” As redeemed saints of God, we are in the business of loosening. We don’t always see transformation as radical as Zacchaeus’; repentance is usually incremental. Yet, just as when we work to undo a tight knot, each loosening helps to loosen another bond, until the knot falls away.
There is no work more holy than helping to bring about repentance and freedom in one another – which means we need also stay aware of our own stuff, our own sin. And as forgiveness flows to us, so does generosity. Put more succinctly, loose the chains and loose some change!
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-30-25 - Opening Clams
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
I know little about clams, but I’m told the only way to get them to open their shells – other than violently, with a knife – is to place them in warm water. After a while they’ll open of their own accord. That is a good way to describe how God loves us into opening our spirits, and how we can love really shut-down people into transformation. Just as the softest heart can be hardened by rejection and judgment, the hardest heart can be softened by acceptance and mercy.
That’s what Jesus did for Zacchaeus. His acceptance in coming to his house; his willingness to stand with him when no one else would, elicit not only repentance but an astonishing generosity: Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”
It’s easy to say “I’m sorry.” It’s a lot harder to make amends, to go back to people you’ve hurt and offer them restitution for what you’ve taken from them. Restitution is the visible fruit of true repentance. In this, Zacchaeus is a champion.
Those who disapproved of Jesus going to Zacchaeus’ house may have said, “By going to a ‘sinner’s’ house, Jesus is dignifying all tax collectors. His presence gives approval to wickedness. Better to isolate sinners than to tolerate them.” But if we isolate those who are destructive, where is the hope for transformation?
I'm reminded of the heat Jodie Foster took for hiring Mel Gibson after the many revelations about his anti-Semitic remarks and actions. She did not condone his views, but made a choice to stand with a friend – and so helped foster (sorry…) the possibility of transformation in him. The hardest heart can be melted by acceptance and mercy, as the softest heart can be hardened by rejection and judgment.
Jesus went to Zacchaeus’ house, not knowing that he would repent, yet perhaps inferring some openness from his tree-climbing. And his risk was rewarded, his grace met with not only sorrow but amendment of life and reversal of justice. Where Zacchaeus’ had taken money from the poor to appease the Romans, he was now giving half his fortune to the poor. And if there was fraud, he offered to make a four-fold restitution. That is an “I’m sorry” with teeth.
Do you know anyone isolated because of their destructive words or actions? Without affirming the behavior, we can provide an environment where hearts can open, and see what happens. That's what people who work with gang members do. Is God is inviting you to give that gift to anyone? If you’ve ever been a clam shut tight and found yourself in a bath of warm, accepting love, you know what it means.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
I know little about clams, but I’m told the only way to get them to open their shells – other than violently, with a knife – is to place them in warm water. After a while they’ll open of their own accord. That is a good way to describe how God loves us into opening our spirits, and how we can love really shut-down people into transformation. Just as the softest heart can be hardened by rejection and judgment, the hardest heart can be softened by acceptance and mercy.
That’s what Jesus did for Zacchaeus. His acceptance in coming to his house; his willingness to stand with him when no one else would, elicit not only repentance but an astonishing generosity: Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”
It’s easy to say “I’m sorry.” It’s a lot harder to make amends, to go back to people you’ve hurt and offer them restitution for what you’ve taken from them. Restitution is the visible fruit of true repentance. In this, Zacchaeus is a champion.
Those who disapproved of Jesus going to Zacchaeus’ house may have said, “By going to a ‘sinner’s’ house, Jesus is dignifying all tax collectors. His presence gives approval to wickedness. Better to isolate sinners than to tolerate them.” But if we isolate those who are destructive, where is the hope for transformation?
I'm reminded of the heat Jodie Foster took for hiring Mel Gibson after the many revelations about his anti-Semitic remarks and actions. She did not condone his views, but made a choice to stand with a friend – and so helped foster (sorry…) the possibility of transformation in him. The hardest heart can be melted by acceptance and mercy, as the softest heart can be hardened by rejection and judgment.
Jesus went to Zacchaeus’ house, not knowing that he would repent, yet perhaps inferring some openness from his tree-climbing. And his risk was rewarded, his grace met with not only sorrow but amendment of life and reversal of justice. Where Zacchaeus’ had taken money from the poor to appease the Romans, he was now giving half his fortune to the poor. And if there was fraud, he offered to make a four-fold restitution. That is an “I’m sorry” with teeth.
Do you know anyone isolated because of their destructive words or actions? Without affirming the behavior, we can provide an environment where hearts can open, and see what happens. That's what people who work with gang members do. Is God is inviting you to give that gift to anyone? If you’ve ever been a clam shut tight and found yourself in a bath of warm, accepting love, you know what it means.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-29-25 - Bad Company
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Zacchaeus may have been happy to hear Jesus say he was coming to his house – but no one else thought it a good move. Luke tells us, “All who saw it began to grumble and said, ‘He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.’”
A sinner. It’s well and good to talk about the Kingdom of God and loving your neighbor as yourself, not to mention loving your enemies – but to actually go to the home of one of society’s most notorious villains? That’s a political third-rail move, guaranteed to get you in trouble with your followers. In our day, it might be analogous to working with sex offenders or drug lords to stop cycles of addiction and violence. Many people can see no humanity in people who abuse others, even if many perpetrators are also victims. If you can categorize someone as an abuser, you can stop thinking of her as a person.
Jesus stood with persons who were victimized, condemned the action and the damage caused – and also reached out to perpetrators. Jesus wasn’t interested in popularity – he was invested in the mission of God to reclaim and restore all humanity to wholeness. All humanity – even those who do their worst. Maybe especially those who do their worst.
Jesus had a way of seeing past a person’s outward traits – illness, possession, greed, even violence. He did not confuse people with their diseases or disorders. Rather, he aligned himself with the core self within that person, and directed the power that made the universe to a person’s inner self, weak as it may have been. He saw who Zacchaeus was, apart from all the wickedness he perpetrated. He saw a broken child of God, not just an “extortioner” or a “sinner.”
He invites us to do no less. Sometimes that inner self is hard to find. In people who are far gone on the path of addiction, for instance, the core self may be very, very faint. Yet we can trust that it is there, because this person is a child of God. And we are called to offer our strength and our will and our love to that core self – not to the outer behavior, but to the inner self. In Christ, no one is beyond repair, not Zacchaeus, not anyone, unless they absolutely choose to be.
Can you think of someone who seems beyond redemption, who is so destructive to herself or others, it’s hard to see any humanity? Might be someone you know of; might be a world leader; might be a category you’ve lumped a whole lot of people into. In prayer today, can you hold that person or group in God’s light for a few moments, asking God to rescue them from who they are becoming? To restore them to who they truly are?
Is God calling you to take action to reach out to such a person? It can be like extending your hand to an angry dog – you might get nipped at. Maybe Jesus says, "Do it anyway."
The baptismal covenant Episcopalians affirm asks, “Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?” We can’t respect someone’s dignity if we lump them into a group of others – saints or sinners. We need the courage to see each person on their own terms. The answer to that question in the baptismal rite is, “I will, with God’s help.” God’s help is there for us when we’re at our worst, and God’s help is here for us to help others become their best.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Zacchaeus may have been happy to hear Jesus say he was coming to his house – but no one else thought it a good move. Luke tells us, “All who saw it began to grumble and said, ‘He has gone to be the guest of one who is a sinner.’”
A sinner. It’s well and good to talk about the Kingdom of God and loving your neighbor as yourself, not to mention loving your enemies – but to actually go to the home of one of society’s most notorious villains? That’s a political third-rail move, guaranteed to get you in trouble with your followers. In our day, it might be analogous to working with sex offenders or drug lords to stop cycles of addiction and violence. Many people can see no humanity in people who abuse others, even if many perpetrators are also victims. If you can categorize someone as an abuser, you can stop thinking of her as a person.
Jesus stood with persons who were victimized, condemned the action and the damage caused – and also reached out to perpetrators. Jesus wasn’t interested in popularity – he was invested in the mission of God to reclaim and restore all humanity to wholeness. All humanity – even those who do their worst. Maybe especially those who do their worst.
Jesus had a way of seeing past a person’s outward traits – illness, possession, greed, even violence. He did not confuse people with their diseases or disorders. Rather, he aligned himself with the core self within that person, and directed the power that made the universe to a person’s inner self, weak as it may have been. He saw who Zacchaeus was, apart from all the wickedness he perpetrated. He saw a broken child of God, not just an “extortioner” or a “sinner.”
He invites us to do no less. Sometimes that inner self is hard to find. In people who are far gone on the path of addiction, for instance, the core self may be very, very faint. Yet we can trust that it is there, because this person is a child of God. And we are called to offer our strength and our will and our love to that core self – not to the outer behavior, but to the inner self. In Christ, no one is beyond repair, not Zacchaeus, not anyone, unless they absolutely choose to be.
Can you think of someone who seems beyond redemption, who is so destructive to herself or others, it’s hard to see any humanity? Might be someone you know of; might be a world leader; might be a category you’ve lumped a whole lot of people into. In prayer today, can you hold that person or group in God’s light for a few moments, asking God to rescue them from who they are becoming? To restore them to who they truly are?
Is God calling you to take action to reach out to such a person? It can be like extending your hand to an angry dog – you might get nipped at. Maybe Jesus says, "Do it anyway."
The baptismal covenant Episcopalians affirm asks, “Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?” We can’t respect someone’s dignity if we lump them into a group of others – saints or sinners. We need the courage to see each person on their own terms. The answer to that question in the baptismal rite is, “I will, with God’s help.” God’s help is there for us when we’re at our worst, and God’s help is here for us to help others become their best.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-28-25 - Who's Coming to Dinner?
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“Jane, can we bring the bishop to your house for lunch?” It was a Sunday, the day after a freak March windstorm had left much of the town without power, and our bishop was making an annual Visitation. We held worship in a dimly lit church, and shivered through a coffee-less coffee hour, but the only place with electricity where the Vestry might have lunch with the Bishop was Jane’s house. Jane was of the generation that views a bishop’s visit as a Big Deal, worthy of weeks of cleaning and polishing – but she said yes, tidied as best she could, got out the fine china, and hosted us. Ready or not.
It must have been a shock for Zacchaeus, sitting in that tree: When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today."
A shock, and a challenge – Jesus, such a celebrity he gathers crowds as he moves through town, is coming to Zach’s house. It would be like being told the President or a Nobel laureate was coming over. It’s exciting, and a social coup – and ratchets up the pressure. What am I going to cook? When did I last clean the bathroom? What will we talk about?
Besides, Zach was safely hidden up that tree. Now he’s going to have to meet this guy he wanted so badly to see. He responds with grace: “So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him.”
How would you respond, if you got an email from Jesus today: “I’m coming to your house this evening.” Would you want to see him? Would you try to put if off? Would you invite anyone else, or just enjoy the chance to talk to him by yourself?
We might imagine it in prayer today – envision that scenario: the note, your response, the preparation, the greeting at the door… What happens? What do you talk about? See how fully you can place yourself into that scene and see where it goes. It’s another way of connecting with Jesus in our imagination.
I suspect Jesus does send us that message, every day. It goes something like this: “I want to come to your house. I want to spend some time with you. I want you to get off the sidelines, out of the bleachers and into the game with me. I’m not just some guy in a book or a stained glass window. I’m the one who made you, who became like you so you could become like me. I love you more than you can ever imagine, and I can transform your life if you let me in. I can transform the world through you if you let me. Can I come to your house, to your heart, today?”
Maybe we always say “yes.” Maybe we say “later,” or “maybe.” We don’t have to clean the house or cook a fancy meal. Jesus knows how messy our lives are, how full, and how beautiful. What he wants is our time and attention.
He's the most life-changing dinner guest we could ever host. Every time.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
“Jane, can we bring the bishop to your house for lunch?” It was a Sunday, the day after a freak March windstorm had left much of the town without power, and our bishop was making an annual Visitation. We held worship in a dimly lit church, and shivered through a coffee-less coffee hour, but the only place with electricity where the Vestry might have lunch with the Bishop was Jane’s house. Jane was of the generation that views a bishop’s visit as a Big Deal, worthy of weeks of cleaning and polishing – but she said yes, tidied as best she could, got out the fine china, and hosted us. Ready or not.
It must have been a shock for Zacchaeus, sitting in that tree: When Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, hurry and come down; for I must stay at your house today."
A shock, and a challenge – Jesus, such a celebrity he gathers crowds as he moves through town, is coming to Zach’s house. It would be like being told the President or a Nobel laureate was coming over. It’s exciting, and a social coup – and ratchets up the pressure. What am I going to cook? When did I last clean the bathroom? What will we talk about?
Besides, Zach was safely hidden up that tree. Now he’s going to have to meet this guy he wanted so badly to see. He responds with grace: “So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him.”
How would you respond, if you got an email from Jesus today: “I’m coming to your house this evening.” Would you want to see him? Would you try to put if off? Would you invite anyone else, or just enjoy the chance to talk to him by yourself?
We might imagine it in prayer today – envision that scenario: the note, your response, the preparation, the greeting at the door… What happens? What do you talk about? See how fully you can place yourself into that scene and see where it goes. It’s another way of connecting with Jesus in our imagination.
I suspect Jesus does send us that message, every day. It goes something like this: “I want to come to your house. I want to spend some time with you. I want you to get off the sidelines, out of the bleachers and into the game with me. I’m not just some guy in a book or a stained glass window. I’m the one who made you, who became like you so you could become like me. I love you more than you can ever imagine, and I can transform your life if you let me in. I can transform the world through you if you let me. Can I come to your house, to your heart, today?”
Maybe we always say “yes.” Maybe we say “later,” or “maybe.” We don’t have to clean the house or cook a fancy meal. Jesus knows how messy our lives are, how full, and how beautiful. What he wants is our time and attention.
He's the most life-changing dinner guest we could ever host. Every time.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-27-25 - Up a Tree
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
In last week’s gospel, Jesus told a parable about a fictitious tax collector, a prototype. This week we get to watch as he meets the real thing. Here’s how Luke begins the story: Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
Tax collectors were considered the lowest form of life by their fellow Jews, hated collaborators in the oppressive Roman tax system. In order to enforce collection – and extract enough over the required amount to make a living themselves – a tax collector had to be powerful and mean. Think Mafia “protection” goons, and we start to get the picture. And here’s Zacchaeus – a chief tax collector in the big town of Jericho! And wealthy. He must be very, very good at his despicable job.
Then we learn something sort of endearing – that this notorious man is so short, and so anxious to see Jesus as he passes through town, that he climbs up a tree to get a glimpse. How sweet. Add the fact that generations have learned his story through a Sunday School ditty, "Zacchaeus was a wee little man, and a wee little man was he/He climbed up in a sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see.” It's hard to think of a “wee little man” as scary and villainous.
So which is he? All of the above, and more? This story does not lend itself to either/or thinking. We’ll dig a bit this week. Today, let’s focus on the tree-climbing. I don’t know too many adults who climb trees (though my sister climbed one in her wedding dress for an epic photo…). How badly did this guy want to see Jesus? What did he want from Jesus? Is his ascent an indication of repentance, or curiosity – or did he want to observe without having to engage Jesus?
Today, in prayer, try to imagine the scene, with Jesus coming through your area. Place yourself in the crowd. What unfolds in your imagination? Stay with it... If you got close to Jesus in a crowd, what would you say? Would you ask for healing? Explanations? Forgiveness? This is one way to pray, to imagine an encounter with Jesus in some of the places the Gospels tell us he was – then it’s more like talking to a person and less like sending thoughts into the ether.
Like Zacchaeus, sometimes we need to change our perspective to see Jesus more clearly. This week we’re being invited up a tree – what might we see from there?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
In last week’s gospel, Jesus told a parable about a fictitious tax collector, a prototype. This week we get to watch as he meets the real thing. Here’s how Luke begins the story: Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
Tax collectors were considered the lowest form of life by their fellow Jews, hated collaborators in the oppressive Roman tax system. In order to enforce collection – and extract enough over the required amount to make a living themselves – a tax collector had to be powerful and mean. Think Mafia “protection” goons, and we start to get the picture. And here’s Zacchaeus – a chief tax collector in the big town of Jericho! And wealthy. He must be very, very good at his despicable job.
Then we learn something sort of endearing – that this notorious man is so short, and so anxious to see Jesus as he passes through town, that he climbs up a tree to get a glimpse. How sweet. Add the fact that generations have learned his story through a Sunday School ditty, "Zacchaeus was a wee little man, and a wee little man was he/He climbed up in a sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see.” It's hard to think of a “wee little man” as scary and villainous.
So which is he? All of the above, and more? This story does not lend itself to either/or thinking. We’ll dig a bit this week. Today, let’s focus on the tree-climbing. I don’t know too many adults who climb trees (though my sister climbed one in her wedding dress for an epic photo…). How badly did this guy want to see Jesus? What did he want from Jesus? Is his ascent an indication of repentance, or curiosity – or did he want to observe without having to engage Jesus?
Today, in prayer, try to imagine the scene, with Jesus coming through your area. Place yourself in the crowd. What unfolds in your imagination? Stay with it... If you got close to Jesus in a crowd, what would you say? Would you ask for healing? Explanations? Forgiveness? This is one way to pray, to imagine an encounter with Jesus in some of the places the Gospels tell us he was – then it’s more like talking to a person and less like sending thoughts into the ether.
Like Zacchaeus, sometimes we need to change our perspective to see Jesus more clearly. This week we’re being invited up a tree – what might we see from there?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-24-25 - Losing Our Religion
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
As we have dug down into Jesus’ parable about the two men praying in the temple, I have not been very tolerant of the self-righteous Pharisee. Neither was Jesus. But let’s give him a little regard. He was motivated to please God in the way he knew best – by following the rules and upholding the whole system that made the rules important. Perhaps the rules, the Law, had become his object of worship, obscuring the offer of relationship God gave along with the Law – “You shall be my people, and I will be your God.”
We might say that the Pharisee represents Religion – capitalization intended, as befits an abstraction. And the tax-collector represents faith. Religion can be a wonderful vehicle for faith – but we should never mistake it for the God it purports to worship. Uncompromising allegiance to words of Scripture or church tradition can blind us to the movement of our Living God. These are God-given gifts – but when we focus on the gifts rather than the Giver, we miss the next new thing God is doing. And our God is always doing a new thing.
I don’t think human beings can get away from religion, hard as we might try to just be “spiritual.” It is human nature to create structures that allow us to feel good, and to repeat a profound experience, and to stay in community with others who have shared that profound experience. Before you know it, we’re gathering at the same time every week, using the same words or songs or rituals that “worked” last week to mediate an encounter with God. If they don’t work as well this week – maybe we double down and get even more rigid.
Meanwhile, God is saying, “Over here, guys – I’m here now.” God is rarely in the last place we saw Him. She’s almost always on the move, doing a new thing, singing a new song, revealing a new facet of her identity.
Today, in prayer, let’s do another set of lists. Name one list “Religion” and the other “Relationship.” What activities of yours would you classify “religion?” Which ones are life-giving? Which ones are stale, or like trying to wear someone else’s clothes, that no longer fit, or feed your faith.
Now, what activities would you name as “relationship building,” that enhance your relationship with God? How would you characterize your relationship with God, on a spectrum from distant to intimate? Is there anything on the first list that gets in the way of the second?
The other day the great REM song, Losing My Religion, ran through my head. Doesn’t have much to do with religion*, but it’s catchy as all get out, and a great theme song for us as we seek to unfetter ourselves from all that is human-made about our interaction with God, and open ourselves to the new winds of the Spirit.
The greatest gift we can give ourselves, and each other, is to lose our “religion” and open our arms wide to the relationship with God that Christ made possible for us through the Holy Spirit. All religion will pass away – but that relationship is ours for eternity.
*According to Wikipedia, band members said "losing my religion" is a southern US expression for losing one's temper or composure.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
As we have dug down into Jesus’ parable about the two men praying in the temple, I have not been very tolerant of the self-righteous Pharisee. Neither was Jesus. But let’s give him a little regard. He was motivated to please God in the way he knew best – by following the rules and upholding the whole system that made the rules important. Perhaps the rules, the Law, had become his object of worship, obscuring the offer of relationship God gave along with the Law – “You shall be my people, and I will be your God.”
We might say that the Pharisee represents Religion – capitalization intended, as befits an abstraction. And the tax-collector represents faith. Religion can be a wonderful vehicle for faith – but we should never mistake it for the God it purports to worship. Uncompromising allegiance to words of Scripture or church tradition can blind us to the movement of our Living God. These are God-given gifts – but when we focus on the gifts rather than the Giver, we miss the next new thing God is doing. And our God is always doing a new thing.
I don’t think human beings can get away from religion, hard as we might try to just be “spiritual.” It is human nature to create structures that allow us to feel good, and to repeat a profound experience, and to stay in community with others who have shared that profound experience. Before you know it, we’re gathering at the same time every week, using the same words or songs or rituals that “worked” last week to mediate an encounter with God. If they don’t work as well this week – maybe we double down and get even more rigid.
Meanwhile, God is saying, “Over here, guys – I’m here now.” God is rarely in the last place we saw Him. She’s almost always on the move, doing a new thing, singing a new song, revealing a new facet of her identity.
Today, in prayer, let’s do another set of lists. Name one list “Religion” and the other “Relationship.” What activities of yours would you classify “religion?” Which ones are life-giving? Which ones are stale, or like trying to wear someone else’s clothes, that no longer fit, or feed your faith.
Now, what activities would you name as “relationship building,” that enhance your relationship with God? How would you characterize your relationship with God, on a spectrum from distant to intimate? Is there anything on the first list that gets in the way of the second?
The other day the great REM song, Losing My Religion, ran through my head. Doesn’t have much to do with religion*, but it’s catchy as all get out, and a great theme song for us as we seek to unfetter ourselves from all that is human-made about our interaction with God, and open ourselves to the new winds of the Spirit.
The greatest gift we can give ourselves, and each other, is to lose our “religion” and open our arms wide to the relationship with God that Christ made possible for us through the Holy Spirit. All religion will pass away – but that relationship is ours for eternity.
*According to Wikipedia, band members said "losing my religion" is a southern US expression for losing one's temper or composure.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-23-25 - Justified
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
How do you feel when you put on an elegant garment? I find it changes the way I think about myself. That is one way of understanding justification. Jesus, in ending his story, clearly sides with the repentant sinner, saying, “I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other…” Why was the more “sinful” tax collector justified and the self-righteous Pharisee not? What does Jesus mean by “justified?”
Justification is key to understanding what it means to be saved by God’s grace. It has to do with being “set right.” Take a clue from how we format our documents – left, right- or center-justified, according to where they are aligned. As a theological term it means to be made righteous, aligned to God’s will. It is not something we can do for ourselves – it is God’s work. It's not even our own righteousness that is conferred on us, but Christ’s. That’s why the “sinful” man was justified – in his humility he was able to receive grace, where the contemptuous, "righteous" man could not.
Martin Luther had a wonderful image for this – he called it “The Glorious Exchange,” in which Christ, the King and Lord of all, left his glory and took on our beggars’ clothes, our sin and self-orientation. But in this exchange Christ does more than take on our lowly status – he gives us his. He takes our rags and dresses us instead in his royal robes of silk and velvet, his perfect righteousness. We get clothed in his holiness; it covers us, redefines us. That is how God sees us, through Christ, as already holy.
How would it feel to put on a royal robe? Imagine it, in prayer. How might you walk differently today, knowing you are secretly royalty? How might you talk differently?
What do you pray about, knowing you have received a cosmic make-over, that you have handed off everything that mars your inner beauty? What would it take to believe we have received such a gift?
We are not recipients of a hand-out, but beloved children of God, reclaimed and redeemed at great cost. God didn’t send a check for us – He sent a Son, whom we know as Jesus the Christ; who came so that we might know Life. As we receive the gift, we become like Christ, his Body, his hands and feet and eyes and voice bearing light to a world that needs it.
We can’t earn this gift, or repay it – we can only receive it. Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet, theologian and Sufi mystic, wrote: “God accepts counterfeit money.” And God exchanges it for gold: You. Me. Infinitely precious, forever justified.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
How do you feel when you put on an elegant garment? I find it changes the way I think about myself. That is one way of understanding justification. Jesus, in ending his story, clearly sides with the repentant sinner, saying, “I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other…” Why was the more “sinful” tax collector justified and the self-righteous Pharisee not? What does Jesus mean by “justified?”
Justification is key to understanding what it means to be saved by God’s grace. It has to do with being “set right.” Take a clue from how we format our documents – left, right- or center-justified, according to where they are aligned. As a theological term it means to be made righteous, aligned to God’s will. It is not something we can do for ourselves – it is God’s work. It's not even our own righteousness that is conferred on us, but Christ’s. That’s why the “sinful” man was justified – in his humility he was able to receive grace, where the contemptuous, "righteous" man could not.
Martin Luther had a wonderful image for this – he called it “The Glorious Exchange,” in which Christ, the King and Lord of all, left his glory and took on our beggars’ clothes, our sin and self-orientation. But in this exchange Christ does more than take on our lowly status – he gives us his. He takes our rags and dresses us instead in his royal robes of silk and velvet, his perfect righteousness. We get clothed in his holiness; it covers us, redefines us. That is how God sees us, through Christ, as already holy.
How would it feel to put on a royal robe? Imagine it, in prayer. How might you walk differently today, knowing you are secretly royalty? How might you talk differently?
What do you pray about, knowing you have received a cosmic make-over, that you have handed off everything that mars your inner beauty? What would it take to believe we have received such a gift?
We are not recipients of a hand-out, but beloved children of God, reclaimed and redeemed at great cost. God didn’t send a check for us – He sent a Son, whom we know as Jesus the Christ; who came so that we might know Life. As we receive the gift, we become like Christ, his Body, his hands and feet and eyes and voice bearing light to a world that needs it.
We can’t earn this gift, or repay it – we can only receive it. Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet, theologian and Sufi mystic, wrote: “God accepts counterfeit money.” And God exchanges it for gold: You. Me. Infinitely precious, forever justified.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-22-25 - Self-Appraisal
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” This is the prayer of the tax-collector in Jesus’ parable. It forms the heart of what is known as the Jesus Prayer, practiced by hesychasts striving to pray without ceasing. Should I make you google it? Naah – I’ll tell you: hesychasm is the “prayer of the heart,” a spiritual discipline that seeks to make prayer constant, internalized on the breath and undergirding daily activity. It is what Franny was attempting in J.D. Salinger’s classic Franny and Zooey, a favorite of mine.
The fuller Jesus Prayer is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a [miserable] sinner.” It is short, and clearly evokes the distinction between us and Christ. To some it smacks of low self-esteem, guilt and shame, and all those icky feelings that have made Christianity so unappealing to so many. What happened to “You are so precious?” Is Jesus really commending self-degradation?
Jesus is commending self-appraisal. This is a prayer from the gut at a moment of self-realization. It represents one stage of repentance, well-described by another theological term: compunction. Compunction is so often accompanied by its buddy, “dread,” that I think of them in tandem, a sort of cabaret act of the soul – “And now, let’s welcome to our spotlight, ‘Compunction and Dread!’”
Compunction is that sick feeling we get when we realize we’ve hurt someone, or something we’ve done or said has been exposed, or we feel inwardly convicted. It is not fun – which is why dread comes swimming up close behind it, bringing the fear of consequences to the surface. At such moments we are most keenly aware of our need for mercy.
That is the heart of repentance, or – look out, here comes another theological term – “metanoia,” which conveys turning. We turn from patterns and behaviors and thinking that lead to pain and separation from God, ourselves, and others. We turn toward the source of mercy, grace and truth. Some ancient baptismal liturgies embodied this, as the baptizands faced west to renounce sin and evil, and turned eastward, toward the rising sun, to affirm Christ as Lord.
Repentance does not mean labeling ourselves unworthy or usurping God’s role as judge. It is truth-telling, house-cleaning, pointing out places of pain or self-reliance, inviting the Holy Physician to heal what is diseased in our spirits. Because we are able to call ourselves sinners, we can also call ourselves saints of God. There’s another great duo, “Sinners and Saints.” Simul justus et peccator, Luther said, “At once justified and sinner.”
In prayer today, ask the Spirit to show you where you feel ashamed, guilty or scared. Sometimes these feelings are irrational, not tied to any real areas of sin in us; sometimes they’re legit and we need to own them. It can be bracing and energizing to face ourselves and invite God into the shadow places. If that sense of compunction comes up – ask God to lift it, to fill you with love and grace.
“Sinner” is not the last word on who we are. It’s just a step along the way to transparency. God has the last word, and it is “beloved.”
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” This is the prayer of the tax-collector in Jesus’ parable. It forms the heart of what is known as the Jesus Prayer, practiced by hesychasts striving to pray without ceasing. Should I make you google it? Naah – I’ll tell you: hesychasm is the “prayer of the heart,” a spiritual discipline that seeks to make prayer constant, internalized on the breath and undergirding daily activity. It is what Franny was attempting in J.D. Salinger’s classic Franny and Zooey, a favorite of mine.
The fuller Jesus Prayer is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a [miserable] sinner.” It is short, and clearly evokes the distinction between us and Christ. To some it smacks of low self-esteem, guilt and shame, and all those icky feelings that have made Christianity so unappealing to so many. What happened to “You are so precious?” Is Jesus really commending self-degradation?
Jesus is commending self-appraisal. This is a prayer from the gut at a moment of self-realization. It represents one stage of repentance, well-described by another theological term: compunction. Compunction is so often accompanied by its buddy, “dread,” that I think of them in tandem, a sort of cabaret act of the soul – “And now, let’s welcome to our spotlight, ‘Compunction and Dread!’”
Compunction is that sick feeling we get when we realize we’ve hurt someone, or something we’ve done or said has been exposed, or we feel inwardly convicted. It is not fun – which is why dread comes swimming up close behind it, bringing the fear of consequences to the surface. At such moments we are most keenly aware of our need for mercy.
That is the heart of repentance, or – look out, here comes another theological term – “metanoia,” which conveys turning. We turn from patterns and behaviors and thinking that lead to pain and separation from God, ourselves, and others. We turn toward the source of mercy, grace and truth. Some ancient baptismal liturgies embodied this, as the baptizands faced west to renounce sin and evil, and turned eastward, toward the rising sun, to affirm Christ as Lord.
Repentance does not mean labeling ourselves unworthy or usurping God’s role as judge. It is truth-telling, house-cleaning, pointing out places of pain or self-reliance, inviting the Holy Physician to heal what is diseased in our spirits. Because we are able to call ourselves sinners, we can also call ourselves saints of God. There’s another great duo, “Sinners and Saints.” Simul justus et peccator, Luther said, “At once justified and sinner.”
In prayer today, ask the Spirit to show you where you feel ashamed, guilty or scared. Sometimes these feelings are irrational, not tied to any real areas of sin in us; sometimes they’re legit and we need to own them. It can be bracing and energizing to face ourselves and invite God into the shadow places. If that sense of compunction comes up – ask God to lift it, to fill you with love and grace.
“Sinner” is not the last word on who we are. It’s just a step along the way to transparency. God has the last word, and it is “beloved.”
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-21-25 - Good and Sorry
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
I said last week, “God doesn’t want us good; God wants us real.” Over-simple, perhaps, but it is how Jesus is shown in the Gospels. He is generous, compassionate and forgiving with the repentant whose sins are outward and obvious, and he is often scathing toward the “good folks,” the Pharisees and scribes who were so sure they were pleasing God.
We see two kinds of righteousness in this week’s story: one based on doing the right things, the other on repenting for doing the wrong things. Jesus clearly stands with the second, suggesting that the way into the Life of God is through clear-eyed humility, not legalistic moral rigor. This message was so radical, it got him killed. It is still radical, and often ignored most by those who call themselves his followers.
Legalism is easier than humility. Humans tend to prefer success to failure, rules to ambiguity. To be honest about the ways we sin “in thought, word and deed” is much tougher than pushing those realities away and citing all the rules we’ve managed to keep. The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable extols his good works, his fasting and tithing – and the fact that he is not a thief, rogue, adulterer or extortioner. But those are easy sins to peg. Jesus goes deeper, suggesting that, in his pride and contempt for those weaker than himself, the Pharisee is actually less righteous than the low-life tax collector.
Of course, it’s not either/or. Christ-followers are called to both good works and repentance. The question is, what comes first? A focus on “keeping the rules” puts the emphasis on our action, not God’s. It often leads to anxiety and pride. But when we start from repentance, the action is with God, whose grace and forgiveness we need. And as we gratefully receive God’s grace, we often respond with compassion for those around us. I would say repentance often leads to good works, but good works rarely lead to repentance.
Want to try a little inventory? Make two columns. On one write everything you think makes you a “good person.” On the other, everything you feel ashamed of or insecure about. Can you live with knowing both columns tell a truth about you? Not the whole truth, but truth? Maybe we can offer God the “sin” column, trusting that God’s forgiveness is here before we even confess.
Now, the “good works” column – take a good look. Do you do all those things from your heart, or because you think you’re “supposed to?” What would you take out of that list if you followed your heart?
We can choose to be self-righteous, or self-aware – generally not at the same time. Seeing ourselves clearly makes it a more difficult to be self-righteous. And why work that hard anyway, when God is giving righteousness away for free?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
I said last week, “God doesn’t want us good; God wants us real.” Over-simple, perhaps, but it is how Jesus is shown in the Gospels. He is generous, compassionate and forgiving with the repentant whose sins are outward and obvious, and he is often scathing toward the “good folks,” the Pharisees and scribes who were so sure they were pleasing God.
We see two kinds of righteousness in this week’s story: one based on doing the right things, the other on repenting for doing the wrong things. Jesus clearly stands with the second, suggesting that the way into the Life of God is through clear-eyed humility, not legalistic moral rigor. This message was so radical, it got him killed. It is still radical, and often ignored most by those who call themselves his followers.
Legalism is easier than humility. Humans tend to prefer success to failure, rules to ambiguity. To be honest about the ways we sin “in thought, word and deed” is much tougher than pushing those realities away and citing all the rules we’ve managed to keep. The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable extols his good works, his fasting and tithing – and the fact that he is not a thief, rogue, adulterer or extortioner. But those are easy sins to peg. Jesus goes deeper, suggesting that, in his pride and contempt for those weaker than himself, the Pharisee is actually less righteous than the low-life tax collector.
Of course, it’s not either/or. Christ-followers are called to both good works and repentance. The question is, what comes first? A focus on “keeping the rules” puts the emphasis on our action, not God’s. It often leads to anxiety and pride. But when we start from repentance, the action is with God, whose grace and forgiveness we need. And as we gratefully receive God’s grace, we often respond with compassion for those around us. I would say repentance often leads to good works, but good works rarely lead to repentance.
Want to try a little inventory? Make two columns. On one write everything you think makes you a “good person.” On the other, everything you feel ashamed of or insecure about. Can you live with knowing both columns tell a truth about you? Not the whole truth, but truth? Maybe we can offer God the “sin” column, trusting that God’s forgiveness is here before we even confess.
Now, the “good works” column – take a good look. Do you do all those things from your heart, or because you think you’re “supposed to?” What would you take out of that list if you followed your heart?
We can choose to be self-righteous, or self-aware – generally not at the same time. Seeing ourselves clearly makes it a more difficult to be self-righteous. And why work that hard anyway, when God is giving righteousness away for free?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-20-25 - Righteous
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
I used to be hyper-critical of myself (and others… those go hand-in-hand). One day I realized I had a trial going on inside my head 24/7. This court was always in session; the judge never called a recess. The prosecutors were vehement, the defense attorney was, well, defensive, always trying to excuse… it was exhausting, always trying to justify myself.
We have a new parable this week; this one is not hard to interpret. Luke telegraphs the message up front: "Jesus told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt.” That pretty much summed up the Pharisees of Jesus’ time, so focused on keeping the Law in minute detail they seemed to lose sight of both God and their neighbor.
There is not much plot to this story – it’s more a situation with two well-known “types”: a Pharisee (professional do-gooder) and a tax-collector (corrupt extortionist, scum of the earth). Both are praying in the temple, but the Pharisee thanks God that he is so much more holy than other people, “especially people like that tax collector over there.” The tax collector, meanwhile, is abjectly repentant, pleading God’s mercy. Jesus says that this is the one who will go home “justified… for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”
This parable is not a call to be modest or circumspect about our gifts or accomplishments. It’s a reminder to be clear about whose judgment on us matters: not our own, and not other peoples, but God’s. The Pharisee in Jesus’ story, even as a caricature, is an excellent likeness of those who usurp God’s role as judge, who dare to declare themselves worthy and others unworthy. (And it’s just as wrong to declare ourselves “bad” and others “better.”).
The Pharisee makes a case for his own goodness – his fasting, tithing, religiosity. And that case is never enough – it has to be augmented by comparison to someone less “good." That’s a problem with self-righteousness – we never get to rest our case. We have to keep marshaling evidence, comparing ourselves. The tax collector, as numerous as his sins may be, is honest before God.
So – which are you more like today? If you feel unsure of your righteousness as a child of God, why? What evidence do you feel compelled to present? What does God say as you pray about that?
Do you find yourself comparing yourself to other people in order to feel better about yourself? If there’s anyone you feel is beneath you… pray for that person or group today. Try on the idea that you are no better or worse than another – though your actions might be.
We have received the Spirit of Christ and his righteousness; we are worthy because of who he is. We can silence the prosecutor and fire the defense attorney; in fact, we can disband the whole court, because God has provided us an Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to stand with us. Actually, our case has already been decided – we’re good to go. Jesus said so.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
I used to be hyper-critical of myself (and others… those go hand-in-hand). One day I realized I had a trial going on inside my head 24/7. This court was always in session; the judge never called a recess. The prosecutors were vehement, the defense attorney was, well, defensive, always trying to excuse… it was exhausting, always trying to justify myself.
We have a new parable this week; this one is not hard to interpret. Luke telegraphs the message up front: "Jesus told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt.” That pretty much summed up the Pharisees of Jesus’ time, so focused on keeping the Law in minute detail they seemed to lose sight of both God and their neighbor.
There is not much plot to this story – it’s more a situation with two well-known “types”: a Pharisee (professional do-gooder) and a tax-collector (corrupt extortionist, scum of the earth). Both are praying in the temple, but the Pharisee thanks God that he is so much more holy than other people, “especially people like that tax collector over there.” The tax collector, meanwhile, is abjectly repentant, pleading God’s mercy. Jesus says that this is the one who will go home “justified… for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”
This parable is not a call to be modest or circumspect about our gifts or accomplishments. It’s a reminder to be clear about whose judgment on us matters: not our own, and not other peoples, but God’s. The Pharisee in Jesus’ story, even as a caricature, is an excellent likeness of those who usurp God’s role as judge, who dare to declare themselves worthy and others unworthy. (And it’s just as wrong to declare ourselves “bad” and others “better.”).
The Pharisee makes a case for his own goodness – his fasting, tithing, religiosity. And that case is never enough – it has to be augmented by comparison to someone less “good." That’s a problem with self-righteousness – we never get to rest our case. We have to keep marshaling evidence, comparing ourselves. The tax collector, as numerous as his sins may be, is honest before God.
So – which are you more like today? If you feel unsure of your righteousness as a child of God, why? What evidence do you feel compelled to present? What does God say as you pray about that?
Do you find yourself comparing yourself to other people in order to feel better about yourself? If there’s anyone you feel is beneath you… pray for that person or group today. Try on the idea that you are no better or worse than another – though your actions might be.
We have received the Spirit of Christ and his righteousness; we are worthy because of who he is. We can silence the prosecutor and fire the defense attorney; in fact, we can disband the whole court, because God has provided us an Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to stand with us. Actually, our case has already been decided – we’re good to go. Jesus said so.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-17-25 - Wrestling With God
You can listen to this reflection here. A reading from the Hebrew Bible for Sunday' is here.
Moral of the week: It’s okay to struggle with God. In fact, the Bible is full of lively encounters with God – negotiations, laments, indignation, door-slamming fights. And guess what? God doesn’t go away. God hangs in, stays with, sometimes appears to change course (or was that the plan all along?).
In other words, God is revealed as One who loves – actively, passionately, fully. And those whom God seems to choose for special blessing or purpose are often far from perfect – but they are open to a robust relationship with God.
One of these was Jacob, the wily grandson of Abraham, twin of Esau, who managed to secure both his brother’s birthright and their father Isaac’s blessing. The tales of his adventures, marriages, schemes, setbacks and successes is richly told in Genesis 25-33. One such story comes up Sunday.
Toward the end of his life, Jacob is returning home with his vast family and flocks, and he hears Esau is still looking for him. Fearful that Esau may still want to kill him, he prepares to encounter the twin he cheated so long ago. He sends his family and everything he owns on ahead. The storyteller is succinct: “Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.” We don’t know who the adversary is, but Jacob holds his own and at daybreak the man wants to leave. But Jacob is tough; he won’t release him until he receives a blessing.
The man tells him, "You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed.” Imagine that! The very name of the nation that will bear God’s blessing means “has striven with God” or “prevails with God.” Talk about an invitation.
Are there issues in your life you want to take up with God? Times when you have struggled with God? Did you wrestle through to a place of resolution – or is it still locked away in you, holding you back from true intimacy in faith? Bring it out! God doesn’t want us to be polite – God wants us to be real. I hear God say, “Bring it! All of it. I love who you are. I want you to be true before me.”
And if we’re really open in this relationship, we might also find our desires or demands changing, as we are shaped by our encounters with the Holy One. That is the goal of the spiritual life: to become ever more truly who we are, who God made us to be. In the process, we shed some of who we’re not.
I once heard about a little girl who used to stop on her way to school and watch a sculptor fashioning a statue of a lion from a block of marble. Week after week she watched as the animal took shape. When it was nearly finished, she stopped to look one day, and said to the sculptor, “Hey, mister, how’d you know there was a lion in there?”
God knows who we are. As we allow ourselves to struggle with God – and to rest in God – we allow all that is not truly “us” to be chiseled away, until we stand in our truest identity, fully known, truly loved. Sometimes at that point God gives us a new name.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Moral of the week: It’s okay to struggle with God. In fact, the Bible is full of lively encounters with God – negotiations, laments, indignation, door-slamming fights. And guess what? God doesn’t go away. God hangs in, stays with, sometimes appears to change course (or was that the plan all along?).
In other words, God is revealed as One who loves – actively, passionately, fully. And those whom God seems to choose for special blessing or purpose are often far from perfect – but they are open to a robust relationship with God.
One of these was Jacob, the wily grandson of Abraham, twin of Esau, who managed to secure both his brother’s birthright and their father Isaac’s blessing. The tales of his adventures, marriages, schemes, setbacks and successes is richly told in Genesis 25-33. One such story comes up Sunday.
Toward the end of his life, Jacob is returning home with his vast family and flocks, and he hears Esau is still looking for him. Fearful that Esau may still want to kill him, he prepares to encounter the twin he cheated so long ago. He sends his family and everything he owns on ahead. The storyteller is succinct: “Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.” We don’t know who the adversary is, but Jacob holds his own and at daybreak the man wants to leave. But Jacob is tough; he won’t release him until he receives a blessing.
The man tells him, "You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed.” Imagine that! The very name of the nation that will bear God’s blessing means “has striven with God” or “prevails with God.” Talk about an invitation.
Are there issues in your life you want to take up with God? Times when you have struggled with God? Did you wrestle through to a place of resolution – or is it still locked away in you, holding you back from true intimacy in faith? Bring it out! God doesn’t want us to be polite – God wants us to be real. I hear God say, “Bring it! All of it. I love who you are. I want you to be true before me.”
And if we’re really open in this relationship, we might also find our desires or demands changing, as we are shaped by our encounters with the Holy One. That is the goal of the spiritual life: to become ever more truly who we are, who God made us to be. In the process, we shed some of who we’re not.
I once heard about a little girl who used to stop on her way to school and watch a sculptor fashioning a statue of a lion from a block of marble. Week after week she watched as the animal took shape. When it was nearly finished, she stopped to look one day, and said to the sculptor, “Hey, mister, how’d you know there was a lion in there?”
God knows who we are. As we allow ourselves to struggle with God – and to rest in God – we allow all that is not truly “us” to be chiseled away, until we stand in our truest identity, fully known, truly loved. Sometimes at that point God gives us a new name.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-16-25 - Have a Little Faith
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Talk about burns – how’s this for a closing: “And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" That’s what Jesus says at the end of his story.
Faith. That again. Isn’t it nicer when the focus is on God’s action – or delayed action? With this parting shot, Jesus swerves the lens neatly back to us. That persistent widow in his story, annoying as she may have been, was also an examplar of faith. She had faith in a system that thus far had yielded no justice. But she kept at it.
How about us? I know many people who turn away from God because their suffering, or the suffering of others, has not been alleviated, as though that were the only criteria for belief. I acknowledge the reality of that pain – AND I want to invite people with that viewpoint to widen their field of vision. On any given day, most of us can see many blessings and answers to prayer and signs of God-life, as well as the persistence of injustice and challenges. We are invited to take it all in, to give praise in all circumstances, to allow the blessings to strengthen our faith for the challenges.
As I wrote this, John Hiatt’s song, Have a Little Faith in Me started up in my head. Though it is a love song from a man to a woman, I can imagine our loving God singing it to us:
When the road gets dark and you can no longer see
Just let my love throw a spark, and have a little faith in me.
Today in prayer, instead of making lists and thinking of all the areas where we want to see God’s justice, let’s recall God’s faithfulness and our own faith. If you want to try a new prayer experience, play the song and imagine God singing it to you (okay, if John Hiatt as God is a little too much, you could just read the words…)
God has chosen to work through our faith, weak or strong as it may be at any given moment. It is a key ingredient in bringing forth justice. So remember. Remember the times when you’ve known God’s faithfulness, and dare to have a little faith, one more time, for Jesus to find.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Talk about burns – how’s this for a closing: “And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" That’s what Jesus says at the end of his story.
Faith. That again. Isn’t it nicer when the focus is on God’s action – or delayed action? With this parting shot, Jesus swerves the lens neatly back to us. That persistent widow in his story, annoying as she may have been, was also an examplar of faith. She had faith in a system that thus far had yielded no justice. But she kept at it.
How about us? I know many people who turn away from God because their suffering, or the suffering of others, has not been alleviated, as though that were the only criteria for belief. I acknowledge the reality of that pain – AND I want to invite people with that viewpoint to widen their field of vision. On any given day, most of us can see many blessings and answers to prayer and signs of God-life, as well as the persistence of injustice and challenges. We are invited to take it all in, to give praise in all circumstances, to allow the blessings to strengthen our faith for the challenges.
As I wrote this, John Hiatt’s song, Have a Little Faith in Me started up in my head. Though it is a love song from a man to a woman, I can imagine our loving God singing it to us:
When the road gets dark and you can no longer see
Just let my love throw a spark, and have a little faith in me.
Today in prayer, instead of making lists and thinking of all the areas where we want to see God’s justice, let’s recall God’s faithfulness and our own faith. If you want to try a new prayer experience, play the song and imagine God singing it to you (okay, if John Hiatt as God is a little too much, you could just read the words…)
God has chosen to work through our faith, weak or strong as it may be at any given moment. It is a key ingredient in bringing forth justice. So remember. Remember the times when you’ve known God’s faithfulness, and dare to have a little faith, one more time, for Jesus to find.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-15-25 - Justice-Makers
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“Justice delayed is justice denied.” This expression can sound tunnel-visioned, oblivious to what are in some cases competing claims or a necessary process of culture change. Or maybe it’s always true, and those less hurried are simply benefiting more from the status quo. “It ain’t that simple,” they say. But to those waiting for justice, it ain’t that complicated.
After telling how the judge is eventually worn down by the widow’s persistence, Jesus says: “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.”
My first reaction is, “Quickly? No delay? How many have cried out to God day and night, century after century, and still the powerful dominate the weak, and the rich hoard resources that keep others poor, and the corrupt steal justice from the powerless..." What do we do with these words?
Well, we can trust, and wait. Chalk it up to the eternal mysteries and keep our focus on all the times we do see justice break through. That’s important, to keep our focus on where God is. And we can go deeper, to try to understand better what Jesus was saying. What if we flip it? What if the God figure in the parable isn’t the judge, but the widow? If we might be any character in a parable, so might God.
How does it change our interpretation if we see God as that helpless widow? We could say that, in giving us free will, God has stayed his own power, becoming reliant on us by choice, relying on us to choose justice over self-gratification. In the Bible, we see God over and over and over again asking his chosen ones to turn back to him, to righteousness and truth and integrity and justice. And over and over again in those stories humankind refuses.
What if God, persistent as that widow, is asking us to bring justice into being? What if, rather than waiting for justice to come from “on high,” we engage more fully as justice-makers, participating with God in restoring all things and all people to wholeness? We may feel helpless in the face of injustices but we aren’t called to work alone. Enough people working together with God’s power can overcome any injustice.
“Justice delayed is justice denied.” This expression can sound tunnel-visioned, oblivious to what are in some cases competing claims or a necessary process of culture change. Or maybe it’s always true, and those less hurried are simply benefiting more from the status quo. “It ain’t that simple,” they say. But to those waiting for justice, it ain’t that complicated.
After telling how the judge is eventually worn down by the widow’s persistence, Jesus says: “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.”
My first reaction is, “Quickly? No delay? How many have cried out to God day and night, century after century, and still the powerful dominate the weak, and the rich hoard resources that keep others poor, and the corrupt steal justice from the powerless..." What do we do with these words?
Well, we can trust, and wait. Chalk it up to the eternal mysteries and keep our focus on all the times we do see justice break through. That’s important, to keep our focus on where God is. And we can go deeper, to try to understand better what Jesus was saying. What if we flip it? What if the God figure in the parable isn’t the judge, but the widow? If we might be any character in a parable, so might God.
How does it change our interpretation if we see God as that helpless widow? We could say that, in giving us free will, God has stayed his own power, becoming reliant on us by choice, relying on us to choose justice over self-gratification. In the Bible, we see God over and over and over again asking his chosen ones to turn back to him, to righteousness and truth and integrity and justice. And over and over again in those stories humankind refuses.
What if God, persistent as that widow, is asking us to bring justice into being? What if, rather than waiting for justice to come from “on high,” we engage more fully as justice-makers, participating with God in restoring all things and all people to wholeness? We may feel helpless in the face of injustices but we aren’t called to work alone. Enough people working together with God’s power can overcome any injustice.
- If you were to see yourself as a maker of justice, where would you start? (or continue…) Somewhere in your life or community, among friends or acquaintances? With a national or global issue?
- And what do you see as your obstacles to bringing forth justice in that situation?
- Who do you need as allies and reinforcements? List some...
- Who are your adversaries – and how might you pray for them?
If this feels overwhelming, remember this: God has entrusted us with the ministry of peace and justice, and God has equipped us with gifts, colleagues – and the power of the Holy Spirit. With the power that made the universe working in us – we can bring about justice. Sooner. Together.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-14-25 - Widow or Judge?
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Interpreting parables can be similar to interpreting dreams – on some level, we can find ourselves in all the characters, and meaning shifts according to who we most identify with. So, in this parable, are you the widow or the judge?
When we feel we’re on the wrong side of justice, powerless, unheard, victims of a system we can’t control, we identify with this widow. It’s hard to get more powerless than widows in Jesus’ day – they were at the mercy of relatives or charity. What situations in your life make you feel powerless? We all have some area in which we don’t get what we want or need, and we get tired of asking. It’s okay to feel a righteous anger over injustice – and it’s okay to be angry at God.
Or do you identify with this judge, unsavory as he may be? Are you tired of people haranguing you to fix everything? Maybe you think this widow ought to take more responsibility for her life. Maybe (the story doesn’t tell us…) the opponent has a good case, and ruling in favor of the widow is not the most just thing, but she’s worn you down.
In many situations we are sitting in the power seat, denying other people resources or justice or simply a hearing. When we hoard assets or exert socio-economic privilege, we’re like that judge. When we fail to honor the humanity in another person, no matter how annoying or destructive we may find them, we’re sitting on that bench.
I don't find either of these characters very appealing. Carl Jung might say they represent our “shadow” sides, negative feelings and tendencies that are part of us, which we don't really like to look at or own. The more we’re able to bring them into the light, though, the better we can be free of their toxic elements. And freedom is our goal in the spiritual life.
Today, name some things you feel helpless about, angry at, sick of. Tell God how you feel. God doesn’t want us to be polite – God wants us to be real. If these are things you often pray about, examine that. Is there another angle from which to look at them? Action you could take? Anyone else who might join you in that prayer?
Then let's switch places and assume the judgment seat. Who is asking you for justice or mercy – or time? Who don’t you want to be bothered with? What resources and power do you have that you might exercise on someone else’s behalf? If you feel forgiveness is needed, ask for that. Even more, ask God to show you God’s solutions for those people so you can join God in helping them.
This is hard work, to look at ourselves clearly. But the light we shine into our shadows is the love of God in Christ, a fierce love that makes us truer than we knew we could be.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Interpreting parables can be similar to interpreting dreams – on some level, we can find ourselves in all the characters, and meaning shifts according to who we most identify with. So, in this parable, are you the widow or the judge?
When we feel we’re on the wrong side of justice, powerless, unheard, victims of a system we can’t control, we identify with this widow. It’s hard to get more powerless than widows in Jesus’ day – they were at the mercy of relatives or charity. What situations in your life make you feel powerless? We all have some area in which we don’t get what we want or need, and we get tired of asking. It’s okay to feel a righteous anger over injustice – and it’s okay to be angry at God.
Or do you identify with this judge, unsavory as he may be? Are you tired of people haranguing you to fix everything? Maybe you think this widow ought to take more responsibility for her life. Maybe (the story doesn’t tell us…) the opponent has a good case, and ruling in favor of the widow is not the most just thing, but she’s worn you down.
In many situations we are sitting in the power seat, denying other people resources or justice or simply a hearing. When we hoard assets or exert socio-economic privilege, we’re like that judge. When we fail to honor the humanity in another person, no matter how annoying or destructive we may find them, we’re sitting on that bench.
I don't find either of these characters very appealing. Carl Jung might say they represent our “shadow” sides, negative feelings and tendencies that are part of us, which we don't really like to look at or own. The more we’re able to bring them into the light, though, the better we can be free of their toxic elements. And freedom is our goal in the spiritual life.
Today, name some things you feel helpless about, angry at, sick of. Tell God how you feel. God doesn’t want us to be polite – God wants us to be real. If these are things you often pray about, examine that. Is there another angle from which to look at them? Action you could take? Anyone else who might join you in that prayer?
Then let's switch places and assume the judgment seat. Who is asking you for justice or mercy – or time? Who don’t you want to be bothered with? What resources and power do you have that you might exercise on someone else’s behalf? If you feel forgiveness is needed, ask for that. Even more, ask God to show you God’s solutions for those people so you can join God in helping them.
This is hard work, to look at ourselves clearly. But the light we shine into our shadows is the love of God in Christ, a fierce love that makes us truer than we knew we could be.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-13-25 - Knockin' On Heaven's Door
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
God shows up in different guises in Jesus’ parables: a forgiving father, an absentee landlord, a generous vineyard owner, an exacting manager, a frantic housewife, the host of a banquet, to name a few. And sometimes Jesus seemed to use a negative example, not to say “this is what God is like,” but rather, “If even someone this lousy can behave in a generous way, how much more will your Father in heaven?”
So our gospel story this week features an unjust judge “who neither feared God nor had respect for people,” being pestered by a persistent widow. He finally gives in and judges in her favor – not because he wants to see justice done, or because he has compassion, but because he wants to get rid of her. Jesus says, “And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night?”
Luke introduces this as a “parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” Jesus suggests we make our needs known to God and keep on asking, day and night. Hey, shouldn't once be enough? Is God deaf? Not listening? Keeping up with his 950 zillion Facebook friends? What kind of a complaint department is this? What kind of justice?
Let’s assume that God knows what God is doing, and that Jesus is conveying truth about God. What benefit could there be to persistence in prayer? That depends on what we consider the purpose of prayer. If it is to get what we ask for, we often find it frustrating not to see the results we desire. If our goal is to draw closer in relationship to God, to open our spirits to deeper understanding and belovedness, then we can pray for the same thing over and over and see what changes in us as well as in the circumstances of the prayer.
Is there something you haven't dared to pray for, which your heart desires? Something that seems impossible? Start today, in faith and humility – and be persistent.
Is there something you feel you’ve prayed for repeatedly, and haven’t seen realized? Tell God how you feel about that… and maybe ask if there’s another way to pray about it. Is God showing you something underneath that prayer?
Sometimes not seeing the desired outcome right away invites us to reexamine the prayer: why do we want that? Does it involve God controlling another person’s actions (the one thing I believe God will not do…)? Can we see some deeper good in our not receiving that desired outcome?
These questions don’t always get answered – and then we’re back at learning to wait on the Lord. But we don’t have to wait passively. We can wait engaged, persistent, insistent, standing on the promises we have received: that the most immediate fruit of sincere prayer is the peace of Christ, that we pray in the presence of Christ, that we can be conduits of the power of Christ.
Then we can invite God to reshape that prayer in us until it becomes God’s prayer. Those always get answered.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
God shows up in different guises in Jesus’ parables: a forgiving father, an absentee landlord, a generous vineyard owner, an exacting manager, a frantic housewife, the host of a banquet, to name a few. And sometimes Jesus seemed to use a negative example, not to say “this is what God is like,” but rather, “If even someone this lousy can behave in a generous way, how much more will your Father in heaven?”
So our gospel story this week features an unjust judge “who neither feared God nor had respect for people,” being pestered by a persistent widow. He finally gives in and judges in her favor – not because he wants to see justice done, or because he has compassion, but because he wants to get rid of her. Jesus says, “And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night?”
Luke introduces this as a “parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” Jesus suggests we make our needs known to God and keep on asking, day and night. Hey, shouldn't once be enough? Is God deaf? Not listening? Keeping up with his 950 zillion Facebook friends? What kind of a complaint department is this? What kind of justice?
Let’s assume that God knows what God is doing, and that Jesus is conveying truth about God. What benefit could there be to persistence in prayer? That depends on what we consider the purpose of prayer. If it is to get what we ask for, we often find it frustrating not to see the results we desire. If our goal is to draw closer in relationship to God, to open our spirits to deeper understanding and belovedness, then we can pray for the same thing over and over and see what changes in us as well as in the circumstances of the prayer.
Is there something you haven't dared to pray for, which your heart desires? Something that seems impossible? Start today, in faith and humility – and be persistent.
Is there something you feel you’ve prayed for repeatedly, and haven’t seen realized? Tell God how you feel about that… and maybe ask if there’s another way to pray about it. Is God showing you something underneath that prayer?
Sometimes not seeing the desired outcome right away invites us to reexamine the prayer: why do we want that? Does it involve God controlling another person’s actions (the one thing I believe God will not do…)? Can we see some deeper good in our not receiving that desired outcome?
These questions don’t always get answered – and then we’re back at learning to wait on the Lord. But we don’t have to wait passively. We can wait engaged, persistent, insistent, standing on the promises we have received: that the most immediate fruit of sincere prayer is the peace of Christ, that we pray in the presence of Christ, that we can be conduits of the power of Christ.
Then we can invite God to reshape that prayer in us until it becomes God’s prayer. Those always get answered.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-10-25 - Well AND Whole
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well,” Jesus says to the Samaritan cured of leprosy.
The phrase “made you well” also means “saved you.” The healing of our bodies and healing of our spirits is a package deal with God. We can choose to open ourselves to the deeper healing of our spirits, the eternal healing – or stop at wellness in the here and now.
All ten men were healed of leprosy; nine returned to their “here and now” lives. Something made this one come back to seek a connection with the Holy One, to throw himself at Jesus’ feet and say thank you. He receives a deeper healing, as Jesus proclaims him whole in body, mind and spirit. His healing is not just temporal but eternal.
Is it his faith or Jesus’ word or a combination that made him well? That is mystery. The faith we bring is certainly a large part of the equation, more than I wish it were. Wouldn't it be simpler if it were all up to God? Yet God seems to work through us, to have us be conduits of God’s power and love, as we invite it to flow through us in faith, for ourselves, for each other, for the world. We can’t do it without God; God won’t do it without us.
Faith is the doorway to transformation. As we allow God’s love to flow through us, we also are healed and drawn closer. Jesus is always inviting us into a deeper relationship with God – not just assent to beliefs, or participation in the life of a religious community, but participation in the life of God. That’s where we get the “holes in our soul” filled, and find meaning and purpose beyond our own lives.
In our story, these two men from different ways of seeing meet in the zone between their lands. This unnamed Samaritan seeks a relationship with Jesus, the Jew, traveling through. We too can meet Jesus, who is always traveling through our lives. Maybe he’s just outside our comfort zone.
Today, you might offer him your thanks and your worship, and ask him to be more real to you in prayer. It helps to be still, and set some time aside, and be open. Be attentive to any words or images or prompts that you sense. Sometimes it’s just stillness. Sometimes there’s more.
This leper-turned-disciple is a model for us. He is grateful, humble and faithful. And Jesus sends him on his way, whole. As God sees us through Christ, so are we.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
“Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well,” Jesus says to the Samaritan cured of leprosy.
The phrase “made you well” also means “saved you.” The healing of our bodies and healing of our spirits is a package deal with God. We can choose to open ourselves to the deeper healing of our spirits, the eternal healing – or stop at wellness in the here and now.
All ten men were healed of leprosy; nine returned to their “here and now” lives. Something made this one come back to seek a connection with the Holy One, to throw himself at Jesus’ feet and say thank you. He receives a deeper healing, as Jesus proclaims him whole in body, mind and spirit. His healing is not just temporal but eternal.
Is it his faith or Jesus’ word or a combination that made him well? That is mystery. The faith we bring is certainly a large part of the equation, more than I wish it were. Wouldn't it be simpler if it were all up to God? Yet God seems to work through us, to have us be conduits of God’s power and love, as we invite it to flow through us in faith, for ourselves, for each other, for the world. We can’t do it without God; God won’t do it without us.
Faith is the doorway to transformation. As we allow God’s love to flow through us, we also are healed and drawn closer. Jesus is always inviting us into a deeper relationship with God – not just assent to beliefs, or participation in the life of a religious community, but participation in the life of God. That’s where we get the “holes in our soul” filled, and find meaning and purpose beyond our own lives.
In our story, these two men from different ways of seeing meet in the zone between their lands. This unnamed Samaritan seeks a relationship with Jesus, the Jew, traveling through. We too can meet Jesus, who is always traveling through our lives. Maybe he’s just outside our comfort zone.
Today, you might offer him your thanks and your worship, and ask him to be more real to you in prayer. It helps to be still, and set some time aside, and be open. Be attentive to any words or images or prompts that you sense. Sometimes it’s just stillness. Sometimes there’s more.
This leper-turned-disciple is a model for us. He is grateful, humble and faithful. And Jesus sends him on his way, whole. As God sees us through Christ, so are we.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-9-25 - Miracles On the Go
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Have you heard the one about the person desperate for a parking spot – late for a meeting, stressed to the max, circling the block, praying, “Dear God, I need a parking space. Please!!!” Turns the corner – lo and behold, there’s a space, right in front of the building. Pulls in, glances skyward and waves, “Never mind – found one.”
One came back. Nine kept walking. Jesus noticed the differential – “Were not ten made clean? The other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”
All ten set out in faith – they weren't healed beforehand. “As they went, they were made clean.” That’s what it means to walk by faith – miracles happen as we go. Twelve baskets of bread and fish just kept not running out as 5000 were fed; cisterns of water became finest wine as they were drawn off.
Nine took the gift in stride. Only one turned back – back to the place of his suffering, the place of his alienation and degradation – to praise God, to thank the stranger whose word made him clean. He knew that only God could heal like this, and he wanted to connect with this man in whom God’s power was so strong.
A Water Daily reader told me she started a gratitude journal, challenging herself to note at least four things each day for which she is grateful. Over time, the notations multiplied and she set herself a new challenge: to write down each day where or in whom she saw God. Tuning our inner eyes and ears to know, “Ah… that was a God-moment;" learning to distinguish Holy Spirit nudges from our own intuition; seeing God’s love or forgiveness in another person opens our spirits to a greater awareness of just how active God is around us. It’s not occasional – it’s all the time. Soon, we come to recognize that what we call “miracles” are just the way God works, as we invite God’s power and love into our situations.
Try on either or both of those spiritual practices for two weeks, a gratitude journal and/or a “where did I perceive God” journal. They are training exercises for spiritual fitness. They build up our strength and resilience, tone our faith muscles, hone our faith senses.
When we name our gifts, we remember the Giver – and then it’s natural to come back in praise and gratitude. And then, my oh my, we find the Giver has even more for us...
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Have you heard the one about the person desperate for a parking spot – late for a meeting, stressed to the max, circling the block, praying, “Dear God, I need a parking space. Please!!!” Turns the corner – lo and behold, there’s a space, right in front of the building. Pulls in, glances skyward and waves, “Never mind – found one.”
One came back. Nine kept walking. Jesus noticed the differential – “Were not ten made clean? The other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”
All ten set out in faith – they weren't healed beforehand. “As they went, they were made clean.” That’s what it means to walk by faith – miracles happen as we go. Twelve baskets of bread and fish just kept not running out as 5000 were fed; cisterns of water became finest wine as they were drawn off.
Nine took the gift in stride. Only one turned back – back to the place of his suffering, the place of his alienation and degradation – to praise God, to thank the stranger whose word made him clean. He knew that only God could heal like this, and he wanted to connect with this man in whom God’s power was so strong.
A Water Daily reader told me she started a gratitude journal, challenging herself to note at least four things each day for which she is grateful. Over time, the notations multiplied and she set herself a new challenge: to write down each day where or in whom she saw God. Tuning our inner eyes and ears to know, “Ah… that was a God-moment;" learning to distinguish Holy Spirit nudges from our own intuition; seeing God’s love or forgiveness in another person opens our spirits to a greater awareness of just how active God is around us. It’s not occasional – it’s all the time. Soon, we come to recognize that what we call “miracles” are just the way God works, as we invite God’s power and love into our situations.
Try on either or both of those spiritual practices for two weeks, a gratitude journal and/or a “where did I perceive God” journal. They are training exercises for spiritual fitness. They build up our strength and resilience, tone our faith muscles, hone our faith senses.
When we name our gifts, we remember the Giver – and then it’s natural to come back in praise and gratitude. And then, my oh my, we find the Giver has even more for us...
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-8-25 - Gratitude
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
One in ten. In an age when we measure rates of return on everything from email “opens” to dividend yields, maybe God says, “Ten percent ain’t bad…” glad that one in ten could look past the amazing wonder of this gift, to offer praise to the Giver:
And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan.
As Jesus tells the story, this is not just any “one in ten” – this one is a double outcast: a leper and a Samaritan. In Gospel stories about Samaritans who “get it,” the writers always seem to point out their ethnicity, like, “Can you believe it?”
The other nine presumably couldn’t wait to get to the temple, be certified as clean, and get back to their homes, families, lives. This one turns back, praising God loudly. He throws himself at Jesus’ feet and thanks him. He is exuberant, extravagant in his praise and thanksgiving.
The messages of this story run much deeper than “Don’t forget to say thank you…,” but that is one. When we say thank you, it multiplies the gift we have received. The giver is affirmed for her generosity, and we in a sense receive the gift more fully as we make our delight known. I don’t know if anyone has tested the biochemical or neurological effects of gratitude, but I’d bet there are some.
Gratitude is the ground for joy. It turns our focus outward. When we cultivate it as a habit, it can change our interior landscape and make the people around us feel appreciated. If we’re not already intentional about it, let’s practice.
We can even throw ourselves at Jesus’ feet, like runners sliding into Home…
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
One in ten. In an age when we measure rates of return on everything from email “opens” to dividend yields, maybe God says, “Ten percent ain’t bad…” glad that one in ten could look past the amazing wonder of this gift, to offer praise to the Giver:
And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan.
As Jesus tells the story, this is not just any “one in ten” – this one is a double outcast: a leper and a Samaritan. In Gospel stories about Samaritans who “get it,” the writers always seem to point out their ethnicity, like, “Can you believe it?”
The other nine presumably couldn’t wait to get to the temple, be certified as clean, and get back to their homes, families, lives. This one turns back, praising God loudly. He throws himself at Jesus’ feet and thanks him. He is exuberant, extravagant in his praise and thanksgiving.
The messages of this story run much deeper than “Don’t forget to say thank you…,” but that is one. When we say thank you, it multiplies the gift we have received. The giver is affirmed for her generosity, and we in a sense receive the gift more fully as we make our delight known. I don’t know if anyone has tested the biochemical or neurological effects of gratitude, but I’d bet there are some.
Gratitude is the ground for joy. It turns our focus outward. When we cultivate it as a habit, it can change our interior landscape and make the people around us feel appreciated. If we’re not already intentional about it, let’s practice.
- What gift of God do you want to say “thank you” for today?
- What person close to you would you like to thank? Maybe write a note or buy a gift?
- What stranger would you like to thank today? What if we all made a point of telling barristas or dry cleaners or check-out clerks or IT fixers or accountants, “I really appreciate the job you do – it makes my life better.” Think how a wave of gratitude could ripple around the world in a matter of hours. Let’s start a TikTok challenge!
We can even throw ourselves at Jesus’ feet, like runners sliding into Home…
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-7-25 - Transformed As We Go
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
What was it was like for those ten lepers as they went along the road toward Jerusalem? They called out to Jesus, “Have mercy on us!” When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.”
Why the priests? The religious laws concerning skin diseases required that a priest certify that the person was no longer diseased. (I’m glad that’s not part of my job description…) Jesus could heal them, but to be reinstated into the community, they had to go through those rituals.
So they went. – “And as they went, they were made clean.” Did one person happen to glance at his hand and see his skin looked different? Or notice he had feeling in his feet again? Did they look at each other in shock and wonder as their very skin became transformed, like new?
One of Sunday’s readings from the Hebrew Bible tells the great story of Naaman, a Syrian army commander who contracts leprosy. A Hebrew slave girl tells his wife that there is a prophet in Israel who can heal him, and he goes to find Elisha, who sends word that he should dip himself seven times in the Jordan. Naaman is outraged at the simplicity of this “treatment,” but his servant prevails upon him: “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, `Wash, and be clean'?" So he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan... his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.”
So often we think healing is complicated and arduous; that can be our experience with surgical or chemical procedures, with protracted recoveries. Healing in the Bible seems so ridiculously simple – God or God’s representative simply says the word and it is done. Could it really be so easy?
More often than we think. When I remember to invite God to release healing in me and in those I pray with, I often see it happen quickly. What’s hard is believing – and that gets much easier the more we see it. That’s why it’s so important that we pray for healing for each other and for the world – the evidence begins to pile up.
Sure, at times illness persists or recurs – there is mystery here, and a temporal reality of decline and death. But our baseline can be the healing we do see, rather than what we don’t. We can plant that seed of faith and give thanks even before we see the healing, and then with each lessening of symptoms or improvement give thanks all the more. “First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn.”
Try it today: pray in faith for healing in something or someone you didn’t think it was possible. And then keep giving thanks over the next few days and weeks, making note of any change or improvement you see. We can keep our energy on what God is doing, even before we see it.
That’s how we build up our faith muscles. And one day we look up and notice we’re transformed. Sometimes it’s in this life, always in the next.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
What was it was like for those ten lepers as they went along the road toward Jerusalem? They called out to Jesus, “Have mercy on us!” When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.”
Why the priests? The religious laws concerning skin diseases required that a priest certify that the person was no longer diseased. (I’m glad that’s not part of my job description…) Jesus could heal them, but to be reinstated into the community, they had to go through those rituals.
So they went. – “And as they went, they were made clean.” Did one person happen to glance at his hand and see his skin looked different? Or notice he had feeling in his feet again? Did they look at each other in shock and wonder as their very skin became transformed, like new?
One of Sunday’s readings from the Hebrew Bible tells the great story of Naaman, a Syrian army commander who contracts leprosy. A Hebrew slave girl tells his wife that there is a prophet in Israel who can heal him, and he goes to find Elisha, who sends word that he should dip himself seven times in the Jordan. Naaman is outraged at the simplicity of this “treatment,” but his servant prevails upon him: “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, `Wash, and be clean'?" So he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan... his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.”
So often we think healing is complicated and arduous; that can be our experience with surgical or chemical procedures, with protracted recoveries. Healing in the Bible seems so ridiculously simple – God or God’s representative simply says the word and it is done. Could it really be so easy?
More often than we think. When I remember to invite God to release healing in me and in those I pray with, I often see it happen quickly. What’s hard is believing – and that gets much easier the more we see it. That’s why it’s so important that we pray for healing for each other and for the world – the evidence begins to pile up.
Sure, at times illness persists or recurs – there is mystery here, and a temporal reality of decline and death. But our baseline can be the healing we do see, rather than what we don’t. We can plant that seed of faith and give thanks even before we see the healing, and then with each lessening of symptoms or improvement give thanks all the more. “First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn.”
Try it today: pray in faith for healing in something or someone you didn’t think it was possible. And then keep giving thanks over the next few days and weeks, making note of any change or improvement you see. We can keep our energy on what God is doing, even before we see it.
That’s how we build up our faith muscles. And one day we look up and notice we’re transformed. Sometimes it’s in this life, always in the next.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-6-25 - Keeping Our Distance
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
This week’s Gospel reading finds Jesus outside the lines again – traveling to Jerusalem through a region between Galilee (home base) and Samaria (“Other-Land”): As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”
Why were they keeping their distance? Because leprosy – in the Bible a catch-all term for skin diseases of various sorts – was considered very contagious. Having any such blemish made one ritually unclean, unfit for temple or community activities. (If you want to read Mosaic law about skin diseases, their treatment and the lengths to which someone who had been healed had to go to be reinstated into full community, read Leviticus 13 and 14 – and 15, if you want to get into really gross stuff....)
Lepers had to keep away from people, so they often lived in small groups outside villages. But these ten must have known something about Jesus, because they call him by name, they call him “Master,” and cry out, “Have mercy on us!”
Who lives on the outskirts of our communities, exiled by their own diseases, choices – or what they fear we think of them? Is anyone calling out to us, we who bear the name and ministry of Christ, crying, “Have mercy?” Someone of a different nationality or ethnicity? A stranger, or someone we find strange? Maybe someone who is poor or unhoused? Someone we know socially, whom we find annoying or troubling, and so we keep our distance?
Who comes to mind? What keeps her or him on the edges of your life? How do you feel about inviting that person closer? How are you being called to pray – for him/her? For yourself? Perhaps you feel outside a community yourself, wishing someone would hear your cry. Ask Jesus to send someone your way.
Jesus knows he can make these lepers whole, because the power of God flows through him. We, who are united with Christ and filled with his life, have been promised that same power flows through us. So we have much to offer to the people on the periphery of our vision, our life.
This week’s story is about healing, inside and out. As we journey through it, let’s start by opening our eyes to notice who’s calling to us from the edges, the margins, outside the lines. That’s so often where we find God.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
This week’s Gospel reading finds Jesus outside the lines again – traveling to Jerusalem through a region between Galilee (home base) and Samaria (“Other-Land”): As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”
Why were they keeping their distance? Because leprosy – in the Bible a catch-all term for skin diseases of various sorts – was considered very contagious. Having any such blemish made one ritually unclean, unfit for temple or community activities. (If you want to read Mosaic law about skin diseases, their treatment and the lengths to which someone who had been healed had to go to be reinstated into full community, read Leviticus 13 and 14 – and 15, if you want to get into really gross stuff....)
Lepers had to keep away from people, so they often lived in small groups outside villages. But these ten must have known something about Jesus, because they call him by name, they call him “Master,” and cry out, “Have mercy on us!”
Who lives on the outskirts of our communities, exiled by their own diseases, choices – or what they fear we think of them? Is anyone calling out to us, we who bear the name and ministry of Christ, crying, “Have mercy?” Someone of a different nationality or ethnicity? A stranger, or someone we find strange? Maybe someone who is poor or unhoused? Someone we know socially, whom we find annoying or troubling, and so we keep our distance?
Who comes to mind? What keeps her or him on the edges of your life? How do you feel about inviting that person closer? How are you being called to pray – for him/her? For yourself? Perhaps you feel outside a community yourself, wishing someone would hear your cry. Ask Jesus to send someone your way.
Jesus knows he can make these lepers whole, because the power of God flows through him. We, who are united with Christ and filled with his life, have been promised that same power flows through us. So we have much to offer to the people on the periphery of our vision, our life.
This week’s story is about healing, inside and out. As we journey through it, let’s start by opening our eyes to notice who’s calling to us from the edges, the margins, outside the lines. That’s so often where we find God.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-3-25 - The Wait
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
One reason people can be reluctant to pray about concerns is that it can feel like nothing happens when we pray. We’d like some sign that God is intervening on our behalf, or even an indication that God is responding to our prayers. We don’t mind waiting if we know we’re eventually going to receive. But what if we can’t see anything? What if nothing’s going to happen? What if God didn’t hear… or doesn’t exist?
Faith is stepping off into the dark, not quite knowing where we’ll land. Once we see, no longer need faith. And so faith includes waiting, which can be excruciating. One reading this Sunday is from the prophet Habakkuk, who expresses his anguish that “…the law becomes slack and justice never prevails." He resolves to keep watch to see how God will answer his complaint. And the Lord does answer: “Write the vision; make it plain,” so that it can be seen from afar. “For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie.“ He adds “...the righteous live by their faith.”
That is our job description, to live by faith, no matter how strong or weak we feel, or how little evidence we see. Jesus says to his disciples, “So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, ‘We are worthless servants; we have done only what we ought to have done!'"
Despite the harsh language, I don’t think Jesus was calling his disciples worthless. He is speaking to his inner circle, who should know better by now. And we too should think of ourselves as servants rather than entitled consumers. Servants don’t get to call all the shots; they do their jobs. They honor the people around them, and they take a day off. And they don’t get to regulate the timing. In an “I want it and I want it now” culture, that can be hard for us.
God’s vision will be realized at the appointed time. "It speaks of the end, and it does not lie." God’s desires cannot be rushed, nor can they be delayed. They can only be trusted in. "If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay."
Wait for it. God may seem slow, but God will bring Life into being. Have faith.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
One reason people can be reluctant to pray about concerns is that it can feel like nothing happens when we pray. We’d like some sign that God is intervening on our behalf, or even an indication that God is responding to our prayers. We don’t mind waiting if we know we’re eventually going to receive. But what if we can’t see anything? What if nothing’s going to happen? What if God didn’t hear… or doesn’t exist?
Faith is stepping off into the dark, not quite knowing where we’ll land. Once we see, no longer need faith. And so faith includes waiting, which can be excruciating. One reading this Sunday is from the prophet Habakkuk, who expresses his anguish that “…the law becomes slack and justice never prevails." He resolves to keep watch to see how God will answer his complaint. And the Lord does answer: “Write the vision; make it plain,” so that it can be seen from afar. “For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie.“ He adds “...the righteous live by their faith.”
That is our job description, to live by faith, no matter how strong or weak we feel, or how little evidence we see. Jesus says to his disciples, “So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, ‘We are worthless servants; we have done only what we ought to have done!'"
Despite the harsh language, I don’t think Jesus was calling his disciples worthless. He is speaking to his inner circle, who should know better by now. And we too should think of ourselves as servants rather than entitled consumers. Servants don’t get to call all the shots; they do their jobs. They honor the people around them, and they take a day off. And they don’t get to regulate the timing. In an “I want it and I want it now” culture, that can be hard for us.
- Is there something that you want now – or yesterday – that seems a long time coming? Healing? Reconciliation? Certainly justice. Rational discourse. An end to violence. Those are a few “big picture” desires.
- What about in your own life? What does God seem to be “tarrying” over an awfully long time? Is there something you have waited for a long time and then received? Remember...
God’s vision will be realized at the appointed time. "It speaks of the end, and it does not lie." God’s desires cannot be rushed, nor can they be delayed. They can only be trusted in. "If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay."
Wait for it. God may seem slow, but God will bring Life into being. Have faith.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-2-25 - Holding Faith Together
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
This week's reading speaks of faith as something you can have more of or less of. The disciples ask for increased faith because they can see what it takes to live this "God-Life." It does take faith to trust in what cannot be seen, to proclaim life in the midst of death, to bear light into darkness and truth in the face of injustice. We need faith to forgive the unforgivable, love the unlovable, heal the incurable, restore those who have been cast aside as worthless.
God seems to wait for us to participate in exercising faith. I wish it were otherwise, for our faith is often weak. But time and again in the Gospels we see Jesus respond to people’s faith, even saying to some, “Your faith has made you well.” Not “my power has made you well,” but “your faith.”
Why would God leave so much up to us, when God knows how feeble and fickle we can be? Is this a cosmic cruelty? It might be, had God not also provided what we need, asking only that we take hold of it. In addition to the “perfect faith” of Jesus, who joins us by his Spirit when we pray, God has also set us into communities of faith.
Faith is a contagious thing, and one which we can hold for one another. We can pass it down from one generation to another, and friend to friend. In Sunday’s epistle, Paul writes to Timothy, “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you.” Lois and Eunice and many a father and grandfather too have “held faith” for their children until such time as they took hold of it. Some are still holding it.
This week's reading speaks of faith as something you can have more of or less of. The disciples ask for increased faith because they can see what it takes to live this "God-Life." It does take faith to trust in what cannot be seen, to proclaim life in the midst of death, to bear light into darkness and truth in the face of injustice. We need faith to forgive the unforgivable, love the unlovable, heal the incurable, restore those who have been cast aside as worthless.
God seems to wait for us to participate in exercising faith. I wish it were otherwise, for our faith is often weak. But time and again in the Gospels we see Jesus respond to people’s faith, even saying to some, “Your faith has made you well.” Not “my power has made you well,” but “your faith.”
Why would God leave so much up to us, when God knows how feeble and fickle we can be? Is this a cosmic cruelty? It might be, had God not also provided what we need, asking only that we take hold of it. In addition to the “perfect faith” of Jesus, who joins us by his Spirit when we pray, God has also set us into communities of faith.
Faith is a contagious thing, and one which we can hold for one another. We can pass it down from one generation to another, and friend to friend. In Sunday’s epistle, Paul writes to Timothy, “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you.” Lois and Eunice and many a father and grandfather too have “held faith” for their children until such time as they took hold of it. Some are still holding it.
- Who are your “grandmothers” and “fathers” in the faith, from whom you learned to trust and believe? Name a few. Give thanks for those men and women.
- Who are your friends in the faith, brothers and sisters who help you believe when your faith is weak?
- And for whom do you do that, by your prayers and your encouragement?
- Is there a “big thing” you’ve had trouble trusting God about that you might ask a community of faith to pray about with you, for you? It’s a godly risk.
Jesus didn’t set us down, wind us up and say, “Okay – go do everything I commanded you.” He said, “Yo, I am with you always, to the end of the ages.” (Okay, most translations say, “Lo…”) We have plenty of faith around us to move trees, mountains, illnesses, injustice – and even hearts.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
10-1-25 - Authority
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
When my beloved cat Dandelion was diagnosed with heart disease I became a font of panicked prayers anytime I thought her breathing looked funny. One day I was praying anxiously, asking Jesus please to heal her, and I sensed him say firmly, “You heal her.” “What?” I said. “You heal her. I’ve given you authority over disease; I’ve given you my name – use it.” (I did - and she lived for several more years, as we moved to two more homes, before she succumbed to a tumor.)
When Jesus told his servants to wield their faith boldly, he illustrated his point with a parable about authority: “Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep, ‘Come here at once and take your place at the table’? Would you not rather say to him, ‘Make supper for me, put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; you can eat and drink later’? Do you thank the servant for doing what was commanded?“
Later in the Gospel of Luke (12:37), Jesus is quoted as saying the opposite. Clearly he is making a different point here, one about authority. He has given his followers authority over nature, sin, disease, demons – even death. (Over pretty much everything except other people with free will – which is why we could tell a mulberry tree to plant itself in the sea, but all the faith in the world can’t change someone's mind or heart...)
Jesus seems ticked off at the timidity of his disciples, given the authority they have as agents of God. “You are giving your challenges and obstacles way too much power. You are in charge – act like it when you pray!”
Jesus invites us to be bold, not timid. Sometimes we let something like a common cold disable us, when we could take our God-given authority and invite the power and love of God to flow through us to bring wholeness. That’s what God does – make things whole. Sometimes we feel powerless over social systems that reinforce injustice, instead of asking how God would have us exercise our faith with the Holy Spirit in that realm.
What are you being invited to take authority over in your life? It might be a personal trait, it might be something in the natural order, or an illness or injury. You might say, "Lord, help me with this one - you have the power."
We don’t have to take authority in a “large and in charge” kind of way. We don’t have to be negative about the obstacle – we can simply stand firm in the power and love of God, unequivocal in our faith that God is in charge and God is at work through our prayers, whatever their “strength.”
The only thing we can do wrong is not pray; shrug our shoulders and walk away, going, “Oh well, that’s bigger than me.” It may be bigger than you and me, but it ain’t bigger than the God who made us.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
When my beloved cat Dandelion was diagnosed with heart disease I became a font of panicked prayers anytime I thought her breathing looked funny. One day I was praying anxiously, asking Jesus please to heal her, and I sensed him say firmly, “You heal her.” “What?” I said. “You heal her. I’ve given you authority over disease; I’ve given you my name – use it.” (I did - and she lived for several more years, as we moved to two more homes, before she succumbed to a tumor.)
When Jesus told his servants to wield their faith boldly, he illustrated his point with a parable about authority: “Who among you would say to your servant who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep, ‘Come here at once and take your place at the table’? Would you not rather say to him, ‘Make supper for me, put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; you can eat and drink later’? Do you thank the servant for doing what was commanded?“
Later in the Gospel of Luke (12:37), Jesus is quoted as saying the opposite. Clearly he is making a different point here, one about authority. He has given his followers authority over nature, sin, disease, demons – even death. (Over pretty much everything except other people with free will – which is why we could tell a mulberry tree to plant itself in the sea, but all the faith in the world can’t change someone's mind or heart...)
Jesus seems ticked off at the timidity of his disciples, given the authority they have as agents of God. “You are giving your challenges and obstacles way too much power. You are in charge – act like it when you pray!”
Jesus invites us to be bold, not timid. Sometimes we let something like a common cold disable us, when we could take our God-given authority and invite the power and love of God to flow through us to bring wholeness. That’s what God does – make things whole. Sometimes we feel powerless over social systems that reinforce injustice, instead of asking how God would have us exercise our faith with the Holy Spirit in that realm.
What are you being invited to take authority over in your life? It might be a personal trait, it might be something in the natural order, or an illness or injury. You might say, "Lord, help me with this one - you have the power."
We don’t have to take authority in a “large and in charge” kind of way. We don’t have to be negative about the obstacle – we can simply stand firm in the power and love of God, unequivocal in our faith that God is in charge and God is at work through our prayers, whatever their “strength.”
The only thing we can do wrong is not pray; shrug our shoulders and walk away, going, “Oh well, that’s bigger than me.” It may be bigger than you and me, but it ain’t bigger than the God who made us.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
9-30-25 - Of Mustard Seeds and Mulberry Trees
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
“If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you."
I don’t know about you – I don’t feel like I have faith to command trees to be uprooted and replanted. Yet Jesus says the tiniest amount of real faith could effect such a thing. Was he exaggerating – or are we missing something?
Jesus demonstrated a sometimes disconcerting authority over the natural order. Winds and waves, water and wine, fevers and diseased cells, and, yes, trees yielded to his command. He suggests that we share this authority by virtue of our participation in the Life of God. I know of one person with strong healing gifts who took that authority at face value and began to pray that fearsome weather systems would weaken and turn, and seismic events settle. Sometimes they did, whether due to her prayers or not.
Jesus suggests we don’t need to have a LOT of faith to allow God to work miracles through us. We just need real faith. Perhaps his somewhat cranky reply to his disciples’ request to “increase our faith” says that, where faith is concerned, it’s not quantity but quality that counts. We don’t have to whip ourselves into a frenzy of faith over “big” things – we are invited to bring our faith, however strong or weak it feels, to bear on any situation that challenges us.
And then we are to trust that the power and love of God that flows through us as children of God can accomplish mighty things, far more than we can do or even imagine. When we join our faith with others in prayer, the flow of power is even greater.
What’s a BIG thing you’d like to invite the power and love of God to affect today? The effects of climate change? Civil wars and famines? Encroaching fascism? Cancer in a beloved? Your own mood?
What’s a small thing you’d like to invite the power and love of God to affect today? It’s always good to exercise our faith on the small things. As with muscles, faith gets stronger when exercised.
We don't really have to worry about how much faith we have; just step out with what you got. Jesus promised that “where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” (Mt 18:20) This means that when we invoke Jesus’ name in prayer, we are invoking his presence through his Spirit. This means He is praying with us – and thus one person in any group is praying with perfect faith. Whatever we add to that is sufficient, even if it’s only a tiny little mustard seed.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
“If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you."
I don’t know about you – I don’t feel like I have faith to command trees to be uprooted and replanted. Yet Jesus says the tiniest amount of real faith could effect such a thing. Was he exaggerating – or are we missing something?
Jesus demonstrated a sometimes disconcerting authority over the natural order. Winds and waves, water and wine, fevers and diseased cells, and, yes, trees yielded to his command. He suggests that we share this authority by virtue of our participation in the Life of God. I know of one person with strong healing gifts who took that authority at face value and began to pray that fearsome weather systems would weaken and turn, and seismic events settle. Sometimes they did, whether due to her prayers or not.
Jesus suggests we don’t need to have a LOT of faith to allow God to work miracles through us. We just need real faith. Perhaps his somewhat cranky reply to his disciples’ request to “increase our faith” says that, where faith is concerned, it’s not quantity but quality that counts. We don’t have to whip ourselves into a frenzy of faith over “big” things – we are invited to bring our faith, however strong or weak it feels, to bear on any situation that challenges us.
And then we are to trust that the power and love of God that flows through us as children of God can accomplish mighty things, far more than we can do or even imagine. When we join our faith with others in prayer, the flow of power is even greater.
What’s a BIG thing you’d like to invite the power and love of God to affect today? The effects of climate change? Civil wars and famines? Encroaching fascism? Cancer in a beloved? Your own mood?
What’s a small thing you’d like to invite the power and love of God to affect today? It’s always good to exercise our faith on the small things. As with muscles, faith gets stronger when exercised.
We don't really have to worry about how much faith we have; just step out with what you got. Jesus promised that “where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” (Mt 18:20) This means that when we invoke Jesus’ name in prayer, we are invoking his presence through his Spirit. This means He is praying with us – and thus one person in any group is praying with perfect faith. Whatever we add to that is sufficient, even if it’s only a tiny little mustard seed.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
9-29-25 - More Faith, Please
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
We might imagine Jesus would be thrilled – his disciples say, “We need more faith, stronger faith.” They’re finally getting it – faith is what this enterprise called the Realm of God runs on. But Jesus seems to doubt they have any faith to increase. “Let me tell you about faith,” he says. The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” The Lord replied, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.
What prompted them to ask for increased faith? Let's see what's going on in the passage right before this in Luke 17: “If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”
Ah – I would ask for more faith too! Who wants to forgive again and again? The disciples are right in thinking that, if that’s what Jesus is asking for, they need more faith. And how about us? Do we have anyone in our life who’s hard to forgive – or who gives us waaaay more “opportunities” to forgive than we’d like? (That might include officials and leaders…) Where does faith come into it?
Faith allows us to see the bigger picture – and maybe not get so hooked by the people who sin against us. Faith allows us to let God be the judge, instead of taking that role ourselves. Faith gives us the eyes to see that person with compassion, even as we hold them to the standards to which we ourselves want to be held. (Ouch…)
We can talk about mulberry trees tomorrow. Today, let’s join the disciples in their prayer, “Lord, increase our faith.”
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
We might imagine Jesus would be thrilled – his disciples say, “We need more faith, stronger faith.” They’re finally getting it – faith is what this enterprise called the Realm of God runs on. But Jesus seems to doubt they have any faith to increase. “Let me tell you about faith,” he says. The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” The Lord replied, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.
What prompted them to ask for increased faith? Let's see what's going on in the passage right before this in Luke 17: “If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”
Ah – I would ask for more faith too! Who wants to forgive again and again? The disciples are right in thinking that, if that’s what Jesus is asking for, they need more faith. And how about us? Do we have anyone in our life who’s hard to forgive – or who gives us waaaay more “opportunities” to forgive than we’d like? (That might include officials and leaders…) Where does faith come into it?
Faith allows us to see the bigger picture – and maybe not get so hooked by the people who sin against us. Faith allows us to let God be the judge, instead of taking that role ourselves. Faith gives us the eyes to see that person with compassion, even as we hold them to the standards to which we ourselves want to be held. (Ouch…)
We can talk about mulberry trees tomorrow. Today, let’s join the disciples in their prayer, “Lord, increase our faith.”
- Tell Jesus what areas of your life you feel your faith is the weakest; where you feel most challenged.
- Name the parts of your life where you feel faithful. Some of us feel faithful about finances but not about our children; or we trust God fully with health, but not work.
- Give thanks for the places where your faith is strong, and ask Jesus for more in the places you feel your faith goes out from under you, like a trick knee.
- Ask the Spirit to fill you with the power and presence and peace of Christ.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
9-26-25 - Good Intentions
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
One of my favorite bumper stickers reads, “Where are we going? And why are we in this hand-basket?” We’re bumping along that road paved with good intentions… and we all know where that leads.
Why do we have trouble acting on what we know, even when the consequences of not doing so are obvious? If we could figure that out as a human race, we’d make some headway on climate change, famine, obesity, racism, you name it. Neither incentives nor warnings seem to move us much.
Jesus knew that – it's where he takes his story next. Once the rich man in the flames of hell realizes there’s no way he can get to heaven or benefit from even a drop of heavenly water, he tries to negotiate for his next-of-kin: “He said, `Then, I beg you to send him to my father's house – for I have five brothers – that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.' Abraham replied, `They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.' He said, `No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.'”
Oh, is that what it’s going to take? Some people have nearly died themselves, and it hasn’t caused them to become any healthier or less self-oriented.
“Abraham said to him, `If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.'" Did Jesus wonder if his mission was futile? But he knew human nature. God gave a litany of laws, a religious rulebook, and yet God’s people rarely remained faithful for long. St. Paul gave himself to living by the Law, and ultimately came to believe that it was not God’s fullest revelation of truth. It was more a tutor or governess until the people of God came to maturity. He proclaimed that Christ was the most complete revelation of God – human, divine, living, crucified, risen.
And so he is. And he is risen from the dead. And he is still saying, “Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep.”
Name some areas in which you have been able to adjust your thinking or behavior. What was it that enabled you to make that change, that shift? (I once lost extra weight because I didn’t want to have to buy new clothes in a larger size. Frugality trumped appetite!)
Name some areas in which you feel stuck, ungenerous. Can you say why change is hard in those areas? What are you still getting out of that behavior, or pattern, or response, or relationship? Can you ask Jesus to help you make some space, some movement?
Good intentions are fine, but they don’t get us very far. Our wills lack the power to change our hearts. Heart change is usually a response to being loved. That’s what happened to Paul – he encountered the undeserved love of the Christ he’d been persecuting. That’s what happens to people in addiction recovery – the love they encounter in the rooms creates a space in which new life can be born. Change that seemed impossible becomes real. New life breaks out.
By ourselves, we can’t do much. With the power of God at work within us? There is nothing we can’t do – including feeding every hungry person on the planet. Really. Dream it, on the road of God-Intentions.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
One of my favorite bumper stickers reads, “Where are we going? And why are we in this hand-basket?” We’re bumping along that road paved with good intentions… and we all know where that leads.
Why do we have trouble acting on what we know, even when the consequences of not doing so are obvious? If we could figure that out as a human race, we’d make some headway on climate change, famine, obesity, racism, you name it. Neither incentives nor warnings seem to move us much.
Jesus knew that – it's where he takes his story next. Once the rich man in the flames of hell realizes there’s no way he can get to heaven or benefit from even a drop of heavenly water, he tries to negotiate for his next-of-kin: “He said, `Then, I beg you to send him to my father's house – for I have five brothers – that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.' Abraham replied, `They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.' He said, `No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.'”
Oh, is that what it’s going to take? Some people have nearly died themselves, and it hasn’t caused them to become any healthier or less self-oriented.
“Abraham said to him, `If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.'" Did Jesus wonder if his mission was futile? But he knew human nature. God gave a litany of laws, a religious rulebook, and yet God’s people rarely remained faithful for long. St. Paul gave himself to living by the Law, and ultimately came to believe that it was not God’s fullest revelation of truth. It was more a tutor or governess until the people of God came to maturity. He proclaimed that Christ was the most complete revelation of God – human, divine, living, crucified, risen.
And so he is. And he is risen from the dead. And he is still saying, “Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep.”
Name some areas in which you have been able to adjust your thinking or behavior. What was it that enabled you to make that change, that shift? (I once lost extra weight because I didn’t want to have to buy new clothes in a larger size. Frugality trumped appetite!)
Name some areas in which you feel stuck, ungenerous. Can you say why change is hard in those areas? What are you still getting out of that behavior, or pattern, or response, or relationship? Can you ask Jesus to help you make some space, some movement?
Good intentions are fine, but they don’t get us very far. Our wills lack the power to change our hearts. Heart change is usually a response to being loved. That’s what happened to Paul – he encountered the undeserved love of the Christ he’d been persecuting. That’s what happens to people in addiction recovery – the love they encounter in the rooms creates a space in which new life can be born. Change that seemed impossible becomes real. New life breaks out.
By ourselves, we can’t do much. With the power of God at work within us? There is nothing we can’t do – including feeding every hungry person on the planet. Really. Dream it, on the road of God-Intentions.
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
9-25-25 - Ticket To Paradise
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
What a story: Jesus introduces his main characters, a rich man who feasted sumptuously; and a poor man covered with sores, who begged at the rich man’s gate. Then he promptly whisks them offstage: “The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried.” No angels for the rich man – and no burial for the poor one, just a one-way ticket to paradise.
The rich man goes south to warmer climes. Way warmer: “In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, `Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.'”
Why is Jesus talking about hell? Doesn’t he know we don’t believe in that anymore? Well, if we’re going to take Jesus at his Word, we need to wrestle with the way he spoke about the afterlife. In stories and teachings, he spoke of eternal punishment – a place of torment and fire, of “outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Sure, he might have been employing folk superstitions of his day in his story-telling… or was he saying there are eternal consequences to our choices, just as there is grace to meet our short-comings?
I am more troubled by the idea that these consequences might be eternally fixed: “But Abraham said, `Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’”
My hope in God’s mercy is that we can choose after death if we haven’t managed it before. (For a great allegorical tale about that, I recommend C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce.) I will continue in that hope – AND attend to the invitation to make adjustments in this life.
It might also trouble us that Jesus tells a story in which God allows someone to suffer so in this lifetime only to make them comfortable in the next. Many would ask, "Why didn’t God take care of him in this world?" To which God might respond, “I put you there. There were people with resources and hearts and free will all around him - and around all who suffer. They had choices...as do you.”
As we pray today, let’s offer thanks for the rewards we enjoy in this life and our hope for the next. Let’s invite the Spirit to give us a holy intolerance for the hell in which many of God’s children live in this world. Let’s pray our way into seeing the choices before us, and ask God to empower us into action.
Yesterday it was U2. Today I’ll give the last word to the aptly named Eddie Money: “I’ve got two tickets to paradise… pack your bags, we’ll leave tonight…”
God has made available unlimited tickets to paradise, and a few instructions on how to pick them up with our Travel Agent, Jesus. We can take them or leave them…
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
What a story: Jesus introduces his main characters, a rich man who feasted sumptuously; and a poor man covered with sores, who begged at the rich man’s gate. Then he promptly whisks them offstage: “The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried.” No angels for the rich man – and no burial for the poor one, just a one-way ticket to paradise.
The rich man goes south to warmer climes. Way warmer: “In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. He called out, `Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.'”
Why is Jesus talking about hell? Doesn’t he know we don’t believe in that anymore? Well, if we’re going to take Jesus at his Word, we need to wrestle with the way he spoke about the afterlife. In stories and teachings, he spoke of eternal punishment – a place of torment and fire, of “outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Sure, he might have been employing folk superstitions of his day in his story-telling… or was he saying there are eternal consequences to our choices, just as there is grace to meet our short-comings?
I am more troubled by the idea that these consequences might be eternally fixed: “But Abraham said, `Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’”
My hope in God’s mercy is that we can choose after death if we haven’t managed it before. (For a great allegorical tale about that, I recommend C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce.) I will continue in that hope – AND attend to the invitation to make adjustments in this life.
It might also trouble us that Jesus tells a story in which God allows someone to suffer so in this lifetime only to make them comfortable in the next. Many would ask, "Why didn’t God take care of him in this world?" To which God might respond, “I put you there. There were people with resources and hearts and free will all around him - and around all who suffer. They had choices...as do you.”
As we pray today, let’s offer thanks for the rewards we enjoy in this life and our hope for the next. Let’s invite the Spirit to give us a holy intolerance for the hell in which many of God’s children live in this world. Let’s pray our way into seeing the choices before us, and ask God to empower us into action.
Yesterday it was U2. Today I’ll give the last word to the aptly named Eddie Money: “I’ve got two tickets to paradise… pack your bags, we’ll leave tonight…”
God has made available unlimited tickets to paradise, and a few instructions on how to pick them up with our Travel Agent, Jesus. We can take them or leave them…
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
9-24-25 - Crumbs From Our Tables
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Many a lyric in a U2 song alludes to a verse of Scripture or a theological idea. Their 2004 song Crumbs From Your Table references the parable we’re exploring this week, especially the second sentence: “And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man's table…”
Bono has said the song was in part a reaction to his attempts to get American evangelicals to take action on the AIDS crisis in Africa – an effort he likened to "getting blood from a stone.” As dwellers in one of the wealthiest countries on earth, and as representatives of Jesus Christ, our churches might be expected to be at the forefront of efforts to address poverty. Many church budgets, though, allocate less than 1 percent to such efforts. Would a more visible and generous engagement with the poor invite more interest in our churches and our faith? It worked for Jesus…
As that song’s chorus goes,
"You speak of signs and wonders /I need something other /
I would believe if I was able /
But I'm waiting on the crumbs from your table." (lyrics here)
What about us? Are we cozy with a culture of wealth that leaves many of the world’s poor begging for survival? Some years ago I read this: According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, enough food is produced globally to feed 12 billion people. Global population now stands at 6.3 billion. So why is it that 800 million people suffer from malnutrition and 1.8 billion from obesity, and diabetes and cardiovascular disease are on the rise worldwide?
That’s a lot of “not seeing” the hungry. That's a lot of hanging on to way more than we need. How long will we tolerate that kind of disparity? We know that some efforts yield results. Way back in the 1990s, the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals made significant progress toward reducing preventable disease and poverty. (Read about it in Bono’s 2010 New York Times editorial.)
Jesus depicts Lazarus as sick, hungry, homeless, forgotten, having no power whatsoever over his circumstances. People who suffer often need not only our resources – they need us to share power and control, a transfusion of life and hope – and yes, food. The rich man in Jesus’ parable didn’t see the beggar at his gate. Who are we missing?
Here’s a prayer experiment for today: “God, show me someone I’m not seeing.” Hold your imagination open for a few minutes – see what words or images take shape. If you get a response, ask the next question: “What shall I do with that person?” Not “for,” “with.” The Lazaruses of our world are not “beggars.” That’s not their identity. They are people with gifts and hopes and dreams and families and histories – and futures. Sometimes we can help shape what kind.
A line from Crumbs From Your Table goes, “Where you live should not decide whether you live or whether you die.” As winners in the birth lottery, and beloved of God, how are we being invited to spread the grace around?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Many a lyric in a U2 song alludes to a verse of Scripture or a theological idea. Their 2004 song Crumbs From Your Table references the parable we’re exploring this week, especially the second sentence: “And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man's table…”
Bono has said the song was in part a reaction to his attempts to get American evangelicals to take action on the AIDS crisis in Africa – an effort he likened to "getting blood from a stone.” As dwellers in one of the wealthiest countries on earth, and as representatives of Jesus Christ, our churches might be expected to be at the forefront of efforts to address poverty. Many church budgets, though, allocate less than 1 percent to such efforts. Would a more visible and generous engagement with the poor invite more interest in our churches and our faith? It worked for Jesus…
As that song’s chorus goes,
"You speak of signs and wonders /I need something other /
I would believe if I was able /
But I'm waiting on the crumbs from your table." (lyrics here)
What about us? Are we cozy with a culture of wealth that leaves many of the world’s poor begging for survival? Some years ago I read this: According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, enough food is produced globally to feed 12 billion people. Global population now stands at 6.3 billion. So why is it that 800 million people suffer from malnutrition and 1.8 billion from obesity, and diabetes and cardiovascular disease are on the rise worldwide?
That’s a lot of “not seeing” the hungry. That's a lot of hanging on to way more than we need. How long will we tolerate that kind of disparity? We know that some efforts yield results. Way back in the 1990s, the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals made significant progress toward reducing preventable disease and poverty. (Read about it in Bono’s 2010 New York Times editorial.)
Jesus depicts Lazarus as sick, hungry, homeless, forgotten, having no power whatsoever over his circumstances. People who suffer often need not only our resources – they need us to share power and control, a transfusion of life and hope – and yes, food. The rich man in Jesus’ parable didn’t see the beggar at his gate. Who are we missing?
Here’s a prayer experiment for today: “God, show me someone I’m not seeing.” Hold your imagination open for a few minutes – see what words or images take shape. If you get a response, ask the next question: “What shall I do with that person?” Not “for,” “with.” The Lazaruses of our world are not “beggars.” That’s not their identity. They are people with gifts and hopes and dreams and families and histories – and futures. Sometimes we can help shape what kind.
A line from Crumbs From Your Table goes, “Where you live should not decide whether you live or whether you die.” As winners in the birth lottery, and beloved of God, how are we being invited to spread the grace around?
© Kate Heichler, 2025. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
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