Water Daily

11-10-22 - New Heavens/New Earth

You can listen to this reflection here.

For the rest of this week we will focus on one of the readings from the Hebrew Bible set for Sunday, a beautiful prophecy in Isaiah, in which God announces: “For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth.” This promise is timely.

Many Christians express their faith and hope in God’s justice by working to ensure equality for all members of our society – people of all colors, genders, levels of wealth, sexual orientations, countries of origin, religious traditions. They see this as is a way of harnessing the power of heaven, to participate with God in bringing about that new earth. Isaiah gives voice to this yearning for peace and security which should be the birthright of every man, woman and child – and animal – on this planet. He articulates beautifully the hope of a restored creation living in harmony:

I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and delight in my people; no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it, or the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime...

Reading that, I think of families grieving the death of elders or infants who did not have access to affordable healthcare; of women and girls who see protection for women being stripped away and now feel less secure; of people of color watching the resurgence of unabashed racism, afraid for their children; of men and women who have lost children and spouses, brothers and uncles to ever increasing levels of gun violence – the sound of weeping never quite dies away.

I think of the promise of security and work and rest depicted in this prophecy:
They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat…

This is true peace, when each person can live in safety in her own home, bringing up his children to thrive in trust. This is the world God says he is bringing into being. This is the promise we are invited to participate in making real. And that work is still before us. Perhaps the challenge is greater now, but the work remains, and we do not do it alone.

What do you long for when you think of God making new heavens and a new earth? What aspect of life in this world do you feel called to help renew? Where do you want to put your energies?

Start by praying about that area, and imagining yourself making a difference, in the power of the Spirit. What do you see yourself doing or saying? Keep inviting God into it.
I know I will keep working and praying for peace on our streets and honor in the halls of power. “They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the LORD.”

I believe in the power of love to transform and convert the most evil heart. I have to, despite evidence to the contrary. The evidence is not more powerful than the power and the promise of God. God is creating the new heavens and the new earth – and we are here at the beginning. Every day.

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11-9-22 - Faith On Trial

You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.

Oh, how good it is to type “November 9,” to be on the other side of election day. I generally post Water Daily a few days in advance, so I am writing this blind. And maybe that’s a good thing… to live by faith means to believe in God’s goodness even though we can’t see around the next corner.

And faith is what Jesus is getting at in this talk to his followers. He is preparing them for hard times to come, when the structures of their faith are torn away and they face persecution from both Jewish leaders and Roman occupiers for their belief in Christ.

"But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name.”

He says they will be betrayed by family and friends and handed over, and, “some of you will die.” But there’s an upside, he says: this will give them a chance to testify. Then he says something strange: don’t prepare. “So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance; for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict.”

Defending our faith is something few of us will have to face. I have heard testimony from African clergy who have known bitter persecution and bombed churches and death threats. But most Christians I know are more likely to be mocked than persecuted for their faith. “Why do you bother with that?”

And what would you answer? What do you say when people ask why you believe in Christ? As the old saw goes, “If you were on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” Name some of that evidence.

We may not have to stand up for our faith very often, but there are occasions when we’re called to testify in other ways – to stand for justice, to speak truth to those who have the power to change things. Every American of faith is going to have a chance in the coming weeks and months and years to bear witness to the power of love in the face of division and rage, perhaps violence. I don’t know what those confrontations may look like, but I believe we can pray for the filling of the Holy Spirit to be ready to stand for love and justice, humility and peace. We may not know what to say, but Jesus, who has promised to be with us through His Spirit, will be right there – and he can be pretty persuasive.

After all, it’s not our job to represent God, or even to make other people believe in God. It is only up to us to make the introductions, to speak of the love and truth we experience. The Spirit can do the rest.

11-8-22- ...And I Feel Fine

You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.

It’s going to be great, or it’s going to be horrendous. The promise of a hopeful future or the demise of all we hold dear. Nearly everyone in this country will feel one of these things by the end of this day (at the very least, let us hope for a conclusive conclusion to most if not all elections today…) Maybe now’s a good time for that REM song: It’s the end of the world as we know It… and I feel fine.

Truly? Can we ever feel fine about worlds ending, whether it’s The World, or pieces of ours? I don’t know about fine, but we can attain a spiritual quality of trust and disentanglement that allows us to meet all kinds of circumstances with serenity. We could use more serenity right about now.

Some of the shock in what Jesus said about the temple being destroyed as a sign of the end (he doesn’t actually say the end of the world…), is that the temple was so solid and so central to his followers' identity. How can something so vital and real become as nothing? Even our grandest buildings, even the institutions they represent, even the hopes and dreams of those who are invested in those institutions, are among the things of this world which are passing away.

And – shock of shocks – so are we. We believe we have a future beyond this world, but our time here is finite. (Here are some photographic reminders of how small we really are in the grand scheme.) When we truly integrate that knowledge into our being, when we truly see each day as a gift to be received in full, not only as a step along the way to another gift tomorrow, we begin to attain that serenity that allows us to meet the darkest times. This is that spiritual quality of apatheia that the desert monastics of the second and third centuries CE spoke about, that holy equanimity that we cultivate as we learn to let go of our agendas and receive God’s life and dreams for us.

Are there things or people or situations about which you find it impossible to feel peaceful? What a day to ask that question! Could you invite God to give you peace even around these matters? What would that look like or feel like? Try to imagine it…

St. Ambrose of Milan, a wonderful fourth century bishop, had a beautiful image for this in one of his sermons on baptism. He says the newly baptized are to be like fish: “Imitate the fish,” he says. “It is in the sea and above the waves. It is in the sea and swims on the waters. On the sea the tempest rages, violent winds blow; but the fish swims on. It does not drown because it is used to swimming. In the same way, this world is the sea for you. It has various currents, huge waves, fierce storms. You too must be a fish, so that the waves of this world do not drown you.”

Even in the face of devastation and loss of all we hold dear, our faith invites us to proclaim the love of a God who weeps with those who weep, who strengthens those who work for recovery, who invites us to look beyond what we can see to a reality of love and restoration we can only dimly glimpse. In Christ, we truly are fine. No matter what. No matter when.

Swim today, my friends. Swim into God’s peace, into God’s purpose, into God’s future for us - which will be, whatever today's outcomes. And click that song link – that’ll give you some moments of joy!

11-7-22 - EOTWAWKI?

You can listen to this reflection here.

Right in time for our cataclysmic election, here comes our Gospel text for Sunday – and it's the end of the world. (You know you’re going to get an REM link at some point this week…) Each fall, as if to match the gathering gloom of shortening days, our lectionary begins to drag scary stories out of our ancestral closet. This echoes an earlier a time, when Advent was more focused on prophetic doom and gloom than it is now.

This conversation starts casually, as some of Jesus’ followers are admiring the temple and its adornments. Jesus is blunt: "As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down."

Now, we the readers know that in 70 CE the Romans did in fact destroy the temple. But this would have been a shocking pronouncement to Jesus’ companions. Imagine that prediction made about a beloved cathedral, or the Capitol – or the World Trade Center in the summer of 2001. It’s inconceivable, yet they want to know when will it be, and how will they know.

Jesus’ answer is cryptic: "Beware that you are not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, `I am he!' and, `The time is near!' Do not go after them.”
He suggests that some will try to gain a following by issuing dire predictions about the end of the world. We’ve seen that in the recent past – remember when the world was going to end on May 21 some years ago?

Why do people fall for this? It is natural to fear what we cannot control, and it’s hard to get bigger in the “you cannot control this” department than the end of the world as we know it. The end of THE world becomes a stand-in for our anxiety about the ends of our worlds – which actually come with some frequency, with wars and famines and pandemics; infidelities and job losses; diagnoses and mega-storms and losses of all sorts. Much of the time, we survive.

What are you most afraid of losing today? Can you name that fear, sit with it, invite Jesus to join you in your imagination? What might he do with it? How might you invite his perfect love to transform that fear into something you can use?

It is true that in some ways our worlds are always ending. But that’s not the whole story - new life is always being born as well, sometimes in the ashes of the old world. God is in the business of making all things new – can’t help himself. Our job is to be open to new life wherever we find it.

(I’m going to wait on REM, but here’s a link to a fun song by a duo I like, Goodnight Moonshine. The song is “End of the World Blues,” and you can find it about 15.55 minutes into this concert on YouTube.)

11-4-22 - The Golden Rule

You can listen to this reflection here.

It doesn’t get much simpler than this: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.”

That’s how Jesus ends the Beatitudes. Most of the world’s religions proclaim some version of this, sometimes in the negative, as in the Talmud, "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellowman. This is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary,” and sometimes amplified, as this from Islamic Sunnah, “No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself.”

The statements in other religions may well derive from this most basic teaching of Jesus, called “The Golden Rule.” It is a statement of the obvious, of clear benefit to us as well as others. A community that lives this way is far more likely to be harmonious, productive and prosperous. So why don’t we?

Human beings seem to be hard-wired to focus on self first. Call it evolutionary advantage, call it original sin, call it looking out for No 1, most people, when presented with a group photograph in which they appear, will first look at themselves. Most of us will share food and belongings and money after we’re sure we have enough. Our sense of self may extend as far as our immediate family and sometimes clan and friends, but it has limits. We simply don’t see “others” at the same level as we do ourselves. Altruism is learned behavior, if observing 2-year-olds is any indication.

Our natural focus on self can blind us to the fact that doing unto others as we would have them do to us is to our greater advantage. We build alliances and friendships of mutual support. We help to create the surroundings we need to thrive. And when we do unto others what is hateful to us, we help to create surroundings that impede our thriving, that cause us to expend too much energy on self-protection and security, on guarding our things and our loved ones, and on dealing with conflict.

None of this has much to do with morality or ethics or making sacrifices – but if most people in a system are not living this way, then those who do are at a disadvantage. That’s where sacrifice comes in. Jesus was the prime example of that, and he was telling his followers what they were signing on for.

And he was pointing them to joy and grace. He was telling them how to access the Life that really is life. If we can develop the habit, in every interaction, of first asking that question, “How would I like to be treated in such a situation?” we will be filled with a lot of that Life. And when that Life gets out and about, the world is changed.

11-3-22 - The Giveaway

You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.

I once went on a mission trip to the Rosebud Reservation in North Dakota, home to some 10,000 Sicangu Sioux, one of the seven tribes of the Lakota nation. I never imagined such poverty existed in the continental United States. The deprivation is much more marked than in urban ghettos or depressed small towns – this was poverty akin to what I’ve seen in Africa or the Caribbean.

But the Lakota have a tradition called the Giveaway. It happens for weddings and other big occasions; when someone dies; and again on the first anniversary of a death. A family invites the whole community to a pow wow and, along with providing a feast and celebration, gives away what they have – sometimes belongings of the deceased, but other things too. The idea is that no one goes away empty-handed. A gift can be a low-cost dollar store item (I still use the plastic laundry basket I was given), or something more precious, a handmade quilt or family jewelry. Even in a place of such deprivation – perhaps especially in such a place – giving is valued far beyond holding on to one’s possessions.

"Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again."

Why did Jesus highlight this attribute for those who would be his followers? Didn’t he know how hard it would be? Did he never see a city where people are begging on every corner? You’d be broke by the time you got to your office if you gave to everyone who begged from you. So the response of many, me included, is to give to almost no one who begs from me.

I don’t know why possessions came to be so important to our culture. They are to me; I don’t want to see my stuff lost or stolen, and though I have far more than I need, I’m not quick to give much away. But I can see the freedom that comes when we do hold our belongings loosely, when we are eager to give and rejoice at seeing others receive.

Perhaps Jesus is so invested in our freedom he suggests we let things go even if it’s not our idea to give. Maybe someone who takes our stuff is doing us a favor.

I don’t know if that’s what we’re meant to think. But I am pretty sure we’re meant to value people more than things. God valued us above all and gave his most precious gift to set us free. What if we started to value that freedom most?

11-2-22 - Blessing the Enemy

You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.

Conflict saps our energy. Sustained conflict can drain our spirits dry. Many of us live with high levels of vitriol on our social media feeds and airwaves. Even those who have pared their lists of friends or followers to the like-minded cannot escape the chasms of division that grow ever deeper. “This is not who we are as Americans,” we cry, even as we lament that we no longer seem able to agree on what that means.

“But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt."

The Way that Jesus invited people to walk was, and is, unnatural for human beings. It is natural to protect yourself and those whom you love, to punish or retaliate when attacked, to hold on to your stuff and decide when and to whom you are going to give your shirt. Yet followers of Christ are called to the super-natural. We are asked to give beyond our natural capacity – and so to ever expand our capacity for giving until we have no more “mine,” just “yours, God.”

What happens when we love someone who hates us, who desires harm for us? We bless them, and thus bless ourselves. We make a space for love where there didn’t appear to be any. We trust that someone will be touched and transformed by that love – maybe the self-declared enemy, or an observer, or we ourselves, even as we risk injury or death in the physical realm.

What happens when we pray for someone who abuses us? This is painful ground, and it cannot be rushed. When we can come to that place, though, we make space for freedom – in our own spirits, in our interactions. We might even create space for perpetrators to come to repentance and healing even if we have no further relationship with them.

But are we really to let someone hit us twice? Are we not to defend ourselves? Of all Jesus’ hard sayings, perhaps this has been most often twisted against victims of violence. I do not believe Jesus is talking about relationships here; he is talking to peacemakers and protesters and makers of justice. If in those contexts we refuse to engage in violence, we model the peace we are proclaiming. We subvert the aggressors and strengthen others to stand against injustice.

And when we give our shirt to one who steals our coat, we proclaim our confidence in God’s provision, and we say to that one “You are worth more than my possessions. And you are better than this.” Will that person listen? That’s not up to us. Our call is to bear witness.

Can I live like this? I don’t know. I appreciate diving a little deeper into a text I have never really mined, to remember that God has given us more than we deserve and forgiven us more than we can ever comprehend. And I know that with God all things are possible, even living this Way of Love.