holding your ground…taking hold on heaven…

Posted on April 15, 2010 by - Uncategorized

there is a gracious power in knowing who you are.

and it’s the knowing that counts.

unapologetic presence.

resources unspent.

no jockeying for position.

but being simply who you are.

and even when you’re not sure who that is

to hold your ground

to listen

to feel that knowing rise within

there are a couple passages in Mary Baker Eddy’s writings that speak to this: “Moral courage is ‘the lion of the tribe of Juda,’ the king of the mental realm. Free and fearless it roams in the forest. Undisturbed it lies in the open field, or rests in “green pastures, . . beside the still waters.”

“And how is man, seen through the lens of Spirit, enlarged, and how counterpoised his origin from dust, and how he presses to his original, never severed from Spirit! O ye who leap disdainfully from this rock of ages, return and plant thy steps in Christ, Truth, “the stone which the builders rejected”! Then will angels administer grace, do thy errands, and be thy dearest allies. The divine law gives to man health and life everlasting — gives a soul to Soul, a present harmony wherein the good man’s heart takes hold on heaven, and whose feet can never be moved. These are His green pastures beside still waters, where faith mounts upward, expatiates, strengthens, and exults.”

there’s so much in the world that would get us to look outside ourselves for confirmation of who we are, and how we’re doing. so many voices, suggestions, conflicting messages, a constant din…

i’ve been thinking about Jesus’ experience during his 40 days in the wilderness: how the temptations came to him; how he responded. The first two came in similar forms: if you really are the son of God…do this…prove it… Jesus didn’t rise to the taunts. He knew who we was; he held his ground; he felt the angels of God’s presence ministering.

how many times do we have the opportunity to listen more deeply for who we are, to stand our ground with what feels right–to feel the peace, strength and authority that comes when we do; and to grapple with the sense of regret or betrayal when we don’t.

it’s never too late to reclaim the ground though; refocus our gaze on what’s true; to feel the authenticity of spiritual dignity and grace–identity rooted in the presence and power of the unchanging goodness of God; to watch how the awareness of this has a way of setting everything right.

“for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes”

Posted on April 12, 2010 by - Uncategorized

spring is weeks early here. the robins are fully ensconced in their nest perched on the vine on our porch, the grass is green, the sky blue. everything sings. one bird is so eager, she starts at 3 am. the joy is uncontainable.

spring.

spring springing.

life resistless emerging.

lives flowing from the wellspring of Life.

life new.

life pure.

life alive.

life unquenchable.

Song of Solomon puts it this way: “Many waters cannot quench this love.”

In Thomas Moore’s words:

“When from the lips of Truth one mighty breath
Shall, like a whirlwind, scatter in its breeze
The whole dark pile of human mockeries;
Then shall the reign of Mind commence on earth,
And starting fresh, as from a second birth,
Man in the sunshine of the world’s new spring,
Shall walk transparent like some holy thing.”

In her article “Voices of Spring” Mary Baker Eddy says this:

“As mortals awake…this adorable, all-inclusive God, and all earth’s
hieroglyphics of Love, are understood.”

And finally ee cummings…an ode to goodness, God, and  Life’s irrepressible All!

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any–lifted from the no
of all nothing–human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

“out of my stony griefs…cleaving the sky”

Posted on April 2, 2010 by - Uncategorized

lifetimes lived in moments.

moments bridging lifetimes.

eternity in moments.

i’ve been thinking about  Jesus; the crucifixion; the  resurrection. its current relevance.

how do you begin to quantify what was offered. what given. what surrendered. what discovered. the sheer depths and poignancy of it. the love given, the love being given. a fierce love. a constant love. a relentless love. a love that brings us to ourselves.

Mary Baker Eddy in her book Science and Health discusses Jesus’ time in the garden of Gethsemane as: “patient woe; the human yielding to the divine; love meeting no response, but still remaining love.”

there’s a hymn by Sarah Adams written back in 1841 that captures the power and promise of resurrection–the kind of dawning and awakening that breaks forth in the blackest of times; that prompts the kind of purity, fervency, honesty of heart and thought that launches us into the lives we were meant to live. struggle not for the sake of struggle, but struggle that sheds the dead briars and branches for new growth in our lives. struggle that surrenders to the winds of God, singing out the life within us, resurrecting, awakening, coming into our own, even as we rise higher, higher from the depths of infinity.

Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer to Thee:
E’en though it be a cross
That raiseth me;
Still all my song shall be,

Refrain
Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer to Thee.

Though like the wanderer,
The sun gone down,
Darkness be over me,
My rest a stone;
Yet in my dreams I’d be

Refrain

There let the way appear,
Steps unto heaven;
All that Thou sendest me
In mercy given;
Angels to beckon me
Refrain

Then, with my waking thoughts
Bright with Thy praise,
Out of my stony griefs
Bethel I’ll raise;
So by my woes to be
Refrain

Or if on joyful wing
Cleaving the sky,
Sun, moon, and stars forgot,
Upward I fly,
Still all my song shall be,

Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer to Thee.

nearer, nearer, even as the arms of divine Love enfold us, nearer. today. wherever we are, whoever we are, Christ’s light dawning within us. the promise of peace. the promise of life. the promise of resurrection.

things not lost

Posted on March 27, 2010 by - Uncategorized

sometimes it can feel like there are a lot of things that we lose along the way: people, friends, loved ones, homes, jobs, opportunities. sometimes its hope, faith, confidence, direction, love.

sometimes it can feel like we’re stranded in the wasteland of our lives, a desert of hopes, a vast and overwhelming wilderness.

i love the promises in Isaiah and Joel: “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose….I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten.”

Mary Baker Eddy‘s definition of wilderness points to the imminent dawning that begins to emerge particularly in the toughest times in our lives: “Loneliness; doubt; darkness. Spontaneity of thought and idea; the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.”

out of the harrowing experiences of human struggle, a life untouched rises out of any kind of rubble, a phoenix, a child-heart so pure that it washes everything in its fierce and gentle light: its anthem, an involuntary song of renewal, joy, praise, unfettered peace.

there is no place in life, not waiting to reveal its gifts to us. its the way we seek that counts. hearts uncluttered glimpse them first–the spiritual impetus within, the still small voice that whispers…I am here, come along, all is well…come and find all that you think  you’ve lost…it’s found.

there is a call to discover the simple and profound relevance of our lives–an undiscardable significance, the spiritual substance and grace of a unique and divine identity. and to discover that this journey is blessed by and includes the journeys of everyone around us…goodness unbounded, never limited, spiritual in compass, with room for all of us to grow, prosper, to seek, find and be found.

i’ve always loved this poem by ee cummings…and somehow it captures the spirit of this journey to me…

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea

“wide open like a lake…”

Posted on March 17, 2010 by - Uncategorized

we get messages from so many different places.

messages. messages that mean something to us. messages that are meant for us are hovering everywhere.

(not the clatter and chatter that tries to fill the airwaves of our thoughts, heads, homes, lives.)

they glance. they beckon. they light. they shout. they whisper. they sing.

we hear them in between the spaces. in between the noise. underneath the words. in between the lines.

they come with true intent.

they come with truth.

they come with peace.

they come to rally, heal, dispell, reveal.

how we hear them. how we see them. glimpse them. discern them. feel our oneness with them…is to know our own true thoughts. it is to trace the heart of thought to source waters that are pure.

in the book of I John we’re encouraged: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God.”

where do thoughts, feelings, inner impulses and inklings lead? do they bring peace, assurance, goodness, calm, confidence, joy, rightness? if they don’t…try them, check them, measure them in the weight and scale of God’s infinite goodness…the Principle of all rightness, the unfaltering certainty of divine Truth. whatever doesn’t land there, discard. let it go up in smoke, dissipating before the stuff that holds. and don’t stop until you do.

Mary Baker Eddy writes it this way: “Are thoughts divine or human? That is the important question.”

and she puts it another way: defend yourself daily against “aggressive mental suggestion.”

such an incredible way to put it…aggressive mental suggestion…how thoughts come in a subtle suggestive and undermining way, encouraging us to doubt, wonder, be afraid, feel suspicious…thoughts that undermine, thoughts that inflame, thoughts that distract, divide, disturb, pull….thoughts that draw us away from that calm and certain center within. but they are never really more than thoughts, suggestions…

it’s seeing this that counts. it’s seeing this that helps us regroup, get our footing, see that our ground is not lost–at any moment.

nothing can truly separate us from the center of God’s goodness and grace. we are held there…we are the presence, power and substance of it expressed, we are the likeness of Love’s true impulse and peace. this is the home, the shelter, the mental space and clarity that keep us steady in any storm. it’s never out there. never going anywhere. here for  the being, the taking, the living.

George Fox founder of the Quakers said this: “Carry some quiet around inside thee. Be still and cool in thy own mind from thy own thoughts,and then thou wilt feel the principle of God to turn thy mind to the Lord from whence cometh life; whereby thou mayest receive the strength and power to allay all storms and tempests.”

And Sara Groves puts it so beautifully in words from her song Like a Lake:

bring the wind and bring the thunder
bring the rain till I am tried
when it’s over bring me stillness
let my face reflect the sky
and all the grace and all the wonder
of a peace that I can’t fake
wide open like a lake

here’s to underlying and constant grace. answers at hand. Love pouring forth its blessings at every turn. messages, messages, sweet good messages here.

the world’s not falling apart…

Posted on March 10, 2010 by - Uncategorized

there are songs that speak

songs that sing the day

songs that  say the word

words that make you see…

Dar Williams has a song that says “the world is not falling apart because of me.” the first time I heard it was on a long drive, a work trip. thoughts of the world were weighing heavy on me. her lyrics pierced right through to meet my need. singing at the top of my lungs right along with her, everything lightened.

the idea that i was responsible for fixing anything, anyone, anywhere…the corresponding worry that i was not up to the task…suddenly seemed absurd. it was like i was being lifted to a different vantage point, from which i could see and feel a divine order, grace, government, love for the entire universe.

it was a sweeping assurance, confirmation that:  “the government is upon His shoulders…” and that “my yoke is easy and my burden light…” (from the books of Isaiah and Matthew)

There’s an interesting dichotomy between being responsible, giving your whole heart, being truly true to yourself and God, living with complete fidelity; and the weighty, burdensome feeling of being responsible for, being party to, and therefore needing to fix a broken world.

easing up on all of it…

casting burdens on the Lord (as the old hymn by Philip Doddridge urges us to do,)

is like gazing through a window that you didn’t know was there–

to discern that things may not be so broken after all,

our gaze, when fixed on that deep and divine Principle Love catapults us to a perspective of piercing clarity, resonant oneness, holy, unfettered being.

responsibility then is not weighty, but the tender impulse to respond to Love’s government of all being.

Mary Baker Eddy puts it this way, “Starting from a higher standpoint, one rises spontaneously, even as light emits light without effort; for “where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

to “look up”

as Christ Jesus told us

especially when it seems like things are falling apart

is to begin to glimpse, to discover, to realize,

the kingdom of God ever within us,

the presence of heaven at hand:

it is to breathe the air of innocence,

to find ourselves washed new,

the whole sweet world held in Love’s fresh light.

“we are more…”

Posted on March 5, 2010 by - Uncategorized

we are more than we think we are.

more than we imagine we can be.

more. so much more.

the prophet Jeremiah speaks of this: “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.”

i love how Jesus brought this out in people: he saw that more, that spiritual heartland of goodness, divine integrity…and helped people see it for themselves. “Seek God first” he said…and all the rest will come.

Seeking first things first…tracing that feeling of more, that inner hunger for more, that unquenchable protest for more to its source…the Source, Truth, Life, divine All, impartial, all-embracing Father Mother Love. Pausing in that presence; standing in that light: showered in the recognition of goodness, preciousness, wholeness and love.

Mary Baker Eddy speaks of this divine more: “And how is man, seen through the lens of Spirit, enlarged, and how counterpoised his origin from dust, and how he presses to his original, never severed from Spirit!…The divine law gives to man health and life everlasting — gives a soul to Soul, a present harmony wherein the good man’s heart takes hold on heaven, and whose feet can never be moved. These are His green pastures beside still waters, where faith mounts upward, expatiates, strengthens, and exults.”

more is in moments; moments where we take hold; ground ourselves; stake our journey forward. moments. this moment. seize this moment. more good this moment: to act, embrace, discover, honor, share. more. not because we are a dearth, but more, more, because this moment is ours, an imminence of infinity orchestrating  certain good.

i loved the opening ceremonies of the Olympics…the spirit, the hope, the unity, the promise of the boundlessness of goodness. and i loved how slam poet Shane Koyczan‘s  poem “We are More” captured this. Here are some excerpts:

“we are more…/we are an idea in the process/of being realized…/we are an experiment going right for a change…/we are not the see-through gloss or glamour/of those who clamour for the failings of others…/we are found missing puzzle pieces…/because we are more than what we say or do/we live to get past what we go through/and learn who we are…/we are the true north/strong and free…/we didn’t just say it/we made it be.”

waiting…

Posted on March 2, 2010 by - Uncategorized

waiting.

waiting.

waiting for?

the call to come,

things to change,

events to turn,

waiting…

there is a kind of waiting, a waiting not passive, not absent from engagement, mental movement, deep underground, foundational work, a waiting that has the spiritual poise and muscle of listening, pausing, waiting on the God, waiting for divine movement on the waters of our thoughts, waiting for the mental peace that comes with a right idea–regardless of the demands that may come with it. it is a waiting that includes complete willingness to act, to follow, to seek, to stand.

Psalms 27 ends with these words. “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.”

Mary Baker Eddy writes: “Beholding the infinite tasks of truth, we pause, — wait on God. Then we push onward, until boundless thought walks enraptured, and conception unconfined is winged to reach the divine glory.”

There is spiritual power in patience, a poise that rises up within us, an exercise of present grace, a fine tuned ear that holds forth for the true sound, a heart so pure, that no amount of clutter or clatter can distract it from its clear intent. This is the ground of life that brings forth inevitable fruit, often rising forth in ways we cannot see, but always made of stuff that holds.

Whatever we’re waiting for is here, calling out our name, flowering up through the concrete of lost hopes, hidden dreams, a life meant, a life ordained, a life loved.

John Borroughs’ poem called Waiting captures this so completely:

Serene, I fold my hands and wait,

Nor care for wind nor tide nor sea;

I rave no more ‘gainst time or fate,

For lo! My own shall come to me.

I stay my haste, I make delays—

For what avails this eager pace?

I stand amid the eternal ways

And what is mine shall know my face,

Asleep, awake, by night or day,

The friends I seek are seeking me,

No wind can drive my bark astray

Nor change the tide of destiny.

What matter if I stand alone?

I wait with joy the coming years;

My heart shall reap where it has sown,

And garner up its fruit of tears.

The waters know their own, and draw

The brook that springs in yonder height;

So flows the good with equal law

Unto the soul of pure delight.

The stars come nightly to the sky,

The tidal wave unto the sea;

Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,

Can keep my own away from me.

“how can i keep from singing?”

Posted on February 24, 2010 by - Uncategorized

“Another year another day at the mines. Digging away just digging. Always turning up gems but just digging still.”

Words from my brother.

I’ve been thinking about the seasoning that happens in our lives, when rough winds come and the earth shakes around us.

There’s a passage in Hebrews that speaks to this: “Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace…”

The shaking…not to upend our lives, but to remove only that which doesn’t belong.

Madeleine L’Engle talks about this idea in her book A Circle of Quiet: “I think that the part of us that has to be burned away is something like the deadwood on  the bush; it has to go, to be burned in the terrible fire of reality, until there is nothing left but our ontological selves; what we are meant to be.”

Mary Baker Eddy puts it this way: “The mounting sense gathers fresh forms and strange fire from the ashes of dissolving self, and drops the world. Meekness heightens immortal attributes only by removing the dust that dims them. Goodness reveals another scene and another self seemingly rolled up in shades, but brought to light by the evolutions of advancing thought…”

the mounting sense…

gathers fresh forms and strange fire…

from the ashes of dissolving self…

drops the world…

o to drop the world…

to find that self seemingly rolled up in shades

revealed by goodness and the evolutions of advancing thought…

seasoning, rebirth, renewal, turning into our real selves, emerging, emerging into who we were always meant to be.

what grace, to watch each other move through storms, seasoned ever with more tenderness, humility, strength, beauty and peace, emerging childlike and pure from the fires of life, unscarred, unscathed, innocent and free.

here’s to the journeys we take together, lessons gleaned, the room we give one another to grow, and the palms of heaven that hold us in their hands.

This hymn by Robert Lowry, adpated by Enya and Nicky Ryan, so says it well:

My life goes on in endless song
Above earth’s lamentations,
I hear the real, though far-off hymn
That hails a new creation.

Through all the tumult and the strife
I hear it’s music ringing,
It sounds an echo in my soul.
How can I keep from singing?

While though the tempest loudly roars,
I hear the truth, it liveth.
And though the darkness ’round me close,
Songs in the night it giveth.

No storm can shake my inmost calm,
While to that rock I’m clinging.
Since love is lord of heaven and earth
How can I keep from singing?

When tyrants tremble in their fear
And hear their death knell ringing,
When friends rejoice both far and near
How can I keep from singing?

In prison cell and dungeon vile
Our thoughts to them are winging,
When friends by shame are undefiled
How can I keep from singing?


solitude is sweet…

Posted on February 19, 2010 by - Uncategorized

i was on an evening flight the other night, a pretty full flight, but generous in that most of the center seats were empty. there was a cradled hush about the space, a quiet unhurried feeling that i don’t usually associate with travel.

there’s something about flights, soaring imperceptibly across vast spaces that prompts deep stillness–and i felt that we were all embraced, held so presently, peacefully in a nowness of grace.

i had thought i’d watch a movie, but instead found myself flooded with insights, questions that prompted more insights, a soaring, hovering, deep submergence in, and influx of ideas. pure heaven.

often i’ve struggled with contained spaces, but i’m always struck by how expansion of thought, inspiration has the capacity to dispell the seeming confines of space and time.

the woman sitting in the window seat didn’t say much, but it was as if there was an understanding between us, a sweet solitude of appreciation, prayer, kindness, love. it was unspoken but poignant, tangible.

it is in stillness that we measure peace–its vast stores have a way of filling canyons of emptiness, sweeping life into dormant hearts. and it is in stillness that we begin to glean the great and all-permeating presence of God.

Dixie Chicks’ song “Easy Silence” captures this spirit: 

I come to find a refuge in the
Easy silence that you make for me
It’s okay when there’s nothing more to say to me
And the peaceful quiet you create for me
And the way you keep the world at bay for me
The way you keep the world at bay

i’m profoundly grateful that all the world’s clamor and chatter cannot quench or quell the grace and presence of spiritual truth, light: the present impetus of God’s infinite all, holding us clear, pure, unstained, loved and safe.

Psalm 46 says “He uttered His voice, the earth melted…Be still and know that I am God.”

Mary Baker Eddy writes: “My sense of nature’s rich glooms is, that loneness lacks but one charm to make it half divine–a friend, with whom to whisper, “Solitude is sweet.”

Here’s to seen and unseen friends who nourish us in stillness–the heaven and holiness of the Holy Spirit, illuming and lightening even the darkest of places.