A Faithful Walk

Wilderness walking is an analogy of a faithful walk through the hard times of life. Of course, the people of God gripe about whatever it is they are short of…water, food, meat, members, money. Name it. God delivers all of the above but the people continue to complain because the problem is solved for today only, tomorrow is still up in the air.

God leads us and feeds us in the wilderness. Manna is a symbol for God’s provision. Manna falls overnight (when we aren’t looking), is good for one day only, and rots if we try to keep it over. We can expect that when God is leading us we will have to wait upon God’s generosity. Full satisfaction is not part of the package.

In the Wilderness we face our fears. Fear of being thirsty led to the first encounter. The people of God demanded water and later food. God delivered water from the rock, then manna, later still quail was given for food. Always there was enough provided for each day, nothing for tomorrow, except to cover the Sabbath. Fear for tomorrow is not part of a faithful life. We are asked to be aware of and thankful for today’s gift. Awareness brings with it the hopeful expectation that God will provide.

For more than ten years I prayed for and received all that l needed in order to grow in such a way that I was eventually chosen and ordained. In all that time there was no assurance that I would be ordained. Six years of undergraduate and graduate school in religious studies, then seminary. It was in that time that I looked at Exodus and the stories of wilderness walking for the first time, and came to terms with my fear that I was wasting my time. What looks like a done deal now, ordination, was an open question for a decade at least.

I learned to take the steps that God had for me now, and to keep taking them way past the time when I was afraid that I was wasting my time.

Endurance: Each gift was recognized and enjoyed as it came.

Gratitude: Each need was expressed in prayer that never quit.

Faith: God’s goodness was lifted up to encourage me.

Hope: Wilderness time was a time of rich growth for me.

We choose how we will respond to a situation of absence and loss. In this Wilderness time will we whine, gripe and groan because there is absence and loss? Will we come to terms with the way God does things? Will we learn to be grateful for what God gives even when those gifts do not solve all the problems? Will we pray for what we need?

Deborah†

Jonah’s Prayer (Part 3)

So I made a prayer and put into it bits of all that had happened that day.  It really was quite a day, and made a nice run up for the meat of the prayer.  I went down to the land whose bars closed over me forever.  You saved my life from the Pit.  That was nicely dramatic, and now we get to the nitty gritty, the apology.  You probably missed it if your wits were not as finely tuned as God’s always are.  My true repentance was a little thin.

            I admitted that “Those who worship vain idols forsake their true loyalty“.  In American English, running away in order to have my own way was a sin because it put what I wanted first.  I should have consented to do what you, OH GOD, asked me to do in the first place.  Running away was the sincerest form of idolatry. That was as close to an apology as I could get in a sea serpent’s belly, and my God surely must have known it. 

            Then I got to the other thing she really wanted from me, my consent to go to Ninevah.  I admitted that my true loyalty would be shown by going to Ninevah as God had asked me to at the beginning of this story. 

            To make the sacrifice of Thanksgiving is to give thanks to God for the goodness of God in the midst of a fearful and scary situation.  This Thanksgiving is sacrificial because the events in which the sacrifice is made would naturally cause us to blame and not to thank.  You have heard my griping for several paragraphs now. Up until that moment of sacrifice I had been blaming, you heard me, and when I had accomplished the sacrifice of thanksgiving, I stopped.  By definition the sacrifice of Thanksgiving is made in our own hearts and means giving up whatever it is we want because God has something else in mind for us. 

            We all know that God’s resolve to save would accomplish the salvation of Ninevah, and not my preaching.  At the same time I needed to acknowledge that God was God for my own sake, and do as I was asked.

            I wrapped up my prayer with something that you can’t see in the printed version, not even in the latest printing.  What can’t be seen is the deep love and respect that years of working for God have brought me.  She knows me and loves me;  I know God and love God. I needed time in the great sea serpent to remember that love.  I couldn’t let her down, not when it counts.  I was pretty sure that we would never be the same if I forgot which one of us was God in this relationship.  When it comes down to it, I would face all of those Ninevites, one at a time or all together, because I love her.  It’s all the reason I need.          

            As I suspected true repentance and heartfelt consent seasoned with love were just what she was waiting for.  We’ve been together for decades now, and I know what she likes to hear.  I was wrong; God was right.  The fish spat me up on the shore just outside Ninevah.  Stinking to high heaven of fish breath and rotted detritus, I bathed in the sea and set myself to go into Ninevah.  Three days of fasting moved me along the trail.

Jonah’s Prayer (Part 2)

I came to in a dark smothery place that stank of rotted vegetation, like sour hay.  I thought I was dead.  Sheol, the place of the dead, is said to be dark and dusty in the stories. I never once heard it described as dank and smelly.  All at once my stomach clenched and heaved as I choked up a quart of sea water.  About that time I noticed I was still breathing.  Not dead?  Do the dead toss their cookies? How could I be alive?  Slowly, like the sun rising, the idea slipped into my mind that God had saved me.  It seemed obvious why she had saved me.  She still wanted me to go to Ninevah.

So what is she waiting for?  Well, it might have been smelly and smothery, but there was nothing else to do but think in that place.  The last thing I remembered was Tiamat of legend, mouth opened wide.  Slowly it dawned on me that I really didn’t want to follow that train of thought. The belly of a fish?  I’m in the belly of a fish? New all time low.  This is unbelievable!  So I sat and fumed and fussed and griped until I ran out of steam.  There was no way to tell time in that place that was no place.  It occurred to me that moving around too much might cause me to be tossed  right back the way I came in.

When you pray to God regularly and listen for answers you start to wonder whether insights like that come from your brain or hers.  If from her, it is best to pay attention. So I sat and fumed, instead of my usual pacing with mild swearing.  She does not approve of the hard stuff.  So far it had been an unpleasant trip beyond any I had ever experienced or heard of, so I spent some time working my mad off.  By nature I am a grouse, so it took awhile.

When I quieted I went through our considerable history together. God isn’t hard to work for, but she just won’t take NO for an answer when it comes to the care of her children.  No, you do not want to mess with her when her heart is set on saving them.  Ninevites of all people!  She is going to be the death of me, yet.  Heathen, warrior people, those Ninevites. So I worked up another good mad.

My stomach growled loudly.  It occurred to me that 3 square meals were not on the plan for this luxury cruise.  I was not yet hungry enough to try any of the rotted stuff that was lying around me on the floor of that fleshy cell.  It was time to think about getting out of here.  So I laid aside my grousing and got to work.  It came to me after considerable pondering on being in the serpent versus being in Ninevah, that in Ninevah I could probably get a good meal.  Nice roasted lamb with fresh herbs and a browned loaf of bread, cup of wine.  It popped into my mind that a sensible man would talk nicely to the God who saved him, and see if a truce could be arranged.  As I said before, when something pops into my mind I often wonder where it came from, and this seemed like really good advice and rather like her.

It had to be a good prayer.  I know what she likes to hear after all these years in service.  After chewing on my mustaches for inspiration, I decided that what this prayer really needed was repentance, true repentance.  Can’t put anything over on the God of the mountains and the sea.

Jonah’s Prayer (Part 1)

Jonah 1: 1-12

The word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.”

But Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD.

Then the LORD sent a great wind on the sea, and such a violent storm arose that the ship threatened to break up. All the sailors were afraid and each cried out to his own god. And they threw the cargo into the sea to lighten the ship.

But Jonah had gone below deck, where he lay down and fell into a deep sleep. The captain went to him and said, “How can you sleep? Get up and call on your god! Maybe he will take notice of us, and we will not perish.”

Then the sailors said to each other, “Come, let us cast lots to find out who is responsible for this calamity.” They cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.

So they asked him, “Tell us, who is responsible for making all this trouble for us? What do you do? Where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you?”

He answered, “I am a Hebrew and I worship the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the land.”

This terrified them and they asked, “What have you done?” (They knew he was running away from the LORD, because he had already told them so.)

The sea was getting rougher and rougher. So they asked him, “What should we do to you to make the sea calm down for us?”

“Pick me up and throw me into the sea,” he replied, “and it will become calm. I know that it is my fault that this great storm has come upon you.”

Jonah’s Prayer

“Throw me overboard.” What was I thinking?  Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.  The boat was sinking and everyone was so frightened.  Throw me overboard, and the storm will cease.  I didn’t think they would actually do it.  Well, I certainly underestimated their desperation.  It really did seem a good idea until I remembered I can’t swim.  Not that it mattered.  Every time my head broke water, waves splashed into my mouth.  My choices were fight it and drown slowly or let go and drown quickly.  Let me think…

About that time the boat rolled over me and I lost all sense of up and down and sank like a stone.  The sea was quieter the further I sank, and I looked all around me taking in what surely were my last sights.  The tops of the long, trailing weeds were tossed by the storm and they swayed gracefully on my way down, clutching at me.  At last I settled in the relative quiet of the rocky bottom with weeds cradling my head in slimy fingers.

That was when I saw IT swimming toward me with its maw opened wide.  Fish hardly describes it. “What a life!”, I moaned. “Lightly drowned and served up for dinner to Tiamat, great Serpent of the deep.” Note to self, “Never argue with your God.  It is nice to have someone to pray to in your final hour.” My last thought before I passed out cold was, “Ninevah or Tiamat.  Lord, what kind of choice is that anyway?”

- Rev. Deborah Rankin

Let there be Lent!

Tools for Lent:

• Broom and large dust catcher
• Mop
• Windex and lintless cloth
• Pledge and soft cloth
• Heavy duty toilet cleanser
• Bleach and scrub brush

Broom to get into the corners of your soul and under the furniture to go after dust doozies of old hurt, bad memories, ill will and dreck in general with a dust catcher to haul them out.

Windex is useful to clean the windows of your soul so that you can see what goes on around you with more understanding and compassion for others.

Pledge makes the surfaces of the furniture of your life – what makes you – clean and bright. A soft cloth brings out the shine.

Heavy duty toilet cleanser – everyone has stains from close encounters with grime that require a bit of elbow grease and powerful cleaning action.

Bleach and scrub brush are needed for stubborn soap scale. Isn’t it odd that getting us clean makes the shower so stubbornly dirty? As we cleanse our souls we leave the place where living water flows bright and clean.

Lenten prayer: Dear Jesus when you help us wash, we are clean indeed. Be present with us in Lent and make it a time of shining light. Amen.

Deborah +



Christ is coming! Merry Christmas!

Christ is Coming

Advent is a powerful season for me. All   the jumbled images of Jesus in Advent invite me to think of Jesus’ coming as Baby, as Savior, Redeemer, Son, Risen Lord, and Judge in no particular order. Last week John the Baptist was a grown man telling us about the one coming after him. This week Jesus and John are still in the womb, Advent leads us to meditate on the whole story, just as the cycle of the story begins again with a Mom, Dad and Baby in a stable. Beginnings and endings tumble over one another, a sampling of chaos preceding the act of creation that brings us a Son. Jesus comes to us this season in whatever role we require.

I imagine Jesus coming in every kind and decent act done in His name. This practice has a powerful effect.   My experience of God with us is built in moments of   time, when grace is revealed. My faith stands on the firm ground of hundreds of kindnesses done to me, done by me. I experienced the love and care of the living God. Faith gains substance in reality through the simple practice of kind and decent acts.

In this   season there is so much to do that it is easy to become a human doing. We have a little list and are checking it twice. Heaven help us if I hold up the line. I have been cursed and cussed roundly this time of year for the sin of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Stop.. Breathe. Do a   kindness in the name of Jesus. In that moment the spell of human doing is broken. I’m free! As we practice human being in the name of Jesus, Jesus comes. Not only do we gain strength by these acts, we are becoming something wonderful, a human being exactly as God intended.

This time of year the readings offer a variety of images of Christ coming to us. They shift again and again, from one to the next like slides in a show of summer vacation with little attention to their sequence in time. In the time we wait for the baby, we are also awaiting the healer and the judge. The multiplied times of visiting for Christ overlap one another like waves coming to the shore. This week two pregnant women meet with good news to share. The time for waiting is almost ended. Which means that the time for the revelation of Christ has come. A child is born; a Son is given. Do a kindness in the name of Jesus. Make it possible for others to see Christ revealed in you.

Merry Christmas!

Deborah+

Summer Days Make Me Feel Fine

It looks like I have my best chance so far to be a grandmother in the next few years. The happy event isn’t even in the planning stages yet, but I have waited so long that a tiny thing like that isn’t stopping me. It has made a little happy place in my head. It is surprising how such a relatively minor thing in the grand scheme of things can build anticipation and interest. I tend to live at light speed, but that little promise of life in another generation slows me down to look at other people’s grandchildren. Dear God, I want one just like that! And we have some real cuties here at St. John’s.

God builds such subtle renewals into the system– forgiveness, healing, new life. I find them as I go about tending my spiritual garden. Yesterday’s grumblings are over there in the bed of forgiveness. That nasty scar caused by mean spirit is being renewed in the healing herb garden. If we tend our spiritual garden from time to time we find a promise of new life when we look. If we call this effort a spiritual discipline it sounds like we couldn’t possible enjoy it. But if we call it tending the spiritual garden we may cultivate seeds of happiness in it. I know many of you are gardeners.

Advent begins Nov. 29. It’s such a good time to tuck the garden in for the winter. I always cut the tops off of the perennials and cover them a bit. Rake up the leaves and bag them. Plant the bulbs that I have rotting in the garage because I always remember them in the spring. Every motion recalls a hundred other days spent the same way. It is a sweet continuity, the folding over of another year.

In the spiritual garden it is a good time to look at relationships in good order and those gone awry. What brings new life in me, and what can I do to fertilize it? What trash in the garden needs to be bagged up and carried away? What can I plant in this season to bring beautiful flowers in the spring? Can I simply enjoy the slow dance of time?

We have plans at St. John’s for November and Advent that will help tend the spiritual garden. Liturgies built into the service, a visitation from St. Andrew on Nov. 8, our 179^th Birthday Celebration on Nov. 22, and a children’s chat on the Advent wreath at the 10:00 service on Nov. 29. There will be the usual Advent daily readings with a couple new offerings. The tools for tending the spiritual garden will be here. Sow seeds of joy now for later!

Deborah+