Dallas Grass

We've had over 2 inches of rain since Monday afternoon. Most of it came on Monday, but we have had showers on and off since then. It's dropped the temp down some and has kept the sun from shining directly on us poor slobs. The humidity is 89% right now, but once the sun comes out from behind those clouds, I bet it jumps up to the 90+%.

I have a problem in the yard. It's called Dallas Grass. This is what Dallas grass looks like. The only thing I know that kills it is MSMA and they took it off the market last year. Another bright move by our EPA. Right up there with their ban on DDT, but that's another blog.
Wait, 2 other things I know of that will kill this stuff. Round-up, which leaves a dead spot the size of the clump you sprayed, and a shovel. Guess what I'm going to do since the ground is soft and I'm thinking the roots will be easily extracted? That's right it's Shovel Time!

You know, sin is like Dallas Grass. It's green like the surrounding grass, it is technically a grass. When you cut the grass, it get's cut with it, you know, it kind of hides in plane site. We talk about the Dallas Grass as if it's something we don't want in our yard, yet, we aren't doing what it takes to remove it. We live with it! It's unsightly, and yet, there it is in all it's glory.

When I remove these clumps of ugliness, there's no guarantee that it's going to stay gone. I may have to break out the Round-up and kill it with chemical! But I will fight it for as long as it's in my life!     

Double-bind

I went to my centering prayer group on Monday and before prayer, we read from a book. What we're on right now is Thomas Keating's The Mystery of Christ. This is a deep read that I can only take a small bite at a time, mainly cuz it's packed with info. We read over the Passion in Mark 15:22-38 and then over some of the thing Keating says about it. What really struck me and still strikes me every Lenten season, is what is being called the double-bind. I'm sure we all experience it on our spiritual journey at some point, but no one ever experienced it to the degree that Jesus did. The double-bind is a crisis of principle that brings about an overwhelming problem of conscience. Two apparent duties that call out for total adherence seem to be in complete opposition to each other. 

A classic example is in the book of Job. Job struggles with the problem of innocent suffering. He knows he is innocent, yet everything has been taken from him. His buddies keep telling him to admit that he has sinned, so God will forgive and take away his suffering. His double-bind consisted of trying to avoid accusing God of injustice and at the same time remaining faithful to his conscience which told him that he had done nothing wrong. 

No one ever knew God the way Jesus knew him. Jesus knew it was all about relationship: a community of persons sharing infinite life and love. Jesus had that relationship with God and tried to transmit it to his disciples. Jesus never suffered from the feeling of separation from God that is our experience as we come to rational consciousness. This feeling of separation is the source of our deep sense of incompletion, guilt and alienation. 

Jesus took this on himself. As Paul writes, "He who knew no sin was made sin for our salvation." Jesus' double-bind is the choice: "Am I to become sin and thus renounce my personal relationship with Abba?" Or "Am I to become sin and thus experience separation from the One who is my whole life?"

Something to think about as we wait with Jesus this week is what his dread was. Not so much the prospect of physical suffering but the impending loss of his personal relationship with the One who meant everything to him.

I'm telling you Keating makes you think.

Salt & Light

I was reading a blog this morning by James Emery White and he had some really great points that I wish I had thought of first! I have been thinking, reading and praying about the  "culture wars". We have always been in culture wars, the folks who have forgotten that or haven't yet learned it in history need to do some research and see for themselves. I understand that you are tired of the talk about same sex marriage and how you feel that NC is now an evil state because of the way they voted against it. I'm tired of hearing how I'm the problem and I read a Bible that's out of touch with the way we live now! Adam Hamilton may be the pastor of the largest UM church in the US, but he does not speak for me! Also, the "Christian's" that yell and scream, "Your infringing on my rights" need to learn something about grace. Yelling at people has never won much that I can think of.    


THIS is where you can read White's blog. I'm going to just comment on it and say that dang, this guy is good and I happen to believe in what he's preaching. We, as Christian's, are called to be salt and light. Not acid and bulldozers! I like what White says about salt being important to keep meat from going bad. The meat (being the culture) is going to go bad, if not eaten, that's what happens. So the church is full of salt and it is to be used to arrest, stop, halt, social decay! That can't happen if the salt stays in the shaker. We have to penetrate the culture, which means we have to have a stance, understand why we believe what we do and get out there.


The other point I really like is that Jesus was offensive! I love that! He offended everybody, all the time! There are tons of preacher's out there that are wanting the lime light, they want to be seen as hip and popular. They stand on the fence, don't say enough about anything controversial, and have taught people to say, "Who am I to judge!" (Preacher man should blog about that topic!) The bottom line is Jesus dying on a cross for everybody's sin! He didn't just die to die! It was because of sin. Jesus took a stance, said what was true, refused to bring in the big guns that he had at his disposal, and he died an awful death! FOR SIN!  


Our goal is to remove every barrier that exists between such persons and their acceptance of the scandal of the cross…except the scandal of the cross!


Sin is the same today as it's always been. It hasn't changed because we have become this new smarter generation of people. We are still called to be salt and light, not acid and bulldozers or pansies and yes-men! 

Grudge

Been doing some thinking about my journey and why I keep coming back to the same issues. It's like, Haven't I spent enough time and energy on that topic God? Waiting, listening....
What do you think?
OK then, let's keep at it shall we?


I think sometimes there in lies the problem, we think because we have prayed about it and spent sometime thinking about it, that it's a done deal. We put in the allotted time and now it's time to move on. 


Have you ever needed to forgive someone? So how long have you needed to forgive them? How much time have you spent on your knees asking God to give you the grace to choose to forgive? I'm guessing, if your anything like me, 5 to 10 minutes. God didn't give me the grace to choose to forgive, so I don't think He wants me to forgive! How's that working for you so far?


We all are broken, messed up human's and God knows all about it. He was there when the breaking happened and he's the one that made you human in the first place. He knew we couldn't fix any of this on our own, so hence, the reason Jesus died for each of us, yes, even those people you don't want to forgive. 


But our whole life boils down to the choices we make doesn't it? The choices I made while growing into this person I am now, made me who I am right now. Good or bad, loud or whatever the opposite is, opened or closed. My problem is I feel like if I let go and forgive, who will get back at them? Who will make them pay for what they've done? How will anyone know how awful they are? We call this hold a grudge. 


Read a story the other day about a woman with a grudge. Her name was Herodias, she was married to Herod and from what I can see, also his brother Phillip. John the Baptist told Herod, It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. And Herodias had a grudge against him, and wanted to kill him. This grudge was the end of John the Baptist. We never hear what happened to the grudge holder after that, but I bet it wasn't a live happily ever after kind of ending.


Here's something to think about: Herodias knew she was wrong. You know holding onto unforgiveness is wrong. Jesus tells us to forgive as we have been forgiven. He never said, Think about it and if you feel like it's something you should do... My problem is I don't think it's happened yet. That's when it hit me, to keep praying for the grace to choose to forgive. It's a choice, everyday, to forgive or to dig it all back up and hold onto that grudge. 

I pray for the grace to choose what brings me closer to God, gives God the glory and is salvation for my soul...everyday!   

Fear

What is up with fear anyway? I just don't get it, I don't want it and it can just go away for all I care! It's not that I'm a fearful person, or so I thought until I started this third week in sin from the spiritual exercises! In fact, if I can muscle my way through something, will it to happen, or work my butt off to see the end product, I am in a very happy place. But aren't we all? And isn't that what Jesus calls us to, go forth and be happy! NOT!!!


I have come to a place where I'm face to face with a fear I thought I had either forgotten about or had muscled my way through. This morning Jesus showed me yet again what I asked him to show me. I don't have faith that I can do certain things. I have failed so many times at so many things that I am fearful to try something new again, even if I know Jesus is with me, and God has made me for such a thing and it's my calling and Preacher man and Pat say I'm ready and they have faith in me to do it! Because it's something that I can't muscle my way through, will to happen or work my butt off to get to the end product. It only has something to do with me because I'm the vessel that God wants to use.

When Preacher man and I were at Seminary, one of the first people he met was a dude named Robert. Robert jumps out of planes. He came to Seminary to be a Chaplain. A chaplain that jumps out of planes. Sometimes Robert even jumps out of planes in the dark, but he doesn't do it alone, he's got his jumpen buddies (or whatever they are called). Robert took classes, read books and started by jumping out of the back of a truck, or something very close to the ground. He learned how to jump into nothingness, steer his way around in the air, how to land and roll so that he wouldn't break anything in his body. He had great teachers, people who had done it a bazzillion and lived to tell about it and, I'm sure he had a desire to jump out of that perfectly good airplane. BUT, I'm sure there was some fear in him when he suited up and got in that perfectly good airplane and took off knowing that he would not be hitting the ground in that very same, perfectly good airplane! Yet, knowing that God had called him to do that, so that He could call him to be a Chaplain, so that Robert could fulfill his calling. 

I'm getting ready to board that plane. I've taken the classes, read the books, been on tons of retreats, talked to the people who have lived through it, yet somehow I feel not quite ready. Surely there are more books to read, more practices to do, something that will make me feel more ready for this. That's when I hear that laughing that always comes from God when I try to out think Him. I start to cry, cuz I'm slowing getting it. This is the meekness that Jesus needs to work through this vessel. This is the humbleness that Jesus wants in order to use me for His purpose. It is not and never will be about what I can muscle my way through or will to happen or work my butt off to see the end product! It's about trusting in where and how and who. Where I've been, How I've been trained and Who I believe in!


I still have some fear, yet I also have a calmness that can only come from the Great Healer Himself! Jesus is my jumpen buddy!         

Deeper

It is getting deeper and deeper in this Retreat in Daily Life that I'm doing (aka Spiritual Exercises). Last week we started on sin, this week we're into personal sin and I think next week we might be in sin again. So, while I'm going through Thanksgiving and wanting to be thankful for all the people and blessings in my life, there is this sin thing that's hanging over my head and it's bringing me down. Maybe not down as much as retrospective. I'm beginning to think that we might need to be looking back over our lives more than we do. Not to remember what we did that was so awesome or how bad we were treated, but too see how God has been there all along.


I have been looking back over my life and considering my history in terms of blessings. My family background, childhood, school years, work years up to the present. To see my life through God's eye's. I've had a blessed life. I then needed to look for elements of transcendence in my life story: compassion and insight flowing out of sin and disorder; isolation and loneliness leading to healing, forgiveness, belonging and freedom; humility in times of success; courage in times of failure. Wow!


The thing that keeps coming to me is that God has always been there! When I turned my back on His love and ran as hard as I could in the opposite direction, He was still there. He has waited on me to come to myself so many times! He is the father in the parodical son story, waiting on me and watching for me. This fills me with such a tenderness and gratefulness that I find I'm at a loss for words.


Then I have to pay special attention to the sinful (dark) moments of my life. How often do we do this? I am coming to an awareness of God's mercy and love that's been extended to me in the midst of my sins. He helps us see the disorder in our lives so that we may become the instruments of that love. So that we have the empathy and compassion to be Jesus to others. If you have lived through your sin and been healed, you too can heal. This is something that God is showing me more and more everyday. He brings people to me that need that healing, that He has shown to me. This is what it means to be the hands and feet of Jesus. 


We have to look at our sin in the face and call it what it is. We turned from God's love, we made the choice, which He gives us, and we didn't choose Him. That's sin coming first in our life, not God. 


Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! ~Romans 7:24     

Sin

I was doing just fine before I started taking this dang Spiritual Exercise of Saint Ignatius! This week is # 7 and we found out that everything up to this point has prepared us for the start of this week. I am beginning to understand why, this week has been hell and I'm only on day 2! We are meditating on the reality of sin and its effects. Not so much in the world as in our own lives.


I find myself not thinking about sin on a daily basis, or at least I didn't use to. I starting to see that might just be satan's plan, to keep us not thinking about it, so we will do IT more often. I mean really, it's depressing to think about all your sins isn't? Up until about, oh I don't know, 2 days ago, I felt pretty good about myself. This morning my reading was Romans 7:14-25 and Romans 5:1-11. In Chapter 7, Paul is talking about the inner conflict...not doing what I want, but doing what I hate. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh...So I find that it to be law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. Great! Thanks for pointing that out for me Paul. I'm going to bet good money that you don't even hear much of this at church do you? Are you always hearing how much Jesus loves you? Does everyone love Advent, but really doesn't get into the whole Lent season? 


We love the good news as long as it's good and doesn't really go into any detail about what MY sin had to do with holding Jesus up on that cross. I had a really interesting talk with my Catholic Spiritual Director 2 weeks ago about the cross in fact. He was looking at one of the few crosses in the church, and he said that he feels like Protestants, need to look at Jesus hanging on the cross more. I said, But Dude, Jesus isn't on the cross anymore!  He said, I know, but sometimes you need to look at it and remember. It's true, we need to remember what our part was and is. 


Are you a thief? Have you ever taken a pen home from work? How about adultery, something we don't openly talk about huh? Wanting something that belongs to someone else? These are just a few of the things that held Jesus up on that cross. Have you repented, said you were sorry, turned away from it? Is there still stuff thats in your life, keeping you separated from the creator of your soul? If there isn't today, you can bet something will come come up tomorrow. 


I feel justified in hating some things in my life. OK, they aren't things, they're people. I have good reason, I'm justified in my feelings, and I was OK with it until this week began. Then just when I thought I could get by, I read this:

How can hate have any part of me?

For I belong to a man who died on a tree-

for those who hated him.

~E. Stanley Jones