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I Like My Church, They Don’t Tell Me What to Think

The world is all gates,

all opportunities,

strings of tension

waiting to be struck.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

I like my church.  They don’t tell me what to think or what to do.  Let me explain.  They do not tell me how to vote.

It just feels wrong for a person of spiritual authority to tell others how they should vote. The “correct” vote isn’t partisan — it can’t be. As people of a community I believe we must vote with our minds and hearts, considering both what is good for ourselves, as well as what is good for others.

I was just a few days ago writing about thinking of others more highly than yourself.  I think this applies …

  • when it comes to how you vote.

  • when it comes to politics.

  • when it comes to what we say in public discourse.  

I also think that we should figure out how to be civil, even as we disagree sometimes vehemently with one another. Let’s not make decisions about each other based on certain issues and where another person might stand.

Our nation has become so divided and it seems to me that politicians don’t even know how to do their jobs any more.

Using the system to hold all votes, no matter what the issue, so that you can keep tax cuts for the wealthiest small percentage of the nation is WRONG as well as holding up legislation that with help the unemployed.

Give the wealthiest Americans a tax cut and history suggests they will save the money rather than spend it. … President Barack Obama wants to extend the cuts for individuals earning less than $200,000 and couples earning less than $250,000 while ending them for those who earn more.  More here.

Who do they work for?  The wealthiest in our nation or the people?

Even as Congress debates whether to extend emergency unemployment checks for more than six million Americans who are approaching the 99-week limit, some four million others are facing the certain end of their benefits over the next year, unless an entirely new program is crafted.  More…

I agree with Jim Wallis, that President could have, even should have, fought harder this week.  Backed into a corner is no place to negotiate so I feel for him as well.

The richest 2 percent of the country just got an extension of tax cuts they didn’t need at great cost to us all. President Barack Obama should have been fighting against the self-interest of the very wealthiest Americans long before this. So he is now backed into a corner, and just made a compromise that he thinks is the best deal possible when up against the clock. He got some good things for working families in the payroll tax cut, the extension of unemployment benefits, various refundable tax credits, and the important middle class tax cut. But the president is now presiding over the great redistribution of wealth that has been going on for a very long time — the redistribution of wealth from the middle and the bottom to the top of American society — and leaving us with the most economic inequality in American history. (Emphasis mine) This will only grow larger with the Obama “compromise.”

Bread for myself

is a material question.

Bread for my neighbor

is a spiritual one.

— Nicholas Berdyaev

I believe every choice we make is a statement of who we are and what we prioritize. For people of faith, our priorities must always lie with the poor and most vulnerable. Extending the Bush tax cuts for the most fortunate while ending unemployment benefits and cutting back services for the poor does not reflect well on the values of faithful Americans.

For that reason, I have signed the following letter (led spiritual leaders in our nation.  There is also one led my Millionaires.) urging Washington to let tax cuts for the most fortunate expire as scheduled at the end of the year. I’ve put an excerpt below.

To me the bottom line is be a person who thinks for themselves.  Search scripture to determine how Jesus would have responded here. We are each moral people who must be guided by our conscience.

I’ll conclude with this from a Seattle Pastor & Thinker, Eugene Cho:

But going back to the question and conversation of civility, I wholehearted agree that we – as a larger society (and as a Christian  community) need to learn how to be civil:

  • We need to learn how to listen.
  • We need to speak without shouting and screaming.
  • We need to not to accuse and attack.
  • We need to stop demonizing one another or prominent leaders.
  • We need to be better informed.
  • We need to agree to give space to disagree. It’s ok.
  • We need to learn where we agree and see how we can work together.

But as Christians, we need to agree that the most significant aspects of our relationship are not our politics, our political views, or our political affiliations but that we are connected together as brothers and sisters in Christ.

Who are we?  Who is our community?  Who are you?  Who is your community?  How does how you vote reflect that?

Philippians 2.1-11 says:

“Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united in Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.  Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others.

In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had: Who, being the very nature of God, did not consider equality of God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a human being, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death–even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

MH

Almost 50 million Americans wonder where their next meal is coming from. One in 5 children live in poverty and many Americans are out of work. At the same time, there are more millionaires in our country today than at the peak of the market in 2007. In the last 30 years, the wealthiest 1% have seen their incomes increase almost 300% while regular Americans are worse off.

We have a responsibility to balance our budgets. We have an equal responsibility to make sure that burden is carried by those who can most afford it. Giving benefits to the rich while denying them to the poor is a sin. As citizens of this country and people of faith, we have an obligation to those in need. The book of Proverbs puts it quite simply: “He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and he who gives gifts to the rich–both come to poverty” (Prov 22:16 NIV).

We believe that our own good is tied up into the common good; that we will meet the challenges of today not just as individuals but together as a nation. We are grateful for the leadership of the PATRIOTIC MILLIONAIRES who have stepped forward to ask that their tax cuts expire. We hope you will heed their counsel.

May God bless the leadership of you and the Congress, and may God bless America to be a blessing to the world.

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it’s 4:59 am, and you disintegrated slowly [A Poem]

Daddy, I miss you. I really do!  I try not to,
because I think I am still mad at you.
I’ve got a nice fat file at the UW Department of Psychiatry to prove it.

I glanced at the back of the room and saw you
sitting there.  With your grin,
how I lived to see that grin of pleasure.
It made the whole world feel r i g h t.
A belly laugh, so unexpected.
As if you were filled
with nothing but pleasure,
oh how I loved your laugh.
There is still so much goodness in you Dad
To be remembered — Passion.  Faith.  Hope.
I glanced over and saw you sitting there.

I want to remember you Dad, before I forget.
When the alarm tweeted at 4:59am,
and you disintegrated slowly,
as I woke and was left
full of longing; I am overwhelmed
by how much I miss you.

In life, I mostly felt your disappointment and my lack.
Perhaps it was your distractions, so important, God’s work
… coupled with a fear that you had.
You didn’t measure up

either.

Oh, in a crisis, if life was falling apart,
of course you were there
and would have honestly and truly,
if you could have, moved mountains to help.  But if not,
if life were NOT falling apart, you were busy doing the “Lord’s Work.”
This should have been okay, could have even been healthy,
if — the damage wasn’t already done.

I want to be lifted from the mire of that gloomy, infested death hole.
I want to be living not impulsively and with my FEAR overcoming EACH AND EVERY WORD.
Not assuming others only tolerate me.
Not speaking with a mute’s stutter.
Not breathing in constant fear.
Not stifling a scream.
I want to live healed, anointed.
I want to believe that you loved me
and are still hoping for me to have
the fullest,
the most joyful and gut-busting,

irrationally ecstatic, good LIFE.

You are no longer here.  And yet you linger in my dreams.
What are you dreaming
for me?

MH 12-9-2010

My father, Dan Harrison, died of brain cancer about eight years ago.  He joined my dream last night in a strange way.  Just sitting there, in the back of a room full of people.  As he often did.  He glanced up and I found myself saying to my sisters “Dad’s not gone.  He’s right over there.” Sometimes I do wonder if people linger in between this world and the next — hoping, wishing, praying even nudging.  I have no theology for this but I do wonder.

My father had a profound effect on me.  There are times when I believe that I did not truly begin living until he died.  At the least I experienced a new life after he died.  There are pages of this story here on my blog.  Many many poems and other thoughts, insights, lessons found here.  It is not completely a story of a broken person, because I found in a true way Christ’s love and that overcame all my sorrows.  I work for and pray for Shalom.

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My Head and My Heart Ache

Conscience, Judas
Image via Wikipedia

I woke up “in a state.”  I cannot shake the foreboding I feel.  It conjures up thoughts of very bleak times in my life.

But I start my day just like any other by popping out of bed, drinking strong coffee, sitting and opening my heart to the day.

Days like this I cannot run from or even slip out from under out of timidity, no matter how hard I try.  The gloominess sticks to me.  That is until I figure out what’s bothering me.  I’ve learned, if I don’t slow down and pay attention to it, this mood will pitch a tent inside me, lurking there for as long as it takes.  Eventually plundering my heart and mind.  And if I’m not careful, my soul.

Shivering from the fear of it, I cede to the fact that I must not ignore it so some things won’t get done today.  I resolve not to be overcome by the anxious ideas or allow my heart to be looted by what I cannot tease out.  My thoughts like are tangled and knotted up in such a way that the only result is my head and heart ache.  Jumbled thoughts, but some along these lines …

  • Why must women work so hard for less money than their male counterparts?

  • Why is the Church the most subtly bigoted place I go to in my entire week?

  • Why are so many Christian marriages “women as modern-day maids serving ‘grown up’ boys.”

  • Why don’t more women question these things and speak up.

  • Why do I get hurt by the subtle ways of discrimination in our culture that don’t change: the old boys club that excludes women historically from the organizations, clubs, pulpits, schools, boards, Presidential jobs of institutions, rock and roll bands, television, important movie roles, and so on?

  • Why is it so hard just to be equals? And why do women accept it?  Why is this still true?

I’m not hurt for myself, but I feel a deep empathy for these women.  And for our daughters who are growing up in this world.

The suffragists managed to vocalize their concerns and in time changed things.  And yet, even as I write this things stay the same.  In doing research for his review of the movie Made in Deganham, about the women strikers against Ford UK, Roger Ebert wanted to find out when equal pay for equal work first became the law in the United States.

“I didn’t discover what I expected. Only two weeks ago, a Republican filibuster in the U. S. Senate prevented passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would have added teeth to measures for equal pay…”  Here’s his full article.

Yeah, you read that right less than a month ago.

Why do I lose sleep, live with heartache, and write about this.  Because it matters, to me.

Jesus

I have read a book recently that parallels the words and work of Jesus through the Gospels:  Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.  His spiritual journey, guiding the three, twelve, the 70 and all the people he met.  Many many things have struck me, but here’s something stunning that’s relevant here.

There is a story that is found in all four books.  That makes it striking right off.  Simon the Leper and the Woman found in Matthew 26.6-16, Mark 14.3-10, Luke 7.36-50 and John 12.1-8.

In these stories these things are true: A woman (unnamed in three books or called a “sinner” and Mary, sister of Martha and Lazarus in the book of John.) used very expensive, perfumed oil, called Spikenard, to wash Jesus’ feet.  She wept on his feet, knowing that he was to die.  She was anointing his body for burial.  The men in the room disregarded her (and her importance) saying she should have sold the oil for money and give it to the poor.  Jesus said, not only did you NOT wash my feet when I came, or honor me treating me with any sort of revere, but you also do not know who this woman is.  She will be remembered he said.  Because they were calling her “sinner” and implying bad things about her, in one account he even tells a story of the creditor with two debtors, one for 500 and one for 150.  He forgave them both equally.    And then, in all except Luke) Judas betrays Jesus.  Yeah, right then and there.

Jesus promised the woman a place in history for she has done the thing that called out to be done if one is attentive, ready and attentive.

All I can do is highlight the thing that stands out to me.

The nameless woman heard of Jesus somewhere, and believed that Jesus was the son of God and would soon die.  She came to honor him.  She wept over his upcoming death, anointed his body in an action of believing faith after which Jesus said she was forgiven.

The Disciples saw her come in and wanted to throw her out.  Pointed out what a terrible choice she made.  Scolded.

Judas rather, one of the twelve disciples who learned from the Rabbi for years, betrayed him for a few coins not believing.  Not learning — seemingly — anything.

I do wonder, if women were at the table with the twelve, oh wait she was there.  Not “welcomed” at the table with them as a guest, but … If women were in the discussion, affirmed and given similar choices and opportunities to men, how would the world be different?  How would I be different?  And you?

I believe it is women who have been most betrayed in this life.  As over and over again in our society message are sent that diminish and demean.   I believe that Jesus has a different message for women.  It’s just that men (some, not all of course) just don’t see and hear the truth of Jesus message to the Church about how men and women relate.

More to come.

————————————————————-

Reading Jesus: A Writer’s Encounter with the Gospels, Mary Gordon, Pantheon Books, NY, 2009.

Humility is hard. Humiliation is harder.

A Krispy Kreme store in Atlanta, Georgia with ...
Image via Wikipedia

I was asked to write some brief thoughts about the application of Philippians 2.1-11 to my life.

My thoughts are neither brief nor, sadly, do I see them applied very well thus far in my life. Thankfully, the journey of faith is a road slowly traveled and full of grace.

Melody

“Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united in Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.  Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others.

In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had: Who, being the very nature of God, did not consider equality of God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a human being, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death–even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Paul’s letter to the Philippians.

Obviously one cannot compare their life, whether you are a spiritual person or not, in any way to what Jesus Christ, the Son of God, gave up — his stature in heaven with God the Father — and Jesus did that for you and me.  And yet, that’s the irony right?  And the beauty.  We are so very human and yet in the words of the Apostle Paul in Philippians we are taught to behave so unnaturally, even supernaturally.  And we can’t.  We can’t do anything like that.  A human life can’t possibly compare.  What then?

Reread this section of Paul’s letter to the Philippians 2.1-11 in Today’s NIV (above).

Honestly, the Apostle Paul rubs me the wrong way, at times.  Especially the way he seems to command the church to do and not do so many things. That I have issues with control is no secret.  So, I struggle with Paul’s emphatic tone and his sometimes enigmatic letters full of instructions that are not always clear in their application today. (Just my opinion here.)

But I have come to respect Paul’s story; his passion, his purity of purpose, his agape love for each church that he started, his strong prayer life, and especially as it applies here, his willingness to make personal sacrifices every day for the cause of Christ.  What he was instructing the Philippians to do, he most definitely lived out himself.

Writing from a prison cell, it is striking that he says “fulfill my joy” or “make my joy complete” (depending on the translation) by having “the same mind and the same love, by being of one spirit and intent on one purpose.”  He’s not saying here’s a way to become a “cookie cutter Christian” thankfully. What he is saying emphatically is do this to be united! And he continues, be humble because it is impossible to be “one church” if you are living for yourself, for your own desires, agendas and needs; If you are constantly seeking those things that only create a better life for yourself, you are not united. And then, as if that were not clear enough he goes on to say don’t do anything out of selfishness and think of others as better than yourself.  And if you do this, the result will be unity.

I’m thinking at this point: “Okay, no biggie.  Have some humility.  Live for others.  Give up your “rights.”   Be unselfish.  Wow, I need to work on this!”  I just haven’t had it put so emphatically before.  It is as if the message of Christ depends on it. Unity. And I should want to live that way!  I guess it’s time to spend some time reflecting on whether that is true in my life.  I’m four verses in and I’m totally convicted that I rarely live as if  others are more important me.

Incredibly to me, at this point Paul becomes gentle so I guess he has a softer side.  I’ve judged him from the lists of dos and don’t in Corinthians.

In a poem he goes on to describe in beautiful words the utter humiliation of Christ for us — Christ’s descent from the throne of God to death as a human on a cross.  That is the humility Paul challenges the church of Philippi to and that is our example — Christ chose humiliation.  As Christ became human, he gave up being seen as God and emptied himself taking on the limitations of human flesh.  He never ceased to be fully God, but for a time he actually gave up GLORY for us.  If your mind isn’t blown at this point, well, you’re not fully taking it in.  It’s mind-boggling.  It is worth pondering a while over the Advent season.  It’s incredible.

Christ became human for me and wants me to become humble and unified with other believers in order to be more like him? NT Wright, in Paul for Everyone, says that an inner life of unity seems unattainable.  No kidding.  But, as we mature these things (paraphrased) should be true about us:

“1 We are to be bringing our thinking into line with one another.

2 Know the Gospel is the the final aim, not simply unity.   If “it” doesn’t align with the Gospel, we could be unified around Krispy Kreme donuts, but that’s not what Paul’s promoting.

3 We are to perform the extraordinary feat of looking at one another with the assumption that everyone else and their needs are more important than our own.”

Humility is hard. Humiliation is harder.

When Paul was writing about this idea to the church in Philippi, it must be said, that they didn’t hold a high view of humility.  No one aspired to be humble or to humiliation in the Greek world.  If I am totally honest, do I really hold that high a view of humility?  Being humble is hard!  When was the last time I gave up my rights?  My power.  That is a form of humility and I honestly do not even know.  That’s not really esteemed in our culture too much.   Paul says we are to regard others as higher than ourselves. And in case we’re still unclear, we are to voluntarily give up our rights (like Jesus.)

As a part of the bigger picture of Philippians, Paul says “True people of God are united by thinking of others as more important than themselves.”

These are difficult times.  The recession has effected so many people, that if you happen to have kept your job you feel incredibly grateful!  If you have lost a job or may have been forced by circumstance to live with family or a friend, you know you are one misstep away from potential disaster.  Perhaps even from joining the most powerless in our society — the poor, the elderly, many children, victims of domestic violence, youth fleeing abusive homes, many immigrants working two or three jobs to get by.  None of these groups of people have power or influence in society.  They are definitely “the least of these.”  Their lives are a struggle and at times unbearable.  At the bottom of this list, rock bottom I think, are those that are have lost their home and live now on the streets.

We make assumptions about the homeless and never question them.   For the most part we avert our eyes and walk quickly past.  There are homeless downtown that are the “stereo-typical homeless person —  male, impoverished, smelly panhandlers that smell like alcohol and are acting slightly off.”  But, actually, the average age for the homeless in Dane County is nine years old. My youngest is nine and he’s just a kid lucky enough to live in a house.  Why him?

hu. mil. i. a. tion. 

n.

1 degradation;2 the state of being disgraced; shame; 3 a humiliating condition or circumstance.

I cannot think of anything more degrading or humiliating than being homeless.  Often, if we think of the homeless at all, we convince ourselves that they somehow deserve it.  It’s not a clear thought and if we keep it ambiguous and undefined we don’t have to face it.  But we probably think that somehow homeless people chose.  I challenge that idea completely.

When you are homeless no one knows who you are or where you are.  You have lost everything:  your old life, important relationships, job safety, the security of a locked door, and more importantly being known by someone, giving and receiving love, feeling content, the goodwill of being in community or a family — They chose to give up all that to be a wanderer known by no one? With no history —  “lost” to your family and society — invisible — and somehow you chose that? This idea is absurd and is based on our chosen ignorance. Even selfishness.

Yes, the truth about homelessness is that it makes us uncomfortable.

A few facts:

The top three reasons people are homeless are:

1 mental illness,

2 domestic violence,

3 inability to pay rent.

In Dane County in 2008:

3,894 people were served in emergency shelters.

3,636 were turned away.

More than three thousand children, teens, elderly, veterans, mothers and fathers, uncles, aunts, PEOPLE were turned away from shelter for lack of space and resources in Madison alone.

A Simple Story.

As a member of BH Downtown, I was recently asked for$ .75  by a panhandler just outside of the Majestic.  I was disconcerted because this wouldn’t happen on the west-side of Madison and I was unsure what to do.  But I was with my kids.  So I dug in my pocket and gave it to him, mainly thinking we have so much and my kids know it.  And I wanted to show them that generosity is important.  (Subsequently I learned giving money to panhandlers in Madison is illegal.)  Looking back I think it is laughable that they might learn anything from our giving up less than a dollar to a homeless person.   There was no sacrifice and there was no lesson learned.

Actually, I have learned because as a member of a downtown Life Group I learned that there are “real” ways to help. (more later)

When it comes to the homeless in Madison, in the past I have consoled my aching conscience with a few dollars and moved on.  And I spent some hours thinking, reading, fretting about the complexity of the homeless situation, growing ever more hopeless about resolving the grander issues of funding and public apathy.

But, being downtown every week, if I choose to see the homeless, they are there.

There is a group here in Madison that does see the  homeless.

Free Food gathers once a week, at three o’clock in the afternoon on Sundays, at the top of State Street, bringing whatever food and goods they have and giving them away.  Variations of this group have been doing this for years.  They give what they have — any kind of food, sometimes new socks.  And now that it is cold they are seeking hats, gloves, blankets and anything to help someone stay warm on the street. (If purchasing some of these things interests you, shoot me an email and I can connect to pick them up.)

As I’ve thought about the Apostle Paul’s challenge to give up yourself for Christ, I see the actions of this group as an example of what Paul is talking about.  I cannot think of anything more humiliating than living on the street, not knowing your next meal will come from; perhaps only having water and a meal once a day.  Being constantly cold.  It sounds horrible.

Homeless people likely did not lose everything by choice, perhaps simply bad luck or a series of unfortunate circumstances.  The less power you have the more difficult it is to regain it.  Powerlessness begets powerlessness in America, that’s a fact.

Paul says regard others [the homeless, or anyone] as higher than yourself. Voluntarily give up your rights. One way to do this is to serve the humiliated.  See them.  Go to where they are. Listen to their story.  Be a friend.  Or just be a meal.  In these cold nights of Wisconsin winter you might even save someone’s life by providing a coat or blanket or warm meal.

If you want to help on any given Sunday you will find these good people giving away food and other resources.  Week in and week out, over the years, people have given up their time, money and things for the lowest and most humiliated in our city.

So even as I write these words in the comfort of my heated home and my belly growling just a bit from “forgetting” to eat dinner, I am convicted.   In my humanity I cannot do anything and I don’t really even want to sometimes. It’s unnatural to put yourself in a situation like that.  And, it is moving into winter and Sunday afternoons are cozy family times at home.  My mind is full of dozens of reasons why I don’t really want or need to help out.

But we are instructed to behave supernaturally.   Jesus Christ, the Son of God, gave up equality with God for you and me.  That’s the rub.  So I need to perhaps get cold and uncomfortable.  Go be something more than I really am, because Christ did so much more for me.  Not because I owe Him but because I am so grateful and humbled.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition

or vain conceit.  Rather,

in humility value others above

yourselves, not looking

to your own interests

but to the interests of others.

I am challenged by these words of Paul to be more like Christ.  Jesus was known for giving up his rights for the sake of the world. What am I known for?

And you?

———————————————————————————

Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters, Tom Wright, Westminster John Knox Press, 2002.

The NIB Commentary, Volume XI, Abingdon Press, 2000

God’s Whisper. [A poem]

Very early in the morning before the sun is up and hours before there is noise
in my sleeping house,

I rise.

As I creep down the stairs,
I hope that no-one hears them creak loudly.

After I have made the blackest coffee, it sits hot and comforting between my cold hands.

I sip it as I sit, read and pray. Pondering things that I do not understand.

Laying down my fears

as if by writing them, somehow I will let them go.

//
I stretch out my legs for a moment and my cat jumps
and sits on them forcing me to settle, just as I was going to be done  she forces me to sit back and to truly stop my spirit, just when I think I am finished there.

At this point I am not inclined to sit any more, all–too–ready–to–get–on–with–my day.

//

Though when I wake, my heart is full of longing to sit with Them, waiting
to hear the sweet whispers of the Father, Son and Spirit.

But soon my restlessness–overcomes–my–eagerness
and hunger to Be With.

By my heavy, sleeping cat on my legs I am suddenly

s l o w e d–d o w n;  just for a moment,
I suppose, I will linger. Suddenly, gone are anxious thoughts and my busyness;

I let it all briefly go.

Forced by my sleeping cat with her heavy weight holding me down.

//

I am reminded

God always longs for me.
God waits for me.

To settle in This quiet presence.
To sit with my questions.
To set aside my wonderment of the pain that surrounds.

To feel the awe of being with a Father that wants me.

There, as my legs fall asleep I am struck by how difficult it is for me to sit.

To receive Holy company.

To receive a Holy welcome.

To settle in and completely BE with Them.

It is as if my cat with her wish to be close to me, to take a nap on my stretched–out–legs,

is the Spirit’s hold, gentle but firm, full of love. Telling me to stay.

//

I am uncomfortable, but my cat sleeps on.  I wiggle my toes to get the blood flowing again.

She blinks sleepily at me.  She is annoyed when I jostle her a bit too much.
My cat just wants to be with me; she has no expectation, no need, no fear.  She has complete trust. Stay, stop squirming she says with a hard glaring look and her nails beginning to claw my leg.

“But my feet! My legs!” I protest.

Stay.

Sit.  Enjoy me.

BE.

God whispers to me.

I Traveled to a Dreamland [A Poem]

It was a long week.  I traveled to a Dreamland.

And in that magical place where I know Everything,
I am Powerful.
My prayers are Answered.
I am Whole.
The future holds no surprises, for I am filled with
Visions telling me All.

As I walk the streets of Perfect Knowledge I asked
what’s left?
After Total Acceptance
Complete Understanding,
Perfection and Glory
what’s left?
I have no Need.
No Confession.
No Sorrows.
No Desire.
No Curiosity.
No Thirst.

No Need and All Knowledge is in fact Unbearable.
In that Dream Land, I found myself
Longing to Wake Up
to My Life, where my days and nights are Full of Questions.
Where I wonder about Almost Everything and every day
still hope for Perfection.

Sure, I shake my fist at God because I remember that Place Without
Hate, Pain or Suffering.
Here Without Complete Understanding, I cannot imagine how
it will come again.
I can only
Rest in Him.
And be grateful for the Absoluteness of My Unknowing.

Waiting? I don’t think so.

Waiting.   We hardly know what to do with waiting in our culture.

Waiting on things makes me frustrated and sometimes even angry.  I want doctors to be on time, fast food lines to be, well, fast, children to be efficient, packages in the mail to be on schedule — all of it irks me.  I cannot stand to wait.  I do wait.  I will wait.  I am learning but American culture seems to feed the beast of impatience.

Do I then bring this attitude to my time with God?  Do I have a low-level contempt despite all that He has done for me?  I am all too often anxious and uncertain — querulous within.  Doubting that He will speak, even though He has proven himself in the past.  How dare I feel impatient with God, when I cannot some days slow down enough to breathe Him in?

I waited patiently for the LORD;

And He inclined to me and heard my cry.

He brought me up out of the pit of destruction,

out of the miry clay,

And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.

He put a new song in my mouth,

a song of praise to our God;

Psalm 40.1-2 NASB

What does it mean to know that God is willing by the Holy Spirit to speak to you?  Would you cease striving so hard to know this and that and open up your soul to God to work?

Andrew Murray, in Waiting on God said:

“Would God that we might get some right conception of what the influence would be of a life given, not in thought, or imagination, or effort, but in the power of the Holy Spirit, wholly to waiting upon God.”1

Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God.

Zephaniah 1.7 NIV

Our waiting cannot be a ‘means to an end.’  But when you come before God and realize that all you want is His presence, then perhaps the spirit of knowing will come.  It will be nothing you have experienced before, where time slows and you are stunned, awed by the moment of being so full of Him.

” …humble the soul into a holy stillness, making way for God to speak and reveal Himself.

“Let everyone who would learn the art of waiting on God remember the lesson: ‘Take heed, and be quiet;’ ‘It is good that a man quietly wait.’ Take time to be separate from all friends and all duties, all cares and all joys; time to be still and quiet before God.

“Take time not only to secure stillness from man and the world, but from self and its energy. Let the Word and prayer be very precious; but remember, even these may hinder the quiet waiting. The activity of the mind in studying the Word, or giving expression to its thoughts in prayer, the activities of the heart, with its desires and hopes and fears, may so engage us that we do not come to the still waiting on the All-Glorious One; our whole being is not prostrate in silence before Him.

“Though at first it may appear difficult to know how thus quietly to wait, with the activities of mind and heart for a time subdued, every effort after it will be rewarded; we shall find that it grows upon us, and the little season of silent worship will bring a peace and a rest that give a blessing not only in prayer, but all the day.”1

Waiting.  Our mind & spirit in everyday life are constantly, impatiently even angrily waiting for God to work.

He only asks for “a quiet reverence, an abiding watching.”

“‘It is good that a man should quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.’ Yes, it is good. The quietness is the confession of our impotence, that with all our willing and running, with all our thinking and praying, it will not be done: we must receive it from God. It is the confession of our trust that our God will in His time come to our help—the quiet resting in Him alone. It is the confession of our desire to sink into our nothingness, and to let Him work and reveal Himself.”1

If you knew that God

through the power of the Holy Spirit would meet you, would be waiting for you, would go against the world and wake in the dark of the night to be with Him.  I have seen that a whole new life will come.

MHH

1 Murray, Andrew.  Waiting on God.

re|think everything

(re|think)

noun

Pronunciation:/ˈriːθɪŋk/

[in singular] a reassessment, especially one that results in changes being made.

I am thinking about many things including the future of this blog.  I was particularly challenged by a conversation this weekend.  My sister questioned why I “live so much in the past?”  She was wishing for me that I would be able to “get on with my life.”

Long before that conversation, I have asked for a clear insight about what is next for me.  I have been seeking — praying — listening.

Rethinking What I Know about Myself.

  • I need to know  that my life contributes to a grander and larger story than simply my own.
  • I have certain passions — God-given, I believe.  Most notable photography.  biblical studies.  women.  any injustice.
  • One spiritual gift I have seems to be Mercy. My heart breaks over the corruption and greed in some that leads to poverty and pain for others.  Over persecuted people groups.  Over homophobia, racism, sexism.  Over anyone being homeless.
  • My voice, in writing, is loud and clear and sometimes even challenging.  Out loud I am meek and unclear, which I experienced this weekend to my dismay.

Rethinking Biblical Translation & Interpretation.

I have a hunger to understand scripture for myself.  Dare I say this?  It frightens me that so much of (most or all) biblical interpretation throughout history was done by men.  It gnaws at me from inside out.

I am not a raging neofeminist or even a strong proponent of a feminist or liberation theology.  (I guess I don’t know enough about them to say one way or another.)  Simply put, things have been stacked against us:women. 

  • A patriarchal society& culture brought us the message of the scriptures that we live our lives by. 
  • Another group of men translated it into the language for “everyone.”
  • And, then in most churches today men stand up and interpret scripture every Sunday and all week long.

“The Bible has shaped the life of the church in a way that nothing else has done and Christians today are the product of the history of its interpretation.” 1

Why should I trust their translations and interpretations categorically without question?  This is simply foolish, in my opinion.  And still I pray for a spirit of humility — that I would be a fertile ground.  I ask why do I think these things and if my motives are wrong or I am simply being foolish in my thinking, that this thinking would change.  And, I have thought of many responses to this conundrum, from applying to be an unpaid intern at my church in biblical hermeneutics, I would hope, to bring a feminine voice to the teaching being done, to going to seminary.

Rethinking My Role.

As I seriously consider the perception of being a “woman of leisure” which I wrote about recently, I get mired in my own frustrations and can’t pull together clear thoughts.  Because it is emotional for me!  I don’t care about the money (perhaps I should) but I want respect.  And I know if I don’t respect women who stay home, then how can I expect others to respect me?

And before you email me about the value of being at home with kids, know that I’ve had more than ten years to ponder this subject.  I don’t need “encouragement” in that regard.  It is an incredibly complicated personal decision for every women and I do respect the difficult place women (so much more than men) are in.  So if you are a man, butt out. No one can make this choice for a woman or explain away her doubt, fear, aspirations, goals, or desire for “accomplishment” or get why she cries to be away from her babies.

Recently, First Lady Michelle Obama was named Most Powerful Woman of the Year, beating out heads of state, chief executives and celebrities in Forbes magazine’s annual listing.  Some women came out saying Ms. Obama talks about herself as a wife and mother and were questioning how that makes her influential?   Gr…..

But I digressed into an issue that is only a side story in my search for a place to make an impact and contribution.

And I am still left thinking at this point, is this blog much ado about nothing?  Is it time to stop?”

Rethink Everything.

It is difficult for me, at times, to look back over the last decade of my life.  In human terms — quitting  a meaningful, challenging job, succumbing to clinical depression, becoming addicted to alcohol, and straying far away from the LORD — it was all failure on my part. And yet, it was through those experiences, as mortifying as they are and were to me, that I have come to recognize many things.

I am actually grateful to have been brought so low.  I can only hope that I am still learning and am becoming a person useful to the LORD.  I had to trudge through the violence of my childhood and my feeling of betrayal and disappointment towards my parents — and forgive them.  This has opened me up to a new life.

Christ’s broken body for me was real and meaningful in a new way never understood until my humiliation.  And gratefully I can say, this drove me to my knees.  I went from someone who felt she was competent, powerful, knowledgeable and puffed up with my importance to a broken reed, hardly knowing up from down.  Alcohol devastated me — became the thing that I lived for.  The passion, the dreaming, the hoping, the living stopped.

I am so grateful to not have lost everything. It is humbling to sit here in the comfort of my home knowing that I am loved by my husband and adored by my children.  Undeserved, as I know how close I came to losing  all that I now hold dear and even my life.

As I consider what the future holds for me I want to be fertile ground.  Looking back, mostly glad to have fallen.  To have learned.  As I look ahead there is no perfect plan.  I must trust while serving, not knowing the future.  Trust that I have a contribution to make, but if that “thing” the “plan” never happens, hope that I will continue to be grateful and if I am never made whole, still I will ask for it.  And hope.  And stay open.

===================================

I have more than fifty poems I have written here.  This one, is called addict.


Being an addict catches me by surprise.  Today,

seemingly innocent things — a drink, a smoke, a purchase, food, even exercise can become

urgent

need.

In the time that it takes to feel a flash of happiness, sadness or regret;

less than 60 seconds of my life

and I remember,

I am an addict.  How could I have forgotten?

Today I must ask what brought this on?

For tomorrow I must fill the need

with OTHER.

As for yesterday, I can only look back and remember

I am an addict, but I am stronger than my need.

And as for this moment — I know I am an addict;

I am. I was. I always will be, always will be

an addict.

ADDICT written april 9, 2009 by melody harrison hanson

Those that have no background in addiction look at the word ADDICT and the word alcoholic as kind of wicked and weak.  Face it, our culture doesn’t understand.  But if you’ve been there, if you live there, if you love someone who does or has you know exactly what I mean.  And I thank you for understanding.

1 Bray, Gerald.  Biblical Interpretation: Past & Present, 1996, IVP

Stop Trying So Hard!

St. Francis de Sales, the gentleman saint and ...
Image via Wikipedia

Don’t lose any opportunity, however small, of being gentle toward everyone. Don’t rely on your own efforts to succeed in your various undertakings, but only on God’s help. Then rest in his care of you, confident that he will do what is best for you, provided that you will, for your part, work diligently but gently. I say “gently” because a tense diligence is harmful both to our heart and to our task and is not really diligence, but rather over eagerness and anxiety…I recommend you to God’s mercy. I beg him, through that same mercy, to fill you with his love.

– Francis de Sales

I am not a gentle person. I am warm and generally kind.  I am open to others, making an effort to set them at ease.  My introversion and social anxiety make it so that this is hard work for me, but I do it out of principle.  And hardheadedness.  I want to know people, so I am damn sure I’m not going to let my flat-sides get in the way.

But my gut response to the world is usually to critique it.  It is all too easy and habitual to jump to conclusions and prejudge.  I am the opposite of temperate.  And I often become grouchy and grumbling about whatever displeases me —  from the coffee in a restaurant, to a reporter’s poor grammar, to the design on a book cover or the style in which a book is written.  Whether lyrics are theological or food is spiced correctly or a shop is ambient, you name it, I’ve got an opinion.  [Unless I don’t care and then I’ve got nothing.  Can’t be bothered… but digress.]

I would like to nurture gentleness in myself, however that is done. Even with my children, whom I absolutely adore, I know I can come across harshly.  That is why I love more-than-anything-in-the-world just to hold them.  To settle into a deep, long snuggle because  no words are necessary then.  And I fear that with my words, too quickly, I become evaluative and, oh dear, too soon, my love must feel conditional to them.

I am very diligent. I pride myself in being a hard worker which I learned from my father.  He taught me that a person never sits idle while being paid to work.  He caught me reading a book, as a teen, while I was working in his office.  I had run out of things to do. That was the day that my work ethic started, after a long talk from him.  Ask for more, I learned that day.  Idleness in a job, well that’s plain wrong.  And one must always carry out the tasks at hand.  I have learned that I love to work hard and if it makes me sweat all the better!  I am grateful to have that work ethic from him.

And yet, when it comes to being diligent, I am tense in my diligence, which de Sales claims is “over eagerness and anxiety.”  Um, yep.  That is so me — mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically, wow do I need God’s mercy and to loose my hands on the vice grip that I hold on my life.  It isn’t pleasant or the kind of diligence required of us.

“I recommend to you God’s mercy.

I beg him, through that same mercy,

to fill you with his love.”

I am just thinking and going nowhere with these thoughts.  Except I that perhaps they were worth writing down.

Once our eyes are open, we can’t pretend we don’t know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows that we know, and holds us responsible to act. –Proverbs 24:12

Be well, friends.

Melody

Francis de Sales lived August 21, 1567 – December 28, 1622.  He was Bishop of Geneva and is a Roman Catholic saint. He worked to convert Protestants back to Catholicism, and was an accomplished preacher. He is known also for his writings on the topic of spiritual direction and spiritual formation, particularly Introduction to the Devout Life.

why must winter come? (a poem)

why must winter come?

it’s fall and yet i walk about the yard in shorts, constantly aware of the heat.  cool enough.  gorgeous leaves, made of reds, yellows, browns chewed into smaller pieces, set aside for the spring.  the grass is still green and growing, fighting.   for it has something more to show for itself.  as i blow the remaining sticks and other fall debris i wonder if it is tomorrow that will bring the cold?

it’s fall and yet the windows are open, as i sip a cold clausthaler and listen to the neighbors’ rowdy party music, i long hop the fence.  i’m not finished with summer yet.  somehow the heat makes it linger on.  the nights are starry and the moon was bright last night.  with the windows open a perfect sleep comes.  down comforters likely out too soon but feel anticipatory.  as i put the fire pit aside to mow, perhaps the last of the fall, i hope we use it again!

one last fire, outside before the morning dew on the lawn freezes and i wish again for a heated garage.  i blow the leaves out of the garage — again — and again as they seem to fight me. wondering how it got this way, again.  the indiscriminate pile-up of bikes, discarded furniture, forgotten projects, and garage sale finds all manage to keep it something other than what it was supposed to be.

and as i sweep the summer’s storm of activity away i think of winter wishing, wondering, what will it hold?  if summers are for friendship, and water toys, laughter, smoky grills, and cold beer what does winter’s promise hold?  for those of us who hold on tight to the warm weather and outdoor chores, the possibilities and hope that come from growing things.  Somehow, i must allow winter to come.

then i will settle in to short nights and freezing toes in the morning.  pull out the wool sweaters, accepting that summer is fully gone.

“Why Do You Care So Much About LGBT Issues? Are YOU queer?”

It’s an honest question, I guess.  But the implication is that in caring for friends who are gay, lesbian or bi-, or any persecuted population, there must be some underlying story.  Let’s be truly honest, at least I will be, for a moment.   And I guess I’ll generalize dangerously, but I think I’m fairly close to the truth when I say …

Some Christians don’t know how to love people that they do not like or do not understand.

They are often the ones who avoid the discomfort of being in a setting with any group that makes them feel a minority.  That is if they even think about it.

They may wrap their beliefs up in a neat and tidy box, but the fact is they are unwilling to have a friend who is queer.  I dare you to step out of your comfort zone.  And I can promise that nothing untoward will happen.  And you just might learn something about yourself.

Let’s broaden the conversation and throw out an even broader generalization but I believe that most people, Christian or not, very rarely allow ourselves to be without our power.

Perhaps unintentionally, but it rare that white people put ourselves in places where we don’t hold that (white) power.    Yeah, I’m talking about white people because being white, we have power just because of the color of our skin.  And we might be complete wing nuts, but it will stay true. Also, being straight in today’s society holds power.  (Being a man holds power, but that’s not the subject here I just had to say it.)

Here is the real truth.  I have someone very close to me who is bi-sexual.  This is someone who I love.  Someone that I would like to come to know the Jesus I know,the way I know him.   Someone who rejects Jesus because of reputation of “the Church” and someone who considers it evidence of bigotry that Christian’s lack love for them…

The friends and acquaintances over the years that are queer — some out and some not, but I love them.  I hurt for them.  I heart aches over the rejection and disapproval that is shown to queer people mostly by Christians.  When I picture those friends in my mind  I have to acknowledge to myself that their lives are incredibly difficult and it is mostly because our culture is so bigoted and I want to love them, take them home and care of them.  It’s the Mother in me who would adopt all these “kids” so that they’d know unconditional love.

And as for being a minority within a dominant culture, well

the little I have learned is that I have all this power that I don’t even acknowledge most of the time.

And this power makes my life so much easier than those that are not white or straight.  Most people, other than whites,  face  the biases and prejudices of the dominant culture every single day.  My culture. My people.  My tribe does this and it hurts me.

And one of my new year’s resolutions (Go ahead, check.  I wrote them down here.) was to place myself in positions where I was a minority — Whether that is my lily whiteness — or my being straight — or my being  a Christian — I want to be with other people, without my power getting in the way, so that I can learn.  I’ll become the better person for it.

So why do I care so much about friends who are LGB or T — and People who are Homeless — and People of Color — and Women ….  And generally anyone who is persecuted for something that they are, because I hope I am a bridge person in between.

I believe that this is what Jesus would want me to do.

It is as complicated and as simple as that.

OCTOBER 8TH UPDATE: I JUST READ AN ARTICLE THAT MADE ME REALIZE HOW STUPID (REALLY JUST LAZY THINKING TO BE HONEST) IT WAS TO CALL MYSELF, AS A WOMAN, GAY.   HENCE THE CHANGE IN TITLE.

http://www.qideas.org/essays/project-love-restoring-a-bridge-with-the-gay-community.aspx?page=4