Category: Examen
Wednesday Devotion
Words for reflection on the day ahead or day past.
Centering . . .
Slow me down
Still my restless mind
Quell my tears
Quench my thirsty soul
Fill me with Your love
God of Truth . . .
God of Love . . .
Jack Walker, Singing with Grandpa, 2007
“Our congregation at Church of the Advocate declares, “We welcome people of every kind of household, at every stage of life and faith and doubt.” We are proud of that welcome and of the diversity it brings.
At one point we embraced “radical welcome,” defining it as “a welcome that doesn’t come easily, that makes us uncomfortable, that changes the community as we are.”
At times we’ve wrestled with our lines of tolerance and the limits of our flexibility.
One member of the congregation perceived in herself a gift for healing and wanted us to put a massage table in front of the altar so that she could lay hands on people there.
Is this part of a radical welcome? Where do we draw the line? How do we say, “That isn’t the way we do things,” while also proclaiming, “All are welcome”?
Lines of intolerance often lead to miscommunications or sudden departures, with no opportunity for further teaching or explanation or understanding. At best, lines of intolerance lead to conversations about norms, expectations, appropriate behaviors, and faithfulness. These days, being less certain in our venture, we say, “We strive to practice radical welcome, though we know it is hard to do.”
Lisa G Fischbeck, “Limits of Welcome: The Sunday I Told Someone to Leave,” The Christian Century, Aug 13, 2015
http://www.christiancentury.
May God make you impatient to get going,
eager to share the love you have found in the house of prayer,
and keen to exhibit mercy and peace in all your activities.
May God make you patient with those who seem tardy,
understanding with those who are hesitant, anxious or afraid,
and gracious towards any who appear (in your eyes) to be failing in their responsibility.
May the mind that was in Christ possess you,
the love that is always at the heart of God enlarge you,
and the joy of the Spirit give you kindly eyes and thankful soul. Amen!
Bruce Prewer, Uniting Church in Australia
http://www.bruceprewer.com/
Devotion
Words for reflection on the day ahead or the day past.
Centering . . .
Whatever your task, do it wholeheartedly, as to God:
in teaching, give all you have;
in speaking, stir to the depths;
in giving, share liberally;
in helping, do so cheerfully.
Contribute to the needs of God’s people,
and practice hospitality.
[based on Colossians 3:23, Romans 12:7-10, 13. Chalice Worship, Cartwright and Harrison, Chalice Press, 1997, p. 390.]
Ponder . . .
Enthusiasm and contempt are both self-fulfilling
Someone who shows up with enthusiasm made a decision before she even encountered what was going on.
The same thing is true for the guy who scowls with contempt before the customer opens his mouth.
It’s a choice.
This choice is contagious.
This choice changes what will happen next.
This choice is at the heart of what it takes to be successful at making change or performing a service.
More than you imagine, we get what we expect.
[Seth Godin, April 9, 2015]
Remember . . .
We all walk a road. Sometimes alone by choice. Sometimes together by necessity.
They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road,
while he was opening the scriptures to us?”
Remember a time when someone opened the scripture for you.
Remember a time when you opened the scripture for another?
What is similar about both those memories?
That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem;
and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together.
They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!”
Remember a time when you saw or experienced the risen Lord.
What did you do next?
Then they told what had happened on the road,
and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
Remember the first time you were at a table.
How is the good news of God known to you when you share bread with others?
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, 1920