Redemption

Three days after a dreadful loss at home to a mediocre team, the local college basketball team won convincingly over the best team in the conference. What happened? The same players that were so dreadful, played brilliantly yesterday. They learned from their mistakes. Cannot we all? A defeat, or a messy time in our lives need not be the end. These times can be our teachers. Sometimes we need to be knocked down, to suffer, to lose, in order to become awakened. Awakened, we can reach for our potential. The team had taken some things for granted. Do you? Now they know that success is not a given. We cannot just show up, even if Woody Allen says it is 80% of anything.

Yesterday's success or good day is no guarantee for today. Yesterday's prayer was for yesterday. The kindness you showed in the past for someone close to you is past kindness. Today is a new day. Do you mope or learn from mistakes? Do you take today for granted based upon the past? If the past was messy, do you expect today to be messy too? If so, you might ask yourself if misery begins with you today.

One Game

Had I judged the local college basketball team from the one game I saw last week, I might want to fire the coach, cancel all scholarships, and disband men's basketball since the team was so dreadful. Well, would I like to be judged or categorized based upon a one time look? Don't we all have bad days, times when we have no energy, can't seem to get it together? I do. Maybe if I saw the team over a period of time and events, I would have a different opinion. God looks at our whole life and not just a one time moment. Am I a basically overall good and caring person? I don't have to be perfect for God. The basketball team won't win every game nor lose every game. Do the best that I can and don't look back reliving those messy moments. Living in self-blame, shame and guilt leaves no place for gratitude that we still have time, and life to live, and that someone loves us always. That someone is God.

Jesus and the Beasts

Why did the beasts in the desert not eat Jesus when he went out there for forty days? Go back to the Noah story. Wild, flesh eating beasts were taken onto the ark. What did they eat? During the storm, the Spirit-filled Kingdom of God ruled in the ark. Everyone, including the animals, sensed a bond with one another. No one hungered for food. I mean, where would you get food for all those animals for 40 days? Certain "natural" tendencies, i.e. to destroy one another in order to survive, was suspended. With sin being destroyed in the storm outside, grace ruled within the ark. The wild animals remembered. Humans forgot. God gave the rainbow to remind all that even when the storm might look at its worst, the sun will shine on everyone.

Now Jesus goes into the desert, driven there by the Spirit. The Spirit is with him and the Kingdom once again reigns. The wild beasts remember instinctually. No one needs to eat. All sit in peace with one another. Jesus experiences the Kingdom in what is thought to be the home of Satan, the scary desert. Jesus went into the desert with a world view focused on his people. In those forty days, he experienced a sense of the kingdom that is for all, even the wild beasts. He comes out of the desert a Son of Man for all people. No one is outside the promise of the covenant Love of God. And we say beasts are dumb animals!

The Desert

Why do we always start Lent with Jesus in the desert? Why not start with a story about Jesus and fasting? After all, we gave up chocolate, coffee, movies, or something else for Lent, so why not talk about giving stuff up? Well, Jesus seems to have run into people who did fast quite well, but they were not very kind, loving, and compassionate with their neighbors. They fasted but were prejudicial. They fasted but were narrow minded. They fasted but were envious of power and control.

The desert is where we deal with all this stuff. Jesus did. Plus, he fasted there too. It is a both/and.

Mix Up

Some preachers mix up conformity with transformation. They think their job is to transform you by telling you what to do, the rules and rites. The idea is that if you obey, you will be transformed. That really is conformity. We have been into conformity since Constantine. Before that, we were more edgy, more prophetic, because we Christians were in love with Jesus Christ. Would you really burn at the stake for a rule on fasting? Generally, these preachers of conformity who are celibate priests, focus on issues that are not much struggle for them, such as birth control, and divorce.

Transformation, on the other hand, is the work of God. The fertile ground in which God works is our failures and sufferings. Failure can reveal our need for God. We cannot become transformed on our own, nor by following a rule. Rules can knit us into community, but cannot transform us. Humility can come only with our mistakes, done over and over, I have found. "Where sin abounds, Grace aboundeth more." Transformed people become prophetic voices if they stay within the community, but challenge it. These are the prophets of the Hebrew Scriptures. If you leave the community because you don't like anyone telling you what to do, or you think they are stupid and you wise, then I suspect you are moving toward narcissism rather than transformation.

Spiritual Development

Last night I attended the local college men's basketball game. We were dreadful. The visiting team "plays long" which means they are very tall on the court. We are not. When our whole team stood up I noticed that we had some very tall players, but they did not play. They sat on the bench the whole game. Why? They are not developed enough. They are tall enough for sure, but maybe too thin yet, or don't know enough of how to play the college paced game. In time they may develop enough physically and mentally to play well. They work on those aspects of their body and talent that need work. Who knows how much talent they still have, that just needs time?

The spiritual life of the soul needs time to develop. We have a soul, like a tall player has tallness. It is a given. We seem to develop early on the talent for talking to God, if we are a believer, and asking for things, or maybe thanking or praising God. If we work on the soul, we can later develop other talents, such as meditating on a passage in scripture, watching a sunset in silence and stillness. Eventually, we can even learn to develop the ability to sit in stillness believing God is present even if we feel nothing. But we have to work at all these layers of our soul. It won't come naturally, any more than a tall person will learn to play the "complete skills" of basketball. It takes daily effort with ups and downs. Soul work has a lot of temptations in the modern world with our gadgets and infinite capacity for diversion. What aspect of your spiritual game are you working on today?

Lent

Why come up for ashes if you have no intent on changing your heart? I ask this question of myself. I am supposed to be repenting my faults, bad attitudes, and stinking thinking. These all begin from the insides. So I need to spend Lent working on the insides. What good is it to do some outside change if nothing is going to happen on the insides? The reason for an outside action such as fasting or spending more time in church is to "remind" me on a daily basis that it is Lent. Giving up sweets is a reminder. It does not change my interior self. People in recovery programs can go to more meetings. They probably won't drink, no small thing, but they won't change the insides either.

So what to do? For me, it is the daily grind, or restful moments, of some meditative reading, silence, stillness, quiet time with myself. Maybe keep a daily journal. God will do the rest. And I probably will become a more pleasant and useful person.