The Language of Lent 2016

The Language of Lent

Parishioners Reflect on the Season 2016

Rector’s Epistle for Ash Wednesday, 2016 What if God had no mercy? No mercy. What if the maker of all things, the potter who threw the world and glazed it so, really could despise his handiwork and destroy it all? What if God had no mercy? No mercy.

Could you love that God? Could you cherish him? Would you do his will?

It seems that if God had no mercy, then terror, not praise, would be our response. Terror would be our response, I think, because we would have to know that we would not be able to do God’s will, and that the lack of mercy would call forth punishments, destructions, and a kind of summary judgment.

We would have to know we would fail him, because doesn’t everybody know deep down that they have, and will continue, to fail to live up to strict expectations of holiness, perfection and virtue? Doesn’t everybody know that we can’t help but mess up from time to time? Or more often?

Maybe not.

Seems like the folks I know who seem assuredly self-righteous are very often also convinced of God’s ultimate lack of mercy to those who fail to seek him rightly. Maybe those who preach of a God who has preordained the torture of the vast majority of human souls in the lake of fire forever — maybe those people are completely missing the point and promise of the Gospel.

It’s actually not maybe. They’re missing the Gospel. They’re messing the Gospel.

No, I believe that instead of a God of no mercy, we have a God who has shown us his true nature of love in the birth, life, baptism, message, cross, death, burial, resurrection, ascension and Pentecost-empowered discipleship of Jesus Christ. I believe that we have the God who hates nothing he’s made. The God who seeks to cleanse, restore, and redeem, and not brainwash, reject and punish.

What if God came to find us, heal us and save us in every way, no matter who we are and what we’ve done?

That’s what God did in Jesus.

What if there was nowhere we could go to flee God’s loving presence? That is the case in the world made by the God who relentlessly pursues his people. “No Mercy” is the way of evil and death and a fallen world. “No Mercy” is the motto of Satan. It is not a virtue of God. For if it were, there’d be no Ark, no Exodus, no Land of Promise, no Prophet, no Baptism, no Messiah, no Church — no chance for me or you.

But all of those gifts have been given by God to cleanse, restore and redeem. And they are for us to use who need them. And we who need them are humble sinners all, in need of God’s saving embrace in Christ Jesus.

— Greg Jones +++ Thursday, Feb. 11, 2016 The Hateful Nail Years ago, one of my dearest friends gave me a handcrafted cross that is made to fit a kitchen window sill. The 10-inch cross itself is painted a lovely dark mahogany, but it grows to 12 inches when mounted on a dark green pedestal.

I decided to move my kitchen cross to my bedside table so it is the last thing I see at night and the first thing I see every morning. The best part is that I get to decorate the cross with beautiful handpainted wooden symbols of the Christian liturgical year.

A blond angel announces Advent with “He is coming!” On Christmas Day a hay-filled manger proclaims “He is Born!” The star of Epiphany shouts, “He is the Light of the World.”

Sadly, on Ash Wednesday, the cross turns menacing, with the hateful nail and the sorrowful words, “He Suffers and Dies.” For 40 days I have to look at that black nail. Sometimes I turn the cross around so I do not have to see it the first thing in the morning and the last thing at night. I am ashamed that the Son of God was taunted and tortured, nailed to a cross, suffered a horrific death, and I cannot even make myself look at the nail.

I would despair, but I know the rest of the story. The world was forever changed that Easter morning, when the stone was rolled away from the tomb and Jesus rose from the dead to live forever.

I gladly remove the hateful nail and replace it with a lovely butterfly.

“HE IS RISEN!” — Jane Bass

Friday, February 12 Lenten Rose In these young days of Lent, I search for life, peeking through frost-crusted earth.

I find — beneath pine straw and seasoned leaves — a white star edges tinged purple the soft yellow stamens lifting their voices like trumpets in practice for Easter morning.

— Susan Byrum Rountree

Saturday, February 13 Both Sides Now I didn't pay a whole lot of attention when the Beatles first sang "When I get older, losing my hair, many years from now. Will you still be sending me a Valentine, Birthday Greetings, bottle of wine?"

Yet suddenly, it is not many years from now and my high school friends and I are adopting this song as our birthday theme song this year. We're asking: Will you still need me, Will you still feed me?" So far everyone has very kindly been answering yes!

If I should somehow forget my advancing years, there are ever so many daily phone calls and letters offering to help me navigate this upcoming phase of my life. There must be a list somewhere of names to pounce upon as fair game when you reach a certain age. While I spend afternoons and evenings pondering insurance options and warding off friendly callers, I spend my mornings quite differently.

In the mornings, I am "Ms Marty." and I play with all my two-year-old friends. What a freshly different world from my 64-year-old life. We laugh, create, play, count, sing and even pray together at snack time and in Chapel. We sing songs such as "Jesus Loves Me," and other children's favorites in Chapel. Here, the children answer every question posed to them with one answer, "Jesus"! In their minds, He is the answer to all Chapel questions.

This experience is so different from my afternoons lately that it makes me hum Joni Mitchell's song "Both Sides Now." Something's lost but something's gained in living every day. I've looked at life from both sides now, from win and lose, and still somehow it's life's illusions I recall. I really don't know life at all.

I might have agreed with the last line earlier in my life, but now I do believe I've learned a few things from living lots of days. Whether winning or losing, or from whichever side I am looking, I have learned that life is much richer when I remember to sing "Jesus Loves Me," and that He is the answer to all things, even outside of Chapel.

If my classmates posed the question to Him "Will you still need me, will you still feed me?" He would answer "Yes, definitely yes." And this is not an illusion, it is something that I have gained in living every day.

—Marty Munt

Sunday, February 14

Leaves Tossed casually Red on green with hoary frost Generosity — Meta Ellington

Monday, February 15 The Incarnation: We Are All Partakers In the Leviticus reading this week, we see the commandments for living in community. We are to treat people fairly. To avoid profiting from their blood. And we are to do this because God is holy.

Then in Matthew, we see this commandment lived out. It’s not just refraining from slander, or taking advantage. It’s also going and doing for. Why? Because the poor and impoverished are Jesus.

There’s a transformation here. Before Jesus, the rules for community are clear. We are to treat each other fairly. We are to be kind. The rules are given as prohibitions, and the “why” is to emulate God. God is holy, and so we must not do certain things.

After the Incarnation, the teaching becomes: God is the poor, and so we must do certain things.

The Incarnation isn’t just Jesus. It transforms all people. Because God became human, beggars, orphans, single parents and the disabled aren’t just people: they are the Incarnation. Jesus can be found in each and every one of them. We no longer treat others correctly, because we seek to be holy. We treat others correctly because it is our ministry to God. What am I saying? What does it mean, that Jesus is the homeless man on the street, the single mom in prison, the drug addict? Once God became human, our suffering became HIS suffering.

The incarnation is broader than just Jesus. The Incarnation has somehow elevated mere mortals.

We are all partakers in the Incarnation.

Jesus didn’t have every experience possible on earth. He was probably not married, certainly not a father. He never got pregnant. He never faced infertility, or stepped on a land mine or experienced dementia.

But we, his followers, have. Our suffering is added to Christ’s. In Hebrews, Jesus is held up as the perfect sacrifice because of his suffering. It stands to reason, then, that as His followers, our suffering makes us perfect priests. Because I have suffered post partum depression, I can minister to others who suffer from it. God redeems my suffering.

— Elaine Bayless

Tuesday, February 16 Need

l know that I cannot stop Spring.

Not with groundhogs or sleet, Not with corrosion or death.

As if any of those things were even under my control.

I know, I know that Spring will come, Filled with hope and glory.

No matter what I do, or don't.

No matter what you don't, or do.

Spring doesn't need us at all.

Fear needs us, however.

Needs us to choose its rational panic.

Keeping our heads down, mouths shut, crouching against we know not what.

Averting our eyes while walking past, closing the door behind us as we go.

Grace needs us too, but it's awkward, vulnerable.

Holding out your hand, taking an outstretched hand.

Expressing kindness, accepting a peculiar compliment.

Consoling a person who lost someone you didn’t know, and letting someone hear your private grief.

Grace needs us to build up courage, to practice it.

Over and over and over.

Even though we don't get it right the first, or fourth or seventeenth time.

Over and over and over.

We cannot hold God's Grace or hide it.

On earth as it is in heaven.

As in heaven, here on earth.

— Anna McLamb ++++ Wednesday, February 17 Rector’s Weekly Epistle Jesus said that we should beware of practicing our piety publicly in order to be seen by others as doing so. He says we should keep our piety cards close to our chest, and not wear them on our sleeves, lest we do so for the wrong reasons. Like being religious for show.

Of course, in the South, being religious for show is an old part of the mix. Jesus’ point though is that our primary motive for acts of piety is to please God. And Jesus reminds us that God is one who “sees in secret.”

And isn’t this the true fear of God, this realization that we are always seen? We are always seen.

Always known. Always held close to the very ground upon which we exist by virtue of the gravity of God. The imposition of ashes that we did last Wednesday finds its grounding in Holy Scripture, Genesis 3.19, which says, “You are dust, and to dust you will return.” Humus is Latin for earth and is the etymological root of the words human and humility. Isn’t it fabulous poetry that humus, human, and humble sound so much alike?

They sound alike, because they are alike. When we talk about humility we are referring to our very human nature. We are beings made of dust. We are dust people. Earth people. Beings wrought by a loving God from the very ground upon which we trod.

I think it’s one of God’s great metaphors in which he says, “I am the ground upon which the cosmos stands, I am the context in which it dwells, and from my holy stuff the universe is made.”

God says, “You – human beings — you stand upon the ground of Earth, and from Earth that you are made, atom by atom. Your bodies are formed from the dust upon which you walk, made special by my love for you alone.”

This is what Human beings are, and this is why humility ought not merely be a characteristic of the wise and holy, but is in fact all that we can hope for, because it is all that we really are. To be humble is not to adopt airs, or to act righteous. Indeed, it is little more than peeling away the residue of pride, attitude and self-construction, to reveal the basic person that God intended for us to become. To be humble is the greatest thing we can do as humans, and yet it involves

adding nothing we do not already possess. It is instead the prayerful work of shedding the clothes of slavery, which we so readily adopt in this world of powers and principalities, and revealing the shining skin of who we were meant to be in the eyes of God. We seek to be humble, because that is the glorious We that God sees; the God who sees the secret We, the hidden We, the We that we really are beneath all the pride and foolishness, the We that God wants us to discover for ourselves. In that humility we will no longer pretend to be what we are not, and we will shed the scales from our eyes and see beneath to the hearts of others.

In the paradoxically blinding light of God’s love, we can finally see each other as God sees us.

And then we will understand why God loves us so much. We will finally understand why Jesus died on the cross for us. We will finally be free from that which keeps us bound. We will finally know, in the fullness of humility, why we have been given the kingdom of God as sons and daughters of the One God. — Greg Jones

++++ Thursday, February 18 Martin Luther It is hard to identify a more influential theologian in the last 500 years of the Christian church than Martin Luther, whose life we remember and celebrate today, the anniversary of his death in 1546. At the time of his death, Luther had initiated the Reformation of the Catholic church which led to the advent of Protestantism; translated the Bible into German which encouraged other attempts to translate the Latin Bible into more accessible, vernacular languages, including English; established through his own life the practice of a married clergy; and wrote so much theological and biblical commentary that at the time of his death, four-fifths of all German printed text was written by him!

For Luther, the 16th century church, through its selling of indulgences and emphasis on “works righteousness,” had lost sight of the essential truth of the Gospel—that we are saved by God in Christ, not by anything we do, but purely based on what Christ has done for us. We can’t achieve salvation; rather it is God’s gift.

By our own efforts, we remain tainted by sin, struggling with that “old man,” in Paul’s words, that continues to put us in bondage to sin. And yet, simultaneously, we are justified, made a “new creature,” made right before God as God sees us in Christ. Simul justus et peccator— simultaneously, at the same time, justified and yet a sinner. It is the faith of Christ, not our works, that saves us.

Luther’s most famous hymn—“Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott”(687/8 in the 1982 Hymnal)—still inspires the Christian church today:

A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing: Our helper he admid the flood of mortal ills prevailing: For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe; His craft and power are great, and armed with cruel hate, On earth is not his equal.

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing; Were not the right man on our side, the man of God’s own choosing: Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is he; Lord Sabaoth his Name, from age to age the same, And he must win the battle.

And though this world, with devils filled, should threaten to undo us; We will not fear, for God hath willed his truth to triumph through us; The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him; His rage we can endure, for lo! his doom is sure, One little word shall fell him.

That word above all earthly powers, no thanks to them, abideth; The Spirit and the gifts are ours through him who with us sideth; Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also; The body they may kill: God’s truth abideth still, His kingdom is for ever.

— Jeff Hensley

Friday, February 19 Forgiveness "Out of the depths have I called to you, Lord; Lord, hear my voice; let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication."

They had been business partners for 34 years, but about 10 years ago things began to change.

His ego got in the way. He snubbed his partner, stopped talking to him. He became protective of "his" clients. Blamed his partner for his discontent.

When the split came, it was calculated and hurtful. While his partner carefully followed legal advice, he, instead, swiftly and deceitfully took 70 percent of the business, then sold it to another person. He betrayed a good man, his one-time friend.

I watched, struggling during those 10 years, hoping and praying that things would change, would somehow get better. I pleaded with God to "fix" it all, but so many times I felt that He had turned His back on me.

When the answer came, it was not what I had expected. The outcome was awful, and I still don't understand why.

The impact of such unethical behavior has been painful and far-reaching. More than ever, forgiveness seems impossible. I know that forgiving someone does not condone their actions.

But this! I just can't do it. Not now. Not soon. Maybe not ever. ".........and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us."

Mind boggling! I am actually praying for God to forgive me in the way that I forgive others — even the unethical business parnter. The only thing I can do — and must do — is continue to pray that God will grant me the grace to forgive someone who so "wrongfully and scornfully" took advantage of someone I love.

I have faith that in time — in God's time — it will happen.

— Margaret Nicholson

Friday, February 20 John 3:30: “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

Dedicated to Regular Bible Study Christopher Hogin’s recent departure (I’m still in denial!) led to some reminiscing. He once challenged us to read the Bible regularly. Yes, all of us, even Episcopalians. In fact, he encouraged us to read the entire Bible, start to finish. Having never done this, I took up his challenge is early 2015. I’m not finished yet, but continue my slow progress with joy and expectation.

So what does this have to do with Lent? Well, as we entered Lent last year, I considered what I would sacrifice. Candy? Alcohol? Cheese? (Yes, cheese, and ask my family, that was agony!) As I reflected, these “sacrifices” didn’t seem to capture the true spirit of the season. I decided this year to instead dedicate myself to a greater daily focus on reading the Bible (see above), prayer and devotions, and a more purposeful routine of thanksgiving to God. I worked to consciously set aside obstacles keeping me from this focus: work stress, anxiety over finances and the future, grief over family loss, perfectionism, etc. In other words, my focus shifted from worry about wordly idols to praising God for His blessings and grace in my life.

Make no mistake, I’m still stressed and anxious, and far from perfect in my targeted focus, but I’m making progress.

As I prayed and meditated with more of a purpose, one Bible verse kept recurring to me. In John 3:30, John the Baptist described his relationship to Jesus.

“He must increase, but I must decrease.”

I think that applies not just to John, but to all of us, and it captures the true sacrificial spirit of Lent. Let the blessings and grace of Jesus “increase” in your lives, and work to “decrease” those things that keep you from the love and salvation of Jesus. During this season of Lent, may Jesus Christ increase in all of our lives, and may we likewise decrease by humbly submitting and surrendering our lives to His will.

— Rob Griffin

Sunday, February 21 The Lenten Rest Many of us have taken music lessons at some point in our lives and have come across the concept of “rests.” A rest in music is a period of silence that helps shape and frame the surrounding sounds. As in music, when we have periods of silence in our lives, we, too, can re-shape and re-frame our lives.

When we are in the wilderness and surrounded by silence, we suddenly hear new things – twigs snapping, the sound of a distant waterfall. When we allow silence to speak to us, we often find we hear the still, quiet voice of God within us.

presence.

Both music and Lent are both about structured time. During these 40 days and 40 nights of Lent, we have an opportunity to restructure our lives to allow a period of rest to enter our souls and enable us to grow spiritually. We are all surrounded by noise, either physical sound or the sound of our own “monkey brain,” as the Buddhists call it, which provides our brain with endless shopping or to-do lists.

But if we can quiet that inner chatter, either with quiet meditation or going for a walk without headsets, then we can give our brains a time of rest in God’s

The rest can be life-changing. Give it a try!

— The Rev. Holly M. Gloff Monday, February 22 Getting the Best in Youth Ministry We loaded the black suburbans and drove single file, like the Secret Service transporting precious cargo and supplies. Our walkie-talkies kept each car linked during the five-hour drive to West Virginia for the Middle School Ski Trip. Each vehicle was self-selected by gender and age, the differences obvious. The smells, snacks, noise level, music and topics discussed were as varied as the height and facial hair of the kids we transported. But still, little had changed since the 80s, when I was in youth group.

While some parents offered me condolences, I was ecstatic to be a chaperone on the ski trip. To get a glimpse at my child in her faith community and with her friends. To be in the mountains.

To eat kid food.

Those who are losing hope for the future need to spend more time with these people. They are smart, kind, funny, independent. Twelve had never skiied before, yet they suited up and hit the slopes, all day long. They were willing to share their towel and knew better than to share a toothbrush. They kept track of their stuff mostly and when they didn’t, they didn’t complain.

There are the same issues you remember: the quiet kid who looks left out or maybe just introverted, the kid who is late for every check-in time, and the one who just doesn’t like getting up.

What was different about this trip, are our youth leaders: Abby, Jason, and Chris. These people are good, no, great. They have wisdom and patience and love for your children — and only one is a parent in real life, so far.

They give their time — and in Abby’s case, her career — to us and to God. They are invested in getting the best for your children and out of them. They have created a Christian community by being amazing Christians themselves.

I am so thankful for their ministry, and I am grateful that my kids will navigate the wilderness of the teen years while being around them and learning from these leaders.

Wow — we are blessed.

— Melanie Jones +++ Tuesday, February 21 Psalm 50:11 I know every bird in the sky, * and the creatures of the fields are in my sight.

The Baltimore Oriole The Birds that Brighten Our Lives The iridescent little Ruby-Throated Hummingbird that feasted on nectar from my honeysuckle vine last summer weighed less than two ounces. By late August he had packed on another halfounce or more before he set off to Mexico or Central America. His wings beat about 53 times during every second during his journey, including the 20 hours that it took for him to fly non-stop across the Gulf of Mexico. He flew alone, guided only by the mysterious instincts implanted in his tiny brain. Sometime this month he will start back again.

The flashy Baltimore Orioles that frequent my feeder now could have gone to Mexico for the winter, too, but for some reason they decided to stick around and give me joy. Was it because the weather was unusually warm, or because I feed them oranges and Concord grape jam? In summer they will hang out in the tops of the

trees, whistling while they cull the neighborhood populations of beetles, crickets, grasshoppers, caterpillars, moths, flies and spiders.

The beautiful Eastern Bluebirds that visit daily love the food and water that I provide, but they turned their beaks up at the box I put up for them. When I replanted the house on the edge of the Saint Michael’s garden, they moved right in. I don’t resent the fact that they are finicky about their lodgings, because their color and good humor provide a welcome respite from winter’s grey days.

If from the unimaginable vastness of the universe God has sent these miraculous and fascinating creatures to brighten our lives, why do we ever doubt what He can do?

— Hugh Stevens

Wednesday, February 23 The Rector’s Weekly Epistle Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth and the life." You’ve heard this I’m sure.

But perhaps you’ve wondered, or assumed you knew the answer: "The way to what?" "The truth about what?" "The life of what?"

Jesus is the way, the truth and the life ... of God. Jesus is the way, the road, the path, the channel given by God to God. Jesus is not the "way to heaven," but the "way to the Father."

Jesus is the truth of God. The truth in full. Not a partial, not a piece, not a portion, but the full truth of God poured out in a full human life. The Word made flesh.

Jesus is the life of God. Not just a godly life. Not just a good life. But the Life of God. The life coursing through God's being — the blood in his veins — the active principle, the verb of action and living, the essential name.

At the end of Lent, we will focus on the fact that Jesus went to Jerusalem to die. He could have quit. He could have run. He could have denied his vocation. But instead he went to Jerusalem, which meant arrest, trial, mockery and murder. He went to be pinioned and pierced; to be poured out as a libation for sin; to be the way, truth and life of the God who pours himself out for our needs, not his own strange and awful will.

He was the presence in space and time and stuff of the God who pours himself out for we who would not pour out grace if we could — and could not pour out enough grace if we would — for the sake of the whole world.

Jesus went to Jerusalem for and from his passion for serving us. Yes, Jesus is the way, truth and life of the God who empties himself of power and glory, and even blood on a cross, for the very people who betray, arrest, abandon and ridicule the suffering servant himself.

Oh, God is that good, friends. That good.

God in God's way, in God's truth, and in God's life has given everything for us, to save us from darkness, from shadow, and from our little ways, truths and lives which lead nowhere but the grave.

Doesn't this sound like a good deal? A truly great free-of-charge kind of deal? It is. It is good, and it's why we call this Good News the heart of our life together.

The way to pour out the power of God is on a donkey — not a stallion or warhorse — but a humble donkey, the way we remember Jesus riding into the glory of his passion. The way to pour out the power of God is to live on trial before the world, in front of friends, skeptics and enemies.The way to pour out the power of God is in a true life consecrated and given to the

ownership of God, so that God can pour grace through us. The way that leads to God is the way of emptying ourselves for our neighbor in a God-thirsty world. The truth about God and the life of God is like unto it.

Friends, the primary focus of the Christian should not be his own salvation, but the needs of his neighbor. That's exactly what the self-emptying way, truth and life of God in Christ is all about. Let us pour out everything we have friends, because the grace of God will not run away and never runs out.

— Greg Jones ++++ Thursday, February 25 Forgiveness is Poetry in Any Language In 20-plus years of law practice, I have written these words (or variations thereon) more times than I can count: Plaintiff, for itself and its officers, directors, shareholders, employees, agents, successors and assigns, hereby forever unconditionally discharges and releases Defendant and its officers, directors, shareholders, employees, agents, successors and assigns from any and all claims, demands, actions, and causes of action, whether known or unknown, contingent or absolute, at law or in equity, that Plaintiff now has or may ever have arising out of or relating to any acts or omissions by Defendant occurring at any time on or before the effective date of this release.

Quintessential legal-ese, right? Nope. It’s poetry. Spiritual poetry. A legal Psalm, of sorts.

Let me explain. In legal terms, this is a general release. When a dispute or lawsuit is settled, the Plaintiff often signs a release like this, usually in exchange for a cash settlement payment from the Defendant, to officially extinguish its legal claims against the Defendant. Released claims simply cease to exist, as if they never were, and cannot be revived. A general release like this one not only snuffs out the claims that caused the dispute, but also any other claims stemming from anything that has ever happened before the moment it is signed. It wipes the slate completely clean. It is, in essence, legal absolution (for a price, of course, but absolution nonetheless). It’s the closest you can get, in the legal world at least, to forgiveness.

And that’s what makes it poetry, despite the long-windedness and the clunky jargon. It’s a distillation of the forgiveness and grace God gives to us every day of our lives. I’m struck by this every Sunday, when we use some strikingly similar language to confess and seek forgiveness for our sins against God. We acknowledge sins “known and unknown.” We seek absolution for both acts and omissions, admitting we have sinned “by what we have done, and what we have left undone.” We ask for forgiveness, and God gives it to us. He says, in essence, “I hereby forever unconditionally discharge and release you for your sins.” Our sins are wiped away, as if they never existed, and are gone forever. He wipes the slate clean.

In other words, God gives us a general release. We don’t deserve it, of course. We haven’t made any cash settlement payment, or done anything else to earn or buy God’s forgiveness. But

He gives it anyway, knowing full well that despite our good intentions and best efforts, it’s only a matter of time before we sin again and come back to ask for yet another one. And he’ll give us that one, too, and the next one, and the next one, not because we deserve it but because His compassion, mercy and love are infinite.

I’m reminded forcibly of all of this when I read a legal release. It evokes in me hope and joy and deep gratitude. It prompts anew the wondrous realization I am a child of God, a beneficiary of His unfathomable grace. That dry and cumbersome language somehow creates unimaginable beauty. And isn’t that the very definition of poetry?

— Kristen Lingo +++ George Herbert February 27 In our liturgical calendar February 27 is appointed the day we remember and celebrate the life of George Herbert, a Welsh-born English priest and poet. Though he only lived 39 years (1593-1633), Herbert’s poetry represents some of the most profound examples of 17th century English verse. He was born into a prominent family and became acquainted with King James. So early in his adult life, he pursued the vocation of a public figure and orator, even serving briefly in Parliament from 1624-5. But by his early 30s, he gave up his political career to become a priest in the Church of England and served a small, rural parish St. Andrews Church, Lower Bremerton, Salisbury, where he remained until his untimely death.

“Nothing is little in God’s service,” wrote Herbert, as he reflected on his transition from a prominent politician to a “country parson,” as he called it. In his life and in his writing, Herbert reminds us that everything in daily life, every job, every calling, however great or small, is a means of serving and worshiping God. Four of his poems are contained in our 1982 Hymnal, including the well-known “King of Glory, King of Peace” (382) and “Let all the world in every corner sing” (402/3). His poem on prayer is especially powerful in that it illustrates the various ways we can pray to God—sometimes in softness and peace, sometimes in rage (“reversed thunder”), sometimes in fear, from the deepest places of our selves (“the souls blood”), God’s very “breath” in us!

Prayer, the Church’s banquet, Angels’ age, God’s breath in man returning to his birth The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage, The Christian plummet sounding heaven and earth; Engine against the Almighty, sinner’s tower, Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear, The six days’ world transposing in an hour, A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear.

Softness, and peace, and love, and joy, and bliss, Exalted manna, gladness of the best, Heaven in ordinary, man well-drest, The milky way, the bird of Paradise, Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the souls blood, The land of spices, something understood.

— Jeff Hensley

Saturday, February 27 Collect “Grant, most merciful Lord, to your faithful people pardon and peace, that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve you with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.”

The Quiet Mind How wonderful the thought of a quiet mind. God promises it; He’s the only one able to grant it. And yet it seems so out of reach in today’s world. Look, you’re reading this in email, right?

After sending some other email? If you’re like me, you checked your phone as soon as you woke up, the bright light making you squint, your mind rushing headlong off the cliff of rest into the busyness of the day.

This season of Lent, we are all called to cultivate a quiet mind for some short (or, God willing, long) part of each day. A quiet mind is one goal of this season of self-examination, as we read and meditate on God’s holy Word.

Because, as today’s collect reminds us, the end use of the quiet mind is to serve God. So, a question: When do you achieve a quiet mind? Is it in the outdoors, by the seashore or on a mountain trail? Is it when you are working for others, sorting food for the hungry or knitting shawls for the lonely? Is it in church, maybe those soft moments between Communion and the blessing?

For me, it’s probably all of the above (except the knitting... my mind would not be quiet for that.) But most days, I am not at the beach.

So, I have a trick. I bought it on Amazon. It’s a 10-minute timer, to help me track the passage of time, literally as fine green sand falls through an hourglass. I use it to force myself to sit still, and think on one thing. This Lent, I am using it to help cultivate a quiet(er) mind every morning, so I will have more to give back to our Lord.

What is your practice for quieting your mind? Can you make time for it today?

— Valerie Bauerlein Jackson

Sunday, February 28 Pray Your Way through the Day If you make a habit of saying a little prayer whenever someone irritates you, cuts you off in traffic, or makes life difficult, when someone does you a favor, when you experience great and friendly service, or when something joyful happens to you—you will soon find yourself praying your way through the day.

Try this simple practice and you will be observing the call for greater prayer during the Lenten season. You will also find that this habit makes your life flow smoother, your self more centered, and your Spirit more aware of God’s presence.

— The Rev. David Crabtree +++++ Monday, February 29 Rust Verses Rest “If you rest, you rust,” American fashion designer Oscar de la Renta once declared. I admire you Oscar, but WHAT? I’m trying to be ok with rest. I’m also familiar with the non-stop, cutthroat, constant striving-to-stay-relevant fashion industry. Living in NYC post college, this is my reality. I crave the fast paced work environment. At the office, I feed on the energy of those working tirelessly around me. Work defines my value. If I don't keep moving up, I’m not worth much. But to alleviate the stress, I run. I work and I run.

Like a hamster, I run the same Central Park loop every day, again and again.

When I can, I hop on a NC-bound flight to visit family, to sink my toes in grainy beach sand.

Well, actually, before my suitcase even hits the stairs, I am out the door, running. My tight-laced running shoes pound the beach as I decompress. The smell of the salt air barely even hits my nostrils before I’m back in NYC. The thing is, I can't wait to be filled with adrenaline from the frenetic pace with which my life runs. I won’t rust anytime soon, but I don’t feel much either.

Running, moving and staying busy is my mantra. It is also my response to grief after my brother Ben dies. If I’m constantly moving I won't have to endure the loss every minute. I pray with each mile that I can run away from the hurt, confusion and pain. The grief is like a heavy blanket weighing me down. After many months, running becomes too taxing, just one more thing to “do.” I’m told if I want to heal, I must sit with my grief. The sitting makes me squirm, yet I detect a slight softening in my heart and maybe even a little hint of healing.

Now I’m the mother of three girls, and these days I stroll on the beach, still one of my favorite places to unwind. I soak in the multi-colored sky, the variety of birds and the geometric sand patterns. I purposefully make myself slow down and search for Key Hole Olympiads, lumbering turtle tracks and fresh turtle nests.I breathe in the heavy sea air.

I talk to God, wrestle with Him and question Him. I thank Him.

There is a stillness and simplicity to my walk on the beach that makes me smile. I don't run anymore, not only because it hurts my 42-year-old body, but because it doesn't bring me relief like it did when I was young. I grieve for running, yet I now crave rest.

The Bible has many things to say about rest. Although I still swoon over Oscar de la Renta’s flowing evening gowns, Jesus says, “Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

Rest is a gift, not the kiss of death as Oscar suggests or I once believed.

The evolution from frenetic to rest is a process still running it’s course in my life and one that will continue to transform me until my final rest. Rust is for bikes. When I rest in body, mind and spirit not only are my joints happy, but my heart is renewed. No WD-40 needed here!

— Molly Painter ++++ Tuesday, March 1 Let It Go My guess is that any of us who have small children or grandchildren have a love/hate relationship with the movie “Frozen.” I could watch it over and over with my granddaughter Harper, just to see the excitement and wonder in her face. Yet I hate being assaulted by the blue and pink Disney merchandise on every aisle of every retail outlet I frequent. And my precious Harper is no mezzo soprano when she sings the song, “Let It Go.” In spite of all that, “Let It Go” was the first thing that came to my mind when I read today’s Gospel about forgiveness. Jesus calls us to forgive as he has forgiven us. Why is that so hard?

Why do I allow myself from time to time to hold on to a perceived slight, a harsh word, anger or the toxicity of the current political dialogue — who knows?

What I do know — and the lesson I have learned over and over in my life — is that when I “Let It Go” and “Let God,” my world changes. When I focus on doing for others, rather than what may have been done to me, my world changes. The anger and hurt of self-absorption changes to joy. The knowledge that Jesus loves me, despite my human foibles, frees me to reach out, to love and to treasure those around me, regardless of past misunderstandings or differences.

So this Lent, I am taking on the practice to “Let It Go.” God help me rise above the noise of my head and the noise of the airwaves. God help me to “Let It Go,” so I may hear and heed Your voice and Your love, and know how to best live out Your Gospel. Thanks be to God! — Hayden Constance

Wednesday, March 2 The Rector’s Weekly Epistle I used to teach an adult Christian formation program called Disciples of Christ in Community (D.O.C.C.) One of the teaching points of D.O.C.C. is that there is a self-serving motivation at work deep inside the human character called Adikia (“Ah-di-kee-uh.”)

Adikia is a Greek word common to the Bible, and it is often translated as “unrighteousness” or “falseness.” Adikia is similar to the Law of the Jungle which requires that we must kill or be killed. Adikia is similar to that “fight or flight” instinct, the animal motivation to preserve one’s life at any cost. Adikia is quite simply the urge to meet one’s own needs for one’s self.

As Jesus says, “he that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory.” (John 7:18) The whole of Scripture is related to this. From Genesis to Revelation, we see the story told, that we were never intended to have to meet our own needs for ourselves. We were given the world, given divine love, given earthly companionship, given everything — freely, for God’s own sake. We “fell” when we decided we would fend for ourselves, disobeying God’s love, rejecting his promises, serving our own pride instead of his Glory.

Unfortunately, because we have been seeking to fend for ourselves for so long — all our lives and all our human existence — the patterns built around Adikia in the human life run deep. By hunting and gathering our physical and emotional needs for so long, we have formed in our identities layer after layer of habits which are both offensive and defensive.

We have developed personal tools and talents suited to winning friends and influencing people, or coping with our failures to do so.

In most of us, this ends up looking like this: • We seek to accumulate status symbols of wealth, style, power; • We adopt personality traits designed to influence others’ opinions of us; • We gain skill at manipulating others affections and allegiances; • We form friendships of convenience or desperation; • We develop facades and masks which we wear much of the time.

In the field of hunting and gathering for our physical and emotional needs, most of us end up creating an image of our self which we show to the world. Sometimes we fool others; sometimes we even fool ourselves as to who we “really are.” Of course, most of us present an image to the world which is part authentic and part inauthentic. Maybe you know what I mean?

On a deeper level, we also suffer from self-judgment; the loss of self-esteem; loneliness; pride; and a host of other issues based on “how well we fend for ourselves” in this arena of hunting and gathering human need. Because, at the end of the day, no matter how good we get at fending for ourselves, we’ll never actually be able to meet our physical, mental and spiritual needs.

Jesus came to show us, to live it out, and to be the kind of human we were meant to be. We are not supposed to meet our own needs for ourselves, but rather to seek only to love God and other and self. Our purpose is to meet the needs of others by un-self-concerned love, with no expectation of payback. This un-self-serving love is called Agape (“Ah-ga-pay”) and this is the way of Jesus. The idea is that if we live only to love and serve the Lord, we will find ourselves being loved and served also. And, voilá, our true needs will be met.

This Lent, I invite you to consider, as I will, “Which parts of our character are rooted in Adikia?”

How, and in how many ways, do we live lives characterized by worry for self? Additionally, I invite you to join me in considering how we might turn instead to lives characterized by Agape.

Can we seek only to love and serve the Lord — and our neighbors as ourself? We can. But will we?

— Greg Jones +++++ Thursday, March 3 Darkness and Light Worship in the evening has always been especially appealing to me. There’s something about the approaching darkness that makes being in the presence of God, through ancient liturgy, particularly meaningful. Evening Prayer (a combination of the monastic offices for sunset and the end of the day) and Compline are our Prayer Book's primary, exceedingly beautiful evening liturgies.

Darkness is a prominent theme during the seasons of Advent and Lent. The darkness of longing for the coming of the Messiah during Advent gives way to the light that shines in the darkness, at the birth of Jesus. The darkness of Lent, including the darkness of our sinful nature and the end of Christ’s ministry on earth at the crucifixion, is broken by the resurrection. For modern day Christians living in a developed country, literal darkness as understood by the writers of scripture, and even our ancestors of a few generations ago, has lost some significance. Artificial light ensures that our homes, streets, offices and churches never need to be dark. This light, of course, doesn’t shield us from emotional and spiritual darkness.

My life’s most sacred experience took place in a darkened hospital room, with my dear and lovely grandmother, as she passed away. Her last words were “Thank you, Lord. I’m so grateful.” That was light breaking through my darkness.

I began my work as a church organist at the age of 13, and since then, making music each Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday has been part of the liturgical fabric of my life.

The music of Lent is much more introspective than that of the rest of the Church Year. I need that, because I’m not inclined toward introspection as much as I should be. Ash Wednesday calls us to observe a holy Lent through self-examination, prayer, and repentance. It reminds us of our mortality, and the gracious gift of everlasting life. Maundy Thursday immerses us in Jesus’ extraordinary act of humility when he washed his disciples’ feet, and his new commandment, to love one another just as he has loved us.

The Good Friday liturgy carries us to the foot of the cross. We pray for all people everywhere, according to their needs, and adore the Christ who has redeemed the world. Although the hour of this service is noon, the darkness is heavy. But, a journey through this darkness makes the light of Easter Day all the more brilliant.

-Kevin Kerstetter ++++ Friday, March 4 Two Rules: Not Easy To Keep, but Beautiful Lent, like Advent, is a season of anticipation, but the thing that we’re anticipating in Lent is much more complicated than what lies beyond Advent. Easter promises everlasting life, but we first must walk with Jesus through death. We must witness his death and know that we caused it.

That is just not as appealing as coming upon a newborn baby and mother, even if they’re in a dirty stable far from home.

I was going to venture that maybe this is why there are no Countdown to Easter calendars for sale, but then I Googled it and realized that there are, in fact, Countdown to Easter calendars for sale.

Even with its complicated ending, though, there are two awesome things about Lent: (i) it’s all about setting priorities, and (ii) it assumes that we have our priorities out of order. My priorities, especially about faith, are often out of order. I get distracted. I forget. Just one example: I have done Morning Prayer on Tuesdays for seven years, which means I have read through Tuesdays on each of the Daily Office Year One and Daily Office Year Two at least three times over.

And still, we will read a passage, and I’ll look at my morning prayer buddy, and at least one of us will say, “I can’t ever remember reading that before.” We know that can’t be the case, and we’re really trying to pay attention, but it’s happened, and more than once. This is just one of the reasons why we keep meeting.

From those Morning Prayer experiences, I can tell you that there is some confusing, confounding and often hard-to-pronounce stuff in the Bible, but the Lenten Scriptures are so clear, like the Gospel from Mark today.

A scribe asks Jesus what are the most important commandments. First, let us absorb the audacity of that. The scribe, whose job may have been to write down words that people say, says to the Son of Man, “Hey, Jesus. You’re a great communicator, but—wow—you have sooooo many rules. Can you just give it to us in a nutshell?”

And then Jesus, in his great mercy, answers this person—and does it clearly! No parables—just answers!

“The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

It’s Biblical Cliffs Notes!

These two commandments are not easy to keep, but they are so beautiful, and understandable, and presented in rank above everything else. Read them. Write them down. Post them somewhere that you’ll notice them. Thanks be to God for clear priorities and a season of reorientation!

— Anna McLamb +++++ Saturday, March 5 The Holes We Create in the Wilderness She had been asking for months but the request fell under the most used category for third children: maybe later. This did not invoke anger from my youngest but she did stay persistent.

Every two weeks, as I placed the cellophane-wrapped books into my canvas bag, Cheyney would ask, "when do I get my card?" On this rainy day, as I begged her to ride along to her older sister's activity, I bribed her with a trip to the library.

"Can I get my card today?" The answer was finally yes. She gleefully jumped in the car, using the opposite side door as directed by her older sister, without fight or commentary.

As I peeked in the back seat, I noticed she had come prepared. Purse, three lip glosses, a canvas satchel and rain boots. We dropped off her sister and headed to the library. As we parked, she exclaimed, "Wow! We must have a lot of stuff in there."

How could it have been so long? Why do we not come more often? I suppose some people feel that way when they pull into the church parking lot.

We climbed the stairs and waited our turn at the desk. My soon-to-be 8-year-old answered each question: name, address and phone number. The independence and pride were palpable. And then, she stuck her own rectangular yellow card into her purse, returned to the children's section and chose seven books to check-out. A right of passage. A simple joy for a mother to witness.

Why had I put it off?

Often my temptations aren't a devilish voice on a mountain top. Rather they come from lazy passivity. The lack of intention creates a void, one where God and an opportunity for love are ignored. This Lent, look around your wilderness and find the holes you have created. Then act ,and let the light shine in, feeling the warmth of God's love.

— Melanie Jones ++++++ Sunday, March 6

Pottery Holy Trinity, one God Unknowable, unexplainable Children, chocolate — Meta Ellington

Monday, March 7 Tranquilty

by Sue Edmonson "Direct us, we pray, in the way that leads to eternal life, that we may come to appear before you in that place of light where you dwell for ever with your saints." — from the Collect for Monday in the Fourth Week of Lent. +++++

Tuesday, March 8 Among Friends John Greenleaf Whittier was a member of The Religious Society of Friends, often called Quakers. His poem, Eternal Goodness, to me, sums up God's relation to man and man's relation to God. I encourage you to read the entire poem. He also wrote a poem called The Brewing of Soma, from which the words are taken for the hymn "Dear Lord and Father of Mankind." I, too, was reared "among Friends," a birthright member of The Religious Society of Friends. — Charles Stout Excerpts from The Eternal Goodness

by John Greenleaf Whittier Who fathoms the Eternal Thought?

Who talks of scheme and plan?

The Lord is God! He needeth not The poor device of man.

Ye see the curse which overbroods A world of pain and loss; I hear our Lord's beatitudes And prayer upon the cross.

I see the wrong that round me lies, I feel the guilt within; I hear, with groan and travail-cries, The world confess its sin.

Yet, in the maddening maze of things, And tossed by storm and flood, To one fixed trust my spirit clings; I know that God is good!

Not mine to look where cherubim And seraphs may not see, But nothing can be good in Him Which evil is in me.

The wrong that pains my soul below I dare not throne above, I know not of His hate, - I know His goodness and His love.

I long for household voices gone, For vanished smiles I long,

But God hath led my dear ones on, And He can do no wrong.

I know not what the future hath Of marvel or surprise, Assured alone that life and death His mercy underlies.

And so beside the Silent Sea I wait the muffled oar; No harm from Him can come to me On ocean or on shore.

I know not where His islands lift Their fronded palms in air; I only know I cannot drift Beyond His love and care.

O brothers! if my faith is vain, If hopes like these betray, Pray for me that my feet may gain The sure and safer way.

And, thou, O Lord! by whom are seen Thy creatures as they be, Forgive me if too close I lean My human heart on Thee!

Orthodox Prayer O God, Father of all, whose Holy Scriptures have given us a guide for living, we ask that you make us all a part of the Body of Christ so that we may experience a true Communion with you despite all our differences. All this we ask in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Wednesday, March 9 Rector’s Weekly Epistle Heirs Through Hope, Knit Together By God Among the marks of modern times, the blended family is something we hear a good bit about.

A blended family is many things, but usually they are households headed by people who have been married to other people. In a blended family one might find a stepfather and a stepmother, or two half-siblings, an adopted aunt, and three step-brothers. Perhaps one might even include one’s grandfather’s girlfriend. Usually the children of one blended family in fact live in two blended families. This was always the case in my life.

My father’s parent divorced when he was a young boy, and each remarried. My dad’s dad had a second wife and two more children, my half-uncle and half-aunt. My dad’s mom had a second husband, who was married twice before, but whose first wife tragically died in a car accident leaving six children, my three step-aunts and three step-uncles. My dad and his brother were adults when their mother married, but my grandmother adopted some of her stepchildren.

My parents divorced when I was a boy and my dad remarried, having two daughters, my halfsisters. My mom remarried to my stepdad, who had already also been my godfather for many years.

I have known a lifetime of multiple households and families of various blends and I must say as I almost always have: It is a blessing. It is a blessing when people of all degrees of sanguinity overcome estrangement and form household bonds of family. It is a blessing because I believe God favors it. God favors the formation of families, of all kinds and shapes. I really mean that.

It is a shame that all the many people in my family tree got divorced. A crying shame. But it is a blessing that new relationships were found and new forms of family founded out of the pain of broken bonds. It hasn’t been easy, but the many facets of blended family that I’ve always known have been a blessing to me. And so I say that God has blessed us in finding new ways for family bonds to have been created, and here we are thankful for them.

I am also glad that the Bible is itself a collection of many stories of blended families of all kinds.

From Genesis to Jesus we see many stories of different family arrangements within an overall narrative of the People of God, who are nothing more than a grand family of God's adoptees.

As Scripture says we are “heirs through hope” knit together by God. Let us rejoice and give thanks for all our families, in their many forms.

— Greg

Thursday, March 10 The Final Triumph The underlying theme of the lectionary readings for today is about God’s people forgetting His sovereignty and abundant love. More often than I care to admit, I fall into that same mindset, sometimes forgetting just who God is and the perfect sacrifice of Jesus.

The busy activity of each day seems to impose on my thoughts and steal God’s glory, replacing it with a modern “golden calf.” I am left feeling defeated as I try to go it alone, using my own strength and limited wisdom. If I stubbornly remain on that chaotic course, eventually, I will question the purpose of it all.

Scripture tells us that when Jesus was crucified and placed in the tomb of darkness, his disciples and followers felt confused, alone and defeated. What possible good could ever come from his death? What was the purpose of his ministry as the Son of God if he was beaten in such a humiliating, gruesome way fit only for the lowest of criminals? In the heat of fearful uncertainty, they scattered and quickly forgot all Jesus taught them. What they didn’t understand was through this painful defeat, God had forgiven their human frailty.

In our home is a collection of prints by Michael Podesta, a calligraphy artist. Each reveals a beautiful spiritual truth but the most symbolic reminder of God’s mercy and sovereignty is the one that hangs above the rest. It explains in profound simplicity God’s plan not only during the Lenten season but also when I feel overwhelmed by questionable circumstances. It is a picture of a crown of thorns and at its center is written, “There are some defeats more triumphant than victories.”

As we walk in faith to the foot of the cross, let us rejoice and not forget the “marvelous works” and “abundant love” of God our Savior whom we serve. His ways thankfully are not our ways.

His thoughts are not our thoughts. Our joyful reconciliation with the Father came forth from the world’s idea of defeat. Even though it is our nature to strive for immediate victories, may we never forget King Jesus is the final triumph. He broke through the sinful barrier and conquered death for you and me. Hallelujah, Jesus Lives!

— Frances Penick

Friday, March 11 I'm In, Amen!

The simple definition of amen is, “exclamation uttered at the end of a prayer or a hymn, meaning 'so be it,' and used to express agreement or assent.”

A few Sundays ago, at the end of the sermon, Greg closed with “amen” and commented on the pronunciation “ah-men” as opposed to the somewhat Southern pronunciation “a-men.” I smiled to myself as I was reminded of the day when our middle son discovered that what was said at the end of a prayer was “ah-men” and not “I’m in!” To him the words, “I’m in,” had made perfect sense — this was how Christians let Jesus know we were on His team.

At the age of seven, his days were filled with anything and everything that had to do with sports.

He continually listed his favorite teams, planned what sports he would play when he was older, and had an impressive grasp on the odds of his favorite team making the playoffs. So it is not a stretch to understand how easy it was for him to believe that when the congregation ended the prayer by saying, “I’m in,” we were merely confirming that we understood the game plan.

That year, his older brother and I were both participating with the middle school youth group.

He had observed the circle of prayer, or “huddle” many times. When I told our assistant rector and youth director the story, the youth group adopted it! They began to say it together at the end of the group prayers on Sunday evenings, as they consciously affirmed belonging. Later that spring, “I’m in” was the official mantra of the Episcopal youth at the Happenings retreat at Camp Trinity.

Now, I know at St. Michael’s we have a competitive, sports-minded congregation. March Madness is around the corner, and we all lose our heads just a little. My own love of hockey was inspired because of that same child’s enthusiasm.

But don’t we all want to belong to the team he imagined at church, too? A team where the Coach knows what position you should play — even if you don’t? A team where every player gets the same opportunities to score? A team that doesn’t vilify the members of other teams, but showers them with love? And most importantly, a team that doesn’t need to worry over whether or not they will make the playoffs, because the championship — the ultimate prize — has already been won on the cross?

I’m in. Are you?

— Allison Atkinson

Saturday, March 12 Psalm 7, Verse 11 God is my shield and defense; he is the savior of the true in heart.

In today's Gospel lesson (John 7:37-52) Jesus said to the people, "Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water." Many in the crowd felt the power of Jesus' message and believed him to be the Messiah at that moment.

As the psalm says, "he is the savior of the true of heart " Others, such as the Pharisees, reminded these people that Jesus could not be the Messiah as he was from Galilee, not Bethlehem, as the scriptures foretold.

Here the heart and the head were in conflict. Here the living waters of our hearts could be, and can be, still today, blocked by our habits of too much thinking. I ask myself, Where can I see this in my life today?

Do I receive him as the savior of my true heart? Do I receive his living water and then let it flow forth without doubt and without living in, and from, my head?

— Shelia Pueschel

Most Merciful Father, As we make our daily journeys through this Holy Lent, help us to listen with the ears of our hearts, to receive your Word as the living water for which we thirst. Help our unbelief so that we can be witness to others as living water pours forth through our "true" hearts.

Amen.

Sunday, March 13 Where True Joy Can Be Found Lent life offers countless opportunities for joy, and much joy comes when we give ourselves to others. It doesn't cost money. It only takes a little time.

Offer encouragement to the doubting, a word of praise to the insecure, kindness to someone who could use a friend, and a word of thanks to those whose service of others often goes unappreciated.

Give the gift of your attention to someone who simply wants to be noticed. Tell your children stories about people whose values you admire when you gather at mealtime.

Don’t be stingy with your smiles—give them freely to everyone you meet. And most important, give your love to those close to you. Hug them, hold them and tell them what they mean to you.

In this way you open your heart to God and others.

— The Rev. David Crabtree

Monday, March 14 No Matter the Age, the Story Stays the Same Walking past the sign that says “Staff Members Only” is always a thrill. And this was especially so, because my friend was leading me to see and to turn the pages of what is believed to be the oldest Bible in North Carolina.

Known as the Durant Bible, it was printed in London in 1599. A 25-year-old Englishman, George Durant, brought it with him when he arrived in America in 1658. He first settled in Virginia but eventually ended up in Perquimans County.

The Bible had been passed down to him, and he continued to pass it to his descendants until one of them donated it to the North Carolina Historical Society in the mid-1800s. It now resides in the vaults of Wilson Library in the North Carolina Collection at Carolina.

As in many family Bibles, births and deaths are noted on its pages, as well as when the Bible was passed from one family member to another. It shows wear to be sure, though it is remarkably well preserved.

Conservators believe the worn leather is actually the book’s second binding.

As I looked at this amazing artifact I couldn’t help but think back to the duct-taped Bible I saw back in August after the death of our beloved Bill Duff. It wasn’t fancy leather binding, nor was it 400-plus years old, but it was iconic nonetheless.

If you have attended St. Michael’s for any length of time, then you know about Bill. If you’re new, find the tributes to him in the Chronicles of Canterbury from last October and ask anyone about him. We’re glad to share.

Given my opportunity to look at the Durant Bible, I turned to the eighth chapter of John, not because I have a go-to chapter of the Bible, but because I had been reading it the night before, knowing it was one of the readings for today.

The book looked different than a modern Bible, most notably with the tell-tale S’s that look like F’s, and the occasional extra E tacked on to a word. The story, though, had not changed, as Jesus finds the Scribes and Pharisees about to stone a woman who had committed adultery and says to them: “Let him that is among you without sinne, cast the first stone at her.”

So the enduring power of the message really struck me. Think about how different the world of 2016 is from the world of the 17th century. Yet that story resonates with us just as much as I’m sure it did with them.

Look, it's the fifth week of Lent, and we’ve long since blown our Lenten discipline, if we even had one. The least I can do is take my pristine Bible, put it on my nightstand and try to be without "sinne" once in awhile. No guarantee that the North Carolina Collection will ever want it, but maybe I can at least wear out the binding a little bit.

— Will Lingo

Tuesday, March 15 A Constant, Complete Sacrifice It’s hard not to compare my life and the spirit of the season of Lent, which, for me, is sacrifice.

Between graduating from college, giving up soccer — the sport I’ve devoted so much of my heart to — landing a ‘big boy’ job, managing my own finances, and the other fast-paced volcanic turbulence in my life, I am forced into an endless pursuit of maturity and sacrifice.

That pursuit manifests itself in many aspects of my life, but today I recall a statement from my boss: “Be willing to completely sacrifice everything.”

He used these words as a rally cry in front of the entire company. He was fresh off an 80-hour work week that helped us land the business of a huge new client. He hadn’t seen his children in three days, he hadn’t slept much, and he was undoubtedly burned out. For him, that temporary sacrifice ended in a successful business acquisition. But for me, it ignited something within.

His words cast me into a state of reflection. I looked at my life over the past year and wondered how much I had really sacrificed. Had I truly sacrificed at all? Had I soared boldly with faith at my back, into an uncharted venture whose outcome was unclear? Had I been willing to relinquish any part of my life? Really?

These questions challenge me to craft a life I can be proud of. I’ve only just started the journey, and I have no clue how it can be done. How can I, at a raw 23 years of age, grasp the magnitude of true sacrifice?

Immersing myself in the spirit of Lent, I realize that this is no uncharted venture. In fact, true sacrifice is a perpetual way of life for which we, as Christians, constantly strive. It’s an 80-hour work week. It’s a mother and father loving each other for nearly 30 years. It’s raising three rambunctious young boys into solid, grounded, introspective young men. It’s channeling a lifetime of lessons and faith into a new endeavor — step by step, toward the horizon of eternal life in the distance.

I see sacrifice every day. We are called to it at every turn — called to shoulder Jesus’ sacrifice for us. And this Lent I am called to shoulder a sacrifice to myself. I am called to understand His sacrifice and channel it toward my endless pursuit, constantly and completely.

— Davis Griffin

Wednesday, March 16 The Rector’s Weekly Epistle Our Story, Past, Present, Future I was very interested in our Senior Warden’s piece on a 400-year-old Bible he saw in the Rare Books collection of the Wilson Library. The Bible had been brought to North Carolina in the mid-1600s by George Durant — the Father of North Carolina — and was passed down for generations by ancestors of Lindsey Reed, a longtime member of St. Michael’s. When I first saw the title page of the Bible what leapt out at me was the publication date of 1599, 11 years before the King James Version!

The Durant Bible is a copy of that older English translation known as the Geneva Bible. As the name suggests, the Geneva Bible was produced by English reformers living in exile in Switzerland during the reign of Bloody Mary, who had reversed the church reforms made in England after Henry VIII and Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer. Forged under the influence of Calvin, the Geneva Bible would become the favorite translation of English Puritans, and for a century was the most commonly used English version for private use. In many ways the Geneva Bible was the hallmark of the Puritans, and it found its way to the American colonies in the hands of many a Puritan and Presbyterian immigrant to these shores. The fact that George Durant carried a Geneva Bible with him to North Carolina in the latter half of the 1600s, and not a King James, suggests that he harbored Puritan sympathies against the established Anglican views of the proprietors of Virginia, from whence he came.

I have my own family Bible sitting on the shelf in my office. It belonged to my grandfather, and it bears the names of my ancestors going back more than two centuries. When I first began to examine it not long ago, I not only discovered the names of my forebears, but even a lock of someone’s hair: clipped, tied and enshrined within the pages of Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians.

The Bible of course is itself a vast saga involving the names of families and nations going back not centuries but millennia. The key is not only to wonder at the Bible as a historic artifact, but as a source of wisdom regarding our ultimate identity. When we look into the Bible, we are not only looking for a word about God, or a bit of story about the past. We are looking for ourselves, our souls and stories, and how we are intertwined in the vast story and plan of God. — Greg

Thursday, March 17 St. Patrick Matthew 28:16–20 The eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Known to us as “The Great Commission,” Christ charges his disciples with their vocation. This command to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ is a most appropriate Gospel for a day in the Christian calendar that we associate with Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland and one of the most famous missionaries in history. His day is shared by Christians and non-Christians alike as a celebration of Ireland and all that is Irish, but we remember this man as first and foremost a believer and a follower of our Lord and Savior.

Now if you are Welsh or of Welsh heritage as am I, you delight in spreading the news that St. Patrick was actually born in Wales. He was captured at age 16 by pirates, wrapped in chains and spirited off to Ireland to serve as a slave.( I have a Welsh cousin who thinks that this is still the only way that any self-respecting Welshman would travel to the Emerald Isle.) After six years in captivity, he escaped, returned to his family in Wales and became a cleric. He returned to Ireland to spread the Gospel to the northern and western regions of the country and was eventually made a bishop.

As we walk through the last days of this Lenten season, I am struck by two things about this very familiar call by Jesus to go into the world to baptize and teach in his name. First of all, Matthew places this appearance and charge to the disciples after the crucifixion and resurrection. So, when the risen Christ announces that “all authority on Heaven and Earth has been given to me,” he does so with a new credibility, a new standing and an undeniable position in the history of the world.

Secondly, the last line of this passage is probably the most comforting sentence in the Bible for me. “And remember, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Through all of the changes, challenges, and fear that this life and this world can present, there is one constant, one comforting presence, one voice that can guide our way. As Christians, this comfort is always present, but we have to tune in to accept its soothing balm. Jesus’s charge and promise to The Twelve, is his charge and promise to us. Go forth and spread My message to all lands, and I will never leave you.

— John Constance

Friday, March 18 Let's Stick with This Stuff My father sang in the choir at church from September to June. In the summer, his Thursday nights and Sundays were given to work in our avocado grove in California, where we lived. He always told me, as I went to Sunday School, Youth Group and also sang in the choir in high school: “Stick with this stuff, you will need it.”

In the 50 years of our marriage, Bruce and I have “stuck with this stuff!” I say we have been “migrant workers,” as we have lived all over this wonderful country — California, Upstate New York, Texas, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina. As I look back, I see that finding a church family was always one of the very first things we always did when we moved to a new place.

Bruce and I met in college when we both sang in the University choir. I was raised in the Congregational Church, he is a cradle Episcopalian. We have both “stuck with this stuff.” I love to look around during the services here and watch the children with their parents as they are learning the prayers, responses, etc. I think of how all these children’s choirs are instilling words the kids will have deep inside them as the years gather.

As I read the Lectionary for today, I am once again aware of how similar our lives today are to those recorded so long ago! We hear the Prophet Jeremiah feeling that he has been led astray by his Lord. Jeremiah has prophesied as he thought he should, but now he feels betrayed.

“Oh Lord I have become a laughingstock all day long everyone mocks me ... The word of the Lord has become for me a reproach and derision all day long …” We hear today how many people, (who once felt going to church, and taking part there), have decided that they have better things to do on Sunday or other days.

Scholars think Jeremiah was active in about 600 BCE. THINK OF THAT! He was proclaiming his Love for God. and folks were “making him a laughingstock!”

Then, in the Gospel of John, we hear how folks were taking up stones to throw at Jesus: “Jesus replied, ‘ I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these are you going to stone me?’ ” No, they reply it is because you are acting like YOU are God. Scholars are not sure when this Gospel was written (maybe late 80 or 90 CE), but clearly, it was written when their world was in turmoil. Jesus asks them to look at what he is doing….”Aren’t these the works that God does with his own? Believe the works and then you can know that I am in the Father and He is in me.” John introduces the idea that the WORD was made FLESH. Like my Dad said, “There is something to this stuff!”

In all three readings today, we see turmoil, trouble “sticking” with this God stuff. The difficulties that Jeremiah and the author of John write about are deeply disconcerting. These followers of God are not just simply happy and blessed all their days! No, some of their days are “filled with derision and reproach.” The Psalm also affirms this: “In my distress I called upon the Lord; I

cried for help…Then the earth reeled and rocked; the foundations of the mountains trembled and quaked because he was angry.”

But wait! The words also hold hope and support as you stay with them. Jesus goes on “to where John had been baptizing and there many believed in him.” Jeremiah 7-13 ends with “Sing to the Lord.. .for he has delivered the life of the needy from the hands of the evildoers.”

Psalm 18 begins with love and praise for the Lord. This is followed by the very difficult, lonely darkness that the psalmist experiences. The Psalm ends with, “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, o Lord my rock and my redeemer.”

How familiar is all of this to us?

We have very difficult, dark and lonely times. We have the community of St. Michael’s and we have the ROCK of our Lord to call upon each and every day and night!

Let's stick with this stuff, ok?

— Joyce Hunn

Saturday, March 19 The Feast of Saint Joseph The only major Saint to have a feast day during Lent is Joseph, the spouse of Mary, the father of Jesus. Joseph doesn’t get much play in the Gospels, certainly not as much as Mary. While he has a role in the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke, particularly in protecting Jesus and Mary in taking them to Egypt to escape Herod’s slaughter of the innocents, he gets little mentioned in the Gospels after Jesus is 12 years old. And he is nowhere to be found during Jesus’ adult life where Mary has significant roles (e.g., the wedding feast at Cana, the crucifixion).

Tradition has it that Joseph was quite old when he married Mary, possibly to emphasize the miraculous nature of Mary’s virginal conception or perhaps to intimate that Joseph probably died during Jesus’ youth, which might explain why we don’t hear of Joseph during Jesus’ adult life. But there is no firm evidence, either in the Gospels or history, to confirm this tradition.

What we do know of Joseph is that he was a devote Jew, a descendant of David, and a carpenter by trade. Thus, as Joseph the Carpenter, he has become the patron saint of those who work with their hands and who teach others an artisan trade. The Gospels also portray him as a man of compassion, who accepted his God-given responsibility to be the father of Jesus and husband of Mary even at the cost of public ridicule (i.e., marrying a young pregnant girl).

With gentleness and humility, he appears to have gone about his daily responsibilities of being faithful to both his God and his family.

And so we celebrate and remember his witness today as we are grateful for those in our lives who faithfully and humbly provide for their families through the work of their hands.

— Jeff Hensley The Collect for Saint Joseph O God, who from the family of your servant David raised up Joseph to be the guardian of your incarnate Son and the spouse of his virgin mother: Give us grace to imitate his uprightness of life and his obedience to your commands: through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Sunday, March 20 The Windmill I am a fan of old photographs, especially of places I know well. This once powerful windmill stands alone, now, as only only the tower remains. The attached house and blades have long since vanished.

Wind was the sole form of non-horse/ man/beast power in this small village in Suffolk, England. The mill ground grain, but other mills around Europe and America provided irrigation, drainage, sawed lumber, processed spices, dyes and tobacco. Wind powered the ships around the world and made transportation easier.

Wind in the Bible could be hot and blasting if it came from the East. The wind that took away the plague of locusts came from the West. If it came from the North, it was free from humidity, and if came from the South, it was soothing, but it could also sometimes be tempestuous and purifying. Wind can symbolize the judgment of God or the soft breeze of the Holy Spirit.

When I go for long walks in the woods, I love the sound of the wind in the trees, and I think of how the wind brings new smells and sounds to my ears. It adds to the symphony of the sounds of nature, and helps me keep focused on God. What sounds act as reminders of God to you?

— The Rev. Holly M. Gloff

Monday, March 21 On Becoming Real I know you.

When I was little, you were the blond, haloed, blue-eyed miracle worker peering out kindly from the five & dime frame on the wall at Nana’s house.

You watched us from the highest of heights -right there, next to Framed Pope Paul VI and Framed John F. Kennedy.

You were SOMEBODY. Even I could figure that much out.

Then, you were the Sacred Heart of Jesus on the stamp-sized scapular the nuns gave us to wear.

Your hair was dark this time, the look in your eye still loving.

But the heart.

The heart!

Bursting from your chest, glowing, aflame, ringed with thorns.

Terrifying.

Later, perched on the bureau between the Love's Baby Soft, the stacked Beatles 45s, my skate key and butterfly hair clip, You were the Infant of Prague, ruler of our pink and green bedroom.

Covered with tiny polyester, shimmery-lacy vestments, your left hand clutching an orb, Your right held up, two fingers extended in blessing.

Funny hat, though.

A little fancy shmancy for my taste.

At Christmas, you were the plaster of Paris figurine, chipped around the edges but swaddled and ready to begin, Bathed in the light of a 15-watt bulb tucked high in the back of the hay-choked manger scene in the living room.

I am sorry to confess that we often hid you, making Mom crazy.

But no matter where we hid you, you always found us again, didn't you?

All grown up now, I see what they did to you.

The bloodied body, the holes in your hands, your feet, your side.

The ring of thorns now crowning your head, blood mixing with tears, with soured wine A far cry from the swaddled baby, the young, glowing savior ...

You don't make the ultimate sacrifice, pay the highest price and come out of it unchanged.

We have grown together, you and I. You look very real to me now.

Human ... but ... not.

Yes, I know you.

Today, better than I ever have, less than I will tomorrow.

Come, my friend.

Let's grow old together. — Beth Grace

Wednesday, March 23 The Rector’s Weekly Epistle We Did It John tells us that Jesus was flogged. It doesn’t go into great detail, but we can assume that it was a typical flogging. I wasn’t there when they beat my Lord, but history records how the Romans and Jews tortured their people.

In the New Testament, Paul explains how he himself was flogged on five separate occasions, by Jewish authorities, each time receiving 39 blows. Two-thirds of these would be on the back, and a third on the chest. He was beaten with a bundle of leather straps called the ‘Scorpion.’ Paul was also beaten three separate times with rods. And eventually, one day, he was beheaded by the Romans. As a full Roman citizen, he got to die quickly.

We don’t know exactly how Jesus was beaten, but we know that the Romans typically used their most vicious techniques on non-Roman-citizens or lower class folk who were under death sentences. The upper classes would be flogged with nice wooden sticks, but the poor were beaten to within an inch of their lives by metal-tipped scourges. We know Jesus had to carry his cross, or at least the 100-pound cross bar, all around town, until he could carry it no more. And after being nailed to it, he died there after only six hours’ time.

The whole thing must have been horrific.

If you’ve reached a certain age, you, too, have probably seen true horror. You’ve probably felt it in the pit of your gut, the dark power of pure, horrible, hating evil. If you’ve ever been around evil human behavior, you know what it must have been like when the mob tortured and mocked and crucified Jesus.

Yes, relatively normal human beings can get dark, and evil, all too easily. Sunni, Shiite, even Christians from America. We all are capable of horrors. You know that we are. In Europe, America, Asia, Africa, people just like us go from everyday living to everyday murdering in the crack of a whip.

We do this. We go from happy to sad, loving to hating, building to smashing, birthing to murdering, in a snap. This is what we do.

So when people want to know, “Why did Jesus have to die?” When people want to know, “Why did God make Jesus die?”

I say, “We did it.”

God didn’t make it happen, we did. God gave us the perfect expression of himself in human form, for free, and we killed him.

Don’t ask God why Jesus had to die! Ask your brother. Ask your sister. Ask your priest. Ask yourself!

Jesus had to die because we had to kill him. We had to kill him because that’s what we do. The king of the Kingdom of God was destined not by God but by the nature of man to be killed on the altar of human pride. Not because of God’s cruel will to sacrifice an innocent Son, but because of our cruel will to sacrifice God’s love in exchange for our own desires. It is not God’s will, but the pride of man which requires bloody sacrifice.

The sad truth is, Jesus had to die because we had to kill him. God didn’t do it, we did. And what hurts so bad is we did it all on our own. We had to do it because the pride of man will always sacrifice the Love of God. And blood will always flow in our world.

The Good News is that God will always offer himself to us knowing that we will do this to Him, and He’s not counting the cost. God comes to us knowing we will murder Him because God is God, and He knows we can’t come any closer to Him on our own. And because He wants to connect, He bridges the gap.

That’s Grace. That’s Good News. God comes to us anyway.

In the shouting horror of this world we’re ruining, in walks the Lamb.

Which is why Jesus wasn’t bitter and angry when we killed him. He was sad, for us. He was worried, for us. He was prayerful, for us. He was up there, for us. He took our sins, not because God made him do it, but because we put them on Him the way we always do. And He accepted them. He carried them. He redeemed them.

You see, Jesus was one of us. He knew who we were. And He knew we had to do it. We’re why Jesus had to die. We did it. But by it He redeemed us.

— Greg Jones

Thursday, March 24 Look in the Window When I first visited St. Michael's in 1989, I entered the church and the windows drew my eye. There is such beauty and symbolism in each one that it's impossible to look at them and not know that the Holy Spirit empowered the artist and the glass artisans to create them.

On my first Sundays as a visitor, I found myself studying the images, choosing favorites (I love the beehive and the Advent lamb), wondering about the meaning behind each important element.

When I came to work here 20 years later and we began developing new branding for the parish, we looked first at the windows, unique to St. Michael's. We studied the symbolism found within each — using the wonderful book, The Windows of St. Michael's, compiled by Harriett Hill — matching details to the many ministries that grow here. From the nativity and the loaves and fishes, to the crown, the crosses and even the goldfinch, the windows are rich with elements that depict not only the liturgical calendar but the very elements that make up the Christian life.

Today is Maundy Thursday, so I look to this day's window for the story of what's to come.

And there is the rooster, crowing his heart out, warning me to pay attention, not just to the fact that Peter denied Jesus, but that I might, too.

The Maundy Thursday service is foreboding and symbolic. The priests wash our feet just as Jesus did, and soon we find ourselves at the altar, receiving the Eucharist at this, the Last Supper before Jesus' death and resurrection. And after supper, our priests strip the altar of its accoutrements and carefully wash it, then clothe the crosses in veils of black.

And there is the rooster, head lifted, throat full with a new message, that in three days time, all will be well.

— Susan Rountree

Friday, March 25 Moss Feathery and green Minute world of unseen wonder Life-giving patience — Meta Ellington

Saturday, March 26

The Old Rugged Cross "On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross, The emblem of suff’ring and shame, And I love that old cross where the Dearest and Best For a world of lost sinners was slain."

The Old Rugged Cross George Bennard (1873-1958) "Indeed God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order the world might be saved through him." John 3:17 — Photo by Lee Hayden, of the Mirada del Alto, Abiquiu, New Mexico, a chapel and meeting house where the Penitentes of Abiquiu worship quietly among themselves.

Sunday, March 27 The Lord has risen indeed! — Greg Jones