Autumn Time

The leaves are beginning to fall in our yards. Football is on the TV on any given evening. There is a slight dip in the temperature in the evenings as well. We begin our yearly routines as we either take our children back to school or watch as it happens to the kids in the neighborhood. We rake leaves, we put away the lawn chairs and we reminisce. Autumn makes as look back at the year gone by. What do we see? If I might suggest, let us look back with a new lens. Let us see where God was in our midst this past year. Maybe it's been a tough year for you, full of stress or peppered with sadness or grief. Do you see God in the middle of this? It's hard sometimes to envision His presence when it seems there are troubles all around. It's easier to see the blessings, the abundant joy, the glorious mornings and star laden nights when your heart is full. But when your heart is troubled, God seems remote and distant. My mother always reminded me that God doesn't move, we do. I have prayed much harder and listened more intently when my heart is "heavy laden", then when my heart is light. Can you see God-with-us?

Let's welcome the fall weather with a renewed spirit of finding God in our daily lives where ever we may be.

Words to Live and Rhyme By

If you weren't there last Sunday, you missed our talented Pastor recite in rhyme his sermon. It was really well done and with his permission I have included the words. We are so blessed to have such a great guy with us and can even rhyme if given the chance!!

A Sabbath Poem by Jeff May

The summer, she's passing
Church attendance has been lapsing
Now we turn to shorter days
When the boats come off the bays
Time grows weak for sun and leisure,
Is this the end of fun and pleasure?

Refrain:
Perhaps Sabbath is more than just rest
It's time to note that we are blest
God stopped the work that 7th day
To give creation freedom's way
For though we live within sin's bent
We are called and claimed and sent.

Shall we grieve our life hereafter,
Our souls bracing for less laughter?
Turn the page on roasting weiners
Boardwalk vendors, wallet cleaners?
When iPhones no longer capture leisure,
Is this the death of all we treasure?

So note the end of summer's haze
The longer nights, the shorter days
And when our tans begin to fade
Will our hopes too be mislaid?
Shall we all make melancholy
Get back to work, forsake the holy?

Refrain

So let us pause amid our memory,
Turn and think 'bout what we carry
What we've learned about our rest
Look and savor all the best
In rest and joy and friendships true
In all these things we are made new.

So learn this truth on Sabbath-taking
Savor sunset, morning coffee making
Take the time in this vacation
Note the rhythm of creation
Listen close; creator's beat
Love's melody: Oh, so sweet.

Refrain

We say that Sabbath is on Sunday
Like it is only meant for one day
Show up at the holy place
Prayer and Kyrie and grace
Then go in peace and serve the Lord
And all week long faith be ignored

So what if Sabbath is more, and more
Like things that make the heart strings soar
Times that build our hearts as one
To take creation's sacred work begun
You may be bent, but you are holy
Sins forgiven, straightened wholly.

Refrain

It's not so much a day of week
It's time to hear the holy speak
God's gracious gift for weary soul
Restored, renewed, is now made whole
Abundant life is Sabbath's aim
Life in the Spirit, each day's claim.

Where is God in All This?

It is a humid, hot day in ol' NJ. If you live in this neck of the woods, it's to be expected. It is almost never hot and dry. Hazy usually accompanies the hot and humid descriptions. It is usually in these long, uncomfortable, mosquito-laden days, we sit in front of the fan, or if we're lucky the air conditioner and begin to ponder things. Why are we here? What is the meaning of our existence? What was God thinking when he came up with mosquitos?

Unfortunately, I cannot answer a single one of those questions definitively. I've pondered them myself. I've read numerous books looking for answers to those global questions of eternal truths. I've even prayed about them, from time to time. Haven't gotten an answer so far. But this I do know, God is IN all this. The Almighty is not a puppeteer nor an absentee landlord. He doesn't sneer from the lofty majestic heavens and cause some catastrophe to befall humankind. He isn't striking down sinners left and right when things don't go "His" way. That isn't my Heavenly Father! I hope to heavens He isn't yours either! God is with us in all things, no matter the calamities we seem to work ourselves into. He is with the sorrowing widows, the repentant thieves, the confused and bewildered children of his world. We have been given free choice and that comes with great responsibility. And sometimes those choices are so outrageously wrong, we marvel at how someone could come to decide upon them. But our God is right there, smack-dab in the chaos and confusion. In the sick and needy. And even int the hot, sultry mosquito days of summer. God is with us! I can still wonder why he created some of the things He did, but to know he walks beside me as I ponder is worth the discomfort of a few itchy bumps on a summer day.

Saints and Poets

Okay, so I'm having lunch with a friend at a local diner. We're catching up on our lives since the last time we saw each other, about a billion years ago. We're laughing and enjoying each other's company. An elderly gentleman comes into the dining area with a younger woman. He's having trouble walking. He's so thin it looks like the wind would blow him over. He sits and sort of stares out into space as the younger woman (I'm guessing a daughter or niece) asks him questions. His eyes wander around the room, but never stop to really look at anything. I have no idea what their interaction is, they are too far away to hear, but it doesn't appear to be rancorous. He isn't agitated and she isn't either from my observation.

Right before this guy came in, my friend had been talking about white water rafting (the mere thought of it makes me jumpy) and hiking with her family. Spending time with the people she loves most in the world. What a joy it was for her (and for me, too for that matter--spending time with family is my all time favorite pastime). And here's this guy at the diner who doesn't appear to even be cognizant of his surroundings, let alone who is beside him. It made me sad to see him.

But then, my friend reminded me how fortunate we are to be able to walk and talk and observe the things around us! From the noisy blue jay outside the window, to the yellow and black swallowtail butterfly silently fluttering by to the smell of the garden my husband has been tilling, the wonders of the Lord's world is almost too much to bear. As we shuffle from one problem to another, never lifting our eyes to the Creator we miss so much! When was the last time you were truly grateful for the things which happen in the blink of an eye, like the blink of an eye! How could we possibly remember to thank the Almighty for breath? For vision? For the senses we employ every single minute of every single day?In one of my favorite plays, Our Town by Thornton Wilder, Emily, the deceased young lady asks the Stage Manager, "Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?" And the sage Stage Manager replies, "No. Saints and poets maybe--they do some."

Let us either be a saint or a poet today and realize the wonderful life we have before us. Before we cannot comprehend  what we are missing or are too tired to pay attention.

This is My Father's World

This a very personal post from me today. I won't wax eloquent about religion or the religious practices at St. Marks. But I need to write today and this is just pouring out of me, so if it's not to your liking, please read on to something else, I won't mind.

The hymn title above was in my head this morning. I never know why particular hymns suddenly inhabit my brain, but today of all days, I think I know why this one was there. Today is the 25th anniversary of my father's death. I remember parts of the day sometimes with such clarity. Other times, I search to try to remember things about him. I honored my father as the bible tells us. He was a good man, flawed as everyone else, but good in his heart. He could fix just about anything. He loved words so much he did crossword puzzles in ink. He was very intelligent even though he never attended college. Not that college is the mark of intelligence, as I'm sure you'll agree. But his knowledge was wide ranging and far reaching. He liked to laugh. He like to read.  He was happy with a Budweiser beer in one hand and cigarette in the other. He was a dad like all the other dads I knew. Not overly anything--loud or caustic or embarrassing. Of course, we're all embarrassed of our fathers at some point, mostly as teenagers. But I was proud he could do so many things and loved his intelligence and humor.

Our Father in heaven...I'm not afraid of saying that. Some people had awful fathers. Mean guys, bad guys. I get it. I really do. But my father was not a bad thing to be for me. And when we talk about our Father in heaven, it's a good association for me. "This is my Father's world, I rest me in the thought..." My heavenly Father is good as far as I'm concerned because my own Father was good. Loving and caring, a little bit hard to fathom sometimes. Both Fathers are good images for me. I would hope the same would be true for everyone, but I know it's not. So when Father's Day rolls around, he won't be here again, but my heavenly Father will be (as he is on all other days) and he still "speaks to me everywhere."

And I thank my heavenly Father for the Father on earth who was with me for just a little while.

How To Pray

One of the nice things about our congregation is that we have people who compose prayers to share each Sunday. The stand up and deliver a prayer each week and we say, "Lord, hear our prayer," after each petition. I've always been kind of envious of those who do that. The are really good at sharing their inner most thoughts out loud with us and most times we can relate to the ideas of praying for peace in the world or asking for comfort for the sick. One of the reasons I don't do this, as much as I love to stand up front, is because I don't feel  I have enough reverence about me. I have a tendency to want to make people smile or laugh and the Prayer of the Day is not the time for a punch line, at least that's the way I look at it.

But I was thinking today about the way we do go about praying for things. Anne Lamont says some of her most fervent prayers are simply, "help me, help me, help me!" I imagine a child asking God to help him with the next spelling test or help in removing the splinter in her first finger which is bothering her. I know I have prayed that there be retribution for the guy who zoomed in the non-existent right lane in order to get to the light in front of me and six other cars. What do we think God will do in these instances? Instant gratification I assume. What if instead we prayed for patience or wisdom? What if we asked God to help us understand the actions that seem stupid to us, but maybe under difference circumstances would be perfectly understandable?

So I have decided that even though I will still ask for peace in the world and help for the sick, I will ask God to help me out with the patience thing and the wisdom thing and those grander, nobler goals. I may still ask about the splinters, though. The really are quite bothersome.

The Busyness of Life

I've noticed something lately. We're all very busy. Of course, you've noticed this yourself I'm sure. And it's not a recent development either. We've been busy for some time now. We're running here and there, checking our phones for messages or emails, driving at breakneck speed to get to the store, the gym, soccer practice, little league, piano lessons and don't forget to pick up the card for Mother's Day in between. Busy, busy, busy. It never stops really unless you force the time to stop. Okay, you can't really force time to stop, but you can decide where you will slow down and use the time you have in the ways in which are important to you.

I had decided quite some time ago that Sunday would be the day to stop and slow down for me. I like to go to church and visit my friends there. I like to go to Sunday School for adults and have conversation about things that interest us. I like to come home and leisurely read the paper (including the comics!) with a cup of coffee. I sometimes visit my mother or my daughter. It is my day of rest. Some of us don't have that luxury. Some of us work on the weekends. And too many of us decide that a "day of rest" is antiquated and quaint. But to you I say, everyone needs some time to stop and smell the dandelions. Everyone needs time to sit and stare out the window at nothing in particular with no particular place to go. It doesn't matter if you use this time to meditate or speak with God. It matters that you stop. Because use of quiet, placid time is important for your well-being. Having some "down" time means you pay attention to the things in life that really matter, like the fact that there are dandelions to smell, or a breeze to feel, or white puffy clouds to watch. It means being "present" in the moment and not planning for the future. It means being still and open to the world which is so sumptuously laid out for you.

Try and take some time this week for just sitting still and being. Not plotting and planning for the next moment to come. Just sitting still and being there.

And if you meet God there, well, all the better!