Faith is Difficult

perhaps faith
in Sacred Love
in Sacred Presence
even in the reality of Sacred
is so difficult

because all human attempts to explain
the unexplainable
to contain the limitless mystery

are inadequate

no images
no teachings completely work
and we are left with more questions than answers
and with tensions we cannot resolve

and so we are asked to live in ambivalence
faithfully

it is not for the faint of heart
and in the end
all we are left with are those brief
moments when we experience Sacred
and we know

and cling to those faint shards of
certainty
and stumble forward
awkwardly

so awkwardly
(our efforts to reflect our Sacred heritage
being oddly counter productive. The harder we try
the worst we seem to do)

searching for the light
in the gathering
dark

trusting
that Sacred is there
and we will find our way
home

If I Believed

Man, I wonder what my life would look like if I really believed this? How would my life be different if I was not scared, if I really believe that I am fully and totally loved by God?
Nadia Bolz-Weber, Accidental Saints, p.70

what difference would it make?

what difference would it make
if I believed I was loved by the Sacred One

if I believed that one could see me
as I truly am
with all my fears and failures
with all my pretensions
and self-deceptions

with all my flaws

and love me?

what difference would it make
if I believed in Sacred Love so much
that I was secure within myself
and had no need
to hide
to impress
could I
as one who dares
to lean back into the embrace of the divine

be free
to be
me?

would I be truly free
to love
you?

If God Wills

Some people work and become wealthy
Others do the same and remain poor
Marriage fills one with energy,
And other it drains.
Don’t trust ways, they change.
A means flails about like a donkey’s tail.
Always add the gratitude clause
To any sense, if God wills,
Then go….
Rumi, Quoted by Jack Kornfield, “A Path With a Heart” p.33

I’d like to think I have some
vague
clue
about what is going on

I don’t

not even close

why people who are cruel and greedy
and bigoted prosper
I will never understand

why good people suffer
and die
and live in poverty
with their glad and generous hearts
disturbs my soul

but so it is
and so it has been

the Bible is a morass
of contradictions
that can be used to promote
both cruelty and compassion

exclusion and inclusion
blessings and curses

go figure

all I can do
is the best that I can do
all I can do is go deep
not into what are ultimately human words and rules
but into the depths of my soul
where the Sacred lives
and brings alive
my heart
my mind

where Spirit enlivens and informs

all I can do is put one foot in front of the other
live one action at a time
and

say
“if God wills”

Believing the Sacred will honor
and use
my heartfelt
intentions
for
good

Looking for Answers

God never answered Job’s question as to why it is that bad things happen to good people… But my guess is that it was not an answer that Job was really after, not some sort of theological explanation of the problem of suffering, which would have left him wiser than he was before but suffering still. I believe, instead, that what Job was really after was not God’s answer, but God’s presence. And of course that was what Job finally found because the way God entered the world without destroying it was to enter Job’s heart even as from the depths of his heart Job cried out to him. And that is the way he makes himself present to all of us.
Frederick Beuchner
________________________________________________________________

I am always looking for answers
somehow it seems as if I can just understand what is going on
it will make it more palatable.

But it is only when the search for answers
pulls me into Presence
that things change.

it seems that knowing about God
is not nearly as powerful
as knowing God

much as knowing about
friendship or love
does not warm the heart
or brighten one’s eye

nearly as much as
having a friend
or receiving and giving
love

I will never “get” God
I will never have the answers
I will never understand
God
the world
or even myself

But I can find
peace, hope, and even love
as my questions
my confusion
even my pain
stir my soul and open me up
to the Presence
within

One Saturday morning

How
Did the rose
Ever open its heart

And give to this world
All its
Beauty?

It felt the encouragement of light
Against its
Being

Otherwise
We all remain

Too

Frightened
Hafiz
____________________

I sit in my study
the morning is dark
as clouds loom
and the green of the grass
glows eerily in the half light

I sit,
minister
therapist

one whom
many feel (including myself in my more foolish moments)

should have it all
figured
out

but I don’t have it all figured out
I am always in the process of figuring it out
I am always just hanging on
by the very tips of my fingers
hoping against hope
that I will not lose grip
and crash
into some abyss

sometimes it feels as if this should mean
that I should not
be trying to guide others
down a path to wellness

or standing in the “high place”
talking about spiritual things

how presumptuous
how dare I!

but then I realize we are all just hanging on
by our fingertips

Jesus had the temptations
and then
Gethsemane

Peter was not much of a “rock”
Paul had a thorn in the flesh…..
and would cry out

“wretched man that I am, who shall rescue me”…

let’s just say
I have my
Moments

wounded
are we all

not broken
not destroyed
just people in the process of figuring it out
making mistakes along the way
and then,
in the Sacred’s grace full presence

taking one more step
and then another
and another

moving toward the light
hoping to bloom
and give the world
all
our
beauty
or a least a brief glimpse

(so the minister sits in his study
and begins
to
write)