TIME

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TIME … slippery, shiny, rushing, dark, twisted

TIME

a burst of light and … a universe is born … TIME
a world circles a yellow star, light, to dark, to light – TIME

plants grow, fruit ripens … decay – TIME
a babies first step, a grandmothers delight – TIME
work, sleep, work, not enough … time

                     STOP . . .

I want this moment to be
I want to just BE –
I want this moment to last,
let me BE right now,

right here,
not moving …
I scream as —

I slowly fall into the next moment of time

Ruth Jewell, ©September 23, 2012

A Swarm of Angels

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YouTube
On Eagles Wings by Michael Joncas 1979
Sung by Josh Groban

Psalm 91:9-12
9 Because you have made the LORD your refuge,
the Most High your dwelling-place,
10 no evil shall befall you,
no scourge come near your tent.
11 For God will command the angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.
12 On their hands they will bear you up,
so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.

Date: Wednesday August 15, 2012
Time: about 4:30 pm
Place: the office of Dr. Michel X

Dr. X: well, the ultrasound of your left carotid artery shows it is 80 to 90 percent blocked and I really don’t know how you have missed having a massive stroke. I want you in surgery tomorrow, so I am scheduling you for 9 am at ES hospital.

For a week now I’ve been trying to articulate what the events of August 15th -17th have honestly meant to me and with the greatest of difficulties I am writing now. For the last week I have responded to the news of emergency surgery and questions about it with a joke or a laugh as if it was just an everyday occurrence. It wasn’t and I know that. What I do know is for the last 5 to 6 years I have complained of several physical symptoms to a series of medical specialists and none of them correlated the symptoms with a blocked artery in my neck. In the last 5 years I have traveled extensively, had several medical procedures done, including surgeries, actively exercised and I NEVER HAD A STROKE. So what I am trying to understand is why me. What or who kept me protected.

When Dr. X came in to tell me I could go home he said “the blockage was so bad the blood flow in your left eye was reversed, you are so lucky to be alive and not incapacitated by a stroke.” I don’t believe ‘luck’ had anything to do with. I believe someone(s) was watching over me.

The hymn “On Eagles Wing” written by Michael Joncas in 1979 is based on Psalm 91 and Isaiah 40:31 and that hymn and Psalm popped into my head on Thursday morning just before surgery. Ok so you might say, it’s not so unusual for a person well versed in theology to think about a favorite hymn or a comforting piece of scripture in times of stress and maybe your right. Life is often about where you put your trust and the path your thoughts take in times of crises. But I will tell you this that when I let go of my fear and give it to that invisible, but tangible presence, I not only feel protected, I am protected. The trust I place in the Holy Spirit is not the kind of trust that says I’m going to be a millionaire, a celebrity, or live a life of ease. Those are things I might want but not need. The trust I’m talking about is trusting that what I NEED will be there, not what I want. It is also recognizing that what I think I need isn’t always what God thinks I need and that again comes down to the difference between “I want” and “I need.”

God needs me to follow the path laid out by Jesus and that is to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly beside my God. That is my model for living. I must admit I don’t always follow that path. It seems I am always drifting off one side of the path or another and when I reach a fork in the road my ego is strong enough to take the wrong one. Such wanderings do make it difficult on the Holy Spirit in guiding me back to the path, the Great Divine is telling me all along the way back “if you had just gone the way I told you to this would have been a lot easier.” Problem is I’m not a good listener and I have a really poor memory. But, just as many people I do come home to the shelter of those comforting wings eventually, most often in times of trouble. Last week I came home real quick!

I don’t want you to think that simply giving into what I believe God wants will make my, or any, life easy because it won’t. In fact if I really follow the path laid out by Jesus, my life will have a heck of number of pitfalls, road blocks, crises, and just plain hard times. The thing of it is I probably won’t notice those hard times. I will see instead the joy of being a partner in God’s creation, the smiles on the faces of those who never had a friend before, and the satisfaction of knowing that something wrong has been made right. Its knowing life isn’t about me, it’s about being part of the plan, about feeling the presence and hearing a swarm of angel’s wings knowing I am just a small cog in a huge plan to bring everyone under the shelter of those wings.

I am grateful to be here to write this, I pray all of you will feel and hear your own angels as they guide you on your own path. May the grace of God go with you

Ruth Jewell, ©August 22, 2012

The One Body

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Ephesians 4:1-16, 1 Corinthians 12

Last week I received an e-mail, not a strange event in and of itself, but this was a message written to one person who then passed it on to me and a number of others because the sender felt the content was both interesting and important. Has that ever happened to you? Have you ever received an e-mail that has passed around from person to person? I would bet you have! Now just suppose all of the other e-mails sent out were lost and only my message survived. Anyone coming after me and reading my e-mail would think “ah, this is a letter to Ruth, and for that reason my name becomes attached to that e-mail forever. Well that is what most theologians believe happened to the Letter to the Ephesians. It is believed this was a circular letter sent out to many congregations but the only one to survive is the one directed to the congregation in Ephesus.

Now that doesn’t change the fact that what is written Ephesians is any less important, but it does mean every community Paul was writing to was having issues about what it meant to be unified as the body of Christ. It also means this letter has a lot to say to us as Christians in the 21st century about how we are called to be unified as One in the Body of Christ.

I have always loved the idea of being part of a body, a community, and all the metaphors derived from a body image. A number of years ago now I enjoyed a skit, written by one of my former pastors, about the rebellion of body parts. The outline of the skit was the foot became tired of taking orders from the head and quit listening to it, then the hand and the rest of the bodies parts decided that they too weren’t going to listen to the head. Well to make a long story short the body kept falling down, smacking itself about, couldn’t get anywhere and was starving because it couldn’t eat. It wasn’t until all the parts began to listen to the head that the body started going places. Places important, you know like the dinner table or reaching out and helping someone else to their place at the table. Of course we all laughed at such a silly sight and thought how clever our pastor was for writing this play. But the important message wasn’t about how silly the premise was rather it was the message we all need to have a coordinating force in our lives, a message provided by Paul in 1 Corinthians 12 and right here in Ephesians 4:1-16.

In this scripture from Ephesians Paul is pleading, well actually begging us, to lead a worthy life holding each other in unity, with all the love and compassion, strength and gentleness we can create. What my pastor was trying to demonstrate is we can’t do that without Jesus at the head of this gangly entity we call the body of Christ. We as members of this Body are give gifts to use in building up the many parts that comprise our lives together as community, but we can’t use them without each other. Now I know I’m not an actual a foot, nor are any of you real hands of a strange kind of body. But, in a way we are those very parts and Paul identifies how those parts work, in Ephesians 4 and in 1 Corinthians 12.

You know we are fortunate to be have both of these scriptures because the two together call us to use the gifts given to us by the spirit to “equip the saints for their ministry,” live a life worthy of walking in the way of Christ, growing up in the spirit, and no longer being children, but rather mature members of the entire body of Christ. Wow that’s a big job and it would be difficult for any one person to do all of those tasks to keep the body growing. But no one person has to, or is supposed to do it all by themselves. That’s the beauty of being part of the community, the body of Christ, we work together. Paul is telling all of the churches, Ephesus included, and all who have come along since the first century that working together to bring about the Kingdom of God is way more fun and a lot easier than going it alone. If Paul had had a computer he would be sending e-mails like crazy.

Let me read to you a little from 1 Corinthians 12:

“14 Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot were to say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body’, that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear were to say, ‘Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body’, that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 19 If all were a single member, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many members, yet one body. . . .

26 If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. 27 Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 28 And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers;”

Just as in Ephesians 4 Paul identifies the spirit given gifts to those who follow in the path of Jesus. And, each of those gifts together is important for the body to open up the Kingdom of God to the world. We may no longer be able to see the gifts of apostle or prophet among us but we do have evangelists, which we now call missionaries, and they still go out to those who haven’t heard the good news and through the example of their lives demonstrate what it means to be a Christian.

We still have pastors and teacher who work hard, here at home, to teach the gospel story, guide those whose faith are just forming, and try to keep our communities safe places to worship and praise God. I love William Barclay’s description of pastors and teachers found in commentary The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians; Pastors and Teachers . . .

“(are the) shepherd(s) of the flock of God … who bears God’s people on (their) heart(s), who feeds them with the truth, who seeks them when they stray away, and who defends them from all that would hurt their faith. And (that) duty is laid on every Christian that (they) should be … shepherd(s) to all (their) brethren.” (additions in parenthesis are mine)

That is our task, that is our call, does it mean we are all going to do it in the same way, no it doesn’t. Each of us has our own specific job to do amongst the whole body and if we don’t live into the gifts given to us, then whole body suffers. It also means that we together, the people of our local Churches, Regional Churches, the National Churches and the Global Churches must work together to be the Body of Christ in the world today and that includes uniting in spirit with the many other Christian Traditions. It also means welcoming all to our table people from all traditions just as Jesus did when he welcomed all to his table and to do it in joy and laughter, in pain and in sorrow.

In just over a month I will be starting a semester of study at the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey Switzerland. The Ecumenical Institute is the educational arm of the World Council of Churches and I am honored to be chosen for this experience of a of a life time. John and I will be living in community and learning how to joyfully join in celebration and worship with individuals from Christian traditions from all over the world. So you see the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians and Ephesians has a special meaning for me. I am going to put what I’ve learned here in this culture into practice in a new culture.

But none of us has to move as far as John and I are going just to practice Paul’s words or the way of Christ. We do it in our neighborhoods, the communities around us by living and speaking what we believe. Paul says in verses 14-16

14 We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. 15 But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.

It is up to us to show what we are made of, to be the body, to be the movement of wholeness, to do as Jesus would, in our everyday lives. That is all that is asked of us, it seems simple doesn’t it, but it isn’t and we can’t do it alone. We can do it only if we are united in the love of God, Christ, and Spirit; we can do anything when we work together as the one body of Christ.

Ruth Jewell ©August 9, 2012

Promises!

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filled to the brim

Isaiah 43:5a Do not fear, for I am with you

Promises!

The Lord said:
She created me, formed me
Tells me “Don’t fear”
She calls me by name and I am hers
I will not be overwhelmed
I can walk through all dark shadows,
and dangerous paths,
I will not be harmed
She ransomed me, bought me
Rescued me from my enemies
Because, She loves me, . . . ME!
I will not fear because GOD is with me

©Ruth Jewell, June 26, 2012 Continue reading Promises!

June Thoughts

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“And God saw that it was good.”
Genesis 1:18b (NRSV)

June is the month of the summer solstice, Mid-Summer, a time of picnics, camping and celebrations of the earth’s abundance.   But here in Washington it never seems very celebratory to me.  After all we have only just begun having warm weather and I always think it’s unfair that the world is turning to winter before summer even begins.   Here in our beloved northwest summer often comes and goes before we even have warm weather, fall and spring are often non-existent and, winter rains and snow hang on with a vise like grip.  We often seem to be just a little out of synch with the rest of the country; warm when everyone else is cool and way too cool when everyone else is scorching.  What’s worse is if we wait 15 minutes everything will change around us.  What was the creator thinking when She formed the American Northwest? Our changing land and weather must bring great joy and laughter to the Creator.

Yet when the sky clears and the sun shines in a canopy of blinding blue we know the special blessing of our home.   We live in a graced land of diversity.  Mountains so high they have snow on them all year, yet deep within their hearts lies the fire of the planet; ground that seems solid beneath our feet yet can shake like a bowl of jelly turning our world upside down. Inviting looking lakes so cold with water from snow melt you can’t swim in them for very long without protection.  An ocean with depths that hide a treasure of animal life found nowhere else like giant octopus nearly as intelligent as we are and whales and salmon of course, can’t forget the salmon.  So I guess God knew what she was doing when she created the magical land we live in.  Each season whether they be hot or cold, wet or dry, cloudy or blinding sun bright gives character, beauty, challenges, change and balance,  . . . life to the place we call home.

The summer solstice, longest day of the year is a time to enjoy the beauty of life in abundance.  Yet it is also the beginning of shorter days and the slide down to winter rains, and snowy days.  The creator never wants us to be bored; always there is change in the air.  The rich smell of roses will change into the smell of wood smoke on the wind and icy blasts will bring the smell of snow and rain down from the mountains; all to be repeated next year.  Change, is what keeps us alive and on June 20th the Earth will begin again to tip away from the warmth of Mother Sun.  But today celebrate the light, revel in the warmth, for tomorrow change will come, to the mountains, the sea, and the land.  Enjoy today the smell of fresh mown grass and roses and listen to song of the robin and of water falling over rock. Tomorrow will bring more change, so live in the moment, enjoy the now, and wait with breathless anticipation for the change that comes tomorrow.

mid-summer

The smell of roses fill the air
and Iris dance in the twilight
of Mid-summer evening
Children race through
the meadow, rings of daisy’s
crown their heads
Creator smiles
blows blessing on the wind
bringing
forgetfulness
of winter past

Ruth Jewell ©June 2012

Meditation on Luke 24:36-48

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A Sermon Offered to Queen Anne Christian Church, Seattle, WA
April 22, 2012

Luke 24:36-48

36While they were talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 37They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost.38He said to them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?  39Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” 40And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?”  42They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43and he took it and ate in their presence.44Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.” 45Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, 46 and he said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, 47and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.48You are witnesses of these things.

Before I begin this meditation I’d like to ask you to take a journey with me back in time.  Back to that Sunday night, with scared Disciples and experience with them the presence of the risen Christ.

So, get comfortable and close your eyes, . . . take a deep,  slow, breath. Now . . . imagine you are one of the Disciples the evening of the resurrection. . . . The room is small and close, . . . the smell of smoke from the cooking fire and broiled fish fill the room. . . . Everyone in the room is excited, . . . fearful, . . . and joyful . . . but also bewildered at the day’s events.  Everyone is talking at once, . . . each voice getting louder than the next in an attempt to be heard. . . .  When suddenly a voice they know so well says . . . “Peace be with you” and there . . . stands Jesus. . . . Silence

How do feel?

What is going through you mind right now?

After all you all saw Jesus’ body laid in the tomb and on Friday and Saturday you thought your movement was at an end with Jesus’ death. Then this morning Mary and the other women have come and said Jesus is risen from the dead, and Cleopas and his friend have returned from Emmaus saying Jesus broke bread with them.   Now, here in this locked, small, smoky, room Jesus stands in front of you.

And Jesus isn’t just standing there he is walking among you, he’s showing his hands and feet and now he’s sitting down and asking for food to eat.  Jesus, the risen Christ, is eating with you!

Tell me you aren’t amazed, . . . that your eyes aren’t as big as saucers,

That your mouth isn’t on the floor,

That, you aren’t a little afraid of what is to come,

tell me that!  . . .

OK it is time to return and reflect, Slowly open your eyes and take a deep breath, your home now in the 21st century.

You know even 2000 years later this story has the power to shake me up, what about you?  I mean if I were one of the Disciples that Friday would have been the worst day of my life. Terrified, of what has happened I would have been in shock and grief.   Saturday morning reality would have begun to set in, I would be beginning to have some fear for my own skin and start asking the questions of “what do we do now, go home and pick up our lives where they left off, preferably before the Romans and temple authorities come after us?”   I’m mean they aren’t in this small locked room because of a crowd of loyal followers outside, they’re in this room hiding in fear of their lives.

So much has changed for this small band of faithful women and men.  One day they are shouting Hosanna and 6 days later they are grieving for the death of a friend, leader and hoped for Messiah.  That’s a lot to comprehend in such short time. It had barely sunk in that Jesus wasn’t there for them anymore and what kind of danger they were in, only to have this miracle happen!  Jesus is alive and Jesus is telling them they are to be the witnesses that spread the Good News, the Gospel!

Have any of you ever been on this crazy kind of merry-go-round life where everything is going just fine, even extraordinarily fine?  Then the world crashes around you and you have to get your life back on track somehow. So you begin to dig your way out only to have God give you another spin on your wild ride. Has that ever happened to you?  It has to me, that’s for sure. When I read this scripture last week I was reading through the glasses of what I thought my life would be, only to have it turned upside down.

Last October I was so excited about graduating this June and being finished with graduate school.  Looking forward to moving on to new things, spending some down time with my family and working with Laurie and Sandy on some great ideas for education and spiritual formation for Queen Anne and our region.  Wow I thought maybe all this will have some meaning after all.

What was I thinking? I had forgotten that none of what I do in this life is about me, it’s about God!  In November God let me know that I wasn’t in control of this show and to stop thinking I was.

My mother used to have this cute little picture over her bed of a little chipmunk holding a daisy with the caption “Be patient, God’s not finished with me yet,” and now I know what that means.  God is not finished with me yet, I still have work to do and things to learn so God told me, “don’t think you can rest on your laurels, . . . ain’t gonna happen.”

That’s what happened to the Disciple (not that I’m putting myself in the same class as those in the upper room), But they, too, thought everything was going just fine and they would rule the world. Then their world is turned upside down and they thought the end of their ride had come. But God comes along and gives them another spin.  Jesus has risen from the dead to offer new life to old ways of thinking and God says “don’t think you can rest on your laurels, ain’t gonna happen.”

In the three days before the resurrection, days of terror and grief the Disciples had given up, and understandably so.  Now just when they are barely getting their wits back Jesus returns and says “you have more work to do, more things to learn.”  He opens their minds to a new reality and finally they understand what Jesus had been trying telling them for all those years. Now they understood what the women had been talking about … ah … wait a minute . . .what did you say Jesus?  We’re to be witnesses for all of this, your teaching, resurrection, everything! We’re to spread the Good News of the Kingdom, that’s a big job.

And Jesus tells them that yes it’s a big job but He and Abba Father would not give it to them if they couldn’t handle it. And that is the good news for us, God doesn’t give anyone more than they can do, But, God does push us to our limits in order for us to reach our potential as spiritual beings.  All of us are being pushed to look at new ways of worship, thinking, being church, at being faithful to the teaching of Jesus.

Each of us (me included) are being pushed to rethink what it means to be follower, companion, and co-creator with God, and not of God.  If there is anything I’ve learned in seminary it is we aren’t to be passive followers just doing what we are told. Nor are we to put God on shelf and only bring God out on Sunday morning.  We are to work alongside God, Jesus and Holy Spirit, just as the Disciples did so long ago, in order to spread the Good News that Jesus taught.

It is not about us; it is about God, Jesus and Holy Spirit and we are to be witnesses, just like the 12, to all we have experienced as partners and friends of God, not servants.

I do not know where I am headed, I dare say you don’t either, nor do we as Faith Communities know, all we can do is go with Gods flow, which is all God is asking,

We can say no, we won’t go, we won’t work with you, but trust me God is incredibly persistent.  You most likely will come around one way or the other.  God cares too much for us, and for what we have to do, to give up on us.

So don’t be surprised on the day you think you have your life all wrapped up in a nice little bow that God shows up and returns you to the merry-go-round and gives it a mighty spin.

All I can say is just enjoy the ride.

Ruth Jewell, ©April 22, 2012

Writers Block

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I am restless today!  Maybe it’s the sunshine outside calling to me, maybe I’m burnt out with class work and writing papers, or maybe I’ve got to many things on my mind to concentrate.  And, focusing and concentration is what I need to do right now.   Two papers are due for a class on Wednesday and I have put off writing them in some rather inventive ways and some not so inventive.

Going to Church of course is always a great excuse for not writing, so is the fact that I have a cold and therefore out of sorts and of course taking time out to write a blog takes up time.  But my greatest procrastination technique is to pretend I’m meditating.  Who knew how much time the space of silence can fill when I need to write, but can’t.  When I fall asleep during silent prayer I can always say “God knows what my body needs and apparently it was rest.”  And, when I’m caught snoring I have been known to repeat Romans 8:26 “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”  No one believes me of course but it makes me feel better, even if it isn’t what Paul meant.

I often wonder from what depth I drag up the words to put on paper, at other times the lake is way too shallow to allow anything worthwhile from surfacing, and today appears to be one the shallow days.  Did Paul have this problem or did the words always come forth?  From what I’ve read of Paul my guess is he struggled with words as well and just like everyone else who uses WORDS to live by Paul had his good days and bad days.  I think Parker Palmer in the forward to his book The Courage to Teach, (Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2007) says it best; “I doubt that I have ever published a page that has not been refried eight or ten or twelve times.”  Yes writing and re-writing is the primary tool of anyone who creates with words.  My motto is if it’s worth writing, it’s worth writing over and over again and my guess is that’s every writer’s motto.  Right now I’m in sixth rewrite and the whole thing still stinks!

I was hoping that writing an entry for my blog would jog (oooo, that rhymes, good for me!) my creative juices.  But, I still feel restless and just want to run as far from my computer as I can get.  Now what else can I do to procrastinate, ah yes clean my study, straighten my books, pet the dog and play with my parrots.  How about another cup of tea, always good for my cold, or just a glass of cold water anything to lubricate my brain in order to get these stupid papers (oh my, did I just say that?) done.

Ok, let me rethink this paper business.  This is my last academic quarter and I have to admit I am burnt out, so I am going to forgive myself for being a little, well more than a little, bit of a procrastination and just relax.  I know it will come (it always does), so I’m going to and get that third cup of tea take a walk and come back when I feel closer to who I am, and not what I think the professor wants.  See you all later.

Ruth Jewell ©April 2012