Category: Moon

Tasting

What Does Life Taste Like, Anyway?

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Can We Ever Taste The Trees Up Close,

The Cold Fog,

The Distant Shore,

The Clear Moon?

As God’s Works For Us!

Isaiah 63:7

I will recount the gracious deeds of the Lord, the praiseworthy acts of the Lord, because of all that the Lord has done for us, and the great favour to the house of Israel that he has shown them according to his mercy, according to the abundance of his steadfast love.

1 Peter 2:3

if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.

…

Words of Grace For Today

We can observe 93 billion light years of universe, though we estimate the universe is more than 7 trillion light years huge.

Why did God create all this?

Before creation it was only void, emptiness, and we can anthropomorphize that God easily could have been lonely. But lonely for such small creatures so capable of evil as us? Really!

The earth’s diameter is only about 13 km, and it’s circumference is 40,000 km. In other words from here to the opposite side of the earth is only 13 km, straight down through the core and back up. Or we can travel from here to the opposite side and back in about 40,000 km. That’s only 42 billionths of one light year. In other words we live our whole lives within 42 nano seconds of a light-year.

Why would God create the entire universe, just for us to exist? Or did God? Maybe we were an afterthought, or a mistake, or a side-effect. (The juries would then be out on whether we are a good side-effect or a bad side-effect or even a deadly side-effect.)

Like a medication that tastes bad but is supposed to do us good, except it turns our stomach so that we cannot hold it down: Maybe that is the kind of side-effect we are in God’s plans for the universe?

Except

when we have tasted how marvellously good God is to us, forgiving us, loving us, renewing us, and sending us out with a purpose grand enough to take more than all the life we have to give, then

we, small as we are, can do none other than go out

recounting the gracious acts of God for us,

for us all.

So it is we go out also into this day, whatever it may bring.

Peace

Even When Stumbling

Wednesday, August 9, 2023

Even In The Darkest Times, God Dwells Among Us Providing What We Need.

Psalm 119:165

Great peace have those who love your law; nothing can make them stumble.

Colossians 3:16

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.

Words of Grace For Today

Living

Living fully

Living fully always with thanks

Living fully always with thanks for all God does among us,

Living among us, God chooses to carry us through all life’s challenges.

Living among us is God bringing us gifts beyond our imaginations

Living among us is God healing us of our every ill

Living among us is God sending us out to share

Living among us is God’s Light

Living among us is God

Living among us

Living

…

Loving.

Jail Time

Di-Lithium Time

Monday, August 7, 2023

Jail-Time Allows Only Dreams

of Moonlit Nights,

and Much More

Genesis 39:20-21

And Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined; he remained there in prison. But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love; he gave him favour in the sight of the chief jailer.

Acts of the Apostles 16:25

About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

Words of Grace For Today

After a long, hard time in the roiling heat of the di-lithium chamber of climate change there’s nothing quite like waking up to a cool breeze blowing in off the lake. The fresh clean air, after days of smoke. The slight chill against one’s face. The comfort in the long sleeve shirt and durable jeans, a head and neck covering hat, and rubber boots, all so that one can make the morning hike to the lake shore and up the hill (for aerobic exercise) to the reclaimed oil lease, and back to …

back to what is left

after losing

everything

to lies,

jail-time and

a criminal record for crimes that never happened.

After a long, hard time in the roiling heat of the di-lithium chambers of jail there’s nothing quite like waking up to a free, cool breeze blowing in off the lake.

Seeing the results of one’s own labours to survive one day at a time, and then one season at a time, and then one year at a time, and after 5 years to be able to prepare for the next year’s hard winter, and the next year’s hellishly hot summer. Setting one’s sleep schedule to fit one’s own life instead of a jailer’s schedule. Resting in a bed one has made. Working at a desk that one has made. Knowing that one’s small abode will not get tossed without notice, and without recourse. Eating food that one prepares oneself, food that one’s body tolerates and is nourishing for it. Taking medications that one keeps oneself, at the hour one needs to take them, and always properly in relation to food intake, keeping throat cancer at bay, and not risking the medication ripping a hole in one’s gut. Being able to live a (hopefully safe) distance from actual criminals and unpredictable, violent addicts. Exercising when one chooses, canoeing on the lake when one is able, working and resting as one chooses, reading what and when one chooses, writing and learning as one chooses, exploring the universe (via the Internet).

After a long, hard time in the roiling heat of the di-lithium chambers of hell there’s nothing quite like waking up to the blessed, free, cool breeze blowing in off the lake.

For having learned the hard way (for there is no easy way to learn this) that God is gracious and walks with one,

into and out of every kind of di-lithium chamber the universe can capture one in,

one knows and trusts that every breath, no matter in or out of a di-lithium chamber of any kind, is the most precious gift, a reminder that God gives blessed life

and nothing is more precious,

nor is anything more required

than breath,

and sharing breath with others,

for life to be blessed,

abundant,

and complete.

Sheepish?

Truth Makes Us Sheepish.

Monday, July 24, 2023

Can We Admit

The Dark Would Have Us,

And

That We Want To Live In The Light?

Psalm 23:3

… he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.

John 10:14

I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,

Words of Grace For Today

There’s not much good about being compared to sheep. Oh, the lambs are cute. Getting up every 2 hours through the nights during the months of lambing season is not at all cute. Stubborn rams and ewes are not anywhere near cute. Helpless and dumb flocks are frustratingly exactly not cute.

So with the 23rd Psalm we start today and any good day with an admission that we are pretty dumb when it comes to living in God’s creation. We go on to admit that we need help and protection from the Evil One. While we are at being humble (always a good start) we can confess our sins and total dependence on God for life itself, for every breath.

Sheep-like we are then. Humble we must be.

God, though, does not see us as useless or dumb or helpless. God leads us in the right paths, not so much for our sake, but for God’s. God wants creation to work (whenever and whatever that will be) as God intends it to work.

At the centre of each of our lives is a ‘soul’, the being of being human, conscious and aware of being alive, of value, of time and future and possibility, of love, hope and faith. Too often our souls rot right out from inside us, dripping on the floor like apples gone bad for way too long, stinky, buggy goo all over our lives.

Then God restores our souls, so that we can also be aware of God’s steadfast love, forgiveness, and renewal of life … life that intends us to live to benefit others.

It’s living to benefit only ourselves that rots our souls out of us.

When we are down and out of soul, in the gutters of creation, far from where God would have us live, we may well cry to God for help.

Always God hears our cries. God knows our voices. And God rescues us, yet again, so that we can know God’s voice: Jesus calling us … calling us to come home, and sending us again to go out into the world to give God’s benefits of life to others. Not simply a sending, but a sendoing.

Good hearty soul time it is then, living for other’s benefit, especially for those who do not deserve it at all … which is who we are every time God comes to rescue us, often with the voice, heart, and hands of other people of God.

Lots of people need what God gives. How can we give some of it today? Each day?

Can we humbly accept that we need others to give it to us, as well, on behalf of God?

Distress

& Trouble All This Long Day?

Welcome to the Human Race.

Wednesday, June 21, 2023

Peace,

Even In The Longest Darkness,

Or The Longest Day!

Psalm 25:17

Relieve the troubles of my heart, and bring me out of my distress.

John 16:33

I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world!’

Words of Grace For Today

I’m sure that to the many first century Christians who were persecuted and killed for their faith the statement that ‘Jesus had conquered the world’ rang pretty empty. As it has for so many persecuted Christians since,

Even to this day.

Truer to so many hearts are the Psalmist’s words, “Relieve the troubles of my heart, and bring me out of my distress.” and in the German the translation include, “The anxieties of my heart are great!”

Troubles are one thing that is common to most humans. And the most destructive response is fear run wild become panic.

In panic we are unable to do anything wise.

Thus Jesus’ words are most helpful, “I have said this to you so that you may have peace!”

Peace is the beginning of coping with any situation, even the most dire and even those that are sure to result in great suffering and even our deaths.

Peace.

May it permeate from God’s Spirit to our spirits and into our bones, muscles and minds,

Also this long summer equinox day, with all it’s inevitable troubles.

God’s Face

Shown and Not Hidden

Thursday, June 15, 2023

Even in the Deepest Darkness

and

in the Thickest Fog,

Like This Moon on a Wintry Morning,

God Does Not Hide From Us.

Ezekiel 39:29

… and I will never again hide my face from them, when I pour out my spirit upon the house of Israel, says the Lord God.

Romans 8:16

… it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, ….

Words of Grace For Today

When God shows God’s face …

Ancient times knew that when one saw God’s face, that was the last thing one would see. One died, and quickly.

God visits Moses, calling him to lead God’s people from slavery to freedom. God hides in a burning bush that is not consumed. Moses is convinced it is God.

Moses climbs Mount Sinai and God shows God’s face to Moses giving him the ten commandments, twice since the people have put up a golden calf to worship. Moses has disappeared up the holy mountain. That’s where God is, and surely Moses has seen God and … of course died. So the people move on, insisting Aaron make a godlet for them from their most precious gold. Moses sees this and throws the stone tables of the ten commandments down, breaking them on the rocks. After the people’s sins are dealt with, Moses climbs the mountain again, and chisels a new set of the same ten commandments.

Moses sees God, twice. And Moses’ face shows it: he has turned ashen white from the exposure.

So when God promises to never hide God’s face from the Israelites again, after God returns to them, is that a promise or a threat?

Will the people turn ashed white from the exposure, or die?

Or …

is something else afoot?

Will God show God’s face and bless the people?

When God’s Spirit gives witness, to our spirits (the German translation interprets the genitive ‘our spirits’ as ‘to our spirits’, instead of the English which interprets it ‘with our spirits’, the ‘to’ makes better sense), then we can know that we are God’s children and …

children need not fear seeing their parent, not if the parent is a good parent as God is.

So …

We can give God thanks and praise that God is with us, and does not hide God’s face from us, children of God that we are.

Yearning

Deeply

Thursday, June 1, 2023

Looking Up,

and Seeing

the Star

Above the Setting Moon.

Isaiah 25:8

… he will swallow up death for ever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.

Philippians 3:10-11

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Words of Grace For Today

I want to know …

Such yearning.

Such yearning that changes the taste and scents of each day, each hour, each minute.

I want to know … but what do we want to know?

So much of life is filled with yearning for the comforts (or things towards comforts) and pleasures that this life offers only with such wiffs, and then they are taken from us, often destroying our ability to yearn with clarity for what will bring health and life.

I want to know … Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings.

Now that is something unlike other yearnings, for it is not for comforts or improvements or anything quickly withering into the evening fog. This yearning to know Christ, the power of his resurrection and (then comes the key to it all – the all that is life and death and existence itself) the sharing of Christ’s sufferings.

That is the key to life: to know Christ by sharing in his suffering. His sufferings were unearned, but offered in order that others might live, and live free and abundantly.

This yearning takes us outside ourselves and extends all that we are toward giving to others; giving everything we can to as many other people as we can so that more and more people will know the power of Christ’s resurrection in their own lives (the hope that moves us beyond living waiting for death).

This yearning is to see that God with a word, has wiped away our tears and disgrace, and the tears and disgrace of all people, and replaced it with the joy and thanksgiving of living fuelled by the power of Christ: self-sacrificial, unconditional love for all people.

May that be our days, and this day. Our hours, and this hour.

The Doer

And the Pretenders

Tuesday, May 30, 2023

Who Are We To Say We Make Anything Happen?

God Makes Even the Moonlight

to Have Colour.

Numbers 11:23

The Lord said to Moses, ‘Is the Lord’s power limited? Now you shall see whether my word will come true for you or not.’

Matthew 18:19

Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.

Words of Grace For Today

There is great power that we humans exercise. We make decisions and plans. Then we go about executing them.

Huge holes are dug and parks established in them. Mountains and plains are excavated for minerals, coal and gravel. Skyscrapers are built that reach high into the sky, standing against wind, rain, storm and most everything (but not airplanes crashed into them.)

All that we do makes us feel powerful.

Yet what we do, even if two or three gather in Jesus’ name to agree on what to ask God for, we are not the ones who do it. God is.

We fool ourselves when we think we do anything good that God has not made possible for us to do.

God is the doer.

We are the pretenders and sometimes even stewards, acknowledging that God is in control, and we ‘work’ on God’s behalf.

Were that it were always so … and more so.

Why not today?

To Be

To Be Noticed

Even When One Is

Burdened, Weary, Outcast

Wednesday, May 24, 2023

Will We Notice Those

Living Far Away

In Desolation?

Psalm 142:4

Look on my right hand and see— there is no one who takes notice of me; no refuge remains to me; no one cares for me.

Matthew 11:28

‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

Words of Grace For Today

After the gathered New-Ibler leaders, the complainers, and Julius had waited for what seemed too long a time, Julius continued, “These are our neighbours, even though they are not part of our community. We should provide for them exactly as God has provided for us through our neighbours. Who knows, the New-Iblers may not be able to return to their lands. They may join our community as many others have in the past.” He reminded them that one of them was not born into this community, and two others parents had joined the community.

“Remember, as well,” Julius continued, “that Raili here is the daughter of one of our members who left to marry her mother and live with the New-Iblers. Remember we need to marry outside our community to ensure our children and their children are born healthy.”

He asked them if they should or should not welcome their guests to join them? The intruders agreed, but they reminded Julius that they came representing many who sent them. So they called a community meeting, as difficult as it was to gather all in one spot.

Together they remembered how blessed they were to have each other, and that though it was a difficult time, they had always welcomed people willing to join them, if they agreed to abide by the decisions of the community and it’s recognized leaders.

Up until that point, everyone had expected Julius to act as their leader. Now they heard one person suggest that like Isaacer from years before, they recognize that Julius would lead them. That brought a round of clapping, raising hands, and general low humming of agreement.

Julius agreed on the one condition that at any time he could leave the duties to others, so that he could continue to be a healer to this community and to travel to provide healing to others, and most of all that he could continue to learn, learn, learn.

Julius then reminded them how they were welcomed as the tired and weary by their own community and by others, as so they would strive to welcome all the tired and weary, the healthy and the ill, the sorrowful and the joyful into their midst.

Give Us

A Break

Sunday, May 14, 2023

The Trees May Look Goners,

and the Sky Dark

with a tiny sliver of a moon,

but that Moon Reflects

the Light of the World.

All is not lost or dark.

Daniel 6:19-24

Then, at break of day, the king got up and hurried to the den of lions. When he came near the den where Daniel was, he cried out anxiously to Daniel, ‘O Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you faithfully serve been able to deliver you from the lions?’ Daniel then said to the king, ‘O king, live for ever! My God sent his angel and shut the lions’ mouths so that they would not hurt me, because I was found blameless before him; and also before you, O king, I have done no wrong.’ Then the king was exceedingly glad and commanded that Daniel be taken up out of the den. So Daniel was taken up out of the den, and no kind of harm was found on him, because he had trusted in his God. The king gave a command, and those who had accused Daniel were brought and thrown into the den of lions—they, their children, and their wives. Before they reached the bottom of the den the lions overpowered them and broke all their bones in pieces.

John 10:27-28

My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand.

Words of Grace For Today

“If one is awake at all, one knows that there is more that goes wrong in life than goes right.” So goes the ‘wisdom’ of those who propagate fear in order to control others, whether it’s politicians or just your local neighbourhood kid out to make her way among the other kids.

Jesus knew (it’s not that great a secret) that fear is the deadliest enemy to living a good life, a life abundant and blessed. In so many ways he taught with words, healing, and example how to live free of fear.

Not that living free of fear frees one from what can take life from us, but why help all that evil life-sucking stuff get to us sooner than it may anyway. Let evil have to work the full routine if it’s going to get us.

Now the writer of Daniel took another tack. We like this one. The enemies plot and succeed in getting the king (against his wishes) to throw our good Daniel into the den of lions to be eaten. Gruesome end, to say the least. But then God intervenes and frees Daniel not only from fear but from the beasts that are to be feared. The king celebrates and then deals with those who forced him to toss Daniel to the lions. He has them thrown to the lions and for them and their families there is no rescue. The lions ‘overpowered them and broke all their bones.’ At least we are spared the bloody details.

But that is not how God works, as the mountain of evidence to the contrary shows so well. Evil, whether it is a company of schemers and plotters who would have us thrown to the lions, or the neighbourhood kid out to run the other kids her way, or the politician who would create fear in order to win elections, or the lawyers, judges, ex’s and other criminals (liars they are) who create lies and punishments for obvious lies, – evil seems to win.

Exactly to that appearance Jesus speaks: it is not a win for them. It is a loss. A loss of decency. A loss of good life. A loss of truth. A loss of honour. A loss of blessings. A loss of one’s soul to the Devil. As for us who suffer the evil efforts of others: we win again, not because of what we do or do not do, but because of what God does for us.

God blesses.

God protects us.

God shows us how to live, even when evil seems to conquer all around us, and how to live free of fear and filled with joy.

God shows us how to leave the battle with evil to God’s power, the power of love in weakness, suffering, and even death – to which God responds with eternal life for us.

No one can take from us what God gives us. And that is the win of a lifetime. Greater a win there is not.