Tag: signs

Spring and hope are tight

Spring and hope are tight. I think they go hiking together, kayaking, catch sunrises and sunsets, listen to the birds, share dreams at happy hour. And they reunite this time of year.

If you have any doubt about that, take a walk and look for the first flowers coming through. Look at color coming into the world after a dark winter. Throw on a short-sleeve t-shirt and sit outside in the sun on the first days that break 60 degrees. There is a shift going on. Even if we dive back into a cold snap, the hope is there. It reminds us. And if we make a point to look for it, to notice it, to share it with others, it might even pull us along to show us more of what it has coming up.

I think God is a fan of spring days as well. They are a chance for us to notice purple–hello to Alice Walker–they are a chance to reach us where we are, in the details of our lives and whatever we have going on. We have a Lent small group going right now, reading Frederick Buechner’s “The Magnificent Defeat.” In an essay called “Message in the Stars,” Buechner writes:

“…there is a God right here in the thick of our day-t0-day lives… trying to get messages through our blindness as we move around down here knee-deep in the fragrant muck and misery and marvel of the world. It is not objective proof of God’s existence that we want but, whether we use religious language for it or not, the experience of his presence…

“His message is not written out in starlight… rather it is written out for each of us in the humdrum, helter-skelter events of each day…

“Who knows what he will say to me today or to you today or in the midst of what kind of unlikely moment he will choose to say it. Not knowing is what makes today a holy mystery as every day is a holy mystery.”

In the winter of the year, or in the winter of our souls, it can be tough to remember to look. Spring gives us a taste of warmth, first glimpses of color, a ray of hope.

If I want to see it, I have to look. I have to open my eyes. I have to look at my life and the world around me.

I like that Buechner uses muck, misery, and marvel together. We each get all those things wrapped up and included in this thing called life. Sometimes the marvel comes out of the other two. It’s not always in the places or the times when we expect it.

But that’s the thing about hope–it’s not something we know for sure, it’s something ahead; something we look forward to. And maybe we think, well, sure, sounds nice, but there is no guarantee. And that’s why spring and hope are tight. We don’t have to live for long to know that spring is coming. It’s going to happen. It’s on the way. We’ve lived through winters, we recognize spring, we know what it looks and feels like. We look for the signs.

And so we have color. And so we have warmth. And so we have spring. And so we have hope.

Signs, Spirit, Connections

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Who wouldn’t want more of each of those in their lives? Those are the fruits of the Spirit as Paul describes them in his letter to the Galatians.

April 13-15, Christ Church Easton went to Camp Arrowhead in Lewes, Delaware, for an Alpha Weekend retreat. More than 40 people headed for the woods, the beach, cabins, bonfires, camaraderie, laughter, and discussions in small groups about our own journeys, struggles, questions, and where we are.

This is our third Alpha Retreat in the past year, running the Alpha Course in the spring and the fall, and I have been blown away each time with amazing and honest people and generous spirits. And the deep laughter that comes with spending a weekend with people in cool places, talking about stuff that matters.

When you ask questions like “How does God guide us?” and “How can I make the most out of the rest of my life?” and people get real with their stories and experiences, profound and unexpected things can happen.

It’s often the unscripted time that makes the weekend. Try showing up at a camp with cabins on the water on Friday the 13th and get ready for the Jason stories. Give people a beach, bonfire, marshmallows, hot dogs, and guitars, and you have an instant party. Break bread together on the beach and in the dining hall, gathered to talk and learn about faith, and in my experience, the Holy Spirit is present in those moments, with these people.

Some people think of worship as what happens at a church service. And it is. But worship is also much more than that. The entire weekend was a celebration, worship. Worship can connect us to God, to people, and to nature, creation. And Camp Arrowhead is a setting to allow all those things to happen. On Sunday morning, before breakfast, I wandered the camp, finding Egrets, Great Blue Herons, Cardinals, Blue Jays. I sat down to read and think about Galatians again after Saturday and read in Gary Snyder’s “Turtle Island,” which is a book I almost always carry.

the path is whatever passes–no
end in itself.

the end is,
grace–ease–

healing,
not saving.

singing
the proof

the proof of the power within.

Joining Snyder’s words, the path, the weekend was grace, ease, healing, singing–the proof of the power within.

After breakfast, and our last small group gathering for the weekend, we gather for a worship service proper, a celebration and culmination of the our time together. Jerrett Hansen, our interim pastor who joined us for the weekend points out, “When the church is in its proper place, we don’t have to go through this thing called life alone.”

He talks about the power of simple signs that we can see throughout our lives if we aren’t too busy looking for the big signs.

“We have been given the great gift in our community to be signs to each other.”

This morning (Monday), I woke up thinking about the Saturday night bonfire on the beach; of everyone coming up with the best way to roast marshmallows or hot dogs; the laughter and conversations. And I got this in a daily e-mail of Frederick Buechner’s  writing:

“In the pages of Scripture, fire is holiness, and perhaps never more hauntingly than in the little charcoal fire that Jesus of Nazareth, newly risen from the dead, kindles for cooking his friends’ breakfast on the beach at daybreak.”

And that’s maybe what a weekend like this is about, what a faith community, a church, is all about. During the Easter season, post-Resurrection: being signs to each other; helping one another along the way; staying connected to God, to the Holy Spirit, to each other, through Jesus Christ.