Living in the Everything

Of my life.  Of life itself.

One of my gifts to myself since retirement has been a subscription to the Sunday New York Times.  I sit with coffee and read and read and read on a Sunday morning.  I have a regular process which begins with the front section that I read pretty carefully, then Sunday Styles, Sunday Review, the arts, and the Magazine and the Book Review. 

The front section is full of news of the world and it is alot.  There is so much going on and it is mostly disturbing.  This Sunday:

•  racial conflict in South Africa's wine country,
•  ISIS in te Phillipines,
•   Billions of dollars of tax incentives in NYC for Hudson Yards, 
•  The Migrant family separations go on,
•   the democrats are swerving left. 

 That is just the front page.  Lately I am finding that it  feels like it is too much.  There is greed, corruption, hate, lying.  Throughout the world.  And it is hard to process all of it.  But I know it is not good to live in ignorance.  So I read and wonder about it all.

When I read other parts of the paper - especially the style section, the book review and the arts I am reminded of the creativity and beauty of the world and the people in it.  I find it uplifting.

And my life has so much in it.  I have had a busy weekend: Mary Wood came and spent the night with two students from Burma.  They are all studying together to get a Doctor of Ministry here in the next three years.  Afterward, the two will return to the refugee camp to teach.  They were so inspiring. Saturday we had friends over for fun and games and last night I went to a comedy club with Marnie and Audrey and her friend Morgan.

At the same time, there continue to be the times in my days where again I encounter the empty spaces within me at this new life without Chuck.  I call it the "deep pool of grief" that I carry around within me.

And so I sit this morning and ponder what it is to live in the "Everything" of life:  the good and the bad, the light and the dark, the beauty and the ugliness.  And where is Jesus in this?

It is the second week of Lent and I read this scripture

"Whoever says "I abide in him" ought to walk just as he walked"  (1 John 2:6)

And I continue to work my way through the Richard Rohr book The Universal Christ and read
"We have faith in Christ so that we can have the faith OF Christ."

I remember that Jesus lived in the everything, too.  Right from the beginning.  I am always touched by his birth in the context of the murderous Herod.  The dreams come to Joseph and he departs to Egypt for a time.  And this week in worship, the text was about the temptation of Christ in the wilderness and in the midst of these trials the angels come and minister to Jesus.  There is the everything - the good and the evil, the trials and the celebrations, the love and the hate. 

I am getting ready for a book discussion tonight of Anne Lamott's Almost Everything and find this quote: 
“Light not only warms, of course, but illuminates both things we want to see and don’t want to see.”

So, I guess living in the light means that we see everything - and trusts that evn in the ugly and hateful and empty times, God is doing something to bring life and beauty and healing.  That, I think, is the faith OF Christ.

Here's a prayer that speaks to me this morning

To Know You

O Lord, you have searched me, and known me,
You understand my thought afar off.
You compass my path and my lying down,
and are acquainted with all my ways;
for there is not a word in my tongue, but lo
you know it altogether.

O you who know me so utterly, help me to
know you
a little.

Arthur Stanley Fisher