a new rhythm of sabbath...

This past year I have tried with spoty success to be more intentional about making space for weekly Sabbath! Pastor and author, Eugene Peterson, once wrote an article titled "Confessions of a Former Sabbath Breaker." Needless to say, I relate! God gave us Sabbath rest for a reason with our best interest in mind. Why is it so easy to neglect obedience to rest?! Anyway, today was the "launch" for a new rhythm and discipline of Sabbath these months ahead before leaving for Argentina early next year.

My church started a new Sunday evening worship service, Grace at Night. So, I am looking forward to attending this evening service and beginning my Sabbath with morning solitude and space for God. Today I kicked things off by going to one of my favorite local places, an outdoor cafe overlooking the Pacific Ocean at the Long Beach Art Museum. I also started reading Mother Teresa's private writings in the new book, Come Be My Light, which has spurred a lot of conversation and debate. After a great morning with God, coffee, and reading....I enjoyed an afternoon phone conversation with a good friend and took it slow. This Sabbath day closed with some meaningful worship and reflection on "Jesus, Light of the World" at Grace at Night!

This new Sabbath rhythm got off to a great start! It was a good day!

Come Be My Light begins with Mother Teresa’s mother’s parting words to her daughter as she left home for India, “Put your hand in His hand, and walk alone with Him. Walk ahead, because if you look back you will go back.” I appreciated reading more on Mother Teresa’s early years of formation and growing into her vocation. Her vocation was the “fruit of her profound relationship with Jesus.” I paid special close attention to the formation process that Mother Teresa went through those early years in the order....Mother Teresa truly walked ahead in spiritual formation and growing into her vocation!

seasons

I know it is a big stretch to say that I experience seasons in Southern California. Here fall means Santa Ana winds and brush fires, while winter means a couple of rain storms if we’re lucky, usually accompanied with mudslides. Spring and summer bring warm and hot temps with some June gloom in between. However, even with my lack of experiencing real seasons, I do feel that my seasonal cycle is a bit out of whack these past two years. Jumping back and forth from Northern to Southern hemispheres (Brasil, Argentina, South Africa) will do that to you, I guess.

All this got me reflecting about seasons and life. Parker Palmer writes a great chapter on the metaphor of seasons in his book, Let Your Life Speak. Palmer prefers the metaphor of seasons of growth, decline, and new life and of comfort and challenge in the cycle of seasons. He shares, “Seasons is a wise metaphor for the movement of life, I think. It suggests that life is neither a battlefield nor a game of chance but something infinitely richer, more promising, more real. The notion that our lives are like the eternal cycle of the seasons does not deny the struggle or joy, the loss of the gain, the darkness or the light, but encourages us to embrace it all -- and to find in all of it opportunities of growth.”

On Autumn, Palmer reflects…. “Autumn is a season of great beauty, but it is also a season of decline: the days grow shorter, the light is suffused, and summer’s abundance decays toward winters’s death. Faced with this inevitable winter, what does nature do in autumn? It scatters the seeds that will bring new growth in the spring – and scatters them with amazing abandon….as I explore autumn’s paradox of dying and seeding, I feel the power of metaphor. In the autumnal events of my own experience, I am easily fixated on surface appearances – on decline of meaning, the decay of relationships, the death of work. And yet if I look more deeply, I may see the myriad possibilities being planted to bear fruit in some season to come.”

Now, since it is spring in Argentina (see Adriana Forcatto’s latest blog post: www.adrianainargentina.blogspot.com)....I’ll share some of Palmer’s reflections on spring for my Southern Hemisphere friends in Argentina, Brasil, and South Africa!

“Though spring begins slowly and tentatively, it grows with a tenacity that never fails to touch me. The smallest and most tender shoots insist on having their way, coming up through ground that looked, only a few weeks earlier, as if it would never grow anything again. The crocuses and snowdrops do not bloom for long. But their mere appearance, however brief, is always a harbinger of hope, and from those small beginnings, hope grows at a geometric rate. The days get longer, the winds get warmer, and the world grows green again. In my own life, as my winters segue into spring, I not only find it hard to cope with mud but hard to credit the small harbingers of larger life to come, hard to hope until the outcome is secure. Spring teaches me to look more carefully for the green stems of possibility: for the intuitive hunch that may turn into a larger insight, for the glance or touch that may thaw a frozen relationship, for the stranger’s act of kindness that makes the world seem hospitable again.

“From autumn’s profligate seedings to the great spring giveaway, nature teaches a steady lesson: if we want to save our lives, we cannot cling to them but must spend them with abandon.”

home

I returned home this week after a great time in Romania and Canada! It was good to be with the WMF community in Galati, Romania. I then flew directly to Toronto to spend some time with my sister, bro-in-law, nieces, and nephew! It was a sweet time full of special memories! Now I am home plowing through my long to do list this month ahead, which includes downsizing and selling stuff in storage, selling more on ebay, lots and lots of reading, studying Spanish, preparing for Argentina.....and enjoying fall activities while I am home like college football, oktoberfest, pumpkin spice lattes, and some first-run television episodes (including The Office tonight!).

some symbols that keep me centered...

Pitcher/Cup...Saucer/Plate

The Pitcher represents God, all He is and all He desires to pour into our life...The Cup represents our life...The Saucer represents our relationships and community...The Plate represents ministry programs and events. The plate sits on the bottom, the saucer in the middle, and the cup is on top.

In this symbol, priority is given to the pitcher-cup relationship between us and God. In John 15:4ff, Jesus teaches his followers to “remain” or “abide” in Him. The Christian life is about first abiding under a steady outpouring of intimacy and relationship with God, so He can then overflow into the saucer of our relationships and plate of ministry. Community and ministry with others must overflow out of the spillage of God’s love and grace experienced in our own lives.

Vine & Branches

"Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing." ~John 15:4-5

I took this picture of the many grapes ready to be harvested in Romania this month.

San Damiano Cross and Bread & Cup

WMF Prayer Rug

The Word Made Flesh community in Romania is making this prayer rug in their chapel. The bags up on top are filled with fabrics from each WMF community around the world.

Candles representing prayers of lament for people living and suffering in poverty around the world.

autumn in toronto...

Just sharing a few pictures from my first few days in Toronto with my sister and her family...

Apple picking with my nieces & nephew

Ashlyn, Aidan, and Alyssa

Downtown Toronto with Donja

grace at night

My church in Seal Beach is kicking off a new Sunday evening service on September 23. I am looking forward to being a part of this worship gathering through the rest of the year before leaving for Argentina! For you fellow Grace'ers here is a blog with more details and updates....http://graceatnight.wordpress.com/

here in toronto

I arrived in Toronto on Monday night after a great week in Galati, Romania with the WMF community there. It was so good to spend time with friends and learn from the many ways God is growing and shaping their community, as they serve and share life together. The week went by way to fast! But, it was super nice to get off the plane in Toronto and be welcomed with sweet hugs from my nieces and nephew! Looking forward to a fun time here with my sister and her family!