- Council meets today after Church.
- Missions Meeting on Monday October 13th at 6:30pm; via Zoom (please request Zoom Link to join)
- Join Us: A Spaghetti Supper is scheduled for October 18th from 5-7pm
- Next Death Cafes are November 15th and December 13th at 4pm (join us for an informal conversation around death and dying that may include curiosities, living well, and managing grief–we provide the sweetness with snacks and coffee)
- Sunday Discussion Circle with Pastor Charlotte Sunday is on the last Sunday of each month after Church; in person and via Zoom–an open discussion around how our themes and words inspire our way of living and being in the world
- Bible Study with Seth is on the 1st and 3rd Sundays after Church; in person and via Zoom
- Charlotte will be away on Sunday October 26th; Seth will be offering the week’s Reflection (there is no Discussion Circle this month)
Watch the recording HERE. Recording posts after services are complete each Sunday (usually by noon).
It is both a big world and small.
There is both a big Mystery and the small mysteries of every day.
There is both a big sound and a small whisper.
When we are in the presence of angels, there is often a sudden multitude of the heavenly hosts. It is often unbearably loud and unbearably bright. It is almost always scary and followed by the words “fear not”. Fear not.
I was with a colleague this past week and we were pondering if the sound is always there and we can’t hear it. If the bright light is always there and we can’t see it. Do we not notice because our senses are dulled and we need a spiritual experience to awaken our senses to something beyond the ordinary? Is it always there and we just don’t notice it? Are we not fully paying attention?
Maybe it’s a little bit of both? A big sound that is too much for us and a small sound we aren’t listening for….
These are unanswerable Questions. They are part of the Mystery. As seekers, we have questions and we have Mystery. The questing of the mystery opens doors and windows (perhaps our own eyes and ears to sense into “something more”).
Nothing is so simple, maybe especially the complexity of being human. Are we human beings who have spiritual experiences? Are we spiritual beings having a human experience?
Perhaps it is the God-Love, Grace, that connects us and opens our eyes to the world (big and small), to one another (near and far), to the Mystery and the mysteries (be awed and full of wonder each and every day), to grace and Grace itself. Perhaps, often, we aren’t fully paying attention. Perhaps, we aren’t noticing. Perhaps, we are too much in our own heads, in our own busy, and dulling our senses from the incredibility all around us.
It seems so simple. And yet, we continually “get lost”. Perhaps…it isn’t so simple. Maybe simplicity is complex. We are complex and life and living is complex.
Think about places where there are too many cars and there is not enough space for all of them—we get traffic jams. What’s the solution? Create more space, obviously. Widen the road or build a second route. Simple.
Did you know that when we build more roads for the cars, the traffic doesn’t lessen? It actually increases. It gets even more congested. It’s the “car paradox”. Make a bigger road and more people start driving on the road and it’s even more congested than it was with the original traffic problem.
Ever notice that the more we have to make our lives simpler, the more we need to make our lives simpler. Even simpler, ever notice the more we have, the more we want (often disguised as need). The more solutions we have, the more problems we create. The more answers we find, the more questions we have. The more we know, the less we know.
The more obvious or simple it seems, the more complex it actually is.
This is great. It truly is.
Paradox, complexity, and tension holds things together. It’s like the glue on the web of creation and life.
Paradox and complexity holds the tension between human and divine. The tension of living and dying. Of good and bad. Of body and spirit. Of all those seeming opposites that actually connect, unite, and hold.
It is the complexity of life that might be simply stated as: life is terrible and life is good.
Yet, even though we live in a web of the tension of simplicity and complexity, we don’t have to make it complicated. The simplest prayer of remembering is: Thank You.
Gratitude.
Gratitude is the foundations of blessings: of seeing, hearing, and trusting.
Gratitude for where we are and what we have. When we truly appreciate, we tend to where we are and what we have. We care for what we have and we wish it for others. Real wealth is having enough to share. Real gratitude, paradoxically, is giving.
The greatest gift we have been given is the gift of this life, however it unfolds and whatever the aches and pains that come along the way. The paradox is that we know this is such a precious gift and yet we continually forget and complain. We worry about what’s around the corner (scarcity and fear of death) and at the same time pretend it’s all okay (there’s plenty) and ignoring the finite time we have here.
One of the gifts of faith (thank you) is that we believe some sort of an afterlife with a loving and forgiving God (if your belief is different…reflect on the faith of what you believe of the afterlife…it’s likely something not to be truly feared, but a new adventure/journey—simply: change).
We easily despair and do less than what we might with this gift of life. Gratitude reminds us to appreciate and to do our part…to share. While it is the nature of life to be both complex and simple, we don’t have to make it complicated.
We might simply remember that Ultimate Grace is wholeness. To be in wholeness with our lives and the whole of creation. To have gratitude in our blessings. To know that our wealth is what we have to share. To learn who to be in the puzzle of paradox and tension. To keep faith and spirit with an often troublesome body and a troublesome world. To be whole ourselves.
To see both as gifts of Grace to be grateful for. Both the joy and grief. Both the good and terrible. To savor the journey as it comes and goes. To remember the wholeness of living in the now and trusting in what’s to come.
To remember to listen for Grace in our small lives as part of a big Mystery. To listen, even when it is sometimes scary and always more than we can possibly know.
The tension of life, being both spiritual and physical beings, is wholeness. If we believe in nothing else, may we believe in the wholeness of Grace/Universe. May we believe that we are held by the love and wholeness of Grace. May we believe in a Love that opens our eyes to see and our hearts to hear.
Community Church of North Orange & Tully 