The Light

I am terrified of mice in the house. I mean pee your pants, stand on the kitchen table and scream terrified.  Yep, that’s me in my husband’s illustration of the word fear.

So it’s 2:30 on a dark cold December morning  and I am laying quietly in my bed trying to go back to sleep after putting my 5 year old to sleep in our bed. I am rudely and suddenly awoken by a high pitched squeaking. It sounds close and stuck! My heart starts racing. I sweat through my clothes and it starts to drip down my face. Now we recently got a hamster so my first irrational thought is maybe the hamster escaped through it’s locked cage and made it through our shut door without me noticing. Hmm..that seems plausible. No, it’s got be a mouse. At this point the noise is louder and sounds like two mice fighting.  One thing  important for you to know is that I drink carbonated water. My rational brain clicks on for half a second and says, “Maybe it’s your water.” No gosh dang it rational brain, that is two mice fighting it out in my bedroom. I am now terrified enough that I am willing to ask for help despite the possible consequence. “Isaac, Isaac,” I shout in a loud whisper in order to try and not wake up the five year I just got to sleep.  Finally I awaken my “could sleep through a zombie attack” husband. “Do you hear that.” “Yeah!” “What is it” I screech out. “I don’t know”  he mumbles. Then summoning all of my courage I ask, “Should I turn on the light,” which I can reach without getting on to the floor. I decide to risk it. Blink, the light comes on. Guess what is not there? That’s right two sword fighting mice. What is there is my water tipped over noisily leaking let bits of water and air.

As I turn out the light and take slow deep breaths to calm myself I hear the small sweet voice of the Holy Spirit. “It was only the very thing you need to live, water, and all you had to do was look at it in the light. Everything seems dangerous in the dark. Let me shine a light on those noises, events, and sights that have your heart racing. Let me show you what they really are. You will have hope, peace, and love in my light.”

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. -Isaiah 9:2

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.- Romans 15:13

Ask yourself today, “What is God asking me to bring into the light?” by Janelle

The Mirror-Living in Community

Kids are often great mirrors. The type of mirror that magnifies every nook and crannie on one's face. The mirror the highlights the flaws that you didn’t see before.

This week at kids fun night I had one of those God inspired, kid driven mirror experiences. It just so happens that the theme for kids fun night this year is community. During the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade night the kids were giving a game to play. It was simple, count as high as you can as a group. The only rule was  only one person can talk at a time and if two or more people talked at one time the counting started all over. As one can imagine the kids started shouting out numbers like popcorn  bursting out of hot oil. At some point two louder voices started counting on their own until a third loud party interrupted and we had to start again. At this point there was a suggestion that we go in a circle. That we each say our number after the person next to us. There was consensus that this plan would work and was the most likely to get us counting higher.

They started out 1, 2, 3,  and then a pause. One little girl needed a second to think through what she was suppose to do. But impatiently another child further down the circle shouts 4 at the same time. We have to start again. A collective “ugh” is heard. Tears burst out of the little girl who was skipped over and the other child claims, “What there was no one talking.” The teacher ask what should we do if there is a pause from one person in our community, someone who needs a second to think. A child shouts, “Kick them out!” My heart sank at the reality of this answer.  “No, no, no,” other children cry “We’ll wait.” The teacher affirms that we should wait for the person. Pointing out when we don’t  wait we hurt others causing damage to the person and the community. At this point the little girl was still very teary and had stepped out of the circle, out of the community, and wasn’t able to rejoin. How often does our impatience, need for comfort, desire to complete a task or difference in understanding get in the way of supporting and loving one another.  It was decided to start again. 1, 2, 3, 4,5...34. We made it around the circle each person doing their part to listen, speak when they were suppose to and we were kind to those next to us, but without a beautiful part of our community.

This for me so clearly illustrates  how we should be living in community. When someone disagrees with us or needs a moment to think, do we by pass them? Do we kick them out for not acting fast enough? Do  we watch as people tearfully remove themselves from community because they were not heard?  I would urge us to wait patiently, to listen and speak carefully, to be kind and generous. To do our part and stay in the circle.

Hebrews 10:25 And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.

John 13:34-35  34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Moving Through the Mourning

We've stepped into this time of mourning over the decision to split made by NWYM. We may even recognize that mourning is necessary to properly heal and move on from a devastating loss. We might even acknowledge that if we don’t allow ourselves to mourn, and give mourning space and time for it to do its healing work, our grief may color any decision we make going forward in ways that we might ultimately regret.

But even if all of that is true, and we agree to give ourselves time to mourn before we try to discern next steps, that doesn’t answer the burning question. "How do we mourn?"(I know some of you probably don’t see that as the burning question. You would lean toward "how do we respond to this?" That may actually be an indicator of the way you are wired to mourn—more on that later."

Dr.s Kenneth Doka and Terry Martin have identified two prominent categories of mourning. As it is in most cases, categories in real life are never nearly as clean as categories in academic theory. It might be more helpful to think of these as two ends of a spectrum with a particular individual's method of mourning falling anywhere along this spectrum.

• Instrumental Mourner—Instrumental mourners tend to process their grief mentally and physically rather than emotionally. In the case of a death in a family, the instrumental mourner would be the one who jumps in to make funeral arrangements and handles all those little details that others find overwhelming. In the case of a terrible tragedy an instrumental mourner might join a group like M.A.D.D., or campaign for a stop sign at the intersection where a fatal accident occurred.

In our situation an instrumental mourner might mourn by analyzing how yearly meeting arrived at the decision it did, or how it might have been handled differently, how we might avoid the same mistake. Or how we should approach a decision making process ourselves.

• Intuitive Mourner—Intuitive mourners tend to process their grief emotionally. They tend to be more comfortable with their emotions and are more sensitive to how they feel and others feel. In the context of a death or tragedy, intuitive mourners are the ones who weep openly and talk candidly about their feelings. To others they may appear to be devastated by the loss.

Along with these two ends of the mourning spectrum, another type of mourning has been identified.

• Dissonant Mourner—Dissonant Mourners tend to hide their feelings to protect whatever public image they want to project. This may be a person who strongly feels the need to vent his/her emotions because nobody else seems so deeply affected. It might also be someone who feels a sense of relief after the death of loved one after a long and agonizing illness. He or she might feel guilty about not being grieved enough.

Dissonant mourners can show up anywhere on the mourning spectrum.

So, if each individual mourns differently, how do we help each other through the mourning process?

• Give each other grace—Remember, everyone mourns differently. It is not uncommon for intuitive mourners to see instrumental mourners as unfeeling or hard hearted. It is also not uncommon for instrumental mourners to see intuitive mourners as weak. Let it be okay that others mourn differently than you do.
• Give yourself grace—Let it be okay that you mourn differently than others.
• Tell stories—Storytelling seems to be one activity that is healing no matter how one mourns. It appeals to the instrumental mourners need to analyze and reflect, while giving intuitive mourners a way to feel and express.

When my family gathered to view my Dad's body before his funeral, we were ushered into a small room to wait while the funeral director set up the casket for viewing. I was leaning against the wall looking out the window. I was caught up in my own thoughts as was everyone else. I happened to reach into my pocket and when I did I felt my pocket knife. The feel of that pocket knife in my hand brought back a flood of memories of my Dad saying things like, “every man should carry a pocket knife. You never know when it will come in handy." And later when I worked for him, him asking me, "where is your pocket knife?" Or saying, "if you had your pocket knife with you, you could fix that problem."
I pulled my knife out of my pocket and held it in my open hand looking at it. This caught my brother's eye. An almost imperceptible smile crossed his face as he reached into his pocket and retrieved a small pocket knife. One of my brothers-in-law whose first job had been working for my dad, pulled out a pocket knife as well. This initiated a time of story telling that allowed us to share our mourning together.

I invite you to share your stories and memories, pleasant or hard, of camp, retreats, summer yearly meeting, shared events with other churches—anything that connects to NWYM—as a way to share our mourning together.

Grief is a part of being human, and mourning is a God-given way to express that grief and share our humanness. Psalm 34:18 promises, "The Lord is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit."  I pray that we not only allow mourning to do its healing in us, but also help us to allow space for God to be present with us.

When Jesus Shows up: 4 stories of Epiphany

Call to Worship for Epiphany

Shine brightly,

star of God,

and guide our wandering world

to where a Prince of Peace is born. 

Where children wish upon a star

or wise men scan the universe in hope 

let your bright beams 

surround their dreams

and guide their hesitating feet

to where a miracle is born.

Enable each of us

to make a New Year’s journey

leaving behind the prejudices and fears

of yester-year,

embracing a fresh openness

by which we welcome all world pilgrims

whose journeys lead to worship and humility. 

Be a sign today

of mercy and of love

like a rainbow in spring

or the bright summer sun,

and show us how our lives

can include the forgotten and forlorn,

   the grieving and the hurt.

And we will offer

to our God

now seen and touched in straw-filled bed

the best gifts in the world:

our joy, our grief, our life.

- David Jenkins

The Epiphany story found in Matthew 2: 1-14 is the story of how God revealed that Jesus came not only for the Jewish people, but for everyone--epiphany does mean manifestation. But in this passage we find 4 epiphany stories not just one. While the Magi are the most prominent characters in the story, there are 4 encounters with Jesus, 4 distinct responses to the encounter, and 4 different outcomes.

Matthew starts out the starts out the passage by establishes distinct parameters for "ownership" of the Messiah. I believe he does this on purpose. He writes:

"After Jesus was born in Bethlehem (means house of bread) in Judea (meaning land belonging to the Jews), during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east (the distant place beyond the borders of Israel where the sun rises) came to Jerusalem. 2 and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews (again, a distinct statement of ownership)? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.’"

The Magi were outsiders. They had no claim on the Messiah, yet they came to see this king being born.Their response was to seek.

That's the first story.

The 2nd story Matthew includes here is the story of Israel's religious leaders. Herod calls them to ask where the child might be found. Here there is a group that shows up and have seen a sign that Israel's messiah had arrived and what is their response? Indifference. The religious leaders provide the information asked for, but then they go about their business without a twitch. If you had been waiting for a messiah for centuries and there was even an outside chance he had arrived, wouldn't you be scrambling to Bethlehem to see for yourself?

That's the 2nd story.

The 3rd story is that of Herod. Like the others, Herod does acknowledge Jesus as a king (the Jewish leaders may not have accepted Jesus as a king, but they did accept the Messiah as one) but Herod sees that king as a threat.  His response it rejection out of fear and self-protection and it reveals the worst version of him.

That's the 3rd story.

The 4th story is that of Mary and Joseph. They may have had some sense of ownership when it came to the messiah; after all, they were Jews, but their response was obedience. They humbly understood that they were stepping into a much larger story even as this king in the form of a child was stepping into their story. All we see in the story is that Joseph has a dream and follows the instructions God gives him without complaint. Mary and Joseph gave up their entire lives and all the expectations that might have gone with them to fill their role  in this unfolding story.

That's the 4th story.

Even though the responses were so different, in many ways the outcomes were very similar. After each of these parties had their encounter with Jesus, their lives were never the same again. This is expressed very well in T.S. Eliot's poem, "The Journey of the Magi."

Journey Of The Magi by T. S. Eliot

'A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.'
And the camels galled, sore-footed,
refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the
terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.

Then the camel men cursing and
grumbling
And running away, and wanting their
liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the
lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns
unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high
prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all
night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears,
saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a
temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of
vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill
beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped in
away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with
vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for
pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so
we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment
too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say)
satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I
remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth,
certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had
seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different;
this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like
Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these
Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old
dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their
gods.
I should be glad of another death.

They journeyed so far to find a king, and ended up in a stable--yet they still felt compelled to fall down  and worship. And then, as Eliot points out, when they found what they found, and understood what they understood, how could they expect to go back to life and have it be the same as it always had been? How can any of us? You can never un-see what you've seen, or un-learn what you have learned.

Do you see yourself in any of these responses? Why are these responses so different?

Have you ever had an encounter with Jesus that made it impossible for you to go back to life as it was--even though you might have wanted to?