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Beloved:
I was awake at 4:30 this morning, thinking about Jesus as a pre-school teacher. A sleepy toddler on his hip, Jesus wades through the rest of them, giving out snack, re-directing one kid, smoothing another’s hair, all the while keeping up a serious conversation on the differences between a stegosaurus and spinosaurus.* My default image is President of the Universe Jesus, busy with peace and justice, truth and reconciliation. He directs his cabinet, disciplines as he deems necessary, holds back one disaster while releasing another. The joke is on me of course, for imagining the two are somehow different; that working with presidents is more complicated that working with pre-schoolers, that their problems are more serious, that in the eyes of the Divine a president and a pre-schooler are even distinguishable? Put the presidents in the preschool classroom, in little suits and ties of course, and what does Jesus do? Tends the children according to each one’s needs; food, comfort, conversation . . . . . . Of course I have no idea what Jesus does all day. What I know for sure is in the wee hours, when my heart is so sad for another family’s great grief, this picture of Jesus with the toddler on his hip and juice boxes in his hand is an exquisite gift. peace & prayers, ~ pastor annette *Spinosaurus are armoured, with plates and horns. Stegasaurus are not. In case you didn’t know.
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Beloved: Sunday morning around 4 am, the red oak tree fell. “It was like a cannon going off,” said my neighbor who heard it. “We heard crashing and shattering. It scared us to death,” said my daughter and her friend. I didn’t know until morning when I looked out the kitchen windows. A squirrel nest once 30 feet high is now six feet off the ground. She didn’t touch the house or any cars. My rose arbor is gone, along with one boxwood and at least half of one redbud. She didn’t uproot and left neither a hole nor a stump. I felt like I might cry, not for the damage but for the end. Not bitter tears, but rather the kind we cry for ones who have lived long, suffered bravely and given much. Tears of grief and joy and gratitude for the privilege of living in their shadow. As her roots slowly pushed deep and her body grew tall, the world changed rapidly around her. She was born in the forest and died in the suburbs. She was already old when the men and machines came. A woman came too and she decided which trees would remain. She wanted to keep them all , even dug up some of the baby redbuds and moved them to the forest edge. The red oak stayed and watched and was loved by the lady. She put her flower garden half in half out of the oak's shade and planted accordingly. A family came with kids and dogs and sleds much noise. And for six more years she shaded them with grace and dignity. When the wind blew, she sang and danced for them for free. She might have stayed another season or two, but for an ice storm. The ice encased every branch and limb. Her arms were so heavy and so she simply let go of the earth. When she landed the ice exploded and she was free. I like imagining her regret at waking the neighbors. peace & prayers, pastor annette  Beloved: Never does the wind blow hard that I don’t expect the giant red oak tree to finish falling. It leans like an old man’s umbrella caught in a gale. It’s rotting from the inside out, turning to sawdust at the ground. “Them there’s yer termites, mam,” the tree man told me. He looked up a long time, taking measure of the branch span. He walked of the distance, thought some more and said, “Good news is, she’ll miss the house. But you can say good-bye to any vehicles in yer driveway. Them redbuds ‘ll be history too. And that there woodshed.” “What should I do?” I asked. “My uncle has the equipment. We can take ‘er down for ya now or cut it up when she falls. Cuttin’ it up’s the cheaper way to go, ‘cept for the cars of course.” “How long until she falls?” “Awww, now, mam, don’t nobody know that. She could come down with the next big wind or just keep leanin’ a little more every year ‘til the top weight pulls ‘er roots out of the ground. No telling how long that might take.” That conversation was three years ago. I still haven’t decided. She’s beautiful, enormous and old. She gives a meadow’s worth of shade and squirrels nest in her arms. Only when the wind blows hard does the decision seem urgent and then only to me. Left alone, she would have fallen in the forest and been home to beetles and bugs for another twenty years and eventually, the soil into and from which her great-grandchilden take root and rise. As the forest is far wiser than me I’ve decided to let it decide. She’s been grace for bird, beast and me. Mine is to be thankful. peace & prayers, pastor annette  Beloved:
Is there anything less interesting on which to spend a chunk of money than a vacuum cleaner? To fix my old one will cost almost as much as a new one, a dilemma I detest. But tumbleweeds of dog hair are rolling through my house so to the vacuum dealer I must go. In her little book, The Quotidian Mysteries ~ Laundry, Liturgy & Women’s Work, Kathleen Norris compares domestic chores to liturgy, drawing meaning from the repetition. The seeming endlessness of cleaning, cooking, shopping are chores things I usually regard as things to ‘get out of the way.’ Out of the way of what? Other, better uses of my time I suppose. Definitely, watching my daughter cheer and my son swim are more important than doing dishes. Yet, the time (and money!) spent is time well spent, if I am present and grateful. There is so much to be grateful for, including a house to clean and the strength to clean it. Lord, may all the stay-at-home parents and students the plumbers, teachers, doctors drivers, lawyers, librarians and cashiers farmers, social workers, musicians and painters the writers, the jewelers, the carpenters and secretaries put hand and heart and mind to this day’s tasks with a grateful spirit. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen Beloved,
A woman married 63 years took to sleeping in a twin size bed after her husband died. “Trying to fall asleep alone, it’s like half of me is gone. The old bed was too big and too lonely.” I think of her as my own husband packs for 3 weeks in Asia. I’ll miss him bringing me morning coffee and calling me through the day, but mostly at night, alone instead of folded against him beneath the quilt. Every book I pick up lately concerns human aloneness. In The Art of Pilgrimage, Phil Cousineau writes of the inescapable fact that we are all strangers in this world. InCadences of Home Walter Brueggeman reframes our aloneness, as individuals and the the church, as divinely designed and intended - God given for God’s purposes. So God wants us to feel lonely? Maybe. Brueggeman argues that God wants us to know where we truly belong, where our true home is and that what we call loneliness, or aloneness, is simply a homesick soul. The task is learning to live faithfully and usefully in the meantime. Instead of resisting or avoiding the loneliness, we can lean into it and discover its peculiar lessons and joys. We can also, always, be grateful too; for what community we do enjoy here and now. Family, friends, church, art, beauty, prayer; the glimpses and glimmers of our true home beyond the veil of the here and now. I pray this freezy day finds you warm in all things soulful. ~ peace & prayers, pastor annette |
I write a Tuesday morning devotional to members and friends of UBC. It is also posted here.
Enjoy! Pastor Annette Copyright
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July 2022
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