Everything Is Grace

February 12, 2019

Beloved:

Friends I know are worried and afraid today – for loved ones who are very sick.  Others are sick themselves, and some grieve great loss.  Marriages that are shaking and employment that strips away integrity leave some people exhausted and discouraged.  The weather is terrible and the news is worse.  Is there a good word anywhere?


Everything is grace . . . says Henri Nouwen in his book Spiritual Formation:  Following the Movements of the Spirit.  The movement from resentment to gratitude is a spiritual one, formed in persistently chosen ways of thinking, doing, being.  Resentment is anger grown cold and hard around the heart, a worldview laced with suspicion and sprinkled with despair – while gratitude recognizes grace, even in our most miserable moments.


Were it not for love, would grief be so hard to bear?  That is grace.  Were it not for peace, would violence tear at us so?  That is grace.  Joy and suffering are made of all one thing.  It is grace.  It is grace.  Everything is grace.


For in everything God is with us, and we can know it when we find the inner quiet to be still and live in each moment at a time.  Everything is grace. 

~peace & prayers,
pastor annette