Emancipation: A Surrender to God

You may be hearing news covering Juneteenth, yesterday’s celebration of Emancipation Day in 1865. And how about the 72 Philadelphia police officers placed on administrative duty over thousands of discriminatory social media posts? Some of them will lose their jobs. Thank you, Philly, for setting an example. And thanks to Pennsylvania's governor for designating June 19 as a state holiday. We've got so much more to do.

Two years ago I wrote a post rather apropos. In fact, it's the last one I wrote here. (It's a decree of its own sort. Please do read it.) Then this past weekend, I planned to share similar words to embolden men in particular to conduct themselves distinctively from the seeming throngs across our country. The words below come from Rule for a New Brother, first published in the UK in 1973. Let us dream, friends. That is, let’s prayerfully envision...

Human freedom is being threatened more than ever. Set yourself against everything that oppresses people. Free yourself from a world that seeks pleasures and possessions and bring others to share your freedom. Set yourself against everything that makes people slaves, politically, economically, socially. You have nothing to lose. No doubt you will have noticed that humanity’s bondage is to sin, to our short-sighted attachment to ourselves. Through your radical surrender to God you will be freed from this and become a deliverer of other people, a breath of fresh air for those you meet, a servant of all, a source of life, expectation and hope.

Read across the Scriptures and we find Jesus as the sign of Jubilee - the time of the Lord's favor, the day all of Nature is set free! He gives LIFE. As followers of his way, we will be his kind of deliverers! 

Now
In this earth
May the social, political, economic
Fathers and Mothers in our societies 

Begin again to collectively, palpably and
Humbly portray our call to FREEDOM.
We will see the great JUBILEE.

Amen.

In my cup

In My Cup

Earl Grey and later ginger breakfast

but neither was first choice

I only think I have to drink my habit
because it's habit to think it

So I told myself: you'll have the tea

and poured it in a cup of no import

Except my breaking from a norm might be
important as making coffee essential to my morn

Then I let myself think on more
than drink: on death and life because of death

and when it will touch me closer with time
or even too close regardless of time 

How death does not come and go

it's all around and through and
how we might never choose to free
death if it was ours to choose

So I think to myself: I'll make the choosing
into habit when the cup is mine to fill
and I'll choose to drink what's in the cup
when the filling can't be mine

--------------------

I wrote this poem a week ago, when our local community had seen two tragic car accidents in a matter of days.  Dying was on my mind, as well as what we do with our freedom, even in the mundane.  My uncle had also been admitted to the hospital two days before and then lost his fight with cancer the following day.  Three others have died in accidents since.

Life as a fledgling

My four-year-old decided to mimic my journal writing (in my journal).  It was cute, until I told her she had to stop to get ready for school and she threw a fit.  Her desire to be grown up is sometimes so endearing but other times it's maddening.  I have lost count of the moments she's insisted she could do something without help and has hurt herself trying.  I'm glad I am there to pick her up again.

I've realized this is my story, even as an adult.  Now and then, I'll wander just far enough by myself and start to get this idea that I've gained enough insight, strength in the wings, that now I'm ready to fly.  Solo. To handle it all alone and suddenly soar.  Never to return?

I love the book, Are You My Mother?.  That baby bird is  pretty cute. He's determined to find his mother.  I will! he says. I WILL!  He jumps (and falls) out of the tree, wanders among strangers, gets a little confused, and doesn't find his mother.  Something scary swoops in and that scary thing takes him home.  His mother returns and the baby bird thinks he's the one who's found her.  How endearing.  She humors him.  Can beaks smirk? They do in children's stories because I can hear her thoughts, Mm hmm, you sure are smart, little one! You've figured it out all by yourself. Look how far you've come!

In actuality, the bird still hasn't learned to fly.  He's a fledgling.  He may be strong enough to try to fly, even leave the nest for a bit, but his mother's job is not done.

It usually takes something of the scary sort to help me find my way home again.  To remember, even if I know how to fly, that the soaring only comes in surrender.  I yield again to the reality that I can't do it alone, and flying with wings like the eagle only happens when I trust the Wind alone.

No matter how far I have come, I need to let the Wind carry me... and lift me again when I jump and fall. 

Spirit, teach me how to really fly.  Teach me long. 



*Second photo image taken from illustration by P. D. Eastman ©1960

gifts (these and those)

i am trying to wrap my heart round a certain concept. if God is my God, what room is there for concern for things, namely the stuff we buy and give and collect and design and hope to add to our other things?

i am struggling again with the christmastime rule: you give nice things to the ones you love. give me permission to break it! please! such demands make me tense. yet i wrestle just the same and more often with the gifts inside me - they dream of color and shape and design, to furbish, enhance and arrange, using hands and mind to create pleasing spaces and nonessentials. be sure, i've understood the good advice and firm arguments for each conflict. i still find myself here, conflicted.

it is tonight i think i've reached the end of this maze, realizing the end should have been my start. i shall begin with the knowledge - i mean a full grasp - that what lies within me is by God's design of grace. it will be freedom to abide by his rules and pursue the privilege of sharing my gifts. if he chooses to grace me with such opportunity, i pray i will joyously bestow them. whether family, friend, neighbor or stranger, those i love will then possess something of another Rule.

this start is not the desire to gain, achieve, impress, appease. start is in profound thankfulness, revelling in the undeserved and mysterious favor received. this is logic leaving no room for anxiety.

now to wrap up my heart with it. . .
what are you wrapped up in?