He left that place and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. On the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, "Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him. Then Jesus said to them, "Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house." And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief. Then he went about among the villages teaching. He called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He ordered them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics. He said to them, "Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them." So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them. -Mark 6:1-13
Self-Guided Retreat
Jesus sends the disciples out. But they’re amateurs. Peter has not yet said, “You are the Messiah.” They have not yet experienced the Lord’s supper, or the crucifixion, or witnessed the resurrection. They have not yet been anointed by the Holy Spirit.
In today's reading from 2 Corinthians, Paul learns in prayer that God's power is made perfect in his weakness: but he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness." So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)
A life of prayer, too, begins in weakness and ignorance; you never suspect the anguish, sense of loss, the profound changes of heart and mind, the dark nights of the soul, the confusions of power and powerlessness of the soul’s unfolding journey. Like so many of life’s endeavors, if you knew what we were in for, you'd never begin.
Today’s theme presents an argument for daring to find the courage to set forth on the unknown path (Meditation One). Somewhere along the way you might awaken to the immensity of your endeavor (Meditation Two). Finally, you must summon a deeper kind of courage to continue (Meditation Three). The Last Word finds you unexpectedly … soaring. “On the edge”as ever, Suzanne
Meditation One (Introit)
Courage To Begin
All serious daring starts from within.
-Harriet Beecher Stowe 1811-1896
It is very dangerous to go into eternity with possibilities which one has oneself prevented from becoming realities. A possibility is a hint from God. One must follow it. In every man there is latent the highest possibility, one must follow it. If God does not wish it then let him prevent it, but one must not hinder oneself. Trusting to God I have dared, but I was not successful; in that is to be found peace, calm and confidence in God. I have not dared: that is a woeful thought, a torment in eternity.
-Soren Kierkegaard, Journals
1813-1855
Miscellany
One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice-- though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles. "Mend my life!" each voice cried. But you didn't stop. You knew what you had to do, though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations, though their melancholy was terrible. It was already late enough, and a wild night, and the road full of fallen branches and stones. But little by little, as you left their voices behind, the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice which you slowly recognized as your own, that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world, determined to do the only thing you could do-- determined to save the only life you could save.
-Mary Oliver (copied here without permission)
W.W. Denslow, The Cowardly Lion
“Then, if you don’t mind, I’ll go with you,” said the Lion, “for my life is simply unbearable without a bit of courage.”
“You will be very welcome,” answered Dorothy, “for you will help to keep away the other wild beasts. It seems to me they must be more cowardly than you are if they allow you to scare them so easily.”
“They really are,” said the Lion: “but that doesn’t make me any braver, and as long as I know myself to be a coward I shall be unhappy.”
-L. Frank Baum, The Wizard of Oz
1856-1919
I've said before that every craftsman searches for what's not there to practice his craft. A builder looks for the rotten hole where the roof caved in. A water-carrier picks the empty pot. A carpenter stops at the house with no door.
On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside of the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, making up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offence, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return.
-Annie Dillard
from Teaching a Stone to Talk
Meditation Three (Integration) Courage To Continue Christians will not be asked how they began but rather how they finished.St. Paul began badly but finished well.Judas’s beginning was praiseworthy but his end was despicable. Many start the climb but few reach the summit. -St. Jerome c.347-420 Whatever you do you need courage.Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong.There are always difficultiesarising that tempt you into believing your critics are right.To map our a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories but it takes brave men and women to win them. -Ralph Waldo Emerson 1803-1882 The Last Word Come to the edge, he said. They said, We are afraid. Come to the edge, he said. They came. He pushed them… And they flew. -Peter McWilliams 1949-2000
Suzanne's Meditation
Safe Place?
So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. Mark 6:12
It's nice being a stay-at-home Christian. But the privilege of security, of being settled, is almost too much to bear these days. The freedom to live a quiet life in safety, with shelter, food, family and friends, is too obvious a luxury. And to sleep peacefully at night? Surround yourself with beauty? I am privileged to be able to use my gifts to give to others without getting my feet dirty. Besides, at my age and level of decrepitude, if I were out and about I'd be more of a burden than a help. I know that. But I can preach repentance from my little tidy corner. But more important, I can discipline myself to be aware of the suffering of others.
The world comes into my safe space, but at a safe distance via the radio, computer, television. War. Starvation. Atrocities. And refugees fleeing for their lives.
The U.S. Military, NASA, the Office of Homeland Security, the NSA, city planners, climate scientists will all tell you: the current refugee crisis is nothing compared with environmental dislocation to come - within and without national borders. No place will be “safe.”
Jesus called the twelve and sent them out two by two to preach and heal and call others to repentance. They were amateurs at the time. But Jesus sent them anyway, to learn by doing and by failing.
We are amateur human beings. We bumble along generation by generation and sometimes stumble into our humanity. Not by being safe - but by trying to emulate the one who gave his life in compassion. Called. Now.
But I am not unaware that my own "safe" life-style, as "modest" as it appears relative to my surroundings, is a source of the very kind of thing that needs repenting.
When they said, 'Repent, repent, repent' We wondered what they meant.
-Leonard Cohen The Future
-sg
Ezekiel, Unknown Illustrator of Petrus Comestor's Bible Historiale, 1372
He said to me: O mortal, stand up on your feet, and I will speak with you. And when he spoke to me, a spirit entered into me and set me on my feet; and I heard him speaking to me. He said to me, Mortal, I am sending you to the people of Israel, to a nation of rebels who have rebelled against me; they and their ancestors have transgressed against me to this very day. The descendants are impudent and stubborn. I am sending you to them, and you shall say to them, "Thus says the Lord GOD." Whether they hear or refuse to hear (for they are a rebellious house), they shall know that there has been a prophet among them.
