Uvalde

Dear Union Family,

We do not know what to say. 

So many words swirl around us.

It is not that there are no theological thoughts or scriptural passages to quote but, in this time, the most healing act may be to stay in our anger and pain. Attempting to move away quickly runs the risk of  failing to let pain do the work of moving us to restorative action.

The murders in Uvalde Elementary School are horrific as is the loss of life in the 213 similar acts of violence in these first 146 days of the year and the hundreds of shootings before—each tearing apart additional lives of parents, siblings, grandparents, spouses, cousins, and friends.  The loss of laughter, hopes, dreams, and moments together is incalculable. We need to express that—to acknowledge the violation of the sanctity of life—to voice that this is utterly wrong and rips us to the core.

How do we talk to our kids about this—our kids who in many instances are already more aware of this harsh reality that we are from years of shooter drills and lock downs in their classrooms?

How do we pray when it feels it is to no avail and prayer itself has entered the political battleground?

We do not know what to say. So many words swirl around us. 

But we do not abandon being present to our kids, holding, feeding, listening, asking what they are feeling, what they are thinking, choosing to live from love not fear. We do not abandon prayer---but we pray for more than comfort and peace.  And we do not pray as a way of diverting attention from institutional evil that perpetuates these deadly acts. Instead, we pray for wisdom and courage to partner with the Spirit to transform our community by tangibly loving our neighbor and working against the fear-based constructs that root identity in guns more than Jesus.

Cole Arthur Riley, author and creator of Black Liturgies, reminds us of Frederick Douglass’ invocation to all of us: “I prayed for 20 years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs.”

We also need to remember we are not alone. To that end, here are a couple of things we can do right now together though a part: 
1) Set a reminder on your phone for 3 pm for the next twenty-one days and, wherever you are, as a community we will pray for government action, for our neighbors and how we are to participate in ending these senseless killings.   

2) Walk or drive around your local schools.  Be mindful of what comes to your attention and how we can respond in countering acts of violence in our communities. 

In this time where the brokenness of an estranged world maybe more present than you remember…

Anger is appropriate—it is a sign of being created in the image of God Who creates life.

Prayer is appropriate—we follow a God who calls us to pray without ceasing.

Action is appropriate—we are called to bear witness to Christ came and lived physically in this world.

Hope is appropriate—the power that raised Jesus from the dead is still transforming lives.

With you in Christ, 

James B and Renée

PS Parents, you have likely received many resources from your kids’ schools but here are a few more that have been referred to us:

• What Remains

• When Bad Things Happen

• Talking to Children About Tragedies & Other News Events

• American Psychological Association: Helping your children manage distress in the aftermath of a shooting

• Anxiety Over School Shootings: Finding proactive ways to deal with worried feelings

Worship in Action

A note from Sharon Mead on celebrating Worship in Action on this Fourth Sunday:

Throughout this week following Easter, I think we often still bask in the joy of the resurrection and Jesus' gift of life and connection to love forever. It's a joyous time. But what’s next after the Easter celebrations are all cleaned up and life moves on? 

Cathy Thwing recently shared a blog post with me from the Transforming Center and I loved this excerpt about Jesus’ post-resurrection priority. His to-do list following the most transforming event in history was pretty simple. Spoiler alert: it's about putting people first. 

"After all Jesus had endured to accomplish victory over death, there were so many things he could have chosen to do in the time between his resurrection and his ascension. He could have hosted a joyous celebration, showed himself (and maybe even gloated a little) to the ones who had humiliated and killed him, or staged a strategic gathering with influencers focused on how he was going to bring in his kingdom. But instead, he initiated a series of private and very personal interactions with his close ones, gently creating space for what they most needed. His people were more important to him than partying, politicking, or planning." 

People first. It was and is as simple as that. No politicking or even big bashes were even considered. It was just time to be with those he was close to and those who needed his encouragement. This is the same motivation we have for Fourth Sundays - serving and spending time with our community and beyond - providing love and encouragement.  

Fourth Sundays are rarely strategic or full of influencers, but it's always a time of personal interactions that just might be what you need. 

Looking forward to Fourth Sunday together!

Lent Signpost. Week 6

Set your face on Jesus’ face

3 pm Daily Prayer:

As we journey this week toward the cross with Jesus,  we invite you to pause in whatever you are doing at 3 pm each day this week and to take a moment to pause and pray.  May this be a week of finding a different, other pace to life that invites space to be with Jesus. 

Luke 9:51

When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.

Read Luke 20 - 24

Spend some time in conversation with God.

---

Question to ponder:

What action can you take this week to help you walk with Jesus during Holy Week and set your face on his face?

Lent Signpost. Week 5

I will not forget you

Our God is with us

John 11:17-44

 Jesus wept.

 Silent tears down Jesus’ face at the tomb of his dear friend, Lazarus.
Tears of grief that death is real.
Tears of sorrow for the suffering of the people he came to save.
Tears of recognition for the path he would soon take. 

Jesus wept.

Jesus, who knew he had the power to raise Lazarus from the tomb and knows that death is not the final word, paused in grief with two sisters and friends to hold space for their sorrow. Their deep, deep sorrow, “if only you’d been here, this wouldn’t have happened.”  He holds their sorrow, that is our sorrow of wanting to unwind the tape and have a different story ending.

This Sunday, that we call Palm Sunday, begins our  week of journeying with Jesus through death to new life. 

 And, we travel with Christ Jesus who weeps over heartache, sorrow, illness, violence, death. 

 We travel with Jesus who wept over Jerusalem as he prepared to give his life for the heartache he had witnessed in his earthly life.  (Luke 19:41-42)

41 As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, 42 saying, “If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. 

We travel with Jesus who keeps his eyes on the purpose to give His life for the sake of the world. (John 12:27-33)

Jesus weeps with us.

 As you weep each day over the brokenness in our world, take time to sit with Jesus who weeps with you. 

You may want to find a quiet space or take a walk.   
Take time to talk with God about what breaks your heart this week.
Allow Jesus to be with you in those places of heartache

Take time to talk with Jesus, who is our God Incarnate. God Emmanuel. God with us.

Jesus weeps with us.

 ….over heartache, violence, sorrow, inequity in our world

…over heartache, violence, sorrow, inequity in our country

…over heartache, violence, sorrow, inequity in our city

 ….over heartache, sorrow, brokenness, grief in n our relationships

 ….over heartache, sorrow, grief, loneliness, disappointment in our personal lives

What do you discover as you weep with Jesus?

Colossians 1 affirms that Jesus is the visible image of the invisible God.

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; 16 for in[h]him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him.

Spend time giving thanks to our God who does not forget us.

• Isaiah 49:13-16

  Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth;
  break forth, O mountains, into singing!

  For the Lord has comforted his people,    
  and will have compassion on his suffering ones.

  But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me,    
  my Lord has forgotten me.”

  Can a woman forget her nursing child,    
  or show no compassion for the child of her womb?

  Even these may forget,    
  yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands.

  your walls are continually before me.17 Your builders outdo your destroyers,     
  and those who laid you waste go away from you.

Prayer from the Book of Common Worship

 Everlasting God,
In your tender love for the human race
You sent your Son to take our nature,
And to suffer death upon the cross.
In your mercy enable us to share in Jesus
Obedience to your will
And in the glorious victory of his resurrection.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord,
Who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
One God, forever and ever.
Amen

During Holy Week (April 11-16) we will post a Scripture reading and prayer. We encourage you to join in Union Prayer Together at 3 pm each.

Prayers for your journey with Jesus.

Lent Signpost. Week 4

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Often a journey requires you to wait. Sometimes waiting on more information to allow you to know how to proceed. Or a tool or provision you require. Or we sit in some place of transfer, waiting on the plane, the boat, the rental car, the bus that will take us to the next place we want to go. 

At this point in the Lenten journey, I often grow impatient. My high hopes for the journey show my tendency toward idealism and I must adjust. There is a stirring that wants to hurry along God’s activity, to press God toward revelation, instead of experiencing the seemingly slow and boring path of obedience and gentle unfolding.

Wait.

Waiting is a bit out of fashion. Even waiting for known periods of time is difficult. We now have clever programs that tell us how long before the next train arrives, or how long your hold time will be on a phone call or when our packages will come to our homes.

We see waiting as a necessary evil or waste of time. But what if the waiting is more significant than the arrival? What if the most meaningful work done in us is when we must wait?

Below is a Psalm for us in our waiting and suggestions on how we might hear God’s invitation.

Take a moment to come fully into the present.  Sit comfortably and alert, close your eyes, and center yourself with breathing.

1.     Hear the word. Read the passage a couple of times aloud to yourself. Listen for a word or phrase from the passage that stands out to you.  Take some silence and repeat it softly to yourself. 

2.     Ask, “How is my life touched?”  Read the Psalm again to discover how this passage touches your life today.  Consider the possibilities or receive a sensory impression as you sit in silence ( I hear, I see, I sense.) Another option is to simply identify one word to sum up the feeling you get from the text.

3.     Ask, “Is there an invitation?” Read again and listen for a possible invitation, for this day and event into the next few days.  Ponder it during several minutes of silence. 

4.     Pray

• Psalm 40 1-2

  I waited and waited and waited for GOD.

  At last he looked; finally he listened.

  He lifted me out of the ditch,

  pulled me from deep mud.

  He stood me up on a solid rock

  to make sure I wouldn’t slip.

  He taught me how to sing the latest God-song,

  a praise-song to our God.

• Psalm 40 5-6

  Nothing and no one

  compares to you!

  I start talking about you, telling what I know,

  and quickly run out of words.

  Neither numbers nor words

  account for you.

  6 Doing something for you, bringing something to you—

  that’s not what you’re after.

  Being religious, acting pious—

  that’s not what you’re asking for.

  You’ve opened my ears

  so I can listen.

• Psalm 40 11-13

  Now GOD, don’t hold out on me,

  don’t hold back your passion.

  Your love and truth

  are all that keeps me together.

  When troubles ganged up on me,

  a mob of sins past counting,

  I was so swamped by guilt

  I couldn’t see my way clear.

  More guilt in my heart than hair on my head,

  so heavy the guilt that my heart gave out.

  13 Soften up, GOD, and intervene;

  hurry and get me some help.

• Psalm 40 16-17

  But all who are hunting for you—

  oh, let them sing and be happy.

  Let those who know what you’re all about

  tell the world you’re great and not quitting.

  And me? I’m a mess. I’m nothing and have nothing:

  make something of me.

  You can do it; you’ve got what it takes—

  but God, don’t put it off.

Lent Signpost. Week 3

Road Closed to Shame | Invitation to the Road of Life

“If you put shame in a petri dish, it needs three ingredients to grow exponentially: secrecy, silence, and judgment. If you put the same amount of shame in the petri dish and douse it with empathy, it can’t survive.”

“Shame is that warm feeling that washes over us, making us feel small, flawed, and never good enough.” Brené Brown

This week we invite you into a modified practice of Imaginative Prayer.

Imaginative prayer is a way of meeting with God by using our imagination to enter a Gospel story. Using our imagination to experience the sights and sounds of the scene helps to bring our whole selves into the presence of Christ, to meet Jesus face-to-face and grow in discovery of who God is and who we are. Here is more information on this practice.

Read our two passages shared on Sunday.

 Luke 5:17-26

What do you see, hear, smell, taste, and touch as you read these words?

Now, imagine that you are with the man who has heard these words from Jesus:

“My friend, your sins are forgiven.”

And then, “stand up and take your bed and go to your home.” 

Take time and imagine that you are walking (maybe, skipping or dancing?) with this man. What do you experience with him?  How do you sense Jesus is looking at him (and you with him)?

Imagine that you look back and see a sign that says, “road closed” and Jesus is standing in front of it.  You know that Jesus covers his shame. 

Allow yourself to close the door on the past that Jesus has covered for him (for you).

Take a moment more to sit with this story and the new life this man is experiencing.

What is an invitation you receive from Jesus?

 John 7:53 – 8-11

What do you see, hear, smell, taste, and touch as you read these words?

Now, imagine that you are with the woman who has heard and received these words from Jesus:

“Where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

“Then neither do I condemn you,” “Go now and sin no more.”

Take time and imagine that you are standing with this woman.  

How do you see her hold her head?  What is your posture as you stand with her? How does she look at Jesus and then begin her walk away from this place that is no longer her place of condemnation?  What do you experience with her?  How do you sense Jesus is looking at her (and you with her)? 

Imagine that you look back and see a sign that says, “road closed” and Jesus is standing in front of it.  You know that Jesus covers her shame.
Allow yourself to close the door on the past that Jesus has covered for her (for you).

Take a moment more to sit with this story and the new life this woman is experiencing.

What is an invitation you receive from Jesus?

PAUSE

As you sit with the invitations you’ve received.  Here these words from Jesus in John 10:10, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”

Imagine again that there is a sign behind you that says ROAD CLOSED.

And, imagine, Jesus saying to you,

“Friend, I entered this world to free you from the road of shame.

Journey with me this week down the road of new life. I am your guide. Trust in me.”

Christ Jesus is freeing you from the Road of Shame.

Take a moment now.

Where do you need to hear Jesus’ words?

“Your sins are forgiven

Now, take up your mat and walk into new life.”

To hear…

Neither do I condemn you.  Live a life of freedom. Not bound by sin. Free to ask forgiveness”.

The road to shame is closed. The invitation to new life is real and for you!

Lent Signpost. Week 2

KEEP WATCH

a post by Emily Huff

We have been living in a global pandemic for over two years now, as Friday, March 11th marked two years since the World Health Organization officially declared the Covid-19 pandemic. On top of that, we see troubling news each day in Ukraine, and it is hard to wrap our minds around what is happening around us as it seems that the world is on fire and there is no safe place.

An article from Education Week that I read in January was titled, “Stress, Hypervigilance, and Decision Fatigue: Teaching During Omicron,” and many of us can relate to the way the article describes how teachers (and all of us for that matter) can’t seem to turn our brains off because our nervous systems have been in firing constantly on high alert in overdrive. “Teachers are in hyper-vigilance mode. We have been for the past two years. Teaching already had problems with attrition before the pandemic. And now? Those problems are all magnified, and we’ve added hyper-vigilance, times 10.” 

I latched onto this word “hyper-vigilance” in the article as it resonated with me in thinking about how we have all been charting the unknown and navigating the last wo years. In listening to the On Being podcast recently by Krista Tippet, I heard her interview Cheri Maples who was a police officer trained in mindfulness by Thich Nhat Hanh who talked about how this intersected in her line of work: “This hyper-vigilance--looking around you all the time, wondering where that next problem is coming from, has pushed us off the charts and out of balance.  And we’ve got to come back down and find some ways to take care of ourselves because otherwise, the stress just keeps on accumulating and we can start shutting down without realizing it. So, we need tools to keep our heart open and soft.”

While this hyper-vigilance has become the way of the world, I believe that we must find tools to keep our hearts open and soft. In order to do this, we are called to a different kind of vigilance as followers of Jesus as the words “keep watch” are given as invitations throughout Scripture. 

·       “Keep watch because you do not know the day or the hour.” Matthew 25:13 (NIV)

·       “God wants the combination of his steady, constant calling and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert for whatever he will do next.” Romans 15:4, The Message 

·      “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes. Matthew 6:34, The Message 

In this season of Lent, some people take on practices rather than giving things up as a way to return to God with all of their hearts. The practice of the examen is one that I am trying to do at the end of each day as a way to keep watch in a radically different way than the hyper-vigilance that I have been living into the last two years. It’s a way to keep my heart open and soft, and it’s really quite simple: 

1. Become aware of God’s presence.
2. Review the day with gratitude.
3. Pay attention to your emotions.
4. Choose one feature of the day and pray from it.
5. Look toward tomorrow.

I’ve chosen to keep a gratitude journal as a part of this practice, and I’ve begun to see it a bit like a “God hunt” through my day as I ask God where He is in the midst of my teaching, in the midst of my family, and in the midst of the ordinary tasks that make up my days. 

At the end of the day, it’s a way to shift my attention and focus. And as I am trying to keep watch in different ways, I am finding comfort knowing that I can also cry out to God to keep watch over us. 

·      The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. Psalm 121:8 (NIV) 

·      "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you." Genesis 28:15 (NIV) 

This Compline prayer from the Book of Common Prayer has also been an anchor to lead me away from the hyper-vigilance and to open my hands to pray for God to hold the weight of this world. 

I invite you to join me in these practices of keeping watch in this season as we trust that the Lord is keeping watch over us all.