Godgrown

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  Mark 9:10 pm on September 13, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

  Shepherds of the Earth 

  

  This morning during the Abbey’s morning vigil, we found ourselves focusing around the idea of living with a conscience toward preserving nature. We prayed about the living, breathing Earth that we have been given “dominion” over, and yet for so long we have in our dominance abused our gift.

  We are Shepherds of the Earth. I have been calling myself this all day today. Last Sunday our little community began recycling. We’ve been opening the windows up in the mornings, and keeping the AC off as long as possible. It won’t solve everything, but its a start.

  I’m not sure what God has for us to learn in this before we are all finished with this experiment in communal life, but I want to give my all to living it out. I get excited about others who are already catching the vision for a simple space for people to live in close proximity and to care for one another spiritually, and to care for the world about them. Our outdoor garden is growing, and more and more we are finding ways of celebrating our Lord in outdoor spaces.

  We are Shepherds of the Earth, and like Tolkien’s Ents (Shepherds of the Forest) if we stand around talking and arguing about whether we should engage ourselves in the battle, we may too quickly find ourselves on the loosing side. I’m ready to start the fight against the Enemy (you don’t think Satan is totally unaware of Global Warming, do you?) – even if that means taking a little longer to seperate out my trash.

  Its a start.

  
   

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  Mark 7:09 am on September 11, 2006 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: World Trade Center   

  5 years 

  

  Today is a day of remembrance. It is easy to try to push past the hard memories to focus on the superficiality of the day’s urgent to-do’s, but there is something much deeper to reflect on in the human psyche today. What happened 5 years ago this morning was a nation-wide shift in focus and paradigm. Now violence and acts of war no longer happened “out there” but the local reality of terror was made tangible for every American.

  Our lives become busy so quickly. We hardly pause for a second to consider the circumstances of our fellow countrymen who died because they chose to go to work that day, and others who died saving them. So quickly we return to “business as usual”, when just a few short years ago we were utterly abhorred at the terrorist’s horrific offense.

  I was a freshman at ACU at the time. I was sitting in Speech Class, and I had just given a persuasive speech about the necessities of making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich WITHOUT getting PB in the jelly or jelly in the PB (that’s an important tip to remember if you ever want to have friends invite you over for a snack ever again). Our teacher had left the room during one of the speeches, and was gone for several minutes after the student had taken his seat. With a terrified, halting voice, our teacher reported that a commercial airplane had just hit one of the twin towers in New York City, and that many people had died. He admitted that he knew nothing more, and then dismissed our class.

  Of course, we all left in a hurry, looking at each other with curious expressions on our faces. I got back to my dorm, and turned on the TV just in time to watch an airplane crash into the second tower. I thought there must have been some sort of mistake – I saw the plane go into the tower, but the other tower was burning and crashing to the ground!?! What was going on here? Then it dawned on me, as it did for every American that morning: this is no accident.

  Many months and years have passed since that morning. But I will never forget the attitude of the nation, and even the world, as the day’s events unfolded. Fear, anger, and rumors spiraled like a whirlwind in my own heart, as well as in the hearts of our campus, and our nation. It was a crisis for an entire people, who for a time began to turn their hearts again toward God. What might have happened if there had been wide scale repentance on America’s part? Would it have made a difference in our world and war in Iraq today? Does God still work that way?

  Where were YOU when you heard the news 5 years ago? Where was God?

  
   
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  Mark 11:12 am on September 8, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

  Holy Now 

  by Peter Mayer

  When I was a boy, each week
  On Sunday, we would go to church
  And pay attention to the priest
  And he would read the Holy Word.
  And consecrate the holy bread
  And everyone would kneel and bow
  Today the only difference is
  Everything is holy now.

  Everything, everything,
  Everything is holy now . . .

  When I was in Sunday school
  We would learn about the time
  Moses split the sea in two
  Jesus made the water wine
  And I remember feeling sad
  that miracles don’t happen still
  But now I can’t keep track
  ‘Cause everything’s a miracle

  Everything, everything
  Everything’s a miracle . . .

  Wine from water is not so small
  An even better magic trick
  is that anything is here at all.
  So the challenging thing becomes
  not to look for miracles
  but finding where there isn’t one.
  Holy water was rare at best
  barely wet my finger tips
  Now I have to hold my breath
  I’m swimming in a sea of it
  Used to be a world half there
  Heaven’s second rate hand me downs
  now I walk it with a reverent air,
  ’cause everything’s holy now.

  This morning outside I stood
  And saw a little red-winged bird
  Shining like a burning bush
  Singing like a scripture verse
  It made me want to bow my head.
  and i remember when church let out -
  how things have changed since then,
  everything is holy now.

  Everything, everything
  Everything is holy now
  Everything, everything,
  Everything is holy now . . .