A section from the book Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, a classic of black literature, has been on my mind this week as I read it again. The book is set in Florida in the 1920s, and the quote here is when Janie, the main character, and her husband are taking shelter as a hurricane, the “screaming wind,” is coming through their town:

“The wind came back with triple fury and put out the light for the last time. They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against crude walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.”

Their eyes were watching God. I’ve always loved that line. It begs the question—regardless of who you are or where you live or the color of your skin or what storm is approaching or overhead —what does it mean be “watching God”? I think this question is key to hope. I’d love to hear your thoughts. What might it mean “watching God” from behind a face mask? From our couches as we watch the news each night? Sitting in company with others but from whom we’re isolated or wrestling with profound differences of conviction? How do we “watch God” in ways that keep us open to whatever ways He chooses to meet us?

Grace and peace,

Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

How precious are your thoughts
about me, O God.
   They cannot be numbered!
I can't even count them;
   they outnumber the grains of sand!
 And when I wake up,
You are still with me!
                       Psalm 139: 17-18 (NLT)


Grace and peace,

Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

Monday is Juneteenth!

On June 19, 1865, about two months after the Confederate general Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox, Va., Gordon Granger, a Union general, arrived in Galveston, Texas, to inform enslaved African Americans of their freedom and that the Civil War had ended. General Granger’s announcement put into effect the Emancipation Proclamation, which had been issued more than two and a half years earlier, on Jan. 1, 1863, by President Abraham Lincoln. So, Juneteenth represents more than just a formalized notice of victory over the Confederacy, but an actual declaration of freedom on the ground. 

Today the Juneteenth national holiday commemorates African American freedom and emphasizes education and achievement. Celebratory traditions often include public readings of the Emancipation Proclamation, singing traditional songs and the reading of works by noted African-American writers. Some Juneteenth celebrations also include rodeos, street fairs, cookouts, family reunions, park parties and historical reenactments.
 
Jelani Greenidge, contributor for Covenant Companion, writes “Now even though Juneteenth was recently established as a federal holiday, celebrations like Juneteenth are more than just political theater. As followers of Jesus, they’re part of our spiritual heritage. Both the longing for freedom and the celebration of its arrival are circular rhythms with echoes of the Jewish Passover feast, where the children of Israel remembered God’s deliverance from the hand of the Egyptian pharaoh. All throughout the Old Testament, we see story after story of God’s faithfulness to God’s covenant people, who often experienced victory and deliverance against formidable odds. In truth, many of the idioms and much of the language from the American Civil Rights Movement invoke those Old Testament texts, the struggles of God’s people as they sojourned through time, facing not only military pressure from neighboring armies but eventually exile and oppression from foreign occupation.
 
So, while Juneteenth does not have a place on the liturgical calendar, it does represent an opportunity for us as a church to raise an Ebenezer, a tangible sign of God’s miraculous providence as we’ve experienced it thus far. As the lyrics of “Amazing Grace” remind us, “through many dangers, toils and snares, we have already come.” As followers of Jesus, we welcome the opportunity to give thanks to God.

If you’d like a good resource to introduce yourself or your kids to Juneteenth, we have found both of these videos are a good start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWBlikh8A2E
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8icqK_KUtQY

Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

I was lying on the hammock on a recent weekend afternoon, watching the leaves of the crape myrtle tree filter out the sun, soaking in the first real warm day of the year. The cedar at the front of the driveway was rubbing its needles together in the breeze, shush-shush-shush, and I could feel the invitation come again, rolling deep through me, like it was coming up from the earth itself. If there had been any real words, they would have been something like this: Stay. Stay in the quiet. Stay right here.

Lying there, listening, I thought about what it means to stay present to what the world is saying, the knowledge of the ground under our feet, the trees, the creatures. What it means to be present to people and relationships, to our own selves. What it means to be present to the Spirit and God’s Love, to really hear and understand and follow Jesus.

There’s a line in Fellowship of the Ring, where Bilbo describes his life (which is deeply tangled in the pull of the Ring) to Gandalf:
Why, I feel all thin, sort of stretched, if you know what I mean: like butter that has been scraped over too much bread. That can't be right. I need a change, or something.

I know I can feel this away. Pulled in so many directions, I can only just stretch myself to cover the surface, so inundated with noise that I can’t hear the whispering of Spirit and earth even if I long for it. It’s not in my power to quiet the whole world - but I can quiet myself, and my part in it. I want to live deeply, attentive to the community and work I’ve been given. Help me, Lord. Kyrie Eleison.

Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

At the Ascension Jesus gave us, his followers, a great task— to go to all the world, proclaiming with our lives and words the Gospel to all people, everywhere.  At Pentecost, He empowered us with His own Spirit to accomplish this task.  At Pentecost, we get to act out with our everyday lives what the Holy Family embodied at Epiphany, the good news that the gift of Jesus is for all people.  All of the longing, doubt, grief, and the sins of the world we held up in the dark nights of Advent and Lent, all of the bright hope and relief that resurrected to life with the Risen Christ is channeled into this great movement of Spirit and Church at Pentecost.  The Holy Spirit is a great fire!

The movement of Pentecost is outward, the great current of Spirit moves us toward all people, in every nation, everywhere.  Some of us send, some of us go, and all of us move toward the peoples of all nations.  This is our one task, our one job until we are reunited with Christ— stay the course, friends of Jesus!
 
Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

Abba Father, our hearts mourn in the wake of this near-constant violence and injustice! Our hearts break as harassment and violence escalate, not just around the country, but in our own neighborhoods and communities. We are scared. We are angry. We are exhausted. We are overwhelmed. We are hurting. We are heartbroken.
 
How long, oh Lord, must your precious children suffer and die because our divisive political system does not bring us together in outrage and determination to make changes that address the deeper roots of this complex problem of violence, mental health and weapons reform? How long must the vulnerable suffer the fear of abuse and violence? How many more will die? Lord, have mercy!
 
We pray for those whose voices and stories have been dismissed or ignored. We pray for those who feel unseen or erased by society. We pray for those who are not seen as image-bearers of God. We pray for those who are afraid to leave their homes, take their children to school, go to work or to the store. We pray for those who have no words, only tears, for what their hearts hold.
 
Lord, our world is so broken! We know this is not Your plan for your creation. Our hearts ache as we remember the most recent victims – innocent elementary school children,   We pray for their families and loved ones who are today facing unimaginable futures without their beloved children. 
 
Lord, you are the God of all creation. You are our defender and protector. You are our healer and comforter. You are our hope and our strength. You are Immanuel and You are with us. We pray that we would experience Your resurrection power at work in our lives and in our communities. We pray that your peace would overcome all fears, your healing would overcome all brokenness, and your love would overcome all evil.
 
We pray for all of us - your sons and daughters of every ethnicity and culture - that we would honor you by honoring the image of you in ourselves and in others. We pray that you would free all of us from the sins of prejudice, hatred, and misused power. Bring us all to a place of repentance and transformation in You. Help us to love mercy, do justice and walk humbly with You. Help us to care for one another. Help us to truly love you with all our hearts, soul, mind and strength and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

Most of last week I kept a silent(ish) retreat. I didn’t go anywhere unnecessary, I was mostly at home, opting out of the extra noise. I kept the phone virtually silent, responding to a few texts with loved ones, no music or podcasts, no television or movies. I wanted space to think deeply, to listen to my inner self for awhile. But my brain didn’t cooperate. It kept churning up weird bits of media I’d previously digested - pop songs, advertisements, movie scenes - like some kind of mental off-gassing. I began to feel uneasy, imagining my neural pathways coated with the greasy streaks of junk food culture. I considered the disturbing question: what if at the end of my life all what flashes before my eyes is an 80’s soda commercial and a scene from an Avenger’s movie? I might laugh about that idea if I didn’t recognize the way my mind latches onto such things, if I didn’t know those things were designed to manipulate my attention and stay lodged in my consciousness.

For the rest of the day, I felt the weight of these questions. How much am I shaped by what I truly value - the sacredness of God’s earth and her creatures, my relationships with others - and how much am I shaped by the noise and expectations of a world that dismays me?

Silence, or at least less noise, is a good discipline for shedding the excess that can obscure what matters most. Even in the thick of our busy lives, we can create opportunities to pay attention, listen to our lives and re-orient to the Kingdom of God underneath all the noise and distractions.

Grace and Peace,

Anita Sorenson

Pastor for Spiritual Formation

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.
I do not give to you as the world gives.
Do not let your hearts be troubled,
and do not let them be afraid.
—John 14.27

I give you the quiet peace of this present moment:
without hurry, fear or need to be elsewhere,
but right here, right now, as you are, at rest.
I give you the strong peace of yourself:
the peace of forgiveness and my delight in who you are,
with no need to prove yourself or do better.
I give you the vibrant peace of oneness with all living things,
the peace of deep belonging,
and reconciliation with all people.
I give you the life-giving peace of my own spirit,
my love, trust and courage beating in your heart,
my presence in your soul.
I give you the joyous peace of trust—
trust in your life and its goodness,
trust in the Beloved and your belovedness.
I give you the renewing peace of healing,
of blessing hidden even in struggle and pain,
of trust that even in suffering all shall be well.
I give not as the world gives, from the outside,
but from within, by your being created,
and it cannot be taken away.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.

Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

This Eastertide, on overload once again, I have chosen as my practice to notice and be grateful for the ways and times that Grace gets in and is enough for me to give thanks and bear the freight of the day. Certainly, the world is giving us too much to bear it seems, when war has broken our hearts with grim prognostications, the governmental systems are not only frayed but mired in standoffs, the environment has gone beyond groaning to wailing as it suffers, our institutions seem be coming apart at the seams, and the specter of COVID still looms over all. 

So, my attention has been pulled back to a favorite grounding text, in which the apostle Paul recounts his own misery, and then concludes that “God’s Grace is sufficient for me.” (2 Corinthians 12:9.) My intention this Eastertide is to look for, take note, savor and give thanks each day for the way that Grace has been sufficient. It has been more challenging than I imagined, not because the Grace is absent or hiding, but because my own perception, imagination and attentiveness are often underdeveloped. 
Grace has appeared:

• First roses have blossomed in my spring garden

• a mother hummingbird has reoccupied a nest tucked up under the eaves, and tends her eggs vigilantly

• my grandboy Teddy has vigorously moved into toddlerhood, with much joie de vivre

• my prayer for deep listening and patience to understand another’s point of view were delivered when I needed them

• my imagination was sparked as I filled bags of books for those who need them, while letting go of things which once gave me joy and I no longer need

My list could go on for ages. And I was reminded by so many Wise Ones of the ways that my faith continues to hold me in the arms of the Holy One of Grace, whose love never ceases, as I am taught how to love with Grace. Professor Kate Bowler brought me this reminder in her new book Good Enough with Jessica Richie; she quotes Thomas Merton here:

To be grateful is to recognize the Love of God in everything He has given us–and he has given us everything. Every breath we draw is a gift of His love, every moment of existence is a grace, for it brings with it immense graces from Him. Gratitude therefore takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder and to praise of the goodness of God. For the grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes the difference.

Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

 
Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation

Dry spells happen not just in the natural world but in our spiritual lives too. There is much we can do to prepare and the principles are surprisingly similar to those in the garden.

First we need to take notice of the signs that suggest a dry spell is on the way. “Unseasonably warm temperatures” or high stress and anxiety, and “lack of rain” or seasons of intensely draining activity, are my two best indicators that I need to take notice of. Its easy to ignore them and hope that the drain on our spiritual reserves will not deplete us, but that is as unlikely as the impact of drought on physical water supplies.

There are several ways to make ourselves less vulnerable to dry spells.

Store more water.
When drought hits every drop of water is precious. We need to store it so that is kept fresh and freely available. Jesus knew that. When he was driven out into the desert it was the “stored water” – his knowledge of the scriptures and the purposes of God – that sustained and strengthened him through what must have been a very dry and draining experience. And in the garden of Gethsemane, I am sure that his night in prayer was what gathered the reserves that would see him through the agonizing journey toward the cross.

Memorizing scriptures, sitting quietly in the presence of God for a few minutes each morning and drinking in the water of God’s Spirit, writing prayers and spending time reflecting on them are all practices that I find store water for me. What about you?

We need to conserve the water that is already in us.
Compost and mulch are a gardener’s best friend, but what are the equivalents in our spiritual lives? When we are dry and drained out it is often almost impossible to reach for the Bible or pray. Reading spiritual books seems to add to our dryness. So, what keeps the water of God flowing strongly within our hearts and souls during a dry spell? For me it is time spent out in the garden, and the reciting of prayers that others have written. Patrick’s Breastplate is an especially powerful prayer in this context. When I read it out loud it resonates through my body and lodges in my heart in a wonderful way. So grateful that I can rely on the words others when my well has run dry!

Grace and peace,
Anita Sorenson
Pastor for Spiritual Formation