by Melissa Taft
You may have noticed a lot of posts about beauty these days. Perhaps we are all longing, in these times of unrest and disaster, for hope. It has been a hard couple of years all around – both personally for many and also globally. We have grieved collectively for the fires and the earthquakes and the deaths and the upheaval. We are collectively experiencing trauma and the remembrance of trauma, and it can be difficult at times to look forward. When the future is clouded or dark, how can we continue on in hope?
While I personally believe that embracing the hard, feeling one’s feelings, and holding grief is necessary and human, I also believe that one of the best ways through to healing is by equally embracing the beauty – and holding grief in tension with gratitude. It is possible to experience wonder, joy, beauty, happiness, and hope while also acknowledging grief, difficulty, and being in the ugly trenches.
Please don’t misunderstand – this is not meant to be “toxic positivity.” I am a bit of a “Pollyanna,” but there is a difference between telling the downtrodden that they should figure out how to be happy in their place anyways, and between offering true hope. One is a command or a guilt trip, and the other is an offering of what exists – leaving space for those in desperate places to partake as they can. So often as Jesus prepared to heal, He first met people where they were and acknowledged them with empathy. He truly is the God-Who-Sees, and He never shamed people for their circumstances or sorrow. If you are in a hard place, there may not be a human ‘silver lining’ you can see – and that’s okay.
Maybe right now it’s hard for you to see beauty – that’s also okay. I would like to invite you, if you can however, to partake of the hope and beauty that God offers to you. He offers beauty in many forms and many ways, to all. I imagine that you may seek it in your daily life, whether realizing it or not. How often do you scroll Instagram or Facebook and stop on a video about something beautiful that has happened, or watch a feel-good movie? Share a humorous image? It’s clear after all that we seek out heart-warming stories – whether real or fictional – and have since time immemorial.
That’s why I believe in the power of Beauty – it grounds us and it connects us while lifting our spirits no matter what circumstance we find ourselves in. My grandma Robbie, whom I’ve written about before, truly believed that beauty could save the world. She believed that God is Beauty, and that His Kindness leads us to Him. When God promises that He “knows the plans (He has) for you, plans not to harm you but to bless you and give you hope and a future,” it isn’t about your ability to bootstrap yourself into hope. It’s about the hope and future He already has available for you.
I loved Christine’s Meditation Monday about seeking beauty over ugliness. One of the practices she encourages is to write down three good things each day. It’s interesting to see how that little practice can grow seeds of gratitude and provide relief in the midst of difficulty. Many of you seemed to resonate with that post as well–and little wonder! We are heading into two years of Covid times and there has been much grief and sorrow and ugliness.
But there has also been beauty and opportunity for hope. John van de Laar’s post on How Beauty Can Save Us powerfully reminds us of how beauty transforms difficult spaces – recalling the artists of Sophiatown. Steve Wickham invites us to consider how Joy is possible and brings possibilities even in the “belly of grief.” Elaine Breckenridge’s relatable narrative about Covid upending rituals and the gifts she found in the midst of it – God’s Gifts in Creation – resonated with many who also had to pivot and find a current normal.
My current normal is rather frantic – I am in a season of difficulty, transition, and change. I hang on to these things, then, with an eager heart. My Grandma Robbie had another tip – put something fun on the calendar. “If you always have something to look forward to, you can keep going,” she was fond of saying. I invite you to put something on the calendar today to look forward to. Even if you create it out of thin air. Even if it’s silly or small. Find something to look forward to. Perhaps the weather will be clear enough to enjoy a sunset; mark it down. Find the bits of beauty God has scattered through your life, and let them be breadcrumbs of wonder leading you to hope.
Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash
Whatever season your garden is in – winter, summer, spring, or fall – there is something to enjoy and tasks to accomplish. And there is spirituality to put into practice! Find God and community through the richness of soil and the shared values of growth. We have many resources available to help – click here to explore!
by Melissa Taft
As January eases into February here in the northern hemisphere, our sacred rhythms hold a necessary tension between the slumbering rest of Winter and the preparation for the new life of Spring. In the southern hemisphere, we have begun the preparations for harvest and the slowing down of winter. Wherever we are, it is time to rest, but also time to grow and prepare. The Church Calendar still celebrates the Christmas miracle in some traditions, but for most, at least in the northern hemisphere, Christmas has waned and we are in the wintering period before the next series of high events–Lent and Easter. While Lent–the Advent of Easter–is still more than a month away, many of you have begun preparing for it.
And so we too prepare–updating our resources and creating new ones. For example, we are thrilled to announce that Lilly Lewin and Christine Sine are partnering up once again for an online retreat focused on Lent! There will be more details in the weeks to come, but for now, please save the date–Saturday, February 26th from 9:30 am-12:30 pm.
There are several resources available now in the Godspace Shop–including a free download on activity ideas for all 40 days of Lent. Additionally, the post Resources for Lent has been updated for 2022 and will continue to be updated as we find new and interesting resources to add. And of course, our master list Lent & Easter Resource Page has been helpful to many of you. We are working to update that as well, so stay tuned and check back through the season. We will be sure to have new things to add and there will be new posts to come, so you may want to bookmark and check in frequently!
Enjoy beautiful prayer cards, an inspirational devotional, and 40 daily ideas guide for Lent — in a convenient downloadable bundle form! For all the details, click here!
A couple of months ago, we moved house – a major change as both the property and area are very different from anything we have lived in before. In addition, both my husband and I are now fully retired, and though I know the time was right, I miss the church community where I was a minister a great deal. We both have plenty to do – I continue to write, he has enough DIY for a century and we are both particularly loving time with our children and grandchildren. But it is an adjustment – which he has made with ease and I am working at.
There was a particular irony, in that I had finally managed to tame our 80ft, uphill garden – as much as you ever can of course. I love gardening. I enjoy the feeling of soil in my hands, the sense of satisfaction in cherishing something to growth, and even the simple tasks such as pruning. So one of the first things I did was look at the garden for potential.
This garden is flat, which is a joy – gardening on the slope of the old house felt like you were slightly intoxicated and everything was somehow moving! This one is very small, and has only had the minimum done for some time. The result is that all around the edges are very large, old evergreen shrubs and a conifer hedge. One section has been cut back, resulting in a rather ugly set of brown broken branches where nothing will regrow – but the birds love it so it will need to stay.
In some of it, we will take out the old shrubs and build raised beds which I can fill with colour and wildlife-friendly planting. It will be a labour of love and take several years. But the back hedge – the ugly bit – will remain a haven for the many species we have already spotted who flit in to feed from a nearby wooded area and stream. Simple pleasures.
However in the centre of it is a gap. I have no idea why – perhaps it was simply pragmatic, a means to get to the back fence for maintenance. And it was to this gap that my gaze was initially and persistently drawn. What could go there? How soon can I get to a nursery? Ideas for planting buzzed around my mind like a persistent wasp.
Now, gardeners will be holding up their hands in horror reading this. The old adage is that you leave a garden a year to see what comes up, which is generally wise advice. There may be bulbs or herbaceous perennials just waiting to erupt as a glorious surprise. However I am pretty sure that is not the case here. There is deep rooted ivy all around the base of the hedge and I doubt anything could penetrate through.
Yet still I have held back. Looking at the gap, I felt for now I should not try to fill it, that it was a way God could speak to me in this new season. It is so easy, isn’t it, to not leave space in our lives, yet that very void holds the capacity for the new thing which may need to grow. This is particularly a temptation if we are reluctant to look inside, to face aging and mortality, or perhaps after these last two years are holding at bay peeking at the trauma and loss which have been so much a feature of this season. But if we simply fill every moment with activity, where will there be the opportunity to hear the gentle voice of love, to discern what may be next?
So, for now at least, I will leave that gap in the hedge.
Join Christine Sine and Lilly Lewin on Saturday, February 26th from 9:30 am-12:30 pm PT for a refreshing and contemplative journey through Lent. Prepare your hearts and minds to find the beauty in Lent’s ashes. Save the date, more details to follow!
Last week I read an intriguing article that talked about how the words we use can change the structure of our brains.
“By keeping positive and optimistic words in mind, you stimulate the work of the frontal lobe. This area includes special speech centers associated with the motor area of the cerebral cortex responsible for your motor functions. As our experiment has shown, the longer you focus on positive speech, the stronger the impact on other areas of the brain will be.” (Research Confirms that The Words We Can Say Can Change the Structure of Our Brains)
At first I thought it sounded a little naive, but then I remembered Paul’s words in Philippians 4: 7-9 here quoted from The Message
Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.
8-9 Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.
Would you believe it – in the next couple of days 3 people suggested this was God’s word for my 71st year, even before I shared my thoughts with them. “Looks like God is trying to tell me something and I have been a little hard of hearing” I decided. I was sure of it when I read this article on Facebook:
The words “I see the world through the people that surround me” really resonated in my soul. As someone commented this is a great spiritual practice to transform the gloom into glory. So I thought I would try an experiment that I heartily recommend to you.
- Each morning I would look at the beauty not the ugliness. I would welcome God into the scarred places of trauma in my life and pray that I would recognize the beauty shining through the ugliness.
- II would write my own headlines for the day. When I suggested this on Facebook, I loved the headlines that appeared: Family meets together for first time in 2 years; The snow slows down the world and it is good; Covid keeps grandkids in US for 2 more glorious weeks with Nana!; Tongan volcanic eruption prompts long-term friends to reconnect. These headlines don’t change the devastation we see around us but they do help us find the inner resources to bring about change.
- Write down three good things that happen each day. This is a fun and energizing exercise – a little like the prayer of examen but with a strong emphasis on the good side of life and the recognition of the goodness of God in the midst of each day. One thing I noticed is that I started with writing 3 good things and that expanded so that now my list is at least 6 good things long.
This is not pretending that there are really no bad things happening in the world, but it does give us the inner resources to face them with more resilience and strength.
I called 2019 my year of Seeing Life Differently and was reminded of that this morning as I worked on this post. It made me want to transform Paul’s words in Philippians: “see differently as a way of life: displace worry with Christ at the centre of your life, discern the ways of truth not falsehood, transform ugliness into beauty, replace your curses with praise to God; settle into a way of life where you work for the good of all creation.”
As I wrote this today I reread the section in Howard Thurman’s biography where he talks about taking his daughters back to the beach in Florida where he spent many fun days as a child. Now (1968) it was a “whites only” beach. Instead of ranting against the injustice he explained to his daughters that they were so powerful that it took the police, the local government and changes in the law to keep them off the beach – an attitude that must have made them proud, not depressed at who they were. Perhaps we need more of that kind of an attitude too as we watch states in the US change voting laws to keep blacks and marginalized populations from voting, because it is true – these parts of the population are powerful and could change the future of this country so it is no wonder those who have usurped their power want to see their rights suppressed.
I know I could get myself in hot water by making a statement like this but part of what I realized this week as I instituted my new practices, is that in the midst of the stress and the pain and the overwhelming fatigue of our current environment, they can give me the new energy I need to work for change in a way that moves more towards God’s shalom purposes of wholeness for all creation.
I want this year to be a year of transforming the ugly into beauty and I hope you do too. Read through this poem that I wrote back in 2019 and prayerfully consider what you could do to bring about the kind of change God wants to see happen in the world.
Read life differently.
Read with love and not with hate,
with compassion and not with judgment,
with generosity and not with scarcity.
See your cup
not half full,
not half empty,
but overflowing with God’s goodness and light and life.
Read life differently.
Look for the wonder of uniqueness,
not the exclusion of sameness.
Embrace don’t reject.
Forgive don’t condemn.
Seek the Son of God.
Work diligently to know
he who is the way, the truth, and the life.
Follow his footsteps,
walk in the ways that leads to eternal life.
Christine Sine (c) 2019
We all need the Wholeness of God…this resource includes reflections and activities for coping and thriving during the COVID-19 challenges in search of shalom as well as hope for restoration during and after this period of social distancing.
A contemplative service with music in the spirit of Taize. Carrie Grace Littauer, prayer leader, with music by Kester Limner and Andy Myers.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-710-756 with additional notes below:
“Wisdom of Saints” Music and lyrics by Kester Limner, shared under the Creative Commons License, Attribution (CC-BY)
“Nothing Can Ever” Copyright and all rights reserved by GIA/Les Presses de Taizé
“Rabboni Beloved” By Kester Limner and Andy Myers, shared under the Creative Commons License, Attribution (CC-BY)
“Veni Sancte Spiritus” Copyright and all rights reserved by GIA/Les Presses de Taizé
Thank you for praying with us! www.saintandrewsseattle.org
Last week Tom and I recorded a Facebook live session on Establishing a Rule of Life. Not only was it extremely popular but we had some amazing responses including the beautiful poem below by Ana Lisa De Jong. Ana Lisa commented: “Thank you Christine Sine and Tom Sine for the inspiration. Your inspiring FB live today and your Mustard Seed community is a fruitful harvest in itself.” For more information on rule of life check out this post Establishing a Rule of Life Rooted in Shalom Enjoy the recording and the poem.
MUSTARD SEEDS
Teach your children to plant trees.
Teach them to open their hands,
scatter seeds.
The world which would squeeze them to its mould,
would have them hold on tight,
bury them under its avalanche
of consumption.
Whereas breathing, living,
is found in breaking open,
pouring ourselves out.
Scattering the seed
which without there isn’t fruit.
Teach your children the beauty of creation.
That what we do makes a difference,
just in the act of doing.
The war for our children’s souls is quiet,
quiet as the drug that lulls them to sleep.
Open their hands, give them seeds.
Living Tree Poetry
January 2022
Looking for New Mustard Seed House Members
It seemed very appropriate to post this today as we are also looking for new members for the Mustard Seed House
Just a reminder for the weekend, we cannot pour from an empty cup!
So take time to actually get some rest! #RESTisHOLY
Take a walk outside, draw, play, get coffee with a friend, do something that brings you joy and refreshes you!
My birthday was yesterday, so like all good hobbits, I want to give you a gift for my birthday. As you may know, I love to pray with my coffee each day and got inspired a few years ago to PRAY WITH YOUR CUP through Holy Week. So go over to freerangeworship.com and get the free download and save it a resource to use this April.
And now, GRAB A COFFEE/TEA CUP and PRAY TODAY
Consider the cup
How is your cup today? Look at your coffee cup/mug/teacup What do you notice? Is it full? Empty? Faded? Cracked or Chipped? How are you feeling like that cup? What do you need to pour out? What do you need Jesus to pour into your cup? May be Peace or Joy? Compassion .. for yourself & for others? Energy to keep going?
What do you need in your cup today?
Jesus is with you & me in the messiness of this life.
In the chipped and cracked places.
In the empty places and the places that are stained & scratched.
Jesus loves us and is with us right where we are!
Drink that in today!
Grab a spoon!
What is stirring in you today? What does the Holy Spirit want to stir in you? As you use spoons throughout the day/week, ask Jesus/Spirit to show you what is being stirred in your life & what needs to be stirred.
A Prayer for you and your Cup…
HOLD YOUR CUP…
Lord Jesus…
Help us to be, to share and drink from
Cups of Transformation
Help us to be Cups of Resurrection
Cups of Restoration
Cups of Healing and Wholeness
Safe to drink from
We are Stained and broken, chipped and cracked…
And some may say we are not the favorite one in the cupboard or on the shelf,
But you Jesus, Love us just as we are!
And use us just the same.
Fill us Jesus with your Living Water!
Help us to share Living Water with those around us!
And bring refreshment and great flavor to our world!
AMEN
©lillylewin and freerangeworship.com
More details coming soon! Join Christine Sine and Lilly Lewin as they guide you through finding beauty in the ashes of Lent Saturday February 26th from 9:30 am to 12:30 pm PT.
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