Five Minute Friday :: Remnant

• So, too, at this present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace. Romans 11:5

• Five Minute Friday : Remnant Linkup

You may know Elijah and his contest with the Ba'als as the scriptural and historic context of "remnant" that the Apostle Paul refers to in order to make his point of God choosing us:

• 1 Kings 18:20-40

I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew. Do you not know what the scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel? "Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars; I alone am left, and they are seeking my life."

But what is the divine reply to Elijah? "I have kept for myself seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal." So, too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace would no longer be grace. Romans 11:1-6

If you've sewn or quilted, or had quilting or sewing family members or friends, you know about fabric remnants. They're typically the tail end of a bolt of fabric that's not big enough to sell by the yard. Or sometimes it's a discontinued pattern they cut into sellable sizes. I used to sew a lot until I no longer did. I'm not sure why I quit, but I wonder… is remnant the same as leftover? Please let me know!

Instead of attempting some heavy-duty theology of gracious election that more than a few have done over the centuries, I'll go more in the direction Kate took. She wrote about her offspring leaving behind remnants of their visits, but I'm considering…

Last Sunday was the Day of Resurrection, Easter Sunday. Especially Orthodox churches celebrate the seven days from Easter Sunday through Easter Saturday as Bright Week; they consider the entire week a single day—the first day of the new creation. We sometimes talk about Eighth Day Theology. Some baptismal fonts have eight sides (octagonal) to help demonstrate our baptism into the new creation, our baptism as a new creation Into Jesus Christ's death and resurrection.

Remnant is this week's prompt, so why am I saying so much about Easter? Jesus had scars in his post-resurrection appearances. It's important to remember the new creation is not pristine; it carries scars and leftovers from our old, deadly pasts. And because the New Creation is the rebirth, the transformation of the old, it contains remnants of what used to be.

What aspects of your past has God already resurrected? What's going on – or not – in your life and world that needs to experience death and resurrection? We look forward to the reality Revelation 21:1-3 describes:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

See, the home of God is among mortals.
God will dwell with them;
they will be God's peoples,
and God will be with them and be their God;

God will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.

But right now?

A remnant of hope will carry us home.

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Losing Moses on the Freeway

Here's a shorter version of my original blog about this book.

• Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice, and said, "All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do." —Exodus 24:3

• Now behold, one came and said to Jesus, "Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?" So Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments." —Matthew 19:16-17

• The way we know we've been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters. Anyone who doesn't love is as good as dead. —1 John 3:14

• Blessed are those who do his commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city. Revelation 22:14

from the baptismal liturgy:

"In Christian love you have presented these children for Holy Baptism. You should, therefore, faithfully bring them to the services of God's house, and teach them the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments. As they grow in years, you should place in their hand the Holy Scriptures…"

Serendipitously I happened to buy a book by former New York Times foreign correspondent Chris Hedges; it's Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America.

In the author's story I recognize major parts of my own journey. At the beginning, the author explains God gave us the Sinai Covenant, the ten words – decalogue or commandments – to enable and sustain community—:

"They [the commandments] were for the ancients, and are for us, the rules that, when honored, hold us together and when dishonored lead to alienation, discord and violence."

Chris Hedges opens the first chapter, Mystery, with his experience as a young seminarian serving a people and a church in the inner-city Boston neighborhood of Roxbury. Its normative violence and human degradation, crumpling, decaying physical infrastructure, pervasive aura of wastedness and death amounted to a setting he'd not previously known (and probably hadn't imagined).

On page 18 Hedges, son of a pastor, admits in words identical to what I've said and written dozens of times over the past few years, "The church was part of my daily rhythm. I look at the world through the eyes it gave me." Also parallel to my experience he says, "But I also knew the church's dark side, its self-righteous smugness, its crushing piety, the way it used religion to exalt itself and how it often masked human cruelty behind the quest for virtue and piety." [page 19] To that I'll add the petty viciousness, self-centeredness, and destructiveness of both local and judicatorial church politics.

I relate to the author's anger as he chronicles [page 11] smashing a glass bottle against the front door of the church building as "…an ending, a final conclusion to a life spent in the powerful and claustrophobic embrace of the church. It is meant to be a break from God. But you trade one god for another. This is how life works. We all have gods."

For myself, the unanticipated separation from full participation in the church to which I'd devoted years of my life and that had played a central role in shaping my goals, lifestyle, and worldview is like experiencing my own death.

On page 11 Hedges says we circle back to the origins of our lives, "if not to embrace it, then to understand how it shaped us, to examine with less heat and anger our marks and scars."

I'm still examining the mosaic in order to find my place, just as I try to discern ways I've helped create it as it has created and recreated me.

On page 175 the author wisely reminds us "They [the commandments] do not call us to practice total self-abnegation, empowering others, as I did at first in Roxbury, to abuse us. They call us rather toward mutual respect and mutual self-sacrifice." In words from a pastor with whom I worked alongside, "God calls us to serve, but not to be walked all over."

To illustrate his advice of setting (physical, in this case) boundaries so you won't be broken and violated, Hedges gives the example of Martin Luther King, Jr. walking from Montgomery to Memphis with a detachment from the National Guard. [pages 29-30]

From the Holy Communion liturgy in the Book of Common Prayer:

God spake these words, and said:

I am the Lord thy God who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods but me.

Lord have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this law.

Examine your lives and conduct by the rule of God's commandments, that you may perceive wherein you have offended in what you have done or left undone, whether in thought, word, or deed. …

Like Israel formed in the searing heat and God's minimal yet faithful supply of the exodus desert, we are a people, a nation. In Lord's Day worship we retell, re-enact in baptism and the Eucharist the meta-narrative of our deliverance from death into life, of Jesus' death and resurrection. Although sometimes I think I loved the Church more than I loved Jesus, after beginning really to hear my story, someone asked me why on earth I'd remained in the church at all and I replied, "This is where I find the sacraments!"

In the Love chapter: "But by giving up parts of ourselves for others, by accepting that we must be willing to lose life to create and preserve life, we honor the core of the commandments. The commandments hold out to us the possibility of love." [page 173] Chris Hedges [page 174]: "The covenant offered by the commandments, the covenant of life, is the covenant of love. It is a covenant that recognizes that all life is sacred and love is the force that makes life together possible. … But it is never too late to turn back. Atonement permits a new way of being. It calls us to life." [pages 173-175]

We people of Maundy Thursday have received Jesus' New Commandment, the mandate of love faithful unto death; by faith and in the Spirit we have infinite access to Jesus Christ's atonement for the buying back, the redemption, for the life of all creation.

Then Moses took the book of the covenant, and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient." —Exodus 24:7

Here we will take the wine and the water;
here we will take the bread of new birth,
here you shall call your sons and your daughters,
call us anew to be salt for the earth.

Give us to drink the wine of compassion;
give us to eat the bread that is you;
nourish us well, and teach us to fashion
lives that are holy and hearts that are true.

Marty Haugen, Here in This Place/Gather Us In, © 1982 GIA Publications, Inc.
• my Amazon review: law that binds; commands that free

Five Minute Friday :: Honor

• Five Minute Friday :: Honor Linkup

• I'm picking up on this old one about towels and service—honor, as well.

Yesterday I asked a guest who was checking in at the hostel where I've been staying and working if he needed a towel. He said no, he didn't; he had a couple of towels with him. I replied I always travel with a towel, too. I started that habit when I stayed in European hostels, and continued it traveling cross-country USA, occasionally lodging in a motel or hotel, but often in a hostel or with a classmate or friend who had limited linens with limited or no laundry facilities.

To receive, claim, or possess an honor is a privilege. It's a charge. It's a responsibility. It's often a trust from other humans. It's often a sacred trust from God.

Revelation 7:9,10,12

⁹ After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰ They cried out in a loud voice, saying, "Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!"
¹² "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen."

Consider honors we have in our families, cities, towns, and workplaces. Honors the church gives us on occasion. The privilege of preaching law and gospel to bring a word of grace; breaking bread and pouring wine, making sure the eschatological feast has flavor and substance. Counseling and consoling. Calls for justice and righteousness.

In order to receive thanksgiving, honor, and glorious blessing, God in Christ Jesus has been responsible – fully responded – to our human needs.

But I started out with towels and time is limited, so where's the honor there?

I observed that to receive, claim, or possess an honor is a privilege. It's a charge. It's a responsibility. It's often a trust from other humans. Often it's a sacred trust from God.

Part of privilege is following Jesus to help make a person or a community more whole. Like a surfer's towel, if you carry one all the time as I generally do (when I travel, not usually round about town) and like that guest does, it can mean warmth and compassion. It can soak up tears, blood, rain, sweat, or water after a refreshing shower. Honoring that other person's needs is a high honor for us. Amen? Amen!

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From Revelation 2

• To him who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna
and I will give him a white stone
with a new name written on the stone
which no one knows except him who receives it.
Revelation 2:17

• And I will give him the morning star.
Revelation 2:28

Five Minute Friday :: Satisfied

• Five Minute Friday :: Satisfied Linkup

Intro

Satisfaction happens after a meal so abundant and delicious it fills your body and your senses. A person becomes satisfied after discussing a problem or conflict in enough detail and clarity to resolve it and move foreword in the situation or relationship. A well-crafted durable item is satisfactory for the use we hoped it would fit.

This is the second week of a new year and the first Five Minute Friday of 2025. Readers of this blog probably know I'm a theology geek and a church geek. With a worldwide plethora of church styles, traditions, denominations, etc., with the confusion of how to interpret scriptural passages about polity, organization, and structure – even with different perspectives on the authority of scripture – how can we interact with churches other than our own, or does scripture allow us to do so?

Magisterial Reformers Martin Luther (especially via Philip Melanchthon) and John Calvin had simple criteria for the presence of the church in any place, in any time.

• "The Church is the congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered. And to the true unity of the Church it is enough to agree concerning the doctrine of the Gospel and the administration of the Sacraments. Nor is it necessary that human traditions, that is, rites or ceremonies, instituted by men, should be everywhere alike. As Paul says: One faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, etc. Ephesians 4, 5. 6." Philipp Melanchthon, Augsburg Confession, Article 7.

• "Wherever we see the Word of God sincerely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there, it is not to be doubted, a church of God exists." John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Vol. 4, chapter 1, section 9.

2025 :: Satisfaction

Augsburg Confession, Article 7, Satis est "It is enough; it is sufficient, it satisfies."

Cool church stuff. But at this start of another new year that will take us 25% of the way through what once was an exciting new century we loved to call Y2K, what satisfies me? What suffices for me? What amounts to a full life, not a simple broken existence? Or can I ever be satisfied?

In his struggles, the Apostle Paul heard the Savior's assurance, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." [2 Corinthians 9:12] But how is "grace sufficient" or satisfactory for Paul, for any of us?

Yesterday I wrote to my star word for this year, Possibility. We can go on and on about spirituality, about feelings and thoughts, but we live in bodies that contain and express spiritual, gracious, thoughtful, and emotional realities. Without those are bodies are incomplete, but without a body they don't have a home, a place to reside. This material reality of substance is so central, the biblical story of creation [Genesis 1 and 2] opens with veggies, plants, trees (sun and water) to nurture bodies of animal and human critters. Agriculture becomes the material foundation of everything! At the end of the bible we read about the New Jerusalem coming down from heaven to earth [Revelation 21:2] and the river of life, trees of life with healing fruit [Revelation 22:1-2].

In the creeds we "believe in the resurrection of the body."

I need, I seek, I want, I long for a bodily and physically abundant life. A life with people, buildings, places, activities, and pets. An embodied reality that welcomes feelings and thoughts and ideas.

News of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch. When Barnabas came and saw the grace of God, he rejoiced, and he encouraged them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast devotion. Acts 11:22-23

With his senses Barnabas saw the grace of God. He didn't hear a disembodied heavenly choir. It wasn't an imaginary apparition. It wasn't even a properly performed liturgy. He saw a caring community of people acting in Jesus' name to provide shelter, food, and other physical necessities. Practicing the forgiveness that generates new life.

Barnabas saw grace at Antioch.

When and where do you see, hear, taste, touch, and smell grace?

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Reign of Christ :: Revelation

We give thanks, O Lord God Almighty
who art, and wast, and art to come
because thou hast taken thy great power
and begun to reign.
Revelation 11:17

Five Minute Friday :: History

Clockwise from upper left:

• Beach House in Truro, Cape Cod, Massachusetts
• All Saints Church, University City, San Diego, California
• Downtown Los Angeles, California
• Boston, Massachusetts skyline across the Charles River
• Five Minute Friday :: History Linkup

We can't escape those written, spoken, and/or illustrated chronicles of events in particular times and places that shape us in both hidden and apparent ways. Most of us know some of our own original and extended family history, the story of our town or city, our province or state—and country, of course. For many that includes history of the place our family migrated from a few years or a few centuries ago. Our awareness of a few millennia of world history may not be as acute as our knowledge of more local and recent events, yet it surrounds us in our habits, preferences, longings, and perspectives.

Then there's the history of the whole people of God. Earlier this month on my scripture blog I wrote a little about salvation history:

Heilsgeschichte [Heil=salvation; Geschichte=history] brings together fairly objective, empirical facts with the lived experiences of the people, often with a sense of saga or myth; Heilsgeschichte has a far greater degree of density than the evidence, cause, and effect history we study in school.

In addition to our incorporation in local and world history, baptism embeds us in the history of planet earth – of all creation – in the history of the whole people of God. Water is the womb of this planet's creation and the womb of our first birth as humans. Baptized into Jesus Christ's death and resurrection, we experience our first death, our second birth – our re-creation – as we identify with earth's history.

Very late Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening, or extremely early Sunday morning the Vigil of Easter revisits the meta-narratives of creation and of deliverance from death to life in the Exodus and Passion/Easter stories. Maybe you've heard of the Passover Seder referred to as "eating history?"

The book of Revelation foretells the reconciliation of all things, of the lion lying down with the lamb, of people from east and west, from north and south, gathered around the welcome table of the Messianic Feast. The garden of resurrection has grown into a city, where the river of life and the tree of life provide for all creation. Some theologians refer to that as the end of history! What do you think?

Our God is God of history. We are God's people. We are people of history. We are people of Easter hope.

Sunday's coming!
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Five Minute Friday :: Hidden

• Five Minute Friday :: Hidden Linkup

To anyone who overcomes, I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give them a white stone with a new name written on the stone, a name no one knows except the one who receives it. And I will give them the Morning Star. Revelation 2:17, 28

For Israel of the exodus, manna was bread from heaven, bread of heaven. They'd trusted God's supply, but then the desert wanderers asked what it was, so it received the name manna or "what is it." Strength for the day at hand along with the possibility of a future was hidden within God's gift that rained from the sky, and not inside anything they might plan, design, or stockpile themselves. After all, they'd learned producing, counting, and anxious saving when they slaved for Pharaoh! Much later on at the autumn ingathering, the land they tilled and cared for would yield provisions to store over the winter months. Much later on. Not right now.

Scripture tells us, our experience shows us, God's presence frequently is hidden, isn't exactly apparent to our senses because many layers of more obvious stuff conceal it. We sometimes discover the Holy Other hidden in people who feel strange to us. In a criminal convicted and crucified by imperial powers. When expectations turned upside down, inside out, suddenly point the way to that new thing God had hidden along the way. In the joyful energy of spontaneous dance. In waters that drown us into oblivion while they birth us anew. We find the divine presence hidden in the emptiness of a once occupied tomb, but why do we still keep seeking the living among the dead?

With nutrients for our bodies, sustenance for our spirits hidden in, with, and under the grain, the yeast, the salt, and the heat that created it, this bread is holy manna. With the surprise of friendship hidden and then revealed when we break bread together, a well-baked loaf leads to the heaven on earth of human connection.

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Five Minute Friday :: Quick

• Five Minute Friday :: Quick Linkup

Header Phrases

• Follow your heart
• There is a place
• In the quick of existence
• Where the mind sees more than the eye
• Peace
• Friends
• 3
• Go Slo
• We, according to his promise,
Look for new heavens and a new earth
[where righteousness dwells]. 2 Peter 3:13


Quick

And behold, I am coming quickly, and my reward is with me, to give to every one according to his work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last. He who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming quickly." Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus! Revelation 22:12, 13, 20

"Quick" in this passage from Revelation sometimes gets translated soon; the Greek supports both. My most frequent connotation of quick is without much delay. Though not necessarily the yesterday we often wish for, quick isn't lightning fast, definitely not at the speed of light.

Quick bread comes to mind. You need to get the recipe and the ingredients. Recipe may already be in your file box or folder, or you may need to search online for one with the best pictures so you can know what'll come out of your oven. Do you have ingredients in pantry and fridge or do they mean a trip to the store? This won't be slow bread, but it's not done yet because you need to mix them up.

Put it all in the oven and wait a short eternity for your so far fairly quick bread to bake. You probably need to let it cool some before enjoying a slice or two with butter or cream cheese and a friendly companion. Yet that procedure is short and quick compared to yeast bread that needs to rise a while, sometimes a very long while; it approaches instantaneous compared to acquiring sourdough starter.

I like the percussive sounds of Jesus promising a quick arrival in contrast to meeting him "soon." We still need to wait longer than our heart's yearning, yet when we seek Jesus he'll be in our midst, fulfilling his coveted promise of new heavens, a new earth. Amen? Amen!

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen! Revelation 22:21

• Zucchini basil quick bread by Tiny Banquet Committee on Flickr

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Five Minute Friday :: Soon

• Five Minute Friday :: Soon Linkup

The one who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming soon."

"Please, Aslan… what do you call soon?" "I call all times soon," said Aslan.
C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Soon. Expected – or wanted – before much longer in calendar time. Most of us want whatever it is sooner rather than later. Desiring something yesterday! is commonplace. Like a little kid who thinks they want to be a teenager, sometimes we don't consider preparation, people, and other necessary inputs for an event or experience to happen.

Are you willing to settle for a lesser one because you can have it sooner? Or is it worth the longer wait for a better one?

We often think of God outside of time as we know it, and God indeed is eternal and transcendent. But in Jesus' incarnation God spent days, years, minutes, and hours like ours. Because God beyond time and space became close at hand immanent within measurable time and space in a body like ours, God knew our longing to have needs fulfilled and wants met as soon as possible.

My header photo glows in late afternoon, late autumn southland sun. It's the golden hour, and I want to go home soon to a place like that. It seems as if I've settled for lesser work, living, and participation options because I could have them sooner. My endless longing and searching for home that still hasn't happened is old stuff, and best guess it will happen a lot sooner if/when I try to find something similar to those few things that actually have worked well. I've already done the longer wait for one that's so much better than the sooner one. So jump in!

PS: In formal theological terms, with God all times are soon, but we need to live in ways that accommodate our earthbound reality.

The one who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming soon."
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!
The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen.
Revelation 22:21-22

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Five Minute Friday :: Vision

• Five Minute Friday :: Vision Linkup

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "See, the home of God is among mortals. God will dwell with them as their God; they will be God's peoples, and God will be with them; God will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away." Revelation 21:1-4

Like a vision board packed with pictures of the future you dream of, the not here right now you expect will manifest and you'll then testify to, scripture reveals God's visions for creation's wellbeing and provides ideas we can follow to partner with God to create heaven on earth. In my focus passage from the book of Revelation that concludes the bible, John the Revelator describes the vision God gave him.

"Sea no more" is far from ecological disaster, but picks up the code word sea or ocean that in scripture frequently denotes untamed chaos, as when Genesis 1 tells us about the dawn of creation when the Spirit of God hovered over the formless empty deep darkness. Oh, yes, the new creation does have a river with life-giving water—"enough" clear clean water along with all we need of everything else.

God's vision of the reign of the Spirit is "shalom" justice and bountiful sufficiency. Reading and studying scripture gives us plenty of practice in learning God's ways. Enough food, safe shelter, healthy community. Good work for good pay in good conditions. Abundant mercy and love. No sorrow or dying or pain. The end of war and violence. Scripture sings in the language of geography and space, because we are embodied humans solidly situated on land.

The God who calls us into new creation partnership is Jeremiah's God so near with laws so just. Along with 2 Peter, we proclaim and claim, "According to God's promise we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells." [2 Peter 3:13] That's quite a vision!

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Five Minute Friday :: Trial

There grows a tree in Paradise
The Pilgrims called it the Tree of Life…
The leaves of the tree
Are for the healing of the nations

Art copyright © Leah Chang / Sun Tree River Design
• Five Minute Friday Linkup :: Trial

All My Trials

I had a little book was given to me,
And every page spells liberty,
All my trials Lord, soon be over.
Too late my brothers, too late
But never mind,
All my trials Lord, soon be over.

There grows a tree in Paradise,
The Pilgrims call it the tree of life,
All my trials Lord, soon be over.
Too late my brothers, too late
But never mind.
All my trials Lord, soon be over.

Excerpt from traditional Bahamian spiritual; full lyrics on Daily Prayer Ministries accessed Thursday 27 January 2022

Trial

"All my trials, Lord, soon be over."

Every page spells liberty?! That must be a very very Good Book! Popular theology that's often not very scriptural too often tells us a certain trial or series of trials is necessary for God to achieve God's purpose in a situation and/or for God to refine us into that next stage certain point. As sweet as it would feel were that the truth, many many trials, disappointments, and conundrums we experience are anything but redemptive; too many to count actually slow us down, detour us, and in the end confound what would have been a better path with a healthier outcome. (In themselves they're not salvific, but in the end God redeems them, no surprise.)

Quite a while ago former neighbor and occasional blogger Sara observed the gospel in one word is–remember! As we necessarily focus on preparing for next week, for tomorrow, for next year, or that dream God revealed to us, we can get caught up in the pain of yet another this isn't quite working out; I thought God had already brought me through this particular type of trial (and I even learned a whole lot from it), but rather than agonizing about each trial du jour, we need to remember the witness of scripture—especially exodus and easter! Those events spell liberty for the future, freedom from a past in bondage to sin and death. Those events point toward the not yet for us that yet is a place God already has gone and waits for us to arrive. Exodus and Easter summon us into well-stewarded creation with pristine waterways, gift-laden trees, a cosmos that thrives and helps heal. Toward the time all our trials are over.

Several times I've quoted Cornel West and I need to remember his reminder, "We are people of hope! Why do we party on Friday nights? Why do we go to church on Sundays?" Because we are Easter people, who love to and who need to practice resurrection! Gospeled Good News from the Good Book!

"The Leaves of the Tree are for the Healing of the Nations."
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Season of Creation 4A: River Sunday

"Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city."
Revelation 22:1-2

River Sunday 2014

God of all creation, at the dawn of time rivers flowed over mountains and through valleys; we ask that in the Spirit of life we may live faithfully to our baptism with water and the word, that the rivers of the new creation would flow freely and provide healing to all the nations. In the name of Jesus the Christ, Amen!

Here's the Eucharistic Prayer I wrote for Season of Creation Year A in 2011:

Eucharistic Prayer Creation A – © leah chang 2011

Earth Day 2014 #greencities

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life,
flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb,
through the middle of the street of the city.
On either side of the river is the tree of life,
and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
Revelation 22:1-2

All Saints' Images

I realize these 1^st and 2^nd lections aren't the RCL texts, but they are Lutheran Book of Worship and that sometimes differs a little.

Isaiah 26:1-4; 8-9; 12-13; 19-21



Revelation 21:9-11; 22-27; (22:1-5)



Matthew 25:1-12

blog action day 2010: water!

9 days late...water and milk and honey!!!

Change dot org sponsors Blog Action Day again this year.

For this year's topic of water, first I considered "what do I know?" I know theology, so now I'm considering the biblical promised land of milk and honey.

Water is the womb of creation.
Genesis 1

¹ "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, ² the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters."

And water is the womb of our first birth and of our re-birth, our re-creation. In baptism, we enter the state of this earth when it was yet unborn; we are submerged in the substance from which first life emerged. God's creative power engulfs us as we identify with this planet's history and with Jesus of Nazareth, who was baptized in the River Jordan.

In the story of the Exodus from slavery, the Hebrew scriptures bring us a well-known account of a 40-year long wandering through an inhospitably arid, apparently barren desert, across a river and then into a place already inhabited by "others."

Remember this? Exodus 3

Exodus 33

^3a "Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey..."

Milk and honey is a sign of the fullness of God's reign in justice and righteousness. Flowing honey and surging milk begin with fertile land and rivers of usable water. Ample milk means abundant cattle grazing on luxuriant grass, bovines that bear healthy calves--and that fertilize the ground. Bees make honey; bees pollinate fruits and flowers. Dairy, beef, honey and harvest mean nourishment for farmers, families and community, with overflowing everything to sell at market or barter and trade in order to get whatever you cannot grow.

The story of creation and of the people of God begins with water, continues with almost countless water-related experiences, including a great flood followed by God's covenant with Noah and with all creation, with Abram/Abraham and later Jacob's passage by the Jabbok River... water's scarcity in the exodus desert is central, since the desert became the place where the people learned to recognize and acknowledge water as gift rather than as taken for granted. In the desert's sparse economy, with surprises like water from the rock and manna from the sky, they also learned the kind of trust in God's provision that would enable them later to live in covenant with each other and with all creation.

Exodus 17

¹From the wilderness of Sin the whole congregation of the Israelites journeyed by stages, as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. ²The people quarreled with Moses, and said, "Give us water to drink." Moses said to them, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?" ³But the people thirsted there for water; and the people complained against Moses and said, "Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?"

Numbers 20

¹The Israelites, the whole congregation, came into the wilderness of Zin in the first month, and the people stayed in Kadesh. Miriam died there, and was buried there. ²Now there was no water for the congregation; so they gathered together against Moses and against Aaron. ³The people quarreled with Moses and said, "Would that we had died when our kindred died before the Lord! ⁴Why have you brought the assembly of the Lord into this wilderness for us and our livestock to die here? ⁵Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to bring us to this wretched place? It is no place for grain, or figs, or vines, or pomegranates; and there is no water to drink."

After they left the geographic, phenomenological Egypt, the people reached into the desert of Shur, where Elim, with its twelve springs of fresh water and seventy palm trees was one of their first stops. Palm trees and fresh springs provided shade and shelter, yet Marah, "bitter waters" was the name of the gateway to Elim's sanctuary, safety and protection.

Exodus 15

²²Then Moses ordered Israel to set out from the Red Sea, and they went into the wilderness of Shur. They went three days in the wilderness and found no water. ²³When they came to Marah, they could not drink the water of Marah because it was bitter. That is why it was called Marah. ²⁴And the people complained against Moses, saying, "What shall we drink?" ²⁵He cried out to the Lord; and the Lord showed him a piece of wood; he threw it into the water, and the water became sweet. ... ²⁷Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve springs of water and seventy palm trees; and they camped there by the water.

Toward the last part of the texts placed last in the biblical canon there's a rich vision of rivers, trees, wholeness and integrity:

Revelation 22

¹Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. ²On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

For God's newly constituted, post-exodus people a new phase begins with the body of water that's threshold between past and future and for the Church, waters and rivers - especially The Jordan River - remain icons of baptism, the event in which God irrevocably claims us and calls us to live in trust and in covenant with all creation. For us, baptism is a liminal, a threshold event that divides a disconnected past from new life in covenant with the church in every time and every place and with all creation.

As Christians we are People of the Book that begins with waters of the first creation and ends with rivers of the new, a book in which water is a persistent image. We people of the book also are people of the journey, a faith-filled, trusting trek that is bordered, boundaried and largely defined by the gift of water and our stewardship thereof, a kind of fluid wandering during which we're never still back there but also never have quite reached what we imagined to be our destination. You know I love Carly Simon's

Let the River Run

We're coming to the edge,
Running on the water,
Coming through the fog,
Your sons and daughters.

Let the river run,
Let all the dreamers
Wake the nation.
Come, the New Jerusalem!

Water is the womb of creation and the geographic, landed location of milk and honey cannot happen without pure, "living" water that keeps on birthing and re-birthing everything on earth. Milk and honey requires fertile ground and rivers that flow—rivers that won't catch on fire! That kind of land grows plump grains in well-stewarded prairies, juicy grapes on heavy-laden vines. Milk and honey is a lively sign of well-nourished people, animals, families and communities, of the sufficiency of shalom for everyone with neither too much nor not enough for anyone!

Only when milk and honey abounds can we offer back to heaven the feast of eucharist that gathers and welcomes all creation and all people, excluding no one (except those who exclude themselves). This "foretaste of the feast to come," as the liturgy expresses it, is the sign and realization of all creation's reconciliation, an emblem of justice and integrity of all and for all, a celebration that depends on the river that depends on the humans that depend on the river, the banquet that cannot happen without... water!

Carl Sagan observes, "If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe." It's a given that we cannot create the universe, but if we want to make apple pies, we must help steward the universe's re-creation and we need to take care of the water, live in covenant with the water, with each other and with all creation.

Blog Action Day 2010: water!!!

River of Life; Tree of Life

I'm blogging a graphic of Revelation 22:2 I did a while ago and that I just Photoshopped. The 2nd lection for yesterday, Easter 6, was Revelation 21:10 to 22:5 that includes the astonishing passage about the river of life flowing from the Throne of God—from the Cross of Calvary! Our God reigns from a cross...



Revelation 22:1-2

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

Prayer of the Day

Bountiful God, you gather your people into your realm, and you promise us food from your tree of life. Nourish us with your word, that empowered by your Spirit we may love one another and the world you have made, through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reign with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen.