To the Joyful Ones

To the Joyful Ones 

“Shield the joyous; and all for your love’s sake.”—Order of Compline, The Book of Common Prayer (Church Publishing, Inc.), p. 134.   

“The joyous.” I know these people. I have worked with them. I live with them. I go to the symphony with them. I read their postings on Facebook. They call me in the early morning on the way to work every day. I go to church with them. I serve with them.

I especially find them at one place I never suspected: at our church’s weekly Food Pantry. They are not only the joyful people who serve there but also those who come for food. That is why I selfishly have gone in the past, not necessarily to offer light but to receive it, especially from the neediest families. I would sit and ask them how they were doing. “I am blessed,” is their response. Then, they bring each other to the Food Pantry and discuss sharing the meals together.

They share poignant stories of how God has been working in their lives, caring for them. They have never met a stranger. They ask us how we have been doing since we last met. Their voices echo laughter. They ask for prayers for other family members. They teach us how to live.

I also meet the joyous at recovery meetings. Gratitude exudes from every pore of their bodies. They know what their life was once like and what it has become in recovery. They remind us that joy can be missing in our lives, whether we have nothing or everything. Happiness does not come from things or substances but from a relationship with a higher power that we most often call God. So, we surrender and decide to let this God run the show. I go to hear people talk at recovery meetings whose “lights are on,” especially when mine seem dim. I always leave lighter and brighter with a handful of gratitude.

What do these groups of people have in common? Community. A community of wounded people who have transformed their pain into healing each other. They are called wounded healers.

food pantry car line

The True Prophet

The True Prophet

“How do we tell the false prophet from the true prophet? The true prophet seldom predicts the future. The true prophet warns us of our present hardness of heart, our prideful presuming to know God’s mind. The ultimate test of the true prophet is love. A mark of the true prophet in any age is humility, self-emptying so there is room for God’s Word.”—Madeleine L’Engle in A Stone for a Pillow (Shaw Books, 2000).

rbg

We owe so much to Madeleine L’Engle and her books for children—which are even better for adults. Perhaps what I will remember the most, however, is that her award-winning 1963 Newbery selection, A Wrinkle in Time, was rejected twenty-six times before it was published and became an instant science fiction classic!

L’Engle tells us how we recognize authentic prophets and know when we speak with a prophetic voice. But there is more. I never know with certainty when I am doing God’s will at the time, but I can sometimes realize afterward that something was God’s will.

L’Engle’s thoughts can be helpful here. If my action is all about me, I must ponder whether this is God’s will. We are likely to hear the voice of God when we are in a place of humility, of self-emptying. If an action of mine is done in love or flows from love, that is a good sign that it may express God’s will. But Madeleine L’Engle tells us that if we think we are doing God’s will—especially if we feel pride that we are on the right track—we must stop and reconsider.

So, it’s a grand mystery. If we think we have it, we don’t. If we don’t believe we have it, we may. I remember that previous helpful quote: “The opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty.”

swearing in

I think our country lost a true prophet in the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a woman who spoke out to help others in humility and love, not for gain for herself, but for those oppressed, warning us of our hardness of heart, who like Madeleine L’Engle never gave up.

 Justice Ginsburg may be best remembered for her powerful dissents, symbolized by her opinions and outward appearance, as she wears those unique dissent collars with her black robes. May we honor her by speaking out in love for justice when we encounter our neighbors oppressed. May we never give up dissenting, even when we think our voice is not being heard.

visit to Little Rock…filled Little Rock’s largest indoor arena of 15000 to 18000

Writing as a Spiritual Practice

Cameron: Writing As a Spiritual Practice

“Do not call procrastination laziness. Call it fear. Fear is what blocks an artist. The fear of not being good enough. The fear of not finishing. The fear of failure and of success. The fear of beginning at all. There is only one cure for fear. That cure is love. Use love for your artist to cure its fear. Stop yelling at yourself. Be nice. Call fear by its right name.”—Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity (Tarcher 1995).

When I suggest to friends that they consider writing a spiritual practice, most respond they don’t know how to start or have no writing talent. It is not their gift. The best antidote to this fear of writing or inadequacy as a writer is Julia Cameron’s book, The Artist’s Way. Cameron suggests starting to write by rising in the morning and writing “morning pages,” which she calls the “primary tool of creative recovery.” These are three longhand pages of whatever comes into our mind. These reflections do not have to make “sense.” Instead, writing them is intended to be a listening exercise in the morning: imagining God’s hand moving through our hands as we write.

I have also experienced this exercise as a clearing or cleaning out of the garbage in my head. Fearful thoughts stay powerful when they remain in my head, but some of their power over me goes away when I put them on paper. Perhaps, in some way, I am turning them over, releasing them to God to begin the creative process.

Cameron recommends we pray for guidance every night and ask for answers. The morning pages are a process of listening for the answers as the day begins.

I often write on the inside covers of books when I start reading them. As I reread Cameron’s book, I pulled back her cover and observed a date twenty years ago. Memories flood in of the book group at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church, with which I read The Artist’s Way over one summer. I especially remember Lee Nix, the chair of my discernment committee, who was a mentor to me and an encourager of creativity. Today, there is also an Artist’s Way for Retirement! Some members of that same group are now reading this version on Zoom, as we are now scattered many miles away from each other.

I believe it enhances the experience to read, write, and work through a book like The Artist’s Way with a book study group—to go together through the book’s many suggested activities and exercises.

Today, I am also reminded of how powerful writing down a date can be in the context of spiritual writing.

   Joanna  https://www.joannaseibert.com/