12-step Eucharist Burning Bush, Saint Mark's Episcopal Church

12-step Eucharist, 17A, September 2, 2026 Burning Bush, Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock

Frederick Buechner calls this story of the burning bush one of the greatest moments in Old Testament history. In fact, he believes it is the key moment. Moses is a stranger and exile in Midian on the east bank of the Gulf of Aqabah. He flees there from Egypt after murdering an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave. We often forget that several of the founders of our religion are murderers. It is interesting how the people we meet in scripture are failures and sinners whom God redeems for great work. Moses settles down and tends his father-in-law’s sheep in the wilderness near the slopes of Mt. Horeb. Then the moment happens. A bush bursts into flame. It blazes up. The heat ripples the air. Leaf and stem become fire, crackling and leaping, as if the air around it were also on fire. But though the bush burns, it does not burn up because it is a miraculous fire. It is a fire that Moses cannot explain any more than we can.

Then, out of the fiery moment, a voice flames up, and of all the conceivable things it might say, its first words are a name. “Moses,” it says. “Moses.” God says it twice, and at the sound of his own name, Moses is caught, just as we would be. We are so much our own names that at the sound of them we cannot help but stop and listen. The voice that calls us by name knows us by name and has something to say to us. So Moses, the stranger and exile, stands there with the muck of the sheep on his shoes, guilty as sin of a man’s murder, and listens and answers.

“Here am I,” he says, waiting for God only knows what will happen next; maybe a lightning bolt will strike and set him on fire like the bush. But what happens next is that the voice from the fire speaks and says, “Take off your shoes. The place where you are standing is holy ground.”1

Each of us knows about a burning bush. In many ways, it brought us here to this 12-Step Eucharist. It is that voice that calls us by name. It is that moment of clarity that calls us by name to stop and realize we are standing on holy ground because God is speaking to us. We may hear this voice as silence or a whisper, but if we keep living with our lives as the center of the universe, the voice grows louder and louder, until it may become a flaming bush. This has been my experience with the Hound of Heaven. This suggests that Moses may not have previously been a good listener!

We return to the holy rooms where we found recovery and to this holy place tonight to remember the warmth of that burning bush and to remember that we were not the first to see and hear God’s voice. And Moses, of course, was not the first either. This is the God of love who will do almost anything to care for us, to let us know how much we are loved, and to offer resurrection from the many things that harm us in this life, and offer an even closer walk with that love divine in the world to come. 

1Frederick Buechner, “Hope,” in Secrets in the Dark, pp. 73-81.

10A Our Souls Fallen Behind Our Bodies, St. Mark's Episcopal Church, July 12, 2026

10A Our Souls Fallen Behind Our Bodies, Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church, July 12, 2026

 At the height of Western colonialism in Africa, a European adventurer set out to explore uncharted regions in the heart of that continent. He hired local tribesmen as porters to carry his supplies.

For days, they covered miles of challenging terrain at a relentless pace. The European explorer was obsessed with meeting his goal within the ambitious timetable he had set for the adventure.

One morning, his porters refused to take another step. There was no drama, no revolt. They simply sat down.

The explorer tried everything to get them moving again. He shouted,/ offered bribes,/ and made threats. Nothing worked. In frustration, he finally asked, “Why aren’t you moving?”

One of the porters explained, “Our souls have fallen behind our bodies, so we must wait for them to catch up.”

Our souls have fallen behind our bodies so we must wait for them to catch up.1

 Does this resonate with you? When our souls have fallen behind our bodies, this isn’t living. It’s merely existing.

But Jesus constantly calls us to a different way,/ a different pattern of life, that nourishes and cares for the soul even as our bodies grow weary.

The porters were not complaining about carrying heavy burdens. Instead, their ordinary lives had instilled in them a wisdom about burdens that many of us have yet to learn.

In this life, we all carry burdens. Sometimes heavy, sometimes lighter. To be alive is to bear some burden.

To put that another way, a carefree life is no life at all. We are made in God’s image, designed to care for each other. Caring, being in relationship is what makes life meaningful.

But in the West, a pattern of life has developed in which we yearn for fulfillment and a life free from stress, strain, toil, or anxiety—no burdens.

We imagine we’ll get there once we reach our career goals, achieve notoriety, hold irresistible power, or accumulate enough wealth.

In the meantime, our energy and attention focus on whatever will get us to that carefree point.

Along the way, we leave our souls behind. We may achieve a great deal. We may make immense technological progress, become well-known, and accumulate considerable wealth./ Yet our hearts feel troubled, our social networks are fraying, and often our family ties unravel. We experience anxiety, exhaustion, and alienation.

We reach for relief. A break. We grab our iPhone, take a drink or a drug, or stream Netflix. Something to take the edge off. For a little while, it helps. Then we’re back to work, at school, or at home.

We’re rushing again. We’ve returned to the same pattern of life that left our souls behind in the first place.

In this digital age, we make the Devil’s job of evil a breeze. Hurry, pathological busyness, distraction, smartphone addiction, and the constant stream of alerts and interruptions—all of these cut us off from the Spirit, Christ, God within us. “When the Evil around us cannot make us bad, the Devil makes us busy.” (John Mark Comer, Live No Lies)////

Our spiritual challenge is to practice sustained awareness or attention,  living intentionally in the present moment. Christians have long understood that this sustained habit of awareness of God’s presence within and around us does not happen by accident. It requires attentiveness and a pattern. This is sowing seeds in good soil. This is what Christian tradition calls a rule of life.

A rule is a spiritual rhythm for living intentionally in the present moment, experiencing God in the present moment. The present moment is where God meets us. Here we cultivate ongoing awareness of God,  beauty, the earth, and truth in everyday life rather than rushing through each day, each moment on autopilot. We notice what is happening within and around us. The cadence of the daily rhythm is marked by time with Scripture, reflection, prayer, and regular worship with a community.

St. Benedict and those who followed him understood that momentary flashes of awareness can awaken us to God’s presence. But a sustained habit of awareness enables us to be in a position to make room for God, who is always present. We stay connected by cultivating the habit of sustained awareness. 2

For example, the Ten Commandments are not rules to follow to remain in God’s favor. They are practices that teach us how to live together in relationship as the kind of people God created us to be.3  

We may think keeping the Sabbath as part of our rule of life means taking a day off. But many of us are just as busy on our days off as we are during the workweek. We cram errands, chores, unfinished projects, and even leisure activities into every available moment. We may stop working for a paycheck, but we never truly stop.

Of course, this misses the point of the Sabbath.

Sabbath means to stop. Stop hurrying. Stop producing. Stop distracting ourselves with all the urgent but not ultimate things in life. The point is not merely rest. The point is remembering what is most real: our life with God. Set aside one day a week to practice remembering that. Over time, Sabbath keeping leads us to carry that sustained habit of attention and awareness of God’s presence into the rest of our lives.

That is how human beings flourish, how we begin to feel in our flesh and bones that we were made by love and for love.

But the default pattern we learned early in life was built on the illusion that the good life is something we achieve, produce by our own efforts.

Today, Jesus reminds us that this way of life is a dead end. “As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing.” (Matthew 13:22)

Jesus tells us, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). This way is not a desire for things, status, or influence. It is a desire for connection, communion, relationship, and love.

We are here to be present—to God, to one another, and to the world. To learn to love and be aware of God before and beside us in the present moment. God calls us to sit in front of a window or on a porch and watch the rain or the birds/ or stop and watch the sunrise or sunset each day.

Be genuinely present to the world around us. To the people, the animals, the plants, and the earth itself. We are here to care. To make the well-being of everyone and everything we encounter matter to us as if our own well-being were inextricably bound to theirs. //

Richard Rohr reminds us that we cannot attain the presence of God, because we are already/ totally, in the presence of God. What’s absent is awareness.4

We will grieve. And we will burst with joy. This is what it means to be created in the image of God. And it’s what it means to truly live. Not to merely exist.

The question is not whether we will carry burdens in this life.// The question is which pattern we will follow to carry life’s burdens.///

It is never too late to Stop,/ Be Aware,/ and get back on the path/ that lets our souls/ catch up/ with our bodies.

1Jake Owensby, “Listening is More Than Existing,”  The Woodlands, May 15, 2026

2 Jake Owensby, “Pentecost Learning the Habit of Attention,” The Woodlands, May 22, 2026 

3Jake Owensby, “What the Commandments are Really for,”  The Woodlands, May 29, 2026

4 Richard Rohr in What the Mystics Know.

Joanna Seibert

12-Step Eucharist, July 1, 2026 St. Mark's, "Whoever welcomes you, welcomes me."

12-Step Eucharist, July 1, 2026, 5:30 pm St. Mark’s Matthew 10:40-42  8A

“Whoever welcomes you, welcomes me.”

How do we see God working in our lives? I rarely know how God is guiding my life in the present moment, but I always find answers when I look backward.

Fifty years ago, on July 4th, 1976, the bicentennial year marking the 200th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, my husband and I, with two toddlers and an infant, crossed the Mississippi and then the Arkansas River, beginning a new adventure in Little Rock. Since that time, the Fourth of July has always been an important holiday, marking another year of nostalgic memories. Our call was to be on the ground floor of a developing Children’s Hospital. Our careers were demanding. Our support staff was grandparents in Memphis who helped us at a moment’s notice, along with a live-in nanny who took a leap of faith to come with us from Iowa. They were both very needed.

We also had pediatric residents and nurses who wanted to spend time with well children, who took our children to ball games, swimming, and movies. We had a lot of help! We were welcomed by so many people.

My husband and I had been involved in the church when we were growing up, and when we were married, but when we journeyed to that “foreign” land named Iowa for graduate residencies, there was no time. There was no time here, either, but somehow it was important for our children to experience a religious life as we had before, though it was no longer important to us.

Well, this is how God works. If you do not want to pay attention to the hound of heaven, God works through your children. We picked St. Mark’s because it was close to our home and we liked their annual antique show. We were drawn in and welcomed by the clergy, Gordon Swope, Charles Chatham, and Truman Welch. Something drew me to a Bible Study, so I met with a small group studying the Sunday lectionary in homes each week. Immediately, we were welcomed by Barbara and Hap Hoffman, who became lifelong friends and welcomed us to a Cursillo weekend. Then there was no holding back. We were hooked. We later left with the Hoffmans to help start St. Margaret’s. There, I heard the call to the diaconate. Later, we were welcomed by three other churches where I served: Trinity Cathedral, St. Luke’s North Little Rock, and now back at St. Mark’s. Along the way, I also realized that alcohol was interfering with my life. A therapist sent me to one of her neighbors, who became my first sponsor, taking me to meetings every day for 3 months. In November, I will have been with that welcoming recovery group for 36 years. God keeps inviting us, welcoming us through God’s messengers. And as a sidebar, also saving our lives. There were many more stories and welcomings that Time won’t allow.

We have a God of love, always welcoming, caring, guiding, loving, saving. We think we know the path God chooses, but we don’t have a clue. It is like walking a labyrinth. WE think we came to Little Rock to care for sick children, which we did, but God led us to people here at St. Mark’s to care for our souls. I went to a therapist, not to be sidetracked to AA, but that is what happened.

And here we are back at St. Mark’s, right where we started. We haven’t really moved off the chessboard, but we are such different people because of the people who welcomed us along the way to a life with Christ.

Does this remind you of a universal theme well expressed in poetry by T.S. Eliot in the closing lines of “Little Gidding” part of Four Quartets:

“We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.”                        Joanna Seibert

12 step Eucharist August 5, 2026 Jacob Wrestling with God 13A

12-Step Eucharist August 5, 2026: Jacob Wrestling with God 13A

Jacob is our biblical poster child for addiction.1 He may not have used alcohol or drugs, but his addiction was control. Jacob steals his brother’s birthright and blessing,/ runs away,/ and meets his deal-making match in Uncle Laban. He also meets the love of his life, cousin Rachel, and serves fourteen years of hard labor for her hand. The struggles of domestic life become life-changing for Jacob; there is probably nothing like having two wives, two mistresses, and eleven children to dispel the illusion of control. Sometimes this is how God works: we get what we ask for and realize our lives have become unmanageable. Jacob desires to change. In a late effort to make amends to his brother and return home, Jacob sends hundreds of animals ahead of him, moves his family to another camp, and waits alone across the river. In the darkness, Jacob meets God or a muscular angel. A new life, a resurrection, often happens in the dark. The birth of a baby also constantly reminds us that new life is a blessed, painful process, often filled with chaos. 

The angel and Jacob fight by feel until dawn. Just as Jacob seems in control,/ the stranger drops his weight onto Jacob’s leg, and “pop,” his hip is out of joint. But Jacob will not let go of the angel. He is in pain and crippled, yet he smells the scent of heaven. Jacob still remembers that scent from a long-ago dream, when he stood at the bottom of a ladder he called “the gate to heaven” while running away from home (Genesis 28:16-17). Then Jacob does what he does best; he makes a deal. “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” Locked in each other’s arms, the angel asks, “What is your name?” If we really listen, we hear the echo of the same question, asked another time by someone who barely sees Jacob. “I am Esau,” he says that last time. “Jacob,” he answers this time, and the name falls away from him like a snake shedding its old skin. He is no longer Jacob, the imposter. He is Israel, the survivor, the one who strives, who struggles with God. Jacob limps to his reunion with Esau, in whom he sees the face of God for the second time in one day. His exile is over. He is back home.

We in this room know the feeling of home. We feel it when we come to this chapel. We feel it when we sit in the chairs at our home recovery group. We remember what our life was like before and what it is like now. We also know the feeling of surrender to the last act of making deals. We still remember that scent of heaven as we struggled with our higher power. And now we go through the remainder of life with a new name and a limp that is our new birthmark. 

Joanna Seibert

1 Barbara Brown Taylor, “Striving With God,” Gospel Medicine, p. 107-114.

Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth May 31

VISITATION OF MARY AND ELIZABETH

Luke 1:39-49

12-step Eucharist, June 3, 2026. St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Little Rock

Mary’s visit to Elizabeth is perhaps our best example of what happens when two people allow the Holy Spirit to intervene in their lives. Elizabeth, late in her third trimester, hears Mary, in her first trimester, greet her. We don’t know what Mary initially says to Elizabeth, but the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leaps for joy. Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, then greets Mary with these words: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb."/ If only we had the courage to say that to each other as we meet. “Blessed are you among women; blessed are you among men.” 

Mary then breaks into the song of praise and thanksgiving, known as the Magnificat. "My soul magnifies the Lord,

And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant."/ If only we would remember to say every morning as we awaken, “My soul magnifies God.”

How wonderful when we meet our neighbor, if the child, the God, the resurrected Christ within us, could leap for joy to see the God, the Christ within our neighbor. What does this story tell us will happen in our lives and in our neighbors’ lives when this occurs? We will be filled with the Holy Spirit, and our neighbor will be empowered to live out a song of gratitude and praise. 

This is one of our most descriptive passages about being and having a spiritual friend, a soul mate. As spiritual friends, we are called to see Christ, new life, in each other. Our friend's response may sometimes be as miraculous as the joy of the Magnificat. How do we see Christ, new life, in our neighbor? It is a gift from the Holy Spirit. Our job is to put ourselves in a position to receive this gift of the Holy Spirit, to see Christ in our neighbor, and then to honor Christ in our neighbor. The promise of this story is that when we reflect Christ, new life, back to our neighbor, she may also see Christ in herself and be enabled to live out the Magnificat. 

What does it mean to "sing out the Magnificat"?

"My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior.” The words are clear. It means living a life of gratitude and remaining open to God working in our lives, even in our greatest times of stress. Our role model is an unmarried, pregnant young girl, empowered by the love of her older relative, who eloquently expresses her faith in God. Through the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth sees God in her young cousin. /When Mary is open to God within herself and can also see and feel God within herself, her response is this great hymn of gratitude and praise.

       What a difference we could make in our own lives and in our neighbors’ lives if we each became an Elizabeth to the Marys we visit and live with daily, at home and at work. When, through the Holy Spirit, we see God, Christ, and new life in our neighbors, the God within us will also "leap for joy" as we continue to meet others/on this road to a happy destiny, one step, one person, one greeting at a time!

Joanna Seibert