Blessings

Photos by Kendra Johnson, Katie Cummings, and Ron Lubungo.

Photos by Kendra Johnson, Katie Cummings, and Ron Lubungo.

An excerpt from a sermon by Christy Waltersdorff, based on Matthew 5:1-12.

“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God.”

Somewhere along the way I started signing letters with the word, “Blessings.” It is a meaningful word that wishes all good things to whomever I am writing. It has the fragrance of grace—that promise of a gift undeserved.

In Matthew’s Gospel we find a list of blessings in the Sermon on the Mount. But more than that, we find a call for action, a teaching that is counter-intuitive, counter-cultural, radical, subversive—just like Jesus, himself. It is not concerned with what is practical or possible, but calls us to turn the values of the world upside down.

“You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you areno more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.”

Matthew helps us to see that we can believe these impossible things because of what we know about Jesus and the God who sent him. God blesses us and asks us to bless others.

“You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.”

One of my Sunday school teachers used to say that the best way to think of the Beatitudes is as “be-attitudes.” They are ways of being—nine blessings that speak the language of grace, proclaiming truth that is the opposite of truth as the world knows it.

“You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family” (The Message).

In his hilltop sermon Jesus addressed those who were, right then, dealing with difficult and painful realities. “Blessed are you who are poor in spirit, at this very moment, for yours is the kingdom of heaven.” Not after you die, not two hundred years from now, but right now.

That promise remains true today. God is with you no matter what happens. You are blessed right now, and you are never alone. God is a God who cares about the meek, the mourners, the peacemakers, those who suffer.

And even as they assure us, the Beatitudes call us to live as the people God created us to be, right here and right now. They encourage us to bless each other as we have been blessed by God, as an act of grace. A blessing is a prayer. It is a gift from God. Blessed are you… Amen.

Christy Waltersdorff is pastor of the York Center Church of the Brethren in Lombard, Ill., and a worship coordinator for National Youth Conference. For suggestions of ways to bless others, visit www.brethren.org/volunteer, www.brethren.org/pray , and www.brethren.org/give .

(Read this issue of eBrethren)

Sacred start

Photos by Wendy McFadden and Bethany Clark.

Photos by Wendy McFadden and Bethany Clark.

By Mandy Garcia

The doctors removed a small bone in the ball of my foot two weeks before Christmas. It was a scheduled, outpatient surgery, but knowing it was coming didn’t make the recovery any less frustrating. Being stuck at home for several weeks put an abrupt halt on my normal schedule and to-do list.

But a few days before the celebration of Christ’s birth, I finally realized that I had been given the Christmas gift I’ve always said I wanted: time to simply sit and savor the season.

It’s probably sad that I finally got my wish because I had no choice, but the fact remains that it was a very special time. I stayed still. I stared at the star on top of our tree and considered God’s leading. I wrapped myself in crocheted blankets and gave thanks for warmth. I watched my neighborhood get tucked in under a thick, white blanket, and praised God for forgiveness that covers sins with mercies white as snow. It was an “in between” time, a sacred space.

In a similar way, January can be an “in between” time for all of us—Church of the Brethren denominational ministries included. We wrap up the loose ends of the past year and get ready to dive into all the exciting things coming up in the new one. National Youth Conference coordinators and the workcamp team stay late at the office for their long awaited registration kick-offs. The Annual Conference office assembles necessities for their site visit in Columbus. And church planters (who seem to have a gift for “in-between” time) get their things in order before the Church Planting Conference in May.

This time before the gears get really moving can feel a little like being stuck at home with a broken foot. But if we frame it right, if we focus on the many wonderful things on the horizon, it takes on a feeling of holy preparation. Like the quiet calm of Christmas, this time can be a gift, sacred space, full of thanks and praise.

As we prepare to dive into this New Year, may we spend our “in between” time watching carefully for God’s leading, full of gratitude, and freely giving as God has so freely given to us.

For a list of ways that you can get involved in Church of the Brethren ministries in 2014, visitwww.brethren.org/events ,www.brethren.org/volunteer , andwww.brethren.org/give .

(Read this issue of eBrethren)

The lesson of the Malibu tile

Malibu tile decorating the Serra Retreat Center

Malibu tile decorating the Serra Retreat Center

– Blogging from the Clergy Women’s Retreat

Serra Retreat Center in Malibu, Calif., where Brethren clergy women are meeting this week, is decorated with the most wonderful tiles. They are set in walls and floors and railings and garden paths.

The tiles were saved after the Malibu Potteries tile factory burned in 1931. According to a history of Serra, 9,000 boxes of tile were salvaged and stored away. The tiles were put into use when the Franciscans purchased the abandoned Rindge family mansion, and the building was completed as a retreat center. But in 1970 another fire destroyed the building. Tiles were once again retrieved and salvaged, and now add color and beauty to a rebuilt center.

In some places tiles are formally placed, and showcased with care. In other places, like one of the garden paths, pieces of broken tiles are strewn in a kind of crazy quilt, no less beautiful than their formally placed kin.

Our retreat leader, Melissa Wiginton, has commented that she loves the values of the Church of the Brethren. She asked us, what are the God-given gifts or values that we Brethren caretake? She named this a “hermeneutic of retrieval,” meaning that our calling as a church is to make sure these values–these gifts from God–are retrieved from the past and available in the future.

Women have been using a hermeneutic of retrieval for a long time. The classic example, of course, is quilting. For generations, women retrieved bits of cloth that were still good, cutting them out of old clothes that were no longer wearable, to sew together into something new and useful and beautiful. A bit of that old summer dress that you loved so much you wore it out, was salvaged from the rag pile to grace the corner of the quilt on the guestbed that helped welcome visitors to your home.

Women don’t do this only through quilting. How many pairs of jeans, rendered unwearable by holes in the knees or stains on the hems, have shown up the next summer as shorts? How many yogurt cartons are washed and show up later in the fridge holding leftovers?

My husband has a hermeneutic of retrieval as a handyman. He saves old pieces of wood and parts of machines and household hardware that he acquires along the way, in case he can re-use them. A set of hinges on an old door that he replaced for a client, for example, may reappear where needed to put a sagging door back in place, right and true.

It’s going to take women and men working together to caretake the gifts entrusted to our church. When Melissa asked what gifts God has given Brethren, the group responded by naming peace, service, community, simplicity, women in ministry, humility, continuing the work of Jesus. I wonder, what other gifts should be added to this list?

And what will the Brethren gifts look like after they are retrieved and made into something new in the future? Will the Brethren values be beautifully formalized? Or strewn about with abandon to become a spiritual version of a crazy quilt? Will future generations see them set in the philosophical walls and spiritual foundations of the worldwide Christian movement?

None of that we can know. Our present job is to take care of our church’s gifts. We must pick out the bits of beauty and usefulness in the old cloth, and keep them for the new quilt to piece tomorrow. We must keep an eye out for the old set of hinges that will polish up beautifully, to put the door to the future in place, right and true.

Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford
Director of News Services
Church of the Brethren

‘I knew that we would all be kindred spirits’

–Blogging from the Church of the Brethren Clergy Women’s Retreat

“I knew that we would all be kindred spirits,” said our worship leader tonight. She gave a presentation on a recent trip to the island of Iona, and said she had been looking forward to this Clergy Women’s Retreat while there and had prayed for the women who would come to this retreat. She brought small stones from Iona to give to each participant.

I looked around the room and thought, are we in fact all kindred spirits?

One might assume that a gathering of Brethren clergy women would, for the most part, be homogenous. But a statistician could find a lot of differentiation among us. This group could easily be “sliced and diced” in a number of ways.

We could be grouped by European or African or Native American or Asian ancestry–which may not all be apparent from our skin tones or accents or names.

If grouped by age or generation, differences would quickly become apparent, variations of culture and lifestyle assumptions would emerge in the baby boomers as opposed to the Gen Xers, for example.

There are women here with decades of experience in pastoral or other forms of ministry. And there are the newly licensed, and some who have been in ministry for only a couple of years or less.

There are extroverts and introverts, artists and writers, academics and administrators, preachers and counselors, chaplains and teachers.

Women have come here from very different geographical places, from the east, the south, the west, the midwest, the mountain states. Each of those settings has its own cultural and political and theological geography–and a varying scale of welcome for women in church leadership.

The group includes women doing ministry in the large metropolises of Chicago, greater Los Angeles, D.C. It also includes women serving in rural settings, where the only way to get to church might be by gravel road.

Some have been in the Church of the Brethren all their lives. Some are brand new to the denomination.

Are we kindred spirits? At one level, I believe so. In Ephesians 4 it is called “the calling with which you have been called.” All called to ministry, all answering God’s call in one way or another. That’s how the women in this gathering are kin, and that is the place our spirits meet.

–Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford
Director of News Services

It’s windy tonight – it’s REALLY windy tonight!

–Blogging from the Church of the Brethren Clergy Women’s Retreat

The wind is blowing fiercely around the Serra Retreat Center tonight, rushing through palms and eucalyptus trees as it hurries on its way down the canyon to the sea. The Serra Retreat Center, where Brethren clergy women started their retreat today, is set high in a canyon above Malibu, within sight of the coastline of southern California.

The day was sunny, clear, warm, beautiful. But with the evening and sunset came the wind.

Worship this evening felt like a still, small space in the middle of tumult. Candles were lit, hymns were sung, prayers were spoken, scripture was read, God’s presence was felt in the beauty of the surrounding hills and sea, and in the warmth of the fellowship, as the wind growled outside and shook the plate glass windows through which in the daylight we may be able to see the ocean.

In a closing offering of sharing, the group was invited to recall and name women who have grounded them in the faith. Names were spoken and memories shared. Beautiful names, dropped one by one into that place of worship: Anna, Mary, Myrna, Louise, Ruby, Patricia, Judy, Phyllis, Nancy, Esther, and many more. Mothers, grandmothers, great grandmothers, and daughters. Teachers, missionaries, pastors, and the spouses of pastors. Living and dead. The matriarchs of the church.

What might that worship experience mean, in the long term, I wonder? It gave me a vision of what clergy women may accomplish in our world. This evening, I saw a tableau of how women in ministry contribute a still, small space where God is present for people beset by a tumultuous world.

Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford
Director of News Services
1/13/2014

Implications

2013 Advent good_news_hi_res   John 1:14

Prayer for the day:
God of grace and truth, thank you for coming to earth in a form that I can relate to, as a human of flesh and blood. Thank you for showing me your love in such a personal way. Help me offer that same love to others. In the name of our neighbor, Jesus the Christ, I pray. AMEN


Question for reflection:

Who around you needs to hear a hopeful word today? With whom will you share the Good News of Jesus?

~ Jonathan Shively, Executive Director, Congregational Life Ministries

Congregational Life Ministries of the Church of the Brethren is offering these simple prayers and questions in connection to this year’s Advent Devotional written by Tim Harvey, pastor of Central Church of the Brethren (Available from Brethren Press in print and E-Book formats). Join us as we look and listen for the coming of the Word through the reading of scripture, Tim’s reflections, times of prayer, and conversations on this blog.

Carry the light

2013 Advent good_news_hi_res   Matthew 2:9

Prayer for the day:
God, help me follow you today, trusting as you lead, grateful for the calling, joyful in the journey.


Question for reflection:

Where is the Christ star guiding you today, and as you enter this new year?

~ Jonathan Shively, Executive Director, Congregational Life Ministries

Congregational Life Ministries of the Church of the Brethren is offering these simple prayers and questions in connection to this year’s Advent Devotional written by Tim Harvey, pastor of Central Church of the Brethren (Available from Brethren Press in print and E-Book formats). Join us as we look and listen for the coming of the Word through the reading of scripture, Tim’s reflections, times of prayer, and conversations on this blog.

Whenever the doors are open

2013 Advent good_news_hi_res   Luke 2:22- 24, 39- 40

Prayer for the day:
God, help me with simple obedience. In the routines of following you, help me see the importance of common acts of worship, humble service, and faithful follow-through. Like Mary and Joseph, make me consistent in “regular” things, open to your wisdom, full of the grace of God.


Question for reflection:

How will/did the routines of your day today draw you closer to Jesus and honor God?

~ Jonathan Shively, Executive Director, Congregational Life Ministries

Congregational Life Ministries of the Church of the Brethren is offering these simple prayers and questions in connection to this year’s Advent Devotional written by Tim Harvey, pastor of Central Church of the Brethren (Available from Brethren Press in print and E-Book formats). Join us as we look and listen for the coming of the Word through the reading of scripture, Tim’s reflections, times of prayer, and conversations on this blog.

A waste of time?

2013 Advent good_news_hi_res  Luke 2:36- 38

Prayer for the day:
Help me keep from getting so busy, Lord, that I miss seeing you even when you’re right in front of me. Give me focus and persistence like Anna, so that I, too, might offer thanks and speak of you to others with deep love and conviction.


Question for reflection:

How do you recognize Jesus in the world today? What testimony are you prepared to give?

~ Jonathan Shively, Executive Director, Congregational Life Ministries

Congregational Life Ministries of the Church of the Brethren is offering these simple prayers and questions in connection to this year’s Advent Devotional written by Tim Harvey, pastor of Central Church of the Brethren (Available from Brethren Press in print and E-Book formats). Join us as we look and listen for the coming of the Word through the reading of scripture, Tim’s reflections, times of prayer, and conversations on this blog.

Almost unspeakable

2013 Advent good_news_hi_res   Matthew 2:16 -18

Prayer for the day:
Soften my heart O, God, that I might have compassion for those who are forgotten, oppressed, and hurt. Harden my resolve, that I might have the courage not to look away but to hear their stories and learn their names. Move my hands, that I might be a servant of peace.


Question for reflection:

As a pacifist, New Testament Christian, I often like to gloss over the genocide, civil war, and violence of the Old Testament. Matthew 2 is a reminder that it continued even after Jesus was born and continued after Jesus died and continues today –2000 years later. Sometimes, my prayers for peace feel so ineffectual and vague against the tide of violence reported in the local news broadcast and global current events. I wish I could do more. How can I hold in my heart the seeming contradictions of God’s loving mercy and the violent realities of our times?

~ Gimbiya Kettering,  Intercultural Ministries Coordinator

Congregational Life Ministries of the Church of the Brethren is offering these simple prayers and questions in connection to this year’s Advent Devotional written by Tim Harvey, pastor of Central Church of the Brethren (Available from Brethren Press in print and E-Book formats). Join us as we look and listen for the coming of the Word through the reading of scripture, Tim’s reflections, times of prayer, and conversations on this blog.