When has the night ended and the day begun? Awakening from the Hour of Dog and Wolf

There is a story told of a rabbi in ancient times who gathered his students together very early one morning, while it was still dark. He put this question to them: "How can you tell when night has ended and the day has begun?"

One student made a suggestion: "Could it be when you can see an animal and you can tell whether it is a sheep or a goat?"

"No, that's not it," answered the rabbi.

Another student said: "Could it be when you look at a tree in the distance and you can tell whether it is a fig tree or a peach tree?"

Again the rabbi answered: "No."

After a few more guesses the students said: "Well, how do you tell when night has ended?"

The rabbi answered: "It is when you look on the face of any man or woman and you see them as your brother or sister. If you cannot do this, then, no matter what time it is, it is still night."

The nights are becoming longer, as I am sure you have noticed. This often brings with it a sense within us to seek hibernation, to go into ourselves. We need to be careful here, as tempting as it is. If we hibernate we are not awake, we are falling asleep.

It can become difficult to awake from our slumber on these cold, darkening mornings that the Autumn brings. The temptation is to stay in and not awaken to life, to turn inwards and not to live in the world.

This last Tuesday I experienced a lovely example of this. I regularly attend an early morning meditation. Now when my alarm went off early on Tuesday morning a part of me didn’t want to get up and step into the cold darkness of the morning. But I did. I prayed my morning prayers; I sought inspiration from the great mystery and listened to the birds outside my window. I got ready for the day. I brushed Molly’s hair and took her to the toilet. We then went to join in meditation. Molly shot in and greeted the folk and also greeted each individual as they arrived. We humans greeted one another with humour and coffee and then we enjoyed silence together in complete darkness as Molly settled down in her bed. As the silence ended the light was just starting to appear. We then began to share about our own personal joys and troubles, our own spiritual journeys. As everyone spoke I looked at their faces and connected with them and saw in them as my own brother and sister, I saw myself reflected back at me. I saw a reflection of the Divine in their eyes and heard it in their words.

It is so tempting at times to separate people into those that are for me and those that are against me; that there are those that are my friends and those who are my foes. That we need to keep an eagle eye out for the ‘foes’, because if we do not they may well cause us harm; that these people are dangerous, even “toxic” and you must keep them out of your life. This is not helpful or healthy. We are all formed from the one flesh and we all have the same spirit flowing through us. Divisiveness does not help anyone.

There is a French saying...Please excuse my accent... “L’heure entre chien et loup” which translates as “The hour between dog and wolf”. The saying is basically describing the time just as the sun is setting, the twilight hours when you cannot really differentiate between dog and wolf, between who is a friend and who is a foe.

Has anyone heard this phrase before “The hour between dog and wolf?”

It first came into my consciousness a few years ago because it was the title of a New Model Army album, as well as a documentary film that was made about their strange and enduring career.

“Between dog and wolf, between water and wine, between wine and blood.” This brings to mind some lyrics from a really old songs of theirs “Better than them” and the words of the chorus...

Divided we were born,divided we live

divided we fall,yeah,divided we die

still we tell ourselves over and over again

we're better than them... (we're better than them)

we're better than them..

We’re not like them, we’re better than them...

“Them” are whoever we think are somehow separate from us...

The song is essentially a rant against this sense of superiority and separation that all groups of people and individuals feel from time to time, that sadly some feel permanently; this sense that somehow we are better than, or less than other people. It seems to go on in all sections of society and throughout human history. It is there in religion, but also secular society. Some religious groups talk about the saved and the unsaved, others talk of being God’s chosen people. When they speak this way they are talking of a God I do not recognise. The God I know accepts and loves all universally. Experience has revealed to me that we are all chosen by God, it’s just that so many of us turn away and cannot believe that there is a spirit that is there in all life.

Then of course there are the anti-religionists who reject any kind of faith at all; who see it all as purely infantile projections. They mock, they poke fun, they separate people into the stupid and the wise. They say we are not like them, we’re better than them.

I am no better by the way; I do it too. There are days when I feel superior to other people and there are days when I feel less than them. That said thank God most days I recognise the truth that there is one human family. We are made of the same flesh and we have the same spirit within each of us.

Something I felt powerful as the dark turned into light on Tuesday morning. In that hour of dog and wolf as the night turned into day.

If we see others as separate from ourselves, we see us and we see them. As Walter Kaufmann, who translated Martin Buber into English put it, when we use words like “Us-Them”, “'the world is divided in two: the children of light and the children of darkness, the sheep and the goats, the elect and the damned.' It is this that leads to a lack of empathy for all people and thus their suffering can be ignored. In such a state any form of barbarity and abuse can become acceptable, something we have seen throughout human history. It still goes on today, we continue to dehumanise, breeding hatred and violence.

As the Nobel Peace Prize Winner, author of such greats as “Night” and Holocaust Survivor Elie Wiesel put it " 'Hatred, is a cancer that is passed from one person to another, one people to another.'

There is one human family, we are each other’s keepers. In “Conversations with Elie Wiesel” Wiesel sees the Biblical question Cain poses to God after killing Abel “Am I my brother’s keeper?” becomes a lens to see brother and sisterhood in broadest humanist sense. As he reflects:

We are all our brothers’ keepers… Either we see in each other brothers, or we live in a world of strangers… There are no strangers in a world that becomes smaller and smaller. Today I know right away when something happens, whatever happens, anywhere in the world. So there is no excuse for us not to be involved in these problems. A century ago, by the time the news of a war reached another place, the war was over. Now people die and the pictures of their dying are offered to you and to me while we are having dinner. Since I know, how can I not transform that knowledge into responsibility? So the key word is “responsibility.” That means I must keep my brother.

When the epistle Paul talked of the oneness, the unity in Christianity, he wrote that in Christ “there is no longer Jew or Greek.” He did not say that there are no longer Jews or Greeks more that people are no longer separated by these distinctions; that they are all one in love, in body and in spirit; that if all people are viewed in the light they are brothers and sisters to one another.

As Tenzin Gyatso XIVth Dalai Lama has said “Mentally, physically and emotionally we are the same. We each have the potential to good and bad and to be overcome by disturbing emotions such as anger, fear, hatred, suspicion and greed. These emotions can be the cause of many problems. On the other hand if you cultivate loving kindness, compassion and concern for others, there will be no room for anger, hatred and jealousy.

These words very much chime with that favourite story of mine, which seem appropriate today, “The Two Wolves”

Do you recall it?

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.

“It’s a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, ego and it makes me cynical about life.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, faith and it fills me with enthusiasm for life. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Where does this sense of superiority come from, this sense that we are somehow better than other people? Where does this fear come from? Well I believe it comes from habit. We are taught to fear the stranger who is not exactly like us, we are taught to separate one another, to see the difference. Habits, especially fear based ones, are hard to break.

So how do we get to the place where we can tell when the night has ended, where when we look into someone else’s eyes we see our brother and our sister. How do we get out of the habit of separating people into one camp or another? Well I believe it begins by us waking up to reverence in one another and to practise loving kindness each and every day. This is not easy. I know this from personal experience. Every day I find myself putting up the barriers of separation; every day I find myself doing all I can to ensure that they come tumbling back down again. It is perhaps a whole life times work and perhaps beyond, this moving from night to day. That said I believe it is possible and we can begin aspiring to it right here right now. We just need to wake up.

Why don’t you try it now? Why don’t you offer a blessing to one another?

Give it a go. Go to one another, look one another in the eye and recognise yourself within each other. Then why don’t you bow in reverence, shake one another’s hand, or if you feel really brave you could even hug your neighbour. As you do why not say to each other...”I honour your sacred humanity, we are made of the same flesh and have the same spirit running through us.”

Now of course this is easy to do amongst friends, people you know. This is perhaps less easy out there in the world outside our window. A hug might be a bit much for a stranger. That said we can practise recognising the sacred in each of us. We can bring an end to the night and a beginning to a new day. We can wake up.

I am going to end today with this story from the life of the Buddha

It is said that soon after his enlightenment that the Buddha passed a man on the road who was struck by the Buddha's extraordinary radiance and peaceful presence. The man stopped and asked, "My friend, what are you? Are you a celestial being or a god?"

"No," said the Buddha.

"Well, then, are you some kind of magician or wizard?"

Again the Buddha answered, "No."

"Are you a man?" "No."

"Well, my friend, then what are you?"

The Buddha replied, “I am awake”.

The night has ended and the day has begun.

We need to be awake.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

Pay It Forward: We Can Become the Blessings We Have Been Waiting For

A friend of mine, named Ronnie, no not Molly’s friend Ronnie the cross between a Jack Russel and a Border Collie, but a human also called Ronnie. Ronnie has been on a bit of a spiritual journey recently. He was away this weekend and was trying to put in practice things he has been learning. One was to do one good deed of generosity each day. He told me he was in the hairdressers the other day. Whilst there he noticed a couple, the man was also having a haircut. When he was finished he offered to pay for the man’s haircut as well as his own. The couple said that they couldn’t let him do that, it just didn’t seem right. Ronnie insisted and told them that he had to do so as he had to do a good deed each day and this was it. That by letting him pay, they were actually doing him a favour. Eventually they relented and let him pay for the haircut, as a favour to him.

It was a lovely tale and its great to see Ronnie progressing. Afterwards I suggested that the next time he finds himself in a similar situation that instead of asking recipients to do him a favour that he could ask them to pass the favour on, to pay it forward for someone else. He seemed to like the idea. I wonder how he has gone about his daily deed doing these last few days.

I shared the story with Annette who told me the following:

“Your friend Ronnie reminds me of two people. (Rev) Dick Boeke who believed in doing a good deed everyday. I was the recipient of lunch on a number of occasions. And also my Dad who did good deeds and when people said "How can I repay you?" always said "Don't repay me, help someone else when they need it."

Funnily enough one of the people who my Dad helped most often was our next door neighbour who had an antiques shop at the top of Stamford Road in Bowdon. The neighbour had a very old Rolls Royce and was always running out of petrol. My Dad would go off to wherever the neighbour needed him with a can of petrol. The antique dealer was also a verger at the parish church in Bowdon and our family always used to refer to him rather naughtily as "the foolish verger"”

Lovely stories that you Annette

The reason Ronnie shared the story with me was in response to myself sharing the wonderful “Love and the Cabbie” by Art Buchwald, which we heard earlier. A tale of hope and love that involves passing on blessings and compliments to others in the hope that they will do the same and thus lift the spirits of all that they meet. Yes, many may reject the good blessing, but others will respond positively and pass it on to others, thus spreading the joy and love. Doesn’t the world need this right now.

Here is the wonderful tale. The language probably seems a little dated now, but I hope you understand the spirit.

“Love and the Cabbie” by Art Buchwald

“I was in New York the other day and rode with a friend in a taxi. When we got out, my friend said to the driver, “Thank you for the ride. You did a superb job of driving.”

The taxi driver was stunned for a second. Then he said, “Are you a wise guy or something?”

“No, my dear man, and I’m not putting you on. I admire the way you keep cool in heavy traffic.”

“Yeah,” the driver said and drove off.

“What was that all about?” I asked.

I am trying to bring love back to New York,” he said. “I believe it’s the only thing that can save the city.”

“How can one man save New York?”

“It’s not one man. I believe I have made that taxi driver’s day. Suppose he has 20 fares. He’s going to be nice to those 20 fares because someone was nice to him. Those fares in turn will be kinder to their employees or shopkeepers or waiters or even their own families. Eventually the goodwill could spread to at least 1,000 people. Now that isn’t bad, is it?”

“But you’re depending on that taxi driver to pass your goodwill to others.”

“I’m not depending on it,” my friend said. “I’m aware that the system isn’t foolproof so I might deal with ten different people today. If out of ten I can make three happy, then eventually I can indirectly influence the attitudes of 3,000 more.”

“It sounds good on paper,” I admitted, “but I’m not sure it words in practice.”

“Nothing is lost if it doesn’t. It didn’t take any of my time to tell that man he was doing a good job. He neither received a larger tip nor a smaller tip. If it fell on deaf ears, so what? Tomorrow there will be another taxi driver I can try to make happy.”

“You’re some kind of a nut,” I said.

“That shows how cynical you have become. I have made a study of this. The thing that seems to be lacking, besides money of course, for our postal employees, is that no one tells people who work for the post office what a good job they’re doing.”

“But they’re not doing a good job.”

“They’re not doing a good job because they feel no one cares if they do or not. Why shouldn’t someone say a kind word to them?”

We were walking past a structure in the process of being built and passed five workmen eating their lunch. My friend stopped. “That’s a magnificent job you men have done. It must be difficult and dangerous work.”

The workmen eyed my friend suspiciously.

“When will it be finished?”

“June, a man grunted.

“Ah. That really is impressive. You must all be very proud.”

We walked away. I said to him, “I haven’t seen anyone like you since The Man From LaMancha.”

“When those men digest my words, they will feel better for it. Somehow the city will benefit from their happiness.”

“But you can’t do this all alone!” I protested. “You’re just one man.”

“The most important thing is not to get discouraged. Making people in the city become kind again is not an easy job, but if I can enlist other people in my campaign. . .”

You just winked at a very plain-looking woman,” I said.

“Yes, I know,” he replied. “And if she’s a schoolteacher, her class will be in for a fantastic day.”

I first heard this story maybe 20 years ago at Cross Street Chapel. I do like it, even if the language might be challenged a little today. What matters is its spirit, its heart. It challenges us to truly pay attention, something I’ve been going on about recently and to act in this world. It teaches how important connection is. How we interact with one another really matters and has an impact. In a world in which we can feel so powerless at times, it is important to understand that what do and do not do matters, they key is in knowing what we can and cannot do in any given situation. I am sure we can all think of interactions that have led to positive change and interaction in our lives. Spiritual living is about bringing these memories alive in our lives. It matters what we do and do not do, it really does. We are not God, but we can make a difference. We can be catalysts of change; all we have to do is accept the gift.

It is easy to look at our world and despair and give up and say “what’s the point? Everyone is out for themselves. If I go out of my way to help another, they’ll just take advantage and what will I ever get back in return?

There is though another way; the way that Ronnie is attempting. The principles found in the “Pay it Forward” concept; the way that Art Buchwald suggested in “Love and the Cabbie”. We can change our world, one act at a time. This is religion in its deepest and simplest form, binding up the broken, and manifesting God’s love in life. At its core is this life affirming principle that in spite of a great deal of evidence to the contrary faith, hope and love do in fact still remain. You see these ripples touch everybody both the giver and receiver and all who are eventually touched by them; both the giver and receiver are transformed by the experience; both giver and receiver are blessed abundantly.

Pay it forward is an interesting term, one of disputed origin. Some say it began with the ancient Greeks. Luminaries such as Benjamin Franklin and Ralph Waldo Emerson made reference to the principle. In his essay “Compensation” Emerson wrote: “In the order of nature we cannot render benefits to those whom we receive them, or only seldom. But the benefit we receive must be rendered again, line for line, deed for deed, cent for cent, to somebody.”

During the 1950’s the phrase “Pay it Forward” was popularised by Robert A Heinlein, initially by being referenced in his book “Between Planets.” Heinlein preached and practised this principle in his daily life and this led to the formation of the Heinlein society, a humanitarian organisation based on this principle.

In the year 2000 Catherine Ryan Hyde published the novel “Pay it Forward” which became a best seller and was soon made into a film by the same title. This led in time to the formation of the “Pay if Forward Foundation.” It even has its own day. Did you know that April 26th is “International Pay It Forward Day”. This is a day when millions of people intentionally commit to acts of kindness and caring.

Pay it forward is based on what is known today as the “ripple effect”, which is really based on Confucius concept of “Concentric Circles of Compassion”. Like a pebble dropped into a pond, our actions create ripples that go out and affect others beyond what we can imagine. It works on the premise that we can make our world a better place if we share, if we care as much for others as we do for ourselves. It is firmly grounded in the ethos of the “Golden Rule of Compassions” a concept found at the core of every single one of the world’s great religious traditions. It is an effort to change the world one small act at a time. Everything we do and everything we do not do really does matter. We affect our world, for good or for ill, with every feeling, every thought, word and or deed.

One of the great movements for social good of the twentieth century is enshrined in the concept of “paying it forward”. Alcoholics Anonymous and the near two hundred other fellowships that have sprung from its principles have brought about recovery for millions of people from all manners of addiction. When a person is released from their destructive addiction they are not asked to pay back what was freely given to them, instead they are asked to pass on what has been given to others in desperate need and when doing so to also pass on that they do not have to pay back what has been given to them, instead they too must pass it forward. This is the basis of the simple movement that has saved millions of lives.

When I look back at my life it blows my mind to think of all the good that people have done for me. I cannot pay them back, but then I do not have to. Instead what is required is live my life in remembrance by paying it forward.

To bless the world all we have to do is remember those wonderful examples that have touched our lives and blessed us with their loving example. No, we cannot pay back to them what they so freely gave to us, but then we don’t have to, all we have to do is pay it forward and become the blessing that we have all been waiting for.

It is easy to look at our world and despair and give up and say “what’s the point? Everyone is out for themselves. If I go out of my way to help another, they’ll just keep on taking advantage and what will I ever get back in return?

There is another way; this other way is the purpose of the “Pay it Forward” movement. We can change our world, one act at a time. This is religion in its deepest and simplest form, binding up the broken manifesting God’s love in life. At its core is this life affirming principle that in spite of a great deal of evidence to the contrary faith, hope and love do in fact still remain. You see these ripples touch everybody both the giver and receiver and all who are eventually touched by them; both the giver and receiver are transformed by the experience; both giver and receiver are blessed abundantly.

So let’s become the blessings we have all been searching for; let’s remember all those times in our lives when someone has gone out of their way to help us with no expectation of anything in return; whether they have helped us materially, intellectually, emotionally, or spirituality; let’s re-feel these occasions and to meditate on them and to come up with ways that we can pay these debts forward; let’s think of ways we can give back to our world; let’s create ripple effects that can impact in our shared world in ways we perhaps can’t even begin to dream of.

We can change our world today; we can become the blessing that we have all been waiting for.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

  

The falling leaf game: How to live spiritually alive

I will begin with a story “Tired of Clinging” by Richard Bach

“Tired of Clinging” by Richard Bach

Once there lived a village of creatures along the bottom of a great crystal river. The current of the river swept silently over them all - young and old, rich and poor, good and evil, the current going its own way, knowing only its own crystal self.

Each creature in its own manner clung tightly to the twigs and rocks at the river bottom, for clinging was their way of life, and resisting the current was what each had learned from birth.

But one creature said at last, 'I am tired of clinging. Though I cannot see it with my eyes, I trust that the current knows where it is going. I shall let go, and let it take me where it will. Clinging, I shall die of boredom.'

The other creatures laughed and said, 'Fool! Let go, and that current you worship will throw you tumbled and smashed across the rocks, and you shall die quicker than boredom!'

But the one heeded them not, and taking a breath did let go, and at once was tumbled and smashed by the current across the rocks.

Yet in time, as the creature refused to cling again, the current lifted him free from the bottom, and he was bruised and hurt no more.

And the creatures downstream, to whom he was a stranger, cried, 'See a miracle! A creature like ourselves, yet he flies! See the Messiah, come to save us all!'

And the one carried in the current said, 'I am no more Messiah than you. The river delights to lift us free, if only we dare let go. Our true work is this voyage, this adventure.'

But they cried the more, 'Saviour!' all the while clinging to the rocks, and when they looked again he was gone, and they were left alone making legends of a Saviour.

By Richard Bach, from "Illusions"

I was hit by a falling conker the other day whilst out in the park. Do not worry I didn’t think that the sky was falling in. That said neither did I make any life changing scientific discoveries either. It was neither a moment of terror, nor was it discovery. I was though transported back to childhood and fun autumnal games that we often played. Games folk all over the land and in others played, as they did in previous and current generations too. I enjoyed watching a group of children with parents and grandparents collecting conkers the other day.

I have been watching autumn these last few weeks, watching the leaves fall from the trees. I was out the other day when I and a friend noticed a what looked like a school teacher taking notes of the trees in the park. We wondered what he was doing. A few days later we saw a group of school children doing the same thing. I never asked them exactly what they were doing, but I did enjoy the attention the paid to the trees in the park. It has helped me pay closer attention the nature of the park that Molly and I enjoy every day.

Living spiritually alive is very much about paying attention. Last week I mentioned that Simone Weil saw attention as a contemplative practice, through which we reap life’s deepest rewards. She saw attention as the rarest form of generosity. It is through attention that we open up to Grace. Attention as she saw it is something way beyond the mere will, which she saw as graceless. For Weil attention is an opening, like prayer, that is full of Grace. It is through attention that we are touched by the majesty and beauty of life, it is how we live spiritually alive.

I am someone who attempts to practise what they preach. Yes of course I do not do this perfectly but I do at least try. As I have said before in order to live spiritually alive we need to increase our sensitivity to life. This begins by paying attention, being alive to everything, fully embracing everything and giving yourself fully to it.

As I said I was reminded of autumnal games the other. One such being “The falling leaf game”.

The game goes something like this; you look at the trees and watch for when the leaves begin to fall. As you see one falling you attempt to catch the leaf before it hits the ground. This is no easy task, although it doesn’t sound too challenging. After all it’s just a leaf, it has no mind of its own and gravity should surely bring it down safely into your hands. Well apparently not. It seems that there are other forces at work, namely the wind. It is virtually impossible to catch the leaves as they fall because they are constantly blown off course by sudden and unpredictable gusts of wind.

Isn’t life like this, beautiful but unpredictable. The leaves rarely fall directly into our hands. How often are they blown off course just as we are about to catch them.

The falling leaves can teach us so much about the spiritual life and spiritual living. They remind me of another mistake we often make. Yes, we often want to rush through things and wish they were over therefore failing to truly experience the gift of the moment. That said we can often do something which inhibits the moment equally. How many of us want to cling on to what we are experiencing right now. David Bumbaugh captures this beautifully in the following meditative poem “Dancing in the wind”

“Dancing in the wind” David Bumbaugh

Except for a few stubborn holdouts
The tree outside my window
Is bare of leaves.
The wind,
This October morning,
Worries those few remaining leaves,
Pulling them this way,
twisting them that way,
tugging at them
until, one by one,
exhausted by the ceaseless effort to hang on,
they go dancing in the wind.
As they waltz past my window,
The stubbornness has left them
And they are finally free.
What is it about living things
That we expend so much energy resisting the inevitable,
Hanging on to what is already gone,
Hoping to sustain a season
Into times that are unreasonable,
Clinging to old habits
Despite the pain and discomfort?
Why are we so afraid to dance in the wind?

Why are we so afraid to dance in the wind? It’s a good question. By clinging to things, whether that be people, possessions, seasons, situations, prestige, appearance, beliefs, disbeliefs, feelings, we fail to experience life fully. We block ourselves from experiencing the full gift of life. We become like the creatures in the story we heard earlier, clinging on but not fully experiencing life. They would rather die of boredom than risk letting go and trust in the current. And then one brave one lets go and they simply mock it as it crashes against the rocks and suffers the pain of freedom until it learns the dance of the current. Still, they are afraid though to let go and experience the freedom themselves. They want their messiah to do it for them or they merely want to spin stories of his journey rather than seeing him as the example and letting go themselves and experiencing the freedom of the current.

The spiritual life, living spiritually alive, is about increasing our sensitivity to reality. This begins by simply paying attention. By lingering for a moment, the imperfect, unfinished moment, and just as importantly let the moment linger in you. To badly paraphrase Whitman, every leaf is a love letter from God. You can pick one up for a moment, but then you must leave it so someone else to find

It is the same with all of life, if we truly pay attention and increase our sensitivity to it. All life can teach us to be all that we can be. We can even learn from the leaves as they fall freely and dance in the wind.

Here’s an extract from Whitman’s Book “Leaves of Grass” from the chapter “Song of Myself” 48th Stanza, that I just badly paraphrased, pay attention the last few lines.

I have said that the soul is not more than the body,
And I have said that the body is not more than the soul,
And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one’s self is,
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud,
And I or you pocketless of a dime may purchase the pick of the earth,
And to glance with an eye or show a bean in its pod confounds the learning of all times,
And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a hero,
And there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheel’d universe,
And I say to any man or woman, Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes.

And I say to mankind, Be not curious about God,
For I who am curious about each am not curious about God,
(No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God and about death.)

I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least,
Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.

Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass,
I find letters from God dropt in the street, and every one is sign’d by God’s name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that wheresoe’er I go,
Others will punctually come for ever and ever.

Pay attention to all that is alive around you, we do not need to cling to anything, be open, live spiritually alive. Why do so many of us cling to things and will not let go? Why do we want to live with the illusion of control? Or on the other hand why do we want to rush through things and not experience the moment we are in? Why are we always wishing for the end of things? What are we afraid of? Why do we not want to fully experience life?

I had several conversations with people last week. Some I have known all my life and others I’ve known for only a short time. In each conversation there was a constant theme. The theme was fear. Fear I believe is at the core the two autumn themes I’ve been speaking of…to either wish days away or to cling to something that is over. These are the fears symbolic of autumn. It is fear that is at the root of the need to cling on and or control and it is fear that causes this desire to wish certain feelings away.

I’m no different myself by the way. I can want to wish certain experiences away, especially if they are uncomfortable, even painful. I noticed myself doing it the other day when I working out in the gym. I don’t always want to go through the pain of it, I just want the results that would come from doing so, but still I stuck at it. I have learnt to develop faith. I’ve also clung onto comfortable things and painful and destructive things at times in my life, for the fear of what might be if I just let go and let the wind of life take hold. It was fear that stopped me.

But what causes the fear, what causes this lack of trust. Well I think that it is lack of faith. Faith in life itself. It comes from a belief that life is hostile, against us and something that cannot be trusted. This is why we cling to things and will not let go. The antidote is faith. Faith in life itself, but this of course is a risk. It is a risk worth taking though and certainly beats the boredom of clinging to those rocks we heard about in the earlier story. We need to learn to let go and trust in the current and trust in the wind and to trust in the ever changing nature of life.

We need to learn to dance too, to play those autumnal games, conkers, catching leaves, hey maybe try kite flying. There is a joy in the ungovernable wind.

This brings to mind a lovely excerpt from Anthony Demello’s “The song of the Bird” it goes by the title “Don’t Change”

"I was neurotic for years. I was anxious and depressed and selfish. Everyone kept telling me to change. I resented them and I agreed with them, and I wanted to change, but simply couldn't, no matter how hard I tried. Then one day someone said to me, Don't change. I love you just as you are. Those words were music to my ears: Don't change, Don't change. Don't change . . . I love you as you are. I relaxed. I came alive. And suddenly I changed!

Now I know that I couldn’t really change until I found someone who would love me whether I changed or not.

Is this how you love me, God?"

Here lays both the problem and the solution. This is why I believe we cling to things or simply wish them away. This is why so many of us are afraid to fully experience the life we are experiencing right here right now. We don’t trust in life. We believe that life is untrustworthy. We fail to experience that love that is so present in life. We feel unacceptable as we are. Certainly this was my problem for so long. Thank God it is no longer the case. I do, I do, I do…every day…

You can see it in the leaves, in the trees in the folk and dogs in the park, in everything. All you have to do is pay attention, give yourself wholeheartedly to it.

This is how we learn to love life, to be a part of life? It begins by paying attention. By increasing our sensitivity to life. It begins perhaps by being like those falling leaves. By falling like those autumnal leaves, by not wishing away our experiences and by not clinging on…It begins by simply letting go and by learning to dance in the wind…

Let’s all learn to dance in the wind…Lets all become like falling leaves…Let’s all learn to dance the impermanence dance…Don’t pick them up though, leave them where you find them, for someone else to see.

So, let’s live more spiritually alive. Let’s increase our sensitivity to life. May our lives become our prayer.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

Cultivating Grace

Here’s a beautiful poem by the farmer poet Wendell Berry

“Grace” by Wendell Berry

The woods is shining this morning.
Red, gold and green, the leaves
lie on the ground, or fall,
or hang full of light in the air still.
Perfect in its rise and in its fall, it takes
the place it has been coming to forever.
It has not hastened here, or lagged.
See how surely it has sought itself,
its roots passing lordly through the earth.
See how without confusion it is
all that it is, and how flawless
its grace is. Running or walking, the way
is the same. Be still. Be still.
“He moves your bones, and the way is clear.”

In the “Sacred Art of Lovingkindness” Rami Shapiro wrote

“Cultivating grace is a bit of a paradox. You cannot get what you always and already have. There is nothing you can or need to do to merit grace. All you need do is accept grace. The reason this is so difficult for us is that our hands are full. We are burdened by carrying the past and the future around with us wherever we go, and have no room for the grace of the present moment. Cultivating grace means putting down the burden of time, and opening our hands to the timeless now.”

It is hard to accept the giftedness of the life we have. This is often because we carry too many burdens of the past around with us. Shapiro is suggesting that to cultivate the gifts of life, all we need to do is prepare ourselves for it, to open ourselves to it. Or to put it another way, to catch the winds of grace, our task is to set our sails; we jus tneed to open our sails and to sail on that wind. The winds are always blowing, its just that we don’t always catch the wind. Now there is often a good reason for this, usually fear, caused from the past. We often prefer to batten down the hatches, than embrace the wind. The wind after all cannot be tamed, it can be a wild beast. As Hurricane Milton has proved once again this week.

As the wonderful hymn goes “Life is the greatest gift of all.” Something we don’t always treasure I know. I certainly haven’t in the past. Throughout our lives many things happen over which we have little say. I do not believe we choose what happens to us. What we do have a say in is how respond to what happens to us. The paraphrase Frankl it is our greatest freedom, perhaps our second greatest gift after life itself.

Neither do I think that life is predetermined, mapped out before us. That all things are inevitable. I do have a sense of the Lure of Divine Love, that if we take time in quietness, that we can connect to that Divine aspect within ourselves and life itself and can then make the wise choices in life, this tapping into this second free gift, this second Grace. If we are too weighed down by things it can be difficult to be open to this therefore cultivate Grace.

I have been marking 21 years of sobriety this week. I was offered the gift of new life having found myself in a dark hole. I accepted this second gift and continued to set my sails ever since. There’s been the odd storm, but generally speaking I have sailed in calmer seas. I have accepted the second freedom and made the most of what I have given, I have cultivated the grace and shared it with many others. Thank you.

Grace is one of those interesting theological terms, that has been understood in so many ways. The most common form is known as “Common Grace”. In the Christian tradition, this is the Grace that is given to each person by God, whether they are believers or not. That said it is not a word owned by this tradition, there are many and varied meanings. These include a type of movement, elegant and refined, like a swan of ballerina. Another would a talent or gift bestowed on someone like Mozart. It could be the condition of being favoured by someone. Or the way a person behaves, acting in good grace. Been given a grace period say in the payment of something. A grace note in music is an extravagant extra that could be played if the performer were so inclined to indulge. A prayer offered in thanks before a meal. A title of someone in high office, “Your Grace”. We can also honour someone with Grace. There are other and varied understanding from the many religious and spiritual traditions. So it is important to understand that when a person speaks of Grace, they may not mean exactly the same thing.

Now for me when I speak of Grace it is about openness, about being open and responding in a generous way. It is a gift offered freely to someone or life itself. It is a response from our heart. It is our ultimate freedom, our ultimate gift we are given. Although to truly cultivate this we need not to be too weighed down by whatever burdens we carry. If we are too weighed down we will struggle to respond to anything and or listen to our own hearts and souls. We will be unable to truly cultivate our grace. By the way we also need to be open to truly accept the grace offered to us.

Paul Brunton in “The Gift of Grace: Awakening to Its Presence” defined grace as the manifestation of God’s friendliness. I like this. That said I want to extend it to the friendliness in everything. Now for me God is at the heart of everything, a kind if panentheism, but still it is for us to engage with this friendliness and bring it to life, to manifest it through our lives. Again I see this as our ultimate freedom.

You can enjoy the grace of life each and every day if you are open enough to receive. It’s always there, its just that sometimes we are closed off to it.

Frederick Beuchner in “Beyond Words” said the following:

“After centuries of handling and mishandling, most religious words have become so shopworn nobody's much interested anymore. Not so with grace, for some reason. Mysteriously, even derivatives like gracious and graceful still have some of the bloom left.

Grace is something you can never get but can only be given. There's no way to earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than you can deserve the taste of raspberries and cream or earn good looks or bring about your own birth.

A good sleep is grace and so are good dreams. Most tears are grace. The smell of rain is grace. Somebody loving you is grace. Loving somebody is grace. Have you ever tried to love somebody?

A crucial eccentricity of the Christian faith is the assertion that people are saved by grace. There's nothing you have to do. There's nothing you have to do. There's nothing you have to do.

The grace of God means something like: "Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are, because the party wouldn't have been complete without you. Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid. I am with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It's for you I created the universe. I love you."

There's only one catch. Like any other gift, the gift of grace can be yours only if you'll reach out and take it.

Maybe being able to reach out and take it is a gift too.”

The key is to be open to both the giving and receiving, it is our ultimate freedom, our ultimate grace.

What stops us often is a sense that we don’t deserve it. That there is something wrong with us, that we live with a sense of shame. It is shame that keeps us locked in and closed down. We become weighed down and closed off to the Grace of life and thus unable to respond in graceful ways.

Lewis B. Smedes in “Shame and Grace: Healing the Shame We Don’t Deserve” said the following:

“Shame is heavy; grace is light. Shame and grace are the two counter-forces in the human spirit: shame depresses; grace lifts. Shame is like gravity, a psychic force that pulls us down. Grace is like levitation, a spiritual force that defies gravity. If our spiritual experience does not lighten our life, we are not experiencing grace.”

It is the shame that holds us back, that closes us in. It doesn’t have to be like that. If we could only recognise that gift that is within us. What Mark Nepo has called “The Timeless Spot of Grace”. He wrote:

“Each person is born with an unencumbered spot, free of expectation and regret, free of ambition and embarrassment, free of fear and worry; an umbilical spot of grace where we were each first touched by god. It is this spot of grace that issues peace. Psychologists call this spot the Psyche, Theologians call it the Soul, Jung calls it the Seat of Unconscious, Hindu masters call it Atman, Buddhists call it Dharma, Rilke calls it Inwardness, Sufis call it Qalb, And Jesus calls it the Center of our Love.

To know this spot of Inwardness is to know who we are, not by surface markers of identity, not by where we work or what we wear or how we like to be addressed, but by feeling our place in relation to the infinite and by inhabiting it. This is a hard lifelong task, for the nature of becoming is a constant filming over of where we begin, while the nature of being is a constant erosion of what is not essential. Each of us lives in the midst of this ongoing tension, growing tarnished or covered over, only to be worn back to that incorruptible spot of grace at our core.”

Life is the greatest gift of all, for better or for worse. We don’t get to choose what happens. Our freedom, our greatest gift, our second grace is in how we respond to life and to others and of course to ourselves. It is our greatest gift, our second grace. We need to be and remain open and not too weighed down.

This requires us to pay attention. Simone Weil saw attention as a contemplative practice, through which we reap life’s deepest rewards, perhaps this is how we cultivate Grace. She saw attention as the rarest form of generosity. It is through attention that we open up to Grace. Attention as she saw it is something way beyond the mere will, which she saw as graceless. For Weil attention is an opening, like prayer, that is full of Grace.

So maybe this is where we begin, in attention. Maybe this is how we prepare ourselves, how we cultivate Grace. Attention is how we accept the giftedness of life. The winds of Grace are always blowing, all around us. We don’t get to choose what happens to us, but we do have the freedom to respond. This is our ultimate freedom, our second grace. We activate this, we cultivate this Grace, by paying attention. In so doing we get to bless each other, this world and in return it blesses us.

I’m going to end with some words of blessing. You know e need to bless more. We can all bless. WE bless by giving ourselves wholeheartedly to life.

“Choose to Bless the World” by Rebecca Anne Parker

Your gifts—whatever you discover them to be—
can be used to bless or curse the world.

The mind's power,
the strength of the hands,
the reaches of the heart,
the gift of speaking, listening, imagining, seeing, waiting

Any of these can serve to feed the hungry,
bind up wounds,
welcome the stranger,
praise what is sacred,
do the work of justice
or offer love.

Any of these can draw down the prison door,
hoard bread,
abandon the poor,
obscure what is holy,
comply with injustice
or withhold love.

You must answer this question:
What will you do with your gifts?

Choose to bless the world.

The choice to bless the world is more than an act of will,
a moving forward into the world
with the intention to do good.

It is an act of recognition,
a confession of surprise,
a grateful acknowledgment
that in the midst of a broken world
unspeakable beauty, grace and mystery abide.

There is an embrace of kindness
that encompasses all life, even yours.

And while there is injustice, anesthetization, or evil
there moves a holy disturbance,
a benevolent rage,
a revolutionary love,
protesting, urging, insisting
that which is sacred will not be defiled.

Those who bless the world live their life
as a gesture of thanks
for this beauty
and this rage.

The choice to bless the world can take you into solitude
to search for the sources
of power and grace;
native wisdom, healing, and liberation.

More, the choice will draw you into community,
the endeavor shared,
the heritage passed on,
the companionship of struggle,
the importance of keeping faith,

the life of ritual and praise,
the comfort of human friendship,
the company of earth
the chorus of life welcoming you.

None of us alone can save the world.
Together—that is another possibility, waiting.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

Blessing of the Animals: Every Creature Is a Book About God

The Christian Mystic of the 13th and 14th century Meister Eckhart said:

“Every single creature is full of God and is a book about God. Every creature is a word of God. If I spend enough time with the tiniest creature, even a caterpillar, I would never have to prepare a sermon. So full of God is every creature.”

I came across this quote the other day as I was struggling with this service. How do I talk about the blessing of animals, as I have done many times before. The quotation suggested that maybe what I need to really do is spend time with, or to reflect on my time, with them. So here goes.

I was out with Molly, her best friend Ronnie and his companion Susan the other day. We were walking round John Leigh Park, the dogs were chasing squirrels, each other and wrestling a bit. Other dogs often join in, when they do. It was a bit of a riot the other day, about 10 of them chasing each other around. They were having a ball. It sometimes gets a bit rough for poor Ronnie, as he is just developing which causes a few issues with other male dogs, something he is learning to take care of. Molly, despite her size, seems to have resolved that a while ago.

When Molly and Ronnie play with a ball together, they get so excited and caught up in things that the ball gets dropped and often lost. There is something in the nature of life in this. Well, the other day they were playing and wrestling and chasing, they dropped the ball and a cocker spaniel wandered up and took it, before trotting off. The ball was gone and I just thought, such is life. We carried on walking as did the other dog, walking the opposite way round the circle. After a while the cocker spaniel was heading home with his family, Just before they did he came over to Molly and Ronnie and dropped the ball at their feet and trotted off home. It blew me a way a little, brought a beautiful broad beaming smile to my face. Myself and Susan laughed to ourselves and I reflected that we were taught a beautiful lesson about the Kingdom of God, alive here and now, or as I prefer to call it, the kin-dom of love.

Dog’s live by and from their nose. They take in the world in rich ways, we humans cannot. They come to life in the richness of things, it is something to behold. They know what e. e. cummings termed the “smelloftheworld”, their olfactory perception is incredible. They can teach us how to experience the world in new and wonderful ways. We sanitise so much of life, by killing off our smell. I have noticed in my time with Molly that my olfactory perception has increased. She has helped me bring to life my lesser used senses, which has enabled my sixth sense to come to greater life and thus brought me closer to God. I suspect that this is what Meister Eckhart may have been hinting at. The soul of animals and their soulfulness generally is helping me to open my own soul and thus bringing me closer to the eternal soul, what Emerson called the Oversoul.

When I look into Molly’s eyes I see a soul so alive, with such feeling and curiosity. So sensitive and in tune with her needs and at ease with herself. She loves to make friends with all she meets and is a real friend to life. She loves to welcome people and bless them when they arrive. I see the same soul alive in people and other creatures too, so animated in their eyes. Of course the world animal is derived from animas, meaning to have a soul.

When we lose one of those souls from our lives, it breaks our hearts. Pet owners call it passing over the rainbow bridge. No doubt many who are here today will be remembering lost loved ones, who came into our lives, opened our hearts and touched our souls and then passed on. I know that Sharon and Helen’s beloved Vegas sadly died this week, he had been a grand old lad and was lovely with Molly when she was just a little puppy. The last time I was at the dog groomers I learnt that Collette, the groomer had just lost her labrador. It must have been so very difficult to pamper other pooches while her beloved had just died, although no doubt comfort came. She shared with me her beloved pets last few hours. I know that the sharing brought some comfort. I also know that the love they shared will be permanently etched on the soul of Collette and no doubt every little dog she grooms in the coming weeks will get that little bit more care and attention.

Despite their limited time in life, animals feel at home. This is something else that the animals can teach us, how to feel at home in our own skin. They do not suffer with this sense that they do not belong here, held back by insecurities and a sense of being wrong at the soul of them. They live from the sense of “Original Blessing” and not “Original Sin”, they are part of the creation that is good at the core of itself. They feel at home in their own bodies and a part of this world. For whatever reason so many people, at times at least, feel that they do not belong here. Surely it is our greatest yearning to feel at home in our own skin, at home here on earth. Oh how living with the animals reminds me of my place amongst animal things, amongst the family of things, it grounds me in my own soul and I feel at one with the one eternal soul.

When I despair at myself or this world and how humans can be so inhumane at times I am reminded of Wendell Berry’s “The Peace of Wild Things”

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Or Mary Oliver’s “Wild Geese”, that reminds me of life’s simple but astonishing gifts. Whoever we are, and however we are, each of us has a place of welcome and honour “in the family of things”…

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting–
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

The wild geese flying over head remind me what it means to live in community, supporting one another and encouraging one another to keep on going, reminding me how much we need one another. Some have described them as being like the “Communion of Saints”, to me it is the “Kin-dom of Love” in full flight.

I have other affections for the birds around my house too. Molly doesn’t necessarily share my love as she loves to chase them as much as the squirrels. Two birds though have lifted my soul over the years. One was the scratty magpie that was happy in its magpie self, despite looking dishevelled and under fed, it didn’t seem bothered. It helped me through a difficult period of my personal life, when I was feeling less than my best. The other of course is the blackbird that I have had wonderful singing competitions with. We raise one another up and sing better than I dreamed possible. We lift up one another’s souls, or at least the blackbird does mine.

That blackbird sings the joy of living in all its mystery. Perhaps this is the greatest joy at the soul of animals, something we could all do well to remember. The soul of animal comes alive in their joy.

When I watch the dogs in the park playing together, they are in total bliss, in utter joy. How they run free and greet one another, how they roll and gently growl and play. How they seem able to judge one another’s size and age and physical capacity. They are clearly happy at play, they show it clearly. They speak in their tongues and they are utterly free. Isn’t this the soul alive.

It certainly brings me soul to life. Eckhart was so right. Every single creature is full of God, is filled with that spirit, their souls are alive. They tell their own story, by simply being themselves, by living their lives, as part of the blessing. I have learnt all I have to do is pay close attention to them, how they live and maybe I will never again have to prepare another sermon, although I hope this one was ok.

May we never forget that we belong here, that we have a place here amongst the family of things.

Below is a video devotion based on the material in this "Blogspot"

I Didn’t Understand a Single Word That Man Said

Pronunciation can be tricky. We learn to speak by listening to others. We repeat what we hear. This is probably why both accents and dialect are to some degree disappearing. We hear so many different types of speech today than we did in the past. As a minister of religion it is vitally important that people can understand what I am saying, that I can articulate. Now of course it is not just the words I say that need to heard and understood, more importantly it is meaning beneath the words that mean the most. Now I know sometimes this does not happen. From time to time people have repeated back to me things they have heard me say, which have been almost the exact opposite of what I meant. Not very often thankfully.

I and others have had a little fun with mine and others troubles with pronunciation recently. It began a couple of Sunday’s ago with Derek’s troubles with “phenomenom”. A word no matter how hard he tried he could not say. Afterwards I offered him a tip, one I have suggested to others, that if you are struggling with this word then you may find help from the Muppets. You may remember the song “manam mana”. I got over my struggles with phenomenon by saying over and over again “Manam mana” and hey presto I could say phenomena. By the time I got to Altrincham I thought I would give Penny some help as she was delivering the same reading as Derek. It was a mistake I think I put her off and I am sorry for that. Sometimes all of us can get too worried about coming across perfectly when what actually matters the most is authenticity and the meaning between what we say.

I have got frustrated with myself at times, because I have been unable to articulate myself perfectly. One word I regularly struggle with is the word “regularly”, it just seems to get stuck on my tongue. I shared about this on Facebook and received some interesting response. I am not the only one who regularly struggles to pronounce “regularly”. Others shared words that they struggled with. Several folk struggle with “phenomena” or “phenomenon”. Other words included “Music”, “behavioural”, “statistics”, “disorientated”, “immediately”, “meteorological”, “Tsunami”, “Ibuprofen”, “Cardigan”, “Abominable”, “Hilariously”, “Enthusiasm and so many more. Apparently Benedict Cumberbatch can’t say penguin, but then who can say Benedict Cumberbatch. I remember the former Leeds United manager Marcelo Bielsa struggled with Ipswich and Leicester and Americans famously struggle with Worcestershire Sause. Now you have just heard me struggle with a few of them.

It was fun and connective to share these common struggles. It is especially difficult if English is not your first language. Not that pronunciation is the most important thing. What matters the most is at the heart of what we say, the meaning beneath the words we say and use. That said it does help if people can understand what you are saying. Sadly accents and dialect can at times get in the way. I have been humbled on a couple of occasions when speaking publicly. Thankfully I was able to laugh about it later. One time was when I was in Transylvania and had delivered a sermon that was translated into Hungarian. There was a TV company there filming for a local news channel. After the service they interviewed Carolyn Jones, who speaks clearly and without an accent. Afterwards she asked if they would like to speak to me, to which they replied “Oh no I didn’t understand a word that man said.” Another time was when I was asked to deliver a workshop and talk in the West Midlands. I read the poem “The Layers” by Stanley Kunitz. Afterwards one or two people didn’t quite understand what I meant as they heard me saying “lair” and not “layer”, they thought I was suggesting that they live in the “lair” of a lion and not the “layers” of life. This is purely about accents. “lay-er” where come from is pronounced “lare” as in “make sure you where plenty of lares today, as it is perishing cold outside.

Now all joking aside. Yes people don’t always understand every word, as it is not always articulated correctly. What is worse though is when someone doesn’t get the heart or meaning behind what is said. Or worse than that they are hurt by words spoken; that the heart and soul does not reach their heart and soul.

Tuesday evening saw the American presidential debate. Two people offering visions for America. It was pretty clear to me what was at the heart and soul of the two and their vision. I hope it has the appropriate impact on those who will vote in the future.

Words matter and the language we use matters too. They can be used creatively or destructively. Minister’s of religion are often referred to as minister’s of the word. This comes from a Greek word that occurs more than 300 times in the New Testament alone. The word is “Logos”. Now traditional trinitarian Christians would see Logos as meaning Jesus Christ, the classic example being in John 1 v 1 and the following line “In the beginning was the word and word was with God and the word was God.”. I don’t believe this is the case. Logos is used in a variety of ways, throughout the Bible. They follow two basic lines of thought though. One is mind and the products of the mind, such as reason, logic is related to logos. The other is an expression of that reason as a word, like a command. Here are some of the examples:

Account, appearance, book, command, conversation, eloquence, flattery, grievance, heard, instruction, matter, message, ministry, news, proposal, question, reason, reasonable, reply, report, rule, rumor, said, say, saying, sentence, speaker, speaking, speech, stories, story, talk, talking, teaching, testimony, thing, things, this, truths, what, why, word and words.

There is something Divine and creative in the way we use words; when spoken in the right way they can be Divine in activity, they do at least if they are spoken with loving and creative extent. The Sufi’s see an association with Divine creative power and words spoken from the Beloved’s lips. So, when you speak such words in love you are part of the Divine creativity. Here is an example from Sana’i

The souls of all the lovers
are mobilized before Your lips;
With You, they are all and everything:
devoid of Your lips, they are nothing.

It matters how we speak what we create with our lips. Our words will become our actions and they certainly speak of our intent. The relationship between and action in an honourable existence is what Hannah Arendt examined throughout her book “The Human Condition” (published in 1958). She wrote:

“With word and deed we insert ourselves into the human world, and this insertion is like a second birth, in which we confirm and take upon ourselves the naked fact of our original physical appearance. This insertion is not forced upon us by necessity, like labor, and it is not prompted by utility, like work. It may be stimulated by the presence of others whose company we may wish to join, but it is never conditioned by them; its impulse springs from the beginning which came into the world when we were born and to which we respond by beginning something new on our own initiative. To act, in its most general sense, means to take an initiative, to begin (as the Greek word archein, “to begin,” “to lead,” and eventually “to rule,” indicates), to set something into motion (which is the original meaning of the Latin agere).”

We create or destroy life through our words and actions, Our meaning, our purpose our love and hate are shown through them. Hopefully this comes through, this is articulated, what is at the heart and soul, even if at times our words and actions can be clumsy, even if we stumble through our words and deeds from time to time. What really matters is our intent, what is our meaning our true logos.

The language we use says a lot about our meaning both personally and culturally. Those who study language learn a great deal about humanity by the way we use words and the emotions those words carry with them. They speak of the meaning as a “Frame”. That these frames are mental structures that shape the way we view the world. The way we see the world affects how we act in the world. Now of course we cannot see these frames they exist at all almost unconscious level. Certain words and language fire us up, they activate an aspect of our brain, almost unconsciously.

What matter is our intent, the meaning beneath what we say. How we articulate that matters. I hope I am making sense today. I hope you can understand my meaning, the meaning in my words, my Logos.

I am reminded here of a joke I once heard about a preacher.

There car had broken down after the Sunday service. Come Monday morning, the Reverend managed to drive the vehicle to the town’s one garage for repairs. “I hope you’ll go easy on the cost,” he told the mechanic. “After all, I’m just a poor preacher.” “I know,” came the reply. “I heard you preach yesterday.”

I hope there is value in the words I preach, even if it is not articulated perfectly.

The ability to speak publicly is a vital tool of ministry, so if a minister loses their voice or ability to speak their effectiveness would be seriously compromised. Well just this did happen to one of the two father’s of British Unitarianism, Joseph Priestley. For many years Dr Priestley struggled with a stammer.

I have a personal affection for Priestley, which has nothing much to do with his actual achievements. No, I have affection for Priestley because he comes from Birstall, in West Yorkshire, where I grew up and he attended Batley Grammar School, where I went. There the comparisons end I’m afraid. I have never been a leading radical, politically and I have never been particularly scientifically minded. That said thankfully I have never suffered from a stammer. I wonder sometimes what Priestley’s accent would have been like. No doubt very different to a man from Birstall these days (B’still as a local would pronounce it)

Joseph Priestley struggled with a stammer for years. It must have been terribly difficult to preach with such an impediment. He did overcome it as it did not affect his later career. That said it did cause him much distress although, as he said, it saved him from being “seduced by the love of popular applause as a preacher”.

My tradition lays great emphasis on the word and the preaching of it. Ok today we may not place authority at the door of scripture, this has been replaced by the conscience of the individual. That said the preached word, articulated correctly is still central to our worship.

Is this though the most important element?

Many people can speak well and articulately. I myself have had some training, but I know I will never be perfect and absolutely clear. I do not wish to be. I need to remain true to who I am, to speak my truth in love and in a language that hopefully others will understand.

To truly minister people need to hear what my heart and soul has to say. I need to speak the language of the heart, but not from someone else’s book of life and experiences. No! These experiences must come from my own; otherwise how can I expect others to relate to what I have to say.

I hope that by continually speaking my truth in love I am able to encourage others to do likewise and that they in turn continue to speak their truth in love. I trust you can understand my intent, my meaning, my logos. I hope that by sharing my truth in love I encourage you to do the same. To me this is the purpose of worship to help you speak and act your truth in love. To me this is what this is all about.

Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"

Life is a Circle: Tradition is not the Worship of Ashes but the Preservation of Fire

Cynicism can be very seductive, to get caught up in all that is wrong with the world. To put down those who speak with a hopeful voice. To say we’ve tried this before, there really is no point to this. It is easy to get caught up in fear and negativity about the world, to say what’s the point; to think what’s the point in doing my little bit, it will make no difference. Well, I don’t believe that for one moment. I live in and by hope. There maybe no point to things, but then life doesn’t work like this. There is no end goal, life is a circle. We are not heading for some unknown place, we are moving in circles and the point is how we live. This is a great universal truth, a truth told by every great story ever told. There is no end to this.

As I mentioned last week I enjoyed much of Summer School. One of the many treasures are the daily “Theme Talks”. Michael Allured was minister of the week. He held the last talk, which began with a story that Michael is well known for telling. The story is the “The Starfish Story”. I have told it myself many times. Here is a version:

A young boy is walking along the beach when he sees hundreds of starfish washed up on the shore. In dismay, and realizing that many of them are still alive, he begins chucking them back out to sea so they won’t die on the beach. A man comes along and asks him, “Why are you throwing those starfish back out into the sea? You can’t possibly save all these starfish! What difference can you make when there are so many to be saved?” After thinking about it for a moment, and throwing one more starfish back out into the water, the boy replies, “I just made a difference for that one!”

As I spoke of last week you never known what one little action can begin to trigger. I know that hope is often born from despair, often a new hope is born. What I kearnt to call respair, a new hope a fresh hope, but it is up to us, inspired by the spirt. There is never an end to anything, the world keeps on spinning round. What the world is though depends on the way we live this day.

As I said I enjoyed the theme talks at Summer School. I can’t talk about them all. I will just talk of some of the aspects of one led by Lizzie Kingston Harrison, who is our Congregational Connections lead and Liz Slade who is our Chief Officer. Lizzie Kingston Harrison is also training for the ministry and is one of several talented people coming through. Whenever Lizzie speaks she impresses me. I had a wonderful conversation at “Ministry in the Making”, that inspired my thinking around some of my own foundational theology. She gave a fascinating talk on Joseph Priestley at the General Assembly. Her contribution to the theme talk was both moving and inspiring. She is rooted in classic Unitarian theology, but with her feet firmly grounded in the present and vision toward the future. She looks forward with real hope. She describes herself as natural optimist, nay radical optimist. She talked about the importance of not focusing on some perceived goal, but to understand that we are grounded in a great historical tradition, a part of history, but that this is not linear, heading toward some unknown promised land. She instead highlights that journey is circular. That all life is circular, that we are not looking for some promised land, some Nirvana, somewhere beyond the rainbow. Well, that is at least how I interpreted her talk. That the Unitarian approach to religion, is real, grounded in this life. That we sanctify in and through this life. That the likes of Priestley and our forebears, in rejecting “Original Sin”, and thus the need to be saved from ourselves, embraced the humanness of Jesus and this life, the sacredness of this life, and as I would see it, that we are here to sanctify in and through life. Throughout her talk she repeated a wonderful phrase. “Tradition is not the worship of ashes but the preservation of fire.” That ours is a living tradition, that can inspire all who live today.

Behind her, as she spoke, was this wonderful image of Hildegard of Bingen’s Mandala, which was a beautiful circular pattern, inspired by one of her mystical visions. It shows the cosmic connection of all angels, all people, and all beings celebrating the creation that God has made for us. It is from the “Second Vision of the Second Part of De Operatione Dei.”

The emphasis of her talk was on the circular nature of life, claiming that this is the wisdom of Ecclesiastes and quoted the following verse from Ecclesiastes 3 vv 1-8

3 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:

2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.

I love Ecclesiastes and the idea that life moves in seasons and that there is time for everything in life, it is every changing and impermanent. To quote the wisdom of Soloman, “This too shall pass.” Now one mistake that is often made with Ecclesiastes is to think that in suggesting there is a time for everything, it does not mean that we can do everything, or that we should even try to do everything. This can be a mistake we make in life and was a repeated theme during Summer School, that it is important to understand what you can do, but not try to do everything, joy and fun and pleasure are vital to the soul. Also, that you need to leave space for others to, live too.

This brings to mind a wonderful poem, a reaction to Ecclesiastes, “A Man in His Life” by Yehuda Amichai

A man in his life has no time to have
Time for everything.
He has no room to have room
For every desire. Ecclesiastes was wrong to claim that.

A man has to hate and love all at once,
With the same eyes to cry and to laugh
With the same hands to throw stones
And to gather them,
Make love in war and war in love.

And hate and forgive and remember and forget
And order and confuse and eat and digest
What long history does
In so many years.

A man in his life has no time.
When he loses he seeks
When he finds he forgets
When he forgets he loves
When he loves he begins forgetting.

And his soul is knowing
And very professional,
Only his body remains an amateur
Always. It tries and fumbles.
He doesn’t learn and gets confused,
Drunk and blind in his pleasures and pains.

In autumn, he will die like a fig,
Shriveled, sweet, full of himself.
The leaves dry out on the ground,
And the naked branches point
To the place where there is time for everything.

We cannot do everything, but we can do something. Also, we can fall and mess up a thousand times, but still begin again in love. I am reminded here of that great nineteenth Unitarian Edward Everett Hale and his famous quote:

“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.”

Going back to Ecclesiastes and its wisdom, despite its limits. The main point of Ecclesiastes is that is there is no point. Now this is not negativity or pessimism. The point so to speak is that there is no end to this. There is no end point we are aiming for, no places where we come to rest. Not a promised Land, a Heaven, a Nirvana, an Oz, an Ithaka. Remember the point of Ithica is that it gave us the beautiful journey. This is the massage of Ecclesiastes, that there is no point to this, so enjoy the tasks we have before us, this is heaven to find our meaning as Frankl highlighted. That heaven is found in the living, not some places at the other side of the rainbow. Yes, seasons come and go, but the fire remains in all the changes, the spirit is alive in and through us and all life. This is the radiant core at the centre that we circle around. No one knows what the future looks like or will be, but that is not what fires and inspires us, what inspires us is the love of what and where we find ourselves, to love it, to follow the example of Jesus and his message of radical love and radical optimism. To bless and sanctify this life. Not perfectly, but with love, imperfectly. Even if we have fallen short a thousand times, to paraphrase Rumi.

What is important is to recognise that we are temporal beings, but that life itself is eternal and our task here is to enjoy this life as part of this life and to take care of what is ours to take of. To bless this life and fully part of it, is what will sustain us, this is where the spirit lives. The mistake is that we focus on some perceived goal, a destination that may not be reached. The key is to sanctify life, one another and in so doing we live sacred lives. To paraphrases good old Forrest Church, to live in such a way that our lives will prove worth dying for by the love we leave behind. The wheel continues to turn, and we get the beautiful journey.

Ecclesiastes, particularly those verses from the third chapter, speak an eternal and universal truth that generation after generation have found that they can relate to. The power of this ancient source lays in its ability to link we who live today with the generations that have walked the earth before us. We all of us have travelled many and varied journeys and lived through all the seasons of life. Nothing is permanent and nothing lasts forever. No one will ever escape the pain of life, but that ought not bring despair because if we remain open we will also know life’s joy. Yes, there is a time to mourn, but there is also a time to dance; there is a time to weep, but there is also a time to laugh.

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven. ”There are many seasons in our lives, just as there are many different emotions. Yes, sometimes we can experience all those emotions in one single day, just as we can experience four seasons in one day. There is a time and perhaps a place for all of them, for to diminish any of them is deny what it is to be fully human. Yes, there is a time to weep, just as there is a time to laugh and there is a time to mourn, just as much as there is a time to dance.

I have wept several times in recent weeks and have held others in their suffering too, that said I have also laughed many times too, I have seen joy and I have seen how life continues on. As Ecclesiastes says in Ch1 v 4 “Generations come and generations go, but the earth abides forever”.

Life is circular, everything changes, but life itself goes on. This is the ultimate teacher, my guru if you like. No person can be as nothing in life is perfect. Remember perfection original meant complete, well nothing is ever complete. Ecclesiastes teaches this so powerfully. There is no end point, the circle is never complete. We need to live with our senses fully awake and alive to everything around us, including our sixth sense with that spirit alive. Look and see for yourself; experience all life yourself; taste everything, bare witness to the impermanence and ever changing nature of life. Summer is ending, autumn is coming; experience everything that is under the sun and all beyond, but experience it yourself, know reality. Investigate life’s true nature, your true nature, experience it yourself. Take in every breath, for each is fleeting and yet so very precious. Love this life and let the spirit inspire your living.

We are a part of a living tradition. To quote Lizzie one final time “Tradition is not the worship of ashes but the preservation of fire.”

Let us be lit up by that living flame.

Below is a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"