As I look back at my life, I cannot even begin to count the number of free meals I have been given. I am not just talking about food here by the way. Throughout my life people have given to me from nothing but pure love. There have been many helping hands, some visible and yet others invisible. Some have given to me before I was even here, that I have freely benefitted from. I have been freely fed by many hands throughout my life. I have eaten and have certainly been filled. Thank you. From this I have been able to give and others have been fed too.
“From you I receive, to you I give, together we share and from this we live”
I am going to share with a piece of wisdom that has been foundational to my ministry. A gift given, that has continued to feed me and those who I serve these last 13 years. It is titled “In The Soup” by Robert Walsh. Interestingly he did a short exchange ministry at the congregations I serve during the 1980’s when John Midgely served as minister. Sadly Robbie died a few years ago. That said his wisdom still feeds. Thank you.
“In The Soup” by Robert Walsh.
My dictionary says that the word minister is etymologically related to the word minestrone. I am not making this up. They are both derived from a Latin root that means to serve.
The image of ministry as minestrone is particularly apt for the ministry church people do all together that make us a ministering congregation. Each bean, each vegetable, each unit of macaroni or pinch of spice gives not only its substance to the soup but also its spirit, its texture its color, its flavour and aroma. Each person offers a unique set of gifts, and if we do our job organizing well, each gift will be creatively matched with a need – so that the whole business becomes a warm, nourishing, life giving religious community.
All who serve the church and the principles and values we hold dear are ministers. If you are doing part of that work, you are doing ministry, no matter how unlikely it may seem. You are in the soup – the minestrone of ministry!
Isn’t it wonderful.
“From you I receive, to you I give, together we share and from this we live.”
I recently had the honour of participating
in “Ministry in the Making”, at Great Hucklow. Those in attendance were newly qualified ministers, those training for the ministry and those about to begin training for the ministry. One of those present was Janine Simms who will be on placement with the congregations I serve from September. It was a privilege to spend time with them and participate in workshops and other activities. They were on the whole an impressive bunch. I feel that our chalice is in good hands. Molly had a wonderful time and it seems that all present fell in love with her. This included the chef who ensured she had a sausage every morning. This has led to one or two problems since we got back as she has got a little fussier about food. Who would want to eat kibble after sausage. They did love her though and she came home with several teddy bears as she kept been given one by the students every time we went to chapel. They certainly want her back and apparently I can accompany her too. The whole week was a wonderful example of both giving and receiving. All certainly gained and abundantly, including Molly.
This year’s “Ministry in the Making” theme was inspired by Kahlil Gibran’s words on ‘Giving’, particularly the following lines: “Then said a rich man, Speak to us of Giving. And he answered: You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.” Giving of yourself is an intimate act. Like the disciples in “The feeding of the five thousands”, when they gave to those they were feeding face to face, in so doing they were filled, as were the disciples no doubt, as both were filled with love by this intimate interaction. In this ultimate free lunch, both receive.
During the week I was invited to speak about ministry. I shared the wonderful piece by Robbie Walsh suggesting that congregational ministry is akin to soup, particularly minestrone soup.
As Walsh highlighted minestrone and ministry share the same root, they both mean to serve. Love and service, I believe. are the essence of true religious living. Our Unitarian tradition is a free religious one, an open one. We come together and serve together, although we may not believe in exactly the same way. Thus we celebrate because as we come together and serve together we create a meal, made up of so many ingredients that could satisfy all and then we serve this meal to those who would like to taste what we have to offer. Our purpose is not to merely serve ourselves, but the world outside of our window. We cannot do this alone, we need one another. We all have something to add to the flavour.
Everyone thirsts and hungers even in our seemingly materially abundant lives. We cannot feed this hunger in isolation, in self-reliance. It is only fed in that relationship that occurs as we feed one another. To me this is the purpose of religious communities like the ones I serve, living breathing fellowships of love. It is also my experience that it is the space, in this relationship that occurs as we serve one another, that God is revealed, that God is once again incarnated. By giving one to another we can know the love that is God.
This brings to mind a rather wonderful teaching story from good old Nasruddin
One day Nasruddin saw a crowd gathered around a pond, watching a priest flailing in the water and calling for help. Of course some people were attempting to rescue--reaching towards the drowning priest and saying "Give me your hand!" The priest kept wrestling with the water and shouting for help. Finally Nasruddin stepped forward: "Let me handle this." He stretched out his hand toward the priest and shouted, "Take my hand!" The priest grabbed Nasruddin's hand so quickly that he nearly fell in. Soon the priest was extracted from the pond... and someone asked Nasruddin what just happened. "It is very simple," he replied. "I know this miser never gave anything to anyone. Instead of saying 'Give me your hand,' I said, 'Take my hand,' and sure enough he took it.
If you are drowning it is advisable to take a helping hand. We all need at times help to pull us out of water. Sorry if this is mixing too many liquid based metaphors, but I’m no Stephen Fry.
No one pulls themselves up from their bootstraps completely alone, all by themselves. From the moment of our births others are involved in creating who we are and who we become. As the old saying goes “It takes a village to raise a child.” No one lives entirely from themselves we are all a part of an interdependent web of relationships that are made of both visible and invisible. Life has taught me that asking for help is actually a sign of both strength and wisdom, rather than weakness. It is a sign of good, mental, emotional and spiritual health. Of course it is not enough to merely ask for health, true healthy humility is about accepting the help offered. We give to others when we allow them to give to others. Those numerous free meals we are given do not only feed us, they feed all. We eat and we are filled by the relationship. Maybe this is what is meant by the old clichéd saying, “there is no such thing as a free meal.” It isn’t true of course, sadly it is a cynical cliché that suggests that you shouldn’t trust generosity. Please don’t fall for it, give and receive abundantly so we can all eat and be filled. If you do it with joy, joy will be your rewards.
From the cradle to the grave we need to keep on giving and receiving whole heartedly, joyfully. We need to keep asking for help when we need it and accept what visible and invisible help is offered. We also need to make ourselves available to be of assistance to others in their need, to be that visible help and to help bring alive that invisible help too. This is not to say that we become unhealthily dependent on others and society as a whole, no not at all. We are though a part of a whole, a complex whole that makes life and community. As we grow and change and become the people that we are this changes shape and reforms constantly, it seems that we are being born again and again to new versions of ourselves. Of course we cannot do this alone. We cannot give birth to ourselves, no one can. We need help and sometimes we need to ask for help from others and in so doing we are of course doing not only a service for ourselves, but for them also. We all feed and we are all fed and abundantly so.
We all hunger for purpose and meaning. As Viktor Frankl pointed out we are driven by a will to find meaning and purpose. I would go further and suggest that we are also driven to find companionship in our increasingly isolated and isolating culture. We need to serve one another, or our souls will starve. I have discovered, and I keep on discovering, that our deepest pangs are not satisfied by the food that is laid on the table but in the relationship that occurs as we feed one another and as we drink from one another’s cup. This is fellowship; a living breathing fellowship of love. This is where the joy in living comes to life.
We are all in the soup of life together and it is our task to serve one another. We all can minister, we can all add substance and flavour to the ministrone soup in which we all share.
Remember we are all in the soup together, let’s all add our substance and our flavour. Lets offer one another those free meals and accept those meals that are offered to us. There is more than enough to go round. The giving and receiving of love is an infinite commodity. It is the joy in living, in life.
“From you I receive, to you I give, together we share and from this we live.”
Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blog spot"
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