“No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.” ~Virginia Woolf

Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly. —from Matthew 11

This week many of us are out of town for vacation or spiritual pilgrimage.  If you are home, take time to rest.  We’ll gather again for worship on July 3rd.

Take Care!

Rather than random acts of kindness, what does it look like to become a person of compassion?  How does our encounter with others not lead to “re-actions” but, instead, resonate with the day-to-action of being a person in the Way of Jesus, a person of kindness?  How is our kindness simply a daily habit of life, a fruit of whole life, rather than a point of pride that we become defensive about?

Let us not underestimate how hard it is to be compassionate. Compassion is hard because it requires the inner disposition to go with others to place where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely, and broken. But this is not our spontaneous response to suffering. What we desire most is to do away with suffering by fleeing from it or finding a quick cure for it.—Henri Nouwen

The thought of death and a life after death can lead to fatalism and apathy, so that we only live life here half-heartedly, or just endure it and ‘get through’. The thought of a life after death can cheat us of the happiness and the pain of this life, so that we squander its treasures, selling them off cheap to heaven. In that respect it is better to live every day as if death didn’t exist, better to love life here and now as unreservedly as if death really were ‘the finish’. The notion that this life is no more than a preparation for a life beyond, is the theory of a refusal to live, and a religious fraud. It is inconsistent with the living God, who is ‘a lover of life’. In that sense it is religious atheism.—Jürgen Moltmann

Come gather for worship with us and help co-create a conversation on kindness, fruit that grows out of the resurrected life, through the texts of Galatians 5 and Matthew 6.  Bring food for a potluck. We’ll meet at Carrie’s place from 5-7pm at 409 Deckner Ave SW.

We’re also celebrating the year of service that Leslie gerber has given us, sending her and her family back home to Kansas in a few weeks.

Starting something is not an event; it’s a series of events. You decide to walk to Cleveland. So you take a first step in the right direction. That’s starting. You spend the rest of the day walking toward Cleveland, one step at a time, picking your feet up and putting them down. At the end of the day, twenty miles later, you stop at a hotel. And what happens the next morning? Either you quit the project or you start again, walking to Cleveland. In fact, every step is a new beginning. Sure, you’re closer than you were yesterday or last week, but you’re still…”
— Seth Godin (Poke the Box)

As you begin this eternal movement toward God
you’ll find struggle and no shortage of suffering
and afterwards ineffable joy…

The flitting bird abandons the nest
and so her eggs never hatch.
The monk or nun grows cold
and faith dies, when the monastic
wanders from place to place.

—Amma Syncletica of Alexandria (c. 316 – c.400) (trans. Scott Cairns)

Sunday we’ll be discussing Forbearance, that weird stick-to-it-iv-ness that we recognize in  those who leave legacies behind them.  Paul recommends it to the Galatians as proof of resurrection in the hear-and-now. Jesus’ step brother wrote, “Anyone who meets a testing challenge head-on and manages to stick it out is mighty fortunate. For such persons loyally in love with God, the reward is life and more life.”  (James 1.12 from the Message)

Come contribute to a discussion on Sticking with Things.  We will be meeting from 5-7 at the DWELL house,817 Dill Ave SW.

God keeps the peace at your borders,
God puts the best bread on your tables. —Psalm 147

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it
will be enough. —Meister Eckhardt

The coming of the Spirit . . . requires that we yield to a power not our own, which is to concede that we are not in charge and that we are not managers of our destiny and our ministry.  Shalom is precisely the capacity to yield to the gift of power, which comes unexpectedly and unexplained and, therefore, is neither understood nor managed by us.  But capacity to receive and yield is not what we nurture or value.  We stress rather consistently control, mastery, and competence.  And the more we master, control, and manage, the less we can yield to the gift.  So, the Spirit does not come among us.  The table is for those who are ready to receive. —Walter Brueggemann

This week we’ll discuss Peace as a fruit of God’s promised resurrection life here and now.

We’re meeting from 5-7 at Troy and Kelley’s 824 Dill Ave SW.