TRUSTWORTHY SAYINGS: March 2021

Wednesday, March 31, 2021

Lenten Devotional Wednesday March 31, 2021

The i Cloud of Witnesses

by Jan Kwiatkowski

Several seasons ago, I referred to the people gathered in Facebook groups as the great iCloud of witnesses. Across cities, states, nations, and continents, we came together and experienced a taste of spiritual connection with people we’d never get to meet in any other way. We also have the opportunity in these circles to get a glimpse of the timeless connection we have with the great cloud of witnesses to whom St. Paul refers.

While it often seems, especially during the times in which we currently live, that connection can be tenuous, distant, and fractured, we have been reminded these last forty days that our connection is deep, strong, and it cannot be broken. Tomorrow, we transition from Lent into the three holy days that lead to Easter. Our time together will soon come to an official end and even though we won’t be together in this same way, we will continue to know the blessing and depth of the authentic connection we have shared on our journey through Lent.

Wherever this Lenten journey has taken us, or will take us, we have the assurance that we are not alone and we never will be alone. The iCloud of witnesses in this time and place is connected to the timeless great cloud of witnesses and nothing can sever that tie. The love of Jesus, who will die and who will rise, binds us always and forever.

Making It Personal:

Do you have a sense of how your journey has been shaped by those with whom you have shared this Lent?

How do you experience spiritual connection in your daily life?

How might you sustain or nurture that moving forward?

What’s it like to think of yourself as part of the great cloud of witnesses?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Lenten Devotional Tuesday March 30, 2021

Known by Name

by Jan Kwiatkowski

One of the first things we want to know when a new child enters a family is their name. When someone we know begins a new relationship and it’s looking serious, we want to know their name. Children begin to understand the significance and power of naming when they are invited into the process of naming the family pet. Many of us have strong preferences for, and associations with, our names or nicknames.

Choosing, knowing, and sharing a name moves us from a position of distance from a person to a closer relationship with a particular someone we know by name.

In business or professional circles, being invited to call someone by their first name, rather than by their title, shifts the nature of the relationship. If naming and knowing a name has this much power in our human relationships, just how much more astonishingly amazing is it that God always has, and always will, know us by name? We are the “much-loved Child of God.” And, what’s most astounding and almost beyond comprehension is that God welcomes and longs for us to call God by name.

In our human frailty, even during those times when we stop calling on God, nothing we could ever do would cause our Creator to stop calling our name and longing for the sound of our response. On this Tuesday in Holy Week, I invite you to pause for a few moments and open your heart to hear that you are a much-loved Child of God.

Making It Personal:

How might you invite your heart to hear the reality that you are a much-loved Child of God?

Reflect on the reality that God longs for the sound of our response. What is the name you call God?

How did you come to know God by that name?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Monday, March 29, 2021

Lenten Devotional Monday March 29, 2021

Pausing to Listen

by Jan Kwiatkowski

On the way to the pool after one of those brief summer thunderstorms, my grandson asked, “Nana, can you hear the puddles splash?” While I’d heard the sound of splashing puddles many times, when my grandchild asked me to listen, I stopped and truly listened. And you know what? Puddles actually do splash. In my eagerness to get to the “good stuff” of pool-time, had I not paused to listen to a little voice, I’d have missed a wonderful moment. In his reflection yesterday, Craig Phillips wrote about the gifts of peace and joy we receive when we take the time to pause and listen.

Most of us have walked the days of Holy Week many times before and we know how the story of the week unfolds. Yet, in our culture’s eagerness to get to the “good stuff” of Easter, I wonder if we might be missing what is being declared to us in the moments of each day of Holy Week?

As we journey through this week, we are, once again, invited to pause and listen for any new things God might be declaring to us. Just as Craig’s backyard invited him to hear what was going on around him, and my grandson invited me to hear a new thing in splashing puddles, perhaps paying closer attention and listening to what we are experiencing in the present moment will allow us to notice what God is doing in our lives, this day, this week, and this Easter.

Making It Personal:

Have you ever found yourself wanting to hurry through the discomfort of Holy Week for the “good stuff” of Easter?

If yes, how might that get in the way of you hearing the things God is saying to you during this week?

What is one thing you can do, or let go of, today in order to pause and listen?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Sunday, March 28, 2021

Palm Sunday March 28, 2021

Listening With All Our Heart, Soul, Strength, and Mind

by Craig Phillips

In the early morning I often sit with my coffee on the deck in my backyard and listen to the sounds around me. I’ve learned to identify the song of the male cardinal calling from the trees. I hear an owl still hooting an hour or so after the sun has come up. After a while, I hear an increase of traffic on the road nearby. All these sounds would be easy to miss if I did not create the time and space to listen to them. Listening to them brings me a sense of peace and joy.

On three occasions before his entrance into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, Jesus warned his disciples that he would be killed and after three days rise again, but “they did not understand him.” Their responses demonstrate that they were unable to hear what Jesus was telling them. They did not hear him, because they were not truly listening to him. They shut their ears to what they were unwilling to hear, that he in fact would be killed.

The Gospels portray Jesus fulfilling the words of the prophet Zechariah, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! … Lo, your king comes to you… humble and riding … on a colt.” As Jesus rides into Jerusalem he hears the noisy expectations of the crowd. They shout, “Hosanna!”—“Save us now!” Some have hopes that Jesus will expel the Romans who occupy the land, and begin to rule an earthly kingdom as did their ancestor David. At the beginning of the week, the crowds greet Jesus with hopeful expectations, but by the end of the week, when he does not fulfill their hopes and dreams, the crowds turn on him screaming, “Crucify him, crucify him!” The sound of excited voices and expectations surround him, call out to him, but Jesus mysteriously remains silent. Jesus heard the clear expectations of the crowd yet remained intent on what he had to do, even as he recognized what would happen to him in Jerusalem.

Most of us know what it’s like to be surrounded by other people’s expectations of us. Sometimes they are realistic expectations, other times they are not. How do we listen to the expectations of other people without losing our own identity or being untrue to ourselves?

When we listen to the events of Holy Week with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind, we encounter a wide range of human emotions from extreme sadness to overwhelming joy. If we can be attentive to the range of emotions we feel as we enter into that story, we open ourselves to being at one with the hope hidden in the inner ground of our being.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Saturday, March 27, 2021

Lenten Devotional Saturday, March 27, 2021

Listening Is Contagious

by Scott Stoner

Two things we have learned from our experience of the coronavirus are just how interconnected we all are with each other, and how easily and quickly a virus can spread.

These two learnings can also apply to the transmission of our emotional states. Have you been part of a group where the leader was chronically negative and critical? I would guess the rest of the group’s morale and spirit eventually became negative and deflated, as well. Compare that to how good it feels to be part of a group in which the leader is positive and supportive. These are but small examples of how strongly our moods and spirits can affect one another.

I coached youth soccer when our kids were growing up, and I remember playing several games against a team whose coach was a screamer, always yelling critical comments at his players. It is not surprising that the players on that team yelled at each other, and at the referee, more than any other team we ever played. Again, the spirit of the leader was contagious.

As Margaret Wheatley says in the quote above, “Listening is a reciprocal process—we become more attentive to others if they have attended to us.” It turns out that listening is also contagious. Good listening invites good listening. If someone does not even pretend to listen to us, the chances are minimal that we will make much effort to listen in return.

When it comes to listening, the choices we make are contagious. The question is, what kind of listening are we sharing with others?

Making It Personal:

What do you think of the idea that listening is contagious?

Can you think of a recent example in which you noticed that listening (good or bad) was contagious?

What kind of listening do you think you are sharing with others?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Friday, March 26, 2021

FRIDAY FUNNIES: STUDENT WHO OBTAINED 0% ON AN EXAM

STUDENT WHO OBTAINED 0% ON AN EXAM

I would have given him 100%! Each answer is technically correct; and funny too. The teacher had no sense of humor but he passed the entrance exam into the University of Crawley...which is someplace in Western Australia

1.. In which sea battle did Nelson die?
* his last battle

Q2.. Where was the Declaration of Independence signed?
* at the bottom of the page

Q3.. River Ravi flows in which state?
* liquid

Q4.. What is the main reason for divorce?
* marriage

Q5.. What is the main reason for failure?
* exams

Q6.. What can you never eat for breakfast?
* Lunch & dinner

Q7.. What looks like half an apple?
* The other half

Q8.. If you throw a red stone into the blue sea what will it become?
* Wet

Q9.. How can a man go eight days without sleeping ?
* No problem, he sleeps at night.

Q10. How can you lift an elephant with one hand?
* You will never find an elephant that has one hand.

Q11. If you had three apples and four oranges in one hand and four apples and three oranges in other hand, what would you have?
* Very large hands

Q12. If it took eight men ten hours to build a wall, how long would it take four men to build it?
*No time at all, the wall is already built.

Q13. How can you drop a raw egg onto a concrete floor without cracking it?

*Any way you want, concrete floors are very hard to crack!!

How do you like the FRIDAY FUNNIES section on my blog?

Please COMMENT and help me evaluate the future of my blog. Thank you.

Lenten Devotional Friday, March 26, 2021

Grief and Gratitude

by Scott Stoner

Earlier this week I wrote about the full range of emotions that we naturally feel. Our feelings will undoubtedly range from the challenging feelings of grief and sadness to the more pleasant emotions of happiness and gratitude. As we think about the emotions we are likely to feel in the midst of significant change, grief certainly needs to be included.

Grief is an inevitable part of our lives because change is always happening in our lives. We all experienced times of grief and loss before the pandemic, and we will experience them again after the pandemic has passed. While none of us desires grief and loss experiences, they are part of the fabric of life. The choice we have then is how we will carry our grief.

Francis Weller, a well-respected psychotherapist and grief expert, provides helpful wisdom on how to carry grief. I will close with the full version of the above quote. His keen insight reminds us that when we take time to honor and listen to our grief, we will find that our capacity for compassion and gratitude are enhanced.

The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them. How much sorrow can I hold? That’s how much gratitude I can give. If I carry only grief, I’ll bend toward cynicism and despair. If I have only gratitude, I’ll become saccharine and won’t develop much compassion for other people’s suffering. Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible.

Making It Personal:

In general, how comfortable are you with listening to and honoring grief—your own and others?

What stands out to you in the Francis Weller quote, and how does that speak to you right now?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Thursday, March 25, 2021

Lenten Devotional Thursday, March 25, 2021

Listening to God in the Midst of Change

by Scott Stoner

I discovered a concept called the J Curve a few years ago, and it has helped me to understand the challenges we face when we go through significant change. In the J Curve diagram you will see that, in the initial stage of change, we experience decreasing stability because we have lost the stability and comfort of what was, yet we don’t necessarily know what is ahead. All we know is that we are experiencing some kind of falling, and this can be unsettling.

As we enter the bottom of the J Curve, it is now clear that we are not returning to the old normal, but we don’t yet have a sense of what a new normal might look like. As we move to the J Curve’s right side, we begin to experience renewed energy and a sense of new possibilities.

I have come to understand that the J Curve is also the Jesus Curve. It is the curve of loss and rebirth, of death and resurrection. To paraphrase Psalm 23, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of a J Curve, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

When I look back over my life, it is often in and through J Curves that my faith has deepened and grown the most. In his reflection last Sunday, Donald Fishburne made this exact point when he wrote, regarding this time of the pandemic, “My prayer life and spiritual life have been broadened and deepened.”

Making It Personal:

What J Curves have you experienced throughout the last year?

Is there a J Curve that you are in the midst of right now?

How has your faith helped you in these times of change?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Wednesday, March 24, 2021

Lenten Devotional Wednesday, March 24, 2021

Listening to Others When They Are Dealing With Change

by Scott Stoner

There is a connection between our capacity to listen to others’ emotions and the capacity to listen to our own. Referring to the scale of emotions in yesterday’s reflection, we will find that our capacity to listen to the “unpleasant” 0-5 emotions of others will be directly related to the ability to do the same with ourselves.

All of us know people who have suffered more than others this past year. The pandemic has hit some individuals and groups of people harder than others. We focused earlier in this devotional on the importance of listening to our neighbors. Being a faithful listener to our neighbors, those who have dealt with more than their share of change this year, is perhaps one of the greatest gifts we can offer them.

As the verse from Proverbs states, people who are grieving don’t need us to give them answers. They probably don’t need advice either. What they need is our loving and caring presence. What they need is for us to be comfortable listening to their grief, pain, and uncertainty. What they need is for us to be truly interested in hearing their real response when we ask, “So how are you doing right now?”

There is a beautiful quote from Henri Nouwen that describes the kind of listening and care people need from us when they are grieving.

The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing ... that is a friend who cares.

Making It Personal:

How comfortable are you in simply listening to another’s grief or sadness?

Have you been a friend to someone who has faced a great deal of change during this past year?

Is there someone right now to whom you feel called to reach out and listen?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Tuesday, March 23, 2021

Lenten Devotional Tuesday, March 23, 2021

Listening to Our Emotions in the Midst of Change

by Scott Stoner

An essential clue about the current state of our emotional wellness is how comfortable we are feeling and expressing the full range of our emotions. Imagine that the full range of emotions exists on a scale from 0-10. Now think of 0-5 as the “unpleasant” emotions, like sadness, anxiety, worry, anger, and fear. Next, think of 6–10 as the “pleasant” emotions, such as joy, love, happiness, excitement, and peace.

Most of us are relatively comfortable feeling and expressing the 6-10 emotions, yet it seems many of us try to avoid feeling and expressing the 0-5 emotions. Here is an important insight regarding this range of emotions: if we block out the 0-5 emotions, we will soon notice that we feel far less of the 6-10 emotions. This is the truth being pointed to in the quote above from Jim Rohn.

Emotions are not good or bad, they simply are. They are like a thermometer, giving us a read on the world around us. Watch a young child and within thirty minutes you will notice that they are comfortable experiencing the full range of 0-10 emotions. They don’t try to build walls around their feelings to protect themselves and don’t get stuck in any one emotion. If we are willing to genuinely listen to and accept all of our emotions without judgment, we too, can avoid getting stuck in any one emotion.

The key is to keep our emotions in motion, let them flow in and through us, and watch them pass like fall leaves on a river, floating downstream until they are out of sight, now just a memory.

Making It Personal:

As you listen to the emotions you feel regarding the changes you have been dealing with in your life, what do you hear?

Are you comfortable listening to and acknowledging the “unpleasant” 0–5 emotions? What about 6-10?

What emotion(s) do you sense right now as you listen to yourself?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Monday, March 22, 2021

Lenten Devotional - Monday, March 22, 2021

Listening in the Midst of Change

by Scott Stoner

In yesterday’s reflection, Donald Fishburne writes about the overwhelming changes that the last year has brought into all of our lives. He wrote openly about the grief and loss that he, and no doubt, all of us, have faced. He says that in the midst of all this change, he has experienced spiritual growth and that he is grateful for how this year has been a form of spiritual pilgrimage.

It was just a little over a year ago that our lives changed in ways we could never have imagined. Given a choice, most people would prefer stability over change, and so it’s not uncommon to hear someone say that they really don’t like change, particularly when it is unplanned. Whether we like it or not, this year has given us all more than enough opportunities to practice adjusting to change.

This week we will focus on listening in the midst of change. This theme is important because it is in the midst of any change that listening is often the most difficult to do. Change, especially when unplanned, creates anxiety, and anxiety tends to constrict our ability to listen well. It is worth noting in this context that the word anxious is derived from the Latin word anguere, which means to tighten or constrict.

This week we will focus on listening to the full range of our emotions when facing change. We will notice when we are constricting and feeling anxious. We will also notice what helps us to be open to listening to ourselves, one another, and to God, so that we can not only face change directly, but actually grow in the midst of it.

Making It Personal:

Name a few changes that have been most significant for you in the last year.

Did any of these changes cause you to constrict with anxiety and make it hard to be open to listening to yourself, others, or God?

What, if anything, has helped you through this time?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Are you finding this Lenten Devotional Series helpful?

Please COMMENT to allow me to evaluate my reactions to my blog.

Should I continue this blog I have felt to re-establish or should I discontinue?

I have already decided to continue through the Month of May 2020

to follow the Lenten Season.

Sunday, March 21, 2021

The Fifth Sunday in Lent March 21, 2021

Listening Along the Pilgrims’ Way

by Donald Fishburne

At a time of expectation before the Passover, some Greeks wished to see Jesus, so Philip and Andrew took these pilgrim seekers to him. As Jesus prayed, a voice from heaven shared God’s glory. Then the crowd heard Jesus say, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” Jesus draws all people to himself— for our healing and salvation. But not without struggle. This would cost Jesus his life.

In the year since Ash Wednesday 2020 we’ve been on a journey. I would say a spiritual pilgrimage, deeper into the heart of God. We did not ask for the suffering and discord that began last year around the globe. But God has been with us all along the way. Perhaps this has been for you, as for me, a lean time of loss and grief, an extended wilderness time. For the longest time we have not been able to gather together around our Lord’s table. But we heard our Lord’s voice, and we listened. It’s never too late to listen.

The Good News for me as we listen in this transformative pilgrim journey is that my prayer life and spiritual life have been broadened and deepened. My wife Sarah says my countenance and spiritual demeanor have changed. I’m more appreciative of the profound faith passed on to me by family, friends, mentors, and by members of the generations before. My ancestors, including literal Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower 400 years ago, were not perfect, nor am I, and now I have to reckon with that. At their worst, some were oppressors of one sort or another. At their best, they were pilgrims walking and sharing the way of faith.

In our day, we choose to take this journey with Jesus, who is guiding us toward Holy Week on a particular storm-tossed pilgrimage. All of us walk alongside Jesus, to mourn, to hope, and, through our faithfulness and our willingness to listen deeply to what this journey is telling us, to be lifted into his resurrected life.

This is the perfect season to invite others to journey with us through Lent toward Easter, as Jesus draws us to the cross and into eternal life and love. All we need to do is begin, right where we are.

Jesus hears and knows our needs and our struggles. Our joys and sorrows. Our fears, our yearnings, our hopes. Jesus desires to create in us clean hearts, loving us into the reign of God, overflowing with peace and joy.

Thank you, Jesus.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Are you finding this Lenten Devotional Series helpful?

Please COMMENT to allow me to evaluate my reactions to my blog.

Should I continue this blog I have felt to re-establish or should I discontinue?

I have already decided to continue through the Month of May 2020

to follow the Lenten Season.

Saturday, March 20, 2021

Lenten Devotional Saturday, March 20, 2021

The Fruit of Listening

by Robbin Brent

As we come to the end of the fourth week in Lent, let’s look at the theme for the week, listening as an act of mercy and love, through the lens of the fruit of the Spirit from Galatians 5. These fruit join with mercy and love to form a powerful foundation on which rests a vibrant life in God. Where, as Jesuit priest and paleontologist Teilhard de Chardin expressed so beautifully, we can trust in the slow work of God.

These fruit give us the guidance we need to slow down so that we can show up in the present moment, the only moment in which we can sense the presence of God. We will need that guidance and support when we show up in the moment and discover unjust suffering and othering inflicted on our neighbors, as Scott Stoner wrote about in week three. And when we feel compelled to stand up and speak out in response to the suffering and division we witness, we can stand strong and faithful in our truth. We will know first-hand the freedom of spirit that is born from our desire to both speak and listen faithfully, trusting that what knits us together is stronger than what threatens to divide us. Malcolm McLaurin offered us a powerful example of this in his reflection in week two through the story of Starr Carter in The Hate U Give.

No matter what, we can trust that God is holding us all with infinite mercy and love that has been infused with the fruit of the Spirit. I can think of no more powerful map and compass for our journey: heart, soul, strength, and mind.

Making It Personal:

Can you think of a time recently where you were compelled to listen to or speak out about a difficult issue? How did it go?

If it didn’t go well, could first grounding yourself in the fruit of the Spirit offer you support and guidance?

Could they help you to be a more faithful listener and advocate?

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Are you finding this Lenten Devotional Series helpful?

Please COMMENT to allow me to evaluate my reactions to my blog.

Should I continue this blog I have felt to re-establish or should I discontinue?

I have already decided to continue through the Month of May 2020

to follow the Lenten Season.

Friday, March 19, 2021

Lenten Devotional Friday, March 19, 2021

Listening Through Creation

by Robbin Brent

I discovered the opening quote in one of my favorite books honoring creation, Earth’s Echo, by Robert Hamma. In this book he explores ways to listen for God in the world around us, how to be present, and how to notice. During this time of great uncertainty, turbulence, loss, and change, I take refuge in two places where I am able to remember God’s mercy and love: by the ocean and in the mountain woods. Oceanside, the rhythm of the tide, the moon’s phases, and the rise and fall of the sun, are a steady source of comfort, inspiration, a place where I experience a deepening of trust in God’s bounty. All I have to do is to show up and pay attention.

In the mountains, it is a walk to an ancient pine tree deep in the woods near my home. Every step I take toward the tree, I am aware of the fidelity of nature to be exactly what it was created to be. It rekindles my desire to listen more deeply for all the ways God lets me know who I am created to be in this world.

A contemplative practice I often engage with in these two places is walking meditation. As I walk, I follow my breathing and sense my feet making contact with the ground. I try to notice when each foot leaves the ground, and the moment they return to the ground. When I get distracted, I just come back to my breath and to my feet. I end with a prayer of thanksgiving for the gift of fully sensing my body in the present moment in God’s glorious creation.

Making It Personal:

Do you have a favorite place in nature where you are more free to notice all the ways God expresses love for you, and for all of creation?

If you aren’t able to travel to that place, do you have mementos you could place in your prayer space? It could be freshly fallen leaves, sea shells, acorns, rocks, fruit/veggie, flowers, etc.

Living Well Through Lent 2021

Are you finding this Lenten Devotional Series helpful?

Please COMMENT to allow me to evaluate my reactions to my blog.

Should I continue this blog I have felt to re-establish or should I discontinue?

I have already decided to continue through the Month of May 2020

to follow the Lenten Season.