Kairos CoMotion Lectionary Dialogue

2 Kings 5:1-17

2012-02-07T07:44:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 6 - Year B

2 Kings 5:1-17

“I will accept nothing!”

This is a strong and difficult response. Who among us is capable of a “nothing” response when our life has significantly changed? We will find a way, subtle or overt, to claim the change and affirm the process.

We have a difficult time simply accepting a new path and beginning to walk it without a moment of conversion to talk about, again and again. It is as if a particular response ties us to a moment of change that we can talk about and talk about, but not proceed from - we get caught in our conversion experience and can’t let it go. The strongest believers are recent converts, the newest in love are blind - so much is riding on their experience being equated with life itself.

Naaman’s final request gives credence to the difficulty of doing “nothing”. If nothing else, we will signify our own cleansing by hauling dirt along, perverse creatures that we are.

Don’t just stand there, do “nothing” and get on with it.

Mark 1:40-45

2012-02-06T15:08:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 6 - Year B

Mark 1:40-45

Should someone come to you, having seen great things in you, how would you respond to them?

If the great thing was something you could do for them, would that be different than if were a great thing they saw you doing for someone else or for yourself?

Presuming you both saw the same possibility, would you do what was asked? If you didn’t see the possibility, would you refrain from even trying?

In this case both the leper and Jesus were gazing in the same direction and a healing eventuated.

Hooray for the moment. Now what? Was this just between the two or did it have a larger context? Obviously, while the two had a similar vision about a healing they did not have the same agreement on what was next. Do you think, in hindsight, that Jesus would have done better to have gotten a written confidentiality statement to constrain any reporting forthcoming from a priestly confirmation ritual? Or, just claimed the healing and told the former leper to spread the news.

What about your moments this week. Are they just your moments or might they give evidence to a larger context and the gifts you need to recognize and enact on a more regular basis? You haven’t really signed a confidentiality statement about your life, have you? Surely not. So, be not afraid to let the news out about your experiences.

roam on

2012-02-03T12:45:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 5 - Year B

leave your official holy place
leave your regular home
leave your desert-ed retreat

no matter which might be termed
holy, holier, holiest
wait! there’s more!

that no-good town next door
that silly goofus next house over
that bustling times square

haven’t you been paying attention
G*D can’t be hog-tied anywhere
Houdini had nothing on G*D’s slipperiness

and, dear creature, pay attention
you are of the same lineage
here there and everywhere

faint not - you’ll just bump your head
mount up - there are boundaries to cross
walk on - past cookie-cutter orthodoxies

build up synagogue, church, and mosque
support fellowships and covens
guard temples and shrines

clean houses, teepees, and yurts
encourage chalets and shacks
fix foundations and roofs

set foot on soil of every color and acidity
wonder at a Marianas Trench and Mount Everest
protect desert and tropical forest

what do you have to lose
certainly not freedom
share blessings

1 Corinthians 9:16-23

2012-02-02T10:00:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 5 - Year B

1 Corinthians 9:16-23

If I proclaim the gospel, this gives me no leg up. Likewise, if I focus healings, I am no farther ahead of anyone else. Whatever my claim to fame, it is a false comfort if I believe it.

What does benefit me by grounding me deeper in the reality of gifts, is simply using those at my disposal. When freely used, by me and for others, great common-wealth is generated.

Again, to do what I do for even the good cause of winning over someone, is to lose my focus. My best is simply my best, regardless of what its effectiveness for some other goal might be. An old song goes, “do what you do do well”. May you do do well and laugh at scatological humor and smile abundantly.

Psalm 147:1-11, 20c

2012-02-01T10:48:00.001-06:00

Epiphany 5 - Year B

Psalm 147:1-11, 20c

Everyone is looking for a gracious G*D - at least one gracious to them, if not to their enemies.

It’s lovely to have a G*D that confirms our center of power and brings an in-group back into relationship with one another and in charge of an occupied space.

How wonderful to have a G*D who mends our every flaw.

There is nothing better than a G*D who sets a large enough context that we can use universally for ourselves and against others.

Indeed, great is our G*D - powerful and wise for smoothing our path to greatness.

While G*D is defined as a lifter of the downtrodden, it is always understood that is us (whiney Christians in America fit this model of feeling persecuted against all facts to the contrary) and never anyone else who experiences being downtrodden. Likewise, the wicked are always “them” and never “us”.

So sing and dance while G*D takes care to keep us on top.

Prosperity is in process because the unseen hand of G*D (whatever economic system is in place) is always at work.

So, keep this relationship going - fear G*D by expressing your steadfast love for the same.

Yep, praise is an easy way to get what you want.

Isaiah 40:21-31

2012-01-31T08:40:00.002-06:00

Epiphany 5 - Year B

Isaiah 40:21-31

Have you not known? Have you not heard (seen, felt, smelled, tasted, sensed in any way)?

There is more than the circle of earth we run on. Raise your eye and see systems and processes whirling slowly - beyond your control.

This larger universe is available to your moments of faintness and powerlessness. Amazingly, this larger reality, from the inside, rises and we mount higher and walk farther.

This wonderful dynamic makes our very being tardis-like. We are larger on the inside than ever we thought for we are connected to an outside which is more intimate than we had felt possible (AstroCantus).

What have you yet to know? What have you not yet experienced as real? All of that and more is available to you and me, and us together. Let this epiphany not go lightly.

Mark 1:29-39

2012-01-30T07:00:00.002-06:00

Epiphany 5 - Year B

Mark 1:29-39

In a synagogue and in a home, healing takes place. Any distinction between sacred and secular is false. Everything Is Holy Now

We are just coming off a synagogue story where the result of a healing was amazement. This home story has the result of bringing all who were sick to Jesus - it doesn't matter if they were in synagogue/church earlier or not. A home setting has more flexibility and authority than any institution that carries restrictive rules in its DNA - rules that limit the freedom of G*D to call and gift and heal anyone, period.

After the openness expressed in a home setting, word comes that even more people are seeking all that such freedom has to offer - “Everyone is searching for you.” When was the last time you heard that about a church?

Interestingly, Jesus takes this information and further expands it - from synagogue to a home in a community to more towns. Eventually we understand the expansion goes to the ends of Galilee and then the earth.

Remember here that there is both a message and a healing. They go hand in hand.

Hear again the message: Belovedness and happiness is real and energizing. This is G*D’s presence and is growing. Respond by not being stuck - change your hearts and lives and trust an abundance in you and in all.

Hear again the healing: All who were sick were brought and healed. All.

Where?

2012-01-27T08:40:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 4 - Year B

they went to Capernaum
the same way
we find ourselves
where we are

they went to synagogue
just because it was sabbath
and teaching occurred
as it does

new sparks flew
not just rote
a new freedom
was flowing

just as unsurprising
as another sabbath
is the presence of
brokenness

what does a new freedom
have to do with brokenness?
is freedom for one
destruction for all others?

if you have to ask
you are blind to the silly
crazy at a creation deep level
lost from your belovedness

and so we stand silent
before a captive
our silence calling
forth depth

such depth of abundance
that brokenness is pushed out
there is no room
where we are not connected

a healer is convulsed
along with the healed
both cry aloud
be whole

amazed? really?
this is creation old
movement
void to an eighth day

what is this?
a new teaching?
no - simply
applied freedom

in Capernaum still
in dark and dreamless streets
you and yours arrive
to freely free

1 Corinthians 8:1-13

2012-01-26T08:41:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 4 - Year B

1 Corinthians 8:1-13

Now, concerning food sacrificed to idols....
Now, concerning xxxx(anything)xxxx....

It appears any claim to knowing forgets that understanding shifts. Thus it is important to come to grips with what is claimed as a source of authority. Here Paul attributes rules, “what everyone knows”, to G*D.

In this case we are reminded that there are rules and principles beyond an immediate limitation on behavior. These larger meta-understandings come from a relationship named love. Through these we find the courage to enter into a new relationship with food and idols. Through these we find the assurance that we can break our own larger rules on behalf of others - doing so willingly, not coerced.

There is not a way to protect others from falling away from their next best ideal, much less one of their past beliefs. To operate out of false protection of another is simple enabling. It would be more helpful if Paul were to speak out of what one can do with integrity while caring for another rather than taking responsibility for their well-being. In this way I can eat with vegans and vegetarians, with omnivores and advocates of steak tartare, without trying to talk them out of their way or show them up with an alternative menu. We need more honoring of differences-in-doing than attempts at conversion-of-being.

Diets do not bring us close to ultimate reality, though they can help remind us to live out of a sense of fullness, not scarcity. Making others into ourself does not construct a paradise. Freedom to respond beyond rules leads us to the big non-rule - be with others as you would have them be with you.

Now, concerning food or anything else, be strong enough in your conscience to be gentle with the conscience of others.

Psalm 111

2012-01-25T09:45:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 4 - Year B

Psalm 111

G*D’s got you in the palm of a nonpareil hand and is listening hard for your ultimate respects uttered in extravagant language.

The fearfulness of your position must be recognized and this begins your learning, but does not end it. And the same for G*D.

Presuming you can get through a bias of G*D for fear inspired behavior, there may arise within you both more options. G*D might hear praise echoing and enduring forever and not be as demanding of that particular response from such as yourself. You might practice thankfulness until it permeates every bone in your body and be a natural response to any unnatural occurrence - not because it is demanded, but because it feels so good.

What is your fear-based learning today?

Deuteronomy 18:15-20

2012-01-24T07:00:00.001-06:00

Epiphany 4 - Year B

Deuteronomy 18:15-20

How straight forward - listen to G*D’s prophet and all will be well for you. If not, of course, it will be all the worse for you. Likewise prophets are to only prophesy what G*D intends. To do otherwise will bring death, obliteration.

This sounds as if it has all the bases covered. Epiphanies will be authorized. How could a prophet system like this go wrong? Well, G*D’s delayed implementation of threats to false prophets seems to have had significant consequences.

It seems as if court prophets, looking out for their own profit, have proliferated over time. There is no shortage of pundits (today’s spelling of prophet). Would that they understood the importance of speaking carefully, lest they be considered heedless and cast away.

Most true prophets end up getting heartburn as they live between the compulsion to speak and a fear to speak beyond what they know. Most false prophets end up prospering under whatever political system they are currently working.

Just know that the next prophet is coming from the people, just like you. And it may well be you. Enjoy the ride.

Mark 1:21-28

2012-01-23T08:34:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 4 - Year B

Mark 1:21-28

Authority - “meaning the freedom to express one’s powers” (JANT).

Authority is a freedom always available, even in coercive situations. Expressing one’s powers may or may not carry the day in the short-run, but it is always a witness to what you consider to be trustworthy. In this you can be as authoritative as Jesus.

It is worth reflecting on the accusation, “Have you come to destroy us?” Certainly there is a sense in which the answer is, “Yes”. For some who are into security, any modification from their ultimate control, is a death. This is the same dynamic used by those privileged in religious power. They must protect every part of their established tradition for the loss of any one part is experienced as a destruction of all of it.

The new Jewish Annotated New Testament is very clear here: “Although there has been a tendency in the modern period to distinguish Jesus’ healings from those of contemporary Jews and others, this is a theological not historical judgment. The miracles in the Gospels contain the same procedures, healing formulae ..., and demonological lore as the magic of the ancient world.”

Let’s not get caught up in trying to make things more holy than they are and openly stick to the simplicity of a freedom to express a power available in the moment.

Rhythm

2012-01-20T07:09:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 3 - Year B

look back through history
and you’ll find yourself
having been spoken for
by someone along the way

that thoughtful ancestor
gives credence
to your deep heart’s core
but is now off the scene

now it is your time
to carry and advocate
an important piece of wisdom
unexperienced by others

carrying on ancient truth
builds a bridge to tomorrow
picking up strangers along the way
entrusting them with yourself

called from their past
into your new today
and better tomorrow
interesting days are ahead

when you have moved on
they will carry on
in strange and wondrous ways
those before you

honor now your ancestors
before you join them
in fulfilling hopes
and overflowing

anticipate your descendants
by planting seeds
they will reap
and replant

1 Corinthians 7:29-31

2012-01-19T12:42:00.002-06:00

Epiphany 3 - Year B

1 Corinthians 7:29-31

If we are going to affirm that the present configuration of love and power is out of balance and passing away, there comes a new challenge.

Continuing to live as though we were perpetually confined to the present is expecting a different outcome from the same behavior. However you were living a day ago, change it today that tomorrow might blossom and grow.

Moving on is a given, treat it as such. Hop to.

Psalm 62:5-12

2012-01-18T11:52:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 3 - Year B

Psalm 62:5-12

Called to change ourselves and the world around us - to set a new course - to enter into a new creation, an 8th day - to whisper and shout about change - to see G*D change : this is our rock of salvation, our power to proceed, regardless.

On the surface of this psalm it is G*D who doesn’t change but is a source of refuge for us when we waver or feel wobbly in the face of one violence or another. This seems to work for some. Blessings to them. For others of us, this static gap between G*D and ourselves is greatly disappointing in its mechanism to keep us in a juvenile state.

When it is all about G*D, its all about nothing.
When it is all about Creation, its all about everything being related.

Jonah 3:1-5, 10

2012-01-17T10:08:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 3 - Year B

Jonah 3:1-5, 10

Change is a consistent part of life. The only thing that doesn’t change is change.

Change comes to Jonah, to the citizens of Nineveh, to G*D.

There is an old story about the 36 hidden saints in the world (Tzadikim Nistarim or Lamed Vav Tzadikim). No one knows who they are, including themselves, but without them the world would grind to a halt. They are seedbeds of change - not in terms of technical innovation, but for how we treat one another. Repentance and forgiveness are great change agents.

Since you may be one of the anonymous saints, what change needs to be made in you to live a whole and mature life that others might experience you and the hope you carry within?

Since your neighbor, or even enemy, may be one of the anonymous saints, what change needs to be made in you for them to be more whole and mature?

Mark 1:14-20

2012-01-16T06:49:00.002-06:00

Epiphany 3 - Year B

Mark 1:14-20

Was the stimulus for Jesus proclaiming “good news of G*D” the arrest of John or Jesus’ return from wilderness of post-baptismal temptations?

If Jesus is seen as the inheritor of Baptist John, folks might well shy away from what appears to be a losing cause - personal repentance and baptism as political/religious resistance.

If this is an external manifestation of an internal strengthening, we might better hear a communal invitation to repentance and trust as good news in and of themselves. Was Jesus empowered by an experience of temptation recognized and dealt with to such an extent that Simon, Andrew, James, and John were able to catch more than the words reported - “Follow me”?

Where, these days, do you hear an invitation to trust a repentance based on a direct encounter with temptation’s power. Is it in the political realm, the religious, the personal, the economic?

Should you be blessed/cursed with hearing an invitation into larger living, which realm will not be affected as you engage yourself with a new level of conscience and consciousness? Yes, every part of life is renewed. You can catch a part of this as you reflect on Martin Luther King, Jr.’s official day, today.

Repentance as empowerment toward a common good is worth looking at. In particular, how this dynamic works within your life and, in general, within the life of the world.

no denying deceit

2012-01-13T09:27:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 2 - Year B

in days of old
Nazareth was questionable
so close to co-optation
by Roman opulence
in nearby Sepphoris

today we ask what good
could come out of Washington, D.C.
or Wall Street wealth obsession
or Main Street job needs
or your freedom

it is a question of deceit
so many are filled to the brim
and to hear it is not important
is a most important word
for Nathanael and all

where Jesus comes from
is a big deal in his day
this significant political question
needs more than a log cabin
or fig tree or halo

wherever Jesus is from
he reveals G*D
wherever you are from
G*D is revealed
by an honest question

back and forth
Jesus and Nathanael
have one epiphany
after another
and invite you

1 Corinthians 6:11-20

2012-01-12T09:25:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 2 - Year B

1 Corinthians 6:11-20

There are two competing values going on here. One is about Jesus and one about G*D.

Jesus has become a certifying authority. Here we get into atonement theologies. Here we find liturgy and ritual with baptism. Fore and aft, these technical diagnostics wrap around a conversation about unity with G*D.

G*D is a living tension between all possibilities and the limits of choice. While having many choices ahead of us, we are limited in those actually available to be implemented. And even within this more limited field we find our choices to be revealing of our deep desire. Here we find a reuniting of body and spirit beyond any creedal power or institutional authority.

The simplest proposition here is, “Anyone united to G*D is one in spirit with G*D”. This basic is also the most complex in its application. Have we honored Jesus by affirming “we have been bought” or is this a prostitution of our unity in G*D? Have we glorified Christ by being baptized or prostituted ourselves to ritualized language about baptism?

Eventually we come back to re-connecting body and spirit, ourselves and G*D. Jesus and Christ, similarly connected, are one model by which we catch a glimpse of what it means to love G*D with our mind and heart, our actions and stillness, our uniqueness and unity.

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18

2012-01-11T09:52:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 2 - Year B

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18

Hooray, G*D knows me, through and through.
Hissss, I don’t know myself, hints aren’t sufficient.

Hooray, G*D is omniscient.
Hissss, I don’t have a clue about why I am.

Hooray, G*D knit me together.
Hissss, I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

Hooray, G*D is still with me.
Hooray, I am still with God.

At some point we experience a shift from Hissss to Hooray. It seems to come in unexpected times. Nathanael met this change with the image of a fig tree. Samuel had his conversion in dream-time. One older, one younger. (Both are males, but that’s standard for patriarchal source material and not a requirement.)

All of a sudden we see, with G*D’s eyes, our unformed substance and join G*D in calling it forth, saving us both, maturing us both, bringing both of us to wholeness and health. In the end there is no way to continue putting ourselves down for the presence of G*D to be seen. Like it or not, G*D also needs to see already formed and still unformed substance through our eyes. If G*D is to be glorified, so must we and all be glorified - this goes beyond a mutual admiration society.

As G*D investigates our life, let us investigate G*D’s life. This is an eternal learning and a worthy road to travel.

1 Samuel 3:1-10, (11-20)

2012-01-10T06:18:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 2 - Year B

1 Samuel 3:1-10, (11-20)

When life outside our experience clamors for attention, we find we are formless and void, we have no database in which to encode data.

Samuel didn’t have it. Eli didn’t put it together the first time around. Blessed be persistence that refuses to let us have the out that Scrooge tried - “an indigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato.” No, eventually we have to put down our explanations, so finely honed, and say to the universe, “Huh?” and “Here I am.”

To finally acknowledge a mystery is to paint a target on your mind and heart that the mystery be birthed in you - that you will live out your revelation.

May you lift from the ground all the revelations that have fallen about you and toss them to the sky. So is trust evidenced and gained.

John 1:43-51

2012-01-09T09:44:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 2 - Year B

John 1:43-51

You want to buy a field? Can anything good come from that sort of investment. Invest, instead, in a bank too big to fail.

You found the fulfillment of Moses and the Prophets in Nazareth? Really, Nazareth!

How easy it would have been for Philip to walk away from Nathanael, but he took his conversation all the way to Missouri - “Come and see.”

How easy is it for you to walk away from a discouraging word? Do you have a next step in a conversation that will eventually lead to such an invitation as Philip’s?

Beyond this example of persistent evangelism, it is instructive to reflect on Nathanael as we do upon Thomas, another doubter. You might be interested in a book by Jennifer Michael Hecht Doubt: A History: The Great Doubters and Their Legacy of Innovation from Socrates and Jesus to Thomas Jefferson and Emily Dickinson.

What is the basis of your belief? If not your friend Philip, why this Jesus claiming to have seen you under the symbol of a fig tree (any good magician could come up with this little praise of being honest, straight-forward, and patriotic)?

Another key ability to participate in life has to do with being able to move our belief as new occasions come along. One tendency is to keep believing the same thing in a new setting and failing to come to grips with a significant variation that would deepen or modify first impressions or beliefs. Blessings on keeping your beliefs up-to-date with your experiences.

from below

2012-01-06T10:12:00.002-06:00

Epiphany 1 - Year B

beginings elude us
always in medias res

what’s next is elusive
still being shaped by now

year by year
we yearn for good

is it light qua light
light related to dark

naming is elemental
shaping perception

peeping from the deep
we grin with the wind

dream on

2012-01-06T10:02:00.001-06:00

Epiphany - Year B

Herod’s time lingers
G*D continues presence
available to glimpses of the wise

the Herod’s of today
sleep uneasy with fears of overthrow
dancing in their heads and before their eyes

the next usurper could come from anywhere
such universalism can never narrow vision
to know what the ancients knew

the least expected place
is exactly where the next birth
of a prophet of justice begins practice

in anticipation of downfall
co-opted co-conspirators live by secrets
and expect enough fear that everyone will

failing to listen to better dreams
Herod loses track of alternative ways
condemning himself to be an eternal villain

which sets today’s choice
not in energy expended - miles traveled or
extravagance of gifts proffered to the surprised

aboriginal dream time
erupts again into our usual fog
shaping past that tomorrow be reshaped

Acts 19:1-7

2012-01-05T09:57:00.000-06:00

Epiphany 1 - Year B

Acts 19:1-7

Were you aware that disciples are waiting to be found?

The boundless that you are in touch with can draw them out of themselves and keep them journeying toward that which they sense but have not heard for themselves.

When a next step in their journey becomes clear, there is rejoicing - theirs and those they will share with. They will speak with one another in newly acquired revelatory language. They will speak with others in tones of ancient and future prophets claiming justice and mercy for outcast and the manger-poor.

This makes learning sound more delightful. Where are you listening for the boundless that your bonds may be loosened and new community formed? If you catch even a glimmer - follow.