The Joy of Waking (Sunday, October 16, 2011)

The Joy of Waking

Sometimes I yearn for sleep and rest,
times alone on some deserted shore;
 when all the actions fade, all chores are done,
are done, all responsibilities handed on
for others to take care of.

But I know that time will come at last,
when there will be unending sleep,
rest eternal, and nothing but time
to contemplate in wonder
all that I have done and been and loved.

So for now, the yearning must give way
for greater joys of rising to greet the day;
of seizing time and making it my own,
binding all the ties of love and work and home
into one coherent masterwork eyes can see.

And if there’s never time enough to do it all,
 I have lived; I have been part
of this holy, earthly symphony
whose tune is Life, whose joy is now,
whose greatest call is not to stop ‘til day is done.

jbs

9/6/00          1/24/10          10/16/11

Joy Awaits (Sunday, October 9, 2011)

The lightest touch can bless us,
the smallest smile;
I have found as much joy in
the subtle hill across the way
as from any Everests I have climbed.

Joy awaits our approach,
our eager apprehension.
For joy to live, we must be
engaged with life, and fully open
our hearts to joy.

That means keeping the fire
of Spirit burning in the abode of our hearts;
that means making a place at our hearth
for Joy to abide,
at the very center of our existence.

Kindle the fires of joy, then;
let them burn within you; pour over them
the living fuel of your love,
your wonder, and your faith;
kindle them until the fires cascade,
and make light and warm your world.

Let the fire burn, untended,
and it will light the way to a heaven
more wondrous than you
could ever dream; a heaven there,
waiting, in the simple, daily joys and duties
you have before you now.


jbs
5/6/03          3/19/06          10/9/11

Why Fear Pleasure? (Sunday, September 25, 2011)

Why fear pleasure?

Why are we afraid of pleasure
as though the God we know
was that mean, severe
punisher of our souls
we gave up long ago?

Why are we afraid of joy
as though the God we know
were that tight and dried-out spirit
giving only to his favorites
and withholding grace from the rest of us?

God to some of us is all abundance all joy
gifts of grace unimaginable waiting
including pleasure and laughter
in the living of our days.

God is not a puny soul
living drunkenly for himself alone
God's grace is our model
as is God's freedom and abundance.

We seek a life of truth
and of connection
neither squandering our days like fools
nor slavishly hoarding them like martyrs

But spending them wisely and mirthfully
with deeds that serve the cause of justice
and words that cause the hearts around us
to leap with pleasure
and smile back at us
in a warm embrace of love.

jbs
3/25/99          9/25/11

Yearning To Be Made New (Sunday, September 18, 2011)

We yearn to be made new,

to rise from bed each morning
a New Man or New Woman, all that we are called to be,
meeting each new challenge and each joy
with full engagement of heart and mind and soul.

But, of course, we carry around with us each day
all that we have ever been before;
we bring along with us all the hidden crystals
of that whom we have already been:
the countless risings and fallings,
the errors, short-sightedness, stuckness, unkindness
that we have faced too many days
and have often added to.

It takes a leap of faith
for societies or for any of us to change.
It takes actually changing, too:
finding the courage and the faith
to do things differently than we always have before,
to act as though (for it will never be true if we don't)
that this is the first day in a brand new age.

Our hearts may grow weary at the thought;
our minds grow full of fear.
But to return to the cold and static way it was before
might well be nothing more than spiritual dying.

jbs
11/1/98          9/18/11

September 11th

As there can be no new birth without pain,
could it be that this awful week-- the sadness,
the horror we have glimpsed and felt
even the anger,
could yet usher forth in history’s time
new ways of being human upon this earth?

Hope dies last they say:
is it possible for us to be innocent enough still
to believe that the lives of those dear, precious souls
(our mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, friends)
yet may be redeemed in flowers of peace, justice, and beauty
from the dust and ashes of humanity’s folly?

Not always in shimmering sunlight
the Spirit moves,
and not always in the bright light of day
Life its lessons teaches;
But often, too, in the deepest midnight when darkness descends,
on the border between darkness and daylight
we look perhaps most clearly into our souls.

These souls of ours were not made to soar to heaven
directly, not looking back, but to collect the dust
of earth as they move toward fulfillment.

That dust of molten steel and charred hopes
is now sacred soil, and always our pain
is a blessed sacrament.

The stone-dark midnight and the rainy morn
will give way in time to the sunlit day;
the freshened breeze will entice again with its sweetness;
just a hint of coolness will pervade the air,
reminding us of what a pleasure it still is to be alive.

For it is from the Hand of Life that all blessings flow;
the Hand of Life and frail human hands:
hands held close with those who have come before,
hands held tight to those who are still with us:
All we can do at a time like this is cling together,
--hold on and hope and pray--
and know in our hearts,
that when the dust finally settles,
no forces seen or unseen,
no puny human powers or principalities,
no terror-mad souls, or hatred or spite
can ever separate us from the love of God;
can block that precious sunlight of God’s new day
from these tired, eager eyes.

jbs
9/11/01 - 9/16/01

A Children's Sunday Meditation (Sunday, June 12, 2011)

It is not just we that drink from earth;

we nourish her as well.

To know the earth within oneself

is to know everything there is to know.

The past that is within us bends eagerly

forward to embrace our future.

The future smiles back at us and

kisses the present moment in all its joy.

All distance is compounded in every cell;

the sense of aging is often but illusion.

Young and old in each of us

greet each the other cheerfully:

There is within each wise old soul

a beautiful child who would come out to play.

In every child’s heart there lies unspoken

all wisdom we could ever hope to hear.

jbs

10/2/00          6/13/04          6/12/11

"Who We Can Become" (Sunday, June 5, 2011)

Who we can become

We do not know our power,
any of us-- except perhaps those
who bathe in the power of others,
commanding armies to march
where they would never dare tread
themselves.

Our power (the power that comes
from within) is so much more humble
(and, let us hope, so much more abiding):
slow to anger, yes-- but too slow at times
to act and know itself, as well.

We can transform the moment,
and in so doing, begin to change
the world.
We can live in truth,
as much as that costs us,
(though, if truth be told,
its sacrifices pale when compared to the suicide
of giving oneself away endlessly
to the forces of death and taxes).

This is the miracle of our birth,
the miracle of our being here:
that in our radical dependence,
our utter insignificance,
we are called to uniqueness as well—
that our responsibility to the world
births the freedom of the soul.

We are called, all of us:
Called to live our lives,
Called to share our gifts,
Called to love one another,
in the continual shedding of old skins,
in the continual sacrifice of our old lives
for new ones.

jbs
2/20/03          6/1/03          6/5/11