Hebrews 12:1-3
The Message
12 1-3 Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we are in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!
Luke 24:28-35
NRSVUE
28 As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. 29 But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So, he went in to stay with them. 30 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight. 32 They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us[f] while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” 33 That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem, and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34 They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” 35 Then they told what had happened on the road and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
John 20:29
The Message
29 Jesus said, “So, you believe because you have seen with your own eyes. Even better blessings are in store for those who believe without seeing.”
Grace and Peace to you from the mystery in whom we live, move and have our being.
There is absolutely nothing about the events Jesus and the disciples went through in this holy week that makes me say “Oh I wish I I’d have been there!” Frankly, it scares me!
There is a great deal of time and energy that goes into my attempts to avoid suffering. Pain, loneliness, betrayal, abandonment, or an enemy’s attack? You name it and I do not want it. Let’s just hide easter eggs, for my sake! My ego tries to warn me at every turn when the potential of emotional harm could happen. Rejection, isolation, disappointment when the mashed potatoes run out early on Thanksgiving. If it is a feast! Make a big pot instead of a bowl that takes till Christmas to get to my side of the table!
No wonder Jesus allowed his disciples to be a participant in the most difficult week of his life. He was teaching them how to deal with their ego. The part of them that will do anything to avoid pain and suffering which includes, taking risks, expressing love, letting go of illusions and certainty, finishing projects, and most importantly growing more intimate with the mystery we call God. As we are led by ego our hearts close.
“Whatever it takes to keep your heart space open is spirituality” Richard Rohr
Ego likes to occupy our heart space. The ego thinks it knows- but it doesn’t know what it doesn’t know. The ego does not see the healing and resurrection ahead of you. The ego holds on to what was, even if it isn’t or wasn’t life giving and creative. The ego attempts to control when there is uncertainty. It says, “this choice may not be wise but at least it’s certain.”
When I think about where I am today, the life I have lived, the beautiful children I have, the friends and community I experience. I realize I have made many decisions; I have acted on what I dreamed could happen, but I could never have predicted the actual outcomes of the life I have. The journey never went as planned but the outcomes are more than I could have hoped for.
Everything does not happen for a reason. God makes reason out of everything that happens.
This brings us to this Holy Week celebration. A feast completely devoid of mashed potatoes. This setup that I have presented to you on the ego may give insight to why Jesus shared the bread and the wine with his disciples, his apprentices. For Jesus, his actions defied his own ego and encouraged the same for our egos. An individual and shared practice of remembering to bypass ego and open the heart space.
Whatever practices we engage in that keep the heart space open is an ongoing experience, a daily experience. This is why we maintain the celebration of bread and wine as a regular practice. It is not for cleansing of our evil ways. It is an opening, an opening of the heart space and a quieting of the ego.
Spirit fills us with an experience of acceptance of where we are at this point in our life. And if it includes suffering, we are not alone in that suffering. We touch the horizon of Jesus’ suffering and the God who suffers and rises with us.
But our lives are not isolated by religious feasts and icons. It is an ongoing experience of breathing every moment of life and allowing God to make creative reason out of what happens.
Life happens and so it did with Jesus and his disciples.
On Monday Jesus raised a man from the dead, cursed a fig tree that did not produce fruit and flipped over the tables of corruption at the temple.
On Tuesday Jesus explained the dead works of religious hypocrisy and the fruitless works of egoistic leaders by taking his apprentices to see the dead fig tree. All the while an ambush on Jesus is being planned with none other than one of his disciples.
On Wednesday Jesus spends time together with his friends and rests. May we share in the brokenness of Jesus and Jesus with ours as we go through Holy Week.
On Wednesday Jesus spends time together with his friends and rests. May we share in the brokenness of Jesus and Jesus with ours as we go through Holy Week.
thursday
Where broken meets broken.
To give ourselves to transformative death, is to excavate all that came before. Certitude, expectations, and illusions. It is painful to release ourselves to the work of spirit. This day we are invited to share in Christs brokenness. Jesus symbolizes this shared brokenness by breaking bread in love with his friends.
As we break bread together, what breaks your heart? May the bread we dip in life’s juice absorb the pain of our disappointments. May this meal be shared together. May we sit in this moment of collective presence. The presence of the curious purposes of the mystery we call God.
FRIDAY
Jesus recognized his feet were not enough to reach a weary world. They went to the cross. His hands were not enough to touch every wounded and longing soul. He stretched them to capacity and there they stayed. His back was not enough to carry the emotional burdens of the world. He carried his cross.
What efforts have you taken physically and mentally that have reached futility? If Jesus life on earth was not expected to be enough, what expectations have you carried in your heart, with your feet and on your hands. May we share in Christs stretched out life, relinquishing all expectations. Today we grieve the loss.
Saturday
RISE UP! Smell the Lillie’s. Sing a new song. Life never ended. Just the illusion. I was buried by life, yet it is life that has raised me up! Though the person of Jesus has died the Spirit of Christ will live forever. So will I!
“Only our imaginations can create a teeny glimmer of the utter magnificence of this new life of living in communion with everyone and everything. Each of us this moment is an unfinished creation awaiting the process of being fully created into our personal Good Friday and Easter.” – Edward Hays
Amen
Wednesday Respite is a 30-min contemplative service of scripture, prayer, music and a Spirited Touchpoint by Henry Rojas, spiritual director at Spirit in the Desert.
Touchpoint is a reflection on where God’s story touches our life story. It is a short homily based on a biblical story of people in the Old and New Testaments and their relationship with God. Our spiritual ancestors’ experience of God’s grace connects with our lives in the present and our relationship with the Divine. Previous Touchpoints are available as PDFs or on SoundCloud.
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