Grey’s does it again.

The season finale of Grey’s - just watched it.  

Extraordinary: the word that healed.   the word that brought hope.   the word that brought life from death.    

Be extraordinary.   Meredith’s mother had told her before she tried to kill herself.   Be extraordinary.  

Meredith spent a lifetime of trying to be extraordinary vocationally as a doctor and as a surgeon.  

But as she figured out in the finale:  be extraordinary - has nothing to do with surgery.    And everything to do with life.  

I get it.   BE extraordinary.   Not do extraordinary.  Not earn extraodinary.   Be extraordinary.  

It has nothing to do with surgery. 

And learning this - I mean really owning this: heart, soul, body and mind - sets us free to try this - to practice it. 

This must be what Jesus was talking about when he said, I came to bring you life - better life that you can imagine …  extraordinary.   be extraordinary.  

leap. love, trust, believe, hope, live and fly.   

what have we done?

What have you done?

I think it’s one of the two most poignant questions God asks of us.    Not in a harsh, angry way but in a rehtorical, sad and broken way.   In a way that says the implications of this will so far outlast the moment in which it was done.   God first asked this of Adam and Eve.  

I think God still asks us that question.  

Last night I asked that question.

My neice was rushed to Children’s hospital from daycare yesterday because she was having trouble breathing.    It ends up that she has allergies.   She’s two and a half and she has allergies.

What have we done in this world?  What have we done to this world?  What have we done to our our bodies? What have we done so that a 2 year old has to have a steroid shot and a breathing treatment and take regularly an inhaler and zyrtec?  

what have we done?

Big and Bigger.

Did you know that the average size dinner plate in America is significantly larger than the average size dinner plate in the UK.   Same goes for portion size as well.    The cars are bigger here.   As with the houses.   As with the roads.   Even the produce is all bigger in the grocery store?   And sure we could find a hundrer reasons why everything is biggere here in the US but it really seems to me like we have this need for everything to bigger. 

Somehow we confuse the idea of ”to grow is to live” with “bigger is better.”   And I’ve really been wondering why recently.   

I had to replace my ipod this week due to an unfortunate circumstance last week.   I really was quite content with what I had, with it’s size, color, shape etc.   I didn’t need anything bigger (bigger in terms of memory in this case).    But come to find out they don’t make my size ipod anymore, they only make ones that are bigger (more memory).    Searching around I came to realize that I could buy what I had but it would actually cost more than buying the bigger one?   This just didn’t make sense to me.   I’m still annoyed that I was forced to buy into this theory that bigger is better.   Forced into this consumerist and corporate mentality of “trade it in for something bigger.”

I happen to like small.   I like small bananas, small apples, small potatoes.  I’ll small plates and small glasses.   I like small stores and small homes.   I don’t know what’s wrong with small.   I like small.   I have even realized I like smaller churches (not the corporate size ones).  

Small to me says, I have enough, I don’t need more.    But that’s probably what underlies this way of thinking and this push in our world.    We always want more or better or bigger because ultimately we are not satisfied.   We will never have enough.   We are restless and this is how we try to fill this void deep within us.   This is how we fulfill the desire for contenment and satisfaction.   

Oh what a mess we are.   A beautiful, glorious mess.   But oh what a mess.  

“You have made us for yourself O God.   And our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”
-Augustine.   

The Gentle Re-Entry.

It really were some of the last words spoken to me before I headed off to the aiport to catch my plane.  

“have a gentle re-entry.”

I laughed.

Chris said to me, “what you have to work today.”

And I said, “I don’t have to go into the office today.   But I am leading a training all day tomorrow.”

She said, “you don’t get memorial day off?”

And I laughed again.

Gentle Re-Entry.  

Hit the ground running, might be a bit more accurate.  

But at least I’m not running on the inside.  

Nope, the inside is still easing back into this crazy world of mine.  

What I am most amused about though is that I really think that I blogged on the “gentle re-entry” last year after my first residency.   And I think I remember laughing then, too.

One of these years, I’ll get it right.  

 

this would be “pre” re-entry.  

leaving.

I realized last night, community is community no matter how old you get.

And no matter how old you get, it’s still hard to leave community. 

Somehow I thought those high school days of tears streaming at the end of a retreat or camp or some expression of community, would dissolve with maturity.

Maturity has nothing to do with it.

Tears may not stream but the rock in my throat is till there.

Classmates have become friends have become companions!

At least our call and charge brings comfort as we enter into the adventure before us, heading our separate ways:

even still, walk alongside with me, for the best is yet to be!

Blow the trumpets!

it’s official.

i’m commissioned.

it is an act of grace really.

because we still have one paper to write this summer

but they commissioned us today!

Charged with walking with God daily and deeply.

Commissioned to walk with others walking with or even just simply seeking God.  

and I received it.  

Received being “seen” and recognized for who I am.

Received the “call” to get down from the tree (in which I think I’ve been hiding and watching for years).

Received the “charge” to go forth and knock on the doors looking and listening for my welcome.  

What a day!  no wonder I’m pooped.  

as it was… as it is.

  I have to admit most classes I’ve taken have been filled with mostly people my age.   But not this one.  And that’s perhaps the beauty of it.    It’s more about call rather than age or place in life.  

Tonight at the end of the lecture,   something about the generations became very apparent.  We had just listened to an episode of this sitcom that runs on NPR - I had never heard of it, but wow, how my friends around me laughed.   I didn’t really get what I was listening to, but I enjoyed it because my friends enjoyed it.    

What was apparent:

Times have changed.   Times are changing.
I am not what my class mates perhaps were at my age.
I assume I will not be what they are at their age now.
Because times have changed.   Times are changing.

But even still:

Something are still the same.  
Somethings are true through all generations.
Somethings are true through all time.

As it was in the beginning, as it is now and as it shall be forever.   Amen.  

one of my new friends.

 

Meet my new lizard friend!  I’m really not one to go for amphibians.   But perhaps it was the fashion appeal of this guy that got my attention.  I saw him twice yesterday as I was sitting outside in the afternoon.    

He’d run along for a bit and then he’d stop.   He’d pause.   Breathed (or it looked like the amphibian take on breathing) and then blow out this magnificent pink accessory from his throat!   And then he’d carry on his way.  Repeating this over and over again.  

Apparently the puff of pink is actually the preparation for combat.   I would imagine much of the world when you’re that size, seems like a battle.   But then again, much of the world when you’re my size seems like a struggle.  

Perhaps I, too would do well to pause and breathe every so often like my new lizard friend.   And before I begin again, take a deep breath and prepare for the cause before me.  

Wonder.

I wonder as I wander….

Today I found a crab — a live one - walking and kind of floating at the very edge of the water.   How cool is that?   He actually seemed to walk with me as I wandered up and down the shore.  

I confess I almost leaped (and I think I did skip and and let out a loud of enough exclamation that folks turned and looked), when the dolphin appeared just feet from me.  

And I was really saddened by all the dead jelly fish that I kept finding washed upon the shore.  

But I wasn’t just awe-struck the first time I saw these little wonders … it was over and over again.   The dolphins just didn’t get old, neither did the crab …

I don’t get to see such things on a regular basis so I suppose I could explain it away if it wasn’t for my neice.   I think she’s becoming my greatest teacher.  

Last week we took a walk in the early evening.   “wow!” she said thrilled to bits.  “the mooooon.”    and she didn’t say it just once, she said it every time she turned to see it:  “wow!  the moooooon.”    And I have this hunch that next week when we take a walk –  she will have the same wide-eyed wonder at the moon.

I’m not sure when we forgot to have wonder.   I’m not sure when we grew out of it.   But I’m really thinking that it’s not just at the beach, that I should be exclaiming joy at the world around me.   

 

 

and the silence begins.

powerful service this evening to begin our 36 hours of silence. 

story, ashes, prayer and vessels.  

very cool.  

as we finished, I could have sworn I heard thunder.   But I dimissed it - storms won’t happen when I’m on retreat.    Walking from the chapel, the sky flashed with sheet lightening.   could just be “heat” lightening I tried to rationalize.

I walked out onto the beach to sing actually.   And there it was: fork lightening coming down on the neighboring island as thunder rolled through the skies.

Self-talk resumed: that’s ok, I can do a thunderstorm.   They only hurricaines down here not tornadoes.  I sang a quick ditty and scurried back to my room. Within minutes staff were knocking on our doors telling us where to convene.   Then we were shuttled in cars to the “safe” place because apparently we were under tornado warning?  Clearly our silence had been interrupted.  

Storms even on retreat?   What is this world coming, too?

and the silence continues.