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Back in the day--way back--when I was just out of college, most local TV stations weren’t 24/7. The local NBC affiliate in Oklahoma City ran local news, Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, and Late Night with David Letterman. After Letterman, they either signed off the air or played old TV reruns and then signed off in the middle of the night.

Along comes this late-night TV news show that just killed it for college students, or people like me who were just getting off work. I watched it every night on a little 12-inch black and white TV with a stick antenna. No cable—my new wife and I were living on love back then.

NBC News Overnight was hosted by Linda Ellerbee and a couple of other guys in and out of the partner chair. Linda Ellerbee is awesome! Ground-breaking female anchor. And the show was super-smart because she is super-smart!

She had me at “And so it goes…”

They had a routine every night at the close of the broadcast. They would do some cool quirky human-interest story and then Linda would look right into the camera with this inside-joke kinda smirk saying “And so it goes…”

Fade to black.

And so it goes…

What a great reference!

Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Sci-fi literature. It’s a classic. Semi-autobiographical and a first-person narrative, it’s the story of a US Army Chaplain’s assistant during WWII—Billy Pilgrim.

Billy Pilgrim is constantly dealing with death. Obviously, it’s a way of life during wartime.
And every time somebody dies, Billy Pilgrim says, “And so it goes…”

Vonnegut moves through the scenes with it. It’s a refrain. It’s an all-purpose transition. Out with the old, in with the new. It’s about death and then here’s what’s next…

And so it goes…

So, this is Lent. It’s the season of reflection, self-inventory, fasting, prayer, doing penance, almsgiving, and self-denial. Repentance. Renewal. This is the time when we “give up something for Lent.”

People quit smoking, give up chocolate, count calories or carbs, etc. And people start a new spiritual discipline sometimes too, like daily prayer, or meditation, or study.

People recommit to following Jesus through the journey to the Last Supper (Maundy Thursday), to the Cross (Good Friday), and to the resurrection (Easter). The Passion. Where everything in Lent ends—Holy Week.

It’s a season of transition. Letting go of the old ways and adopting new life in Christ.

Paul talks about it in 2 Corinthians 5:17--
So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!

Everything has become new!
Everything old has passed away.

And so it goes…

We’re in this whole season of transition right now. All of us. Not just church. COVID has changed everything and just this Monday, we crossed the half-million mark for those who have died from COVID. The president said something in a White House memorial Monday night about not getting numb to the sorrow. So true!

We must allow ourselves to grieve. For our neighbors, friends, relatives. Everybody knows someone who has died. Pray for your—and their—family’s comfort and peace in our losses. So great. So much.

Grieve for the passing of our friends and relations.
Grieve too, for the passing of time and traditions.
Sure, it’s true that in Christ Jesus everything old has become new. That’s true!

But it doesn’t mean that we’re numb to the change, that life change doesn’t hurt.

Everything becomes new!
Everything old passes away.
That doesn’t come without pain.

And that’s always true.
There is no resurrection without crucifixion.
You don’t get to Easter without Good Friday.

That’s all part of doing the work in Lent.
You and I are doing it.
Playing and praying through the pain.
Everything old passes away.
Everything becomes new!
All of us, together.

And so it goes…

Grace & Peace,
Scott

Ash Wednesday.
Lent already?
I know, right? What happened? Another year.
Boom!

Get your ashes and the Lord’s Supper (well, sort of…) on Zoom tonight at 7pm with us and Cokesbury & Fairmount United Methodist Churches. Pastor Lynn and I are leading on Zoom. Here’s the link. Have some bread or crackers and juice or water ready to serve yourself communion. And, if you want to do your own ashes, you can use the soot of a candle you’ve blown out, or olive oil to symbolically impose the ashes!

Let’s do a little worship tonight and set the right tone for Lent! You’ll be in and out in short order. Then you can spend the rest of the evening wondering if you smudged your forehead. Just sayin…

No matter how you’ve chosen to observe Lent, that part tends to be an individual thing. But, it’s also something we do together, corporately, in community. A former moderator of PC(USA), Bruce Reyes Chow, reminds us of it today. Community.

Although certain aspects of Lent, and any Lenten discipline, require self-reflection and self-awareness, we must not enter that endeavor believing that it is only about our individual experiences. For we are reminded over and over and over again that the journey of life, the walk to the cross, and the experience of resurrection is a communal one—together we often turn on one another and away from God; and together we can experience forgiveness, repentance, and new life; and together we can be the best of who God intends.

Is not this the fast that I choose:
    to loose the bonds of injustice,
    to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
    and to break every yoke?

-- Isaiah 58:6 (NRSV)

Come tonight and let’s do this—Lent.
Life in the fast lane--
Fasting, forgiving, repenting, and being the best of who God intends.
All we can do is the best we can do…let’s do this!

Grace and peace,
Scott

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Lent Is Coming

2/10/2021

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Lent Is Coming

Several times a week, I join a guided meditation Zoom call by the Yoga studio that I belong to. I do both yoga and meditation for my own personal devotional work besides reading Bible, Richard Rohr, Philip Newell, Phyllis Tickle, and journaling every day. Yoga and meditation are part of my routine because to me, Christianity doesn’t do a very good job of connecting body and Spirit. We focus a lot on mind and Spirit. We do a pretty good job of that—reasoning and growing our way into this life as children of God.

I often read things that I wish I had written—in last week’s blog I copied “She Let Go,” a poem by Saphire Rose. Just stuff I can relate to in my bones. A lot of the time, this happens when I read Richard Rohr. He rings that bell all the time for me.

RR rang my bell on a couple of fronts going into Lent last year. I read him every day. RR is a Franciscan friar (something I learned about, too) and founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque.

First this from RR:
Since Jesus himself was humble and poor, then the pure and simple imitation of Jesus became Francis’ life agenda. He was a fundamentalist, not about doctrinal Scriptures, but about lifestyle Scriptures: take nothing for your journey; eat what is set before you; work for your wages; wear no shoes. This is still revolutionary thinking for most Christians, although it is the very “marrow of the Gospel,” to use Francis’ own phrase—He knew intuitively what many educators have now proven--that humans tend to live themselves into new ways of thinking more than think themselves into new ways of living. The lecture method changes very few people at any deep or long-lasting level. It normally does not touch the unconscious, where all our hurts and motives lie hidden and disguised.

And then this, on atonement:
Jesus did not come to change the mind of God about humanity. It did not need changing. Jesus came to change the mind of humanity about God! God is not someone to be afraid of but is the Ground of Being and on our side.
The Franciscan minority position, our alternative orthodoxy, is basically saying that no atonement is necessary. Some call it “at-one-ment” instead of atonement. There is no bill to be paid; there is simply a union to be named. Jesus didn’t come to solve a problem; he came to reveal the true nature of God as Love.

Whew! This is the kind of stuff that makes your brain hurt and it speaks into Lent. Lent is an entire season of Christian atonement. By giving something up that doesn’t make us “at-one” with God or adopting spiritual disciplines in Lent that do bring us closer to God, I think we often come at it trying to think ourselves into new ways of living.

What if we just followed Jesus? Purely and simply living into the lifestyle scriptures. Stop focusing on right belief and focus on right practice. Living into it.

Doing. Being. Connecting mind, body, and Spirit!

I can’t help but think if we just tried to live into new ways of thinking, we will see Jesus changing our minds about God!

I’m just gonna leave that right there, because that alone is enough to make your brain hurt.

Grace and peace,
Scott

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She Let Go

2/2/2021

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She let go.
She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.
She let go of the fear.
She let go of the judgments.
She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head.
She let go of the committee of indecision within her.
She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons.
Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.
She didn’t ask anyone for advice.
She didn’t read a book on how to let go.
She didn’t search the scriptures.
She just let go.
She let go of all of the memories that held her back.
She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward.
She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do it just right.
She didn’t promise to let go.
She didn’t journal about it.
She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer.
She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper.
She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope.
She just let go.
She didn’t analyze whether she should let go.
She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter.
She didn’t do a five-step Spiritual Mind Treatment.
She didn’t call the prayer line.
She didn’t utter one word.
She just let go.
No one was around when it happened.
There was no applause or congratulations.
No one thanked her or praised her.
No one noticed a thing.
Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.
There was no effort.
There was no struggle.
It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad.
It was what it was, and it is just that.
In the space of letting go, she let it all be.
A small smile came over her face.
A light breeze blew through her.
And the sun and the moon shone forevermore…
©2003 Saphire Rose

Every now and then I come across something that’s so good, I wish I’d written it. Today’s one of those days.
May this be the year we let go!

Grace and peace,
Scott

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And So It Goes...

Life in the Fast Lane

Lent Is Coming

She Let Go

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