God shows up in whirlwinds, starry skies, burning bushes, and perfect strangers

“People encounter God under shady oak trees, on riverbanks, at the tops of mountains, and in long stretches of barren wilderness. God shows up in whirlwinds, starry skies, burning bushes, and perfect strangers. When people want to know more about God, the son of God tells them to pay attention to the lilies of the field and the birds of the air, to women kneading bread and workers lining up for their pay. Whoever wrote this stuff believed that people could learn as much about the ways of God from paying attention to the world as they could from paying attention to scripture. What is true is what happens, even if what happens is not always right. People can learn as much about the ways of God from business deals gone bad or sparrows falling to the ground as they can from reciting the books of the Bible in order. They can learn as much from a love affair or a wildflower as they can from knowing the Ten Commandments by heart.” 

~Barbara Brown Taylor in An Altar in the World

Not going to change my ways...

“I'm not going to change my ways,
just to please you or appease you,
inside a crowd five billion proud willing to punch it out,
right, wrong, weak strong,
ashes to ashes all fall down.”

~Dave Matthews

Incredible video of an eagle flying!

A bird owner in France put a camera on the back of an eagle!  Wow!

"You might be Jesus"... on hospitality ~ by Lauren Winner

Lauren Winner has much wisdom in her book, "Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis," which we will be using later this Fall in a course that I am leading at St. Paul's Memorial.  Here is one wonderful reflection on a friend of her who exhibits some radical hospitality:

"My friend Sarah had a run of a few months in which -- because on principle she invites in anyone who knocks on her door -- she hung out with Jehovah's Witnesses every Saturday morning.  Each Saturday, she told them that she wasn't going to convert, but that they were welcome to come in for a cup of tea.  They did, week after week.  "I don't think very may people let them come in, " Sarah says.

Last week, Sarah opened her door to find a traveling salesman.  She invited him in, told him she was not planning to buy a vacuum cleaner and that in fact, because her baby was asleep upstairs, he couldn't turn on his demo model, and then she offered him a cup of coffee.  He asked why she was offering him coffee, when she wasn't even going to let him show her the vacuum cleaner, and she said it was because she worships a God who has said that he may be found in any person, any near or far neighbor, andy prisoner or beggar on the street, any guest.  "So, I'm offering you coffee because you might be Jesus," Sarah said.  The vacuum cleaner salesman said it was the strangest house call he'd ever made, but he took the coffee." 

~Lauren Winner in Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis

Frederick Buechner's full quote on Vocation

The writer Frederich Buechner is a wonderful thinker and writer and his writings on vocation have informed many people in many walks of life.  Usually, the final part of this passage is quoted, but I thought that it was particularly helpful to reflect on the entire passage.



Vocation

It comes from the Latin vocare, to call, and means the work a man is called to by God. There are all different kinds of voices calling you to all different kinds of work, and the problem is to find out which is the voice of God rather than of Society, say, or the Super-ego, or Self-interest. By and large a good rule for finding out is this. The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done. If you really get a kick out of your work, you've presumably met requirement (a), but if your work is writing TV deodorant commercials, the chances are you've missed requirement (b). On the other hand, if your work is being a doctor in a leper colony, you have probably met requirement (b), but if most of the time you're bored and depressed by it, the chances are you have not only bypassed (a) but probably aren't helping your patients much either.

Neither the hair shirt nor the soft berth will do. The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet.

- Originally published in Wishful Thinking