From the beginning

Another snowy Sunday morning.............

My aunt talks about being little and looking at the night sky with her father, my grandfather, and he said to her "Could something this beautiful be an accident?"

      I look around the congregation each Sunday and I ask could something this beautiful be an accident.  The lives brought together, generations later, sons and daughters brought together.

     When I was young we would sit around the dinner table and occasionally my sister and I would retell a story that had happened in the past (mind you we were still in elementary school at the time) we began to notice one of our younger brothers would pipe up at the end of a story and say "I remember that!"  Every once in a while he would even try to add a piece of information...how dare he! Well my sister and I found this unacceptable!  How could he try to get in on our memories.  So we began to trip him up.  We would make up a story and lead him along until predictably he would say "I remember that!"  Once the bait was taken we would shout "No you don't.... it didn't happen!"

     How horrible we were to do this. All he wanted was to be a part of our story; to belong.  I imagine he wanted to think that even though he couldn't remember what we were talking about that he was there, he was with us always.

     This is God's promise, I am always with you and I have always been with you.  I began my relationship with you in the stars, just look up...our history rests there, I have been with you since the beginning, no need to pretend what I share with you.  If you ever feel alone--I am with you.

     Oh, there will be tricksters along the way, people trying to tell us we don't belong, or that we missed something, that we will never be as worthy of this relationship as they are.  There will be those who even set us up to fail, delighting in our stumbling ways. 

    But take heart in those times ----God says "Do not be afraid I am with you."

e.e. cummings

i carry your heart

i carry your heart with me

(i carry it in my heart)

i am never without it

(anywhere i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)

i want no world

(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)