On that same day,
two of Jesus' followers were going on the road
to Emmaus, and they were talking to each other
about all that had happened. Jesus
appeared to them, but they did not recognize
him. They returned and told the others,
but these would not believe it..
Message:
My husband Loren and I joined the
church in the last year, after a short period of
church-shopping. I’ve been very impressed with this
church – the generosity, dedication to
inclusiveness, and openness to neighbors. We’re
delighted that we landed here.
I believe that I have a sacred story,
just as each of us inhabits a sacred story. It’s
easy to get lost in our stories – in the woes,
sometimes the drama, sometimes the successes – and
mistake our stories for who we are. Yet, our
stories offer us a sacred opportunity--one of
illuminating Spirit in our lives. The Sufi poet
Rumi said, “Our stories are like the water we draw
for our bath – they carry messages between the fire
and our skin, and they cleanse us.”
I grew up the oldest and the bossiest
of 5 children in a loving home. As a child, I was
very in love with God. As a teen-ager, as soon as I
had a license, I borrowed the family car and drove
to Mass before school.. I studied theology in
college. In nursing, I found a profession that I
loved. I found injustices that needed righting.
I don't want you to get the wrong
picture. I might have been in love with God, but I
also certainly loved my Easter clothes and shoes,
and loved boys as well. I had plenty of wild years,
but that’s a message for another place and time.
Loren and I together found the wild in the
wilderness of southeast Alaska, where we raised our
son. We fell in love with the wild and wet country
there.
Mine has been life where goodness was
easily found. I’ve had to work harder in more recent
years to find what I think is God.
Eleven years ago, I sat for my
morning ritual of tea with God and Drea. Drea was
my cat, and each she morning after she would berate
me for closing the door on her, we would sit down
for prayer and meditation. On that morning, I
emerged from meditation and said, “ I’m ready for
anything You have in store for me.”
I was ready. Although I had been
working as a hospice nurse and loved it, I was ready
for a change – maybe a move from the wild to town,
perhaps a change in jobs. It was only hours later
that day, as I was going up some steps, that I was
suddenly unable to breathe. I could not catch my
breath.
That moment precipitated many months
in and out of hospitals, trying to get my lungs to
work. When I returned home, it was with a terminal
diagnosis. I would have 5-10 years to live,
multiple episodes of loosing my breath and more
hospitalizations.
In communion with our earth at this
time of Spring when we see new growth and light all
around us, in our Christian story, too, we are in a
period of new light, a time we are invited to roll
back our stones and take a glimpse of who re really
are – at our Godhood, our divinity.
Sometime in our life I think each of
us will be betrayed, but we’re also offered our own
journey or opportunity find our way beyond
impediments to our own resurrection story.
I felt betrayed. I was used to
handling heavy boat lines, hiking and cross-country
skiing in the back-country of southeast Alaska. As
a nurse, I had traveled the state teaching other
people how to live healthy lives – all the things
you can do to be sure you’d never be sick. And now
I had a terminal illness, and I could only expect it
to get worse. Would I live to see my son get
married? Meet my grandchildren? I surely wouldn't
grow old with Loren, or continue to be a nurse into
my 80s as I had wanted to do. I was devastated.
There were things I wanted in life. I felt
betrayed.
In our scripture reading, the
followers of Jesus wanted something as well, and
they felt betrayed. Their perception was obscured
by what they wanted. They can’t see their master,
because what they want is in the way.
I wanted a cure. We tried
everything, but it didn’t work. It came to the
point where I had to choose between breathing and
eating, between breathing and showering. We weren’t
given a cure, but I think we were given healing
instead.
Each crisis or disappointment offered
me an opportunity to turn and turn. The song the
choir sang has been my guidance since the time I
started this journey. When we find ourselves in the
place just right, it will be in the valley of love
and delight. Nothing about a career, home, long
life; just love and delight.
Over time, losses have continued to
be painful. But each time as I turn and let go of
what I wanted, I make more space for joy. My
husband has been an incredible companion – just the
right person for this project. For us, each time our
world shrank – our joy did not, even as we prepared
ourselves for my death. I found that what I could
do got to be less and less, but the joy did not.
Just as the sun sets each of our
bodies will finish it's time. Sometimes when are
sick, we get a cure, sometimes not, but healing is
always available. Just like the companions
of Jesus, I had to let go of my expectations. When
I can do that, I am open to what I call the kingdom
of God – to the present moment in all its
immenseness.
Over the years got to know
humiliation, loss of my self image, and depression
as I lost my work and the ability to do the things
that defined who I used to be. Sometimes I was in a
rage with my doctors and nurses – their airs of
confidence – because I was supposed to be
where they were. But I do think that little
girl who liked God – that high-schooler who liked
God as well as the boys – grew up to be someone who
was given a magic wand to turn a pot of crud into
gold, water into wine.
In 2004, we were blessed to receive a
new set of lungs – a gift from a family who made
that gift in a time that was tragic for them. Their
child of 16 had died – that’s whose lungs I carry
within me now.
I attended our son's marriage. There
are no grandchildren yet. They asked if they should
get going, given my circumstances. I said to my
son’s kind wife that they need to do these things in
their own time. But to my son I said, “Yes! Get
going!”
But I can walk, I can sing, and I can
dance. Doing the laundry can be a delight because I
can do it. And yet death still remains close.
That’s a gift.
A simple cold or case of food
poisoning could be the end for this body I inhabit.
The drugs I take can precipitate the end as well.
And we live with that. Each day, much of my time is
spent surviving. That doesn’t matter, because I’m
here now. Truly, I hope to live a long time but I
may not. I am enjoying making new plans, setting up
all those expectations again – all those hopes and
dreams – but I still remember to loosen the pull of
all those thing.
As I reach out and stretch my finger,
then release the arrow, I let go of the things that
matter. It used to be too hard. It was painful.
So instead of letting go, over time I learned to
just loosen. Each time, when I do, there is more
room to bring in Spirit.
I think I’m getting better. Thursday
night class has helped as well. I was recently
hospitalized for emergency surgery. I was no longer
jealous and raging. In fact, I was quite proud of
the nurses and all of the other people involved.
And I took time to interview every one of them about
what they were going to do in the next election and
reminded them to go to caucus. If one can ignore
pain and having one's chest cut open and still have
a great time, I did. I think I actually had a
ball.
Gratitude, which Loren calls the only
prayer, has deepened for us.. Miracles are all
about for us if I am “turned” in a way to receive
them. Warm rain, a bird, my friend Marlene who has
invited me to stop carrying sadness for the family
that lost their child, and instead to carry their
love.
I need only to turn.
And, quite important to add, to
remember that the miracles I receive may not be the
ones I had in mind.
In the early years I asked often,
“Why me?” I asked in sadness. Now I ask “why me,”
because I can’t believe how blessed I have been to
be guided into this journey. Now when I take the
bread and wine of communion, my commitment is to let
moments just be moments. Moments to breathe into,
to look upon with the eyes of God. It's exciting to
me to learn to gaze more largely without judgment,
as Spirit might. At moments in my body, at moments
on the road, and in our nation and our world. For
where are Her eyes, if not mine, and His ears if not
mine? And yours?
