Threads of Grace

I want their hearts to be encouraged, and knit together in love... Colossians 2:2

It has been two weeks since I returned from "Threads of Grace," a knitting retreat at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Meridian, where dear friendships were renewed and the ties that bind were strengthened. The time was brief - not even 24 hours - but the fellowship was full and the yarn flowed freely.

A few women at the retreat were from other churches in Meridian, where they hoped to start prayer shawl ministries. It was lovely to have the opportunity to tell the story of how this ministry grew at St. Paul's from a small circle of tentative knitters to a generous helping of women (and a brave man or two) who have knit or crocheted and given away nearly one hundred prayer shawls and other knitted comforts.

We began the morning with a service of prayer and a blessing of our hands. I've laid hands on people's heads before, and I've washed feet, but I had never anointed hands. We found some prayers on the Prayer Shawl Ministry website, but most of what we used came from medical communities in which the chaplain blesses the hands of hospital staff as they go about their work.

Officiant This is holy ground.

People We’re standing on holy ground.

Officiant For God is present.

People And where God is, is Holy.

Officiant These are holy hands.

People God’s given us holy hands.

Officiant God works through these hands,

People And so these hands are holy.

Officiant Where God is, is Holy.

People The work of our hands is holy work.

Adapted from Alyson Breisch

Most of our time was spent sitting and knitting, usually after having been well-fed a home-cooked meal, and enjoying one another's company and wisdom ("Now how do I fix this dropped stitch?" "What is a knit two together?" "Which yarn do you use for this pattern?"...) Once, however, we knit in silence meditation following a reading from The Reverend Barbara Crafton's book, The Sewing Room, in which she reflects on the way in which sewing was handed down to her, and how she is handing it down to others. Most knitters could also tell the story of the person who taught them to knit, and in a group like ours those stories are often interwoven.

The only workshop of the day was a lesson in making stitch markers. Don't look, mom! Santa told me he was working on a few of these for a few nice knitters on his list...

Many thanks to my friends at St. Paul's for inviting me to be part of this special weekend!

Let us pray. Holy God, mantle of our hearts: We ask your blessing upon all who have come before us; whose hands have been instruments of creativity and beauty; who have used humble tools and handspun wool to provide cover and warmth for themselves and for those they loved; who have taught our hands the rhythm of their work; who have felt, as we will feel, the yarn in their fingers; who have seen, as we will see, the growth of the fabric; who have heard, as we will hear, the click of the needles.

We ask your blessing upon our hands. They perform countless mundane tasks; they also create great beauty. Each and every day, they reach out, touch, write, scrub, lift, push, pull, grasp, gesture, and guide. Upon these hands, our hands uplifted to you, we ask your gracious blessing, that their work may bear fruit, that their labor may be always in love, and that their rest may be in your embrace. Amen. Adapted from Janet Bristow

Artwork: Pictures from the weekend; "Agnes knitting the nations together in peace," by Susan Goff.

Another Surprise!

As thunder rumbled through dark gray clouds, I stayed outside to finish some yard work this afternoon. I was pulling weeds here and there, and finally decided to tackle a mess of vines that were overtaking some variegated privets and sunflowers.

I checked as best I could to be sure nothing was poisonous, and started pulling. Suddenly I noticed a tiny furry caterpillar curled up around the stem of one of the vines. He didn't move when I touched him with the tip of my gloves, nor when I tried to coax him off the vine with a leaf. I put the vine aside with all the others I had pulled, and looked where I had been weeding...

Aren't they beautiful (the colors don't show up quite as well on blogger as they do in the original picture)? I have no idea what they are, or what they had been eating. Were they eating the vine? If so, what kind of vine is it? They were definitely on the privet now, and one was munching away on a leaf, but he stopped before too long. Not to his liking?

The rain finally started after I got a few pictures. I draped some remnants of the vine (I think - there were several vines there) over the privet branch, but still am not sure exactly what they were eating. Here is a picture of some of the other plants and vines growing in the area (I'm not sure what they all are - there's one more I don't have a picture of, a vine with fluffly, feathery blue flowers)...

A long search on-line hasn't turned up many clues, except that they could possibly be caterpillars of the Io moth. There was a female Io moth in our yard not too long ago...

Could anyone offer other ideas? I'm especially concerned that I may have pulled away their food, and would love to know what I need to bring over to their branch...

Late Summer Surprises

Back in the late spring and early summer, we wished we had joined in the search for monarch caterpillars. They were everywhere in our lives - just not at our house! Little Charlie got to see one emerge from its chrysalis at school, and we looked forward to stories from friends who were keeping caterpillars at home.

What a surprise to have a caterpillar in our house now! It's late in the season for black swallowtails, but Stripey 2 is soldiering on, now as a pupa in his chrysalis. He hung on his stick for a little more than a day before shedding his skin one last time while no one was watching and settling inside his chrysalis to become a butterfly.

The white silken thread that helps hold him to the stick is called a "girdle" - it actually wraps around him like a little sling. The websites I've read disagree about whether these caterpillars make a chrysalis that resembles the stick on which they hang, but Stripey 2 appears to have done just that!

Outside the guestroom window, other late summer surprises are appearing. A gray hairstreak was visiting our Mexican heather.

Another impatiens has finally decided to begin growing and blooming.

The snapdragons are blooming again, too. I wanted to try getting a picture that would take in the whole border in front of the house, one that would show the little riot of colors that makes me smile every time I pull in the driveway. After I snapped this shot, I looked at it on the camera's little screen...do you see what I see?

Here's a closer look at those snapdragons.

We were so surprised to see eight common buckeye caterpillars happily munching away on my poor little snapdragons! They're all different sizes - two are quite large, and one is adorably small.

Common buckeyes lay eggs one at a time on separate leaves, so who knows how many more might be waiting to hatch! When they're ready to make a chrysalis they'll hang in a "j" position on a stick (we propped a few up beside the flowers, just in case) and then form their chrysalis so that it blends in with their surroundings.

We watched them crawl and eat for a long time before we went back inside. I don't think we'll bring them in - their favorite food is snapdragons, and I suspect the snapdragons wouldn't stay yummy for long if I pulled them out of the ground. So we'll trust Mother Nature to take care of these friends, and hope that there are more happy surprises in store for us and them as they grow!

I suppose I must say goodbye, though, to my snapdragons, several of which are apparently the reasons why the caterpillars have grown as big as they are...

Psalm 84

Those who go through the desolate valley will find it a place of springs, for the early rains have covered it with pools of water. Psalm 84:5

Well, my yard was not quite a desolate valley, but neither was it a place of springs. Three new crepe myrtles were growing taller, but not blooming. I planted impatiens and hosta in full sun, then moved them (too late, I was afraid) when I realized my mistake. In their places I planted Mexican heather and some kind of yellow flower, but they weren't doing well, either. June was so hot and dry, everything was languishing.

I worried about my plants when Little Charlie and I left for 10 days in July. Big Charlie was going to be gone, too, and there would be no one to water the yard. But it rained. And rained. And rained. And then, it rained some more.

My crepe myrtles!

The impatiens, now tucked underneath other plants, have started to mound and bloom!

The hostas, just barely surviving when we left, have juicy new leaves and lovely purple flowers.

The Mexican heather and the yellow flowers have grown and are attracting neighborhood bees and butterflies.

For God is both sun and shield; God will give grace and glory. Psalm 84:10

Aloha

Perhaps another reason I'm moving more slowly on my log cabin squares (although I did finally finish square number 15 this weekend - take that, you turtles!) is that I've run into a few distractions. One of them is this.

A colleague is moving away, and I wanted to give her something in gratitude for her friendship and her support of my ministry. She is so gracious and kind-hearted and passionate in her work, balancing perfectly the airs of authority and femininity. I will miss her.

Cozy isn't a traditional prayer shawl pattern, but I'm certainly thinking about my friend and thanking God for her as I knit it. The yarn is Luster Sheen from Red Heart, and is all acrylic but has a look and feel like linen or mercerized cotton.

The color ("medium blue" according to the label) belongs both to St. Andrew's School and to my friend's native Hawaii ocean - her office walls are covered in pictures and postcards so lovely you can almost hear the surf. (The first picture actually shows the color more accurately.)

I didn't cast on enough stitches, even though I cast on more than the pattern suggested, so I'm going to have to create a border for the two long sides in order for it to be wide enough to wear as a shawl. I'm looking forward to indulging in the pages of Nicky Epstein's Knitting On the Edge! After all, in the words of our school motton, "we will find a way or we will make one..."

Prayer Squares

I was trying to find a new way to photograph my log cabin squares for my last post, and only ended up sharing a few. As I looked back through the pictures this morning, though, some of the others caught my eye.

I've been reading Three Cups of Tea, chronicling the work of Greg Mortenson to build schools in remote regions of Pakistan. It is a remarkable story that takes the reader quite literally to great heights of humanity and great depths of character. People whom the world would describe (and even more so now than when the story began pre-September 11) as enemies come together, open their hearts to one another, embrace a common vision, and build up hope stone by stone, beam by beam, school by school.

In those rare moments when I put the book down, I turn on the computer to catch up on news from General Convention. It is amazing to me that with the click of a few keys I can see pictures from the floor, read about resolutions, view the breathtaking diversity of people, and listen to them pray and sing and speak together. In her opening sermon, Bishop Katherine spoke about the heart, not just as the seat of our emotions but as place from which we think and reason and make decisions. We were given a new heart when Jesus offered us his very own, and just as a human heart needs to beat to stay healthy, we need to exercise the hearts that have been transplanted into us.

"Every time we gather," she said, "the Spirit offers a pacemaker jolt to tweak the rhythm of this heart. The challenge is whether or not we'll recognize and receive that renewed life, whether the muscle will respond with a strengthened beat, sending more life into the world.... So how will this heart push more lifeblood out into a languishing world? Can you hear the heartbeat? Mission... mission... mission... mission..."

Greg Mortenson is not an Episcopalian. Most of the people with whom he works are not Christian. But that has not impeded the beating of their hearts in rhythm with one another and with God, and many thousands the world over have felt their hearts renewed and strengthened by his story.

Pakistan is a Muslim country, but the region where Greg first imagined a better world was once Buddhist. In fact, the mosque in Korphe where he built the first school was once a Buddhist temple. Voices and images of prayer - Muslim, Christian, and Buddhist - have been mingling in my own heart, which is perhaps why when I looked at these pictures this morning I saw prayer flags rather than quilt squares.

Almighty and everliving God, be present with those who take counsel for the renewal and mission of your Church and your world. Teach us in all things to seek first your honor and glory. Guide us to perceive what is right, and grant us both the courage to pursue it and the grace to accomplish it. Book of Common Prayer, p. 818

The water is fine...

We had the privilege today of witnessing the baptism of one of Little Charlie's friends in the waters of the Reservoir.  It was truly an outward and visible sign chosen to share with the world the inward and spiritual grace of the relationship she cherishes with Jesus Christ.

I asked Little Charlie what he thought baptism was.

"Being bathed by the Holy Spirit," he said.

Proper 20A

Another week at Christ Church in Vicksburg. The drive over this morning was foggy, softening the edges of the world. I was listening to a podcast of NPR's program Speaking of Faith in which physician and storyteller Rachel Naomi Remen spoke about the edges of life, when the difference between healing and curing an illness softens grief and secures hope. The stories we read and write have beginnings and endings, but our lives' stories continue in the lives of those who follow us.

Jonah 3:10-4:11; Psalm 145: 1-8; Philippians 1:21-30; Matthew 20:1-16

The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out to hire laborers for his vineyard. The grapes must have been at their peak, bursting with juice and nearly falling off the vine. They needed to be harvested quickly before they became overripe and unsuitable for making into the fine wines for which he was known...

This morning we hear the second in a series of five parables, stories in which familiar characters and circumstances are poured into the press along with an unknown quantity of grace, that we might drink a draught of God's kingdom.

...The landowner went early to the marketplace, where those who were not so fortunate as he to own land waited in the darkness before dawn to be hired as manual laborers for the day. The routine was always the same – up before daybreak, home after sundown, another day's work done, another denarius earned. It was just enough to feed a family for a single day, and so the law demanded that laborers be paid on the same day they had worked. Not all landowners observed the law.

At the marketplace, the landowner picked the laborers who would pick his grapes, and he contracted with them for the usual daily wage. They followed the landowner back to his vineyard and took their places among the laden vines. There they worked for several hours before the landowner announced he had further business in the marketplace. When he returned, he brought with him additional laborers for which those who were first hired were grateful. The vineyard was large and the harvest was bountiful, and their arms were already aching from plucking so many grapes...

Parables are not like any other kind of story. Most things we think parables are it turns out they are not – allegories, metaphors, not even similes, although they often use the words like or as. The kingdom of heaven is like... The Greek word for parable means to lay beside. And so it is that, in his parables, Jesus lays such familiar images as vineyards and landowners and day laborers beside such unfamiliar images as the grace of God. Theologian Walter Wink wrote that parables are “lumps of coal squeezed into diamonds that catch the rays of something ultimate and glint it at our lives.”

...As the day wore on, and the sun baked the backs of the workers in the vineyard, the landowner returned three more times to the marketplace. Always there were more who were willing to come to his vineyard to help with the harvest, and the landowner promised each a fair wage.

At last the work was done, just as the last rays of sunlight cast their golden gleam over the vineyard, empty now of grapes and full of those waiting for their pay. The first hired walked wearily to where the landowner was carefully counting out coins. The last hired watched him wondering what portion would be left for them after all the others had been compensated. Everyone was counting their blessings that this landowner was going to pay them anything at all. Looking up from his ledger, the landowner motioned to the last hired, who came forward to receive their pay. They shrugged, thinking it strange that he would pay them first, and held out their hands for their pittance. In the near-dark, none could believe their eyes as they looked at the full denarius the landowner had given them...

Parables always start with the part that is familiar, so that as the story is told, we can easily add up the details and determine what the sum will be. Except, we know, parables always contain a twist at the end of the story, the entirely unfamiliar part, so that the total ends up being much different than the sum of its parts. That a landowner, for example, would be so generous as to pay someone a full denarius – a full day's wage – for an hour's worth of work was entirely unfamiliar. The parable could easily have stopped there and glinted a gilded ray of something ultimate at our lives – the generosity of God toward those who least expect it. But this parable twists again...

...The rest of the laborers wondered if they had misheard the landowner when they were hired. Perhaps they were being paid a denarius for every hour they had worked? The first hired were so busy adding up new and enormous sums in their heads that they hardly noticed as the workers hired throughout the day went forward to receive their fair wage as well. Finally, only the first hired were left, their muscles aching, their hands stained purple, their faces dirty with a mixture of sweat and dust, their minds rehearsing their gratitude for the landowner's generous reward. Into their palms the landowner pressed their pay – a single denarius, no more.

As their calculations crumbled, their anger rose. You have made them equal to us?!? they protested, in the same way a child stamps her feet and insists, It's not fair!! At this, the landowner, in whose eyes mingled both pity and patient amusement, in the same way a parent looks upon a child stamping her feet...at this the landowner said, I am doing you no wrong. I am not unfair. Did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?

Because, more often than not in scripture, and I daresay more often than not for us, it takes characters more than once to learn a lesson (just look at the disciples, who will follow this parable with an argument over who gets the best seat in heaven)...because it takes more than once to learn a lesson, those first hired to work in the vineyard most likely stamped and seethed all the way home. Over dinner they speculated loudly over the personal merits of those who had been hired later in the day, the ones who had not been so diligent as they to get up before daybreak. Surely they had slept late. Surely they had spent the morning spending the previous day's wage on booze. Surely they were out wasting the grace - I mean, the denarius, they had been so generously given in the landowner's vineyard...They didn't deserve it...

Parables invite us to glimpse what is ultimate through their many facets, not just one. And so it is that the Reverend Barbara Brown Taylor wonders why we have for so long gazed upon the facet in which we see our faces reflected in the faces of those first hired. Like them, we aren't really offended by the landowner's generosity toward those who came last (we can grant that much grace)...we aren't offended until we realize our hard work hasn't earned us even more generosity. We instantly understand the injustice of the situation. It's not fair!! We easily sympathize with their anger, sharing their conviction that they worked harder and therefore deserved a higher wage. It's not fair!! We readily recognize their fear of losing their identity, an identity wrapped up in measuring worth as merit, as something earned. It's not fair!!

If we turn the parable slightly, though, we find ourselves facing the facet in which are reflected the faces of those hired last. Can we admit that we recognize ourselves in those faces, too? In the faces of those who have not labored the longest or worked the hardest? Because, of course, this is a parable – it is not about grapes or vines or coins or marketplaces or laborers who arrive first or last. This is a parable. It is about grace. It is about the kingdom of God. The kingdom of heaven is like...

It seems that in the kingdom of God, grace is offered not as a wage but rather as a gift, and it is given in equal measure to all. Or can we even use the word “measure” when we speak of grace? For how can we measure fullness that cannot be exhausted? God is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and of great kindness. I knew it! Jonah cried. I knew you would be gracious, that you would be generous toward Ninevah. And where does that leave me? It's not fair!!

The truth is, none of us deserve the grace we have been given by God in Jesus Christ. Not one of us. Thank goodness grace is by its very nature not fair, it does not play by the rules, it does not pay by the ledger book. It is given because God loves us, and desires that we receive daily what we need to live in the kingdom of heaven, to work at its harvest, to bring in its bounty.

God knows us, writes one of my favorite authors, Molly Wolf. God knows every smallest strand of who we are, and loves us with a stunning extravagance of love. God's grace is wider and higher and deeper than the firmament of heaven, richer than the Milky Way...God's great desire is for us to be all that we can be...and for us to take that bounty of love and wrap ourselves in it, rejoicing. Maybe not what we accept or deserve...But who said grace was in proportion to anything? Amen.

Artwork: Photograph from Wing Canyon Vineyard; "The Red Vineyard", by Vincent Van Gogh; Jan L. Richardson