“This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. ~ Matthew 6:9 - 13 The other day I spent time with a woman who grew up with a father who rarely expressed his love and often shared with her what he thought were her "short-comings." These were the words that her father would use when he spoke to her growing up. "I just never felt like I was good enough, and now as an adult, he still is telling me what I have failed at," she admitted.
Her father, who is now dying, expects her to be the daughter to come and care for him and take care of all the things that he wants, while also telling him what a wonderful father he has been and to tell him how much she loves him. It's not the first time that I have encountered someone who has struggled with their relationship with a parent. I have to admit that there is still a tone my father can take, and even me at 56 years of age, feels like the eight-year-old boy that is in trouble. For this woman, her father is requiring her to do what is not only painful for her, but also, invites her to not be authentic with him. "I have to forgive him," she shared. One of the things that we have to realize is that when we have had things happen to us, or pain caused by others towards us, we have the right to feel hurt, and to be angry. While this woman is actually looking for a way to have closure with her father as he lays dying, there is also a lot that she is not saying. Much of what we talked about had to do with forgiveness. "Forgiveness is a choice," I shared with her. Forgiveness is always an option. I reminded her, "Forgiving someone does not mean that you forget, and sometimes reconciliation is simply something that can't happen." When I was a young person I remember my grandmother telling me that when I ask for forgiveness from God, it is like writing it on a piece of paper that is thrown away and never looked at again. "But I am not God," is what I now quickly admit. Over the years, and having had several conversations around forgiveness, and the pain that parents have caused to their children (including the times that I have not been the best at parenting as well), I recognize that not everyone is equipped to provide good parenting skills. Many times the results of a difficult relationship with a parent stems from the difficult relationship the parent had with a parent growing up. It's in these times that forgiveness first begins to take the form of empathy or even compassion for the person who has brought us pain. Not because of what they did, but in spite of it. The woman, as we continued to talk, seemed to find some peace in the conversation, recognizing even in her own parenting skills, some of the very things that she despised about her own childhood. Forgiveness happens when we put aside our own feelings, or need, for revenge, anger and guilt. It is something that we must learn to practice, and for this woman, was something she would have to work through as well as she spends the last weeks with her father. A lesson that we can all practice and learn. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019
0 Comments
He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!”Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” ~ Mark 4:38 - 41 Last night about midnight our home was shaken by severe weather coming through the area. For many of my neighbors, every time we encounter storms, they are reminded of Hurricane Harvey and the flooding it caused where we live. As the storm front approached, a planter toppled over in the wind, knocking against the house. The thunder caused one of our dogs to jump into bed to seek consoling, until our alarm system went off in the home, noting that a Tornado Warning had just been issued for our community.
It was a stormy night! Lately when I encounter storms, I try to remember the night that the storms began to rage while Jesus slept in a boat upon the water as the disciples began to worry about their safety. They are being tossed about, while Jesus sleeps. They finally awaken him, afraid of sinking, and Jesus looks at them and then calms the storm. He then asks the disciples, "What's wrong? Don't you have faith?" I recognize that we will always have storms. Sometimes storms involve anger, restlessnes, depression, and a number of other situations. What I try to remind myself is that even in the midst of the storm, God is present. When we begin to feel God's presence, our storms can become less frightening. Learning to live with God in the eye of the storm, we all can be safely brought to a place where we can once again find peace and joy. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. ~ John 5:8-9 This morning I woke up feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders. It's a feeling that I don't like, but in this case, it has to do with my own decisions. It's not often that this happens, but the reality of the day is upon me. I know that I will be okay. It's just that I have an idea of how I "hope" things will turn out, but in the back of my mind, I am already having doubts.
I think we have all had this encounter with life. When doubt seems to sit in the corner of the room, and begins to whisper, "No you can't." It's amazing how one little thought can begin to grow into something that leaves us second-guessing ourselves. It's times like these that I think about what is most important about the things that I am feeling, experiencing, or need to act upon. It's as if I am trying to "self-triage" my life! Jesus says: "If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him ... take up his cross and follow me" (Matthew 16:24). He does not say: "Look for a cross" or "Make a cross." There really is no need to search for a cross or to design one for ourselves. We all have our own cross to bear already, and it exists in a way that it is hard for us to carry. Jesus is asking us if we are willing to reach down, accept what is before us, to have the energy to lift it up, and to carry it. Crosses take many forms. Whether it is self-doubt or depression. Maybe it has to do with our job or something in your family that has added stress to your life. Maybe you have have been the victim of a crime or been bullied. Maybe it is a struggle to make a choice about something or when you can't seem to move beyond something that has happened to you. Maybe it is something that you do that continually sabotages your own self. Much of what we are asked to carry has nothing to do with us. It was not something that we wanted in our life. Maybe it is something that we hate, or reject, but exists and we cannot ignore it. Jesus invites us to carry them alongside him. I must admit, I still struggle at times to understand how it is that this is to make things better? What does happen, is that somewhere along the way, Jesus invites us to exchange the weight of his cross for ours. In the darkness of the night, praying for answers, Jesus speaks to us and says, "So, let me take it from you for a while." Like so many things that happen to us in our life, when we look at them from a distance, we can suddenly begin to move forward. There is something about distance that allows us to see things for what they are. When the weight of the situation is no longer ours to carry, we can suddenly stand again. I am reminded of the day the paralyzed man was lowered through the ceiling by four friends, and Jesus stares at the paralyzed man and commands that he, "Take up his mat and walk." The very thing that once held the man, he now carries it. It is what we are invited to do each day. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 "Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed," says the Lord, who has compassion on you. ~ Isaiah 54:10 I remember spending time with a woman suffering from a form of dementia. She would just tell me random things. We had been talking for about fifteen minutes when she became silent and just looked at me. Then with the most serious voice she said to me, "You know an escalator can never break, it simply becomes stairs."
She then announced that she was ready to read the paper, and wanted to know if someone would let her dog out (she didn't have a dog at the time.) Her comment about the escalator made me begin to think about us. While we may see ourselves as broken, or wounded, we still have purpose. I couldn't help but realize the image was sitting before me. While she seemed talk about a number of things that seemed meaningless, it was as if she was relating to me that she understood her own disease, and was saying to me, "I'm still here and I am still living through my brokenness." Each day there are those around us who are living their life, broken. There are those with broken hearts, broken minds, broken bodies, broken spirits and broken relationships. The older I get, the more I am able to accept the idea that Jesus invites us to live in our brokenness. It is as if he invites us to accept our own brokenness, just as he did the brokenness of the cross. I have known people who live out their faith in amazing ways, by talking about their brokenness, and how that brokenness changed them. Years ago while talking to a man who had survived a terrible drug addiction who was now helping others become sober, I asked him, "What would you change in your life if you could?" His response? "Absolutely nothing." He realized that because of his own addiction and recovery, his own brokenness had made it possible for him to help others because he knew that brokenness "first hand." Jesus does not ask us to reject our brokenness, but to accept it, and to ask God to help us make something of it. It is through this acceptance that God finds a way to take us to a new place, where a new life is waiting, and where we can become stronger. Not just stronger for ourselves, but for others. In many ways that is the beauty of living through these things that have changed us. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 "Consider him who endured such hostility against himself... so that you may not grow weary or lose heart." ~ Hebrews 12:3 I have often wondered if Jesus ever returned to the hillside where he hung on a cross and died? Did he once again walk the streets where he carried the cross, remembered how he was feeling and the words that were yelled at him as he struggled to take each step? Did he once again approach the tomb where his body, bloody, broken and gray, wrapped in a piece of cloth, was shut away into darkness? Did he sit, look and wonder, like so many of us do, at the places where our lives have been changed? To this day, every time I pass through the intersection of Elgin and San Jacinto in downtown Houston, I remember the day that a man failed to stop his car and hit me while I sat at a red light. I remember the sound, the smells, and the impact, that seemed to change my life forever, including some of the pain that I continue to carry with me from the injuries that I sustained that day. They are a type of wound that I continue to carry. I can still remember where I was standing when my dad called me to tell me that my stepmother had died, as well as, what the room looked like where my first child was born. The porch I stood on when I encountered my first kiss, and the field next to our home that I often looked out upon, with corn ready to harvest, when I dreamed of places I hoped to go. I recall the teachers who encouraged me to write, and the time someone with authority told me I was under arrest while I stood outside an establishment, protesting for the rights of someone who had already experienced more than I could ever imagine. Every time I pass Santa Fe High School, I remember the day last May that I held the hand of a mother whose daughter had been shot. Did Jesus visit Lazarus and talk about what it felt like to draw the his final breath, and then to suddenly realize that he was alive again? And what did the voice of Jesus sound like as he proclaimed, "Lazarus, come forth?" These are things I wonder about Jesus, his resurrection, and the time he spent as he once again visited familiar places. The morning of Jesus' resurrection, the women who were walking to the tomb to care for Jesus' body, may have walked in silence, thinking of the final images of Jesus, only to discover he was not there. The place where they last saw him, was now the place where a great miracle had taken place. This place was now where they were standing, staring into the face of an angel, asking the women, "Why are you looking for the living among the dead?" The place now has new meaning. It makes me realize that mourning can become dancing. That beauty can come from ashes. That life can come from a place of death, and that new beginnings can start when a chapter closes abruptly. The places where we have encountered life-changing milestones are sacred. They are altars where we have experienced vulnerability and provided the words that help us to describe our faith, even when the experience has taken our breath away. While we may struggle to understand why some things happen to us, the impact of the milestone will always change us. I am reminded of the words of Helen Keller who wrote, "What we have once enjoyed we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us." Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019
Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.” ~ Genesis 1:26 Years ago the author James McBride wrote the book, "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother." It is filled with both the tragedies of racism and the struggles of his mother who grew up white, the daughter of a Rabbi, who fell in love with a black man, became pregnant, left her family, converted to Christianity and raised her family in Harlem. James shares of her struggles, but also his struggle to understand the white Jesus he so often saw in church, and how his mother taught him that God is simply the "color of water."
I have shared that with others throughout my own life, especially when my nephew, also of mixed race, asked me at the age of three when his skin would turn white. Telling a three-year-old of their worth, and just how special God had created him to be was not something he wanted to know. He wanted to know why he was different, and when he would look like all the "other people," in our family, and later, often the image he saw of Jesus hanging in church. This morning I am reminded as I study droplets of water on the lilies after last night's rain, that the color of water is easy to relate to, as it reflects whatever it is clinging to at the time. It is the reflection of the sky above, or the green meadow, or the granite face of a mountain overlooking a lake. God clings to us, and the image belongs to the Creator who fashioned us from dust, making us in an image that was declared as "good." No where does salvation require us to mark, "Race." We are forced to embrace a color in order to exist in a world that places value and privilege upon the ability to meet some standard that then classifies and separates us from one another, when God is proclaiming that we are ALL God's own. I wonder if the water realizes it's ability to teach us about God and God's image? The image of God is a tapestry woven from strands of many colors and people. It is not meant to be a thing that divides us, but rather demonstrates the ability of God to do many things, and to be many things to all people. It is the reminder to us that God will go to great lengths to be in relationship with us, and to remind us that we must look beyond the color of our skin, and into the hearts of humanity. It is in that reflection that we discover God living among each of us. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 "Oh God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings. My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me." ~ Psalm 63: 1, 3, 6-8
How do we make ourselves available to God, as well as, one another? Years ago I intentionally entered into a period of time that each day I would begin the day by saying, "Today Lord, I empty myself of me. In this empty vessel, please fill me with all that You desire for me, and the strength to remain faithful to that desire." I would like to say I was successful. Instead I discovered I would be so very critical of myself any time that I sensed I was going in another direction. My focus on when I messed up completely overwhelmed what I had initially hoped for the exercise. As many people who have overcome addictions will share, you must learn that every day is a new opportunity. I think we all need to recognize that the blessing of each new day is truly a day that we can begin again. The re-creative nature of God gives us hope that today will be better than yesterday. Although God has that hope for us, we will always be part of the process. "Attitude is everything," is truly the mantra of every person who has ever tried to change, make a difference in a situation, or when faced with a challenging situation. May the joy of the Lord be our strength. May the hope of today fill us with anticipation of God's goodness. May each of us, at the end of this day, before closing our eyes, find peace. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 "Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God." ~ Ephesians 5: 1,2 Yesterday I spent time with a couple celebrating their wedding anniversary. As we looked at pictures from the couple's wedding day, the two both smiled and were able to recall so much about the day, including the weather, different conversations, and the vows that they made.
As we talked, the man shared, "and the vows that we made that day were the easiest words to tell her because I just love her so much." For the last year the couple has struggled with the wife's cancer diagnosis, surgery, treatments, and now hospice. "This is what I promised her. That I will care for her, no matter what." This has been hard on the couple. The initial treatment involved the removal of her tongue, a muscle from her arm being used to reconstruct a tongue, no longer being able to eat food, or speak clearly, and now watching as the cancer invades her neck and face. For me, they are the most sacred example of covenant and unconditional love. The conversation was filled with many emotions. There are simply those moments when you realize the presence of God in the moment. For us, this is the covenant that God has made with each of us. As I sat and listened, I realized the deep pain that was present that will never go away. The woman, almost befriends her woundedness at this point, and realizes the deep love that she has for her husband, and he, for her. What I learned in that moment was that their covenant for one another is filled with many truths. They now say what is on their mind to one another, and they listen, without judgment. They understand the need to hear, "it will be okay," and that, "I love you, no matter what." Essentially, it is what we seek each day in our life, and our faith. It is our deep need to know that God loves us, unconditionally, and that our words and actions matter to God. That somehow, when we fail, or fall short, of what God wants for us, there is not some punishment awaiting, but rather, grace, and forgiveness. The unconditional covenant that God has with us means that God is waiting to take us, hold us, and to remind us that we belong to God... ALWAYS! The greatest pain that we will ever bear is our own. The greatest love we will ever encounter is the love that God has for us. We invite God's unconditional covenant with us when we forgive instead of getting angry with one another. When we find that ability to bless our enemy, rather than cursing at them. When we care for the wounds of others, rather than driving salt into them. When we discover the words to encourage others, instead of discouraging. When we find a way to provide hope, rather than taking the person down the pathway of despair. When we hug, instead of harassing. When we no longer ignore others, and instead, turning a cold-shoulder, affirming, rather than criticizing. When we praise instead of tearing the other apart. In all of these situations, we affirm the covenant that God has with us, and invites that covenant to be visible for the world to see. While there was great joy in the sharing that I encountered yesterday, there was also a great sense of sadness, knowing that the time that this couple has left is escaping them with each moment. Learning to live out our love for God and one another will always provide for moments that will be meaningful. Stay in God's grip! G. Todd Williams (c) 2019 |
AuthorRev. G. Todd Williams is the author of the book, "Remember Me When..." and is a former hospice chaplain and pastor. Archives
February 2024
|