Rev. Joan Pell Sierra Pines United Methodist Church Sermon: 6/25/2017 Series: Living the Blessing Way Scripture: Psalm 148:7-12 & 42:1-4 <Psalm 148:7-12> Blessings to Me 7 Praise the Lord from the earth, you sea monsters and all deeps, 8 fire and hail, snow and frost, stormy wind fulfilling his command! 9 Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars! 10 Wild animals and all cattle, creeping things and flying birds! 11 Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth! 12 Young men and women alike, old and young together! <Psalm 42:1-4> 1 As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me continually, Where is your God? 4 These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I went with the throng, and led them in procession to the house of God, with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival. This is the second in our sermon series as we look at Celtic Spirituality. Celtic spirituality characterized the British church from the 4 th century and was then pushed aside to fringes by the Roman church in the 600s and today we tend to associate it with St Patrick and Ireland and St Columba and the highlands and -1-
islands of Scotland. It has its origins in the mystical traditions of the Old and New Testaments and in the teachings of the disciple and apostle John. Celtic Spirituality has a strong sense of the goodness of creation, in which the life of God can be glimpsed everywhere. Heaven and earth are inseparably intertwined. God s spirit is present in all of creation, the animals and the plants. It is a spirituality that is intensely aware of the earth, sea and the sky. The image of God is to be seen in every newborn child and people are essentially good. God is at the very heart of life. Redemption is a setting free, a releasing of what we are created to be. All created things carry within them the grace and goodness of God. We can listen to the heartbeat of God within all things, ourselves, one another and the whole of creation. 1 One of the characteristics of Celtic Spirituality is their prayers of blessing and asking God to bless all aspects of their lives and creation. Hence the name of this sermon series. Celtic blessing prayers are a way of seeing holiness and sacredness in everything. The dictionary describes blessed as consecrated; sacred; holy; sanctified. 2 It requires us to have a sense of noticing what is happening around us, of being in the moment, and being thankful for that moment. As the Psalms we heard read to us say, all of creation is to give God praise: 7 Praise the Lord from the earth, 9 Mountains and all hills, 10 Wild animals and all cattle, 11 Kings of the earth and all peoples, 12 Young men and women alike, old and young together! (Psalm 148) Two weeks ago we thought about the rhythms in our lives. Both our daily rhythms, and the rhythms of the season. Sunrise, Morning, Noon, Afternoon, Sunset and Evening and Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. The sun lighting up the day, and the moon and the stars shining in the dark night. And we heard some of the prayers of United Methodist Beth Richardson from her book: Christ Beside Me, Christ Within Me. Today, we are thinking about the blessings in the everyday moments of our lives: walking the dog, sipping coffee, washing the dishes. How often do we pause in awe to see the things that are around us that usually go unnoticed? There are so many moments that can just pass us by without the intentionality of inviting God to come into them and acknowledging that every moment is a holy moment. 1 Philip J. Newell, Listening for the Heartbeat of God: A Celtic Spirituality ( New York: Paulist Press, 1997). 2 http://www.dictionary.com/browse/blessed?s=t -2-
There s an ancient Celtic prayer form that uses the phrase Bless to Me. A Scotsman called Alexander Carmichael went around collecting a lot of the Celtic blessings in the late 1800 s and published them in a book called Carmina Gadelica. Here s a Bless to Me prayer from there. Each thing mine eye sees; Each sound mine ear hears; Each odor that goes to my nostrils Each taste that goes to my lips; Each note that goes to my song, Each ray that guides my way, Each thing that I pursue. Each lure that tempts my will, The zeal that seeks my living soul. The Three that seek my heart. 3 Bless to Me prayers can be more specific as well. Bless to me this walk with the dog. Bless to me these coffee beans. Bless to me this cup. Bless to me this birdsong. Bless to me the quiet before sunrise. Bless to me these falling leaves. The Bless to Me prayer focuses on a tool, an item or an activity and the way it contributes to the pray-ers life. It is a prayer of the present moment, a specific acknowledgment of the presence of the holy right now in this place. 4 Bless to Me this is a strange phrase to our ears. When we pray this phrase we are asking to God to make this moment right now holy and sacred so that we will be able to see and feel God s presence in the moment. We are delighting in the small things in the everyday objects and routine happenings and moving through the day deliberately noticing. Here s a great quote from author and teacher Deena Metzger: Each day is a tapestry in which threads of broccoli, children, building, planting, and thinking interweave in intimate connection. We can become so focused on our own accomplishments that we will not even see the holy, sacred, healing grace of God present all around us. 5 3 As quoted by Beth A. Richardson, Christ Beside Me, Christ Within Me: Celtic Blessings (Nashville: Upper Room Books, 2016), 33 4 Beth A. Richardson, Christ Beside Me, Christ Within Me: Celtic Blessings (Nashville: Upper Room Books, 2016), 18 5 As quoted by Marca McFee, Bless to Me: A Worship Design Studio Summer Ordinary Time Series. Worship Design Studio, 2017. www.worshipdesignstudio.com. -3-
Beth Richardson wrote this prayer: Walking the Dog (page 36). Over the past few weeks preparing for this series, I ve really found myself looking for the little things and praying Bless to Me. Bless to Me this drive to work. Bless to Me this flower bursting into bloom. Bless to Me this hot day. Bless to Me this tap and running water. Encourage you. Last summer, Adrian and I vacationed in Scotland and took a day trip over to the Island of Iona and visited the Abbey there. As well as the Abbey, there was a Benedictine Monastery. Since 1938 the Abbey and Monastery buildings have been used by a religious group called the Iona Community worshipping in the Celtic way. In the usual way of a monastery, there is a cloister. A cloister is a covered walk-way with colonnades arranged in a rectangle with open space in the middle. In this case with the abbey is on one side of the quadrangle, the dormitory, refectory and other rooms opening off of it on the other three sides. Installed in the middle of the quad, there may have originally been a tree of life symbolic of all good things that come from God. But back in 1959, the Lithuanian artist and Jew, Jacob Lipchitz, made the sculpture that stands there today. As you walk around the cloister you see glimpses of the statue. It was one of many beautiful moments as we were there that day that I gave thanks for. And the guide explained that this statue is called Descent of the Spirit. Lipchitz was commissioned by a Frenchman to create a statue of the Virgin Mary. As you walk around, you see different views. As a Jew, he was not sure how to go about this. On a subway in New York he had an idea. The virgin would be placed within a mandala (a Tibetan religious form representing the entre cosmos). There would be a dove above and a lam below. 6 And, there are three supporting angels too to assist this great visitation, as the dove powerfully pours forth the Holy Spirit to envelop and give light and hope to the whole world. At one level Lipchitz is pointing to the Jesus story, conceived by the Spirit in the womb of Mary. At another level he is pointing to the universe story. Everything is conceived by the Spirit in the womb of the cosmos. Everything is sacred. 7 So that statue really fits with the spirituality of the Iona Community. Celtic spirituality appreciates that creation is good and that by looking deeply into a human face we can glimpse the image of God. And in a newborn child, the sacred image of God is there. In the Western Isles, there developed the practice of a prayer and a blessing at the birth of a child by the midwives or womb- 6 Harry Reid, The Soul of Scotland: Celebrating Scotland's Spiritual Richness, 142. 7 John Philip Newell, The Rebirthing of God: Christianity's Struggle for New Beginnings, 3. -4-
women as they were called. The midwife would also put water on the baby s forehead as part of the blessing, a birth-baptism as opposed to priestly-baptism that happened later. As Alexander Carmichael went around collecting Celtic blessings that had been orally passed down. This blessing was shared by a midwife: The little drop of the Father on thy little forehead, beloved one. The little drop of the Son on thy little forehead, beloved one. The little drop of the Spirit on thy little forehead, beloved one. To keep thee for the Three, to shield thee, to surround thee. To save thee for the Three, to fill thee with the graces. The little drop of the Three to lave thee with the graces. 8 So, as well as the daily opportunities in the ordinary things of life for Bless to Me prayers, there s also those special moments in time that mark the rites of passage in our lives: births, marriages, and deaths, first day of school, graduations, new home, retirement. These are sacred thresholds into new and unchartered territory and when we surround them with blessing we have the assurance that our next steps are anointed and held by God. Beth Richardson wrote this prayer of blessing entitled: For a Home (page 67) As we celebrate these sacred, holy, rites of passages, may we do so, not our own, but with others as the Psalmist reminded us in Ps 42: I went with the throng, and led them in procession to the house of God, with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival. May we find our lives are more holy by looking for the blessings in the ordinary moments of our lives and in those special times. Let s appreciate and remember the Celtic view that God s image is in the whole of creation, that creation is good, and in it we can hear God s heartbeat. Let s take the time to pause and slow down and appreciate the holy moments that we so often miss. Let s pray the prayer Bless to Me as we go about our daily lives. Thanks be to God. Amen. Let us pray. <In the silence of your hearts, complete the sentence as you pray for the ordinary or maybe special things in your life > Bless to Me, O God... 8 John Philip Newell, The Rebirthing of God: Christianity's Struggle for New Beginnings, 50. -5-
Resources Newell, Philip J. Listening for the Heartbeat of God: A Celtic Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press, 1997. McFee, Marca. Bless to Me: A Worship Design Studio Summer Ordinary Time Series. Worship Design Studio, 2017. www.worshipdesignstudio.com. Richardson, Beth A. Christ Beside Me, Christ Within Me: Celtic Blessings. Nashville: Upper Room Books, 2016. -6-