Not so with you…

 

Matthew 20:24-28

When the ten heard it, they were angry with the two brothers. But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

Not so with you…

Modelling power that shows up as vulnerability

and courage in the face of all that is uncertain

Not so with you…

Modelling power that shows up as grief

and walks alongside the broken hearted

Not so with you…

Modelling power that shows up as healing

in arms outstretched to cradle the wounded

Not so with you…

Modelling power that shows up as love

and tenderness that is never exhausted in serving others

Not so with you… in whom power is subverted

Not so with you…

(Liz Crumlish December 2023)

Keep on seeing

 Matthew 25:42-45

for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’

We saw you…

in the eyes of the homeless guy who sits near the ATM

as we made our transaction

and he pleaded for enough spare change

to pay for a night in the hostel

We saw you…

In those queued outside the cafe

that allows folk to pay it forward

a queue that silently waits

for the dregs we leave behind

We saw you…

in the harried mum

who is desperately trying to keep her child from kicking off

on the over-crowded train that is proving too much

for her child’s neuro-diverse world

knowing her parenting is being judged and found wanting

We saw you…

Even as we frowned and tutted

at the one who stumbled on approaching the communion rail

not noticing how you greeted them with outstretched arms

as you would any long lost friends

and in the woman with learning difficulties

who can barely read the liturgy

but who knows grace when she sees it

in the bread and the wine

We saw you, Lord…

And you see us

You call us today

not to fix the brokenness of the world

but to keep on seeing you

hunkered amidst the pain and the hurt

choking in the dust and the rubble

and not to look away

to offer a hand

or a cup of cool water 

for all of “the least of these.”

Liz Crumlish November 2023

It's complicated - Jael and the tent peg

 

Judges 5:24-28
“Most blessed of women be Jael,
the wife of Heber the Kenite,
of tent-dwelling women most blessed.
He asked water and she gave him milk,
she brought him curds in a lordly bowl.
She put her hand to the tent peg
and her right hand to the workmen’s mallet;
she struck Sisera a blow,
she crushed his head,
she shattered and pierced his temple.
He sank, he fell,
he lay still at her feet;
at her feet he sank, he fell;
where he sank, there he fell dead.
“Out of the window she peered,
the mother of Sisera gazed through the lattice:
‘Why is his chariot so long in coming?
Why tarry the hoofbeats of his chariots?’

Jael waited 
for opportunity
for the chance
to avenge her people
Lying in wait
to charm the man
who thought he was home and dry
who thought he’d escaped the fate
of all who fought alongside him, felled in battle
And, as he slunk home
where his mother waited in welcome
Sisera was waylaid
by a resourceful woman
A woman who did not bring him
the water he demanded
but gave him more 
than he could have imagined
fine milk
a place to rest
and a deadly blow with a tent peg
He surely didn’t see that coming!
Meanwhile Sisera’s mother
knowing the cowardice of her son
in abandoning his comrades
waited anxiously for his return
endorsing his treachery
with a mother’s love.
Sisera’s mistake was not wrought 
in the midst of battle
but in his underestimating
the passion
and strength
 of a woman
whose loved ones he wronged. 
Always a grave mistake.

(Liz Crumlish 2020) 

Seek division

 Luke 12:49-53

“I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptised, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three;

they will be divided:

father against son

and son against father,

mother against daughter

and daughter against mother,

mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law

and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”

Not a gospel I wanted to encounter today

as I celebrated Eucharist

Not a text I wished to contemplate

as we wonder what on earth is going on in the world

and as we fervently pray for peace

And yet a gospel that tells it like it is

A gospel that doesn’t shy away from the mess of relationships

and the carnage of being human

of living alongside difference

in all it’s vulnerability and power

A gospel that calls us to account

for all the ways we are indifferent

choosing the way of least resistance

that leads to an easy life.

Just maybe we are called

by the God of peace

to side with the poor and oppressed

to stand with the persecuted 

to hunker down with the hopeless

and to wail with the bereft

To take sides in conflict

and not side with the oppressor by our passivity

in the face of injustice.

Perhaps this is just the kind of gospel

I need to hear today

to strengthen my resolve

to be where God is

on the side of love at all costs

and in the divisions that may cause.

Liz Crumlish October 2023

Embracing the Cailleach

Wise women 

have always been feared

their wisdom reviled or discredited

their ‘unconmentional’ ways

seen as a threat to good order

And, though retribution may have moved 

beyond trials and burnings,

witch hunts are still alive and well

They are just more subtly disguised…

Presented as ‘concerns for welfare’,

exclusions ‘for our own good’.

Executed as persistent attempts to keep us in our own lane

and dampen down the exuberance and creativity 

of which we stand accused.

In this witching season

may we look out for one another

May we pay heed to the signs,

call out the hypocrisy

and whip up a storm of resistance  -

linking arms as we keep the sparkle polished

garnering the power of our ancestors -

all those wise women who have gone before.

May we persist in disrupting the ordinary 

with our shocking impropriety

and propensity for mischief 

confounding those who consistently underestimate our power.

And may we continue to bring healing and joy

wreaking havoc wherever we go

breathing new life into the spirit of the Cailleach.

Liz Crumlish October 2023

Praying for peace

Taking time to pray…

while revelling in the sheer beauty of creation

with the sound of wild geese overhead

and the crash of waves on the beach

seems a far cry

from the midst of the storm of conflicts 

raging throughout the world

where lives are rendered as collateral

in incomprehensible power games 

and land is raised to rubble

magnifying fear of the other.

Witnessing injured children apportioning blame, 

clutching with determination 

promises of revenge and retribution,

extinguishes hope for peaceful resolution 

as hatred and division

are passed from generation to generation.

How long, O God?

For what shall we pray

How shall we tell a new story

of justice and mercy

and inhabit the ways of peace?

Make us relentless in our efforts

to change hearts and minds

working tirelessly for reconciliation

embracing difference and diversity

and life in all its fullness