Pastor’s Email Devotion The Week of Epiphany 3 January 26, 2014 SCRIPTURE -- Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. (Psalm 52:7, NRSV) REFLECTION -- Yes, I am going to do it to you one more time. A short reflection with an even longer poem. (No prayer this week – this poem is prayer-like, I think). As we stand only halfway through our potential snow season, having had more snowfalls through January than I can easily remember, my mind turns to this literary treasure that one of our members sent to me after my reflection on shoveling snow two weeks ago (thank you Jen!). It lifts up themes of patience, beauty, the pursuit of perfection, stillness, seasoned companionship, sermons, concentration, and quite possibly my favorite … the “pocket of silence” snow shoveling creates for me. I wear no hair knot – I’d rather lay down than sit (which keeps my back surgeon happy) – and I stink at meditation … but none-the-less, I am this Buddha at this moment in time crafted out of this winter day. I pray that you can find grace in a snow filled day, either in shoveling or some other engagement with God’s frozen bounty. I also pray that you have someone with whom you can share cocoa and cards while your boots drip near the door, and if not, that you can find the blessed solace of “pockets of silence” in your life … times that allow pondering akin to that of a young woman who long ago pondered the first coming of our Lord into the life of the world. May that Lord enter your life in many and various ways this week. PROMPT -- Shoveling Snow With Buddha In the usual iconography of the temple or the local Wok you would never see him doing such a thing, tossing the dry snow over a mountain of his bare, round shoulder, his hair tied in a knot, a model of concentration. Sitting is more his speed, if that is the word for what he does, or does not do. Even the season is wrong for him. In all his manifestations, is it not warm or slightly humid? Is this not implied by his serene expression, that smile so wide it wraps itself around the waist of the universe? But here we are, working our way down the driveway, one shovelful at a time. We toss the light powder into the clear air. We feel the cold mist on our faces. And with every heave we disappear and become lost to each other in these sudden clouds of our own making, these fountain-bursts of snow. This is so much better than a sermon in church, I say out loud, but Buddha keeps on shoveling. This is the true religion, the religion of snow, and sunlight and winter geese barking in the sky, I say, but he is too busy to hear me. He has thrown himself into shoveling snow as if it were the purpose of existence, as if the sign of a perfect life were a clear driveway you could back the car down easily and drive off into the vanities of the world with a broken heater fan and a song on the radio. All morning long we work side by side, me with my commentary and he inside his generous pocket of silence, until the hour is nearly noon and the snow is piled high all around us; then, I hear him speak. After this, he asks, can we go inside and play cards? Certainly, I reply, and I will heat some milk and bring cups of hot chocolate to the table while you shuffle the deck. and our boots stand dripping by the door. Aaah, says the Buddha, lifting his eyes and leaning for a moment on his shovel before he drives the thin blade again deep into the glittering white snow. ~ Billy Collins ~
Posted on: Mon, 27 Jan 2014 03:53:59 +0000
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