I am now officially, constantly, in search of boredom. I am weary of having an interesting life and would happily spend an entire week with nothing to do except the things I want to do. In last spring I acquired a small raised garden bed in which I planted tomatoes and peppers and cucumbers and way too much zucchini. I enjoy spending time out there each day, squeezing the tomatoes and puzzling over the odd way cucumbers fill out. So happy was I with that experiment that I then acquired a smaller raised garden bed with the intention of planting some full sun flowers—zinnias and peonies to be exact. And so excited with that was I that I then spent two months playing the online shopping “out of stock” game—you know, you click on it every morning and once or twice else during the day until miraculously one day it says “1 left in stock” and you order it! In this manner I finally acquired two more, and set about getting soil and mulch and plants to populate my growing flower garden. Are you enjoying this story? Good! So that was the plan for this week; put the beds together, fill them, plant and water and enjoy the new flowers right along with those strange cucumbers.
But then en route to drop my husband for an appointment a tire went flat. Since we were only down the block I drove home the better to be safe while we waited for the spare tire person to arrive magically (LOL). But, then, a loud explosion and (never mind how it happened) the rear windshield shattered. Oh fine, now we have to find the magical windshield repair person too. Just to make it all more interesting this was all happening while the local meteorology folks began scaring us with news about another heat wave “stay inside, don’t go outside, don’t do anything, hold your breath” they seemed to say. (In the end, the worst of it was 105° F (40.5° C.) Not to mention that before the heat wave, when it was still cold at night, the furnace decided to stop working. So we got to arrange a visit from the not so magical furnace repair person on top of all of the rest. Trust me, it was a very interesting week.
Grace finally has come I’m glad to report. The heat wave has passed, everything is repaired, we are sleeping well, all is calm for the moment (although I still need to tend to those raised beds). Of course, grace comes from grace, by which I mean, grace creates grace in the same manner that love builds up. A little bit of grace—such as finding myself outrageously thankful for the magical spare tire and windshield people and thanking them effusively—creates grace, and that returns as more grace. It is a constant challenge for me to remain in a state of grace, given my penchant for detail and control. One of God’s gifts to us, then, is the pathway to a life of grace, and it is our charge, if not also our destiny, to maintain it by receiving it thankfully.
Closely related to grace is wisdom—the ripening of knowledge over time. Wisdom comes from the merger of experience and maturity with regard to the receipt of grace, the knowledge that grace comes from love given and received in equal measure. Wisdom manifests the courage and confidence to trust in grace, not only to receive it with thanksgiving but to know when to trust. Wisdom is a kind of gracious power emanating from a loving heart with its “on button” set to “care.” Care, because of course, love is the beginning of wisdom. The love we are created to manifest is the love and loving we are called to share. It is by the action of loving that we change our own hearts into sources of grace, it is by the ongoing building up of love that we grow grace and love into wisdom.
Scripture reminds us that King Solomon’s wisdom was indeed a gift from God given in response to an outpouring of love and care (1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14). The Psalmist (Psalm 111: 10) sings that worship of God is the beginning of wisdom, reminding us that it is in loving one another that we most effectively worship God who has given us love. Ephesians (5:15-20) reminds us that wisdom comes from the action of being filled with the Spirit because to fill our hearts and souls with joy is to build up love. John’s Gospel (6:53-59) reminds us that it is the living bread of God’s love given in Christ that is the gateway to eternity. To live forever is to live in love, which is to live in loving.
Grace, wisdom, love—what do these say to us as LGBTQ siblings and heirs? Grace is the gift we are given in our creation as loving people created in God’s own loving image, grace is in the love we share in our logical families, grace is in the smiles and laughter and hugs of the communities of love we create. Wisdom is in the ways in which we understand that we are not created to satisfy heteronormative traditions, but rather we are created and indeed called to use our grace-given mature knowledge to build up love and logical families and loving communities. And, of course, love is the glue.
Grace, wisdom, love—these are pathways to unity with the God who creates us through unity with one another. We are called to move past the details of our interesting lives and to focus instead on those moments of thanksgiving from which true grace emerges.
Proper 15 Year B RCL 2021 (1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14; Psalm 111 Confitebor tibi; Ephesians 5:15-20; John 6:51-58)
©2021 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.
Dimensions of Reality: glbt Christian spirituality 