Waverly Heights UCC

(this is the last in a series of Lenten Meditation on forgiveness — for background, resources, and an approach to using these meditations, please check the About the Meditations page. If you are reading/engaging with these meditations, please do let me know. Pastor David)

Prayer
Patient, compassionate God, open to me the heart of forgiveness. Fire in me the courage to see honestly my true needs and those of others. Inspire in me creative responses that claim and champion our shared humanity. Give me grace to forgive and to accept forgiveness.

Meditation
Gratitude: Gratitude helps bring us to a place of acceptance that is the final stage of forgiveness. Coming to that place of forgiveness, in turn, fills us with further gratitude. An attitude of gratitude is a remembrance of blessing, of God’s grace, of God’s presence even in times when we are feeling far from blessed. Have we felt anger toward one who has hurt us? a desire to extract some repayment? or self-loathing for being in this situation in the first place? Even in the turmoil of such feelings, something may turn our thoughts to God and to gratitude; someone may be for us the incarnation of God’s loving, accepting presence.

For me, thought of God almost always brings perspective to any situation. Most often I find myself smiling at least a little. I remember, I just know in my bones, that always God has opened for me a way forward—usually straight through in honest feeling and understanding of all the hurts and failings in myself and others. And I’m grateful for that sense of assurance—again this time a way will open. That gratitude gives the balance and stability needed to risk, to begin opening the door of deep forgiveness.

Call to Mind both the sorrows and the gratitudes you feel right now. Try writing them down, maybe five or ten things that are griefs for you, and five or ten things for which you are grateful.

Imagine Jesus is with you (picture him anyway you like), or perhaps just picture a close friend sitting by you. Read out your lists. Notice how it feels to be simply heard and accepted, the pains and the joys alike.

Check-in with your feelings. Are you relaxed, or clenched up? What thoughts arise? Are you able to keep, or reestablish touch with your peaceful, beloved center?

Gratitude, Hopes, Prayers: Reflect a moment more on your own experience of forgiveness. If you feel grateful, say thank you. What further hopes rise up in you? do you have a prayer you would offer to God?

Psalm 134
A Song of Ascents.
¹ Come, bless the Lord, all you servants of the Lord,
who stand by night in the house of the Lord!
² Lift up your hands to the holy place,
and bless the Lord.

³ May the Lord, maker of heaven and earth,
bless you from Zion.

Benediction Prayer

May I know, again and again and always, that God loves me. May I grow in trust in God’s peace that passes all understanding. May I taste God’s goodness, rest in God’s peace, and find courage and strength in a grateful heart.  Amen.

(this the fourth in a series of Lenten Meditations on forgiveness — for background, resources, and an approach to using these meditations, please check the About the Meditations page)

Prayer
Patient, compassionate God, open to me the heart of forgiveness. Fire in me the courage to see honestly my true needs and those of others. Inspire in me creative responses that claim and champion our shared humanity. Give me grace to forgive and to accept forgiveness.

Meditation
Tell me again: Tell me again, help me to hear: I am loved. I am forgiven. God loves me just as I am. God’s love frees and strengthens me to love and forgive.

The business of forgiveness—giving and receiving forgiveness, to and for ourselves and others—calls for strength. Where does that strength come from? Well, training and practice of course, just like weight training builds our physical strength. But I think what we are training is not so much our own “spiritual muscle” but rather our openness to a strength beyond our own. It is the strength of God’s love for  us that gives us strength for the work of forgiveness.

I know this can sound abstract and disconnected from our real lives. And if I told you it is an experience you have to have it could sound a bit woo-woo.. In fact, God’s love is the most concrete and practical reality of our lives every day. It’s there in every breath we take, in the face of family, friend, and stranger, in every free choice we make hoping for the best. How we recognize this reality in all these things is a matter of grace and a mystery. And even so, it’s something we can practice.

Call to Mind your breath; right now just notice the next four or five breaths before you go on.

Imagine all the people who have breathed this same air, and al the people who will: some molecules of each breath shared with the people around you and also with those far away in time and space. You breathe with your parents and grandparents, with grandchildren and great-nieces yet unborn, with most intimate love, with strangers, with enemies. We are all connected. This is God’s gift, God’s love in action. Perhaps when we forgive others we are always also forgiving a part of ourselves.

Check-in with your feelings. Are you relaxed, or clenched up? What thoughts arise? Are you able to keep, or reestablish touch with your peaceful, beloved center?

Gratitude, Hopes, Prayers: Reflect a moment, maybe even write down: what are you grateful for, right now? what hopes rise up in you? do you have a prayer you would offer to God?

Psalm 126

Benediction Prayer

May I know, again and again and always, that God loves me. May I grow in trust in God’s peace that passes all understanding. May God open me to recognize and trust in God’s powerful love. Amen.

(this is the third in a series of Lenten Meditation on forgiveness — for background, resources, and an approach to using these meditations, please check the About the Meditations page)

Prayer
Patient, compassionate God, open to me the heart of forgiveness. Fire in me the courage to see honestly my true needs and those of others. Inspire in me creative responses that claim and champion our shared humanity. Give me grace to forgive and to accept forgiveness.

Meditation
Setting aside “should”: One of the things that can get in the way of forgiveness is all our shoulds — working in both directions. “I should forgive him” is a far cry from “I do forgive him.” The former is a voice from outside our true self, however deeply internalized it may be. Often that external voice is connected to religion, “If I call myself a Christian I ought to be able to forgive.” The latter, I do forgive, can only come from our truest, fullest selves — from the place where we know our own weakness is recognized and accepted, where we are touched by the unconditional love of the divine. “I should forgive” doesn’t get us anywhere. “I do forgive” recognizes an arrival (at least at a waystation — the journey is a lifetime.)

And in the other direction, “She should admit how wrong she was and apologize” is another way of keeping forgiveness at arm’s length, conditioning it on something or someone outside ourselves.

Forgiveness is a process. Dwelling in thoughts about what we or anyone else should do keeps us in one place, not stepping out on the journey toward forgiveness. Forgiveness is also a practice. We need to be gentle with ourselves as we learn to forgive.

Call to Mind what it feels like to be stuck, to go over and over the same thoughts, to believe something is wrong with someone — wrong with yourself or wrong with someone else.

Imagine the stuckness is a room you are in. Go to the door, open it, and step out onto the path there. (If the door is blocked, locked, or guarded, slip out the window!) Take the first few steps along the path.

Check-in with your feelings. Are you relaxed, or clenched up? What thoughts arise? If this exercise helped you, bask in it just a moment more. If not, let it go and move on.

Gratitude, Hopes, Prayers: Reflect a moment, maybe even write down: what are you grateful for, right now? what hopes rise up in you? do you have a prayer you would offer to God?

Psalm 130
A Song of Ascents.
¹ Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord.
² Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to the voice of my supplications!
³ If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
Lord, who could stand?
⁴ But there is forgiveness with you,
so that you may be revered.
⁵ I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
⁶ my soul waits for the Lord
more than those who watch for the morning,
more than those who watch for the morning.
⁷ O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with him is great power to redeem.
⁸ It is he who will redeem Israel
from all its iniquities.

Benediction Prayer
May I know, again and again and always, that God loves me. May I grow in trust in God’s peace that passes all understanding. May God give me gentleness, patience, and determination with myself and all others. Amen.