The World Is Not a Stage

Matthew 6:1-6 and 16-21 (The Message)

The World Is Not a Stage

6 “Be especially careful when you are trying to be good so that you don’t make a performance out of it. It might be good theater, but the God who made you won’t be applauding.

2-4 “When you do something for someone else, don’t call attention to yourself. You’ve seen them in action, I’m sure—‘playactors’ I call them—treating prayer meeting and street corner alike as a stage, acting compassionate as long as someone is watching, playing to the crowds. They get applause, true, but that’s all they get. When you help someone out, don’t think about how it looks. Just do it—quietly and unobtrusively. That is the way your God, who conceived you in love, working behind the scenes, helps you out.

Pray with Simplicity

5 “And when you come before God, don’t turn that into a theatrical production either. All these people making a regular show out of their prayers, hoping for fifteen minutes of fame! Do you think God sits in a box seat?

6 “Here’s what I want you to do: Find a quiet, secluded place so you won’t be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace.

16-18 “When you practice some appetite-denying discipline to better concentrate on God, don’t make a production out of it. It might turn you into a small-time celebrity but it won’t make you a saint. If you ‘go into training’ inwardly, act normal outwardly. Shampoo and comb your hair, brush your teeth, wash your face. God doesn’t require attention-getting devices. He won’t overlook what you are doing; he’ll reward you well.

A Life of God-Worship

19-21 “Don’t hoard treasure down here where it gets eaten by moths and corroded by rust or—worse!—stolen by burglars. Stockpile treasure in heaven, where it’s safe from moth and rust and burglars. It’s obvious, isn’t it? The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being.

“Tune In” by Rev. Lisle Gwynn Garrity

seeking: Is this the fast that I choose?

by Rev. Sarah Speed

at the start

Is this the fast I choose?
Will I wake with the sun each morning?
Will I start with thank you?
Will I peel back the cage around my frame to let you in
or will I get too busy? Will my Bible collect dust on the shelf, along with my journal, along with my sense of self,
or will I roll back the stone and wade in?

Every new season beckons something of us—
attention, beauty, the chance to create.
This season is no different.
So, like moths to the light, will we find our way toward God, or will we hover, circling fake suns?

I am seeking something deeper.
I am kicking off my shoes.
I am starting this season on holy ground.

Constellations

By April Little

 I was told that my body was not to be trusted. 

That she was a stumbling block, that her desires were evil.

I wasn’t told that I am made from stardust. 

Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur—

God took dirt and dust and breath and made a human being.

I wasn’t told how our bodies connect us to the universe and each other.

Bone of bone, flesh of flesh, our bodies are roots deep in the soil of the earth. 

In an individualistic world where you were taught that the only point

was to buy your ticket to heaven and try to get others to do the same,

you miss out on the heavens that are here and now.

As Jesus said, the Kingdom of Heaven is among us, within us.

When everything I knew crumbled beneath me like ancient stone,

and I fell from the community with which I had been aligned,

my spiritual homeland,

I found myself in a new constellation.

One that looked so much more like freedom,

where I could bring my full self,

and see that Divine image in others,

the shining of stardust,

the glory of dirt,

 all of it named Beloved and Good.

We, as the LGBTQ+ community and its allies,

live into this blessing:

we find each other in our wandering,

in our desires for companionship,

seeing each other for who we truly are, fully known.

May we all remember how loved we are,

and how beautiful it is when we constellate,

united by something greater than ourselves.