April 30

Is it all about me?
Am I the center of the universe?
What if my life isn’t driven by what I need, what I want, what makes me happy?
What if I stop trying to be the fixer of all that is broken?
What if I renounce my need to be perfect or moral or right?
What if I release my agenda for me: my hurts, my expectations, my desires?
What if I stop forcing reality to be the way I want it to be and forgive my reality for being what it is?
What if I am not set apart from the rest of the world, but a part of it?
What if I see myself, not through my own eyes, but through the eyes of God?
What if it isn’t all about me?
….
If it isn’t all about me, or you, or us, or them… is it all about God?
Is God the center of the universe?
What if we allow God to be who God really is, instead of who we need God to be?
What if my true identity isn’t defined by how I am a person like no other, but it’s found in a God who created me in the divine image, just like everyone else?
What if we are in God, and God is in us?
What if we stop expecting God to answer our prayers, and our lives become God’s answer to prayer?
What if God is bigger than one person, one religion, one country, one way of seeing the world?
What if each of us is a small piece of God’s presence in the world?
What if it’s all about God being in ALL, and ALL being in God?

Excerpt from Nancy’s Noodle
http://insidenancysnoodle.blogspot.com/2012/04/journey-to-center-of-universe.html

NT – Today we begin the Gospel of John. For the esoteric among us, John is the favorite. For the ones who love metaphor, allusions, and similes, John is the favorite. For the ones that want different, John is your man.
John is not a synoptic gospel. The first 3 – Matthew, Mark, and Luke have much of the same stories, plot lines, even in some cases, the same words. They are called ‘synoptic’ (meaning same to the eyes) gospels. There are loads of theories out there – my favorite being Mark was first, then Matthew used Mark and a book of sayings (called Q for Quella, meaning word lessons), and Luke was written to tidy up Matthew and provide an overarching view of the life of Jesus and the first 30 years of the early church in Acts and a missing part that covered Paul’s life in Rome.
John, however, is entirely different. There are 7 ‘sames’ in all 4 gospels. We have one in our scripture passage today.
John The Baptist is in all 4 gospels and in all 4 gospels there is tension as to whether or not John was the Messiah or Jesus was.
One commentary that I read long ago postulated that as the gospels were being written, John’s followers still had the primacy in Israel as far as followers. John clearly had a lot of followers. Peter and Andrew were followers of John before they came to Jesus. John clearly made the Pharisees mad as you know what. He seriously angered Herod who imprisoned him and then eventually, reluctantly according the synoptics, had him killed.
In John, John the Baptist repeatedly states he is not the Messiah, he is not the one, he is so much lower than Jesus. I think the true question the Pharisees were proposing was “why is he not here, baptizing, and you are?” And the truth, the final truth is – Jesus did not baptize anyone. Did you realize that? I didn’t until I really sat down and thought about it. John the Baptist baptized, Peter did, Paul did a bunch, Jesus, none.
What the rest of the Gospel of John does after this little interlude with John the Baptist is talk about what Jesus The Messiah is really like and what Jesus the Messiah really did and what Jesus the Messiah really is going to do.
The writer of the G. of J. was an educated man. He wrote in classical Greek and he wrote well. He was well versed in the plays and novellas of the day. The G. of J. has story archs, yes, metaphors and allusions, character development and different types of literature all woven together into a beautiful
piece about Jesus.

Proverbs 14:13-14
Even in laughter, the heart may ache, and joy may end in grief.
This is true. After my brother Nathan died, I went several times to a grief support group at church. One of the statements that the facilitator made was that ALL relationships end in grief. Somebody dies, somebody leaves, the relationship is broken. But you can’t stop having relationships because of that. Instead, you have to live in the moment.
This is a hard thing to do when you KNOW that grief is either just around the corner or coming up fast.
Many of the moms that I have been friends with at Woodward are my friends on FaceBook. They are all boo-hooing over the graduation of their kids. I have to say, I have done some of that myself. Here is a picture of Matthew on his first day of kindergarten. Here is a picture of him Friday, his last day in school uniform.

I posted that on FaceBook, thinking it would be a nice nostalgia for a lot of people who know me and him. Instead, I spent most of the afternoon moaning over my upcoming loss.
Our proverbs today address this very emotion. I AM proud of Matthew and all he has accomplished. I AM excited about his college choice – Presbyterian College in Clinton SC and I AM excited that he has achieved the goal of graduation from Woodward Academy.
But I am sad, sad, sad for me and Don and Cole. We will be very lonely without him.
The next proverb in our scripture, though, is comforting and in some way, challenging to me. “The faithless will be fully repaid for their ways, and the good man rewarded for his.”
You can’t stop being in relationships because one – mother to an in-house son – ends. Things and people change and it is up to me to stay in the moment and keep working to the next goals.

Peace and grace to you this week. Even if you have to skimp, stay in the Word. God loves you and so do I.