Doubters Are Welcome!

This is the remarkable painting by Caravaggio titled, "The Incredulity of St. Thomas."No one shows the emotion, the detail and the awe like this remarkable painter. His version of the raising of Lazarus is one of my all time favorites and this is a close second.I'm choosing this painting this week because we are now "post-Easter." The Gospel writers reveal several incidents which all fall into the category of post-Easter appearances--those times when Jesus appeared after his resurrection.Thomas' hand.... watch it enter directly into the flesh of Jesus and look at his curiosity. Doubters are welcomed by Jesus--not shamed! Jesus did not shun Thomas or ridicule him and this is our invitation to also bring our doubts to the encounters with Jesus and not hide them or go sub-subterranean with them. Jesus lets us bring all of our doubts into his presence and somehow accepts them--accepts us--and loves us despite them.I am struck with the vulnerability of Jesus here. He's exposed. He's ready. He is not withdrawing. Always available. Always waiting on us. Always ready to take us--doubts and all. How he does this, I do not know but THAT he does this humbles me. What does this painting stir in you as you sit here and enter this amazing scene?In this post-Easter season, we need to bask in what has happened this past week. It's the soul's D-Day. It's the soul's most important holiday and not just the church's.Pause with this painting and be invited, like Thomas to truly enter the presence--the person of Jesus.Stephen W. SmithPotter's Innwww.pottersinn.com

One Week from Today

One week from today is Maunday Thursday---that scandalous night when Jesus orchestrated a dinner party that ended in his arrest and eventual death the next day. Of all the days of Holy Week, this one day is the most awful and most beautiful.Here we find Jesus eager to share a meal where the food would merely transport them to a deeper meaning of his true identity and what he was about to do. He told his companions that he was eager to share the meal with them--but why eager?There is a holy eagerness that we find ourselves drawn into as we journey towards Easter. An eagerness for the music to switch from minor keys to major melodies! In some churches, you can't say "Hallelujah" until Easter Sunday---all through the Lenten Season---imagine no Hallelujahs. We find ourselves eager to say and to believe in the Hallelujah of Easter.One week from today, we'll be on the final countdown towards Lent ending and Easter's gift to us.Am I ready for this change?What do I need to give attention to in this season of waiting?One week from the world began to alter its course.This is my Lenten Journey.Stephen W. Smithwww.pottersinn.comPotter's Inn

My Sabbath and Lenten Thoughts

I'm thinking tonight about my friend, Lazarus...my need for this Sabbath day...my Lenten Journey. Let me explain.Finally, I've taken the time to have my sabbath--my time of ceasing. I thought it would never come. My personal rhythm has been sadly interrupted and neglected due to travel, work and choices that have not always been wise or life-giving. So, it's been a life-giving day which included fasting from food in order to re-align my life and get my rule of life back in order. All of the things that I have intentionally chosen to do this Sabbath have helped to refuel my soul and helped what felt dead inside to come back to life. For such is the journey of Lent and when combined with Sabbath makes me glad--yet again to be alive.It's remarkable this week that across much of the Orthodox world, this week is the Feast of Lazarus. Sadly the protestant church has neglected this important story and event in the life of Jesus. Lazarus was actually resurrected a week before the week of Passion that Jesus experienced. He foreshadowed the death and resurrection of Jesus and thus, Jesus knew full well that only in a few days that he, too would experience this scandalous agony and ultimate victory.The Lenten Journey for me this year has forced me to be more mindful--more awake--to what is happening both inside me and around me. I started my Lenten Journey by asking this important question which I blogged about: "What in me that seems dead--needs to come back to life? Now, several weeks into my Lenten Journey I know the answer.It came to me today on my Sabbath walk on the Santa Fe trail. It was a beautiful day here in Colorado. I wore short sleeves on the trail and walked through the wind and it came to me....that which felt most dead.... felt a rumble of a tombstone being slightly--oh, so every slightly back and some light came in.Lazarus... you heard that too--didn't you...the faint sound of the tomb being moved back....yet still asleep in death... you waited for His Voice to all you. He called. You moved. You came to life. So, I too, wait on His Voice.This is my Lenten Journey!Stephen W. SmithPotter's Innwww.pottersinn.com

A Lenten Supper

The title of this painting is "Supper at Emmaus"...but it could well be a Lenten Supper. A Lenten Supper is any meal--which becomes MORE than a meal. A Lenten Supper is a meal where the soul is nourished along with the body. These are times we long for to connect; be known, be heard, be understood and be loved.All of this is happening in this painting and it is my profound experience that this deep and soulful connection happens many times when I gather with a friend for lunch and the lunch becomes MORE than a lunch. The time becomes--encounter. The time becomes church. The time is when Jesus is suddenly in our midst and we feast on him, not just our Cobb salad or tuna fish sandwich.Lent is our time to slow the mind to run in sync with our souls. How does this happen admits our busy lives and demanding schedules? It happens when we create space and linger in time allowing Jesus to show up. In his presence we find ourselves alone no longer. In his presence our agony is assuaged. In his presence there is the fullness of joy.I want a Lenten Supper with my closest companions. I want Jesus to show up in our midst. I am wanting Easter real bad right now.This is my Lenten Journey!The painting is my reflective work this week using Juliet Benner's book. It's by Caravaggio.Stephen W. SmithPotter's Innwww.pottersinn.com

Our Lenten Hope

This amazing painting by Caravaggio is compelling. In the painting, the artist invites us to join this amazing dinner party. It's the scene after the first Easter and is titled, "The Supper at Emmaus." It's a favorite Bible story because Jesus reveals himself to his companions at the table. They did not recognize him on their long walk. They did not recognize him anywhere but at the table. There they recognize the nail pierced hands, the love of Jesus in their midst and their hope for many more Easter experiences. As Jesus broke the bread, their dullness of insight was also broken. Everything changed because of the table--and who was sitting around the table.This Lenten Season, I've sat with this painting explored more in depth by Juliet Benner in her remarkable and inviting book that I'm using this Lent.What must these followers of Jesus be thinking? Be feeling? Be experiencing at this moment of transformation when their eyes were opened? Imagine this as you study the painting. I so want to be there with them...with him.I like it that Jesus' hand is outstretched to me. It is as if I, too, belong there. I like it that there is room at the table for me. I like it that in that scene of intimacy, I too, would have my eyes widened and opened which I so need these days. I long to sit at a table like that. Don't you?As you find out in following Blog entries, this picture has so captivated me for some years now since it first came to may attention that it lays the foundation for our own ministry to begin having intimate gatherings, around the table, where we can too, experience the love of Jesus in our midst. It is what is missing in the fast pace, hurry sickened, fast food nation that we are living in. There seems to be no time for such intimate dinners. But why?The table of Jesus is where he did most of his teaching; where many were found by the love of God and where men and women were ushered in the church of two or three that Jesus spoke about and wanted us to also experience.This is the Jesus Meal.This is where I belong.This is where I am invited.This is my only hope.Caravaggio knew something that I'm wanting to know. Through the medium of his art, I can find my place at the table where I belong. Where you belong.It is our Lenten Hope.This is my Lenten JourneyStephen W. Smithwww.pottersinn.com

Lent: Lost in Space and Time

I was reading a favorite book of mine this morning and stopped when the author penned this line: "Implanted in the monastic heart is the desire to learn how to make a life rather than just a living." It's found in Macrina Wiederkehr's book, Seven Sacred Pauses. Her book is about living in rhythm by embracing a life of prayers similar to the Benedictines which have captured space in my heart over the past few years. Their old ancient wisdom and lifestyle offers us our best shot at learning a new way to live.Macrina's words are not new to me but this morning, they found a barren place in my soul. For the past three weeks, Gwen and I have been on the east coast leading three different ministry events--events for others, not for ourselves. We returned home near mid-night on Sunday knowing that the first thing we both needed to do was to find our center again. Life and the demands of ministry had somehow swooped down causing us to lose our equilibrium in nearly every way.Travel does that.... we cross time zones and lose our perspective. We have to meet other's expectations while burying our own. We feel out of sync. Imagine a life like this.... a life...not just a few days or weeks.Now, I can return to my Lenten Journey...how is yours going? A few weeks ago, we embarked on a 40 day walk to the Cross. It's fast, coming to an end. Now I must prepare a Maundy Thursday sermon that I've been invited to preach and I'm drawn to reflect on what it means to spend a time in vigil--an old word from an old world but it was a time when people seriously waited---waited for a soldier to come home; waited for someone dying to take their last breath; waiting for a new life to begin.Now, perhaps you, like me, can embrace the idea of entering an Easter Vigil--to regain the land that we have lost in our busyness and to live our lives and not to merely eek out an existance. Easter is our only hope!If you can scroll back to my last Lenten entry...the busy, busy painting and try again to find Jesus in the midst of the chaos. He's there. Do you see him?This is my Lentern Journey.Stephen W. SmithPotter's Innwww.pottersinn.com

Busy, Busy Lent

Hurry sickness is a malady that is infecting many of us this Lenten Season. Perhaps you had good intentions like I did to spend meaningful moments with God this Lent but the busyness is already sucking the life out of some of us. This Lenten Season, I"m reading Juliet Benner's beautiful book, Contemplative Vision and focusing on a piece of art each week to allow myself to be drawn in and to find the meaning for my own heart and soul. It's my way of trying to become more focused this Lent.How appropriate that Benner chooses "Census at Bethlehem" as one of the pieces she uses to help us understand the movement from busyness to becoming contemplative. Take a moment and study the painting. It's busy. Lots of people scurrying around; lots of people accomplishing tasks. Lots of people doing things. You can barely notice the pregnant Mary and the determined Joseph in the painting at all--but they are there indeed. Have you found them? Look half way over and at the bottom of the painting and you'll find them.To see Jesus, we have to look. We have to search. We don't always enjoy epiphanies and burning bushes on our journey do we? Looking for Jesus has to be intentional in our busy world--otherwise we might miss him--miss the holy moment that awaits us when we finally find him or he finds us. Lent is the intentional choice to look...and to look for meaning.In Lent, as Spring unfolds the majesty, resolve to lessen the load of your busy days but considering these action steps.1. Take a 10 minute walk OUTSIDE to look for Jesus.2. Take a 10 minute break in the midst of your day--like I am right now to even write this meditation. I came home after a meeting and rather than driving back to the office to "do" more, I'm using this time to withdrawn from the busy, unfolding day to have a moment to breathe. I need that. Do you.3. Read a book that can draw you into "seeing" Jesus in a whole new way this Lent. Like Benner's book or something you've had but have not read yet. Let it become your Lenten Journey--an intentional choice to think daily about the journey to the cross.I'm aware in Breugel the Elder's painting here that many people are doing many things. It was his intent to show us that we can miss Jesus.What if you are so busy that you miss the resurrection? What in you needs to come back to life? That's a Lenten Question worthy of stopping and having a cup of tea with or coffee over and pondering to see if you can find Jesus in the midst of a busy day, busy Lenten Season and busy Spring.This is my Lenten Journey.How is your's going?Stephen W. SmithPotter's Inn

Lenten Meditation #2: The Raising of Lazarus

This is one of the last oil paintings painted by Vincent Van Gogh. It shows the raising of Lazarus which is it's title. Jesus is not in the image but Lazarus is really a self-portrait of the artist himself, Vincent Van Gogh. Van Gogh saw himself as dead rising again to new life.See the sun, an ever present symbol in Van Gogh's work giving light, hope and presence. Notice Mary's surprise. Did she not really believe that what Jesus said could actually happen? Do we believe this?Lent is the 40 day journey that we walk towards Easter. We wonder now if we can make the journey. It's only the first day. On the first day, we sit with this question:What's dead in me that needs to be raised to new life?As I sit here and ponder this myself my mind roams to my weariness of my writing a new book. I"m ready for it to be done. The past two days have been painfully disappointing because I cloistered myself to work and work on the manuscript only to read the first chapter and to hate it. Hate it so much that I'm starting over with it. It's an uphill journey like the journey to Easter is for me right now. What feels dead is the very thing I have focused on the most this past year. I wonder today, if I will feel the life again; the passion again to find the right words.This is my journey to the cross I suppose. To be willing to lay down what I have valued most in order to be free to walk towards Jesus and to walk with him.As I write this early this morning, I'm aware of my own weariness and the need for a soul rest. Sometimes our minds can be so active like a pin-ball game--a machine where there is a lot of action with balls bouncing, things to avoid, traps to fall into and more. We want the peace.Yet, unless there is a resurrection, there will be no peace.This is my Lenten Journey. How would you describe yours?Lent helps me gain and re-gain perspective on the journey ahead of me. 40 days until Easter.Lenten Blessings!Stephen W. Smithwww.pottersinn.com