Dear Friends,
Last week during our weekly staff meeting, Noah talked about relentlessly trusting. I confess that I can’t tell you more about what he was referring to, because those two words sent me off in my own mind and heart. And they’ve been with me constantly since then.
Relentless. No matter what. Holding tight. Undaunted.
A few days later, I thought about what it would mean to relentlessly trust that the God that I have had brief experiences of as the unconditional loving presence—is indeed really present, always. It occurred to me that if I really did relentlessly trust that, I would not hold onto the worries and myths about being alone, about not being enough, about not being effective. I would be simply focused on gratefully, humbly being a channel for that love. Which I am. Sometimes. For brief periods of time. But then, I forget. Again.
A divine source of eternal love is more than I can comprehend, which may be why I continue to hold dual realities: one being that my treasured, personal experiences of the eternal Divine presence are real, and two being that I am alone and failing at doing this work and living this life. Some moments feel like I’m doing a two-step with Spirit. Other times, I think I’m dancing in the dark without any music or partner.
As I walked on, as with so much of life these days, my thoughts turned to my garden. Bittersweet came to mind. Now, there is something relentless. A friend who knows such things once told me that bittersweet can grow with as little as a quarter inch of root. Even as I do constant battle trying to keep it at bay in the yard, I am in constant awe of its tenacity.
Forget being like the lilies of the field, I thought! I need to be bittersweet! I need to put down relentless, trusting roots in the God of Love that I have had glimpses of within me. To hold the moments of transformation of so many people I’ve been blessed to accompany through the years in my heart, and root my life there. To have this be my meditation in every breath.
It was so much easier to be a trusting channel before the pandemic. All of my life I’ve felt rooted in Spirit in the midst of the presence of others, because it is so much easier for me to see the Divine in them. Doing youth ministry on Zoom from my orange office, I’ve had to find the vast majority of that grounding in Light in other places. I am so grateful for the glimpses I’ve caught this year: in tender conversations with store clerks, while watching nature out the window by my desk, in texts with our kids half a continent away, in emails and letters from Friends around the Yearly Meeting, in the courage and honesty of middle schoolers, and in the laughter and wisdom of children. In the deep sincerity of parents and youth workers, and with my co-workers on the Yearly Meeting staff.
Listing these helps me see and remember just how many glimpses of the Divine I have been privileged to see this past year. I realize that I've been gifted with enough. Enough that I can once again root myself in Love and belonging. Filled with gratitude, I can imagine having bittersweet roots that hold me while I daily, oh so imperfectly, practice being a joy-filled, humble, and relentlessly trusting channel of God’s love. Until I forget, again.
Sometimes 2 words are enough.
With love and deep gratitude for each of you who have shown me glimpses of the Divine,
Gretchen