Morning has broken... like the first morning

Morning light is changing. The first flush of dawn is softer, pastel rather than bright and sharp, often wreathed in fog, the hills below wrapped in clouds with only the tops peeking through. As I sit and look out at the front pasture, there is a misty impressionistic edge to the trees and fields. The cool stillness of the early morning is a gentle blessing for all the hurry of the day to come. The horses and the donkeys run and kick up their heels when I let them out of the stalls, rejoicing in the beginning of the day.
Each season of the year has its own special flavor in the morning... spring crab apple sweet, summer marigold sharp, fall tangy apple sweet and sour, winter dry wine. The mornings of each of these seasons is different and like my children, there is no favorite, just differences. Fall mornings with their softer edges are preparing me for my time of remembrance. The sour pain of loss is sweetened by the joy of memories.
I love early morning time. As a mother responsible for getting the kids up, fed and off to their days, I lost my mornings to the business of living and family. Now that children are grown and gone, I wallow in the pure pleasure of watching and feeling another day come to be. Perhaps it has something to do with my allotment of days growing shorter as well as time for appreciation... whatever the reason, I am grateful for fall early mornings.
Not only does the quality of light change in autumn, but the days shorten as well. Even though the change has been coming gradually, there is always one day when I wake up and feel the difference. It is dark when I wake up and dark when I come home from eating supper with Mama. I have to gather the horses and donkeys up before I go down the hill because it is harder to round them up in the dark. Morning light comes more slowly and evening shade comes more quickly. The sunset light no longer lingers as a benediction on the hills. The lazy light of summer is gone.
I wonder what the first mornings were like. Was the dawn of all creation a spring, summer, fall or winter day? Or perhaps it was all of them with creation time taking all the seasons to accomplish. Creation does take time... time to consider and savor the possibilities as well as the outcome. I suspect God took a long time, perhaps many seasons, so the pleasure of creation could sustain him in the hard, lonely, angry days to come as her creation children tested the Love that brought them into being.
The wonderful old Christian hymn “Morning is Breaking” was written in 1922 by Eleanor Farjeon. I love the images of the first dewfall, the first sunrise, the first day. But it is in the living of all the days that follow the firsts, all the seasons of the years as they flow by in a river of time, that we can choose to live as God intended, in the fullness of time. The fullness of time... not just our favorite season, not just in the firsts, but in all our days and in all our ways of being... filled with the Love that knows no ending. And as we live the seasons of our lives loving the One who first loved us, our light changes just as the morning light changes. It becomes brighter, steadier, softer, sharper, and sweeter as our soul’s creation ripens in the fullness of God’s time.
Dearly Beloved Three in One, let me not lose sight of times passing in the scurrying around days of my life. Catch me up in the glory of the season’s light that I might see Thee more clearly as my time is drawing to a close. For those whose light is flickering, keep them close by so that they might feel the warmth and see the LoveLight that surrounds their days even in the midst of fear and distress. May it be so for all of your Morning Creation. Amen.

Morning has broken...

My fall every morning routine... get up at 6:30 or 7... fix a cup of hot tea and eat breakfast... go to the stable and feed horses and donkeys hay... write for an hour or so... feed cows two to four bales of hay. Winter sees another afternoon feeding added to the mix. On Mondays I go to town with mama for a grocery/cat food/used book store/eat lunch out/physical therapy trip. Tuesdays I catch up on household work and get ready for my Wednesday class. Wednesday I teach a group of women who are exploring their creativity. We play for three hours with many different kinds of art material and I am always surprised by the sheer beauty that lives inside each person’s soul waiting for a path to be made plain. Thursdays are consumed by two three hour classes in picture matting and framing that I teach at our local community college. One class is in the morning and one at night. Fridays and Saturdays are at home days with Michael, tending to farm chores... bush hogging, wood cutting... and visiting with friends. Sundays have traditionally been reserved for church but since we left church, Sundays are becoming Sabbath with rest, ritual and relief from the press of the world.
This morning I am sitting at my computer listening to the sounds of friends moving back and forth, up and down the stairs, fixing breakfast, soft conversation of the easy sort that comes with years of relationship. It is the Morning Hymn for this Sabbath. After twenty eight years, we are having a reunion and I am reminded why I fell in love with these friends in the beginning. They know how to be and do communion and community. For all these years, they have met monthly with a book discussion as the formal agenda while they lived their lives together as the Family of God. Death, divorce, weddings, children with cancer, illness, successes, joys and celebrations have been held close in the tender hearts of this group. Countless meals prepared, prayers prayed, hugs handed out, tears wiped away, conflict managed with grace, differences diffused by the Love that binds these children of God together.
This group of women taught me how to make homemade bread, danced with me in worship (I have the pictures to prove it), celebrated the birth of our son Adam, introduced me to the world of organic eating before there was such a concept, made sand candles at the beach retreat, showed me how to live a creative joyfilled life in the midst of the “dailiness” of life, included me in a sisterhood that continues to this day. They showed up Friday with their husbands, their own sheets and towels, and meals prepared. I was allowed to cook the Friday night meal but everything else was brought by the group. We ate high on the hog all weekend long. It was wonderful slow food prepared with care and love. Meals lasted long after we had finished eating as we sat around the table talking and listening. Candlelight and fireflames lit and warmed the room and love’s warmth eased our hearts as we sat together. Every meal was Eucharist and all were welcome at the table.
Eukharistia... origin Greek...thanksgiving... combination of eu “well” and kharizesthai “offer graciously”... For this small moment in time on Sabbath Rest farm, all was well and all was offered graciously. We gathered together, the wine and bread of our lives offered up to one another and to God. Laughter, tears, worship, walks, hayrides, animal blessings, a new Psalm written for me, good food, remembrance of the lives we have shared apart and together... There is no hitch in the getalong of my soul this Sabbath. It has been a gracious plenty and I am filled up and overflowing with thanksgiving.

Peggy’s Psalm for the Animals ( A New Psalm 151) Written by Judy Timmons

O God, you have created them for our care and our pleasure,
The horse Junie B to munch the grass and give me rides in her saddle
The source of my long awaited desire to have a horse of my own.
The once silent donkeys who have found their voices,
Braying to let us know of their hunger or displeasure,
Following close on our heels to greener pastures.
Daddy’s cows and their descendants who marvel at these hills,
So different from flat Georgia pastures.
Barn cats and yard dogs, creations of Yours, all,
Doing their duties-taking care of the grain mice and
Chasing away intruders, whether on two legs or four.

O Lord, how wonderful is your creation of all these four footed beasts
That we fondly call friends and helpers on this much loved land of yours.
You have loaned them to us for a time as you have shared all your world with us
For our care and pleasure.

O Lord, they and we need rain to grow their feed and to nourish our soil and our souls.
Hear our prayer for life-gicing showers of blessings from the heavens.
Turn not a deaf ear to our entreaties.
Answer this prayer and pour down your healing waters of liquid love on all of us.

Moment by moment...

We had been gone from the farm for one night. It was a special memory trip for us... visiting Texas after a long absence. Our first church with Michael as associate pastor, our first child, our first home, our first new car... all happened in Waco, Texas. Those three years loomed large in our memory and had shaped our lives in ways we are still discovering. So, here we were, far, far away when we get the call. Annabelle is calving and it is a breech birth.
Birth at the farm, no matter how many times we observe it, is always a miracle in the making. Every calf that comes into our world at Sabbath Rest Farm is celebrated. Our cows and bull are long in the tooth but still procreating regularly and we are grateful. Annabelle is one of our younger cows but she was in trouble and so was her calf. She could not give birth without help. If she didn’t get help, she and the calf would both die. Gary came, and he and David pulled the calf. That is a powerful painful experience for cow, calf and helpers. The calf was limp and not breathing so Gary breathed life into him, mouth to mouth. Afterwards, all who had gathered to help, named the baby Gladd...Gary, Lisa, Annabelle, Dianne, David... all the helpers remembered in the little black baby boy’s name.
Erich Fromm says, “Birth is not one act; it is a process... To live is to be born every minute. Death occurs when birth stops.” The paradox of birth is that is it is both one act and a process. All life has a beginning, some more difficult than others. And all life is a process, a series of passages, a journey, a pilgrimage. Like Gladd, some of us are breech births and some of us slip easily into the new world, all of us life novices. As we are born into this world, so are we born into the world of faith. Jesus’ words, “You must be born again...” make perfect sense when you watch baby calves being born.
After a baby calf is born, the herd will allow the mother and calf some time alone to get acquainted. When the mother is ready, each member of the herd will pass by, gently nosing and smelling and licking a welcome to the new kid in the pasture. Our mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, aunts, uncles and cousins in the faith help birth us again into the kingdom of God.
They are the midwives for the first birth of faith and as we grow, help breathe new life into our souls as we make difficult transitions. We must be born again and again and again if we are to live in the moment we have been given. When we stop being born, we die to the gifts of the present and get trapped in despair, boredom, ingratitude or any one of the many deadly sins that lie in wait for those who live unaware of God’s presence in every moment of time.
Our hearts will break and our hearts will soar if we live in the moment. As one songwriter said, “My heart is shattered and held together with crazy glue.” Being present to the moment, aware of all we have been given, seeing all the awful imperfections balanced by all the awesome
beauty, will break your heart even as Jesus’ heart was broken. How many times did he stand and weep... over Lazerus, in the Garden, over Jerusalem, on the cross... his tears flowing from the knowledge that great love brings equal measures of joy and sorrow. But if we live life in the moment, nothing is wasted, neither tears nor laughter. All are a part of our new births bringing new life to what was dead and gone.
My prayer is found in the words of the old hymn...“Moment by moment I’m kept in his love; moment by moment I’ve life from above; looking to Jesus ‘til glory doth shine; moment by moment, O Lord, I am thine.”

The grass IS greener...

The grass truly is greener on the other side of the fence at the farm this month. Three horses and two donkeys can eat a great deal of grass and the three acre pasture we have fenced in for them has been eaten to the ground. As I walk to my kitchen sink in the late afternoon, their heads hang over the gate and through the fence, waiting and watching for me (or someone) to set them free. As I walk out on the back porch, Shirley T and Blacknosed Kate begin to sing a donkey song in anticipation of the sweet soft green grass just on the other side of the fence. The horses nicker and step back and forth, tasting the grass in their imaginations.
As the horses and donkeys walk through the gate, they stop and nibble a little on the yard grass but then move swiftly to the lush fields in front of the high barn. These fields have been mowed regularly for hay so it is mostly grass with few weeds. They wander back and forth, not really going anywhere, just looking for the best stand of clover. All five of them stay close together and if one gets too far away, the whole herd will move to join them. There is an unseen cord that keeps them connected.
After an hour or two of grazing, I go to gather them up for the return to the paddock pasture. Dakota, like me, is old and tired, so he is the easiest to catch. I loop the pocket halter over his neck, around his muzzle and begin to lead him back. The others ignore us as we leave but we keep on walking. Soon I will hear the rumble of hooves as donkeys and horses run past us, kicking up their heels just for the fun of it. The donkeys were so drunk on green grass one night that they ran circles in the yard, kicking and braying, party time.
The trick to green grass as a food is that it is possible for a horse to kill itself by eating too much of it. The sugar in the grass can cause the horse to put on so much weight that it founders. Some horses are more prone to this problem than others. Dakota and Dixie can eat grass all day long and not have a problem but Junie B has to have her grazing restricted with a grazing muzzle. Too much of a good thing can be dangerous.
The horses and donkeys know the answers to questions I have difficulty answering for myself. Who am I? Each animal knows who it is in relationship with others of its own kind. Kate and Shirley know they are donkeys and the horses are the other. The horses connect to each other and have clear relationship boundaries. If a horse gets too close to a donkey, it will get a bloody nose from a kick. If Dixie goes into Junie B’s stall at night, she gets chased out by Junie B. The interesting paradox is their knowledge of themselves is as separate beings, as well as a part of the herd. Dixie knows she can bully Dakota and make him move over. But she stands close to him during nap time, snuggled up close, secure in their connection. Kate knows she can push Shirley away from a bucket of feed but gets anxious when she can’t see Shirley. She walks or runs until she locates her companion. Then you can see her relax, anxiety melting away.
Who am I? I am me, a separate creation, full of unique one of a kind never been seen before never to be seen again components. The mold was broken after my creation. But I am also part of my herd, just like everyone else, no better, no worse, nothing special. What a wonderful gift this is, to be special and not so special at the same time. I am balanced on the top rail of the fence that divides separate self and herd membership. To know myself, I must be in relationship with others unlike me... Republican and Democrat, city dweller and farmer, fundamentalist believer and barely believer, old and young. I need the companionship and security that comes from being with a herd that is like me, too. The truth is I have many herds... my work camp crew, my covenant group, my believer friends, my neighborhood family/friends, my family, some more alike me than others. Like the donkeys and the horses, we need both the same and different to know the answer to the question “Who am I?”
When I read about the disciples, I see a group of people who were so different from one another... fishermen, tax collector, doctor, educated and uneducated, hot headed and calm, skeptic and faith believer, male and female (I include the Marys as disciples)... and so like one another... Jewish, in the same country, at the same point of time in history, living by the same set of cultural and religious rules. Their common belief in Jesus, set them free to be their own unique selves, giving their best gifts even as they bullied and bumped up against one another. Like Dakota and Dixie, Peter and Paul, I can find my true self alone in a herd. Who am I? I am a piece of a whole and a whole piece, created by a loving God who values my gifts and forgives my sins, a person whose life is important and unimportant, a part of a herd and a solitary soul.
The old shaped note hymn says it best... “There’s a wideness in God’s mercy like the wideness of the sea; there’s a kindness in his justice which is more than liberty. There is welcome for the sinner and more graces for the good; there is mercy with the Saviour, there is healing in his blood. For the love of God is broader than the measure of man’s mind; and the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind. If our love were but more simple, we should take him at his word; and our lives would be all sunshine in the sweetness of our Lord.” There is room for us all in the wide kind graced broad merciful simple sweet loving God who leads us home to our evening pasture...