THE APPLICATION
"Doing" Christianity (or not?)
Read of each of thes 4 quotes one a time but pause before reading the next one and write down your one or two word "gut reaction" first thing, that comes to mind response to the quote you have just read.


I remember a conference in NYC. The topic was social justice. Assembled for the meeting were theologians, pastors, priests, nuns and lay church leaders. At one point a Native American stood up, looked out over the mostly white audience, and said, "Regardless of what the New Testament says, most Christians are materialists with no experience of the Spirit. Regardless of what the New Testament says, most Christians are individualists with no real experience of community." He paused for a moment and then continued: "Let’s pretend that you were all Christians. If you were Christians, you would no longer accumulate. You would share everything you had. You would actually love one another. And you would treat each other as if you were family." His eyes were piercing as he asked, "Why don’t you do that? Why don’t you live that way?"
By Jim Wallis Source: The Call to Conversion
Your first reaction_________________-
"The cost of following Jesus entails not only giving up the past, but also giving up various options for the future." Vinay Samuel Quoted in Cry Freedom, by Charles Ringma
Your first reaction_________________-
The Talmud (Jewish )Look ahead. You are not expected to complete the task. Neither are you permitted to lay it down. (In other words we cant quit just because something is to big for us to finish!)
Your first reaction_________________-
"Serving others was meant to be more of a lifestyle than an event"
Jennifer L Arnwine in Jan Feb 2008 Alive Now p. 4
Your first reaction_________________

Reflecting on these quotes together: What do they say to you? Do you agree with them? Does it seem impossible? What did you do today to be a Christian on purpose?
How can you do this more often? Do you want to make this more of a lifestyle rather than an experience?
What is one step you can take to make this happen more in some part of your life.... try to be as specific and practical as possible considering your particular situation in life? What will get in the way of your doing that?
Spend time in silence and reflection, then journal your thoughts
Possible group sharing..what is some small change you could try make in the way you live your daily life..give an example if you can


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DEVOTION AND REFLECTION FOR WEDNESDAY
" THE DAY OFF"
This is (or was) a day to think about how you spend time not working or at rest and play, slowly down to think or just to be!... whether you went tubing or off to see some site, or just spent the day around the Tree of Life Center.
Continue to practice your sense of awareness and peace.
Maybe this is a day to not do any multitasking? Maybe you can do some inner listening or be quiet as you think about what you are doing or what you did.
Pay attention to beauty and joy and things that make you happy? There is always some goodness of life in every day. Celebrate it!
What did you enjoy about not having to work! Consider also these thoughts
W. Muller writes about Sabbath and Sabbath times:
"We need to listen to the spiritual traditions. Jesus said, "Behold, I bring you tidings of great joy," and "Come, that you might have life and have that abundantly." The Buddha spoke about joy being the fruit of spiritual practice. No spiritual tradition says that God wants us to be exhausted. No scripture says we’re supposed to be totally burned out. Almost every scripture says that the fruit of life is joy—being happy in all that we have been given and all that arises in the course of human life. There are sorrows, but the more spacious we become, the more joyful we become in being able to embrace everything. The Sabbath has a joyful uselessness to it. We are not supposed to accomplish anything of any significance so that we can stop looking for what’s not there and have the time to drink from what’s already here. When we’re on the wheel of constant work, our eye is on the next thing that has to be done, what hasn’t been accomplished yet. Sabbath is a time to eat what you’ve cooked, to harvest what you’ve planted and to give thanks for what you’ve been given. It’s a time to bless our loved ones and to eat, drink, ..... The sensual delight associated with Sabbath reminds us that one of the fruits of spiritual practice is useless happiness.
Once people feel nourished and refreshed, they cannot help but be kind; just so, the world aches for the generosity of a well-rested people. Source: Sabbath By Wayne Muller

WHEN YOUR SPIRITstarts to feel weary,feed yourself with quietness,with beauty,and with prayer.
- Helen R. Neinast and Thomas C. Ettinger
**********************************************************************On poverty and the poor.
A devotional focus
Obviously you are seeing conditions that might be very different from your own. Rosebud is at least among the top ten poorest area in the United States. Journal some of your observations about this.
Read the following statements slowly and let them settle into you. You might also write down a word or two of response or question after each of these statements


The median income for a household in the Census Data Population fpr Rsoebud was $19,906, and the median income for a family was $19,866. Males had a median income of $17,188 versus $23,886 for females. The per capita income for the CDP was $8,462. About 40.8% of families and 43.6% of the population were below the poverty line, including 46.8% of those under age 18 and 11.9% of those age 65 or over.

Wacantognaka, the Lakota word for generosity, means to contribute to the well-being of one's people and all life by sharing and giving freely. This sharing is not just of objects and possessions, but of emotions like sympathy, compassion, kindness. It also means to be generous with one's personal time.http://www.aktalakota.org/index.cfm?cat=1&artid=46
The measure of a society’s progress is not whether it can give more to those who have more, but whether it can provide enough to those who have less.- David Lim
O God, to those who have hunger give bread; and to us who have bread give the hunger for justice. - A Latin American prayer Quoted in Cry Freedom, by Charles Ringma
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Psalms 72:1-4 Give the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to a king's son. May he judge your people with righteousness, and your poor with justice. May the mountains yield prosperity for the people, and the hills, in righteousness. May he defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the needy, and crush the oppressor.

Deuteronomy 24:19 When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it; it shall be left for the alien, the orphan, and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all your undertakings.
Proverbs 22:9 Those who are generous are blessed, for they share their bread with the poor.
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Proverbs 13:41 Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker, but those who are kind to the needy honor [God].

For not only do people need food, but they need also the touch of a hand, the sound of a voice. For food lasts but a day, but love is for always.
- Mother Teresa


By Shane Claiborne Source: The Irresistible Revolution

Almost every time we talk with affluent folks about God’s will to end poverty, someone says, "But didn’t Jesus say, ‘The poor will always be with you’?"
As we study the Scriptures, we see how many texts we have misread, contextualized and exegeted to hear what we want to. Like this one about the poor being among us, which Jesus says in the home of a leper and after a poor marginalized woman anoints his feet with perfume. The poor were all around him. Far from saying in defeat that we should not worry about the poor, since they will always be among us, Jesus is pointing the church to her true identity - she is to live close to those who suffer.
The poor will always be among us, because the empire will always produce poor people, and they will find a home in the church, a citizenship in the kingdom of God, where the ‘hungry are filled with good things and the rich sent away empty.’ I heard that Gandhi, when people asked him if he was a Christian, would often reply, "Ask the poor. They will tell you who the Christians are."

By Leonardo Boff Source: Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor
Is it possible to live in peace and happiness when you know that two-thirds of human beings are suffering, hungry and poor? To be human we have to have compassion. This solidarity is really the defining factor of our humanity and is gradually being lost in a culture of material values. It’s not only the cry of the poor we must listen to but also the cry of the earth. The earth and human beings are both threatened. We must do something to change the situation….
There won’t be a Noah’s Ark to save only some of us. To meet people’s fundamental concerns, change is needed. The world as it is does not offer the majority of humanity life but rather hell. I believe that change is possible, because I cannot accept a God who could remain indifferent to this world, but only one who cares about the poor and the suffering.
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So you Americans who really want to help the poor have to change your own government first. You Americans who want to see an end to hunger and poverty have to take a stand. You have to fight just like we’re fighting—even harder. You have to be ready to be jailed, to be abused, to be repressed. And you have to have the character, the courage, the morale, and the spirit to confront whatever comes your way.
- Elvia Alvarado Don’t Be Afraid Gringo: A Honduran Woman Speaks from the Heart


By Frederick Buechner Source: The Longing for Home

Woe to us indeed if we forget the homeless ones who have no vote, no power, nobody to lobby for them, and who might as well have no faces even, the way we try to avoid the troubling sight of them in the streets of the cities where they roam like stray cats. And as we listen each night to the news of what happened in our lives that day, woe to us if we forget our own homelessness.
To be homeless the way people like you and me are apt to be homeless is to have homes all over the place but not to be really at home in any of them. To be really at home is to be really at peace, and our lives are so intricately interwoven that there can be no real peace for any of us until there is peace for all of us.

Jean Vanier
When I discover that I am accepted and loved as a person, with my strengths and weaknesses, when I discover that I carry within myself a secret, the secret of my uniqueness, then I can begin to open up to others and respect their secret. Each human being, however small or weak, has something to bring to humanity. As we start to really get to know others, as we begin to listen to each other’s stories, things begin to change. We begin the movement from exclusion to inclusion, from fear to trust, from closedness to openness, from judgment and prejudice to forgiveness and understanding. It is a movement of the heart.
It is not just a question of performing good deeds for those who are excluded but of being open and vulnerable to them in order to receive the life that they can offer; it is to become their friends. If we start to include the ‘disadvantaged’ in our lives and enter into heartfelt relationships with them, they will change things in us. They will call us to be people of mutual trust, to take time to listen and be with each other. They will call us out from our individualism and need for power into belonging to each other and being open to others. They will break down the prejudices and protective walls that gave rise to exclusion in the first place. They will then start to affect our human organizations, revealing new ways of being and walking together.
So, the one-way street, where those on top tell those at the bottom what to do, what to think, and how to be, becomes a two-way street, where we listen to what they, the ‘outsiders,’ the ’strangers,’ have to say and we accept what they have to give, that is, a simpler and more profound understanding of what it means to be truly human.
If we start to see people ‘at the bottom’ as friends, as people with gifts to bring to others, then the social pyramid, with the powerful, the knowledgeable, and the wealthy on top, becomes a place of belonging where each person finds their place and where we live in mutual trust.
Is this a Utopian vision? If it is lived at the grassroots level, in families, communities, and other places of belonging, this vision can gradually permeate our societies and humanize them.
I’m not suggesting for a moment that each one of us must welcome into our homes all those who are marginalized. I am suggesting that if each one of us, with our gifts and weaknesses, our capacities and our needs, opens our heart to a few people who are different and become their friends, receive life from them, our societies would change. This is the way of the heart.
Jean Vanier is the founder of L’Arche, a network of communities in 30 countries for people with intellectual disabilities and their assistants. This writing is from his book, Becoming Human.

I ONCE heard a wise priest say, in a meditation on gratitude, that we should be especially grateful for whatever breaks our hearts. Reflecting on God’s promise to write "upon" our hearts rather than "within" them, he suggested that our own hearts are so hard that all God can do is write upon the surface (Jer. 31:33). It is only when our hearts break, that they break open: then the word of God can enter deeply, like a seed in a harrowed field.
Perhaps this heartbroken availability is the "gift of tears" the desert fathers prized so highly, and urged each other to seek so urgently. … But in a special mercy, not only the specifically prayed-for tears of the ascetics will avail us this vision and this ministry: the ordinary sorrows of an ordinary life will suffice.
- Deborah Smith Douglas "Wounded and Healed" From p. 23 of Weavings Journal, March/April 2000.
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This Devotion or Spiritual Practice Exercise is on words and language ;
what and how we communicate with each other
Be mindful and careful with your words.. We use them all day long, both giving and receiving. It is one of the most powerful things that we do each day. As a group these words can hurt or help us in community. Listen to how you hear language being used around you. How will you let Christ speak though you today? How do words shape your actions and feedings and altitudes. How are you listening?

Consider the following statements.

By Margaret Wheatley Source: Turning to One Another

A gesture of love is anything we do that helps others discover their humanity. Any act where we turn to one another. Open our hearts. Extend ourselves. Listen. Any time we’re patient. Curious. Quiet. Engaged…. Conversation does this—it requires that we extend ourselves, that we open our minds and hearts a bit more, that we turn to someone, curious about how they live their life.
Speaking to each other involves risk. It’s often difficult to extend ourselves, to let down our guard, especially with those we fear or avoid. When we’re willing to overcome our fear and speak to them, that is a gesture of love. Strangely, what we say is not that important. We have ended the silence that keeps us apart.


By Dietrich Bonhoeffer Source: Life Together
It must be a decisive rule of every Christian fellowship that each individual is prohibited from saying much that occurs to him….
Where this discipline of the tongue is practiced right from the beginning, each individual will make a matchless discovery. He will be able to cease from constantly scrutinizing the other person, judging him, condemning him…. Now he can allow the brother to exist as a completely free person, as God made him to be.
Now the other person, in the freedom with which he was created, becomes the occasion of joy, whereas before he was only a nuisance and an affliction. God does not will that I should fashion the other person according to the image that seems good to me, that is, in my own image; rather in his very freedom from me, God made this person in His image. I can never know beforehand how God’s image should appear in others.

Scripture: Read James 3
What was the most helpful or encouraging word that your heard all day? How will you consider your words tomorrow?