Tuesday Prayer for 3-31-15: Always Again

Dear God:

I remember one of those times I was holding my head in my hands.

My heart was in my throat and beating so fast it was making it difficult to breathe.

My heart was beating so hard it felt like it was rocking my body.

I had failed.  

I had failed, badly.

My failure had caused other people pain and I was so sorry and so ashamed and it was so clear that any sense of worth was spilling at my feet like loose change.

I could talk about how things got better. I could talk about how important that moment was. I could say all these things but,

what is also true,

is that, well…

We are all time travelers of sorts and these are times we visit everyday. As I remember this one, my heart leans towards the places it was at this moment and starts to do some of the things it did. These moments are not in the “was.” This moment is always with me.

Lent comes when it comes. Its not just forty days once a year but a part of

every

forty

minutes

along with sabbath and Easter and funerals and baptisms and all these other things that mark the times as broken and beautiful. Lent comes along and we are at the table as our love and our betrayal and our failure and our hope and our pain share bread and wine in the presence of genuine belly laughs and smiles forced around gritting teeth.

This, we find, is what wholeness is. Healing becomes integration.

This is the truth that sets us free and defeats the fear of death eventually (though not forever).

I remember one of those times I was holding my head in my hand and, then, taking a deep breath. I remember sitting up, looking around and sighing. I remember looking up, stretching my back, tipping back my head, placing my hands on my knees, and getting ready.

Amen.