Brothers and sisters:
Have no anxiety at all, but in everything,
by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,
make your requests known to God.
Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers and sisters,
whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is just, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious,
if there is any excellence
and if there is anything worthy of praise,
think about these things.
Keep on doing what you have learned and received
and heard and seen in me.
Then the God of peace will be with you.
https://fathermikehomilies.fireside.fm/10823
This morning song lyrics from this song floated through my brain over and again and complemented Fr Mike Schmitz homily. And just like the musical earworm giving me snippets of the lyrics my brain is giving me snippets of this post, letting me know that I can tie all of the above together and yet it’s so quick that my fingers have a hard time keeping up with all the thoughts.
During Bible school one year I memorized Philippians 4, the whole thing. Can I recite it now? No. Do I recall this often, yes. In Fr Mike’s homily he reminded us that Paul was writing this from prison, a place he did not deserve to be. He was in prison for proclaiming Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, and the forgiveness of sin. And here Paul writes about trusting in God. As Fr Mike reflected on this scripture he gave the definition of anxiety, and while I knew this and sometimes experience being anxious I’m not sure that I would be able to define anxiety in this way, and given clear remedy for this. Paul gives the remedy right there: prayer and thanksgiving: essentially thanking God for all He’s given us and I don’t mean in the “thank you for life” or “thank you for the bar of dark chocolate with pistachios” kind of way, no this is much more specific focusing on all of the gifts God gives, and how He’s brought us through to where we are now. Things like morning coffee, preventing the vehicle collision, stitching my finger while quilting and not hitting the bone in my finger, holding hands with my husband, coming to understand my husband more deeply, the ways that my husband offers me opportunities to grow in patience and kindness that then stretch out and over others as I’ve had practice Being patient.
And then giving to God, sharing with God, all the things that are on my heart and mind – from the what I have to/need to do and for friends, and quilts and video to edit and making dinner (this is frustration inducing lemme tell ya) and insight into the books I’m reading and here’s what I’m concerned about as I enter formation as a spiritual director. And Holy Spirit I need the words here in this conversation and all that jazz. And Lord, I have this childhood memory that is rather painful and I kinda live here in the pain of being abandoned or the wondering why this happened and I can still feel the physical pain of this. Help. “Help” is by far one of my favorite prayers. The thing about prayer, the harder part about prayer is that like a conversation with anyone we can see and hear it is important to stop and listen and wait for the response. In that moment, in those moments when I feel abandonment most deeply Jesus was with me. I was too little to know this deeply in that particular moment it is now I can see/feel that.
In those moments when I experienced great Joy He is there too. Thank you God for being with tme.
In those moments when faith seemed so sweet and easy, Jesus is there sipping wine and chatting with me.
In those moments when faith was so difficult that I nearly walked away Jesus is there, whispering for me to keep going, you’re almost through.
As I reflect this morning I am grateful for Paul’s letter to the Philippians. That I recall these words of encouragement when things seem to go kaflooie or are so beautiful I might miss it. I can see this morning how these words of Paul are tied to, wed to, John’s Gospel, specifically the conversation Jesus has with Martha. I’ve been wanting to bring these two together for a five minute presentation I need to give in two weeks. Now to tweak this to five minutes and keep it there. And I can tie it to the book we’re reading. Wow and Yeah and Thanks God.
This quilt, titled 49 pieces of Chocolat, has a missing piece. There is one piece of a 50 piece charm pack of a line called Chocolat that went missing in the vortex of my sewing room. This was, at the time, frustrating, however it does make for both good storytelling and exercises problem solving skills that quilters engage with great regularity. I love that I came up with a solution that both fits this quilt and is not always easily noticed. Even if it was this really doesn’t bother me in a way that would make me toss the quilt to the cats. Rather it reminds me that there is great beauty in flexibility. Oh and there’s more, and part of me desires to go on writing in these delightful platitudes about what quilts teach and how they help me grow. They do.
Then there is the desire to stitch all of this together: when we are looking at things, whether it’s a quilt we made or that someone else made, when we see flaws take the time to look for, to seek out and search for the good. When we see flaws in ourselves, while this is good, we must also take the time to seek out and search for the good in ourselves, giving God thanks for that and working on honing those skills, traits and gift. As we hone those skills we become proficient and better at them. This is in part, how we grow in gratitude. Practicing gratitude helps train us in recognizing the good and true and beautiful, just like practicing piecing, or practicing machine quilting helps us hone our overall quilting skills. We are, I am, often so afraid of making mistakes, making terrible content, or ugly quilts, that I get stuck, and miss out on the beauty of what I am able to do.
While my mad skill is machine quilting as evidenced by so many quilts, I still struggle with making thread choices, picking designs, and with the tension. This is part of what it means to be a machine quilter. It’s part of what it means to be a quilter period.
And so I give thanks.
God bless,
Teri
A Quilter's Heart 