Monday Morning Meditation #49: Relationships Are Two-Sided

As I worked on this post, I read and read and read. I read all the way through 2 Chronicles. Nothing touched me. Then I bored into Nehemiah. Nothing touched me. So I read more, and still nothing touched me. Then I understood what was happening. I was reading for me. I was waiting for something to touch me. But it is not about me. (Golly, how hard it is to internalize that truth.) Then, at last, I did what I usually do before I begin reading. I asked God what He wanted me to take away from the reading, what He wanted me to put into this post. Shortly after that, the words of Nehemiah 9 reached out and stopped me. This is a beautiful and striking passage, one worth reading slowly, in detail, over and over. (The meditation will be more meaningful, I think, if you do the reading now and make your own assessment of the text before reading mine.)

Reading: Nehemiah 9.

Meditation: When I started out reading, I was committing the same mistake that the Israelis were described as making. I forgot that relationships are two-way, not one-way. The Israelis moved along, self-absorbed in their lives; I moved along, self-absorbed in my reading. All the time, God kept performing miracle after miracle for them, providing for them, and forgiving them their arrogant ignorance of Him, of the other side of the relationship. In my case, I spent years literally as a blest atheist; God kept performing miracles in my life that I did not see, providing for me although I did not notice, and forgiving me for the one-sided relationship. This morning, as I read, He stayed in the background, patiently waiting for that moment when I would remember that I was not reading for myself but for Him, when I would remember that I did not move from writing for academic presses to writing for Him by my own decision but by His direction, and, most important, when I would remember that there is no relationship without the participation of both parties.

I always begin the lectio part of lectio divina with a short prayer for guidance. This morning, the prayer was so short as not to exist, and I got exactly what I asked for: nothing. When I remembered that there were two of us involved her, confessed my failing, and asked for help, I got the help I needed, as did the Israelis in this story in Nemehia when they confessed their sins and renewed their covenant with God.

Contemplation: That is far as I can go with you this Monday morning. I must retire to private prayer to thank God for giving me yet another chance, to praise Him for His capacity for forgiveness, to repent for any time that I might have tried to go it alone, forgetting that relationships are two-sided, and to ask God to keep tapping me on the shoulder when I become selfishly oblivious to His presence as much as I regret that obliviousness later. Then I will spend as much time as I can in contemplation, my favorite part of the day, letting God take over the direction in which my relationship with Him moves.

I will leave you to your prayer and contemplation, but first, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I hope you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation posts. (During the week, he also posts great homilies and other thoughtful discussions. I enjoy reading those, too.)

For additional inspiration throughout the week, I would point out two sets of blogs: (1) the list of devotional blogs that follow the enumeration of Monday Morning Meditations on the sidebar of this blog and (2) my blogroll, where I am following a number of inspirational priests and writers about spiritual matters. I learn so very much from all these people. I highly recommend them to you.

Monday Morning Meditation #12: An Impatient People

This week, ploughing through chapters of Exodus that contain the laws that God gave to His people, I recognized the initial corpus of regulations for British common law upon which US law rests. Informative enough to require reflection!

After wondering whether I was being set up to become an overnight lawyer, I reached the more interesting (to me) story of how the Israelites grew tired of waiting for Moses -- there were, after all, a lot of laws being handed down -- and coerced Aaron into making a golden calf for them to worship. Of course, God was angry. Moses was so angry that he broke the tablets containing the Ten Commandments.

Reading: Exodus 32: 1-6

Meditation: I cannot help but see immense parallel between the Israelites' attitude and the attitude that I see on a daily basis, and, admittedly, even have at times adopted myself. The Israelites were not the only impatient people!

So many times I have heard people say that God did not answer their prayer. My catechism kids, for example, in their moments of greater skepticism will say that God does not care about them or will even question whether God exists because they did not get the answer to prayer that they wanted in precisely the manner they wanted at precisely the time that they wanted. Beyond understanding that "no" is a legitimate answer, they often need to be led to consider the possibilities that (1) God's answer will be better for them in the long run, (2) sometimes we want and ask for things that we should not have, and (3) that seemingly unanswered prayers may simply be prayers that have not been answered yet. I cannot recall not having a prayer answered, but I can recall longer waits than I would have liked and often getting answers I had not anticipated -- better answers, more creative answers, la chose juste that is beyond my capacity to conceive even though I am an inveterate out-of-the-box thinker. (My daughter, Lizzie, insists that I have not yet found the box.)

Deep down we know that patience is a virtue. Don't many of us pray for patience? But, as the joke goes, don't we often tell God that we want more patience, and we want it right now? Yes, we are an impatient people.

Sufis consider waiting to be a virtue that God requires of them. I have a Sufi friend, a poet, whose life has embodied this virtue and whose writing is filled with it. Deep down we, too, know the value of waiting. Don't we say that we often receive greater enjoyment in the anticipation than in the receiving of something? When we receive something for which we have long waited, don't we attach greater meaning to it? Ah, yes, we do that and know that, but nonetheless we are an impatient people.

And that is far as I can go with you on this Monday morning. I must retire to prayer to ask God for that proverbial patience, to express my regret for my daily moments of impatience, especially in those cases when I don't rein in or hide my impatience well in working with employees, to give thanks for God's great kindness in not becoming angry with me as with the Israelites (at least, I have never seen His anger, but then I have not yet made any golden calves -- fortunately, I don't have the gold, literal or allegorical, to do that), to offer praise for the ways in which He leads me to develop patience by the practice of waiting, and especially to tell Him that I know He spoils me far more often than I deserve (but I like it) by not making me wait very long at all.

After that, I will spend some time in contemplation, patiently abiding in His presence, which is the most joyful start to the day that I have ever experienced.

I will now leave you to your prayer and contemplation, but first, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I hope you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation.

Have a good day and a spirit-filled week, and may you find the patience you need in dealing with others and the trust to wait for responses to prayers not yet answered.

If you pick this up as a weekly devotional activity, please share with me and others your own thoughts about the message of Exodus 32: 1-6 or any other scripture that you choose for meditation. Feel free to copy the image of the mission church; maybe some time in the near future my Internet-inept self will be able to figure out how to use the Mr. Linky buttons, but to date I remain incompetent at the more sophisticated blog stuff. In the interim, you are welcome to use the image and share the meme of Monday Morning Meditation for starting out the work week closer to God.