Dear Friends,

On our spiritual pilgrimage, one of our favorite stories in our heritage depicts Jacob lying down to sleep and taking a stone in that place to use as a pillow (Genesis 28: 10-17). He dreams of a ladder going from heaven to earth with angels ascending and descending on it. God approaches him and promises, "Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go." When he wakes up in the morning, Jacob says, "God is in this very place and I didn't even know it…How awesome is this place! This is none other than the House of God, and this is the Gate of Heaven." This first Sunday of Lent, at our liturgy, we will give each of you a stone to dream on. We invite you to take it home with you and, if you wish, place it under your pillow to dream on. Your very house, your very being, will reveal itself to you as the House of God, the Gate of Heaven. In placing the stone under your pillow, we anticipate that even as you sleep, your every breath will be praising God and God will be with you revealing God's love for you even as you sleep. (Dreams, as you might remember, are a very powerful place where God reveals.) If you are not able to be with us this Sunday, perhaps you might like to choose a stone in your yard that 'speaks' to you!

We will use this stone as our symbol through this Lenten Season. In the temptation story which is the Gospel reading this first Sunday of Lent (we will use Matthew's version), the devil tells Jesus, "Command these stones to turn into bread." The context is that Jesus has been fasting for forty days but can feed himself by turning these stones into bread. On Palm Sunday, the Pharisees tell Jesus to stop his followers from shouting, "Hosanna!" and Jesus responds, "If these were silent, even the very stones would cry out in praise." (Luke 19:40). On Easter Sunday morning, the women keep asking who will roll back the stone. They find the stone rolled away and the Risen Jesus not immediately visible.

We invite you, during this Lenten Season, if you wish, to reflect on the many significances of stone in our tradition. To portray the responsiveness of God to us, Jesus asks, "What parent among you would give your child a stone when the child asks for bread" (Matthew 7:9). To portray the mysteriousness of God's ways, Jesus quotes the psalm, "The stone which the builders rejected, has become the cornerstone" (Matthew 21:42; 1 Peter 2:7). To invite to forgiveness, Jesus says to those about to condemn the woman found committing adultery, "Let the one among you without sin, cast the first stone" (John 8: 1-11). When Jesus cries over the death of his friend Lazarus, he commands the mourners to take away the stone, unbind Lazarus and let him go free (John 11: 38-44). Jesus establishes a new covenant with God's People, written not on stone, but on their hearts (Jeremiah 31:33, 2 Corinthians 3:3). We, like the early Christians, are invited: "Like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house" (1 Peter 2: 5). Many blessings for holy meditations as you build the "House of God "that is your life this Lenten Season.

All of this prompts us to hearken back to last Sunday's Gospel of the paralytic carried for healing by his four friends. Because any one of us can experience spiritual paralysis, there is another powerful aspect to this gospel story. It is that it was his friends, those who cared about the man who was paralyzed, who were instrumental in his healing. It is a strong message that we come to God through one another. It was his 'community' who "opened up space" for him to meet Jesus; it was his community who "broke through" on his behalf. We need one another, and this story is an unassailable account of the hefty impact we have on one another's faith and healing. We may not all have the physical strength to manually carry one another; but together we can harness the spiritual strength to bring one another home.

If you are seeking community to support you as you open your personal Gate of Heaven, we invite you to join us at Spirit of Life. As a community, we try wholeheartedly to "be Christ" to one another, to tend to the needs of one another, and to those in need in our world. Together, we celebrate our belief that we are being transformed by God's grace as we gather together in prayer. We warmly invite you to come and gather with us at our Table, and join in our experience of the "kin-dom" of God. We are an inclusive, open, affirming and interactive community, deeply committed to being a people of "justice and joy."

May your dreams reveal God's love and peace, and nourish your soul,

Find more about past weekly reflections and podcasts in our ARCHIVE PAGE.