Friends,
Spring in Iowa is generous. Green grass, flowers, and weeds rise from our good soil. The trees outdo each other in producing leaves. The sun gives us long days and twilight evenings for sitting on the deck. Even the stars and the moon have been generous lately. Have you noticed? Soon sweet corn will generously fill with kernels and tomatoes will overflow with juice. It’s all gift.
In this spirit of generosity, I would like you to give a gift to yourself today. Take time.
Scratch that. We can’t "take" time. And we can’t make time either. We all have the same amount of time. Today use some time just pausing. Give yourself the gift of sitting peacefully. How much time is available for you to do this? 30 minutes? 15 minutes? 5 minutes? 3 minutes? (Good grief! What are you doing to yourself? If you only have 3 minutes, you are abusing time and yourself!) However much time you can spare, use it. And simply sit. Treat yourself like a friend and invite you to sit and mind-chat. Tell yourself about a time in your life when you felt at peace. Your grandmother’s kitchen? In the library at college? Walking the dog? Describe it all to your friend, you. Let you enjoy it. Be generous to you.
If I could, I would remove all the anxiety in the world. Anxiety is that mad mix of worry and fear that buzzes in our bones and keeps us regarding the world around us suspiciously as though it is all a threat and we have to be on guard. Anxiety requires our constant attention. It is a terrible thief robbing us of joy and peace. If we only have three minutes to sit quietly in peace in a day, it’s probably because anxiety is stealing a lot of the other 1,437 minutes.
I think if anxiety vanished if we didn’t spend so much of our souls dealing with it, we could spend our lives on the really good stuff. We could spend more time reading to kids, listening to the stories of the elderly, baking pies (I really like pie, not the weird kinds like raisin cream or gooseberry. The normal kind of pies, blueberry, and lemon meringue.) and making music. We could get to work cleaning up our poor dirty planet. We could grow more tomatoes and sweet corn. We could tackle the problems of the day, mental health, immigration, racism, poverty, and hunger, like friends working side by side, generous hearts, finding laughter, and joy in this good work.
To get there, I think we have to start by doing what God does, and what all creation does: being generous with our souls. Generosity breathed in and peace breathed out.
So, maybe 3 minutes today. And maybe 5 tomorrow? We have a way to go, but the path to the goodness of God begins in our hearts. Be generous. Give yourself a little gift today. It is spring in Iowa. Perhaps it can be spring in our lives too.
Blessings,
Pastor Cindy
Pastor Cindy Hickman
West Des Moines United Methodist Church
720 Grand Ave
West Des Moines, Iowa 50265
515-279-0826
Let’s worship together! Sunday morning. In-person at 9 am. Livestreaming at 9 a.m. Or a special online service at 9:30 a.m. Worship in the way that works for you.
Coming up at WDMUMC
Retiring Our Bell Ministry. Monday at 10:30 a.m. we will ring our bell one last time for the more than 6,070 people in Iowa who have died from covid. Watch online or come and watch in person. Thank our faithful bell ringers. This has been a sad and powerful ministry that has kept us mindful of those who grieve and the cost of this pandemic.
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