Opening to the Spirit
Today's Word: Now
With what the Buddhists call a beginner’s mind everything in life can be like that first bite. mind and spirit. To experience the warmth of the sudsy water slipping over our hands, the beauty of form in shiny spoon and open cup. When I remember to do this, washing the dishes becomes the most important thing I can do, because it is the only thing I am doing. Because, as the master of mindfulness reminds us, if we're not living in the now at the sink, chances are slim we are in the now when we sit down to tea afterward, or read the paper, or sweep the floor.
The Sufi poet Kabir said, we live in "the tiniest house of time." Isn't eternity a series of countless nows strung together in a long chain we call time? Now is now, this moment, and now this one. Whatever has gone before, whatever comes after - now is the only moment we truly own. now. Instead of thinking about what it means intellectually we will experience what it is saying to us right now.
When we are not engaged explicitly in what others might recognize as spiritual practice we are still praying without ceasing. Our prayer is our presence. We engage in conversation and really listen. We see the person in front of us and love them just as they are, without any need for them to change or to do anything for us. We enjoy God’s creation, really tasting our food and really seeing the beauty that is around us. The suffering of others is felt in our own bodies – quite literally as compassion – and we do not look away.
Everything is happening now. Anything else is only our commentary about it. Whatever we think we should have done differently in the past or whatever we might worry about in the future is all in our minds. Right here, right now, this is where God is and always has been. There is no need to wait.
~~~ One word, three voices this time (one of us on vacation) - we invite you to reflect with us. If you were that fourth voice, what would you say? What does it mean to live in the NOW?
~~~ Rev. Mead Baldwin pastors the Hatley, Waterville & North Hatley United Churches; Rev. Lynn Dillabough is now Rector of St. Paul's in Brockville ON. She continues to write for this column as a dedicated colleague with the Eastern Townships clergy writing team; Rev. Lee Ann Hogle ministers to the Ayer’s Cliff, Magog & Georgeville United Churches; Rev. Carole Martignacco pastors Uuestrie – the Unitarian Universalists in North Hatley.