Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase “each other“
doesn’t make any sense.
Rumi
(Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi was a 13th century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar,
Sufi mystic and theologian.)
Reflection
Have you ever had the kind of spiritual experience that Rumi is describing? The kind where we feel close to God and all that is the mystery that is God. When all that separates us from other people disappears and we disappear into the universe.
It can happen anytime, anywhere – in church, in community, in nature – anywhere. Those special moments in our lives – marriage, birth of children, baptism, birthdays and anniversaries almost always have some element where our hearts are near to bursting with the moment.
Rumi lets us see that space where the judgments of right and wrong whichseem to prevail in our lives are suspended. The present opens up to let everyone and everything just be without us having to worry – well about anything – not about ourselves, not about who other people are, not about what they think of us or anything else – it all gets blurred in the moment.Everything just is.
The saddest, most profoundly dark moments like illness, tragedy and death also seem to bring us close to God and erase those boundaries between us. Those times when all we can do is pour our hearts out in prayer. Prayer that falls as tears and undoes us. We may be self-confident purposeful individuals in our everyday lives but sometimes, in a moment, We are lost in the profoundness of whatever it is we are facing or have had to endure. And there is only the vastness of the moment and, hopefully, at some point, the peace of God’s presence.
There is a place in our minds and our hearts that calls to us to see ourselves in this universe and as part of the wonderful creation which God called good in Genesis. To be in that place is just a step away from who we are most of the time. It is a step closer to all those things we cherish people and animals, nature, the air we breathe, the water we drink – all those people and things different from us yet integral to us and and interwoven into our lives.
Rumi’s poem is at once a reminder and an invitation.
This Call and Response song has music written by Brian Hoover and he adapts Rumi’s poem - I know some of you don’t know the tune but who knows what the future holds! Thanks to Maggie Timms for introducing me to this song.
Out beyond
All right and wrong
There is a field
I’ll meet you there
Out beyond
All right and wrong
There is a field
I’ll meet you there
I’ll meet you there, we’ll dance all night
I’ll meet you there beyond all wrong and right
Prayer
God of Mystery
God of the universe
We live in such a time of upheaval
that we are overwhelmed by the calls for our attention.
We fear for the health of our communities
and the forests we depend on
and the water that is home for many creatures.
We know that all people matter and every child matters
And yet justice seems elusive and people are still being brutalized and traumatized and stigmatized because of their religion or the colour of their skin or where they were born
Help us, O God, to see this creation of yours as a whole
A whole person
A whole community
A whole world
A whole universe
Help us to envision the wholeness
That was there in the creation that you pronounced good
Help us to work toward a wholeness that provides for those who have little, those who are homeless, those who are ill, those who are lonely,-
bring into their lives the wholeness we all seek.
Help us to be your whole people together
In the name of Jesus the Christ
Who taught us to pray saying
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
there is a field. I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase “each other“
doesn’t make any sense.
Rumi
(Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi was a 13th century Persian poet, jurist, Islamic scholar,
Sufi mystic and theologian.)
Reflection
Have you ever had the kind of spiritual experience that Rumi is describing? The kind where we feel close to God and all that is the mystery that is God. When all that separates us from other people disappears and we disappear into the universe.
It can happen anytime, anywhere – in church, in community, in nature – anywhere. Those special moments in our lives – marriage, birth of children, baptism, birthdays and anniversaries almost always have some element where our hearts are near to bursting with the moment.
Rumi lets us see that space where the judgments of right and wrong whichseem to prevail in our lives are suspended. The present opens up to let everyone and everything just be without us having to worry – well about anything – not about ourselves, not about who other people are, not about what they think of us or anything else – it all gets blurred in the moment.Everything just is.
The saddest, most profoundly dark moments like illness, tragedy and death also seem to bring us close to God and erase those boundaries between us. Those times when all we can do is pour our hearts out in prayer. Prayer that falls as tears and undoes us. We may be self-confident purposeful individuals in our everyday lives but sometimes, in a moment, We are lost in the profoundness of whatever it is we are facing or have had to endure. And there is only the vastness of the moment and, hopefully, at some point, the peace of God’s presence.
There is a place in our minds and our hearts that calls to us to see ourselves in this universe and as part of the wonderful creation which God called good in Genesis. To be in that place is just a step away from who we are most of the time. It is a step closer to all those things we cherish people and animals, nature, the air we breathe, the water we drink – all those people and things different from us yet integral to us and and interwoven into our lives.
Rumi’s poem is at once a reminder and an invitation.
This Call and Response song has music written by Brian Hoover and he adapts Rumi’s poem - I know some of you don’t know the tune but who knows what the future holds! Thanks to Maggie Timms for introducing me to this song.
Out beyond
All right and wrong
There is a field
I’ll meet you there
Out beyond
All right and wrong
There is a field
I’ll meet you there
I’ll meet you there, we’ll dance all night
I’ll meet you there beyond all wrong and right
Prayer
God of Mystery
God of the universe
We live in such a time of upheaval
that we are overwhelmed by the calls for our attention.
We fear for the health of our communities
and the forests we depend on
and the water that is home for many creatures.
We know that all people matter and every child matters
And yet justice seems elusive and people are still being brutalized and traumatized and stigmatized because of their religion or the colour of their skin or where they were born
Help us, O God, to see this creation of yours as a whole
A whole person
A whole community
A whole world
A whole universe
Help us to envision the wholeness
That was there in the creation that you pronounced good
Help us to work toward a wholeness that provides for those who have little, those who are homeless, those who are ill, those who are lonely,-
bring into their lives the wholeness we all seek.
Help us to be your whole people together
In the name of Jesus the Christ
Who taught us to pray saying
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
