Invite - Christian Lindbeck

Hope Rises - Christian Lindbeck (Matt. 5:14-16; Acts 2)

Taking soundings 
of our surroundings
is wisdom.
Awareness of the direction
our shadow falls
lends specificity
and 
orientation.

Hope chirrups from the bushes,
hinting at
an invitation
to follow
the leaf-strewn path.
Hope welcomes
and whispers,
seeks out
and 
cherishes the unlovely.
Hope is a glimpse,
a glimmer
of possibility;
a light penetrating
through dark brambles,
a previous prison.

Hope is a minuscule seed
buried in the tomb
of earth,
pregnant with potential.

Just imagine
the hope that spawns hope -
just imagine
the dreams
that can become actual
and transform lives.

Earth's naval
is an eddy, 
spinning God's-breath
vortexes,
ever-widening circles
of power
flows to enliven
a dead sea,
resurrecting
and restoring all
it touches.
Come.
Drink freely.

And each who drinks,
from each will flow
life-giving liquid,
precious drops
of sparkling hope,
glistening tiaras,
chandelier mirrors
multiplying
dancing flickers
like sparks
dotting
and igniting
the night 
sky.

First the Good News, now This - Tim Knipp (Matt. 6, 11, 13)

"Are you He?
Tell me please - "
Healer, helper,
tender teacher,
spotlit traveler
through a world
of grief.
Are You the answer
and if so, why
do questions 
persist like
carrion flies?

Take a tiny seed and sow it -
in time it becomes a tree;
grains of yeast hidden,
will raise dough to 
overflow
the bowl.

Ages overlap,
like tectonic plates,
shifting,
shaking,
lifting and rumbling
to break and change
the landscape.
Your Kingdom come
in this place and time:
melting hearts like 
lava oozing
from stone,
shake and shiver
souls 
to unite islands,
let continents collide
and coalesce.

Seek it and we will 
see it,
breathe it in 
and it will penetrate
our pores,
animate our limbs
and infect
our finances.

Your Kingdom come
here and now
amid these smelly
ruins;
dip your rags
in our blood and 
bandage our 
splintered hearts;
plant hope again,
in the deep 
and the 
dark.

Rest: Outside series - Christian Lindbeck (Ps. 4:8)

Blessed, blessed rest;
letting go, releasing all,
succumbing
to somnolence.
Essential essence,
mysterious,
dark,
unnerving,
sleep is a reminder
that I am not the center.

Vulnerable.
Inert.
Unable to act,
we humbly sleep
while God does His work.

Sleep: a daily invitation
to accept limitation,
to trust the larger story,
to put myself
in perspective.

What am I?
A vapor,
a child whose father 
never sleeps,
limited,
broken
and in need of
recuperation.

Nature-sleeps
are heaven's vitamins:
the breath of plants
mingles with human inhalations,
trees calm
and dirt heals.

Breathe deep
the healing rhythms
of earth's fauna
and flora.
Respire
as ocean waves
roll in upon sand
then suction 
seaward
again
and 
again.

Sleep
and trust.
Sleep and trust.
Sleep
is
trust.

OUTSIDE -Tim Knipp - On the Mountain - Matt. 5, Ezra 27:16, Is. 2, Lu. 6:12

July 22, 2018

Notes from the Texas road. Thanks for the sermons on the Hillcrest website 

Outside Series - Christian Lindbeck - Listening Outside Psalm 148, Psalm 19 Romans 1

Finally got to listen to some of the message we've missed while on our epic road trip. We are listening in our trusty Honda on the bumpy Texas highway.

Tend and Protect: Outside Series - Tim Knipp (Gen. 4:9; 2:15; Num. 3:7; 8:26; 18:5)

We have been
called to care for
and tend 
our world
and one another.
Working in concert
with the giver of life -
trimming
and weeding
and feeding - 
we are rewarded
with beauty,
sustenance,
the promise of 
shalom.

Priests to the earth,
we kneel
to render our
work of 
service-worship.
Adorning earth's temple,
we mow grass
and shovel manure:
our holy orders.

Let us be shaped
and pruned
as we serve
and protect,
keep and tend.

Growing things
reveal intricacies 
of God's character,
like peeling layers
of onion releases
pungencies,
earthy and sharp;
as planting a seed
in darkness 
begins a process
of new life -
buried
to rise anew.