Ponderings of the General Presbyter of the Presbytery of Sheppards and Lapsley

Sue Westfall

April 10, 2023

 

Christ is Risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

With joy yesterday the church declared the great mystery of our faith, Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again! With heavenly chorus and full brass the church moves out of the somber season of Lent into the joy of Eastertide in which we celebrate Christ’s victory over death and our death-dealing ways.  And we are invited into this new world to be new. So I share a reflection from Wendell Berry, the Kentucky farmer turned poet, as he invites us to practice resurrection.

 

So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion – put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn’t go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

How will you practice resurrection in this Eastertide?

 

As ever in prayer,

Sue