Traveling Light Relay

Behind all things
behind the grey surface
there is a glory escaping
born of heaven
and belongs to heaven
a light that welcomes
a more profound way of seeing things
that transfigures the world
that casts a spell of hope
that sees the glory in the cross
and life within death
it is a glory
that meets us here
on this mountain
where Jesus Christ
covered in the dust of the world
is caught up in the glory of heaven
welcome to the mountain

— by Rev. Roddy Hamilton

Christ has planted his Table like an oasis along our pathway, in order that when we become weary with travel, weak and hungry in our souls, discouraged and wounded because of our false steps, stumbling, and failing, we may then enter there and be refreshed with the living Bread of Life.

— Carl Olof Rosenius (1816-1868),
a Lutheran lay preacher on the Eucharist as the viaticum, the pilgrim’s food

Life is deep and simple, and what our society gives us is shallow and complicated.

— Fred Rogers,
in Christianity Today

Home is the center of my being where I can hear the voice that’s says, ‘you are my beloved in who I am well pleased’. Jesus made it clear that the same voice that he heard in the Jordan River and on Mount Tabor can be heard by me. He makes it clear that there is a home with the father. But if I decide to keep control, if I go out into the world, I will keep running around asking everything, ‘do you really love me, do you really love me?’ I give all the power to the voices of the world. It is the world that defines me then. The world’s love is full of ifs, ‘yes I love you if you are good-looking, if you are intelligent, if you are well off, if you are educated, if you have connections, if you are productive’… endless ifs and it is not too hard to know when I have left home spiritually. Resentment, jealousy, desire for revenge, lust, greed, ambition, rivalry are all obvious signs that I have left home, that I am letting the world define me with its love full of ifs. But when I am home with the Father then I know I am the beloved. I can confront and console and admonish without any fear of rejection or need for affirmation, I can suffer persecution without the need for revenge or receive praise without using it as proof of my goodness.

— Henri Nouwen,
The Return of the Prodigal Son

If there’s one thing that comes through in every bit of the Christmas story, it’s that if you are a smart, sophisticated person and you insist only smart, sophisticated people have the truth, you’re not going to be much of a Christian. Maybe you’ll never become a Christian at all, but you certainly won’t be much of a Christian till you get over it. Jesus Christ, the gospel, Christmas, turns the world’s idea of success upside down.
All during Jesus’ life, the apostles and the disciples keep saying to him, “Jesus, when are you going to take power and save the world?” Jesus keeps saying, “I’m going to lose power to save the world.” They go, “Lord, when are you going to take power and save the world?” They don’t get it. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Absolutely.

— Timothy Keller
from a sermon preached in 1996

Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means at the point of highest reality. A chastity or honesty or mercy which yields to danger will be chaste or honest only on conditions. Pilate was merciful till it became risky.

— “Screwtape,” a senior devil, to his nephew, “Wormwood,”
in The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

To escape the distress caused by regret for the past or fear about the future, this is the rule to follow: leave the past to the infinite mercy of God, the future to his good providence; give the present wholly to his love by being faithful to his grace.

— Jean-Pierre de Caussade,
The Joy of the Saints