The Mystery of Grace

Grace conferred on my head by a bishop and eight priests 
as I knelt there praying for the courage to accept God's plans for me.  
I wondered if I'd feel anything at all; anything different. 
And one friend, who had said she could not be there, was among them. 
Not vested. I hadn't seen her arrive. 
But there she was, smiling at my surprise.
And suddenly, I glimpsed................. grace. 

Grace was everywhere that sunny day in June, 
but that one friend who came and surprised me?  
That defined it. 
That ephemeral mystery of God's grace. 
An extended hand, calling on the Holy Spirit to make me into something
impossible for me to do alone; something God asked me to do. 
Grace. 

It does not leave us where it found us. 

The Donkey

No one thinks much about the donkey that took center stage on Palm Sunday so many years ago, yet Scripture is replete with these "sideliners" who we know were present, yet are pretty much ignored. 

• I think about the innkeeper in Bethlehem that chilly night so long ago. Did he ever return to the manger? Did he see the multitude of the heavenly host? Or the baby wrapped in swaddling cloths?
• And I wonder about those guys who circled Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well with stones in their fists. We know that not one threw a rock, but were they changed? Where did they slink off to when they left the scene, one by one? 
• And did the bride at the wedding at Cana ever find out that Jesus saved the day when her father ran low on wine? Did she ever thank Jesus? Or ask him how he did it? 

What became of these essential figurines in our faith who don't receive but a passing mention?
And what do they have to tell us about our own humanity? Poet Mary Oliver pointed me to their simple existence with her obscure poem called "The Poet Thinks about the Donkey."   Oliver drew my attention to not just the donkey, but all the others. What wisdom do these sideliners have to impart to us? She made me wonder about my own "donkey-ness" as I seek to deepen my relationships with the Lord and with others. 

What wisdom can the donkey impart to us? Here's the poem: 

                                            The Poet Thinks about the Donkey

                                                                                                                          

                               On the outskirts of Jerusalem

                               the donkey waited.

                               Not especially brave, or filled with understanding,

                               he stood and waited.

                               How horses, turned out in the meadow,

                                    leap with delight!

                              How doves, released from their cages,

                                    clatter away, splashed with sunlight!

                           But the donkey, tied to a tree as usual, waited.

                           Then he let himself be led away.

                              Then he let the stranger mount.

                              Never had he seen such crowds!

                              And I wonder if he at all imagined what was to happen.

                              Still, he was what he had always been: small, dark, obedient.

                              I hope, finally, he felt brave.

                              I hope, finally, he loved the man who rode so lightly upon him,

                              as he lifted one dusty hoof and stepped, as he had to, forward.

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-                                              - Mary Oliver