S U N D A Y
Love Our Souls + September Restful Things link: Week 17 of Ordinary Time
Before you begin…
Tonight is the first Restful Things Zoom conversation for paid subscribers! You’re invited to join me live as I reflect on both the simple and profound invitations to rest I’ve experienced this month. This is a practice that helps me recall what I’m learning about the restful way of Jesus, and I think you’ll love it!
The conversation is also a teaser for my monthly What I Learned newsletter. If you browse through past versions, you’ll notice everything is welcome in this conversation— from the extraordinary experiences to the ordinary daily discoveries. I’ll guide us through a few minutes of quiet reflection, give a preview of what I’ll be sharing in my September What I Learned post, and invite you to tell us about a couple of things you’ve learned about rest this month.
Don’t worry. I won’t put anyone on the spot. If listening in rather than sharing is more your style, you are welcome to the conversation, too!
Restful Things conversation tonight!, 7:30-8:45 p.m. (Eastern)
See Zoom link below
If you are a paid subscriber, I hope you’ll join us. If you’re not, subscribe now to see the Zoom link below. You’ll also have access to the full recording of the conversation in next week’s newsletter!
Sunday’s scripture
Jonah 3:10—4:11; Psalm 145:14-21v; Philippians 1:21-27; Matthew 20:1-16
This week we are contemplating what it means to love our souls.
Our readings today offer insight into the temptation to hoard God’s indiscriminate love and mercy to all people. With Jonah, we are reminded that sometimes on the heels of God’s powerful affection for humanity and mysterious movement in the hearts of people, we are tempted to feel shortchanged in some way. Our capacity to hold God’s love can wither when our souls are fatigued.
I’m reminded of Elijah running into the wilderness after God’s powerful movement at the altars of Baal. God moved powerfully in Ninevah, and while Jonah is famous for running away first and Elijah afterward, both of them share a similar aftermath. They are tired and they feel alone, left to question the goodness of God for them personally. Their souls wither in the heat and fatigue of participating in God’s loving and powerful action in the presence of their enemies.
Through these seven weeks, as we’ve alternated between facets of loving our neighbor and loving ourselves, we’ve meditated on four imperatives and three invitations. We’ve considered the biblical commands to love our neighbors with acts of hospitality, generosity, justice, and forgiveness and to love ourselves as body and mind. Today we conclude with the third invitation to love our souls.
In his book, Bobby Gross begins this chapter about loving our souls acknowledging that “the concepts of soul (psyche) and spirit (pneuma) each carry a range of meanings, which at points overlap, as do the concepts of heart and soul.” I would have loved for him to include a chapter on loving our hearts as a way to consider what it means to welcome ourselves as emotional beings, and I think his emphasis here on taking care of our souls gets close. The soul, as I’ve come to understand it, is the sum of all our parts, our true, God-created selves. [The Bible Project offers a wonderful series about these distinct parts of our personhood here.]
With that in mind, I’ve recorded myself reading an excerpt from my book, The Spacious Path: Practicing the Restful Way of Jesus, that focuses on our true selves as the whole person who is created beloved, named beloved, and invited to rest in the belovedness of Jesus. I hope that you’ll take some time this week to listen to the state of your soul and I’ve written a prayer to help you respond to the belovedness Jesus shares with us. You’ll find the written and audio versions below.
Today’s image is a new favorite from Homer Winslow. While it more directly reflects the Scripture passages we’ll be reading throughout the week, I loved meditating on the hints I see of Jonah finding shelter under the vine and the weary harvesters in Matthew.
Since this newsletter is named Restful, it probably won’t surprise you that I never get tired of musical interpretations of Jesus’ astounding invitation in Matthew 11:28-30 and I love that The Porter’s Gate keeps returning to the passage too. I recommend you click play to listen to the song as you observe the image. What do you notice? What do you feel?
May I invite you to give attention to the state of your soul, and open yourself to God’s loving and healing presence as you look, listen, read, pray, and practice today’s meditation.
Restfully,
Tamara
