Tag: Laurel Dykstra

Wild Lectionary: The mixology of Faith and Fear

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed Discipleship1 Comment
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Erazo-Paris Family Archives, circa May 1969

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 14 (19)

1 Kings 19:9-18 & Matthew 14:22-33

[Elijah] answered “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” 1 Kings 19:10

26But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” Matthew 14:27

By Priscilla Paris-Austin

Faith and fear seem to reside right next to each other in our world. I don’t know about you but I find this to be true in my family story over and over again. While the two seem incompatible, as I look back I can see how closely they are aligned, one driving me to the other, or moving me through its companion, until I find my way back to God’s enduring and steadfast love.

Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: The mixology of Faith and Fear” →

Wild Lectionary: Kingdom Like a Seed

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed Discipleship1 Comment
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wild mustard (public domain)

Eighth Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 12(17)

Matthew 13:31-32

This week’s Wild Lectionary offers two different but complimentary takes on the seed parables.

The first is a host of resources –devotions, bible studies, children’s curricula, adult education material etc. prepared by A Rocha Canada for churches that are new to engaging with creation care. The free downloadable materials are focused on Good Seed Sunday, celebrated the Sunday after Earth Day, but are also relevant for the Season of Creation and this summer stretch of Year A in the Revised Common Lectionary where we visit the seed parables in Matthew.

The second offering is excerpts from an essay by Jim Perkinson: Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Kingdom Like a Seed” →

Wild Lectionary: Earthkeepers

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Nelson leads prayers on Burnaby Mountain in the path of the Kinder Morgan pipeline.

Seventh Sunday After Pentecost
Proper 11 (16)
Romans 8:12-25

By Nelson Lee

I am an engineer working to address climate change, writing from the Coast Salish Seas where the city of Vancouver, BC has been established. First son of a refugee from China and an immigrant from Germany, both fleeing war. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Earthkeepers” →

Wild Lectionary: The Good Seed

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Sole Food pic
Photo credit: Kelsey Brick

Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 10 (15)
Ps. 65:9-13; Is. 55:10-13; Mt. 13:1-9, 18-23

By Jason Wood

Seeds, seeds, seeds.

Three of six of the appointed texts for today talk about them. The Psalmist refers to seeds implicitly, praising YHWH as the source of life-giving rains, fertile fields, and abundant harvests. Isaiah meditates upon seeds as the inevitable byproduct of the rain watering the earth, assuring his audience that, in the same way, God’s word is fruitful and effective. And Matthew relates one of Jesus’ most well-known parables, one of broad-scattered seed, thwarted growth, and stunningly rich production from the few that fall on good soil. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: The Good Seed” →

Wild Lectionary: Seeking at the Essence

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Screen shot 2011-04-02 at 11.49.13 AM
Women at the well in Akot, South Sudan

Fifth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 9 (14)

Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67

By Judith Doll

Water – the essence of life. It is absolutely necessary for all living things to survive and has been since the beginning of time.

Water – Where does it come from? From the rain, falling from the heavens; from the streams, the rivers, the lakes, the ocean, and the rivers under the earth accessible by wells. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Seeking at the Essence” →

Wild Lectionary: Reintegrating God in Everything

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imageBy Naim Edwards

(This post is a Bonus Wild Lectionary Reflection from the readings a month ago)

The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. Acts 17:24-25

Clifton and Vanessa named me Naim Kenyatta. We are the descendants of Black West Africans (and an Irishmen or two) taken from their homelands and transplanted to these so-called United States of America. Our lineage has been traced back twelve generations geographically all the way to Maryland and Virginia. Besides that, we understand that forced separation from our indigenous language and region has essentially vanquished all direct ties to Africa. My family has been here since before the U.S. was even the U.S. We are more American than America, yet most Black people continue to be treated like second class citizens. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Reintegrating God in Everything” →

Dear Little Men

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, UncategorizedLeave a comment

8400446437(1).jpgBy Laurel Dykstra, Salal and Cedar

Dear Little Men,

Thank you. I was completely baffled by the book that you sequel, Little Women. My mother loved it; she wanted me to love it. Girly classmates adored it and tried to enjoin me in their effusing in a “you like books and I like this one book so we totally have this thing in common right?” way. Continue reading “Dear Little Men” →

Wild Lectionary: Our Mortal Bodies Are a Part of the Whole of Creation

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IMG_6125Proper 8, Year A,
Fourth Sunday after Pentecost Lectionary 13

Romans 6:12-23

By Carmen Retzlaff

Many readers and hearers over the centuries have struggled with, or at least wondered about, Paul’s apparent condescension toward the physical body. It comes into question again in this passage from the letter to the Christian community in Rome. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Our Mortal Bodies Are a Part of the Whole of Creation” →

Wild Lectionary: She Saw a Well of Water

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Uncategorized, Watershed DiscipleshipLeave a comment
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Desert Well by David Winnie, Creative Commons, 2008

Proper 7, Season After Pentecost

Genesis 21:8-21

The biblical portrait(s) of Hagar include surrogacy, power, African identity, patriarchal family, enslavement, physical violence, pregnancy, migration, wilderness, water and the naming of God as one who sees. These are hard subjects and it would be easy to preach on another text. But when migrant bodies, mothers and children, are dying of thirst in the Arizona desert; when African refugees drown by the thousands in the Mediterranean; when corporations like Nestle, Kinder Morgan, and Dakota Access trample Indigenous women’s teaching that Water is Life; when the story of Isaac and Ishmael is used to normalize the Israeli occupation of Palestine; when overt acts of hatred against Muslims are escalating; and when white women’s complicity in criminalizing black bodies and exonerating murderous police is all but invisible, we cannot side-step this heritage that so profoundly speaks to our present. Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: She Saw a Well of Water” →

Blessing of the Bicycles

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed Discipleship1 Comment
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Photo credit: Bayne Stanley

By Laurel Dykstra, Salal and Cedar

On May 29, Salal and Cedar and Fossil Free Faith organized “bike to worship week” and a blessing of the bicycles. Below is an article written by Laurel Dykstra for the Diocese of Westminster. Following the article is the order of service and intercessions.

Vancouver’s Christ Church Cathedral has a new bell tower but the bells ringing in the 120 year old church on May 29th were attached to the handle-bars of bicycles. With sacramental chrism oil, bicycle chain oil, holy water and prayers, Anglican Bishop Melissa Skelton, two priests, and a United Church Minister blessed bicycles, transit passes, and a host of people who are making an effort to reduce the environmental impact of their commute to worship.

While light from the stained glass windows colored their faces, a congregation of about twenty-five listened to a passage from Ezekiel about the prophet’s vision of a wheel within a wheel and they prayed for the safety of cyclists, fossil fuel divestment and the victims of climate disasters and wars for oil.   Led by a cross and banners and the bishop with miter, crozier and cope, cyclists and pedestrians processed out of the church to a hospitality station on the street where they offered coffee, snacks, bike maps and “ride-by blessings” to commuters on the bike route outside. Continue reading “Blessing of the Bicycles” →