Daily Devotions and Podcasts
Prayer: Lord, help me to see You in every part of my day, even in the places I least expect. Open my eyes to Your presence in the ordinary and the extraordinary moments of life. Amen.
The Cathedral of Hope Devotion Ministry began as an answer to Progressive Christians who wanted to start their days with a little insight, observation, or wisdom about the Christian faith from their own point of view. Conservative internet devotions were abundant, but there was not much out there for liberal thinkers. The need was clear.
Being a large church, we had a generous amount of writing talent available and also a large number of congregants with theological training who were not on the pulpit. In the early days of the ministry, most of the writing was done by the clergy, but gradually the majority of the writers emerged from those lay volunteers.
That dynamic is still in place as new authors are always joining in to keep the ideas fresh. It’s a fitting structure for any center of progressive thought. This particular Body of Christ has many voices and each one has a unique and important story to tell.
SCRIPTURE Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. WORDS OF HOPE Creating Space for Hope There are times on the journey of life when we wonder about this thing called hope. Your 17-year-old son is diagnosed with terminal melanoma. The neighbor next door takes his own life, leaving his spouse to provide and care for their four children ages 3 to 11. At age 62, your position at work is eliminated and there are few prospects for your area of experience. Despair can seem more familiar than hope at times. The writer of Lamentations declares: “Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for God’s compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion; therefore, I will wait for the Lord.’” (Lamentations 3:22-24) When I was at a particularly low place in my life, I recall the words of a friend who said, “You can choose to get bitter or better.” Hope chooses the latter. Hope is more than wishful thinking; it is an intention. We choose—we declare our intent to create space for hope to exist and to thrive. The gifted poet, Emily Dickinson, struggled with depression most of her life and never lived to see her works published. Still, she penned the words, written in the mid 1800’s, that endure still: “Hope” is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - And sings the tune without the words - And never stops - at all - PRAYER Holy One, may we leave space—indeed, create space—chiseling it out of rock if necessary, for your precious gift of Hope. Holy Spirit come, dwell with us and make it so! Amen. DEVOTION AUTHOR Rev. Dr. Gary Kindley Pastoral Psychotherapist DrGK.org
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Words of Hope Podcast
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SCRIPTURE Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. WORDS OF HOPE Creating Space for Hope There are times on the journey of life when we wonder about this thing called hope. Your 17-year-old son is diagnosed with terminal melanoma. The neighbor next door takes his own life, leaving his spouse to provide and care for their four children ages 3 to 11. At age 62, your position at work is eliminated and there are few prospects for your area of experience. Despair can seem more familiar than hope at times. The writer of Lamentations declares: “Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for God’s compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion; therefore, I will wait for the Lord.’” (Lamentations 3:22-24) When I was at a particularly low place in my life, I recall the words of a friend who said, “You can choose to get bitter or better.” Hope chooses the latter. Hope is more than wishful thinking; it is an intention. We choose—we declare our intent to create space for hope to exist and to thrive. The gifted poet, Emily Dickinson, struggled with depression most of her life and never lived to see her works published. Still, she penned the words, written in the mid 1800’s, that endure still: “Hope” is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - And sings the tune without the words - And never stops - at all - PRAYER Holy One, may we leave space—indeed, create space—chiseling it out of rock if necessary, for your precious gift of Hope. Holy Spirit come, dwell with us and make it so! Amen. DEVOTION AUTHOR Rev. Dr. Gary Kindley Pastoral Psychotherapist DrGK.org
SCRIPTURE Colossians 3:12 Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Colossians 3:12 WORDS OF HOPE The morning Joyce died a dear friend came to the hospital and would stop at nothing before she wrapped me in her arms and held me while I wept. She stayed with me as I walked through the official leaving of her body, grown cold to my touch, and then followed me home to make toast—the only thing I could eat. Then she cleaned out the refrigerator so that there would be room for casserole-comfort. I know intimately the relationship of loss and kindness of which Naomi Shihab Nye speaks in her poem: “Before you know what kindness really is/ you must lose things,/feel the future dissolve in a moment/like salt in a weakened broth./What you held in your hand,/ what you counted and carefully saved,/ all this must go so you know/how desolate the landscape can be/ between the regions of kindness.”* How desolate a landscape indeed. We are sadly seeing in our country right now cruelty and hatred of a magnitude which still shocks and horrifies, sanctioned even at the highest corridors of power. So, this morning on World Kindness Day let us commit ourselves to an ethic of kindness. Recently, I heard a conservative pastor say that you don’t really have to agree on anything to be kind. If we accept the truth in that assertion, kindness can become one of the paths back to each other. Contrarily, looking at the roots of the word “unkind” are telling. “Uncynde” in Old English means “unnatural, not in accord with the regular course of nature.” Therefore, our unkindness is unnatural, not living in accord with our God given nature. In our unkindness we do not see that “no [person] is alien” to us, to paraphrase John Donne’s famous poem.** Kindness begins when I see you, witness your struggle, discomfort, or pain, and something inside of me stirs in the heart—compassion, empathy, desire to alleviate suffering—and moves me to turn that feeling into action. Kindness, then, whether the simplest act of opening a door for someone on a walker, comforting a young person who has been excluded at school, taking meals to our unhoused neighbors, or committing ourselves to the long faithfulness of a critically ill friend’s care, is the resilient spiritual thread that weaves us together in our humanity, helps create kindred out of strangers, brings heaven closer to earth. To return to our poet: “Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,/you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing./You must wake up with sorrow. /You must speak to it till your voice/catches the thread of all sorrows/and you see the size of the cloth.” When we understand the size of the fabric of world sorrow, or as Fr. Richard Rohr calls it, “the tears of things,” it’s as if we cannot do anything other than take kindness with us every day—“like a shadow or a friend” (Nye). PRAYER God whose steadfast loving kindness transforms our hearts, “For as long as space endures/And for as long as living beings remain/Until then may I, too, abide/To dispel the misery of the world.”*** Amen. DEVOTION AUTHOR Dr. Pat Saxon *A link to Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem https://poets.org/poem/kindness ** John Donne, “No Man is an Island” *** The quoted part of the prayer is the Dalai Lama’s.
SCRIPTURE Romans 15.1 For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. WORDS OF HOPE Although it may not seem very spiritual, I sometimes wonder how certain things smelled back in the days of the Bible. I imagine there were lots of familiar smells such as fires burning while people cooked, anointing oils, wine, and various smells in nature, but for the ancient Bible days, I can pretty much stop there. Recently, somebody asked on a social media page about what they remembered of things and places past while living in Arlington, Texas, the city where I grew up in my teen years. I remembered a little country store called Granny and Granddad’s. Suddenly I was taken back in time and remembering very specifically how that little store smelled when I first walked in. It was the home of old wood, candy, popcorn, and whatever hot foods they were serving that day. My mind then wandered off to other places. Another location I remembered was Wyatt’s cafeteria where I could distinctly pick out the olfactory pleasures of fresh coffee, chocolate cake, roast beef, and brown gravy. If three is a charm, the third place was a toy store in North Dallas called Booth’s Toys. I really don’t know how to describe those smells that were in the store; maybe nothing more than brand new boxes of games and plastic model kits. The smells contributed so much to those treasured few minutes of just walking into a magical place with no intent of doing anything but looking at all those wonderful toys. Those smells created some kind of inspiration deep within me. Maybe it was anticipating the toys of my birthday, the plastic masks of Halloween, the holly and candy canes of Christmas; or just the idea of living in some kind of mystical fantasy paradise. I don’t really know how to label those feelings. What matters is all of these things combined created indelible memories. I was inspired. It’s how we tell our stories, share memories, and reminisce about the days that we have delegated as ideal. Yet, all of this gives context to relate my memories to yours. When I think of those remote people of history who wrote the texts of what we’ve come to call the Bible, I wonder how their familiar smells and dwelling places may have inspired them to write about the things they did. How would we have been affected by writing in the fresh smelling outdoor sunshine? Would we write a Psalm of praise? How about the Apostle Paul breathing damp mold smells in a tiny dark Roman jail cell or David writing while hiding in a cave from the tyrannical King Saul? Would we write about social justice? If they could afford it, did the writers smell burning bee’s wax or favorite foods cooking nearby? Would those fragrances inspire us to write about loving the people we call our families? We’ll never really know, but I’m convinced the fragrances of their world were as influential to them as ours are to us. PRAYER Loving Creator, I’m thankful for the people you inspired to give us a tiny glimpse of their world. It fascinates us and influences us so much that we are still reading and interpreting their messages thousands of years later. Help me to be aware of the sights and smells of the world around me and to be conscious of my own words. Will what I say or do today be worth remembering in a hundred years, let alone next week? May your world live in my words. DEVOTION AUTHOR Charlie C. Rose Order of St. Francis and St. Clare
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