The Woven Grace of Community
Table Talk
Setting the Table
You are welcome here. Come just as you are, bringing whatever is on your heart today. Take a few moments and allow yourself to just be. Take a couple deep breaths, grab yourself a cup of coffee, light a candle, do something that brings you comfort. Allow yourself to be present in this moment.
Consider how God often holds us through the hands of those who love us.
When we honestly ask ourselves which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand.
— Henri J.M. Nouwen
Isaiah 41:13
For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, ‘Do not fear, I will help you.'
Galatians 6:2
Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
Food for Thought
Recently, I was walking through a serious health diagnosis that left me reeling. Throughout this journey, an image stubbornly had taken up residence in my mind. In it, I was standing on the rim of a dark pit, the bottom of which was frighteningly invisible. Some days as I walked through the journey I was on, my fear threatened to pull me down deeper than I would be able to climb out of.
I found, during this journey, an opportunity to take my own pastoral advice for a test drive. As I started reaching out to my community for support, a curious thing happened – the image changed. What had started as me dangling over a deep pit, shifted into a new image. In this one, I was still hovering over the pit, but was being held up on a finely woven sling. I am a weaver, so I immediately appreciated the fineness of the weave. But, as my vision shifted, the image revealed that each of the warp and weft threads were coming from one of my beloveds standing around the circumference of the pit. Not held by them, but from them.
I was being held up by the love of the community I had built, inherited, and been gifted.
Fear could not consume me because the love of my community would not allow it to.
Lent is a season in which we are invited to reflect on Christ’s journey to the cross as if it is our own. We are each of us always invited to take up our cross and follow Christ (Matthew 16:24), but at no time in our liturgical year is this so visceral as during the Lenten season.
While we may embrace this calling to carry our crosses in a special way during Lent, let us disabuse ourselves of the notion that we must do so alone.
The overarching arc of Scripture runs from the creation to the perfection of community. And not just community, but community that holds its beloveds. Scripture is full of stories of people holding and being held. When David and Jonathan parted, they fell into each other's arms (1 Samuel 20:41). The friends who refused to be turned away from the overflowing house in Capernaum, held their paralyzed friend between them not only as they let him down through the roof but presumably on the entire journey to the roof (Mark 2). I imagine that Mary Magdalene tried to hold Jesus after his resurrection not only because of her mingled grief and joy, but also because she had embraced him previously (John 20:11-17).
As we journey to the cross, many of us bearing crosses that dig painfully into our own backs, may we always remember to look to the periphery and see all who are holding us up. And may we always be on the periphery holding others up.
For if we are called to take Christ’s cross, called to be stewards of God’s very good creation, then perhaps it is through us and through our beloveds that the promise of Isaiah 41:13 is being made real: “For I the Lord your God hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, ‘Do not fear, I will help you.”
Take a small piece of yarn, ribbon, or thread and keep it with you during Lent — in your pocket, wrapped around your wrist, or tucked into your prayer book. Each time fear, grief, or overwhelm rises, pause and name one person who has held you and say a prayer of thanksgiving for them.
Many of us are far more comfortable being the one on the periphery holding others up than being the one suspended and needing help. During Lent, practice one act of holy receiving: say yes when someone offers help, ask for prayer instead of silently carrying it, let someone bring the meal, answer honestly when asked, “How are you?”, accept care without minimizing your need.
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Blessing
Loving God,
When fear opens wide beneath us, help us to trust the love with which you hold us. Give us the humility to receive care when we are weak, and the courage to stand at the edges of others’ pain with steady compassion.
Amen.
A little Table Talk for your table...
When has fear or difficulty felt like a “pit” in your life, and who has acted as part of your “woven sling” to hold you up? How did that shape your experience of God’s presence?
In what ways do you see yourself standing at the periphery, helping to hold others in their struggles? What small acts of love or support could you offer this week?
How does the image of being held by community deepen your understanding of taking up the cross and trusting God’s promise to help?
Try taking it to the Kids Table...
Can you think of a time you were scared or worried? Who helped you feel safe, loved, or brave?
Who could you help this week by being kind, sharing, or listening? How can you be like a “thread” that holds someone up?
How do you think God helps us when we feel scared? How can we notice God working through the people around us?
Meet This WEek’s Writer...
Rev. Dr. Amy L. Chilton is the Senior Minister at Phillips Memorial Baptist Church in Cranston, RI. She is a native of the Pacific Northwest, the mother of a college student, and an avid fiber artist, reader, and gardener. She has a PhD in Systematic Theology and Philosophy and is passionate about global theological diversity and creating equitable space for the theological contributions of those at the margins. She has served on both coasts in theological education and in ministry in the American Baptist Churches, USA.
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