It's Thursday morning and I have just come from a visit with two women of the parish in whose deep humility and faithfulness I recognize the characteristics of a considerable sanctity. Typical of their generation, these two saints have been, and remain women of action. They are members of the generations of Episcopalians, now increasingly elderly, who were raised to be good servants and stewards in the house of God. Yet, remarkably these women also exude a deep holiness that flows from lives rooted in a spirit of gratitude, steeped in awareness of the presence of God in everything, and in everyone, around them.

The focus of our conversation was to share with me their experience of being prayer partners. As such they have supported one another in a powerful ministry of intercessory prayer over many years. What our conversation got me thinking about was how to infect others with their experience of being fruitful in prayer?

However, I need to step back for a moment to something I was exploring in the sermon for this past Sunday located at relationalrealities.com. In the Gospel we received Jesus' invitation for those of us who are weary to come with our heavy burdens and experience the ease and lightness of the yoke that comes from relationship with him.  Those familiar with the 1928 Book of Common Prayer recognize this text as the Comfortable Words that followed the pronouncement of absolution.

In the context of the sermon I was highlighting the need for us to shift from a culture of membership to one of discipleship.  Membership is an appropriate term to describe our relationship to the many voluntary associations we belong to. As members, we decide when to join. When we cease to receive any benefit from membership, or we fall-out  over an issue, we decide to leave. However, usually we decide to leave when we become burnt-out after years of selfless service.

So many of us approach our relationship with the Church in exactly this same way. In a culture of membership, some of us leave the Church because it doesn't suit us any more. Some of us leave if we have a disagreement with someone, often the Rector. Yet, so many more of us are in danger of falling away because after years of selfless service, we become burnt-out. Our weariness at carrying burdens too heavy for any one person to assume, finally exhausts us.

The problem here is that as members we feel it's our duty to take responsibility and be good servants and others are more than happy to leave us to shoulder the burden alone. Yet, Christ is not inviting us to become worthy, and responsible servants. Christ invites us to become disciples. The difference between being a member and becoming a disciple is that the latter involves entering into a life-giving relationship where our actions in living the Christian life nourish us, rather than starve us into exhaustion.

Jesus said: learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart, and (through relationship with me) you will find rest for your (hungry and weary) souls. The two women I met with this morning, despite belonging to a generation characterized for its stoic attitude to service, are full of life and are infectiously exuberant. With humility they are centered on the primary manifestation of the spiritual life, i.e. gratitude. In short they know the life-giving nature of accepting Christ's offer of relationship with him as disciples and so have become dynamos humming with a sense of presence of the Lord. I am reminded of the great 16th Century Indian poet, Kabir who commented: There are seasons in the mind, great currents and winds move there, the true yogi ties a rein to them; a power plant he (she) becomes.

I returned to the office, reportedly glowing. I had been infected. My mind turns now to how we might spread this particular infection throughout the parish?

Yours in Christ, Mark+

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