A SENSITIVE MATTER

Hi There !

So, Mother's Day.

Cards, visits, flowers, food.

Terrific, yet tough.

As a pastor,  I would struggle every year on Mother's Day to be especially sensitive to

what I said and what we did in church that Sunday.

In the congregation would be many magnificent moms - Apple Pie, All American Moms!

In the congregation there would also be women who so wanted to be moms and couldn't.

I can still feel the pain of Ruth. She would almost skip church as we celebrated  mothers.

Her heart ached because she was never  able to conceive.

In the mix would be Helicopter Moms, who should have been grounded years ago.

Then there were women who mothered, but deep down never wanted to.

They knew, and so did their kids.

So sadly, there were mothers who had lost children

through miscarriage, accident, illness, war or other violences.

There were mothers estranged from their children.

There were mothers who knew they really weren't good at it.

And tragically, there were toxic mothers, who severely damaged their children's heads and hearts.

On top of all this, there were the mothers and their children's spouses, who,

despite hearty posturing to the contrary, were at best a Mutual Toleration Society.

See why I struggled for sensitivity?



Now, honestly I'm not trying to scare anyone off from celebrating something

as primary, pivotal, and wonderful as motherhood.

Yet, whether it's Mother's Day or just a regular go to work day,

sensitivity is so critical to our spiritual lives out here on the street of everyday life.

Sensitivity is not pandering to others' moods and caprices.

Sensitivity does not mean we need to tighten up and walk around on egg shells.

It does mean that essential tones in the symphony of our spiritual lives are

to "sense" rightly and "respond" appropriately to who is actually  there before us.

That calls into play our  mind, heart, and hopefully,

 a savoy psyche, as well as a generous spirit.

In our authenticity we need to tune into who and how the other is,

and interact as close to reality as we can get just then.



Sensitivity doesn't show up high on many spirituality menus.

It's not seen as all that "spiritual."

But is. It conditions the interaction, hopefully the blending, of spirits.

Sensitivity calls for soulful acuity, be that at the watercooler, texting, at a party, greeting the kids

after school - at every personal interface, indeed,  at every "inter-heart."

 

Last Sunday I was the guest of a dear friend at a lovely English Tea House.

Enter, ever so slowly, the waitress.

I venture she has never heard of soft skills.

Things were pretty arid in the personality department.

She only gave me a needed knife when I asked for it,

and then plunked it down upside down.

It seemed she went on vacation between courses.

All this called for Sensitivity on Steroids.

The more I tuned to the waitress the more I sensed, as in sensitivity,

 a damaged spirit at her center.

Here psychic heart rate was close to coding.

Who/what dulled and dented her I couldn't know.

I did know I needed to gently use the only thing available to me in that setting.

So at each interchange I loved her in my heart and simply spoke thanks,

bypassing her rote, mechanical manner.



Fast forward to yesterday.

Completely the opposite of Sunday and the waitress.

I blew it big time.

I was quite insensitive to the most important person in my life.

Our spirits clashed rather than blended.

How humbling to be blogging on the spirituality of sensitivity,

and be anything but spiritually sensitive.

So, I know of what I speak.

I know of real spiritual sensitivity.

I recommend it.

I know of utter failure at spiritual sensitivity.

Please be a lot more real and really sensitive than I was.




There really is nothing as sacred as a person, whether they know it or not.

We need  to know it  and respond  to each person with a sensitivity worthy of the divine.

In the background I hear the life words of Jesus:

" Whatever you do to another you do unto me" ( Matthew 25:40 ).

We have it  on that good authority that:

"There really is nothing as sacred as a person, whether they know it or not.

 We need to know it and respond to each person with a sensitivity worthy of the divine."

IT'S A SENSITIVE MATTER.



Thanks for the pleasure of your company today.

All the best to you and our whole wide world.

Holding you in

God's Dear Love,

    John Frank




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