For those of us with children or grandchildren, we feel the big out-breath of being on this side of the ending of the school year – the graduations, the celebrations and promotions. With a great burst of energy and a sigh across the stage or the classroom threshold, we have eased our way into summer. Thank God, phew, wow. My son (my youngest!) graduated from high school and turned 19 three days later, and one week after that my oldest child graduated from college. While it happens all the time, and is in that sense quite ordinary, it’s a big deal. It’s a really big deal every time. Walking across that stage, getting that empty diploma folder, being seen in the ritual that says “I DID THAT!” with your feet walking, your hands receiving, and your family watching makes a garden-variety moment into a magic portal. The bridge from what is behind you now to what might be yours up ahead.
I was reminded of this poem – Instructions On Not Giving Up – as my daughter Helen walked the stage at UC Santa Cruz on Sunday. Patient, plodding, a green skin growing over whatever winter did to us, a return to the strange idea of continuous living despite the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. I love the observation, not just the idea, that we cycle through the deprivation, the “underground”, of winters and all the while…something is happening. Perhaps we thought nothing was happening, perhaps we got frustrated when we couldn’t see the growth fast enough, or note the change on the surface where we could satisfy ourselves with it or even take credit for it. And then, sometimes when we aren’t even looking, a new slick leaf unfurling happens right under our noses. And it’s so ordinary and miraculous and something we can only see with grateful eyes. Look at that! She didn’t give up, he didn’t give up, that tree didn’t give up! We didn’t give up.
This is a spring poem for sure, and here past the beginning of summer, we see this greenness all around us now. Things are fruiting, blooming, waving happily at us in the light breeze when we can get it. Let the green trees, the ones that pushed out all that “greening” in April and May, really get to you. Stand still and wonder at what happens when a living thing does not give up. What happens when we follow the instructions on not giving up that are all around us?
- We have a garden at Grace. Go look at it. It has instructions on not giving up. We have an oak tree and a redwood tree at Grace. Go look at them. They have instructions on not giving up.
- We have long-time parishioners at Grace, people who have built this place and continue to see to its survival. Talk to them. They have instructions on not giving up.
- We have children here, people who are curious and honest and earnestly wanting to be included. Talk to them. They have instructions on not giving up.
- We have people of color at Grace and LGBTQ+ people here at Grace. Talk to them. They have a particularly tested set of instructions on not giving up.
- We have clergy and lay ministers here at Grace, people who have given their lives and attention to the Gospels at a time when that message is often adulterated and dismissed. Talk to them. They have instructions on giving up.
- We have all lived these lives! Everyone you see at Grace has a winter inside them that became spring, and a lush summer, and died again in the fall. We all have instructions for not giving up. All of us.
I know it’s summer but I want to encourage you to keep coming to church, keep coming to community, keep coming to Grace. Just like any relationship that needs constancy, your practice of faith in the company of imperfect others requires that you show up, that you lean in and not give up. What we need is here, and in every season, what we need is instructions for not giving up.
What energy is building inside you, waiting to unfurl? See you at 9 am on Sundays and for any other little moment of a new slick leaf unfurling like a fist to an open palm. It’s a big deal; it’s a big deal every time. Don’t give up!
Fine then, I’ll take it.
I’ll take it all.
Sarah Christopher
Associate Pastor
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