Reflections from a Lenten porch sit practice

For Lent this year I thought I’d add a daily practice of sitting on our back porch for ten minutes, doing nothing. I didn’t actually end up doing this every day. Maybe about half the days total. But hey, twenty-ish days of porch sits are better than no days of porch sits, right?

I don’t really have a neat and tidy take-away from it, but I did enjoy slowing down and noticing what’s all around me every day. There are many things I don’t always take time to look at.

I also felt like it was an opportunity to say a small little “screw you,” in my own way, to the destructive capitalistic forces that try to make us feel guilty and worthless if we don’t spend every second of every day doing “productive” things. I’m here to listen and watch for one who said, pay attention to the birds and wildflowers and learn thoroughly from them. And if that isn’t a bit of an anti-capitalist manifesto, I’m not sure what is.

After each porch sit, I wrote a sentence or two about what stood out to me from that time. I’d like to share these thoughts with you. I edited some of them lightly but didn’t wrap them up with a neat introduction or conclusion, because I think they resist that. (The real world resists that . . . although if you get something in particular out of these thoughts, or if you relate to some of them, I’d love to hear it.)

Do you have a practice along these lines—maybe one you’ve been able to sustain beyond Lent? I’m all ears.

Here’s what I wrote:

Today I noticed a plant I never noticed before, high up over the neighbors’ yard, poking out between cedar boughs, reaching toward the sun.

Today I thought about how I don’t often go outside and look up. I thought about how tall the cedar trees are. Then I watched the clouds wisp surprisingly quickly across the sky until there was no blue left, all gray.

Today I watched a small black-headed bird perch on a hanging basket and turn his head back and forth, almost watching me, until my phone made a noise and startled us both.

Today I noticed and gave thanks for the trees all around us that have not been cut down.

Today I felt the wind and watched everyone else feel it, too: the cedars, the grasses, the cat whose ears twitch at every rustling sound. To be attuned like that to the Spirit who moves like wind.

Today I watched the rain come down in steady gray mist-lines and felt that God is close to those who weep with broken hearts. I can think of many.

Today I looked at the neighbors’ newly re-growing fig tree, dramatically chopped down, finding ways to grow again.

Today I noticed that the raspberry plants I feared were dead are making new leaf-buds.

Today I felt unsettled, not sure where to focus, until I closed my eyes and listened to the rain. It plops and splatters with so many different sounds.

Today I thought about how each fruit tree returns to life at its own pace: the pear buds ready to open, the sweet cherry buds farther along than the sour ones. 

Tonight I let the airplanes taking off on the right and the cars driving down Ambaum on the left surround me with sound.

Tonight the clouds stood still and the fir tree silhouettes were striking against the darkening sky. Mostly, though, I just watched the cat who is now ours as she sat in the grass, grateful that her shelter days are over.

Tonight I listened as one bird sang four notes over and over, trilling and warbling a little differently each time. I wondered what her song meant. 

Tonight the rain dripped in rhythm with the wind. I heard the airplanes and yearned for silence.

This evening I couldn’t believe I could sit outside in a short-sleeved shirt. I felt the gift of an unseasonably warm day.

Tonight I looked West and marveled at how much brightness was still in the sky after 8 pm.

Tonight I thought about how small the pear tree buds were at the beginning of Lent. Now, they’re blooming. And yet the air is still cold, so cold.

Tonight, in the dark, I thought about how delightfully slowly plants grow. I thought about the miracle it is that the strawberry plants are starting to flower even though it’s still so cold. 

Today I watched the long-haired dark cat with the white boots—the one who always scurries away quickly when he sees me—saunter slowly across the backyard, not noticing me, or not caring.

Today I saw little bugs flitting about and hoped they might be pollinating the fruit trees and not eating the leafy greens.

Today I feel sad about many things, but I also feel joy when I sit still long enough that birds feel safe venturing to the bird feeder a few feet away.

God enrobes the wildflowers

Roses…so needy
Sweet peas – more like a wildflower

(28) And about clothing, why are y’all worried? Learn thoroughly from the wildflowers of the field, how they grow; they do not labor nor spin. (29) But I say to y’all that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these ones. (30) And if God so enrobes the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is thrown into a furnace, (will he) not much more y’all, y’all of little faith? -Jesus (Matthew 6:28-30, my translation)

I didn’t realize, until I translated this passage, that the verb in v. 30—translated above as enrobes—is different from the verb in v. 29, translated as clothed. I thought Solomon in his glory was clothed, and so the wildflowers, too, were clothed. But even more gloriously.

This was a reasonable thing to think, given that the NRSV translates both verbs as clothed, and the NIV goes for dressed when it comes to Solomon and clothed when referring to the grass.

I kind of like the translation enrobes for the grass, though. I feel like it adds another dimension, another flavor. It isn’t just that the wildflowers are clothed even more beautifully than Solomon. They aren’t just clothed, like he is. They’re enrobed.

This word that I’m translating as enrobed is ἀμφιέννυμι. And to be clear, ἀμφιέννυμι could also be translated as clothed. But it would be a little odd for Jesus/Matthew to use two different verbs in adjacent sentences to mean the same thing. We might do this in English for style points, but people didn’t really do this in Koine Greek. 

I also think it’s interesting that this word, ἀμφιέννυμι, comes from a root that means “to invest.” I like the possible implication: that God enrobes the wildflowers in a way that evokes the concept of investment. God invests, or God is invested, in the wildflowers—even if by typical capitalist standards it may be an unwise investment; after all, the wildflowers pop up among the grass of the field, and the whole lot of it is here today but burned up in the furnace tomorrow.

I also find it interesting that ἀμφιέννυμι is used only four times in the whole New Testament. It isn’t one of the usual words for clothing. (In comparison, the word that describes Solomon being clothed in v. 29 is used 24 times in the New Testament.) 

And it’s really just used in two different stories. 

There are Jesus’ words about the wildflowers here, and his very similar words in Luke 12:28. 

And then there are Jesus’ words about John the Baptist in Matthew 11:8 (and his very similar words in Luke 7:25): As John’s disciples were leaving, Jesus began to speak to the crowd about John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed swayed by the wind? 8 If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear fine clothes are in kings’ palaces” (Matt 11:7-8, NIV). 

“A man dressed in fine clothes”—or, more literally, “a person enrobed in soft clothing.” Or something like that. Rich folks who hang out in kings’ palaces are enrobed in the same way the grasses of the field are enrobed. (Side note: check out this post for more thoughts on Matthew 11:7-8 and the surrounding verses if you’re interested.) 

Or, to look at it another way, God’s plant creations, like wildflowers, are enrobed in beauty—while God’s prophets hang out far from kings’ palaces. An interesting contrast. 

Anyhow, I like the idea of short-lived and fragile wildflowers being enrobed with the kind of beauty even the richest humans only dream of. That’s cool. 

And I like that we’re talking about wildflowers, here—the kind of plants not intentionally cultivated by humans. The kind we easily overlook. The kind we don’t even try to save from the furnace as they get thrown in to be burned up alongside the grass.

I think of the landscaping we inherited when we moved into our home. We have several rose plants, and they’re very pretty—but also (in some cases, anyway) very high maintenance. They want to be deadheaded constantly, fertilized every few weeks, watered on hot days (but not during the heat of the day), cleared of blackspot-infected fallen leaves, pruned yearly.  

The rose plants are so needy. In contrast, there’s a sweet pea plant that seems to just magically grow back year after year. It’s more like a weed, really—and a tenacious one. It takes over an impressively large space if I don’t cut it back. And it’s also really beautiful. 

I wonder if this is the sort of thing Jesus is thinking of when he talks about God enrobing the lilies—not the plants we intentionally cultivate for their beauty, but the ones that just grow on their own. Is a rose more beautiful than a sweet pea? I’m not sure. I feel like they’re both gorgeous in their own ways. God enrobes them both.

Maybe the rich kingliness of the word enrobe can help us see wildflowers—and the natural world in general—closer to the way God does.

Solomon was just clothed. But the wildflowers are enrobed. God treasures them, holds them, doesn’t just take care of their needs but makes them glorious. And this is God’s heart toward us as well. 

Have a favorite wildflower? Thoughts or feelings about roses or sweet peas or Solomon or clothing and robes? As always, feel free to holler in the comments or via email!

God is Calling Her Children

God is Calling Her Children

God is calling 
her children to the garden,

to walk through wildflowers
in the place where life 
grows slowly and unveils itself 
in its own time,

to let soil slip through fingers
in the place where we 
do not need to be 

trailblazers,
conquerors and colonizers,
chairpeople and board members,

but, rather, midwives:

those who care and watch
and move to catch

the world that is to come.

So God is calling,
listen as she calls forth

feminine ambition: 

the kind that runs with Spirit wind behind
and does not lose its breath

until its tiny corner of the world
bursts with divine love,

until our eyes see God in every person
and our hands have done the good 
that they could do

and let that be 
enough.

Light pink roses

We have one more kind of rose that I haven’t posted pictures of yet, and I don’t want it to feel left out.

There are four identical plants (if the colors look different, it’s just different sunlight).

A couple weeks ago I felt like I was spending a lot of time deadheading them, so one day I counted…and I cut off 120 deadheads total from those four plants. In case that was a fluke, I counted again two days later, and got 158.

Then, yesterday, after having deadheaded thoroughly two days before, I counted again and got 268 (!). I’m not sure if I like how this is trending in terms of amount of deadheading work, but the roses sure are lovely…

A splash of color for you in these dark times.

Shrub Roses

While I’ve been doing blackspot battle on several of our more traditional-looking rose plants, these lovely shrub roses snuck up on me and started going wild with gorgeous bright pink blooms.

Insert lesson about resilience here if you like, or about some of the most beautiful things in life being pure gift and out of our control…or just enjoy these pictures.