Look for the October 2010 release of my new book, Reluctant Pilgrim!
Please note, this blog contains original content. Please do not reproduce any content without permission from the author.
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Just a weekly blog ruminating about life and community.
For the past two years I have been writing weekly devotions for my local church community reflecting on how I experience God and the call of the gospel in the midst of the daily life while also trying to live more faithfully into the ecclessial seasons. The purpose of these reflections have been to create a deeper sense of community amongst my congregation during the week, and to foster imaginative ways of thinking and talking about what it means to be a part of a local church community – while still nurturing a relationship with the Triune God and finding the Church in little pockets throughout the week.
I hope this blog can serve as a wider outlet for such musings and ruminations for those of us who yearn for spiritual nourishment, who sense there is “more” to yearn for and that “more” takes the shape of Christian community, the church as we find it on Sundays but ALSO as we find it gathering amongst us in little pockets during the week- friends coming together to pray, to read books together, to care for one another, to challenge and inspire one another, to celebrate each others miracles and joys, to listen to each others troubles, and to find moments of hope that sustain us till the kingdom comes.
I believe that our Christian growth is grounded in the local church community but I will openly confess that I do not always understand the local church. Nor do I always feel like being a part of one for a variety of reasons. But Christ has said he can be found there so I go each week, as one of just many broken, yearning, flawed people who hope to catch a glimpse, and to perhaps be that glimpse to someone else. I also believe that the church extends beyond tangible walls. Finding God in the mundane spaces of daily life is a beautiful and worthy challenge to which God calls us. And so I strive to see, live, and experience church in so many other ways during the week.
I love this quote attributed to John Calvin:
For those to whom [God] is Father the church may also be Mother…For there is no other way to enter into life unless this mother conceive us in her womb, give us birth, nourish us at her breast, and lastly, unless she keep us under her care and guidance until, putting off mortal flesh, we become like angels. Our weakness does not allow us to be dismissed from her school until we have been pupils all our lives. Furthermore, away from her bosom one cannot hope for any forgiveness of sins or any salvation.
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Look for the October 2010 release of my new book, Reluctant Pilgrim, a spiritual memoir.
Keep visiting to learn more!
Enuma
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Contacting Enuma
Thank you for taking the time to read and follow my blog. I both love and appreciate reader responses. Please feel free to comment on anything you read on here. If you prefer a less public forum to share your thoughts you can reach me via email.
helloenuma@gmail.com
I will try to respond as best I can to your comments.
Chi,
Thanks for all you do. For your laughter, prayers and yes, deep thinking for it is only that that can produce the kind of insight one finds in your writings.
Today, I am moved by The Prayer for Lent. I was about to share it with my small christian group in upstate NY when thankfully, I noticed the warning not to. I have instead provided them the link to your website and hope they visit to read it at our last meeting tonight.
The group meets weekly with yours truly the only out of town member participating from thousands of miles away in Brussels. It has been great because unlike them, I have had to put my thoughts down in writing and that has been an amazing experience as well. Our last session for Lent is today and although it has been challenging with my travel schedule, I am looking forward to the next opportunity.
I hope to visit your site often.
Keep it up!
By: Angela Nwaneri on March 31, 2010
at 3:40 am
HI, Enuma, it’s Barbara from Rochester, NY, entering a new comment after my long first one flew off into the mysterious beyond when you looked at it before!
To recap:
Your writing here, as elsewhere, is honest, funny, provocative, fresh, and it calls for the reader to think and rethink and look at life and faith through new lenses. Great stuff, and I want you to stay friends with me even when you become famous and in demand worldwide for personal presentations.
Thanks for your taking the time to share your reflections in the ways you do. You know that I have sent printouts of your All Saints’ devotions to the man with whom I correspond on Death Row at Central Prison in Raleigh, Nate. I hope to send on some of these blog comments to him as well. They don’t get a lot of interesting stuff to read there, and he gobbles up this kind of material, which deepend his new and strong faith. So, your work moves through prison walls, as the spirit of Jesus moved through walls of the upper room to discouraged disciples.
I personally am terrible at daily disciplines and devotions, with so little will power in that direction. The quality of your pieces gives me greater impetus to stop and absorb the blog entries, and let them situate in my soul and stir me around.
Finally, I gave so many of those Worry Doll sets to my kids, their friends, my friends, as amulets of peace. And yes, the real dolls are our sister friends, those Jesus people right up close.
Love, Barbara
By: Barbara Zelter on August 27, 2009
at 2:32 pm
Can hardly wait for this to bloom, Enuma. Today I really am moved by the image of “becoming like angels”…. how that could change how I choose to life this day.
By: Pamela on August 19, 2009
at 2:59 pm