In honor of women’s history month, I’m sharing some stories from my ebook, “15 Things You Never Knew About Women of the Bible.” There’s a link at the end if you’d like to download this free resource and read more untold stories of hidden women of the Bible. Enjoy!
15. A Woman Fights a Seven-Headed Dragon While Giving Birth
At the end of the Bible in the mysterious book of Revelation, we find the woman who is clothed with the sun with the moon under her feet (12:1). On her head, she wears a crown of twelve stars. She is giving birth to a savior of the earth while a great dragon with seven heads and ten horns stands before her so that he might devour her child as soon as he is born. The dragon is evil, of course, and he has great power, enough to wipe a third of the stars from the sky with his tail and throw them to earth (12:4).
This woman is perhaps symbolic of God’s people or the goodness of Creation itself. Just as she gives birth to a savior, God rescues her baby and gives her eagle’s wings to fly off into the wilderness to be nurtured for a period of time. Or as the scripture says, “for a time, and times and half a time.” (12:14). The story tells us that creation came to the aid of the woman as she fled the evil dragon. The earth “opened its mouth and swallowed the river that the dragon had poured from his mouth” (12:16).
She comes into the story just as war is breaking out in heaven; one in which Michael and his angels fight against the dragon and his angels. A war of darkness and light, the darkness is defeated in the end. But in the meantime, the devil dragon increases his power on the earth, charging his batteries with the hatred, greed, and deception of the people he stirs up in the world. The dragon may be expelled from heaven, but he lives, as the story tells us, to make war on all the woman’s children.
The woman clothed with the sun shows us the unique combination of vulnerability and strength that women carry so well. Giving birth to anything—a baby, a dream, a relationship, a new beginning—is a precarious and vulnerable act. But women have a unique ability to channel a deeper strength that shelters what remains vulnerable within us. Even though we may be hunted by the dragons of our past, by trauma, pain, or oppression, God gives us the ability to channel our Divine gifts into the world. Giving us the wings of an eagle to carry us when we’re too tired to carry ourselves, taking us to the wilderness to be nurtured until the way is clear.
Check out more stories like this one in this free PDF. Find out about the woman who was with God at the creation of the world, the women who were prophets, military leaders, and the women who funded Jesus’ ministry. Click this link for your free download.
Much of what we have known as “regular” life is up in the air these days. With so much isolation, many of us have been feeling the effects of a long term, pent up anxiety. We watch the news of explosive anger, violence, slander and bickering among our peers. We see more racism than reconciliation, more violence than victory, and more stress than sanity. COVID has us all guessing about what’s next and in need of some serious relief.
We need more than slogans like “stay positive” and “keep it real.” We need wisdom that has its roots deeply in the ground, we need to hear from people who’ve been through stuff like this before. We need ancient wisdom for anxious times. After all, we’re choking on information while we’re starving for wisdom.
We need to hear from someone who has the audacity to say things like this:
It’s okay that things are not fine. Carpe diem, anyway. Don’t worry about it, whatever will be will be. Find some friends to go through hard things, you can’t do it alone. While you’re busy figuring out how to buy food and pay rent, make sure you don’t let your soul starve. What was will be again, what happened will happen again.
Don’t get excited—it’s the same old story. Nobody remembers what happened yesterday. And the things that will happen tomorrow? Nobody’ll remember them either. Let go and live. (from Ecclesiastes “The Message” translation)
These are the things I’ve picked up from reading and writing songs about ancient wisdom. Before being introduced to the sages of old in seminary, I was previously unaware of Wisdom’s secrets. As I studied the Wisdom of many traditions, I began to see that beneath all the layers of do’s and don’ts that we’ve packed into our spiritual and religious traditions, there is a water table of cool, refreshing, thirst quenching wisdom. Just waiting to be discovered especially in times like these. Wisdom was made for times that feel like the end of the world. Wisdom’s got this.
“Out beyond ideas of rightdoing and wrongdoing, there is a field, I’ll meet you there.” –Rumi, 13th Century Sufi Poet
Maybe one doesn’t go looking for Wisdom, maybe it just finds you after you’ve thoroughly exhausted every other possible answer to the existential dread we all feel inside. For me, it happened a few years after that life altering experience known as divorce. I headed to seminary and was introduced to the wisdom literature of the world, including the books found in our very own Old Testament.
Wisdom is not something we really notice that much, but it’s been with us along. Calling out to us in the voices of ancient grandmothers, storytellers and poets of old. Telling us not to fret, it’s okay that things are not fine. Giving us honesty over politically motivated speech. Wisdom doesn’t dish up easy answers, but calls us to get rooted in something greater than ourselves and stop chasing the wind, for God’s sake.
Wisdom literature comes to us from many traditions, it’s timeless. It’s something that we all have in common, it’s built into us, it comes with the whole “created in the image of God” thing. But we need to cultivate it in order to experience its fruits. It can ground us in difficult times, show us how to live through anxiety and fear and even enable us to continue to bear fruit during times of drought.
It helps us to be still long enough to cultivate peace, even in the midst of unsettled issues. Wisdom teaches us how to trust God for the next right thing to be revealed.
It’s exactly what we need to get through COVID.
Rumi, a Sufi poet from the 13th century said: “perhaps you are searching among the branches for what can only be found at the roots.” I invite you to consider that this COVID chasm, this time of great change might be the one time when you can truly listen to the roots of wisdom calling.
We hear from the sages of old, reminding us that “this too shall pass.” COVID has pulled back a few layers and exposed us to our vulnerability. As we work through what that means, it’s good to take some advice from ancient wisdom, to find something at the roots of us, at the core of our collective humanity, something that connects us all.
Here are a few takeaways from Ecclesiastes, one of the Wisdom books of the Old Testament. If you’d like to explore some of the voices of ancient wisdom traditions and learn how to apply them to your every-day life, join me for an upcoming workshop “Kiss the Ground: Finding Peace in a Chaotic World” (see below) There’ll be music, laughter, some aha moments, new friends and some creative wisdom to take with you in a special gift from me. So don’t go crazy, get grounded!
From the Quester in Ecclesiastes:
Don’t Worry About It
What was will be again, what happened will happen again.
By yourself you’reunprotected. With a friend you can face the worst. Can you round up a third? A three-stranded rope isn’teasilysnapped.
Carpe Diem, Anyway!
Seize life! Eat bread with gusto, Drink wine with a robust heart. Oh yes—Godtakespleasurein your pleasure! Dress festively every morning. Don’tskimponcolorsandscarves. Relish life with the spouse you love Each and every day of your precarious life. Each day is God’sgift.It’sallyougetinexchange For the hard work of staying alive. Make the most of each one! Whatever turns up, grab it and do it. And heartily! This is your last and only chance at it.
Don’t Let Your Soul Go Hungry
We work to feed our appetites; Meanwhile our souls go hungry.
Join me for this online workshop on Aug 2nd. Just click the image above to register. Participants will experience the voices of ancient wisdom from various world traditions including poetry from Rumi, Hafiz, Ecclesiastes, and even some ancient Egyptian wisdom poetry. Learning how to let this ancient wisdom flow into our modern lives in anxious times. With registration, participants will be given a link to download music and a PDF with creative journaling prompts and highlighted wisdom poetry that will form the content for this workshop. Participants can use this material in every day lives, creating a habit of visiting ancient wisdom and becoming rooted in that which is greater than ourselves.
Sherry received a grant from the Louisville Institute to study Wisdom traditions from around the world and channel them into modern songs. She created “Kiss the Ground,” a beautiful CD full of wisdom from the sages of old. These songs, curated from Wisdom traditions in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Egyptian and Native American spirituality act as guides through difficult topics. The workshop will cover the topics of the sages including: loneliness, finding purpose in a meaningless world, love, death, and entering into a dialogue with creation.
It feels apocalyptic right now. A worldwide pandemic, a potential break-down in food distribution systems, cataclysmic weather patterns, violence, economic struggles, and now something no one expected, killer hornets! It’s enough to make us go crazy. That is, if we didn’t already have a story to guide us through. A story that tells us there is not only a way in the wilderness, but the wilderness is the way.
“Stories hold the world together,” as storyteller Michael Meade has said. There’s a wonderful story hidden in the Bible that can help us find our way through these chaotic and uncertain times, a story of the woman clothed with the sun with the moon at her feet. She wears a crown on her head of twelve stars and she represents the people of God, the goodness of creation itself. We come across her in chapter twelve in one of the books most of us have spent our lives avoiding, Revelation. She appears on the scene just as a war is breaking out in heaven, giving birth to something new while fighting off evil in the form of the world’s most powerful dragon. He was so powerful, in fact, that he had seven heads and he swept a third of the stars from heaven with his tail.
Just as she gives birth to a son who is to be a great leader for the nations, the dragon tries to devour her baby. But God saves him, and gives her the wings of an eagle to fly off into the wilderness to be nourished there, for a time and times and half a time, as the story goes. This is when the dragon gets really angry and declares war on the world. But the woman watches from the wilderness, where she is strengthened and nurtured by God. While God and all God’s angels fight the war in heaven, eventually defeating the dragon forever, the death of evil .
She is nourished in the wilderness, and so are we. This motif is in many stories in the Bible. The way is made clear, not in the heat of battle, but in the forced retreat to the wilderness. None of us go there willingly, or so the story goes. Hagar is banished to the wilderness and finds the way, led by God. The Israelites escape to the wilderness and find a whole new future. Jesus is forced into the wilderness by the Spirit and finds the strength to carry out his mission there. We are tested in the wilderness, but it is also the place we are taken to be nourished, nurtured and learn to depend on a power greater than ourselves. It’s the place where we let go and learn to trust in God who shows us that there is not only a way in the wilderness, but the wilderness is the Way.
The Wilderness is the Way.
It feels like we are all on a very long wilderness journey, thanks to COVID19. The days are long without much direction, we are anxious about how our needs will be met and often wondering what to do next. We need a story to guide us, to hold us together, to tell us who we are, to ground us in something bigger than the evidence of the day. The woman clothed with the sun steps into this dark book of revelation and into the darkness of our world, and reveals something new. This something new can be a navigation point for all of us as we try to figure out what to do with each day’s chaos. God is doing a new thing, even and especially in the wilderness, in the uncertainty of our days, in the chaos of our world.
We may feel like we are at the end of a story, but the woman clothed with the sun shows us it just may be a new beginning. This feeling that we are doomed and that chaos is the only thing that rules the day is actually a trick the seven headed dragon, and the chaos monsters of our world, play upon us. The darkness of chaos is always trying to convince us that the world is full of doom and gloom and that our best days are behind us. But the woman clothed with the sun tells us, “don’t fall for it.” Resist and wait, resist and pray. God will surely come and give you rest, nurture and a way forward. Giving you the uplift of eagle’s wings just when you need it the most.
The seven headed dragon would have you believe that chaos is in control, it exists to create the chaos of uncertainty in the world. But it also feeds off of our lack of faith, our fear. Revelation tells us that God wins the war in heaven and it’s the death of evil, forever. It’s a scenario that plays out a million times a day, all over the world. Though the dragon takes its bite, love always wins. Love is the most powerful force in the universe.
This story shows us that God walks through the dark hills of our lives, too, lifting us up when we have no more strength to fight. Saving the evidence we have created out of goodness. God gives us rest and nurture, even in the middle of the fight. God not only makes a way in the wilderness, the wilderness becomes the way itself. To new life, new creation and the experience of God’s love invading the world.
Trust that God will meet you when you face the chaos monsters of your days, and give you what you need to find rest, renewal and peace. God will even fight the battle for you, when you are ready to let go.
Check out more hidden stories of women of the Bible in this free resource, click here to download the free PDF
There are little sprouts coming up in my garden from seeds I planted a couple of weeks ago. It’s kind of a miracle. Since I planted these seeds, my garden has experienced torrential downpours, a tornado and even frost. These sprouts shouldn’t be appearing, and yet new life is bursting into view. The seed has abided in the very substance of it’s being, the ground, and together, they are forming something new – nourishment.
The word abide comes to mind as I watch these tiny miracles spring from creation itself. To abide means to continue without fading or being lost. To take refuge and root in that which is greater than ourselves. In so many spiritual traditions, this is the core concept. abiding in the Creator, in God, in the Great Spirit. Jesus speaks of abiding in God as God abides in us. There is a oneness at the core of this abiding, a merging with that which gives life that allows us to “continue without fading or being lost.” A Power greater than ourselves meets us in the darkness of our world and nourishes us, turning us into something new, giving us the strength to nourish others.
To turn towards the practice of abiding is to turn towards something greater than the winds that toss us about or the events of our lives that threaten to lead us down pathways of despair. We need this nourishment each day of abiding, it is the very thing that keeps us spiritually alive. It is the path of life, our very refuge.
It can be difficult to practice the very thing we need the most when all around us seems chaotic and driven by fear. But remembering to abide can be a practice that not only saves us in these times but changes us on the other side. Taking some moments throughout the day to develop this practice can provide a rootedness that can carry us through our lives and through difficult times. In fact, these thin spaces of our lives, when the veil between heaven and earth is cracked open through suffering, can be the perfect time to begin or perhaps begin again.
Here is one of the practices I use to abide. Feel free to adapt it or develop your own.
Centering Prayer: This is a practice that has been used by monastics for hundreds of years, but Fr. Thomas Keating really brought this practice into the mainstream. There are many videos of him discussing it on Youtube and you can readily find them by doing a search with his name + “centering prayer.” Sometimes, I listen to them while driving. He is the real pro and I recommend learning the art of the practice from his videos. Being a musician, I like to innovate a little. I adapted my version of this practice several years ago. You can use a word or a phrase that helps you feel connected to God. I often use the word, “Creator” but it can be a word such as “love” or “grace” or “peace.” The important thing to remember is that anyone can do centering prayer, it is available to us all. Sit in a comfortable position, breathe deeply for a few minutes, slowly. As you breath in you say the word at the tip of the inhale of your breath, say it in your mind. Then breathe out slowly. Repeat this for 10 to 20 minutes (or however long) as you seek to connect with God. If your mind drifts off, just gently get back into the practice. It may take a few minutes for the mind to settle. When I have trouble settling my mind (often), I add a little soundtrack of Tibetan prayer bells, which again can easily be found on Youtube. The bells help my mind to sink into the breath. Somehow, the vibrations of the bells are very calming.
Maybe you are like so many people and may have problems with the God concept. So many people have been raised to believe that God is wrathful and punishing or indifferent and uncaring. But God is unconditional love itself. Something that is hard for us to fathom. If you have trouble with the concept of God, try this acronym: G.O.D. – Good, Orderly Direction. God desires to move us to a place of sanity in a world that sometimes feels like it is overwhelmed with insanity (Einstein’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results).
We need new practices to solve old problems, to confound old narratives of hurt and pain. Or maybe taking old practices and making them new. Centering prayer, as Thomas Keating has said, is a form of “Divine Therapy,” that over time, quiets the mind and helps us connect to the heart. In other words, to abide, to continue without fading or being lost.
As we return to God throughout the day in prayer, we discover a miracle. God abides in us, giving us strength, growing our internal resources, giving us hope even in times of uncertainty.
Here’s a little piece of a song I love, created with Rumi’s poetry and a wonderful composer, Conni Ellisor. It’s called “Kiss the Ground” and the lyrics really remind me of the importance of being grounded in that Power that is greater than myself. Enjoy!
In a post 9/11 era and the age of the global pandemic, we are waking up to the new reality of collective trauma. It’s not something most of us want to discuss over coffee, in fact, we’d really rather avoid any unpleasant conversation about trauma in general. Yet, here we are, trying to get centered in a time that feels as if “the center cannot hold.” (W.B Yeats) The truth is, we can find a center that holds, that is, if we learn to cultivate it. But first, we need to understand why its so difficult to find. Our feelings give us clues.
Living in a culture of collective trauma often feels like we may have lost access to a loving, hopeful or joyful self, the very center of our being. It seems the evidence around us points only to the tragic loss of safety or sanity. And that is the core issue, that we are trying to gain a sense of peace, sanity and stability from outside of ourselves, trying to construct a center from things that simply cannot hold.
When we find ourselves in the grip of fear and trauma, we begin grasping for solutions. Where we may have once lived in a world that seemed to provide a measure of stability, we find that our usual framework may have lost its ability to sustain us anymore. Though it may seem easier to reach outside of ourselves for solutions, the key to healing the wounds of collective trauma is to go within, but that is easier said than done.
Trauma affects us in many different ways, but one of the main coping mechanisms that can hinder our healing is hypervigilance. It is a state of being constantly on watch, born from the expectation that something horrible is about to happen. In hypervigilance, one constantly feels the need to control and manage one’s environment. Most of us experience it as anxiety, some as anger, but it is also there in addictions to media devices and the constant news feeds of the ongoing tragedies of the world. Our hypervigilance gets confirmed over and over again by our news feeds through the evidence of terrible events unfolding all over the world. Add to that the violence occurring in one’s own life or community and a hypervigilant state then becomes justified. We are caught in an unending loop of needing to monitor and control an environment that seems to be spinning out of control. We can easily become trapped in hypervigilance and this can keep us from taking the healing journey within. Hypervigilance can also keep us in a state of fatigue and exhaustion. Because it’s exhausting to constantly be on watch.
Collective trauma also generates the feeling that the world, events and our lives are moving very fast and it is difficult to slow down. Media seems to play a prominent role in maintaining a hypervigilant state, though it can also provide opportunities for healing when its used wisely.
What we all too often fail to experience in our culture is any true acknowledgment and would be healing from the deep psychological wounds of trauma. But how do we even approach these wounds that seem to overwhelm us at every turn? The pain seems so much greater than the solution. In addition, the places that once seemed to keep peace and order seem to be less available. Churches are closing at an alarming rate, massive expanses of wilderness are being co-opted for natural resource development, the places that once brought peace seem to be bordering on extinction.
When Jesus, the great healer, walked among us, he shared the radical notion that the kingdom of God, the place where the healing happens, is within. Jesus left us a pathway, the Spirit or Holy Spirit, as a guide to this realm within. Whether you think of it as a kingdom or a realm or a dimension, it’s the same thing, he told us that we must go within if we are to discover our authentic soul life awaiting us, that part of us that is eternal, indestructible, connected to God, connected to love. The Christ Spirit is a companion to walk with us on this journey. The Great Healer walks among us still.
If we continue to seek out what is hidden in our hearts, the image of God within us all, we will begin to catch some initial glimpses of the possibility of healing. But we cannot do it alone, we need others to walk with us. Somehow, this inward journey is easier to do in a supportive community.
Stabilizing Community
As we take the risk of an inner journey, we need communities that provide stability for us to experience moving from a trauma driven way of functioning in the world, to a love infused way of being. To risk healing requires nurture from others. There are communities out there that can become places of healing for us if we seek them out. Even now, as we are learning to connect virtually, Zoom meetings are popping up everywhere. Churches are forming virtual small groups, 12 step programs are forming regular Zoom meetings, group therapies are going online now and so much more. You will find that if you ask God for direction, to supply your need to connect to community, you will find connection. Sometimes we just need to take the first step and ask for what we need.
Just as collective trauma is contagious, so is collective healing. Our journey inward to sit with pain, to bring it before the Divine Light and risk loving love into being is a pathway to overcoming fear in our ourselves and in our world. As we learn to cultivate the Center within ourselves, we will naturally help others to find it, too. Healing is contagious!
We are due for a collective healing and it begins in each of our hearts, each day. Claim some territory in your heart today for healing, slow down, breathe, meditate on the heart. As you do, ask God to be present and feel the wounds of fear letting go. Keep coming back to the prayer of the heart and to the community of prayer, the heart among hearts of love will surely find the way to God., the Center that holds.
P.S. Here’s a meditative song to help you on your path to finding a prayerful state within. I wrote this song after beginning to practice the first step of a 12 step program: “I am powerless over…..” Fill in the blank. Sometimes this step takes up a long portion of my prayer time! Naming all the things I’m powerless over helps me to enter into God space, where I’m letting go of control. “Surrender” is always a third option, after we’ve exhausted fighting and fleeing, we can just surrender to whatever God is trying to do in our lives and let it unfold.
