Who are my mother and brothers?

Anne Lamott wrote once that there are two kinds of prayers: “help me, help me, help me” and “thank you, thank you, thank you.” Lately I’ve been saying the “help me, help me, help me” one a lot. I’ve been struggling to manage a lot of competing commitments, without the appropriate amount of time. (Of course, there’s probably NEVER an appropriate amount of time.) Anyway, today was my turn to preach in chapel at school, and for days I’ve been having a hard time “getting it together.” I found the songs I wanted to use (“All are welcome,” and Brian Wren’s “When love is found”), God even sent a boatload of middle school kids who wanted to be the choir, but I was feeling completely stuck with the words. Finally, late last night after teaching until 9:30 pm, I had to give up and simply acknowledge that it was in God’s hands, not my own. I threw out my drafts, went to sleep, got up at the crack of dawn, and wrote a homily. The text for the day is Luke 8:19-21, where Jesus appears to be redefining what he means by mother and brothers: “those who hear the word of God and do it.” All I can say is “thank you, thank you, thank you” for sending some words in my direction. If you’re curious about what I finally was given to say, you can find it here (in pdf format).