Gathering of Eagles First People Reunion
June 27 to July 2, 2010 — Camp of the Ozarks
July 2 Communion Service remarks by Andrew Bolton
We have been blessed this week. People who for a long time have been estranged have been reconciled. There has been a healing of hearts, minds and spirits this week. I think we have been a sanctuary, a safe and holy place for each other and so enabling the Holy Spirit to do its work.
I think in the past I have been sensitive to the Holy Spirit through nature. However, this week I have really listened, been stiller, deeper because of the witness of Native American ways and witness. This has been a personal blessing to me this week.
The children have been extraordinary this week. They have been so open. I have really enjoyed them. We have been blessed by our children and grandchildren – adopted or natural!
This week we have been served by a dedicated, holy people. These people have included those who have tendered the fire on the one hand to those who have fed us so joyfully through their loving kitchen ministry. I have never seen kitchen staff so joyful in their service. They have blessed by wonderful food and in their joyful Spirit. There has also been a warm welcome to all. Each one who has come throughout the week I have sensed the presence of Jesus in him or her.
We have remembered with sadness and pain the great suffering of Native Americans in the past and the ongoing suffering of the surviving remnant today. Native Americans have known and know unspeakable anguish. Yet we also have sensed hope for the future. The non-geographical congregation is a new beginning. This Reunion is the beginning of the communal rising of a people. The drums will beat out the good news of this gathering of eagles, this foretaste of Zion that even made budget!
- God has spoken to us this week: As creator of a beautiful earth. We have enjoyed the lovely grounds of this week’s camp and praised God for them. God has also blessed us – dare I say it! – with glorious English summer days this week – sunny but not too hot and humid.
- God has spoken to us this week: Through the Son, Jesus, who is teacher, who knows about suffering, rejection, death, and rising again. Jesus knows the pain and anguish of Native Americans in his own body. Jesus speaks to our condition of suffering and at the same time speaks with hope in rising again.
- God has spoken to us this week: As Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has been the presence of God’s love among us this week. The work of the Holy Spirit this week has been in healing, guiding, and lifting up.
Remember this week in the days ahead. Remember brothers and sisters. Remember the One who has been present among us.
This is my request and challenge: In the days ahead put your trust in that Spirit that leads to do good, that leads to do rightly, that leads us to in service to our brothers and sisters in the name of Jesus.
Blessed be the tie that binds ….