Softening the soul...

"Softening the soul..." isn't that a lovely expression? It is a term used by Robert Wicks to describe treating ourselves with gentle grace and authentic patience.  He writes: "We all make mistakes - sometimes big ones - but there is always an opportunity for love to grow from these regrettable acts when we are open to letting the Lord teach us. But there are two questions we must answer: will we clearly recognize our faults and through God's love let a freeing, renewing grace come to us? Can we have patience and be as compassionate with ourselves as we are or need to become with others?"

Right there is the conundrum of the spiritual journey: being honest and letting God take charge of our failures and sins, and, allowing grace to wash over and nourish us for the long haul rather than giving in to fear, judgement or shame. One of my favorite U2 songs, "Dirty Days" articulates and expresses what it feels like to me to be honest about myself - sins and all.  I hear a heavy-hearted Bono lament the brokenness that resonates inside and out for most adults beyond a certain age, yes?

I don't know you and you don't know the half of it
I had a starring role
I was the bad guy who walked out
They said be careful where you aim
'cause where you aim you just might hit
You can hold onto something so tight
You've already lost it

Dragging me down
That's not the way it used to be
You can't even remember
What I'm trying to forget
It was a dirty day
Dirty day

You're looking for explanations
I don't even understand
If you need someone to blame
Throw a rock in the air
You'll hit someone guilty... 
And just to make sure there is no ambiguity, he ends the song with a chant that is a truth all too real:  these days, days, days run away like horses over the hill.  Life is short - and often cruel - without a sense of honesty and grace it becomes brutal.  This isn't self-pity or delusion - nor is it narcissistic injury - as he seems aware of the paradox of honesty: it hurts and also sets us free. Like Anne Lamott writes: sometimes my mind is like a bad neighborhood and I don't want to go there all by myself!

What I particularly like about this song - and most of the tunes from this period - is their stunning lack of sentimentality.  U2 doesn't try to force a pretty ending on this confession. They just let it sit there and fade away with the Edge's piercing guitar. Another song points to the second part of the equation - patience and trusting that grace is greater than sin - in the form of "Until the End of the World."

It is, of course, Judas singing to Jesus (although that is not clear at first.)  The set-up could be a forgotten or spurned lover...

I took the money

I spiked your drink
You miss too much these days if you stop to think
You lead me on with those innocent eyes
You know I love the element of surprise
In the garden I was playing the tart
I kissed your lips and broke your heart
You...you were acting like it was
The end of the world

(Love...love...)

In my dream I was drowning my sorrows
But my sorrows, they learned to swim
Surrounding me, going down on me
Spilling over the brim
Waves of regret and waves of joy
I reached out for the one I tried to destroy
You...you said you'd wait
'til the end of the world

This reminds me of the Sufi story of Jesus looking and looking, pacing in consternation, as creation comes to a close. Finally, the Father asks the Son what is the matter? "I am still waiting - and searching - for Judas..." Grace trumps karma as they sing in another time and place. I found a recent posting by Fr. Richard Rohr addressed much the same thing in his observation about Jesus.  The key is grounded in uniting these two truths so that they soften our souls.

He made the two into one, breaking down the barrier keeping them apart. . . . He destroyed in his own person the hostility . . . to create one single New Humanity . . . restoring peace through the cross, to unite them in a single Body and reconcile all things into God. — Ephesians 2:14-16

What an absolutely amazing passage this is! It is an utterly new agenda for humanity which has never largely been followed. It demands a rather high level of consciousness and conscience.

In the mystery of paradox, if you try to rest on one side and forget the other, you always lose the Bigger Truth. The “Four Square Gospel,” revealed on the cross, is always Yes/And. As many sages have said, the opposite of every profound truth is normally another profound truth, and they must listen to one another for wisdom to emerge.

We’ve seen, for example, Christian cultures, like much of Latin America, Russia, and Europe, that are entirely centered on a pious, individualistic notion of the Cross, while losing any real sense of Resurrection for history or others. Justice for the poor, for animals, or for the earth was not even in the conversation. In the USA, on the other hand, we created a convenient prosperity gospel—trumped-up resurrection for a few and almost no reference to the pain and suffering of the world. Much of American evangelical Christianity up to now has had little capacity for self-criticism, and tries to get to resurrection without any acknowledgment of the cross that most of the world must carry. They limit Christ’s salvation to a very individualistic notion, and their “Christ” ends up being very small and stingy.

Jesus was hung on—and held together—the cosmic collision of opposites (revealed in the very geometric sign of the cross). He let it destroy him, as his two nailed hands held all the great opposites safely together as one: the good and the bad thief, heaven and earth, matter and spirit, both sinners and saints gathered at his feet, a traditional Jew revealing a very revolutionary message to his and all religion, a naked male body revealing an utterly feminine soul. On the cross, Jesus becomes the Cosmic Christ.

When the student is ready...

Last night I took a book off one of my shelves at home and

began to take it in. Apparently it has been sitting there for almost six years. But, as the old saying goes, "When the student is ready, the Buddha will appear." And apparently it took about six years for this student to now become ready for Robert Wicks' small volume entitled Prayerfulness: Awakening to the Fullness of Life. There are a few reasons this strikes me as valuable to mention.

First, I have been yearning to take another step closer to the Lord in prayer. As so often happens to me, as time passes I am so easily distracted. I get into a mediation groove and then find other things that grab my attention until my simple rituals of quiet prayer, solitude and spiritual reading fall into disrepute. Small wonder that Wicks restates the obvious: a satisfying commitment to prayer and meditation is built on practices that bring clarity and kindness. "This balance must be just right: too much clarity and you will hurt yourself (what  psycho-dynamic  psychologists call 'narcissistic injury.') On the other hand, too much kindness and there will be little or no growth; instead we will miss, gloss over or too quickly excuse our behavior."
Since the summer I know I have been running on empty in some ways. Over and again, Di tells me: are you taking time for prayer and quiet retreat? And I always have some excuse - good things to do - until I find myself beat and weary and fretting. So, since the start of Advent, I've been sneaking up on reclaiming my time-tested rituals - and this book by Wicks' is part of my Epiphany renewal.

Second, as we make arrangements to head back to Tucson to visit with our dear friend Roger one last time, I've been struck by how "foolish" this trip is on some levels. We don't have the money. We barely have the time. And there is so much going on at church. I was working myself into a fretting frenzy last night over these things - actually waking myself up from sleep at 1:20 am all worried and agitated - when I read these words in Prayerfulness:

The underlying attitude that will allow us to enhance our inner soil is offered to us in the words of Jesus: be like little children ... Children have a simplicity, hopefulness and recognition of the importance of compassion that, at its core, is a central aspect of both caring for others and taking the next step in our spiritual life. One child's reaction to a difficult situation reminds me of this. She was late coming home from school, and her mother was worried. When she finally stepped through the door, her mother yelled at her for being late, then caught herself and asked, "Why were you late anyway?" To which the little girl responded: "I was helping a friend in trouble." And, asked her mother,"what did you do to help your friend?" To which the child replied quite simply, "I sat down next to her and helped her cry..." A faith-filled person must never turn her back on others, but instead offer them a space to share their burdens.

"That is why we're going to Tucson, numbskull" I said to myself. It isn't about what we can afford or being there at the right time or doing any church work. It is just being real with those we love and helping one another to cry. And as I put the book back on my night stand, I took a quick look at the back fly leaf only to see an endorsement by Bishop Gerald Kincanas who, as you might guess, is the Roman Catholic bishop of Tucson.

Wicks quotes Henri Nouwen from the Genesee Diary about the centrality of making solitude and quiet prayer a part of our daily rituals: "Is there a quiet stream underneath the fluctuating affirmations and rejections of my little world? Is there a still point where my life is anchored and from which I can reach out to others with hope and courage and confidence?" He continues: "simple rituals of prayerfulness balance the secular obsessions with success, fame, power, physical attractiveness, money or simply getting our way. They help prevent such normal human desires from becoming idols."

For some reason, only then was I able to go to sleep. Today at church, after worship was over, a young couple told me they sensed something deep was taking place among us. Another young woman told me that she feels called to become a member of our community. "Last week, I don't know what hit me, but I found myself weeping all throughout the liturgy. I kept looking at that big Celtic cross... my grandmother gave me one just like it... and then today when you talked about turning points and knocked, it just hit me... and I feel like I need to be part of this." Me, too... and I know it is time to go deeper.

St. Charles Borromeo said: "Be sure that you first preach by the way you live. If you do not, people will notice that you say one thing but live otherwise." The time has come to take the preaching of my life deeper.

Confession is good for the soul: I finally quit caring about being cool...

For most of my life I have worried about - and wanted to be - cool. Mostly that title has eluded me. In fourth grade I was the geeky guy who listened to both Saint Saens AND The Four Seasons (along with some smokin' girl groups, too like the Jaynettes the Shirelles, Little Eva and the Shangra Las.) For a short time - sixth grade - my weight wasn't out of control, but all throughout what we once called junior high and then high school I was the fat kid who played bass guitar. I was at times witty - I had a wicked sense for good tunes - and could dance like a white kid who listened to a LOT of James Brown (and Frank Zappa and the Beatles!) But I had no illusions: I was never cool.
In time, I found my niche as an oddball musical intellectual who loved Jesus. And children. And poetry and movies and dogs. That is still mostly true all these years later. The reason I am confessing that I recently quit caring about being cool is that over the past year I've seen articles and books talking about this or that gimmick to bring more people back into the church. For most of my 30 years I've read almost EVERY recommended theological and tactical prescription for reaching out and making the church relevant. 

And, sadly, I've tried a lot of them in my quest to be successful as a cool pastor. I've done praise bands. I learned all about digital worship. I worked at creating small groups. And youth ministries. And lay led mission and compassion teams. I've led marriage enrichment retreats and spiritual life retreats, too. I've been active in social justice networks, food coops and tactical outreach to young families and senior citizens. 

Tonight, however, when I saw two postings on Facebook advocating yet another gimmick for making the church more authentic - and by implication, more interesting and satisfying for today's consumers - I said out loud: that's it - enough bullshit - I don't care anymore about being cool. Maybe that's been true for me for about 10 years, yes? I am a slow learner, so maybe I can only now give expression to something I have known to be true for the last decade. In my experience, there are essentially only three reasons why people go to church and remain connected:

+ First, the community is grounded in the living Spirit and presence of Jesus. It can be contemporary or traditional, liturgical or low church, it can be Protestant, Catholic, Anglican or Orthodox. The style doesn't matter. All that matters is that the leadership and a deep core of the community knows, trusts and follows Jesus. Christ is all we have to share with the world anyway - not better lattes or cinema or music or childcare - for like God's Holy Spirit said to the disciples on the mountain after the Lord's transfiguration:  this is my beloved Son - listen to him - and when the smoke cleared there was Jesus only. That is the key: Jesus only. Now please don't misunderstand me: I am NOT saying that Jesus is the only way to God's grace; nor am I suggesting that only Christians will be welcomed into God's eternal love. I am just saying that without Jesus the church is just a gimmick - and all people, especially young people, have excellent bullshit detectors and that is why more and more stay away.

+ Second, there comes a moment in some of our lives when we realize that we don't know what is really important in life. It might happen after an illness - or a divorce - or getting sober - or a car accident. It might happen when our first child is born. Or we look out upon the Grand Canyon and are filled with an awe we neither understand nor can control. It might hit you while standing in the Tate Modern gazing in meditation upon the Rothko paintings. Or at a U2 or Springsteen or Lady Gaga or Arvo Paart concert. Whatever the catalyst, you sense that there is something greater and more beautiful to life than you have ever known before - and you want to encounter this awe at a deeper level. So you go on a quest - and maybe you'll find a church that can help you. Not every church is equipped to do this. Many of our contemporary congregations are mostly interested in either the prosperity gospel or helping you manage your time and money better. They don't really know very much about the care and cure of the soul. But some do... and those are the churches that have something to offer souls who are on fire. And when people find such congregations, they usually end up staying, too.
+ Third, when we start to grow up and settle in to a spiritual commitment, we realize we can't make it all by ourselves. We need help and encouragement and correction and sustenance. Nobody can live into the counter-cultural truth of the Sermon on the Mount all by themselves. Nobody can stay grounded and humble and focused on joy given the hassles of real life. Nobody can find their way through the haze of a dark night of the soul without support. In a word, people need to be in community to go deeper. This takes a while to grasp. It isn't the first reason people stay in church. But it becomes a key reason as women and men mature. We simply aren't wise enough, bright enough, loving enough, strong enough or faithful enough to do live into the way of Christ all by ourselves. We need help. And some churches offer a little help along the way.

Jesus - awe and humility - and community are the three things that both attract authentic seekers to a church - and keep them grounded. Not gimmicks. Not alcohol and hymns. Not earrings and rock and roll. Or jazz or hip hop or tattoos or the best coffee in town. Just Jesus - his awesome and humbling grace - and a community of encouragement. And none of that is cool. It is just real - and soul healing. And that's a freakin' wonderful truth from my perspective tonight.

Starting to get the Good Friday groove...

Earlier this year I wrote something about seeking gentleness in all things. In a volume of poetry that Leonard Cohen published as The Book of Mercy he speaks some of the words I sense in my soul. I am particularly moved by "You Who Pour Mercy into Hell."

You who pour mercy into hell, sole authority in the highest and lowest worlds, let your anger disperse the mist in this aimless place, where even my sins fall short of the mark. Let me be with you again, absolute companion, let me study your ways which are just beyond the hope of evil. Seize my heart out of its fantasy, direct my heart from the fiction of secrecy, you who know the secrets of every heart, whose mercy is to be the secret of longing.

Let every heart declare its secret, let every song disclose your love, let us bring to you the sorrows of our freedom. Blessed are you, who opens a gate, in every moment, to enter in truth of tarry in hell. Let me be with you again, let me put this away, you who wait beside me, who have broken down your world to gather hearts. Blessed is your name, blessed is the confession of your name. Kindle the darkness of my calling, let me cry to the one who judged the heart in justice and mercy. Arouse my heart again with the limitless breath you breathe into me, around the secret from obscurity.

I am starting to get a sense that this should be the opening and closing prayer to this year's Good Friday liturgy - coupled with differing versions of the song first made popular by the Animals but radically reinterpreted by both Nina Simone and Yusuf Islam - Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood. At first I was thinking in particular of the narrative of Peter who stands as an archetype for us in the light of Jesus: Peter is every man/woman who is moved and changed within but who still wrestles with fear, shame and grief. But I am wondering now if we might include other biblical narratives to include Mary Magdalene's confusion as well as the uncertainty that Christ's mother and Judas lived through on the dark side of Easter?
The arc of this experimental liturgy in music, poetry, visual art and scripture would be on the Lord's death. But I am wondering if we might deconstruct the story and retell it from the confusion of three key players? Because, at least in my theology, even through their confusion and betrayal God's grace is stronger than doubt or sin, yes? And just as each of us - individually and together - seek forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace, so too the very founders of the Body of Christ.

I am hearing a very open and free jazz improvisation on "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" to start this liturgy before Cohen's prayer is recited on top of the music. And after the music and words have taken root, we would move into the first vocal interpretation of the song to be followed by a series of readings, poems, songs and silence.

I'm also thinking that this tune by Portishead - It's Only You - sounds like something Magdalene would be singing if she were a 21st century hipster owning her real doubts and longings.  And I love the genre-bending these cats do on this cut.  The guiding light for creating this liturgy is the grace Jesus makes flesh.  Earlier this morning, Fr. Richard Rohr put it like this:

You deserve to know my science for interpreting sacred texts.

It is called a “hermeneutic.” Without an honest and declared hermeneutic, we have no consistency or authority in our interpretation of the Bible. My methodology is very simple; I will try to interpret Scripture the way that Jesus did.

Even more than telling us exactly what to see in the Scriptures, Jesus taught us how to see, what to emphasize, and also what could be de-emphasized, or even ignored. Jesus is himself our hermeneutic, and he was in no way a fundamentalist or literalist. He was a man of the Spirit. Just watch him and watch how he does it (which means you must have some knowledge of his Scriptures!).

Jesus consistently ignored or even denied exclusionary, punitive, and triumphalistic texts in his own Jewish Bible in favor of texts that emphasized inclusion, mercy, and justice for the oppressed. He had a deeper and wider eye that knew what passages were creating a highway for God and which passages were merely cultural, self-serving, and legalistic additions. When Christians state that every line in the Bible is of equal importance and inspiration, they are being very unlike Jesus. 

Jesus read the inspired text in an inspired way, which is precisely why he was accused of “teaching with authority and not like our scribes” (Matthew 7:29).

At a worship team meeting the other night one wise and creative soul said, "What would happen if we designed our Good Friday liturgy and music first and then worked backwards to shape our Lenten emphasis? What would happen if throughout Lent we were hearing some of the music that will be lifted up as prayer in the Good Friday liturgy?" What a freakin' brilliant idea... let's see how this starts to take shape and form and we find the groove for Good Friday.

credits
1) Adrian Kellard @ http://mocra.wordpress.com/category/exhibitions/good-friday-2010/
2) Misunderstood @ ddefectiveink.blogspot.com

I will weep when you are weeping...

Yesterday I spent a little time listening to a colleague in ministry who

was feeling frustrated, hurt and hassled by some of the crazy bullshit that goes on in the life of the church.It can zap your soul of both humor and hope when out of the blue some reasonably good person asks you to do something stupid or compromising. It is equally invasive and unsettling when people who should know better act in punitive and petty ways.

I remember back in my first church when I was serving as an Associate Minister in Michigan and naively asked if the church office was closed on the day after Thanksgiving? Like many young academics I was used to spending the days after our feast with my family getting ready for the fullness of Advent. I can still see the face of my Senior Minister - who, truth be told, hired me by lying to me about the congregation's interest in authentic urban ministry - when he turned and said to me in a smug and patronizing voice: "Well, I am off on the Friday after Thanksgiving but I expect everyone else to be in the office because we are NOT closed. We need to be ready to serve God's people." 

It felt like a deliberate slap in my face. So after letting this degrading attack register, I said with utter contempt:  "That's bullshit. I'm going to bring this to the Personnel Committee. You are no different or better than anyone else on this staff." What followed was my first shouting match at a staff meeting. And it continued full voice for about three minutes until my Senior Minister announced, "Sure, whatever, BRING it to the Personnel Committee and we'll see what happens." I was too green to realize this was simply his way of telling me that he called all the shots and the committee was stacked to rule in his favor. Which, of course, it did - and they ruled that all staff except the Senior Minister had to report for work on Friday.

And damn if that bastard didn't call my church office at 9:05 am on Friday morning after Thanksgiving to make certain I was present and accounted for. It was in that moment that I learned the beauty of passive aggression!  So I took his call and assured him that we were all ready for action. Then I went out to the local grocery store and bought a wild lunch for everyone on the staff, came back to set an elaborate table and insisted that we all take 3 hours to enjoy it! The secretaries, Sunday School director and janitor were a little nervous at first but I said if there was any issue, they should send the complaint to me. And when word got out about our party, let's just say that my relationship with my Senior Minister went steadily down hill from there.

Nevertheless, I learned two things about how I wanted to do things in ministry from that unexpected slap in the face. First, I made a commitment that on my watch the church office would ALWAYS be closed the day after Thanksgiving. And that has been true for nearly 30 years. My staff and I will work our butts off throughout Advent and Christmas Eve. One grace day is the least we can offer.  

Second, I asked God to help me always remember how shitty it feels to be on the bottom of the barrel. Not only is it important to me to feel that empty aching in the gut that grabs you when church politics or dysfunctional behavior reaches up and smacks you without warning; but I want to try to work in ways that never give me benefits that arent' shared by the rest of the staff. If I get time off, so do they. I get it that there are different requirements and different expectations for our different positions, but everyone deserves dignity, respect, fairness and solidarity. Once, in my early days in this church, I told a disbelieving staff that even with the stock market crash, if the officers were going to give me a cost of living raise, it would have to be an across the board raise. No one believed that they would go for it, but I insisted that this was the only fair way to go forward as part of the Body of Christ. It wasn't much money, to be sure; but it was the same percentage for each and all of us. 

And EVERYONE was off for the day after Thanksgiving, too.  We still have crazy bullshit to deal with - and I guess we always will until this life is over.  I came across this extended quote from Buechner that speaks to living by faith.

Christ is our employer as surely as the general contractor is the carpenter's employer, only the chances are that this side of Paradise we will never see his face except mirrored darkly in dreams and shadows, if we're lucky, and in each other's faces... We are, all of us, Mary Magdalene, who reached out to him at the end only to embrace the empty air. We are the ones who stopped for a bit to eat that evening at Emmaus and, as soon as they saw who it was that was sitting there at the table with them, found him vanished from their sight.

Abraham, Moses, Gideon, Rahab, Sarah are our brothers and sisters because, like them, we all must live in faith, as the great chapter puts it with a staggering honesty that should be a lesson to us all, "not having received what was promised, but having seen it and greeted it from afar," and only from afar. And yet the country we seek and do not truly find, at least not here, not now, the heavenly country and homeland, is there somewhere as surely as our yearning for it is there; and I think that our yearning for it is itself as much a part of the truth of it as your yearning for love or beauty or peace is a part of those truths.  And Christ is there with us on our way as surely as the way itself is there that has brought us to this place. It has brought us. We are here. He is with us - that is our faith - but only in unseen ways, as subtle and pervasive as the air.

And so we listen - and pray - and laugh and cry together as best we are able.  Like the hymn puts it:  I will laugh when you are laughing, when you weep, I'll weep with you; I will share your joys and sorrows till we've seen this journey through.

My heart is breaking...

Almost seven years ago, we left Tucson - but over and over again it keeps calling my name. Three years ago today, Gabby Giffords was shot in the head and six of her constituents were murdered in a Safeway parking lot. Di and I were viewing Mako Fujimura's exhibit in a Soho art gallery based upon his illuminated manuscript celebrating the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible.  A young woman who Dianne had mentored in confirmation called us to tell us of the horror.Shortly before we went to this gallery I learned that my predecessor in ministry's son was not only engaged to Gabby's administrative aide, but had been accepted into law school at the University of Arizona.

My friend Mark from Tucson, who once served as moderator of my congregation, came to Pittsfield to preach my installation service as the new pastor. My friends Mark, Larry and Linda came to Tucson for the 30th anniversary celebration of my ordination. And we've been back twice to celebrate the weddings of young people we knew and loved during our days of ministry.  

And now one of my dearest old Tucson friends, Roger, has entered into

hospice. Roger is one of the sweetest, most creative and humble men I have ever known. I worked closely with his wife, Debby, who is another dear friend for 10+ years in ministry. She was my closest ally and most trusted colleague during our time in the desert Southwest. We feasted together, we partied together, we wept and laughed and held one another accountable for stupid bullshit throughout the years together, too. In addition to Linda and Larry - and my band mates in Stranger - leaving Roger and Debby was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do in my life.

And now my buddy Roger is starting to say good-bye. Generally speaking, the protocol for old clergy is to stay away and maintain very clear boundaries in these kinds of circumstances; after you leave a church, the contemporary rules say that the only ethical path is non-contact. Well, I practice healthy boundaries and support non-intervention once you leave a congregation. And, my friend is dying so I'm going to find a way to go back to Tucson one more time to say good-bye. To share a few beers - and a whole lot of tears - with some of the people who not only sacrificed so much for the ministry we loved but also loved me and my family when we weren't very lovable. It would be just stupid and cruel not to find a way to get back and tell my man Roger how much he changed my life - and how much I love him.

So come hell or high water, we're going to make it happen somehow - and soon! 

Worship notes for Epiphany I...

NOTE: Here are my worship notes for this coming Sunday, January 12,

2014.  As we explore the spirituality of Epiphany more carefully, many of the old stories become new again.

Introduction

All of the biblical texts we’re asked to consider today speak of turning points that hold unknown possibilities for each of us, for all of us and for the whole creation.  These turning points are sometimes personal, other times historical and often take shape and form in what we call the liturgical rhythm of our worship and prayer.  Different insights about these turning points, you see, are expressed in the songs and prayers and aesthetics of worship as we journey together from Advent to Christmas, Christmas to Epiphany, Epiphany to Lent all the way to Pentecost. And while the stories of this journey are usually focused upon Jesus, they invite us to consider where God is meeting us along the way in our lives, too.  The wise and poetic Frederick Buechner put it like this:

Life itself can be thought of as an alphabet by which God graciously makes known his presence and purpose and power among us. Like the Hebrew alphabet, the alphabet of grace has no vowels, and in that sense God’s words to us are always veiled, subtle, cryptic, so that it is left to us to delve into their meaning, to fill in the vowels for ourselves by means of all the faith and imagination we can muster. Now God speaks to us in such a way, presumably, not because he chooses to be obscure but because, unlike a dictionary word whose meaning is fixed, the meaning of an incarnate word is the meaning it has for the one it is spoken to, the meaning that becomes clear and effective in our lives only when we ferret it out for ourselves

Now I have to tell you that I am knocked-out by Buechner’s suggestion that our lives contain some of God’s words to us. I love the notion that God is still speaking to us in all things.  What we must learn to do is listen to our lives with all the faith and imagination we can muster if we want to grow as people of integrity, depth and grace.  This is clearly one of the ways the Word becomes Flesh, yes?

Some of us, of course, don’t want to go deeper – and it isn’t up to me to judge why – I just know it to be true.  It could be that we’re too weary at this moment in time – or too afraid – or too sad.  Sometimes we’re just too lazy to try – I know that has been true in my life – and we’re not all that different. There are a multiplicity of reasons why we don’t want to give the energy to listening to our lives. And sometimes we don’t even know why we can’t go deeper. It is just where we are in life.

But for those who are ready – for those who are willing and able to embrace the invitation to listen for the word of the Lord within our lives – God promises us a powerful, perplexing, awesome, challenging and enriching encounter with the sacred as it become flesh within and among us.  Buechner is right in telling us it requires all the faith and imagination we can muster to “ferret out for ourselves” what the Holy One is saying to us at any given moment in time.  It also takes some guidance and assistance which is where worship comes back into to the picture; worship is where we first learn to listen for the word of the Lord in our lives. By paying attention to the turning points in Christ’s story we begin to realize that what was true for Jesus is also true for you and me.

+  Are you with me on that?  Do you know what I am saying? 

+  We don’t continually rehearse the story of the Lord just to memorize the facts.  No, we watch, listen, ponder and sing about Christ to know how God was at work in his life and how God is now speaking to you and me through our lives.

So let me first give you some of my thoughts about today’s biblical texts that focus upon the baptism of Jesus.  And then I would like to see what these insights might be saying to us about our own lives and times, ok?

Insights

Now remember that we’re being asked to consider these stories

through the unique lens of Epiphany.  Each of the liturgical turning points in our tradition offers us slightly different ways of listening to our lives and seeing a portion of God’s grace in action. 

+  Advent, for example, gives us permission to honor our deepest longings as we hear the stories of Christ’s coming.  We all ache and hurt, we all know doubt and fear; Advent asks us not to bury our longings but turn them into prayers in anticipation of Christ’s coming in grace.

+  Christmas is a different turning point:  here we celebrate God’s presence with us in our flesh – it is a feast of grace – a blessing shared with us that we can never earn or purchase or even fully comprehend.  It is an invitation to live with gratitude.

+  And now we’re in the season of Epiphany where we look for signs of God’s light in the most unexpected places – like a peasant infant in a stable – like a Messiah come to bring healing to the bruised and broken reeds of the world – like Jesus who embraces his calling to ministry by humbling accepting baptism.

I am coming to believe that one of the clues about living into the spirituality of Epiphany is to be found in all the upside-down images given to us in the stories of this season.  Take what the poet and prophet Isaiah says about the Lord:  a bruised reed he will not break.  Maybe you have seen a bruised reed by a pond or lake – its tip bent over – dangling down? The little child in me always wants to snap that part off and break the bruised reed.  Preacher Steve Godfrey says we have an almost irresistible urge to do this: we want to “snap it off… because it’s just not right to leave it dangling down… in fact, it feels so good to break off that bruised reed.” It seems like it is a part of human nature to want to break that thing and snap it off. (http://churchin the world .com /2014/01/05/a-bruised-reed-he-will-not-break/)

+  To which the prophet Isaiah says: it may be human nature, but God’s servant guided by the Spirit, a bruised reed he will NOT break; God’s servant, you see, comes for justice, for mercy, for healing, to open the eyes of the blind and release the captives from their bondage.

+  God’s servant is not a slave to childish urges: a bruised reed – a wounded soul – a person in pain will not be broken. Remember what Psalm 23 tells us about God’s servant? “He leads me beside still waters and restores my soul.”

That’s one of the upside down images we’re given at the start of Epiphany: a bruised reed he will NOT break. Two others take place during the baptism of Jesus where first the Lord embraces the identity of God’s humble servant by placing himself into John’s hands; and second where the skies open and God calls Christ the beloved. In order for this baptism to have taken place, both Jesus and John had to give up some old ways of thinking and become open to what God was actually saying to them in their lives. The way I get this story is that both Jesus and John had to choose to let God’s Spirit guide them rather than their own desires or the expectations and habits of their generation,

+  Jesus had to give up any sense that his ministry would be about power in the traditional understanding of that word. He would not be a Messiah with an army; he would become a servant who would not break a bruised reed.  He would literally place himself in John’s hands and experience the humility of going under the waters to show the world what the upside-down nature of living in his kingdom of peace and compassion looked like from the bottom up and from inside out.

+  John, too, had to “release his old way of seeing the world.”  The Baptizer spoke of Jesus as the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world… the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”  In the gospel of John we’re told that the Baptist realized that he must decrease in order for Christ to increase and prosper. And yet in today’s story it is John who accepts the role reversal wherein the last shall become first as he baptizes Jesus.

The way I see it both Jesus and John listened to what God was saying to them in their lives and embraced God’s greater mind at this key turning point.  That’s what the word metanoia is all about. Often we translate it in a narrow way as repentance – and for many people repentance means to feel sorry about the bad things we have done in our lives.  Now, there’s nothing wrong with feeling sorry for the bad things we’ve done in our lives – we’ve all done them – and those feelings can be helpful. I think of the heartache and sadness I have caused some of my loved ones and the way that makes me feel – and those feeling push me towards better and more loving choices if I’m paying attention, yes?

+  But repentance is not limited to feeling badly about the way we have hurt others; as theologian Cynthia Bourgeault puts it:  the Greek word, metanoia, that we translate into English as repentance also means to go beyond the mind – to go into the larger mind – the higher or meta message of God’s kingdom of grace. 

+  She suggests that rather than emphasizing repentance as a scolding – change your bad ways sayeth the Lord – the deeper or higher wisdom of repentance should sound something like: “Look, look! The Lord is inviting us into a new way of seeing and living. Come into the larger vision and see how the unforced rhythms of grace do it.” 

That is what the second upside-down image of the heavens opening in this baptism story tells us for what does God say at the baptism of Jesus but: “You are my beloved?”  No scolding, no shaming, no fear or even judgment. Rather we are given a glimpse into the greater mind of the Lord who calls Jesus – and by extension you and me – the beloved. We are the cherished - the sacred and beautiful servants of God’s grace – who make mistakes and often sin, to be sure.  But who are not condemned, rather we are liberated by love. 

+  Do you recall that portion of scripture that some zealot always displays at a televised football game: John 3:16? It is a beautiful summary of the heart of our faith, but it is incomplete without the following verse in John 3:17.  Together they tell us:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, so that who so ever believeth in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but rather that the world might be made whole through him.

+  Are you with me so far?  All the images, symbols and actions involving this baptism are saturated in the upside-down blessing of God’s grace.  They are an invitation into a repentance that enlarges our vision and allies our hearts with God’s deepest truth.

In this light, the baptism of Jesus was clearly a turning point in his life.  It was a moment when he chose to commit himself to God’s greater vision of grace.  It was an act that expressed God’s deepest truth to the world: you are God’s beloved.  It symbolized how his ministry would reverse both habit and history through humility and compassion.  And it incarnated what it means for us to listen to our lives for the alphabet of God’s grace.

+  Jesus didn’t just wake up one day and jump into the Jordan with his cousin John, right? He spent years in reflection.  He fasted and prayed.  He listened and asked questions of his elders, too.

+  Remember the story of when Jesus was 12 years old?  His family had gone to Jerusalem to the Temple for the Feast of Passover.  And as they were returning home, Joseph and Mary discovered that Jesus wasn’t with the other young men.  In terror they returned to Jerusalem only to find the young Jesus sitting in a circle with the wise old men asking them questions.

+  This is yet another of those upside-down symbols – questions are not only acceptable – they are to be encouraged and expressed.  St. Thomas Aquinas used to say to the fundamentalists of his day:  If Jesus could ask questions and bring challenges to his tradition, why can’t we.

+  The story continues with Jesus going out to wander for 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness.  It seems that wandering and wilderness are often part of what we must listen to as we bring faith and imagination into the listening of our lives.

+  And don’t forget the dark night of the soul where in anguish the Master cried out:  My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me? 

Through the lens of Epiphany, the whole story of Christ’s life can be about turning points – how he learned to listen for the word of the Lord in his life – and what that tells us about God’s metanoia and the unforced rhythms of grace.

Conclusion

So think out loud with me now about three broad categories of turning points that have some-thing to tell us about listening for the world of the Lord in our lives.  Over the years I have come to summarize them like this:  there are personal turning points, there are liturgical turning points and there are social/historical turning points. 

+  Liturgically, what season in the life of the church really energizes you?  Can you say why?  Are there parts of our spiritual seasons that make you uncomfortable?  What is that discomfort saying to you, do you think?

+  Have you had really sacred – or totally disastrous – holy days?  A Christmas that nourished your soul?  Or one that was agonizing and horrible?  Or have there been moments in your life that FELT like Christmas?  Or Good Friday?  See what I mean? 

That is one layer – the liturgical – and by paying attention you can listen for the word of the Lord in your life through what takes place in worship.  Another whole layer involves the social and historical realm.

+  Can you name a world event – or a force of nature – that changed the course of your life for good or ill?

+  Wars have been turning points for many – has that been true for you?  What about politics – have you been touched or changed by the political life of our nation?

+  Some people have been changed forever by travel – is that true for you? What other social and historical turning points have made a difference in your life?

And then there are the personal turning points – love, death, birth, rites of passage – times of great grief or moments of profound joy – education – art – music:  all of these personal encounters can impact us and change us forever.

+  Anyone care to share how a personal turning point has made a difference in your life?

+  Do you have a sense how listening to these moments of your lives is a way of discerning God’s voice to you in the most intimate way?  How is it part of the alphabet of grace?

Buechner once told the story of a great theologian who was lecturing at a university about miracles.  And when he was asked to give a specific example he turned and said: “There is only one miracle… and that is life.”  Are you listening to it?

Have you wept at anything during this past year? Has your heart beat faster because of beauty? Have you thought seriously about the fact that someday you are going to die? More often than not do you really listen when people are speaking to you instead of waiting for your turn to speak? Is there anybody you know in whose place, if one of you had to suffer great pain, you would volunteer yourself?  If your answer to all – or most of these – questions in NO, the chances are that you are already dead.

One of the blessings of the spirituality of Epiphany is that we are invited, encouraged, poked, prodded, pulled and challenged to listen to where life and light is breaking into our lives – and then cherish it.  The very moment Jesus came up out of the baptismal waters, the skies opened up and he saw God’s Spirit—it looked like a dove descending and landing upon him – and as the Spirit became flesh, he heard a voice: “This is my beloved, chosen and marked by my love, to be the delight of my life.” And what was true then, is true today for those with ears to hear.

credits:

1) Daniel Bonnell @ one-hand-clapping.blogspot.com

2) www.nelson-atkins.org

3) Laurie Justus Pace @ www.dailypainters.com

4) Chris Cook, Jesus after Baptism, @ www.chriscookartist.com

5) Bearden, The Dove @ nonsite.org

6) Bearden, Baptism @ www.courses.psu.edu

God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom...

Today is the Feast of Epiphany: in the course of 8 hours it rained

and all the snow melted; then in the blink of an eye, more snow came down and it became wicked cold. Buechner writes that "the foolishness of the wise is perhaps nowhere better illustrated than by the way the three Magi went to Herod the Great, King of the Jews, to find the whereabouts of the holy child who had just been born..." 

It is not unusual, is it, for the powerful to trust other elites? Clearly, the Magi needed assistance in comprehending a spiritual tradition different from their own. So like speaks to like only as Thoreau observed and the royal view of the world remained intact. Until, of course, the learned travelers arrived at the stable. Then all bets were off because this was hardly the resting place of nobility. Imagine their surprise... no wonder they "left by a different route." Buechner concludes that perhaps there is no better illustration of the wisdom of the foolish than Christ in the manger.

So I've been wondering a lot about the wisdom of foolishness. As I noted yesterday there is an ancient, pre-Christian tradition of winter revelry throughout Europe that by medieval times was known as the Feast of Fools. It was a time of drunken abandon as well as social commentary where the last literally became first and social order was turned upside down. A Lord of Misrule was elected, clerics in masks and dressed in women's clothing danced and cavorted in sacred places singing obscene songs, eating what was often forbidden and acting out in ways that would ordinarily be unthinkable. 

Other cultures, like the Tohono o'odham of Arizona, held wine festivals that accomplished much the same thing. I recall one elder telling me that after the cactus blossoms had been harvested in the late spring, and the wine fermented, all hell would broke loose for a few days. Respectable people lost track of their obligations and the most unlikely people wound up in one another's beds. And when the festival was over all the indiscretions were forgotten and life returned to the order it usually maintained.

Now I am not all that interested in indiscretions, but I am fascinated by the deeper truth of the Feast of Fools: the prefigurative nature of living and loving in ways that bring value to the forgotten and worth to the broken seems to me to be at the heart of authentic Christian living. St. Paul put it like this in I Corinthians 17-25.

Christ did not send me to baptize but to proclaim the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its power. For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.’ Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 

For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.

My hunch is that practicing living into this upside-down foolish wisdom is what is at the heart of the spirituality of Epiphany.
At the feast of fools humor can sometimes be cruel
But under certain conditions you have to forget the rules

At the feast of fools everybody has a voice
Nobody goes to the bottom except by their own choice

It's time for the silent criers to be held in love
It's time for the ones who dig graves for them
 to get that final shove
It's time for the horizons of the universe to be glimpsed even by the faceless kings of corporations
It's time for chaos to win and walk off with the prize which turns out to be nothing

At the feast of fools outlaws can all come home
You can wear any disguise you want but you'll be naked past the bone

At the feast of fools people's hands weave light
There is a diamond wind flowering in the darkest night

It's time for the silent criers to be held in love
It's time for the ones who dig graves for them
 to get that final shove
It's time for the horizons of the universe to be glimpsed even by the faceless kings of corporations
It's time for chaos to win and walk off with the prize which turns out to be (a big fat) nothing.

It's time for the singers of songs without hope to take a hard look and start from scratch again
It's time for these headlights racing against inescapable dark to be just forgotten
It's time for Harlequin to leap out of the future into the midst of a world of dancers
It's time for us all to stand hushed in the cathedral of silence waiting at the river's end.