I strongly believe that God speaks to us in many ways, and that God finds ways that we can best listen. Some of us need to be hit over the head (figuratively speaking, of course). Others of us need to be caught off guard. Dreams are big in the Bible, as a way of God getting through to some hard-headed people. I know some people dismiss dreams as just a psychological movie of what's going on in our heads and hearts. If we're anxious about something, we dream that we're naked on a school bus-- something like that. (I hate that one)
But in the Bible, God speaks to Joseph (of Genesis) in dreams, and uses those dreams to help others, to predict terrible things, help them prepare, and also to enlighten. Joseph is known to be a dreamer, but in a good sense. Dreams don't seem rational, of course, and we might dismiss someone as "just a dreamer." But what a sad world it would be if we lost the ability to dream.
It's in dreams, I believe, that we get to touch Eternity, if only for a moment.
God told the Joseph in the New Testament to get off his butt and accept Mary as his wife, even though she was pregnant and trying to convince him that it was the Holy Spirit, whatever THAT was! Apparently God was very convincing in this dream to Joseph, because God had to get through the guy's hurt pride. God also came to the wise men in a dream and told them to go home a different way, to avoid the wrath of King Herod. They listened to their dreams, trusting that God was speaking in them.
I believe in dreams.
But it's hard to share our dreams, because, well, someone might think we're a little off our rocker. Or irrational. Yeah, dreams can be irrational. But God's pretty irrational, if you think about it. Especially if you read the stories in the Bible! Yikes! Do we believe this stuff? Yep.
Dreams don't always give clear answers, but they can comfort and strengthen. Give us a memory, an image to hold onto.
A couple of months ago, during the season of Lent, I dreamed that I was standing across a table from my dear friend Karen. We were sorting some kind of grains, standing at the table. She was her usual lively, healthy, amused, fun self.
Still working with her hands, she looked up at me and said, "The tests are going to turn out fine."
I immediately started to sob. I knew how her story would turn out. "No, they aren't," I said.
She smiled a little more weakly, perhaps losing her resolve, and said, "Yes, they are."
I broke down, forgot what I was doing, and shook my head. "No, they aren't at all."
She stopped working, and looked at me. She leaned forward on the table and said urgently, "Then REMEMBER ME," she leaned in closer and took hold of my arms, "REMEMBER ME."
It was a bittersweet dream, because it felt like I was with her, truly, communicating gently. She wasn't afraid or in despair, but seemed resolved to the truth of the outcome of her life. But she gently reminded me to remember her. Remember her with my own life. Remember her with love. Remember, even when it hurt to remember. Remember, too, that she's alive. I needed that message, as we got closer to Holy Week.
I remember her every day-- as if she had to tell me...
Another day, just last month, I was having a hard time. There's some days that grief just sneaks up on you and envelops you with sadness. I had such a day. I was thinking of all the talks Karen and I had in our last days together, and I missed her terribly, the closeness we had through all of that.
Then I dreamed I was at Karen's house. And yet it wasn't her house. It was a house where I'd spent the best moments of my life so far. A place of overwhelming grace, comfort and joy-- the kind of place that just filled me with peace to be there. And she was there.
She looked healthy and beautiful, with her usual smile lighting up her face. I hugged her for a long time, holding the back of her head in one hand, so grateful to be able to hug her again. She was so happy. I pulled away and said to her, "I love you so much."
She smiled at me. "I love you so much, too!" she said, her arms still around me.
When I woke up, I could still feel her hug, as if I'd really been with her. I lay still for a long time, just savoring the gift.
Two days later, in that place where you're not quite awake but you're not really asleep, I heard Karen's voice say, "Do you need a touch every so often, Peggy?"
I rolled over and as I woke up, I said out loud, "Yes."
Whenever I hear or see something beautiful, she seems so close. During one visit to her house when she was in hospice care, she sat up in her bed, looking out the window. She told me about a commercial on TV-- she couldn't remember what it was for-- but it had a little boy in it who just threw up his arms in pure delight and said, "it's all beautiful!" She loved that commercial.
She looked at the lake, the ducks, the birds flying by, the squirrels feeding on the corn her husband Jim had left out there for them. She talked about her husband who gave her such a good life. She talked about her kids, whom she was so proud of. She talked about her friends who were so good to her, sending her cards and gifts, and even sneaking peeks into her hospital room when she hadn't wanted to receive any visitors. She held up her hands as she looked out the window, and talked of her life. "It's all beautiful!" she said, her face lit up with joy, and tears in her eyes. In the face of her impending death, she still saw the beauty of God, of life, of love. And she was grateful.
Last week I was in Minneapolis for a conference, and the music every day was astounding. The kind of music that lifted you up, made you cry, laugh out loud, and feel like God was reaching out and embracing us all-- I felt like if I turned around, I would see Karen listening, too, receiving the gift of music in all its beauty and joy, saying, "It's all beautiful!" It was like I could almost touch her fingertips. For a moment, and many moments after that, I knew she was ok. More than ok.
She's just beautiful.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Sending Forth
I remember your feet
you asked me to uncover them
because they were hot--
the night you left
I touched your feet
your legs
as if somehow
I could hold you here
I remember your hand
so soft
so firmly grasping mine
till both were sweaty
I tried to memorize
the feeling of your hand
in mine
knowing I would need it later
I remember your eyes
green,
or hazel, maybe
but always shining
whether with tears
or a smile --
then that night
when I gently closed your eyelids
with my right hand
in my first attempt of many
to let you go.
5/22
grief sucks
it's like a boulder
in your stomach
or a slow bleeding
leak
and you can't find the source
to plug it up
because you can't
the hole will always be there
you just learn to live
with a gaping hole in you
you have to breathe differently
walk differently
sometimes you forget
where you are
or what you were doing
or even what you were thinking
it's like
learning to breathe
underwater.
3/7
you're here
I can feel you
strange
the joy snuck up
and hugged me
I wish you could talk
to me
I dreamt I touched you
to memorize you
before you disappeared again
bittersweet
passionate joy
bittered by your absence
and yet full
of your presence
is this a taste of love
in the New World?
are you sneaking me
a piece
of heaven?
2/21
you asked me to uncover them
because they were hot--
the night you left
I touched your feet
your legs
as if somehow
I could hold you here
I remember your hand
so soft
so firmly grasping mine
till both were sweaty
I tried to memorize
the feeling of your hand
in mine
knowing I would need it later
I remember your eyes
green,
or hazel, maybe
but always shining
whether with tears
or a smile --
then that night
when I gently closed your eyelids
with my right hand
in my first attempt of many
to let you go.
5/22
grief sucks
it's like a boulder
in your stomach
or a slow bleeding
leak
and you can't find the source
to plug it up
because you can't
the hole will always be there
you just learn to live
with a gaping hole in you
you have to breathe differently
walk differently
sometimes you forget
where you are
or what you were doing
or even what you were thinking
it's like
learning to breathe
underwater.
3/7
you're here
I can feel you
strange
the joy snuck up
and hugged me
I wish you could talk
to me
I dreamt I touched you
to memorize you
before you disappeared again
bittersweet
passionate joy
bittered by your absence
and yet full
of your presence
is this a taste of love
in the New World?
are you sneaking me
a piece
of heaven?
2/21
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Power In the Word
Last week I had the opportunity to fly away. I'd wanted to go to the Annual Festival of Homiletics in years past, but never got there. This year it was in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a place where I'd only changed planes once. I don't know what made me do it, but I emailed an old friend-- Bonnie, whom I hadn't seen in three years and who I knew had moved but wasn't sure where she'd landed. But I knew also that she was graduating from seminary, and so I took a chance and asked her if she'd be interested in meeting me at the Festival.
Would she be interested?
It just so happens she just recently MOVED to Minneapolis! Of course! And I could stay at her house!
Serendiptious, my husband said. You're meant to go, he observed.
I needed a vacation. This wouldn't be a vacation, technically it was a Continuing Education trip, but it was time away, and I had suspicions that it could be fun. The last time I'd taken a vacation was a desperate run to a nearby camp for a few days away, which ended in me finding out that Karen had cancer. That seems like years ago.
There's something about flying away that is good for the soul. I'd been mired and weighed down with grief these many months. It seemed that everything related to death or made me think of death, and life was beginning to look like a crap shoot-- just waiting to see who fell next. My perspective had gotten a little clouded, to say the least.
The Festival was Monday through Friday last week, and during that time I would be saturated with excellent preaching, music and lectures from people whose books I read in seminary, and who are on the cutting edge of a new thing that I believe God is doing in the Church. I guess everybody wouldn't appreciate listening to 3-4 sermons a day and sitting in church for hours on end. But being someone who delivers that good Word every week, trying desperately and achingly to find the nugget that will connect to our 21st century lives and pains, I was long overdue for my space in the pew rather than the pulpit. I didn't realize until I got there, how desperately thirsty and famished I was for a Word for my own soul. How I needed to be fed and watered myself! My soul was getting dangerously thin.
I worshipped in two large churches all week. A Presbyterian and a Lutheran church. Both old buildings built in great majesty, the architecture itself lured your soul toward the heavens. I heard music with origins from all over the globe, singing praise to God and celebrating God's amazing grace. I heard preachers from several different traditions, male and female, black and white, old and young, that stirred my soul, set before me a banquet feast of word and Spirit. No boring sermons in sight. People who made me believe again in the power of the Word to feed, to nourish and even to set people on fire to bring a little love into the love-starved world. People who made me feel that this crazy profession I'm in may be crazy, but it's Jesus-crazy, and therefore more sane than most things that are going on in the world. I got hope. And that's no small thing. I felt like I was cleaned, inside and out, scrubbed and bathed, toweled gently dry only to be graciously drenched with God's thirst-quenching Spirit.
We were Methodists, Presbyterians, United Church of Christers, Baptists, and Lutherans, all worshipping together. There were people from California to New Jersey, Africa and England. All drawn together because some crazy burning bush enlightened our path somewhere and we found ourselves in pulpits preaching the Word that seems foolish in the ears of the rest of the world. We listened to a Presbyterian Choir that would rival the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, to an African American Woman who made us feel like we could just reach up and touch heaven if we tried, an African American man whose voice squeezed tears out of us at the sheer beauty of his music, a songwriter/singer with a guitar who survived the death of her husband to cancer and her own bout of breast cancer, who put words together that made the darkness seem so light.
There is power in the Word.
Up in the sky, looking down on the grid-like landscape of Nebraska, everything seemed so clean. Beautiful. Sometimes you need to get some distance to see clearly. Sometimes you need to fly up into the sky and look down at the ant-sized cars and trucks of your home to get perspective. Sometimes it's as simple as remembering that we all need to eat and drink, to be fed, to be bathed, to come away for awhile and breathe. I didn't get away from my grief. Everywhere I went I still thought of Karen. In the stories of loss and grief and healing and air that people spoke, I heard my own story. When the human angels sang and played their music, I sometimes felt that I could reach out and touch Karen's fingertips while she enjoyed the heaven-like music that filled the space with God and Spirit. I cried at the memory of standing on the edge of this world six months ago and catching a glimpse of heaven as Karen held my hand.
There is power in the Word. And for now, I'll keep on preaching, scattering seeds, trusting that they will fall on fertile ground and somewhere in darkness and light, someone else will be fed and watered and made new again.
There IS power in the Word.
Would she be interested?
It just so happens she just recently MOVED to Minneapolis! Of course! And I could stay at her house!
Serendiptious, my husband said. You're meant to go, he observed.
I needed a vacation. This wouldn't be a vacation, technically it was a Continuing Education trip, but it was time away, and I had suspicions that it could be fun. The last time I'd taken a vacation was a desperate run to a nearby camp for a few days away, which ended in me finding out that Karen had cancer. That seems like years ago.
There's something about flying away that is good for the soul. I'd been mired and weighed down with grief these many months. It seemed that everything related to death or made me think of death, and life was beginning to look like a crap shoot-- just waiting to see who fell next. My perspective had gotten a little clouded, to say the least.
The Festival was Monday through Friday last week, and during that time I would be saturated with excellent preaching, music and lectures from people whose books I read in seminary, and who are on the cutting edge of a new thing that I believe God is doing in the Church. I guess everybody wouldn't appreciate listening to 3-4 sermons a day and sitting in church for hours on end. But being someone who delivers that good Word every week, trying desperately and achingly to find the nugget that will connect to our 21st century lives and pains, I was long overdue for my space in the pew rather than the pulpit. I didn't realize until I got there, how desperately thirsty and famished I was for a Word for my own soul. How I needed to be fed and watered myself! My soul was getting dangerously thin.
I worshipped in two large churches all week. A Presbyterian and a Lutheran church. Both old buildings built in great majesty, the architecture itself lured your soul toward the heavens. I heard music with origins from all over the globe, singing praise to God and celebrating God's amazing grace. I heard preachers from several different traditions, male and female, black and white, old and young, that stirred my soul, set before me a banquet feast of word and Spirit. No boring sermons in sight. People who made me believe again in the power of the Word to feed, to nourish and even to set people on fire to bring a little love into the love-starved world. People who made me feel that this crazy profession I'm in may be crazy, but it's Jesus-crazy, and therefore more sane than most things that are going on in the world. I got hope. And that's no small thing. I felt like I was cleaned, inside and out, scrubbed and bathed, toweled gently dry only to be graciously drenched with God's thirst-quenching Spirit.
We were Methodists, Presbyterians, United Church of Christers, Baptists, and Lutherans, all worshipping together. There were people from California to New Jersey, Africa and England. All drawn together because some crazy burning bush enlightened our path somewhere and we found ourselves in pulpits preaching the Word that seems foolish in the ears of the rest of the world. We listened to a Presbyterian Choir that would rival the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, to an African American Woman who made us feel like we could just reach up and touch heaven if we tried, an African American man whose voice squeezed tears out of us at the sheer beauty of his music, a songwriter/singer with a guitar who survived the death of her husband to cancer and her own bout of breast cancer, who put words together that made the darkness seem so light.
There is power in the Word.
Up in the sky, looking down on the grid-like landscape of Nebraska, everything seemed so clean. Beautiful. Sometimes you need to get some distance to see clearly. Sometimes you need to fly up into the sky and look down at the ant-sized cars and trucks of your home to get perspective. Sometimes it's as simple as remembering that we all need to eat and drink, to be fed, to be bathed, to come away for awhile and breathe. I didn't get away from my grief. Everywhere I went I still thought of Karen. In the stories of loss and grief and healing and air that people spoke, I heard my own story. When the human angels sang and played their music, I sometimes felt that I could reach out and touch Karen's fingertips while she enjoyed the heaven-like music that filled the space with God and Spirit. I cried at the memory of standing on the edge of this world six months ago and catching a glimpse of heaven as Karen held my hand.
There is power in the Word. And for now, I'll keep on preaching, scattering seeds, trusting that they will fall on fertile ground and somewhere in darkness and light, someone else will be fed and watered and made new again.
There IS power in the Word.
In the Beginning....
“AND IT WAS GOOD”
Genesis 1:1-2a
Faith United
May 18, 2008
Whenever I read this passage
I am reminded again of one of my favorite movies
“Dead Poets’ Society”
about a young professor played by Robin Williams
who comes to teach English at a snotty boys only prep school
The school prides itself on its staunch adherence to Tradition
and high academic quality
It’s not a place where one is encouraged to color outside the lines
or think their own thoughts
stick to the book, and you’ll do well
Then along comes Mr. Keating
who is passionate and spirited
particularly about the power of language and poetry
The first day of class
he has a student read the Introduction
in a textbook about poetry
The Introduction piece is a dry, boring, analysis of poetry
using scales and numbers to rate a certain poem
It’s all very intellectual and devoid of any emotional interaction
Just read the poetry like a text book and measure it
with scientific measurements
to judge its quality
After the student dutifully read the passage in the book
and many of the students took very careful notes
Mr. Keating got up and said to the class
one word:
“Excrement.”
One of my professors in seminary used to say something
similar when he was offended by an idea
that went against the glory of God:
He’s say, “bovine excrement.”
And that’s what Mr. Keating thought of this scientific method
of analyzing poetry
So the first act of the class that semester
was to rip out the entire introduction of the textbook
and the class learned that day
that poetry is not just something to be read
and analyzed
but poetry is something to be taken into yourself
tasted, experienced, enjoyed, celebrated
let it become a part of you
and awaken your senses
This week I read another example of what happens
when we use the Bible as a textbook
or just a bunch of paper with written words
In Olathe, Kansas, a man was arrested for possession of marijuana
This is a true story—
and when he came before the judge to offer defense
he based his defense on Genesis 1:29
where it says, “And God said, I have given you every herb bearing seed
which is upon the face of the earth….”
Judge Earl Jones, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune,
was not impressed with this man’s interpretation of Scripture
He said to the man
“as a mere mortal I’m finding you guilty
of possession of marijuana.
If you want to appeal to a higher authority,
that’s fine with me.”
The man was convicted and sentenced
I get very tired of people who use the Bible to argue anything
I get tired of people dissecting it like it’s a dead frog
to be picked apart and analyzed
and I get particularly offended
when people, anybody, use the Bible as a weapon
I also find that the people who scream the loudest
and are the most relentless and ferocious
when it comes to the Bible
are people who haven’t read the whole thing carefully
Look at Genesis 1 and 2, for instance
If you read those two chapters carefully,
you will see that there are two different creation stories
The first one ends at Chapter 2, verse 4
and the second one starts in Chapter 2, verse 5
They’re different
very different
I much prefer the first one
which is much richer and full of poetry
In the first creation story,
man and woman were created at the same time
made in the image of God
in the second story is that bit about man being created
he gets to name everything
and then he seems lonely,
so God does surgery on him
removes a bone and forms it into a woman
Why are there two different stories?
And how are we supposed to know which one
is true?
I get mentally disturbed
when people start arguing about scientific findings
vs. the stories of the Bible
I also realize that humankind goes to extremes
I understand, I do too
Billy Joel has a song called,
“I Don’t Know Why I Go to Extremes”
and I’ve always considered that my theme song
My husband has never argued against that
But I think we all do
It’s all or nothing
This or That
Us or Them
Good or Bad, with clear lines in between
And so it goes with the arguments about
how the world is made
It’s got to be all or nothing
It has to be exactly as Genesis 1 describes it
(by the way, no one ever deals with the second story
in this debate)
or it has to be Evolution started with a big impersonal Bang--
Either/or
All or nothing
And when we get caught up in those arguments
I believe we are missing the whole point
Genesis 1 is a poem,
it’s a hymn to the glory of God’s creative power
a celebration of God’s awesomeness
A celebration to the unspeakable power of the God
who can create something out of nothing
I don’t claim to know how God did it
If I understood that, I would be God
The Bible is not a history textbook
nor a science textbook
but it is a faith document
It contains the word of God
it is a witness to God’s greatness and power
and beauty
seen the eyes and senses of people long ago
The book of Genesis is attributed to Moses
or Moses and friends
but the thing is, the book of Genesis was written
after the people of God
were set free from slavery in Egypt
and sent to the Promised Land
After they had experienced that awesome deliverance
at the hands of God
they looked back and wrote about the beginning of the world
as they knew it
They’d come to know the power of this God, this Yahweh,
and the endless possiblities of what God can and will do
and has done
And I believe that we will never understand
no matter how smart we get
we will never understand the full complexities
of God’s creation
But look at what we’ve discovered over the centuries
look at what science has uncovered
about the most minute beings in the universe
or even the expanse of the universe
being far more than our human minds can comprehend
Creation is so much bigger than
than the people who wrote Genesis realized
They thought that Earth was mostly it
I’m not saying at all
that our intellectual progress
in any way negates the Bible
The Bible is still true
but with the passage of time and the gaining of more
intricate knowledge,
the Genesis story becomes more and more amazing
God has given us the gift of knowledge
and the ability to learn, discover, and continually
uncover new things
I don’t believe we’ll ever get to the fullness of knowledge
there is just that much to discover
I don’t know exactly how the earth and the planets
and the galaxies were created
I’m not that smart
It doesn’t matter to me how long it took God
to do it
it doesn’t matter to me HOW God did it
All that matters to me,
and the message of Genesis for me
is the incredible news that
however it came about
and in whatever time frame,
God is the author of it all
I admire people who can unravel great mysteries
as long as they know that their knowledge is limited
The Bible contains truths that transcend science and history
I don’t care if they find the ark of Noah
or the Shroud of Turin
or ancient chariot wheels on the bottom of the ocean
Because my faith doesn’t depend on scientific evidence
I don’t have to prove it
It is faith
That doesn’t mean I’m stupid
or that I ignore hard data or scientific evidence
I love to learn
I love to discover
and all that we discover about the complexities of the world
is just further evidence to me
of the awesomeness of God
who is the Author of it all
The beauty of Genesis is the power and the glory of God
who made all things
seen and unseen
things we haven’t discovered yet
God made those too
Did God do it in seven 24-hour days?
That’s not the point
The measurement of time is a human-made construction
we know very little about the origins of timekeeping
We do know the ancient Hebrews divided the week into 7 days
because 7 is a number of perfection and wholeness
completeness
But beyond that, we know very little
Except God made Day and Night
God put a rhythm in creation
from the very beginning
There is evening, there is morning
day after day after day
And if you notice,
each day begins, evening, morning
because for the ancient Hebrews
the day started at sundown
and it is described that way for the first six days
evening, morning, day
But when we get to the seventh day,
the rhythm changes
The seventh day doesn’t have an end
And some people say that that’s because
our relationship with God is eternal
and so it goes on and on
as does creation
God’s act of creation didn’t stop
all those years ago
but creation is always going on
in the rhythms that God first introduced to it
Evening, morning, day, night
summer, winter, spring and fall
every year it goes round and round
things come to life
are born and created
and things and people die
go back to the earth
and are re-created once again
and the cycle keeps going on and on
God is always creating
Look at you and me
What are we, the psalmist says,
that God is even mindful of us?
you think of the expanse of the universe
and why would God bother with us,
in comparison are just little specks?
But God is mindful of us,
God knows each of us by name
amidst the vastness of this ongoing creation
That’s pretty awesome, if you ask me
That God would even bother with the likes of me
when I’m just such a little part of the whole vast picture
I can’t tell you how the world was created
but I can tell you Who did it
and Who is still behind it every day
I like what a scholar wrote recently;
“A glass window stands before us. We raise our eyes and see the glass; we note its quality, and observe its defects; we speculate on its composition. Or we look straight through it on the great prospect of land and sea and sky beyond. So there are two ways of looking at the world. We may see the world and absorb ourselves in the wonders of nature. That is the scientific way. Or we may look right through the world and see God behind it. That is the religious way.
The scientific way of looking at the world is not wrong any more than the glass-manufacturer’s way of looking at the window. This way of looking at things has its very important uses. Nevertheless the window was placed there not to be looked at but to be looked through; and the world has failed of its purpose unless it too is looked through and the eye rests not on it but on its God….”
I like to tell people that I was born in the wrong place --
Right time, wrong place
When I go back to New Jersey,
I look around and I wonder what people look at
how they nourish their souls
I love Nebraska, you know that by now
I love the way you live with creation every day
The planting and the growing
the unpredictability of the weather
and it’s impact on the crops
The new birth of cattle or sheep or goats
Life and death
Life governed by rhythm of the seasons
I love being able to look at the vastness of the sky
when I drive here and there
Or looking at the weird behavior of birds
as they do their choreography in groups in the sky
or seeing the many different kinds of birds
seeing the cattle out in the field
the occasional llama or other different animal
Here in Nebraska, I can be in touch with God’s awesome creation
every day
My soul can be refreshed on the trip between here
and Kearney
or out in the boondocks of endless prairie
The smells of life and earth
of bovine excrement, even, reminds me that life is going on
all around me
and sometimes I can just take a moment
to see the beauty of God’s world
and how despite the things that break my heart
the world keeps going on
and the world will keep going on
season after season,
evening, morning, another day
And God looks upon it all, and says, “Wow, that’s pretty good.”
The seventh day never ends
There is a God-given reason for everything
and how it works
evening, morning, day
Work, rest, play
Inhale, exhale, the ebb and flow of God’s life in us
Even now, you are breathing in and out
without even thinking about it
God is constantly breathing life in you
In, out, in, out,
Night may come, and night may be long and dark
but as the psalmist says,
joy comes in the morning
because morning always comes
and brings us a new day
We dishonor God
when we ignore the gift of Sabbath
It’s built in to creation
Work, rest, work, rest
We are exhausted
spiritually, emotionally, physically and mentally
God knew from the beginning of time
that we need rest, Sabbath, restoration
or we die inside if not completely
Keeping Sabbath, taking time of rest as a part of your schedule
is a profound act of faith
Faith in the promise that we are all made in the image of God
equally,
we all bear that stamp upon us
it’s there already at birth,
we don’t earn it, we can’t lose it,
we are made in the image of God
Life is a gift,
life itself is grace
breathing in and out
can be a great symbol of taking in God’s spirit daily
even when we’re not thinking about it
because God longs to re-create us daily
feeding us, nourishing us,
sustaining us, until that time when evening comes
and we get to live forever
in God’s eternal Day…
Don’t miss the gift
don’t miss the beauty of life all around you
don’t miss the glory of God speaking to you
through the ongoing creation
God is very proud of creation
and the ongoing glory of it
despite the powers of death that always threaten
despite our human tendecies to want to destroy
instead of create
God says that it is good
all the God has created
It is good, it is very, very good...
Spend your life uncovering all that that means….
Genesis 1:1-2a
Faith United
May 18, 2008
Whenever I read this passage
I am reminded again of one of my favorite movies
“Dead Poets’ Society”
about a young professor played by Robin Williams
who comes to teach English at a snotty boys only prep school
The school prides itself on its staunch adherence to Tradition
and high academic quality
It’s not a place where one is encouraged to color outside the lines
or think their own thoughts
stick to the book, and you’ll do well
Then along comes Mr. Keating
who is passionate and spirited
particularly about the power of language and poetry
The first day of class
he has a student read the Introduction
in a textbook about poetry
The Introduction piece is a dry, boring, analysis of poetry
using scales and numbers to rate a certain poem
It’s all very intellectual and devoid of any emotional interaction
Just read the poetry like a text book and measure it
with scientific measurements
to judge its quality
After the student dutifully read the passage in the book
and many of the students took very careful notes
Mr. Keating got up and said to the class
one word:
“Excrement.”
One of my professors in seminary used to say something
similar when he was offended by an idea
that went against the glory of God:
He’s say, “bovine excrement.”
And that’s what Mr. Keating thought of this scientific method
of analyzing poetry
So the first act of the class that semester
was to rip out the entire introduction of the textbook
and the class learned that day
that poetry is not just something to be read
and analyzed
but poetry is something to be taken into yourself
tasted, experienced, enjoyed, celebrated
let it become a part of you
and awaken your senses
This week I read another example of what happens
when we use the Bible as a textbook
or just a bunch of paper with written words
In Olathe, Kansas, a man was arrested for possession of marijuana
This is a true story—
and when he came before the judge to offer defense
he based his defense on Genesis 1:29
where it says, “And God said, I have given you every herb bearing seed
which is upon the face of the earth….”
Judge Earl Jones, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune,
was not impressed with this man’s interpretation of Scripture
He said to the man
“as a mere mortal I’m finding you guilty
of possession of marijuana.
If you want to appeal to a higher authority,
that’s fine with me.”
The man was convicted and sentenced
I get very tired of people who use the Bible to argue anything
I get tired of people dissecting it like it’s a dead frog
to be picked apart and analyzed
and I get particularly offended
when people, anybody, use the Bible as a weapon
I also find that the people who scream the loudest
and are the most relentless and ferocious
when it comes to the Bible
are people who haven’t read the whole thing carefully
Look at Genesis 1 and 2, for instance
If you read those two chapters carefully,
you will see that there are two different creation stories
The first one ends at Chapter 2, verse 4
and the second one starts in Chapter 2, verse 5
They’re different
very different
I much prefer the first one
which is much richer and full of poetry
In the first creation story,
man and woman were created at the same time
made in the image of God
in the second story is that bit about man being created
he gets to name everything
and then he seems lonely,
so God does surgery on him
removes a bone and forms it into a woman
Why are there two different stories?
And how are we supposed to know which one
is true?
I get mentally disturbed
when people start arguing about scientific findings
vs. the stories of the Bible
I also realize that humankind goes to extremes
I understand, I do too
Billy Joel has a song called,
“I Don’t Know Why I Go to Extremes”
and I’ve always considered that my theme song
My husband has never argued against that
But I think we all do
It’s all or nothing
This or That
Us or Them
Good or Bad, with clear lines in between
And so it goes with the arguments about
how the world is made
It’s got to be all or nothing
It has to be exactly as Genesis 1 describes it
(by the way, no one ever deals with the second story
in this debate)
or it has to be Evolution started with a big impersonal Bang--
Either/or
All or nothing
And when we get caught up in those arguments
I believe we are missing the whole point
Genesis 1 is a poem,
it’s a hymn to the glory of God’s creative power
a celebration of God’s awesomeness
A celebration to the unspeakable power of the God
who can create something out of nothing
I don’t claim to know how God did it
If I understood that, I would be God
The Bible is not a history textbook
nor a science textbook
but it is a faith document
It contains the word of God
it is a witness to God’s greatness and power
and beauty
seen the eyes and senses of people long ago
The book of Genesis is attributed to Moses
or Moses and friends
but the thing is, the book of Genesis was written
after the people of God
were set free from slavery in Egypt
and sent to the Promised Land
After they had experienced that awesome deliverance
at the hands of God
they looked back and wrote about the beginning of the world
as they knew it
They’d come to know the power of this God, this Yahweh,
and the endless possiblities of what God can and will do
and has done
And I believe that we will never understand
no matter how smart we get
we will never understand the full complexities
of God’s creation
But look at what we’ve discovered over the centuries
look at what science has uncovered
about the most minute beings in the universe
or even the expanse of the universe
being far more than our human minds can comprehend
Creation is so much bigger than
than the people who wrote Genesis realized
They thought that Earth was mostly it
I’m not saying at all
that our intellectual progress
in any way negates the Bible
The Bible is still true
but with the passage of time and the gaining of more
intricate knowledge,
the Genesis story becomes more and more amazing
God has given us the gift of knowledge
and the ability to learn, discover, and continually
uncover new things
I don’t believe we’ll ever get to the fullness of knowledge
there is just that much to discover
I don’t know exactly how the earth and the planets
and the galaxies were created
I’m not that smart
It doesn’t matter to me how long it took God
to do it
it doesn’t matter to me HOW God did it
All that matters to me,
and the message of Genesis for me
is the incredible news that
however it came about
and in whatever time frame,
God is the author of it all
I admire people who can unravel great mysteries
as long as they know that their knowledge is limited
The Bible contains truths that transcend science and history
I don’t care if they find the ark of Noah
or the Shroud of Turin
or ancient chariot wheels on the bottom of the ocean
Because my faith doesn’t depend on scientific evidence
I don’t have to prove it
It is faith
That doesn’t mean I’m stupid
or that I ignore hard data or scientific evidence
I love to learn
I love to discover
and all that we discover about the complexities of the world
is just further evidence to me
of the awesomeness of God
who is the Author of it all
The beauty of Genesis is the power and the glory of God
who made all things
seen and unseen
things we haven’t discovered yet
God made those too
Did God do it in seven 24-hour days?
That’s not the point
The measurement of time is a human-made construction
we know very little about the origins of timekeeping
We do know the ancient Hebrews divided the week into 7 days
because 7 is a number of perfection and wholeness
completeness
But beyond that, we know very little
Except God made Day and Night
God put a rhythm in creation
from the very beginning
There is evening, there is morning
day after day after day
And if you notice,
each day begins, evening, morning
because for the ancient Hebrews
the day started at sundown
and it is described that way for the first six days
evening, morning, day
But when we get to the seventh day,
the rhythm changes
The seventh day doesn’t have an end
And some people say that that’s because
our relationship with God is eternal
and so it goes on and on
as does creation
God’s act of creation didn’t stop
all those years ago
but creation is always going on
in the rhythms that God first introduced to it
Evening, morning, day, night
summer, winter, spring and fall
every year it goes round and round
things come to life
are born and created
and things and people die
go back to the earth
and are re-created once again
and the cycle keeps going on and on
God is always creating
Look at you and me
What are we, the psalmist says,
that God is even mindful of us?
you think of the expanse of the universe
and why would God bother with us,
in comparison are just little specks?
But God is mindful of us,
God knows each of us by name
amidst the vastness of this ongoing creation
That’s pretty awesome, if you ask me
That God would even bother with the likes of me
when I’m just such a little part of the whole vast picture
I can’t tell you how the world was created
but I can tell you Who did it
and Who is still behind it every day
I like what a scholar wrote recently;
“A glass window stands before us. We raise our eyes and see the glass; we note its quality, and observe its defects; we speculate on its composition. Or we look straight through it on the great prospect of land and sea and sky beyond. So there are two ways of looking at the world. We may see the world and absorb ourselves in the wonders of nature. That is the scientific way. Or we may look right through the world and see God behind it. That is the religious way.
The scientific way of looking at the world is not wrong any more than the glass-manufacturer’s way of looking at the window. This way of looking at things has its very important uses. Nevertheless the window was placed there not to be looked at but to be looked through; and the world has failed of its purpose unless it too is looked through and the eye rests not on it but on its God….”
I like to tell people that I was born in the wrong place --
Right time, wrong place
When I go back to New Jersey,
I look around and I wonder what people look at
how they nourish their souls
I love Nebraska, you know that by now
I love the way you live with creation every day
The planting and the growing
the unpredictability of the weather
and it’s impact on the crops
The new birth of cattle or sheep or goats
Life and death
Life governed by rhythm of the seasons
I love being able to look at the vastness of the sky
when I drive here and there
Or looking at the weird behavior of birds
as they do their choreography in groups in the sky
or seeing the many different kinds of birds
seeing the cattle out in the field
the occasional llama or other different animal
Here in Nebraska, I can be in touch with God’s awesome creation
every day
My soul can be refreshed on the trip between here
and Kearney
or out in the boondocks of endless prairie
The smells of life and earth
of bovine excrement, even, reminds me that life is going on
all around me
and sometimes I can just take a moment
to see the beauty of God’s world
and how despite the things that break my heart
the world keeps going on
and the world will keep going on
season after season,
evening, morning, another day
And God looks upon it all, and says, “Wow, that’s pretty good.”
The seventh day never ends
There is a God-given reason for everything
and how it works
evening, morning, day
Work, rest, play
Inhale, exhale, the ebb and flow of God’s life in us
Even now, you are breathing in and out
without even thinking about it
God is constantly breathing life in you
In, out, in, out,
Night may come, and night may be long and dark
but as the psalmist says,
joy comes in the morning
because morning always comes
and brings us a new day
We dishonor God
when we ignore the gift of Sabbath
It’s built in to creation
Work, rest, work, rest
We are exhausted
spiritually, emotionally, physically and mentally
God knew from the beginning of time
that we need rest, Sabbath, restoration
or we die inside if not completely
Keeping Sabbath, taking time of rest as a part of your schedule
is a profound act of faith
Faith in the promise that we are all made in the image of God
equally,
we all bear that stamp upon us
it’s there already at birth,
we don’t earn it, we can’t lose it,
we are made in the image of God
Life is a gift,
life itself is grace
breathing in and out
can be a great symbol of taking in God’s spirit daily
even when we’re not thinking about it
because God longs to re-create us daily
feeding us, nourishing us,
sustaining us, until that time when evening comes
and we get to live forever
in God’s eternal Day…
Don’t miss the gift
don’t miss the beauty of life all around you
don’t miss the glory of God speaking to you
through the ongoing creation
God is very proud of creation
and the ongoing glory of it
despite the powers of death that always threaten
despite our human tendecies to want to destroy
instead of create
God says that it is good
all the God has created
It is good, it is very, very good...
Spend your life uncovering all that that means….
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Sarah GENE
This is actually something written recently by my daughter, Sarah Gene after a trip to Kansas City to attend an event honoring Dr. Eugene Lowry, the source of her middle name.
It’s Gene, G-E-N-E by Sarah Gene
Just a few weeks ago, my class was asking each other what their middle names were. Some answers were whispered, paired with the reddening of the speaker’s cheeks, and some were shouted, having been forced from the person by constant pestering and prodding. One of my good friends stated hers proudly, and received laughs and teasing in return. I slouched in my chair, shaking my head at my classmates’ insolence. It was then a particularly irritating member of my class asked me the repetitive question. “So what’s your middle name, Sarah?” He spat my name out of his mouth like a swallowed bug. I replied promptly, and with no hesitation. “Gene,” I answered, smiling. “G-E-N-E.” Since I had shown no reluctance or embarrassment, he had no idea what to do. He sort of smiled uncomfortably, and walked away.
Another time, my best friend asked me why I had a picture of a man sitting at a piano as my computer background. I explained to her that the man was my godfather, Gene Lowry. I went on to add to his résumé. I told her he was an accomplished jazz pianist, a professor at my mom’s seminary school (I also explained to her what exactly a seminary was), and the pastor who had baptized me. Then for the grand slam. I explained as best as I could how I got my name Sarah, from his wife, Sarah Lowry, and my middle name, Gene, from Dr. Eugene L. Lowry. She only stared at me, perplexed. I smiled and patted her on the back sympathetically. “Never mind,” I said. “I didn’t get it the first time either.”
The last time I’d seen him before coming to Kansas City to celebrate his book, I had been ten years old. I hardly remember it. But this time particularly stood out in my mind. I didn’t know exactly what to expect. I mean, I knew, obviously, that he’d gotten older, and that he was bound to comment on how much taller I’d gotten, but that was all. I was not expecting the energetic, bubbly young-hearted man I saw. He pounded those piano keys until I was sure they would break, and he’d even try to shout over the thunderous music. Powerful, soulful words passed from his lips, and yet he made us laugh. Music was his energy, and surged through his blood, and kept him alive. It was, in a word, almost surreal. Music was Gene, and Gene was music. It was as simple, as wonderful, as that.
It’s Gene, G-E-N-E by Sarah Gene
Just a few weeks ago, my class was asking each other what their middle names were. Some answers were whispered, paired with the reddening of the speaker’s cheeks, and some were shouted, having been forced from the person by constant pestering and prodding. One of my good friends stated hers proudly, and received laughs and teasing in return. I slouched in my chair, shaking my head at my classmates’ insolence. It was then a particularly irritating member of my class asked me the repetitive question. “So what’s your middle name, Sarah?” He spat my name out of his mouth like a swallowed bug. I replied promptly, and with no hesitation. “Gene,” I answered, smiling. “G-E-N-E.” Since I had shown no reluctance or embarrassment, he had no idea what to do. He sort of smiled uncomfortably, and walked away.
Another time, my best friend asked me why I had a picture of a man sitting at a piano as my computer background. I explained to her that the man was my godfather, Gene Lowry. I went on to add to his résumé. I told her he was an accomplished jazz pianist, a professor at my mom’s seminary school (I also explained to her what exactly a seminary was), and the pastor who had baptized me. Then for the grand slam. I explained as best as I could how I got my name Sarah, from his wife, Sarah Lowry, and my middle name, Gene, from Dr. Eugene L. Lowry. She only stared at me, perplexed. I smiled and patted her on the back sympathetically. “Never mind,” I said. “I didn’t get it the first time either.”
The last time I’d seen him before coming to Kansas City to celebrate his book, I had been ten years old. I hardly remember it. But this time particularly stood out in my mind. I didn’t know exactly what to expect. I mean, I knew, obviously, that he’d gotten older, and that he was bound to comment on how much taller I’d gotten, but that was all. I was not expecting the energetic, bubbly young-hearted man I saw. He pounded those piano keys until I was sure they would break, and he’d even try to shout over the thunderous music. Powerful, soulful words passed from his lips, and yet he made us laugh. Music was his energy, and surged through his blood, and kept him alive. It was, in a word, almost surreal. Music was Gene, and Gene was music. It was as simple, as wonderful, as that.
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Come To the Waters
“TAKING THE PLUNGE”
John 7:37-44
Faith United
May 11, 2008
I was fifteen when I first went to summer church camp
We didn’t have a Camp Comeca or anything
nearly as nice
but the camp I went to was held in a prep school
in a town called Pennington, New Jersey
I wasn’t big on the idea of going away for 6 days
I was a very shy kid
and the kind that felt much more comfortable
hanging around in the background
I wasn’t good at sports and didn’t go out for much
extracurricular activities
I didn’t think I was all that smart
or had any exceptional gifts that would
make me stand out in a crowd
I just felt like nothin’ special
which I suppose isn’t so odd at 15
I think we all need someone to notice us
someone in our lives to say, “hey, you’re beautiful”
someone that sees some potential in us
and isn’t afraid to tell us
I went to summer camp
and I was so nervous about it
I lost 10 pounds in 6 days
I simply didn’t eat the whole week
I was there
I was homesick
By day two I wanted to just go home
and in fact, convinced my parents to come get me
However, they ended up insisting that I stay
I suffered through most of the week,
not eating, drinking 7UP to calm my stomach
and sitting on the sidelines
The director of the camp
was a pastor named Ed in his mid-thirties
and he was just kind of whacko
I didn’t like him
He was way too extroverted and nuts for my taste
He kind of scared me, in fact
When I saw him coming down the hall
I usually turned around
kind of afraid that he’d talk to me
I was just that self-conscious at 15
One day, later in the week,
I finally gave in and agreed to go swimming
during the swim time
instead of holing up in my room
with a book
When I walked into the swimming area,
I wore my towel around my neck
shorts over my swimsuit and a Tshirt
and sneakers on my feet
I carried my camera in my hand
I figured since I was staying,
I might take a few pictures after all
As I walked into the swimming area
suddenly I felt an arm around my waist
and I was being jerked toward the swimming pool
It was Ed
I got so mad
I started kicking and screaming
someone else reached out and grabbed my camera
while Ed lifted me off the ground
swung me around
and threw me into the pool
I came up to the surface
spitting mad
my sneakers still on my feet
my shorts and T shirt drenched
and stuck to my body
And there was Ed, standing by the side of the pool
looking a bit self-satisfied
with his hands on his hips
I started toward the side of the pool
and was at first held back by my towel
that was still around my neck
and all of a sudden I started to laugh
I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe
Everyone else was laughing, too
including a cute kid
that ended up being my first love
by the end of the week
Ed helped me out of the pool
and gave me a dry towel
Later we sat in the snack bar
and just talked
talked about everything
talked about stuff I wouldn’t talk to any other adult about
like what it felt like to be a nerd
and to feel like nuthin’ special
That was 28 years ago
Ed and I still keep in touch
Looking back, what happened that day
felt like a baptism to me
He literally knocked me off guard
drew attention to me
when I felt like no one knew I existed
and got me to lighten up
That was my first experience of God’s grace
A dunking, an immersion, a cold bath
Jesus said, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me,
and let the one who believes in me drink!”
I think of the old Nestea commercial
where the person is so hot and sweaty
takes a sip of iced tea
and falls backwards into a cool,
pool of water
and the water envelopes him
as he goes under, fully refreshed
That’s how I imagine God’s grace
“Out of the believer’s heart shall flow
rivers of living water,”
Jesus said
and he said this about the Holy Spirit
That same Spirit that brooded over the dark waters
before the creation of the world
the same Spirit that drenched everyone
at Pentecost 2,000 years ago
is the same Spirit
that God says flows through us
each of us and all of us who want it
I love the image of water
I get that
Rabbi Irwin Kula,
who wrote a book called “Yearnings: Embracing the Sacred
Messiness of Life”
said in that book that the Hebrew word for “blessing” is “bracha”
and if you change one vowel of that word
the word means “pool of water”
The word “blessing” was first used by God’s people
who lived in the desert
Just imagine coming across a reservoir of water
in the middle of the stark, dry, endless and hot wilderness
When your tongue feels like cotton
Imagine kneeling by that water and dipping your face in it
cupping your hands in it
to bring the cool, fresh water to your mouth
Ancient Israelites saw water as a blessing
It was a gift
So the word for blessing
was essentially born out of a very physical yearning
a deep, harsh thirst
and the absolute wonder of quenching that deep thirst
I’ve always been drawn to water
When I was in college and was homesick
and feeling out of place
like I didn’t fit in there either,
I’d walk down to the Creek
and find peace there
I’d find God there
Sometimes I’d wade into the numbing cold water
and splash my face in it
get my clothes wet
When I was a little girl
my best friend had a swimming pool
in her backyard
and I’d dive in straight to the bottom
and lay on the bottom of the pool
and look up at the sun coming through
the surface of the water
There was always something precious to me
about water
and I’d stay down there as long as I could hold my breath
come up for air
and go back down again
Today is the day of Pentecost
what we refer to as the birthday of the Christian Church
because the Holy Spirit that created the heavens and the earth
was let loose on Pentecost
let loose on God’s people
filling them with power and life
filling them with joy and the ability to communicate
with one another
The Holy Spirit came among them
and made all those individual people
into a community
a body of believers
people who didn’t speak the same language
and yet were given the language of God’s love and blessing
to draw them together
and make of them a people
Pentecost is awesome
It’s a day that beckons us to keep breathing
It’s a day that lures us, draws us
into the fold of God’s loving arms
and helps us get a life
a life we could not have previously imagined
Things on the outside may not change
circumstances, or bare facts
but we can change on the inside
we can be made stronger
we can be made more alive
Anne Lamott, a Christian writer,
writes that Christianity is all about water
“Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters,” Jesus says
She writes:
“It’s about baptism—full immersion,
falling into something elemental and wet
Most of what we do in worldly life
is geared toward staying dry,
looking good, and not going under
But in baptism you agree to do something
that’s a little sloppy
because it’s also holy and absurd
It’s about surrender,” she writes,
“giving in to what we can’t control
it’s a willingness to let go of balance
and decorum and just get DRENCHED.”
It’s about surrender
On the day of Pentecost,
the followers of Jesus
were overtaken by the Spirit of God
Blown away by it, you might say
They were caught up in it
before they knew what was happening
And they spoke languages that they’d never spoken before
so that others outside
those that were different, foreign
could understand
and hear the words of God’s blessing and love
They didn’t ask for it
They were kind of assaulted by Grace
knocked over by the Spirit
and they didn’t know themselves
when they came up for air
They were different
They looked the same,
sounded the same, dressed the same as before
but they were new inside
There was power, and there was joy
and there was life gushing up inside of them
like a river running through them
a constant flowing stream of blessing
always feeding, always nourishing
always quenching
I was still a nerd when I went back home
after camp
but I still believe it was the beginning of a new journey for me
a journey of accepting that God loved me after all
that there were hidden gifts inside of me
that would someday blossom unexpectedly
and they did
All because one person SAW me
saw more to me that I believed there was
and he drenched me with God’s grace
before I could protest and resist
It’s about surrender
It’s about realizing that there are a lot of things in this world
that we can’t change
things in our own lives that we have no control over
it’s about surrendering to God’s grace
about letting God take over
and doing with us what God wants to do
Why do we join a church?
What’s the point?
Why do make a big deal out of it?
Why do we make promises
that we are very likely to break?
Because here at church we pray
we give, we feed, we hug, we cry with each other
When you’re at the end of your rope,
we’ll tie a knot in it to help you hang on
We come in here from the craziness of our lives
and pray about it
we pray about all those things in the world
that we can’t change
but we believe that God CAN and WILL someday
We bring our tears
and allow them to become a baptism of blessing
We bring our broken hearts
and find healing and strength with each other
and with the Spirit that lured us here to begin with
We join a church
to help us find a path and light to live by
We come here hoping to develop our sense of purpose
to help give us heart, balance,
to learn gratitude and experience joy
all in the midst of community
We hurt each other sometimes
and sometimes that makes people go away
but families hurt each other too
people do that sort of thing
but we’re coaxed back by a chance to start again
to be forgiven and to forgive
to offer each other a cup of cold water
when we’re so desperately thirsty
To feed each other
when sometimes we forget how to feed ourselves
Sometimes, we’re here to push each other
into the pool of God’s grace
and allow it to overwhelm us
enfold us
fill our lungs, wash us, cleanse us, refresh us
I find it strange that Jesus caused so much division
among the people
some people thought he was a miracle
and others wanted to arrest him
and lock him up
And I think that goes to show that we as humans
have a very hard time with blessing
We have a hard time giving them
because it takes something out of us
and leaves us vulnerable
And we have a hard time receiving it
as if we feel embarrassed or undeserving
And yet I believe we all hunger for it
hunger for a blessing
for the gift of knowing that we are beloved
that we are someone precious
that we have gifts inside of us
that God put there
to help make us and the world more beautiful
and peaceful
So wherever you are, and wherever you come from
however deep your thirst
however long you’ve been wandering
and feeling lost
Come to the waters
and drink deeply
drink long
Feel the goodness, the coolness
and the nourishing waters of God’s blessing
fill you to overflowing
wash you and make you clean
refresh you and put you back on your feet again
Let anyone who is thirsty, come and drink…..
John 7:37-44
Faith United
May 11, 2008
I was fifteen when I first went to summer church camp
We didn’t have a Camp Comeca or anything
nearly as nice
but the camp I went to was held in a prep school
in a town called Pennington, New Jersey
I wasn’t big on the idea of going away for 6 days
I was a very shy kid
and the kind that felt much more comfortable
hanging around in the background
I wasn’t good at sports and didn’t go out for much
extracurricular activities
I didn’t think I was all that smart
or had any exceptional gifts that would
make me stand out in a crowd
I just felt like nothin’ special
which I suppose isn’t so odd at 15
I think we all need someone to notice us
someone in our lives to say, “hey, you’re beautiful”
someone that sees some potential in us
and isn’t afraid to tell us
I went to summer camp
and I was so nervous about it
I lost 10 pounds in 6 days
I simply didn’t eat the whole week
I was there
I was homesick
By day two I wanted to just go home
and in fact, convinced my parents to come get me
However, they ended up insisting that I stay
I suffered through most of the week,
not eating, drinking 7UP to calm my stomach
and sitting on the sidelines
The director of the camp
was a pastor named Ed in his mid-thirties
and he was just kind of whacko
I didn’t like him
He was way too extroverted and nuts for my taste
He kind of scared me, in fact
When I saw him coming down the hall
I usually turned around
kind of afraid that he’d talk to me
I was just that self-conscious at 15
One day, later in the week,
I finally gave in and agreed to go swimming
during the swim time
instead of holing up in my room
with a book
When I walked into the swimming area,
I wore my towel around my neck
shorts over my swimsuit and a Tshirt
and sneakers on my feet
I carried my camera in my hand
I figured since I was staying,
I might take a few pictures after all
As I walked into the swimming area
suddenly I felt an arm around my waist
and I was being jerked toward the swimming pool
It was Ed
I got so mad
I started kicking and screaming
someone else reached out and grabbed my camera
while Ed lifted me off the ground
swung me around
and threw me into the pool
I came up to the surface
spitting mad
my sneakers still on my feet
my shorts and T shirt drenched
and stuck to my body
And there was Ed, standing by the side of the pool
looking a bit self-satisfied
with his hands on his hips
I started toward the side of the pool
and was at first held back by my towel
that was still around my neck
and all of a sudden I started to laugh
I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe
Everyone else was laughing, too
including a cute kid
that ended up being my first love
by the end of the week
Ed helped me out of the pool
and gave me a dry towel
Later we sat in the snack bar
and just talked
talked about everything
talked about stuff I wouldn’t talk to any other adult about
like what it felt like to be a nerd
and to feel like nuthin’ special
That was 28 years ago
Ed and I still keep in touch
Looking back, what happened that day
felt like a baptism to me
He literally knocked me off guard
drew attention to me
when I felt like no one knew I existed
and got me to lighten up
That was my first experience of God’s grace
A dunking, an immersion, a cold bath
Jesus said, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me,
and let the one who believes in me drink!”
I think of the old Nestea commercial
where the person is so hot and sweaty
takes a sip of iced tea
and falls backwards into a cool,
pool of water
and the water envelopes him
as he goes under, fully refreshed
That’s how I imagine God’s grace
“Out of the believer’s heart shall flow
rivers of living water,”
Jesus said
and he said this about the Holy Spirit
That same Spirit that brooded over the dark waters
before the creation of the world
the same Spirit that drenched everyone
at Pentecost 2,000 years ago
is the same Spirit
that God says flows through us
each of us and all of us who want it
I love the image of water
I get that
Rabbi Irwin Kula,
who wrote a book called “Yearnings: Embracing the Sacred
Messiness of Life”
said in that book that the Hebrew word for “blessing” is “bracha”
and if you change one vowel of that word
the word means “pool of water”
The word “blessing” was first used by God’s people
who lived in the desert
Just imagine coming across a reservoir of water
in the middle of the stark, dry, endless and hot wilderness
When your tongue feels like cotton
Imagine kneeling by that water and dipping your face in it
cupping your hands in it
to bring the cool, fresh water to your mouth
Ancient Israelites saw water as a blessing
It was a gift
So the word for blessing
was essentially born out of a very physical yearning
a deep, harsh thirst
and the absolute wonder of quenching that deep thirst
I’ve always been drawn to water
When I was in college and was homesick
and feeling out of place
like I didn’t fit in there either,
I’d walk down to the Creek
and find peace there
I’d find God there
Sometimes I’d wade into the numbing cold water
and splash my face in it
get my clothes wet
When I was a little girl
my best friend had a swimming pool
in her backyard
and I’d dive in straight to the bottom
and lay on the bottom of the pool
and look up at the sun coming through
the surface of the water
There was always something precious to me
about water
and I’d stay down there as long as I could hold my breath
come up for air
and go back down again
Today is the day of Pentecost
what we refer to as the birthday of the Christian Church
because the Holy Spirit that created the heavens and the earth
was let loose on Pentecost
let loose on God’s people
filling them with power and life
filling them with joy and the ability to communicate
with one another
The Holy Spirit came among them
and made all those individual people
into a community
a body of believers
people who didn’t speak the same language
and yet were given the language of God’s love and blessing
to draw them together
and make of them a people
Pentecost is awesome
It’s a day that beckons us to keep breathing
It’s a day that lures us, draws us
into the fold of God’s loving arms
and helps us get a life
a life we could not have previously imagined
Things on the outside may not change
circumstances, or bare facts
but we can change on the inside
we can be made stronger
we can be made more alive
Anne Lamott, a Christian writer,
writes that Christianity is all about water
“Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters,” Jesus says
She writes:
“It’s about baptism—full immersion,
falling into something elemental and wet
Most of what we do in worldly life
is geared toward staying dry,
looking good, and not going under
But in baptism you agree to do something
that’s a little sloppy
because it’s also holy and absurd
It’s about surrender,” she writes,
“giving in to what we can’t control
it’s a willingness to let go of balance
and decorum and just get DRENCHED.”
It’s about surrender
On the day of Pentecost,
the followers of Jesus
were overtaken by the Spirit of God
Blown away by it, you might say
They were caught up in it
before they knew what was happening
And they spoke languages that they’d never spoken before
so that others outside
those that were different, foreign
could understand
and hear the words of God’s blessing and love
They didn’t ask for it
They were kind of assaulted by Grace
knocked over by the Spirit
and they didn’t know themselves
when they came up for air
They were different
They looked the same,
sounded the same, dressed the same as before
but they were new inside
There was power, and there was joy
and there was life gushing up inside of them
like a river running through them
a constant flowing stream of blessing
always feeding, always nourishing
always quenching
I was still a nerd when I went back home
after camp
but I still believe it was the beginning of a new journey for me
a journey of accepting that God loved me after all
that there were hidden gifts inside of me
that would someday blossom unexpectedly
and they did
All because one person SAW me
saw more to me that I believed there was
and he drenched me with God’s grace
before I could protest and resist
It’s about surrender
It’s about realizing that there are a lot of things in this world
that we can’t change
things in our own lives that we have no control over
it’s about surrendering to God’s grace
about letting God take over
and doing with us what God wants to do
Why do we join a church?
What’s the point?
Why do make a big deal out of it?
Why do we make promises
that we are very likely to break?
Because here at church we pray
we give, we feed, we hug, we cry with each other
When you’re at the end of your rope,
we’ll tie a knot in it to help you hang on
We come in here from the craziness of our lives
and pray about it
we pray about all those things in the world
that we can’t change
but we believe that God CAN and WILL someday
We bring our tears
and allow them to become a baptism of blessing
We bring our broken hearts
and find healing and strength with each other
and with the Spirit that lured us here to begin with
We join a church
to help us find a path and light to live by
We come here hoping to develop our sense of purpose
to help give us heart, balance,
to learn gratitude and experience joy
all in the midst of community
We hurt each other sometimes
and sometimes that makes people go away
but families hurt each other too
people do that sort of thing
but we’re coaxed back by a chance to start again
to be forgiven and to forgive
to offer each other a cup of cold water
when we’re so desperately thirsty
To feed each other
when sometimes we forget how to feed ourselves
Sometimes, we’re here to push each other
into the pool of God’s grace
and allow it to overwhelm us
enfold us
fill our lungs, wash us, cleanse us, refresh us
I find it strange that Jesus caused so much division
among the people
some people thought he was a miracle
and others wanted to arrest him
and lock him up
And I think that goes to show that we as humans
have a very hard time with blessing
We have a hard time giving them
because it takes something out of us
and leaves us vulnerable
And we have a hard time receiving it
as if we feel embarrassed or undeserving
And yet I believe we all hunger for it
hunger for a blessing
for the gift of knowing that we are beloved
that we are someone precious
that we have gifts inside of us
that God put there
to help make us and the world more beautiful
and peaceful
So wherever you are, and wherever you come from
however deep your thirst
however long you’ve been wandering
and feeling lost
Come to the waters
and drink deeply
drink long
Feel the goodness, the coolness
and the nourishing waters of God’s blessing
fill you to overflowing
wash you and make you clean
refresh you and put you back on your feet again
Let anyone who is thirsty, come and drink…..
There's No Place Like Home
GRADUATION COMMUNITY SERVICE
GIBBON HIGH SCHOOL, 2008
Well, first let me say that I am very honored
to be asked to speak to you today
This is kind of big day for you!
As I thought this week about what I could say to you
on this the occasion of your high school graduation
I thought of a lot of things
First of all, I wanted to say something that would keep your attention
I didn’t want you dozing off on me
I only get to do this once
so pay attention
I also didn’t want to say stuff that you might expect me to say
stuff like, “you are our future,”
or “don’t be afraid to dream,”
or “your future is wide open”
yada yada yada
I mean, not that that’s not good stuff
it is
it’s just a bit too cliché for me
Also, it occurred to me, though I might not want to dwell on this,
that next month is the 25th anniversary
of my own graduation from high school
So in other words, to you I must seem ancient
and so, what can an old lady more than twice your age
have to tell you of any significance?
If nothing else, I am here to tell you
you will survive
There is life after high school
I also started to wonder
why we make you wear those ridiculous looking hats
I mean, sure, we’ve all done it
but do you realize how silly you look?
So I looked up cap and gown on the internet
to see if I could find out
whose fault it is that we have to wear those
silly little square hats that never fit right
and had to be attached with bobbie pins
as if they weren’t embarrassing enough
at least, it looks like, they’ve finally figured out
that elastic is a good thing
how long did THAT take?
Anyway, I digress
I looked it up and of course, that hat you’re wearing
is usually called a mortarboard
So, I looked up mortarboard on Dictionary.com
(Let me just say that I didn’t have the luxury of the internet
when I was in high school….)
Anyway, Dictionary.com says that a mortarboard is
#1 a square board with a handle used for holding
and carrying masonry mortar
Ok
Or, of course, it is #2, The square academic cap,
sometimes called a mortarboard
because of its similarity in appearance to the
mortarboard used by masons.
Feels kind of silly, doesn’t it?
You’re walking around with a board on your head
that is fashioned after the board masons use
to fasten bricks together….
Which is just another illustration
that even the most solemn of occasions
the most serious and important occasions
are still an occasion to laugh at absurdity
I learned that in the 25 years
since I graduated high school
that it’s very, very important
to laugh at yourself
and even more important to do so
at the most solemn occasions in your life
Because otherwise you might take yourself too seriously
and that’s not good
Twenty five years ago, I was scared to death
I kept thinking everything would be better…. WHEN
When I graduated from high school
when I graduated from college
when I found the love of my life
when I got my first real job
everything would be better WHEN
But whenever those things came along
there was always more …
more that was needed
the time never came
when everything would be completely alright
I wore that silly mortarboard on my head
and I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life
Not a clue
and people kept asking me what I was going to do
as if one can know such lofty things at 17 or 18
Maybe you have some idea, and that’s good
but it’s ok if you don’t
you’ve got a lot of time to figure that out
You’ve worked hard to get here
you’ve done a lot of extra things
either because you like them
or because it’ll look good on your resume
or both
you’ve learned to fill up as much of your time
as possible just like all the anxiety-ridden adults
in your world
Brad Paisley has a song called “A Letter to Me”
in which he’s writing a letter to his 17 year old self
trying to tell himself at that age
what all he’s learned
I wish I could do that
I would tell myself to lighten up
to not take myself so seriously
to not take life so seriously
To learn how to play and enjoy myself
without hurting myself or anyone else
but to be sure and have fun
To work hard, remembering that life is not all about work
That life is not meant to be a burden to carry
life is a gift from God
a gift to savor, to share, to enjoy
and to use well
A lot of people live their lives like it’s a burden
When I was 18, I did that
I didn’t know that life was a gift from God
that it was a gift of responsibility
and a gift of joy --equally
So I would say to you, stay balanced
Have enough joy in your life to be truly living
and yet take life seriously enough
to be responsible, to make wise decisions
and to remember that it’s not all about you
You, I hate to tell you, are not the center of the universe
the world does not revolve around you
But you are given a part to play
in this beautiful world that is always changing and growing
You have been given gifts to share with the world
that the world needs
You don’t have to be like someone else
you just have to be you
and to do that as honestly and beautifully as you can
Think of others when you make choices
think of how it affects other people or the rest of the world
or think about what your life says to those younger than you
who are watching you
But most importantly,
remember that you are enough
God has given you everything you need
to live this life
You are not today who you will be 5 years from now
you will grow, you will learn, you will change
but the core of who you are will stay the same
Our family really likes to take road trips
we enjoy the traveling as much as getting to the destination
Getting there is only part of the fun
and when it’s time to leave
we know we still have the fun
of the journey home
The journey you’ve been on to this point
is just the beginning
ok, that sounds cliché, I admit, but it’s true
The first 18 years has given you a foundation of who you are
you will play around with that
you’ll pinch the clay here, add a little color there
maybe dye your hair various colors
in the coming years
you’ll try something new
you’ll meet new people
some of whom you’ll want to hold onto forever
and others you’ll be eager to say goodbye to
You will try
and you will fail sometimes
and that’s ok
Your heart will break, and it will be healed again
Whatever you do after high school,
it will be new
people out there won’t know
what we know about you
they won’t know that you’re great at basketball or volleyball
or you’re a great writer or singer
or you had girls falling all over themselves
just to talk to you in the hallway
They won’t know if you were at the top of your class
or if you felt like the dork of the century
wherever you go from here
it will be new
a blank book for you to write the rest of your story
It’s not a new book
but it’s a sequel to the story that’s been written
these first 18 years
Some of it you wish you could burn, maybe
or tear up
somehow forget
but everything that’s been written before now
is a part of who you are, for better or worse
and that is what you will take with you
as you continue to write the story
Fredrick Buechner is an old guy
but he’s one of my favorite writers
and in one of my favorite books
he talks about the Wizard of Oz
Yea, no kidding…
You know the story, we all know the story
Dorothy is a girl living on the prairies of Kansas
wishing she were somewhere else
more exciting
somewhere over the rainbow
because it would have to be really far
from Kansas to be interesting at all
Then she’s scooped up in a cyclone
and carried off to a really weird place
with little people who have funny voices
She’s told that the only person who can help her get home
is the great wizard of Oz
but she’ll have to journey to see him
Along that journey
she meets some weird characters
A talking scarecrow who dreams of having a brain
a tin man who only wants a heart
and a cowardly lion who only wants
to not be so afraid anymore
Well, they have quite the adventures along the road
with one another
as they pursue their dreams and deepest desires
And when they meet the great Wizard of Oz,
they are horribly disappointed
because it turns out that he’s just a little old man
behind a curtain
a little old man from Omaha, Nebraska, mind you
But as they talk with the nervous, odd little man
they realize some things that they need to know
Looking back on their journey to Oz
they realize, that whenever they got into a crisis
it was the smarts of the brainless scarecrow
that got them out
or when things went horribly wrong,
the heartless tin man was no big help at first
because he’d get so choked up with feeling
and sorrow for others
that he’d cry and make himself rust
And they realized, too
that when they were really scared
and when they faced down horrible creatures
it was the cowardly lion who stepped forward
willing to stand up for them all
So the puny little so-called wizard,
who really was no wizard at all,
but just a little old man from Omaha—
this man tells them that they all had everything they needed
that each of them already had what they traveled so far to find
but the only way they could have learned that
was to make the journey
that was sometimes dark, sometimes fun,
sometimes very scary and dangerous
and yet brought them where they needed to be
Even Dorothy had what she needed to get back home
the slippers on her feet
she just had to make the journey
in order to realize that there’s no place like home
a place called Kansas
a place where the skies were sometimes dark
and sometimes there were vicious storms
that threatened their lives
but it was still home
They learned that things like a brain, a heart and courage
are never posessed as gifts
but are always gifts that are earned and gained
by living and loving and staying on the road
You are enough
You have everything inside of you that you need
to live
We’re all on the way, none of us have arrived yet
even though some of us are 25 years or so
ahead of you on the road
You may learn things I haven’t learned yet
you may see things and experience things
that I never have
because each of us are given our own journey to travel
and we’re given the companions we need
to help us get there
You are given a life as a gift from God
and right now, you are standing on the edge of a new thing
sure, you’ll make mistakes
sure, you’ll look like a fool sometimes
The world doesn’t revolve around you
but the world is waiting for you to contribute your gifts
to make a difference
I like Garth Brooks
and he wrote a song called The Change
and in it he sings about how he wants to make a difference
but when he tries, it doesn’t seem to do all that much
you save one person,
there are countless others who need saving
you feed one child
there are millions of others who are starving
and he says,
“I hear them saying, you’ll never change things
and no matter what you do
it’s still the same thing
but it’s not the world that I am changing
I do this so the world will know
it will not change me…”
There are things that you’re going to want to try
just to feel grown up
there are a lot of forces out there
that will try to tell you what to think, what to feel
and what to believe
Don’t forget where you’ve come from
the story of your life so far
because you will take it with you
you will alter it, tweek it,
change a paragraph here and there
and steer the plot in a whole new direction
but don’t forget who you are
and where you’ve come from
Find your own verse to contribute to the Great Song
the Song of Creation that God has begun in you
You already have everything you need
to be the person God created you to be
stay open to God’s beautiful creativity
keep a good sense of humor
don’t take yourself too seriously
work hard,
think of others
but remember to have fun
Remember that life is a gift
handle it with care
And know that wherever you go, whatever you do
God’s loving arms are always around you…
Thank you.
GIBBON HIGH SCHOOL, 2008
Well, first let me say that I am very honored
to be asked to speak to you today
This is kind of big day for you!
As I thought this week about what I could say to you
on this the occasion of your high school graduation
I thought of a lot of things
First of all, I wanted to say something that would keep your attention
I didn’t want you dozing off on me
I only get to do this once
so pay attention
I also didn’t want to say stuff that you might expect me to say
stuff like, “you are our future,”
or “don’t be afraid to dream,”
or “your future is wide open”
yada yada yada
I mean, not that that’s not good stuff
it is
it’s just a bit too cliché for me
Also, it occurred to me, though I might not want to dwell on this,
that next month is the 25th anniversary
of my own graduation from high school
So in other words, to you I must seem ancient
and so, what can an old lady more than twice your age
have to tell you of any significance?
If nothing else, I am here to tell you
you will survive
There is life after high school
I also started to wonder
why we make you wear those ridiculous looking hats
I mean, sure, we’ve all done it
but do you realize how silly you look?
So I looked up cap and gown on the internet
to see if I could find out
whose fault it is that we have to wear those
silly little square hats that never fit right
and had to be attached with bobbie pins
as if they weren’t embarrassing enough
at least, it looks like, they’ve finally figured out
that elastic is a good thing
how long did THAT take?
Anyway, I digress
I looked it up and of course, that hat you’re wearing
is usually called a mortarboard
So, I looked up mortarboard on Dictionary.com
(Let me just say that I didn’t have the luxury of the internet
when I was in high school….)
Anyway, Dictionary.com says that a mortarboard is
#1 a square board with a handle used for holding
and carrying masonry mortar
Ok
Or, of course, it is #2, The square academic cap,
sometimes called a mortarboard
because of its similarity in appearance to the
mortarboard used by masons.
Feels kind of silly, doesn’t it?
You’re walking around with a board on your head
that is fashioned after the board masons use
to fasten bricks together….
Which is just another illustration
that even the most solemn of occasions
the most serious and important occasions
are still an occasion to laugh at absurdity
I learned that in the 25 years
since I graduated high school
that it’s very, very important
to laugh at yourself
and even more important to do so
at the most solemn occasions in your life
Because otherwise you might take yourself too seriously
and that’s not good
Twenty five years ago, I was scared to death
I kept thinking everything would be better…. WHEN
When I graduated from high school
when I graduated from college
when I found the love of my life
when I got my first real job
everything would be better WHEN
But whenever those things came along
there was always more …
more that was needed
the time never came
when everything would be completely alright
I wore that silly mortarboard on my head
and I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life
Not a clue
and people kept asking me what I was going to do
as if one can know such lofty things at 17 or 18
Maybe you have some idea, and that’s good
but it’s ok if you don’t
you’ve got a lot of time to figure that out
You’ve worked hard to get here
you’ve done a lot of extra things
either because you like them
or because it’ll look good on your resume
or both
you’ve learned to fill up as much of your time
as possible just like all the anxiety-ridden adults
in your world
Brad Paisley has a song called “A Letter to Me”
in which he’s writing a letter to his 17 year old self
trying to tell himself at that age
what all he’s learned
I wish I could do that
I would tell myself to lighten up
to not take myself so seriously
to not take life so seriously
To learn how to play and enjoy myself
without hurting myself or anyone else
but to be sure and have fun
To work hard, remembering that life is not all about work
That life is not meant to be a burden to carry
life is a gift from God
a gift to savor, to share, to enjoy
and to use well
A lot of people live their lives like it’s a burden
When I was 18, I did that
I didn’t know that life was a gift from God
that it was a gift of responsibility
and a gift of joy --equally
So I would say to you, stay balanced
Have enough joy in your life to be truly living
and yet take life seriously enough
to be responsible, to make wise decisions
and to remember that it’s not all about you
You, I hate to tell you, are not the center of the universe
the world does not revolve around you
But you are given a part to play
in this beautiful world that is always changing and growing
You have been given gifts to share with the world
that the world needs
You don’t have to be like someone else
you just have to be you
and to do that as honestly and beautifully as you can
Think of others when you make choices
think of how it affects other people or the rest of the world
or think about what your life says to those younger than you
who are watching you
But most importantly,
remember that you are enough
God has given you everything you need
to live this life
You are not today who you will be 5 years from now
you will grow, you will learn, you will change
but the core of who you are will stay the same
Our family really likes to take road trips
we enjoy the traveling as much as getting to the destination
Getting there is only part of the fun
and when it’s time to leave
we know we still have the fun
of the journey home
The journey you’ve been on to this point
is just the beginning
ok, that sounds cliché, I admit, but it’s true
The first 18 years has given you a foundation of who you are
you will play around with that
you’ll pinch the clay here, add a little color there
maybe dye your hair various colors
in the coming years
you’ll try something new
you’ll meet new people
some of whom you’ll want to hold onto forever
and others you’ll be eager to say goodbye to
You will try
and you will fail sometimes
and that’s ok
Your heart will break, and it will be healed again
Whatever you do after high school,
it will be new
people out there won’t know
what we know about you
they won’t know that you’re great at basketball or volleyball
or you’re a great writer or singer
or you had girls falling all over themselves
just to talk to you in the hallway
They won’t know if you were at the top of your class
or if you felt like the dork of the century
wherever you go from here
it will be new
a blank book for you to write the rest of your story
It’s not a new book
but it’s a sequel to the story that’s been written
these first 18 years
Some of it you wish you could burn, maybe
or tear up
somehow forget
but everything that’s been written before now
is a part of who you are, for better or worse
and that is what you will take with you
as you continue to write the story
Fredrick Buechner is an old guy
but he’s one of my favorite writers
and in one of my favorite books
he talks about the Wizard of Oz
Yea, no kidding…
You know the story, we all know the story
Dorothy is a girl living on the prairies of Kansas
wishing she were somewhere else
more exciting
somewhere over the rainbow
because it would have to be really far
from Kansas to be interesting at all
Then she’s scooped up in a cyclone
and carried off to a really weird place
with little people who have funny voices
She’s told that the only person who can help her get home
is the great wizard of Oz
but she’ll have to journey to see him
Along that journey
she meets some weird characters
A talking scarecrow who dreams of having a brain
a tin man who only wants a heart
and a cowardly lion who only wants
to not be so afraid anymore
Well, they have quite the adventures along the road
with one another
as they pursue their dreams and deepest desires
And when they meet the great Wizard of Oz,
they are horribly disappointed
because it turns out that he’s just a little old man
behind a curtain
a little old man from Omaha, Nebraska, mind you
But as they talk with the nervous, odd little man
they realize some things that they need to know
Looking back on their journey to Oz
they realize, that whenever they got into a crisis
it was the smarts of the brainless scarecrow
that got them out
or when things went horribly wrong,
the heartless tin man was no big help at first
because he’d get so choked up with feeling
and sorrow for others
that he’d cry and make himself rust
And they realized, too
that when they were really scared
and when they faced down horrible creatures
it was the cowardly lion who stepped forward
willing to stand up for them all
So the puny little so-called wizard,
who really was no wizard at all,
but just a little old man from Omaha—
this man tells them that they all had everything they needed
that each of them already had what they traveled so far to find
but the only way they could have learned that
was to make the journey
that was sometimes dark, sometimes fun,
sometimes very scary and dangerous
and yet brought them where they needed to be
Even Dorothy had what she needed to get back home
the slippers on her feet
she just had to make the journey
in order to realize that there’s no place like home
a place called Kansas
a place where the skies were sometimes dark
and sometimes there were vicious storms
that threatened their lives
but it was still home
They learned that things like a brain, a heart and courage
are never posessed as gifts
but are always gifts that are earned and gained
by living and loving and staying on the road
You are enough
You have everything inside of you that you need
to live
We’re all on the way, none of us have arrived yet
even though some of us are 25 years or so
ahead of you on the road
You may learn things I haven’t learned yet
you may see things and experience things
that I never have
because each of us are given our own journey to travel
and we’re given the companions we need
to help us get there
You are given a life as a gift from God
and right now, you are standing on the edge of a new thing
sure, you’ll make mistakes
sure, you’ll look like a fool sometimes
The world doesn’t revolve around you
but the world is waiting for you to contribute your gifts
to make a difference
I like Garth Brooks
and he wrote a song called The Change
and in it he sings about how he wants to make a difference
but when he tries, it doesn’t seem to do all that much
you save one person,
there are countless others who need saving
you feed one child
there are millions of others who are starving
and he says,
“I hear them saying, you’ll never change things
and no matter what you do
it’s still the same thing
but it’s not the world that I am changing
I do this so the world will know
it will not change me…”
There are things that you’re going to want to try
just to feel grown up
there are a lot of forces out there
that will try to tell you what to think, what to feel
and what to believe
Don’t forget where you’ve come from
the story of your life so far
because you will take it with you
you will alter it, tweek it,
change a paragraph here and there
and steer the plot in a whole new direction
but don’t forget who you are
and where you’ve come from
Find your own verse to contribute to the Great Song
the Song of Creation that God has begun in you
You already have everything you need
to be the person God created you to be
stay open to God’s beautiful creativity
keep a good sense of humor
don’t take yourself too seriously
work hard,
think of others
but remember to have fun
Remember that life is a gift
handle it with care
And know that wherever you go, whatever you do
God’s loving arms are always around you…
Thank you.
Friday, May 2, 2008
The Preacher
If anyone were ever to write a book about me, I'm sure there would have to be a chapter in it about Gene Lowry. Anyone who has ever come close to me usually figures out that Gene plays a huge role in my life and ministry. In fact, I wouldn't be doing this crazy thing called ministry if it weren't for Gene. Some days I don't know whether to thank him or punch him in the arm -- hard. But Gene did more than get me into the pulpit, he got me out of my own proverbial fenced-in backyard. He broadened my horizons-- literally. He gave me hope.
It all started with a sermon. 1989. Ocean City, New Jersey. St. Peter's United Methodist Church. June. Hot and humid. I was 24 years old in body-- much older in spirit. My life was unexciting, and I had little prospects for any future possibilities of excitement. I lived on my own in a fairly nice apartment in Collingswood, NJ (hometown of Michael Landon) and worked in a real estate firm in Haddonfield, NJ (a.k.a. Uppityville) as a secretary. I knew this was not my life's calling, but I was beginning to think I didn't have a life's calling. I'd just broken up with a really good-looking guy from Pennsylvania who had a black belt in karate and drove a really nice white BMW. I'd thought he was was the one. Alas, he was not.
June, 1989, I was so bored I went to Ocean City after work to meet my parents at the Southern New Jersey Annual Conference Meeting. This is not something any normal person would do for fun, but well, that reflects the nature of my life then. We had a nice dinner, I got to see some old friends who were also attending the Conference, and then we went together over to St. Peter's UMC for the evening worship. At that point I'd only listened to one preacher, mostly, all my life, and that was my father. My father was good, mind you, but he was, after all, my father. It's hard to be inspired by your own father, especially after hearing him for 24 years, from womb to present. I'd heard some other preachers, and was not easily impressed. One might say suffered from Too Much Preaching. So I'd gotten into the habit of tuning out most preachers when I went to such meetings, daydreaming about something or other to get through till the next hymn. (I loved singing at Annual Conference-- there's nothing like 1,000 United Methodist pastors and lay people singing together!! John Wesley would have been proud)
But that night was different. I settled into the hard, wooden pew, that was kind of sticky with humidity-- St. Paul' was a large church, but old, and therefore had not invested in air conditioning. All the windows that did open were in fact opened, and occasionally we had a stray seagull fly through the sanctuary to get to the other side. Gene Lowry, the preacher of the evening entered the pulpit, and donned his bifocals. Oh great, I must have thought, this guy's going to be really exciting!
Gene looks a lot like Abraham Lincoln, and I would guess that's a compliment to Abraham Lincoln. He's tall, thin, gaunt in the face, with what one might call an "angular" face. He read the Scripture, Matthew 25:14-30; the Parable of the Talents. As he read the Scripture, he looked up often, raising his eyebrows, adding expressions and drama to the reading, so much so that it dídn't even sound like he was reading. I sat up, therefore unpeeling my shirt from the back of the varnished pew, and started listening. Gene dramatically removed his bifocals and laid them to the side of the pulpit... and began to preach.
Whoa!! How'd he do that? He drew me in from the beginning, so that I couldn't NOT listen. He made me laugh, chuckle, and listen to every word. He had no notes but just talked, told the story, in such a way that we were THERE. He described the scene, the people-- you could imagine the expressions, the feelings of those involved. At one point, my chest started to hurt, and I realized I was holding my breath. I let out a deep breath, and braced myself with my hands by my sides on the pew as I leaned forward.
As he talked about the third servant in the story who buried the talent that the Master had entrusted to him, I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. He talked about the man being afraid of the enormous gift that was entrusted to him, so much so that he panicked and hid it in a deep, dark hole in the backyard. Then the poor slob paced around that hole, lest someone KNOW where he'd buried it and come dig it up. He didn't eat, he didn't sleep, he just paced, while the first two servants took what they were given and doubled the Master's money through some clever dealings. When the Master finally got home, the other servants were commended for their cleverness, and the poor, sleep-deprived, nervy third servant, wringing his bony hands and whimpering, was reprimanded for being a coward.
Hey! I liked that guy! He...well, I could relate to him! Wait a minute, how did this Lowry dude KNOW? How did he describe... me? I felt the weight of my lostness in that moment, my hopelessness and lack of direction. Someone understood what it was to be me. But who WAS he? Then the admonition: "Get out of the backyard! Enter into the joy of your Master!!" And Gene's eyes looked over the expanse of the sanctuary filled with 1,000 people. Then he picked up his glasses... and walked away from the pulpit.
Hey! Where's he going? I sat back, again, sticking to the varnished pew, feeling utterly exhausted. How did he do that? I was shaking, I thought I might have to throw up. My mother looked over at me and smiled. "Good, huh?" she said.
I whispered back, "how did he know I was here?" She looked at me questioningly, and opened the hymnal to the next hymn.
My life changed after that night. Two months later I was enrolled in seminary at Drew University Theological School, still wondering what hit me. A lot of things had, in fact, hit me during those two months, landing me in the unikely landing of seminary. But my life opened up. The horizons opened up. I made straight A's for the first time in my whole education, I won awards and scholarships-- who WAS this person inhabiting my body?
A year later, it turns out my horizons opened up further. I'd fallen in love with a bearded second-career student named Larry who was the local cheerleader and unpaid 'human commercial for the obscure (to us) state of Nebraska. (Where WAS Nebraska anyway???) He couldn't say enough good about Nebraska. Weird guy. But he grew on me. By the time he left for Nebraska, I couldn't get him out of my heart. Over the summer, he racked up a $150 a month phone bill calling me (apparently he liked me too), and managed to drive the 26-hour drive (straight through) back East a few times to see me. This was ridiculous. He started looking into ways that he could serve a church in New Jersey while I finished seminary. New Jersey was full (it always is). There was "no way" I was going out to the God-forsaken Midwest (by then I'd found Nebraska on a map). Then in August, 1990, Gene Lowry came to Ocean Grove (different town than before) to preach at a campmeeting. I took a friend with me to hear him. I didn't want to meet him, he scared me to death. Anyone that could change my life completely with 20 minutes of words had to be pretty scary.
Gene, as always, was terrific. Inspiring. I decided to go back and hear him another night. This time, I took a 10-page typewritten, single-spaced letter I'd written, describing for him what happened to me that first time I heard him preach, and how my year had unfolded. I was nervous. Shy. Scared to death. The sermon was on the Gerasene demoniac (Luke 5), and the last thing Gene said was, "Go and tell what the Lord has done." Aw, crap. Ok. I will.
I nervously approached Gene with my thick envelope containing the letter, and awkwardly introduced myself, stuttering, stumbling over words, wiping my sweaty hands periodically on my pants. He was gracious, friendly even (I didn't know this was a Midwestern thing). He took the envelope and put it in his inside coat pocket and promised to read it later. He acted like he was really glad to meet me-- which, thinking back, why wouldn't he? How often does someone walk up to you and say, in essence, 'you've changed my life?'
Well, the rest is a very interesting, but even longer, story. There was more correspondance, more face to face conversations, and a few months later, I gave up my full-tuition scholarship to transfer to St. Paul School of Theology in another remote place out there somewhere called Kansas City, Missouri. That's where Gene Lowry taught preaching. Which happened to be about 6 hours from this bearded man I couldn't get out of my heart. How covenient. (I know, 6 hours? By New Jersey standards, that's absurd. In the Midwest, it's just a long car ride. Besides, it beat being 26 hours away!)
I transferred to St. Paul in January of 1991, got engaged to Larry, and we came back to New Jersey in August of 1991 to get married. During the first two years of my marriage, I commuted four hours (the Conference was nice enough to move us two hours closer) to Kansas City every week to school in my F150 pick up truck.
During seminary, but even more so after graduation, our friendship with Gene and Sarah Lowry grew. In 1994, I gave birth to Sarah Gene, with Gene's jazz piano music playing on the cassette player by the bed. The name of the cassette tape was called "The Sound of Good News." Sarah Gene was literally born to the sound of Gene playing the piano. Two months later, Gene and Sarah travelled up to Tilden, NE where we lived and pastored, to baptize Sarah Gene. Gene preached-- of course-- and played the piano for us all in celebration of Sarah Gene's baptism. Gene Lowry preached at my seminary graduation in 1993 and at my ordination as Elder in the Nebraska Annual Conference in 1996. In 1998 I got to be one of the speakers at his retirement from teaching at St. Paul School of Theology.
We travel to places where he's preaching whenever he comes near (even during our years in Pennsylvania), and sometimes we simply go to visit them in Kansas City. We email, we call, we keep each other posted on each others' lives. Gene didn't just teach me how to preach. He taught me how to hope, to dare, even to dream. He is a continual reminder when I tend to cut off the possibilities for myself, to see beyond the borders of my own "backyard." He made me be honest, and to stop hiding who I really was. He made me a preacher, sure, but he also helped me learn how to live.
I can only hope that my own life makes such a difference.
It all started with a sermon. 1989. Ocean City, New Jersey. St. Peter's United Methodist Church. June. Hot and humid. I was 24 years old in body-- much older in spirit. My life was unexciting, and I had little prospects for any future possibilities of excitement. I lived on my own in a fairly nice apartment in Collingswood, NJ (hometown of Michael Landon) and worked in a real estate firm in Haddonfield, NJ (a.k.a. Uppityville) as a secretary. I knew this was not my life's calling, but I was beginning to think I didn't have a life's calling. I'd just broken up with a really good-looking guy from Pennsylvania who had a black belt in karate and drove a really nice white BMW. I'd thought he was was the one. Alas, he was not.
June, 1989, I was so bored I went to Ocean City after work to meet my parents at the Southern New Jersey Annual Conference Meeting. This is not something any normal person would do for fun, but well, that reflects the nature of my life then. We had a nice dinner, I got to see some old friends who were also attending the Conference, and then we went together over to St. Peter's UMC for the evening worship. At that point I'd only listened to one preacher, mostly, all my life, and that was my father. My father was good, mind you, but he was, after all, my father. It's hard to be inspired by your own father, especially after hearing him for 24 years, from womb to present. I'd heard some other preachers, and was not easily impressed. One might say suffered from Too Much Preaching. So I'd gotten into the habit of tuning out most preachers when I went to such meetings, daydreaming about something or other to get through till the next hymn. (I loved singing at Annual Conference-- there's nothing like 1,000 United Methodist pastors and lay people singing together!! John Wesley would have been proud)
But that night was different. I settled into the hard, wooden pew, that was kind of sticky with humidity-- St. Paul' was a large church, but old, and therefore had not invested in air conditioning. All the windows that did open were in fact opened, and occasionally we had a stray seagull fly through the sanctuary to get to the other side. Gene Lowry, the preacher of the evening entered the pulpit, and donned his bifocals. Oh great, I must have thought, this guy's going to be really exciting!
Gene looks a lot like Abraham Lincoln, and I would guess that's a compliment to Abraham Lincoln. He's tall, thin, gaunt in the face, with what one might call an "angular" face. He read the Scripture, Matthew 25:14-30; the Parable of the Talents. As he read the Scripture, he looked up often, raising his eyebrows, adding expressions and drama to the reading, so much so that it dídn't even sound like he was reading. I sat up, therefore unpeeling my shirt from the back of the varnished pew, and started listening. Gene dramatically removed his bifocals and laid them to the side of the pulpit... and began to preach.
Whoa!! How'd he do that? He drew me in from the beginning, so that I couldn't NOT listen. He made me laugh, chuckle, and listen to every word. He had no notes but just talked, told the story, in such a way that we were THERE. He described the scene, the people-- you could imagine the expressions, the feelings of those involved. At one point, my chest started to hurt, and I realized I was holding my breath. I let out a deep breath, and braced myself with my hands by my sides on the pew as I leaned forward.
As he talked about the third servant in the story who buried the talent that the Master had entrusted to him, I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. He talked about the man being afraid of the enormous gift that was entrusted to him, so much so that he panicked and hid it in a deep, dark hole in the backyard. Then the poor slob paced around that hole, lest someone KNOW where he'd buried it and come dig it up. He didn't eat, he didn't sleep, he just paced, while the first two servants took what they were given and doubled the Master's money through some clever dealings. When the Master finally got home, the other servants were commended for their cleverness, and the poor, sleep-deprived, nervy third servant, wringing his bony hands and whimpering, was reprimanded for being a coward.
Hey! I liked that guy! He...well, I could relate to him! Wait a minute, how did this Lowry dude KNOW? How did he describe... me? I felt the weight of my lostness in that moment, my hopelessness and lack of direction. Someone understood what it was to be me. But who WAS he? Then the admonition: "Get out of the backyard! Enter into the joy of your Master!!" And Gene's eyes looked over the expanse of the sanctuary filled with 1,000 people. Then he picked up his glasses... and walked away from the pulpit.
Hey! Where's he going? I sat back, again, sticking to the varnished pew, feeling utterly exhausted. How did he do that? I was shaking, I thought I might have to throw up. My mother looked over at me and smiled. "Good, huh?" she said.
I whispered back, "how did he know I was here?" She looked at me questioningly, and opened the hymnal to the next hymn.
My life changed after that night. Two months later I was enrolled in seminary at Drew University Theological School, still wondering what hit me. A lot of things had, in fact, hit me during those two months, landing me in the unikely landing of seminary. But my life opened up. The horizons opened up. I made straight A's for the first time in my whole education, I won awards and scholarships-- who WAS this person inhabiting my body?
A year later, it turns out my horizons opened up further. I'd fallen in love with a bearded second-career student named Larry who was the local cheerleader and unpaid 'human commercial for the obscure (to us) state of Nebraska. (Where WAS Nebraska anyway???) He couldn't say enough good about Nebraska. Weird guy. But he grew on me. By the time he left for Nebraska, I couldn't get him out of my heart. Over the summer, he racked up a $150 a month phone bill calling me (apparently he liked me too), and managed to drive the 26-hour drive (straight through) back East a few times to see me. This was ridiculous. He started looking into ways that he could serve a church in New Jersey while I finished seminary. New Jersey was full (it always is). There was "no way" I was going out to the God-forsaken Midwest (by then I'd found Nebraska on a map). Then in August, 1990, Gene Lowry came to Ocean Grove (different town than before) to preach at a campmeeting. I took a friend with me to hear him. I didn't want to meet him, he scared me to death. Anyone that could change my life completely with 20 minutes of words had to be pretty scary.
Gene, as always, was terrific. Inspiring. I decided to go back and hear him another night. This time, I took a 10-page typewritten, single-spaced letter I'd written, describing for him what happened to me that first time I heard him preach, and how my year had unfolded. I was nervous. Shy. Scared to death. The sermon was on the Gerasene demoniac (Luke 5), and the last thing Gene said was, "Go and tell what the Lord has done." Aw, crap. Ok. I will.
I nervously approached Gene with my thick envelope containing the letter, and awkwardly introduced myself, stuttering, stumbling over words, wiping my sweaty hands periodically on my pants. He was gracious, friendly even (I didn't know this was a Midwestern thing). He took the envelope and put it in his inside coat pocket and promised to read it later. He acted like he was really glad to meet me-- which, thinking back, why wouldn't he? How often does someone walk up to you and say, in essence, 'you've changed my life?'
Well, the rest is a very interesting, but even longer, story. There was more correspondance, more face to face conversations, and a few months later, I gave up my full-tuition scholarship to transfer to St. Paul School of Theology in another remote place out there somewhere called Kansas City, Missouri. That's where Gene Lowry taught preaching. Which happened to be about 6 hours from this bearded man I couldn't get out of my heart. How covenient. (I know, 6 hours? By New Jersey standards, that's absurd. In the Midwest, it's just a long car ride. Besides, it beat being 26 hours away!)
I transferred to St. Paul in January of 1991, got engaged to Larry, and we came back to New Jersey in August of 1991 to get married. During the first two years of my marriage, I commuted four hours (the Conference was nice enough to move us two hours closer) to Kansas City every week to school in my F150 pick up truck.
During seminary, but even more so after graduation, our friendship with Gene and Sarah Lowry grew. In 1994, I gave birth to Sarah Gene, with Gene's jazz piano music playing on the cassette player by the bed. The name of the cassette tape was called "The Sound of Good News." Sarah Gene was literally born to the sound of Gene playing the piano. Two months later, Gene and Sarah travelled up to Tilden, NE where we lived and pastored, to baptize Sarah Gene. Gene preached-- of course-- and played the piano for us all in celebration of Sarah Gene's baptism. Gene Lowry preached at my seminary graduation in 1993 and at my ordination as Elder in the Nebraska Annual Conference in 1996. In 1998 I got to be one of the speakers at his retirement from teaching at St. Paul School of Theology.
We travel to places where he's preaching whenever he comes near (even during our years in Pennsylvania), and sometimes we simply go to visit them in Kansas City. We email, we call, we keep each other posted on each others' lives. Gene didn't just teach me how to preach. He taught me how to hope, to dare, even to dream. He is a continual reminder when I tend to cut off the possibilities for myself, to see beyond the borders of my own "backyard." He made me be honest, and to stop hiding who I really was. He made me a preacher, sure, but he also helped me learn how to live.
I can only hope that my own life makes such a difference.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
after
someone wrote once
that grief is a lot like fear
and i get that
i remember being brave
i remember being calm
but that seems like forever
ago
now i'm shaking
as if i step on a crack
i really will break my mother's back
or if i love someone too much
they will surely die
or if i relax for a second
a tsunami will hit the midwest
oh god
when did i get so powerful?
maybe i really do believe deep down
that it was eve
who doomed us all
by taking a bite out of life
pmr
that grief is a lot like fear
and i get that
i remember being brave
i remember being calm
but that seems like forever
ago
now i'm shaking
as if i step on a crack
i really will break my mother's back
or if i love someone too much
they will surely die
or if i relax for a second
a tsunami will hit the midwest
oh god
when did i get so powerful?
maybe i really do believe deep down
that it was eve
who doomed us all
by taking a bite out of life
pmr
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