"This Land is Whose Land?"

“It’s Earth Day?”, I said to myself. My morning commute was accompanied by my usual friend on the radio who told me that the piece I was listening to, something about nature, was offered in honor of Earth Day. My virtual friend, whose personality I know only from the radio show he hosts, surprised me with his next comment: “Today we honor our Mother Earth. We should be thankful today for all of the gifts we receive from our Mother.” Following which he played another beautiful piece of music inspired by the world that surrounds us.

“Mother Earth?”, I said to myself, out loud this time. “Well,” my nature-loving side debated, “we do call the earth ‘Mother Earth’. You got a problem with that old man?”  “Yes,” I replied to my nature-inspired self, “and calling my ideas ‘old’ isn’t helping your case, so watch your language. My problem is that I think the term ‘Mother Earth’ confuses the Creator with the Created.  The Earth, I suppose you could say, has a personality. It certainly is unique among the planets and, it seems, unique among the whole (known) universe.  But I don’t think of the Earth as my mother, nor even as the earth as the mother of anything else. The earth didn’t ‘give birth’ to gifts.” 

“Not so fast, fuddy-duddy”, my tree-hugger side laughed. “Let’s agree that God created the earth. So says the holy writings relied upon by Jews and Christians to know the One True God. But once God created the Earth it started re-producing itself. It started shaking inside so much that mountains and islands popped up. The land started drifting about into continents separated by oceans. And then, well you see what became of all of those fish and birds and furry creatures.  Except for the ones that are gone forever (or at least until New Earth.) You don’t call those gifts?”

“Gifts they are,” my theologian-self agreed, “but from whom? I am thankful for annual reminder of Earth Day, remembering my awe of what is and my regret over what is not.  But the one who weeps at our ignorant disregard of the gift of Creation is not our Mother Earth, but our God, who blesses us like a Father and Mother both. I love you, tree-hugger side of myself; but I don’t want you to ever forget who gave us trees to hug and who commanded us to keep them safe until the Creator makes them new.”

"The End is Still to Come" (Part 2)

This wasn’t the way it was supposed to end. No, the week that began with “Hosanna” didn’t end the way anyone had wanted. I wonder if Jesus was surprised by the ending.

Low in the grave he lay. His friends observe the Sabbath as observant Jews do. But their hearts are broken into as many pieces as a heart can break.  Fear grips them, one eye always on the door, one ear listening for approaching footsteps or pounding horse hooves.  Friday was not their best day. In fact, the way they retreated in the final hour, they could not bear the thought of how they contributed to making it the world’s worst day. Messiah is dead.

They review in their heads his sermons. Collectively they try to piece them together, asking each other how exactly he phrased those beautiful and ominous words. “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of the birth pains.” (Mark 13:7-8, NIV) Yes, those were the words.

Is it possible that this is not the end then? Dare we hope that the pain we feel, the fear with which we face the world today could still be replaced with hope?  The birth pains are just beginning, which must mean that there are more pains of the birthing process to happen. But, is the tomb of despair also a womb of delight?

On this Saturday, stirring in the tomb which is a womb, the end is being written.  Do not be deceived. What you see are just signs that the best ending ever imagined is written on the last page.  Do not be afraid. The life you live today, the pain, the anguish, the stones which seemingly cannot be rolled away in your life, will be moved.

It is Saturday.  When life has entombed you on Saturday, recall what He said, “…but the end is still to come.” Live for this ending. You won’t want to miss it.

"The End is Still to Come" (Part 1)

We live for the end.  We love good endings.  We love to read the book that is full of mysterious twists and turns and our minds begin to imagine the end.

 “How will this end?”, we wonder, and the temptation to turn to the last page can become overwhelming.  How can the author bring together all of these plot lines and solve all of the main character’s dilemmas in the remaining pages?  So we keep on reading, because we know that the end is still to come.

Sometimes the story is so good that we don’t want it to end.  We would rather stay lost in the writer’s imagination. We don’t want our tour through fantasy-land to end, because, well, this is the life we want to live and, even though we cannot live that life, we can imagine it. So, we slow down our reading pace, drinking in each word, like the first sip of morning coffee or the last sip of evening wine. 

And sometimes, well, the story is just not very good. We want to skip to the end and get this dreary read over with. Or we just put the book away. Enough.

What kind of story are you living? What kind of ending do you imagine for your story? Do you want to keep reading?

It’s the Sabbath before the Sunday on which the crowds adored the main character. They loved His story.  They thought they knew how it would end: the king is coming!

But wait, is he a king or criminal? Who could have dreamt that this is what the Author had in mind? Their songs become jeers?  Their palms become swords?  Holy Week!

We live for the end. We love good endings.  Imagine that this story isn’t just the old, old story. Imagine that His story is your story too? How do you want it to end?

  

When Life Makes You a 16 Seed

Sixteen seeds have a 98 per cent chance of losing their first (and thus only) game in the tournament.  That’s life for a 16 seed. So, why bother playing the game?

(First a little background for the uninitiated.  There are over 300 colleges and universities which have men’s basketball teams at the highest level, called “D-1”.  Of that group, 68 teams are invited to an annual single-elimination (“lose and go home”) basketball tournament. The better teams play the lesser teams first. The best four teams are placed, or “seeded”, in the first round of games against the worst of the 68 qualifying teams, called “16 seeds.”  For over thirty years no “16” has beaten a “1”.)

So, why bother playing the “16 v. 1”  game? Because when you are a 16 seed you believe you can win.  Each year at least one 16-seed player declares, “We can beat anyone.”  They believe it. They are champions of their own conference, and they have won something like 20 of their 25 games, and they believe in themselves. And then the game is played and they lose. Every time. Reality sets in.  The game is over.  No one cares.

You would think that “David loses to Goliath” should be a headline, but it’s not. People expect David to lose to Goliath, except in the Bible story.  We want David to win, but, let’s face it, in our lives, Goliath wins more than he loses.  And yet all kinds of “Davids” keep taking up 5 smooth stones, trying to slay life’s giant enemy. I wonder if when Jesus was a little boy he played with a slingshot, pretending to be the superhero he admired from the temple stories.  But then, maybe not. Maybe he knew that he was born to be a 16 seed, always playing a 1.  Oh, he would have his moments, but then, in the end, the enemy won. And he knew it was going to happen. But, Jesus kept playing.

Why did Jesus bother to play the game of life if he knew he was going to end up dead on a cross? Well, maybe the cross isn’t the end of the game. Maybe the game isn’t over. Maybe all the “cross-watchers” are wrong. Maybe the people who give you no chance to succeed in your life don’t know that the game of life isn’t what it appears; that David still beats Goliath; that good conquers evil; that the faithful are rewarded with the victor’s crown. The game isn’t over, friend. Keep on playing.  Someone cares.

What Are You Teaching Those Children?

It all went so quickly.  Martha had been ill, but not this sick.  So it was a surprise to Joyce and her siblings when they received the call: Martha was in the hospital. It was early evening.  Then a second call came: hurry to the hospital.  And then there they were,  Joyce and her siblings, looking at Martha as she prepared to take her last breath.  Joyce, wanting to offer words of comfort, hunted for the Bible and turned to Psalm 23. Realizing that she left her glasses at home, she reached out her arm as far as she could, but the words were just a gray blob. So Joyce summoned up old Sunday School memorization lessons and she started reciting Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd…”  She surprised herself at how well it came back to her. She could see the expression on Martha’s face change as the familiar words were repeated.  Then Joyce asked Martha if she would like to pray. Martha somehow managed to nod in assent, so Joyce and Martha and the others bowed their heads, folded their hands, and everyone followed Martha’s lead in saying “Our Father…”. And then Martha slipped from this world through the thin veil and started her dance into the world to come.

As I prepared for the funeral I couldn’t help but think of all of the church teachers and pastors who taught Martha and Joyce where to find Psalm 23; of those formative leaders who coaxed Joyce into memorizing “the whole thing.”  I marveled at the fact that someone taught the family the Lord’s Prayer, and that it had been used enough to remain in the memory banks of these adult siblings.  As I delivered the funeral message, doing my best to put Martha’s life and death into perspective for the mourners who survived her, I saw the children, assembled there to watch and learn how to mourn for their aunt, a lesson they will need to use often in the next 60 or so  years of their lives.

And then it struck me.  The question flooded my mind “Will those children know Psalm 23, or even where to find it, when they spend the last hours with their siblings in 60 years? What are you teaching those children?”  I could say that the church lost the culture wars to work schedules which exhaust parents; to youth sports leaders who discovered that their activities were a better option for many than Sundays in church; or a dozen other excuses for our failure to reach the very children the church is charged with teaching.  Or, I could choose to not accept defeat. I could choose to rally the church and parents to start learning how to reach and teach the precious children who will one day be at each other’s bedside grasping for words that would be their only comfort in life and in death.  I choose to engage in the mission for the children.  You?

What Are You Afraid Of?

Rebekah Gregory knows fear.  She knows it in a way that most people never will.  You may recognize Ms. Gregory’s name as one of the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing. Despite many, many surgical attempts, she lost her lower left leg and she now walks with a prosthetic leg.  For nearly two years she lived in fear of her attacker, Dzhohkar Tsarnaev.  Try as Ms. Gregory might, she could not shake the images and the nightmares and the fear of confronting evil again.

Ms. Gregory, a fit 27-year old woman, blond hair, brown eyes, looks for all the world like a woman in control of life.  But, she wasn’t.  The tragic consequences of the bombing were with her, and will be for the rest of her life.  She was asked to testify at the trial of Mr. Tsarnaev, who faces the death penalty. She described her emotions to a television news reporter as beginning with a sense of dread as she approached the court room.  In a letter to her assailant she describes how she came to an amazing realization as she faced him in the courtroom.  She told the reporter, “When I walked into the courtroom and was able to look him in the face I realized that that fear was gone and I wasn’t afraid. He became nobody to me again.”  She posted a letter to the defendant on her Facebook page in which she describes how facing this person was “the crazy kind of step forward I needed all along.”

I don’t know what you deepest fear is these days.  Perhaps it is a fear caused by someone who you can, in a safe environment, come face to face with and find the beginning of healing.  More likely, what we fear is not a person but a more undefined dread. Mostly it is the loss of control; a loss of security; a fear of an unknown future.  Like Ms. Gregory, our prescription is to face our fears head-on, to find a way to control the fear so it does not control us.  What steps can you take to begin to overcome your fear?

For a 90-year old woman I know, her fear is for the future of this world.  She describes how watching the evening news causes her to cry out, “Lord, how long?”  And then, one Sunday, she sang with God’s people the words “for the darkness shall turn to dawning…and Christ’s great kingdom shall come on earth, the kingdom of love and light.” Here was here source of hope.  What she found was a way to know that our present and future life is not random. That which we hope in is greater than that which we fear.

"Little Blue Birds Fly"

Audra (“don’t call me Audrey”) McDonald is blessed with a voice that can melt butter or shake the rafters.  Ms. McDonald, whom I heard in concert, performed a concert of Broadway show tunes. And while the music was wonderful, the stories were the thing that caught my ear.

Like the time she wanted to give a gift to her cast in a show in which she was acting.  (Ms. McDonald holds the record for the most Tony Awards received by any one person). She went to a place called Covenant House, a shelter for homeless youth, to deliver a check as a donation in honor of her cast.  While there she encountered a street youth, with all his worldly possessions contained in a garbage bag, and she saw how he was welcomed into the house. She witnessed hospitality like it is meant to be. She saw this young man receiving the words that could change his life, “It’s all right. We’ve got you now. You are going to be fine.”  So, she not only left a check; she joined the international board of directors and tells people around the country the story of Covenant House during her concerts. 

Or like the story of how she, an African-American woman, came to be on stage in front of a mostly white audience.  She reminded us of something that is so easy to forget.  She told us that she doesn’t ever forget that if it wasn’t for the people before her who fought all of the bloody battles for equality among the races in the United State that she would not be able to eat in the same restaurants with us; she wouldn’t be able to drink from the same drinking fountains; she wouldn’t be able to sit in the same seats on public transportation as the white people do; why, she probably would not have even been welcome on the very stage on which we now witnessed her singing.  So it is that she advocates for marriage equality, a cause which she equates with the battle for racial equality.

I have been wondering why Ms. McDonald sprinkles these stories among her songs. And I thought about a line from her last song, “Over the Rainbow”. You know the line: “If happy little blue birds fly beyond the rainbow/ why, o why can’t I?”  Life gave her the chance to fly high, and as she soars, she encourages all the other little birds.  I don’t know what stage God has given you. Maybe it is the kitchen floor and your kids are your audience.  They are little birds who want to fly.  Give them wings.