Popular

Now I remember why I dreaded 6th grade. Every morning for an entire school year I told my mother, "I have a headache, stomach ache, toothache, I feel sick, I think I'm going to throw up,
my leg hurts...." I never landed on the magic body part that would elicit any sympathy. I went to school that year and got a perfect attendance award. My daughter is going through 6th grade social angst. Her best friend of 5 years, both from Church and school has joined a group of "popular girls" who all look alike. They've somewhat ostracized my daughter. Of course there are two sides to the story, but its 6th grade reality TV stuff. So....
I ask her tonight at dinner, "So how are you and J. getting along lately?"
She says, "She's hanging out with the popular girls. But they are only popular with themselves, everyone else thinks they're snobs and stuck up and stupid. They don't talk to me because I hang out with the other girls who don't look like them."
"Hmmm...." I say in daddy-ese. "So you don't want to be popular?"
"No. I'm glad I'm logical. They think they're popular, but no one else does. Why would I want to be part of a group like that? There's better people to hang around with at school."
"Hmmmm..." I say again. I want to say "Can you put that in writing and can I show it to you in a couple years?"
Instead I say, "Its hard to be insecure. When people don't know who they are they depend on other people to tell them who they are. I hope you'll always be yourself, not what other people tell you to be so people will like you."
"Yeah", she says, "pass the peanut butter."
I hope that meant "Yeah, I already got that down, dad, tell me something new" and not "I didn't understand a word you just said".
I guess I'll see.

Things I Miss

Joe, my dead best friend and bass player.
Playing the blues with Joe and Jesse in the carport.
Sunset Church of Christ Wednesday night college class. 500 people, acapella.
"Lead Me Gently Home, Father", "I'll Fly Away", "O Lord, Our Lord How Excellent Thy Name",
"O Sacred Head", "The Spacious Firmament on High", "My Stubborn Will at Last Hath Yielded"
Collecting guitars.
Mark, Dr. Dan, Allan at the Plantation on Sunday nights.
Clay and Janet's living room, trying to become Orthodox.
The Tempe Church of Christ Sunday morning adult Bible class. 120 of the nicest people I've ever had the honor of teaching.
Reading novels.
Writing until 3:00 in the morning.
My Hawaiian shorts.
Drawing.
My red Bugatti replica and the leather aviator's cap and goggles.
Dirt bikes on Saturday morning with Craig.
Tuesday night Bible study.
Thursday night dates with Britt.
more later.... off to lead Typika......

Four Years

I've been stopping at a Circle K in the early morning to get coffee and little chocolate donuts for breakfast. Every morning she is there at the register. She looks like one of those drawings of the big, sad-eyed urchin kids that were popular in the late 60's. Every morning I say, Good morning... How are you today? ... Thanks! ...See you tomorrow!... Every morning she slowly looked up like a beaten dog and dropped the change in my hand. Not a word.

After three years she'd say hello, goodbye. The last three months or so she's actually spoken full sentences. This morning we had an actual conversation. She is training a new clerk. I said something like, "Don't do too good a job, he might replace you!" She actually smiled and said he's going to be working the night shift so no problem. "See you tomorrow" she says as I leave.

Transformation. It only comes through relationships, it seems. We might sometimes change through a catastrophic instant meeting with someone, but more often its through long term relationships. Its like the difference, as I say at work, between 20 years of experience or one year of experience twenty times. Change happens when someone pursues us persistently and relentlessly and draws us toward a place we fear or even might secretly desire. I look at Lent and think, God is talking to me. How long has He been visiting me, speaking, drawing me into Himself, and I just stare at Him. I acknowledge His coming and going, I take His offerings. How long will it take for me to speak a word, a sincere hello, or maybe even "see you tomorrow" as if I really want to see Him again. And am I willing and able to see Him in all the people He sends to me, all in His image, all "the least of these" that represent Christ to me. Who will say hello to me tomorrow that I will just stare at and miss God again?

Eavesdropping

Life is pretty much a ditto of a couple posts ago.

A conversation I never thought I'd have standing in my kitchen. You can listen in....

My wife: The hospice nurse came by today. We talked about my dad wetting his bed 3 times a night. She showed me a "Texas Catheter". Its an external catheter we can put on him.

Me: Hmmm.... didn't know they made something like that.

Thomas (who lives with us and helps with Dad): I saw those when I worked in nursing homes.

My wife: Yeah, its like a condom with a tube attached with a bag at the end. The nurse showed me how to put it on.

Me: hmmm... soooo....how did it go?

My wife: Well.... you just never dream that you'd be putting a condom on your father.

Me: Thomas, you've put condoms on before haven't you?

Thomas: Not on another man....

Me: Why do they call it a Texas Catheter?

My wife: I don't have a clue.

Me: Well, if I ever get like that be sure you order a Rhode Island Catheter....

Thomas turns red while my wife has to sit down in a chair exhausted from laughing.

What a

depressing blog...someone says. Hmmm... I muse. I go to the blogsite with the links to a zilliongazillion other blogs. What's depressing? Blogs about wanton sexual encounters, blogs about sports statistics, blogs about movie stars, blogs about rock bands, blogs ranting in free verse into an oblivious universe, blogs crying for a reader to acknowledge that the writer exists...

I suppose to some I have depressing circumstances. Comparatively I suppose there are even more depressing lives other people are living. But people don't get much comfort from comparing their lives to other's. "It could be worse, cheer up" doesn't go far, and certainly won't get you a graduate degree in counseling, nor will it make people regard you as a wellspring of spiritual advice.... Even if it's true and good advice....

There is something noble about martyrdom in people's minds. Its an "ultimate sacrifice" based on principles and hard choice in the face of great pain and loss. I suppose if we face life like it is martyrdom, though it is a slow and sometimes painful torturous process, it has a sense of nobility to it. We purposefully climb onto the altar. We conciously give our life, cut ourselves off from the safety and comfort of the familiar, the warm, the shelter and conveniences of what feels good and right at the moment for the sake of a higher good. Its kind of like jumping on the hand grenade that blows up, not all at once, but slowly and inexorably piercing you with the shrapnel of life until your life is spent protecting those around you. Yeah, that sounds depressing, but make it into a war movie and have Tom Hanks do it in slow motion, there's not a dry eye in the house. The difference is when the hand grenade is real you only have to jump on it once and its a done deal. When it is life, you have to make the decision by the minute sometimes. That is true martyrdom, that is heroic and a bazillion people do it every day.

So no. My life isn't depressing. It only gets depressing when I live unconciously, obliviously and
willfully pursuing comforts and exchanging the truth of my life for the lie of mind and soul numbing entertainments and distractions. I'd rather pay attention to the reality of the world than escape it. Well, most of the time.

So, you'll have to excuse me... I think I need to go help change my father in law's diaper, we had Mexican food tonight.

Been a While

since I've posted anything. Not that life has nothing worth writing about, it is that life is too furious to permit me the luxury of collecting a pithless thought and putting it on "paper".
My father in law is consuming more and more time and testing my wife's depths of patience and good natured bearing of all things. She complained to a friend that she is not treating me well lately. Such is her spirit. Gil had a heart attack a couple weeks ago. We called 911 and then spent part of the night at the VA hospital watching grizzled and burned out veterans with limbs missing trying to bum smokes and matches off hospital staff and people in the waiting rooms.
He has refused treatment and since has had two minor heart attacks at home.

He has bad days. On those days he stares into space, cannot walk, has to be fed, and is non-communicative. A good day is when we can get him from his room to the dining room via his walker to eat with the family.

Our bedroom is in the basement and Gil's room is above us. We have a baby monitor walkie talkie in his room. Part of his disease is he gets liquid down his lungs and gags and chokes a lot. When he tries to clear his throat he yells: "AAARRRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHGHGHGHGHGHHHHHHHH!!!!" He does this several times a night. At other times he screams "HEEELLLLPPPP!!!" We find him with chest pains, fallen out of bed or trapped somehow between his bed and the wall. My wife was changing his diapers two or three times a night until recently. Uninterrupted sleep is a luxury these days.

We finally got Hospice involved and they have set us up with several home health care things like catheters, oxygen and aspirators. Gil's room is looking more and more like a hospital ward and smells like one. I built his coffin last weekend in my carport. We brought it in and showed it to him in his room. He liked it. He said he wanted red velvet for the lining. But then he chuckled and said, that might scandalize people. I said, yeah, you don't want them thinking we're burying a whore. He laughed. It is now in our basement waiting for him to repose. Some of our friends won't go down to the basement. I tell them that some monks sleep with their coffins in their rooms. The constant remembrance of death is a good thing. It keeps us sober. Living with someone who is dying keeps you sober too. Just in case you don't have a coffin laying around as a reminder.


My youngest daughter is 12. She sits across the dining room table from Grandpa every night while he gags and hacks and spits up phlegm and yells "AAAAARRRRGHGHGHGHHHHH"
with a drip of snot hanging like a melting icicle from his beaked nose. She looks at me, but there is not pre-teen disgust in her eyes. It is more like pain and compassion and helplessness and
embarrassment combined. I tap her foot with mine under the table and give her a wink. She half smiles at me. She has taken some hard insults from him over the past couple years. He's not a "kid" person. But she serves him, helps him whenever we ask and is polite and respectful to him. I am sure this is what "kid sainthood" looks a lot like.

The radio show I host, "Our Life in Christ" is doing well. After five years it seems to be gaining some attention and people are finding it helpful. Along with more exposure is coming more administrative duties as well as more attention to quality control and subject content on the programs. Unfortunately the success of the show comes and financial support from area Churches has dwindled due to parish problems. Being self employed, I've managed to find extra work and float the program for a few months but we lost another parish recently. We're going to look for some private support but that's time away from working to pay the bills.

In the past two months I've also been part of a group of people who will be starting a new OCA mission near Arizona State University. The priest in charge wants me to be one of the key lay leadership and my wife to be choir director. We tentatively begin services on Zaccheus Sunday.
There is much to do before we can open the doors.

My father has been diagnosed with emphysema, my oldest son just broke up with his fiancee after half the wedding had been planned, my daughter and step son in Tucson have been fairly low maintenance lately, thank God.... and I never ordered the Christmas present I was supposed to buy for my wife from all the kids. I shopped the brick and mortar stores for it and by the time I had enough money in my checking account to actually buy it, it wouldn't have been delivered on time... it got put on the back burner and the tsunami of our life washed the intentions way down the shoreline until my stepdaughter called and was angry because I never ordered it.... my wife being the saint that she is will bear this also with grace.

I got a "cease and desist contracting" letter from the Arizona Registrar of Contractors two weeks ago due to a complaint against me lodged by a "brother in Christ" who is a, forgive me, a cheap millionaire lawyer who thinks I've screwed him. The short story is I worked for him at less than my cost because he's a member of the Church and wellll....no good deeds go unpunished. In my former days .... well.....he has one more thing to be grateful for, that he didn't do this to me in my former days. I'm pretty sure he's going to sue me on top of everything.

So. That's about six weeks in a nutshell. I'm sure there's tons of minor things I've forgotten.
But at the end of the day I look at the clock and its already 10:45pm. I haven't showered, we barely finished eating dinner, and I have bids, invoices, return calls, email and radio show research to do. But instead of doing all that I wrote in my blog. I'm still alive. And yes, this is living.

Alone

My earliest recollections of emotions in my childhood are of loneliness. By the time I entered high school it was a pervasive and deep painful throb, like an ear ache in my spirit. The mystery was that no one would have guessed. I was constantly surrounded by people. They seemed to like me, I was wellll.... popular, even though I was small, goony, geeky and eccentric.
I had a knack for making people laugh. People like to laugh, I figured out early in my life, and as we moved from state to state and country to country with the Navy, I grew to depend on that talent to be sure I wasn't alone in a new place.

But there was a deep suspicion within me. Actually, not a suspicion but a grudging acceptance of a reality I could not bear: people didn't like ME, they liked what I decided to show them, which was a fake "me", or at best, only a part of me that I knew people would like. Their acceptance was a lie... not that they were faking it, I was...they really liked what they thought I was, I just knew that wasn't me they liked. So, in the midst of people who "liked me" I was lonely.

Fast forward, or whatever you do to a DVD now... a few decades, and now I see a distinction between lonely and alone that is grounded in God. Alone is a choice. Lonely is a consequence.
A person can be alone but not lonely. A person can be surrounded by friends, family, and even saints and be lonely.

We are not intended to function with loneliness. God is Trinity. We are created in His image, that is, for communion, love, community, union, unity and mutuality. Apart from that God has no existence, apart from that we do not "exist" even though we might be breathing. Loneliness is the ultimate fear factor. To be alone means we are rejected. To be alone means our acceptance by other people is based on a lie, an unreality. It is all a consequence of the fall, of sin, of the fear of death. Death is not merely stopping breathing, it is being cut off from everything and every one. We'll do almost anything to keep even a fake relationship because bad breath is better than no breath at all. Fake acceptance is better than real rejection.
An illusion of love and communion is better than the substance of dark silence in the middle of the night. I think that is why sex sells so well in our culture...we are lonelier than ever and its better to wrestle with a warm body with no soul than to wrestle with a pillow in the middle of the night within your own soul.

The greatest risk the human being can take is not eating cow intestines or being covered with cockroaches. It is being real. The problem is, the fear is, if you are real, you get real responses.
Most of us cannot face reality, so we dance around it.

So, yes. The entire human race is afraid of being alone. But much of the human race cannot
face the fact they are indeed alone and are grasping at illusions and images, relationships of fog that obscure the bleak landscape within them. The sickness of the soul is to live without real love.

And the only cure for the soul is Truth.

I'm Not God

Are tsunamis all relative? I think of an earthquake 3,000 miles away that ends up killing God only knows how many people and devastating even more people's lives. Then I get home and find out a former client who is a lawyer and a member of my Church (I won't get into the "I said/he said" details....) turned in a complaint about me to the State Registrar of Contractors that could potentially shut down my livelihood. My father in law falls down and hurts his leg and it sends a tidal wave of inconveniences and changes of schedules and sleepless nights over our family life. The cat pukes in the hall and I step in it in the dark. And.... well, the daily litany of life's smaller injustices and speed bumps. Does seeing a picture of miles of wrecked coastline change my life? Well, no, the cat puke still stinks and I have to wash my feet and clean the floor. It doesn't heal my father in law's swollen leg or make him able to walk, or make him able to stand steadily and hit the toilet when he pee's. The Red Cross isn't going to help me pay off the two grand the lawyer wants to stop harassing me. I can intellectually see the difference between my situation and the coastal cities of India. I can feel compassion for their wretched lives and cumulative grief beyond imagination. But, in the end, when I open my eyes this is where I am, in my house, with my petty problems that don't go away because someone else has bigger ones ten thousand miles away. I suppose I should and could thank God my problems aren't bigger than they are. But most of the time I'm so wrapped up in my own stuff that I don't think about that. The tsunami is real, the deaths are real, for certain. But the other reality is, it is pictures in a lighted box in my living room. My father in law laying on the floor of his bathroom isn't. We have to pick him up and clean the walls and floors of the bathroom and change his clothes.

It is amazing to me how quickly we can feel compassion when watching the news and then
just as quickly lose it when something happens, even something like the phone ringing or
dinner being ready or checking my email.

I suppose that if we were able to feel the accumulated totality of the pain of all the people that we hear about in every newscast about every murder, death, loss and injustice ever told about and never be able to slough it off or forget about it, we'd be crushed beneath it all.

Perhaps that is why Isaiah said He "bore our griefs" and was "crushed for our iniquities".
He took on the totality of the burden of the sins and griefs of what it means to be human in a fallen world and never laid that down or lost it or forgot it.

My reaction when I step in cat puke alone should let me know I'm not God. Sometimes I need to be reminded of that.

Ordinary

My kids ask me what I did today. I always tell them the same thing:
"I woke up, I went to work, I came home, I ate dinner, I'm going to bed." Pretty ordinary existence. It doesn't sound like an environment where I can "be all I can be"....

What makes life "extraordinary"? What circumstances do I have to manufacture to attain my
"all I can be-ness"? What will lift me out of the mundane and dullness of my routine existence?

Maybe being all you can be is accomplished simply by paying attention. Maybe it is just noticing what you see when you open your eyes. Maybe its as simple as paying attention to what you say to those you work with and for, who you choose to pay attention to or ignore throughout the day, how you regard your labor, and whether or not you give thanks for your meal and your roof and bed. Ordinary is dull. But the dullness is within us: dull of hearing, dull of seeing, dull of passion for life's gifts and unimaginable complexity.

If we but live conciously we lift up our eyes to the infinite horizons of the creation and all of its magnificence and wonder. And if we open our hearts we will know the most extraordinary
experience of human existence: to fall on our knees and give thanks to the Creator of it all.

Sleeping with Sewage

hmmm....Freud might have a field day with my blog's obsession with sewage. But somehow my life seems to attract a lot of it. Maybe I'm one of those "vessels of dishonor" (read: toilet) that St. Paul talks about. Who am I to say to The Potter "Why do I keep collecting crap???" Maybe its because I can.

Well, anyway....I'm sitting here while the thinset dries in my father in law's bathroom.
He overflowed his toilet for the third time a couple days ago. If it weren't for gravity and the fact that our bedroom is in our basement, and our bed is right underneath his bathroom, that wouldn't be such a bad thing. Physics, unlike some other logical principles, works in our house, so the water and all that it carries with it falls on our bed.

The first time he did it we were gone. He was still well enough we could leave him alone for a couple hours at a time. I came home and heard something like a tub filling. I found Gil in his bathroom standing in about two inches of water flushing the toilet over and over. I went downstairs and my ceiling had a belly like a whale and there was water flowing down the walls and about an inch of water on the floor. We pulled up the carpet and well.... other stuff.

The second time the sump pump went out in our basement. The sump pump pumps the waste from the toilet upstairs into the sewer lines. If it doesn't pump, it overflows. It flooded my office floor with about 5 gallons of sewage. It was late in the day so I had to replace it. Fishing an old sump pump out of a twenty gallon tank in the floor that services your toilet in the basement is not for the weak. Now I know why contractors call plumbers "turd herders". About 10:00pm I finished the installation and was getting ready to go to bed. I walked in my bedroom and there was a stream of water falling onto my bed through a hole in the ceiling. I ran upstairs and there was Gil. He was doing the same thing but we caught him before the whole bathroom was full and it only soaked our bed.

This time, I decided that to rely on Gil's ability to reason, I should rely on my ability to build things to keep it from happening again. So I ripped up his floor, put in new plywood and cement backer board, sloped the floor and put in a floor drain, a new commercial grade toilet and waterproof tile on the floor.

Gil sits in his chair in his bedroom while I'm working in his bathroom. I walk by him and he says, "I'm so sorry you have to do this."

I think, "Yeah, so am I." But not because I resent him, but because the world is fallen and people shouldn't get degenerative neurological diseases that eat at their brains and nervous systems and organs. I'm sorry I have to do this because it isn't fair that he feels like a burden on us, even though he is, but not in the way he thinks. And yeah, I'm sorry I have to do this because I HAVE to do it because my life is so narcissistic and self centered that I need God to dish out crap to me to make me serve someone else, be compassionate, not resent the inconveniences of other people's needs, and serve the lost, the helpless, the ones who cannot return a favor except by saying "I'm sorry you have to do this......"

I remember over 3 decades ago praying to God "Thou art the Potter, I am the clay... break me and make me into a vessel for your purposes." Little did I know God would decide I needed to be a toilet. Glory to God.

Dropping Stuff in A Toilet

Sunday morning getting ready for Church. Its always when you are running late you accidentally drop something in the toilet. It occurred to me that no matter how fast you put something into water and yank it out, it gets wet. Well, duh.

Perhaps holiness is the same way. If I come into contact with someone or something that is holy perhaps I cannot avoid "getting wet". If I am holy in an unholy situation perhaps those around me cannot help "getting wet" whether they like it or not. Sure they can dry off if they choose, but the fact is they experienced the unavoidable consequence of encountering the Spirit. I'm not usually a drinking fountain in the desert, or a buck twenty nine bottle of water, or a tidal wave or a jacuzzi, mostly I'm just a toilet, a vessel of dishonorable use that people accidentally drop their stuff into. It is sobering to know that however they encounter Christ in me, they get wet.

Subway Evangelist

I visited my son in Boston last week, never been back East. Back East you do this crazy thing... You go underground and ride a train to get places because you don't dare try to drive. I could live underground...There's Dunkin Donuts and magazine vendors down there.

There's also the tall skinny man with 1970's gold rimmed semi-rectangular aviator glasses that look like goggles on his face. He stands like a wooden Indian with his hands outstretched with a stack of white note card sized tracts. Around his neck is a cardboard sandwich sign about the size of a 19" TV that hangs on his chest and back. It has scriptures on it, all the scriptures that no one wants to go public with... you know, the judgment ones, hellfire and damnation. And some opinions about what the scriptures mean. On the straps holding the sign are some 3x5 cards that read "Repent or Burn!" "Christ or Hell" or something like that. A crowd comes down the stairs and part like the Red Sea when they get within 10 feet of him then re-converge on the other side of where he stands. He stares straight ahead, never making eye contact with anyone.

I walked up to him, stood in front of him, took a tract from his hand and said, "God bless you for living out your faith." He looked at me. Something in his face changed for a heartbeat....
"Thank you" he said and looked away into space again.

He may never "convert" a single person in his life, but I prayed God has mercy upon him and knows he was putting his whole being on the line for the sake of keeping people out of hell. He may look like a fool, but I've been a greater fool for far less noble causes. I fear I'm the one in the greater need for mercy.

ASK ME ABOUT JESUS

I was shopping for CD’s at the office supply store when I noticed him. Nearly everyone in the store was in business attire, suits, sport coats, designer casual, mid-calf dresses. It was easy to notice him because he wore a tattered T-shirt worn thin in places, a message across the back, thrift store polyester bell bottoms and a wide belt. His chopped hair looked like it had been cut with a pocket knife and stood up, because of nature, not mousse. I noticed a few of the patrons smile condescendingly as he passed by them, a few pretended they just didn't see him. When I got close to him, I got embarrassed.

The back of his T-shirt, in big block letters said, "ASK ME ABOUT JESUS". His belt was one of those embossed cowboy belts, but instead of his name across the back it said, "JESUS IS LORD". His belt buckle was the size of a hub cap engraved with "PRAISE THE LORD". My first thought was, "Oh. no. these are the kinds of goofy people who turn people off to Christianity. There is not a person in here who would ask this guy about directions to Circle K much less about Jesus. And I know I certainly wouldn't send one of these people to him if they were seeking authoritative answers about Jesus."

Then I caught myself.

"So, just who do you have in mind as an authority on Jesus, Steve?" I asked myself, "someone more like yourself I'll bet. Someone with a degree in Jesus-ology, someone sharp, witty, articulate, judgmental, rejecting, condescending, and more impressed with the outward trappings of the culture than the inner spirit of the person?" (I talk to myself like this.)

He, I .... whoever was talking to myself. . . was right. So he looked more like a geek than a Greek scholar. But who better to ask about Jesus than someone who NEEDS him. Jesus probably IS his best friend because he didn't look like a person who had many friends (I know, I know….even that is judgmental). And again, I was confronted with the scandal of the gospel, the kingdom of "fools for Christ's sake". I thought about all the people who know Jesus far better than I ever will because they have no one else to go to, nothing else to hope in no illusions to hold on to, no pretenses to keep up. They are the foremost authorities on what it means to have Jesus as a friend and not only does the world reject them, we do too.

Mark my words, we seek out the flamboyant, the clever, the ones who can tell a marvelous, hilarious, moving story of how God intervened powerfully and miraculously in their lives to give them Christian smiley faces and victorious faith and deep spirituality. You will never see any "goofy looking", inarticulate people on the lecture circuits telling their stories. No, you will never hear them give a testimonial, read a book by them nor hear a tape of a class they have taught. Heck, even the Christian talk radio people cut them off early in the conversations. But if you get to the end of this and feel like you want to talk to one of them you don't have to go far to find them, they are right in your church. They have been there all along, you just have not opened your eyes to see them. Look around next Sunday. You will see them in the same pew, week after week, quietly living out their private desperations in the company of their best friend. Jesus. Their lives are really the essence of spirituality.

For the most part they give no thought to all the fine theological distinctions between faith and endurance, spirituality and perseverance, overcoming and holding on, victory and sticking it out. Theirs is a death grip on life simply because to let go would mean utter ruin. If we understood their pain we would know they have greater strength in their weakness than ten of us who feel like we have found a convenient handle on God and life. Talk to them, see if it is not so.

They are the ones who take no thought for tomorrow, it is enough to survive one more day, sometimes one more hour. The burden of even three tomorrows would crush them should they consider it seriously. They are the ones who "let go and let God", not because they necessarily gave control of their lives to God because some spiritual guru recommended it as a path to greater awareness, but because life was wrenched from their grasp by forces they could neither comprehend nor control. They have no inner strength left to hang on, no well devised plans and clever techniques left to arrange and order even a tiny corner of their universe. They do not read the latest Christian self help books on grief, depression, fear and anxiety so they can identify which stage they are in and work out a plan to get on to the next and eventually get on with a normal existence. They have no normal existence, they are perpetually out of control, careening in a fearful, wild roller coaster they are unable to stop, their screams of desperation drowned out by the screams of joy of the happy Christians around them.

You see, these are the true heroes of the Hillside Sermon. They are the poor in spirit, the ones who mourn. They are the ones in need of mercy, the ones starving for righteousness, the helpless, the hopeless, the castaways. But these are the guests of honor at the Feast of All Feasts. These are the lame, the weak, the spiritual bag-ladies and winos constrained by the Gospel from the gutters and cardboard shelters of life to come enjoy the banquet given to those who can only come and eat but could never bring pot-luck or return the favor. They are the ones with no pretenses of being there because they knew the host, hobnobbed with the right pastors or parish council members or were members of some moving shaking Church organization. They know they are being fed, not helping themselves. These should be our teachers. They, not we, are the sign of the kingdom come; not the articulate, the Who's Who in Whatever, the easy to look at, the shoppers-through-catalogues, the cutting-edge people. "The lame walk, the blind see, the Gospel is preached to the poor" St. John was told when he asked if the kingdom that Jesus preached was for real. The shepherdless sheep are sought after and gathered into the fold. The outcasts, the ones we refuse to see, the ones who didn't make the cut, the ones whose names are "Who?", the lepers, the untouchables, the social disgraces, the lowliest of the low, the sinfulest of the sinners, the lostest of the lost, these are all present at the king's banquet table. They are the sign of the kingdom among you.

We should look up to them because they have been lifted from the last place to the first. They would never presume, dare, even think, of claiming the first seat. Even now when they hear the Master's voice saying, "Come up here, sit by me", they look behind them thinking His call is to someone else, someone like you or me who write blogs and post to lists and teach classes and tell stories and divulge wisdom. But it is for them. The last in line are called out and given eternal "cuts".

So, the next time I see him I hope I have the guts to set aside my arrogance and condescending spirit and ask him about Jesus. I hope he will take the time to talk to me even though I wouldn't have taken the time to talk to him.

Rolling in Raw Sewage

The rain in San Diego had washed 180 days' worth of sewage, sludge, grime and muck into the beach waters. I was on vacation from Arizona and hadn't seen the beach for ages, so I went anyway in spite of the warnings on the news and the intermittent drizzle of rain. Three bright yellow signs at the entrance to the beach said "DANGER: RAW SEWAGE. DO NOT ENTER THE WATER! HEALTH HAZARD!"... and some other ominous words about horrific diseases to that effect. Swimming in my toilet never appealed to me, so I didn't enter the water, I walked along it. I scurried up the sand whenever the waves rushed up to bite my ankles.

I was looking down at the sand for beach glass and sea shells for my daughter. I glanced up and saw three people. There were two men with big cameras and lenses the size of a roll of 40 gallon black trash bags. And a woman. She was wearing... well.... not wearing is more the truth.... something akin to dental floss, except a foot of floss has more fibres to it, I think. She was sprawled on the beach, rolling in the waves of raw sewage in poses that would make Gumby greener with envy than he already is.

I wondered what the purpose of the photo session was and where her pictures would end up.
I wondered who would be rolling in the sewage of an 8x10 glossy of her, what disease of the mind and heart would eat at the soul of the ones who gazed on her image. I wondered if she disregarded the warning signs in her heart the first time she posed like she disregarded the warnings of the big yellow posters on the beach.

A life guard came along and told her to get out of the water. She put on her pants and sweater, and she and her companions left the beach laughing and talking. I guess if I had offered her my coat and told her to get out of the water and get out of the business because it was unhealthy for her soul, she probably would have left with two things to laugh about.

In sorrow I watched them walk past the warning signs and up the steps to their car. As they drove away, I prayed to the Virgin Mary to try to touch her heart, that she will heed the warning signs some day.

Time

Woke up at 2:30am to finish a job at a doctor's office before they opened for patients at 7:00am.
Went to another job and painted a living room while the client watched every brush-stroke until 5:30pm. I got home about 6 and my daughter says "I'm going to ride my bike with Kaya before dinner." Fifteen minutes later I get a call from Kaya's cell phone. "You better come, Kenzie fell off her bike and I think her arm is broken." We spend the next 3 and a half hours at urgent care. Good friends brought us dinner at the care center. I get home and finish business, answer email and get ready for the next day's work. I think I know why God invented time. If everything happened to us all at once, we couldn't bear it. Then it all becomes yesterday. Smart, God is.

Dinner with God

Life is tough lately. Do you ever get the feeling God is telling you "EAT WHAT'S ON YOUR PLATE, IT'S GOOD FOR YOU!" ? Pass the salt, please.....

What I Learned at Vacation Bible School III

On the last night of the Living Vacation Bible School all the cast and characters and kids gathered for a big helium balloon release on the front lawn. All the cast came in costume. There was John the Baptist with locusts on his hairy coat. There was Peter, and Abdul the rappin’ money changer. There was Blind Bart and Mary Magdelene. And Satan.

Being adults and therefore thinking like rational grown up adults, we were kind of slow on the uptake when we decided to have all the cast come in costume. Because, you see, if we had thought about it, it would have dawned on us that if some of the kids thought I was Jesus they would think Dan was Satan. And they did. I looked up and saw one of the staff coming toward me with a small child in tow. He toddled along a half step behind her, a death grip on the young lady’s hand, and looking back over his shoulder every few steps. They stopped in front of me and she picked him up. “Joshua’s afraid.” she said, “and he wanted to see you.” I reached out and took him from her arms, his head was turning like a balloon in a windstorm. He was obviously looking for someone. “What’s the matter, Joshua?” I asked him.
“The devil is back. He’s here. I saw him,” he said pointing into the crowd.
“I tried telling him it’s not really the devil, that it’s just a man in a costume, but he’s still scared,” the young girl said, shrugging her shoulders.

“Joshua . . ..”I said. Then I didn’t know what to say. The first thing that came to my mind, truly, was “Don’t worry, the devil won’t hurt you.” No. I thought, that just doesn’t sound right. (Not only didn’t it sound right but I fear now it really betrays our adult thinking about Satan: you know the truth comes out under pressure like that.) Then I thought: I’ll take him to Dan and show him that it is just a disguise, that Dan is really a nice guy and he and I are friends. But that didn’t seem right either. Jesus and Satan buddies? Satan is really a nice guy underneath his disguises? Nah… Strike two. Another bad idea.

Then it dawned on me. “Joshua!” I said with an air of authority, “you remember what happened Monday night when I chased the devil away?” He nodded, his little forehead still furrowed with fear. “O.K. This is all you have to do if the devil comes near you. You just look him straight in the eye and you say, ‘You devil, in the name of Jesus, get lost!’” Joshua looked at me, his eyes widened and his face broke into a big grin. He wiggled to get down and I set him on the ground. He looked up at me, still grinning, and said with glee, “Yeah!” and ran off shouting, “In the name of Jesus, get lost you devil!”

By the end of the evening Dan had been rebuked several times by children with faith that Jesus’ name alone would protect them from the evil one.

I wonder how many times a day Satan gets rebuked by grown-ups with faith like a child’s? Probably not many. We are too sophisticated to believe in a “real devil”, we are too philosophical, psychological and theological for such a simplistic answer to the problem of temptation to do evil. But in all of our sophistication we are still too weak to resist temptation. Armed with all of our therapies, philosophies and theologies we still walk out with the stuff the cashier missed, lie about the traffic, make the lunch date with the co-worker, call in sick, conveniently “forget”, and speak our minds. Maybe all we really have to do is what Jesus did and say, “Begone, Satan. I’m with God.” Maybe what James said is true, “Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” Maybe it really is just that simple.

Oh, for the heart of a child again.

The Greatest Commandment

And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” And He said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind’ This is the greatest and foremost commandment. And the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.” Matt. 22:35-40

I remember laying our Fr. Wiley’s garments for the Mass. I handled them as though they were the garments of Christ Himself. I remember the first Mass I served, my soprano second grade voice mumbling and stumbling through the Latin. I still feel a shiver of awe that I had at the altar, being so close to the sacrament.

I remember I decided to become a priest in that same year. I never fulfilled that desire within the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church. Along my way I exchanged the majestic ritual and awe of the Latin high Mass for the simplicity and literalness of a protestant “Bible Church” tradition. I have since returned to the majesty of the liturgy in the Eastern Orthodox Church, but I am not here to defend or condemn any of these, but to merely bear witness to the love of God.

The common thread in my change of beliefs and traditions was my desire to obey the command of Christ. Along the way from Catholicism to Protestantism, somewhere, some how, the commandments themselves became gods, wooden exactness became the criteria for my salvation. There was no mystery, all was knowledge, reverence became fear, and humility became spiritual arrogance. In all of this there was a gnawing hollowness. While I was convinced in my mind I was accomplishing something good, there was something of great importance missing.

Somewhere, somehow, I discovered mystery and awe again. I found in my life things of inexplicable grace and power. I became a child again, I ceased to figure out how the rabbit got into the hat and reveled in the joy of the magic. I ceased to try to understand how we can conjure up love from hearts battered and hurt by life, and just loved people. It was then that I understood God. It was then that I discovered peace.

Jesus said there are really only two commandments. All the other commandments are corollary or commentary. The two greatest commandments: fall in love…joyfully, passionately, head over heels, wonderfully in love with the Lord your God, and have compassion and mercy, forgiveness and grace for your neighbor.

I hear the simplicity of the commandment and my heart fails within me. How can it be?

How can I be commanded to love? How can I bring forth on command the joyful, consuming passion of love? I know I can act as though I love someone. There have been times moral expediency or guilt or fear or lust have commanded me to act as though I was in love. Sometimes the act fooled those for whom I was acting, sometimes not. In the acting though, there was no consuming passion, no tears of joyful wonder, no sacrifice of my life beyond the expectation of something of equal or greater value in return, nothing to surprise myself at the depth of love and desire I had for my beloved.

And how can I be commanded to look at someone suffering and feel my stomach wrench in compassion for him? I know I can be coerced by guilt or the desire for praise into giving or acting like I am moved by suffering. Despite the act, my heart can still remain cold, unmoved and selfishly motivated.

In the simplicity of the commandment is the root of my distress. I know I cannot be commanded to do the very thing I am commanded to do. The love I know I ought to have for God and my neighbor I cannot bring forth on demand. Even if the demand is from God Himself.

I intuitively understand in other aspects of life I cannot be commanded even to appreciate something, much less to love someone. I cannot be told to appreciate Picasso, Debussey, T.S. Elliot, heavy metal hair bands, French food or jazz. I cannot be told to worship the ground someone walks on. I cannot be commanded to adore someone. I know these things about myself and yet I have blindly accepted the notion that God thinks He can command me to appreciate Him, love Him unconditionally and passionately and care deeply and sacrificially about His creations.

The problem with accepting the notion that God has actually commanded or even issued a strong suggestion that we had better love Him and our neighbor (whether the suggestion is for our own good or not is irrelevant here) is that other notions come with the package, much like fleas on a dog. The flea on this dog is that I am supposed to be capable of loving on command. I know full well I cannot. Even if it is for my own good. And so I struggle with the command and I struggle with my inability to obey fully and love as deeply as God tells me I ought.

But here are some things I have come to understand. These things have opened to me the mystery of the command:

There are things of wonder and beauty that move me deeply and incomprehensibly to feelings that I cannot control. I am commanded, in a sense, and I am powerless to disobey. I understand these things: To see my best friend for the first time in many years is a command to smile and be glad. To say goodbye to one I love, to embrace for the last time in this life is a command to look deeply and wordlessly at one another and feel a deep emptiness fill with tears. To hear “You are forgiven” after grievously hurting someone I love is a command to be humbled and grateful and at peace within. To see a child hollow eyed and reduced to skin over bones by hunger is a command to feel compassion. When I hear a certain piece of music it is a command to remember that friend, that love, that time when….., and to feel just as I did all those years ago. The smell of roses, a “greasy spoon” on a certain street corner, a photograph, a name alone is a command to rejoice, to be misty eyed, to smile, to feel melancholy or to laugh. These things command me, not with words, but with wonder and majesty and beauty that reaches into the depths of my most secret needs and desires and my most sacred memories and deepest hungers.

Perhaps then, it is not that God commands me or tells me that I MUST fall in love with Him, as in “YOU WILL EAT THOSE PEAS, YOUNG MAN!!”, but it is that he simply places Himself before me in all of His loveliness, beauty, awesome majesty and gracious mercy. Perhaps He commands me, He draws from my heart and soul all the love and devotion and adoration I harbor within me by His very presence. He does not seek to coerce love from me by directive, but He goes to any length to compel me to adoration and to elicit my love from me. For God to reveal Himself to me is in itself the command to love Him with all my heart, soul, mind and strength. To be forgiven by Him is the command to have peace. To know His mercy is the command to walk humbly with Him in gratitude. To see His heart’s desire for my heart is the command to rejoice. To find His love unending and infinite is the command to worship and adore.

Thus the greatest commandment is not so much a dictate but more the deepest desire of God’s heart being expressed to me. “Fall in love with me” is the command of His presence, the compelling message of the Cross.

The second greatest commandment is like the first- to love your neighbor as yourself. It is like the first because it is impossible to fulfill by sheer will. It is like the first because it is an overflowing of the first, a command that is rooted in the passion we have for our Beloved God. This I have come to understand too.

Being in love commands me to see the world through new eyes. Where there was once nothing of interest now there is delirious beauty. I now see irises and strawberries in a way I have never seen them before. Love commands me to hear music and the wind in the trees like I’ve never heard it before. I feel the temperature of the morning air like I’ve never felt it before. My love commands me to be touched by certain words, by thunder, artichokes, concrete park benches, hot dogs and blue in ways that I have never known because they are now shared with my beloved.

So, you see, I have fallen in love with God. I now see the world as through new eyes. Being in love with God is the command to see my neighbor in a new way. To see someone in need, or hurting or sorrowful or doubting or in pain, this is the command to my heart to be compassionate, forgiving, kind, gracious and merciful. It is simply what happens because of my heart’s deepest love and longing for its Beloved, God. I cannot help it, it all happens inexplicably and overwhelmingly. The presence of the world before me is itself a command to love it and serve it because of the love I have for its Creator.

Jesus said, “If I be lifted up upon the cross, I will draw all men unto myself.” From His cross He draws from within me all that I am and all that I have. All is new, I am my Beloved’s and He is mine. In His consuming passion He has done what all the finest and best lovers in stories and in history have always done. He gave His life to possess me, to win my eternal devotion and love.

Yes, the Cross is like the old song, the smell of a summer’s new mown grass, the distant rumble of a freight train in the humid night, the sound of an old familiar voice, a friend walking through the door unannounced, that draws from somewhere deep within me a remembrance of what once was, and rekindles the fierce desire to know Him, a passion for His presence, my love, peace, and sometimes a tear of grief and yes, even a weeping for joy.

What a Wimp

So, I just finished soldering a new hose bib on my house. It has only been hanging there with a set of rusted channel locks for a handle for ohhhhh... six or seven years now......

Yeah, I've fantacized about martyrdom before. Sure, I'd suffer for Christ. Go ahead, torture me, I'll endure and not deny Him.

As I sit here with an ice pack on my burned fingers that I put in the path of the blue flame of a blow torch for less time than the interim between first and second place in the 50 meter dash in the Olympics, I wonder....

Man, pain hurts. Name the price to make this go away, I'd probably pay it......

What I Learned at Vacation Bible School Part 2

“And now ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce someone you all know very well, Jesus’ greatest enemy, the prince of darkness, Belzeebub, the devil himself… SATAN!!!” The spotlight swings stage left.

About a hundred kids jump and shriek when Satan, dressed in a black leather jacket, red cape, horns and pointy ears springs from a red, back-lit, fog shrouded rock. But they are soon entranced, Satan is a very smooth talking character. Satan tells how he tried to tempt Jesus into changing stones into free Happy Meals for himself and all the kids. He tells how he tried to get him to fly like Superman off the top of the church building to REALLY make VBS cool, but all to no avail. Then Satan takes out a handful of candy, red cinnamon “fire balls”, and starts tossing it around to all the kids in the audience. They all grab and catch and scramble on the floor to pick it up. “Have some candy kids! You’ll be my friends won’t you? See, they love me!!”

Satan sneers at the kids, “I may not be able to get Jesus to do what I want but I bet I can get YOU to! If you do what I say I’ll give you candy and sodas and you can stay up as late as you want… and then YOU’LL be my friends…. AHHH..HAHAHAHAHA!!!”

Jesus jumps up from his seat nearby and shouts, “Satan, you leave God’s children alone!" Jesus strides over to Satan and gets right in his face and pokes a finger in his chest.

"You mess with them, you answer to ME! You got that??” The kids go silent. Jesus and Satan are standing inches from each other, toe to toe, nose to nose, eyeball to eyeball. There is not a breath. Satan slowly backs down, cowering, and slinks back to his cave. “I’ll be back!” he shouts. The kids go wild. “Yaaaayyyyy Jesus!” And it’s off to the learning centers for more Bible times experiences.

One of the children is crying. Daniel. He’s almost four. Maybe Satan scared him. I look at his mouth and it is all red, he is drooling red slime. Maybe he bumped his mouth on a song book rack and cut his lip ….again.

I stoop down and hold his tiny face. “Daniel, are you hurt sweetheart?” Tears roll, he shakes his head side to side. His mouth is working overtime, puckering, drooling, sucking, biting his lips. It is not blood. I hear clicking inside his mouth.

“What’s in your mouth, Daniel… here, let me see.”

“It’s candy from the devil,” he says, drooling and sniffling.

“Well, what’s the matter Daniel? Why are you crying?”

“Cuz it’s ho-oooo-oot!” he says in a quivering voice.

“Well, Daniel, if it’s hot, why don’t you spit it out?”

“Cuz it’s caa-aaandy!” he wails.

Oh child, you said a mouthful. At three and a half you stated more clearly than any theologian the warfare within us.

Oh child, at three and a half the warfare already rages within you.

And what candy from the devil are you holding onto, O "grown up" child of God?

A lifestyle? Dinner parties or beer parties, Mercedes or pickups, Georgio Armani or Levis, mansions or cheap motels, or somewhere in between?

An image? Footloose and free, competent and invulnerable, sharing and caring, rich and powerful, martyred and self sacrificing, spiritual and righteous, angry and rebellious, non-conformist or on the edge, in the know and on the inside track of everything?

A relationship? Illicit, destructive, hopeless, imaginary, ego gratifying, degrading or questionable?

And what is it costing you O child, what is it hurting?

Your peace, your wife, your sincerity, your children, your honesty, your ideals, your self respect, your dreams, your hopes, your reputation, your ability to feel true joy, to see the world with a clear eye, to delight in the world with a pure heart, to look in the mirror with a clear conscience?

And, child, if you hurt so much, why don’t you let it go?

Because it’s candy.

Yes little children, we like the look, we love the feeling, we love the pleasure, we revel in the admiration and ego boost. So we eat the apple and then try to fix or drown out the bitter consequence. Sometimes we fast and pray, seek spiritual counsel and we still have a stash of candy hidden in the closet. When every word on overcoming sin has been spoken, when every encouragement has been uttered and every step of every program has been applied and you lose the battle, you still fall, you still hurt, you know you are dying, there is still yet one last word. It is the only word that really matters in the end to the wretched dying losers of the battle with temptation.

“No condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

O, the sweet love of God. Taste and see that the Lord is Good. Rejoice O child of God, and eat the Body and Blood of your Savior. Taste the heavenly gift, laugh and be exceedingly glad you sinners, His Body is True Food and His Blood, True Drink. Rejoice you who have tasted the bitterness of sin, Jesus is the Snickers of God.