Scones of Christ

One recent evening, I stayed after my closing shift in the hospital kitchen, to do some baking. This is something I’ve become know for: baking cookies, at least once a week. This time, though, rather than cookies for that night’s staff, or for sale the following day, I was making scones for the operating room nurses and surgeons, who had eight extra surgeries scheduled the next day. They’ve been huge fans of my scones, preferring them over my cookies.

I was somewhere amid the mixing of ingredients and forming of the dough when I realized that what I was doing was something that wouldn’t be allowed, anywhere else I’ve worked. (Too many problems with someone staying on after their shift, not to mention the food-costs of making something not on the menu.)

In this small river-valley where I live, there’s a sense of close-knit community that sets it apart from even other small towns. It’s one of the things that drew me to repeatedly visit, led me to eventually move here. I’ve come to accept it, expect it—having forgotten what a distinguishing characteristic it is.

Just because something has been so for nearly a decade doesn’t make it any less a thing of grace. And it is likely its own act of grace, recognizing grace. When I realized how I’d been blest to work in a place that allows me to do a simple act like baking, I prayed thanks for that blessing, and also the blessing of being able to see it as so.

This story, to close. I learned to bake—cookies, scones, muffins, and such—at a local café that’s since gone out of business. Five or so years ago, during my early days there, one of the co-owners was a retired Catholic priest and monk. Invariably, every time I’d have him taste-test something I was working on, before taking that taste, he’d intone, “Body of Christ.”

Community

In a recent conversation with a nurse at the hospital where we both work, I was telling how my having to work every Sunday interferes with my being able to attend worship. She mentioned that she just needs to step outside in order to spend time with God. Now, the part of Colorado where we live is awesome, and quite easily does evoke an, “Oh my God;” and further, I grew up the son of a wildlife biologist, so I know about coming to be with God in the quiet of the forests, alongside the living waters. But church worship isn’t about our alone time with God. It’s about our coming together as a community to join together in being with God.

To remain outside of such community makes it easier to sink totally into one’s self, to settle and stagnate, to become a singular, not really alive thing. You’re not rubbing up against the notions of others’, particularly the troublesome ones which poke holes in your notions and carry their implications further, or in differing directions, than you intended. Nor are you having oddball ideas thrust at you, which sink in and begin growing—whether weedy growth or possibly beautiful and beneficial things you’ve never seen before. Of course, with a community you have needs, dreams, hopes, desires, hang-ups, and irritating habits other than your own. You cease being the center of the universe, instead, becoming just one more body continually going in circles.

As these things happen, what started this conversation with the nurse was my mentioning it was World Communion Sunday. So, I see a certain properness that our conversation led me to consider the communion aspect of worship which distinguishes it from solitary time alone with God.

Which Way?

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6 NRSV

Oy vey, the ways these words of Jesus have been used to insist that Christianity is the sole, one true religion, with all others falling short, at best. It’s yet one more place where a line from God’s love letter to God’s people is used to bludgeon them.

This passage comes from the book of John, which begins: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” So seems to me we need to come to this particular Gospel with a pair of eyes that don’t read only what’s on the surface of the pages, but also discern what’s beneath and behind the writing. We need to read in brief bits, stopping to ponder what we’ve read, asking what it means. To apply John’s words literally is to miss their point and their intention by a wide mark.

Look again at what Jesus said: “No one comes to the Father…” This isn’t about getting God closer to us; it’s about our getting closer to God. After all, this is the same God who’ll leave the ninety-nine gathered sheep in order to search for the lost one sheep. The same God whom St Paul says loves us so fiercely and persistently that there is nothing whatsoever at all that can separate us from that love. And surely one of the reasons God’s ways are not our ways is because God is so phenomenally beyond human perception.

It doesn’t seem to me that such a God would have but one singular port of entry. Too, there’s an earlier verse in John, where Jesus says, “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. [10:14]” We’re dealing, again, with metaphor; but one interpretation made by Christian scholars is that Jesus is including non-Christians as members of The Sheepfold of God. So, what was Jesus talking about in the opening passage? I think it’s worth discussing.

Harmonic Frustration

In one blog I follow, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer posts a poem of hers, every day. A recent post refers to the song of a river; and what keeps it from falling into the clogged waters of cliché is Trommer’s telling us this riversong is due to the river being frustrated in its course, being impeded by changes and obstacles in its path.

Here’s the poem I’m referring to:

Tanka

The river song

fills the evening—an homage

not to flow

but to what

stands in its way.

Like most folks, I don’t like being frustrated. This poem, though, has me thinking. Just maybe there is something substantial to the cliché regarding the silver linings of dark clouds, or of the lotus flower blooming in a pile of yak flop. It also got me remembering that sounds, and especially musical ones, don’t happen without vibrations; and vibrations can’t occur unless there’s a disturbance to an object’s stasis, its sense of stillness and poise. Until, say a guitar string, is strung in taut tension and then plucked, there is no note, no music.

And I’m not all that comfortable with how this applies to life—to my life, especially. It makes me squirm, seeing that it’s only by being stretched and struck, or by being thwarted, that allows music to be manifested. But it does offer another meaning to the notion that we’re to be instruments of God’s will.

Carried Away

I work in a hospital kitchen where there’s often too much to do, and too few people to get it done, sanely and civilly. So, it’s not just the cooking appliances that can get hot. Feeling we’re understaffed is a common sensation. Lunches can be especially exasperating, with patient meals, and two distinct staff/visitor meals—the regular lunch and the lunch special—all needing to be prepared and ready to go at roughly the exact same time.

During one recent lunch, things were even more frenzied and crazy making than typical. But once the patient trays had been delivered, the staff/visitor lunches had been put out and were being devoured, and things had begun settling down, I noticed one of the lunch special sandwiches had been set aside for me, wrapped in foil, with my name on it. Despite the chaos, I was still, nonetheless, being thought of, being loved.

It can happen to any of us that life carries us away. Our world diminishes and scrunches in around us, limiting our view. We become isolated and self-absorbed, forgetting it’s not solely about us. All around us, things seem, at best, half-empty. It easily becomes a vicious cycle, a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Fortunately, as Paul tells us, there is not anything, nor any combination of things, that can separate us from, stand in the way of us, being loved. And it’s not usually with grandiose gestures that love is expressed. Paraphrasing Paul, love doesn’t call attention to itself; it just is. It’s typically seen in the quiet commonplace actions, ones we would otherwise skip over, missing their subtle transcendence.

Which brings us this crucial lesson: Love is all around; we just need to open ourselves to the seeing it. The kingdom of God is, afterall, right here, right now. Heaven: It’s under our feet.

Safe Landing?

There’s a Christian aphorism that goes something like: God doesn’t promise us a smooth flight, just a safe landing. I have issues with this notion; and it’s such a broadly open metaphor. Just when is this safe landing? At the end of the journey through our current dark forest? At the end of our life? At the beginning of our eternal afterlife? Part of what vexes me, I think, is that this phrase sounds so wise and wonderfully comforting, yet winds up not meaning much of anything. Like meringue and cotton candy, it seems so richly decadent and sweet at first, yet leaves nothing to sustain a body. It also bothers me because it’s so obviously untrue. Think Dietrich Bonhoeffer; the early Christian martyr, Stephen; the persecutions leading to death of Christians (and non-Christians, too) throughout today’s world—and this is scarcely even the tip of a ginormous iceberg. They're crashes, not landings; and they’re definitely far from “safe.”

Yet, still, our God knows each and every hair of each and every one of us. The “more excellent way” of God, is love. And, to be quite certain, if God didn’t absolutely desire to deal with us, we would have been dropped ages and ages ago.

Greater minds than mine have been unable to solve this seeming discrepancy: Our omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniloving God allows us to live such impotent, distant, and hate-riddled lives. “God’s ways our not our ways,” sure. But couldn’t they be, at least once in awhile, more “godly?” Then again, as Paul says, we won’t see things clearly until later on. At the moment, things remain muddled. And it surely often escapes us the myriad ways God does indeed sublimely intervene into our lives, softening its blows. Perhaps, what God promises us is actually a safe-er landing.

Nevermind the Source

I recently spent the day in Grand Junction, where Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, a poet I’ve know of for close to a decade, was giving an afternoon workshop followed by a reading that evening. The subject of the workshop was Rumi, a 12^th century Islamic mystic, whose poems can turn our beliefs and perceptions on their heads—much like Christ’s teachings. One of the poems we discussed closed with the couplet: Take sips of this pure wine being poured./Don’t mind that you’ve been given a dirty cup. (Coleman Barks translation)

All but one of the poems Rosemerry read that evening came from the same collection. Before starting, she told the story of how that collection had come about. A fellow poet approached her about doing a collection for a publishing house he’d just started. However, she was going through a tumultuous time, and didn’t feel up to doing so. Nonetheless, he patiently persisted, which wound up helping Rosemerry out of her dark forest.

“One of the most important things can we do,” Rosemerry said, “is to shine a light for one another.”

While I don’t think hindsight is truly 20/20, things do often seem clearer after the fact. And we frequently don’t initially recognize the assistance we’re being offered because it’s coming from an unexpected source: say pure wine in a dirty glass. Likewise, I think we often discount the times we’ve shone a light upon someone’s murky path, (or we choose not to help even though we want to), because we’re too focused on our perceived “dirtiness,” rather than the purity of our offerings.

The bumper sticker does have it right: “We’re all alone in this, together.”

Judge Not

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” …If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. 1 Corinthians 12:21, 26 NRSV

I’ve had trouble with this passage from the very first time I heard it; and each time, since. Perhaps Paul wasn’t as clear-headed in picking a metaphor as he should have been. Of course the body can continue in the absence of certain parts: eyes, ears, limbs, digits, even organs such as the gall bladder, appendix, a kidney or a lung, or with only part of the liver, or just half the brain. But take away, say, the heart, and unless there’s a machine, the body goes, too. Between the hand and the head, which is dispensable and which is indispensable?

However, even though the body can still manage, even thrive, without certain parts, it nonetheless does suffer. For instance, I’m still capable and functional with only half my hearing (ears), but things would be easier, simpler, and better if I had the whole, rather than the half.

In my other blog, I recently mentioned coming across a blogpost by Christie Aschwanden, discussing the envy she felt toward another writer, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer; and how this feeling turned out to be mutual. Comparing ourselves with others is a steep and oil-slicked slope. In my blogpost, I mentioned some of the reasons I, too, envy Rosemerry. However, it turned out one of my reasons is based on a false assumption, thus negating it. (Not that each of the other reasons aren’t also suspect.)

We’re told to, “Judge not,” which we typically take to mean that we’re not to be harsh in determining how another person should behave, act, etc. But I don’t think it’s a limited thing. Just maybe, it’s across the board. We’re also not to judge others as being better, more valuable than we are. You know, love our neighbor as ourself.

Maybe judging/comparing/valuing spiritual gifts is another area where God’s ways are not ours: They're all equal

Awful Fear

This past week I purchased a, Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, for its explanations of the origin and formation of words. Some words contain such differing or even opposing meanings, which intrigues me. One such word is, awful. It’s all but exclusively used to indicate horrific or, at least, terrible circumstances. Extremely rarely is it used to mean, “Full of awe.” So, I looked up the word.

As suspected, it’s the addition of the suffix, “ful,” to the root word, “awe,” which has its origins in Old English, from Gothic and Germanic sources, meaning, “fear.” Sure enough, the first definition for awe is: Terror, dread. However, Old English also used the word to mean, “Reverential fear or wonder.” This secondary defining delights me. Here, again, the dual, seemingly opposite nature of the word. Also, it seems to be hinting fear and wonder are closely connected, if not synonymous.

“Fear the Lord.” Oy vey, how many times have we stumbled over this? Jesus tells us, “God is love,” and to, “Fear not,” yet throughout Scripture, we’re told to fear God. My dictionary was of no help, stating “fear” has its roots in the Middle English, “lie in wait,” which is defined, “the action or process of watching out for an enemy or of lurking in ambush.” Therefore, God is an enemy for whom we’re lurking in ambush, watching out for? What’s up with that? Sure, I’ll occasionally, (okay, often), get upset with God, but I don’t think I go so far as considering God an enemy. I’m certainly not planning to ambush God—talk about setting yourself up to fail. And, actually, it appears it’s God who ambushes us.

But there is something here, and I think it’s worth noting. Look again at that second definition of, awe: Reverential fear or wonder. I’m not so certain fear and wonder are all that far apart. Here’s what Annie Dillard has to say: “It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return.” (Teaching a Stone to Talk, pp58-9.) Here, is our “reverential fear and wonder,” eh?

I think Rich Mullins uncharacteristically missed the mark. Our God is not, “an awesome God.” Our God is an awe-full God.

Is it Grace Happening?

It's been awhile since it's come up, but there's something of an ongoing argument I've been having with a local writer who's taken me under her wing. When some unexpected good thing, or moreso, when a series of good things has come my way, I've held that life is inexplicable, whereas Susan maintains life makes clear sense, and the Universe does reward us for our positive actions.

I'm a struggling writer. Struggling not so much in the sense of being paid for my writing, but struggling to place my tush in the chair and keep it there---no ifs, no ands, no buts. Recently, however, I'm being uncharacteristically consistent in doing at least some wee bit, even if just fifteen minutes, of writing each day. A short time after this consistency started taking hold, people came to me with writing assignments: an article for a church's newsletter which turned into a corresponding article for the local newspaper, a book review while I was still working on a previous review for the same editor, and an invite to participate in a reading with writers I look up to as part of a bookstore's re-opening. There have been other things, but those are most of the highlights.

If and when I mention this uptick to Susan, I'm certain she'll argue for my seeing it as the result of, reward, for "good behavior." (In her defense, she has ample reasons and cause in trying to get me to see the effects of my writing, more clearly.) However, I have trouble with a "Universe" or "God" that rewards. If this is so, then isn't there also a punishing side to that coin?

But then, things do go together. While it's true that life is inexplicable, and not only due to Grace; it's also true that actions do yield results. There does seem to be currents, like a river, running through out lives. (Living Water, anyone?) It's more than possible that certain actions do open us more to, place us directly in, those currents. Just as Biblical commandments aren't given just because, "God says so," but because they simply make life more straight and true, certain positive, faithful actions bring us into fuller more abundant life.

I guess Susan and I continue arguing because we're both right.