Miscellaneous
Finding Jesus … in Our Poverty
Where do you look for Jesus?
Do you look for Jesus in Church?
Do you look for Jesus in the Word?
In your quiet times?
In prayer?
We’ve all looked for Jesus in these places. And we’ve found Him there, once or twice. And we (I) have thought, “Jesus dwells in the Word … so I will wait here until He comes back to show Himself to me again.” And I wait. And we wait.
Martin Buber has said that community is the place of theophany, so we go to church and except that “where two or three are gather” there He is. And I wait. And we wait to find him in this place.
Quiet times alone in prayer, worship and the Bible are the place where our personal relationship with Jesus is built. And it’s true … to an extent. He speaks to us and then silence. Silence. And we wait.
Where is Jesus? Why is it that He’s so silent, so often, despite the fact that we are genuinely seeking His presence? Why does He so often remain so distant while our faith so languishes in the desert?
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God is rarely present in a place, or a set aside time. But, “He dwells with the broken and the contrite.”
The hungry.
The naked.
The stranger.
The imprisoned.
The sick.
Jesus says, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
But, it is not us giving to the have not’s. It’s not those of us with a spiritually induced Messiah complex swooping in to help the broken. No, those aren’t the one’s meeting Jesus either.
Jean Vanier, a former naval officer, former professor who received his Ph.D. in moral philosophy in Paris, and eventual founder of “L’Arche”, (a movement of communities that seeks to create a family environment for those who’ve been rejected because of their mental disability), has this to say:
“Jesus came to bring the good news to the poor, not to those who serve the poor! I think we can only truly experience the presence of God, meet Jesus, received the good news, in and through our own poverty, because the kingdom of God belongs to the poor, the poor in spirit, the poor who are crying out for love … God is present in the poverty and wounds of their heart.”
So that the one “place” we might always find God is in brokenness. I’ve seen people who have tried to “break themselves” so as to spur the presence of God in their lives. And that’s not what I’m talking about here.
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Buber was right. Jesus was right. Theophany is in the community, AND he dwells with the broken! But it’s not always in individual brokenness, but in the broken community.
God calls himself the “Paraclete” which means “the one who answers the cry.”
We will find Jesus at the funeral.
We will find Jesus around the death bed.
We will find Jesus in the prisons.
In the hurting families.
With the fatherless. With the widow.
And we will find Him, not as outsiders of the broken community, but as ones who find ourselves apart of it.
And I think we will soon realize that He himself is not dwelling with the broken and the contrite as just the “Paraclete”, but because He too is most like … most comfortable with the broken. It’s not that he’s there just because he’s saving us … it’s that He’s with the broken because He’s most like us.
I hope we all find that Jesus dwells with the broken communities.
Fear does not fill Heaven, Love does
After 36 hours of no electricity from hurricane Irene, we’ve just been restored to full functionality but not without some property damage (pictures tomorrow).
Today, I’m privileged to host Deb Hill, who blogs at Muse and the Queen Honey Bee.
The post that I wrote on “Why 99% of Pastors Agree with Rob Bell … at Funerals” has sparked a lot of good conversation. In all, it’s totaled over 10,000 hits and continues to attract new readers to my blog every day despite being published some five months ago.
And out of those 10,000 hits only THREE people have shared with me their experience of hearing a pastor preach the deceased to hell (which speaks to the goodness and wisdom of the mass majority of pastors). Deb’s story was perhaps the most emotive, and redemptive, so I asked her to share it with us. The only thing better than her talent for story telling, is the story itself. Enjoy.
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I have vivid memories of my friend:
My very first; he’s standing on a table at Kindergarten, stamping his feet and swearing at the top of his lungs. I was, at one and the same time, appalled and admiring of this audacious display!
It’s the summer before grade one, he and I are climbing on the roof of his parent’s garage, after expressly being forbidden to do so, and experiencing the thrill of ‘getting away’ with it.
We are re-connecting in a combined Jr. High after nine years apart because we were educated in different systems. (He was Roman Catholic- Seperate School, I, Protestant/Lutheran-Public School). After having ‘failed’ twice he was two years behind me and quite fed-up with formal education!
The thing was, my friend had been born with water on the brain. The Drs. had succesfully inserted a shunt to drain the excess fluid, but he was, shall we say, different.
It was the 70’s and the education system was woefully inadequate to deal with a child born with hydrocephalus who had pronounced learning disabilities and behaviorial issues. (He was often a Royal Pain!)
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But my friend was more than his condition….
He was incredibly quick-witted, mischievous, kind and loyal.
We were teenagers in the 80’s in Small-Town, Canada. Nowhere to go, nothing to do except ‘ Sex, Drugs and Rock-and-Roll’. (And far too much under-age drinking).
But there was more to us than that…
There were afternoons at the lake, swimming and boating and water-skiing. There were picnics on the off-beaten trails and canoe trips and mid-afternoon coffee breaks at my work to cheer up the day and there was laughter. Lots and lots of laughter. Most important, there was a deep and abiding Friendship!
I eventually left to the Big City, off to University. My friend, stayed home…
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One afternoon, I got the dreaded Phone Call…
It was May 10th. Mother’s Day. Sunday.
We were 19.
My Mom called to let me know that my friend had been tragically killed in a single vehicle roll-over in the early hours of the morning.
The driver survived.
Drugs and alcohol were a factor.
My friend’s Mother had the unimaginable task of having to identify the remains of her youngest child, her baby. They wouldn’t let her lift the sheet. She identified him by his crooked baby finger on his left hand.
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At the Funeral the Priest preached for half an hour on how my friend:
(a son, brother, grandson, nephew, cousin, a baptized child of God)
was burning in Hell because of his lifestyle choices,
and the rest of us (his friends) better shape up and start living right or we would come to the same fate.
Really?!
You see, the Priest’s message of God’s wrath and condemnation had not been my experience:
The night before the funeral I had the most vivid ‘dream’ of God the Father holding me all night in my grief and despair. I was not living a ‘Christian’ lifestyle anymore than my friend had been, yet God showed up, without me even asking. He held and comforted me. He sustained me with His presence. He held the grief, that threatened to consume me, at bay. This ‘holding’ went to my deepest core, to my inmost self. It lasted all night.
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I was no more worthy than my dead friend to receive the Mercy of God.
For two decades I carried the weight of the Priest’s funeral sermon with me. Questions roiled and churned, but remained unanswered:
Why my friend and not me?
My friend and I knew the same Gospel, the same Jesus.
My friend was no more wicked than I.
My lifestyle choices had been the same as his.
Would/could God really send my friend to Hell but show me such tender gentleness and compassion?
Had God brought this young man into the world, created him with handicaps that made his life difficult, to say the least, just so He could violently wrench his life away and then throw him into eternal damnation?
Really?!
My heart ached for his Mother.
My friend died on her birthday, on Mother’s Day.
She was grieving, bereft, and all she had been offered was the hopelessness of Hell.
She shared at the funeral reception with us, his closest friends, how as he was leaving to go out the night he died, she had had a premonition and an overwhelming urge to run after him and beg him to stay home. She felt he was going to die. She had stopped herself because she didn’t want to embarrass him in front of his friends. She told herself she was being melodramatic, silly. But when, by early Sunday afternoon he still wasn’t home, she KNEW! Now she carried cavernous guilt for not having listened to/acted upon that Inner Voice. If only she had tried…if only…
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Almost twenty years later, as I sat at my kitchen table sharing this whole experience with my own Mom, pouring out all the unresolved grief and turmoil, the Holy Spirit was able to bring me closure and peace:
God spoke to my heart, dropped His peace into my soul.
My friend’s Mother (and myself) needed the healing Mystery of God’s Love, not the wounding Fear of God’s Wrath.
God let me know that just as I had not been forsaken or left orphaned, neither had my friend.
In his time of greatest need, during the accident and the trauma of dying, God the Father was there holding him, comforting him, and extending him Mercy.
I know that I will see my friend again, and that Priest was wrong…
Fear does not fill Heaven, Love does.
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Have you received, experienced the Mystery of God’s Love that seemingly defies the conventional teachings of the Church? Are you, like myself, afraid to trust that these experiences are truly from God? Is it easier to believe in a God who widely condemns and narrowly extends mercy? Why?
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After subscribing to her blog, you can follow Deb on Twitter.
To Those Who Would Comfort Me: A Guest Poem
Todd Hiestand is one of my best friends from seminary. I was privileged to meet his mom, Carol Hiestand, at a graduation party, and I shared with her what I do, and she shared some of the story of how she lost her brother.
Carol writes about the following poem and the death that inspired it:
My 49 year old brother (my only surviving sibling) was hunting in the Montana Mountain Wilderness early November 2005 and failed to show up later in the day after what was to be a brief “I’ll meet you down over the hill at the end of that road.” What followed was a 32 hour search and when found, he had already succumbed to hypothermia.
We were in Illinois helpless and praying and hoping. I wrote this a year later, right around the first anniversay of his death.
This poem represents a “Holy Saturday” experience that so many of us go through when we’re in the middle of death.
To Those Who Would Comfort Me
Don’t tell me you know how I feel
even if you have lost your brother!
You didn’t lose mine.
Don’t tell me how I will grieve,
even if you’ve journeyed through grief.
Your grief is not my grief.
Your journey is not my journey.
Instead, let me tell you how I feel.
Then hold me as I weep.
Don’t tell me God is Sovereign.
I know that.
Give me time to believe it once again
for myself . . .
for this time in my life.
Don’t ask me if I’m glad
my brother is in heaven.
Of course I am glad he’s in HEAVEN.
But right now I want him here with me.
And don’t talk to me yet of all the things
he is experiencing there.
I miss him too much for that to comfort me.
Someone wrote:
“For the believer, grief is not
about the one who has died.
It’s about the ones
who are left behind
who must redefine their lives
without the one they love.”
This will take time.
Don’t casually quote Romans 8:28.
I believe that too,
but I need time to internalize it
for myself.
in this situation.
This too takes time.
God, Thank you!
for the people in my life,
who walk beside me on this journey,
allowing me to travel
at the speed I can manage,
And cheer for me when I make it to
another milestone
they knew I would reach all along.
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Death has an odd way of producing silence even when so much wants to be said. Carol did such a great job at putting into words what so many of us feel or have felt.
Cheating On Your Local Undertaker
(Preface: If at anytime you are are utterly confused by this blog post, please skip to the bottom and read the postscript.)
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I know who you are. You can’t hide it.
You simply don’t allow my charming smile to affect you. My attempt at small talk is given the cold shoulder. And you won’t even look into my eyes.
You’ve already been taken. You’ve already given your heart to another.
I understand how it is.
Maybe he buried your mother. Maybe he buried a close friend.
And he has your heart. You talk about him like he’s the best thing on God’s green earth … his tender touch; his compassionate eyes, the professionalism he exhibits in that suit have won your hurting heart over. You’ll never bury with another.
It doesn’t matter that my funeral home is larger.
It doesn’t matter that I’m younger.
It doesn’t matter that my services are cheaper.
It doesn’t matter that I’m on call all night long.
You will never cheat on him … after all he’s done for you. You’ve pledged your faithfulness to him.
I understand.
Even if I speak tenderly: “Please sign the register book. And here’s a memorial folder.” But you just look down. Averting your eyes.
I know my voice is tempting you to connect with me, as you raise your eyes and whisper, “Thank you”
Suddenly, guilt envelopes your heart, as pictures of “the one” funeral director who was the last one to let you down start flashing through your mind. “Did I just connect with him when I said, ‘Thank you’? Did I commit an act of unfaithfulness? Did I cheat?”
Oh, I know what I’ve done. I sniffed you out as soon as you entered through the funeral home door. You were afraid to like me. You were sold out on YOUR funeral director and had all but forgotten any other funeral directors even existed. You came to this viewing to see your friend who had just lost her father and you didn’t expect to see me. But, when you saw me you started to wonder … your world started to open up.
I know you have a history with him. I know he treated you well. I could tell by the way you averted your eyes from me and spoke to me so coldly. You’re probably from a neighboring town, close enough that you COULD, POSSIBLY leave the funeral director in your home town and come on over to me.
And I know, that this meeting won’t be enough to entrust your heart to me. But, I can bet the next time you see me, you’ll reciprocate my smile. And the meeting after that, you might return my small talk.
And, our meeting after that might be slightly more personal. You might entrust me with your hardships and pain, and let my tender touch and compassionate eyes ease your pain.
I know what I’m doing. I’m going to be your next funeral director.
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(Postscript: It’s funny how you can tell who’s committed to another funeral director. Like I mentioned, they’ll often give you a cold shoulder. The relationship between a funeral director and their families is like few business relationships because of its personal nature. There’s a real commitment that takes place, and when a family “cheats” (takes their business to another funeral home), it often does feel like they’re personally rejecting YOU! And, I know of a number of funeral directors who play the temptress, and try and lure our families over to their funeral home through different marketing ploys. It’s kinda silly and kinda immature … and, it’s kinda funny.)
Three Ways to Slow Down the Journey
“Don’t blink, son, because the older you get, the faster time goes. Before you know it, you’ll be old and ready to pass the last horizon.”
I’ve been told something like that about every other month by some older person who’s willing to share their well seasoned wisdom.
And it’s true, isn’t it?
The older we get the faster time goes. The speed of time seems directly correlated to our age. Here are my theories … I have a couple of them because I think they’re all related and all a bit true:
1.) With age, comes responsibility, with responsibility comes busyness and with busyness comes the quickened pace of time.
2.) The older we get, the better we get at life and so the faster we go. It’s like a mountain biker struggling to get down through the obstacles of life, and all of a sudden he gets to the bottom of the hill and there’s an open road.
Life — as we learn how to maneuver it — is full of obstacles, but once we begin to learn the basic principles, life starts to flatten out into a smooth, flat course that we can flat out race upon. Okay, so maybe it’s not a straight road, but I think you can understand what I’m saying.
3.) The older we get, the more situated we become and the more we can just go about life using habits. Habits, for the most part, are things that can produce mind death and with mind death, comes time speed.
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WHAT DO YOU DO IF YOU WANT TO SLOW TIME DOWN? DO THE OPPOSITE OF THE ABOVE!
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1.) Become less busy. This is so hard and so anti-American because in order to do this you have to leave some of your responsibilities.
2.) Do things that are hard and going to cause you to struggle. What are you not good at?
Are you bad at dancing? Take dancing lessons. Are you awful at writing? Start writing. Are you anti-social? Go to a party or a small group at church.
3.) Start learning again. Take a college course … or go back to college to get a new degree. You can do it!
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Slowing down the journey, trying new things, embracing difficulty, might just be the prescription to slowing down the speed of time.
