A thousand drumbeats

My first attempted sonnet that was eventually published on the former site Every Day Poets and printed in the first anthology Best of Every Day Poets a few years ago.

A thousand drumbeats
(c) 2008 Terry Zimmer

A thousand drumbeats dance the ground
To say ‘Come play’; to me invite
A leave-taking that, heeded, might
For time a grief or worry drown.

A leaf, rain-felled, will quick a-brown
Unquick’d from branch that nectar drank
And will, with time, in brothers’ rank
Decay to crumb, no longer found.

Ah - when my last leaf is shed
The drum will halt, still-quiet.
A naked tree will rise undead,
And grasp the bright sun’s sky; it
Clothed with new leaf – so it is said –
Nor cares nor cries deny it.

What They Had

What They Had

Terry Zimmer, 2010

 

The usher on the left approached the altar,

 draped in mixed furs, dyed, pied greys, to this season’s colors, and

 cut square-shouldered, falling below the knees, to this season’s style.

 She rotated on one heel and assumed a posture of practiced dignity

 as though receiving diplomats, executives and artists into her

 well-appointed salon for evening repast and short cello programme. The

 cathedral was cold and she stood in her fur because it was what she had.

The usher on the right sauntered to the rail in a faux-leather jacket

 that read Sun City Motor Oil across the back, which cracked surface was

 interrupted with souvenir patches and an American flag. He turned and leaned

 forward, leading with one shoulder, welcoming the good folk to the feast of

 flesh and blood a few short steps away, like a used car salesman

 welcoming the next prospective deal to the lot. The cathedral was cold

 and he stood in his jacket because it was what he had.

The priest stood facing out from the center of the apse, rounded shoulders

 giving shape to a gleaming alb and green chausuble and stole threaded in

 gold and silver symbols of faith holding up a hand bearing a ring bearing

 a gem bearing both heritage and tradition. His words in English echoed

 in Latin in the diction and cadence of an engraved invitation. Break this

 bread. Drink this cup. The cathedral was cold and he stood in his vestments

 because it was what he had.

Faqspeak

Having googled “faqspeak”, I am surprised to have retrieved no hits for its use as a word. Therefore I offer it as a neologism. What do I mean by “faqspeak”? Exactly that. Well, almost. 

I hereby coin "faqspeak" (pronounced 'fak-speak') to  describe the phenomenon by which a speaker habitually begins each point of an exposition with a question. As a rhetorical device, asking a question then answering it can sometimes be effective. As a rhetorical habit, where it shapes most of an entire discourse, it not only annoys by its repetition, but undermines the art and effect of exposition. 

Effective exposition contains an element of drama. The thesis (or protagonist) may enter in the first scene, or be introduced after the stage is set. Subtext and subplot artfully carry the argument along, adding nuance, color and, most important, multiple levels of access in understanding motivation and purpose. The denouement closes the story leaving the audience convinced it is the only way it could have reasonably ended. The speaker established dogma with drama.

By contrast, "faqspeak" constitutes a coarse opening for a simple assertion. By controlling the question, the speaker crudely controls the range of response. Faqspeak sounds defensive because it is. I remember first noticing its use in the press conferences of a bush-league Secretary of Defense trying to explain why we should topple the regime of a dictator who did not pose an immediate threat. He did not explain anything: he merely answered his own questions. Repeatedly.

Many catechisms have long used the FAQ format it to reinforce recitation in a pedagogical setting. Cyber-wizards in the early internet days brought it to the mainstream in a technical support context. Somehow it morphed into a marketing tool to push information rather than to document user-originated inquiries and user-oriented responses. The kudzu-like spread of faqspeak found in corporate and political messaging today means to induce catechetical recitation of corporate and political agendas. We let powers that be (or wannabe) ask our questions for us.

My challenge for myself is to eschew the temptation to control the conversation by avoiding faqspeak. Used occasionally, it can be effective. This article uses it exactly once. Used habitually, it reduces what could be an eloquent description or explanation to a series of talking points. (Do not get me started on PowerPoint presentations.) Talking points do accommodate our short attention span, but they excuse us from the responsibility of thinking something through to the point where we might understand it.

Adding “faqspeak” to my own vocabulary helps me recognize it when I hear it and label it when I use it. I intend to catch myself before using it and to replace it with a more thoughtful (if not brief) explanation of what I am trying to communicate. This means letting listeners ask their own questions and answering only questions other people ask. It means waiting for others to form a response to my questions and to form a response that is not a question itself. That strikes me as a more effective, humane and satisfying way to conduct discourse.

Where have you heard faqspeak? Does our vocabulary need this new word?

Our Horse for a King

I am reading several Psalms in my devotions that are heavily themed with God's majesty and royalty. It made me think of a statement I read recently that among King James' motivations for providing a new translation of the scriptures 400 years ago was the intention to reinforce the authority of the monarchy. I don't know what word choices or interpretations reflect that, but it caused me to consider the disconnect between how some passages are understood differently read in a democratic society, as opposed to under monarchical or dictatorial rule. What do we miss and misunderstand by not living under the same kind of government the KJV was specifically meant to shore up?

My readings this morning also reminded me of God's reluctance to let Israel have a king in the first place. They pleaded like a six-year-old child: "but everyone else has one!!". God warned them that a king would draft their young men into armies and appropriate their property in taxes, which results the scriptures dutifully record. But other than the bureaucratic, militaristic and economic burdens in His warnings, God did not warn them of one consequence. They would no longer view Him as they did before. Having a king would diminish their relationship with Him.

Stories in the Old Testament, before the time of the kings, concentrate on patriarchs and prophets. But in those stories, God also came to the people in personal visitations and close encounters (Immanuel - God with us). Even in the exodus from Egypt, God made Himself known in a pillar of fire or leading cloud that all the people could see. For all the thundering and roar of Sinai, people witnessed God's presence directly. Not that it always made that much of a difference to them.

In God's plea with His people to forgo a king, might there have been a grieving plea not to interpose a figurehead between Himself and them? Like a wise father who sees his child run off to join the me-too of his generation, did God not restrain Himself from lamenting the mutual loss that would come from inserting a government between Himself and Israel? When a king became the only leader Israel would follow, did then the Messiah not have to be prophesied to be a king among his other identities? And did not the anticipation of a kingly messiah not obscure the arrival of an unlikely messiah in the actual incarnation.

Immanuel did come near again, disguised, but Himself nonetheless. But what did we miss in the distraction of demanding a king?

Really Good Parents

This post is in response to a Facebook post of the type that I run into every couple of weeks. It is titled "Angry Mom Shreds Common Core by Writing This on Her Son's Test".

I don't know whence Angry Mom gets her information about Common Core, or her Anger. But this is my response....


Dear Really Good Parent,

I mean that. You are a Really Good Parent.

You want what is best for your son. You want him to do well, to be well, and, well, even to exceed you in his character and his fortune, I would bet.

You are a Really Good Parent.

Being a Really Good Parent, however, does not make you a Really Good Educator. Nor would being a Really Good Engineer make you a Really Good Educator. Even having been a Really Good Student would not make you a Really Good Educator.

I can tell you were probably a Really Good Student because you can solve that arithmetic problem from the Common Core a lot faster using the way you learned than by using one of the modeled procedures in the Common Core. You learned a long time ago that 7-takeaway-6 is 1 and that 2-takeaway-1 is 1 and that 4-takeaway-3 is 1. You memorized a lot of simple addition, subtraction, multiplication and division problems that led to harder problems where you had to carry, borrow and remember decimal places. You internalized those methods so well, you probably don't even have to think about how you solved the problem, you just did it.

I learned those methods, too, and even learned "the New Math" along with it. I internalized the procedures and can do those problems really fast. Just like you.

Doing those kind of problems relies heavily on being able to manipulate symbols and to process logic. Those are fairly abstract capabilities. I would guess that being able to process logic and manipulate symbols contributed to your being a Really Good Engineer.

Here's the thing: not everyone can process logic and manipulate symbols like you and I can. Those are two powerful capabilities that are not common in the population.

Developing those capabilities is not really a matter of practice, trying harder, technique or virtue. Developing those capabilities is more about how you perceive and process your world - in short, how your brain is wired. Of course, a person not wired for those capabilities can practice, try harder, google a technique and clean the chalkboard erasers for their teacher and they may be able to demonstrate some progress. But, because that is not how they perceive and process their world, it will not help them when it comes to learning new things.

When we learn new stuff, we first revert to form.

Most Really Good Students are those who are typically wired with those capabilities to process logic and manipulate symbols (especially math and engineering students). The majority of students have to rely on other capabilities to succeed - like spatial reasoning, kinesthetic experiences, or story telling. And this is the good news: those students can also be Really Good if they are presented with learning opportunities that address their learning styles.

Really Good Educators know that.

Here's something else: Really Good Parents only have to apply their Really Good Parenting over two or five or maybe eight children. They get a long time to practice and even a few years to learn who their children are. Over that time, they can make mistakes, make up for their losses and often be forgiven by their children because they have taught their children how to love and respect others' differences and shortcomings.

Really Good Educators have to hit the floor running on Day One with 15, 20 or 30 children. They have to ensure that everyone has the same opportunity to learn. Not just the Really Good Students like you and me. They have to address multiple learning styles and even learning disabilities in the course of their work. They didn't have 6, 10, 15 years to learn about any of those children or watch them grow up.

The approach to subtracting in the homework problem you didn't like relied on the position of numbers on a number line and on movement to represent addition and subtraction. It used space instead of symbols to represent the problem. (Remember that numbers are abstractions and numerals are only one of many possible representations. Counting on your fingers is another representation.)

Think about how you felt when you couldn't make sense of a problem represented with space and movement. That is how most students feel when presented with columns of numeric symbols and told to "borrow one from the hundreds' place". They don't get it and say "this problem is stupid". For those students, saying "4-takeaway-3 is 1" may be no more meaningful than saying "Roses are red, violets are blue". They are words and words can be arbitrary. (Roses can also be yellow. Or blue. And what, exactly, is 'violet'?) When those students are confronted with a problem that requires manipulating symbols and processing logic, they often conclude "I must not be good at math".

Your son, like you and me, might be very successful at processing symbols and logic. Even so, it doesn't hurt us to learn alternate strategies. Other students who are better at reasoning in space or motion won't be hurt by learning to manipulate numerals. Few people operate in a single mode. All of us can probably benefit by alternate ways of seeing. Or hearing. Or grasping.

Real Good Teachers help children become Really Good Students by giving them alternate paths to a goal. They help them become Really Good People by seeing (or grasping) that those who take alternate paths are not valued any more or less than they are.

States and districts adopt Common Core because they want everyone to get the opportunity to succeed at a set of baseline learning outcomes. Some students may do it faster by one approach over another, but everyone gets the chance. No one should be held back because they learn differently or require alternate paths to achievement.

Common Core is an exercise in respecting others' differences and shortcomings when it comes to reaching a common goal together.

I am thankful for Really Good Parents and Really Good Students, because I teach, too. I am also a parent. I am especially thankful for Really Good Educators who rise to the challenge of recognizing and responding to a room full of diverse capabilities every semester that measures out their career.

My hat is off to all Really Good Parents and Really Good Educators who are committed to helping all children become Really Good Students and Really Good People.

Point of View

One of my daughters emailed me last night asking if I had gotten to "the museum part" in Wally Lamb's book I know this much is true where he talks about how we curate the pain and injustices that people have wrought on us. I emailed back "no" and she found it herself shortly after.

When I went to bed that night and opened the book to continue reading, I came upon "the museum part" within a few pages. In the scene, a psychiatrist responds to the protagonist in a therapy session with "You are merely giving me a tour of ... your museum of pain. Your sanctuary of justifiable indignation.....You are a meticulous steward of the pain and injustices people have visited upon you... a scrupulous coroner."

The book is very good. And it has given me many opportunities for reflection.

I went to church this morning. The homily was on the Gospel passage, the story of the Prodigal Son (or the Prodigal God, as Lloyd John Ogilvie would have had it.). But the Epistle lesson was from Paul's second letter to the Corinthians. I read the Epistle text like I had never read it before.

The perspective of the passage is instructive. It is not written in the second person. That is not because Paul was ever sheepish about speaking directly to his audience. He never shied away from an assertion. This passage, however, is written in the third person. I believe that perspective is critical to understanding what Paul means to say.

When this passage is generally read or preached, the message delivered is "because you, sinner, are a new creation, you should be able to bring your life into line with morals, expectations and rules by dint of your transformed life in Christ." This is a key passage in the message "you are not what you should be - so change!" (And don't make any excuses.)

I have heard, received and internalized this message as the following: If I am a new creation in Christ, then I have the power - the obligation - to change myself, or to let myself be changed. To become more acceptable. More normal. The unspoken corollary is that if I cannot (or will not) be changed, then I must not be in Christ in the first place.

It is true that we are renewed and transformed when we encounter the astounding love and grace of God. We do change. But that is not what this passage is about. The metaphor of a "new creation" echoes the original and sudden "Let there be..." moment. The changes that actually occur in our life take time. They are the result of long process and often do not take us where we or others expect.

What has happened immediately in Christ is that our sins are forgiven and no more held against us. This is exactly what the passage addresses. Read the passage again, and pay attention to the third person perspective. In the second person, one would expect to hear "You are a new creation.... (so shape up!)" But Paul goes in a different direction.

In the third person, Paul discusses how we look on one another and how we look on Christ. How we "regard" someone else "from a human point of view" and once knew Christ from that same view. But now we regard one another as a "new creation". "See"! (that is, "see the other person") "See" others as "in Christ". What does "seeing others in Christ" amount to? Holding them to higher standards? Judging them more severely because they are "new creations"? Paul does not go there with this language.

"Seeing others in Christ" means this: In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them. That is the significance of the new creation. It is a creation where accusation and offense have no place. To "see others in Christ" is to count others' trespasses against them (or, our own against ourselves) no longer.

A gracious and merciful "let there be reconciliation" moment through Christ resulted in the new creation. The "newness" is simply that we are forgiven. We are impelled, then, to treat others as forgiven new creatures. Reconciled. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. That treatment goes beyond the church. Paul is explicit. "... in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them". This is where the third person is significant. Paul doesn't say "you are a new creation, etc". He says "the world".

"their"

"them"

In Christ, the supreme fact is that God has reconciled the world to Himself. We carry the message of that reconciliation. The message is "God no longer counts your trespasses against you." If God does not, how can we. It remains only for the world to reconcile itself to God's grace and love. Nothing impedes our office as ambassadors of that message more than to maintain our own "sanctuary of justifiable indignation" or to curate others' offenses against God or ourselves.

I haven't finished the book yet. I still have several hundred pages to go. While I don't always care for "happy" endings, I always like redemptive ones. I am hoping by the end of the book there will be one less museum of pain.

Behold, how they love one another

Justin Lee, founder and head of the Gay Christian Network (GCN) has just published a new book, TORN which addresses the unsuccessful (to date) conversation between the Church and GLBTQ people and the effect of that conversation on the gospel's impact in the world. I haven't read Justin's book yet, but I have heard him speak and have witnessed his courage and diplomacy in tackling the divide between the Church and GLBTQ people in other venues.

As part of the book's release, he has asked bloggers from whatever side of any fence (including those straddling said fence) to dedicate a post to the effort to bring the conversation to some level of sanity. His appeal and links to other bloggers' contributions are found here. This is my contribution.

It would be tempting here to rehearse demands for recognition and tolerance. But a demand is not a dialog. And demands would assume the ability of one party to represent a whole. Any true dialog must begin at a place where we can find common ground.

GLBTQ people in general and Christians in general already share a lot of common ground. First, and this should be obvious, we share a common humanity. We share a range of characteristics and experiences to which neither group can claim any more right of ownership than the other. Second, we claim a common environment - the world in which we live and its resources. Sharing the same world, we are neighbors in it. Third, we share the fact of the communities in which we live, even though we may live in multiple, different, overlapping and sometimes conflicting communities. Despite that, we share the fact of communal inclination. Being communal is a part of being human. But living in a communities is a different dimension than either specific humanity or non-personal environment. Both GLBTQ people and Christians live their lives in the context of communities.

Those basic areas will suffice for now to describe what Christians in general and GLBTQ people hold in common. I don't think that should engender any argument.

Christians who are GLBTQ have even more in common with other Christians than GLBTQ people in general do.

With respect to the previous list, GLBTQ Christians and other Christians share the notion that our humanity is in the image of God and that our person, our "self", is a gift from God. 'Gift' is a strange word. We use it often to mean a special favor, like a birthday gift: something obtained and gifted with our uniqueness in mind. We also think of a "gift" as a grace broadcast over all peoples. It is both and neither. What is significant is that GLBTQ Christians share, with other Christians, the idea that what makes for the human in general and the "I" in particular has been designed by God for reasons that are both loving and unknown. That view inspires a wonder and a worship of our Maker and Lover for the gift of our Selves.

Behind the "God made me the way I am" rhetoric is a real truth that it does us no good and brings God no glory to consider ourselves defective. Even original sin, while crippling, is not the result of a defect. It is the result of a free will, which is no defect. GLBTQ and other Christians can share that conviction. Our dialog can begin in the agreement that what God made is good, and that "it is he who has made us and not we ourselves", as the Hundredth Psalm puts it. That, at least, should be a starting point.

Christians who are GLBTQ and other Christians also share a view of their environment and resources that they, too, are ordered by God, magnifying that wonder and worship for a God who makes himself known in this world. It is not just a religious motivation that is important here - that is merely an aspect of humanity. What is important is the personal and universal witness of God's attention to and provision for our needs in giving us the gift of Life. Even for the sparrows.

And orphans.

And outcasts.

And strangers.

And who is my neighbor, anyway?

While GLBTQ people are not sparrows or orphans or otherwise incapacitated, they are strangers to the Church, at least for now. GLBTQ Christians are often strangers in their own churches. I don't think it would be hard to find agreement among any group of Christians that strangers should be made welcome and that the alien should find hospitality among God's people. Our dialog can continue in recognizing that celebrating God as the giver of Life means a respect for all life in this world and sharing our piece of the world and our resources with all. What has God provided us that we are prone to withhold from others?

Finally, GLBTQ Christians also share with other Christians in the communion of the Church. As the Nicene Creed asserts, there is one holy, catholic and apostolic church. It includes all who dare hope in Christ. Period. That statement does not draw out any controversy until we take it upon ourselves to attempt to identify who  "all" might mean. That is to say, until we take on a job we have not been asked or possess qualifications to perform.

Our communion is in the Body and Blood of Christ, not just in the physical act of "take and eat", but in the existential reality of being members of one Body and being the benefactors of a transcendent blood-sacrifice. There are mysteries which can neither be argued or explained. The dialog we pursue must validate "one holy, catholic and apostolic church. It must be a witness to "one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all". A dialog that begins in what we hold in common must lead to a unity and a love which bears witness to the world of our Lord. That is what is at stake.

The sanity, to return to Justin's plea, can only come when we celebrate our differences in unity. We the Church have learned to do this in other areas. It was hard. It took time. But few would return to the days of forced conversions, inquisitions, witch-scares, scarlet letters, segregation or the dismissal of women. Let it be said of the church, without condition, without discrimination, and by all who desire to come, "behold, how they love one another."

Made Able to Stand

I have read Romans 14 many times. Its admonition not to cause any brother to stumble was a cornerstone in the communal church in which I was raised. But cornerstones themselves are made for stumbling, as it implies elsewhere. In my growing-up church, this passage was an oft-repeated warning against doing anything to give offense. It upheld the status quo on any matter, because any deviation from the status quo would surely offend some weaker brother.

But as this passage was read in the Epistle lesson at my current church recently, I noticed the fourth verse of the chapter which must have been added after I was long gone from my old church: "Who are you to judge the servant of another? To his own master he stands or falls; and he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand."

The Lord is able to make him stand.

Far from its use to monger fear among the saints and to maintain conformity in all things, and beyond the instruction to mind one's own business when it comes to judging each others' spiritual lives is the assurance that, as regards that weaker brother, the Lord is able to make him stand.

Who is the weaker brother? In the church in which I grew up, the weaker brother was one who, given a liberty, would surely take it. But in Romans, the weaker brother is one who, given a liberty (eating meat) would surely be afraid to take it. I was raised believing the weaker brother would fall in to sin by not observing boundaries and conforming to rules. We all had to follow the rules so as not to cause him to stumble. No one ever suggested the weaker brother was the one who wouldn't let go of the rules.

Paul says the weaker brother falls into legalism by not being able to see past the rules: by setting boundaries for himself in fear. (That fear is a litter-mate of the fear that hounded the servant in Jesus' parable: the servant who buried the treasure the Master had given into his stewardship.) We are not constrained to the boundaries a brother sets for himself out of his timidity. Love certainly leads us not to flaunt our liberties in his face. Respect for our common master leads us to respect the weaker brother and not to judge him. But we do not need to bow to his anxiety. The Lord is able to make him stand. In time, he will stand and cross his own boundaries to discover now-unimaginable freedoms.

In the mean time, we have our own fears to face. We have our own fear-born boundaries to cross. And we have the same hope that He will make us stand, too, and lead us into freedoms we can not now ourselves imagine.

Heirs, not Stewards

When I was presented with the opportunity to share in a stewardship temple talk at my church recently, I was drawn to the theme of this one: “Owner, not Renters”. Recent events in my life have caused a change in my circumstances and in my relationship to property such that I am no longer a Property Owner, but a Renter once again and adjusting to that old relationship.

But as I waded into the given passage from the first part of Ephesians and considered what it had to say to me about stewardship, other notions came to mind.

A steward is the chief servant of an estate. As such, he is neither Renter nor Owner.  He represents an owner, who has vested authority in him to manage or govern in his name.  A good steward works in the best interests of his master. 

And this is where stewardship intersects with Paul’s preface in his letter to the Ephesians.  Paul tells us in this passage what God has done for us.  According to Paul, He has chosen us, He has predestined us to adoption as sons and daughters, He has bestowed grace on us through Jesus who has secured our forgiveness and redemption.  God has revealed His intimate purposes to us, has declared us heirs and has confirmed us as His own possessions by His Holy Spirit.

God, then, has elevated us not from Renters to Property Owners, but rather from stewards to heirs.  We are no longer mere caretakers of an asset that will pass through a lineage of which we have no part.  He has brought us into the family and has made us a part of the line itself. We have been graduated from servants to family.

It is from that position as joint heirs of the kingdom of God that we invest our resources, our time, our capabilities – our very Selves in its prosperity to the praise and the glory of God. That’s what Paul says.

So how do I feel about being a renter again? I would have to say I feel relieved of some responsibilities that I did not particularly enjoy. But I also feel a certain loss of status in a society that grants homeowners a bit more respect, credibility and financial advantage.

Then I remember who I am. I am a beloved, adopted child of God. Paul reminds me that when I exercise my stewardship in God’s kingdom, I am taking good care of the heritage God has given me, as well as the inheritance He will one day confer.

Chosen

Our Adult Christian Education class is viewing a series on the Old Testament from a professor at Vanderbilt University. Today's lesson covered the stories of Cain & Abel and Noah. The professor made the point that aspects of these stories (as well as the Creation story) are to be found in other Middle Eastern and Greek mythologies. The purveyors of the OT stories must have had many more details at their disposal for the stories to be part of their meaningful legend.

The class facilitator, herself a teacher of theology, emphasized the importance of understanding that the OT stories did not stand alone. They were a variation on a whole cloth narrative (cf Hmong story quilts) common to  the peoples of the Middle East. She quoted a favorite writer (whose name I did not get) that there is only one story in mankind - the story of our identity. The OT variations are entwined in and informed by their early Middle Eastern milieu, but still climaxed in the identity story of Israel.

That made me think of the OT pericope for the day from Exodus 33. In it, Moses dickered with God to define the terms of his chosen-ness and the Israelites' chosen-ness. "You have said we have found favor in your sight, but now show us Your way so we can find favor in your sight." That could be read as a pious request to learn just how to obey YHWH. Or it could be read as an attempt to put himself and the Israelites on even footing with God. "We'll both be each other's favorites - then it will be an equal partnership. We won't owe you any more than you owe us." That sounds cynical, but it is not unlike the bargains we often attempt with God ourselves. Moses' further arguments sound more along the lines of resolving an identity crisis than of swearing fealty and obeisance.

God says in Exodus "My presence will go with you" and Moses replies "If your presence will NOT go, then do not move us from this place... in this way, we will be distinct." Moses goes so far as to negotiate witnessing God's glory itself. God accommodates Him. "You can see my back, but not my face." God even described himself in bodily terms, as though He was in the image of man, and not the other way around.

Finally, Moses was confident that he was the chosen leader of a chosen people. But the operation looks more like a messy birthing than a ceremonial anointing. Tearing a chosen people for the One God out of the fabric of Middle Eastern polytheism and mythologies was an arduous process. That is the story of the OT.

The New Testament reverses that story, resulting in an almost equally messy patchwork called the Church. With the Church there is no more chosen leader or chosen race. The narrative tradition and cult practices of the longstanding chosen people must be liberalized to accommodate other stories. The peoples of the Middle East (Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria...) are linked together again, along with uttermost parts of the earth in a new story known as the Gospel. In the Gospel there is no Jew, Greek, male, female, slave nor freeman. The Gospel is the final story of the identity of a people of God comprised of those in the image of God learning to bear witness to the glory of God for all time.

The Question

Synchronicity is the apparent alignment of meaningful events in one's life: a serendipitous juxtaposition. I experience this most Sundays as I read the selection of biblical texts that comprise the service of worship. The Old Testament reading, the Psalms, the New Testament reading and the +Gospel+.

Last week's OT reading was the 10 commandments. The Psalm was a song of restoration. The NT reading was Paul's declaration that, though he could boast his credentials as the Ideal Jew, he boasted, instead, in righteousness through faith in Christ, wanting to know Him and the power of His resurrection.

The +Gospel+ from Matthew was the account of Jesus telling religious leaders the story of the landowner to who sent a series of servants, and finally his son to collect what was due him from his tenants. The tenants abused and killed the messengers and son. Jesus asked the leaders "Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?". The leaders' response was that he would put them to a wretched death and lease the vineyard to more cooperative, deserving tenants.

Jesus replies to them with an enigmatic reference to the stone the builders rejected becoming the chief cornerstone, revealing an amazing work of God. Then he tells them that the kingdom of God will be taken away from the leaders and given to others, followed by another strange statement that those who fall on the stone will be broken to pieces and those on whom the stone falls will be crushed.

Typical Jesus.

Always nailing people with a good pointed story. Always going in a different direction than you expect. Always throwing in an inexplicable reference to some obtuse passage.

The landowner story seems clear enough. God is the landlord who planted the vineyard and owns everything. He sends prophets and finally his son to collect what is due. The Jews, the original lessees, kill them all and are undeserving, so God turns them away and gives the kingdom to the Gentiles. Yea, our side wins. More evidence against "Christ-killers" and from Matthew, no less. The +Gospel+, like history, is always written by the "winners".

Jesus was the "stone the builders rejected", and if you stumble over that fact, he will come falling on you like an avalanche and bury your sorry self. So you better not pout, you better not cry.

Typical Jesus.

Or, typical way we read Jesus. Typical way we analyze the stories for allegories, assign roles to people or people groups we know or don't like, affirm ourselves as God's BFFs and embrace the good news for us. It always sucks not to be us.

I have always been bothered by the reference to the cornerstone in Jesus' reply. Not that I don't recognize Jesus himself as the cornerstone of my righteousness. Yes. Absolutely. But that reference after this particular story is a non sequitor. The story images are of vineyards, grapes and business. The cornerstone image is of architecture and environmental hazards. How does that relate to the story if the point of the story is about who wins and who loses in the race to be God's best friends.

Last Sunday, reading this story after the stark enumeration of the commandments, the psalmist's cry to God for preservation and restoration and Paul's repudiation of the law as the way to righteousness, my attention moved from the story to Jesus' question.

"What will the owner of the vineyard do to the tenants?"

The leaders gave Jesus the same answer that we - a primarily Gentile church - give Him today.

"Why, of course, they will receive their just desserts!!"

It is always good to know the right answer. Except for when you don't.

Jesus distracted us with a story when his question was aimed at our hearts. Typical Jesus.

Soaking in the OT, NT and Psalms before coming to this +Gospel+ passage, I became aware that Jesus didn't have to ask those leaders what would happen next in his story unless he wanted to. Or, unless he wanted reveal what was in their hearts. What was in their hearts was allegiance to the Law - the notion that righteousness means obeying the Law and justice means well-deserved consequences when you don't. That is what is in our hearts when we finish Jesus' story with the landowner's retribution. That is the cornerstone of our ethics, morality and justice.

The cornerstone of the +Gospel+ is different. It is one we often stumble over. And reject. When we fall on it it breaks us. It crushes our self-righteousness.

The +Gospel+ is the story where the landowner sends his son, knowing full well what will happen to him. The +Gospel+ is the story where the landowner watches His Son die at the hands of cruel men. The +Gospel+ is the story where the son, in death's agony, appeals to his father for mercy for his unknowing tormentors. The +Gospel+ is the story that ends with the landowner raising his son from the dead to show the hateful, greedy, undeserving, self-righteous tenants how powerful his forgiveness can be.

The +Gospel+ is the story where a servant is forgiven a huge debt in its entirety. We stumble over the +Gospel+ every time when we, like that servant, are determined to exact payment for a paltry debt from another servant. The kingdom is taken away from us not because we, the world to whom it was offered, killed the son. The kingdom is taken away from us when we, like the ungrateful servant, insist on an accounting of debt to the Law instead of an accounting of God's mercy.

Jesus did not tell the leaders that the kingdom would be taken from them because they were Jews and that is how the story was supposed to end. The kingdom will be taken away from anyone who is ready to take it away from someone else. It will be given, as Jesus said, to those who produce the fruit of the kingdom: those who exhibit the merciful love, forgiveness, grace that flows into their lives by being engrafted into Christ.

That mercy, like the plot twist to Jesus' story where the landowner raises the son from the dead, is "the stone the builders rejected" that "has become the cornerstone". That grace truly is "the Lord's doing" and "amazing before our eyes".

Jesus tells a story and asks how it ends. He doesn't want to know how well we know the commandments and can judge by them. He wants to know how well we know God.

Typical Jesus.

We Are Gods

One of my brothers called last Sunday with a question.

He prefaced his question with the remark that, although I have no credibility with him on political and economic matters, I might occasionally have an insight into the Bible. Our mother would have called that a "back-handed compliment".

My brother had been golfing with an author (my preference would have been to be writing about a golfer - oh wait, I am). The author was talking about his recent book asserting that, being gods, we are empowered for complete self-actualization and mastery of our fate. Or something like that.

To my brother, it all sounded a bit too new-agey, and he challenged his golf cart mate on that claim. The author replied that Jesus once responded to his detractors with a quotation from their Law that "ye are gods" (John 10:34), thus Jesus affirmed his position. My brother wanted to know what Jesus would have meant, because he knew Jesus wasn't putting us on par with God.

I had generally treated the verse in John as a "fly-over" passage. The surface meaning didn't fit my general theology, so I passed over it on my way to someplace important. I had, like the author, assumed that to be a god was an invitation to divinity. An exaltation. Empowerment. I had overlooked what Jesus said because I never bothered to look what Jesus was quoting.

Jesus was quoting Psalm 82. Psalm 82 does say "you are gods". But the context of that declaration is that God, who is judge of all the earth, is exasperated with people because they judge unjustly. People ignore the injustice of poverty and sickness and broken families among them. The Psalmist, Asaph, laments that the people who God has made stewards over His creation and in their communities neglect that stewardship and do not exercise justice. They do not make things right where they live. He says "you are gods", and continues "but you shall die like men and fall like princes". The Psalm closes looking forward to the day when God will arise and make all things right Himself. We are "gods" in our delegated role as caretakers and caregivers.

Far from affirming our divine spark and juicing our human potential, Jesus reminds us (and his detractors) of the stewardship and compassion that is our true calling. Caring for creation and for each other is still what differentiates us from the other animals and approximates god-likeness. Maybe being a god is less about power and glory and more about loving and mercy. Or maybe being a god encompasses all of power and glory and love and mercy, but the only part we can practice is love and mercy. We do tend to do badly in the power and glory department.

Not surprising then, when we go back to John 10, this is exactly the point Jesus was making about his own god-likeness. It sounded like blasphemy when Jesus called God his father because his listeners thought he was exalting himself. But Jesus did not argue his status, he argued his track record. He was doing the work of his father - making things right on earth. He argued that if the good work he was doing reflected the good work that God sent him to do, then, in view of the Psalm, he was a "god", or at the least, a "son of god". Specifically, the Son of God.

Unfortunately, it is the honor of it all that most appeals to us when we hear that we are "like God": we glory in the promotion to a more prominent and influential status. It feeds our pride. However it is not our designation as "gods" that affirms our capacity to perform. It is our capacity for compassion that nominates us as "gods" and actual caring that confirms us in that office. The true god serves. Jesus did. Humility enables god-likeness. Meekness puts it within putting distance. Do justice. Love mercy. Walk humbly with God.

I was glad the conversation my brother had with that author on the links gave me another chance to understand what Jesus said. I was glad to be reminded that loving each other makes up most of what we have been sent to do. It is something I usually forget. It's always nice to have a mulligan.

And as for politics and the economy... well, remember the poor, the sick and the helpless.

Water Walking

Of the story of Jesus walking on water and Peter's attempt to do likewise, Nadia Bolz-Weber writes that Peter's failure to have faith enough for the miraculous is not the point. The point she emphasizes is that Jesus was coming to him already and to get into the boat with his fearful followers.

I would consider another aspect of the story as well: When Jesus chided Peter for being "of little faith" (and I will use the gentler "chide" rather than "rebuke"), was He referring to Peter's failed attempt, or to Peter's challenge in the first place "Lord, if it is you, command me..."?

Peter's imposition strikes me as more dubious than his presumption to walk on water on two counts.

First, it eerily echoes Satan's challenge to Jesus "if you are the Son of God...", challenging the apparition to prove its identity, even after hearing its voice across the waters "Take heart, it is I, do not fear". Peter did not take heart at the familiar voice, believing, perhaps, that he was left vulnerable by his lord in the middle of the sea to the deceptions of random ghosts and sea sprites.

But the second indictment of Peter's faith was that, as an experienced fisherman caught in a storm, he was ready to jettison all he knew of the sea, storms and sailing for some kind of immediate magic that would carry him above, not through, the storm. Sometimes faith is demonstrated, not in spectacular deliverance, but in pressing on every day, doing what you know.

Happily, as Bolz-Weber expounds, Jesus' response to Peter's shortcomings in the faith department - whatever its source - is His immediate and comforting presence in the boat with those He loved. It was when they knew He was already at their side that He quieted the wind.

Heart and Soul

Last Sunday I read Joel Hoffman's And God Said explaining the art and science of translating ancient Hebrew scriptures and shedding light on several mistranslations in the King James Version of the Old Testament.

The Epistle reading in church today was from Romans 7 - Paul's conflict between his mind, will and flesh. It brought to mind Hoffman's chapter on translating "heart" and "soul". Hoffman seemed to reflect the more holistic Jewish notion of those two words encompassing our whole being. We (Westerners) seem to have compartmentalized notions of our tangible and intangible selves. This is borne out in how the KJV expresses the Great Commandment in Deuteronomy to "love the Lord thy God with all our heart, soul and strength". Westerners treat the Hebrew word translated "heart" as a tangible metaphor for love and desire, but the Hebrew word elsewhere refers mind and will as well as love and desire, and shades of meaning surrounding these intangibilities. The Hebrew word translated "soul" goes beyond that intangible, ambiguous construct to refer in other places to the life forces thought to reside in the blood and other body parts. The Hebrew word translated as "strength" is also used as an adverb as we would use "very" - in other words, emphasizing "heart" and "soul", but not necessarily adding another component to our being.

Among these meanings our whole being is meant to be encompassed. We are to love God with all that we are. The Hebrew is not easily resolved into parts.

In Romans 7, Paul seems to reflect the more Hellenistic dichotomy of body and soul in how he articulates his conflict. (I confess that while I admire the grandeur of Paul's general theology, sometimes I find his specific arguments more culture-bound and less convincing.) The reading today brought Hoffman's "one being" back to mind (my phrase, not his) and reminded me that God does not see us in parts (or "in part"), but in the whole and His dealings with us are thus intended.

Deaf Things

I neither wrote nor translated this piece, and wish I could have done either. It is from the anthology of Serbian poetry translated by Charles Simic, The Horse Has Six Legs. If you don't read any other book of poems this year, read this one. The following is an excerpt (Stanza 10) of the poem Deaf Things by Momcilo Nastasijevic.

(10)
Pain
so it turned black

I want, since it happens,
for this wound
to be living to its depths.

Out of this hell
for a breath of some paradise -
out of this sin
for someone to become a saint.

For this suffering
and muddle
to have no end.

For the sake of that grace,
forever, this curse.

A Sweet Truth

A sweet truth brushes my soul, caresses my breast.

While I reach toward my heart, it dances over my hand,
trembling through my fingers, slipping past, but not dropped;
apprehended, but not grasped.

My elbow bends, extending my arm in a sweep of space,
but the truth eludes the circle drawn;
it instead imposes its own presence:
my wrists yield to its press. It buoys my arms,
giving lift to my shoulders and lightness to my head.

My torso stretches up against its force, this truth.
Its weight teeters upon my wrists and I balance the arch of my back
with a forward shift of my loins, forward
until my knees fold and my
head snaps front to keep from falling;
balanced but dropped
to my knees with a jolt,
head bowed.

The truth that shored my shoulders closes in like a shadow
of immense light: I collapse in a ball,
encompassed,
overwhelmed. Truth enters my sides,
my belly, my vessels, my glands,
my lungs until I respire its essence,
sweat its virtue,
bleed its words.


Dedicated to John Nimmiti

Translating Rilke, I.55

From The Book of Hours, I.55
Much of this translation was taken from Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God by Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy. I also translated several additional lines they left out.
----------------------------------

The poets have scattered you
   (a storm tore through their stammering)
   but I want to gather you up again into a vessel
   that could make you glad.

I wander through the winds that churn you:
   that churn you a thousand times over.
I retrieve all the pieces of you that I find:
   from the blind man who used you for his drinking cup,
   from the butler who hid you in the back of the closet,
   from the beggar who held you out to passers-by.
Sometimes the largest parts of your soul I found in a child.

You see, I am a Collector.

One who, like a shepherd, hides behind the back of his hand
   so that you don't see him watching you
   (you would like to evade his notice, turning instead
    into the stranger's sites)

One who dreams of making you complete, and, in so doing
   completes himself.

Translating Rilke, I.3

From The Book of Hours, I.3
----------------------------------

I have many cossacked brothers living in the South:
   their spectres rise through cloistered laurel.
Through humanity ablaze in their Madonnas I recognize
   the ember of God - and often dream of young Titians.

But when I peer over the edge of myself,
   God - my God - is dark.
A knot of a hundred buried roots drinking in silence.

All I know is that I arise out of this ferment whose
   silence stills my branches
   except for the rustle of the Wind.

Acknowledgment to Anita Barrows and Joanna Macy in Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God for the image of "ferment" from Rilke's word choice "Waerme".

Translating Rilke, III.6

From The Book of Hours, III.6
-----------------------------------

O Lord, grant to each his own death.
The dying discharged from each life:
   by the love one gained,
   the meaning made and
   anguish that remained.

Translating Rilke, I.40

From The Book of Hours, I.40
-----------------------------------

I have hymns I keep to myself.

Though the celestory of my being looms high above you,
my soul bows with you at the rail. You perceive me to be
too grand for you but I am not. You barely discern me
from among all the others kneeling with you.

You graze like a flock of sheep while I watch among you
until evening draws you home. Then I return with you
in the sound of muffled hooves on the bridge,
hiding my own return in the steam rising from your backs.