Life At The Well

Last night one of our daughters asked me what I was “giving up for Lent” --- and I smiled because, while I have been considering the question for a couple of weeks, I really didn’t have an answer. I didn’t know what I was going to ‘give up’ – but I did know what I wanted to accomplish in this season that leads up to the Easter celebration of Jesus’ resurrection. I want to stand before my Savior in 40 days stripped of anything that hinders my loving Him.

Henri Nouwen, when considering the vocational change that led him to leave a professorship at Harvard to become the chaplain at a home for mentally and physically handicapped adults, wrote: “These broken, wounded and completely unpretentious people forced me to let go of my relevant self – the self that can do things, show things, prove things, build things – and forced me to reclaim that unadorned self in which I am completely vulnerable, open to receive and give love regardless of any accomplishments.” For Nouwen, finding unencumbered love required not only that he ‘give up’ his academic and social standing at Harvard, but also that he embrace or ‘take on’ the brokenness and woundedness of others, so that the kingdom of God might be extended through him … to them.

So, as I anticipate celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus in 40 days, I am doing so with Jesus words imprinted anew on my heart: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Matt 16:24-26 (ESV)

My start on the journey is examen – to allow God full access in searching my attitudes, motives, thoughts, words and actions, so that I can crucify the remnants of my old man to make way for the growth of the new. To deny the world in me, so that I may follow the One in me Who is greater than the world.

Counting down,
Harry

"If I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seed, I cannot produce wheat. Cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat. If I want to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface. I must be ploughed up and resown." - CS Lewis

The attempt to retain my Self and my desires and wants and wishes, while merely adding Jesus into the mix ... is futile. And frustrating. Every step of my journey is replete with discoveries that another area of my life has been held in reserve from God, somehow rationalized that mere correction or enlightenment would sufficiently mask whatever tendency or opinon or behavior that I had not yet dealt with.

I must be ploughed up and resown.

For I am crucified with Christ ... at times it seems as though I have been connected with Christ, or comfy with Christ or even compulsively with Christ. But I am afraid that I am only now embracing crucifixtion. Embracing may even seem a tad aggressive ... but the language is rather ... eh, forceful. Crucified with Christ ... ploughed up and resown. Transformed, not reformed.

But, as I have learned this week, often the hardest way is the one that appears easiest. To neglect an area that is need of ploughing is only mandating that I will have to face the problem of becoming overgrown and useless at some later date. Again, Lewis writes: "The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says, "Give me All."

Plough me up Lord, and re-seed me as You will.

I returned home after a whirlwind stay in Louisiana surrounding my grandmother's funeral. Vocationally, I deal with death often, but as a 'family participant' in these events, new perspectives were awakeded. I felt some need to create harmony and reconciliation in my family, where often those things have been absent. And I realized, again, how superficially I/we live sometimes. How many of my words were utered solely to boost my appearance among 'old acquaintances' that I have not seen in 25 years? Even part, if not most, of my need to seek peace among siblings and other extended family members, was in response to seeing how artifically we have related to each other. We have been so intent on filling the expectations and perceptons we have of one another that we could not genuinely relate to one another.

Not that I believe that mindset can be toppled immediately, because I don't know how many others are willing to unmask, but I recognized my deep inner fatigue at trying to be something ... anything, other than who and what I am. But the road to transparency if frought with peril ... fears, worries, the revlation of my imperfections .. you get the picture. CS Lewis spoke of the need to be dye or stain that soaks into the fiber, rather than pain that merely covers the surface. I am in need of fiber-shaking ... not fresh coating.

I say all that to relate the conviction that I must devote myself to more contemplative time and activities. Even my soul maintainance has, of late, been hyperactive and not so surpringly, self-powered. I have discovered many aspects of my personality and charatcer that are in need of examination ... so if you'll excuse me now ..

Peace.

I just finished reading The Intimate Merton, compiled from Thomas Merton's personal journals - and it has given me a new perspective to Father Louis. It would be easy to collect quotes from Merton and read his books and arrive at the conclusion that he was a 'spiritual giant' -- bold, faithful and consistent. But his journals tell a more complex story than that. In my mind, perhaps their greatest value is in giving readers insight into the struggles and questions and failures and agony that Merton's lfe of spiritual questing produced. He articulates what many (most?) spiritual seekers (I use this word not in the contemporary church growth connotation -- rather to signify kingdom travellers, truth journey-ers, soul searchers ... those somewhere in the spectrum of believers-in-the-making and disciples-to-be) encounter: inconsistency, times of doubt, penetrating moments of self-realization, and sometimes unanswerable questions. And yet, Merton kept returning to the All that was beyond our nothingness.

I needed to read that. If I have learned anything in the journey of the past few years, it is that neat answers (that come alliterated, and rhyming .. if possible) rarely provide the nourishment for my soul that I need to face life in God's presence with my own soul laid bare before Him. (Not that I've got the whole soul-baring thing down at, yet :>)) But as my faith-relationshipwith Jesus deepens, many of the things that I was pretty sure I knew ... seem questionable. Certainly they are OPEN to question. Where I once was content to live in the world of "right answers" -- indeed was dedicated to finding and learning them all, so that I could wield them on command, like the neatly costumed performers of most dog-and-preacher shows -- I have come to a place where "right answers" and those who wield them .. scare me to death. My faith has formed in the crucible of doubt. My grasp of truth has been strengthened by encounters with deception. My zeal has been fanned from the embers of apathy. My peace received in struggle.

I think I'll go back and re-read some of Merton's other books, to see how they hit me now. Timing is everything, they say. By the way, I am leaving for a week in Louisiana to attend my dear grandmother's funeral .. she died yesterday. Talk about troubles -- a woman of deep faith, born, raised and remained in the Catholic tradition -- she witnessed the abandonment of any faith by some children and grandkids, a granddaughter dabbling in Wicca and Buddhism, and her oldest and favorite grandson who became a Protestant preacher. And yet she always practiced a love and tolerance that goes way beyond ecumenism .. all theway to faith and love. May God receive her with grace and delight.

Peace.

"The great sin, the source of all other sins, is idolatry. Never has it been greater, more prevalent than now. It is almost completely unrecognized -- preceisely because it is so overwhelmingly total. It takes in everything. There is nothing else left. Fetishism of power, machines, possessions, medicine, sports, clothes, etc., all kept going by greed for money and power." -Thomas Merton

Written in his journal on Saturday, April 17th. Forty two years ago! What would Father Louis think today if he were still alive? Somehow I'm betting he would not know (nor care) who advanced on American Idol, who danced with what star or who got kicked off the Survivor island. OK, OK .. so picking on 'reality' shows is really to easy. But words become cliche only when they harbor a nugget of truth that is repeated often enough to become familiar. And given how superficial our social discourse is these days, I find it compelling to use those references as illustrations to the perverse idolatry that corrupts nearly every fiber of our cultural, social and moral landscape.

God deliver us from one more best-seller turned small group curriculum.
God deliver us from one more spiritual platitude by anything-you-believe-is-OK "leaders."
God deliver us from narrow-minded, self-righteous legalists.
God .. deliver us from the all the extremes of self.

Allow us to find our balance ... our center ... in You. For then, and only then, can we build community with each other. I am blessed to be discovering the possibilities as God draws some to this conclusion that personal spiritual formation in the context of loving friends, opens the wounds of our idolatrous society and heals them. I suspect that churches birthed in traditional organizational structures will find this possible in segments rather than in large corporatre contexts. Success will not be universally recognized because it won't necessarily come with trophies to growth. But it will, and is coming with fruit. The fruit of the Spirit produced in people making Christ the center, and tearing down the walls that divide sacred and secular - to live all for Him. Reality faith, instead of reality television.

Peace.

Whew and wow! Perhaps for reasons that I have not yet fully fleshed out yet, this year has been the most intensive focus on the resurrection of Jesus that I have ever engaged. Not that I perfectly understand or can articulate all that is encompassed in the notion of Christ being bodily raised from death ... but I am certainly more grounded in the resurrection than I was at the start of Lent. So for that, I am thankful.

In addition to many fine writings, I appreciated this post from Monastic Mumblings. Wonderful thoughts on the evidence of Jesus' divinity for the first century Hebrew mind. Part of the wonder of this Easter celebration has been the conclusion I've reached, inescapably, about teh role the resurrection played in the early church's understanding of identity and mission. Much in line with plenty of my thoughts over the past two years, it appears that our theology has been so Westernized that we have contaminated the genuine power of life change that exists in the message of God's Word of (New) Life. So to my journeys I add this sidebar -- how (if it is even possible) do we/I lead a 'traditional' church into the re-discovery of being a resurrection people? I don't mean traditional, as in vs. contemporary .. I mean traditional, as in, the way churches are formed, structured and operate in the United States/Western world today?

I don't guess I write to offer answers .. only to muse over the situation as I am encountering it.

Peace.

Ruth. Diana. Hattie.

Three names of three women that God has brought into my life over the past months to force me to reconsider all that I thought I knew about following Christ and about "church." Their lives tell a story of brokenness that is far beyond mere poverty, or lonliness, or bad choices. Their life-stories resonate with a deep need for good news, because in their wildest imaginations ... they can't come up with any. Such deep-seeded brokenness has - in different ways for each of them - left them believing that they are less human because of their circumstances.

Robin (my wife) and I sat up late into the night after having spent some time with one of these women ... weeping and brainstorming and wondering. The place where this woman is .. everyday reality ... is so disheartening and so .. so ruined, that we both recognized that any "benevolence program" or "day of service" or "random act of kindness" would be nothing more than a sneeze in a windstorm. Pitifully lacking. Arrogantly superficial. Desperately un-Christlike.

Robin said aloud what I was thinking: "Her problems are so overwhelming. Her situation is so complicated. What can we do? And even as I ask that, I'm afraid that the answer is quite simple, and that I already know it." Hattie needs someone who will initiate a relationship that makes her more fully human. It cannot be done with a couple of bags of groceries, or a ride to "church" or help with a utility bill. Hattie needs someone to love her -- plain and simple.

And there is in that solution, great and terrible risk. Risk that I wil have to spend some of my time, or maybe some of my money. Risk that I will have to - gulp - get involved in her life. The truth is, I have always had a compassionate heart, and find ministry to the "poor" and "needy" a relatively easy place to go, but a new layer of understanding opened for me last night. Meeting needs is a demonstration of concern .. of compassion .. of care, but it is not love. Love feeds a hungry person. Not for the opportunity to "evangelize" or better yet, "moralize", but love feeds a person because they are hungry. Today. And again tomorrow. And next week. And next month. Faithfulness to Christ cannot be accomplished through even the most well meaning of programs. The institution of 'church' cannot corporately love people, and love is what ruined, broken people need most. Love needs to be transferred person to person, elbow to elbow, 'seeping into the cracks of life' one author said, to create a new reality.

I'm not sure yet, what this means for Robin and me ... but then again, I'm afraid I already know the answer and it is quite simple. More to come ....

Peace.