Between Epiphanies

You are cordially invited to our first Life Bridge Dialogue: Veterans & Civilians.

Life Bridge Dialogues are intentional conversations between veterans and civilians focusing on the impact of war upon both groups. We come together in mutual support and respect to begin healing the soul wounds of war.

Our first dialogue is scheduled to coincide with the observance of Memorial Day. It’s one thing to thank a vet for their service and their sacrifice. It’s another thing to stay and listen to what that service meant.

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We went to see about adopting another dog yesterday. I met a woman in a LinkedIn discussion group for Collie owners, and learned about an adoptable collie she was fostering. The dog had been mistreated and was extremely shy and skittish especially around strange people. When we went to meet her, it was obvious she was much more at home with other dogs than people. She and our dog Prince got along well, but around us, her tail was tucked between her legs and she was terrified.

As hard as it was for us, we had to recognize that this particular dog needed much more than we would be able to give. Where she was in foster care much better for her at this point on the journey she had to make.

As we drove home, still thinking it over and talking about it, I remembered my first dog. I was no more than eight or nine. Our family went up to Greenwood Lake in NY State where members of our church had a cottage. I was playing out in the woods where I found a little black and white stray dog. My father said it was a fox terrier mix. Probably more than that, but I never really inquired into her background any deeper than that. What’s it really matter between friends?

The dog was terribly shy and skittish but eventually she came to me, and then she wouldn’t leave me. Stuck with me like glue. I had been adopted. I brought her back to the cottage and announced to everyone that wanted to keep her. The adults all laughed and made comments about how bad she smelled and fleas, but then they went into their mysterious adult world for their discussions and I noted from my eight year old world that I hadn’t heard ‘no’, and that was good enough for me.

After dinner, my father went out with our friend to find the dog’s owner. If the dog had an owner they said, it would be this man. Not a pleasant man I sensed. But we had to ask. Half an hour later, they came back and my father paid the guy $5 and that was that.

This is the threshold that grace first entered in my life. An important bridge was crossed that night. Through this little dog, I began to know myself as one who could care and love, as well as one who was cared for and loved. Maybe that’s what pets do for us.

Someday, I have no doubt the right adoptable collie will come along, just like our little fox terrier, I named Spot. Clever right? I was only eight, give me a break.

I remember sitting with Spot, while we waited for my father to return. Spot was curled sleeping in my lap, farting up a storm. I held her afraid to move and disturb her sleep, my eyes watering, feeling like a king in a bountiful new land.

At Bible study, the question was asked, Could Jesus have come down from the cross if he wanted to? Or, was he unable to save himself? Most everyone opted for the first, that Jesus could have come down from the cross but chose not to do so. There is certainly a lot to support that view.

The Bible says that Jesus had the power to still to wind and the waves. Jesus could drive out demons, cure diseases, restore sight to the blind and even raise the dead. It’s only logical to believe that this power would be at Jesus disposal when Jesus needed it most…to save himself. On the order of things that Jesus had already done, coming down off the cross was pretty small potatoes. A no brainer really.

I remember sitting by the hospital bedside of an elderly woman once, who provided sole care for her learning disabled brother. Even though she herself got around with a walking frame. She’d been a widow for 18 years, never had children, and she and her brother were all the family they had left. She lay in the hospital bed physically exhausted, and worried sick. What would happen to her brother if she died now? He would not be able to stay on his own. All they had was each other. He would have to be put in a home and that would most certainly kill him. She couldn’t bear the thought.

No, she had to live and return home to care for him, but whether she lived, or died that very night, was beyond her control. She knew it. All she could do was cry some hard angry tears. That always struck me as a pretty good definition of being human.

Being human boils down to exercising control over everything except the things we need most. Being human means coming face to face with our ultimate vulnerability, our utter lack of power over anything and everything that really matters. Every Sunday we say that Jesus was fully human as well as being fully divine. Is humanity something you can step in and out of at will? Like a pair of slippers or something? I suppose we try often enough, in the little games we play, the schemes we hatch when we try to play God. But ultimately, being human comes down to this moment. Desperately needing what we are helpless to acquire for ourselves.

Oh, I’d like to think that Jesus had a “Get out of Jail” card in his back pocket, and that he could use it if things got too unbearable on that cross. I like to think I have one too. I suspect otherwise though, when I remember that woman staring at the ceiling, facing an unimaginable future for the brother she loved that she was powerless to control. Or, as I recall my own mother and all of our family gathered helplessly around my father’s dying bedside, being dragged into a future we prayed mightily to be spared.

I remember the woman recovered and returned home to her brother. How relieved she was when I drove her to their farmhouse. I left for a new church sometime after, and I never found out how it ultimately turned out for them. Maybe the brother died first and the woman’s unimaginable future became her own. I suspect they needed each other to survive, and neither of them could make it alone. Maybe they went together, or maybe they’re still in that farmhouse. I don’t know.

I do know that it’s been more than 10 years into that unimagined future after they unhooked my father from all the machines and monitors and we left the ICU for the last time under an incredibly starry night sky. The path we’ve walked since that night has been a well-travelled one. Full of heavy stones and lots of broken glass. I’ve met hundreds of others on it. It doesn’t lead to oblivion, or the realization of my worst fears, though at times it sure feels like it. But here’s the thing, just when it does, there’s this sharp bend at a blind curve that runs you right through Golgotha. That’s where Jesus is waiting for you. He’s rolled some heavy stones out of the way to get there. Not to worry though, it’s all in the wrists.

You have to wonder about God sometimes.

For about a week, I’ve been thinking about an article I read that talked about getting pastors out of their offices and into the community. One even went so far as to say that the pastor shouldn’t come back to the church until the next Sunday worship.

The article made a lot of sense. Too much sense. I knew I should give it a try, but that immediately put me smack up against my naturally introverted personality. You see, I’m a quiet, shy sort. It’s true. I don’t like calling attention to myself. Lots of clergy are like that I’ve found. Like I said, you have to wonder about God sometimes.

When I go to a public place, I like to slip in anonymously. I like to observe, reflect and contemplate; take notes. The last thing I want to do is to be noticed. That being said, the idea wouldn’t let me go. I thought I could wait it out. Let it die of apathy or neglect, like my Christmas poinsettias. No such luck. After ten days of working up the courage, I decided to give it a try. I put on my collar, pack up my laptop and a fist full of business cards. Off to Starbucks.

This is where God gets a little heavy handed. Sometimes God is subtle and nuanced. Sometimes God swings a sledgehammer. This was definitely sledgehammer territory.

It was a beautiful spring morning. I parked the car and I thought I could maybe set up my mobile office outside where I’d be less likely to be noticed. Stick a toe in the water before jumping into the pool. I check the tables on the side of the building. A young woman is sitting at one of the tables, with her laptop set up. I recognized her when she looked up. It was Jessie, the editor of the online Patch newsletter. She shades her eyes and smiles.

“Oh hi Rev, office hours,” she points to her table and laughs. “Beautiful morning isn’t it?”

It is indeed, I agree, and I promise to send her another blog post soon (sooner than I thought) and tell her what a great job she’s doing with the Patch newsletter.

“Thanks,” she smiles and excuses herself when her cell phone rings.

OK God, you have my attention. It wasn’t exactly a burning bush, but close enough. But our Lord was just warming up.

I went inside and ordered a grande (why can’t Starbucks just say small medium and large like everybody else?) and a yogurt thing for lunch, and while I’m waiting to pick up my order, a woman who had just picked up her drink looks at me, sees the collar and asks, “You’re a priest? What church are you from?” I fumble in my bag for one of my cards I hadn’t even had a chance to get out yet, mumbling something about the Reformation and being Lutheran. The woman couldn’t care less. She continues with a sense of urgency, “What does God say about divorce?” “What are you supposed to do when someone rejects you?”

I could see the pain in her eyes, as I handed her my card and tried to think what to say…I was kind of drawing a blank. The espresso machine was hissing steamed milk behind me. Steely Dan was playing something I remembered from high school on the speaker. It was a stupid song then, and the years haven’t improved it. What words of wisdom do you come up with waiting for a grande?

Suddenly God took me back to my own divorce many years ago. What a terrible time in my life. The isolation I felt. The sense of abandonment, even by God. God held it up to me in an instant. What would I have needed to hear then? I recognized the woman’s look. And I also remembered the beginnings of new birth that were stirring, though I couldn’t see it then. If only I could have seen it then. Maybe it wasn’t the right time. There’s a time for planting and a time for the harvest. God showed it all to me in a second.

“That’s a really hard situation,” I said finally. “All you can do is the best you can. Just know that God hasn’t rejected you.”

A jolt, like an electric shock charges the air between us.  The woman takes my card and suddenly seems self-conscious. She thanks me, head down, picks up her coffee and moves quickly for the door. We’re strangers after all. A brief window of grace has opened and then it closes.

In last week’s Gospel, Jesus told Nicodemus, “The wind blows where it will. You hear the sound of it, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going. So it is with the Spirit.”

I suppose you never really know if what you say makes a difference. In the end, you can only hope. Nor can you ever know how God will lead you across the borders of social convention to touch a life and in turn, to be touched. Sometimes though, you just open a window and the wind takes your breath away.

You really have to wonder about God sometimes.  Guess I’ll have to learn to say ‘grande’ and get used to Steely Dan all over again.