Detours

Today I walked into my noon Bible study and there was animated buzzing conversation all around. I eagerly jumped in, until I realized we had forgotten something. "Wait! Let's pray!" I interrupted. We stopped long enough to say grace, and then went back to our lunches and our conversation.

What was the passionate topic we were discussing? Detours.

They say, of course, that there are only two seasons in Minnesota: winter and road construction. This reality has become more evident than usual for us this spring, as major highway construction is going on in our neighborhood's back yard.

All of the freeway entrances near our home have been closed for the last month, and will be all summer. Last weekend, the major highway through our city was closed, from my neighborhood downtown.

And starting this weekend, two more bridges were demolished, and part of the street that runs in front of our church was closed, the part that goes over the freeway. Our children's ministry coordinator described the scene on Monday evening: cars coming down the street, seeing the roadblock, and turning around abruptly to go back in the opposite direction -- during rush hour.

Tuesday evening I took my usual back roads home. They are not closed. However, as I approached my intersection, I saw two blocks of cars, waiting to get on the same road.

Everybody's looking for a different way home right now. The shortest route is no longer an option.

We need these road repairs. They are long overdue. But it is bitter medicine to take. And it means that we will have to take detours for awhile, we will have to slow down, we will be inconvenienced. For people in a hurry, with never enough time, with a sense of urgency, this is a difficult lesson to learn. Maybe we won't learn it, anyway.

We need more than road repairs. We need humanity repairs. Sometimes a detour, which seems like a waste of time, is part of the process of repairing our lives. And God -- the God who walked this earth with us -- walks with us in the detours, maybe even more than in those straight line, goal-oriented trips we take.

Writing Stories

When I was in first grade, I learned how to read. I didn't start early, like some children do. I didn't learn to read at all until I started first grade. But, at almost the same time, I starting writing.

At the time, all we had in school was Dick And Jane. I supplemented Dick and Jane with simple stories of visiting the farm, a few of the things I felt that the Dick and Jane stories left out They were suburban, like me, but they just didn't seem to have a wide enough experience of the world, in my view. A little later I began a series of stories about two girls who were best friends, remarkably similar to my own best friend and me. The stories, I think, we also updated versions of the Maud Hart Lovelace Betsy-Tacy books. Turn of the century Mankato was transformed into suburban Minneapolis, with adventures such as: putting on a play in the garage, sleeping outdoors in a treehouse, and trying to avoid annoying brothers and sisters.

I had a brief foray into feminism with "A Girl on our Baseball Team": vintage about 4th grade. I am amazed at how undeterred I was by the fact that I didn't know anything about baseball. I tried my hand at mystery stories at least twice. And in junior high, I dabbled in science fiction. One earnest story, I remember, was about how the computers eventually took over the world, unwilling to leave it in the hands of fallible human beings. (I did not have any conscious knowledge of 2001 or "Hal" at that time. really.)

I wrote alone; I wrote with others. I remember one year going over to a friend's house nearly every day after school and taking out a cheap Schaeffer cartridge pen and sitting down together to write stories. We sat at a low child's table in her basement and scribbled furiously while the TV hummed in the background. We would take turns reading portions of stories to each other at the end of the afternoon.

In junior high I also experimented with some (in retrospect) really bad poetry. I started writing short humor pieces, as well. I continued to write stories: of families with many children, of campaigns for student council president, of young people running away from home. I wrote one humorous one-act play, and a story about a little girl who believed that someday she would be famous. It was called "destined."

However, somewhere along the line I just stopped writing stories. I think I was freer when I didn't know how much I didn't know. I wrote stories, unconcerned about facts, about research, about areas of the country, the world, and historical events. I wrote stories to make life more interesting than it was. I wrote stories just because I liked it. I wrote stories because I liked to hang around words.

I still like stories. And I like, more than ever, hanging around words, hearing the way they sound. But I haven't written any stories for a long time. I don't know exactly why. I know it's a lot harder than I used to think it was. Maybe that's part of it. Maybe I'm less curious too, but that would be sad. But sometimes I miss it: creating a little world, with people and places and plots thickening.

I wonder if I will ever write another story.

Church yesterday

It was a big day in church yesterday, and mostly NOT because of my great sermon. It was a great day for me because we had, for our Adult Forum, the director of the Benedictine Center in St. Paul, here to teach us about Lectio Divina. It turns out that he is a Lutheran; he and his family worship at a church in St. Paul near the capital. The only thing I'm sad about is that I never get to go to the adult forums, because we have worship services all morning. This is one that I would have liked to attend.

Then, after our 10:00 service, our U.S. Representative Keith Ellison came for another adult forum. It turns out that someone from my congregation works with his office in some or another capacity (although I'm not sure exactly how that is). We are part of his district, and he wanted to come and tell us some of the things they are working on in Congress. He came to worship as well. He sat in the back and of course, since he is a Muslim, he didn't come up for communion. I didn't get to hear him either, as I was leading another worship service at that time. So I can't tell you anything about the content of his message.

Also, for the first time this last Sunday, we included prayers for healing and anointing at our last worship service, for anyone who would like to be prayed for. We will include a service of healing every month at the last service on the last Sunday of the month. I am glad for this.

Then I went home, and my husband had organized a little surprise party for me, with cake and coffee, and sushi, salad and snacks. And presents.

Sermon: The unknown god

I used to see them on occasion back when I was downtown working. Street-corner preachers. Have you ever encountered one? Sometimes they are standing on a box, often holding up a big Bible, and preaching their hearts out to anyone who will listen. Which to be honest with you, is usually: no one. What I remember, whether the encounter was on a street corner on a warm summer day – or during the winter, up above in one of the city skyways, was how spectacularly ignored those preachers were by the people hurrying by. I could never make out exactly what they were saying, but when I would catch a few words, I could tell that they quoted a lot of Bible passages, and that they were often angry. God was not pleased with us, they said, and there was a judgment coming. It was time to repent and turn to God. But we – kept right on going, not stopping to consider our lives and the great God the preacher was trying to tell us about.

Paul at the Areopagus is a kind of a street-corner preacher, isn’t he? In our lesson today he is in Athens, wandering through the city. While he is there he is disturbed by all the idols that he sees, and hebegins by speaking in the synagogues and to everyone he meets about Jesus and the resurrection. Finally, people are curious and they invite him to the Areopagus – a rocky hill which serves asa meeting place where people gather to hear new ideas. According to the verse right before our lesson starts, the people of Athens are always interested in new ideas.) And what we hear today is Paul’s "street corner preaching" to the people who are gathered.

It’s tempting to make fun of the preachers who stand on street corners, I suppose. But they are doing one thing right, at least – they are not just in the church, but they are out in the street, in the marketplace, talking about God. They are out where the people are living and working and trying to get by, like Paul was in Athens, and wherever he traveled. It’s tempting to make fun of "street corner preachers", but at least in one way, they are meeting the people where they are, just like Paul did. They are "going public" with their with their faith, and just like Paul, they are preaching repentance – they are exhorting people to turn to God.

But that’s where the similarity ends. For one thing Paul doesn’t do is rattle off a lot of Bible passages. He’s speaking to people who have no knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures, so he doesn’t use scripture at all. As he wants to introduce them to the God he believes in, the God he trusts, instead he looks around him and notices the marketplace and the culture of Athens. He notices all of the different altars there are and he comments, "I see that you are very religious." He starts where they are – and amid all of the altars and the marketplace and the bustling, busy people he notices, he sees one altar that bears the inscription "To an unknown God." Who knows where that came from? Perhaps in a time of famine or war or difficulty, the people were praying to all of their different gods and decided that they must be leaving someone out, and so they created a new altar, "to an unknown god," just to be sure. There’s a kind of humility there as well, isn’t there? To an unknown god....it’s as if the people of Athens are admitting – we don’t know everything. There’s more knowledge, more wisdom, more out there that we haven’t discovered yet. And so this is where Paul begins: this unknown god – he tells them – this is the god I am going to tell you about.

In a way, that’s still the task today, and for us, isn’t it? To make known the unknown god. For even though there are stacks of books in the religion section of the libraries and the bookstores, and even though there are many churches throughout our community and in this religious nation of ours, there is still a sense that our God is still "the unknown god." In our marketplaces, there are still many competing altars, promising us peace or security, wealth or success, popularity, or beauty of love. If only we will serve them. There are the cruel gods that preach the message that it’s important to be the last survivor on the island. There are the soothing gods telling us if only we say this or that affirmation, we can heal our lives. There are gods that tell us if pray the right prayer, god will make us successful. This is still a sense that the God we believe in and the God we trust is an unknown God – the God who created the heavens and the earth, but who dwells with us, "in whom we live and move and have our being," as Paul tells the Athenians. There’s still a sense that our God – the God who in Jesus went to the cross – is still unknown. And it is we – the church – who, through our words and actions, make him known.

But how do we do that? How do we do that? Well, for most of us, it’s not by standing on street corners (I think I hear a collective sigh of relief!) But it is by recognizing that we have something in common with one another, whether we are believers or not, but simply by being members of the human family. Paul doesn’t start his sermon by shouting about all of the idols. He begins by observing, "I see you are very religious." He notices them sweeping in front of their altars, and polishing the brass on the artifacts, and taking good care of the temples, and he tells them about a God big enough to take care of them. "He gives to all mortals life and breath and all things." He tells them about an expansive god, a god wide enough, and big enough to encompass the whole world, to embrace the whole world, and everyone in it.

A long time ago while I was living in Japan, I learned about a man who had been a general during World War II. In fact, he was important enough that he had gotten a paragraph mention in one of the popular military history books, as he had something to do with military strategy in the Pacific. Sometimes after the war, he had become a Christian, and was present every Sunday at Musashino Church in Tokyo, always sitting faithfully in the same spot. The missionary who knew him told me that when he became a Christian, he threw away his "god shelf" – where his ancestors supposedly were – and gave himself completely to the Christian faith. Bt this is a difficult decision for a Japanese, for whom "taking care of the ancestors" is an important family obligation. What was it that finally convinced him to be baptized and live as a Christian? It was the creation stories in Genesis – and particularly the story of the creation of the whole world. In Japan, he explained, the creation stories only mentioned the creation of Japan. But the Christian god was the god of the Whole World.

And yet, that is not enough to know, is it? It’s not enough for us. It’s a beginning. To know that god is the creator of heaven and earth, is the God of Japan and the U.S., the God of Germany and Afghanistan, of Israel and Palestine. God is the Lord of all the nations – and yet God is also near to us – ‘indeed, he is not far from each one of us.’ We reach out and try to grasp him, we are searching for him, and yet – he’s so close, ‘in him we live and move and have our being.’ So close, but still sometimes we don’t wee.

Dr. Rachel Remen tells the story of a young boy with cancer, with a dismal diagnosis. He was a wonderful and happy child, and all the different treatments were taking a toll on him, changing him. And they were running out of options. They finally tried something very experimental, but everyone was very pessimistic. They were sure it wouldn’t work. Dr. Remen talks about reading his blood charts each day and giving the bad news to his parents. Sometimes it would go up a little, but always a little, and she told them, "It’s within the margin of error." His blood started at about a 6, and each day she saw the same thing, until one day, she gave is mother the news, and the boy’s mother touched her arm and said, "He’s getting better! My boy is getting better!" His blood levels had gone up to 7.4. He WAS getting better, but she didn’t see it. She couldn’t see it.

God is so close to us, but most of the time we don’t see: because we don’t expect to see him with the poor, we don’t expect to see him with the outcasts, we don’t expect to see him with the hungry, we don’t expect to see him on the cross. God in Christ is so close to us, but most of the time we don’t see. And we don’t expect to see him feeding the hungry, and we don’t expect to see him welcoming the outcasts, and we don’t expect to see him raising up, empowering the poor. We don’t expect to see him risen from the dead, and living among us: giving us life.

We don’t expect to see him, but he’s here, reaching out to us, loving us, giving us life. And not us only -- but the whole world. The unknown god -- made known in Christ -- and as we live and love the world. AMEN

Disclaimer: I did not mean to hit publish so soon. (oops!)

Seeking: Opinions of Dog People

It's spring, spring, spring, even though it SNOWED last night. So it's muddy muddy muddy as well. And, all the little critters are back, too.

To celebrate spring and the absence of huge snow drifts, husband fixed the porch fence so that Scout can run out the back door directly into the yard: but not the street.

But the puppy has been taxing our patience this morning. She discovered a chipmunk or a gopher in one of our gutter spouts when we let her out this morning, and she would not come back in. She HAD to get that animal out of the gutter. Husband moved the gutter spout, but she was then interested in every other gutter spout: there HAS to be an animal in there somewhere.

When I got home from church for lunch, Husband said we had gone on to the Next Level: the small animal had finally vacated the gutter spout, and Scout caught her. I look out the back door, and there she was, tossing it up in the air like a squeaky toy, running around with it in her mouth.

She would not come in.

She would come up near the door, and then, when we opened it, she would run back the other way, toward her catch. Then she would move the animal to another area in the yard.

Finally, I went out to the yard, and called her. I was surprised when she came right to me, and sat in front of me. She let me take her collar and bring her in. (And I wiped off her Extremely Muddy Paws.) I guess those obedience sessions paid off some.

The thing is: the Animal is still out there. If I had time, I'd let her out again, and have her practice coming to me, and letting her go back to the Animal. We could also just go out and find it and just get rid of it. But that might make her more possessive the next time she catches one. Or, we could.... is there another option???

What would you do?

P.S. Disclaimer: the picture is not our yard.

An Old Versus Modern (Postmodern?) Friday Five

Singing Owl from over at Revgalblogpals offers these thoughts and this friday five:

Yesterday I had two separate conversations in which people were musing about how much change is occurring. The WW II generation, of which my mom is a part, went from horse and buggy to automobiles, saw the lessening, or even the end of many diseases, went from widespread use of kerosene lamps and outhouses (in the country, and most folks were rural)) to a totally electrified and plumbed society. The fastest means of communication was a telegraph. The second conversation--gulp--was about MY generation and how much change occurred in the last half of the 20th century. The person said his 13 year old had not seen a vinyl record album until a few days before, couldn't remember a time without cell phones, and on and on.

As for the questions!

1. What modern convenience/invention could you absolutely, positively not live without?

Sadly, there are a lot of modern conveniences that I would be lost without. I can't imagine life without music, so I would be bereft without a CD player of some kind of music player. However, I play the piano and think: hmmm, what if I sat down and made my OWN music more. I don't have a dishwasher (though I would love to have one) so it's not that. And, just in the last year, my computer has become almost indispensable, as I have become connected with more people in a 21st century sort of way.

Another way of looking at the question: how modern? flush toilet, shower and washer and dryer really are indispensable (not just addictive), and my mother can remember not having them, as a girl on the farm.

2. What modern convenience/invention do you wish had never seen the light of day? Why?

I think the cell phone. I actually want one, so it's a little hypocritical, but I also see the downside. One of my pastoral colleagues said a few years back that she refused to get a cell phone because, "there should be some times people CAN'T get ahold of you. You are not the same as God."

3. Do you own a music-playing device older than a CD player? More than one? If so, do you use it (them)?

We still own a turntable, although we never use it. However, our college age stepson uses it, when he comes home. He likes vinyl.

4. Do you find the rapid change in our world exciting, scary, a mix...or something else?

Well, I'm not keeping up. I don't have an ipod, or an iphone, or any or the i things yet. I'm saving up for a laptop and a digital camera. I find it both exciting and scary. I really like how the internet brings us closer: I can't believe the people I had connected with in the last year. I'm also scared by how fast mis-information can spread now, via internet. Faster even than information. And though I am connected with people all over the country on-line, do I lose sight of who is my real community? And is it tempting to invest less in the the people and the communities right here? I don't know the answer, these are questions.

5. What did our forebears have that we have lost and you'd like to regain?

More of a sense of community, and all of the benefits that community brings: support, comfort, encouragement -- and power. It's as we gather together with a vision that we begin to have the power to change the world, our communities, our churches.

Bonus points if you have a suggestion of how to begin that process.

Here's one: call up five people in your community or your congregation and invite them to have coffee or something. Sit down with them for about 40 minutes and listen to their stories -- what makes them tick, where they came from, what they are afraid of, what they dream about. That's the beginning (where can I redeem my points, then?)

Like the Energizer Bunny....

..... last week I just kept going and going, meeting with a young man who wants to be baptized, doing hospice calls, presiding at a funeral, going to community meetings, meeting with a baptismal family, having coffee with parish members, planning Bible studies. I also planned to attend (as always) our Synod Assembly last weekend, where we would introduce our churchwide Book of Faith initiative, a plan to get our congregations more deeply into reading and hearing and discerning God's Word in the Scriptures.

And I kept thinking, hmmm, I have a little sore throat.

And a little cough. But just at night.

But I wasn't sleeping all that well, because of the "little cough".

And on Friday I got sick. Really sick. I had to leave the Synod Assembly and go home. Actually, someone took me home. We went back and picked up my car on Saturday night.

On Sunday I went to church. I did feel much better, having slept and slept and slept. I also Prayed in Color for the first time, and found it a really meditative experience. Maybe I should have stayed home again on Sunday, but I just couldn't bring myself to miss Sunday serivces for the second time in a month. And I really really really wanted to be there for the baptism, for the little red-headed baby who would stare at me for the whole baptism, and whose fingers curled around mine.

After church, we drove out of town to my mother's home town, where several of my relatives still live. Let's just call it "the farm." It's down in southwestern Minnesota where my grandfather farmed, and where one of my uncles and his two sons farm now. Another aunt and uncle live in town, in my grandparent's house. Going there is like going home.

Scout went with us. She rides well. She had never been to the farm before. We haven't gone down there in years. Too busy. And I told my aunt, "I don't want to do anything. I just want to relax." She made hamburger stroganoff for supper.

After supper, she had invited everyone else in from the farms, for cake and ice cream, for my birthday. It was a little surprise.

Just for a little while, I could remember that I'm not the energizer bunny. I'm not. I'm a sinner, and a child of God, and I live by grace, and by God's love for me.

And the occasional cake and ice cream doesn't hurt a bit.