The water was still there

The boat was still almost full of water.

After the storm stopped, I mean.

The waves had been high, the wind had been strong.
It would have been loud.
It would have been rough.
It would have been terrifying.

There were guys on the boat who bought more boats than they ever sailed. Matthew was far better at collecting taxes than tacking into the wind. But there were guys on the boat who knew wind, who knew waves, who knew what to do to do when everyone else turned green.

And they couldn’t do anything.

The wind and the waves were so bad that the best were baffled.

So they told God that he was trying to kill them. That he was clueless. That he was out of touch with what was happening to them That he didn’t understand anything about what is was like to live down here. That he didn’t care.

They told him that to his face.
Because he was sleeping in the back of the boat.
Their boat.

The boat that was almost full of water.

And so he said, “Peace. Be still.”
Not to them.
To the wind.
To the lake water pouring over the side of the boat.

To them he said, “So how come you don’t trust me yet?”

And, of course, he had a good point. He was, after all, sitting in the boat that was almost full of water. If it had gone down, if they had gone down, he would have gone down. And they had discussed the fact from time to time that he could do amazing tricks. Like making people live.

But it’s easy to think miracles cool and trust obvious when you aren’t up to your hips in water in a boat that is almost full of water.

So the wind stopped. And the waves stopped. And the silence pressed against their ears. And the immensity of authority pressed against their hearts.

And the boat was still almost full of water. .

Sometimes, without a reminder that it really happened, disciples forget the storm.And think they weren’t all that scared. And leave a tip for the miracle-worker on the table on the way out.

But when you have to row a boat full of water to the other side of the lake (because Someone stopped the wind), you tend to remember the danger you were in. And maybe, just maybe, you ask him how he did that.

And if he can make waves of fear stop, too.

————

From the book of Mark, the end of chapter four.

it is not what you think

“If you read the Bible, it will mess with your theology.”
Pastor Bill Lepley,
Grabill Missionary Church
September 28, 2008

That showed up early in the sermon last Sunday. Hope and I looked at each other. Hope and Nancy and I all wrote it down.

Theology is, most simply,  the study of God. We all have a theology, an understanding of God, or at least of god.. We’re formed this understanding through study and conversation and life. We’ve arrived at it through good and lousy experiences, through odd people, through responses to and reactions against.

I want to narrow the discussion for a bit. If our theology talks at all about the God that is identified in the Bible, then we have arrived at several conclusions in our theology. We may say that we don’t believe in that God. We may say that we believe that God to be a certain way (loving, violent, distant, personal, arbitrary, confusing). We may say that we believe completely in that God.

Whatever our theology, it is likely that reading the Bible will be remarkably disruptive. Many of us have sampled, and form our conclusions on the sampling. Many of us have heard things second hand. Many of us have read as if a list of rules or boring essay.

But what if it is actually a collection of love letters? What if it is actually a collection of stories? What if it is actually a Story still being written?

What if…I actually read it?

conversation at twelve

She went to Meijer at midnight.
Or to Kroger or A&P
or whatever grocery store is open long after most people do their shopping.

It was a small town,
everyone knew everyone.
Everyone knew everything.
About everyone.

That’s why she went to Meijer at midnight.
Because she didn’t need everyone
who knew everything
about everyone
looking at her.

The women, with fierce defensive eyes,
clutching their husbands’ arms with quick tight fingers.
The men, wary and wondering.

First was fun at first but then not so much.
(She knew them by their numbers, her husbands)
Second was a fresh start, but physical.
Third, fourth, fifth.
No wonder no one talked.
No wonder everyone talked.

But she didn’t care.
Anymore.
About anything.

So she never found value
and she never found hope
and she never found her.

And she came for groceries and bottled water
in the middle of the night.

And then a man walked up and asked her for a bottle of water.
Complete stranger.
In the wrong part of town.

His kind kept to themselves,
didn’t care about the equal part of
separate but equal.

His kind wouldn’t take a second glance,
would look askance
wouldn’t take a chance
on anything touched by
her kind.

And the man walked up and asked her for a bottle of water.

She told him what she thought,
that he was mocking her.

She wouldn’t have,
not in a crowd,
but with no one around
really old music playing
in the middle of the night,
she felt free enough to challenge him.

After all, he was taking all the risk in talking to her.

He talked to her.
He asked her for help.
He offered her healing.

And she told everyone to come and meet him.
The one who listened to her.

And told her everything she had ever done.

details

Back from vacation, facing a challenge.

“How was your trip?” That’s what everyone wants to know.

Well, not everyone. Some people couldn’t care less about our trip. They wish they could have a vacation, wish they could go somewhere, wish they could just fly off.

But other people want to know about our trip. They want details. They want to know whether we saw what they would see. They want to know whether we did what they would do. They want the story to be the story that would be the way they would tell it.

So what do we tell them? What parts matter to the person asking?

It’s challenging to know where to start. You see, we were gone from Thursday morning until Monday evening.

• There are stories about travel: the delayed flight. The bumpy flight. The queasy flight. The Mustang convertible (free upgrade).
• There are the stories about geography. The coast. The lighthouse. The state park. The trails and trees. The beach late at night and in the morning
• There are stories about food. The pizza Thursday night. Friday night. Saturday night. Monday lunch. Different every time. Oh yeah…and the steak. And cuppa pie. And the subtext of vegetable avoidance.
• There are stories about relationship. Three guys getting meat in a convertible with the top down listening to NPR. Talking late into the night.
• There are stories of children. Trying to get attention. Throwing up. In a store. Climbing everywhere. Avoiding poison ivy.
• There are stories of flora. Ladyslippers. Bleeding hearts. Trillium. and even moss (pictured).
• There are stories of stories.

It would take more than 5 days to write all the details of touch and taste and sound and sight, of voices and glances and expressions. And it would take weeks and pages to capture the different perspectives and the unanswered questions. And if we take it to the level of the moss, to detail that is the size of a matchstick head, we will be here forever, trying to describe what happened.

Recently, a friend said, “We don’t have many details in the Bible do we?” And I realized that it’s true. There are huge gaps. But then I read what John writes about his book, the gospel of John:

And there are also many other things which Jesus did, which if they were written in detail, I suppose that even the world itself would not contain the books that would be written.

And it suddenly made sense why we don’t have very many specifics about the sound of his voice or the kinds of things he built or all the jokes he told or all the miracles he did or why Mary Magdalene cared about him so much. All of those are things that we would love to know, that would round out our picture of him. We would love the details.But we don’t get them. Because if a five day trip takes weeks to describe, then a life would take, well, forever.

We only get enough detail for John to do what he wanted to do. And here’s what he said he wanted to do:

Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.

The gospels are selective history of Jesus, just like every conversation with me is selective history. Not because I’m trying to hide anything, necessarily, but because there is so much detail available and so little time to talk that I have to filter.

And so the mental frame for us in reading John is, does the detail we have tell the story he’s trying to tell?

It’s a great question.

Want some pizza and decaf?

be still. again.

So Jesus is a great trainer. He teaches and heals people and tells demons to get out of people and spends a bunch of time on a comparatively small group. Twelve of these are a core group, are the main team. One day He sends these twelve out in pairs to go to the towns of Israel and tell them that the kingdom of God is at hand. He also tells them that they will be able to do the things He’s been doing.

So they go. And they do. Miracles, I mean. They actually do miracles. So they come back to Jesus and they say, “It works! It was amazing!” and He takes them across the lake to a solitary place, to get away for awhile from the trip.

He understands at that moment that they need to get away at catch their breath before the adrenaline crashes because, well, because He just heard what happens to people who are at odds with how “religion is supposed to work.” He just got the news that His relative John was killed by Herod in a pretty random way.

So they go across the water and get to the solitary place where there are, well, 15,000 people. It was solitary until word got out that Jesus was holding a spiritual retreat for a few of His closest friends. And Jesus goes ahead and talks to the whole group because He has compassion on them because they, these 15,000 people who are scattered across the hills, look a lot like sheep without a shepherd.

So at the end of the day, when everyone realizes that no one packed much food, Jesus feeds them. Actually, the disciples feed everyone as they start passing out food and passing and passing. Actually, Jesus says, “feed them” and the disciples say, “with what?” and Jesus says, “what do you have? and they say, “5 biscuits and two smelt.” and Jesus says, “thank you Father for this food” and breaks it into about 12 portions and they start passing and passing and passing. They end up with 12 baskets…one for each disciple.

So Jesus puts them back on the boat and dismisses the crowd and finally gets to spend some time with His Dad. And the disciples go out on the lake and the wind is strong and they can’t get far and then Jesus comes walking on the water. And they’re afraid and He tells them to relax and Peter says, “Okay, if it’s you tell me to come” and Jesus does and Peter does…and then Peter realizes he’s walking on water and get scared and goes down and Jesus grabs him and they get into the boat and the wind stops…so they can get to shore.

And they get to shore and a bunch of people show up and Jesus starts the healing again. And a few days later, after feeding another 4,000 people and talking with a bunch of Pharisees and all, they are back on the boat. And Jesus says, “beware the yeast of the Pharisees.” and the disciples say, “He’s saying we should have brought more food on the trip.” and Jesus says, “I have fed, like, 25,000 people on 12 biscuits and some smelt. If we need food, I can make food. Beware the yeast of the Pharisees.”

So here’s my question. Did Jesus know that there would be 15,012 people on His so-called solitary retreat?

Because if He did, it means that sometimes to find Him, to have time with Him, to be in His presence, we don’t have to be alone. In fact, He set a model of teaching His disciples about ministry recovery in the middle of a huge crowd.

In fact, he said to them, in essence, for at least today you don’t get to be alone with me as a destination. Their alone time was in the boat on the way over. And what He needed to teach them was that He could provide rest, food, wind stopping, healing, in the middle of life being lived.

Jesus did spend time with the Father that night. It was core to His existence as God. And we need to seek time with God, of that I am sure. But as I am struggling this week to understand stillness, I’m wrestling with the truth that maybe it is more a gift than a goal. And I’m faced with the reality that I can’t do theology for everyone if I am rooting it in or basing it on my own personality.

Clearly a work in process, if not in progress. Me, I mean.

Technorati Tags: jesus rest sabbath solitude

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Malachi: someone else’s words.

I was mildly annoyed last night since I had said a week ago that I would be commenting on the study I’m doing on the book of Malachi. I had done nothing. So I kind of decided that it was one more thing that I thought was a good idea but couldn’t quite follow up with. (I know, preposition. Deal with it.)

But then I read this, a response to today’s lesson, a comment which is far from summary, more a improvisation on the same theme, a picking up of the same melody line I was chasing and drawing out a marvelous line. And, it’s far better than I could post in my current state.

And so, my original, unstated, dream came true: that by talking about this book of Malachi while teaching, we could have conversation in this way as well.

So read this by Laurie.

And thanks.

technorati tags:malachi, community2.0

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Malachi. A love letter

I start teaching a class at church in the morning to a group of people in the middle part of life. (How’s that for diplomatic?) The youngest child of a person in the class is 4, the oldest are well into life on their own. There are several very young grandparents in the class.

Our topic? The Old Testament book of Malachi, the last book in the Old Testament. It is often overlooked, has no big label, isn’t known for a famous author. We’re going to take about five weeks on this book.

So why am I talking about it here? Because I’m going to occasionally talk about it here over the next few weeks and I figured I’d give fair warning. I’ll label these posts in the title.

What’s really interesting to me about this book is its style. It is a conversation of sorts, between God and some of the people called by his name. There are 7 times in this book where we read God saying, “I say this, but you say, ‘when did we ever…’”

It’s a style that is consistent with conversations heard in any house with a parent and a teenager. The parent points out a behavior. With a whiny voice the teen responds, “But Da-ud (two syllables), when did I do that?” And then the dad patiently explains what the problem is.

We don’t expect that kind of conversation with God. Except that we often live with that kind of conversation, unwilling to listen, unwilling to consider that God might have a point.

But perhaps the most unexpected thing is that the conversation starting with God saying, “I have loved you.” And then, after Judah says, “But how have you loved us”, we read about how a nation gets destroyed.

Somehow that doesn’t sound like love. But think about a husband who really loves his wife. I mean a lot. For a long time. And someone stood by while she was assaulted and kidnapped. And laughed. And taunted. What would we think if that husband just shrugged his shoulders and said, “whatever.” Wouldn’t we expect–even in our enlightened, calm, deliberative age–wouldn’t we expect that husband to be pretty ballistic?

God is that husband.

Oh.

technorati tags:malachi, love, teaching, bible, levite

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It’s all my fault

I love to take the blame for everything. It’s a joke around our office that if things are messed up, it must be Jon. Unfortunately, I think that for people like me, people who are blame takers, we like being argumentative martyrs because we get affirmation. By throwing ourselves on the grenade of blame, people will say, “It’s not all you” and what responsibility IS ours will also get muted.

The other night, I realized just now wrong that strategy is when Ben said, “to obey is better than sacrifice.” It’s a phrase from a Bible story. The king has been waiting and waiting for the prophet to show put to offer a sacrifice. The king, Saul, decides not to wait. As the stuff is on the altar, Samuel, the prophet, shows up. Saul defends himself by saying that this is for God, and so it should be okay. Samuel says although sacrificing is good, obeying is even better.

Giving people what they want in a relationship is important. Buying flowers for your spouse is nice, but if what she wants is to talk with you, the most expensive bunch of flowers, the sacrifice, is offensive.

My big dramatic confessions–”it’s my fault”–are wrong. They are a faulty sacrifice. They divert attention from the real situation which needs attention. There may be a system problem, and I make it personal. There may be an actual failure in someone else, and I take the attention away from the correction and redirection they need. There may be a shared responsibility and I make it difficult to work together to solve the problem by making it be my fault.

Whether we are trying to build a relationship with God, with a team, with a loved one, with an enemy, giving them what they want rather than what costs us a lot is the best solution. To obey, to pay attention to the other person, is better than sacrifice, calling attention to ourselves.

technorati tags:relationship, sacrifice, team, selfmanagement

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Confession

I confess that I live in two worlds. One is the world which says, “I have come that you may have life and have it more abundantly.” The other is the world which says, “If I’m late to this meeting, they will be upset with me. What if I don’t know the answer to that question. That’s not done? I’m in trouble now.”

I suppose this is just revealing the script that is running in my head, and that script, perhaps, just needs to be changed. That’s what some counselors would suggest anyway. They, of course, would be working on the stuff in my head without necessarily having anything to say about the words that are outside my head.

I could use some kind of shorthand and call them “spiritual/secular” or “ideal/real” or God/human” but I’m not comfortable doing that kind of dichotomizing. Somehow, there has to be a connection between the big stuff that Jesus says and the level of human interaction.

Into this ongoing struggle that I am having came a little beam of light this week. I subscribe to a list called Daily Manna, that sends me 3-4 verses every day. A couple days ago, I read, “This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together
with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the
promise in Christ Jesus.” So Paul is talking about some big mystery that he is called to proclaim, and the mystery is that people who hate each other with a gut-level, from generation-to-generation, to the death kind of hatred, those kind of people will belong together. I’m reading this at the same time the news is talking about the ratcheting up of conflict in Israel.

So maybe, the practicality of the mystery is that people who hate each other can, with a common ground in Jesus, overcome that hatred. That I can imagine on a daily basis. I can imagine a couple people starting to get along because of forgiving each other and the history.

I’m still working on the abundant life part when dealing with some of the computer issues I have to solve, but reconciliation between enemies, that’s a pretty cool sample of there only being one world…as long as it somehow includes Jesus.

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Working on teaching

I’m teaching this week, and have been asking people what to teach about. What i’ve heard from a couple of people has been talking about intimacy with God. I wonder whether connecting that with the prayer for china…or prayer for anyone or anything would work. How can we get to intimacy and in that context, make our requests known. Asking, for example, that those in china can know the tenderness we know. Asking that the believers there will have strength in the inner man. Perhaps our role in their battle is to be intercessors, following the request of Paul at the end of Ephesians.

But what if we thought about how that kind of intercession is rooted in understanding that God is our Father, and we are asking Dad to take care of our sibling.

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