A Son's Letter: Hope Will Win.

Offensive Faith, Alternative Visions.

I preached some version of this text on August 28, 2016.  It's the first time in this particular congregation I've received multiple "I'm Offended" responses.  Jesus received these responses regularly, so I'm in good company.  I stand by what I've preached as being faithful to the text and the ministry of Jesus.  

Luke 14: 1, 7-14

On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the sabbath, they were watching him closely.

When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. “When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, ‘Give this person your place,’ and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” He said also to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”.

The invitations come at least once a month, more often in the late fall and early winter.  They really ramp up in December.  It’s the Gala.  Or the Big Wig Dinner. Or the Lobster Boil… The seats at these dinners start at around $200 – or buy a whole table and bring your friends for just $3000. 

As you enter the venue, you immediately notice the décor:  shiny marble floors, live plants, original art, an extravagant water fountain.  Wait staff take your outer coat in exchange for a ticket.  You are directed to the event.

When you walk into the room, you notice immediately that the host has decked out everything in their very best.  The tables are nicely arranged. Nice china and a striking array of silverware (remember to start at the outside and work your way in). Several glasses of different sizes and shapes are a part of the setting.  Ornate centerpieces decorate each table.

Off to the side there is a table where Champaign is being poured. Anxious but dutiful wait staff carry trays of butlered hors d'oeuvres  (not canapés before dinner).  The social inequality between guests and the wait staff is palpable.

Before dinner, people mill around the room noticing the place cards on each table, -- beautiful people, lovely food. 

Up in front, the raised platform – the Dias where the important and prominent people will be seated on just one side of the rectangular table – this is the mark of influence and status.  The closer you are seated to these important people, the more important you are. 

The program begins and dinner is served.  As the anxious wait staff clear the dishes and pour the coffee, there is some celebratory talk accompanied by polite applause.  There are stories or a video that’s intentionally designed to cause the tension between the heart strings and the wallet to tighten.  And there are pledge cards.

We have the scene of many fundraising situations – the stewardship drive! – Last Sunday's Tea at Plymouth Place, and, today’s gospel story.

Jesus has been invited to the gala hosted by the most prominent of the Pharisees.  Why on earth would Jesus would eat at a Pharisee’s house? They criticized Jesus for blasphemy when he forgave sins, for uncleanness when he ate with sinners!   As dinner begins, the Pharisees watch Jesus carefully. The crowd is anxious to see if he can measure up to this level of social class. 

The table talk is at first polite… who will be the next leader at the village gate? How about that foreigner that took over Eli’s father’s vineyard.  And then it gets awkward.  Jesus speaks. 

“Is it legal to heal on the Sabbath?”

This is not friendly chatter.  This is confrontational.  Jesus is challenging the accepted and cultural interpretation of the Torah.  Then without anyone asking his opinion, Jesus starts to give advice to the other guests about where they should be sitting. And to the host about who should be invited to these parties.  His opinions are contrary to the social conventions of this crowd and show disregard for the tradition. 

Surely you know someone who has thrown this type of fire bomb into a conversation.  And it’s never comfortable.  People who ask questions that shake the status quo are rarely welcome in any setting.  As one person said, “they are arsonists in the hospitality forest^[i].  They delight in watching social situations become conflagrations.”    They don’t get invited back. 

Can you hear the disciples trying to hush Jesus?  “Com’on Jesus, this dinner is hosted by an influential person. He could be tapped to finance this ministry and give it some status in Israel.  Just be friendly, keep your elbows off the table, and politely eat these appetizers – Just fit in!  Be like them so we can benefit from what they have!”

But everyday of living in faith calls us to ask – or be asked – confrontational questions. 

?      Why do Christians attack people who don’t believe as you do?

?      Why is that Christian leader kowtowing to the whims of that political party? 

?      If you follow a person who claims that God is love, why are you not speaking out against hate crimes?

?      Why is the church silent about gun violence, injustices against people of color, degradation of women?

?      Why won’t you deal with your fear of discussing sex and sexuality and stop dehumanizing LGBTQ people?

?      If you worship the God of creation, why are you not doing more to defend the earth from destruction in the name of corporate greed?

Jesus was politely invited to this gala, watches how things are being done, and promptly offers unasked-for advice all the while he knows full well that he is offending every social grace of the day.  He saw how everyone there jockeyed for the best seats near the dais where they can see and be seen by the important people of the day.  He butts into the conversation and offers an alternative reality for those who are driven by status:  Humility. 

“When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host;”

Don’t assume you are the best. Don’t assume you have the only correct vision of reality.  Don’t seek out the recognition of others for your correctness. 

That’s an alternative reality butting against the face of a culture that does not want to hear it.  It’s impolite to raise a different perspective of reality to someone who benefits from the current culture; surely the Pharisees and those present in that dinner party expected to measure Jesus by their culture, their understanding of the world, and their standards of expected behavior.  And that did not include humility.  And it certainly did not include inviting those of lesser social status to a meal!

We too face this dilemma.  Our cultural system is at its core in favor of the dominance of EuroAmerican, white, English speaking, “Christian” power structures.  We live in a culture that is as resistant to changes in this structure as the Pharisees were in their day – after all, it favors us, it shapes us, it therefore reflects us.

In Waking Up White, Debby Irving relates a story. 

My family believed that if you don’t have anything nice to say, you don’t say anything at all.  The resulting behavior showed up as silence or swift change of topic in mid-conversation.  People who “pushed” the conversation were thought of as poorly raised and ignorant.  By being socialized not to seek out or listen to perspectives that might conflict with mine set me up to shut out or shut down the experiences of people of color as told by people of color.  Meanwhile, throughout my life the image of happy, thriving white people set against struggling people of color repeated itself in books and media.  The imbalance fed and fed again my misinterpretation of what as normal and superior.”^[ii]

Indeed, Jesus is now seen by the host and the religious leaders as poorly raised and ignorant.  They too were socialized to NOT listen to perspectives that conflict with their own – to shut down the experiences and perspectives of people different from their own.  And, having been raised in that culture, they had grown to see it as normal and superior.

And we are in the same boat when it comes to our innate White Privilege.

In August 9^th’s Christian Century, William Lamar puts it this way:

{Humility} is a profoundly un-American impulse. 

I'm going to interrupt this quote.  In using the term "American," Lamar is showing ethocentricity. America goes from Canada to Argentina. We are Americans, but so are Mexicans and Brazilians and Canadians. It is less ethnocentric to say USAmerican. To say we're American and Mexicans are not is an over extension of our nationalism. So I'm going to edit this quote as I read it.  

This nation is not humble. USAmericans assume that USAmerican political, economic, and foreign policy prescriptions will fix a world much older and often much wiser. Many USAmerican churches—which often seem more USAmerican than Christian—lack humility as well. Chauvinism animated their theological forebears to take the faith of the wrongfully convicted Executed One and use it as a tool for plunder. A similar chauvinism is evident in their own dog-whistling around Muslims, immigrants, sexual minorities, and black and brown people. God knows USAmerica and many of her churches need Jesus’s unsolicited advice.^[iii]

Why does Jesus have to stir up trouble? Why does he criticize people who invite him into their homes? Why can’t Jesus leave a pleasant enough dinner party well enough alone? It is because Jesus understands what is at stake. For him, the reality is that the rectangular table around which the culture of the Pharisees have created their culture excludes the very children of God that they were called to center their life and ministry upon.  The reality of a cultural system that by its very nature elevates some and excludes others is unjust and does not reflect the realm of God. In the culture of God’s realm, there is no need to jockey for position, because all are equally welcome. There are no throwaways when it comes to human beings. Christians are to honor the least among us—the poor and marginalized. The very culture that the Pharisees created -- and that then defined reality for them and their identities -- seeks to exclude those who don’t fit into the created culture. 

Jesus spoke a different reality, gave unsolicited advice on how to turn the dominate culture into God’s preferred reality.  Of course it wasn’t heard with open ears – too much was at stake!  Of course it was not practical – because rationality is based upon the culture from which it is derived.  Jesus turns the reality of the Pharisees on its head.  For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.

Rev. LaMar writes,

We need the imagination to see beyond what exists. We are not called to be practical. We are called to be the vanguard of a new world, a world where humility is the means of exaltation and quid pro quo is replaced by sola gratis.^[iv]

As disciples of Jesus of Nazareth, we are commanded to examine carefully the culture we call “normal.”  We are commanded to seek out, listen to, and seek to understand the narratives of those who have a different perspective, a different experience of reality, a different identity – and to reconcile our “normal” with the vision of God’s round table.  

Ask the questions:

?      Why do we attack people who don’t believe as you do?

?      Why do we kowtow to the whims of this or that political party? 

?      If we follow a person who claims that God is love, why are we not speaking out against hate crimes?

?      Why are we silent about gun violence, injustices against people of color, degradation of women?

?      Why don’t we deal with our fear of discussing sex and sexuality and stop dehumanizing LGBTQ people?

?      Why are we not doing more to defend the earth from destruction in the name of corporate greed?

?      Why are we acting as legs to hold up a rectangular table instead of welcoming all to God’s Round Table?

Our General Minister John Dorhauer put this more explicitly.  Look at the back of your bulletin.  Read. Imagine.  Be the Church.
(Posted as Graphic below the endnotes)

---

[i] Source unknown, possibly David Lose.

[ii] Debby Irving, Walking Up White: Finding Myself In the Story of Race,  Cambridge MA:  Elephant Room Press, 2014;  p65.

[iii] William H. LaMar IV, LIVING BY THE WORD  August 28, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Christian Century, Aug 09, 2016, accessed online: http://www.christiancentury.org/article/2016-07/august-28-22nd-sunday-ordinary-time

[iv] Ibid

Nydan dell' Amore Vero Sather, 9 years, 7 months.

Nydan dell' Amore Vero was born January 25, 2007, Sugarbear of EC Leonardo Rosa Glauca CZ  (European Champion) and GIC Annamaria dell' Amore Vero Grand Champion in the home of Drazenka Jurisic in Greece as part of the 7th litter of dell' Amore Vero Breeders of fine Russian Blues.  He was the sire of numerous champion Russian Blue litters under the care of Big Creek Cattery in Kansas City, Missouri USA  until retirement in January, 2011.

In early 2012, Nydan became Royal Owner of one Judy Sather of Waverly Ohio. His daily routine included awakening Judy each morning, rearranging Judy's coif, riding on the seat of the walker, being dutifully swathed in human arms, and taking numerous naps upon the throne of a warm lap.  He loved his human subject dearly and brought great joy to Judy and all who met him.

Nydan will be remembered as one who welcomed all human subjects to his palace, warmly embraced all who scritched his ears, entertained the avian masses who visited his feeders, and dutifully watched for invaders from under the refrigerator.

After several years of persevering through illness, and with the good care and love of his human Judy, Nydan is now free from his suffering. Nydan’s beautiful personality, his loyalty, and his charm will be painfully missed. We love you Nydan and because of your love, we have known even more joy. Thank you Nydan, Sugarbear, sweet Russian Blue. We will miss you.

Kick, Stroke, Breathe, Change Direction

I can find any number of distractions from getting certain things done.  I sat down to write this  column…. oh look, my desk needs to be cleaned off.  Oh, I need to call so and so about visiting next week.  Oh, I need to complete such and such before that meeting next week. Oh, another email just arrived – I wonder if so and so responded to my question.  Did I make that change in next week’s worship bulletin?  Did I get those plans done for the Women’s Retreat?  Oh my, there’s a text message from Dan saying he’s left his office and will be home in an hour…oh my, how did it get to be 5:30 already.  What did I get done today?!

I’m not always a procrastinator; I primarily put off things that I’m not certain about.  I’m at the gym and swimming by 5:30 every morning.  I’m confident about my ability to swim laps while pacing my breathing, knowing to watch ahead of me so I can flip over at the end of the pool to change direction.  I know when I need to swim on my back so I can slow down my breathing and let my heart rest a bit.  I instinctively know when my 45 minutes of pool time is over and it’s time to move on with the day. I have a solid handle on the pace of this routine: kick, stroke, breathe, kick, stroke, breathe, kick stroke, breathe, change direction, kick, stroke, breathe.

Once I’m out of my routine, outside my comfort zone, or creating a new pattern, I struggle to focus and be productive. Patterns and routines help us to stay on task, to work toward the visions and goals we’ve set.  Kick, stroke, breathe, kick, stroke, breathe, kick stroke, breathe, change direction, kick, stroke, breathe. The pattern keeps me moving forward through the water and through time toward the end goal.

What are your thoughts about the future?  Have you ever wondered what your life will be like in 5 years? Ten years?  Twenty-Five years?  It’s difficult to make plans when we don’t know what else will be happening in the world around us.  Yet each of us has an idea of what we’d like to happen.  We have hopes, dreams, and often a vision for the future.  What are the patterns we need to develop to get there?  Are we kicking toward the future, or putting it off, distracted by this moments whims?  Are we taking time to breathe in God’s Spirit so we can regain our sense of direction and re-orient ourselves toward the goal?  Are we making strokes that are productively moving us or just waving our arms? 

Kick, stroke, breathe, kick, stroke, breathe, change direction, kick, stroke, breathe.

In our congregation, we’ve worked through the basics of swimming in these unknown waters of the 21^st Century: the Alban Plan has filled the pool with hopeful waters and provided excellent orientation and direction; our staff, leadership, and ministry teams are working together to make efficient strokes that propel us forward to the goals of healthy, life-giving ministries that move us to be the voices for grace-filled justice and extravagant love; engaging opportunities to nurture and grow faith; and a plan for a self-sustaining building so that our resources can be put into reaching out to others.  And worship offers us the breath and revitalization to nourish our bodies and rest our souls.

Kick, stroke, breathe, kick, stroke, breathe, change direction, kick, stroke, breathe.

Wait, change direction?  The future of Christianity requires us to keep swimming and constantly change direction. We will need to take our heads out of the water, look around to see where we are, take a deep breath, and redirect ourselves toward God’s future so we don’t knock our heads against the wall. If we don’t take time to breathe in God’s Spirit, we will drown in these moving waters. We need to lift our heads above the surface and breathe deeply of God’s life-giving Spirit so that we have the energy to turn ourselves around again and again. 

Kick, stroke, breathe, kick, stroke, breathe, change direction, kick, stroke, breathe.

In the heat of this August day, I invite you to take the plunge with me.  Let’s move back into the waters of growing faith – Accepting All, Reaching Out, and Touching Lives – breathing in God’s guidance as we go.

The Fluid of Life

So it has begun.  I walked into the lab and they took all the information they would take if I were donating blood.  In fact, except that some people were receiving liquids via their veins, it looks like any blood bank set-up to me.   

There were the usual "blood donation questions:   have I been out of the country and to where, have I been "around" any people with HIV/AIDS or Hepatitis, how much water I'd had in the last 24 hours and if I had taken the prescribed aspirin, and which arm would I prefer the needle go into.  As I climbed up on the bench/recliner, I thought of the many times I'd given blood and asked myself if this could be any different. 

Somewhere in my dresser, I have a 10 gallon blood donation pin from the Red Cross.  But it has been over 13 years since I've given blood.  I remember that last time: it was in Mount Airy, Maryland at the gym where we were members.  We'd joined the gym not only for the health benefits, but because it was a great place to network as part of our planting a new church.  I was the last pint of the day.  In those days, they pricked the finger and used a pipette to gather the precious drops and placed them into a test tube of blue liquid to watch the rate at which they descended to the bottom.  If it moved fast enough, your iron count was sufficient and you could give blood.   Mine dropped like a lead balloon -- as it always had.  Looking back, that was evidence of what is now a marked reality: I had too much iron in my blood.  Six months later, I had a heart attack.  Yet another bit of evidence of what is now reality:  When the fluid of life contains too much of a good thing -- Iron overload -- the heart, pancreas, and liver try to hoard it and cause life threatening problems. Heart medications brought an end to my donation days which in turned added to my system hoarding the iron and causing further problems. 

Looks like a Donation setup.

The lab tech made small talk as he scrubbed my arm.  "Just a small pinch."  The needle was in place and the "phlebotomy" was underway.  That's such a strange word: from the Greek roots for vein cutting.  In other parts of the world, it's called "venesection" from the Latin roots of the same words.  Both feel like misnomers to me.  What they are doing involves cutting the vein, but only to extract its contents: iron rich fluid of life.

I'd never had any issues with blood donation. I was always on and off the table in less than 15  minutes. It seemed my blood was anxious to leave my body and move on to give life to someone else.  But not this time.  Despite my faithfully pumping that sponge ball, the blood was slow to descend to the collection unit.  Formerly bright red, it now has a brown tinge to it.  My veins are filled with the mud of irony existence.  Like my "older" body, the substance of life is slow to move, harder to bring into new possibilities.  I drank 2 quarts of water while pumping the sponge ball in the hope that more liquid will help move it along; it only increased my need to get off the table.  Adding to the urgency, I was nauseous and had a pounding headache. 

After an hour of trying to reach to goal of 750 ml, the technician said it is time to give up; next time will go better.  Ironically, when he removed the needle, we had a difficult time getting the vein to stop bleeding.

I set up another appointment for a week later. I sat in their waiting area drinking water and snacking on a bag of salty corn chips.  I hoped I would feel better in time to make dinner at home.  I did my best to make a healthy supper for the two of us.  Then I collapsed into my recliner and struggled to stay awake through the evening's television shows.  

And so it begins, this journey toward "management" of my hemochromatosis, a chronic blood disorder.  I wish I could say I feel better already.  I can't.  I'm tired.  My brain, while having moments of clarity, feels like there's a haze of thick fog between my present and my objectives.  When the haze does lift, I'm overwhelmed by the need to accomplish everything only to have the haze fall deeply and thickly again.  

I long for the day when I will have the energy to climb to the third floor of the house and work on my wood projects, when I will feel like I can go to the gym and still make it through the rest of the day, when I will again see musical notation and hear it in my head, when I will have a long enough moment of clarity to write a thought provoking article or sermon.  

But for now, these are the goals toward which I journey. For now, I can just place one foot in front of the other and make progress in that general direction.  For now, I will lean upon those who journey with me in love, who help to lighten my load, and who are my fluid of life:  Love.   

 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

Swimming Out of the Mud

I exist in the bottom of the gene pool.  That’s the standing joke in my family.  Being the youngest of 10 children, and born when my parents were beyond their prime child bearing years, I’ve had more than my share of health issues.  I’m the one who had sensitive skin and had to have all my clothes doubly rinsed lest I break out in rashes; I was allergic to soap!  I’m the one allergic to bee stings. I’m the one that dislocated not one but both shoulders and elbows as a toddler.  I’m the one who had a major case of chicken pox in my 30’s, a heart attack in my 40’s, and TIA’s in my 50’s.  I seemed to have inherited all the weakest of genes.  I am the mud at the bottom of the family gene pool.  And it has struck again.

A bit of back ground:  When you inherit a recessive gene, it generally causes little to no harm because it is recessive.  It is when you inherit two recessive versions of the same gene that the mutation becomes active.

One exception to this is the HFE gene.  This is the bit of chromosomal matter that controls the way the body absorbs iron in the liver.  There are two common mutations, C282Y and H63D, and one less common mutation, S65C.  Any of these in singular allele has a 50/50 chance of interrupting the body's control of iron absorption and causing iron overload – the body absorbs more iron from food than it needs and keeps absorbing it and storing it in the vital organs.  Double alleles of these, or a combination of any two of these mutation will cause iron overload eventually.  Iron overload will lead to organ damage, particularly liver damage, pancreatitis, and heart disease. 

Lucky me, I have one C282Y allele, and one S65C; only I did not know anything about it.  I’d never heard of hemochromatosis until my oldest son called and asked me about it about 2 years ago.  His iron counts were high and genetic testing showed that he had one allele for the mutation.  Luckily, this has not led to major symptoms for him.  Forgetting that I’m the bottom of the gene pool, I assumed it must have come from his father’s side of the family.  I was wrong.

I've been sick on an off for about 6 months; it’s been such a variety of things that seemed so unrelated: a recurring infection, a few headaches, general malaise.  Since Christmas, however, I've been exhausted and weak. Initially, blood work showed my liver enzymes to be very high.  Further tests have confirmed that my ferritin levels are also high.  And scans show that I have non-alcoholic cirrhosis and diminished liver function.  The genetic tests were the dots on the ‘i’s and crossing of the ‘t’s:  I have active classic hemochromatosis.  Hemochromatosis is the single most common genetic disorder (it is not a disease!) which afflicts 1 in 300 in North America.   I might go play the lottery with these odds!

At this point, the treatment is twofold: a regimen of phlebotomies (blood letting) with the goal of removing accumulated ferritin to bring my counts within the normal range; and a restricted diet that limits high iron foods and foods that increase the absorption of iron while increasing the foods/spices that inhibit absorption. This is a very manageable condition once it's under control.  Once the ferritin levels are down, careful diet and giving blood 4 times a year may take care of it.

In the meantime, while those levels are working their way down with each bloodletting session (phlebotomy), I remain tired. I’m sleeping up to 16 hours a day.  I can’t get through the day without a mid day nap.  And I’m completely done in by 9 each evening even with a nap.  I have no choice but to slow down, stop more often, and take better care of myself.

I'm sick. I will get better. I have to change my life style.  And it's because of this dang-blasted lousy gene pool.  And the mud I got from the bottom of it. 

Here’s the end of my mud bath.  I refuse to roll over and play dead.  I’m getting up and moving on through this thing.  What ever it takes.  

Show Me The Way, part 2

Confession:  Today I just don't feel like doing anything.  I have little energy, next to no enthusiasm, and a whole lot of questions.  I'm overly distracted by the things that are not at my desk:  the thoughts and distractions arising from earlier conversations; the news that came from a telephone call earlier; the wind that nearly blew me over as I walked to and from the store earlier, the bright blue sky and the billowing clouds outside my window.  What I'd really like to do is go home and crawl into bed and sleep the rest of the day away.  But of course, I can't.  I've got a sermon to write, a report overdue to the church leaders, and a stack of notes that require follow up.  So here I sit. And stare.  And babble.

Ash Wednesday

Fleeting Bits of Melting Beauty

Seven of the eight of my office windows have 24 panes of glass separated by (metal of some kind) strips; the remaining has just 18 panes because of a permanently installed air conditioner. 

Of these 168 panes of glass, each was covered in frost when I arrived this morning. The patterns of the frost were different in each pane, yet each was beautiful and together they were as stunning as any stained glass. 

Slowly, as the sun rises higher in the sky, those panes in the east windows are melting; the sound of the crinkling ice is ever so slight, but noticeable in the otherwise silent building. 

So it is with God's voice in the midst of these frightful days. Barely noticeably the Realm of God crinkles into our midst like a fleeting bit of melting beauty. 

The Light of hope, shalom, grace, and extravagant love changes us too. 

The ice may be the result of the bitter cold. But the light still shines upon each of us and warms our souls.

Please, Show me the Way to the Light, Peace, and Hope

This morning, I climbed on the elliptical cross trainer at the gym and pressed “genius play” on my ancient iPod Nano.  I set the resistance on the machine and my feet began the familiar motions.  As I check my speed and pace my breathing, Queen’s 1980 hit starting rocking in my ears:

Are you ready? Hey are you ready for this?
Are you hanging on the edge of your seat?
....And another one bites the dust.  Another one bites the dust.

What kind of sardonic humor infers that a song about a violent death by guns is motivation for working out?  Perhaps the rhythm; perhaps the strong bass beating.  I try to shrug it off by thinking about the calories that are biting the dust as I sweat on this ghastly machine.  But on the silent televisions in front of me, reports of a gun violence and the deaths of young people fill the screens. 

Another one bites the dust.  Another one bites the dust.

The screens now show President Obama crying about children lost to violence.  The faces of children and teenagers who have been murdered by guns flash by; the faces of police officers and others who have died by the gun.  My mind wanders to the long list of names of the sons and daughters who have died by violence in our own city. When I look up, a report of yet another execution by Isis and then several by an Arab nation is on the television.  I’m reminded of those whose lives have ended on our own death rows. When will it ever end?

Another one bites the dust.  Another one bites the dust.

From dust we have come and to dust we shall return.  Each of us is made of the dust of the stars and each breathes the air once in the lungs of the ancients.  Each of us is a child of God who is loved no matter what, precious in God’s sight.

 

And yet our world seemingly has no regard for the sanctity of God’s children’s breath.

I glance at the cross trainer and see that I’ve gone a mile in under 9 minutes; my heart rate is well above the target.  I’m gripping the handles firmly as I slow my pace.  As if by cue, my ancient technology has cross faded into another song. Styx is playing:

And I feel this empty place inside so afraid that I’ve lost my faith

Show me the way, show me the way,

Take me tonight to the river and wash my illusions away

Please show me the way.

I close my eyes and breath.  I remember hearing this for the first time as our country prepared to enter Iraq in Dessert Shield in 1991.  The lyrics are a father’s response to his son’s struggle to accept his father’s Christian faith when we live in a world so filled with hatred; the song is a prayer for direction in the midst of hopelessness.   The six eight time of the ballad melody complicates my keeping tempo with my feet on the machine.  But I peddle on.

And as I slowly drift to sleep, for a moment dreams are sacred
I close my eyes and know there's peace in a world so filled with hatred
Then I wake up each morning and turn on the news to find we've so far to go
And I keep on hoping for a sign, so afraid I just won't know

The television screens have moved on to the weather, traffic, and commercials for a competing gym. The elliptical screen says I’ve gone nearly 2 miles in the 18 minutes.  And yet I’m still in exactly the same spot in which I began.  I’ve only been spinning the wheels and not moving forward.  The sweat on my brow is not evidence of progress as much as it is energy burned fuming over that which should not be, things I claim to be helpless to change. 

But in a moment of clarity, or perhaps oxygen deprivation, I realize that today is the first day of Epiphany, the season of light. No longer Christmastide, the days are lengthening, and the celebration of the Sages navigation to the Christ child by the light of a star has begun.  

There is light; there is hope; there is justice within our future.  Styx is still singing:

And if I see your light, should I believe
Tell me how will I know

Show me the way, show me the way
Give me the strength and the courage
To believe that I'll get there someday
And please show me the way

The strength and courage to get there someday will not come from spinning our wheels.  God depends upon us to turn the wheels of change and bring in the realm of God’s peace, justice, and mercy through extravagant love poured out for all God’s children.  God is showing us the way.  God is speaking to us through the songs on the radio, the voices of children in the streets, and in the quiet of the funeral parlor.  God is calling us to action.

Church, it’s time to turn the dust of our inactivity into the breath of God’s Realm. 

Let’s make this new year be one of Faith in Action.  Let’s take off our treadmills and start the journey toward God’s Shalom.