“Most of Us Can Read the Writing on the Wall; We Just Assume It's Addressed to Someone Else --Ivern Ball

Once there was a group of people who surveyed the resources of the world and said to each other, "How can we be sure that we have enough in hard times?  We want to survive whatever happens. Let us start collecting food and knowledge so that we are safe and secure when a crisis occurs."  So they started hoarding so much and so eagerly that other people protested and said:  "You have much more than you need, while we don't have enough to survive.  Give us part of your wealth!"  But the fearful hoarders said:  "No, no, we need to keep this in case of an emergency, in case things go bad for us, too, in case our lives are threatened."  But the others said:  "We are dying now; please give us food and materials and knowledge to survive.  We can't wait; we need it now."  Then the fearful hoarders became even more fearful, since they became afraid that the poor and hungry would attack them.  So they said to one another:  "Let us build walls around our wealth so that no stranger can take it from us."  They started erecting walls so high that they could not even see anymore whether there were enemies outside the walls or not!  As their fear increased they told each other:  "Our enemies have become so numerous that they may be able to tear down our walls.  Our walls are not strong enough to keep them away.  We need to put explosives and barbed wire on top of the walls so that nobody will dare to even come close gto us."  Now instead of feeling safe and secure behind their armed walls they found themselves trapped in the prison they had  built with their own fear."         --Henri Nouwen

A sobering story.  A story that mirrors much.  What do you see?

The Ego Makes Sure The Joke's On Me

The ego is --surprise!--egotistical.  It's all about me.  The ego, that selfish part of us, hates two things: exposure and change.


The ego will resort to any means to avoid being found out.  It will minimize--"It's not as though I robbed a dozen banks; it was just one."  It will rationalize--"I needed the money more than the bank did."  It will deny--"what bank?"  

It will do anything but tell or face the truth because that then would necessitate change.  We will cling to what's familiar even though it's killing us and we'll act like it's just another day in paradise.  "I'm in the dance band on the Titanic, singing Nearer My God to Thee."  The ego thrives on equilibrium; the current status quo may be as dysfunctional as a Big Brother episode, but it's predictable, though possibly lethal.  

Decades ago, I was a therapist in a rural county mental health clinic.  An adolescent male whom I'll call Sherwin Williams was a substance abuser.  Sherwin was into huffing spray paint.  One day he showed up for his appointment, walking into my office as nonchalant and ho-hum as could be.  He had a large circle of paint around his nose and mouth; walking in naked wouldn't have made him look any more conspicuous.  I asked him how he was doing.  "Fine."  I asked him if he had been huffing lately.   "Nope.  I'm clean." 


Are you kidding me?  How stupid do I look?  His ego was so entrenched in denial that what was obvious to anyone else was not even factored into the equation.  I still shake my head in disbelief when I think of Sherwin.  

But then there are those occasions when I look in the mirror--when I am honest with and about myself--and I can't believe it.  There's paint all over my face.  

Don't worry about me, though.   Like Sherwin, I'm fine.  I just need to stay away from mirrors. 

Am I Looking for the Infinite in the Finite?

I love to read.  I love to read from poets and mystics and theologians and  Franciscan monks and men and women who describe their pilgrimage.  Reading is the equivalent of eating.  I feast upon good books and deep thoughts and touching memoir. 


 I love to listen to music.  If I'm feeling lethargic, music can serve to energize me.  The Stones.   Springsteen.  Steve Winwood's, "You Gotta Roll With It, Baby."  Marshall Tucker's "Can't You See?"  Some music soothes and comforts my melancholy.  Van Morrison has made me cry.  Sarah McLachlan's mournful soul has caressed my own. 


I'm always looking for the next book to ground me, to anchor me in my journey.  I'm always listening to the next new artist, hoping that, maybe this time , the healing will come, the mood will stabilize, the epiphany will occur.    


I think I'm kidding myself.  I want to read, but I don't want to be read by the One who truly knows me.  I want to continue to expand my mind, hoping that through the vehicle of my mind I will eventually experience that "Aha!" revelation.  At other times I feel it is the heart that is the necessary mode of movement.  Maybe the next album will usher in a new lasting sense of peace and ease my anxious spirit. 


There's a part of me that knows better.  Yet, a part continues to pursue down paths that will not lead me to my desired destination.

Don't worry; I'm not about to engage in a frenzied book-burning extravaganza.  I'm not going to melt my cd's in a puddle, fueled by misguided repentance.    I'll keep reading, I'll keep listening.  Two questions arise.  Am I willing to be read?  Secondly, am I willing to listen to One who speaks in silence and solitude? 


Mick Jagger put it well:  I can't get no satisfaction. . . .and I try, and I try, and I try.

Fundamentalism: A Blessing and a Beating

I am a recovering fundamentalist.   I go to meetings weekly--every Sunday morning at a grace-filled church.  Ironically, I am grateful for aspects of my fundamentalist heritage.  My childhood fundamentalist church instilled in me a respect for and devotion to the Bible as the revealed Word of God.  In those early years I memorized much Scripture.  It wasn't that I was devout and preferred the Bible to my comic books; the church instilled and impressed those passages upon my mind. To this day recalling some of those passages in times of turmoil has brought me encouragement.  For that I am grateful.   


My fundamentalist past taught me the reality of objective Truth.  There are anchoring truths--realities--which, indeed, are true, whether or not I choose to acknowledge them.   That, to this day, instilled within me a passionate pursuit of what and Who is Truth.    For that, too, I am thankful.


Unfortunately, virtues pursued to excess become vices--and much of fundamentalism is about extremes, rather than balance.   The fundamentalist preoccupation with Word precluded little attention to Spirit.  My faith and life was centered on rule-keeping, rather than relationship.  It was a life of merely obeying God, devoid of loving God--or having a sense of God loving me.  My church instilled a fear-based life of obedience.  My obedience was not prompted or fueled by my love for God, but by our fear of falling into the hands of a holy God.  I was squeaky clean behaviorally, but shamed and fearful emotionally.  It was a terrible world with which to cope. 


 In our focus on truth, and this is a common trait of fundamentalism, we believed that we alone possessed the Truth.   We were very exclusive, which you would think would appear to us as a contradiction to the life and teachings of Jesus.  It wasn't a part of our consciousness then, nor is it among fundamentalists now.  If there is a disagreement in beliefs, the other party's stance or belief isn't regarded as different, but as wrong.  Consequently, even though many of my friends attended other denominations which held the same basic view of  Christ/ the Bible that we did, because they differed from us in other areas of belief we viewed them as either back-sliders or heretical, and it was our mission to "witness" to Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, certainly Catholics, and anyone else who wasn't us. 

That way of thinking breeds a self-righteousness  (which, in the gospel records, Jesus adamantly rejects) and a sense of moral superiority (which--who would have thought?--in the gospel records, Jesus adamantly rejects.)   We were concerned about the eternal destiny of these "lost souls" but simultaneously looked down upon them, loathing their language and and judging their behavior. 


Fundamentalism tends to breed a negation of life, rather than an affirmation of our existence.  Growing up I knew what was wrong, what I couldn't and shouldn't do, but I had no clue what I was meant and designed  to do.  Thou-shalt-nots prevailed.    That negation is all-encompassing; it is a mindset, the Weltanschaaung --the worldview, the way they perceive reality.  Typically, if a fundamentalist encounters a different belief or theological concept, the initial and, usually, the settled response is, "I know what is true and I know I am right; there is something spurious about this person's belief.  Be wary!!"  Seldom is there an openness to the possibility that I might learn from this other person, that maybe they have something to offer me that might enrich or expand my existing faith.  Instead, "they are wrong and it's up to me to refute them."  It's a negation of anything incoming that does not arise from their own closed system.  


I cannot adequately communicate the depth of relief  I feel in God having extricated me from that system decades ago.  It was oppressive, the dead legalism suffocating.  To be transported and transformed from a life of fearful obedience to a life that is loving response is a beautiful thing.  To move from being saved by God to being loved by God is, as they say, priceless. 

I feel a heaviness lately,  birthed on two fronts.  On an individual level, I am  feeling unfairly judged.  Someone I love very much is a fundamentalist and they are rejecting much of what and who I read--my mentors--and is the next step a rejection of me?  That would be terribly painful.  On a corporate level, our church is facing  judgment and  rejection by certain fundamentalist believers.  I love our church and so that pain is also felt by me. 


I need grace.  My initial impulse is not one of a loving response.  It makes me angry; I want to fight back.  I want to tell them how unlike Jesus they are in their condemnation, in their exclusivity.  I want to tell them that the Ultimate Judgment will not focus on whether or not we give mental assent to a certain number of theological propositions about Jesus.  We will be judged not on the basis if I held all the right beliefs about Jesus, but if I lived and loved like Jesus.   


But if I resort to that, then I am no different than these individuals who seem so judgmental.  I need grace.  I want to love when condemned.  I need to bless when seemingly cursed.  I want to bestow the love of Christ when hammered by the letter of the law. 

I have a long way to go.  I don't want my first reactive response to be one of regarding them as "freakin' fundies," but as my brothers and sisters.  And I want to love these brothers and sisters in God's family who would question my own belonging to that same family.

I need grace.


 (I apologize for the drought in my blogging.  We were out of the country the past 2 weeks, preceded by a 3 month hitch in Honduras.  I hope to re-establish some consistency in writing.  Thanks for your patience.)

A Sign of the Times

I have a friend who has been in the construction trade for decades.  He has headed up projects constructing entire subdivisions, as well as road and bridge construction.  He is now nearing retirement and for whatever reasons the company to whom he has given his life is now treating him badly before he exits.  He has been demoted from his multi-faceted responsibilities and lately they have him working as a “flagger.”  I should say, standing around and being bored out of his freakin’ mind as a flagger.  No offense to any flaggers, but a chimpanzee—on an off day—could perform the job.  (If you can earn that kind of income--read further-- doing what you do, more power to you.)

  
I didn’t realize this but apparently the state regards “flagging” so difficult that certification is required.  Flagging 101.  “Class, we will devote the entire morning to the intricacies of turning the sign.  Write this down:  turn it to the side that says GO when traffic can resume; turn it to the side that says STOP when you want traffic to, uh, stop.  Now, in groups of two’s practice this maneuver with each other until you can do so without notes.”

He feels humiliated that he may very well finish his career in this capacity.  Maybe that’s the whole purpose of the company doing this.  One of my favorite sites for sarcasm—despair.com—offers this “demotivator:” 

I think that’s their attitude--dead wrong, but thoroughly convinced.

It gets absurdly funny.  He tells me that a flagger will start out at  around $28 an hour, some of them working 14-16 hours a day, time and a half on Sat., and double-time on Sun.  Here’s the “welcome to America” moment.  At some of the bridge or RR crossing construction sites flaggers are standing at attention with their signs for 8-16 hours but, get this--the road is completely barricaded, closed to all traffic.  There are no “flagees,” only a solitary flagger.  I think this is absolutely brilliant.  Only in America

Maybe there’s a metaphor here.  Am I “flagging” a non-existent crowd?  Do I get on any one of my personal soapboxes and provide answers to questions people aren’t asking?    Am I intersecting with the traffic of humanity around me or am I off in my own little world waving irrelevant signs?  Am I on roads no one is traveling, not because I'm so advanced but because I'm clueless?  


And why am I waving an abrasive sign in someone's face, anyway?

Disdained in Life, Discarded in Death

He was a loner, but likeable.  John was a very intelligent homeless man who stayed in one of the local shelters at night, and fended for himself during the day.  His yellow-tinted glasses gave color to his weary eyes.

I first met him a year or so ago.  Our church operated out of a small storefront and served breakfast to the homeless early each Sunday morning.  We would pack 60, sometime 70, homeless men and women into our narrow quarters.  John was anxious around crowds.  He would arrive late, and linger outside.  He seldom asked for a meal, but always asked for coffee.  I struck up conversation with him, and it became a near-weekly ritual.  I looked forward to seeing him.

He would miss a week or two but always managed to reappear. During this time I left for 3 months to work with the poor in Honduras.   Upon returning,I didn't see John for a couple weeks and asked a street person who was a buddy of John's.  He told me John had died months ago.  I was shocked.

Nobody on our "team" had heard anything.  The grapevine of the homeless network was quiet; John was aloof enough that his brothers of the street apparently either didn't know or didn't care.

How does someone die without anyone noticing?  How does a man created in imago Dei--the image of God--die and get discarded like a cigarette butt tossed out the window?  How can you become so lost, so invisible that no one notices you dying?

I don't know.  I do know this:  I miss John.  John, I wish I had known your health had been significantly deteriorating.  Maybe I could have been there with you so you wouldn't have died alone.  Maybe some family member broke out of their comfort zone and re-established contact with you and held your hand and uttered comforting words and provided loving presence as you died.  Maybe.  I hope so.

No one should die alone.

Another Angle About Our Return Home

We have returned home.  The return trip home was not without a delayed flight, a cancelled flight, the beloved airlines losing ¾ of our checked baggage, and the bus breaking down between Chicago and home.  “Other than that. . . how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?”

It is quite an adjustment to life back home.  There is so much sensory stimulation here in contrast to rural Honduras.  Noise, movement, traffic, bombardment by TV, schedule deadlines.  I forgot how difficult it is to relax here due to the constant stimulation of all our senses.  Another difference is the pace.  I’ll put it in driving terminology.   Here I feel I’m always in 5^th gear—hurry, you’re running late,  ya snooze ya lose.  In Honduras life is done in 2nd or 3rd gear.  As the director of the Mercy International, our mission base, said about a scheduled hike into the mountains, “We would like to leave at 9:00; we will leave when we are ready.”  People tend to take priority over projects.  In Honduras, time is to be enjoyed, not monitored.  As a friend put it,  “You have the watch; we have the time.”   If only I could learn to down-shift. . .  I can already  feel myself tensing up now that we’re back.

I’ll share a realization or two with you.  We take the ordinary for granted.  We assume the routine and the people in our lives are a given.  In going to Honduras we left EVERYTHING and EVERYONE that had been familiar to us.  We were transported to a culture where we knew less than 10 people in the entire country.  We know very little Spanish and the vast majority of Hondurans knew absolutely no English.  We uprooted from our entire support system—family, friends, community of faith—and I wasn’t prepared for the gaping hole that created.  Being home now and being able to call anyone anytime, being able to laugh together and embrace and hold and hug—all that I had taken for granted—I now regard as a gift to be cherished.  The ordinary is a gift.  Cherish it.  On one of our walks through the Honduras countryside Les took a picture that I regarded at the time as a waste of time and camera space.  My thoughts were, it's a stupid cow.  What's the big deal?

 Now I get it.

I also realize how spoiled and fortunate and blessed I am even when life is at its worst.  I knew about the poverty there but living in it for 3 months moved it from my head to my heart.  I’ll give just one example.  One of Mercy International’s missions is to build houses/shelter for the poorest of the poor who reside In the mountains.  These people are the furthest removed from accessing resources, medical care, and supplies.  We took a U. S. team up to a mountain village, requiring a 2 hour fifteen minute drive over an unpaved mountain road and then a 3 hour hike to get to this area. Each evening our team would fire up the Coleman gas stoves and cook dinner.  During every meal the Honduran children are standing around us watching us eat.  We can’t give our food away because we need the carbs/energy for the difficult physical labor we’re engaging in.  So, you learn to eat, in spite of these kids staring at you and your plate of food.  One night, we had food left over—rice, actually.  So we asked the kids if they would like the remaining rice.  It broke my heart as they grabbed rice by the fistful.

 I knew these children don’t have much, but had no idea they were “grab it by the handfuls” hungry.

There is much more to share at another time.  We wanted let you know we’re back and we thank you for your support, your encouragement, your friendship.

We now face a most significant decision—do we return/relocate to Honduras and serve full-time, or do we consider other avenues of serving??  Honestly, we do not have a clear sense of direction at this point.  We have allotted two months in which to make that decision.  Any insight or direction you might offer will be appreciated.  We will appreciate your prayers, as well, regarding this decision.

I’ll end with several reasons we loved the people we served.

Be thankful for what and who you have.

Grace and Peace, Steve and Leslie