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reminders of an (almost) perfect day

reminders of an (almost) perfect day

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The Bubbles reflected in Jordan Pond

This is one of my favorite photographs from a five-mile hike over Penobscot and Sargent mountains in Acadia National Park. It frames the reflection of the Bubbles overlooking the north end of Jordan Pond. I like the way the photo turned out, granite mounds reflected in the still waters, framed by green branches and a half-submerged rock in the foreground.

Stoney, our two-and-a-half year old Australian Shepherd, accompanied me on the hike and we both had a great time that day. At least I know I did!

Stoney on Sargent Mountain

I had been anticipating and planning this day for a year. Each year for three years, Stoney and I have done a hike in the Jordan Pond area. Last year I heard about Sargent Mountain Pond and decided we needed to see it! The pond lies between the two summits and offers both unusually beautiful views and a refreshing rest stop mid-hike. Here’s a view of the pond …

Sargent Mountain Pond

 
As Stoney and I headed up the trail from Jordan Pond House, the Pond and the flanks of Penobscot Mountain to the west and Pemetic Mountain to the east of the Pond were engulfed in low-lying clouds. But the clouds gave way to strong sunlight as we made our way onto the summit ridge. The day was everything I had anticipated … and more. The climbing was challenging and exhilarating; Sargent Mountain Pond was a delight; and the views from the top of Sargent were an unexpected treat. It was an (almost) perfect day! And a day I will remember for a long time … at least until next year and our next hike!

(Click on any photo to see a larger image!)

a view through the trees

a view through the trees

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ocean view through the trees on Monhegan Island

I like this photograph.

It is different from most of my other Monhegan photos — no stunning cliffs rising from the sea, no waves exploding on the rocks guarding the shoreline, no colorful lilies or picturesque lighthouses or interesting people — just this view through the trees.

Is it a photograph of the sea or is the sea just the background? Is our attention drawn by the dead tree in the foreground or do we see past the tree? Is it the dark lines of the dead tree or the bold greens of the living trees or orange of the lichen-covered rocks, the expansive sea in the distance or the intimate path in the near corner, that makes this photograph beautiful?

It is all these things. It is the way all the pieces of the photograph “fit” together and don’t fit together. It is the juxtaposition of life and death, of soft and hard, of light and dark, of sharp and smooth, of intimacy and immensity, that makes this photograph engaging … and beautiful. It is beautiful because it shows something real, this particular piece of earth as it is, as it has become, not something put together or composed by the artist, but something already there. Here is the artistry … of God: death and life, immediacy and transcendence, something that exists wholly oblivious to and careless of me, and yet of which, when I am present and when I pay attention, I am a part.

This is what we are like, too — products of God’s artistry, a strange juxtaposition of the heavenly and the mundane, full of contradictions, but beautiful as we are, beautiful because we are, beautiful because we are from God.

making sense, moving forward

making sense, moving forward

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We live in a world that is so different from the world of the generations that have preceded us. The pace of change is dizzying. The amount of accessible — unavoidably accessible! — information is overwhelming. We bear the burden of knowing too much, almost more than we can bear to know. It is not only the problems of family and community and region that weigh on our hearts, but the problems of a whole world: famine and disease and natural disaster, war and oppression and unabashed genocide, injustice and mistrust and entrenched hatred. We know so much about the world and about the people who fill it, so much more about so many more people, so many people so different from us as we are so different from them — different traditions, different dreams, different perceptions, different values, different beliefs.

How do we make sense of this world? How do we stretch minds and hearts to “fit” all the information, all the people, in a way that allows us to move forward with eyes and ears still open? As believers, how do we reconcile ourselves and our faith to diverging and even openly hostile points of view?

Some do it by holding tightly to received traditions, by clinging to a clearly defined spiritual calculus that distinguishes between those who are right and those who are wrong, by subscribing to a parochial religious worldview that leaves most of humanity on the outside. In the face of a world full of questions, these folks survive by adopting a faith full of ready answers.

Others do it by redefining “truth” and “righteousness” and “salvation:” what matters is what is true for you, what is right is what allows us to co-exist, salvation is avoidance of conflict. In the face of a world full of questions, these folks survive by believing there really aren’t any answers.

But is there a third option? Is there a way for believers other than strict fundamentalism or uncritical pluralism? Can we make sense of this world without ignoring the majority of the facts? Can we move forward without abandoning our loyalty to a personal God? We need a third way, because the church is being torn apart, dangerously polarized, torn apart by people who are scared, scared of losing their faith, scared of losing their lives, polarized by people scared of obsolescence, scared of irrelevance, scared of being marginalized, scared of losing their souls.

I believe there is a third way. The first two ways have one important feature in common: fear … fear of losing, fear of criticism, fear of being wrong, fear of being irrelevant, fear of the daunting and dizzying and befuddling and overwhelming world in which we live! And the natural response to fear is … fight or flight! Taking control of a situation that is out of control by removing myself or by arming myself. “Solving” the threatening situation by taking a unilateral course of action. But, as believers, when we act unilaterally, when we “take control” — one way or another, we leave God out. We discover a third way when we let God in, when we listen — really listen — to God, instead of deciding for ourselves what we must do to survive and to “protect” the faith!

Perfect love drives out fear.

Love is the third way! Loving God with all your soul and all your mind and all your strength … and loving your neighbor as you love yourself.

God is not a cipher! God is not whatever we think God is or whatever we want God to be! God is a particular being, with a distinctive character and distinctive intentions. It is possible for us to be right about what we think we know of God, and it is possble for us to be utterly wrong about what we think we know of God! We must seek God, listen to God, wait for God, not pretend we already know exactly what God wants, or that we can never know what God wants. Our task is not to use God, as a war club or a slogan, but to love God.

In the same way, your neighbor is not a cipher, but a person, a person who deserves to be loved. Your primary task is not to defeat your neighbor, protect yourself from your neighbor, convert your neighbor, enlighten your neighbor, but to love your neighbor. Love your neighbor!

Don’t be scared! Love God and trust God to love you. In the face of a world full of questions, you don’t have to have all the answers … but you know there are answers!

You don’t have to fight or run away. You can move forward, with confidence in God, with hope for the future, with readiness to love your neighbor who is so very different from you, but equally loved by God. As believers, we take our cue from God, the God revealed in Jesus Christ, a God of love, a God of mercy, a God of grace. We love, we show mercy, we extend grace.

We don’t need to take control. We leave that to God. We know our job …

whose church is it?

whose church is it?

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Christ is like a single body, which has many parts; it is still one body, even though it is made up of different parts.

So, then, the eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” Nor can the head say to the feet, “Well, I don’t need you!”

But that is just what we are doing! Saying we don’t need each other. Saying we’d be better off without each other. It breaks my heart! We call ourselves The United Church of Christ, but I wonder. Sometimes, it seems, we are hardly “united” and hardly “of Christ.”

We are increasingly polarized as a church, mimicking the increasing polarization of American society when we should be resisting it and showing the world another way! We show ourselves to be “just like everybody else,” as resentful and stubborn and proud and controlling as everybody else. When we don’t get our own way, we pout and call names.

It is increasingly difficult to “live in the middle” in the United Church of Christ, which is probably a poor description of what it is I am advocating. Being “in the middle” is not about compromising, but about being a bridge; not about being lukewarm or noncommittal, but about understanding and loving both “sides” … the eyes and the hands, the head and the feet.

The church belongs to Christ. not to us, and Christ the Lord hardly needs us to defend him! He wants us to love him … and to love each other.

The evangelical “wing” of the United Church of Christ has something of great value to offer the whole church. But to accuse the church of “abandoning historic Christianity,” to seek to divide the church against itself, to encourage and support churches in withdrawing from the United Church of Christ shows no love to the church nor to the Christ to whom the church belongs.

The liberal “wing” of the United Church of Christ has something of great value to offer the whole church. But to mock and ostracize and marginalize evangelical folks who are genuinely concerned about the integrity of the church and its witness, who genuinely love God and want to discern and to do God’s will only does harm to the cause of Christ and cripples the church’s witness.

It is about doing God’s will, about praying with Jesus: Thy will be done. It is about discerning God’s will — together. Sometimes, it will take time and patience and generosity and selflessness and lots of humility to reach a place of agreement — or better, a place of discernment — where we do know together what it is God is calling us to do.

But in the meanwhile, there is much that God does will that is abundantly clear!

  • God calls us to love the Lord our God above everything else, everything else. It is hard to imagine that we could turn our backs on each other if we would genuinely join hearts and voices in professing our love to God.
  • God calls us to love each other. Not to judge each other — that job God guards jealously — but to love each other.
  • And God calls us to be one. We know that! We take our motto from Jesus’ prayer: That they may all be one. Do we mean it? Can we show the world what Jesus wanted us to show the world, a people united, not by ideology or politics or race or even religious agenda, but by love alone, a love for God and a love for each other that never gives up?
the sami got me thinking

the sami got me thinking

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Sami dressLast evening my wife and I attended a Sons of Norway gathering as guests of some friends of ours. We shared a catered meal, listened as members conducted club business, and watched with them a documentary on the recent history of the Sami, an indigenous people of northern Scandinavia and far northwest Russia, known for their reindeer-herding, fishing, and colorful dress, among other things. (Photo courtesy: Trym Ivar Bergsmo/Finnmark Tourist Board; click on the photo to see a larger image.)

It was a troubling film. The story of the Sami is so much like the story of other indigenous peoples — in Australia, in Africa, in South America, and on this continent. They are pushed aside, displaced from traditional lands, absorbed or oppressed by the dominant culture. Traditional means of economic production often become unavailable to them, because of the encroachment of competing interests or the degradation of natural resources. They are forcibly “re-educated” in the language and customs of the dominant culture, and their own language and culture are threatened with extinction.

The Sami have done well, adjusting to a new way of life, surviving both within and alongside the European cultures of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia, while preserving their own distinctive ways and forging a stronger social and political unity. But along the way, they have been caricatured, belittled, marginalized, and mocked. Just like the aborigines of Australia or the Xhosa of South Africa or the Sioux of North America, they have been treated as a lower form of humanity and their culture demeaned and expunged.

What is it about us? What is it about all of us that is so intolerant of diversity? What is it that makes us want to homogenize culture, to marginalize or eradicate or utterly transform what we find peculiar? We still do it. We disrespect immigrant peoples by proposing “English as official language” laws, supposedly to aid their assimilation into American culture, but oppressors and cultural elitists have always supposed they know what is best for everybody else. We export our preferred economic model and our preferred political model, sometimes by moral persuasion, sometimes by leveraging our power and influence, and sometimes by plain use of force. But we are not uniquely at fault in this. It seems no culture can resist the impulse to see itself as superior to any other culture with which it comes in contact, and to seek, if possible, to dominate and “convert” their “unfortunate” neighbors.

It is more than troubling. It causes me doubt and shame … because Christians, at least Christians in name, have too often been among the “culture-killers.” But I cannot believe, I do not believe, that such behavior is a product of Christian faith itself. This is not the way of Christ or the way of Christ’s faithful followers. Authentic faith does not encourage homogeneity, but diversity: The Spirit’s presence is shown in some way in each person for the good of all. And again: There is no difference between Jews and Gentiles, between slaves and free, between men and women; you are all one in union with Christ, which is not to denigrate the differences between people, but to say that differences in gender or race or social status offer no reason to make distinctions. We are one in Christ; in Christ we have equal value, equal importance … we are equally loved. And what shall we say to the God who is the creator of all living things, of every human person: You may think this is good, but we know better!”?

May God forgive us our cultural biases and our haste in equating “foreign” with “inferior.” And may our witness to Jesus be about spreading the good news of the gospel of peace, not about spreading our particular brand of culture.

making beauty

making beauty

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(Originally published Saturday, December 31, 2005)

I have been doing a bit of ranting lately … about the horrors of the death penalty, about the scandal of an administration that is reluctant to expressly disavow torture, about the shortsighted greed that would rather despoil an untouched wilderness than spend the time and money to develop alternative energy sources or to find ways to use our present energy resources more efficiently.

But I want to end the year on a positive note! Because in spite of all its ills and all our failings, the world in which we live is filled with much that is beautiful, most of it brought into being by the God who brought the universe into being, but some of it brought into being by us, creatures made to be like God. We are very much like God when we are making beauty. In just these last few days I have had the privilege of enjoying great beauty …

… the beauty of a sanctuary lighted by a hundred handheld candles and filled with the sound of a hundred voices singing of the dawn of redeeming grace.

… the beauty of the aroma of poached pears, a dish new to me prepared by our eldest son.

… the beauty of language, powerful and intimate, words describing feelings, words describing grief, words crafted by Joan Didion to document and make sense of a year of grieving the sudden death of her husband, beautiful because even words of grief reveal the wonder and mystery and majesty of human love.

… the beauty of giving gifts and receiving gifts when the one giving and the one receiving both know, and know each other know, that it isn’t about the gift!

We are at our best when we are making beauty. When we praise beauty and preserve beauty and especially when we make beauty, we show ourselves to be true children of the God who delights in beauty …

point of no return?

point of no return?

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I remember pulling hard and fast on the paddle, propelling my whitewater canoe forward with the accelerating current toward the brink of Wonder Falls, an eighteen-foot falls on the Big Sandy River. I remember the point of no return, when I knew there was no turning back, no turning around, when I knew that I was committed, that one way or another I was going over the falls!

I made the choice to be there. I made the choice to run the falls. But once I passed that point of no return, I had no more choice … We make countless choices every day that commit us, countless choices we cannot undo. We cannot stop and say “Ooops. I want a ‘do-over.'” or “Wait a minute. I changed my mind.”

Maturity is about taking responsibility for our commitments, about understanding the consequences — and the gravity — of our choices … about thinking carefully, choosing decisively, acting boldly, and accepting whatever befalls us. We can learn from our mistakes; we just cannot undo them. The choices I make in this one moment inexorably alter the options I have available in the next.

And yet … And yet …

It seems to me that the gospel of Jesus Christ changes the rules about points of no return. Not absolving us of our responsibilities, not denying the very real consequences of our choices, but somehow reaching us, holding us, saving us when we have passed what we thought was the point of no return. There is no point beyond which the love of God cannot reach us! There is no point beyond which the grace of God cannot bring us back! I am never — never! — committed to a failed life, never — never! — doomed to hell. There is always for us — for any of us — the possibility of forgiveness, of justice, of mercy, of grace.

Now that is something for which to be thankful!

it’s the little things that matter

it’s the little things that matter

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Love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable …

It’s not in the grand gestures that love leaves its mark … the unexpected gift, the display of sympathy, the kind words. It is in the little things, like stopping what you are doing to listen, pulling your mind from wherever it is to give this one moment to the person in front of you.

I’ve been thinking about that this week. I’ve been thinking about my children and the ways I show them my love. I have loved them — by providing for them, by rooting for them, by guiding them, by correcting them, by telling them I love them. But I wonder if the true success — or failure — of my love for them will be measured in those fleeting moments, like when a daughter comes home and says “Hi” and I give her my time or I go back to doing whatever it is I am doing. Or like when a son calls on the phone and I make it short or pass the phone to my wife or I find a way to communicate to him how excited I am to hear from him.

It’s the little things that matter, because it is in the little things that we reveal our heart … not what we have intentionally chosen to show of ourselves to the rest of the world, but what we really are.