“Between the Shock and the Schlock”
It matters how we depict Jesus. It matters what we say, how we think, write, and sing about him. It matters what kind of power we trust and who we trust to wield it. The good news is that despite the schlock and shock plastered on T-shirts and billboards, there are artists, musicians, authors, poets, photographers, and theologians whose renderings of God get preciously close to getting it right – as close as we humans can get.
“The Sound of Music”
My two-year-old has come to associate her mother with the sound of organ music being played in a sanctuary. Not a bad legacy to leave with your children – your being brought to mind every time they hear music being played on a keyboard.
One day down the road when I am “aw gone,” I wonder what kinds of things my children will associate with their father. I shudder to think of what they might be.
What will stir a remembrance of you in those who know you best?
“Have Home, Will Travel”
Life’s a moveable feast whose Host meets us at table on Sunday wherever we are, then meets us throughout the week, throughout the years, throughout our lives, wherever we go.
Have home, will travel.
“The Weight of Many Hands”
Years ago, Dr. Fred Craddock preached a sermon on ordination. All I remember is the title: “The Weight of Many Hands.” I’ve looked for it over the years, but even sleuthing with Google and AI, I can find no trace of it. I do, however, know its meaning deep down. I have spent four decades empowered and directed by the ever-present weight of those hands. Mind you, theirs is not an onerous weight, a burden. To the contrary, their presence is an unfailing source of “strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,” an indefatigable blessing.
“May I Have This Dance?”
Cue the music on the boom box. Nothing mawkish or maudlin, mind you! Play something surging with life, something that in its joyous defiance of death sets the feet to tapping, the fingers to snapping, the head to bobbing in sync with the buoyant beat.
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? (1 Corinthians 15:55)
Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed!
“It Ends with the Doxology”
The Psalms begin with a flurry of laments, but by the end they give way to full-throated praise. Psalm 150 pulls out all the stops. The Book of Revelation, that vexing book that growls with loud noises and paints menacing images ends in a cascade of praise. In so doing, it brings the sweep of Scripture to a soaring acclamation. The Bible ends in Doxology.
“A Moment of Clarity”
Said the preacher at the revival, "I worked side-by-side with a martyr. To this day, when I’m washing dishes, it's as if he's standing right next to me. In those moments, I realize I have no excuses for turning away from the challenges that face me as a follower of Jesus Christ.”
Then the preacher stepped down to the base of the chancel steps and said, “God doesn’t call everybody to die for their faith. But God does call everybody to live for it.”
I went forward.
“Bard of the Bible”
I remember the professor of an elective I took during my sophomore year in college after I dropped a political science class. It was the only class still open: “The Bible as Literature.” After rolling my eyes and sighing at having to take a class on the Bible, I took my seat in Dr. Battenhouse’s classroom. For the first time in my life, the Bible came alive for me.
“Selah”
I mention this seismology, psalmody, and psychology because many times in the past months I’ve been with people about whom I care deeply who’ve said in so many words – italicized with question marks and exclamation marks – The foundations are shaking! What’s a person to do?
I get it. I know where they’re coming from. You do, too. The alarm and angst I hear is not generated by the tinkling of trinkets on a shelf, but rumblings national and international with implications any human being with any sensitivity can recognize. Feel. Fret over. Fear.
“Valentine to a Custodian”
File this one under Valentine cards to church custodians. I know it’s an odd topic, but I want to send a little love and appreciation to the men and women who care for the Lord’s House by telling you about one of my dearest colleagues in ministry.
“Onward March”
We had our MLK Day march. We wended our way up and down the aisles of the sanctuary holding our signs and singing. Then this: members of the congregation slipped out of their seats and joined us. Our march increased in number to the point that we had a veritable wedding reception conga line of marchers singing We’ll walk hand-in-hand, We shall all be free, and a bonus verse of We shall overcome
“A Shoot from the Stump of Jesse”
It happens. Every once in a while we’re broken open in worship. God tears open the heavens and comes down. Sends a child. Evokes a shoot from a stump. The beloved carol sings, “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in Thee tonight,” whereupon grown men weep and blubber, “May I hold your baby?”
“Christmas Dinner”
Grady would amble in from time to time, help himself to some coffee, and talk to whoever happened to be nearby in an unintelligible gibberish, the product of misfitting teeth or none at all, I could never tell. He also had the rather disconcerting habit of kissing peoples’ hands, or trying to anyway, in a manner that in nowise resembled the chivalrous gesture initiated by a woman of royal class offering her hand to a kneeling knight.
Orientation: Joyful
I’ll never forget Don processing down the center aisle that Third Sunday of Advent as we sang the opening hymn. He walked unsteadily, his face gaunt. As he reached the front of the sanctuary, his back to the congregation, his face toward where I stood on the chancel, the flame of the candlelighter he held before him bathed his jaundiced face in a soft glow. I remember the look on his face – a peace that passes understanding; a radiant, intrepid joy.
Queen of the Pumpkin Pie
One of my nieces made a crown out of a napkin and we concocted a coronation ceremony. I played a make-believe trumpet fanfare as one of my girls walked behind Rose and placed the napkin crown on her head.
I intoned, “We crown thee Her Majesty Rose. Queen of the Pumpkin Pie.” Whereupon not just our table, but the folks within ear and eyeshot of our table applauded.
“Bad Sausage”
A wise elder in the Lexington, KY, church I served from 2014-2022 had held nearly every position a lay member could. He’d seen it all – the church and its people in all their glory and gory from the inside out. One day, musing over an incident when something went sideways at meeting and someone threw up their hands in exasperation, Josh folded his hands, placed them on his chest, calmly shook his head, and opined, “If you work where the sausage is made, sometimes it can make you sick to your stomach.”
Holy Mosey (with regards to William Least Heat Moon)
Jennie and I just returned from a bucket list trip to New England to bask in the fall foliage. We thereby joined a pilgrimage undertaken annually by tens of thousands of “leaf peepers,” a term that sounds uncomfortably voyeuristic, but what can I say? We ogled unsuspecting leaves as they changed from their summer green wardrobe to their fall yellows, reds, and oranges. We oohed, aahed, and whistled catcalls as maples, elms, and birches denuded themselves before our peeping eyes. Leaf peepers? Guilty as charged.
Power Outage
Having lived in Hurricane Alley on the NC coast during the 1990s while serving First Christian, Wilmington, I’ve experienced hurricanes. Hugo made landfall north of Charleston, SC, the year our family arrived in Wilmington (1989). In ensuing years, Bertha (1996), Fran (1996), and Bonnie (1998) came a-callin’.
The first two questions that proceed from people’s mouths after a hurricane are 1) Are you all right? and 2) Do you have power? Power as in electricity, which after hurricanes we were without for anywhere from hours to days to weeks.
“Urban Hobo”
Donald was, for all intents and purposes, a hobo. In an earlier era, Donald would have called the rail yards home. He would have hopped trains, slept in a rolling boxcar, and carried his worldly belongings in a bandana tied to the end of a pole slung over his shoulder. Cue Roger Miller’s “King of the Road.”
“The Pursuit of Happiness”
I don’t know how many people these days equate the pursuit of happiness with the pursuit of moral excellence or how many seek and aspire to be selfless leaders who evidence the capacity for self-control – strength rooted in gentleness – but it wouldn’t hurt to give it a try.