Once, her absence bothered him so much he got up, put on his robe and walked downstairs. He sat in his chair and listened to himself breathe. An occasional car drove by the house, sending a wave of light across the ceiling. The air was chill. He looked down at his wrinkled hands, blue in the midnight, and saw his wedding ring. Too tired to cry, he sighed, stood up and trudged to the kitchen.

He grabbed a small glass from a cupboard above the sink and filled it with water. Taking a small sip, he stared out the window on the clear, bright, windless night. Dew shimmered on the grassy lawn where the tree shadows did not reach. He alone saw it while the world slept. The night. The shadows. The glistening grass.

Not that he didn’t try to see more. But try as he might, he could not envision her face. Gone so soon? After fifty-five years of seeing each other every day! Every morning, he would arise and go to this very kitchen. He would fix the coffee, turn on the machine, and set out two coffee cups on the counter, one for him and one for her. After retrieving the newspaper, he would go to his chair and read it while the coffee brewed.

Soon, her soft footsteps would sound on the stairs, and he would look up to greet her, precede her into the kitchen, pour out two cups — black — and they would sit at the table together to start the day. As rituals go, it wasn’t complicated or profound. Still, he was glad they began most mornings face to face.

How was it then, that he could not picture her pretty face now? Less than a week after laying her in the ground? Pictures of her were everywhere throughout the house, but he couldn’t see them, couldn’t see into them. He picked them up often and held them in his hands. He leafed through the photo albums of their trips. He traced their life together through them: from the time she was a schoolgirl, to that sexy young mother standing in the yard with a baby on her hip; she who had been the life of so many parties, his dance partner, lover, Valentine, “mom” on all the Christmases and birthdays and vacations and outings through the years, until the day she became “grandma” and her hair turned white and she was the petite one with sparkling eyes, like dew in the moonlight, in the front row of the large family portrait. He gazed often and hard at this evidence, yet couldn’t make sense of it. His vision blurred, his mind fogged, his chest heaved.

Who knows how long he stood there in the night? Out the window, the shadows had shifted, and a wave of weariness crashed over him. He set the glass in the sink and made his way back upstairs. He crawled into bed, pulled the warm, heavy covers up to his chin, and slept for the few hours of darkness that remained.

He awoke as usual, swung his legs over the edge of the bed, put on his slippers, picked his robe off the chair, and tied the belt around his waist. He made his way to the bathroom and performed his morning toilet. He ran warm water over his glasses and rubbed them with soapy fingers, washing away the dust and smears. Drying them, he placed them on his nose and looked at the old man in the mirror. He had made it another day.

The morning shone brightly through the living room windows as he went downstairs. Going into the kitchen, he slid open a drawer and separated a new coffee filter from its box. He went to the freezer and retrieved the bag of coffee beans, dumped some into the grinder and then ground them up fine. Measuring out just the right amount, he scooped the fragrant coffee into the filter and placed it carefully in the basket of the pot. He poured the water into the reservoir and closed the top. Reaching up, he grabbed two coffee cups off the shelf and placed them on the counter.

Then he went to retrieve the morning paper.

See John 10:22-42. Video created by five staff members from Calvary Church, Santa Ana, CA.

Once upon a time there was a playwright. While this playwright was the best who ever lived, his passion was not for his plays, but for his son, the greatest actor of his time. The son loved to act, and to bring joy, truth and meaning to audiences of every age and all kind. His gifts were immense, and his talent untapped. This son had played many parts, but had never played a part that truly demonstrated his true talents and potential.

Both the playwright and his son were convinced that, if the right play could ever be created, this young actor could change the world forever.

So the playwright devoted himself to the writing of the greatest play ever conceived, a play that would somehow tell the story of the world, and yet be the story of every person. Yet, above all, this play would finally and undoubtedly reveal the playwright’s son as the greatest actor of the age.

And so the play came to be. The play was written in chapters and scenes, and was played out slowly, over many nights, in a grand auditorium where thousands could attend. After a majestic and complex first act, the son took to the stage for four incredible and magnificent sections of the play. His performance was amazing, yet it was even more than what it appeared. The audience was stunned to see that this actor had, in fact, been in the entire first act, and his wonderful performance left everyone in awe.

The play was the story of this actor. He was its great key and meaning. The tragedy and triumph of this actor became the hope of all who saw his story. Their lives were changed by this performance. It was not just a play; it was a window and an answer into the meaning of life.

The playwright had yet more surprises in store. The second half of the play invited the audience to join the story; to take the truth, power and beauty of what they had seen in the playwright’s son into the darkest corners of the world and into ever facet of their own lives. This play could change the course of life, even the destiny of the world.

When the play’s sublime ending had unfolded, the audience realized that this play was not a simple play at all, but a revelation of this amazing actor and his message of hope and life for all people. This play presented an invitation into a new way of life embodied and presented by the actor in this perfect story. Everyone left the theater realizing they must continue the play themselves.

In years to come, however, the playwright was saddened to discover that the play was largely overlooked in favor of a great interest in….the script. Copies of the script of his play had become massively popular, and his son, while being appreciated as a character in the story, was not truly appreciated as the playwright had intended. The son came to mean little more than a role in a play, while the script came to be almost mysteriously and superstitously revered. The script became the point of discussions and societies. Disagreements broke out, and schools of interpretation were everywhere. Experts arose to debate and defend their views on the script.

These experts on the play grew in influence, and were able to explain everything in the play in detail, usually in ways the playwright found absurd and depressing. The experts had little appreciation of the Great Actor, his message and his significance. They found him interesting only in their debates about the true interpretation of the play. What had been a life-transforming experience became an object of study.

The invitation to live out the remaining acts of the play became something of a tired joke, and the son decided to never play the stage again. But one could go virtually anywhere and find battles and books written about minute details of the script. The actor’s words became the source of more animosity and hostility than love and humility. It was a sad and ironic end to a dream.

The playwright never wrote again, and after a time, there were few who remembered that the true power of the play was the son, and not the script. When someone would ask the playwright what the play was really about, or question the meaning of some detail, he would ask a question in return: “How can you read the play, and not see that it is about my son?”

Let me put this question to you: How did your new life begin? Was it by working your heads off to please God? Or was it by responding to God’s Message to you? Are you going to continue this craziness? For only crazy people would think they could complete by their own efforts what was begun by God. If you weren’t smart enough or strong enough to begin it, how do you suppose you could perfect it? Did you go through this whole painful learning process for nothing? It is not yet a total loss, but it certainly will be if you keep this up!

• Galatians 3:2-4, MSG

One day Dorothy and Toto found themselves in a wondrous world—not in Kansas anymore! for sure. You might say they arrived there by grace alone. In the midst of their mostly tranquil but unsatisfying life, a life that had prompted Dorothy to dream of a better land “over the rainbow,” they found that land solely through a power greater than themselves. A twister blew off the plains, picked them up and twirled them ’round, and set them done in a new realm. Sepia tones turned to technicolor, drab became dynamic—everything was new.

For the first time in her life, Dorothy felt alive. However, also for the first time, she knew that her ultimate dream was to find home. How could she find her way home?

Dorothy received a simple answer: “Follow the yellow brick road.” And, looking up, she beheld a clear path of golden bricks winding around and leading off into the distance. This road, she was promised, would take her to the city of Oz, where she would meet the powerful Wizard. He would give her the answer. He would show her the way to go home.

The advice she got, of course, proved inadequate. Following the yellow brick road made things worse and ultimately left her stranded and still wondering how she would ever get home.

It must be admitted that Dorothy found blessings and learned lessons along the way. She found friends, as needy as she, who joined her on the quest to find answers at the end of the road. She also found danger and difficulty. Various troubles and obstacles hindered and threatened the journey. In confronting them, this humble farm girl discovered hidden resources within herself, as well as the reassurance and security that comes from having loyal companions to help you fight your battles. Dorothy also learned that the world has its charlatans, who, despite their public reputations, are nothing more than pathetic imposters. They influence others through the power of suggestion and manipulation. They know how to market themselves. They build great cities but hide behind little curtains.

When it was all over, and she had reached the end of the road, Dorothy stood with Toto in her arms and a tear in her eye. She had not found the way home. The yellow brick road, as simple and well-marked as it was, had led her nowhere. The great city had proved no better than the farmyard at satisfying her heart. Her friends couldn’t give her what she ultimately needed. Nor could the great and powerful Wizard.

Having begun her journey by the gracious intervention of a Power greater than herself, she now realized that all the paths she had taken subsequently were dead ends. Though they came highly recommended and were firmly believed in by those who promoted them, they could not ultimately help Dorothy or lead her home.

In the end, however, grace once more intervened. As Dorothy stood weeping, Glinda the Good Witch appeared.

Dorothy: Oh, will you help me? Can you help me?
Glinda: You don’t need to be helped any longer. You’ve always had the power to go back to Kansas.
Dorothy: I have?
Scarecrow: Then why didn’t you tell her before?
Glinda: Because she wouldn’t have believed me. She had to learn it for herself.

What?

Read those words again. “You’ve always had the power to go back to Kansas.”

From the moment grace set her down in a new land, she had the power to find home. She had the ability to make the journey. She had the resources to make it all the way. She didn’t know it then. But it had all been given to her.

She didn’t need the yellow brick road. She didn’t need the city. She didn’t need the wizard. She and her friends (who, by the way learned the same lesson), didn’t need what they thought they needed, or what others thought they needed. All the “paths” laid out for them proved to be worthless. All the “experts” proved incapable of granting their deepest needs and wants.

They only needed to make the journey. In walking, they found the way.

Traveler, your footsteps are
the way, and nothing more.
Traveler, there is not a way;
the way is made by walking.

• Antonio Machado

Note from CM: Since this is our national sports “holy week,” I thought I’d re-post one of Michael’s rare excursions into the use of sports to illustrate a spiritual point.

I’m not usually the guy with sports illustrations, but this one couldn’t be passed up. (And if anyone I know says to me that I was “secretly” talking about them, I’m going to laugh right at you, very loudly.) This is so relevant to thousands of situations, it preaches itself without explanation.

Young pastors, listen up.

Friday night high school football with several other men is a highlight of fall for me, and last night was the first game we’d seen. The who, what and where aren’t important, but one aspect of the game was memorable.

The officiating crew was terrible. I know that’s a frequent complaint, but I didn’t really have a dog in the fight and the team I was modestly pulling for won, so I’m not whining. The terrible officiating simply ruined the game. I felt bad for everyone: fans, coaches and, of course, the boys.

In short, the officials threw over 30 flags, most of them frivolous, and mostly in the second half when one team had some hope of gaining momentum enough to make up a three touchdown deficit. There were four reversed calls. Four! Four times the announcer read the signal, the teams reacted, and then a couple of minutes later- without benefit of instant replay- the call was reversed, usually taking away a fumble recovery or a first down.

The coaches repeatedly received sideline warnings for being out on the playing field pleading their case. I usually find coach complaints unprofessional, but these coaches were in the middle of complete chaos and they couldn’t be blamed for speaking up.

It appeared to me and my friends that one referee was making most of these calls, and the others were gently trying to correct him and restrain his excessive penalty calling impulses. But to no avail. By the fourth quarter, both teams looked completely drained. The game had gone on much longer than a normal game. For the entire third and fourth quarters, it seemed that no more than two plays in a row occurred without a penalty.

Tempers briefly flared between the teams, which gave us some hope that the game would get interesting, but the referees quelled that as well. With the last 12 minutes left, everyone on the field was out of it, and even the crowd was silent with disgust.

Really, it was one of the worst displays of officiating I’ve ever seen.

It reminded me a lot of lessons for those of us who minister to and with the body of Christ. So Christian leaders, ministry leaders, pastors, youth ministers, denominational types, preachers, evangelists, district superintendents, bishops, cardinals and popes……consider a few lessons from a very badly officiated football game. If you can’t see how it applies to what we do, throw a flag in the comments.

1. Let the team play the game. It’s about the Gospel first, then it’s about people, then the church. It’s not about you until we get well down the list of what’s important.

2. You’re there to serve, and if you truly serve you will rarely need to be the person everyone thinks about or talks about all the time. Other people will look good. Everyone will have a stake in a good experience. You will look competent.

3. Find that balance between you doing your job and the regular Christian doing his/hers. When good leaders are finished, it looks like they were working with a great team.

4. You don’t have to call every infraction you see. Question your sensitivity to pointing out what is wrong. Barney Fife was probably right most of the time when he arrested jaywalkers. The compulsion to make the game about your ability to see infractions is a disqualifier from being an official, in my opinion. There’s a difference between looking the other way all the time and seeing where leadership is needed judiciously.

5. If you have to be escorted to your car by law enforcement, you probably didn’t do a very good job that day. (I know that’s not universally true, and sometimes you have to make the tough call and make lots of people unhappy. But that should be rare, not regular.) If you have to change your phone number and are constantly talking about those who are out to get you, consider a reality check. That angry mob may be the only way to get your attention.

6. If we go home talking about how many times you told everyone that something was wrong, I doubt that we heard the Gospel. An abundance of corrections isn’t Good News, in case you didn’t know that.

7. Yes, some coaches and players are upset with the officials who are “just doing their job.” And yes, you can probably quote the rulebook better than they can. But remember that the striped shirt and the rulebook don’t insure that you are anyone’s superior or that you have seen everything and understand everything. Sometimes the other guy really did see the play better than you did.

God called you to demonstrate his gifts and to use yours. In that order, about 98% to 2%.

8. When your fellow referees tell you it’s time to back off a bit for the sake of the game and your own integrity as an official, listen to them. They may see something you need to see, but that you can’t see while you are practicing your two handed double flag toss act.

9. That despondent look on the players’ faces after your 20th flag of the night…..pay close attention to it. It’s telling you something nothing else will; something sad that’s hard to put into words. Remember that if that player quits tomorrow, he can be blamed, of course. But you are a large part of why. You took away his joy and convinced him that his best efforts were pointless. He knows he’s imperfect. Do you know that about yourself?

10. One of the good things about being an official in this game is we don’t have to reinvent our identity or our role with every game. Those striped shirts are about continuity with what’s best, not about originality in officiating. In other words, stay old school. Hide behind the masters. There have been great officials before us that showed us what to do and how to do it in a way that made te game better. Learn from those examples. Imitate them. Doubt yourself and your instant reactions a bit more. Search for wisdom even more diligently than you share yours.

By Chaplain Mike

An illustration from my pastor’s sermon Sunday:

Not too many years ago, my wife and I were on a rare date downtown Indianapolis. It was in the heat of August, so we were at an outside table on the sidewalk on Washington Street. There we were, enjoying the moment of closeness, when out of the corner of my eye passes an individual in a Star Wars storm trooper costume. I looked around and saw another and then another. And over there was Princess Leah . . . over there three Luke Skywalkers . . . Jaba the Hut! I looked at my wife, and then at my adult beverage, then to the storm troopers.

It turns out the national Star Wars convention was in town that weekend. And heavens! Did they ever dress the part?! Man! Were they were living the story, acting the character, and caught up in the moment!

When it comes to the Adventure we have with Jesus Christ, you should know that it is not only the people in the Bible world who dress differently. They are not the only ones who put on new apparel and live a different story. But each one of you, as you become part of the adventure of Jesus’ life, will dress differently. You will present yourself to the world differently. You live out of a new sense of identity and character.

The apostle Paul says in Galatians 3:27, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.”

And in Romans13:14 he says, “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

As one of the characters in Jesus’ adventure, you have a new sense of self, a new identity to live from. And as you allow yourself, as you give yourself the freedom to get caught up in the moment, to live the story, you will never feel more alive.

In Jesus, we have the privilege of living in God’s story of redemption. At times, we may appear to the world as strange and as out of place as the participants in a Star Wars convention. They may think we’re only fantasizing, trying to fulfill a wish-dream, getting caught up in a meaningless display of play-acting.

Nothing is more real. As Pastor Mike said, “Give yourself the freedom to get caught up in the moment. Live the story. You will never feel more alive.”

You can read the whole sermon at Pastor Mike’s blog.

The other day, we were talking about Jesus’ command to “judge not,” and I said this in a post about how I have learned to think about judging others.

Connected to this is the humility that needs to accompany all claims of knowledge of other persons. Boy oh boy oh boy have I learned this at OBI. I may know the behavior, but I don’t know the story, or the journey. Every day I ask God to keep me humble in what I say about a student’s behavior, because I had a pretty normal childhood, and many of these kids haven’t had the first normal day yet. So when I “judge”- and I have to, as do we all here- I try to keep in mind that I see very very little of the big picture.

A commenter posted the following response.

QUOTE: “I may know the behavior, but I don’t know the story, or the journey.”The story and the journey do not matter. Sin is sin. Saul had a story and journey behind his consulting the medium at Endor. Uzzah had a story and journey behind reaching out to hold up the ark. Ananias and Sapphira had a story and journey behind lying about the money they had given.

The scourge of our age is that no one takes responsibility for their sin. There’s always a story and always a reason and always some other thing that shifts the blame.

But when God says “don’t,” you don’t. End of story (and journey, too.) That’s our problem–we just can’t leave it at that. Relativism and the postmodern mindset has instilled in this generation the idea that motives count more than truth. That’s been wrong since The Garden and will continue to be wrong.

Now, if you noticed that I never said the actions in question weren’t wrong, you are a good and reasonable reader. If you noticed that I never suggested excusing anyone for things done wrong, you are also a good and calm person. I commend you.

It made me think about a story. It’s one of those stories that I think is very important in my life, because I have thought about it over and over, and it always means more each time. It’s a story about something I did wrong, and how my father handled it. It also seems to be a story about God, and it is my answer to the guy who says our stories and journeys don’t matter.

I was eighteen, and my pride and joy was a 1965 Chevrolet Biscayne. Navy Blue. It was really a sweet car, and I enjoyed driving it. It was also my dating car, and that was the start of this problem.

I had a date with a girl from work. We’d been out a few times, and on this date, we wound up on a dark country road, out in the corn fields. I’m not going to explain that. If I need to, you are too religious.

I decided I wanted to back my car into a smaller road just off of the road I was travelling. This small road was over a very, very large ditch. I backed in, but I misjudged the location of my car, and one of my back wheels went hanging over the ditch. My car was rear wheel drive, and I couldn’t move forward. Fortunately, the car didn’t fall into the ditch, though that was something of a miracle.

I did all I could to get the car to move forward. I raced and raced and raced the engine, but the wheel that was hanging free just spun and nothing happened. I ran the engine so fast and hard, that the heater core burned out, and the car filled with smoke.

I decided to get out of the car and try to push it forward. For some stupid reason, I didn’t get out on the passenger side. I thought the ditch was very shallow, and I got out on the driver’s side. I was wrong. The ditch was deep- almost over my head, and full of freezing water. I could easily have drowned, but instead, I was just felt really stupid.

I made it out of the ditch and tried to push the car forward, but nothing helped. I realized I had to get some help. There was a farmhouse across the road, so I got my date and began walking to the farmhouse, soaked in muddy water.

I don’t remember much about that conversation, but it’s safe to say this man wasn’t glad to see me, wasn’t overwhelmed with compassion, had seen several of my kind before, and thought my twenty bucks wasn’t enough for a tow. He had little to say, but he pulled us out with his tractor, and took my money.

I drove my date home, and then headed to the house. The car was a mess, and the burned out heater core was still smoking.

Now, I need to say that my dad got mad at me a lot, about all kinds of things. He gave me a very hard time about things I deserved and things that really didn’t matter. He was a very anxious, and often angry, person. He had bought the car I was driving, and we didn’t have much money, so I was supposed to care about the car. He maintained the car, changing the oil when I acted oblivious to how a car worked. He loved the car a lot more than I did. As I drove home, I assumed that either I was going to lose my car, or possibly be in more trouble than I had ever been before. I was afraid. Really afraid.

Added to my fear about my dad’s reaction to the damage to the car was my fear of what my dad would do when he realized what I was doing out in the middle of a corn field. He wasn’t dumb. I was really more frightened by having to tell dad that I was on a date out in a corn field than I was telling him about the damage to the car. The damage was stupid. The date in a corn field was wrong, and embarassing. Especially since I was a preacher, because preachers don’t do things like park in corn fields with their dates. They pray and read their Bibles.

I arrived home, and it was obvious from the look of the car, and the smoke coming from under the hood, that I had a mess on my hands. The mud told the story of where I had been. I was thinking of some kind of lie as fast as my mind would work.

I do not recall the conversation. I just recall that my dad didn’t react at all. He sensed something, and something in his own life, probably in his own past, came to mind, and he treated me with grace and kindness. He didn’t yell. I didn’t have to tell a tale, because it was obvious that he wasn’t going to ask about the details. He even put his arm around me and said everything would be ok. Maybe I was a lot more upset than I recall.

Now I know that heater cores are expensive, but dad never made me pay for it, or grounded me, or punished me in any way. I completely dodged the bullet. I was so grateful. I think I decided God was real.

At the time, I didn’t appreciate what was going on here. I didn’t appreciate that my dad’s story caused him to treat me with compassion. His own journey had included some similar mistakes, and on this occasion, he remembered something that birthed kindness towards his stupidly wrong son.

The commenter above is, of course, quite right that we live in an irresponsible time, a time with lots of excuses for behavior. We also live in a time when people use their life experiences to try and manipulate our emotions and reactions. I don’t want to be like that.

But our stories do matter. Our journeys do matter. God brought us though those journeys. He brought us on the paths we’ve travelled to give us our stories. Some of us have very painful, lonely stories that have caused us to want to find love from other people, and some of those relationships were stupid and wrong. Some of us don’t do what is right very often, because we’ve grown up around people who never taught us right and wrong. Some of us have cruel and mean aspects of our personalities, because of what we’ve experienced that make us suspicious and distrustful of others. Some of us have suffered, and we do things out of fear of hurting again. Some of our stories include terrible things that we can’t think about, and they affect us in ways we don’t understand at all.

Sometimes when I see someone doing something that is bad or wrong, I wonder what happened in their journey that made that bad thing seem good for a moment. What made the rage or the promiscuity seem right at the time? I know there is more to what has happened than just the “sin” that I can see.

Return of the Prodigal Son, Murillo

Does God care about our stories? I think he does. I think he knows our stories a lot better than we do, and I can picture him reading our stories and being sad at some parts and angry at other parts. I don’t think he misses any of our sins, and I don’t thing he misses any of the reasons for why I do what I do. I believe the father of the prodigal knew what the boy was doing in that far country with all his money, and knew for years that his son was a selfish and impulsive child. Maybe the father knew why he was that way. Either way, he forgave and restored his son, and didn’t make any kind of a scene about the boy’s mistakes. He didn’t even give him a lecture about being responsible, or I told you so, or do you know how worried I’ve been? None of that.

I am sure that when the boy hugged his father, it was hard to realize that his dad knew all about him, but if he did realize that, wouldn’t it mean that his father loved him more than he ever thought was possible? Isn’t that why the Psalmist says “search me and know me?” Not just to know my sins, but all about me? Because we can trust God’s knowledge of our stories to be compassionate.

I know there are people who think God should be like a big computer, only noticing that we didn’t put in the right numbers, and caring about nothing else. My dad could have ignored his heart, and punished me for all that I did wrong. But he didn’t, and I’ll be it was because my dad was a forgiven person who knew about the kind of love God shows to sinners in Jesus. Mayby that’s why my dad cried every time he prayed at dinner.

There is so much wrong in my life, but all of it has a story. That may irritate some people or sound like an excuse, but it is true. I can’t understand a lot of my own story. Some of it makes me angry, and parts make me sad. I have to trust God to know all of it, and to one day put it all together in a resurrected life of perfect happiness. He can hold my story and my journey as a perfect thing in his fatherly hands, because he sees it all in his own purpose, and in the story of Jesus.

Finally, his story takes all of our stories, and puts them together into something wonderful.

By Chaplain Mike

We haven’t had a good day of rain where I live for over two months.

Our lawns are past turning brown. Now they are brittle, straw-like. Weeds provide the only green at ground level. They proliferate. Hardy, demonically so, they thrive where all that is desirable dies from thirst.

Farmers are cleaning up their fields earlier this year. The combines throw corn dust into the air and it wafts down the road, into town, and into our nostrils. I drive my car through the car wash, and by the time I’m down the street, it’s covered again by a thin blanket of fine earth and debris. The atmosphere is so thick with nature’s own pollution that we are perpetually clearing our throats, coughing, blowing our noses, and sleeping fitfully at night for lack of breath.

The sun is a cruel friend, playing some sick practical joke on us. He kills with feigned kindness, extending warmth with one hand and thirst with the other. Low and brilliant in the sky, he illuminates the autumn leaves, and we admire their spectacular beauty. But we are lulled into forgetting that this is, in reality, a funeral home elegance, a ceremonial dressing-up before gray winter skies swallow up all color. The whole world is dying of thirst.

Israel spent forty years wandering in a desert wilderness. I can’t imagine. How parched can one get?

O God, you are my God;
I earnestly search for you.
My soul thirsts for you;
my whole body longs for you
in this parched and weary land
where there is no water. (Ps 63:1, NLT)

Lethargy must be overcome in these circumstances. It would be so easy to stay inside, breathe only conditioned air, savor a cold drink, and shut out the dry, dusty world. Some, for health reasons, must do so. For others like me, however, it is a day long fight against the noontime demon. Day after day.

In the words of those great theologians, the Temptations, I wish it would rain.

Not, What is salvation?  What is it like?

Comparisons, though incomplete, are good.  They enable us to comprehend things we’ve never seen or experienced; they enable us to generalize and categorize.  They underlie almost all human understanding of God, whom we can’t experience in the same way we do created things.  Jesus frequently spoke using comparisons; so do modern thinkers.

Recently I’ve seen three common similes concerning salvation.  They all contain aspects of the truth, but inevitably each falls short of the complete truth.  I want to look at them in order to understand better what salvation is like, and to know what we have to do to be saved.

God the Merciful Judge
First, we’re like a man who enters court charged with a crime.  He is put in the dock.  The evidence against him is presented, and it is damning evidence.  The jury of his peers deliberates and brings forth a verdict of guilty.  The judge pronounces the sentence — death.  For a moment a hush falls over the courtroom.  Just as the spectators sigh, clear their throats, and get ready to leave, the judge says, “But — I choose to count you innocent of the crime that has been proven against you, and you are free.  Go and break the law no more.”  The accused — now the forgiven — flushes with an incredulous relief.  He babbles incoherent thanks to the judge who freed him, then he leaves the courtroom a free man.

This is a powerful and wonderful image.  We can easily picture a courtroom and imagine how we would feel condemned to death.  This story illustrates the absolute power of God over our fate and reminds us that there will be a judgment, and that we won’t look good on that day.  We can imagine the feeling of being set free, declared innocent, let off the ultimate penalty.  Let’s keep this image in mind.  It’s a good one.

But if our only image of God’s relationship with us is this courtroom scene, there’s a danger.  We may well forget to live with God day by day.  The criminal was set free; now he can do what he wants.  But a freed criminal has to learn to live a new life, to change himself and all his habits in order to live as a free man in fact, not just in name.  This comparison vividly illustrates the moment of forgiveness, but it tells us nothing about our life from that point.  If God is only the judge who pardons us, then what is our ongoing relationship with him?

God Our Life
In the second story, we’re like a woman who’s always on the brink of death.  She must breathe every few seconds to stay alive; anything that interferes with her breathing will kill her in minutes.  She has to eat and drink frequently to stay alive.  Without food she’ll be dead in a few weeks, without drink in a few days.  Each breath, each meal is a reprieve from death.  She may occasionally delude herself that the meals are of her own providing, but she knows that the air she breathes is nothing but a free gift, beyond her control.

This story isn’t even a comparison, it’s just a statement of fact.  We are all that woman, exactly.  The paragraph describes our life.

This second story completes the first in some ways.  We are not only forgiven our offenses, we are given the very means of life.  We can’t just walk away free from God the Judge and do what we want.  Without him we can’t walk; we can’t live.  Our salvation is not only a one-time tearing up of a charge sheet.  Our salvation is a minute-by-minute relationship with the only source of life.  Salvation in this sense is never done.  Jesus’ work for us is done, but our life with him is not, nor will it ever be.  He is our daily sustenance.

Even this second image, however, is not all the truth.   Before we need air and food and water, we need life.  Dead people can’t breathe or eat or drink.  And we are, in fact, dead in sin.

God the Resurrection
In the third story, we’re like Lazarus. Actually dead.  Stinking.  Beginning to decompose.  There is no life in him, no power to change his condition.  He is entirely at the mercy of the death that comes through sin.  Then he hears a voice calling from outside, calling his name.  He gets up — not through his own strength, but through the strength of the call.  Trailing his grave clothes he lurches blindly to the entrance of the tomb.  Even there he needs the door to be opened for him.  And then light, and joy, and welcome are waiting for his vile self outside the tomb.

The Christian life is not just pleading in front of a judge; it’s not even the daily inhaling of grace.  It is nothing until Jesus hauls us from the tomb.  If we ever forget that, then we delude ourselves that we have power to feed ourselves, power to walk out of a courtroom and live a free life.

Which Is Our Story?
Several commenters recently raised questions about our salvation, how it works and how we work.  The dialogue is usually conducted as a faith-versus-works, Calvin-versus-Arminius dispute.  These disputes are foolish.  They usually arise because people have adopted different stories of salvation.  Those who claim that salvation is a change that comes in the twinkling of an eye berate those who understand salvation as a lifelong choice of life over death, and vice versa.  You can — or can’t — lose your salvation.  You should — or mustn’t — participate in confession and the sacraments.  Advocates of the courtroom drama, when they hear people talk about salvation being a lifelong process, think that the Judge’s power and faithfulness are being questioned.  The life-long-process people worry that a Gospel of one-time freedom will lead to stagnation and libertine living.  Those who focus exclusively on the resurrection story can’t accept that anyone has anything to bring to the relationship with God, while others say that we can choose to turn to him or from him.  No single story tells us the whole truth.

So—what must we do to be saved? The answer involves going backward through the three salvation stories told here.

At first, we can do nothing.  Unprovoked grace calls us.  If you are thinking at all about God and wondering how to love him and serve him better, then you are hearing him calling you from the tomb.  He is calling you to a unique moment of salvation, to resurrection, to the beginning of a new life.

Then the newly resurrected life consists of learning to breathe, eat, and drink God.  Of being with him every moment.  Of absorbing his grace and mercy into ourselves and being slowly transformed as we do so into his likeness.  It’s a life of constant re-turning, of learning to recognize the difference between health and morbidity and learning to prefer health to morbidity.  At any moment we may choose to cut ourselves off from the source of life, and then we begin to die, even if we don’t sense it right away.  This salvation is not a unique moment, it’s a lifelong relationship with the Lord of life.  It can been breached, as can any relationship; but through God’s grace it can be healed.

We’re resurrected; we’re living in relationship with God; these are a “means of grace,” as the prayer book has it.  But there’s more.  There’s “the hope of glory.”  When we come to stand before the Judge, knowing we were dead in sin, knowing we chose death so often in our walk with God, we still have hope.  It was he who called us to life and he who sustained us in that life.  He’ll tear up the charges against us, having already fulfilled the law himself.  This third salvation is accomplished in a moment of grace, as was the first salvation.

But which one of these three is more important, which is less?  Which is first, and which is last?   These are meaningless questions to ask of a God beyond time.

All I know is this:  I have been saved.  I am being saved.  I will be saved.  Amen.

By Chaplain Mike

I hope no reader will suppose that “mere” Christianity is here put forward as an alternative to the creeds of the existing communions—as if a man could adopt it in preference to Congregationalism or Greek Orthodoxy or anything else. It is more like a hall out of which doors open into several rooms. If I can bring anyone into that hall I shall have done what I attempted. But it is in the rooms, not in the hall, that there are fires and chairs and meals.

• C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Part of the “post-evangelical wilderness” experience is a deep sense of longing to be at home.

Psalm 63 carries the heading, “A psalm of David, regarding a time when David was in the wilderness of Judah.” Wandering in the desert places left him hungry, thirsty, eager for a renewal of the vital experience of worship and fellowship he had known with his brethren in the Temple.

O God, you are my God;
I earnestly search for you.
My soul thirsts for you;
my whole body longs for you
in this parched and weary land
where there is no water.

I have seen you in your sanctuary
and gazed upon your power and glory.

• Psalm 63:1-2 (NLT)

David longed for home. There’s no place like home.

As wonderful as “a personal relationship with Jesus” sounds to our individualistically-oriented ears, Scripture, tradition, history, and experience teach us that this relationship is most fully realized in the communion of saints.

When the family sits down at table together, the abundance of our Father’s provision becomes most apparent to us. At the table, our identity as family members is confirmed and reinforced. We take our part in the family story. We recall and celebrate unique experiences we’ve shared together. We laugh about our idiosyncracies and foibles. We discuss the broader world from a perspective that looks out from our front door. Here we praise and tease one another, and address family concerns. Here the memories of family members no longer with us are recalled. Here we welcome the newborns, the children, and baptize them into the family’s ways—we teach them the silly kids’ songs, tell them the old jokes and stories, and at some point show them the secret family handshake and codes and let them in on a few of the skeletons in the family closet. Here we welcome guests, translating our strange dialect into words they can understand and, hopefully, appreciate.

You simply can’t know these things in the same way when you’re on the move, sleeping in tents, having to pack up and travel to the next location all the time. There’s a certain charm to sitting around the campfire, but it’s the ephemeral thrill of the open road, the wanderer, the hobo. You feel the exhilaration of freedom for a time, but hauling water and firewood, sleeping on the ground, dealing with the weather, bugs, and strange sounds in the night, and setting up and breaking camp gets old after awhile.

The word the Bible uses to talk about Israel settling down in the Promised Land after forty years of wandering in the wilderness is instructive—rest. God gave them rest. It just felt downright good to sit a spell and put their feet up for awhile. However, as wonderful as that homecoming was, Hebrews 3-4 tells us they never really found complete rest, even in the good land. A settled home in this present world could never fully satisfy the hunger in their hearts for the city in the age to come. They looked for a city built by God himself, a permanent home of righteousness and peace, the home God creates through Christ for his forever family in a new creation.

Nevertheless, having a “home” here and now is also vital, as essential as it is for desert travelers to find an oasis, or better yet, a destination that provides some kind of long pause from impermanence.

Never was C.S. Lewis’s wisdom more evident than in the opening pages of Mere Christianity, when he spoke to this subject. You can talk about personal belief, a Christianity of essential truths that one embraces, a faith with which one, as an individual, agrees. You can set forth a “mere Christianity” that satisfies a seeker’s heart, mind, soul and spirit, and introduces him into a vital relationship with the true and living God.

“Mere Christianity” brings these believers into a great hallway in God’s magnificent mansion. You mingle there. You converse with others who have entered through the front door. You talk about how great it is that you have been invited and welcomed in. You praise the gracious hospitality of your Host. You are humbled at the generosity of the One who made it possible for you to have a home.

And then you notice that some are making their way into various rooms along the corridor. Peeking into one of these rooms, you see comfortable chairs, a crackling fire in the hearth, and a table spread with a feast. Not sure if you are invited in, you observe, and then go back into the hall.

After awhile, you begin to feel a bit uncomfortable. You’re running out of things to say to the others mingling there. You look around for a place to sit down, but there are no chairs. Your stomach growls, but your eyes spot no food being served. You wonder where you will sleep that night.

You’ve been welcomed in, and you’re thankful to be out of the cold and rain. You sigh; that’s better. A place of respite from the storm. A hallway where you can rest for a little while.

But it’s a hallway. And soon you are restless once more.