Preparing for the Journey

This is not a picture of my transportation for my sabbatical journey! It is actually a picture of a boat on the Sea of Galilee taken by my friend, Blair Both, on her journey to Israel earlier this year. Journies, whether by land, air or sea, seem to take a long time to plan. In less than a month I will leave New Harmony for three months of travelling, studying, exploring, and resting. In the next few weeks until I leave things will undoubtedly get hectic. I am trying to make this preparation time a part of the whole experience. It is the work I need to be involved in right now and it is important. It is not just about making sure I have the right clothes for cooler weather and that I have all the various accessories I will need for travel; it is more about preparing my mind and heart to receive this time. If I don't do that work this adventure will slip away in a fog of busyness. Preparation is part of the journey. It may be the part I least like but I want to invest myself in doing it well. So it is on to the next task...

I just finished reading "The Shack" by William P. Young (Windblown Media, 2007). It is an unusual book. It has a "fantasy" feel to it, not unlike Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" or Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia." It is a very appealing book. It contains lighthearted dialogue between a man named MacKenzie (Mack) and the Trinity (as in Father, Son and Holy Spirit)! The theology worked out in this encounter is for the most part quite "right on." I am sure that not everyone would agree with me on this and that's okay. As a friend of mine used to say, "We all have our own heresies."

The book does many things well, but perhaps the most important part of what it does is giving voice to the problem of suffering in the world. Why do people, especially children, suffer? Why doesn't God intervene and stop evil from happening? These questions are as old as humanity and if we are not struggling with them then we are probably in denial. But the book is larger than this problem. The Shack gives us a picture of how much God loves us. I said to someone after reading the book that it made me fall in love with Jesus all over again! And in some ways it did. I have been recommending the book to lots of people.

The gospel lesson (Matthew 18:15 - 20) for this Sunday (September 7) is about Jesus' instructions for conflict in the church. They are uncomfortable words - words that challenge me to do better at "speaking the truth in love." Going to the person who hurts me or betrays me or gives me a hard time, and telling them how I feel is way more vulnerable than I want to be most of the time. Forgiving those same folks means looking deep inside myself. It means confronting my own dark desires and not just once; but over and over until they are exorcised from my heart.

In The Shack God helps Mack come to a point where he can forgive the man who murdered his young daughter, Missy. After he says the words, "I forgive you" over and over, he turns to God and says, "So is it all right if I'm still angry?" God does not hesitate with his answer, "Absolutely! What he did was terrible...But don't let the anger and pain and loss you feel prevent you from forgiving him and removing your hands from around his neck." God continues with this wisdom, "Son, you may have to declare your forgiveness a hundred times the first day and the second day, but the third day will be less and each day after, until one day you will realize that you have forgiven completely." (The Shack, page 227)

Madeline L'Engle was fond of saying that love is not always that wonderful warm feeling rather love is a decision. Love is an act of the will, not of the emotions. Forgiveness is so much the same way. There are times when I don't want to even consider forgiving someone. My feelings are no where near forgiveness. At times like that it is best to just stop and turn around completely - face a new direction and make myself walk into forgiveness. The world is a hard place and life gets more complicated each day. Someone said to me many years ago, "Keep life simple...keep short accounts." Keep the emotional baggage down to a minimum by not letting those accounts of anger and unforgiveness get out of hand. Settle the accounts quickly - or as Jesus would say, "Go to your brother or sister and work it out." I will pray for you in this challenge if you will pray for me.

This Sunday's lections included the story of Moses and the burning bush from Exodus. I had written a sermon on the Gospel lesson from Matthew and I wound up scrapping the written test to talk about Moses. The gospel was the story of Peter's confession of Jesus as the Messiah and Jesus' rebuke of Peter. In the gospel lesson is Jesus' call to us to "Deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him." I'm not sure when I have lately "denied myself" anything! I tend be able to rationalize giving myself what I want, whether its things or thoughts. Part of denying myself is to make myself turn aside from the path I am following, whether mentally or physically and turn to face what God wants for me. That's certainly what Moses had to do when confronted with the burning bush.

Moses was tending his flock, actually his father-in-law's flock when out of the corner of his eye he saw a bush burning but not being consumed by the fire. Moses, who had killed one of Pharoh's soldiers, probably did not want to face into that fire. We all know deep inside when something has "the odor of holiness" about it. Perhaps it's the way the sun comes through a window or a sudden and unexpected breeze across our skin; we know that God is present and we know it deep within. Whether we stop to acknowledge the "holy" or simply wait until the shivering in our belly ceases so we can continue to do the next thing, we know that temptation to "turn aside" into the holy moment. Moses could have kept on tending the sheep; perhaps he had already passed by several other "burning bushes" before this one. God might have continued to pursue him or moved on to find another person to deliver his people. Moses did turn aside. He denied himself the pleasure of remaining a simple shepherd. He denied himself the safety of hiding from Pharoh. He faced into the burning bush and in doing so he faced his greatest fears with God's help.

Perhaps this is one way that reconciliation happens. We face into our worst fears, into the burning bush and we deny ourselves the pleasure of staying angry, or cynical, or filled with hate. There is pleasure in keeping those feelings alive. Turning away from the path of anger and face into God's love burning brightly for us opens up a new opportunity for action and for forgiveness. I wonder how many burning bushes I pass by each day? I wonder how many opportunities for turning aside to face God's love I walk past each week? Oh for the grace and courage to deny myself and turn aside.

This is a picture of Rublev's icon of Christ the Redeemer from the 14th century. It was discovered in the early 1900's in an old woodshed where, according to ledgend, it was face down and being used as a step. In April of this year, the iconographer, Peter Pearson (http://www.nb.net/~pearson) came to New Harmony and for an Icon Workshop. This is the icon we painted. It was a wonderful experience. I used this icon yesterday as a part of a slide show at St. Stephen's before worship. The gospel lesson was Matthew's story of the Canaanite woman coming to Jesus and the disciples to ask them to heal here daughter. (Matthew 15:20-28) Whatever Jesus was doing in this story he was not using his best pastoral skills. But the woman in the story is such an example to us of persistence and prayer. She is also a model for us of the Jesus Prayer (the prayer of the heart)... "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner..." This woman, although not Jewish, was no doubt a believer in God and one who had called upon God's mercy many times.

I remember how much of a change it was in my life when many years ago I learned the Jesus Prayer at a day long retreat in Durham, NC. The Society of St. John the Evangelist (http://www.ssje.org/) had a house there at the time the the brothers taught us how to pray this prayer of hospitality. It is the place my heart goes when I don't know how to pray or when I am angry or confused. I guess I would say that it is the "home page" for my prayers. This icon of Jesus is one of the pictures that comes to mind with that prayer. Over the years I have had other prayers that have meant much to me, but this prayer of the heart has been my home.

The Culture of Reconciliation

This icon is from a church in Galilee. A friend visited there recently and this picture was among those she took there. She also brought me a small copy of this icon - 2 inches X 3 inches, written with what looks like an eyelash! It is stunning, the faces very clear and the colors much like the one pictured here.

The scene is Jesus with Peter on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. It pictures the disciples in a rolling sea behind them with the Galilean hills reaching up around the sea. But it is clearly the post-resurrection event where Jesus cooks breakfast for the disciples. In that event Jesus asks Peter, "Do you love me?" He asks him three times and each time Peter professes his love for Jesus. There is much that can be learned from this encounter, and it is clear that Jesus is "dealing" with Peter - he is taking him to a new place of ministry. He is enabling Peter's pastoral minstry by shepherding him through the rocky ground of his own betrayal. From this moment on Peter's love for those who come seeking will reflect this moment when Jesus loved him in spite of his failures.

I just finished "The Lemon Tree," by Sandy Tolan. It is the true story of two families - Palestinian and Israeli - who live in the same house in Ramla. Before Israel gained its independence in 1948, the house was owned by the Palestinian family of Bashir. As the Palestinians are relocated, the house is inhabited by a Jewish family whose daughter, Dalia, struggles to come to terms with her identity. Tolan follows Dalia and Bashir's difficult friendship and their struggle to understand and honor their different histories in the land of Palestine. I found it a helpful book for understanding the history of Middle East conflict and the enormous cultural difficulties that prevent healing and reconciliation. Are cultural differences a barrier to reconciliation happening?

Reconciliation

In late October I will leave on a three month sabbatical. Twenty three years ago when I traveled to Israel on a pilgrimage, I had very little understanding for the depth of pain that resides in that "holy land." I remember the day we went to Yad Vashim - the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem. Our Palestinian Christian guide asked to be let out of the tour bus at the gate which led up a hill to Yad Vashim. He would not go with us because he said that the Israelis made much of their Holocaust while creating a "Holocaust" for the Palestinians. Later at the Temple Mount I was forbidden from going onto this sacred ground because I was a woman. I had to ask a "man" to place my prayer into the Western Wall of the mount. I stood with tears in my eyes and thought about Paul's words, that Jesus had come to break down the dividing wall... But in so many ways that wall is higher than ever. It is now a physical wall dividing Jews from Palestinians in Jerusalem. There are many, many other walls - rich from poor, persons of color from anglos, gays and lesbians from straight, conservative from liberal... Where does it end? Can the division end? How do we find the ways to talk to each other, finding the common ground on which to build relationships instead of walls? I don't know the answers.

When I was in South Africa in 1998 at the end of the "Truth and Reconciliation Commission's" work, we had a chance to meet with some of the TRC members. One of the persons who had listened over and over to the stories of those who came forward remarked that "the telling of truth did not always lead to reconciliation." How do we keep from building walls which separate?

I hope this time away on Sabbatical will begin to answer some of these questions for me. I will write more about the actual "stuff"of the sabbatical later.