“We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies…”

– Romans 8:22-23

Companions on the Way,

February is a bridge month, split between the brilliant light of Epiphany and the ensuing descent into Lent.  The last burst of Epiphany comes in a mountaintop vision of a transfigured Jesus holding council with Moses and Elijah—stand ins for Israel’s covenant and prophetic traditions.  Dazzled by the light, the three awestruck disciples who’ve made the hike with Jesus struggle to understand what it all might mean.  Peter finally settles on the idea that they ought to set up tents and stay awhile—why not let the adulation sink in!  He mistakes the martyr’s white Jesus is wearing for party attire.

I don’t blame Peter.  After all the day-by-day slogging through fear, loss, trauma and fickle internet connections the pandemic has brought upon us for twelve months running, I’m eager for a celebration, too!  The vaccines are beginning to do their thing, to slowly turn the tide.  But there is no magic by which we will be transported back to our pre-pandemic lives.  Even when the road ahead is lined with hope, the losses are real and close at hand; no inoculation can sweep them away. The bridge we cross this month moves us off the stage of luminous light and points us down the hill to the road leading to Jerusalem.  Over the threshold of that bridge are the words: “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.”  Never, in this generation, have these words bespoke such truth.

In a prose poem entitled WARNING TO THE READER, Robert Bly writes:[1]

Sometimes farm granaries become especially beautiful when all the oats or wheat are gone, and wind has swept the rough floor clean. Standing inside, we see around us, coming in through the cracks between shrunken wall boards, bands or strips of sunlight. So in a poem about imprisonment, one sees a little light.

But how many birds have died trapped in these granaries. The bird, seeing freedom in the light, flutters up the walls and falls back again and again. The way out is where the rats enter and leave; but the rat’s hole is low to the floor. Writers, be careful then by showing the sunlight on the walls not to promise the anxious and panicky blackbirds a way out!

I say to the reader, beware. Readers who love poems of light may sit hunched in the corner with nothing in their gizzards for four days, light failing, the eyes glazed . . .
They may end as a mound of feathers and a skull on the open boardwood floor . . .

On the Mount of Transfiguration, limned by such awe-full light, one could imagine—as the disciples did, as the birds in Bly’s poem did—that in those slats of light lies freedom!  But the downward wending trail of Lent testifies to the deeper truth: the only way out is down and through—through the rat’s hole.  The only true gateway to resurrection is the cross.

Our hope for this life and the next, finally, comes not from any power we have nor attribute we possess, but from trusting that we do not journey alone.  Christ journeys with us; we have each other; and are accompanied by the Spirit “who intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”  And that, dear ones, is enough.

With you on the Way,

Pastor Erik

[1] From his collection, What Have I Ever Lost by Dying? (New York: HarperCollins, 1992) p. 65

“Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.”

– Philippians 4:8-9

Dearly Beloved,

It all started with an older gentleman who pulled up to the Dairy Queen drive-through in Brainerd, Minnesota, at the height of the lunch hour.  “I’d also like to pay for the car behind me,” he told the cashier.  “Whatever they’ve ordered, I’ll cover it.”  Darla Anderson rang up the two orders and thought that would be the end of it.  But two days and hundreds of cars later, she and the rest of the crew were still ringing up “pay it forward” orders as each person who came to the drive-through offered to pay for the car behind them.  “I’ve seen ‘pay it forward’ chains that went on for about 20 cars, but never anything like this,” said store manager Tina Jensen.  In the end, the chain spanned more than 900 cars over 2½ days. [1]

After a year filled with news assaulting us at every turn with stories of selfishness, injustice, violence, and the ever widen­ing effects of the pandemic, reading this story in the paper was balm for my soul.  Nothing earth shattering.  Nothing that will turn the tide on the coronavirus or wipe away systemic racism.  Yet, a sign that it is still possible to choose to “pay it forward” in the best sense of the phrase, rather than to choose revenge or “pay back.” The fact that 900+ cars over multiple days partici­pated in what one single man initiated says something about how hungry we are for acts generosity and simple signs of hope and caring.  As far as I know, the gentleman who started it all didn’t check with the occupants of the car behind him to see whether they shared the same politics as himself before he paid for their meal; he didn’t quiz them about their faith stance, where they came from, or other features of their biography, in order to ascertain whether they DESERVED a free lunch or not.  He simply gave freely, graciously—gratis.  And his so doing, inspired others to do the same.  Generosity became contagious on that day.

The words with which Paul closes his letter to the Philippians (above) seem an appropriate way for us to begin this new year.  Instead of dwelling on what is incomplete in ourselves and wrong in the world, Paul says, train your thoughts on the higher virtues, higher goals.  And don’t just go there with your mind—let your feet, your hands, your hearts come along, too. “Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.”

In his reflection for January 1st, Father Richard Rohr wrote something that gives me great hope.[2]  “Even after fifty years of practicing contemplation,” he writes, “my immediate response to most situations includes attachment, defensiveness, judgment, con­trol, and analysis. I am better at calculating than contemplating.  A good New Year’s practice for us would be to admit that that most of us start there.” I find his utter transparency inspiring.  When he goes on to talk about his “hour-by-hour battle” to embrace the True Self, which is always controlled and blinded by “the defensive needs of the separate self,” I nod my head in recognition.  Then he goes on:  “I cannot risk losing touch with either my angels or my demons. They are both good teachers… The gaze of compassion, looking out at life from the place of divine intimacy is really all I have, and all I have to give, even though I don’t always do it.”  In this second gaze, which God ever invites us into, “critical thinking and compassion are finally coming together,” allowing us to see the other “with God’s own eyes, the eyes of compassion.”

When Rohr, a fellow Christian I admire, speaks freely about his own limitations and God’s constant invitation to taste and see God’s goodness and compassion, then there is hope for me!

I expect no miracle cures for myself or the world in 2021.  But I hold fast to the promise that the One who chose to pitch his tent among us in Jesus will continue to companion us along the way, inviting us to “pay forward” with no small measure of delight the undeserved favor we have received from his hand.

With you on the Way,

Pastor Erik

[1] See the article by Cathy Free in the 12/14/20 edition of the Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2020/12/14/dairy-queen-drive-thru-chain/

[2] You can find his full reflection here: https://cac.org/the-second-gaze-2021-01-01/?utm_source=cm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dm&utm_content=summary