Pentimento

A Word From Our Sponsor

There’s something refreshing about waxing on in stream of consciousness after a pastor delivers a touching sermon or one that hits the high note. But there’s always a part of me that feels like sharing the ideas that I blog is partially rooted in having to borrow unduly from the articulate preaching from which they are birthed.

I’ve struggled with a personal disclaimer for this, but in the spirit of what you are about to read, I, again, had to borrow the “words I wish I wrote” from a book by Robert Fulghum, a preacher, entitled, aptly, Words I Wish I Wrote:

As a child, I was taught the Christian view of life according to the Columbus Avenue Baptist Church in Waco , Texas. By age 21, I had things figured out for myself. Or so I thought. Forty years later … I laugh. My reconsideration is well described in the words of playwright Lillian Hellman, in the introduction to her biographical reflection entitled Pentimento:

Old paint on canvas, as it ages, sometimes becomes transparent. When that happens it is possible, in some pictures, to see the original lines: a tree will show through a woman’s dress, a child makes way for a dog, a large boat is no longer on an open sea. That is called pentimento because the painter “repented,” changed his mind. Perhaps, it would be as well to say that the old conception, replaced by a later choice, is a way of seeing and then seeing again. That is all I mean about the people in this book. The paint has aged now and I wanted to see what was there for me once, what is there for me now.

To see and then see again … this quality of pentimento. There is a transparency to my accumulated writing. When I look deep beneath my declarations, I see the underlying thoughts of others. As hard as I have tried to speak my own voice, I realize now how much of what I have said is neither
original nor unique. Thought is forever being revived, recycled, and renewed.

At twenty one, I could discuss transportation theory with authority. At sixty, I know which bus to catch to go where, what the fare is, and how to get back home again. It is not my bus, but I know how to use it.

To choose one’s own way. But in so doing, I’ve found that others have always been this way before me. And they have spoken of the way in words I wish I had written – in language I could not improve upon. Not a discouraging realization at all, but the recognition of great companionship.

I absolutely am indebted to the great preaching heard at Mt Zion which provides ALL the pentimento underlying what anyone reads … reworded … in these pages.

Subliminal Sermon

Readings:
Acts 16:9-15
Revelation 21:10,22-22:5
John 14:23-29

This week Pastor Johnson describes the texts as a wonderfully strung set of pearls laid out for all to see. Sometimes, it seems only in retrospect that I can even begin to see the pearls or that one goes better with the other than all by itself. Then he proceeded to string them … Acts … Revelation … and John.

There is constant reference made to the light, the sun, the lamp that comes with the realization of God’s will. After basking in this light, no other message will again, ever do. Once the night that was before is quenched in this light, it “will be on their foreheads” and the night will be no more. The night is presumably some metaphor for all or each of us before we have such an encounter with God and The Word. When touched by the message of God, our hearts are opened, as was Lydia’s, to “listen eagerly and await what was said (in His name)”.

The metaphor was brought home in the face of a worshiper of God named Lydia in Acts. It was brought to us in the deftly painted description of a night visitor to a college dormitory named Henry Yoger. I will ask Pastor Johnson’s indulgence, as he asked ours, if I borrow some of his articulate descriptors.

It was the Spring of 1967. The setting: college … a breeding ground for the undisciplined, the unguided, those yet without vision and possibly those with a shallow, untested faith life. Certainly every college has a dollop of this. Pastor Johnson’s room is a varied collection of unfinished papers adorning a desk punctuated by an ashtray full of snubbed out Lucky Strikes. It’s 10 p.m. and there’s a knock on the door. Standing in that doorway, a man in a crisp black suit, a starched and bleached white clerical collar, rimless glasses and steel grey hair, combed back. The man was Pastor Henry Yoger. The vision was apparently one that prompted greeters of such a visage to move adeptly to cover the Lucky Strike war zone with the as-yet-unfinished treatises on Dante’s Inferno. But the point of the story was that Henry Yoger made a night time pilgrimage, of sorts, to seek out one of the souls on that campus and deliver a message. That message was, I believe, at its essence, to see if Gary Johnson would like to consider taking up study in the ministry of God. I do not recall his immediate reaction, if he shared it, but this is usually the scene in the movie where the young college student, holding a snubbed out Lucky Strike behind his left ear, looks incredulously at the visitor and wants to pinch himself to see if this is really happening. Is he imagining this? Is he Ray Kinsella hearing voices in the corn field? Well, here’s a modern day Lydia! A messenger from God interceded in a young man’s life, immersing him in a light from which he could never look back.

Such incidences, Pastor Johnson reminded us, are God Incidences, chance meetings between unlikely people that lead one or both to the realization that it’s not the things of this world that matter at all.

We BEST serve when we focus on the things NOT of this world!

When we focus NOT on this world, but on visions and dreams, fields of dreams, that people who have not “been exposed to the light” can not see., where the City gates are open and there is no night. But there is the sweet smell of possibility.

When we recently heard the Lenten story of Jesus washing the disciples feet during the Last Supper, I couldn’t help but think that Jesus’ bigger gift to the disciples might not have been only washing their feet. It may very well have been the message behind it – I do this to remind you to serve others, to be self-forgetful and “pay it forward”. Someone does for you and you do for others. Take care of each other and I will take care of you. Jump and the net will appear.

God and His messengers come in the micro-moments of our lives …….

The moments in which a young student opens a college dorm room to a sight that he never forgets, that 40 years hence he describes with alarmingly accurate and descriptive detail, down to the letter. He can still smell the moment. These are the micro-moments, the slices of our existence, the Thin Places where our worlds are entered by the Almighty to serve us notice that his Kingdom is NOT of this world. And, if you are to serve Him, it will be by serving one another. God sends that lucrative and rich message through a paper thin door and often by way of a character we’re not likely to forget.

John Denver, in the movie Oh God, is visited by, well … God, played by George Burns. God appears in the form of an older man in a baseball cap. In a line only Burns could deliver as he did, he says “You were expecting someone younger. I know. It’s all those pictures with the robes and sandals. Frankly, I never got it …. I come to you in a form you can understand me.” He then proceeds to give John a message to give the rest of the world “Take care of one another. I gave you everything you need to do it.”

God sends those messengers for sure. But they do come in thin slices of existence, in micro-moments, in glimpses, lit only by starlight … to lead us from night into a day that will never end. So we have to be awake and paying attention. Micro-moments can be missed if we’re pre-occupied with the ways of this world. Micro-moments in which bread and wine become body and blood, where young Lucky Strike laden, impressionable college lads consider a life dedicated to The Word and The Way.

In the world of advertising, subliminal messages are thin slices of film or video spliced into a running ad or film … sometimes a tub of popcorn or a refreshingly cool soda. The human brain takes in the vision that the conscious mind does not appear to perceive. And the body reacts accordingly, becoming hungry or thirsty. The remarkable human physiology sees the message, regardless of its thinness in the visually perceptive plane. So it might be with the thin slices on which God interjects his promptings for us. If you miss the splice, you miss the message – so we must be willing to watch and consider visions, dreams, possibilities.

Pastor Johnson knew and knows to this day that Henry Yoger was a man who believed in possibilities. Much like Al Smith, Jackie Robinson, Mother Theresa, Susan B. Anthony and those who kept their eyes on the prize, they believed in the voice in the corn field that “sent me to find you”. They believed in possibility and renewal, that God could “make a new thing”, that hope, as Emily Dickinson reminded us all, is “the thing with feathers”.

Subliminal messages are still illegal in advertising, but they are part of Gods modus operandi. When we preach the Gospel, Pastor Johnson subtly references that it is most likely to be in a locker room, in an honest and sincere conversation about God, in simple words and in simple stories. I blogged about a sign in the halls of Cardinal Stritch University that I feel compelled to repeat here:

Preach the Gospel always; when necessary use words.

Henry Yoger’s very presence spoke volumes to a young college student. He had a vision that there was something to this young man that made a trip to visit him in the dark of the night a worthwhile or compelling enterprise, must-see Unreality Church. He had a vision, a notion of the possibility that made it necessary to ask that young man to pray about the vision he had for that young man to go into the ministry.

He believed in the power of the resurrection, the power of renewal, the power of possibility in lives. It’s NEVER too late for God to act. And there’s NEVER a wrong time for the asking to occur.

Please forgive me this one last indulgence of a visit to The Field of Dreams. Ray Kinsella and Terrance Mann travel to Chisolm, Minnesota to visit an old ball player Archibald “Moonlight” Graham. He played one inning in the major leagues, had one at bat and never got a hit. He had a dream of getting that one hit, looking down a major league pitcher, letting him think you knew something he didn’t, get a hit and sliding headfirst into fresh dirt. Doc Graham never has the baseball career, but becomes a doctor in a small town in Minnesota, making a world of difference to the entire community.

Ray asks him if he would come with him to a place where those dreams (of making the big leagues) do come true. Graham declines the offer. Ray implores him “It’d kill a man to come this close to their dreams and not touch them! They’d consider that a tragedy!”

Graham’s reply … simply “No son. If I’d only become a doctor for 5 minutes, now that’d been a tragedy.” And he winks.

He gets it! Just as Lydia gets it! It’s not about this world, about the big leagues, the big house and the promotion. Lydia and Moonlight are free from the shackles of worldly wealth, zip codes, status. Now they say “I am not a subject of the rulers of this age.”

They’ve both had a taste. And they’re not going back.

In a later scene, Ray and Terrance have at least one more micro-moment. They pick up a stray hitchhiker, a young man with all the world agleam in his eye. They ask him his name, He says “Archie … Archie Graham”. He comes to Iowa, plays the big league players, but crosses the first base line – that THIN LINE that separates the space between man and the possibilities. He becomes old Doc Graham. He saves Ray’s daughter from choking on a hot dog, then walks toward the corn field, never able to return to the worldly want he once had. Ray says he’s sorry and “Thank you”. Doc says “No son …… Thank You!”

Thank you for believing in the possibility and for asking me to also!

Henry Yoger, as an old man, died while planting flowers in his garden. Flowers … the perennial sign of hope and possibility, of renewal and new life.

I figure it’s a good money bet Pastor Johnson says thanks often enough for Henry Yoger and a trip he took, and a knock on his door. In one of those micro-moments, he paid it forward today by sharing his story. What a powerful glimpse.

Preach the Gospel always; when necessary, use words.

But, if not words, pull an unkempt college student buried in Lucky Strikes out of his comfort zone, take someone into your home, pay something forward … for it is in those other-worldy moments, in those thin places and slices that we are in the midst of the light and the truth that sets us free.

Where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope ...

Readings:
April 22, 2007
Acts 9: 1-6, 17-20
Revelation 5: 11-14
John 21: 1-19

April 29, 2007
Acts 9: 36-43
Revelation 7: 9-17
John 10: 22-30

As Pastor Johnson reminded us this week, witnessing is often best done by example. We say what we believe in the Nicene Creed, but “what will bring someone to God is sitting and having a soda with them and telling them your story. So sit down, open a soda, here’s a story …

Two blogs for one. I couldn’t figure out why I was having a hard time blogging last week. Then, this Sunday morning, I felt I might have been told why. The two sermons and the entire early service intertwined in a “God’s threading the tapestry” sort of way. I will ask the pastors to forgive me if the scriptural texts do not bear this out, but, upon climbing the stairs once back in my home, the witness from the pulpits appeared to. The Prayer of St. Francis, which my mother cross-stitched and gave me in college, sits atop that staircase.

In the testimonial this week and in both sermons, last week and this, I heard the threaded messages. And, as I walked to my room, it caught my eye. And there they were, in burnt orange and green stitched yarn, staring at me:

Where there is doubt, faith …. it is in giving that we receive

Where there is despair, hope … it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Donna Zarek gave an emotional and moving testimonial about having faith to do what your heart tells you is right, but your mind tells you to be cautious of “just in case”. In what made the testimonial especially moving to me, the message was about a sheep who felt they might have been lost, but was then found; a message had been revisited and therein learned. It was true growth of the spiritual variety. Why it was absolutely moving was that it is a very hard thing to showcase one’s growth for everyone to see. But therein lay the root of my feeling fortunate to have experienced her witness firsthand. THIS Mt. Zion is a special place where disciples can walk up and witness to their doubts and witness to how the spirit helped them move beyond their doubts, their worries, their roadblocks to faith. In her book, The Artist’s Way, Julie Cameron fondly says that to unblock our connection with the spirit we must …

Jump … and the net will appear

Where there was doubt and worry and caution “just in case”, there became faith … that the net would appear. Somewhere, somehow. The testimonial we were privileged to hear this week took a withdrawal from the bank of “just in case” and made a deposit in the bank of “the net will appear”.

Then it was Pastor Kendra Mohn’s turn. And in an amazing segue, she continued the service in a way that struck me in two significant ways.

After Donna’s testimonial, she was so wise in knowing to say “After an experience such as this, I know not what words to add. Thank goodness, at times like these, God does the speaking”. In a hallway at Cardinal Stritch University lies a plaque that says

“Preach the Gospel always; when necessary, use words.”

It is just as wise to know when not to use words and allow the proclamation to speak for itself in the action of, in this case, a heartfelt testimonial.

Secondly, and just as thoughtfully, she asked all the children at the service if they would like to come to the altar to witness the miracle of the Baptism of Clare Grant Kasdorf. The children do not know from worry, they’ve yet to learn doubt. And we were invited to witness the miracle through their eyes. The children’s book The Polar Express reminds us that adults can lose their ability to “see magic” and “to believe”. They can, at some point, no longer hear the first bell of Christmas. Children still can. Not only did the children witness, as Pastor Johnson reminded us, that something happened at the altar that transcended ritual, but we were welcomed by these two wise pastors to talk to our children in the way home … as a way of cementing their experience, but, perhaps just as much, to have our own children witness to us .. the sound of the bell, the magic, the belief.

Wow, I’m psyched just to be a disciple-in-training at a camp such as this.

And then, with awareness still tingling, I watched Pastor Johnson rise slowly but steadily into the pulpit with the aid of his crutch. He may feel uncomfortable for my saying this, but then that man tied it all together like some master craftsman. Why all the threads seemed to fit together to “tell a story”. And it went something like this:

There was a faithful minister named Dorcas. She quietly made the tunics, she knitted the prayer shawls, she tended to the altar linens, she collected the bulletins and cleaned the church pews. Quietly. Much like those who tended to the roads that needed fixing this Lent, the humble and quiet work, small things done with great love, as Mother Theresa is want to remind us. Dorcas is the one most often not noticed, who doesn’t get credit and doesn’t seek credit.

But in her quiet doing is a powerful message. PRAXIS – action as opposed to theory; it matters more what we do than what we say. For in that doing, faith lives!

Pastor Johnson knowingly gets excited when he gets to the part where he reminds us that it’s not a coincidence that kids crowd around a Baptismal font and they “get it”, Peter “gets” Dorcas and why she does what she does, in faith disciples “get” the 6 quarters a day. You don’t have to say it, you just have to show it, to live it. A static status quo is death; faith is alive and is evidenced in growth! The growth that occurs in a faith that is lived breaks all the rules! The Gospel breaks the laws of physics, chemistry, science, reality.

Forget Reality TV, give me Unreality Church!

As Pastor Mohn commiserated “We are, all of us, a continual mix of tragedy and joy, challenges and rejuvenation, despair and hope”. One day, the utter despair at Virginia Tech, the next day a Baptism and a vigil, a splash of water on our faces and candles lit by the thousands to awaken and rekindle hope. To shed the despair, a daily death and resurrection”.

As Pastor Johnson eerily resounded “We have found life in what was once the stench of death. The unreality Church breaks all the rules. It believes we can see the magic in Baptism, can see 6 quarters a day, can turn topsy into turvy. You won’t see it on TV or on the news and that’s … just …. fine. Sheep are practically blind, they smell and they get lost a lot. It’s OK that we’re sheep. And it’s OK if we’re all different kinds of sheep. Sure, we have despair but we are the people of hope”. All spoken by a man who used a crutch to get himself into the pulpit … who didn’t have to be there, but was. It matters what we do more than what we say. And because he did, what he said made all the difference.

Where there is doubt, faith …. it is in giving that we receive

Where there is despair, hope … it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

You don’t have to say it; you just have to live it.

Now that’s a story I can sit down to a soda with and pass on one more time.


Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light;

where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood as to understand;

to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.