Little help here?
So I’m trying to figure out exactly what this blog will look like over the next couple of years. I’ve committed myself to putting some serious time into RLP. I thought maybe you could help me think about this.
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The Slow Church
Near the front of our main building sit two rather mysterious slabs of concrete with pink and green paint on the top. They are benches dropped off some 5 years ago by a woman who thought they might make a nice addition to the church. We talked about it at our next elders’ meeting. Not everyone was convinced we needed benches, though we all allowed they might be nice. One person wasn’t crazy about the colored paint. Others didn’t mind it. The general consensus was that someone should probably figure out how to put the benches together and do it. A year or so later, it was brought up again. There wasn’t much energy for the project, but again we agreed that someone should probably go ahead and put those benches together. Another year went by. The concrete blocks sank softly into the earth, the way things do when they sit in one place for long time....READ THE REST at HighCallingBlogs.com
Exegesis
So here’s what you do. You take a phrase or a word or a short teaching out of the Bible. Something like “The book of life,” or “The Son of Man,” or “The Light of the World,” or “No one comes to the Father but by me.” These phrases could mean anything. They meant something in their day, surely, but the deepest and most scholarly study in the world cannot unravel exactly what they meant.
But you. You somehow know the truth. You take these phrases with no study at all, and you fill them with your theology, like someone filling helium balloons at a carnival. Then you hang a little basket below your balloons and float away, so delighted in the complex theological construct that you’ve put together. And from your elevated position you lay burdens on people that you could never keep yourself. Lightning bolts thrown down from
The Ministers' Morgue - Part Three
The final chapter. Read part one and part two.
The man looked at me for a moment or two. He spun his chair around, grabbed a cup, and poured himself some coffee from a Mr. Coffee machine on the credenza behind him.
“Cup of coffee?” he asked without turning around.
“Oh, no. Thanks though.”
He spun back around and opened a desk drawer. He took out a small, flask-shaped bottle of whiskey and poured a shot into his coffee. He looked at me and raised the bottle
The Ministers' Morgue - Part Two
My apologies, but this thing has now turned into three parts. I hope not four. Final part (hopefully) is coming soon.
The man pulled the sheet off of Doug, leaving him completely naked on the metal table. He glanced over, noticed me wincing, and got a cloth to cover Doug’s midsection.
“That’s better,” I said.
He put on some latex gloves and selected a scalpel from a tray full of shiny instruments. He placed the blade near the top of Doug’s shoulder, then looked at me and said, “There won’t be any blood when
The Ministers' Morgue
I got the news that a minister friend had died in Waco. He dropped dead right on the sidewalk. There was no warning. A witness said he looked surprised for a moment, and then fell in a heap. I hadn’t heard from Doug in years, so I was surprised to find that my name was in his wallet, listed as the person to contact in an emergency. He had a wife, but she left him years ago. I heard he was working at a church in Waco. I wondered why they didn’t call someone in the congregation.
The police told me I needed to go to Waco to identify the body. I had never done that before, so I was a little nervous. But what choice did I have? Doug was a friend, even if we hadn’t seen each other recently. He needed this last thing done for him, and apparently I was
Mouse turd on the communion table
Well, what would you have titled this?
Because there is really one one fitting title for this piece about the little present I found recently at the communion table. And turd is the only word that works in that title. Because turd is a great word. When you drop turd into a sentence, it shouts its presence with a coarse, rolling resonance that sounds like a springy sound effect in some cheap comedy.
Boi-oi-oi-oing.
My wife and I joined two friends recently in leading a retreat at a lovely retreat center on the Frio River in the Hill Country of Texas. The retreat ended, and we four presided over a communion table to celebrate our final time of worship with the group. I was setting up the communion elements while people were filing into the room for the service. That’s when I noticed a mouse turd sitting right in the middle of the table.
At this point in the story, I’m afraid it’s going to become quite clear that I’m not a normal sort of person. Your average person would have hurriedly disposed of the turd, following this with a thorough cleaning of the table. I, on the other hand, ran to get my camera. I began snapping shots of the turd. Close, far, with the macro function, without, turning the camera this way and that.
“Okay, mouse turd, work the camera. Yes. Beautiful. Give me some attitude. Sweet!”
“Why, why, why?” you ask me, shaking your head in disbelief. “Why would you take a picture of a mouse turd on a communion table?”
A Love Letter for Redeemed Pagans and Lost Christians
There is only one righteous way for you to be saved if you’ve spent too much time in the Church. You must lay your religion down. Lay it down hard. Drop it. Leave it on the trail and walk away from it. And you have to mean it. You can’t fake this. You have to renounce religion and leave it for good. As far as you know, you’ll never pick it up again.
After that you can walk freely in the wild places where faith can still be found. As you walk, stretch out your arms and touch the foliage on either side of the trail, because these trees are the borders of your faith and this earth your true home. And every leaf jutting into your path is itself a fossil, laid down before the ages, suddenly exposed and within hand’s reach along the cut-edges of the trail.
Who laid bare these leafy walls? Who cut this covenant trail and left these leaves exposed to my eyes and my hands and my mind?
If fear has seized your heart, and you want to look back at what you left behind, hear this: There are no religions of The Word. Because if there is a Word our frail ears can’t hear it. What we have are religions that clamor after The Word and talk about The Word and market The Word and brand themselves as keepers of The Word. It’s all best guesses and hearsay, and if you can’t own up to that and still keep faith with your brothers and sisters, you’re just fooling yourself and maybe that’s okay with you. That’s all some people want - to be nicely and gently and comfortably fooled.
I know the Bible, for I have spent half a lifetime looking there, but it cannot give you The Word. And if you treat those words as if they were The Word, then the Bible will be dead to you. The stories will turn their faces away from you, fold their robes over their shoulders, and go to sleep.
So you won’t have the Bible to cling to. I’m sorry.
The way of things
The way governments and businesses treat people. The way people unload their anger on the innocent. The way slick talkers get ahead and the way good people lose in the end.
The way those who believe in God can be so angry. The way people use religion to leverage power. The way spiritual things dry up and become hard and ruined. The way our best intentions still bring pain.
The way bad people take pleasure in the suffering of others. The way good people run out of energy and are consumed by apathy. The way we lose hope because everything is so big. The way innocence leaves the young and cynicism seizes the elderly.
The way the earth bleeds when you cut it. The way mothers protect their children and the way fathers respect that power. The way weeds hold the land when nothing else can. The way tender seedlings shatter concrete and water wears away stone.
The way you can follow beauty to the molecular level and still not find its source. The way all things young are tender and beloved. The way an artist pulls on your heartstrings and the way saints can make you believe again. The way the human face conveys a thousand nuanced emotions.
The way a clean baby smells and the way her feet feel. The way we laugh at everything, even the sad things. The way women cry so easily. The way men try to be strong then burst into tears. The way children trust everyone until we teach them not to.
The way everything big and small, everything physical and emotional, everything that really matters is always falling toward a center of gravity.
And the way that terrible falling to the center tickles your stomach and makes you grieve but also laugh and be so glad that you were a part of it all.
rlp
A one size fits all parable
I can’t believe it.
You wanted to know the truth.
Yeah, but...
That’s why I warned you. But you had to know.
I still can’t believe it.
“I want to know the truth. About God, Jesus, who shot JFK, life, Darwin, all of it.” That’s what you said; that’s what you told me.
But I just. I don’t want to know this. I don’t know what to do now. How to act or be.
You’ll find a way to deal with it. Everyone does. It’s all part of the journey.
So that guy was right?
What guy?
That one guy. Who was always saying that stuff about, you know, all that stuff we talked about. I hate that guy. He was right?
Yep.
See, that’s the part that really gets me. I mean it’s all shocking, but that guy was right? THAT GUY?
Well, technically he was wrong too, but he was more right than you were. Technically. Of course, it depends on how you look at it.
What do you mean?
Well, if he was here - if your positions were reversed - I’d be telling him that you were right. Or more right than he was anyway.
What? You mean everyone’s right?
I wouldn’t say that. No.
Everyone’s wrong?
More or less. If you feel like you have to say something, I guess that’s the best way to say it. Yeah, everyone’s wrong.
Oh my God. Wait. Should I say that now? Now that...
No one cares if you say that or don’t.
Okay. Oh my God. My life. What was I living for? What were we all living for? Think about how much time I...all the arguments, the hours I spent talking like I knew something, thinking I really did know something.
Stop.
What? What did I do?
Nothing. Just stop. Right now, how you feel. Bewildered, lost, unsure, humble, insignificant.
Yeah.
Spam & Grey Poupon
Once I ate a piece of fried Spam with Grey Poupon on it. I was fully aware of the irony of this. Indeed, I took great pleasure contemplating it during the meal. And I thought it was delicious.
Whatever that says about me is true.
I like cake icing a lot. The more the better. The only thing that stops me from fighting children for the corner piece of cake at birthday parties is knowing I would look ridiculous. I will, however, try to position myself in line so that I might be given the corner piece. If handed the corner piece of cake, I will likely protest briefly, saying "that's way too much icing, but okay if you insist."
Whatever that says about me is true.
I have loved Pepperidge Farm Goldfish Crackers for a quarter of a century. I only eat the Parmesan cheese version. Unfortunately, Pepperidge Farm has a problem with product consistency. Some Goldfish are salted less than others, and some are puffier with a powdery texture that I don’t like. I learn the batch numbers and look through the packages on the shelves for good batches. Currently you should stay away from anything beginning with a D or a W. The RU series is pretty good.
Whatever that says about me is true.
Works in Progress
“Bearing Witness,” a Foy Davis story set in Fort Davis, Texas when Foy was in 3rd grade. Part one was posted 3-17-10. Part two should be ready next week.
“Lenten Satchel,” a short essay on the strange items that make up my Lenten journey this year. Because of Tracy’s comment. Posted here 3-18-10
“Last Things,” an essay about my final days at Covenant. Soon to be published by the Christian Century. Will be linked here when it is online at the CC website.
My Latest Book
I’m proud to announce that Turtles All The Way Down came out in November of 2009. This was my first experience with the Consafo model of social media community publishing.
2000 copies were printed. We sold well over 500 as advance purchases or in the weeks leading up to Christmas. This paid for the printing costs completely.