Observe

Tomorrow Jami is back in town. Three whole days together here.
For right now, I have to get some sleep. I'm working at the hospital from 7 am to 4pm, and even now I know that I'm not going to get as much sleep as I'll need.
Still. We've been apart for 16 days now and it feels like a month or more.
When we would walk around the track at Agnes Scott I'd spend time looking up at this observatory. What kind of school affords such a building? What would it be like if Columbia Seminary had an observatory like this? In the 19th century the seminary had a chair of life sciences or something like that. Life Sciences! I think Woodrow, the professor who liked evolution, who the powers that be tried to get rid of (did they? I can't remember) was one of the holders of that chair. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the chair disappeared with him. Any one can endow a chair for any reason. I suppose that the seminary could have a chair of animal husbandry and ethics - or environmental ethics. Speaking of endowments, how is the painting of the endowment going. I continue working on it, applying layers of paint, changing the composition, adding and subtracting elements. My goal is a gray pulpy mass resonant with meaning. Both parts of that sentence are vital: not just a gray pulpy mass; not just resonant with meaning. I've got to arrive at the right tone and texture of gray: the world is full of grays. In the new wing of the High Museum there is a large Anselm Kiefer. Kiefer was the hot artist of the mid-90s, but his cachet is still pretty high. He paints big and complex. The first of his paintings I'd seen in person was at the Guggenheim: a wonderful, encrusted, combination of straw, paint, lead, and God knows what else that was as big as a house. The High now has one of his works, a large gray painting with great impasto swirls of paint depicting waves breaking on the shore at night with the constellations over head. I'm going for more gray, more pulpy, more meaningfully resonant - but not that big. I need to be able to fit it in my car.
Did mention Jami is flying in tomorrow? Her arms are bound to be tired.
I love her.

Be kind for everyone

Last year, Jami and I were drinking bloody Marys in the kitchen and she was cooking something wonderful and we were listening to NPR's "Speaking of Faith with Christa Tippett," when her guest quoted this saying, "be kind for everyone is fighting a great battle." Her Guest attributed it to Philo. In fact most of the internet references to this phrase and its various permutations - every one [man, person, people] is carrying [fighting] a [great] burden [battle] [inside] - reliably but unnecessarily beginning with "be kind - refer this phrase to Philo. Checking the Philoblog (yes, there's a blog devoted to Philo of Alexandria: see philoblogger.blogspot.com of 9/19/2005 for the google hit on this topic) shows however that people who really love Philo and have read him cannot locate this phrase in any work of Philo. This phrase is also popularly attributed to Plato. An occasional person cites anonymous, but most people feel a need to cite someone: "an ancient Asian philosopher"; "a Russian proverb"; "St. Philo", among others (Marian Parker, who is that?) . The Philo blog discussion refers frustratingly to an article published in 1906, that refers to II Peter 1:57 - there're no more than 21 verses in any of its three chapters though, 61 verses in the whole book, and nothing faintly resembles this saying. When I looked this saying up last year, I eventually found a source that said it came from an American lecturer of the late 19th century: that is that this phrase may not have existed before 1880. John Watson, a prime minister of Australia is cited a few times as coining this sentence, but he's not the person I'd seen cited before. I know it's not Marion Parker. Another citation attributed it to both Watson and TH Thompson: it could be the latter, as that's the ordinary kind of American name I'd originally seen cited for it, that I faintly remember, and that is now absent from google's cache.
Still whenever I see this phrase cited for Philo (and it's so offhandedly cited to be embarrassing: the work it comes from is never cited - it would be like me quoting something and citing "Bible" or "Encyclopedia Britanica") I've begun to laugh. After awhile Philo will be stuck with this phrase, something he didn't say, while things that he did say, admirable things are gradually forgotten. Enough people believe that this is Plato that there could even be a dispute: it would be interesting to see how they settle that dispute - I hope not through counting internet citations. I feel a great deal of fun could be achieved by citing just about anyone. I love the "Asian philosopher" or the "Russian proverb": what bold attempts to give it some exotic cache. It might as well be cited as Ben Franklin, and I'm surprised no one has done that. I'm going for Thomas Paine: that great battle inside: there's a lot of pain in that.
Mark Twain in his book Roughing It describes a similar experience. In all his western journeys invariably he'd be treated to a story about Horace Greeley, a shaggy dog story. It would be prefaced by "Here's something you might not be aware of, Horace Greeley once rode this [stage, train, boat] .... " and it wold go on interminably. School marms would tell it (where have all the school marms gone?), Indians, young and old: this story might spring out of the mouth of anyone and Twain became gradually on his guard: he shied away from associating with certain people, fearing that this anecdote would be sprung on him. And he says, the worst thing is "it never happened." These things take on a life of their own.

I took Louise, The Cat, to the vet this morning

One of our cats, a member of the "kitten sisters in Christ", Louise, has developed a lesion under her left ear. And it's grown bigger over the week until I was able to schedule an appointment with the vet. Because I don't have to be at the hospital until noon today, I was able to get a morning slot. So I brought the kitten in. She mewed all the way, her plaintive mew, constant as a homing beacon. When we arrived at the vet and I took her to the examining room, she purred so much that the intern had difficulty obtaining a pulse. Finally the doctor came in and looked at her. Louise apparently loves being the one cat in a room full of people: none of her crabby instincts kicked in: instead she was happy to be poked and prodded and given a shot. The doctor asked me if we had fleas or if she was on any flea regime, but I didn't know. I called Jami, I suppose in the middle of convocation at Duke, and the call was dropped. So I couldn't give an answer. The vet said that she could also be allergic to air borne things as well. "Cats," he said. I said that yes, Louise is definitely allergic to cats, at least three other cats. Suddenly it all made sense. The other cats cause her to break out.
While writing the doctor's comments above I wanted to concoct a good Tom Swifty, but none occurred to me. As I thought that I thought: "If only Louise were a dog, " the vet concurred. Perfection.

A very happy day

I was looking through my photos, and this photo appealed to me: there's my dad - how incredible it is getting him out of the house; there I am, on my graduation day back in May 2006; and there's Jami, her beautiful smile radiating happiness. I look at this photograph and joy floods my soul.

Hey Beautiful

Jami, thankfully, loves puns. She may aver otherwise, but, as I was telling someone today, eating blue cheese burgers with bacon at the Brick Store, Michael McLaughlin, I think, who I was telling, describing our cats, which Jami had named, of which two, Thelma and Louise, refer to a movie, which Michael found hilarious, not the movie, but the naming of the cats, and two, Catalina and Cleocatra, both "cat" puns, that it would seem that she protests too vociferously about my puns, when she entertains the habit on her own and nurtures her own wordplay.
[a 92 word sentence: hold the applause, a tour de force of syntax, a taxing of syntactical tacticianation; a grammar phone home about] She had a pun for me tonight on the phone, which I can't recall right now, but I'm sure that she remembers. What I did come up with was this idea that in the Old Testament, ancient Israel, olden Palestine, that huge mobs would form on the seventh day, causing no end of interference with human intercourse, and these mobs would prowl the country side, sightseeing as it were, but causing societal breakdowns; all this because of these wandering groups on the seventh day, and so these so called "sabbath-tours" had to be stopped.
Look at that smile up there. That is the most beautiful smile in the world. And she's bringing that smile here this Friday.

undercover kitten

Catalina, our torty, ensconced in the sheets: a picture taken last summer, but still good. She says, " hello world. Please don't eat me." Right now the cats are lounging around me on the living room floor. Louise is on the register; Thelma curled up on the rug. Cleo is next to the door, ready to make her escape. Where is Catalina? On the bed, licking her paws, like she knows something the rest of the world doesn't. What might this knowledge be? Perhaps that she would be tasty in a wine reduction. According to Jami, Catalina lived her early life in the wild, escaping predation, living by her wits. Now, even after years of domestic security, this little cat acts quite skittish - as if she is afraid that she'll be eaten. She is particularly afraid that her owners might eat her. She harbors this fear even while rubbing against us and purring like a diesel engine. She purrs like a truck engine on a cold morning - I can hear this cat purring on the other side of the house. I am going to bed now, and it may be that the cats remain in here, perhaps hesitant to disturb my sonorous breathing, my somnolent perorations pro proboscis. I do know that at precisely 6:45 Catalina will be sitting on my chest purring like a diesel truck. Time to eat! Wake up human.

It's all clear now

When I was in college at Brevard, and I was all of 19 years old, I was an ardent Christian. I was also an insecure Christian, stung by years in a country Methodist church where each altar call was like a knife dug into my soul. That experience combined with attending small, sparsely attended Baptist churches with my grand parents - where though sparsely attended, no effort was spared in painting the full grimy picture of my guilt: all slimy, dark, inescapable, woven into my personality like the amino acid sequence in my DNA, and all pointy, and every one could see it, and I should be ashamed to walk the earth in daylight, and I could never repent enough. In light of all this, when I discovered God's grace (which had been there all along; but since it's not a popular topic for revival preachers, you wouldn't know it had been there all along. Oh they'll mention it in passing; there's even a popular hymn with the word in the title. The message of grace, that God has accepted us from the beginning of the world, is antithetical to the production of guilt necessary for the altar call. Best to make grace something you earn, something God gives to the good people, something you can lose), when I discovered God's grace, I discovered that I was all right after all, that whatever litany of accusation went on in my head wasn't from God. I was pretty ticked: years spent feeling like crap when I didn't have to (no one has to), feeling like God hated me. I was an angry Christian. I had unfortunately discovered the truth of grace while hanging out with people who might be called "fundy." I had certainly bought into the whole inerrancy, miracles, "the Church is filled with unbelievers: Liberals!" polemic that continues to be popular to this day.
One day, the group of us had a conversation with the Methodist minister from across the street from campus. He was all about form criticism, documentary hypotheses, Babylonian mythology, and such - very threatening stuff. He said something intelligent and persuasive and I snapped. I laid into him, arguing that he wasn't a real Christian. I was full of indignation. (I was also projecting onto him my frustration with the Methodist Church). I remember him telling me, "you and I are not so far apart." But I would not be reconciled. I was triumphant.
Years later, while at seminary, reading the Anchor Exodus commentary by Propp, I thought, "hmmm, Exodus is probably some kind of vision quest story, like other stories with heroes who go into the desert and have a vision from God. There is no archaeological evidence that it ever happened, but that's not important and doesn't detract from its usefulness or message." I can look at the Bible as a hodge podge of stories, tendentious, politically motivated , disputatious, testimonial, reflecting the crises of exile, death, resurrection, persecution, martyrdom, poverty, loss - all that. Daniel? probably written as a polemic during the Maccabean times, with the intention of avoiding the violence the Maccabees used, while still offering resistance to the Syrian-Greeks: at least when you look at it that way, it all snaps into place.
I was thinking these thoughts and I thought of this minister that I had vilified as "not really a Christian." I thought of him, and I realized that I had become him. I am now the person I railed against 28 years ago.
I've mentioned this realization to a few people now. I was talking to someone yesterday and I said, "it's only a matter of time now before some young kid, full of the Holy Spirit and righteous indignation, latches onto something I say and from the depth of his being launches into a full scale defamation of my status as a Christian. With great anger he'll say, 'You're not really a Christian.' I know it's only a matter of time, and you know, I welcome it."
"What will you tell him, what will you say?" my friend asked.
I thought for a moment. There is only one thing that I could say, "Tag."

a fine statue of the madonna at Agnes Scott

I enjoy finding art in odd places. This sculpture of the Madonna is tucked in the back of the art building, under some trees. I'm embarrassed that I don't know if you clean granite or let it develop a patina of pollution. I think that the marble statues of Rome and Athens have the pollution cleansed off. Still this is a good piece of work. Leo Steinberg, a famous art historian at U Penn wrote a book called the Sexuality of Jesus Christ in Renaissance art and modern oblivion. In this book he wrote about how important for an understanding of the incarnation that Jesus' penis be displayed. This sculpture makes me think of that work - a wonderful work and I wish that I had a copy of it. Our library at Columbia should have it, but the development of theology in terms of iconography and the history of art is ignored. There's a little bit - acquired haphazardly through gifts mostly. Last summer when Catherine Kapekian gave a seminar on art in the Church and worship, I had some hope, but now the topic seems lost. Still what do I know. I gladly encourage anyone who works to bring art and music into the conversation of theological and spiritual development in a central way - not in terms of mimesis, illustration, or program, but as disciplines that allow a unique approach to God, where the text is the image. It takes some training in iconography, in symbols, a willingness to be open to poetic and allusional modes of dialog, taking some of the privilege away from the verbal and written. As I read in an issue of Journal of New Testament Studies, it is important to recall that the original message of the gospel was not written but spoken, and that the word was performative: both speaker and audience negotiating the word's meaning, dependent on each other. Here on Agnes Scott's campus is a performative word, that Christ was incarnate as any other baby, frail as any other male, and that Mary was like any other woman, any other mother, and that God's strength is displayed for humans through God as human in weakness and cruciformity, and it is this life and cruciformity that we are called to enter into and participate in.

Chairs

For the last several months, chairs have been stored in the basement mens room of the library at Columbia Seminary. They're lined up from wall to wall facing the urinals and stalls, like in a barber shop. The space where the study desks were is now being used for storage, so the chairs that were displaced (I don't know what happened to the desks) now provide much needed seating in the mens room. We feel a certain relief. Now we know that we don't need to be in a hurry to use the facilities: we can stop and reflect on what we might do; how our day is going; great theological questions. Or, should the urinals and stalls be filled, we now no longer need to stand around awkwardly, but we can calmly sit, until the necessary and appropriate fixture is available. And if we are having a conversation, we can now continue that conversation while our colleague goes about his business. While having a wall of chairs may seem frivolous, a needed service is being provided. What is being modeled here is more than a gesture of expediency on the part of the physical plant; what is being modeled here is an example of our "liberty in Christ." We are being invited to fully relax and find space for meditating in a mens only sanctuary. Here it is that today's male seminary student can find solace, space to be himself, a sabbath from his cares - hence you could call them "sabbath-rooms."
Of course this begs the question: what is the state of the womens room? Are there chairs? How are they arranged? I can say this, chancing a glance after the library had officially closed, after all students and most staff had made a bee-line for the hinterlands and outskirts, that there are two chairs in there, close in and catty-cornered to a single stall. What does that mean? I don't know and I won't speculate. I am happy to say though that both sexes are having their spiritual needs met, that neither is more "privy-ledged" than the other; that men and women are able to discover their means of spirituality in their cloistered space, and find relief.

At Keats' house

Here we are, in separate photographs, at Keats' House. Jami, beautiful and witty, looks directly into the camera; I, pensive, my scarf draped along my belly, gaze across the yard. Jami wrote about salad and bird poo recently; I don't have any material like that - but it doesn't sound very Keatsian: salad and poo - saladpoo might be an organic hair product. There is a Seinfeld where Kramer prepares a salad while taking a shower. He tells Elaine just as she's biting into some lettuce. Wonderful moment.
Keats' house is a wonderful place, right across from the Heath. Inside artifacts remain from the famous poet. Among the papers I saw, a bad debt from betting at the track, a certain amount owed on Melancholy, a horse that had not done so well.
I love you honey.

not a vacation photo

Louise demonstrates how to surf the web. Someday this pose will be replicated at our house in Durham. As I write this Louise is sprawled across the couch next to me and Thelma is lounging on the arm of the couch, under the lamp, facing the wall. They do this every night. Is there nothing they don't know about relaxation? What can we learn from them?

Toward the end, a storm cleared out

Finally, a storm cleared the air. As we were leaving, the horizon became visible again and the air was crisp. The wind died down, and the waves lazily crashed onto the shore. It's always sad to leave the beach, and a week later, the finely honed tan I'd developed there had begun to fade.
Tomorrow, Monday, I begin my chaplain residency at Atlanta Medical Center.

Time passagees

I could have taken photographs of the waves all day. When we arrived at Kiawah the waves were gentle, arriving one at a time, caressing the shore. Our last day at Kiawah, it rained, but the ocean was even more placid. It seemed almost lake-like. When we arrived at Oak Island the waves were brisker and the ocean more active, but the waves came one or two at a time. By week's end the waves were coming in groups of threes and twos, from left and right, and the ocean was choppy, and the wind more than brisk.
I could do a Monet thing with waves. Painting a whole series of them. Constable painted a whole series of clouds.

hog heaven

Driving north on US 17 we stopped at Hog Heaven, a bar-b-que and raw bar restaurant on Pawley's Island. The bar-b-que was superb: two vinegar sauces, hot and mild; a mustard sauce labeled as tangy; and a tomato sauce recommended for chicken and ribs (but which went well on the pork as well). Jami raved about it, and she's more the connoisseur than I am. We'll stop here again I'm certain. The grand thing is that it's a buffet. The tea is sweet and good and the pork is plentiful. A person could impair themself eating here. Still we made it back to the car, and when we arrived at Oak Island only an hour or so later, we had a good bar-b-que story.
One beautiful thing about moving to Durham is that I love North Carolina bar-b-que, even more so than Georgia's. In fact, I love Alabama bar-b-que, especially around Birmingham more. You can only find good Brunswick stew around Atlanta though.

The near end

Our vacation had begun on Kiawah, where there are placid waves gently lapping the shore, like a kitten hovering over its milk. During five days there and four days at Oak Island, the ocean cuddled around our ankles and hugged us about the waist, rocking us like infants serene in bassinet. But the last three days of our excursion the ocean displayed its fickle nature and turned on us, Poseidon sending great loads of churning foam shell cracking against the sand caked bluffs of the shore. The wind wailed and blew sand in our hair, building up in our pores. The face of the water occluded and the inhabitants of the beach were shrouded in haze. Heat, wind, sand, salt, wrack, jetsam, haze: all joined together. I sat upon the shore in these days, reading Kierkegaard in an effort to come to terms with nature's changes. All too soon I retreated back to the beach house where I water colored.

pictures of waves

I took picture after picture of waves. It's my pleasure to share them.

Attitudes toward history

The last few days the temperature rose, a storm created brutal waves, and the wind blew so hard our umbrellas would often be plucked up and somersault across the dunes. I didn't venture far out into the surf and spent my time wading among the wrack at low tide and picking out shells that appealed to me. Scallops predominated. Twisty volutes were to be had, but very small and sometimes damaged. I discovered a sand dollar - actually a sand half-dollar right before it became two sand quarters. The color in this photo seems unusual for my camera. Earlier, when we were at Kiawah, I proposed that a doctor that worked on mussels, welks and such would be a gastropodiatrist.

Spotted

I was up in our room, doing something, perhaps writing that sermon (or some earlier version where sports superstars vie for prizes for ordinary people like you and me, who've sent in our boxtops and had our name drawn out of the hopper), and I noticed that she and her friends from Wisconsin's English department's doctoral program were having a gabfest. I took a photo to capture the moment, and then I noticed that she was looking right at me, as if she'd spotted me in my clandestine perch. She's giving me that look that she gives me when I come up with jokes like this cannibal joke that I concocted: did you hear about the cannibal who converted and now no longer eats human flesh - well, except for the occasional nun out of habit.
If you look carefully you can see real admiration - among other things. Living apart I'm not able to communicate these things to her so easily. I miss her. I love her.

Reading Barth at the Beach

Jami, my beloved beautiful wife, loves it that I bring a theological library to the beach and that I sit in the sun, wearing my old panama hat, pouring over Barth's Church Dogmatics 4.3.2. I can't think of anything better to do. Barth continues to be the most engaging theological mind available to us. Note that my nubby pasty knees are beginning to look reddish.
Today, during the examination committee, Martha asked me, other than Barth, which theologian I would take with me - I suppose in some kind of bomb shelter situation or else some kind of exile where I couldn't take much. She wouldn't let me take Barth. I said, "you'd let other people take him." And she insisted. So I responded Eberhard Jungel. Jungel has said, "God's way of being himself is by being God for us." And "God's entry into history in the incarnation and the cross, his historicality and his impassibility, is his own chosen goal." This is related to Barth's statement that God's freedom is expressed in God's limiting and directing his activity - that is: it is the Greeks who speak of God as limitless, but limitlessness is a unique prison, where God becomes predictable to philosophers as an abstraction but not much help to particular human beings in particular circumstances. Jungel extends Barth and brings up some interesting discussions: particularly in writing about parables as descriptions of the kingdom. His magnum opus is God the Mystery of the World.
When I was talking to my cousin Cheryl after all this, and I told her Martha asked me this question, I mentioned how my response had thrown her. Jungel is not a typical response. I had thought about James Cone. But speaking with Cheryl it occurred to me that I should have responded '"Charlotte von Kirschbaum." That would be the smart aleck response. Von Kirschbaum was Barth's secretary. They wrote the dogmatics almost in tandem - and she's given little credit. CvK is buried with Barth and his wife, Nellie - it was a strange relationship. A book could be written about strange relationships of Christian writers: CS Lewis, Charles Williams, Tillich. To outsiders these relationships appear strange, but to those inside they probably seemed OK. Karl and Charlotte were undoubtedly productive. I could have said Von Kirschbaum and still carried my volumes of the Church Dogmatics with me - at least up to 4.1 or so when she came down with Alzheimers.

Another step closer

Today I preached the sermon on Hebrews to a room of ministers and elders on the examination committee; I answered questions on polity, theology, bible and worship. All went well - a good time was had by all. Now all that remains is presentation to the presbytery at the September meeting, and then, all going well, an ordination service. It's all wonderfully exciting, and I'm terribly exhausted. Jami is thrilled. She encourages me so much. I wish that she could have been here.
For now: I'm happy but tired. Martha Moore-Keish mentioned a martini - that would be good: a Grey Goose, straight up with three olives; or a Plymouth, dirty, with three olives. Tomorrow I'll celebrate. Tonight a quiet evening at home with the cats and a movie, or two.

Here's my draft of the ordination sermon

Hebrews 11:29 - 12:2 . ²⁹ By faith the people passed through the Red Sea as if it were dry land, but when the Egyptians attempted to do so they were drowned. ³⁰ By faith the walls of Jericho fell after they had been encircled for seven days. ³¹ By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had received the spies in peace. ³² And what more should I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets-- ³³who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions,³⁴ quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. ³⁵ Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, in order to obtain a better resurrection. ³⁶ Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. ³⁷ They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented-- ³⁸ of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground. ³⁹ Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, ⁴⁰ since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect. ^NRS Hebrews 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us,² looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

I went to the ocean, the Atlantic, in North Carolina, and I saw the waves crashing into the thin ribbon of sandy beach with loud surges , withdrawing tons of water along with shell and sand. The sight was so fierce, the wind and waves deafening, the coastline so fragile. I thought to myself, I asked, “how long has this been going on?” Millions of years. I could see why some people only want the earth to be 6000 years old: they want a manageable figure. When I think that this has been the way it's always been at the land/ocean boundary for uncountable years, I feel very small and insignificant. I have no control. I have no chance of making a mark. I can not stand against the immense power of the sea.

I walked into the surf and the waves beat me back. One after another they proclaimed their intent to knock me down and then, sinisterly drag me out beyond my depth. If I were to carry something out there and not hold tight, the waves would wring it from me and I'd never recover it. The sea has swallowed people and ships and even cities – where the coast is eroded or large tsunamis come. This has been going on for a long time.

In scripture the ocean symbolizes chaos. The writers of scripture reflected a fear of the sea. In the sea Leviathan prowls swallowing all who venture out. Only God can tame Leviathan. The humor of the book of Jonah is that an Israelite seeks refuge in going out to sea. The covenant with Abraham is after all, to inherit the land, not the sea. Solomon builds a navy, but when it disappears no one misses it. There's no lament psalm lamenting the loss of a single ship. The ocean is chaos and it's best to stay away.

We can think of our text today as a description of how the Israelites faced chaos: By faith. Not that faith was an instrument they used, an ingredient of their success, like some kind of incantation. The force of the Greek word here signifies more that it was “because of faith.” That is: faith impelled them into the chaos. Their natural instinct is to stay on land, but faith impels them into the waves. They step into the waves and, incredibly, the waves give way. Faith makes a path through the chaos.

The Egyptians face this chaos as well. They have the best technology. They are masters of war and strategy. They are experts in wisdom and organization. They are well fed and proud. They are confident; they don't know defeat or fear. The Egyptians march straight into the sea. The waves encircle them. The sand sinks under them and bogs them down. They flail and lash at the waves. Soon the waves they were attacking lay siege on them instead. And they are no more. They were impelled into the sea by their own sense of mastery and confidence, and the chaos has vanquished them. Leviathan swallowed them whole.

What is this faith the writer to the Hebrews talks about, this faith that walks into chaos – not blindly into chaos, unaware, but walking into chaos and amazingly finding land to stand on? This is not a faith we manufacture, but is the gift of the Holy Spirit. It is the faith of Jesus, Faith's beginning and perfection. Jesus' life is the living example of God's approach to chaos. In Jesus faith was crafted from the beginning of the world, and it is his faith that orders and sustains all creation. This is the faith that the Holy Spirit worked in humanity from the beginning: from Abel to Abraham to Moses to us; it leads through the reality of the people of Israel ascendant and Israel in exile; it leads through the reality of the Cross and Death and Resurrection. Faith sees these realities for what they are: temporary, created, exercising power through fear of death, and manipulating people through the fear of scarcity. Faith triumphs over these things, and grows and thrives in Jesus, from first to last.

On our own, acting as if we were our own cause, we drown in the chaos of the world. Even if our intentions are impeccable, filled with high motive, without the faith of Jesus as our motivating force, our efforts come to nothing. We look to him, unafraid despite the threat of chaos, knowing that in him we stand on dry land. This is our calling: to walk with Jesus on the sea. We can't believe that we could do such a thing, and we struggle. We live in a world that is confident that it subdues chaos by its own power. We are surrounded by a world that wants to tell a story about human capacity. We master the planet and ourselves. We are extolled with tales of self-reliance, the "can do" spirit. To ask for help is to be weak. The world lauds unilateral action. And so we are easily distracted by the glamor of it: how strong and heroic it seems. It is the way of the Egyptian army. It is an attractive narrative that has found a home with world powers throughout history: Persia, Greece, Rome, the Crusades, Spain, Britain, and so on – all were in love with their own expertise. All claimed that they could defeat chaos, only to sink in their own pretensions. As individuals we face that same temptation – to claim autonomy as our freedom, to believe we've earned it through our own expertise. We face it in our church and our jobs and our relationships – unaware that our autonomous freedom is no more effective than the Egyptian army in fighting chaos.

Hebrews tells us that we're partners with each other and partners with Christ. We are partners with believers in all time, connected in faith that follows Christ, that rests in Christ from the beginning and is nourished and brought to completion in him. We are surrounded by a cloud of believers who witness, throughout all time, the triumph of the faith of Jesus and the defeat of chaos. We are in the Church that Christ has called together. We are called from pursuing our own ends, our own safety, and we are called to run this race set by Christ. This race runs right though chaos. We are called from the beach into the crashing waves. We are called to run, not to stand and do nothing. As Barth says, “do something. Don't practice doing nothing under the guise of a so called prudence. Do something, even if correction and forgiveness are needed in the doing.” The prudence of doing nothing gives the illusion of competence: that our autonomy is working. But this is not running the race.

We do not run this race alone. Just as Hebrews was addressed to the Church and spoken aloud to those assembled, so it can not be heard and acted out alone, as if all that were required of faith was just ourselves sitting alone in our studies. We are called, like the Hebrews, to endure. To not cease in hospitality; to not cease aiding those in prison; to not cease upholding and helping each other in love. This is the faith that Jesus has pioneered and perfected for us. The Holy Spirit has planted it in our hearts, and grows it and nurtures it. It is the faith that impels us in Christ to walk into the sea. It is in this faith that we discover that the sea that we run on is like dry land. Leviathan does not swallow us, and we inherit life in God, undiminished in generosity, triumphant over the fear of death, given to us in God's grace.

No writing , just images

Home from the sea

Above is a photo of the most beautiful woman in the world, reading on the beach at Oak Island; below is a picture of the roundest ordination candidate in the PCUSA. While Jami is in Durham, settling down, I remain here in Atlanta, preparing for the exam committee and beginning my chaplain residency. I sure do miss her. I love her terribly. Not that I'm terrible but that her absence is an awful thing.
I would write more, but I have a sermon to write.