That Pinpoint of Time

That Pinpoint of Time

(“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” Revelation 22:13)

Did your time feel like it was funneled down a
vortex slide into a single pinpoint of everything?
All the past and future convened to meet in a super mass
of holy magnitude and whirlwinds of exceptional mass.
It seemed as if the air had solidified and the ground turned
like a twirling toddler getting himself dizzy and falling
on the floor.
I was going to hold the door open for you to walk out
into the sunshine. But you were lost in your encounter
with all of time meeting in the single space you occupied.
Your yesterday caught up with you,
your tomorrow greeted you on the back end. There was no
escaping the way that time began to unravel your straight-line
existence. You could do nothing but smile and test the
air to be sure it was still breathable.

We had met years ago when time still ran a straight line.
We knew where we had been and hoped we would enjoy
where we were going. We never thought that we would
encounter the fullness of the mystery of the tornados of time.

While everything moved horizontally toward the edge of your existence
you could count the days by moons and suns. But here was all creation
swirling around you, day and night meeting each other from
front to back with future and past sharing places under your
gaze.

We did not expect to find the Spirit moving in such a way that
we could find her no matter which direction we faced. It was not
simply our past and future, but the rule seemed to be that whatever
direction we looked the divine had been there first. It was only
a hint, but it seemed the crucial mass of time reminded us
of the Spirit that occupies everything. Yesterday and tomorrow
were now full of the light that shines without the sun. Frightened
at first
now we twirled ourselves at the invitation of the Spirit that
filled all things front to back, top to bottom, horizontal and
vertical, we knew the diagonal was fully filled in that
pinpoint of time.

Overflow

Overflow

(“Your barns will be filled with grain, and you will have too much wine to store it all.” Proverbs 3:10)

There were nights when the only light from the stars
could be seen from the bottom of a well. So narrow the
constellations
were lost while the earth turned toward morning.
The problem with homemade telescopes is
they whittle the sky down to only a sliver view.
Pointed so accurately they could not see the
waving grain or the vats full of wine just a few
steps away from the bottom of the shaft that kept
it all watered so well.

Climbing out to see the midnight sky, the expanse
was effusive with pinpoint twinkles a million years old.
And the moon, large as harvest, lit it all like a ragamuffin’s
lamp. The wheat waved like happy scarecrows,
the wine flowed like a bride’s long veil.

We heard the sound of a distant choir that hung
above the night, the angels laughing like teenagers
caught dancing on the hills. Our point of view
opened the set list of the universe to our ears and eyes.
It all seemed an accident, a lucky alignment of
coincidences that conspired to break us open from
the inside out.

This was the beginning, the answer to the refrain
that repeated the verse and chorus over and over
again. This was the overnight song we had heard about.
This was the overflow, the existential evidence that
there was more than just the wingspan of our limited reach.
This was the abundance promised by voices that
translated divine music into the lingua franca.

The Road was Darker

The Road was Darker

(“My life is stuck in the dirt. Now make me live again according to your promise!” Psalm 119:25)

The road was darker than usual
and I was unsure about the corners that wound
through the hills. I had spent the day wishing the
sun would shine more brilliantly to drive the
sludge away from my mind.

I had sat in the middle of incomplete and
run-on sentences that wanted to be certain that
I served my time.

And so, I left that small circle that surrounded me
with more weight than I could carry.
The night had fallen and I only wanted to find
somewhere that felt like home.

They were made of dust and so was I. But
beyond the wall of rocks they built to teach me
who to exclude,
they were certain they were building a temple when
instead
it was armory always preparing for war.

My anxiety grew, my skin turned white,
my voice caught in the back of my throat.
Mark my words, I had no syllables to say that
would make a way out of the imprisoned improvisations
that used “no” in ways that nonsense never heard.

There was no one who knew everything about me
so I set out from there on an excursion through the
night that might land me somewhere that left my
humanity alone. I wanted to find a place where
I could close my eyes and know that no one stole
my story while I was not looking.

I found a place to fill my lungs and revive my
fainted heart. Just outside of town there were circles
within circles and tables laden with bread and honey.
I pulled up with my lights on and tested the ground
to see if it would hold the full weight of me.
I turned off the engine and took my time examining the
lightly designed coffee cups being filled for vagabonds like me.

Empty but Filled

Empty but Filled

(“I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.” Philippians 4:12)

I am empty but being filled,
I am full but not slowing down.
I am flowing but not reckless.
I am thankful and that sits sweet upon my
tongue
like chocolate and mint in the afternoon.

There is a presence that inhabits it all,
a weight that does not burden,
a strong power that lays across my shoulders
like a yoke shared in joy.

Cancel my subscription to constant pleas
for more. I will dine in the dark, or I will
feast in the light, but I will be fed, nevertheless.

Disquiet my constant apprehensions, invade my
anxious silence. Fill it, oh Holy One who comes to recover
what was stolen, to redeem that which waits to be seen.
Take my shadows out of the caverns I’ve carved and
turn me around to face the light, to feel the warm and
nearness of the pleasant rays upon my body.

I have been without,
I have been within,
I have stolen moments,
I have them back again.
I picture the perfect from my
uncertain soul. But I find,
loose or windy, that the words of peace
can settle into the crevices between my shadowy self,
and bring me to him alit and gracious for all I lack,
for all I discover, for all I’m given, for all I return.

Just two hours before dawn on a late winter night
I felt the gravity quilt
enwrap me slowly.

I have learned, for now, that empty and full are
only words,
and that the Only One can inhabit it all.

A Day Without the Sun

A Day Without the Sun

(“In days filled with trouble, I search for you. And at night I tirelessly lift my hands in prayer, refusing comfort.” Psalm 77:2)

There is no way to explain why the hole I dug
is so empty today. I meant to fill it with artifacts
for the next generation to unearth. But all they will find
is a pamphlet full of words signifying less than a bursting
shovel of dirt.
Don’t misunderstand,
I wanted to be handed truth in a dozen handbags,
but had trouble finding what I insisted existed in
heartfelt utterances of pain.
They laid hands on me to cast out the final vestiges
of insanity. It was instantly regarded as a complete
waste of time.
I can’t forget about the heat I felt when
healing spiraled around my catastrophes. I refuse
to give up on deity in all its idiosyncrasies. I’m
under the thunder of a dozen shovels of earth.
I waited for a new sentence that would outline the
reasons
everything feels empty today. I spoke the words that
I thought I believed and was left
flat on my face underneath a day without the sun.
I love you, that is all that remains of every
statement of faith I’ve ever believed. I hoped to
bring you better news; I hoped I could read a letter
sent in a scented envelope that convinced me to
believe anew the through-line from heaven to earth.
Sandwiched between serious and hilarious
I’ve come to believe all that matters
is the love that comes through the door unbidden,
like a caisson containing the weapons
we swore we would destroy once we followed the
Prince of Peace. But they still are guarded
in our gun cabinets like gold. I wish I could speak
one hundred words to melt the ammunition hoarded by
songs of unbelief.
Today I wished god was a genii who waves a wand
and restores the days I have lost by my misbehavior.
Today it has cost me a little more sanity and my
brain is numb because the words have come to mean nothing
but now grow like poppies in the field.

What The Hoopla was About

What The Hoopla was About

(“Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.” Luke 15:20b)

It was completely unexpected. Servants scurried to buy balloons
and helium tanks. Chefs stewed, smoked, and roasted all the stores
on the farm.
The musicians were lined up, setting their equipment on a flat-bed truck,
still uncertain what the hoopla was all about.

The father’s eyes drooped as days went on. His tears dropped like
rain on the dust around his sandals. He worked his horses hard.
He carried both a burden and diamond of reflections he knew were
brighter than the weeks he had endured. When a son leaves a father,
the rooms are silent; there are gaps in the stories around the dinner table.

The father was not angry. But a son was lost, a boy was dead, and
would found and alive fix anything at all?

He measured his gaze from the porch to the end of the field. He took
the place of a sentry in the warming morning leading till noon. Was their
a dust trail on the horizon? Was there a voice that would make his heart
spin again? When you love deeply you lose nothing though your son has
moved outside the circumference of time. Love is held in reserve,
or how shall the party be ready if all we do is forget?

A certain day, it is difficult to know it precisely, there came a shadow
up the road. There came a boy with shoulders hunched over. There came a
son
who did not think he should be a son. There came a boy who thought
he should be a slave.

Fathers know none of that nonsense. Mothers bake bread every day in hopes
the runaway will show up, sneaking in the screen door from the back porch.

This is love, this sprinting embrace. This is love, this kissing of the face.
This is love, this father, son, son, mother, though not all enjoyed the party.
This is love that surrenders

To foolish shenanigans and brings the children home.

You Cannot Love an Icon

You Cannot Love an Icon

(“The earth is filled with your love, Lord; teach me your decrees.” Psalm 119:64)

You cannot love an icon,
a mask you’ve fashioned to hide the
goodness in your opponent’s face.

You have severed the connective tissue that
binds you, love to love.

Get an education,
come out from the shadows,
join the celebration
that heals your icy biases.

Beware when people call evil, good; and good, evil.
Beware when love is meant for only a chosen few.
Beware when war is called peaceful; peace, uncivil.
Beware when outrage is mistaken for the truth.

The world is flooded, an unending stream,
a placid lake of uncaged love,
a river that causes deserts to bloom.
(Don’t unearth the outcasts too soon.)

Get a renovation,
step down from your tower,
take a long vacation
from all your fiery minuses.

The world is brimming, earth saturated
like a lava cake with chocolate,
a comfort that causes the hearts to thaw.
(Erase the conclusions you’ve drawn.)

Cross the street, cross the divide,
get over your unbridled myopia.
The sacrifice of love is a stronger law than
the weaklings of hate. Look love in the face,
undefine the abominations you think have
sealed their fate,

And dig in the mud, take off the makeup,
remove the icons from your venerated shelves,
and learn, oh learn,
the love that loves
better than ourselves.

Blind Spots

Blind Spots

(“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low.” Luke 3:4-5)

Way back in 1973 I was in my first major car crash. Only 18, I was driving home from my job at a pharmacy in Lafayette, Ca, to Concord. I was on the freeway and approached the split that veering left would take me home or to the right, take me further south. In those days I drove a blue Volkswagen van with tie-dye curtains. I had not merged into the left lane soon enough.

Driving in the second lane from the right, I needed to make my way one more lane to the left. I glanced in my truck-style sideview mirrors, then my rearview mirror and once more to the left one. I saw no cars. I had already set my blinker and began to merge into the next lane.

Suddenly I heard the angry honk of a car almost immediately to my left. I quickly turned the steering wheel to the right, applied the brakes a bit, and went into an out of control fishtail. I was now beyond the median that began to separate the two freeways.

At around 50 mph my right tires hit the median, and though it was no more than six inches high at this point, my van flipped to its side and skid across two lanes of traffic stopping on the right-hand shoulder.

Inside the van I was scared to death, and the whole thing seemed to happen in slow motion. A coffee mug lost its attachment to gravity and cracked into my forehead. Pencils, papers and a couple of books were suspended around me for what couldn’t have been more than a few seconds. Besides a scratch to my head, I was unhurt. I did call a friend to take me to the hospital and got to wear a lovely foam collar for a few weeks. Things could have been much worse. As the van skid across two lanes of traffic it was also leaking gasoline. The frame metal was sparking like the Fourth of July. I was extremely fortunate to escape a conflagration.

John the Baptist is telling people to “Prepare the way of the Lord.” He doesn’t specifically mention blind spots, but I think the image may be useful when we think about our own heart preparation.

He speaks of two things that should happen (among others): every valley should be filled, and every mountain should be made low. I think there may be blind spots associated with those who feel like their life is in the lowlands, and other blind spots for those who think they live on the mountain.

The valleys need to be “filled”. I think the valleys can refer to any disparaging thought about ourselves that keeps us from receiving the Lord’s best into our lives. Imagine someone who has constantly been told that they will never measure up, or they don’t have enough talent to pursue a dream. Or even worse, that God will punish them if the do not change. (So, they try with all their might to change, find they cannot, and determine they are outside of God’s blessing.)

I am reading a biography of the American First Ladies. Do you know that two of them lost children; one in a railroad accident where she saw a piece of metal take off the back of her beloved son’s head. For the rest of her life she believed God was punishing her because she had not been a good enough mother to that son!

She was a valley that needed to be “filled”. But imagine someone coming to her and saying, “I’ve lost a child too. You’ve just got to buck up, get on with your life. Stop complaining. I never complained.” Or, even worse, someone who has lost two children tells her the same thing. Think about it. Will these comments “fill” her valley? No, they dig it only deeper.

This person will now believe that, not only is God punishing her, but that she doesn’t even have the inner resolve to make life better. Those in the valley need to be filled, not given an earful. People are in valleys for may reasons. Mental illness can contribute to it, so can addiction, and of course, indulgent sin. But the answer for the one in the valley is filling.

Their blind spot is the inability to see God’s grace and mercy that are just up the road for them. If you are in a valley, please trust God wants to fill you with His grace. Examine the gospels and see how Jesus treated everyone who found themselves in the low places of life.

The other blind spot is just as prevalent and maybe harder to self-assess. When we are the mountain that needs to be made low, we usually feel like we are doing just fine in life. We may be a successful businessperson. A doctor with a burgeoning practice. A politician who is winning. We may even be and average man or woman, but we are pleased that we have kept all the rules that we think are important.

Nationalism is such a mountain. So is a strict reading of certain Bible passages that attempt to make other people submit to them. If it is “Israel first”, we have excluded 99 percent of the world’s population. If it is “America first”, the blind spot is just the same. And, when you are on the mountain, you have little empathy for anyone who, for whatever reason, is still down there in the valley slipping upon mountain trails.

Mountain people are the ones who lecture valley people about how to get out of the valley. Mountain people do not venture down, they wait for others through sheer effort, to make their way up the rugged slopes.

But that is not God’s solution. His solution, in preparing our way for the Lord, is that the mountain must come down! It’s as if He is saying, “If you won’t come down off your high righteous peak, then I’ll have to bring you and the mountain down to everyone else’s level.”

What is your blind spot today? Do you think you do not deserve anything from God? Well, you are wrong. You deserve love from the very One who created you. And you don’t earn it, you already have it because of God’s nature. That is why Jesus came; to show us the nature of Father God. Let Him fill up the low place, breathe again, and step into life.

Are you on the mountain? Have you lived surrounded by a Christian mindset for so long that you can no longer identify with people who struggle? Then hightail it off that mountain as quickly as you can! Sit with the mentally ill. Love the outcast. Welcome the immigrant and stranger.  Comfort the transsexual who struggles to know their way in life. Stop playing it safe.

Once valleys are lifted and mountains are torn down, that puts us all on the same level, doesn’t it? And guess what, that is exactly what God intended.

Staying Filled

 “I will satisfy those who are weary, and I will refresh every soul in the grips of sorrow.” Jeremiah 31:25

I needed to visit a few people in the hospital earlier this week. Since we pastor a rural town, round trip is some 60 miles. Leaving town I had less than a quarter tank of fuel and when I was ready to return about an eight of a tank remained. It was 90 degrees outside, my headache was doing its daily best and I toyed with driving straight home without filling up.