Disoriented

Finding oneself in the center of a new and unfamiliar city can be disorienting.

On a visit with friends a couple of years ago to San Francisco—a beautiful city full of beautiful and welcoming features—a hotel concierge gave some “simple” directions from a hotel in the Embarcadero to where we could catch a trolly to Fisherman’s Wharf for some clam chowder in a sourdough bowl and an Anchor Steam.

 Unfortunately, a lot of the streets in that part of the city run diagonally, and apparently AT&T isn’t as major a cellular player on the West Coast as it in on the East, and so despite deploying four smartphones, we were soon four adults trying to get somewhere by committee, simply wandering to-and-fro with no sense of north, south, or east…or what we really needed, west.

We were disoriented and quite obviously tourists.

I bring this up because as the book of Hebrews reaches its climax in chapters 11 and 12, this week’s Epistle reading from the second half of chapter 12 points to a new and unfamiliar (and fairly major!) city we’re promised for the future, and of which, according to this passage, we’re already citizens.

It’s a city that’s both now and not yet. And if that’s not mind bending enough, this present/future city is also full of exciting and welcoming features that we might find, in a word, disorienting.

It ought to, however, have the opposite effect. We are, after all, locals.

Endurance Running

Endurance Running

With all the layers I wear on Sunday mornings you may not have noticed, but I do not exactly possess what you could, in any reasonable—or any other—way call a marathoner’s body. And I never have. Nevertheless, once upon a time I gave it a shot. I started training to run a marathon in my mid-30s, but because of pain in my knees and hips from the constant pounding, gave it up after six months or so.

And that’s when I learned about sprint triathlons: a half-mile swim; 25-mile ride; and 10k (6.2 mile) run.

You may have guessed that I’m naturally buoyant, so swimming wasn’t a huge problem; I really liked riding my bike (especially downhill!); and in shorter distances—say 5 to 7 miles—I was a passable runner. So that’s where I put my energy.

And although I competed in several sprint triathlons over the next few years, two things in particular stand out to me vividly from my very first race…things I could have learned from this week’s Epistle reading.

Grasping Versus Giving

You may be familiar with the story of the monkey trapped with its hand in a jar, grasping a banana which it would not let go.  This story has been attributed to at least the Greeks (Aesop or Epictetus), the Sufis (Khwaja Ali Ramitani, died 1306), and Robert Pirsig, author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.  In The Greek version, the story portrays a boy clutching "filberts" (i.e. hazelnuts): 

A Boy was given permission to put his hand into a pitcher to get some filberts. But he took such a great fistful that he could not draw his hand out again. There he stood, unwilling to give up a single filbert and yet unable to get them all out at once. Vexed and disappointed he began to cry. "My boy," said his mother, "be satisfied with half the nuts you have taken and you will easily get your hand out. Then perhaps you may have some more filberts some other time."  The Aesop for Children

The lesson is that greed for more than what we need leads to entrapment.  It seems correct...almost.  However, Jesus offers more than general wisdom on how to be happier in the long run; rather, he offers a different way to live altogether.  He says that our movements aren't shaped by grasping at all, but by giving--even giving everything we have: 

Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

What creates such movement?  What causes our hands to open and our resources to flow?  What does life look like when we are free from grasping and freely giving? 

This text provokes many challenging questions for me and I hope it does for you, too.  It will make our engagement with Jesus' words together all the more productive this Sunday and I look forward to seeing you soon.

Steve Engstrom+

The Seventh Sunday After Pentecost

Almighty and everlasting God, you are always more ready to hear than we to pray, and to give more than we either desire or deserve: Pour down upon us the abundance of your mercy, forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things for which we are not worthy to ask, except through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ our Savior; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

…How Many Tunics?

As a driver I’ve been involved, in one way or another, in four collisions I can recall. The first was near my parents’ house, driving at night through thick white snow, coming back home from Walmart. I was driving their Jeep Grand Cherokee, which, luckily, rode high and meant there was little damage to their car when I somehow missed that the car in front of me was slowing to turn left and we careened into its rear end. My brother’s girlfriend, who was pregnant at the time, had ridden along. Thankfully none of us were injured. As it happened I knew the person I hit, though not well. Their rear end was smashed, but I don’t think they filed for it. They said it was an old car and they were just glad everyone was okay, their son included. In the second I bumped into a car at a stoplight in broad daylight with no extenuating circumstances whatsoever. I was just plain distracted. The third was a little more interesting. It was about five years ago, maybe six. Elizabeth and I had some sort of tiff as I was heading out the door to the grocery store, and distracted by frustration I didn’t check my rear view mirror before zooming our CR-V out of its spot. If I had checked, I’d have seen the flank of our Ranger behind me, which asserted itself regardless. I found it instantly difficult to be frustrated about our argument as I walked back inside to tell Elizabeth I had hit our car with our other car. I was pretty embarrassed until, about a month later, my father-in-law hit the same car in the same spot. Misery loves company. In the last accident, almost a year ago, I was rear-ended in traffic by a driver taking his daughter to school who missed the ‘stop’ in ‘stop-and-go,’ smashing into my Camry’s trunk at about twenty or thirty. It was the first time I’d ever filed an insurance claim. But none of these were as instructive as what happened two weeks ago when Elizabeth was hit in the Target parking lot by a young and suddenly very nervous driver. There is some bumper damage, and the safety cameras need to be checked, but everyone was fine. Handling the matter was just another thing on my to-do list until I sat down with this week’s Scripture passages. I’ve felt a little awkward ever since.

See you Sunday.

Thomas Pfenson

Slightly Distorted

I own a pair of expensive prescription sunglasses (above) that aren’t quite right. I can’t tell you exactly how they’re wrong, but the lenses seem to ever so slightly distort my periphery, and, if I wear them long enough, give me headaches.

Conscience is a lens; the lens through which we perceive reality. We can see in Scripture three ways an otherwise healthy conscience can be distorted, or bent: inward, outward, and if far enough in either direction, shattered.

This week’s Gospel reading—a story of Mary, Martha, Messiah, and manipulation—is a case study in how a conscience slightly distorted reveals itself in the warp and woof of life.

See you Sunday.

Steve+

Just A List

In our epistle reading last week, St Paul enumerated the fruit of the Spirit for us (Galatians 5:22-23): love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (for those of you who are also members of the Oxford Comma Club, you’re welcome).

It’s an amazing and aspirational list, but it’s just a list if we leave it there. Paul doesn’t want that to happen, so he immediately gives us in chapter six several examples of what it might actually look like to live a life in which this list becomes practice. In doing so, he puts his finger directly on the root of an immense problem we experience in our culture today…why we don’t, and why we can’t, get along.

Sadly, more and more, even in the Church.

See you Sunday.

Steve+

Hand to the Plow

As Jesus worked his way towards his ultimate goal in Jerusalem, those around him were caught up in the drama unprepared. Their enthusiasm exposed false motives, distractions, qualifications. They were not entirely aligned with Jesus' purpose; they were not heading in the same direction. Jesus was headed one way; they, another. Jesus says "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."

Jesus disrupted and disoriented the perceptions of even his closest followers at times. It is important for us to sit with this for a moment, to let ourselves acknowledge the tension that plays out between our wills and his, between our expectations and his, between our desires and his.

As we’ll see, the exchange that Jesus offers us isn't between what we want and what he wants; it's between an old life and a new life. Putting our hand to the plow without looking back is about what we see ahead of us, and that makes all the difference.

These are hard, good words from Jesus, and I look forward to hearing them together with you on Sunday.

Steve Engstrom+