Out Walking tag:typepad.com,2003:weblog-272824 2012-01-06T23:03:34-05:00 looking for the true, the good & the beautiful -- in the world TypePad Their Big Fat Greek Album (Burlap to Cashmere to Me) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20168e50cae6b970c 2012-01-06T23:03:34-05:00 2012-01-06T23:03:34-05:00 I have little idea what most of the songs on Burlap to Cashmere's self-titled 2010 album mean, but it doesn't mean they're not memorable. Out of the blue, in a restaurant or from the back seat of the car, my son may sing "I will ride my bus" and my daughter echo "my bus," and the song "Digee Dime" is summoned (oops, sorry, that's from their 1998 album, "Anybody Out There?") and that unforgettable chorus, "digee dime, digee dime, digee dime," rings out, which, whatever it means, we love. Or there is my wife's favorite profundity from (it seems like) several of their songs, Steven Delopoulos's "hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey," her less robust version issuing forth when I least expect. Or there's that great line from "Orchestrated Love Song, the wistful "I wanna live on a boat and sail away with my children," once again sung by daughter, and we all nod inwardly in agreement. It's like a shared lexicon, shorthand album-speak --- one quip, one phrase, and the entire song, the entire album is conjured up. Their music has become a sonic appendage to our family life, shared space. I don't know what I was listening to in 1998, but it's my loss that I missed hearing BTC's debut release. But when last year's album came out, it immediately resonated with me. The love affair with their sound was sealed when I heard them in concert, an even better rendition of the songs on the album, and in respect to the songs played from their more produced 1998 album, more organic. These are guys you want to invite over for a meal, take home, keep around for awhile, guys obviously in love with making music, enjoying being with one another. Fronted by Delopolous and his cousin, Johnny Philippidis, with a beat laid down by long-time friend Theodore Pagano, this is family music, soaked in the sounds of the Mediterranean, mixed with a little Cat Stevens and Simon and Garfunkel, and simmered in the stew of what I imagine to be a big, lovable, sometimes loud Greek family, with cryptically profound lyrics that won't leave your head. Digee dime, digee dime. In the end, it doesn't really matter so much that we don't pick up the meaning, as phrases themselves carry meaning, settling down in the context of our lives and working into our own circumstances. Do I "wanna live on a boat and sail away with my children?" You bet I do. Sometimes. Sometimes when life is overwhelming I want to gather my family and go away, away from media, from problems, from phone calls, from toil. It captures a longing we must all feel at some point. To "ride my bus" seems to speak to me of the place where I am, to the comfort of the mundane (but familiar) lives we all live. "Love Reclaims the Atmosphere" is a gentle exhortation to "crucify your fear. . . send blessings to your critics. . . be careful with the least of these. . . ," channeling Simon and Garfunkel through a prism of faith. Coming to "Closer to the Edge" I find myself hitting repeat, repeat, repeat, as Delopolous sings "Closer to the edge I found/ I was standing in the second round/ I was laughing but I didn't make a sound/ Now I'm flying with my feet on the ground," and while I don't know what he's talking about I want it to be true of me. It bouys me, fills me with joy. But it's the album closer, "The Other Country," that I find myself waiting on. In direct gospel lyrics, Delopolous sings: Do not be afraid of this earthly city Do not be afraid when the Pharaoh's nigh Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death Even though I sink through the ocean You will rescue me I am standing in the fire But I can hear the choir singing I was a blind man stumbling But now I see The phrase "the other country" makes me think of C.S. Lewis's reference, more than once, to that "other country," as when he said, "I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others to do the same." But perhaps I return time and again to this song because the night I heard BTC in concert was just days after I placed my dying mother in hospice care and one week before her death. That propinquity etches the song on my heart and carries the aroma of hope that she is enjoying that "other country" even now. But that's my story. You have your own. And God knows Steven, Johnny, and Thedore have their own. It was, after all, Philippidis's near tragic beating in an episode of road rage that, in part, brought these two cousins and friend back together to write and play music again. Hearing them, I have a sense that they're in it for the long haul. And we're the better for it. Buy it. Listen to it with your family. Let it seep into the corners of your life. Get a whiff of the other country. Opa! (translation: an exclamation of joy). Steve West

41K8PJTMC8L._SL500_AA300_I have little idea what most of the songs on Burlap to Cashmere's self-titled 2010 album mean, but it doesn't mean they're not memorable.  Out of the blue, in a restaurant or from the back seat of the car, my son may sing "I will ride my bus" and my daughter echo "my bus," and the song "Digee Dime" is summoned (oops, sorry, that's from their 1998 album, "Anybody Out There?") and that unforgettable chorus, "digee dime, digee dime, digee dime," rings out, which, whatever it means, we love.  Or there is my wife's favorite profundity from (it seems like) several of their songs, Steven Delopoulos's "hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey," her less robust version issuing forth when I least expect.  Or there's that great line from "Orchestrated Love Song, the wistful "I wanna live on a boat and sail away with my children," once again sung by daughter, and we all nod inwardly in agreement.  It's like a shared lexicon, shorthand album-speak --- one quip, one phrase, and the entire song, the entire album is conjured up.  Their music has become a sonic appendage to our family life, shared space.

I don't know what I was listening to in 1998, but it's my loss that I missed hearing BTC's debut release.  But when last year's album came out, it immediately resonated with me.  The love affair with their sound was sealed when I heard them in concert, an even better rendition of the songs on the album, and in respect to the songs played from their more produced 1998 album, more organic.  These are guys you want to invite over for a meal, take home, keep around for awhile, guys obviously in love with making music, enjoying being with one another.  Fronted by Delopolous and his cousin, Johnny Philippidis, with a beat laid down by long-time friend Theodore Pagano, this is family music, soaked in the sounds of the Mediterranean, mixed with a little Cat Stevens and Simon and Garfunkel, and simmered in the stew of what I imagine to be a big, lovable, sometimes loud Greek family, with cryptically profound lyrics that won't leave your head.  Digee dime, digee dime.

In the end, it doesn't really matter so much that we don't pick up the meaning, as phrases themselves carry meaning, settling down in the context of our lives and working into our own circumstances.  Do I "wanna live on a boat and sail away with my children?"  You bet I do.  Sometimes.  Sometimes when life is overwhelming I want to gather my family and go away, away from media, from problems, from phone calls, from toil.  It captures a longing we must all feel at some point.  To "ride my bus" seems to speak to me of the place where I am, to the comfort of the mundane (but familiar) lives we all live.  "Love Reclaims the Atmosphere" is a gentle exhortation to "crucify your fear. . . send blessings to your critics. . . be careful with the least of these. . . ," channeling Simon and Garfunkel through a prism of faith.  Coming to "Closer to the Edge" I find myself hitting repeat, repeat, repeat, as Delopolous sings "Closer to the edge I found/ I was standing in the second round/ I was laughing but I didn't make a sound/ Now I'm flying with my feet on the ground," and while I don't know what he's talking about I want it to be true of me. It bouys me, fills me with joy.

But it's the album closer, "The Other Country," that I find myself waiting on.  In direct gospel lyrics, Delopolous sings:

Do not be afraid of this earthly city 
Do not be afraid when the Pharaoh's nigh 
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death 
Even though I sink through the ocean 
You will rescue me 
I am standing in the fire 
But I can hear the choir singing 
I was a blind man stumbling 
But now I see 

The phrase "the other country" makes me think of C.S. Lewis's reference, more than once, to that "other country," as when he said, "I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others to do the same."  But perhaps I return time and again to this song because the night I heard BTC in concert was just days after I placed my dying mother in hospice care and one week before her death.  That propinquity etches the song on my heart and carries the aroma of hope that she is enjoying that "other country" even now.

But that's my story.  You have your own.  And God knows Steven, Johnny, and Thedore have their own.  It was, after all, Philippidis's near tragic beating in an episode of road rage that, in part, brought these two cousins and friend back together to write and play music again. Hearing them, I have a sense that they're in it for the long haul. And we're the better for it.

Buy it.  Listen to it with your family.  Let it seep into the corners of your life.  Get a whiff of the other country.

Opa! (translation: an exclamation of joy).

 

 The Antidote for (c)hristmas tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20162fe8de31c970d 2011-12-29T23:38:42-05:00 2011-12-29T23:37:35-05:00 Your words were found, and I ate them; and your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name, O Lord, God of hosts. I did not sit in the company of revelers, nor did I rejoice; I sat alone, because your hand was upon me, for you had filled me with indignation. (Jeremiah 15: 16-17) Sometimes, in the midst of all the run-up to Christmas, it's nigh impossible to catch the real Christmas. Not that I didn't try this year. I read books about the Incarnation. I attended a Lessons and Carols service. I considered the Christian meaning with which we invest what are essentially pagan celebratons. And yet while all of this is good, I feel like a minnow trying to swim upstream in a torrent of Christmas marketing and obligatory social functions and gift-giving. Sometimes, perhaps a little like Jeremiah, I can't sit in the company of the revelers but feel the emptiness of it all. I've been here before. The best Christmas I remember was also the most difficult for my wife and I. Some time after Thanksgiving of 1991 we received a call from a counselor at a pregnancy life care center in a small town in Oregon informing us that an unwed mother she counseled --- a high school senior --- had chosen us to parent her soon-to-be-born child. That Advent season was just that: an advent, a season of expectancy not just of His birth but of this immediate birth. While filled with joy, we also pondered what it all meant, questioned how it would transpire, and considered the possibility that it would all unwind. To believe otherwise took faith and hope. Ultimately, it took love --- the love of a child that had not come from us, who had been borne outside us but providentially for us. Thus, Advent was in some ways all awry, fraught with the thoughts not of the Incarnate One, but the child to come, and yet in so many ways our thoughts and preparations were suggestive of exactly how Advent should be observed, took us out of the Christmas rush and onto another focus entirely: a birth. Two days before Christmas, we received an urgent call from the counselor. The birthmother was in labor and desperately wanted us present at birth. We booked tickets for our 3000 mile journey, left tree and gifts and family, moved our foreign exchange student across the street to live with neighbors, and left. Arriving, we were informed it was false labor. Since it was too expensive to fly home and then back for true labor, we settled into a mom-and-pop motel in a town of no more than 2500 people, strangers in a strange land. It rained every day. Fog and mist enveloped us. Sheep moved in a meadow outside our window. We bought cheap paper Christmas decorations and stuck them on our walls. On Sunday, being Presbyterians, we went to the local presbyterian church. The "sermon" was a reading of "How Grinch Who Stole Christmas." I waited for the application. There was none. We felt alone, missed home, family, friends, and church. We waited. We spent our days having lunch and driving around with a very pregnant teenage girl --- a girl and our baby. We waited some more. But eventually, a baby boy was born, and we came home on January 7th, just over two weeks later. Advent, Christmas, and even Epiphany were over. We missed it. Or did we? Maybe that's the only antidote for christmas --- for the false one, the cultural one that is destined to collapse the day after --- to be wrenched out of the place in which you find yourself and be set down in a foreign land. All I know is that when you have been stripped of what passes for Christmas here and set down in a place where your focus is on a child to come, Advent becomes a sober waiting, the birth a celebration, Christmastide a long settling into a new reality. Unto us a child is born, Isaiah says. For us, a child was born. Scripture has its own way of working in us a new reality, of course. It's just that sometimes it's so difficult to really hear what it is saying in the midst of all that swirls around us. We say "unto us a child is born" --- in fact, we say it every year --- and yet we behave as if it happens every day. But on at least one Christmas it wasn't like that for me. It was unique, otherworldly, and world-changing. And if that birth was so momentous, how can I ever again pass by the words "unto us a child is born" and not be awestruck at the reality of the Creator of all poured into a little boy? Really. Unto us a child is born. As Jeremiah would say: "Eat that." Revel in that. Be indignant about any Christmas that passes for a celebration of less than that. Sit alone and ruminate on the love of a God who poured Himself out for a world that will celebrate anything but His birth. Rejoice, and be glad. Steve West

Your words were found, and I ate them;
          and your words became for me a joy
          and the delight of my heart,
for I am called by your name,
          O Lord, God of hosts.
I did not sit in the company of revelers,
          nor did I rejoice;
I sat alone, because your hand was
                    upon me,
          for you had filled me with indignation.

(Jeremiah 15: 16-17)

Sometimes, in the midst of all the run-up to Christmas, it's nigh impossible to catch the real Christmas.  Not that I didn't try this year. I read books about the Incarnation.  I attended a Lessons and Carols service.  I considered the Christian meaning with which we invest what are essentially pagan celebratons.  And yet while all of this is good, I feel like a minnow trying to swim upstream in a torrent of Christmas marketing and obligatory social functions and gift-giving.  Sometimes, perhaps a little like Jeremiah, I can't sit in the company of the revelers but feel the emptiness of it all.  I've been here before. 

The best Christmas I remember was also the most difficult for my wife and I.  Some time after Thanksgiving of 1991 we received a call from a counselor at a pregnancy life care center in a small town in Oregon informing us that an unwed mother she counseled --- a high school senior --- had chosen us to parent her soon-to-be-born child.  That Advent season was just that: an advent, a season of expectancy not just of His birth but of this immediate birth.  While filled with joy, we also pondered what it all meant, questioned how it would transpire, and considered the possibility that it would all unwind.  To believe otherwise took faith and hope.  Ultimately, it took love --- the love of a child that had not come from us, who had been borne outside us but providentially for us.  Thus, Advent was in some ways all awry, fraught with the thoughts not of the Incarnate One, but the child to come, and yet in so many ways our thoughts and preparations were suggestive of exactly how Advent should be observed, took us out of the Christmas rush and onto another focus entirely: a birth.

Two days before Christmas, we received an urgent call from the counselor.  The birthmother was in labor and desperately wanted us present at birth.  We booked tickets for our 3000 mile journey, left tree and gifts and family, moved our foreign exchange student across the street to live with neighbors, and left.  Arriving, we were informed it was false labor.  Since it was too expensive to fly home and then back for true labor, we settled into a mom-and-pop motel in a town of no more than 2500 people, strangers in a strange land.  It rained every day.  Fog and mist enveloped us. Sheep moved in a meadow outside our window.  We bought cheap paper Christmas decorations and stuck them on our walls.  On Sunday, being Presbyterians, we went to the local presbyterian church.  The "sermon" was a reading of "How Grinch Who Stole Christmas." I waited for the application.  There was none.  We felt alone, missed home, family, friends, and church.  We waited.  We spent our days having lunch and driving around with a very pregnant teenage girl --- a girl and our baby.  We waited some more.  But eventually, a baby boy was born, and we came home on January 7th, just over two weeks later.  Advent, Christmas, and even Epiphany were over.  We missed it.  Or did we?

Maybe that's the only antidote for christmas --- for the false one, the cultural one that is destined to collapse the day after --- to be wrenched out of the place in which you find yourself and be set down in a foreign land.  All I know is that when you have been stripped of what passes for Christmas here and set down in a place where your focus is on a child to come, Advent becomes a sober waiting, the birth a celebration, Christmastide a long settling into a new reality.  Unto us a child is born, Isaiah says.  For us, a child was born.

Scripture has its own way of working in us a new reality, of course.  It's just that sometimes it's so difficult to really hear what it is saying in the midst of all that swirls around us.  We say "unto us a child is born" --- in fact, we say it every year --- and yet we behave as if it happens every day.  But on at least one Christmas it wasn't like that for me.  It was unique, otherworldly, and world-changing.  And if that birth was so momentous, how can I ever again pass by the words "unto us a child is born" and not be awestruck at the reality of the Creator of all poured into a little boy?

Really.  Unto us a child is born.  As Jeremiah would say: "Eat that."  Revel in that.  Be indignant about any Christmas that passes for a celebration of less than that.  Sit alone and ruminate on the love of a God who poured Himself out for a world that will celebrate anything but His birth. Rejoice, and be glad.

 

 

 The Christmas Gift (A Story) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20154379e4a60970c 2011-12-24T12:32:58-05:00 2011-12-29T23:47:12-05:00 When Scott and Buddy delivered our new washer and dryer, they pulled their white delivery truck right up to the tippy top of our driveway and stopped, front wheels perched over the grassy sideyard. Watching from the window, I noticed neither of them got out of the cab. They sat there. A little gas or oil dripped from the underside of the truck, making a sheen on the concrete, and I was momentarily distracted by the thought of a fiery ball of flame as the truck blew, ignited by a spark. Someone was smoking inside, but it was too hazy to see. I opened the door and stepped out on the porch. "Hey, come on in." I waved. I walked about halfway to the cab on the truck. "You can come on in." The window cracked just a sliver, about a tongue's breadth, and Scott said "Is that yor dog?" He pointed toward the backyard where my German Shepherd, Jake, stood, fully extended, paws casually draped over the fence, tongue out, face lit up. "Yeah. She's harmless. She likes people." Buddy leaned forward. "Do he bite?" His eyes were wide. "Nah, he don't bite" I had lapsed into the vernacular. "I mean, she won't bite you. Might lick you, but she won't bite.'" Scott and Buddy sat there. Smoke curled from the cracked window. "He got teeth, don't he?," said Buddy. Jake was smiling at Scott and Buddy, quivering with excitement. She let out a welp of impatience. "Put yor dog up or we ain't getting out." Scott cranked the window up. They sat there. The substance continued to drip from the truck, pooling on the driveway. The motor ticked like motors tick when they're settling into a new place. "Really, she's OK. Don't worry about her." I said "don't worry about her," raising my voice a tad. The window creaked open. "Ain't coming. Put the dog up." "Hang on." I walked around the truck and went over to Jake, who by this time was trying to crawl over the fence, barking and pawing at the wood fence boards. "Jake! Jake! Calm down, girl, calm down." She plopped down. I unlatched the gate, grabbed her by the collar, picked up some rope I kept by the gate for times like this. I dragged her over to a small maple tree in the center of the back yard. She tugged at the rope. Resolute, stiffened paws dug into the soft earth where the grass had given up due to Jake's constant treading. "Don't look back there, Jake. You can't play with them. Sit down. Behave yourself." I gave her a bone to play with. She didn't sit. Didn't want the bone. She strained at the rope and whimpered. I walked back to the gate, latched it, and went up to the window where Scott sat. The widow creaked down, this time wider. "He gone?" "Yeah, I tied her up. You guys come on out. Don't worry about Jake." The door opened and a hulking man dropped from the cab to the driveway. "I'm Scott," he said, "and that there's Billy." Billy came around the back of the truck at that point. It looked like he weighed about 275, broad shouldered with a stomach wrapped in a white t-shirt lapping over green army dungarees secured by a rope belt. I'd never seen a rope used for a belt and mused on why anyone would do such a thing until he spoke. "Billy," he said. He extended his hand. I was amused by the sight of lanky Scott and sumo-wrestler Billy, but I snapped out of it quickly. "I'm glad you guys showed up so soon. I need you to get the washer and dryer in the house and hooked up before my wife returns. It's her Christmas present. I want to surprise her." Billy popped the latch on the trailer and the door rolled up with snap. A blast of air rolled out that smelled like oil and cardboard and pizza. . . pizza? I sniffed. "Yeah, sorry, Billy and I had a little lunch before we came." "Hey, no problem." "Scott, I can't tote that washer." "Get the hand truck, stupid. . . . oh, sorry Mr. . . Mr. Woglenaut. Woglenaut?" "German. Polish. Something, I don't know. Just call me Rob." "Mr. Rob, where we headin' with this thing?" "Right in the front door." Scott unlatched and extended the ramp from the back of the trailer. Billy lumbered up the ramp and bent over. I looked away, suddenly very interested in the gutters on my house. "Jeez, Billy, get some suspenders, will ya?," Scott said. "You can see China from here." Scott hacked and spit on the driveway. On my driveway. I turned around and noted that Billy had repositioned himself, now had the hand truck belt wrapped around the washer. He began to back it down the ramp, as Scott watched. Maybe it was my imagination, but the ramp seemed to buckle a bit, straining under the weight. Once down, he dragged it toward the front door. "Hang on, let me get the door." I ran around Billy, up the front steps, and opened the door. By this time, Scott was pulling on the handles of the hand truck, backing up the steps, while Billy pushed. I heard a sound from the back door. Jake! I went to the back door. Jake had broken the rope, was scratching at the back door window, barking and throwing himself against the door. I opened the door, intent on grabbing his collar and then retying him to the tree before Scott or Billy noticed. But Jake would have none of it. He bounded through the door, knocked me to the floor, and ran toward the front door where Scott was just cresting the top step. On the way, what was left of his chain caught on the carefully-decorated Christmas tree we had set in the den. Down when the tree! Ornaments burst and rolled across the floor. It all excited Jake. He kept going, making a beeline for the front door. Just then, Scott looked around. "What the. . .?" He dropped the washer. Billy rolled to the side, his fall cushioned by a bed of pine straw. The washer thudded down the steps, began rolling down the hill towards the street. Pulling the entire Christmas tree, the stand screeching across our hardwood floor, Jake ran out the front door, leaped from the front step, and was caught in mid-air by the tree --- which had lodged in the front door. He fell back. Scott was in the cab of the truck. The window cracked. "Hey, Billy, get in here." Billy sloshed toward the truck, Jake barking and straining at the leash, bound by the tree. "Hey, come on back, you guys. I'll put Jake up." The truck fired. Scott backed it down the driveway, narrowly missing the fire hydrant at the street. Jake continued to bark. Blocked by the tree, I went around to the side door. By the time I opened it, the truck was gone. The washer had rolled down the hill, still on the hand-truck, lodged in some azaleas in the natural area. I walked over to where the truck had been parked. A greasy spot remained. I looked up just in time to see my wife's car pull into our driveway. Steve West

When Scott and Buddy delivered our new washer and dryer, they pulled their white delivery truck right up to the tippy top of our driveway and stopped, front wheels perched over the grassy sideyard.  Watching from the window, I noticed neither of them got out of the cab.  They sat there.  A little gas or oil dripped from the underside of the truck, making a sheen on the concrete, and I was momentarily distracted by the thought of a fiery ball of flame as the truck blew, ignited by a spark.  Someone was smoking inside, but it was too hazy to see.

I opened the door and stepped out on the porch.  "Hey, come on in." I waved.  I walked about halfway to the cab on the truck.  "You can come on in."

The window cracked just a sliver, about a tongue's breadth, and Scott said "Is that yor dog?"  He pointed toward the backyard where my German Shepherd, Jake, stood, fully extended, paws casually draped over the fence, tongue out, face lit up.

"Yeah.  She's harmless.  She likes people."

Buddy leaned forward.  "Do he bite?"  His eyes were wide.

"Nah, he don't bite"  I had lapsed into the vernacular.  "I mean, she won't bite you.  Might lick you, but she won't bite.'" 

Scott and Buddy sat there.  Smoke curled from the cracked window.

"He got teeth, don't he?," said Buddy.  Jake was smiling at Scott and Buddy, quivering with excitement.  She let out a welp of impatience.

"Put yor dog up or we ain't getting out."  Scott cranked the window up.  They sat there. The substance continued to drip from the truck, pooling on the driveway.  The motor ticked like motors tick when they're settling into a new place.

"Really, she's OK.  Don't worry about her."  I said "don't worry about her," raising my voice a tad.  The window creaked open.

"Ain't coming.  Put the dog up."

"Hang on."  I walked around the truck and went over to Jake, who by this time was trying to crawl over the fence, barking and pawing at the wood fence boards.

"Jake!  Jake!  Calm down, girl, calm down." She plopped down.  I unlatched the gate, grabbed her by the collar, picked up some rope I kept by the gate for times like this. I dragged her over to a small maple tree in the center of the back yard.  She tugged at the rope.  Resolute, stiffened paws dug into the soft earth where the grass had given up due to Jake's constant treading.

"Don't look back there, Jake.  You can't play with them.  Sit down.  Behave yourself." I gave her a bone to play with.  She didn't sit.  Didn't want the bone.  She strained at the rope and whimpered. I walked back to the gate, latched it, and went up to the window where Scott sat.  The widow creaked down, this time wider.

"He gone?"

"Yeah, I tied her up.  You guys come on out.  Don't worry about Jake."

The door opened and a hulking man dropped from the cab to the driveway.  "I'm Scott," he said, "and that there's Billy." Billy came around the back of the truck at that point.  It looked like he weighed about 275, broad shouldered with a stomach wrapped in a white t-shirt lapping over green army dungarees secured by a rope belt.  I'd never seen a rope used for a belt and mused on why anyone would do such a thing until he spoke.

"Billy," he said.  He extended his hand. 

I was amused by the sight of lanky Scott and sumo-wrestler Billy, but I snapped out of it quickly.

"I'm glad you guys showed up so soon. I need you to get the washer and dryer in the house and hooked up before my wife returns.  It's her Christmas present.  I want to surprise her."

Billy popped the latch on the trailer and the door rolled up with snap.  A blast of air rolled out that smelled like oil and cardboard and pizza. . . pizza? I sniffed.

"Yeah, sorry, Billy and I had a little lunch before we came."

"Hey, no problem."

"Scott, I can't tote that washer."

"Get the hand truck, stupid. . . . oh, sorry Mr. . . Mr. Woglenaut. Woglenaut?"

"German.  Polish.  Something, I don't know.  Just call me Rob."

"Mr. Rob, where we headin' with this thing?"

"Right in the front door."

Scott unlatched and extended the ramp from the back of the trailer.  Billy lumbered up the ramp and bent over.  I looked away, suddenly very interested in the gutters on my house.

"Jeez, Billy, get some suspenders, will ya?," Scott said.  "You can see China from here."  Scott hacked and spit on the driveway.  On my driveway.  I turned around and noted that Billy had repositioned himself, now had the hand truck belt wrapped around the washer.  He began to back it down the ramp, as Scott watched.  Maybe it was my imagination, but the ramp seemed to buckle a bit, straining under the weight.  Once down, he dragged it toward the front door.

"Hang on, let me get the door."  I ran around Billy, up the front steps, and opened the door.  By this time, Scott was pulling on the handles of the hand truck, backing up the steps, while Billy pushed.  I heard a sound from the back door.  Jake!   I went to the back door.  Jake had broken the rope, was scratching at the back door window, barking and throwing himself against the door.  I opened the door, intent on grabbing his collar and then retying him to the tree before Scott or Billy noticed.

But Jake would have none of it.  He bounded through the door, knocked me to the floor, and ran toward the front door where Scott was just cresting the top step.  On the way, what was left of his chain caught on the carefully-decorated Christmas tree we had set in the den.  Down when the tree!  Ornaments burst and rolled across the floor.  It all excited Jake.  He kept going, making a beeline for the front door.

Just then, Scott looked around.  "What the. . .?"  He dropped the washer.  Billy rolled to the side, his fall cushioned by a bed of pine straw.  The washer thudded down the steps, began rolling down the hill towards the street.  Pulling the entire Christmas tree, the stand screeching across our hardwood floor, Jake ran out the front door, leaped from the front step, and was caught in mid-air by the tree --- which had lodged in the front door.  He  fell back.

Scott was in the cab of the truck.  The window cracked.  "Hey, Billy, get in here."  Billy sloshed toward the truck, Jake barking  and straining at the leash, bound by the tree.

"Hey, come on back, you guys.  I'll put Jake up."

The truck fired.  Scott backed it down the driveway, narrowly missing the fire hydrant at the street.  Jake continued to bark.  Blocked by the tree, I went around to the side door.  By the time I opened it, the truck was gone.  The washer had rolled down the hill, still on the hand-truck, lodged in some azaleas in the natural area.  I walked over to where the truck had been parked.  A greasy spot remained.  I looked up just in time to see my wife's car pull into our driveway.

 

 

 Christmas Eve With Glen Campbell (A Little Story) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015438391565970c 2011-12-12T20:43:20-05:00 2011-12-13T22:22:29-05:00 A little story out of somewhere, an exercise in writing with no end purpose in mind. This, for what it's worth, is what you get! (No disrespect intended to the fine man and musician that is the real Glen Campbell.) Steve West

When you have to do it, you just have to. Don't make no difference what anyone says. Just is.  That's what I kept telling myself, at least.  Simple as that.  After all, I got me a cat and two dogs and a critter ain't got no tail. That's my pig.  He's a good one.  Likes TV, like Arnold.  Remember Arnold?  With the likes of these, who needs a woman?

I's setting watching TV the other night, wraslin' it was, cause I like a good wraslin' match I do, and my boy --- the one ain't got no sense --- come in asking after her.  I told him she ain't here.  She took off.  Skipped town with all the cash I had on me and my pistol as well.  Can't figure it. What kind of woman would do that, just run off like that what with a kid to raise up? Just drove off.  Left me in the dust.  I cursed at her, though I know I shouldn't a done like that what with the boy looking on and all, but it got all over me.  I think she's touched, got a screw loose.  Took to hoarding paper bags and saving pieces of fabric and anything else she could get her hands on.

My pig's name is Glen Campbell, seeing as he likes to watch that show with me and all.  Sits right up on the settee and listens.  Stands up when Glen sings and plays and sits down when he don't.  Smart pig, that Glen Campbell.

Smarter'n that woman left here.

He asked where his Momma was and I told him don't bother with that, told him she'd be back d'reckly.  Glen Campbell snorted at that.  Got down off the settee and went round and round in circles on the floor, snorting'. I told him to stop disrespecting me like that, calling me a liar and all.  But he didn't mind me.  The boy watched him, rolled a little Matchbox car back and forth on the top of the settee, eyes looking down at the pig.

I told him go on back to his room, make himself busy.   He did.  The old trailer creaked as he ran down the hall.  I sipped on my beer, poured some in Glen Campbell's dish.  He lapped it up.  That pig is no teetotaler, that's for sure.  But I'm careful, as nothing's worse than a lit pig.  One time Glen Campbell had two beers, one time when I lost count, and he commenced to charging at the TV set every time the commercials came on.  But at least he had the good sense to wait until the commercials.

My dogs won't touch the stuff.  Can't hold the liquor, I guess.  Just as well.  Them hounds are stoked enough anyhow.

The cat used to drink Thunderbird wine.  Got religion and gave it up though.  One day we's watching Jimmy Swaggert me and the cat, and Preacher Jimmy gets all agitated talking 'bout the baptism of the Holy Spirit and all, and all of a sudden the cat jumps off the settee and kneels with his paws together and commenced to praying right there on the floor, after which he springs up in the air like something scared it and begins rolling about all over the floor.  No kidding.

That cat never drank again.  Became downright sissy, even let the dogs lick it and never raised a paw to scratch 'em.  For a day even I considered giving up the drink.  Instead I gave up watching Jimmy Swaggert.

I said get back in your room, boy!  I told him not to come out here.  Where's that woman, anyway?  Where's that woman when you need her?  What am I gonna do about the boy, anyway?

He's got 'em in a headlock, dragging him all over the ring.  Glen Campbell is all excited, running around the settee, squealing.  I love wrastling!

She said I was nothing but a drunk, and I said she was nothing but a no good hussie, and she told me to go to "h-e-double-hockey-sticks" and I told her the same.  I should'a cut her loose a long time ago.

That boy's got her eyes.

Big Dave's got him pinned.

The dogs commenced to barking.

When the door opened I knew it was her.  I knew she'd be back.  I knew she wouldn't leave me.

"I got us a Christmas tree, Jess.  You gonna help me get it in?  Or you gonna sit there?"

I'm gonna help her.  "Boy, come out here, your Momma's home."  I'm gonna help her.  For some reason, my eyes began to water.  I wiped them with the back of my hand.  Glen Campbell sighed.  I'm gonna help her.  It's Christmas Eve, ain't it?  I'm feeling good.
 
I stood up and took her by the hand.  The boy slipped his hand in mine.  In his other was a bag filled with little pieces of fabric, paper bags with colored Bible scenes, and a string of colored lights.







 Carrying Scripture tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20162fda76a7b970d 2011-12-10T22:36:41-05:00 2011-12-10T22:36:41-05:00 It's too soon to call it a habit, and yet one hoped-for "habit" I have adopted lately is that of carrying a scripture verse with me on a 3 x 5 index card tucked in my shirt pocket. You won't find me marketing this brilliant new idea to Thomas Nelson or Zondervan as a new spiritual discipline; there is certainly nothing new about it, and yet it is new to me. Don't call it Bible memorization. That conjures up a training motif that, despite its value, shuts it down for me. That may well happen on the way, but the way I am talking about is meditation, thinking about one Bible verse, maybe even one phrase, all day long. This yields surprising insights. Take Philippians 4: 5b-7. In the NIV translation (and the way I memorized it), verse 6 is a new sentence that begins with "Do not be anxious. . .," but the ESV links that beginning directive by a semicolon with the last part of verse 5, "The Lord is at hand," so that it reads like this: "The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, make your request known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." Together, verses 6 and 7, as set out in the NIV and as so often quoted, used to make me feel helpless and even angry. Commanding an anxious person to not be anxious is a near impossible command to follow, if indeed it be a command. And it certainly doesn't produce peace. And yet carrying this verse with me and seeing it throughout the day made me draw great comfort from the linkage I mention. Rather than a command, I saw more of an assurance, something like this: "Look, God is near. He is in control. He is wise and good and all-powerful. Therefore, you don't need to worry. Focus not on what you lack but on what you have. Give your cares to me. Let me carry them." Settling into me was the sense that God's peace is more the result of focusing on His nearness and His provision than any attempt not to be anxious. I don't know what led the ESV translators to use the semicolon, but I'm glad they did. I noticed. I may not have, however, if I had not carried that scripture with me all day. Having it in my pocket, I not only caught it out of the corner of my eye but felt it. I read it while stopped at a traffic light, between bites at lunch, and when I noticed it during my work. I carried it in my hand when I took a walk. In a sense, it became three-dimensional, carried me as I carried it. God's Word is all kinds of things. A light. A double-edged sword. Even an index card. But in the end, beyond those tangibilities, it's a person, and we don't carry it. He carries us. Lord Jesus, come yourself, and dwell with us, be human as we are, and overcome what overwhelms us. Come into the midst of my evil, come close to my unfaithfulness. Share my sin, which I hate and which I cannot leave. Be my brother, Thou Holy God. Be my brother in the kingdom of evil and suffering and death. Come with me in my death, come with me in my suffering, come with me as I struggle with evil. And make me holy and pure, despite my sin and death. (Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Christmas Sermons, ed. Edwin Robertson) Steve West

It's too soon to call it a habit, and yet one hoped-for "habit" I have adopted lately is that of carrying a scripture verse with me on a 3 x 5 index card tucked in my shirt pocket.  You won't find me marketing this brilliant new idea to Thomas Nelson or Zondervan as a new spiritual discipline; there is certainly nothing new about it, and yet it is new to me.

Don't call it Bible memorization.  That conjures up a training motif that, despite its value, shuts it down for me.  That may well happen on the way, but the way I am talking about is meditation, thinking about one Bible verse, maybe even one phrase, all day long.  This yields surprising insights.

Take Philippians 4: 5b-7.  In the NIV translation (and the way I memorized it), verse 6 is a new sentence that begins with "Do not be anxious. . .," but the ESV links that beginning directive by a semicolon with the last part of verse 5, "The Lord is at hand," so that it reads like this: "The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, make your request known to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus."

Together, verses 6 and 7, as set out in the NIV and as so often quoted, used to make me feel helpless and even angry.  Commanding an anxious person to not be anxious is a near impossible command to follow, if indeed it be a command.  And it certainly doesn't produce peace.  And yet carrying this verse with me and seeing it throughout the day made me draw great comfort from the linkage I mention.  Rather than a command, I saw more of an assurance, something like this: "Look, God is near.  He is in control.  He is wise and good and all-powerful.  Therefore, you don't need to worry.  Focus not on what you lack but on what you have.  Give your cares to me.  Let me carry them."  Settling into me was the sense that God's peace is more the result of focusing on His nearness and His provision than any attempt not to be anxious.

I don't know what led the ESV translators to use the semicolon, but I'm glad they did.  I noticed.  I may not have, however, if I had not carried that scripture with me all day.  Having it in my pocket, I not only caught it out of the corner of my eye but felt it.  I read it while stopped at a traffic light, between bites at lunch, and when I noticed it during my work.  I carried it in my hand when I took a walk.  In a sense, it became three-dimensional, carried me as I carried it.

God's Word is all kinds of things.  A light. A double-edged sword.  Even an index card.  But in the end, beyond those tangibilities, it's a person, and we don't carry it.  He carries us.

Lord Jesus, come yourself, and dwell with us, be human as we are, and overcome what overwhelms us.  Come into the midst of my evil, come close to my unfaithfulness.  Share my sin, which I hate and which I cannot leave.  Be my brother, Thou Holy God.  Be my brother in the kingdom of evil and suffering and death.  Come with me in my death, come with me in my suffering, come with me as I struggle with evil.  And make me holy and pure, despite my sin and death.

(Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Christmas Sermons, ed. Edwin Robertson)

 

 Oh, Melancholia tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015393b9c134970b 2011-11-29T16:44:18-05:00 2011-11-30T01:04:48-05:00 My son accuses me of only listening to songs that are depressing and gloomy. It makes me sad that he would think that. Chalk that propensity up to years of listening to folk singers and singer-songwriters, many of whom major in angst and world-weariness. No, I can't blame them. Really, it's deep childhood trauma, the emotional scars of two events. One, our dog, Pug (haunting name, isn't it?) died on Christmas Day. Imagine that, a day on which the Incarnation is celebrated and our dog chooses that very day to "decarnate" himself. Well, or something like that. I was four, and you can imagine what I suffer from these 49 years later. And then there were my three wicked step-sisters --- no, really just sisters, though the idea of stepsisters just sounds more wicked, doesn't it? Before I had any dignity, that is, about the age of four, they dressed me up like a girl and paraded me around the neighborhood. Have I forgotten? Not on your life. And yet, by God's grace this has not created any gender confusion but only contributed to this melancholia of which I write. Oh, melancholia. What a delicious disposition. It's coming on Christmas. . . and if I had a river I'd skate away. . . at least that's what Joni Mitchell says in that kind of but not really Christmas song called, in true holiday fashion, "The River." On the day after Thanksgiving I pull out all my lyrically saddest or most musically morose songs --- all my Joni Mitchell sound-a-likes --- and play them over and over again on long car trips to wails of complaint and gnashings of teeth from the rear quarter. I love it. There is nothing like a sad Christmas song to cheer the heart. Give me a minor key, anytime, an unresolved coda, a santa-brought-no-gifts-wife-left-dog-died-got-fired sort of faux country song, and I'm happy. Sorta. This Christmas I'm off to a particularly good start. The Moravian Star I always hang over the side door lights up just fine indoors but won't light up outdoors. Peters out just across the threshold. It's inexplicable. Spooked. Gremlin-ized. I'm afraid to task my son with it, as he may well make it more aerodynamic and yet still not solve the lighting problem. (He's an aerospace student/pilot type.) I'll make it fly --- one kick and I'll put it in my neighbor's front yard, and then we'll see if it lights up. Got my daughter a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with one sad ornament on it. The acorn don't fall far from the tree, does it? Sad, sad tree, and she's so happy with it. I may even get a big tree and decorate it Charlie Brown style. Very feng shui. It takes a lot of effort to be lazy and call it simple. One ornament. Just one. [Dad, what are you writing? A new blog post. About what? Joy and happiness. No you're not! It's you. It can't be.] You see what I must put up with. My melancholia is not respected, not taken seriously. I am the butt of jokes, at the forefront of derision. That makes me sad. I am predisposed to words like bittersweet, ambivalent, or even adjectival phrases like happy-sad, as they all seem to be saying two things at once. Keeps people hopping when you talk like that, and it suits my inwardly smiling melancholic disposition to find sadness inside of happiness, to be both-and not either-or. But speaking of words, and getting to the point of this meditation on my melancholy, there seems to be a bias against the melancholic, a sense that it means someone who is depressed all the time. Dig a little, though, and you see another definition, an older one: "pensive contemplation." In that, I hear the Psalmist and Jesus, something to aspire to and not avoid. When David declared in that most melancholy of psalms that "I lie awake; I have become like a bird alone on a roof (Ps. 102:7, NIV), he wasn't simply depressed but both burdened and comforted --- he laments his sin and that of a nation and yet is comforted by assurances that God is faithful and compasisonate and will "rebuild Zion" (v. 16) and "respond to the prayer of the destitute" (v. 17). He lay in a state of "pensive contemplation." And when Jesus said "blessed are those who mourn," which is a state, as John Stott reminds us, to aspire to, a burden over the sin both without and within, he did not fail to promise that those who aspire to such mourning "will be comforted" (Mt. 5:4). There is deep joy and hope and promise wrapped in a holy sadness over sin. I can't play the truly sad songs, the lyrically nihilistic or musically chaotic. I can't play them because they aren't true, beautiful, or good. They embody the despairing sadness of a people without faith, hope, or love. That's not me. The melancholy songs speak to me because they carry the weight of sin and yet are better able to hold the promise of joy than the light and happy fluff. A pensive contemplation is a posture that often suits me. The deeper trauma that affects me is not sibling devilry or the loss of childhood pets but the trauma of grace. From that, thank God, I will never ever recover. Steve West

My son accuses me of only listening to songs that are depressing and gloomy.  It makes me sad that he would think that.

Chalk that propensity up to years of listening to folk singers and singer-songwriters, many of whom major in angst and world-weariness.  No, I can't blame them.  Really, it's deep childhood trauma, the emotional scars of two events.  One, our dog, Pug (haunting name, isn't it?) died on Christmas Day.  Imagine that, a day on which the Incarnation is celebrated and our dog chooses that very day to "decarnate" himself.  Well, or something like that.  I was four, and you can imagine what I suffer from these 49 years later.

And then there were my three wicked step-sisters --- no, really just sisters, though the idea of stepsisters just sounds more wicked, doesn't it?  Before I had any dignity, that is, about the age of four, they dressed me up like a girl and paraded me around the neighborhood.  Have I forgotten?  Not on your life.  And yet, by God's grace this has not created any gender confusion but only contributed to this melancholia of which I write.

Oh, melancholia.  What a delicious disposition.  It's coming on Christmas. . . and if I had a river I'd skate away. . . at least that's what Joni Mitchell says in that kind of but not really Christmas song called, in true holiday fashion, "The River."  On the day after Thanksgiving I pull out all my lyrically saddest or most musically morose songs  --- all my Joni Mitchell sound-a-likes --- and play them over and over again on long car trips to wails of complaint and gnashings of teeth from the rear quarter.  I love it.  There is nothing like a sad Christmas song to cheer the heart.  Give me a minor key, anytime, an unresolved coda, a santa-brought-no-gifts-wife-left-dog-died-got-fired sort of faux country song, and I'm happy.  Sorta.

This Christmas I'm off to a particularly good start.  The Moravian Star I always hang over the side door lights up just fine indoors but won't light up outdoors.  Peters out just across the threshold.  It's inexplicable.  Spooked.  Gremlin-ized.  I'm afraid to task my son with it, as he may well make it more aerodynamic and yet still not solve the lighting problem.  (He's an aerospace student/pilot type.)  I'll make it fly --- one kick and I'll put it in my neighbor's front yard, and then we'll see if it lights up.

Got my daughter a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with one sad ornament on it.  The acorn don't fall far from the tree, does it?  Sad, sad tree, and she's so happy with it. I may even get a big tree and decorate it Charlie Brown style.  Very feng shui.  It takes a lot of effort to be lazy and call it simple.  One ornament.  Just one.

[Dad, what are you writing?

A new blog post.

About what?

Joy and happiness.

No you're not!  It's you.  It can't be.]

You see what I must put up with.  My melancholia is not respected, not taken seriously.  I am the butt of jokes, at the forefront of derision.  That makes me sad.

I am predisposed to words like bittersweet, ambivalent, or even adjectival phrases like happy-sad, as they all seem to be saying two things at once.  Keeps people hopping when you talk like that, and it suits my inwardly smiling melancholic disposition to find sadness inside of happiness, to be both-and not either-or.

But speaking of words, and getting to the point of this meditation on my melancholy, there seems to be a bias against the melancholic, a sense that it means someone who is depressed all the time.  Dig a little, though, and you see another definition, an older one: "pensive contemplation."  In that, I hear the Psalmist and Jesus, something to aspire to and not avoid.

When David declared in that most melancholy of psalms that "I lie awake; I have become like a bird alone on a roof (Ps. 102:7, NIV), he wasn't simply depressed but both burdened and comforted ---  he laments his sin and that of a nation and yet is comforted by assurances that God is faithful and compasisonate and will "rebuild Zion" (v. 16) and "respond to the prayer of the destitute" (v. 17).  He lay in a state of "pensive contemplation."  And when Jesus said "blessed are those who mourn," which is a state, as John Stott reminds us, to aspire to, a burden over the sin both without and within, he did not fail to promise that those who aspire to such mourning "will be comforted" (Mt. 5:4).  There is deep joy and hope and promise wrapped in a holy sadness over sin.

I can't play the truly sad songs, the lyrically nihilistic or musically chaotic.  I can't play them because they aren't true, beautiful, or good.  They embody the despairing sadness of a people without faith, hope, or love.  That's not me.

The melancholy songs speak to me because they carry the weight of sin and yet are better able to hold the promise of joy than the light and happy fluff.  A pensive contemplation is a posture that often suits me.  The deeper trauma that affects me is not sibling devilry or the loss of childhood pets but the trauma of grace.  From that, thank God, I will never ever recover.

 That Other Country tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20154373541e3970c 2011-11-23T23:55:00-05:00 2011-11-24T00:09:59-05:00 A couple of weeks ago I remarked to someone outside my church that "people were dying all around me." She advised that they had been dying all along, that I just hadn't noticed. Fair enough. Still, it seems there has been an unusual spike in deaths. For example, on October 15th my mother died. One month previously, her brother died. One month after her, the other brother died. My cousin's wife's mother died. My pastor's mother died. A co-worker's mother died. And so it goes. People truly are dying all around me. The monk, Benedict, once said that as a Christian one is to "keep death daily before your eyes." When I wrote that quote down on January 11, 1997, I don't think I fully appreciated what it meant. It's easy to avoid death in this culture. I drive 20 minutes to work and back each day, and I pass no cemeteries. I saw a rare funeral procession the other day, and no one seemed to know (or care) how to act in its wake. Few pulled over or made way. A couple of drivers even impatiently tried to pass the line. And when death does come home to some, they do not know how to behave. They stumble over it, run from it. When I was laid up in a hospital once for six weeks, someone told me not to "waste my suffering." I didn't want to hear that, and yet it was good advice, though it has taken me years to understand it. Rather than giving into distraction or denial, it's better to let death wash over you, to live in it for a season. I wouldn't say that's fun, but it is good. I'm not at all happy about death, because it's not normal, was not intended by God, and yet it holds its lessons. It's a great reminder that we live in a shadow-land of distractions and cares that diverts us from our homeward focus, that "other country" which all of scripture points to. In an essay published over a decade ago, "The Glory of His Discontent," Don Hudson asserts that we are consoled in our own discontent --- our "holy" discontent --- in that God is also discontent. He longs for an end to the suffering of the world, to a final end to death, to a time when all is made right. In imaging Him, we do likewise. After all, something is amiss if we believe that this world is normal or as good as it gets, even though in the best of times we may deceive ourselves with such thoughts. "Keep death daily before your eyes." I doubt I can ever not do that now. But I wouldn't have it otherwise, as it has made me a little more dependent on the only One who offers true consolation, to the One who knows our discontent better than do we. Jesus wept. God looks longingly out over a planet and people bent and marred by an unholy Disruptor, and He waits. The Comforter comes and encircles us, carries the weight of our discontent. And we live in the hope that our discontent will finally be undone, that all that is wrong will be made right. . . in that other country. Steve West

A couple of weeks ago I remarked to someone outside my church that "people were dying all around me."  She advised that they had been dying all along, that I just hadn't noticed.  Fair enough.  Still, it seems there has been an unusual spike in deaths. For example, on October 15th my mother died.  One month previously, her brother died.  One month after her, the other brother died.  My cousin's wife's mother died.  My pastor's mother died.  A co-worker's mother died.  And so it goes.  People truly are dying all around me.

The monk, Benedict, once said that as a Christian one is to "keep death daily before your eyes."  When I wrote that quote down on January 11, 1997, I don't think I fully appreciated what it meant.  It's easy to avoid death in this culture.  I drive 20 minutes to work and back each day, and I pass no cemeteries.  I saw a rare funeral procession the other day, and no one seemed to know (or care) how to act in its wake.  Few pulled over or made way.  A couple of drivers even impatiently tried to pass the line.  And when death does come home to some, they do not know how to behave. They stumble over it, run from it.

When I was laid up in a  hospital once for six weeks, someone told me not to "waste my suffering."  I didn't want to hear that, and yet it was good advice, though it has taken me years to understand it.  Rather than giving into distraction or denial, it's better to let death wash over you, to live in it for a season.   I wouldn't say that's fun, but it is good.  I'm not at all happy about death, because it's not normal, was not intended by God, and yet it holds its lessons.  It's a great reminder that we live in a shadow-land of distractions and cares that diverts us from our homeward focus, that "other country" which all of scripture points to.

In an essay published over a decade ago, "The Glory of His Discontent," Don Hudson asserts that we are consoled in our own discontent --- our "holy" discontent --- in that God is also discontent.  He longs for  an end to the suffering of the world, to a final end to death, to a time when all is made right.  In imaging Him, we do likewise.  After all, something is amiss if we believe that this world is normal or as good as it gets, even though in the best of times we may deceive ourselves with such thoughts.

"Keep death daily before your eyes."  I doubt I can ever not do that now.  But I wouldn't have it otherwise, as it has made me a little more dependent on the only One who offers true consolation, to the One who knows our discontent better than do we.  Jesus wept.  God looks longingly out over a planet and people bent and marred by an unholy Disruptor, and He waits.  The Comforter comes and encircles us, carries the weight of our discontent.  And we live in the hope that our discontent will finally be undone, that all that is wrong will be made right. . . in that other country.

 From Saint to Saint to Saint tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015436da3c18970c 2011-11-13T17:18:14-05:00 2011-11-13T17:10:41-05:00 "The colored sunsets and starry heavens, the beautiful mountains and the shining seas, the frgrant woods and painted flowers, are not half so beautiful as a soul that is serving Jesus out of love, in the wear and tear of common, unpoetic life." (Frederick William Faber, in All for Jesus) Of the nearly 400 books and notebooks which I cleaned out of my mother's house before she died, I found very few that yielded any personal reflections, any key to who she was and what she was thinking. Perhaps it was characteristic of her generation not to speak about themselves. But in additon to her well-marked Bible, one book that stands out (and which I have) is one I have seen on her nightstand or table by her chair for many years. Streams in the Desert, by Mrs. Charles E. Cowman, is a book I never once looked at though it is one that my mother obviously read and re-read many times. The cover of this 1992 large print edition (which, I confess, is nice for my eyes now), is well-worn from hands that carried it, opened it, and closed it, many of its pages falling from the binding. It's not that she made notes in the book, as she did not, but she placed bookmarks in various places. I can only guess at why the words on the marked pages meant something to her, and yet it gives me pleasure to follow her path, to look on pages that made her pause and reflect. I didn't know anything about the author, Lettie Cowman, but I found out that she and her husband were missionaries to Japan and China during the early years of the Twentieth Century until they were forced to return home because of her husband's health. She nursed him for six years. Other than that, little more is to be found in her bio, and perhaps that is as it should be. And yet her book, first published in 1925, has sold more than two million copies. Like my mother's library and her bookmarks, it reveals the path she walked, the quotes and writings that meant something to her. As such, it is a great source of encouragement to anyone struggling with a trial or difficulty. One page marked by my mother had the quote from Faber in it. Though the text does not make it clear, Faber was a Catholic priest in London who wrote, among other works, a book called All for Jesus, or the Easy Ways of Love Divine. The fourth edition, the only one I found on Google Books, was published in 1854. Reading just a little bit of it shows a man consumed with love for Jesus and for the common life he shared with his parishioners. For example, he begins the book like this: Jesus belongs to us. He vouchsafes to put himself at our disposal. He communicates to us everything of His which we are capable of receiving. He loves us with a love that no words can tell, nay, above all our thought and imagination. And He condescends to desire, with a longing that is equally indescribable, that we should love Him, with a fervent and entire love. And so it goes. And then the quote that forms the epigraph for this short post has a beautiful phrase that demonstrates his celebration of the common life --- "the wear and tear of common, unpoetic life." I love that sense that it is not the sainted who are to be revered so much as are the common, faithful Christians, those in the mud and muck of life, in the unpoetic trenches of daily obedience. There is my mother who no doubt had her share of tribulation; Lettie Cowman, who cared for an ailing husband for six long years; and William Faber, parish priest faithfully serving his people --- the communion of saints, all now together in the presence of Jesus. Don't discount the the paths taken by the aged and the long-dead. They have tread where we shall go. Follow the bookmarks of their lives. Go from saint to saint to saint. Steve West

"The colored sunsets and starry heavens, the beautiful mountains and the shining seas, the frgrant woods and painted flowers, are not half so beautiful as a soul that is serving Jesus out of love, in the wear and tear of common, unpoetic life."  (Frederick William Faber, in All for Jesus)

Of the nearly 400 books and notebooks which I cleaned out of my mother's house before she died, I found very few that yielded any personal reflections, any key to who she was and what she was thinking.  Perhaps it was characteristic of her generation not to speak about themselves.  But in additon to her well-marked Bible, one book that stands out (and which I have) is one I have seen on her nightstand or table by her chair for many years.  Streams in the Desert, by Mrs. Charles E. Cowman, is a book I never once looked at though it is one that my mother obviously read and re-read many times.  The cover of this 1992 large print edition (which, I confess, is nice for my eyes now), is well-worn from hands that carried it, opened it, and closed it, many of its pages falling from the binding.  It's not that she made notes in the book, as she did not, but she placed bookmarks in various places.  I can only guess at why the words on the marked pages meant something to her, and yet it gives me pleasure to follow her path, to look on pages that made her pause and reflect.

I didn't know anything about the author, Lettie Cowman, but I found out that she and her husband were missionaries to Japan and China during the early years of the Twentieth Century until they were forced to return home because of her husband's health.  She nursed him for six years.  Other than that, little more is to be found in her bio, and perhaps that is as it should be.  And yet her book, first published in 1925, has sold more than two million copies.  Like my mother's library and her bookmarks, it reveals the path she walked, the quotes and writings that meant something to her.  As such, it is a great source of encouragement to anyone struggling with a trial or difficulty.

One page marked by my mother had the quote from Faber in it.  Though the text does not make it clear, Faber was a Catholic priest in London who wrote, among other works, a book called All for Jesus, or the Easy Ways of Love Divine.  The fourth edition, the only one I found on Google Books, was published in 1854.  Reading just a little bit of it shows a man consumed with love for Jesus and for the common life he shared with his parishioners.  For example, he begins the book like this:

Jesus belongs to us.  He vouchsafes to put himself at our disposal.  He communicates to us everything of His which we are capable of receiving.  He loves us with a love that no words can tell, nay, above all our thought and imagination.  And He condescends to desire, with a longing that is equally indescribable, that we should love Him, with a fervent and entire love.    

And so it goes.  And then the quote that forms the epigraph for this short post has a beautiful phrase that demonstrates his celebration of the common life --- "the wear and tear of common, unpoetic life."  I love that sense that it is not the sainted who are to be revered so much as are the common, faithful Christians, those in the mud and muck of life, in the unpoetic trenches of daily obedience.  There is my mother who no doubt had her share of tribulation; Lettie Cowman, who cared for an ailing husband for six long years; and William Faber, parish priest faithfully serving his people --- the communion of saints, all now together in the presence of Jesus.

Don't discount the the paths taken by the aged and the long-dead.  They have tread where we shall go.  Follow the bookmarks of their lives.  Go from saint to saint to saint.

 

 Thanatopsis tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e20162fc071004970d 2011-11-01T15:37:02-04:00 2011-11-01T15:37:02-04:00 On October 15th, my mother died after a long bout with Parkinson's Disease. She was 84. I miss her. I miss a lot of things. I miss the ins and outs of my childhood, the home I grew up in, my father, my cat Pumpkin, and my dog Faith. I miss a world without cell phones, the internet, and cable tv which, despite the good they bring also bring so much that is destructive and distracting. I have no love for nostalgia, for a time that I know to be somewhat illusory in memory, yet what I really miss is my mother in that time, in a time when she was there and all was right and the world was under her care. A few days ago, coming home from a time with family, I passed by the exit to the hospice where she spent her last eight days of life. I was overcome with sadness borne of what I think is really a lingering homelessness. Though my mother had declined to the point where two-way conversation was not possible, she was still present in body. There was always a place for me to go, a person to see, a reminder of the home I once had. Though I long ago made a new home with my wife and family, my mother still represented my childhood home, the last physical reminder of that home. Now, I really can't go home. Francis Schaeffer once wrote (and no doubt many times spoke) of the world as we know it being abnormal. It is not what it was intended to be. Death is not normal. My lingering homelessness is not normal. When you are confronted by death, then like no other time you realize the contrast between what was intended by God and what is. Loss is now part of our life. The curse of sin, like a relentless entropy, is winding down the world. And yet, thank God, it doesn't end there. When my mother died believing in Christ, I sensed a new reality, one in which she is literally living on right now in the presence of Christ. What I have assented to in my mind for many years I now assented to in heart. And if she lives, then there is deeper magic at work in the world, one undoing the curse of sin and ultimately reversing death itself. In some moments over the last year I allowed myself to think that all my mother did and thought, all the books she read, Bible study notes she took, dreams she had, and letters she wrote were all lost, would go to the grave with her. They are not lost. Every single thing she did mattered. Not only is it part of her legacy but also a part of who she still is becoming. Nothing is lost but sin. In Paradise she is only more of who she already had become. There is no subtraction in death. And yet still I miss her and what she represents. I miss home. I know something of what the Israelites felt in their Babylonian exile. The Psalmist says that "[b]y the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion" (Ps. 137:1). Whatever home they made in a foreign land, they longed for their true homeland. Alien, stranger, sojourner, and exile --- so do I. But my mother knows no homesickness or homelessness. She's already Home. Steve West

On October 15th, my mother died after a long bout with Parkinson's Disease.  She was 84.  I miss her.

I miss a lot of things.  I miss the ins and outs of my childhood, the home I grew up in, my father, my cat Pumpkin,  and my dog Faith.  I miss a world without cell phones, the internet, and cable tv which, despite the good they bring also bring so much that is destructive and distracting.  I have no love for nostalgia, for a time that I know to be somewhat illusory in memory,  yet what I really miss is my mother in that time, in a  time when she was there and all was right and the world was under her care.

A few days ago, coming home from a time with family, I passed by the exit to the hospice where she spent her last eight days of life.  I was overcome with sadness borne of what I think is really a lingering homelessness.  Though my mother had declined to the point where two-way conversation was not possible, she was still present in body.  There was always a place for me to go, a person to see, a reminder of the home I once had.  Though I long ago made a new home with my wife and family, my mother still represented my childhood home, the last physical reminder of that home.  Now, I really can't go home.

Francis Schaeffer once wrote (and no doubt many times spoke) of the world as we know it being abnormal.  It is not what it was intended to be.  Death is not normal.  My lingering homelessness is not normal.  When you are confronted by death, then like no other time you realize the contrast between what was intended by God and what is.  Loss is now part of our life.  The curse of sin, like a relentless entropy, is winding down the world.

And yet, thank God, it doesn't end there.  When my mother died believing in Christ, I sensed a new reality, one in which she is literally living on right now in the presence of Christ.  What I have assented to in my mind for many years I now assented to in heart.  And if she lives, then there is deeper magic at work in the world, one undoing the curse of sin and ultimately reversing death itself.

In some moments over the last year I allowed myself to think that all my mother did and thought, all the books she read, Bible study notes she took, dreams she had, and letters she wrote were all lost, would go to the grave with her.  They are not lost.  Every single thing she did mattered.  Not only is it part of her legacy but also a part of who she still is becoming. Nothing is lost but sin.  In Paradise she is only more of who she already had become.  There is no subtraction in death.

And yet still I miss her and what she represents.  I miss home.  I know something of what the Israelites felt in their Babylonian exile.  The Psalmist says that "[b]y the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion" (Ps. 137:1).  Whatever home they made in a foreign land, they longed for their true homeland.

Alien, stranger, sojourner, and exile --- so do I.  But my mother knows no homesickness or homelessness.  She's already Home.

 Swimming in the Greatness of the Ordinary: A Review of Michael O'Briens's "Island of the World" tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015435927ec5970c 2011-09-22T22:15:33-04:00 2011-09-23T15:58:49-04:00 Michael O'Brien's over 800 page novel, Island of the World, is daunting in an era of short attention spans, and yet the reader's commitment to it will bear fruit in a renewed sense of God's providence, in the dignity of human life, and in Christian virtue. As with all great novels, I did not want it to end and continue to carry its protagonist, Josip Lasta, into the day with me, informing my sense of who I am and should be. The novel is epic in more ways than one. Set in the unsettled pre-World War II Balkans of 1933, it follows the life of Josip, then 12, as the world around him unwinds. Yugoslavia is wracked by civil war, as facsists, communists, and nationalists resist German and Italian occupiers. A hellish scenario unwinds, turning Josip's idyllic village world upside down and wrenching him from the deep Catholic faith of his childhood. The remainder of the novel, played out in Yugoslavia, Italy, and the United States, is a record of his life-long odyssey to recover that faith, as well as live it, to reckon with the demons of his path and accept the life he is given. Although the novel has a destination, like any good novel, the journey is what truly matters. Particularly enjoyable along the way are the poetic and theological insights gained. For example, when talking with Miriam, his friend's wife, about St. Augustine's teachings about word and sign, Josip is beside himself with excitement: "Miriam, Miriam," he exclaims, do you understand what this means!?" "I think I do, Josip." "It means that the world is radiant with signs. Heaven is pouring out continual messages, but we can hardly read them, you see, because we are blind and deaf and do not know who we really are. The signs in th earth, inanimate and organic, living and dead, are not divine in themselves, but they are creations of the divine. . . ." Josip goes on to lament the fact that much of humanity misses these signs, how "we live and move and have our being within a vast masterpiece" of which we are often unaware. That sense permeates the book. As Josip says near the end of his life, his great freedom is that everyday "he can swim in the greatness of the ordinary." Following his life, you are inspired by his courage, perseverance, honesty, and humility. For all the tragedy that unfolds in the life of Josip Lasta, the novel imparts great hope, a deep and unsentimental awareness of God's providential ordering of all the details of our lives, even its sufferings bound up with meaning. Our own sense of what life can and should be is enlarged, and a deep thankfulness settles in. At least that's what I was left with. Canadian Catholic Michael O'Brien's narrative brims with poetic sensibility and, indeed, his poetry finds expression in Josip, a mathematician turned poet. You'll find many full-length poems, rich with natural imagery and theological insight. Not a word in this word-full book is wasted, and yet the prose is neither dense nor daunting but flows naturally and richly. After completing the book, I went back and read the short Prologue. I realize now how little I understood of it then: "We are born, we eat, we learn, and die. We leave a tracery of messages in the lives of others, a little shifting of the soil, a stone moved from here to there, a word uttered, a song, a poem left behind. I was here, each of us declare. I was here." Josip Lasta says this is ordinary life, life for all of us, and yet in the "island of the world" everything points outside itself to God, to eternity. Everything means something. The real foundations of the world are not in brick and mortar but above. I recommend Island of the World if you have some time. It just might be one of my favorite books of all time. Steve West

51oysBy0seL._AA115_ Michael O'Brien's over 800 page novel, Island of the World, is daunting in an era of short attention spans, and yet the reader's commitment to it will bear fruit in a renewed sense of God's providence, in the dignity of human life, and in Christian virtue.  As with all great novels, I did not want it to end and continue to carry its protagonist, Josip Lasta, into the day with me, informing my sense of who I am and should be.

The novel is epic in more ways than one.  Set in the unsettled pre-World War II Balkans of 1933, it follows the life of Josip, then 12, as the world around him unwinds.  Yugoslavia is wracked by civil war, as facsists, communists, and nationalists resist German and Italian occupiers.  A hellish scenario unwinds, turning Josip's idyllic village world upside down and wrenching him from the deep Catholic faith of his childhood.  The remainder of the novel, played out in Yugoslavia, Italy, and the United States, is a record of his life-long odyssey to recover that faith, as well as live it, to reckon with the demons of his path and accept the life he is given.

Although the novel has a destination, like any good novel, the journey is what truly matters.  Particularly enjoyable along the way are the poetic and theological insights gained.  For example, when talking with Miriam, his friend's wife, about St. Augustine's teachings about word and sign, Josip is beside himself with excitement:

"Miriam, Miriam," he exclaims, do you understand what this means!?"

"I think I do, Josip."

"It means that the world is radiant with signs.  Heaven is pouring out continual messages, but we can hardly read them, you see, because we are blind and deaf and do not know who we really are.  The signs in th earth, inanimate and organic, living and dead, are not divine in themselves, but they are creations of the divine. . . ."

Josip goes on to lament the fact that much of humanity misses these signs, how "we live and move and have our being within a vast masterpiece" of which we are often unaware.  That sense permeates the book.  As Josip says near the end of his life, his great freedom is that everyday "he can swim in the greatness of the ordinary."  Following his life, you are inspired by his courage, perseverance, honesty, and humility.  For all the tragedy that unfolds in the life of Josip Lasta, the novel imparts great hope, a deep and unsentimental awareness of God's providential ordering of all the details of our lives, even its sufferings bound up with meaning.  Our own sense of what life can and should be is enlarged, and a deep thankfulness settles in.  At least that's what I was left with.

Canadian Catholic Michael O'Brien's narrative brims with poetic sensibility and, indeed, his poetry finds expression in Josip, a mathematician turned poet.  You'll find many full-length poems, rich with natural imagery and theological insight.  Not a word in this word-full book is wasted, and yet the prose is neither dense nor daunting but flows naturally and richly.

After completing the book, I went back and read the short Prologue.  I realize now how little I understood of it then:

"We are born, we eat, we learn, and die.  We leave a tracery of messages in the lives of others, a little shifting of the soil, a stone moved from here to there, a word uttered, a song, a poem left behind.  I was here, each of us declare.  I was here."

Josip Lasta says this is ordinary life, life for all of us, and yet in the "island of the world" everything points outside itself to God, to eternity.  Everything means something.  The real foundations of the world are not in brick and mortar but above.

I recommend Island of the World if you have some time.  It just might be one of my favorite books of all time.

 

 Why Old Words Matter tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015391aa627e970b 2011-09-17T13:26:55-04:00 2011-09-17T13:26:55-04:00 One of the values of old, even archaic words is that their very strangeness helps us hear them. If, as Pablo Picasso said, "art is the lie that tells the truth," then the indirection of those strange old words has a way of telling the truth even more fully than the ones with which we are so familiar. In fact, the very familiarity of so-called modern words can render them cliche and render us numb to their meaning. I noticed this recently when I had opportunity to compare both the updated modern and classic language editions of Oswald Chambers' classic devotional, My Utmost for His Highest. In the selection for August 20th in the classic edition, for example, Chambers contrasts the self-conscious life with the Christ-conscious life, noting that "Jesus says 'Come unto Me. . . and I will give you rest,' that is, Christ-consciousness will take the place of self-consciousness." In the hands of the updater, self-consciousness turns into "self-awareness," a word that may have a similar denotation but has an unfortunate (and distracting) pop psychology connotation. For me, to say "Christ-awareness will take the place of self-awareness" doesn't quite carry the full meaning. Or take the entry from June 2nd. Chambers repeatedly uses the word "haunted" to refer to a life completely taken up in God, and yet, as the updater renders it, we are merely "obsessed" with God. First of all, to say we are obsessed with God gets it backwards: What Chambers is saying is that it is God who is obsessed with us. And to say He haunts us is thrilling, really, as it makes me think of the mystery of His continual presence and the relentless way in which He pursues us, that "hound of Heaven." Spooky, and good, isn't it? It's not that old is always better. But the burden should be on the updater to justify a change. Older words require more of us. And yet these elder words are ripe for reflection. Winston Churchill said that "short words are best and the old words when short are best of all." He may have been focusing on the simplicity and not the fullsomeness of old words, but I imagine he would agree that an older word is often better than a newer one. So forget the updated editions. Stick to classics. Wade in and stop on an old word. Ponder it until it gives up its full meaning. Let it speak across time to you. Steve West

One of the values of old, even archaic words is that their very strangeness helps us hear them.  If, as Pablo Picasso said, "art is the lie that tells the truth," then the indirection of those strange old words has a way of telling the truth even more fully than the ones with which we are so familiar.  In fact, the very familiarity of so-called modern words can render them cliche and render us numb to their meaning.

I noticed this recently when I had opportunity to compare both the updated modern and classic language editions of Oswald Chambers' classic devotional, My Utmost for His Highest.  In the selection for August 20th in the classic edition, for example, Chambers contrasts the self-conscious life with the Christ-conscious life, noting that "Jesus says 'Come unto Me. . . and I will give you rest,' that is, Christ-consciousness will take the place of self-consciousness."  In the hands of the updater, self-consciousness  turns into "self-awareness," a word that may have a similar denotation but has an unfortunate (and distracting) pop psychology connotation.  For me, to say "Christ-awareness will take the place of self-awareness" doesn't quite carry the full meaning.

Or take the entry from June 2nd.  Chambers repeatedly uses the word "haunted" to refer to a life completely taken up in God, and yet, as the updater renders it, we are merely "obsessed" with God.  First of all, to say we are obsessed with God gets it backwards: What Chambers is saying is that it is God who is obsessed with us.  And to say He haunts us is thrilling, really, as it makes me think of the mystery of His continual presence and the relentless way in which He pursues us, that "hound of Heaven."  Spooky, and good, isn't it?  It's not that old is always better.  But the burden should be on the updater to justify a change.

Older words require more of us.  And yet these elder words are ripe for reflection.  Winston Churchill said that "short words are best and the old words when short are best of all."  He may have been focusing on the simplicity and not the fullsomeness of old words, but I imagine he would agree that an older word is often better than a newer one.

So forget the updated editions.  Stick to classics. Wade in and stop on an old word.  Ponder it until it gives up its full meaning.  Let it speak across time to you.

 When All Times Become One Time tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a00d83451fedc69e2015391a7a1e9970b 2011-09-16T18:39:48-04:00 2011-09-16T18:38:33-04:00 On my first grade report card, my teacher, Mrs. Nell Teague, comments that "Stephen is so shy in class that he hardly ever contributes to class discussion." That was first quarter. The next quarter she says "Stephen speaks with less hesitation but almost never volunteers without being asked something specifically. The third quarter there is only this ominous comment: "May we have a conference Friday, April 16th at 2:45?" I suppose they planned some intervention to get me talking. I don't know what transpired, but by the last quarter of first grade she is able to write "I am delighted with Stephen's maturation - he is so much more outgoing and relaxed." I doubt that. I think she was just being hopeful. I don't think I liked Mrs. Teague very much. But hearing her describe my hesitancy to speak up in class is to be thankful, to be reminded that I am not so much different than I was at the age of six, 47 years ago. I remain reluctant to speak up. I have no problem being in front of groups of people, with public speaking or leading, but I do not like to speak up when in crowds of people. It's somewhat comforting to know I didn't just get that way overnight, and I'm probably not going to change. In fact, I don't think I want to change. What I have long realized is that there are plenty of other people who can articulate my inchoate thoughts (as well as no small number of blowhards), and so, given that it comes so natural for them, I let them. It is who I am. The core of who I was then is still the core of who I am now. I am the same person, and for all the deficiencies I own, I am glad. To look at my six-year old self, to peer back in time across a million moments good and bad since then, is an odd, sometimes surreal experience. Reading others' words about me makes me feel close in time to who I was then, almost as if the intervening 47 years are elastic, accordion-like, sometimes stretching so as to feel a gulf impossibly wide and unbridgeable, sometimes collapsing to only inches like moments apart. Somewhat akin to that odd sense of deja vu that comes upon us unaware, this elasticity of time surprises us, like something otherworldly and outside our day-to-day experience. I'm not being blasphemous when I say it is God-like, a faint and fleeting shadow of the way God experiences time all the time. That God is beyond time, even supra-dimensional, perhaps explains why we have such difficulty with apocalyptic literature in Scripture. As Catholic writer Michael O'Brien recently said about the Book of Revelation: We are in the final battle, we are in the apocalypse, we are in the book of Revelation, which the Church, beginning with most of the Church Fathers, believes to be a vision of the entire unfolding of salvation history after the Incarnation, culminating in the total victory of Christ over the entire cosmos and its restoration to the Father. The book of Revelation is not a schematic diagram or a flat blueprint or a purely linear time-line. It is a mysterious multi-dimensional vision which surely contains linear-chronological aspects, but that is not the whole thing. Indeed it is not the main thing. In other words, God's revelation to John was a reflection of his multi-dimensional character, in time (or times) but also outside time. Given our finitude, it is difficult for us to fully or easily grasp, and we revert to time lines and graphs to show its fulfillment, reducing it to something understandable, trackable, and (sometimes) even manageable. God is not like that. He defies neat categories. And so do we. We are made in God's image. As such, impressed upon is is something of God's nature. Nevertheless, theologians often distinguish between the communicable and incommunicable attributes of God. As it goes, the latter belong to God alone --- things like self-existence (asceity) or immutability (unchangeableness) or eternality (transcendence of time) --- as opposed to the former --- things like love, mercy, and goodness, or the fact that we create just as God created. However, without minimizing that unbridgeable gulf between Creator and creature, I sometimes wonder if if such neat categorizations always hold up. Take eternality. Clearly God is everlasting in a sense that we are not and never will be, but is that attribute entirely incommunicable? Michael Horton, who adopts Augustine's view of eternity, concludes that "eternity transcends temporal categories," and that [w]hile God transcends time, redeemed creatures will experience a regathering of their times in perfect joy and fulfillment." if we experience this regathering then in whole, why not on occasion, even fleetingly, now? Is what I experienced at six years of age really so far removed from where I am now? Sometimes it doesn't feel like it. So. . . Hello Mrs. Teague, class, Trina Payne, and Jimmy Simms. It's me, Stephen, now just Steve. I'm the same kid. Really. It's been a long time, I know. Trina, I hope you found a husband. Sorry it didn't work out for us no matter how many pennies you saved for it. Mrs. Teague, what exactly did you talk to my mother about in that conference? Jimmy, I forgive you for blabbing about me kissing Trina during rest time. And people, I still don't speak up much, and I don't think I ever will. I look forward to Heaven, to the collapsing of all times, to the fulfillment of time, to the time when all times become in some mysterious sense one time. Until then, I like to think I have just a glimpse of that through something as iconic as a report card, a window into another of my times. Steve West

On my first grade report card, my teacher, Mrs. Nell Teague, comments that "Stephen is so shy in class that he hardly ever contributes to class discussion." That was first quarter. The next quarter she says "Stephen speaks with less hesitation but almost never volunteers without being asked something specifically. The third quarter there is only this ominous comment: "May we have a conference Friday, April 16th at 2:45?" I suppose they planned some intervention to get me talking. I don't know what transpired, but by the last quarter of first grade she is able to write "I am delighted with Stephen's maturation - he is so much more outgoing and relaxed." I doubt that. I think she was just being hopeful.

I don't think I liked Mrs. Teague very much. But hearing her describe my hesitancy to speak up in class is to be thankful, to be reminded that I am not so much different than I was at the age of six, 47 years ago. I remain reluctant to speak up.  I have no problem being in front of groups of people, with public speaking or leading, but I do not like to speak up when in crowds of people. It's somewhat comforting to know I didn't just get that way overnight, and I'm probably not going to change.  In fact, I don't think I want to change.  What I have long realized is that there are plenty of other people who can articulate my inchoate thoughts (as well as no small number of blowhards), and so, given that it comes so natural for them, I let them.   It is who I am.  The core of who I was then is still the core of who I am now.  I am the same person, and for all the deficiencies I own, I am glad.

To look at my six-year old self, to peer back in time across a million moments good and bad since then, is an odd, sometimes surreal experience.  Reading others' words about me makes me feel close in time to who I was then, almost as if the intervening 47 years are elastic, accordion-like, sometimes stretching so as to feel a gulf impossibly wide and unbridgeable, sometimes collapsing to only inches like moments apart.  Somewhat akin to that odd sense of deja vu that comes upon us unaware, this elasticity of time surprises us, like something otherworldly and outside our day-to-day experience.  I'm not being blasphemous when I say it is God-like, a faint and fleeting shadow of the way God experiences time all the time.

That God is beyond time, even supra-dimensional, perhaps explains why we have such difficulty with apocalyptic literature in Scripture.  As Catholic writer Michael O'Brien recently said about the Book of Revelation:

We are in the final battle, we are in the apocalypse, we are in the book of Revelation, which the Church, beginning with most of the Church Fathers, believes to be a vision of the entire unfolding of salvation history after the Incarnation, culminating in the total victory of Christ over the entire cosmos and its restoration to the Father. The book of Revelation is not a schematic diagram or a flat blueprint or a purely linear time-line. It is a mysterious multi-dimensional vision which surely contains linear-chronological aspects, but that is not the whole thing. Indeed it is not the main thing.

In other words, God's revelation to John was a reflection of his multi-dimensional character, in time (or times) but also outside time.  Given our finitude, it is difficult for us to fully or easily grasp, and we revert to time lines and graphs to show its fulfillment, reducing it to something understandable, trackable, and (sometimes) even manageable.  God is not like that.  He defies neat categories.

And so do we.  We are made in God's image.  As such, impressed upon is is something of God's nature.  Nevertheless, theologians often distinguish between the communicable  and incommunicable attributes of God.  As it goes, the latter belong to God alone --- things like self-existence (asceity) or immutability (unchangeableness) or eternality (transcendence of time) --- as opposed to the former --- things like love, mercy, and goodness, or the fact that we create just as God created.  However, without minimizing that unbridgeable gulf between Creator and creature, I sometimes wonder if if such neat categorizations always hold up.

Take eternality.  Clearly God is everlasting in a sense that we are not and never will be, but is that attribute entirely incommunicable?  Michael Horton, who adopts Augustine's view of eternity, concludes that "eternity transcends temporal categories," and that [w]hile God transcends time, redeemed creatures will experience a regathering of their times in perfect joy and fulfillment."  if we experience this regathering then in whole, why not on occasion, even fleetingly, now?  Is what I experienced at six years of age really so far removed from where I am now?  Sometimes it doesn't feel like it.

So. . . Hello Mrs. Teague, class, Trina Payne, and Jimmy Simms.  It's me, Stephen, now just Steve.  I'm the same kid.  Really.  It's been a long time, I know.  Trina, I hope you found a husband.  Sorry it didn't work out for us no matter how many pennies you saved for it.  Mrs. Teague, what exactly did you talk to my mother about in that conference?  Jimmy, I forgive you for blabbing about me kissing Trina during rest time.  And people, I still don't speak up much, and I don't think I ever will.

 I look forward to Heaven, to the collapsing of all times, to the fulfillment of time, to the time when all times become in some mysterious sense one time.  Until then, I like to think I have just a glimpse of that through something as iconic as a report card, a window into another of my times.