The Quest for God (1)

The quest, was it more urgently prevalent in the middle ages? 
Did the Enlightenment sidetrack the quest?
Or is it built into our DNA, either to be acknowledged or denied?
Though nearly 70% in our country say they believe in God, atheism is also on the rise.
But in spite of selfism, consumerism, and materialism, does an unfilled need continue to persist?
Sometimes even undeniably?

Maybe Edwin Arlington Robinson had it right:

"The world is not a prison house; it is a spiritual kindergarten

where millions of bewildered infants

are trying to spell G-O-D with the wrong blocks."

Simon Tugwell in The Beatitudes stimulates my reflection too:

"It is the desire for God which is the most fundamental appetite of all,  and it is an appetite we can never eliminate.  We may seek to disown it, but it will not go away.  If we deny that it is there, we shall in fact only divert it to some other object or range of objects.  And that will mean that we invest some creature or creatures with the full burden of our need for God, a burden which no creature can carry."

A Chapel Service

I sat in the back row, letting my eyes go over the staff that had gathered.
I noticed the age range.  Many had obviously worked at Bethany Christian Services for a long time.
Others, more youthful, had only recently come onboard.
But all, young and older, men and women, were here because of their commitment to the work of mercy and compassion.
They had been invited to come and listen to the story of a co-worker, the story of extraordinary danger and breath-taking rescue.  The story of God's grace.
I had heard the story more than a year earlier.  As chair of the CALL (Calvin Academy for Life-long Learning) Public Events Committee, I had invited Dona Abbott, the Director of Bethany Christian Services for Kent County, to speak at our Noontime Series on the work with refugees.  She took this young Vietnamese woman along who, as Refugee Service Supervisor, had her own story to tell.
The story of how a 17 year-old girl had escaped Vietnam on a poorly maintained fishing boat.
The story of how she had been spared, wondrously and unbelievably, from falling to her death, from being snatched and carried off by pirates to a fate worse than death, from being raped by camp guards.
The story of how she came to understand and believe later, safe in America and with a Christian family, that God had been present in her treacherous escape, enfolding her in his safe-keeping arms, and that he had a purpose for her life--to help others out of love and compassion.
The story of this Buddhist-raised woman stirred something in me.
Enough to seek her out after the presentation.
Enough to tell her that I would like to write her story.
Now, a year and a half later, I listened to her share the story with her colleagues.
Not only her story, but also her vision of a Christian orphanage in Vietnam, for which she has been praying and working and raising funds.
And I saw that they, too, her fellow workers, were deeply touched and inspired.

Afterward I wondered.
Had it been it the Spirit nudging me to talk to My-Yyen the first time we met?
Is that why the story was written and now finds itself in a book (Through Dark Places: True Stories of Human Tragedy, Faith, and Miracles)?
For that is how it was discovered by a Bethany reader, and that's how this chapel gathering became an occasion.
And that is how many there present wanted the book for themselves, to encounter the awesome presence of God's work in the lives of his choice, including the life of a young Buddhist girl who had never heard of God.
And that is how others who read her story may share in the blessing that her life has become, a life impelled by gratitude and servanthood.

That chapel blessed me too.
The Spirit's nudging will do that.

Epiphany Hymn

     Dear God, We Are Your Singers

Dear God, we are your singers on this earth

 we sing of peace, we sing of joy and light

 we bring glad tidings of a Savior’s birth

to all who cry and suffer in the night.

We sing to those afflicted and in grief

 we would lift up the brokenhearted ones

 we sing of love, of hope, and of relief,

of restored lives and blessed innocence.

We sing to those chained in a prison cell

 we sing the ancient prophet’s freedom song

 we sing deliverance from a Satan’s hell

to all the lost who for salvation long.

We sing, we shout for all the world to hear:

 take off your rags now, and put on the new

 for night has ended, and the Lord is near

all that God’s promised will at last come true!

Therefore we sing, from sea to shining sea

 with steadfast faith and with a holy mirth

 let’s clear away the remnants of debris

and let’s begin to build our God’s new earth.

                           text: hjbaron [based on Isaiah 61]

                                    tune: Genevan 124 [ PH 521: God of the Prophets]          

At year's end.

Old Year's Day is meant, I think, for busy human beings to find a chair in a quiet corner, and think.
Think back on the year that was.
Think back on the person who was alive in it--yourself.
Think back on the things done, and not done.
Think back on the places seen, and the things discovered.
Think back on the new people met, and the "old" people lost.
Think back on the things that troubled body or soul, and that seem to have no end.
Think back on the good things that filled the heart, and be glad.
Think back on family and friends who entered the dark places of life, and saw little light.
Think back on a suffering world for which Jesus may be weeping still, and pray.
Think back on agents of goodness that reached out to arms outstretched, and give thanks.

We can only think back, for all our yesterdays are history.
We cannot think ahead, for all our tomorrows are mystery.

But we do have choice.
We can choose to make our life mean something, today and tomorrow too.
During these waning hours of 2010, it's good to remember the words of Jimmy Carter:

"I have one life and one chance to make it count for something.
I am free to choose what that something is, and the something I have chosen is my faith.
My faith demands...that I do whatever I can, wherever I am, for as long as I can, with whatever I have, to try to make a difference."

Maybe a difference for all the tomorrows to come.
In God's name.

a thought

People quarrel about all sorts of things.
Sometimes quarrels turn into heated arguments, then into warfare.
I don't like disputes when they turn serious, when they begin to hurt, when words turn into weapons.
But it happens.
It even happens among Christians, especially when they forget their name.
And when it happens in churches, in assemblies, at synods--I die a little.
Then I think of G.K. Chesterton, when he said:
 
              Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair.


Ah yes, so let it be!

Christmas and the Great Event Organizer

222 TALKING WITH GOD


Note: shortly before the final layout of Talking with God was decreed permanently and irreversibly, it became necessary to cut three pages; I chose these three.
Our character, the Great Event Organizer, knows how an incredible event of cosmic proportions should be planned.
Or, he thinks he does.

                                        
                                 Another Christmas?

I know you’re planning something special this season, Lord.
Well, I have an idea, ‘cause this is going to be the biggest and best celebration ever, right?
So this is what we’re going to do: a spectacular celestial fireworks!
Shooting stars streaking all over the sky!
Lightning flashes that make the whole globe glow!
Claps of thunder that will get the attention of even the most jaded!
It’ll be the kind of annunciation no one can ignore.
What do you say?

Just one special star?
I wonder if anyone will notice!

And an angel?
Well, that’s not how I’d do it, but an angel can be pretty special too.
Send it flaming down through the sky, blazing like a meteor, so that all eyes go up.
Then let it hover about a mile or so above ground, and give that angel a mighty voice that cleaves the night sky when it announces the birth of God on earth.

Say, have you thought of waiting 2000 years, when television cameras can catch this fiery flash from heaven and make the whole world watch in wonder?

The time is now; okay.

What? No universal annunciation?
Just one angel appearing to a young girl in Nazareth, of all places?
With no witnesses?
What’s the use of that!
Who’s going to believe her?

Okay, listen God, I have another idea:
send your best angel choirs down to give
heavenly Christmas concerts in every major population center.
Send the biggest ones to downtown Jerusalem and Temple Square!
Let the light of their wings radiate through the whole city
as a fitting symbol for the "light of the world."
Let their music waft through every cobblestoned alley and silence every speech.
Make the whole world listen and believe!

Good, you will send a choir.
But only one?

Where?!
To a forsaken field far from town?
To a bunch of tone-deaf shepherds?
Why?!
Who is going to believe an ignorant, superstitious shepherd?
Dear God, what kind of production planning is this?
I mean, let’s shoot for some results here!

Well, let’s talk about the blessed event itself, then.
This is going to be special, right?
Of consequence for the whole world, right?
The birth that is going to make the Big Difference for ever and ever?
So, let’s see.
No celestial pyrotechnics in earthly skies, you said.
A big mistake, I think, but you’re the Boss.
At least let’s do the Birth Day right, okay?
I know the palace is out—too bad but Pilate wouldn’t understand.
I think I can find a mansion fit for a king, though.
I’ve got connections, you know.
I know a rich young ruler with a beautiful pad.
Or Nicodemus of the Sanhedrin,
or Joseph of Arimathea—all well-heeled and prominent.
I can arrange for the peasant girl—yes, Mary—to get a special invitation;
just leave everything to me.

Not in Jerusalem?!
In Bethlehem!!

I don’t get it.
So, what are we going to use—Herod’s palace?
I didn’t think so.

Bethlehem—that rather limits the options, doesn’t it.
No Hiltons or Hyatts there yet.
You sure you don’t want to wait a couple of millennia?
We could have flashing neon signs all over; and CNN.
Well, let me see what I can do, though I must say you make it rather difficult.
I’ll pick the best place there is.
And I’ll arrange for the best doctors in town.
I’ll take care of a complete layette too.
Plus we’ll need a town crier or something.
And how about a fancy carriage with white Arabians for the temple ceremony?

What?!
No room in any inn?
Not even for the Heavenly King?
What kind of start in life do you plan to give your only Son!

A cattle shed?!
Is this supposed to be some kind of divine joke?
No doubt it’s going to make many laugh themselves silly.
For who’s going to bow their knee to a deprived infant in a smelly barn?

Oh, the shepherds—of course.
And who’s going to believe that this underprivileged baby is the Savior of the world?

I mean, dear God, do you know what you are doing?

your ways are not my ways...
therefore, whoever humbles himself like this
child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
And whoever welcomes a little child like this
in my name welcomes me. 

To ponder: What can we learn from God’s "different" ways?

The words of Job

Maybe one powerful reason that Job was strong enough to survive the loss of everything but his soul, when even his life had become loathsome to him, was what his life had stood for, what the quality and the worth of his very being had meant to others.
Job never heard the words of Jesus: "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."
But Job lived by them.
He honored the great commandment: love each other.

"I delivered the poor who cried out,
The fatherless and the one who had no helper.
The blessing of a perishing man came upon me,
And I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.
I put on righteousness, and it clothed me;
I was eyes to the blind,
And I was feet to the lame.
I was a father to the poor,
And I searched out the case that I did not know.
I broke the fangs of the wicked,
And I plucked the victim from his teeth."
                                          -Job 29: 12-17

"For God so loved the world...."

Christmas is on the calendar, and we rejoice.
Better still that Christmas be in our hearts.