Hand Me My Sunglasses, Won't You?

Hand me my sunglasses, won’t you?
I know the sun has set
but can’t you see the moon’s
hurting my eyes?  so bright it hangs
now in the sky I can scarce look
forward for fear of seared retinas
and I am the one driving, you know?

Hand me my sunglasses, won’t you?
The moon’s burning my eyes –
what right has the moon to sear
itself upon my retinas like it’s some
kin or other to the sun?  Can you
explain that to me?

Hand me my sunglasses, won’t you?
They’re in my purse . . . I need them.
Yes, I drive with sunglasses in the dark
Don’t you?

Hand me my sunglasses, won’t you?
I need to turn down this world just
a notch or two – the moon’s just too
bright tonight – I’m scared it can
see into my soul

Hand me my sunglasses, won’t you?

Every traveler needs a co-pilot
a fellow traveler on life’s road
one who can toss me a cigarette
out of my raincoat pocket with
nary a glance or thought – two
moving as one – Michigan’s never
been my dream, but so many other
places fade into unreality in the rear-
view mirror as the moon before me
blinds me to all that’s left behind
in the darkness on the road traveled
or less so – it really doesn’t matter
when there’s someone to hand me
my sunglasses and care about my
explanation – who needs sunglasses
in the dark?  It’s the question begging
to be asked as I look to my right and
remember again that I am alone

____________________

*Hats off to Simon & Garfunkel.  Bonus points if you get the reference (well, if there're no bonus points, at least there's an implicit admission of a certain age, eh?).

Mule & Plow: Being Church

You’ll be the mule; I’ll be the plow.

Come harvest time, we’ll work it out.

There’s still a lot of love

here in these troubled fields.

Singing the pain, sorrow and hope of hard times in the farm lands, Nanci Griffith speaks into the soul of despair and in their singing, somehow reshape the darkness into light.

Reshaping the darkness into light: that, I think, is the principal ‘job’ of the Christian.

It’s not Pollyanna.  There’s no call for Hallmark here.

What there is is the belief, surely based on past experience, that together is the tipping point, if not the answer.

Fundamentally, that’s what church is: a together enterprise.

Far from perfect, shoot, we’re often not even friends.

But what we are is not alone.

What we are is together, mule and plow – plow and mule.

What we are is stepping out of darkness into the hope of love – there, where the light lives.

The Bringer of the Dawn

When I was a student chaplain in the children’s hospital section of Robert Wood Johnson hospital in New Jersey, I was called to sit and wait with parents whose son was being cut out of his car by the jaws of life.  They had been to the scene and sent to the hospital to await his arrival.  Down I rushed, in my standard black suit with my chaplain badge prominent around my neck.

When the mom saw me, a horrible thing happened.  She dropped to the floor – literally dropped – as if the very life had been sucked out of her, she dropped and began screaming her pain and agony.

She thought my presence meant he had died.  After about the half second it took me to realize what was happening, I did the only thing I could think to do – I dropped to the ground beside her.  I laid as close as I could get to her and put my face right into hers.  I called her by name.  And I began to tell her that her son was not dead. . . that she had seen him with her own eyes and knew he lived.  I touched her, I held her, I pulled her face into mine and we laid in the middle of that hospital hallway floor together until she could see me and hear me and believe me.

I’m sure it was only moments, but it seemed like forever, that time when she could see or hear nothing except me dressed in black, come, she was sure, to tell her the worst news of her life.  Somehow the moments passed and slowly we arose, hands held together and slowly she could believe that if I was an angel, it was not as the Angel of Death that I came, but as the Angel of Love.

That’s how I see God in my woundedness . . . lying there on the floor beside me . . . speaking softly, gently, persistently, into my heart, that my worst fears are not true, that God is right there, that the dawn comes.  I, of course, was and am limited by skin, but not so God, who lies not beside us, but crawls up inside the hardest parts of us . . . the dark places where no dawn has ever been . . . and whispers . . . I am here . . . fear not.

God of the dawn, yes, but even more, God of our darkness. . . Lord of our sickness . . . Ruler of our lies . . . Healer of our brokenness . . . Companion of our lostness . . . Lover of our worst selves . . . Inhabiter of the worst of our black holes . . . there in all of what we would hide even from ourselves, lives the Bringer of the Dawn.

Sermon Cliff Note: "Now there were some Greeks . . ."

Now there were some Greeks . . .

You know – the not-from-here folks. . . 

maybe they heard about Lazarus

dead-raised

or maybe

they saw the donkey parade

However they heard, new in town,

they went to seek out the newest thing – 

the wonder-working parable speaker

In those days, everybody wanted to see Jesus

Someone wants to see him

and Jesus talks about. . .

seeds falling to the ground

and glorified things 

and serving 

and following . . . 

him

Son-of-Man-Jesus was about to die –

and he was speaking in riddles

and we were scratching our heads . . .

Taking pity on us, he gave us the parable about the seeds –

as if that helped!

Sure, I get it – seeds ‘die’ for the plant to live

and produce even more seeds –

But what does that have to do with a couple of Greeks

dropping by for a visit?!?  

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we get it!

We didn’t then, but we do now . . . 

Jesus’ dying brought more followers

somehow, in his dying,

We and he became more than we had ever been

And the usual blah, blah, blah . . . 

Serve me, follow me . . . 

Follow me, serve me . . . 

Serve and follow me =’s honor from God

Okay, already, we get it!

But did we?

Do we?

Probably not . . .

When Jesus died . . . 

When he died, it all changed . . . 

Without him, I would have just gone home . . . 

and every now and then, 

when someone from the old days

showed up, I’d have remembered

We’d have laughed and cried

and then gone back to our lives

But with what happened after, 

there was no going back

not for any of us . . . 

It hurts to admit how impatient He made me back in the day . . .

But it’s true . . . 

I just kept wanting him

Just once . . . 

To get – to – the – point

But he never did

how could he?

He was the point!

Loving, maddening, parable-telling, weird . . . Him!

And he knew it would be hard . . . 

It troubled him – what he, what we, would have to go through . . . 

But he showed us how to do it . . .

Not complaining . . . 

Not trying to get out of it . . .not then, anyway –

No – he took a deep breath, said “This is why I came”

and threw himself upon FatherGod . . .

And God heard him –

I have and I will . . . 

That’s what God’s voice said that day . . . 

I have heard you . . .

I will live up to myself in You, Son!

Now, said God . . .

Now you will know . . . 

Now is judging time . . . 

Now is Satan-kicking-out time . . . 

Now is Jesus lifting up time . . . 

Now is earth-reconciling to Me time . . . 

No wonder people thought the Voice of Heaven

was thunder . . . 

That kind of message

rolls 

and echoes

around the world

and down the corridors of time . . . 

making human tuning forks

of us all . . . 

Still we did not understand . . . 

How?

Who?

The questions were endless . . . 

Who are you to say these things?

How can Messiah ever die?

Why do you say these things?

He was pleading with us – 

Believe . . . please believe . . . 

Believe and become . . . 

There was darkness in the land . . . 

He wasn’t wrong about that . . . 

how he yearned for us

to step out of that darkness

and into his light . . . 

What happened to the Greeks?

I think they were the point . . . 

or their question was – 

Sir, we want to see Jesus.

In answer, Jesus 

offered up himself

Now the circle is complete -- 

for once,

somebody actually got the question right . . .