Graft in Our Hearts

One of my best childhood buddies at Camp Winnataska exhibited some odd behavior. Now, I’m not one to talk, as I once caused quite a fuss when I got splashed in a canoe because I was supposed to be in the dry boat (I know, I know I was am a dork!). My friend, Stephen, was odd in some other ways though. He moved from Tennessee to Arizona, but kept coming back to camp every summer, and so he had a different accent than everyone else. He was not used to the humidity, so he took way too many showers for camp. Plus, there was something else.

During a trip up to Gatlinburg, TN Stephen had gotten his ankle caught in one of the ski lift chairs. As a result of the emergency accident he had to have immediate surgery. The doctors had to take a section of his skin from his buttocks to cover his torn up ankle. Not only would my friend readily show the gruesome ankle injury, he was known to show from whence that flesh had initially come (at least in the boys’ cabin)! This was the first time I had ever heard of a skin graft and to this day this type of procedure fascinates me.

I am struck by the fact that doctors can take skin from one part of our body and use it to patch another part of us. I am amazed that surgeons acting quickly can harvest the organs from a deceased person to give life to another human. I am uplifted by the enormous number of people that show up to give blood to help others when disasters strike. While I do not understand all of the nuances of the science behind these life-giving events, I can (and we all can) marvel at the gift that comes from someone making a sacrificial gift and life-saving action for someone else. I wonder if this works on a spiritual level as well.

This coming Sunday’s Collect (opening prayer) has some real beauty within it:
Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things: Graft in our hearts the love of your Name; increase in us true religion; nourish us with all goodness; and bring forth in us the fruit of good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever. Amen. (Book of Common Prayer, 233, Italics added for emphasis.)

In particular the italicized part halts me. The word graft calls to mind those life-giving efforts that require skill, speed, and care. When we pray that God graft in our hearts the love of God’s Name we are undergoing a spiritual procedure that may manifest itself in multitudinous ways! The love that God plants in our hearts will hopefully “increase in us true religion; nourish us with all goodness; and bring forth in us the fruit of good works.” However, what I take away from this is not these potentially fantastic results, but a realization about the One who places this love in the first place.

God loves us so much and so freely that God was willing not just to take our own flesh to graft in our hearts, but to place God’s own flesh within us! God came to dwell here among us to show us the way back to home to God, to make all things holy, and to show us the fullest extent of love. The procedure that all of Creation underwent when Jesus exhibited a love that was and is stronger than sin, separation, and even death was and is an eternal grafting of this type of love on our hearts and into the very fabric of the universe. May we all be so bold as to remember that our hearts, our souls, our bodies, and our entire selves are not merely our own, but are our God’s and possess within their being the imprint of God's love. Within us God grafted the love that exists eternally may we allow it to grow and transform us!

Best Seats In The House

Recently my wife Kim and I were flying home from Mexico where we went on our honeymoon trip. After several days in paradise the voyage home felt bittersweet. We boarded the plane, feeling a bit like human cattle, and found our reserved spots—we were sadly not flying Southwest Airlines. Once in our seats we waited. Who would it be coming down the aisle to sit next to us?

Eventually a middle-aged woman approached the position right next to Kim. She looked disheveled and at first appeared to be talking to herself. Later we found out she was traveling with someone sitting across the row from her. On top of this, for the entire flight--from wheels up to wheels down-- this person did not stop eating. She brought an entire backpack full of pretzels, trail mix, and even some Funyons. I had never seen anything quite like it, except maybe at a hotdog eating contest. Much to my wife’s credit she casually kept her cool even when the crumbs were raining down upon her. I came off the plane thinking about our next flight, “How much would it cost to get into first class?”

We are not always so graphically filed into socioeconomic classes as when we fly on airplanes. To afford a plane ticket in the first place means that one has some means. And yet, is there a more stratified situation among those with resources than loading onto an airplane? What are we then to do?

This coming Sunday’s Gospel lesson from Luke tells the story of Jesus in an analogous situation. At a Sabbath meal in the home of a leader of the Pharisees Jesus observes how people seek out the places of honor. Using the setting of a wedding banquet the teacher warns of choosing the seats of privilege, as the host may come and move you to a lower spot to make room for someone with more prestige. It is better, Jesus tells us, to sit in the lowest spot so the host will say, “Friend, move up higher.” If only the pilot might say that to some lucky passenger sitting in row 99!

So that’s it right? Jesus is righteously angry at those who exalt themselves and praises those who humble themselves, including the poor folk who are sitting back in coach. Not exactly! While an airplane is not a universal symbol, a banquet table might be. And, what comes after Jesus’ advice (let's face it, it's not really a parable) about the wedding banquet sheds light on the importance of where we sit not just at dinner parties, but in our lives.

Humans yearn for gratification. We long to be told we are worthy. The truth is that all of us are both unworthy (compared to the Almighty One) and completely worth (because of the Almighty One) at the same time. The trouble is that some of us tend to forget this paradox and side only with the misunderstanding that me and my folk are worthy while others are unworthy. When Jesus challenged the leader of the Pharisees to give a banquet for “the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind” he was trying to remind the self-aggrandizing, religious elite of this Truth apparent in the Torah commandments to take care of the widow, the orphaned, and those on the margins. Still, there is more.

Jesus in this imaginary banquet for the fringe-dwellers pulled the curtain back to reveal the feast that awaits all guests who are invited into the Kingdom of God. By all invited guests I mean everyone! Sill, we must realize that some have a hard time understanding that they have been sent a personalized invitation! The first bit of this Gospel lesson serves as practical advice, but it also put into the heart of the listeners that feeling of being disgraced by being told that one is in the wrong place. And, those who are traditionally disgraced in the eyes of society (the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind) do not get told they do not belong at the banquet in the kingdom. Instead, the host tells them to come and sit in the seats of honor.

How would our churches change if we did not feel that we had to have our spot at the expense of the visiting family? How would airlines change if they did away with classes or privilege members? How would we change if we went beyond our human nature of trying to categorize and put down others so that we feel worthy of some contrived spot of honor? God calls ALL OF US to the Kingdom of God banquet. Even if we are simultaneously worthy and unworthy God calls us. Invite others to join around the table at which we all have seats of honor, even if it means giving up your own place of privilege in this life to do it.

Magnificent Magnification

How does your soul magnify the Lord's presence in it?

I hardly remember anything from high school biology class. Perhaps this is due to the horror of dissecting frogs and the smell of formaldehyde that stuck with me for weeks, but I do recall enjoying using microscopes. On several occasions we had the task of identifying different parts of simple cells that had been placed on glass slides that we would put underneath the lens of the basic scope. With great pleasure I would shift the splices around until I could see the membrane walls, nucleus, cytoplasm, mitochondria, and of course the Golgi apparatus. Do not ask me what any of these parts are, as I really could not tell you, but I loved searching for them in ninth grade.

Oftentimes though as I was attempting to identify these particular parts of a basic cell I would move the slide such that it went beyond the sight of the microscope. Starring through the lenses I felt some disappointment as my eyes strained to see nothing there. A microscope serves no purpose at all if there is nothing to magnify.

A few years ago I was given a t-shirt that belonged to my grandfather. On one of his birthdays his family gave him this shirt, which features a picture of him on the front of it. In the picture he is holding up a magnifying glass to his teeth so that his smile appears much larger than usual. I can recall playing with that magnifying glass and doing the same trick he was doing in that picture. I also remember that if there was nothing at which to look the magnifying glass was pointless. Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord.” However, without God the story of Mary’s life and her soul appears blurry and without purpose, just like our own lives.

Most of the time I cannot begin to comprehend the Virgin Birth. It makes absolutely no sense from a reasoned, logical point of view. From the little I remember in biology class this is simply not how the birthing process happens. Part of me wants to say, “Other religions did this fantastic birth narrative thing, so Christians just wanted to do something similar.” And yet, if Mary’s ministry as the God-bearer happened without God, then her soul’s magnification would have been out of focus. We would not even remember her witness if it did not produce abundantly.

Mary’s life though was not just about the nine months in which she was the Theotokos (that is God bearer in Greek, and it is how the Greek Church refers to Mary). The earthly caretaker of Jesus the Christ walked alongside her son every step of his life. She cared for him when a child, she raised him up within her Faith Tradition, she pushed him to strive for greatness performing his first miracle at Cana, she did not rebuke him when Jesus said his disciples were his true family, and even when her own magnifying soul was pierced at Jesus’ death she remained faithful. I look at all of this and marvel. I also feel a little deflated, as though there is nothing in my own soul to be magnified. This is precisely the point though.

Our lives are not about what we accomplish. They are not about what we do or do not do on our own. They are not about the greatness that exists within our hearts (as all the Olympic commercials want to tell us), but rather as followers of Jesus our existence is about something else entirely. We, like Mary, are given the gift of magnification. What we magnify though is not something of our own creation alone, but instead what God creates with us within our souls.

There are countless ways to be microscopes and magnifying glasses for what God is doing within us. And, Mary shows us with her witness that it is not just about a fantastic moment when God comes to speak with us. Rather, to magnify we must do what Mary did “Ponder all these things in [our] hearts” (Luke 2:19). To amplify how God exists in our souls we must first be present enough within our own beings that we meet God in the home that is our hearts.

The Transfiguration: A Guide to Our Spiritual Life

Today we celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, which means we get to hear the story of John, James, and of course, Peter. Oh Peter! We’ll get to him in a moment, for now though, can you imagine being those disciples hiking along with Jesus on this mountaintop journey? First, they hiked up to the top of Mount Hermon, which stands at about 9,200 feet. Next, they watched as Jesus in the midst of prayer began glowing brighter than anything on earth. Then, out of nowhere Moses and Elijah the paragons of the Jewish Faith appeared. And finally, a cloud obscured their vision such that they could not see and a voice spoke from the fog saying, “This is my Son, my chosen; listen to him!” This had to be an intensely overwhelming experience.

We are probably not accustomed to having such spiritual moments. When was the last time that you saw your spiritual leader transfigured by God or joined by some pillars of the Faith? Still, we like the disciples do have peak spiritual moments. We are not immune to both the valleys and the mountains on our journey. In the midst of Peter’s experience of Jesus’ Transfiguration he said something so trivial and out of place that I have a hard time not belittling the disciple. Peter spoke, “Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah,” and Luke even adds the editorial comment, “Not knowing what he said.” This sentiment by Peter stands out though as one of the most human responses to an encounter with the Divine.

More people now believe that they have had an encounter with the Divine than in previous generations over the last 100 years, says the Pew Research Center. Maybe it is not quite like what Peter, John, and James saw on top of the mountain, but something is happening in our desire for and our belief in connections with God. Our response to these encounters though seems woefully undisciplined. I can hardly recall a time growing up when I learned what to do when or if I felt like I had some sort of epiphany or spiritual experience. Often then we respond like Peter, not knowing what we do or say.

The typical human response to Divinity is to encase God somehow. From primitive societies up to this very moment we have been trying to make a home for God, just like Peter did during the Transfiguration. This is not a bad thing, this is just what we do. We want to be able to come back to the overwhelming moment with God. We yearn to hold onto God. We desire some reliable way of getting spiritually high. And yet, this story of the Transfiguration actually provides us with a blueprint to how we might respond to feeling the overabundant presence of the Almighty.

After Peter said his comment, after God came and spoke, and after things went back to normal (if that was even possible for the disciples) everything went silent, stark, and quiet. The disciples, probably in shock from being some of the only people to come into the direct presence of the Almighty without dying, could not say anything. And so they did not. They remained silent as they descended down the mountain. They would not even speak of this experience for weeks, not until after Jesus died and was raised. This might be a good guide to the divine life.

All of us live in immediate proximity of the Divine. In our hearts, minds, bodies, and souls, in our relationships, in Creation around us is God’s omnipresent nature. We may not always recognize it, but God is always here with us. Sometimes those moments when everything seems right make us want to hold onto the moment like Peter did. Instead maybe we could just enjoy the contact with God. Perhaps we can allow that moment to permeate our beings. I can sometimes want to talk so much about what I have experienced—I know it’s an occupational hazard of being a priest. And yet, when we meet God the most fitting response might just be to be… to be quiet, to be silent, and to be reverent, as we allow this experience to shape us and form us. Let us look to the Transfiguration as an example of how we might be transformed by God, quietly taking in Divine Communion as God permeates our entire existence.

Keeping Watch

The night before brave souls would be knighted by King Arthur they had to fulfill one last requirement. In the chapel, all through the small hours of the morning, they had to keep watch. I remember hearing the stories of the knights of the Round Table as a child when I went to Camp Winnataska. These legends remain an important strand in the weave of the camp's ethos. Today though, I wonder how readily available are opportunities for night watches or watches of any kind.

This coming Sunday's Gospel lesson from Luke challenges us to "be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that [we] may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks" (12:36). As I admitted in yesterday's blog I am quite impatient, so how do I (and how do we) learn to wait in a society devoid of rituals that bid us to practice the art of waiting on the Lord? We must take a page from King Arthur's book and bring back the vigil, but perhaps in a different way.

Every Maundy Thursday growing up at St. Andrew's Church in Birmingham I found myself with family members and strangers alike sitting in St. Mary's Chapel waiting. Many churches have this practice on remembering Jesus' call to stay awake with him praying, like he did in the Garden of Gethsemane. So, for an entire hour I was compelled to sit in silence. This was awfully challenging when I was a rambunctious tween. I could read or draw very politely, but that was it. "What a bore!" I thought. My mom did wisely provide the proverbial carrot of pizza at the end of that hour vigil, but this was my only real world link to what I had heard in the stories of King Arthur's knights, and I did not much like it.

Fast forward to college when Chaplain Tom Ward invited some friends and me to take part in a type of Christian meditation. I felt a little pressured by them to come along, but quickly I discovered through Tom's excitement about this type of prayer that this was not just some strange new theological fad. No, this was and very much still is a way of vigilantly waiting for Christ's knocking at our hearts. For most of my sophomore year I tried out this type of prayer, and I still recall that being the most grounded year of college. Then, I lost touch with Centering Prayer, which calls for one to focus on a word that centers one's entire being on resting in God's presence. That was until I met my wife.

About four years ago I met Kim at a meeting for our seminary's flag football team (I know right?). Immediately I felt a connection with her, and one of the ways that we immediately bonded was through Centering Prayer. I was in serious need of some spiritual depth as I entered my final year of MDiv. studies. I felt like God was pounding on the door of my heart, but how could I get down to unlock it and let Christ inside? Kim invited me to practice this type of patient prayer, which I struggled with this time around. However, the more I practice it the more it fills me up and allows me to realize that it is not about the practice of prayer, but how our lives become a life of waiting and watching.

Cursillo Reunion groups ask the question, "What was your closest moment to Christ this week?" I feel like what Jesus attempts to say to us through this week's reading is wait and watch for my coming. Centering Prayer wakes me up to a contemplative life in which I am constantly wondering where will I see God's handiwork next. This Cursillo question does likewise. So, how will you wait for God? Through prayer? Through a Cursillo Reunion or other small group? Through serving others? Through looking for Christ in the Holy Eucharist? We all are charged with the task of keeping watch. How do you wait for God?

You Ready?

Cpt. John Parker depicted in the Lexington Minuteman monument.
How were minutemen ready so quickly?

While I am not much of one any more, there was a time when I felt like quite the history buff. I loved learning the little details about periods of history and the movements civilizations have made throughout time. The American Revolutionary War stood out as a particular era of interest, especially the overthrowing of an oppressive govern, the founding of modern democracy, and so many wise minds coming together to build more than just a nation but a more advanced way of living. However, one detail of this time always threw me for a loop. How was it possible for the minutemen to be ready to go off to battle at a moment’s notice? HOW?

I know this seems like a tiny detail to question, but I just do not get it. I am a planner. I take weeks to get ready to go out of town for a night. I have packing lists stored on my computer for every occasion, and still I cannot get ready in an hour or two much less a minute. How was it possible for these men to be ready to go off to battle that quickly? I still am not sure the answer, but this same type of precarious question haunts me when I read over this coming Sunday’s Gospel lesson from Luke 12:32-40.

Jesus tells his disciples, “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks.” And he also says, “But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.” How Jesus are we to be ready for the master to return all the time? I can easily detect in these two sentences the vast difference between those who are ready and waiting and those who fall asleep while on watch. And yet, like the minutemen’s quick preparations, the dutiful servant’s steadfast patience leaves me feeling lacking.

Somehow through the real life experiences of when we must wait are teaching me how to be ready and waiting spiritually. When I was a child I often felt like I would die of boredom waiting until it was time to go to a friend’s house to spend the night or play. Later in college I can remember the same feeling creeping into my heart when I was having to be patient until a buddy was finished with a paper, so that we could go grab dinner or a beer. Even now I am learning to wait with friends, family, colleagues, and my beloved wife. All my neurosis when it comes to getting ready weeks in advance does mean that I end up waiting a fair share for others to get to that same point. And yet, in all of this I have slowly been realizing that these moments of practicing patient are not a waste (as much as I want to say that they are). No, God's presence persists just as palpably when I am having to wait, as it does when I am enjoying the thing for which I waited. The key seems to be remembering that every moment, even the ones I deem boring, are not just a gift from God but even something more.

We wait, we practice patience, and we dress ourselves for action with lamps lit, so that we may realize that the Son of Man comes to us. Some will say that moment will happen solely at the End of Days. I am more of the belief that Christ perpetually comes to us knocking at the door of our hearts. Sure, we may more fully realize his Advent on the Last Day or on our last day. Still, our call is not to neurotically prepare with anxiety, so that we might be ready for a trip once in a while, but rather to learn to always be prepared like those minutemen were ready to march out at a moment’s notice. Being ready though requires our diligence (our paying attention). We need a community to form us and teach us. To be prepared calls for us to stumble and mess up, so that we might wake up. Then, late one night or early one morning we might just be ready to recognize that God’s grace is bidding us to see what is always happening... Christ perpetually coming to be with us! You ready?

Flip the Script

Noncomplementary behavior is one of the invisible forces explored on the NPR Podcast Invisibilia.

It was a warm summer evening in Washington D.C. when eight friends gathered together to raise a glass or two of French wine and share in a delicious dinner. A man named Michael, his Wife, and their 14 year-old daughter were among the guests. The group talked and toasted the night away with laughter filling up the nighttime air. Then, all of a sudden it happened.

An arm stretched out of seemingly nowhere to produce a gun with a long barrel. The hand with the gun belonged to a man. The man was well kempt, dressed in athletic gear, and of medium height and build. He pointed the gun at one of Michael’s friends, then at Michael’s wife. The intruder asked her to give him her money, first in a calm voice, then more hysterically.

Michael and his friends believed the man, but there was a slight problem, none of them had any money. The group of friends next attempted to persuade the man to pursue some alternative path. At first, they tried guilt. “What would your mother think?” they asked. He replied angrily, “I have no mother!” Michael kept thinking, this is going to end terribly, “We may end up dead.”

Then, one of the women at the table, Christina, piped up. She spoke to the man with the gun saying that this group of friends was there celebrating, and why not join them for a glass of wine. A switch went off in the man and the entire group could feel it. All of a sudden the man’s countenance shifted. He took a sip from the glass he was handed and replied, “[Man], that’s a really good glass of wine.” He reached down for some cheese on the table and put the gun in his pocket.

Then, the man uttered, “I think I’ve come to the wrong place.” The group all responded supportively, “We understand.” For a moment they all sat together in this strange bit of fellowship with the celestial lights of the night shining down and the sound of cicadas filling the space of the night air. At this moment the intruding man, now disarmed, asked, “Can I get a hug?”

One by one the party-goers gave the man a hug. Then he asked for a group hug, which the friends reluctantly gave to the once threatening man. He said he was sorry, and walked out the gate with a glass of wine in his hand. After catching their breath and calming down a bit the friends found the wine glass on the concrete in the alleyway. It was not smashed and shattered in anger or revolt. It was not haphazardly tossed aside in apathy. No, the glass was neatly placed on the ground. All of the friends went inside to cry in gratitude.

This is a story from the podcast Invisibilia, which means invisible things. The show airs on N.P.R. and explores the hidden forces—“ideas, beliefs, assumptions, and emotions”—that control our human behavior. On this particular episode, the program broached a topic called “noncomplementary behavior.” Most of the time when someone is mean to us our instinctive response is reply in the same way. When someone does us a favor we respond in turn. Noncomplementary behavior, though is something different. It is exactly how Jesus lived his life and how he teaches us to live ours as well.

Jesus said “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile” (Matthew 5:38-41). Additionally he spoke, “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you” (6:27-28). Countless stories Jesus told—including today’s—show us how we can use noncomplementary behavior to reveal God’s Kingdom here and now.

The Good Samaritan was a story to teach his Jewish followers to see their enemies as neighbors. The Prodigal Son informed those listening that no matter how far away they thought they were or someone else was from the Father, God was always ready to embrace and celebrate a child’s coming home. And in today’s Gospel lesson Jesus again used noncomplementary behavior to show us that he was not sent to be a judge or an arbitrator, but a teacher and a friend.

A man came to get Jesus to settle the score between his brother and him. Jesus would do no such thing, but instead warned against greed telling a parable. A man had a bumper crop. To accommodate for this great yield he contemplated tearing down his barns and building up HUGE silos in their place. This was shrewd business. To build up a new barn was complementary behavior. However, the motivation this man felt was not best business practices, but rather greed. He wanted to not just build silos, but to silo himself off from the world saying, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” This too is common behavior in our world.

Even though Jesus came to teach us the way to the Father we continually think we can feed our own souls. We still can be infected by all types of greed, not just for money, but also for power, prestige, and place in this world. God says to us just like he said to that man long ago, “You fool! Right now your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” We who have been given some of God’s abundance can get tricked into thinking that it belongs to us and that the common practice is to hide it all away, but that is not what Jesus teaches us here.

Now listen, do not leave here and liquidate your 401k that is not what I am saying, but what we store up matters. We may believe that we own things in this world, but all of it — every single penny— belongs to God. Now notice the way Jesus talks about the bumper crop. He does not say the man produced it, but rather than the rich man’s land produced it. It is God who provided for the man, but he got greedy and wanted to insulate himself from the world. When we silo away ourselves, our souls, and what we believe we have produced on our own we may be doing what is prevalent in our society, but this is not how Jesus lived his life—and it’s not how teaches us to live.

Jesus used noncomplementary behavior throughout his life to live the Good News of God’s Saving Grace. When asked to be a judge in this lesson, he instead taught and befriended the brother to help him learn. When at Table with his followers Jesus did not take the best seat, but alternatively he served his disciples to teach them about real leadership. When being crucified on the cross Jesus’ last words, “Father forgive them, for they know not what to do” fly in the face of a world obsessed with vengeance. And, the ultimate noncomplimentary behavior came as God responds to our attempts to kill Jesus not with wrath, but with the loving light of the Resurrection.

We seem to be wired to respond in complementary ways. When someone rips out our eye we want to come back and take out both of theirs. If someone talks badly about us we do the same. Some believe the solution to violence is more violence. Some are turning to more and more isolation to silo themselves off from anything that is different. This is not the way of Jesus. Jesus used noncomplementary behavior to flip the script. True wealth is not in banks but in sharing with others, right leadership is not in lording over others but in serving them, and real power comes not in perpetuating violence but in the love that not even death can overcome.

“Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that,” the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said. May we respond to the hate, fear, injustice, and greed of this world not in kind, but with noncomplementary behavior loving, opening, seeking reconciliation, and giving of ourselves to one another, just like Jesus taught us. I mean if a glass of wine can disarm a would be robber what can flipping the script not do?