Why Life Is Beautiful and Hard and The Two Are Impossibly Caught Up In One Another

I have these two pictures in my office.  Cameron with me and Eliza with me.  They were Father's Day gifts in 2002.  In the frame with each is a list of reasons why "I love daddy...".  Julie undoubtedly asked them to list some things then she typed them up and put the pictures together and they are the best Father's Day present in the history of Father's Day presents.  They say things like "he pushes me on the swing" (Eliza) and the one that has always made me misty every single time I read it, "he never forgets me" (Cameron).
I have always guessed the "he never forgets me" came from a consideration of the fact that I have usually been the one who has had the flexibility of schedule to do the majority of the dropping off and picking up for school over the years.  So when the young Cameron would come out of pre-school or elementary school he couldn't recall dad just not coming to get him.
If you could put one thing in your child's head about you I think it would be the idea that whatever happens, whenever it happens, whatever it happens to be, that you, the parent, would always have them on your mind.  You would never forget them.  And, as I've thought about it, I think this is why Cameron's leaving for school at Western Kentucky University to start his college career this past Thursday has been so hard.
Of course I will miss him.  I will miss him every time I walk by his room.  Every time I go to the grocery and don't need to pick up a few Three Cheese Ziti frozen dinners because he goes through them like a seventeen year-old through frozen dinners.  Every time I watch some political pundit say some dumb thing on tv and file it away to tell Cameron later.  Every time I hear a new song and want to run the song or the band by Cameron because he's one of the two or three people in the world who have musical sensibilities in alignment with my own.  Every time I walk past a couch that doesn't have a kid sprawled on it munching on popcorn and watching the Real Housewives of somewhere.  So most every second of every day I guess is where I'm headed with this.
But what the picture got me to thinking was this:  the thing that I will miss most is the need to be remembered.  There isn't anymore picking up to do.  Not in the day to day, boring, school gets out at 2:00 p.m. sort of way.  Soccer practice ends at 6:00 p.m. today sort of way.  Come get me when I call from my friends house sort of way.  My schedule is more my own.  And what my heart knows is that given the choice between a schedule more my own and needing to remember, I so much prefer needing to remember.  Because I won't forget.  I promise you, I won't forget.

I am so thankful for the years when "he never forgets" was an important part of Cameron's world and my place in it.  I'd say more, but Eliza just let me know that she's awake and hungry - what am I going to do about it?  In this beautiful and hard life thing, it is so nice to be needed.  I've gotta go find a fourteen year-old breakfast.

Why We Need Ash Wednesday

Create a clean heart for me, God;

put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me!

Psalm 51:10

Two unrelated events are on my mind this Ash Wednesday.
First, a story on our local news last night about an apparent hate crime in nearby Shepherdsville.  Our family lives in Mt. Washington and the church I pastor - Hebron Presbyterian - has a Shepherdsville address, but is actually several miles north of Shepherdsville; at the end of the day though, it's all Bullitt County.  So this was local.  The crime took place in a storefront in an older stripmall type structure.  It appeared to be something of a convenience store and was identified as a "Smoke Shop".  The place was ransacked, the stores contents thrown every which way and paint splashed here and there with vile words and messages included.  Ugly.  The owner of the store was reported to be from another country, but it was never clearly stated as to where.  It's an important detail I guess, but the basic ugliness of what this appears to be needs no further explanation.

Second, I just read news accounts of the death of American print journalist Marie Colvin and French photo journalist Remi Orchlik after they came under intense fire while reporting the events currently going on in Syria.  The story of reports filed in the past couple of days by Ms. Colvin were especially poignant as she pleaded with the world to pay attention to the slaughter taking place in Syria and very specifically reported of the death of a two year old child as a result of the shelling.

Somehow these two unrelated events make me even more aware of why we need Ash Wednesday, why we need Lent, why we need Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter.  We need today because there is much that we need to turn from, much in our lives and in our world that requires repentance.  There is a brokenness that is at times beyond our comprehension.  It's in far off places like Syria and it's much closer by in Shepherdsville and it's still closer in myself.  I need and we need the space of Lent to prepare and to reflect.  And I/we need to embrace the reality of how very much we need what Christ has done for us - how completely necessary is this Lenten journey.

Lots of Water

I'm guessing no one has ever played a football game with John 3:23 emblazoned on their eye blacks.

"John was baptizing at Aenon near Salem because there was lots of water there, and people were coming to him to be baptized."

I've surely read this verse before, but it's never caught me like it has today.  It seems so almost innocuous.  Kind of telling us something obvious.  John was baptizing at a place because there was lots of water there - of course he was.  He's John the Baptizer, it's what he does and what he does what he does with.

Maybe it's saying something about the water.  It puts me in the mind of another New Testament passage - from Acts 8 - Phillip and the Ethiopian eunuch.  Phillip shares the good news with the Ethiopian and then "As they went down the road, they came to some water."  Yep. They just happened to come to some water on a desert road just when they happened to need some.  "The eunuch said, 'Look!  Water!  What would keep me from being baptized?'"  Well...nothing.

John's got plenty of water for baptizing.  Phillip, it turned out, had plenty of water for baptizing.  John needed lots.  Phillip just needed some to show up in a pretty unlikely place.  They both got what they needed - water.  I think neither John nor Phillip was surprised to find the water they needed.  I'm afraid that too often the surprise to we mainline Christians wouldn't be that we have water, but that we could need "lots" of it.  We have received a wonderful gift - baptism, named and claimed as God's own people.  And we, like John, have lots of water.  John was expecting to use it - he knew he'd need lots of water.

I want to have that kind of expectation.

Our seminary student at Hebron, Maureen Clark, has guided us into a practice that our denomination has suggested churches make a part of the service of worship.  Each week we pour water into our baptismal font.  Sometimes at the prayer of confession and assurance of pardon.  During the sermon.  During the children's time.  Call To Worship.  Benediction.  It could happen any time.  It's been poured by Maureen, by myself, by children, youth and adults.  People like it best when the big pourers do it.  Folks who hold the pitcher high and let them see the water fall and hear the unmistakable sound it makes as it reminds us of our baptism, as it reminds us of the endless ways water winds its way through the stories of Scripture.

It reminds us that water is not scarce.  Water is available and abundant.  We have lots.  No need to imagine that it's scarce or that the font is maybe even empty.  We have been blessed.  Folks came to John, a man came to Phillip (okay, technically I guess Phillip was led to that man), God sends people to us and we are sent to people.  And there is lots of water.  Lots.

Unity

A thing Jesus did not say:  "Come follow me.  Until you hear me say something or see me do something you disagree with."
Cheryl Mound is a member of the United Church Women of the United Church of Canada.  I don't know her.  But I read her devotional.  She was up on January 2, 2012 in "These Days" (a quarterly devotional magazine produced by the Presbyterian Publishing Corporation).  I read Cheryl's words on January 2 and have been returning to them regularly since.
"God calls us to live in a faith community as Jesus did.  We are not meant to walk alone or to avoid debate among ourselves.  Others are there to travel with us on the journey.  When we walk with others, God walks with us.  As this year unfolds, let us take opportunities to live as God intends."
In that brief paragraph something came together for me that for whatever reason had been jumbled up to that point.  Yes, God is relational within God's own being - an idea we try to put words to when we talk about the Trinity.  And, yes, God created us to be in relationship with God and with one another.  And I think these ideas have always been core ideas for me.  But never so vividly or concretely.
We live in a divisive time in the denomination I'm a part of (the Presbyterian Church USA) and in the larger world - our present political climate could be exhibit A.  And somehow, division came to seem not only possible, but in some instances preferable.  As though the highest value we could aspire to would be some sort of imagined purity - we will walk only with those who agree with us at every point.  There is an allure to this.  Purity isn't a bad thing.  It's almost certainly preferable to impurity.
There are though, I believe, multiple problems with this approach to our relationships - the main problem being if we keep it up we won't have any relationships. Really.  We will either at one point or another find a reason to part ways with nearly everyone OR we will learn to never say what we really think, feel, believe in our heart of hearts so as not to lose contact with those about whom we care.  The former is a progressive winnowing process.  The latter is a progressive dishonesty process.
I am thinking that Cheryl Mound has it right. We are not meant to walk alone.  And we are not meant to avoid debate among ourselves.  We are meant to walk in relationship and to honestly share what we believe about God and faith and matters of importance.  We are also meant to listen to others as they walk with us and share about God and faith and matters of importance from the place where they live.  And we are meant to have conversation, dialogue and debate about those things.  And in that conversation the other may learn and we may learn and we may both find ourselves in someplace we had not imagined and would never have visited on our own.
I cannot categorically state that there are not instances when the healthiest thing for a person or group of people to do is to part company with another person or group of people.  However, with a great nudge from Cheryl Mound I'm increasingly likely to say that working at the relationship with tenacity and perseverance and faith even when (and perhaps even more so) it's a challenge is the healthiest alternative available.

Top 10 (+7) Of 2011

Inspired by my son Cameron's blog for his high school news magazine I've decided to throw together a top ten list of songs for 2011.  To be truthful, not a great year for music, but there are some bright spots.  At least one qualifier, I've got nothing against Adele, I just don't hear her right I guess.

Top Ten of 2011

1.      Brighter Than The Sun – Colbie Caillet

Bringing back Fleetwood Mac type vibe and that’s a good thing.

2.     Tonight, Tonight – Hot Chelle Rae

Perfect pop confection.  Flawless.

3.     This Is Country Music – Brad Paisley

What the title says.  Cliché upon cliché reminds that cliché begins somewhere in truth, which is what country does better than any genre.

4.      Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall – Coldplay

These guys are magic.  Physically unable to make bad music.

5.      Good Life – One Republic

A guilty pleasure I think, but a really sonically pleasing one.

6.     You and Tequila – Kenny Chesney (with Grace Potter)

Kenny Chesney and Grace Potter do what you would least expect – understated.

7.      Back To December – Taylor Swift

       Lovely.

8.      Paris – Grace Potter and the Nocturnals

“If I was from Paris I would say….”  Not understated at all.  Big time fun.

9.     You and I – Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga pulls off the unlikely, only Gaga could do it, task of suggesting mid 70’s Elton John, sounding like the lost Shania Twain single, and building in a Brian May signature moment. 

10   Mean – Taylor Swift

Another great song by a great songwriter.  Most of us just live through pain, heartbreak, joy, ordinary events, etc.  Taylor Swift lives through it and then writes a great song about it.

11  Edge Of Glory –Lady Gaga

Clarence Clemons last great moment.   The Big Man was on the charts when he left us.

12.  Crazy Girl – Eli Young Band

Not quite as good as the best off of “Jet Black and Jealous”, but still a cut above most country folks.

13.  For The First Time – The Script

A pop song about making a relationship work in a tough economy.  Wonder how this found an audience.

14.  Moves Like Jagger – Maroon  5

While it’s unlikely anyone actually has the moves like Jagger (except Mick himself), this song is catchy like Maroon 5.

15. The One That Got Away – Katy Perry

Music sounds like Katy Perry, lyrics sound like Taylor Swift.

16. Superheavy – Miracle Worker

Mick chimes in with “There’s nothing wrong with you I can’t fix!  I comea runnin’ with my little bag o’ tricks.”  That guy still has the moves like Jagger. 

17.  Modern Love – Matt Nathanson

Thoughtful pop that sneaks up on you by not trying to hard.

To check out Cameron's list...

http://ww2.bullittschools.org/BEHSLiveWire/index.php/2011/12/31/12-31-2011-all-you-need-is-love-2-best-and-worst-songs-of-2011/