Getting a Hand Up at Christmas

Getting back to the Celtic roots that generates the impetus for this blog I share with you an incident in the life of the Celtic saint Brendan. He is the one called the Navigator, a sixth century monk who spends most of his life in a small boat made of leather and wicker and called a coracle. Brendan believed that God had sent him on a mission to an earthly paradise similar to the one God had given to Adam and to Eve, and though he sailed into and out of many ports,he never found his Eden. Near the end of his life, around 580 A.D., he meets up with a Welsh monk named Gildis and they talk into the wee hours of the morning. At the end of the conversation, Gildis stands up, and for the first time, Brendan sees that Gildis has only one leg.  The other was gone from the knee down.  He was hopping sideways to reach for his stick in the corner when he lost his balance.  He would have fallen in a heap had not Brendan lept forward and caught him.  In gratitude, Gildis nodded at Brendan, and said, “I am as crippled as the dark world.” To which Brendan replied, “If it come to that, which of us is not, my dear Gildis?” And the truth that Brendan offers next transcends both calendar and culture, for his words to Gildis are these: “to give each other a hand when we are falling, is perhaps the only work that matters in the end.”


During my sojourn out in California and Nevada, I invited Ann Weems to come to Zephyr Point Conference Center on Lake Tahoe and facilitate a retreat for pastors in Sacramento Presbytery. Over the course of working out the details, setting the agenda, etc., Ann and I developed quite a relationship, and there will be more about what when on at that retreat in a later posting, but for now, I share with you one of her poems from her book Kneeling In Bethlehem:

                   Some of us walk into Advent tethered to our unresolved yesterdays.

                   The pain is still stabbing.  The hurt is still throbbing.

                   It is not that we don't know better.  It is just that we

                   Cannot stand up any more by ourselves.  On the way to Bethlehem,

                   Will you give us a hand?

        

         One of the images of God we often see in medieval stained glass windows is that of a hand descending from the clouds of heaven. Is it too hard to imagine that “hand” becoming a child who becomes a man who stretches out his hand to steady us when we are falling? And if God in Christ can do that for us, perhaps it is not too great  a stretch to imagine that this is what he wants us to do for each other.  That we give a hand in order to keep someone else from falling. That maybe someone we barely know, and yet we know enough that someone's hand is needed to help steady this person for whatever lies ahead. Or that someone could be a person whom we know quite well - a spouse, a parent, a child. And we become aware that a hand reaches out across a room and draws the other closer, a hand that reaches across a sofa to connect with another to say, “I’m sorry. Please take me back. I do not want to fall any further.”

When I was working in Northern Ireland in the summer of 2006, at a place called Corrymeela, I encountered another image of the Hand of God. Corrymeela is a retreat center for groups working on reconciliation issues.  In part, it deals with the issues of Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland, but it also works with issues in families to effect reconciliation. In the chapel at this retreat center is this charcoal drawing. I found it haunting then, and I find it haunting still.  The hand of who – a child, a man, a woman? – falling physically, mentally, psychologically, emotionally? And who is it that holds on to the hand that appears to be reaching out for something, or someone, upon which to hold on to – is it God, is it you, is it me?

Over the next twelve days (Christmastide), we will be giving – and receiving – gifts.  What greater gift can we give or can we receive than a hand that lifts us up; than a hand that lifts someone else up and keeps them from falling any further. God offered that hand to a world that had fallen into the depths of sin, and a world that continues to fall; a hand that keeps us from falling outside the pale of his grace. It is this image of God, incarnate in the Christ, which I envision whenever I hear Josh Gorban sing “You Raise Me Up.” With the orchestra behind him, the lyrics soar to a crescendo, and then, almost in a whisper, Gorban sings: “…You raise me up to be more than I can be.”

In this Christmastide, do you need to receive the gift of a hand up to keep you from falling further into whatever darkness may be swirling around you? Can God work his grace through someone else that you may be raised to a greater self-understanding? Or do you perhaps need to give the gift of a hand up to someone whom you know is falling and does not need to fall any further, that they might rise above the waves of self-doubt that are consuming them?  Can you think of a better gift that you might give … that you might receive … at this time of year?


Jerry

Christmas As Improvisation

Some years ago, I was over at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary along with members of my colleague group for a seminar as a part of our participation in the College of Pastoral Leaders. The theme of this seminar was “Improvisation,” and how that related to excellence in ministry. The leadership of the event made good use of several jazz musicians as well as some local artists from the Austin area. I have never been a big jazz fan, but I am learning to appreciate it more and more at this point in my life. I am intrigued by the way improvisation works within the mind and fingers of an artist or a musician. I had to admit that this whole idea of improvisation in ministry was a compelling concept. Now in this Advent/Christmastide season, I find myself drawn to share some thoughts on how our respective ministries might be strengthened by a little (or a lot of) improvisation. One of the definitions of improvisation that I took away from that Austin experience is this: “improvisation is the art of transforming what you have before you into something so glorious that it takes your breath away and people cannot help but be awed in its presence.” Generally speaking, in the visual arts or in the auditory arts, there is always a central theme around which the artist shapes his or her creation. If the artist, or someone familiar with the artist's work, wants to do some improvisation on that person's artistic creation, it must be done in a manner that this central theme is not lost. As we think about improvisation in ministry, and ministry in this particular season, the central theme of Christmas is salvation – for unto us a child is born … and he shall save his people from their sins. In a post modern, post Christian culture, I have found that even within Christian communities, we barely give lip service to the gospel message of salvation; in the grand scheme of what seems important at this time of year, how many of us give much thought to salvation? On one of the radio stations here in Houston that plays continuous Christmas music, the words from “Silent Night” were changed from “our savior is born,” to “the savior is born” and I wonder how many people caught the change. In the original, it is personal; in the change, it is not. In a commentary on National Public Radio, Adam Gopnik spoke of how he was into all the glitz and false piety he saw around him there in his home of New York City from the middle of November through the month of December. I believe Gopnik saw something of the improvisation of it all; there is still a thread, a theme, an idea of the nativity that pointed to something beyond the ornamentation at Rockefeller Center and the window displays along Fifth Avenue. It is the idea of rebirth and renewal tied so deeply to the rhythms of the season and to the rhythms of human existence that somehow keeps us connected amidst the increasing secularization of the holiday. He finishes with these words, “You go to war, or towards peace, with whatever Christmas you’ve got.” At first I thought Gopnik's summation was a bit lame, but I kept turning his words over in my mind. You and I probably want the Christ-event, the experience of Christmas to be more than it has been in the past. We find ourselves speculating, "wouldn't it be great if only ..." But the harsh reality is that we each move forward with whatever thread of the Christmas story that we can hold on to, because when everything is said and done, it is really all that we've got. The other day I went to visit one of our members who is recovering from surgery, but now is facing more problems seemingly unrelated to the surgery. She is alert and conversive, but she is scared. She told me of bible verses he had learned as a child, and she keeps reciting them over in her mind, sometimes not remembering the complete verses, but able to link them together into a mental meditation. She is not able to read in her current condition, but her mind is clear. When she told me about reciting these verses in her head, even when they were not complete, I responded to her, "...well, Janice, sometimes you just have to improvise." Her eyes lit up and she smiled, "That's it, pastor, and you know, that's okay - even that helps push the clouds of fear and uncertainty away." As any of us seek to make sense of the ills and the problems that beset us; sometimes the best we can do is improvise: we go into any situation that is before us with whatever we've got. But the glorious thing about this is the way it points us to a more excellent ministry than we might otherwise have provided to those to whom God sends us; sometimes, with what little we may have to work with, strange and wonderful events may be so transformational that they take our breath away. In December of 2008, up in Sutter County northeast of Sacramento, California, not too far from where we were living at the time, in a small community called Paradise, a family set out to cut their own Christmas tree. A snow storm blew in, and they became disoriented and lost in the storm. Other family members did not know exactly where they had traveled in search of that tree. Finally, after two days in the harsh elements of the high Sierras, and just before another storm was to hit, they were … saved. In their hunt for the perfect tree, they lost their way. In their hunt for lost souls, their rescuers found their way opening up to them; a way that led to salvation. In their search and rescue efforts, the people of Paradise, California never lost the thread of hope which was woven into each frustrating hour of their search. In a situation like this, when they are not exactly sure where their efforts would take them, they were able to keep the music of this rescue operation playing. Perhaps they did not recognize it at the time but each person on that snow covered mountain was improvising on the theme of hope, and they kept working that theme until- what they had before them turned into something so glorious that it took their breath away and people could not help but be awed in its presence - they who were lost are now found; they, whom others thought were dead, are now alive. Paul writes in Philippians: “… our citizenship is in heaven and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. In this Christmas miracle in the high Sierras, I could not help but be struck by a bit of dramatic irony. When Paul writes “our citizenship is in heaven,” some translations would use another word for heaven: “paradise.” It is from there that we in the Christian faith are expecting a savior. And so it was for that family who was lost and so it was for their neighbors who set out to rescue them, all of whom called "Paradise" home. The central theme of this Advent/Christmas season is still salvation, whether or not we give much thought to it with all the distractions that surround us. But maybe this year amid the constant drone of secular Christmas music over the airwaves and in the malls and stores where you shop, you might just hear, or even better, experience an improvisation on that central theme of the Christmas story that will transform whatever Christmas you've currently "got," into something so glorious that it takes your breath away and you cannot help but be awed in its presence. Jerry

0