Easter! Easter! Easter!

 

Most everyone has a favorite story. Mine goes back to that time when my wife and I visited the Passion Play in Oberammergau  And I can stlll remember what I surprise I found there. The Passion play opened with Jesus riding into Jerusalem and a whole stage of people shouting the king has come. They yelled hallelujahs until they were hoarse. And then the story told of the last week Jesus spent marching, stumbling the way of the cross. We saw it all as Jesus  slowly made his way up that terrible hill. The crucifixion was gruesome as he was nailed to the central cross with two criminals on each side. And his mother and her friends stayed there until the end. And we saw those who loved him take him down from the cross and buried him. 

The lights on the stage darkened and almost went out. We sat mostly in darkness. But the thing I remembered most was happened next. Weeping women came on the stage and stood by the tomb hoping to get in. But the stone was too heavy. And suddenly an angel came and without saying a word, unrolled a long white aisle cloth from the stone doors down the steps to the where the audience sat. And as the grieving women beat on the great stone doors they began to slowly open. And light came from inside those doors. The light grew stronger and dazzling light slowly filled the stage and the whole theatre. The stone doors opened wide. And Jesus came through the streaming light. As he walked across the stage from everywhere a multitude of children came running forward, laughing and grabbing his legs. He had come back.

We didn’t say much as we left. Most of the crowd were quiet.But I could not get the scene of Jesus coming through the darkness into that blinding light. Or even more the laughter of all those children.

Dark Saturday--When You Have Nothing to Say

It was over. Jesus’ death. And tenderly they took down his broken blood-stained body. Joseph, a rich man asked for the body. Nicodemus was there numb but there. And there was a terrible silence. No one really knew what to do. Like us, they shuffled through that awful day. Grief paralyzed the best of them. No angels came that day. Silence. Just silence.

If we have lived very long we have been there. And it was too soon.  Trying to fathom our loss. Like those on that first Saturday we have little if anything to say.  

Once when my friend lost his little girl after a long battle with cancer.  I hugged my friend and the next day I wrote him a note. And a note came back from him. It read: “Thank you for what you did not say.” Looking back I remember had little I had to say to this friend on the hardest of days. And we grievers have stood in some line as friends came by. Hugging, whispering. Some with tears in their eyes. And some, God bless them, just wanting to say something that might help. “Aren’t you glad she does not have to suffer.” “He’s with his Mama and Papa and the child they lost years ago and they are all so happy.” Some just said: “God took him…this was God’s will.” Or maybe the worst said when a child dies, “God took her to his flower garden.” Well-meaning people hurt by their comments. In our desperation we have all talked, talked when we should have been quiet.

When they shuffled by to say something when I lost Mother or Father or brother or great friend words could not possibly help in this time. Afterwards I do remember the notes and cards they sent. Telling me they stood with me at this awful time. Many came at great risk unpacking their own grief they thought was behind them. Picking again some old scab that began to leak out what you thought was over.

All the accounts in the Gospels of that dark day are mostly silent. The writers had little to say. So this is why the Pieta has touched so many of us. The  wounded mother holds the body of her dead son. This says it all.

So like Ecclesiastes says there comes a time for silence. Prayers yes. Maybe some food sent to the grievers. Maybe a Memorial gift to honor this loved one.

But first we don’t need words. “Don’t tell—show…” So we pause from our work and projects and the business of every day to do what those early disciples did. “We had hoped he was the one to redeem Israel.” No sadder words.

We have all been there or will. The comfort of God will come. Jesus promised, “ I will not leave you as orphans.” “I send my Spirit.” And “In time I will heal your broken hearts.” But not yet. But maybe those words we find at the end of Revelation are true: ”I heard a great voice from the throne saying, ‘See the home of God is among us. He will dwell with us as our God’ we will be his peoples, and God himself will be with us; he will wipe away every tear from our eyes, Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’”

But not on this day. But somewhere some time when we need it most and do not expect it at all. 

    

Good Friday--On a Hill Faraway

 

On A Hill Far Away - Good Friday

This Good Friday I remember a story I heard somewhere. A preacher chose slides for her Good Friday’s evening service. One of the slides of the crucifixion the minister was painted by Grunewald. It was painted for the Hermitage of DSt. Anthony in the fifteenth century during an outbreak of the black plague. The hermits had taken upon themselves the mission of nursing the sick and burying the dead from the plague.

Many of the victims suffered from the symptom called “St. Anthony’s Fire,” where the circulation stops and the lower limbs become gangrenous and putrefying even while the person lived. This was in the days before scientific medicine and the hermits could do very little for the victim but to cool their fevers and be with them in their agonizing deaths.

Over the altar Grunewald painted the figure of Christ on the cross—dead, twisted and repulsive, gray and green with corruption...His legs swollen with St. Anthony’s fire. He painted the Lord against a black sky and a dead sea. 

The hermits did what they could for the victims, and one thing they did was to leave each arriving patient alone on his pallet before that picture, many of them almost too sick to see it. But now and again one of them almost too ill to see it. But now and again one of them would look at it and say to himself, “In a few hours I must go t my death through foul and terrible pain. But so did He, and God turned that experience to the salvation of the whole world. If that is so, what, then, can He not do for me?”

And so this day let us grow quiet and remember that hill far away. And bring with us names and loved ones and people we do not know—and lift up this whole tattered world to the One with the nail-scarred hands.

“See from His head, His hands, His feet

Sorrow and love flow mingled down

Did e’re such love and sorrow meet,

Or thorns compose so rich  crown.”

Holy Week in a Not-so-Holy World

 

Palm Sunday is behind us. The crowds then and now have gone back to their business. Along the road are remnants of that day. Trampled grass. Withered palms. Crowded road with all their alleluias silent now. It is almost as if yesterday—or was it the day before—as if nothing special had happened. Before the week ends there will be a terrible hill and blood and gore and smugness and tears, too. Rome with all their soldiers were there. Always in charge. And scattered and fearful little knots of heart broken half-believers. There was gambling and laughter and cursing thieves and a middle cross where stretched there was a naked dying man and impalpable sorrow. 

This would be the setting that the church later would call Holy. Was this a bad joke? Holy? The whole long terrible week holy? And in that not-so-holy place the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world hung. And since that time people have clung to their own rugged crosses and hoped they would make it through their own sloughs of despond.

Amazingly amid everything wrong and unjust there was a kindly light that led them through their own flicking sputtering gloom. At first those closest to him were so bereft they hid in caves. Even after Easter they shuffled down roads muttering :”We had hoped he would be the one to redeem Israel.” How wrong they were in their not-so-holy world. 

And us just beginning our own way of the cross are we any different? Some of us still hunker down in churches and synagogues too—singing what we hope will be true, taking tiny remnants of bread and wine and whispering over and over: let it be. God, let it be.

But outside those stained glass windows the doors open to anything but holy. Fear stalks most of us. Look at any direction from cancers and mental illness to Alzheimers to kids on drugs to freshly dug graves. Not to mention Gaza and Israel and Ukraine and Russia and a red and white and blue tattered flag or all the ugliness and hatred that runs rampant. Remember back when he railed out in pain and delirium: “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” Sound familiar.

And from that first Via Dolorosa—the Arabs call it the way of pain—we dare to walk this road station after station. Pilate…and Simon coming forward to help. Soldiers spitting and cursing. And a weeping mother. 

His falling not once but again and again. And then the nails and the terrible crown and the tearing of flesh as his splintered cross was put in place. 

So we come this week, like Bunyan’s Pilgrim with a burden on our backs. And we follow this week called holy like all those others along their way. We may even have our own crosses and sin and unfinishedness 

But we know the headlines and twisted power and whatever dark there may be at the top of all our stairs—we keep coming back. Hoping, hoping this lamb that they say takes away the sins of the world would stop on our street and stand by our door. They made it, not without scars and tears but moving through it all a centerpiece they believed was sound and sure.  Taking in his arms all those who were weary and heavy laden.

And despite the odds they would, like their Lord, give mercy and love and care and even peace in the midst of their raging wars. And we climb the hill with all those others and we find something that keeps us going.

And wonder of wonders it may be the truest thing that ever was.

Holy…Holy…Holy even here—especially here.

Ash Wednesday, Etc.

ASH WEDNESDAY, ETC. 

 “…you neglect and belittle the desert

The desert is not remote in the southern tropics,

The desert is not only around the corner,

The desert is squeezed in the tube-train next to you,

The desert is in the heart of your brother.”

—T.S. Eliot, Choruses from the Rock

Ash Wednesday. Didn’t we do that? Oh yes, again and again and again.

Why do we keep doing this year after year, decade after decade—centuries too. 

We stand in the line with all others. And when our time comes some preacher or priest will mark our foreheads with the smudge of the cross. He or she will whisper: “You are dust and to dust you shall return.” And we move away and find our pew again as the line goes on waiting for their sign. Waiting for the strange words. Maybe just waiting.

This is why most of us have come through the years. It is a somber time. It is a holy time. It is a painful time. 

If you are like me you remember the promises you made year after year on this day. And you also remember how you washed that smudge off your face as if that settles it all. But you broke those promises you made this day and this season. 

And old T.S. Eliot is right. This day and those that follow are the desert times. 

Even those set free slaves in Egypt. They crossed the water and found what? Desert. And the whole book came out of that cursed place where water was scarce and hunger was real and fear seemed, like the desert to cover everything.

And marked sometimes I remember that we all berth mark not of the beast whatever that means. But another mark like all our brothers and sisters the world over where one day sooner or later we really will be dust.

But the desert brings dust and it can choke us. And does. It can be a lonesome  place where we remember that, as Mark Connelly reminds us “even bein’ God ain’t no bed of roses.” So we walk the winding trail that he walked. Where the ups and downs and the ups and downs seem to go on forever. 

So we bring our burdens to lay them down. The old song :”take your burden to the Lord and leave it there.” But we don’t. Like the Pilgrim in Pilgrim’s Progress we stagger with our own burden. All of us. 

You name it. Old age. Cancer. Heart. Pain.That baby grave you left behind. Grief of a zillion sorts. Fear. The anger that just comes seemingly out of nowhere. Or the pettiness that cripples and diminishes us. Or the black dog that follows us one and all.

 

We wash off the mark—we think. But it is there. But lurking around us, too are those stained glass windows that tell us of faith and hope and love too. And Jesus hanging on the cross. And somehow those windows tell everybody’s story. 

Gloomy yes. Darkness yes. But we leave the shadowy church and walk out into the sunshine. It’s so bright we find it hard to see. But life is there—despite the ashes. Kids throwing frisbees or footballs. Wearing the bright orange hoping every game will be won. An old woman leaves behind you. On a walker. Knowing somehow she will get in her car and go home maybe to an empty house. But surrounded by her pictures and memories and a pictured cross she got at the Dollar Store. She goes on with her faith, with her hope and most of all her love.

Maybe that’s why we keep coming on this day. To be marked. And to know this matters terribly. Even in the desert.

Saying Goodbye to the House

“How hard it is to escape from places. However carefully one goes they hold you—you leave little bits of your self fluttering on the fences—like rags and shreds of your very life.”

                                                                  --Katherine Mansfield

The house is almost empty except two garbage bags and a few items to give away. Moving from four bedrooms to 4 rooms takes some adjusting. Understatement. 

We looked at an empty house about twelve years ago. As we walked in the living room filled with light. I told Gayle: “This just might be the house.” And she agreed. We moved in December 15th that year. “It’s too late for a Christmas tree.” But my kids said, “You gotta have a Christmas tree.” And so we hauled down from our new attic our seven-foot Christmas tree. And when it was decorated we just stood back, saying little, just “Ah.” 

And that was the beginning of a slow but sure love affair with this house.

And so this morning walking trough quiet empty, empty rooms memories swirled. Moving Gayle’s seven-foot grand. Adding shutters to the windows we could afford covering. Putting carpet down those 15 streps so we wouldn’t kill ourselves. Buying a few things but not much. We moved in our stuff. But hopelessly sentimental so many things we brought had a history. And we hung the paintings. Matthew’s art work. Some huge and some small. And Cecile Martin’s work and Carol Tinsley’s and LIz Smith’s and Susan Wooten’s too.  We tacked up prints and paintings from trip after trip. And we loved them all. 

I took a room upstairs for my office, dragged up heavy book cases and began to fill them up. I had filing cabinets to house my too-many sermons.and there was my computer and big old walnut desk that someone gave me. 

We filled the place with furniture from garage sales and consignment and antique stores. And there were two or three TV’s and a great CD player. And a dining room table that could tell a hundred stories. 

Outside I tackled the tiny yard around our patio. Ferns and hostas and ajuga and inpatients and begonias. Out back I hauled in good dirt and compost and began to plant. Many things. Roses. Shastas and phlox and so many yellow daisies that my wife kept saying: “Don’t you think you are overdoing it?”

So for twelve years we loved the place. But in my late eighties it seemed a good time to move. From four bed rooms to four rooms. And the sorting out and trying what to decide what to take and not take was overwhelming. But somewhere I learned a lesson as we packed up books and called the Goodwill and filled a zillion black garbage bags. And struggled with what to do with all this dishes my wife loved and so much more. But what I learned was that we semi-hoarders began to realize we did not really didn’t need all those treasurers. 

And so the tears ran and there were huge lumps in our throats and we wondered if this was the craziest thing we had ever done. But maybe the weariness of packing and moving helped us know so much of what we thought was important was not really was precious as we remembered. 

And so everything is out of the house. We close on the house in two weeks. Thank God it sold. And there are days as we remember grief comes trickling back. But it doesn’t stay.

We’ve done this many times. And every time the leaving behind is hard. But we began time after time to open a new chapter. Every one proved to be different. And we found ourselves doing things differently than before. Looking around at all the emptiness we wonder. 

Buechner once told of a wonderful trip his family spent in the mountains. And after several weeks they had to pack and move on. And somebody said, “Why do we ever have to leave this place? Why can’t we just stay.” And Buechner said he learned that they left it all behind to become human beings and discover there would be fine things out there they had yet to know.

And this is where we are. Closing a chapter and opening up with new pages fresh and yet to be filled. In leaving I remember something  Dag Hammarskjold once wrote: "For all that has been thanks. For all that is to be yes.” May it be so not just for us but for the people out there whose names and faces we do not know. 

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Bill French--He Left a Mark

   

 

In a world that seems to have gone mad we all need some sustaining grace. Many of you have never heard of Bill French. Unless you live in Upstate South Carolina around Clemson. 

But this man in his quiet ways left a mark on so many lives. He and his parents moved South from New York in the 1960’s. His parents both developed progressive Alzheimer’s disease and Bill found the resources to keep them at home. What a Caregiver. As a devoted son he made sure his parents had physical and mental stimulation and because of his hands-on care his father and mother found meaningful quality of life. 

Only those who have experienced the hard work of caregiving know how difficult this task must have been for both his parents with dementia.But he took them on car rides, local outings, brought good friends into his home and at local facilities. He learned to cook nutritional meals for them. 

So he cared for both parents until the end of their lives. His father died in 1980 and his mother died in 1997.But this was not the end of his story. He began to work as volunteer at the local Retirement Center called Clemson Downs. 

I remember reading that when the nurse, Florence Nightingale moved through the hospital the sick loved her and many would kiss her shadow as she passed by. She changed the lives of the sick and the dying. 

Bill French learned the names and faces at the Downs and their families during this most vulnerable time in their lives. You could see him leave his car in the parking lot bringing in homemade cookies, entire meals, soup and ice cream, cakes for special occasions and flowers. He led monthly care giving support groups at this Nursing facility.  I saw him attending funeral after funeral for those he had loved and cared for. 

I could go on and on talking abut this man who never married but spent his whole life giving, encouraging, loving. He will be missed by so many of us. For once upon a time a man named Bill left his mark and made an incredible difference.

In our day when so much seems so wrong—whether you knew him or not remember this guy named Bill and all those cadre of angels in many places we have never heard of. Turn off the TV, push aside the newspapers and thank God that in this world there are still angels of mercy who leave the mark of love on whose in need. 

And so Bill we do not say farewell for we will remember that light you brought into the darkness and how it shone and how much it helped.

I leave Bill with this Benediction that comes from the Roman Catholic Prayer for the Dead:

“Into paradise may the angels lead our brother Bill, 

at his coming may the martyrs take him up

into eternal rest

and may the chorus of angels lead him to that holy city, 

and the place of perpetual light.”

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com