Midweek Service: Marketplace Mentality?

July 10, 2013 By

The summer series called Midweek Service continues this week with a sermon from John 2, a powerful story that shakes us where we live . . . if we let it:

Marketplace Mentality?
John 2:13-24
The Cleansing of the Temple
Diana R.G. Trautwein
A Sermon Preached at Montecito Covenant Church
Date undetermined, but sometime in 2005 before the arrival of a new pastor

We have just read from the second chapter of the gospel of John this morning.  This is a chapter that marks beginnings: the beginnings of Jesus’ ministry of miracles> – with the joyful changing of water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana in the opening verses of chapter two; and the beginnings of Jesus’ ministry of <em >majestyas he moves through the temple courtyard with authority, and with surprising anger – and as he begins to engage the Jewish leaders in the kind of cryptic dialog that will characterize his relationship with them until the end of his life.

Now if your early exposure to scripture was anything like mine, you probably learned a fair amount about that ministry of miracles. Miracles make great stories; they remind us of Jesus’ tender heart and of his desire to help people along the road to wholeness and health. And the story of the water into wine is a lovely, happy example of just that kind of thing. Jesus gathers his newfound friends, brings them along to a wedding party. And while there, he listens to his mother (something every mother in this room is always delighted to hear!), he works quietly, behind the scenes, revealing his power to the servants only, and he produces – simply by the power of his presence and his will – enormous quantities of top-quality wine for the party-goers. John’s gospel tells us that this was ‘the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples put their faith in him.’

‘Jesus revealed his glory . . .’ To whom? To the servants – and to those who became his disciples. So this second chapter of John’s gospel begins with Jesus drawing the people on the edges toward himself.

And it continues with Jesus starting to alienate the <strong >people at the center of things. For his ‘second number’ – as he moves into that ministry of majesty that most of us are far less familiar with — he does a startling thing in a very public way, as opposed to a quiet thing in a very private way. And, in the process of doing this very startling and very public thing, he makes a powerful statement about exactly who he is and why he has come.

Jesus has come to the world of human beings, joined in the day-to-day routine of making friends and going to parties and sometimes listening to his mom and sometimes not.  And his very presence in that routine stuff, makes the simplest gesture a moment of sacred power and mystery.

And in this chapter, he has come to the very heartbeat of his society’s sacred showplace. When he does, he recognizes and points out how it has been subverted and diluted and dramatically and wildly separated from anything even close to sacred.

The everyday is touched by the divine and transformed into a shining moment of joy and recognition and glory. That which is viewed by human eyes as ordinary becomes extraordinary.

And that which is viewed by human eyes as extraordinary becomes even less than ordinary in the scene before us this morning.

The spectacular Jerusalem temple – the centerpiece of Jewish faith in first century Palestine –- is revealed as something far less than what it is touted to be. Jesus dramatically points out that his Father’s house has become some sort of a ‘bizarre bazaar’ –- a place of commerce rather than prayer, a place where barnyard animals, birdcages and bankers have created a noisy, dirty, confusing and shockingly profane space.

The temple court has turned into an arena, overcrowded with the wrong kind of people and the wrong kind of activity. Jesus lifts the curtain, so to speak, and reveals the truth that the emperor has no clothes, the Wizard of Oz is nothing more than a bumbling, middle-aged inventor on a power trip, the temple is no longer the place where God dwells.

And he makes a lot of important people very, very unhappy when he does so.

So . . . which is the ‘real Jesus?’ The happy-go-lucky, water-into-wine, hail-fellow-well-met Jesus we meet in verses 1-12? Or the angry, zealous, whip-snapping, table-turning, animal-driving, in-your-face, rabble-rouser we meet in verses 13-24?

Which one would you rather meet today?

Which one do you need to meet today?

Are you thirsty for some excellent new wine? Wine that has been ‘kissed’ by the carpenter from Nazareth who’s just beginning to reveal himself as someone more than a carpenter?

Or do you have some tables that need turning over, some messy animals and noisy birds that need shooing away so that you can once again discover where God dwells?

Perhaps, like me, you find that you need a bit of both today.  Truth be told, I believe we always need a bit of both.  We need regular reminders that Jesus is far more complex than any painting of him we might enjoy, far more multi-faceted than any formula or bromide we might read or hear, far more interesting and challenging, perhaps even life-threatening, than we are often led to believe. For Jesus is, as I’ve noted before –- and I believe with these exact words — Jesus is a righteous dude. Right here, in the beginning of his ministry on earth, we begin to see that. John lays it out for us in bold strokes.

There is a Truth, with a capital “T,” in Jesus that just cuts through all the gunk we human beings try to build around ourselves. That gunk that’s designed to show the world that we’re really on top of this ‘spiritual’ stuff, that we’ve got the righteousness rules all figured out, that we can somehow circumscribe God and keep him confined to our own, very limited vision of him.

The Jews were God’s peculiar and particular, chosen people – the ones through whom God decided to show himself to the rest of the world. God drew them to himself, told the story of salvation through them and yet, somehow, they so often misheard the plot, or stopped listening to the story, or decided to make up their own ending.

Not too different from the way we would do it, the way we DO do it. The Temple built during Solomon’s time was glorious, built to God’s specifications and it was the agreed-upon space wherein God would reside during the days of the ancient kingdom of Israel.

But that temple was destroyed as the people ignored God’s story and were eventually led away into captivity. A second, smaller and less ornate temple was rebuilt after the exile and it, too disappeared into the sands of the wilderness.

By the time Jesus entered time and space, King Herod had decided to build a magnificent edifice, in a misguided attempt to ‘get in good’ with the Jews he was sent to rule. He constructed a huge building with a concentric series of courts leading up to the Holy of Holies – that space where only the High Priest could enter and then, only once a year. That space where Zechariah met God and learned he would have a boy to be named John, who would become the Baptizer.

Coming out and down from that holiest of places, there were increasingly inclusive spaces – one for the rest of the priests, one for Jewish men, one for Jewish women, and, at the outside edge, one for Gentiles. That’s where those outside the circle of Israel were invited in. That’s the space where anyone interested in learning more about this God of theirs could come and be taught. That’s the space where all the nations could come and learn to pray.

And that’s the space that was filled with noise and confusion, with animals and merchants and moneychangers. when Jesus strode through it that day, long ago. The other gospel accounts of this incident record Jesus quoting the Old Testament and saying, “It is written, ‘My house will be a house of prayer, but you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’” And Mark even adds the phrase, “a house of prayer for all nations,” underscoring the universal and inclusive nature of the temple’s outer courtyard.

But as Jesus looked around, he saw that it was no longer a welcoming place for strangers and for seekers. It was a bustling marketplace, filled to overflowing with the paraphernalia required by both the sacrificial system and the temple tax structure. There were laws in place, you see. Detailed laws about how much ‘tax’ every adult Jewish male was to pay to the temple for the privilege of worshiping and offering sacrifices there. And that tax had to be paid in one kind of coinage only, so tables were set up – right there in the temple itself – for the changing of Roman coins into the ones acceptable to the temple hierarchy.

And, just to make things more convenient – the animals – the perfect, unblemished animals required for the various kinds of sacrifices needed at those important feast days – the animals were right there, available (for a price, of course) to the pilgrims who traveled to Jerusalem to observe the holy days. Now they used to be available in the valley, just outside the city walls – but over time, they moved closer and closer into the center of things, until they actually encroached on temple territory itself. The mentality of the marketplace had overtaken sacred space and as it did so, it eliminated the only avenue through which 1st century seekers could begin to learn about God.

So, Jesus came for the Holy Days. And Jesus saw that his Father’s house had been scandalized and vandalized and trivialized –and he was furious!

Wouldn’t you love to have seen it? Well, at least part of me would love to have seen it! And the other part of me is terribly worried that I would have heartily joined in with those who questioned Jesus’ authority to do what he did.

“What right do you have to say what you’ve said? What right do you have to do what you’ve done? You’ve messed it up, Jesus.  You’ve mixed it up, You’ve thrown everything all around and confused us all. Just who do you think you are?? What sign can you show us to prove that you really do have a right to do what you’ve done??”

And I would probably have heard Jesus’ answer in the same way that those agitated ‘in’ people heard it: “Destroy this temple and I will raise it again in three days,” said Jesus, the carpenter. Yeah, right. Who are you kidding? It’s taken 46 years to get this magnificent building to this point. 46 years, they said, and you’re going to raise it up in 3 days?? You and what army?? Don’t be ridiculous.

Be honest, now.  Isn’t that what you’d have been thinking?

John tells us that’s pretty much what the disciples were thinking. He doesn’t say it in so many words, but the implication is there.  Why else would he add, “After he was raised from the dead, the disciples recalled what he had said.  Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.” Even the disciples – who had just had such a great time partying with the Lord and his magically created, delicious wine – couldn’t fathom what in the world he was doing or what he was saying about what he was doing.

It is a startling way to begin a ministry – a bold, controversial, puzzling act and an even stranger verbal response.

NOW, with the hindsight of 2000 years, the traditions of the church and most importantly, the word of God written, we know that Jesus was talking about himself.   That the building behind him was no longer the dwelling place of God on earth – in fact, it never had been in quite the way that Jesus now began to speak about.

For Jesus is beginning to teach these slightly dense yet dearly loved people that he himself is the dwelling place of God on earth. He himself is God, come, as John’s gospel puts it in the prologue, come ‘to tabernacle with humans,’ come to show us the Father, come to bring his sacred touch to our profane lives, come to transform us into living, breathing temples of the Holy Spirit, come to grow a new temple, an organic one, a body —  a huge body of men and women, boys and girls, living across the globe and across the years — that will be the temple for all the millennia until that time when time will not be. Then the temple will be God himself, right in our midst, and we will be in the realm of the new heaven and the new earth.

Now that’s challenging stuff.  That’s life-changing stuff, maybe even life-threatening stuff – at least life as we too often live it. (Song lyrics inserted on the screens at this point, lyrics from “Becky and Me,” written by Chris Rice)

Becky has a house on Abundant Life Boulevard
A good name, good family, and butterflies in her yard
Becky loves Jesus and really wants to make Him proud
She tears up in church and she sings her harmonies loud
She’s got a Bible by the bed, a prayer journal, and a fish on her car
She makes sure to bow her head and give thanks in every restaurant
But is that enough?

C’mon Becky, let’s go for a ride
If I’m driving too fast then I apologize
But there’s a world out there that we left behind
Full of souls as important as yours and mine
Looks like a reckless road, and a sacrifice
And I’m crazy scared it may cost our lives
But then I remember Jesus died
So c’mon Becky
Let’s go for a ride

I’m rolling up to Becky’s house on my Sunday drive
I have to laugh to myself ’cause it looks exactly like mine
I smile and wave at all the happy people strolling by
We’ve got the same walk, same talk, and the same sparkle in our eyes
‘Cause we’re thankful for the blessings, but maybe we could lay ’em aside
I get a feeling we might be missin’ the time of our lives

So hop in and hold on tight
c’mon Becky, let’s go for a ride
If I’m driving too fast then I apologize
But there’s a world out there that we left behind
Full of souls as important as yours and mine
Looks like a reckless road, and a sacrifice
And I’m crazy scared it may cost our lives
But then I remember Jesus died
So c’mon Becky Let’s go for a ride

‘Cause we’re thankful for the blessings, but maybe we could lay ’em aside?
I get a feeling we might be heading for the time of our lives

So hop in and hold on tight
C’mon Becky, let’s go for a ride
If I’m driving too fast then I apologize
But there’s a world out there that we left behind
Full of souls as important as yours and mine
Looks like a reckless road, and a sacrifice
And I’m crazy scared it may cost our lives
But then I remember Jesus died
So c’mon Becky Let’s go for a ride

So, if Jesus were to walk through this temple today, what would he find? This temple – meaning. not this building, wonderful and beautiful and set apart as it is to be sacred space – not this building, but this temple — our bodies – each of us, together and separately?

What are the things that have gotten in the way of our Father’s house?

The market place? Trying to do the right things, say the right things, impress the right people with our piety? Trying, perhaps, to offer ourselves as burnt sacrifices when that job has already been done, far more completely than any one of us could ever do it?

When Jesus arrived at that long ago courtyard, he found it crowded with the wrong kind of people doing the wrong kinds of activities. Instead of being open to the world – a place where strangers were invited in – to find a place of learning, of quiet, of prayer, a place to explore what it might mean to approach the God of the Universe, The God of the World, The God of the People of God – it was a place crowded with marketeers, with stray animals, with people trying to change money from profane to sacred – to make things kosher, to line up the ducks, to make the pieces fit, to keep God inside the dimensions of a box of their own creation.

And Jesus said, no.

Open it up, quiet it down. Make this place a temple again, a place of prayer – for all people – not just the okey-dokey people. Not just the people with the right kind of money. Not just the people who know the rules and obey the rules, but the people who haven’t a clue and who need one so very badly.

Is there space in this temple – this body of believers – for God to really dwell and do a new thing? Is there space in this temple for a new pastor, a new pastor’s family, a new pastor’s ideas and leadership?

Is there space in this temple for new people, people different from the ‘in’ group, people on the edges, people who need a clue?

Is there space in this temple for new ways to worship together? For new music, for new art, for new drama? Is there space in this temple for new ministries to children? to students? to adults? Is there space in this temple for God to do the work God wants to do in and through us? What needs to be cleaned up and driven out of your life? Of my life? Of our life together?

Oh, Jesus, We need new wine, And we need the tingle of that whip. We need to wake up and reach out and open wide. We need to let you in in ways that may scare us a little, that may make us wonder what in the world you’re up to. We need you to be the Lord of the church, the one through whom we meet God Almighty, the one who dwells in us by the presence of the Holy  Spirit.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Remind us that you came to make our ordinary lives sacred. Slice our hearts with your loving touch and help us to hear your call, and then, to obey it.

Amen.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Toward A More Perfect Union — A Deeper Family

July 4, 2013 By

It’s the first Thursday of the month! And that means I’m writing over at A Deeper Family today. It’s also our national birthday – the Fourth of July – so here is a picture of some fireworks we enjoyed while we were in Dresden, Germany, about two months ago. Please come on over and join me at ADF to read the rest of this reflection . . .

The heat is rising in waves from the concrete deck, shimmering in that strange, invisible way that heat waves do. The whole of southern California is turning up the AC, blowing fans over bowls of ice, taking quick dips in the pool or bathtub, trying to even out the air temp in as many creative ways as possible.

Here, in our coastal town, we’ve had temperatures in the 90’s for almost a week now – unusual in early July. Often our national holiday is shrouded in fog; the annual fireworks display can only be seen in bits and pieces, when an occasional rocket climbs above the layers of goop circling round the end of the pier.

This year, however, the show should be grand. But we will not be there.

We’ve seen lots of fireworks in our day, and sent more than a few brilliant displays into the  skies ourselves. Yet these days, listening to the pops and bangs and whizzes is almost as much fun as seeing their aerial display. Maybe we’ll watch the televised ones from DC and NYC, who knows? I only know we won’t be joining the throngs who will jam the beachfront boulevard and then struggle to make their way, ever-so-slowly, up to the freeway and home again, home again.

At this end of 47+ years together, we are increasingly careful about how we spend our time and energy, wanting not to waste any of it with crowds and confusion. Maybe that makes us old fogies. In fact, I am SURE it makes us old fogies. And you know what? I am more comfortable with that idea than I ever dreamed I might be. Believe me, it’s not all bad, being a fogey. It has its perks.

Like . . .

Wanna know what those perks look like from our end? Well, come on over. Just click this sentence and you’ll find the list. 

Filed Under: A Deeper Family, Aging, Encouragement, family, God's gifts, Grandparenting, Marriage, memoir, personal journey, Uncategorized

Midweek Service: Written On Our Hearts

July 3, 2013 By

This summer series of long-ago sermons continues with one from Lent in the year 2003 – a full decade ago. We had a different Senior Pastor then and were facing into different life events as a congregation and as a nation. Yet, somehow, this message is not tied to a particular time in history, but an expression of one of the most powerful of God’s timeless truths.

Written on Our Hearts

Jeremiah 31:31-34
April 6, 2003
5th Sunday in Lent
preached at Montecito Covenant Church by
Diana R.G. Trautwein

My husband and I have just returned from a week away – something we both needed and thoroughly enjoyed.  We traveled to the desert, and a primary motivating factor for this trip was to see if we could find some displays of famous California wildflowers.

Now both of us are native Californians and we have lived here almost all of our lives, yet we have never done the wildflower bit. People come from all over the world – as we quickly discovered – to see the wonders of the desert on fire with the colors of God’s palette – but we, like the cobbler’s children without any shoes – had never taken the time to see the beauty that God provides for us each and every spring.  So this year we did it.

We drove to beautiful, downtown Palmdale the first night out, with the intention of seeing the Poppy Reserve near Lancaster.  And we did see the Poppy Reserve, and we actually saw thousands of poppies strewn over the hills and fields.  Unfortunately, we didn’t truly see them in all of their splendor and glory because. . .these little flowers, which land where the breezes blow them –  and at one time, according to the conquering Spanish explorers, flowed like rivers of molten lava toward the sea with colors so vibrant they could be seen from the decks of their ships as they sailed into what would eventually be known as the Los Angeles harbor area – these little golden flowers are incredibly crafty.

Somewhere written in their DNA is the helpful hint that neither shadow nor wind is good for them.  So. . . as the late afternoon sunshine casts longer and longer shadows over the landscape (as it did on the afternoon we arrived) – or as the wind picks up velocity greater than a gentle breeze (which it did the next morning, on our way out to Death Valley) these exceedingly well-bred, vibrantly colored cups of gold clamp their little heads tightly shut and hide themselves away from potential threat – and from poorly-educated flower-viewers like ourselves!

There is a law ‘written on their hearts’  – a law that says: “Darkness and high winds are dangerous to your future – protect yourself!”  And California’s golden poppies are totally obedient to that interior instruction. They don’t have to be taught to do this – they KNOW to do it, it’s become a part of their identity as poppies and it just comes naturally.

I wonder. . . what laws are written on our hearts this morning?  What do we at the core of our being, know so well that it has become part of our identity?  What beliefs/ideas/values/instructions/’laws’ do we hold so close to ourselves that they just come naturally. . .

Tuck those questions in the back of your mind and we’ll get back to them in a few minutes.  Because just now, I want to remind us all that for the past four weeks, we’ve been traveling through the Old Testament on our Lenten journey to the cross.  We’ve been examining the ways in which Almighty God reached out to his human creatures in order to engage them in relationship.  We looked at Noah, the flood and the rainbow promise; we looked at Abraham, a childless old man who was taken by God out into the desert, pointed toward the night sky and promised offspring as numerous as the sparkling canopy of stars above him; we looked at the 10 Commandments given to Moses on the mountain of God – the beautiful law of God that set out parameters in which God’s people could live rich and full lives.

Over these weeks, we began to get a picture of what God had in mind when he created a Covenant people for himself, a people who would belong to him in a particular way, enjoying his love, protection and blessing and, in return, worshipping him alone.  And then last week, Curt took us to a point in that covenant relationship that was painfully close to home, and we watched the grumbling, idolatrous, rebellious, cranky people of God decide to move away from the covenant relationship and go their own way, ultimately saved from dismay, despair and death only by the gracious deliverance of the God they had abandoned.  This wasn’t the first time God’s covenant people had turned away from the promise, and it most definitely was not the last.

Today, we come – in some ways, at least – to a very different place, in a very different time.  Yet some things never change.  The prophet Jeremiah has been warning the people of Judah that their days as landowners are numbered.  Why?  Because they have continued to be a grumbling, idolatrous, rebellious and cranky bunch.  They’ve worked their way through judges and kings and wars and alliances and misalliances, all the while ignoring God’s promises and disobeying God’s law.  In fact, the people of God are no more.  They are living in exile, scattered amongst their enemies, disheartened and disinherited.

And right there, in the midst of that kind of confusion, turmoil, dismay, anxiety. . .right there in the midst of it all, God decides to do a new thing, a radically new thing – a new thing that is based on an old idea – a familiar idea – a covenant idea.  And it comes in the form of a promise – a promise to the people of the land that was no more, the people of the divided kingdom, the exiled kingdom, the people whom God chose as his own special tribe, despite their disobedience, despite their failure to be all that he called them to be.  And the promise is found in Jeremiah 31:31-34:

“The day will come,” says the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah. This covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I loved them as a husband loves his wife,” says the LORD.  “But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel on that day,” says the LORD. “I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts.  I will be their God and they will be my people.  And they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their family, saying, `You should know the LORD.’ For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will already know me,” says the LORD. “And I will forgive their wickedness and will never again remember their sins.”

 

These beautiful words were given to a people living in exile, a people who had ruptured their relationship with their God so severely that something entirely new was required to salvage things.  These words were given to Israel and to Judah and they were words of hope and delight, words of encouragement and reconciliation.  And they were built on an entirely new concept.  No more rainbows in the sky, no more stars in the night, no more tablets of stone – no more externalsigns for the covenant people of God.  No.  The day is coming, says the Lord, when I will write my law on their <em >hearts, I will put it in their minds – and they will KNOW me, really, truly, know me –from the inside out>, rather than the other way around.  This is a new covenant, says the Lord — a new way of entering into agreement with one another, a new way of enjoying relationship together, a new way of being connected, committed, intertwined, covenanted together.

The old way had not done the job.  Coming at things from the outside in wasn’t cutting it.  Signs and promises – as wonderful as they are – aren’t powerful enough in and of themselves to change things from the inside out, God knew that, and Israel learned it – through painful and difficult experience.  And every one of us in this room can testify to this truth.  Tablets of stone, lists of rules, even very clearly laid out instructions for good behavior and wise choices do not make a heckuva lot of difference if we don’t find them inside us.  If they’re something outside of ourselves, they can’t effect change that is real and lasting on the inside.  They need to be written on our hearts, part of our identity, a natural and normal part of who we are.

Is it any wonder, then, that the early church read these words and saw Jesus in them?  Is it any wonder that Jesus himself borrowed this language to talk about his mission, his purpose in life, his work here on earth?  As he gathered his disciples in the upper room the night before he was betrayed and murdered, he offered his friends the traditional cup of Passover wine, the cup of blessing, with these very words:

“This cup is the new covenant in my blood,” he said.  “Do this in remembering me.”  And so they did, and so we do.  For this is how God writes his law, his love, on our hearts. . . through the blood of Jesus.

About seven or eight years ago, Alison Krauss sang an old, old gospel song on a highly successful album, a song that puts this marvelous truth into poetry that truly gets your toes to tappin’.  It’s called “When God Dips His Pen of Love in My Heart”

When God dips His pen of love in my heart,
And He writes my soul a message He wants me to know.
His spirit all divine, fills this sinful soul of mine.
When God dips His love in my heart.

He walked up every step of Calvary’s rugged way.
And He gave His life completely to bring a better day.
My life was steeped in sin, but in love He took me in.
His blood washed away every stain.

I said I wouldn’t tell it to a livin’ soul.
How He brought salvation and He made me whole.
But I found I couldn’t hide /such a love /as Jesus did impart.
Well. . .  He made me laugh and He made me cry.
Set my sinful soul on fire (hallelujah).
When God dips His love in my heart.

Hallelujah.
When God dips His love,
His sweet love,
In my heart.

There was only one way that God could change his people from the inside out – and that way was Jesus.  With the incarnation, when God became human and came to walk and talk and live among men and women, it truly became possible for God to dip his pen of love in our hearts.

For in Jesus, the glorious, transcendent creator of the universe comes within touching distance.

In Jesus, the character and the glory of God are fully revealed and realized.

In Jesus, we are able to see the real deal, not our imagined images of either terror or comfort, those pictures of God that we carry around in our heads and our hearts, those pictures that are shaped by our culture, our parents, our own psyches.

We meet Jesus in the pages of scripture and then we meet Jesus in a personal encounter, an experience that changes our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh, an experience that calls us to ‘know’ God, starting at the center, starting on the inside, learning more and more about what it means to trust.

Brennan Manning’s book called Ruthless Trust has been enormously helpful to me in understanding what it means to know God in the way that Jeremiah is describing in these beautiful verses before us this morning, especially chapter seven of Manning’s book.  For the intimate way in which this verb ‘know’ is used by the prophet implies a relationship firmly built upon trust. “For everyone, from the least to the greatest, will already know me,” says the LORD. “And I will forgive their wickedness and will never again remember their sins.”  The door to intimacy with God is open wide and is totally inclusive – ‘everyone, from the least to the greatest’ – and Jesus is that door.

What exactly is trust and how does it help us know God?

Trust is that marvelous combination of faith and hope – faith that comes from a personal experience of the living God as encountered in Jesus – and hope in the promises of Jesus, with full expectation that the promises he makes will be kept.  We need both qualities – faith and hope – in order to grow in trust.  If we trust Jesus, we can begin to let him soften our hearts, to write his words of love in our very tender flesh, to rest and relax in that love and to be all of who we are without fear.  “I will forgive their wickedness,” the Lord tells us in Jeremiah, “and will never again remember their sins.”  Manning talks about it this way:

“Our trust in Jesus grows as we shift from making self-conscious efforts to be good to allowing ourselves to be as we are (not as we should be).  The Holy Spirit moves us from the head to the heart . . .”

And as that trust grows, we find ourselves understanding at deeper and deeper levels what it means to be in relationship with a covenant-making God.  There are most certainly no guarantees that life will be trouble-free.  On the contrary, Jesus himself warned that following him would involve suffering, possibly even rejection and death.  What is promised is love, what is promised is acceptance and forgiveness, what is promised is peace, what is promised is presence, even when the way seems overwhelmingly difficult, even when life seems way too complicated, even when tears are our constant companion.  And we could add this morning, even when we are a nation at war, even when our pastor is leaving, even when our loved ones are suffering.  Even then. . . he is worthy of our trust.

The rabbis of old noticed that in this passage in Jeremiah the word ‘on’ is used when describing our hearts rather than the word ‘in,’ and they wrestled with that word choice for years.  Why did God’s Word say ‘on’ our hearts?  Why not ‘in’?  The answer they came to was this:

The text reads ‘on’ so that when our hearts are broken (as they always will be in this life), then the love written there can fall ‘in’ and help us to heal.

So now I’m back to the beginning. . . and I’m wondering. . . what is written on our hearts?  Do we find ‘laws’ like:

“Success at all costs.”
“Things are more important than people.”
“You can never be too rich or too thin.”

Or perhaps like these:

“I’m basically a no-good, worthless pile of nothing.”
“If I let people come too close, they’ll see what I’m really like and hate me.”
“I’ve been hurt before and nobody’s gonna do that again.”
“If I smile and say ‘I’m fine,’ nobody will know how much pain I’m in.”

When your heart breaks – and believe me, it will – are those the kinds of ‘laws’ that you want to fall in?  What possible healing can those words bring?

Ah, but if you are growing in your trust, your knowledge of God, then perhaps you are beginning to find laws like these at the center of who you are, words of love written on your heart:

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.”
“Love your neighbor as yourself.”
“Because of Jesus, I know that Almighty God, Creator of the Universe, is also Abba,           Father.”
“I am his and he is mine.”
“Jesus loves me, this I know.”

May it be so – by the grace of God, may it be so.

 

Filed Under: biblical reflection, Encouragement, God's gifts, Sermons/Homilies, Spiritual Formation, Uncategorized

Midweek Service: Deborah — “The LORD Is Marching Ahead of You”

June 19, 2013 By

This week finds me dipping once again into that time when we were between senior pastors, when we were in the midst of transition and new construction at the same time. It’s really good for me to remember how faithful God was to us during that 2-year time stretch — and how faithful the community was to one another, too.

All stained/painted glass windows in this series are from the Cathedral of St. Vitas in Prague, The Czech Republic

Made to Matter: People Who Partnered with God
Deborah:  “The Lord Is Marching Ahead of You”

Preached at Montecito Covenant Church
November 16, 2003
by Diana R.G. Trautwein

Today is a day for telling stories, for remembering stories, for celebrating stories. Today is a day for finding ourselves in the midst of someone else’s story, in the midst of our own story, and most wonderfully of all, today is a day for finding ourselves in the midst of God’s story, sometimes when we least expect it.

I find myself this morning nearing the end of a long, hard weekend. And there are about 15 other folks scattered around this room this morning who find themselves in the same place. Your Church Council leaders met on Friday night for 3 hours and then again yesterday from 9-4:30 in order to spend some concentrated time together, learning more about the people we’ve been seeing around the tables at our meetings each month, learning more about what it means to truly be a leadership ‘team,’ learning more about what it means to dream God’s dreams for this place, to take some risks with one another, to be encouraged by God’s words delivered to us through the words of a friend and fellow traveler.

Yes, it has been a long, hard weekend. But also, a tremendously exciting weekend. To catch a tiny glimpse of what God is up to in this place — to be reminded, even in the midst of what seem at times to be overwhelmingly difficult circumstances that, “The Lord is marching ahead of us” — this is a wonderful thing. In fact, I would venture to say, it is a life-changing thing, a life-saving thing.

And today, we’re going to look at the biblical story of Deborah and we’re going to remind ourselves that the Lord our God is not out of the marching business – that God does indeed remain faithful to his promise to walk with us, to partner with us in this life. We are going to hear the wonderful truth one more time, the truth that when we show up, God shows up. And that is all that is required, no matter how overwhelming the circumstances may appear to be.

So . . . the story-telling begins. With Deborah.

A little background, please. . . I’m sure you all remember Moses, the Exodus, Joshua and the taking of the land from the early books of the Old Testament, right? Sometimes it’s good to remember that this was a very long time ago, that the Israelites were a pretty rough-neck group, probably armed at any given time with wooden, maybe bronze implements and weapons. They had strong tribal ties, yet they were only very loosely connected to one another. And when they moved into the land, suddenly they found themselves surrounded by a much more sophisticated culture, one with fortified cities, elaborate and difficult religious rituals, and sometimes much more effective weaponry.

They struggled to settle in, and they did a pretty lousy job. This was true primarily because they allowed themselves to get sucked into and subdued by the cultures around them, adopting their rituals, intermarrying, and basically forgetting who they were as children of God, as God’s chosen people.

And if I’m honest, I can’t blame them too much for that. Sometimes it’s just plain easier to ‘go with the flow,’ to do what everyone else is doing, to worship the god you can see rather than the One who is unseen by human eyes.

And after the death of Joshua, that’s pretty much what happened. The book of Judges is the story of the people of God regularly forgetting who they were, of falling into the ways of the world around them, and then of suffering the consequences of their amnesia. And those consequences involved coming under the oppressive control of those surrounding people groups with alarming and depressing regularity.

Every so often, though, someone within the chosen people would remember — “Wait a minute here. . . we have a God who calls us by name. Shame on us because we’ve forgotten to call HIM by name.”

And the next thing you see in the whole, sad story of the Judges are these moments of remembering, of calling on the name of the LORD for mercy and deliverance, of deciding to show up. And guess what? Every single time they do that, every time they show up — God shows up. And the first thing God does is to raise up a leader, an encourager, sometimes a warrior, but always someone upon whom God’s Spirit rests in a special way. These leaders were called judges over the people, and through them, God showed the people the way toward freedom, deliverance and ultimately, peace in their land.

Our story this morning is early in the series of these sad cycles of forgetting and remembering, and it’s told in two chapters — one a narrative and the other a long poem or song. Chapter 4 outlines the events as they happened, but chapter 5 fills in the blanks of the narrative with a fascinating, creative and beautiful set of verses. These verses, this song, is probably the oldest piece of scripture that we have in the entire Bible — one of the very first things that the people of Israel wrote down to help them remember the faithfulness of God.

And this is the story it tells: Joshua is long dead. The people have sunk into despair and oppression at least three times and have then remembered God three times. And once again, times are tough. A Canaanite king named Jabin, who builds huge forts for cities and then lives behind the walls, has forced the scraggly band of Israelite people into a hard and discouraging life

They have endured twenty years of oppression of the worst kind. Jabin’s military general Sisera has built himself a terrifying army of men and machines. The Philistines had discovered the secret of smelting iron and then used that knowledge to devise a deadly killing machine — the heavy duty tanks of their day — in the form of a chariot made of iron. These chariots could trample a man on foot in mere seconds. The Philistines used these chariots to keep the Israelites off the roads and to continue to use the most primitive of farming methods. This meant they could never rise above subsistence living and it generally made their lives miserable.

What could a group of unsophisticated, under-equipped, tribal warriors ever hope to do against such technological superiority?

Well, they began by calling on the LORD for help, as verse 3 of chapter 4 tells us. And then the very next verse begins the amazing story of how God chose to deliver his people this time.

 “At that time Deborah, a prophetess, wife of Lappidoth, was judging Israel. She used to sit under the palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim; and the Israelites came up to her for judgment.”

So, here is the new leader! A woman. A woman who is a prophet, who sits under a palm tree up in the hills.

Uh. . . I’m not sure this would have been MY first choice for the salvation of the people, but. . . Deborah is God’s choice.

And God’s choice calls on Barak, who lives in a different community, one that is in closer proximity to those walled cities and those awful chariots. Deborah has a word for Barak when he gets there. And in the original language, it comes in the form of a question: “Didn’t the Lord God command you to go? To take an army and lead the way to Mt. Tabor?”

And his reply is more than a little bit surprising: yes, he knows the question. Yes, he’ll go to Mt. Tabor . . . under one condition: if Deborah comes with him. I’m betting he figured that it might be a good idea to take the ‘word of the LORD’ along with them into battle. And Deborah, the one who sat under the palm tree, she IS the word of the Lord during this time period.

So Barak gathers together a very rag-tag bunch of 10,000 foot soldiers and they head to the top of Mt. Tabor, peering down into the Kishon River Valley. Which might not have been the smartest military strategy in the world.

EXCEPT. . .

Deborah is listening to the LORD. She comes along with Barak and she continues to listen as Sisera arrives with his men and his iron chariots and all of them fill that river bed. She is still listening . . . until . . . she yells out, “NOW. Charge! Now is the time. The LORD is marching ahead of you!”

At this point, I’d like to take a small pause in the story-telling and offer a word of support for Barak. It is true that he wanted a woman to go with him. And yes, Deborah told him that that choice of his would mean that he would be outdone by a woman before the day was over. And it is also true that early in this story, the narrator sets us up to discover who this woman might be when he mentions Heber the Kenite and his tent near the battle site.

But just try to imagine this, okay? You’re on the top of a mountain with a bunch of guys with sticks and maybe some very bendy bronze spears. At the bottom of the mountain are 900 iron chariots, at least that many horses and thousands of soldiers outfitted in the very latest fashion of heavy metal armor. You’ve decided to throw in your lot with this woman who talks to God and she says, “CHARGE!” just when your men can see the overwhelming might of the enemy.

What was she thinking??

To better help us understand the timing of all this, it really helps to jump from the narrative in chapter 4 to the song in chapter 5, where there are a couple of hints in verse 20 and 21:

“The stars fought from heaven, from their courses they fought against Sisera. The torrent Kishon swept them away, the onrushing torrent, the torrent Kishon. March on, my soul!”

So, what do you suppose Deborah was listening for up there on the mountaintop as she waited with Barak and his motley band of fighting men?

She was listening for a word from the LORD, and I think that word came in the rushing roar of a summertime flash flood, as a rainstorm caused a wall of water to surge down that canyon below them, engulfing those heavy iron monsters in a miry bog of water and mud.

So as the Israelites descended the mountain, all of Sisera’s men — including Sisera himself — jumped out of their chariots, off of their horses, dropped off their heavy armor and weaponry and ran for their lives. It was a complete rout!!

And then, of course, there is the wonderful, very gory footnote of this story — the detail that every Confirmation student just loves! Running in fear of his life from Barak and his men, Sisera caught sight of those Kenite tents. Now Heber has had a friendly relationship with Sisera’s boss, Jabin, and Sisera knows it. What he doesn’t seem to know is the long history of good relationship between the Kenites and the Israelites, going all the way back to Moses’ marriage to the daughter of Jethro, who was a Kenite.

Heber’s wife, Jael, stands outside her tent and offers Sisera hospitality as he runs toward them. “Have a rest,” she says. “How about some milk or yogurt?” she says. And the milk has its usual soporific effect and Sisera falls asleep, exhausted from his wild running retreat.

And then, Jael — amazing warrior that she turned out to be — took one of her hefty wooden tent pegs, and her handy-dandy wooden mallet, and she smashed that peg right through the man’s temple and into the ground beneath him.

End of Sisera. End of story.

But let’s notice how it is that God chose to do God’s work in this particular story for a few minutes. God brought deliverance to God’s people by assembling a surprising team of leaders. First and foremost, there was Deborah — who listened to God, who spoke for God to the people, who believed that God would do God’s part.

Deborah is like a brightly blazing torch, shining the light of God, the hope of God, the call of God, into the lives of the people God called her to lead. She spent time under that palm tree listening to God, listening to the people, reflecting on what God wanted, and, when asked, she also leapt into action, going with Barak and the troops to the mountaintop.

Without her, a willing instrument in God’s hands, there would be no story.

But there is also Barak. As I noted earlier, he gets a bit of a bad rap in both the story and the song. But the New Testament writer of Hebrews, chapter 11, lists him with some of the other judges rather than listing Deborah. What’s up with that?

Well, I think we can find ample evidence to support the argument that Barak had a measure of faith as well. Perhaps his was not as sure and steady as Deborah’s, but he was willing to trust her, to act on Deborah’s command without knowing what God was going to do to save the day, wasn’t he? I think that’s why he’s included in the roll call of heroes of faith in that chapter in Hebrews. Barak trusted Deborah’s relationship with God, and ultimately, he trusted Deborah’s God to get him through.

And then, of course, there is Jael. It’s tough to make a moral heroine out of a woman who uses subterfuge and violence to accomplish her goals, but she, too, is important to this whole tale. In a way, Jael did the dirty work. At least that’s how it appears to us, standing here in the 21st century. As followers of Jesus Christ, the Peace of God, it is hard for us to wrap our minds around the bloody violence of the Old Testament. Yet I find hope and encouragement even in this hard part of the story. For we, too, are warriors in a battle. And sometimes, the circumstances of the battlefield around us seem overwhelming.

Our children are sucked in by the values of this culture, and sometimes, so are we. We read the newspapers, listen to the news, try and balance the checkbooks, deal with aging and dying parents, or with rebellious and broken children, live with sadness and sorrow on every side. Sometimes it looks just plain overwhelming and hopeless.

The bad guys around us seem to have heavy-duty iron chariots and we’ve just got these pointy sticks!

And what can you do against the bad guys with a wooden stick and a mallet anyway?

Well, you can do a heckuva lot of damage! You can take the bad guy out of the picture entirely if you’re in line with God’s purposes for the battle, if you’re relying on God to ultimately snatch victory out of the jaws of defeat.

I have to tell you that for a long list of reasons this past week has been one of overwhelming circumstances for me. I can’t even tell you exactly why. We have dear friends in pain, parents living with loss, more work to do than can humanly be done, and I’ve been feeling more than a little bit hopeless about not finding enough people to do the work I think God is calling us to do right here, right now, at Montecito Covenant Church

But here’s the deal: I spend too much time looking at the hard stuff. Now that stuff is certainly real and I don’t want to make light of it in any way. But sometimes, looking at all of that tends to take my focus off the palm tree, that place where I can meet God, where I can talk and laugh and wonder with friends and co-workers, with the people who can speak God’s words of hope into my life.

There have been times in my life and ministry when I have been tapped by God to be a Deborah in the lives of others. I am humbled by that and grateful for those opportunities when they arise.

But this week, I needed a Deborah or two . . . or three or 14 or 15!

And here’s what happened: I showed up, 14 members of the Church Council showed up, and God showed up. It was a remarkable time. As we closed our time together on Friday night, we affirmed in one another some qualities of leadership we saw, using a list provided by our consultant as we move through this time of transition.

And we also asked for prayer for that one area where we each felt the weakest that night. One of us asked for more clarity and confidence; another asked for more compassion; I and several others asked for a greater degree of hopefulness as we continue together to provide leadership for this congregation.

I went home tired, feeling like the evening’s exercises had been good and helpful, but dreading another full day of group work when I had a sermon to write and a computer that had shut down.

As we began on Saturday, we were led in a time of sharing and prayer. And you know what? The woman who had asked for confidence and clarity, spoke with passion and great articulation about her faith in God, her faith in this process, her faith in this church. She lit a fire that morning that burned all day long. And a man, who had asked for compassion the night before, shared a wonderful story of family sharing and prayer that had broken through some barriers that night following our session.

Around the room we went and heard from one another exactly how God showed up! And I’ve got to tell you, at the end of the day, after listening and laughing and dreaming together, my own sense of hope was rekindled, big time.

So I’m here today to give testimony to the truth that overwhelming circumstances are God’s specialty! That if we show up, God will show up. In fact, God is already there,  waiting for us to catch a clue. My prayer for all of us this day is that we would meet God meeting us in the midst of whatever overwhelming circumstances we are facing. That we might cry with the psalmist, “That some boast in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD!” That we might learn to write and sing our own songs of victory, just as the Israelites wrote a song to celebrate Deborah and Barak and Jael.

Wherever you are this morning, whether you’re in need of a Deborah, or you’re equipped to be a Deborah; whether you’re needing or offering strong words of encouragement from the LORD; whether you’re more like Barak, looking for a partner in the LORD to face the battle together; or even if your circumstances are more like Jael’s, calling for a firm, clear stand against evil in order for the victory to be won. . . wherever you are this morning, I urge you to lift your eyes from the circumstances that surround you and to ‘call on the name of the LORD,’ and then to listen for the word of the LORD — in the pages of scripture, as God speaks to your heart in prayer, or as God speaks to you through the words of a fellow believer — and then to act on what you hear.

Look beyond the circumstances;
call on the name of the LORD;
listen to the word of the LORD;
act in confidence that the LORD will bring the victory. Amen.

Filed Under: biblical reflection, biblical studies, community, Encouragement, God's gifts, hope, ministry, preaching, Sermons/Homilies, Uncategorized

Foggy Morning: Ruminations & Photographs

June 17, 2013 By

I spent Thursday morning at the Goleta Slough last week,
and I spoke into my phone as I sat there.
This is the transcript of that speaking. (Pretty much!)
I’m thinking this was an artist’s playdate of sorts. . . 

Cormorants, beautiful black and sleek, yet they wreak such havoc.
The trees above these birds are sticks now.
Ashen, dead.


I sit, staring.
The tide ebbs and flows, the horizon fades away.
An occasional gull, tern, cormorant, or duck flies by.
I can hear the chatter of children far down the beach.

And the, low  guttural tones of the men who drive these weary motorhomes.
What must it be like to live like this, day after day?
Chatting in the parking lot, slugging back a six pack.
Suddenly a dolphin surfaces very close by.
Oh, have I ever told you how these creatures speak to me of God?
I see he has a companion.
Somehow life is better with a swimming partner.

Summer must truly be here, a lifeguard walks by,
carrying his bright orange rescue pad.

Summer in Santa Barbara is often gray,
as the heat from the central valley of California rises,
it sucks the fog up to the beach along the central coast.
But today, instead of feeling suffocating, this cool, moist blanket is soothing.

My husband is flying to Chicago, once again attending meetings.
He gets so nervous before he travels, and so do I.
Neither one of us likes to travel alone anymore;
I’m not sure we ever did.
We have surely done it often enough,
and once we arrive at our destination, most worries dissipate.
But travel days are hard — and the days leading up to travel days.

47 years is a very long time.
We’ve had adventures, raised children, cared for grandchildren,
moved several times, each dealt with the stresses of our own individual careers.
And we’ve done all of it together, growing up together,
growing into marriage together.
So separation is both good and hard.
It’s good for us to remember that we are separate.
Each of us is an individual, with different gifts and interests,
and those gifts and interests need nourishment,
encouragement, outlet.

Yes, we still need
to do those things which nurture us as people as well as a couple.
But the other reality is this one: everything else in life is better together.

I just saw a plane take off in my rearview mirror, perhaps it was his.
He flies first to San Francisco, then on to Chicago.
Meetings all day tomorrow, half a day Saturday, then home again Saturday night.


I look forward to his return, but I also look forward to some space and time alone.
Taking an hour to sit and stare at the ocean is something
I find more difficult to do when I know my husband is at home.
Why is that, I wonder?

I think I still carry a lot of baggage from my early life.
I still hear the voice of my mother in my head,
the one reminding me to be ever present and careful,
to look out always for my husband’s interests above my own.

I have come around intellectually and on some emotional level to the belief that
each of our interests and gifts are important,
that decisions are made mutually,
that God’s call is unique to each one of us
as well as unique to our marriage relationship.

But I still hear my mother’s anxious questions.
“Does Dick think this is okay?”
“Are you keeping your husband happy?”
And I still remember, clear as a bell,
her words about one of her very best friends,
after her husband betrayed her with a member of his congregation
and left their marriage.
I still remember these words:
“If only she had taken better care of herself.
If only she weren’t so smart.
If only she had kept all that intelligence in check.”

It makes me physically sick to write those words.
Yet this is what my mother believed, and this is what she raised me to believe.
How sad is that?

The cars are starting to pull into the lot now –
it’s a summer day at the beach.
People will be here in droves.

My clue that time is up.
What will this day bring next?

It brought a lot of loveliness and a fair amount of pain, actually. Leisurely shopping for the first time in ages; lunch out, every bite delicious, while reading a favorite author on my Kindle; time at the beach at the other end of town as the sun was setting. Unfortunately, on my walk there, my ‘bad’ knee acted up fiercely, requiring a trip to urgent care the next day. Three x-rays and 1 shot of cortisone later, I am much better. Undoubtedly, this relaxing day helped to move that recovery along.

Joining this with Laura, Michelle, Jen and Ann:



Filed Under: Beauty, God's gifts, Marriage, memoir, personal journey, Photo Essay, photography, Santa Barbara, Uncategorized, Writing

Midweek Service: What Are You Afraid Of?

June 11, 2013 By

Continuing a summer series of sermons, posting them on Wednesdays to honor
a tradition of midweek services, long since gone.
This one was preached in the summertime about six years ago
and it is one of my favorites. Every sermon I’ve ever preached
has been preached to me first — and this one hit me where I live.
I am so grateful for a strong, healthy, loving Savior,
who is bigger than my fears and refuses to be categorized as ‘nice.’

What Are You Afraid Of?
Luke 8:26-39
by Diana R.G. Trautwein
A sermon preached at Montecito Covenant Church
June 24, 2007

Things that go bump in the night.  Scary stories or movies.  Invaders who do harm to hearth and home.  Kidnappers, car-jackers, rapists or mercenaries.  Cancer, heart disease, multiple sclerosis.  The list of things that frighten us sometimes seems endless, don’t you think?  There is something to be frightened about on the news or in the papers every single minute of every single day; there are hard and horrible things happening in our neighborhoods, around the corner, across the street.  Scary stuff happens to our friends, our families, even to us.

Honestly, it is a wonder that we ever leave our homes at all – except for all the scary things in that place!  Spiders in the corner, bathtubs to drown in, showers to slip in, steps to fall down, windows to be broken into, doors to be jimmied….there are days when it feels like they’re (whoever ‘they’ may be) out to get us!  Days when the onslaught of dangerous forces from without makes us want to curl into a fetal position and stay under the blankets all day long.

You think I’m exaggerating – and perhaps I am.  But here’s something I know to be true and not an exaggeration at all.  If you think the stuff that’s outside of us is really, truly scary: just wait ‘til you take a good, long look at the stuff that’s inside of us – that stuff can shiver your timbers, and send you scuttling back to bed for good.

That is, if we’re brave enough to take more than a peek at what’s in there.  Most of the time, it’s easier, and much, much safer, to look to the outside of us . . . and then get to work and build up those walls of resistance, dream up those plans for escape, invest in those security systems, add that extra alarm to our car, buy more insurance for our possessions. The inside of us is much harder to manage, much more difficult to protect, much more terrifying to examine.

There is a series of stories that have come down to us from the 13th century about a fabled wise fool named Nasrudin.  One of my favorites is this one, and I found it in this great little book titled, The Gift of Being Yourself: The Sacred Call to Self-Discovery, written by Dr. David Benner :

 “Nasrudin – the protagonist of many Middle Eastern, Greek and Russian folktales – was approaching the door of his house one night when he suddenly realized he had lost his key.  He tried to look around for it, but the night was so dark he could hardly see the ground.  So he got down on his hands and knees and examined the ground where he was standing.  But it was still too dark to see anything. Moving back toward a street-lamp, he again got down and began a meticulous examination of the area.

        “A friend came by and, noticing him, asked what he was doing.  Nasrudin replied, “I       lost my key and am looking for it.”  So the friend too got down on his hands and knees and began to search.

       “’After a while, the friend asked,  ‘Do you remember where you might have lost the key?’   “’Certainly,” answered Nasrudin.  ‘I lost it in my house.’   ‘’They why are you looking for it out here?’ Because,” answered Nasrudin, “the light is so much better here.””

It’s so much easier to look outside for things, and then try to arm ourselves against all the scary, hard stuff in life that comes at us from ‘out there,’ than it is to look inside, to examine the tough, scary truth about ourselves, as we really are, and by God’s grace and through his powerful word of authority, become who we can be.  It’s that internal look, that interior examination, that wrestling with the demons within that can make the difference between a life that’s lived in fear and denial and a life that’s lived in power and hope.

Our gospel story for today outlines this powerful truth in some interesting and thought-provoking ways.  Will you hear the word of the Lord as it is recorded for us in the gospel of Luke, chapter 8, verses 26-39:

They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the lake from Galilee. When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town. For a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!” For Jesus had commanded the evil spirit to come out of the man. Many times it had seized him, and though he was chained hand and foot and kept under guard, he had broken his chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places.

       Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”

    “Legion,” he replied, because many demons had gone into him. And they begged Jesus repeatedly not to order them to go into the Abyss.

    A large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. The demons begged Jesus to let them go into the pigs, and he gave them permission. When the demons came out of the man, they went into the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

    When those tending the pigs saw what had happened, they ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone out, sitting at Jesus’ feet, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. Those who had seen it told the people how the demon-possessed man had been cured. Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he got into the boat and left.

    The man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.

Oh my, what a story.  It comes second in a series of four stories in Luke’s gospel, four stories which tell us about the authority and power which Jesus had in several different realms of human existence.  It directlyfollowsthe story of Jesus calming the stormy sea, simply by the power of his word.  It comes justbeforetwo interwoven miracle stories – one illustrating Jesus’ power to heal chronic illness and one illustrating Jesus’ power over death itself.

In this story, Jesus has just calmed the chaos of the storm, thereby taming the beasts in the natural, created world, and now he proceeds to calm the chaos in this strange, wild, frightening beast of a man who wanders the tombs.

The presence of the swine in this story tells us that Jesus and his band of followers have entered Gentile territory; they’ve crossed the Sea of Galilee and entered a new and different place, only to be immediately accosted by a man described as demon-possessed.

We can’t even begin to understand all the layers of meaning implicit in the use of the word ‘demons’ in this story about Jesus and his word of authority.  21st century westerners are uncomfortable with the idea of evil forces inhabiting human persons.  Many, if not most, people walking the streets of Santa Barbara this morning would deny their existence outright.  Yet missionaries who carry the gospel to less sophisticated cultures than our own, tell stories that sound a whole lot like this one.  Perhaps what one commentator said is true, “Satan has less need to manifest himself openly in a culture that denies his existence.”

Yet despite our own culture’s struggle with the idea of Satan or the devil or his demons, no one living in the here and now can deny the existence of evil in our world and in ourselves.  A great old southern preacher named Fred Craddock says, “All names of the enemies have been changed but the battle still rages.” And while we may not know too much about the kind of demon possession that is pictured here, we certainly know about our own personal demons.  Those things that cripple us and trip us up, big-time.  Those addictions and behaviors and thought processes and reactions that hold us captive, that keep us wandering in the tombs, lonely and frightened and disconnected from our best selves, disconnected from God.

A look at just a few recent news headlines reminds us of this truth:

Last week, police around the world arrested hundreds of people involved in the internet trafficking of child pornography.  31 children – so far – have been released from captivity, some of them involved in horrific, sexual abuse, shown world wide through live video streaming.

Over 6 million Americans aged 12 and over have used crack cocaine at least once in their lives.

5 percent of high school students have used crystal meth.

A US Dept of Health and Human Services bulletin from January of last year, showed that 11% of 8th graders, 22% of 10th graders and 29% of high school seniors had done intense, heavy, binge drinking within the two weeks prior to the survey being taken.  Now, consuming large amounts of alcohol at any age is dangerous, but it is especially calamitous for adolescent brains, causing permanent damage and leading to a lifetime of risky, dangerous behavior patterns.

Every one of these terrifying statistics has at its base the reality of demons within. Because we live in the computer age, we can cover up the mess in there a tad better than the Gerasene man was able to do.  The pedophilia ring that was broken up last week named it’s website “Kids: the Light of Our Lives,” for heaven’s sake.

No, most of our ‘demons’ don’t cause us to wander the cemeteries without our clothes on, yelling at the top of our lungs.

Yet the truth is that every one of us in this room deals with now, or has dealt with at some point in the past, our own particular and unique set of demons.  We each have our shadow side, those areas of pain and difficulty that need to be named and then opened to the healing power of Jesus so that we, too, might become those who are, ‘clothed and in our right minds, sitting at the feet of the Lord.’

Please hear this wonderful truth, however: whatever it is that you’re dealing with inside, it is not outside the reach of Jesus’ authority to resolve.

Look at what happens in our story.  Jesus sails into foreign territory, and makes it his own.  He remains completely calm and unflappable throughout his confrontation with the demon-possessed man, never raising his voice, never saying or doing violence of any kind.  He immediately takes charge of this chaotic and chronic situation, commanding the evil forces to leave the man alone.  Those forces recognize the authority of Jesus, calling him “Son of the Most High God,” and begging for mercy. Jesus calls the demon by name and exercises complete authority over it.  In an almost humorous turn of events, Jesus agrees with the demons to send them into the nearby herd of pigs (one unclean thing into another, I guess!), clearly not allowing them to dictate their ultimate destination.  They end up in the abyss, despite their pleas to the contrary.

Jesus is in charge, from beginning to end, and his authority over the evil that dwells inside of us human creatures is complete and sure.

The man himself is able to witness the resolution of his long-term suffering and imprisonment – he can see those pigs running right off the cliff into the water, and he knows that his healing from the inside out has been accomplished.  He literally becomes a new man.  Discovered by the frightened townspeople to be – not a raving madman, haunting the lonely, desolate places outside of town – but a disciple – (the language of ‘sitting at Jesus’ feet’ is a dead giveaway to his new status) – now they find a learner, a quiet, calm, clear-headed, fully clothed, fully released, God-possessed human being.

Wow!  Time to bring out the fatted calf, right?  The people in the town must have wanted to have a big, old party, don’t you think?

Well . . . not exactly.

Apparently, the evil they knew was far less frightening to them than the power they didn’t know.  So their primary response to this strange Jewish man from the other side of the lake is one of fear, perhaps, even of terror.  Because the authority of Jesus is a very scary thing.  When Jesus comes on the scene, he shakes things up.  He rattles the cage, he upsets the status quo, he does startling things, he can’t be tamed, or put in a box, or sent to the tombs to wander around alone.

Too much modern Christianity forgets this truth.  We’ve tried pretty hard to make Jesus a really nice guy, with a nice smile and great hair. He loves little kids (and indeed, he does), he hunts for little lost lambs (and indeed, he does), he tells quaint stories, he helps people out a lot, he’s just a really great guy, you know?

Look again.  This is one gutsy guy, not intimidated by the crazy man wandering around naked in the graveyard.  This is a guy who talks right back to the demons, who clearly is in charge here, who is willing to do a daring and economically threatening thing like destroy an entire herd of pigs to salvage one human life.  This is a demanding guy, who tells the newly re-born Gerasene that, no, he cannot leave his home and follow him.  Rather, this new disciple must stay put and be a witness in his own hometown. He must tell the story of what God has done for him – he must go back to the town from which he had been ejected and isolated, back to the people who were even more frightened by the dramatic change in his demeanor and behavior than they were by his previous lunacy, back to the very ones who wanted him kept at a safe distance, outside the city gates.  And he must tell them of freedom and of healing and of God’s power.

These are not the responses, these are not the actions, these are not the words of a “really nice guy,” a really “great guy.”  Maybe this air-brushing we do so easily and so frequently is one of the ways in which we, too, ask Jesus to leave, to get away from us, because we cannot understand his power, we cannot accept his authority.  We domesticate him right out of the picture.  Dorothy Sayers, British writer and theologian from the early 20th century, put it this way:

“The people who hanged Christ…never accused him of being a bore. On the contrary, they thought him too dynamic to be safe. It has been left for later generations to muffle up the shadowing personality and surround him with an atmosphere of tedium. We have very efficiently pared the claws of the lion of Judea, certified him ‘meek and mild,’ and recommended him as a fitting household pet for pale curates and pious old ladies.”

May God forgive us for trying to smooth off the brave, outrageous edges of our magnificent Savior!

If we are to face our own demons, we need Someone who is strong and unflappable, One who is centered and authoritative, a Friend to stand with us, to go before us, to show us the truth about ourselves, to name that demon within and to tell it, in no uncertain terms, exactly where it can go!

Jesus is that Friend.  Thanks be to God.

 

Let us pray:

Holy God, Brave Savior, Powerful Holy Spirit,

Oh, how we thank you for this story.  For the clear evidence of your deep desire for our wholeness, for the word of authority that only you can speak to the demons within.  They have lots of names, Lord, and sometimes we’re too frightened or too proud to acknowledge their presence.  Deep and dark sexual fantasies, addictions to alcohol, or pornography, or drugs, or food, or shopping, or gambling.  An untamed tongue that too often flares in anger, or cuts in criticism, a spirit of despair that feels increasingly familiar and comfortable, an unwillingness to extend ourselves in your name to people we find scary or odd, a spirit of lethargy or apathy that keeps us at a distance from people or projects that would bring us good and build your kingdom, a debilitating shyness that inhibits our ability to offer that cup of cold water, a refusal to think of those from other cultures or other races as creatures also made in your image.

You know us better than we know ourselves, Lord.  Show us what we need to name.  By your grace, enable us to release authority over our demons to you, embolden us to ask for help, if we need it – medical or psychological or recovery help – all of them instruments of your healing power – then continue to heal us from the lingering aftereffects not only of our own demons, but also of the denial, of the wrong behavior, of the wrong choices that such demons produce in us. Then we will gladly bear witness to all that you have done for us, O Lord, because of Jesus, in whose name we pray, Amen.

 

 

Filed Under: biblical reflection, biblical study, community, Encouragement, ministry, preaching, Public Prayers, Sermons/Homilies, The Church, Uncategorized, Words

The Gift of Travel — Part 8: The Czech Republic — A Photo Essay

June 9, 2013 By

Somewhere soon after leaving Bad Spandau, we crossed the border to
The Czech Republic, heading for the small town of Litomerice.
This post will feature that town and our introduction to Prague,
after we left the ship.
We are so grateful that we opted for the 3-day extension,
because if our only impression of that great city had been based
on the one day connected to the cruise . . .
well, I’ll let you be the judge if that was the best impression
to be had from Prague!

You can find all the parts of this series
by clicking on the links below:

Part 1 is here,
part 2 here,
part 3 on this line,
part 4 will be found here,
part 5 clicks over from here,
part 6 from here,
and part 7 . . . well, it’s right here. 

It rained most of that morning, so we stayed in and watched the water sliding
down the window.
We also visited several locks for the first time on this river.
Those are interesting but sometimes tedious,
as you wait for the boat to rise or fall.

It is necessary to vacate your room sometime in the morning to
allow the housekeeping staff to come in and straighten
things, replace your towels as needed,
and leave you humorous small gifts on your bed.

Just as we arrived in Litomerice, the clouds parted,
and we were able to walk all around this interesting Czech town.
First up the hill to the church.

Another passenger told us that she had read that about 65% of the country is atheist.
That was a stunning number to hear!
But as I watched this tour guide, and the one in Prague,
treat the churches we visited with a certain amount of
dismissive disdain, I could believe it.
I wonder what the difference is between this land
and a place like Poland, where nearly 100% of the people coming
out from under the yoke of Communism are pretty devout Catholics.
I’m thinking it must have something to do with the
vibrancy of the church at the time of occupation,
but who knows?

You know, these fancy pulpits are beautiful to look at,
but I cannot imagine preaching from one!
So separated from the congregation, and usually high above them.
That says a lot of things I’m not very comfortable with.

These beautiful peonies graced a side altar.
I loved the way they caught the sunlight.

Next, the town square. When my son looked at these pictures,
he immediately said, “You can tell you’re in the Czech Republic, can’t you, Mom?
See how different the spires are? They have those fine, pointed edges.”

I hadn’t really noticed. But now I see it in all these pictures!

Tours are really helpful in lots of ways.
Except for this one: having to stay connected to a group of
people when you really want to duck down a side street on your own.
Most of the time, we were quite content,
because the guides were excellent and we wanted to
learn from them.
But once in a while, that old rebellious nature of mine shows up.

I appreciated the fact that the Czechs themselves
erected this monument to a poet they loved.
Not a military leader (as all the Communist statues note), but a poet.
I like that.

Paintings and small sculptures above the doors
were the original house addresses in about the 18th century.

The clouds really celebrated our view for us, didn’t they?

I loved this zigzag staircase.

And this silvery tree in the park with the view.

And this goofy granddad on the horsey, too.

Next stop — not  a favorite: beer-tasting.
The Czechs love their home-grown beer,
and this rustic restaurant housed a micro-brewery.

They provided a tray of condiments and snacks,
and samples of 3 kinds of beer.
I believe they’re called pilsners rather than ales.
I took a Coke light, Dick sampled (barely) and I tasted.
I never learned to like anything alcoholic,
though I’ve tasted a few wines that almost made me a believer.
But it was fun to see this cellar and the
equipment that produces the beverages.

Back to the ship to rest and change for our last dinner aboard.

The entire crew was out to meet us as we went down to the dining room.
They did such a superb job of caring for all 107 of us.

The place settings were even more elegant than usual,
and the menu?
FAB.

Our table-mates were from the Coventry area of Britain —
almost half the passengers came from the British Isles.

The pastry chef was a red-headed German young man who was about 22.
And he just outdid himself every single day.
This platter was the post-dessert dessert.
STUFFED.

The next morning, I said farewell to my lovely rose,
which had lasted beautifully all week long,
and we hopscotched our way around the luggage
outside the doors.
All of it was loaded onto the busses and unloaded
into the hotel rooms by others.
This is a very nice feature of tours.
Very nice, indeed.

And we boarded the busses for the 40 minute drive from the Elbe River to the Moldau (in German) and the Hilton Hotel just above it.

Czech completely defeats me!

Good-bye, boat. Good-bye, Elbe.

Hello, Hilton.

Our rooms would not be ready for several hours,
so we had a brief break and climbed back on the busses
for a tour of Prague.

Slight problem.
It was the hottest day of the year so far — mid-80’s —
and everyone in the entire city decided to be out and about
to enjoy the beauty of the day.
Yowza, it was crowded!!

We drove across the river and up the hill to the palace/castle
(pictures of that place to come in the final couple of posts).
They have guards at every gate of the palace area, and they change on the hour,
with a whole big changing of the guard ceremony at noon.

So, imagine you’re in a group of about 40 amidst this throng,
and you’re trying to keep up with your guide,
who is in a very big hurry to keep to a certain timetable,
and you’d like to try and take a few pictures along the way.
Well, it wasn’t easy.

I did manage to get a few exteriors of St. Vitus’s Cathedral — enough to know I wanted to come back to this place — but she literally led us in one door and out the other.
I was lucky to get even one inside shot this day.

The photo series above was taken from the ‘golden side’ of the church.
Perhaps you can see why.
And it was here that we saw the most interesting tour group of the entire trip so far,
these travelers from Bavaria.

Apparently they keep cameras in those lederhosen and dirndls.
Who knew??

Everywhere, PEOPLE.

Trying to see the noon changing of the guard. Not terribly successful.

But I did manage to get this wrought iron and gilt detail.

We found a vantage point and shot a few city views.
But the heat caused quite a significant haze and it was tough to see much.

Next stop, the river.
We walked along the side of it for awhile, and through a lovely park to
get to the most famous bridge of all, the Charles.

Unfortunately, that place was the most crowded yet!
We were set loose to find lunch and then meet at the gate to the bridge.
Unfortunately, we had no Czech money yet,
but were assured that most people would accept euros or dollars or
credit cards, so we chose a delightful garden restaurant,
sat down, ordered and then thought to ask —
no, actually, they did not take anything but Czech crowns.
So we went to McDonald’s and split a burger.
And it was quite good.

The beautiful manhole covers continued across the border.

I thought it was sweet that this real baby wanted to pat the sculpted one,
part of a larger exhibit making a statement about the
dangers of technology.
Not sure I buy that warning —
babies will always be babies.

Thank God.

We saw small numbers of these padlocks on fence rails in other cities,
but this place took the cake!
An engaged couple puts one on to mark their engagement
and secure their eternal connection.
Cities are learning that it is cheaper to replace the entire
section of wrought iron than to manually remove all those locks.

This troll figure picture was shot through the rails of the padlock fence.
Apparently, trolls are big in Czech fairy tales.

This is the Beatles’ wall, where young Czech dissidents would write out lyrics from Beatles’ songs as a means of protest against the Communists.
Just standing near this wall could get you arrested in the good old days.

The garden we almost ate lunch in.

The entrance to the Charles Bridge.

And the street just behind the entrance. The MacDonald’s was at the top of this street.

I lifted my camera above my head to try and get a couple of pictures of the bridge without
hordes of people in the shot.

Next we walked across to the old town where we waited
for a particular clock to chime — supposedly the 12 apostles come out on the hour.

It was a lovely clock, but the apostles?
They were tough to see in the side windows.
Not sure it was worth standing in the heat,
but what the heck?
I preferred this view of the town hall towers across from the clock. 

I have looked at this picture about 10 times since I took it,
and it wasn’t until I posted it here that I noticed that the brickwork
pattern is different in each tower.
Go figure. 

The last part of our walk took us by this street vendor.
People stood at nearby tall tables, wolfing down chunks of this stuff.

The synagogue in the Jewish quarter — still in use, I believe.

And more pictures of Prague and
a final post about leaving Europe and returning home still to come.

Filed Under: Beauty, Church, Encouragement, Eric, Family/Travel, Fun, God's gifts, memoir, personal journey, Photo Essay, photography, Travel, Uncategorized

The Gift of Travel – Part 5: Cruising to Dresden — A Photo Essay

June 7, 2013 By

So . . . already, I cannot keep it to the number I had hoped.
We saw so.much.goodness.
(More likely, I took too.many.pictures.)
So, this post will be about getting to and enjoying Meissen.
The next one will be about Dresden.
Then on to Saxon Switzerland (a national park, not a country),
and probably two posts on the Czech Republic, especially Prague.

You can find Part 1 here,
Part 2 here,
Part 3 here,
and Part 4 here. 

After our immersion in Reformation history, we cruised all morning the next day
to the city of Meissen, which houses the famous porcelain manufacturing company.
The first couple of dozen pictures were shot during that lovely,
relaxing time on the water — pictures of farmland,
changing topography, small villages,
animals, people on bicycles. . . just the ordinary stuff of daily life,
but somehow, as seen from the deck of a river boat,
things of extraordinary, often breath-taking beauty.
I think that — above and beyond the riches of history, the extravagance of
rulers past, the lure of museum treasures —
the richest kind of gift from this experience is this one:
the extraordinary ordinary,
the downright deliciousness of dailyness.

At last, a stork in the nest!
You have  undoubtedly noticed that the terrain is beginning to change:
sloping hillsides, rocky cliffs here and there,
vineyards and more villages.
This whole stretch was so very lovely.

 A bicycle and walking path paralleled the river for miles and miles.

Just before lunch, we drew near to Meissen, a city almost completely unharmed
in WWII. It’s majestic castle/fortress loomed over
the entire harbor area and seemed to beg for pictures
from every conceivable angle.

 The waterfront area was charming and we docked very near this row of houses.

Boarded our busses and proceeded first to the Meissen plant,
which is in the heart of the town and employs over 600 people.
Our guide was a remarkable woman of about 60.
She had grown up in Communist Eastern Europe
and her family was known to be Catholic.
She was humiliated in school, made to stand in front of the class,
and later, despite being an excellent student,
was denied access to the finer colleges.
She once held a ‘job’ at Meissen that had no function.
For eight hours a day for FOUR YEARS,
she went to work and had nothing to do.
That right there is its own kind of hell.

This is the Meissen insignia
and if you’re blessed to own any of their fine porcelain ware,
you’ll find it somewhere on each piece.

As we entered the ‘manufaktur,’ as the locals call it, these charming girls
were just getting out of school.
Loved the pink socks.

I have to tell  you that I could not afford anything from the seconds table,
much less something from this boutique.
Yikes.

 The tour did help me to understand what goes into making this lovely stuff,
and that helps me (a little) with the pricing.
We moved from room to room,
each artist had a box with audio tapes in various languages.
With a push of a button, music and narration began,
and each one did his or her part in the ‘assembly line.’

First the basic shapes are formed on a wheel.

Then the finer details are made by hand and prepared for the first firing.

 The first layer of paint goes on at this point.
And then I think they’re fired again.

This woman adds another layer of color and a finish and the pieces
are fired for the last time.

I would love to have seen one of those ovens, but that was not part of the tour. :>)

 There was a small museum, which contained
this organ, whose pipes are made of porcelain;

this gorgeous urn, which was about two feet tall;

these delicate figurines, which were my favorites;

and a special exhibit of a variety of flower arrangements. . .
made entirely from porcelain.
Loved looking at them — but would not care for the maintenance one bit.

We chose an optional walking tour up to the fortress complex and loved
the views and the general feel of this lovely small city.

Even the manhole covers are beautiful.

This right here? This is why my knees still ache!
(All the stairs everywhere plus the cobblestones make for one miserable
arthritic, I’ll tell you.)

We thoroughly enjoyed our tour of this town and came back to the
boat almost reluctantly.
But soon, the quietness of the river did its magic,
and we tucked in for our time in Dresden the next day.

Entering the city of Dresden, going under a low bridge just as a tram crossed over the top of it. Yes, we’re into a much bigger city now.
More adventures to come!

Filed Under: Beauty, Birds, Encouragement, Family/Travel, God's gifts, memoir, personal journey, Photo Essay, photography, Travel, Uncategorized

The Gift of Travel – Part 4 – Worlitz, Wittenberg & Torgau: A Photo Essay

June 7, 2013 By

Get ready to ‘set a spell,’ ’cause there are a whole lot of photos with this one.
You can find Part 1 here,
Part 2 here,
and Part 3 here. 

In the wee hours of the morning, we docked in a small town called Dessau, disembarked after breakfast and headed out to one of the most beautiful places we’ve seen in Europe.
It is the largest ‘English-style’ garden on the continent,
designed in the late 18th century to be more expansive and less formal
than earlier baroque gardens.
(We took a peek at the rooftop deck on the Schumann and were favorably impressed.
However, we had to wait until later in the week for the weather to warm up a bit
before enjoying its comforts.)

Our three busses (we were almost always on Bus “C”)
took us into the town and we briefly explored the
churchyard and small restaurant which border the garden.
Turns out we were waiting to board another boat,
but a very different kind.
Called gondolas, they seat about 15 people
and are rowed around the large lake that makes up most
of the Worlitz Garden area.
Our rower was maybe 15 years old,
wiry and small but very strong.
He spoke not one word of English,
so we smiled a lot.

English country gardens feature buildings, bridges and small structures and statues
rather than formal hedges and planted borders.

And this one was just glorious.
They had recently had a special fund-raiser of some kind
and several thousand people set out blankets all over the lawns
for a magnificent concert on the water
(the musicians were in the boats) and a fireworks show.
Must have been something!

It was an idyllic hour, very quiet . . . except for the occasional raucous
sounds coming from this guy, as he tried to woo the hen to the right.
Wow, those peacocks are gorgeous to look at,
but TERRIBLE to listen to.

We stopped for a cup of hot chocolate on our way back to the bus, enjoying
this clematis vine on the restaurant wall.

Time for lunch and setting sail once again.
We arrived in Wittenberg very late in the day,
and enjoyed an excellent lecture by our program director Radim
about the importance of Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation
to the history of Europe, and indeed, the world.
This was the part of the trip we had both looked forward to the most!

We loved the town, but struggled with our guide’s poor command of English,
the first time that has ever happened on a Viking trip.
Fortunately, almost everything she tried to tell us,
our Director had already described!

Storks are a sign of spring and good luck in many parts of Europe.
This nest was empty.

It was a cold, damp morning and we were grateful that this was a walking tour —
it warmed us right up.
The town of Wittenberg is small and charming, even though chunks of it
are undergoing renovation and construction.

This is the monastery in which Luther lived and worked
before he tacked those 95 theses onto the church door.
It is also the house where he and his wife later raised their family.
It is now a museum.
2017 will mark the 500th anniversary of this major event,
and that is why the town is undergoing renovation and construction everywhere.

Katherine (Kate or Katje) Luther, a former nun whom Luther married, loved
and partnered with for over 20 years.

Luther’s primary preaching pulpit — even though he was short,
it was so small that he had to kneel to preach from it.

The back door to Luther’s primary lecture hall, shown below.
And yes, students stood for most lectures.

 An early edition of the Augsburg Confession.

A favorite Luther quote, one that I sent to The High Calling
because of how very well it fits their mission and ministry.

The sun began to shine through the clouds and we enjoyed walking down the main street of this lovely, small town. Both the preaching church at the top of the street
and the monastery church at the bottom were under renovation
and couldn’t really be seen very well.
The one at the bottom is where Luther (or a student of his)
tacked up those theses.

You can probably spot our tour guide with her ‘lollipop’ in the picture below.

The famous doors, snapped in a hurry
when the construction gate was momentarily opened.

And then we were sailing once again, as the sun began to set.
We pulled into the neighboring town of Torgau just before dinner
and took an evening walk-thru.
This is the town where Luther died and Katie had a restaurant for a while.
It was fun to see in the moonlight.

And then it was back to our moveable hotel for a delicious night’s rest on the water.


Next Installment — Meissen & Dresden. And I think there will be an extra cruise post, bringing the total to 8 (I hope!).

Filed Under: Beauty, Family/Travel, God's gifts, memoir, personal journey, Photo Essay, photography, Travel, Uncategorized

The Gift of Travel – Part 3 – Getting to the Boat

June 7, 2013 By

Sunday morning, May 12th, we boarded one of three buses to begin
the trip to the Clara Schumann — the river boat that would be our
home-away-from-home for the next week.
We stopped at this bridge, a meeting point during
the cold war, for spy exchanges.

 It was a beautiful location, there on the outskirts of Potsdam, a place
which has become a vacation spot for many Berliners.

Just outside the city is the home that Frederick the Great built for himself.
His wife lived elsewhere.
They had no children.
Are you surprised?

The palace is small as palaces go — 12 rooms — but the grounds are stunning.

He named it “Sans Souci,” ‘no worries’ – I think he and Bobby McFerrin
would have gotten along well, don’t you?

Next stop – lunch. Released from the bus for 75 minutes, we first explored
the church next to the bus parking lot and then we found our
way to a charming outdoor cafe in the Dutch quarter of town,
enjoying tuna salad and the view.

 

 Lovely shared gardens carved right out of the sidewalk on some streets,
and a delightful floral border at the city park,
which also housed a cemetery where all inscriptions were in Russian.

Next stop, the gorgeous Tudor styled ‘palace’ and grounds
where the Potsdam agreement was signed.
The guide was so intent on giving us as much info
as possible, that we stood in a driving rain
outside this place, listening hard.
Don’t think I can recall a single detail,
except that half of Europe ended up with Stalin.


Driving to our final destination — our ship! — we passed through
the first of many, MANY fields of this stuff.
It’s called rape seed and its ground up with a few other things
to produce canola oil and — get this — ethanol, at least in Europe.
Never noticed any vehicles reeking of veggie oil, however.

At last, the Elegant Elbe was in view — and the Schumann.

Our luggage had already been delivered to our room,
and we gathered for what would be a daily briefing
about the next day’s travels.
Then we had the most sumptuous welcome dinner,
complete with roses for Mother’s Day
and a 50th Anniversary celebration for our tablemates.
We began to move on the river just as dinner began,
and we remembered why we love this mode of travel so much.
These boats move slowly but steadily and
the landscape is always lovely to see —
even if it’s only the water, a bridge or two, and acres of flat farmland.

At the end of the day, we headed
to bed in our tiny, tiny, but oh-so-welcome room.



Next installment: Worlitz Garden and Wittenberg.

Filed Under: Beauty, Encouragement, Family/Travel, God's gifts, Marriage, personal journey, Photo Essay, photography, Travel, Uncategorized
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