poverty

Meaning of the Crucifixion

Evangelism, Food, generosity, Healing, Holy Spirit, Icons, Imagination, Love, Meditation, Ministry, ministry, mystery, poverty, purpose, purpose, salvation, Spirituality, Stations of the Cross, Strength, Uncategorized, vision

Most of us have grown up on the teaching that Jesus is “The Lamb that takes away the sins of the world,” this is known as the Substitution or Atonement of Christ. He is the sacrifice instead of us, that sets us free from the bondage to sin and death.    

What if instead, Jesus were “The Bread of Life?” If he were the ancient scythe harvesting the weeds from our fields so that our grains could grow strong and provide us with the food for our rolls, our muffins, our flat breads and our pizzas, then he would be our provider of nourishment and strength. 

He would be feeding us, making us stronger day by day and building us up to be protectors of the weak, the needy, and the defeated of this world. If we hold to the substitution theory, we stay on the weak position always. 

We will always need God, for it is in Christ that we have our victories. As Romans 8:37 reads, “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

Because we have the victories, we are called to go out in power to defend the cause of the marginalized, the ones who have not found the power of God for themselves. We aren’t given this power to build our own mansions, enlarge our own kingdoms, or build up our own wealth.  

God gives us this victory to secure food for the hungry, shelter for the homeless, and care for the lonely. When we meet their needs, we meet the needs of the Christ who said, 

“This is my body broken for you.”

More Power: Thoughts on the Spiritually of A Found Object Icon

Creativity, Fear, generosity, Healing, Health, Holy Spirit, home, Icons, Imagination, Love, Mental Illness, Ministry, ministry, mystery, poverty, Prayer, purpose, renewal, salvation, Spirituality, Strength, Travel, Uncategorized, vision, Work

I should never begin working with power tools without caffeine. Having said this, I’m glad to report that I still have all the fingers on each hand and no body parts remain glued to a flat surface, unlike Tim “The Tool Man” Allen. My only error was to put my battery pack backwards into the charging unit. This meant I needed an extra hand to help me pull it loose. God provides, for my young neighbor was handy to pull the charger away while I held the battery’s release mechanism. Two minds are better than one, and two efforts double the power.

My friends at the Canvas Community Church in downtown Little Rock, Arkansas, work with the homeless folks there. Street people are made in the image of God, just as you and I are. They have broken lives, just as you and I do. Their brokenness is out on view for all to see, whereas ours is often hidden behind elegant facades or ordinary tract homes. Canvas will host a Good Friday Stations of the Cross worship service for their community. Their art outreach program with the homeless produces some of the art, but other artists offer their works for exhibition and sale also. A portion of the proceeds befits the church’s outreach ministry.

Icons are such sacred objects that they have acquired a sense of holiness all their own. This attribution of holiness to the icon itself, rather than to the person or subject represented, led to the Iconoclast Controversy. Some destroyed many precious works of art because they thought the image was being worshiped, rather than God or Jesus. We do this today, of course, when we worship our “litmus test issues,” such as which Bible translation is the only sacred cow, what age the earth is (a cover for the Creation science or evidential science debate), or picking a Christian candidate to support (by virtue of the proof texting quotes with which we agree, of course).

My thought is that we still worship the image, but fail to worship God or Jesus. If we were to go beyond the icon/image, we might see more of us meeting the Christ who lives on the streets, in the prisons, and in the sickbeds of our nation:

Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ (Matthew 25:34-36)

In the ten hours I was in my studio assembling this icon, I had time to remember where I found all these items that make up this altarpiece. The two red supporting decorative brackets are from a home decorating project that never got off the ground because I decided to tear out the old counter space rather than to make a mosaic there. I hauled the wood shelf back from a walk. It was once a scrap piece of a fence that kept someone out or in. I pick up sticks that feel right, and scraps of wood or crushed soda cans that call out my name. The debris of this world has a beauty of its own kind, just as the acknowledged fine materials of our convention have value. If one day we found a way to manufacture gold, the metal would become base in a heartbeat.

That Chrysler hubcap was a real find! I may have found that on vacation when I stopped along a quiet roadside to snap a photo. The old crosses are from my days of living in large homes, rather than a small condo. The green glass cross broke in a move, but I couldn’t give it up. Most of us can’t give up our brokenness to the Christ who said, “This is my body, broken for you.” This is why we share our broken lives with all who are broken by sorrow, illness, pain, or hurts. We may wind up rusted on the side of the road, like the windshield wiper or we may end up painted over and stashed away in a garage like the board on which this icon exists. I also used beads and old pieces of jewelry that needed to be recycled and repurposed, in the great icon making tradition.

The power of the icon isn’t in the materials. I’ve made icons of macaroni and plastic jewels that read “holiness” as much as any ancient icon. I’ve had people make icons from their grandmother’s jewelry boxes. These too read as holy icons, even if they are nonrepresentational. The power comes through the Holy Spirit into the artist and then into the work. When I make a work such as this, my hands are steady, my pace is slow, and I lose all track of time. I enter into another realm, so to speak, that of the icon itself. The ancients believed that the icons were a window into heaven. I believe this is true, for the power of such an object is to take us out of our ordinary experiences and into a world where there is no more hunger, pain, or grief.

The icon’s great mystery and power is to remind us that ordinary materials can open us up to the truth and beauty of the holy. When our eyes are jaded by the ugliness of the world about us: wars, beheadings, poverty, injustice, economic destabilization, and human insensitivity, look upon the icons and enter into the power of the one who makes all things holy:

“He will transform the body of our humiliation that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, by the power that also enables him to make all things subject to himself.” (Philippians 3:21)

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OPEN WOUNDS AND LOOSE BINDINGS

Creativity, generosity, Health, Mental Illness, Ministry, mystery, photography, poverty, purpose, renewal, shame, Spirituality, Strength, Uncategorized, vision

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Sometimes we bind our wounds with bandages that don’t quite cover the scars. Then these scrapes and cuts don’t heal properly, but stay open and never mend. The doctors among us may be concerned that these wounds are sites for a new infection, but the healers know that suchwounds are given to us for the healing of others. Our visible scars make us accessible to the woundedness of others. If we hide our woundedness and weakness under the bandages of strength, then they may be afraid to seek us out for comfort or support.

if we hide ourselves behind our well placed bandages, then we have missed the opportunity to pour out our experience of God’s love and hope in our lives into their lives. Perhaps that is why the wounds of Christ’s crucifixion were visible on his resurrection body. Most people think after they die, they will have a perfect body, but if we get a body like our Lord’s, surely we will have the evidence of the scars of this world, even if we no longer feel the pain.

Those of us who are bearing the pains of the world in our hearts, minds, and bodies will show those scars on our outer selves. We can’t wrap ourselves up like an Egyptian mummy! Even if we did, these bandages would fall away and expose our woundedness. Only then can we be best used by God.

Psalms 147:3–He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds.

MY ACCIDENTAL VACATION

Creativity, Fear, Food, generosity, Holy Spirit, Imagination, Ministry, poverty, purpose, renewal, Retirement, Spirituality, Strength, Stress, Travel, Uncategorized, vision, Work

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Everyone should take at least one accidental vacation, at least once in their life. This event will throw you off your game plan, sweep away your plan B, and leave you up a creek without a paddle. This is your Kobayashi Maru, your Waterloo, and your Little Big Horn all rolled up into one. Most of us think we trust God, but we really trust our own strengths, capabilities, support systems, and friendship ties. We aren’t prepared to “go to a land God will show us” or to go as the 12 were sent, taking “nothing for our journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money, not even an extra tunic.” (Luke 9:3) I planned to be gone to visit my nephew’s organic farm for 2 weeks; I was gone a whole month. I got bit by an attack telephone pole on my way out of the gas station. It’s my story, I’m sticking to it. Once I got the big red Ram rental truck, I headed out of Dodge in my Dodge. By the next day, I was on the beach in North Carolina.

Like a pirate, I stayed as long as I had a room, and then I moved on. Some accommodations were great, but some I bought cleaning products for my personal safety. I found a welcome everywhere. I ate mostly from the grocery and the icebox in the rooms. Fresh fruit, cheese, cottage cheese, spinach, carrots, mushrooms, avocado, and bread made up my living off the land menu. One night I did get fresh cooked shrimp from the deli for a great salad. My last night on the beach I treated myself to a fake pirate’s ship venu restaurant, but it was a fine meal. I ate the appetizer sampler platter and a salad, so that was more than enough rich food for me!

When I came back to the tiny town where my busted baby sat, I stopped in the arts coffee shop to ask the barista if she knew a nicer place than the motel on the highway. They called Yvonne at the bed and breakfast, and talked her into giving me a discount since I would be an extended stay and was here as a “victim of circumstances.” I was glad, for the highway motel looked suspect and I was ready to be treated as a princess for a change. I guess all my pirate swagger had “swigged” out on the trip back. I was ready for lace curtains and 48 acres of piney woods quiet, not to mention three course breakfasts in the morning. Those breakfasts were to die for! My spirits were being revived daily.

While I’m not much of a drama queen, I do tend to worry. This is one trip that I did not worry, for I realized that I was getting a beach vacation out of this, due to my prime of life coverage, as well as the rental car. I might as well enjoy it to the fullest of my ability, within the limits of the finances available to me. The beach provided long walks for the morning and evening. Then of course, I did have to climb America’s tallest lighthouse, just to say I had done it.

The second week at the B&B would be on me, but there wasn’t anything I could do about that, so I could be thankful that I got a great price from the locals who showed hospitality to me. I vacationed in town, ate there, took photos, wrote, drank coffee in the cafe, and hung out. I was relaxed. I did pay some bills and wire some money to the bank, just to be safe. I washed clothes. An ordinary life.

What isn’t ordinary is leaning on others and receiving from them more than I gave in return. As a giver, I am always on the pouring out side. This time I was on the receiving end, and I have never been so filled in my whole life! From the day I hiked up the Rainbow Falls Trail, I discovered that while I might be able to almost get there by myself, I sure couldn’t get down without help. Thank God Trevor, Angie & that unnamed angel turned up with the hiking stick to help me down! The clerk at the hotel upgraded my room to the jacoozi when he heard my story, and I was again thankful.

Most of us don’t receive well, because it puts us in the weak position. We would rather be in the giving or strong position. That’s why we like that verse “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” (acts 20:36) it claims to quote Christ, but no gospel contains that quote. Someone always has to receive, however, for the giver to get the blessing. If we aren’t on the receiving end, we rob the giver of the blessing of generosity. If we aren’t in the receiving end, we rob ourselves of the blessings of humility and poverty. These are blessings because in them we can share he nature of Christ. It was for our sakes, that though he was rich, he became poor, so that by his poverty we might become rich” (2 Cor 8:9).

So I commend to you the idea of an “accidental vacation.” Perhaps you won’t need to bash in the front end of your vehicle to get the message, but some of us are like ornery mules: God needs to get our attention in a big way. Even the worst events God can use for good, for those who love God and are called according to God’s purposes. I discovered that each person I met on this trip was at a crux in their life, just as I was. They were at a decision point, a transition point, or a new calling was taking hold in their lives, just as it was in my own. Perhaps what seemed to be only an accident to some, God was able to make into a greater design for good: not just for me, but for the people who shared their stories and lives with me on my accidental vacation. I’m looking forward to retirement, but for me that just means redefining my calling to “word, sacrament, & order.” My word will be my creative endeavors, both painting and writing, serving the sacraments in the congregations and communities in which I fellowship, and being faithful to my brothers and sisters in our order of the elders.

WOUNDS, HEALING AND LOVE: THE MYSTERY OF THE JOURNEY

Food, Forgiveness, Health, Icons, Imagination, Italy, Love, Meditation, Ministry, mystery, poverty, purpose, renewal, salvation, Spirituality, Strength, Travel, Uncategorized, vision, Work

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At dinner Friday night with some friends, I met a lady from their church. I remarked that I needed to find something on the Mexican restaurant’s menu that wouldn’t damage my wellness plan. I’ve been pre-diabetic for eight years now, but I’ve managed my condition with diet and exercise. I even have a Fitbit exercise monitor that links to my sparks people food record. “Gosh! That’s so much trouble” she said, “why do you worry with all that?” I looked at her and replied, “Because I have a family history of diabetes, I’m pre-diabetic, and my younger brother is insulin dependent and already had congestive heart failure. I don’t want to go there too.” “Been there, done that. It’s all part of life,” she said.

I have been on a healing journey for years. What, you say, are you just spiritually slow, recalcitrant, a backslider, sluggardly, or just too busy to take care of yourself? If our healing journeys are toward our recovery of our original image of divine creation, I’m not yet there, but I persist by the grace of God.

I don’t berate myself for not yet arriving, but the last few years I’ve had a hardness of my heart regarding others who have gone “so far, but no farther.” They have in effect become settlers and comfortable at some village located in a cozy hollow beside a pleasant stream. They have nice neighbors and maybe a few quaint nut cases to liven up the town gossip mills. I confess that as one who can hardly wait for the next adventure, the next project, or even the next day, I’m not big on being “settled.”

This is why I’ve had six careers in my working life: artist, real estate investor, art teacher, insurance sales, wife and mom, and ministry. Now that I’m in retirement, I’ve taken up writing and resurrected my artistic endeavors. I’m not settled enough to sit around, drink coffee and rehash my glory days or even talk about current events. I’m too involved in making current events!

This icon, “He Healed Others, Cannot He Heal Himself?” Is made of found objects which I picked up while walking around Mercy Hospital in Hot Springs, Arkansas. This 1.5 mile circuit from my local YMCA takes me from one healing place past many others: doctors’ offices, cancer treatment sites, home healthcare training schools, pharmacies, and clinics of every type. Across the street one can get food for the body. The busy roads and highways are a bountiful source for the castaway chunks of this human life.

As I picked up these assorted pieces of debris, I thought of the cast off people in this world: the hungry, the dying, the disabled, the terminally ill, the deaf, and the blind. The greatest healing sign was raising Lazarus from the dead! I had an old postcard from a trip to Italy I could use, along with some old embroidery hoops from the grandparent’s house that I’ll never use on a cloth, but I’ve “saved for the memories of their name.”

In the first three Gospels, the “chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him” (Matthew 27:41-42). To “save” is to heal, to preserve from harm, or to get well. We speak today of “being saved” as if it were a one and done, but in fact it is both an instantaneous and a long term process.

We want our wounds to be healed NOW! By golly, and don’t leave any visible scar as a sign of our past pain, but remove all signs of our imperfection from our hearts, minds, and souls. Just as the Son of a God took a human body to taste all of our peak and low experiences, even to the abandonment of death, I think God may have a purpose in leaving us with our scars as we continue on our journey.

The scars we bear are signs to others of the journey we’re still traveling, much like the stamps in our passports. They are the marks of our past pain and brokenness. If God were to wipe those identifying marks away, no one would know to seek us out as guides along their own journeys. God may be leaving these wounds open so that we can pour God’s love out through our brokenness into the lives of this hurting and hopeless world.

Our world is full of people that have been told that they need to get well before God will love them, but what they are really being told is “My wounds are covered over with a fake skin of perfection, so until you adopt your fake skin, find another place to worship.” Our open wounds that let God’s love flow through to all people, the wandering wounded and the settled saints both, is what will bring us closer to God as we come closer to our neighbor. Sometimes it’s easier to love a holy God than an unholy neighbor, but loving God’s creation should be a goal of our spiritual journey.

TO LIVE IN A WATERED GARDEN!

Creativity, epilepsy, Fear, garden, generosity, Health, Imagination, Ministry, poverty, purpose, Spirituality, Strength, Stress, Uncategorized, vision, Work

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The various named storms of this winter season are piling up like the laundry in my baskets, but the cold weather and the bad roads are keeping me inside and away from the commercial laundromat that I frequent. Since when did we start naming winter storms like summer hurricanes anyway? I must have been asleep, but until this winter in Arkansas, I’ve not paid much attention to the weather channel, for our best predictions here are “wait five minutes and it will be something else” and “nobody ever gets it right.”

“Cold and dark” are the two best Arkansas winter predictions, followed by “unusually sunny and warm.” These will follow each other as sure as day follows the night, for I remember the weekend a decade ago when most of my people skipped church to go to the lake because it was 70 degrees in NW Arkansas. However, the very next Sunday we were inundated with 3 feet of snow at Mount Sequoyah Retreat Center and everyone who was on the mountain stayed there. The workers couldn’t leave, so Mount Sequoyah gave them rooms to winter over the storm. Some of the extreme cold shut down the heating systems in the old buildings and the repair crew couldn’t drive up the iced mountain incline, so the staff gave us newer accommodations at no extra charge. A sudden virus began to work its way through our retreat group, but we had a doctor among us who was taking a week’s retreat before she began work at a new clinic for the uninsured. She made morning and afternoon rounds of the incapacitated in their cabins and dosed them with a preparation she had made at the local pharmacy.

This must be what life is like in a tended garden. We are cared for while strong and when we are weak. We are fed, kept safe from invaders, covered when it’s too cold, and nursed when we seem to weaken. Our gardener not only loves us, but cares for us and provides what we need. We may want gilding for our lilies, but our gardener knows the difference between needs and superfluous wants. We will have “enough,” of that we need not fear.

More money will not make us happier. We would give all the money we have in this world to have our child returned to life from a too early death, our spouse brought back from the living death that is Alzheimer’s Disease, or to save a loved one from the ravages of some addictive substance. Money will not buy these things. Money cannot buy peace of mind itself, for if we focus on money, then we will get anxious. The value of money goes up and down with every sneeze of the president, the arguments of congress, and the ebbs and flows of our economy. Yet we who are people of faith “live in a watered garden,” tended and cared for by a gracious and good God and we “shall never languish again.”

“…their life shall become like a watered garden,
and they shall never languish again.” Jeremiah 31:12

THE NO ROOM INN

at risk kids, Children, Evangelism, Fear, Holy Spirit, home, Icons, Imagination, Ministry, poverty, purpose, renewal, salvation, vision, Work

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Context is everything. In the real world of my daily hikes, the objects in this artwork are pieces of trash that I’ve found lying near the path that I walk. Put together with a fresh eye to shape and color, they become instead a nativity scene. I live in Hot Springs, Arkansas, a place known for its healing waters to the native peoples who once roamed these lands and now known as our nation’s first National Park. We have two large hospitals, a rarity for a town of only 35,500 people, but we also serve outlying rural counties. If you want healing, this is the place to come, for we have spas, bathhouses, great food, a beautiful lake and mountains.

The local YMCA is just down the road from the Mercy Hospital campus. If I leave the Y, I can get a 1.5 mile hike with varying grades and enough level spots to recover my wind and get the whole done in about 30 minutes. I’ve about trained the courtesy cart lady to wave at me and pass me by. At first I think I struggled enough that she would stop to offer me a lift.

When we speak about context in a work of art or context in a biblical verse, we mean that we need to look at the surroundings. The surroundings in an art work include the artist’s life experiences, as well as the image they were viewing. We artists pour the sum of who we are into the whole of the world as we see it.

Likewise with the biblical context, we ask: what was the writer’s intent, what do we know of his life experience, what seems to be his goal in writing as he does, what does his choice of words or images suggest, why are some stories unique and not repeated by other writers, and to what do the stories before and immediately after point?

In the New Testament, Luke is the only writer to mention that the birth of Jesus took place outside of an established lodging place. He uses the Greek word Kataluma, which means “lodging, inn, or guest room,” depending on the context. He is also the only one to mention the parable of the Good Samaritan. Healing takes place for the victim of bandits at the inn and for the whole world at the no room inn.

“And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn” –Luke 2:7

“He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him” –Luke 10:34

The No Room Inn Nativity has the standard imagery of the Holy Family: Joseph is the tall, blue, flattened paint can with the radiator head; Mary is is the crushed coca-cola can with the tin can head and screws for eyes; the angel on the left is a rain washed McDonald’s French fry container with a tin can lid for a head; and the baby Jesus is an orange plastic cross/halo resting in a VIP parking ticket from a NASCAR race I attended in November. Alone, these are just pieces of trash, but together on a gold background, this collage becomes an icon worthy of reminding us that the King of this world began his life in a No Room Inn.

This Jesus who came to heal the rift between God and humanity, began his human life on the outside. Those of us who feel like we aren’t meant for the inside need to realize that Jesus spent his whole life on the margins, healing the sick, feeding the hungry, and casting out demons, while at the same time afflicting the comfortable insiders who came for the show. Context is everything. Take your ministry out into the streets, find the broken bits of “trash” that have the potential to become new. Begin a healing ministry, not for those inside your comfortable inn, but for those who are told, “No room!”

The One Who Shows Weakness Is The One Who Is Healed

Creativity, Family, Food, Health, Holy Spirit, Mental Illness, Ministry, poverty, purpose, renewal, salvation, shame, Strength, Uncategorized, Work

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Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there who had a withered hand. They watched him to see whether he would cure him on the sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand, “Come forward.” Then he said to them, “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. He looked around at them with anger; he was grieved at their hardness of heart and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. (Mark 3:1-5)

Jesus is all about the change or the cure. Jesus makes the difference in a person’s life from being on the margins to being brought back into community. This is the original good news of the Gospel, but we in the modern church seem to have relegated this message to “scripture alone.” We are more about showing only our “fixed up faces” rather than our “withered hands” that need The Lord’s touch to make us whole again. The former we can fix with make up and masks, but the latter needs true spiritual power.

No wonder that when our paintbox is exhausted and our good hand is weary of holding up the disguise of competence before our faces, our carefully constructed facades of “managing” begin to crumble. One more tilt in our tectonic plate will cause the whole to crumble like a Haitian slum dwelling. Yet we persist in thinking that “If I only try harder to hold onto my strengths, I will make my way through these hard times.” We don’t understand the gospel message of surrendering to our weakness in order to receive healing and wholeness.

We tend to think of healing as the absence of disease, but often healing is acceptance of our condition and making the changes in our life necessary to live in “wellness.” When my doctor said I was insulin resistant and on the way to becoming diabetic, I began to exercise more and count calories and carbohydrates. I lost 50 pounds, am stuck there now, but have my blood sugars in the range of normal. I still have the low blood sugars, so I’m not out of the woods yet, but my lifestyle change is a form of “healing.” It’s not a miracle of course, but my faith and the Holy Spirit empowered me. Likewise, for one who is depressive or bipolar, taking medicine regularly and participating in therapy sessions is a part of their wellness plan.

We move so quickly each day, throwing on the mask or the makeup, that we don’t engage our selves in the mirror except to think, “my upper lip needs waxing again!” Or “how did my eyebrows get so brushy?” Then we are on our busy way, filling up our hours and minutes with activity both meaningful and mind numbing. The searching of our heart of hearts, or introspection, isn’t our long suit, anymore than long term planning. We tend to do what is immediate and before us. Because we have constructed our masks so well and worn them for so long, our heart of hearts is buried under many layers.

If Jesus came to our place of worship, would he be able to see these withered hearts? Are any of us as brave as the man in the synagogue, that we would offered our withered heart out for all to see? The one who shows weakness is the one who is healed.

THE PARK MAY BE CLOSED BUT THE CITY ISN’T

at risk kids, Creativity, Food, generosity, Imagination, Meditation, photography, poverty, Travel, Uncategorized, vision, Work

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I took the back way home. Even though I was using the GPS, I deviated from her well intentioned directions. Perhaps I was just intent on exploring, or perhaps I had “authority issues” I needed to work out on leadership, since no one in our country’s Capitol seemed to care for the the poor and the weak any more. “It doesn’t affect me, so why should I worry? Most people won’t notice anything amiss in their daily lives.” How easily we discount “the other.” We think so often only of ourselves: of me, myself, and my. My exploration, as I call the GPS recalculating mode, led me to an island of peace in the heart of the industrial zone of Hot Springs National Park.

Because of the current government shutdown, the park spa, museum, and natural spaces are shut down. We can still walk up to the fountains of the ever flowing springs and fill our water bottles for free, but hiking the trails are forbidden until the money flows from DC. The City of Hot Springs National Park belongs to the state of Arkansas, so it was Wednesday as usual. Our schools had lunch and adults went to work (unless they were federal employees or national guardsmen).

I ended my exploration at Sanders Plumbing Supply. There I found an old wooden railroad trestle bridge crossing both the road and the creek that runs beside it. I parked in the business lot, took my iPhone and crossed the street. The slope down into the creek was gentle and dry, for we haven’t had much rain in these parts. As I clambered into the shallow stream, I walked on an extruded basalt flow. That this old volcanic rock had coursed across the earth in an ancient time and still persisted reminded me that life is more than just today. Even the years of water had not worn it down. I made a short instamatic video of the rippling water, the waving weeds, and the sunlight touching the water. I was finding my peace again.

These black basalt beds were big enough to stretch out on, so I took advantage of this position. Folks in Arkansas aren’t much used to seeing a gray haired lady dressed in bright yellow and red lying in the middle of a creek bed and taking photos. I got a lot of friendly honks & waves from the passing cars. Then again, a person of any age doing something out of the ordinary is apt to get encouragement from the folks who aren’t quite up to stepping out of the safe path themselves.

When I came home, I made this little drawing in a Strathmore watercolor sketchbook. It’s no bigger than an iPad mini. I used an ordinary ink pen, the same tool with which I journal on most days. To focus on the antiquity of the natural elements and the constancy of God’s divine providence for God’s creation reminded me that this day’s problems are being handled by a higher power. As I drew the old railroad trestle bridge, I realized that “this train is bound for glory” (Woody Guthry). We may not see the train right now, but it won’t carry the self-righteous anymore than the hustlers or the sinners. It will carry the humble, the ones who put their trust in God, and care for all of God’s people, not just for the ones who can return the favor.

“For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land” (Deuteronomy 15:11).

When It’s Too Dark To See

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The Light overcomes the Darkness

The Light overcomes the Darkness

“The light shineth in the darkness and the darkness comprehended it not.”  ~~ John 1:5 KJV

As a young woman, I spent time in England visiting the great museums and learning to appreciate their custom of afternoon tea after a long day of tromping through visual pleasures and historic treasures contained in the various public and private galleries of our parent land. I saw the Elgin marbles, better known as the sculpture frieze from the Greek Parthenon. The great Turner paintings, which are full of colors and imagery, were worth several days of visits, for they have their own gallery.

As I stood sketching one of Turner’s works, “Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus,” I made sure to maintain proper museum decorum for artists wielding sharp objects: no swift moves, stay beyond arm’s reach of the priceless object, and never mutter out loud even in wonder or awe. Into this open space came another visitor who took a look at the painting, read out loud the title on the gilded frame, stepped back to give the canvas rendering of the one-eyed giant on a high cliff raising a mighty rock to crush the tiny single sailed ship that cruised below on which the hero Ulysses was on its prow shaking his fist at the giant above and daring Polyphemus to cast down the rock and sink his tiny barge.  All of this detail was set in a beautiful land and seascape.

As the visitor studied the painting, I was watching him out of the corner of my eye. This bit of drama was proving more interesting than the sketch that I was rendering. At that moment, he shook his head and said, “Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus: I don’t see it. I don’t see it at all!”

Just as a match struck in a dark cave will light up a broad area, the light that comes into the dark world brings illumination to those who have eyes to see it. Some people will look at this light and never comprehend or understand it. They will never see it, never choose it, never attain it and never come into their inheritance.  This doesn’t seem like an optimistic or “light filled” statement, but the difficult truth is that “the light shines in the darkness and the darkness didn’t comprehend it” (NRSV). We ask then, why do some people thrive, enduring dark periods of their lives, while others let the darkness over come them? Why do some claim victory over the darkness or depression, but others suffer defeat and despair?

Perhaps some people have been in darkness so long, that when the light of God comes to them, they don’t recognize it as light. They only know darkness and the light is a stranger or an interloper. They are afraid to open their life to a new friend. Maybe they have been hiding in the darkness of our world for so long that they are afraid to risk showing their true selves in the light. They are afraid of showing themselves to other people, but even more afraid of revealing themselves to the God who already knows their true selves. Most of us however, are concerned more with the validation of our peers than about God’s praise, and that is why we cannot comprehend the light, but continue to live in the darkness of this world.

Not only individuals, but also communities and whole systems are caught up in darkness. There were times in my ministry that I wanted to add anti-depressants to the local/regional/national/continental water supply, but mass medication isn’t the solution. People need to care for one another, not just for their own color, or class, or neighborhood, or tribe, or party. We have to work together for the good of all and make sure the weakest have their basic needs met. Then we can work to bring the living standards up for all by focusing on what does work: education, mentoring youths and families at risk, and providing jobs and living wages with benefits.

Yet none of these will mean anything without a strong faith community, for we again will be reduced to “each one for him/herself.” Without the light to guide them, people don’t persevere in dark times. None of the improvements in our own lives, our family, our community, our country, or our world will come easily or quickly. We may not see the “new creation” in our lifetime, but we will always see the light of justice, hope peace, love and truth on the horizon. This light shines in our present darkness and if the darkness comprehends it not, we who have the light within us must share this light with others!

How can you be a light in the darkness? In a world full of negativity, can you be a positive force for good, for change, or a defender of the weak/wounded/weary? Can you shine your light before others that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven? (Matthew 5:16)  As a spiritual exercise, keep a daily list/journal of the opportunities you found and/or missed to be a light for Christ in the world.  At the end of the week, read these over. Notice your impact. A little rain over many years wears down the mighty mountain to tiny grains of sand.