don't eat alone

Woodstock happened the summer before I started high school.

I was living in Nairobi, Kenya. Later that fall, I got a copy of the soundtrack, and then my first guitar that Christmas. Some of the first songs I learned were off that record: “Drugstore Truck-Drivin’ Man,” “Wooden Ships,” and “I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die Rag.” I never got good enough to play Hendrix’s “Star Spangled Banner.”

Though I was a long way from America, I followed the protests and saw the footage of flag-draped coffins being unloaded. I knew the war was wrong. Many years later, my brother was living in Stow, Ohio, next to Kent, and sent me a Kent State sweatshirt. “Of anyone I know,” he said, “if you could have been there, you would have been there.”

I really thought our generation would grow up and change the world. We didn’t. I thought our passion for peace would drive us to do things that had gone undone for too long. It didn’t. We lost hope and found cynicism. We gave up and sold out.

The ten-year anniversary of Woodstock was the summer of my second year in seminary. I remember seeing this New Yorker cartoon. It wasn’t funny then. It’s tragic now, particularly as I listen to self-righteous Baby Boomers complain about the students who have stepped up and called for a reckoning on gun violence. And my generation’s condescension didn’t start with March for Our Lives. We’ve been bashing Millennials for awhile: they’re entitled; they want a trophy for participating; they are too connected to their devices. Blah, blah, blah . . .

Maybe be accuse them of self-absorption because we know it so well. If any generation has settled for getting-what’s-mine-first, it’s us. Not them. We make fun of the participation trophies because we traded our quest for peace for mutual funds and stock options. The increasing inequity in our country lies at our feet. Our generation has been the one in charge while the rich get richer and the poor get screwed. Some of us may have championed women’s rights and civil rights, but only for a season. We suck on our follow through.

I want to stand up as an unabashed supporter of the Millennials and Gen-X and Gen-Z. They are offering a different style of leadership, a different way of looking at each other than anything we came up with. I wish everyone of our elected officials over the age of fifty would be driven out of office in the next elections. I know that is drastic. But we need drastic. Most of us Baby Boomers can’t see past our comfort zones.

But I don’t mean to focus on us. We blew it. The best we can do now is play a supporting role for these young people who are willing to work to bring real and meaningful change. We were once, too, but we didn’t do it. Of course, there are reasons that we could name for why things happened as they did, and one of those is the generations before us didn’t do much to encourage us. Now we are the older ones. We are the self-described “ones who know.”

Remember what it felt like when we protested and people said we were communists, or radicals, or crazy, or evil? Let’s not do that to the generations who have followed us. Let us, instead, follow and support them not because they are young and idealistic, but because they are hopeful and determined and true. As David Bowie sang,

and these children that you spit on
as they try to change their worlds
are immune to your consultations
they’re quite aware of what they’re going through

There is something happening here, and it’s not because of us. It is because our children are tired of the world we handed them and they are taking charge. We can choose to insult them, to create obstacles for them, or we can choose to participate and support them. Alas, we will not get trophies–only a better world than the one we gave them.

Peace,
Milton

I came home from working in my window seat at the Marketplace and found a post from a friend who talked about being “smacked in the face again by some serious meanness.” As I was digging through some old notes tonight, I found a short story I wrote a long time ago. I don’t write them often. Somehow, it feels like a good word for tonight.

___________________________

By Heart

Cal realized he had forgotten his reading glasses when he sat down in his second row pew and opened his worship guide. He could read the bold print, but he couldn’t decipher some of the smaller instructions. He wasn’t worried though. He had been in church all of his life and things weren’t that different from week to week. The best news for him was he didn’t have to worry about the hymns because he knew his favorites by heart. When he came to words he didn’t know, he just sang the word “watermelon” over and over so it looked like he knew what he was singing.

When the accompanist began to play the introduction to “It Is Well With My Soul,” Cal was transported; it was one of his favorites. Since the song was reflective, the instructions in the worship guide were for the congregation to remain seated. When the introduction finished, he began to sing,

When peace like a river attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll
Whatever my lot thou has taught me to say
It is well, it is well with my soul

He lost himself in the song and was only slightly aware of how quiet the people were in the pews around him. He could hear one, maybe two, voices from the choir loft. When the chorus came, everyone joined in.

It is well (it is well)
With my soul (with my soul)
It is well, it is well
With my soul.

When the hymn was over, Dave leaned up from the pew behind Cal and said, “Nice job, buddy. That first verse was supposed to be a solo from the choir.”

Cal tried to laugh it off—and did as far as Dave knew, but he felt like an idiot. When the service was over, he slipped out the side door before the choir came back to hang up their robes. Maybe folks would forget by next week.

Brenda took her solos seriously. She didn’t feel like she did a lot of things well, but she knew she could sing. And she loved to sing. When Roscoe, the choir director, asked her to sing the first verse of “It is Well With My Soul” as a solo to lead the congregation into prayer time, she jumped at the chance. She loved the hymn and even knew the story behind it, which she promptly told to the rest of the choir as they rehearsed before worship,

“Horatio Spafford lost all of his possessions in the Chicago Fire and then lost all four of his daughters when their ship crashed into another as it crossed the Atlantic. Only his wife survived. A few weeks later, while he was on a ship going to meet her, he said he passed near the place where his daughters died and the Holy Spirit gave the words to him. “

For full effect, Roscoe chose to play the hymn on the piano. Brenda quietly cleared her throat and then began to sing precisely on cue. But she was not singing a solo. There was another voice—another voice not in the choir loft. The voice was singing well, but the problem was that they were singing at all. She looked around until she spotted a man in the second row, singing with his eyes closed. Since the choir sat in the back of the small sanctuary, she couldn’t get his attention to wave him off. She also couldn’t set the mood she wanted for worship because he hadn’t paid attention to the instructions in the bulletin. Despite all of her hard work, what people would remember was the guy in the front singing when he wasn’t supposed to. Her attempt to make worship more meaningful with her voice was shattered by the phantom singer. The song was ruined, she thought as she sat down at the end of the hymn. She felt a hurt, slighted, and disregarded, but mostly she felt like a failure. She had one gift to bring to worship and someone sat on it. What good was a broken gift?

Charley always got to church on time and he always sat in the balcony, which, in his little church, was a single row of chairs. He mostly came to church because he had nowhere else to go and the folks here didn’t seem to mind him being around. In fact, they were pretty good at including him in things, even though faith was new to him. He had only been coming for six or eight months. He liked to come early to hear the choir practice. Soon after he sat down, he heard someone telling a story about one of the songs and how it had been written because a man lost all his children.

Charley knew that feeling, too. Since his ex-wife had moved, he didn’t even know where his children were. She made it clear he did not deserve to see them because of all he had done. He didn’t know what else to do but agree with her.

When it came time for the song, the lady who had told the story stood up to sing. Charley had heard her before. She had a beautiful voice that was strong and soft at the same time. But when she started singing, it wasn’t just her. There was a male voice coming from the front of the church. Even though he never turned around, the two singers were right together and sounded beautiful. Charley was sure they had practiced a lot to be able to sing so well without being able to see what each other was doing. He read the words as they sang and tried to join in with the rest of the congregation, but never mastered more than the chorus: it is well, it is well with my soul.

He wondered if the writer really felt well in his soul as he stared into the sea that had swallowed up his daughters, or if he was trying to convince himself he could feel that way. All Charley knew was the words felt true when he heard them and he needed something to feel true, even if only for a moment.

Charley was coming down from the balcony just as Brenda was moving to hang up her choir robe in the closet next to the stairs.

“I liked the way you and that guy did the hymn this morning,” he said. “It touched me.”

“It was supposed to be like that,” she said before she could catch herself.

He smiled and shook her hand.

“Thank you.”

Peace,

Milton

“Metaphors in Motion”—Mark 11:1-11
A Sermon for First Church of Christ, Congregational of East Haddam, Connecticut
Palm Sunday, March 25, 2018

When we talk about it, we make it sound like a parade: Jesus’ “triumphal entry” into Jerusalem. We picture crowds lining the streets, even throwing down their garments like a red carpet, waving palm branches, and shouting, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” The heading for this passage added by the Bible translators reads, “Jesus Enters Jerusalem as King.”

But look at the story.

Jesus and his disciples were traveling from Galilee to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. If we look back in Mark 10, we can see a lot of things were going on. The religious leaders were tried to trick him into a doctrinal trap by asking him questions about divorce. When the disciples tried to keep a group of children from bothering Jesus, he not only welcomed them but said they understood how to open their hearts. “Be like the children,” he said, “and you will understand what it means to follow me.”

After the kids left, a man we have come to know as the rich young ruler came to Jesus looking for validation. “I obey all the law and the prophets,” he proclaimed, even though I think he knew he was missing something. Jesus told him if he wanted to understand what discipleship was about, he would need to give up all his stuff. The man couldn’t do it. He liked his privileged life. So he walked away.

Not long after that, James and John asked Jesus if they could sit on either side of him when they all got to heaven. Though it’s not in Mark’s gospel, Jesus’ response to them almost sounds as though he said, “You did hear what I just told that last guy, right?” He spelled it out clearly: God calls us to serve, not to be served. What am I going to get out of this? is never the first question. And then, when they got to Jericho, he restored the sight of a blind man named Bartimaeus who called out to him as he entered the city. Mark says, once Bartimaeus could see, he followed Jesus, both literally and figuratively; Mark says Bartimaeus “followed Jesus down the road.” Bartimaeus could see what the rich young ruler could not.

When they got to Jerusalem, Jesus gave the disciples rather mysterious instructions about going to someone’s barn and untying their donkey. “If someone asks what you’re doing, tell them, ‘The Master needs it.’” When I was a kid, I thought this story made Jesus sound magic—like he had some sort of mind controlling power. Once the disciples used the magic words, they could have walked off with almost anything. I asked my dad about it one day and he said, “I think Jesus just knew the guy with the donkey.” I had never thought that Jesus might have planned ahead, or had friends other than those listed in the gospels. But Jesus had planned ahed. His ride into town was not spontaneous. He knew how he wanted to enter the city.

The disciples came back with the donkey, made a seat for Jesus out of their coats, and he rode into town. Mark says, “many people” spread their coats on the ground and “others” waved palm branches. Our collective Christian imagination over the centuries has turned this into a city-wide celebration, but I’m guessing it was on a much smaller scale, and not very royal at that. It was a metaphor in motion. A real king would have ridden into town in a chariot, or at least on a fine stallion. He would have been flanked by protection. The point would have been a presentation of power.

Jesus rode bareback on a mule. A farm animal. A beast of burden. And he entered the city with all the pomp and circumstance of a neighborhood parade, except parade implies a procession of some sort. He was not proceeced, protected, announced, or even accompanied. It was just him. Those who lined the street shouted, “Hosanna,” which comes from a Hebrew word that means “save us.” Like Bartimaeus, most everyone was looking for healing.

Yesterday, in at least eight hundred cities and towns across America, millions of people participated in the March for Our Lives, a protest calling for a serious and meaningful discussion about how we deal with firearms in our country. My town, Guilford, was the location for the Shoreline gathering because the Guilford Green is large and because our town has been affected directly by gun violence in recent days. In late January, one of our teenage boys was accidentally killed by a gun belonging to a friend’s father, who failed to keep it locked up.

I have no idea how many people were there, but it was the largest crowd I have ever seen on our green. I saw reports this morning that estimated two to three thousand gathered to hear speakers and singers. The organizers worked hard to make our informal gathering a meaningful one. And it was. The march itself was rather ceremonial: we walked a little less than a mile and ended up back where we started. But it, too, was a metaphor in motion: it was a wake-up call, an incarnational statement that we trust if we show up and listen to each other, we will find healing.

Ginger, my wife, was one of the speakers and she made a point of recognizing the privilege of those of us gathered there. Last night, I listened to Naomi Wadler, an eleven-year old who spoke at the March in Washington. She said she wanted to speak for the African-American women and girls who are victims of gun violence but never make the front page. Then she said,

It is my privilege to be here today. I am indeed full of privilege. My voice has been heard. I am here to acknowledge their stories, to say they matter, to say their names, because I can, and I was asked to be. For far too long, these names, these black girls and women, have been just numbers. I’m here to say, “Never again” for those girls, too. I am here to say that everyone should value those girls, too.

Jesus saw most everything around him. Because Jesus was astute and perceptive, I think he knew his entry into Jerusalem was anything but triumphant. He knew he was on the wrong side of the religious leaders; he knew the government considered him a menace, an instigator. And he knew his disciples were still struggling to understand who he was and what was happening. He knew he was not walking into a happy ending. It would have been easy for him to despair, or to become cynical. He had poured his life into his disciples, and they wanted him to pick a favorite. As the crowd shouted, “Hosanna,” I wonder if Jesus felt encouraged or defeated. It’s hard to tell. He doesn’t say a word.

At our march in Guilford, speaker after speaker went back over the list of mass shootings: Columbine, Sandy Hook, Las Vegas, Orlando, Parkland—I know I am not listing them all. Almost all of them lamented that after each one there has been a cry for something to be done and nothing has happened. This time, it seems, the teenagers of this “mass shooting generation” are old enough to respond and to take action. They bring energy and hope when those of us who are older have settled for cynicism and despair. They are taking to the streets of our towns and cities and call us to believe that things can change, that we can be healed.

I am not saying these kids are our messiahs as much as they offer us a lens through which to see Jesus. The people who lined the streets to welcome him came to Jerusalem every year for Passover, and every year the Romans were still in charge. That they were remembering their deliverance from Egypt while they were under Roman occupation was a bitter irony that was not lost on the Jewish people, I’m sure. And, when they shouted, “Save us,” to Jesus, I’m not sure they expected much.

But Jesus did. He believed it mattered that he was riding into town. He planned for everything down to the donkey and then he set things in motion. As he had said to James and John, he had come to serve—to give his life for others. Now he was showing them what that looked like.

If Bartimaeus did follow Jesus all the way to Jerusalem, maybe he was one of the first ones to begin to shout, much as he had done in Jericho. “Hosanna. Save us.” On this Palm Sunday, two thousand years of sadness and violence later, we are still singing the same song. “Hosanna. Save us.” As I stood on the Green yesterday, and listened to person after person call for things to change, I could hear it in our voices. “Hosanna. Save us.”

When Bartimaeus first cried out for help in Jericho, Jesus asked, “What do you want me to do for you?”
“I want to see,” Bartimaeus answered.
“Go,” Jesus said, “your faith has healed you.”

What Bartimaeus saw was that healing is hard work. The next few chapters in Mark’s gospel are filled with Jesus’ words, and most of them are not easy to take, or even to understand. There’s a good chance some of the people shouting “Save us” as Jesus entered Jerusalem were crying “Crucify him” by the end of the week. Once we are given eyes to see our world as Jesus does, we are called to be healers too.

To heal the violence in our country will take more than gathering on the Green. It will be hard work. That’s what we have to plan for. That’s what we have to choose to do. We cannot walk away like the young ruler and take shelter in our privilege. In our world of violence and grief, we need to offer not just our thoughts and prayers, but our thoughts, prayers, and actions. We need to move beyond our privilege and risk losing to serve those around us. We need to open our hearts like the children we saw and heard at the marches yesterday. Jesus is calling us to wake up, stand up, and follow him down the road—to be metaphors of motion, incarnations of God’s love, carriers of hope and healing. Let’s follow him down the road. Amen.

Peace,
Milton

It’s astonishing to see the swirl of hope and energy around the March for Our Lives, which will happen across the country tomorrow. In our little snow globe town of Guilford, Connecticut, we are having a march of our own, rather than going to one of the larger ones because our community was touched deeply by the accidental death of one of our teenagers, who was also a part of our church. For us, the issue is more than just the mass shootings; we want to address our gun culture on a larger scale.

My perspective on tomorrow has also been altered by the shooting of Stephon Clark, who was shot twenty times by two Sacramento police officers because they thought he had a gun. It was his smartphone. Stephon Clark was African-American and joins a list that is far, far too long of men and women of color who have been killed by law enforcement.

I know Clark’s shooting is not the same as a mass shooting in a school, and yet the violence feels connected to me. One of the reasons given for why police fire so many rounds is the quick response of the triggers on their guns. Perhaps they, too, need less fire power. But, lest my point get lost in that argument, what stands out to me here has to do with race.

David Hogg, one of the students who survived the shooting at Parkland, has been challenging the media for “racial parity” in governing gun violence. We all need to hear these words. If pictures help, here is the cover of TIME magazine this week, as we prepare for the March for Our Lives.

Here is the cover after the marches in Ferguson.

The reality is that the white people marching tomorrow will not face a response from militarized riot squads. We will not be tear-gassed, or considered a threat. And, most of us who are marching tomorrow did not take to the streets after Ferguson, or any number of other tragedies caused by gun violence.

Perhaps we should keep our walking shoes on.

Peace,
Milton