Impossible!

I’ve been thinking a lot about unity lately.

It probably all started when I found myself unwilling to send my monthly update to the YAMs because I “didn’t have any news.” Really, I felt my news was unworthy in comparison to theirs. And while I realized that thought’s untruth them moment it entered my mind, it remained a difficult thing to overcome.

Then I went to the Denver Women’s Chorus concert for work, and spent the evening in a room full of GLBT men and women singing songs about human rights and societal transformation. It was powerful, but I couldn’t help thinking “it’s easy to sing this stuff when you’re in a room full of people who think the same thing.”

And then I started thinking about how not-passionate I am sometimes about the work that I do and the people that we serve. And I’m beginning to realize that’s because I have no one that I have to justify it to. No one to teach. No one to persuade. Naturally, everyone I work with thinks that giving people food and IDs and helping them find jobs is a good thing. Naturally, most of the church people I talk to also think this is a good thing. So who do I have to be passionate with? Who do I have to argue with? Who do I have to instruct and exhort?

The sermon at the church I presented at last Sunday was about the tower of Babel. It wasn’t a great sermon, but it did raise the idea that the story of the tower of Babel is a lesson about difference.

But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.

Nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

Maybe now, as we have come so far in conquering the barriers of language, other differences are arising so that we must find ways in which to truly build unity and work together.

Maybe it is not yet time to see the Kingdom revealed.

Nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

hypocrisy is funny.

sometimes, having your own hypocrisy shoved in your face just makes you laugh.

like when you’ve been trying all day to finish an article about how service to the poor is the surest way to encounter christ in the people around you…and then you get really frustrated when you get called down to outreach to do intakes.

and then one of your clients says you’re “the shit” just because you find him a can of chicken.

not that any of this has happened to me. ever.

We cannot walk alone

Okay, I’ll vote for Obama.

to the end.

It’s amazing how quickly things speed up.

Only a month ago, I was craving desk work, church visits, community events – real work to do, real relationships to build both in and out of the workplace.

Now, it seems like life won’t stop. I have writing projects in piles on my desk, a list of calls to make that just keeps getting longer, meetings with staff where we rehash details of old programs over and over, church visits every weekend.
And I don’t know how it happened.

When I was home for Christmas, I talked with several people about how I feel like I have so few connections here. I don’t have relationships outside of work, except for my church ladies, and when I see them, it’s for a silent soup supper. We talked about Elizabeth Elliot’s ideal – “wherever you are, be all there” – a fitting mirror for my time in Denver, as she shares this thought as she reflects on her long years waiting for Jim to come back from Ecuador and include her in his work.

I made a New Year’s resolution to try to live in that way – all here – focusing on the present. And I asked people to pray. And now I can’t seem to get away from “be all there.” From the ideas of stability and commitment to the ministry we are called to in the present moment.

At a church I visited last weekend for DenUM, the pastor said in passing, “Jesus’ time on earth was short. So everything he said or did, he said or did for a reason.” Am I acting with purpose?

At Benedictine Way, we are now focusing on the part of the Rule that talks about stability. As John McQuiston paraphrases, “Be gentle with this life, and use the light of life to live fully in your time.” Am I treating my life gently – not as though it were fragile and could break at any moment, but recognizing the preciousness of the gift I have been given?

As we enter the story of the last supper in John’s gospel, we read these words:

“Now, just before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.”

Jesus knows where he comes from. He knows where he is going. But he also knows that now is the time to demonstrate love to those who are in his presence.

It is at this point in his ministry that the ultimate fulfillment of Jesus’ life on earth is now tangible and in reach – he no longer has to wait, to hold back, to let people gradually move to understanding – he can enter the greater plan, he can act boldly and truthfully – he no longer has to coddle and prod and explain every little detail – in a moment, in just a few days, the disciples eyes will be opened, they will finally understand! Everything is right there!

And he takes a towel off of the table. He kneels down. Removes Peter’s shoes. And washes his feet.

It is at this very moment of entering into something altogether new in his life that Jesus performs the supreme act of service.

This is the example I am meant to follow. This is the holiness that I strive to attain.

If my act of service is stacks of writing projects on my desk, long lists of phone calls, weekend church visits and volunteer recruitment, and afternoons spent teaching people how to bag beans – surely I can invest myself wholeheartedly into that. If performing this service means being miles away from those I love the most and those who know me best, surely I can continue to work.

We are called to concentration. To listening. To silent, stay-put, service at the times when we most want to run on to the next phase of life.

He loved them to the end.

“We’ll make it I swear…”

Sometimes, I wish I could call Linda Crain and arrange a coffee date.