Thoughts for the Week—May 2008
Thought for the Week: 5/19/08—REMEMBERING = STAYING CONNECTED

It’s about to be Memorial Day.  Interesting history there: at the end of the worst war America, it began as Decoration
Day, calling for honoring the fallen dead of North and South in a variety of local observances.  The overwhelming grief
of that generation, the loss of so many, the sense of a gigantic debt of all surviving to those cut down—all gathered in a
general sense that the sacrifice must be honored for all time to come.  And that became our Memorial Day.  (For more,
see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorial_day )

What undoubtedly began in part as a partisan and particular remembrance became over the years something much
more general and universal.  Today we commemorate all those who have fallen in the nation’s wars.  As well we should.

The purpose of remembrance is to prevent the loss of what is remembered.  If we do not keep touch with the cost of
the struggles of past generations, we lose all too soon the appreciation of what they have given us at such great sacrifice.

For us moderns, it is easy to be caught up in the holiday, the “day off,” the chance to eat, and travel, and consume.  We
lose touch with what we have and who we are if all we know how to do is revel in our immediate pleasure.  We isolate
in our own cocoon of contentment, and lose connection with our fellow countrymen and our common humanity.

In the Church, we face the same struggle even more intensely and for much the same reason.  Present pleasure and
diversion too easily erases our consciousness of purpose, direction, meaning and our debt to those who have given us
so much.  And to the One who has given us all.

As we begin the summer season of travel and ease, let us—for Jesus’ sake, and for our mere humanity—remember.  
Wherever you are, each Sunday, honor the God who made you with your worship.  Stay connected: to your God, your
family, your purpose and your self.
Thought for the Week: 5/12/08—SERVANTHOOD, ANYONE?

I remember the look of astonishment on my friend’s face now, years later, with a mixture of sadness and anger,
sympathy and frustration, but mostly wonder at how completely it revealed not only his feelings but our whole
culture.

Our colleague had just said with pride that his 19 year old son had decided to join the Marines.  My friend could
barely contain his shock and, well, disdain.  The conversation was mercifully cut short, but later he went on at some
length—why would anyone want their boy to go into the military, to take the risks, to endure the hardship and the
danger, to serve?  

His words opened a window for me into what we are all becoming.

We are carefully taught every day by our world, by every commercial and story we read or see, to be served and
to spend as little time serving others as we possibly can:  in that world, servants are losers.  “Get and spend, you
deserve it!” “He who dies with the most toys, wins.”

That is a genuinely purposeless life.  When you can buy your gods, the old prophets knew, you have nothing to
hold your life together in hard times or to the end.  And a church that becomes nothing but a consumer club has no
God worth talking about either.

Let us not be that.  We who have been given so very, very much, surely must know that what we have is only a
means to a much higher and greater end.  

The real God calls us to a service that is the only perfect freedom, the freedom from self, and appetite, and the
narcissism that consumes so many around us every day.

“The greatest among you shall be the servant of all.”  The one who said that proved it, revolutionized the world,
and set us free.  For his love’s sake, let us dare to take the servant’s role every day and in every relationship, and
be free indeed.
Thought for the Week: 5/26/08—Estivation

The bears know when to hibernate when the weather starts getting cold.  Texans, California red-legged frogs, and
lungfishes (see your www.wikipedia.org) know when to crawl under the mud or head for the beach or the mountains
when it gets hot, and that is “estivation” from Latin aestas, which means summer.

Bears get fat before they hibernate.  A lot of us get fat(ter) while we estivate, ’cause it’s too hot out there to move
around a lot and the stuff we cool off with has carbs in it, whether from sugar cane or hops.

I do not doubt for a moment that we need to estivate as much as the bears need to hibernate.  One of my great
suspicions (verging on paranoia) has been that year-round schooling was really intended to turn all our children (and us)
into little robo-proletarians who never had enough time to reflect on what They were telling us to do.  (One suspects
soccer is popular with Them because you just never can stop for a second, to peer out to the outfield and point the way
for the next homer, like the Babe did in the Great Old Days of baseball.)

No, we need to estivate, whether at the beach or in the mountains or out in the street, having subverted the fire hydrant
into a neighborhood entertainment.  We must cool the brain for a season, and be able to ponder, and step away from
the busyness.  

Do NOT think that’s a “walk” from checking in with the God who gave us all this to ponder.  All the more, as we take
our rest, we need to sit in the quiet of the church house, and look about us, and hear and touch and taste and smell the
sweet, holy moment of reflection.  That calls us to our best selves, and renews us and places us where we belong in this
universe—resting in our Father’s arms.  Then our rest really does fit us aright for the busy season and the load of work.  
And nothing can separate us from him, or ourselves, our hopes, and our future.
GOD IS YOUR FATHER
BUT WE ARE NOT YOUR MOTHER
CLEAN UP YOUR OWN DISHES
Thought for the Week: 5/05/08—WHO DOES YOUR LAUNDRY?

Thousands of homes all over the country are preparing joyfully to receive their college and school young folk back
home and lower the water levels of many reservoirs washing clothes that may not have received the touch of water
since mid-January.  With this thought, I was pleasantly reminded of a sign from the days when we helped lead the
college ministry 20 years ago in San Marcos.  A feisty redheaded campus peer minister put it up in the kitchen
there, where we had supper every Wednesday night for 30 or 40 collegians:





Part of our job as Church is serving others.  Another important part is teaching manners and civility and
responsibility, to young and old alike.  The two are not opposed notions.  Just like every family, doing the chores,
and helping everyone to take their part in doing the chores, are both important tasks.

We’re coming up on Mother’s Day.  God bless ’em, they cleaned up after us all our lives, and they taught us how
to do it for ourselves, eventually, despite all our resistance.  Thank them for both those things, when you call or
write or stop by, and if they are not still on-planet, stop a minute this day (and everyday), and thank them as you
pray your prayer for them.

And then pass it on.  Clean up someone else’s mess, and then help them learn how to do it for themselves.  It is all
part of the same lesson—Gospel and Law, loving and learning, Jesus and Holy Spirit.  

You will know the Holy Ghost has truly arrived for Pentecost when the kids do the laundry for themselves.  It beats
speaking in tongues!