"But two old friends embracing in a garden because they both of them know that they will never see one another again." (F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 97)
If I were to look at all the friends I have had over the years, I wonder what I would remember about the last time I saw them? What were we doing? Was our goodbye a normal friendly one, or were heated words exchanged? Did we know that was the last time we'd see each other?
Facebook has done a funny thing in reacquainting folks. I've reconnected with people I hadn't thought about in years. And since I don't usually part with heated words, it has been a pleasure reconnecting generally.
The truth is actually that every good bye, see ya later etc, has always the possibility of it being a last one. Maybe that's why I try not to leave my house with a cross word towards my wife or my children. Mainly because I wouldn't want that to ever be the last thing they or I remember.
Since I have been present when people have said goodbye, before turning off a vent I know the pit in your stomach feeling that would come knowing that on this side of death, I will not see that person again.
Of course as a person of faith, I will always look forward to a reunion with those I love.
Blessings,
Ed
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Reflections for 4/13/11
"Maybe it is because it is to the ones who are most fully alive that death comes most unbearably."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p.97)
This week I will have my third funeral 5 weeks. All three deaths were not unexpected. And in at least two of the cases probably more of a blessing. That of course doesn't take away from the sadness and grief that the family and friends of the deceased feel.
I've had the privilege of being with people when they die. In most cases it was a very peaceful shutting down. I have also baptized a still born baby, and been present for the grief of that family at the loss of their child. That death not expected.
I'd like to think that I'm as prepared for death as anyone. I don't wish to die anytime soon, but I don't fear it. There might be some disappointment that I might not have seen or accomplished everything that I'd hoped to.
Most of us don't get to pick the day of our death. For most folks we'd like to see a long and enjoyable life that just ends romantically lying down one night and not waking up. Sometimes that happens, though not that often.
I don't know how gracefully I would accept a health diagnosis that gave me a definite time frame. I hope I never have to find out.
Blessings,
Ed
This week I will have my third funeral 5 weeks. All three deaths were not unexpected. And in at least two of the cases probably more of a blessing. That of course doesn't take away from the sadness and grief that the family and friends of the deceased feel.
I've had the privilege of being with people when they die. In most cases it was a very peaceful shutting down. I have also baptized a still born baby, and been present for the grief of that family at the loss of their child. That death not expected.
I'd like to think that I'm as prepared for death as anyone. I don't wish to die anytime soon, but I don't fear it. There might be some disappointment that I might not have seen or accomplished everything that I'd hoped to.
Most of us don't get to pick the day of our death. For most folks we'd like to see a long and enjoyable life that just ends romantically lying down one night and not waking up. Sometimes that happens, though not that often.
I don't know how gracefully I would accept a health diagnosis that gave me a definite time frame. I hope I never have to find out.
Blessings,
Ed
Reflections for 4/12/11
"'He set his face to go to Jerusalem,' the Gospel says, and it was a journey from which he seems to have known that he would both never return and return always even unto the end of time and beyond."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 96)
I've never actually bought a one way ticket, not literally or figuratively. I suppose there is a part of me that even when I leave a place, I or it never fully leaves. There are places in my past that I have gone from, heading in a new direction, but somewhere in the rear view mirror of my mind those places still have a hook in me.
The times that I have ever returned, I know that I'm usually let down. The place has changed, not always physically, but often emotionally for me. And that is probably the way it should be. Part of the memory of any place fades a little each day, and when you literally revisit, there are emotions that still come up, but I rarely say, I wish I were still here.
This is true for the town I grew up in, the college I graduated from, the seminary I graduated from and even the first church I served. These places haven't gotten worse mind you, they are just different from what I remember them being, and they can't be that for me anymore.
Blessings,
Ed
I've never actually bought a one way ticket, not literally or figuratively. I suppose there is a part of me that even when I leave a place, I or it never fully leaves. There are places in my past that I have gone from, heading in a new direction, but somewhere in the rear view mirror of my mind those places still have a hook in me.
The times that I have ever returned, I know that I'm usually let down. The place has changed, not always physically, but often emotionally for me. And that is probably the way it should be. Part of the memory of any place fades a little each day, and when you literally revisit, there are emotions that still come up, but I rarely say, I wish I were still here.
This is true for the town I grew up in, the college I graduated from, the seminary I graduated from and even the first church I served. These places haven't gotten worse mind you, they are just different from what I remember them being, and they can't be that for me anymore.
Blessings,
Ed
Monday, April 11, 2011
Reflections 4/11/11
"In eating the bread and drinking the wine, they are to remember him. Jesus tells them, and to remember him not merely in the sense of letting their minds drift back to him in the dim past but in the sense of recalling him to the immediate present. They are to remember him the way when we remember someone we love who has died, he is alive again within us to the point where we can all but hear him speak and our hearts kindle to the reality of his presence."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 96)
I don't know if my love for food has parallels to my love for communion. I will say that I have very vivid memories of the churches that I spent significant time in. All of them were eucharistically centered. Most did not use baked bread. There were the places that used such thin wafers that they stuck to the roof of your mouth. Some wafers had a little more substance. The wine ran the gamut of decent port to muscatel. What is probably even more true is that in all of those places it was even more the people that I recall the most.
Same with real food too. Many of the important and beloved folks in my life have some signature recipe, that if I had it outside of their presence I would remember them.
Of course there are other triggers that bring beloved people back from just a memory to being very present to us. What brings your most beloved back to the forefront of your mind and heart? Are there "signature dishes that when you taste and see, you say "just like he/she used to make?"
Blessings,
Ed
I don't know if my love for food has parallels to my love for communion. I will say that I have very vivid memories of the churches that I spent significant time in. All of them were eucharistically centered. Most did not use baked bread. There were the places that used such thin wafers that they stuck to the roof of your mouth. Some wafers had a little more substance. The wine ran the gamut of decent port to muscatel. What is probably even more true is that in all of those places it was even more the people that I recall the most.
Same with real food too. Many of the important and beloved folks in my life have some signature recipe, that if I had it outside of their presence I would remember them.
Of course there are other triggers that bring beloved people back from just a memory to being very present to us. What brings your most beloved back to the forefront of your mind and heart? Are there "signature dishes that when you taste and see, you say "just like he/she used to make?"
Blessings,
Ed
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Reflections for 4/10/11
"In terms of the world's sanity, Jesus is crazy as a coot, and anybody who thnks he can follow him without being a little crazy too is laboring less under a cross than under a delusion."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life." p.95)
Under my senior picture in my high school year book I quoted rock singer Joe Walsh, "they say I'm crazy but I have a good time, life's been good to me so far."
I certainly had a reputation for being crazy, not in a psychological way, but in terms of marching to the beat of my own drummer. I would say what is on my mind, without thinking of the consequences. I would have done lousy with living by public opinion polls. I wrestled, which is usually associated with crazy people. But I also tended to be smiling a good chunk of the time. I think it was generally because I was doing what I wanted to do and loved doing it.
There is a certain amount of craziness in being a person of faith. Much of what I believe is unprovable by scientific means. And there's certainly enough scientific proof of how things work, yet I keep believing. While following Jesus is not nearly as risky a business as it once was, or still is in some places in the world, the apathy that I sometimes encounter is often harder to deal with than out and out hostility.
But for me being a crazy Christian, especially an Episcopalian, has given me many good times, wonderful memories and also moments of really feeling like I'm making a difference in my small part of the world. And in following Christ and believing in God, I've found that in fact life has been good to me so far.
Blessings,
Ed
Under my senior picture in my high school year book I quoted rock singer Joe Walsh, "they say I'm crazy but I have a good time, life's been good to me so far."
I certainly had a reputation for being crazy, not in a psychological way, but in terms of marching to the beat of my own drummer. I would say what is on my mind, without thinking of the consequences. I would have done lousy with living by public opinion polls. I wrestled, which is usually associated with crazy people. But I also tended to be smiling a good chunk of the time. I think it was generally because I was doing what I wanted to do and loved doing it.
There is a certain amount of craziness in being a person of faith. Much of what I believe is unprovable by scientific means. And there's certainly enough scientific proof of how things work, yet I keep believing. While following Jesus is not nearly as risky a business as it once was, or still is in some places in the world, the apathy that I sometimes encounter is often harder to deal with than out and out hostility.
But for me being a crazy Christian, especially an Episcopalian, has given me many good times, wonderful memories and also moments of really feeling like I'm making a difference in my small part of the world. And in following Christ and believing in God, I've found that in fact life has been good to me so far.
Blessings,
Ed
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Reflections for 4/9/11
"We break fast together, break bread together fast with the clock on the wall over my wife's head tick-tocking our time away, time away. Soon it will be time to leave for school. Soon enough it will be time to leave."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 94)
Today was the start of Little League in Wenonah, the town that I live in. It is a small town, so we have a parade and all the boys and girls march in their uniforms. I gave a blessing at the request of the "Commissioner." I seem to be the fallback clergy in town. I've been doing it for years. The day was sort of bittersweet in that neither of my sons walked in the parade, because neither is in Little League anymore. Time had moved on for us.
Sometimes I sense that time drags, either by day or week or years. Other times it seems to fly by. Sometimes I half jokingly speak of retiring in 13 years. And folks will tell me not to wish my life away like that. I also know that in three years life will be very different for me and I'll have choices to make.
What I have noticed about time, is that when I'm have fun, it flies. When I'm bored it drags. Good thing I have fun most of the time.
I close with this hymn about time by Isaac Watts:
1 O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home:
2 Under the shadow of thy throne,
thy saints have dwelt secure;
sufficient is thine arm alone,
and our defense is sure.
3 Before the hills in order stood,
or earth received her frame,
from everlasting thou art God,
to endless years the same.
4 A thousand ages in thy sight
are like an evening gone;
short as the watch that ends the night
before the rising sun.
5 Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
bears all our years away;
they fly, forgotten, as a dream
dies at the opening day.
6 O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
be thou our guide while troubles last,
and our eternal home.
Blessings,
Ed
Today was the start of Little League in Wenonah, the town that I live in. It is a small town, so we have a parade and all the boys and girls march in their uniforms. I gave a blessing at the request of the "Commissioner." I seem to be the fallback clergy in town. I've been doing it for years. The day was sort of bittersweet in that neither of my sons walked in the parade, because neither is in Little League anymore. Time had moved on for us.
Sometimes I sense that time drags, either by day or week or years. Other times it seems to fly by. Sometimes I half jokingly speak of retiring in 13 years. And folks will tell me not to wish my life away like that. I also know that in three years life will be very different for me and I'll have choices to make.
What I have noticed about time, is that when I'm have fun, it flies. When I'm bored it drags. Good thing I have fun most of the time.
I close with this hymn about time by Isaac Watts:
1 O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home:
2 Under the shadow of thy throne,
thy saints have dwelt secure;
sufficient is thine arm alone,
and our defense is sure.
3 Before the hills in order stood,
or earth received her frame,
from everlasting thou art God,
to endless years the same.
4 A thousand ages in thy sight
are like an evening gone;
short as the watch that ends the night
before the rising sun.
5 Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
bears all our years away;
they fly, forgotten, as a dream
dies at the opening day.
6 O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
be thou our guide while troubles last,
and our eternal home.
Blessings,
Ed
Friday, April 8, 2011
Reflections for 4/8/11
"How do I happen to believe in God? I will give one more answer which can be stated briefly. Writing novels. I got into the habit of looking for plots. After awhile, I began to suspect that my own life had a plot. And after awhile more, I began to suspect that life itself has a plot."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 94)
I am not a believer in predestination. I am a believer in process theology, which might be more easily understood as constant ongoing revelation. Because of my belief in a living God, and one who seems to be interested in me and everyone else, what I do affects God's next move with regards to me. The final chapter is basically written I believe, though I should probably leave room for last minute edits.
So what if anything do I see as the plot development in my life? From my own perspective it seems rather mundane. Get born, grow up in a reasonably stable environment. Go off to college. Fall in and out of love. End up in love and married. Find a career, start own family, keep living.
Okay so that's a plot synopsis, the cliff notes if you will, and I'm leaving out some of the twists, the thickenings etc. While there are chapters that are complete and can now be read and interpreted, there is still much to be written I hope.
Each day is at a minimum a new line in the plot. Each life change the close of a chapter. I find the author to be one incredibly imaginative writer, considering the character(s) he has to work with.
Blessings,
Ed
I am not a believer in predestination. I am a believer in process theology, which might be more easily understood as constant ongoing revelation. Because of my belief in a living God, and one who seems to be interested in me and everyone else, what I do affects God's next move with regards to me. The final chapter is basically written I believe, though I should probably leave room for last minute edits.
So what if anything do I see as the plot development in my life? From my own perspective it seems rather mundane. Get born, grow up in a reasonably stable environment. Go off to college. Fall in and out of love. End up in love and married. Find a career, start own family, keep living.
Okay so that's a plot synopsis, the cliff notes if you will, and I'm leaving out some of the twists, the thickenings etc. While there are chapters that are complete and can now be read and interpreted, there is still much to be written I hope.
Each day is at a minimum a new line in the plot. Each life change the close of a chapter. I find the author to be one incredibly imaginative writer, considering the character(s) he has to work with.
Blessings,
Ed
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