The salt of hope

 “If salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned?” –Matthew 5:13-16

 I remember once when my youngest daughter was a little girl (maybe 6 or 7), she called me at work one day very excited.  She had just received a new book full of knock knock jokes and she wanted me to know!  In fact, she was so excited, without saying hello, she just started in with the jokes.  I answer the phone, and hear a familiar voice say: Knock Knock! And so, what else could I do but say: Whose there?  And for perhaps the next 10 minutes she was laughing and reading jokes to me, one right after the other. Barely a pause. Maybe 2 or 3 pages of them.  And yes, it was inane.  But, I have to say, by the time she was reading me the fifth or sixth joke it was no longer the joke that mattered. I couldn’t stop laughing. Not at the jokes, but at her joy and excitement and delight in reading them to me.  And the fact that a someone had called me at work to tell me knock knock jokes; AND they wouldn’t stop!

 By the time she finished, I was exhausted from laughing, and my cheeks hurt. But, what a glorious feeling.  I don’t remember if I was having a hard day, or if anything was going wrong,  I just remember hanging up that phone and feel a strange and wonderful lightness.  A sense that there was something good in the world. A feeling of hope.  Nothing had really changed. But for me, the world seemed like a better place because a six-year-old called me up and read me 20 (or more) knock knock jokes. If she had stopped after one or two, it would have been cute.  But, forgettable.  But her persistence, made it something more.

“You are the salt of the earth,” Jesus tells His disciples. And then challenges them to be that salt, reminding them that if salt loses its taste, what is it good for, but to be “thrown out and trampled underfoot.” (cf 5:13b) But how are we to be salt for the world?  How do we add flavor to this life?

My daughter wasn’t doing anything “special.” She was just being herself. She had received a gift and she wanted to share it with someone.  That’s all.  Nothing special. Nothing fancy. Just a phone call and a few very silly jokes.  But think about salt.  What is salt? Nothing fancy. Nothing too special (unless you buy one of those strange sea-salt things with the crystals that you have to grind or a flavored salt to go with your popcorn or garlic salt! Eegads… I’m so glad Jesus didn’t say we were supposed to be celery salt).

What I’m trying to say is this:  We are called to be salt of the earth. Salt is common and simple and often goes unnoticed, except in its absence.  It may not be essential, but it adds flavor and without many foods seem flavorless.  I wonder if part of what Jesus was telling his disciples was this: wherever you go, add flavor. Be a source of joy. Be a source of renewal.

 It doesn’t take much.  Another example I often think of is this: A few years ago, I had back surgery.  When I woke in the recovery room I was shivering and confused and felt lost. The nurse was telling me something and I remember a doctor (or someone) asking me a question, but most of all I remember shivering. I guess it is how I react to the anesthesia. It was a coldness inside me that I couldn’t escape. They put those warm blankets over me and I just sat there waiting for my teeth to stop chattering. And suddenly, my wife was standing next to me with a cup of hot black tea in a white Styrofoam cup. And I remember taking that cup and looking at it –not sure if I could drink it. But she encouraged me to take a sip and I did and oh, how good it felt going down.  As I finished it, I remember looking up and she was already standing there with another cup. It was nothing fancy. Nothing amazing. No cream. No sugar. Just plain old Lipton tea and a cup of hot water. I don’t remember a word she said or the doctors. But, I remember how she kept bringing me those cups of tea. And how good it felt just to hold them; to sip on them.  And I remember I felt loved. I felt like I mattered to someone; that in this world so full of pain and cold and confusion, someone cared.  That’s the key to being salt. You don’t have to save the world. You don’t have to fix anything.  You just have to care.  Just show up. Again and again.  That’s what it means to be salt of the earth.  Small and humble; it may not get noticed, but it makes all the difference.

So, what does this mean? I will call this the knock knock theory.  The first step is to knock.  Make time, seek someone out; let them know that they matter.  Maybe your first “knock” is to get on your knees and say a prayer.  Ask God to show you who needs salt.  Is someone you know feeling down, running on empty, truly losing hope?  You may not be able to fix anything for them, possibly you shouldn’t even try, but you can let them know they matter.  Ask them to talk; ask them about their life, their experiences, their dreams, or their favorite book. Maybe offer them a hot cup of tea (and a ginger snap). If you can’t think of anything else to say, ask them who was their favorite teacher in middle school.  You may be surprised by their answer… and delighted by what they remember.  If nothing else, just sit with them, in silence. Drink your tea, eat your cookie and don’t say a word.  That’s okay, too.

The first time will feel odd.   It will be awkward.  The second time, too.  Possibly, even the third. But keep it up.  The key is consistency.  And that takes time. With time and consistency, that person will begin to know that you care. They will know that they matter.  And that is the key to hope. And I guess that’s the second “knock.” It can’t be a one-time thing. You have to knock again. And again. And again.  And I think there’s a parable about that, too (cf. Luke 11:5-8 & 18:1-8).

 And don’t worry that you don’t have anything to say or anything to offer. Remember, Jesus doesn’t ask you to be the pot roast or the scrambled eggs or even the tofurkey.  Those come and go.  We aren’t called to come and go. We are called to be there, on the table, every day, every night, every meal.  We are called not to be the roast goose Bernoise, but the salt that gives it flavor.  The friend who gives hope. You may not change the world, but you just might change someone’s life.  And you know what, that may be even better. 

What's in your ark?

“The waters swelled, lifting the ark
until it floated off the ground…”  -Genesis 7:17b

The ark floated off the ground.  It rose up –and then, as the waters rose, swelling, it floated away.  The ark is what survives the flood. The ark and all that is in it. So, what we put in the ark is very important.  And I am pondering now… what have I put in my ark?

Think back to the original story. What did God have Noah put in his ark? Two of every living thing, male and female.  All life. All living things. Basically, God told Noah to value life; every living thing, from the wisest owl to the dumbest ox, from the mighty elephant to the lowly mouse, predator and prey—all living things. Life itself. Put it in your ark! Protect it. Value it. And when the flood waters came and the ark floated of the ground, that was what was saved. Life itself, that was what was in Noah’s ark.  What is in your ark?  That’s what I am asking myself these days. Like that commercial—What’s in your wallet?

What’s in your ark?  I think that is a question I couldn’t have imagined before this flood. Without the surreal experience of the past few days, I wouldn’t have realized the importance of this very basic, very essential question.

Yesterday we went back to Carol’s house (my mother-in-law).  We wanted to see if the water had gone down and we could get into her house and salvage a few things. Instead we learned that the water had risen. The knee-deep water from Sunday was now perhaps waist or even chest deep in places. And, while he was checking our ID, the policeman who was there told us to be careful. An alligator had been spotted in the water on one of the streets.  So, instead of going into her house we stood around –about ½ a mile away—just staring at the vastness of the water and thinking about all the things we should have got out of the house on Sunday morning –when we still had the chance.  And astonished that this is what our world had come to –the flood waters rose, they swelled, and there was nothing we could do about it…

But standing there, we were approached by a City of Houston worker who had just been talking to another woman. He came over to us and asked us where our house was.  Lynne explained to him she was hoping to get into her mother’s house but it was too deep. He asked for the address and she told him and he handed her his phone. He said there were pictures on it of all the houses on the flooded streets.  He told her she could look through the pictures and send any that were helpful to herself. At least you’ll have that for insurance purposes, he said. He showed her how to navigate through the pictures and how to select them and send one to herself. Then he left his phone with her and walked away to check on someone else.  When she finally found a picture, it was frightening. The water looked like it was over halfway up the front wall of the house. Maybe 5 feet deep.

As we stood there, a few other neighbors were gathering nearby and staring at the water with us and another man and his small boy came over and asked if any of us wanted to borrow his canoe and go in and take pictures of our houses.  He said someone else had just borrowed it, but when that person got back we could take a turn.  His little boy, maybe 8 years old, offered to go for us if we didn’t know how to paddle a canoe.  

Think about that: all over Houston in small and great and even heroic ways people are offering help, even putting their own lives at risk to help one another.

“The flood waters swelled, lifting the ark until it floated…”

What are you you putting in your ark?

The other side of this is: as we drove up to try and check on my mother-in-law’s house, the policeman was there at the barricade checking IDs. Certainly, he might have been there to make sure no one accidentally drove into the waters; protecting us from our own foolishness. Wen he told us about the alligator we laughed.  He didn’t.  I suspect, more than anything, he was there to protect the almost abandoned neighborhood from looters.  The news keeps warning us about looters and scammers who are coming to these troubled places to take advantage of a horrible situation.

“The flood waters swelled, and the ark floated off the ground…”

When the flood waters swell, your ark will begin to float… what will be in it?

There is another ark in the Bible. The one that Moses builds. In the days of Noah and the flood, God tells Noah to place all living things in it.  In the days of the Exodus, He had Moses build another Ark as a dwelling place for His own presence among His people. Put the thing you value most in the ark. Life. God… What do you value most?

In both places God gives pretty detailed directions for the ark’s construction; He is clearly concerned with the making of the Ark. But I think that may be because He is even more concerned with what we put inside it.  And because He knows that the floodwaters are coming. They always do.  And God knows that whatever we put in that ark, that is what will survive the flood.   That is what will begin to float when the flood waters swell.  What are you putting in your ark?  Yesterday my wife gave the keys to one of our cars to a friend who had to be rescued in the middle of the night from her flooding house.   And before that she learned that a neighbor needed formula her baby and we were off to the store.  What will survive your flood? Faith, love, generosity, kindness, compassion, courage, a reassuring smile? or will it be: selfishness, greed, cunning and hate?   In Houston, mostly we have seen only the good –but in places, sadly, we have seen all of these floating in the flood waters around us.

Like the commercial asks: What’s in your ark?