The discipline of reading

“He had a daughter, Sheerah, who built Upper

and Lower Beth-Horon and Uzzen-Sheerah.”

--1 Chronicles 7:24

In chapter 11 of 1 Chronicles there is a list of names; one more list. The story was just getting started when the author gave us another list of names.  So far this book has felt like one long list; name after name. In fact, the first 10 chapters are really just a series of genealogies. Many of the names are utterly meaningless to me, names like Abishua, Gera and Shephuphan… They were sons of someone or fathers of someone and the author of this book felt it important to list them here, but rarely offers supporting evidence or an explanation why.  On the other hand, the genealogy does go back to the very beginning, so I do recognize some of the names: Adam, Cain, Nimrod “the first mighty warrior[1],” Noah, Shem, Abraham, Isaac, Israel [aka. Jacob]…  And I understand all of this is important as a kind of build up to the Kingship of David.  But it really is (for the most part) just a bunch of names, just genealogical lists tracing paternity; for example: “Sons of Reuben, first-born of Israel: Henoch, Pallu, Hezron, Carmi. Sons of Joel: Shemaiah his son, Gog his son, Shimei his son…” etc. etc. (cf. 5:3)  Every once in a while we get clues about where someone lived or what they did; for instance we learn that there was a clan of linen-workers at Beth-Ashbea and there were potters who lived at Netaim (cf. 4:21-23), and temple singers who worked around the clock (cf. 6:16) but almost nothing else in the way of details. And almost totally the list is of sons and fathers… a patriarchal genealogy.

On occasion, and it stands out because it is so rare, we hear of a woman.  Usually only because she is the mother of a son.  But, very strikingly, in chapter 7 we hear of Sheerah, daughter of Ephraim. And about her we are told not that she was someone’s mother, but that she “built upper and lower Beth-Horon and Uzzen-Sheerah.” (cf. 7:24). Coming so abruptly amidst this flood of male names with little or no details, this odd –and seemingly important-- detail stands out even more. It makes me wonder about this woman, and it makes me wonder about these long-forgotten towns she built and about the author. Who was she and why was she so important to the author that he/she would include such details? And then I wondered about her name, and whether the creator of He-Man and She-ra was inspired by this powerful builder of towns.

And then I wondered why nothing was made of her in the footnotes in my Study Bible?  Surely one of the editors must have realized that readers who get this far will be curious about her. Why does this woman stand out in this way? But there is nothing in my study Bible. I would have appreciated even a note that acknowledged my curiosity by noting that the towns are unknown and their builder is mentioned nowhere else in scripture (which is basically what I found on Wickipedia).   

But as I continued reading Sheerah fades into the endless flood of more and more names. Many readers might choose to skip over these first 10 (or 11) chapters because of the lack of narrative.  They seem like an extended (almost endless) footnote to the story of David & his kingdom. But not me. I have made a commitment to read every word of the Bible, and so I trudge on. I intend to read every the and and and thus and such—and even every name of every begotter who ever begotted or was begotten by such or thus or…well, you get my drift.  My approach is this:  If this is the Word of God, then every single word of it must be worth reading; not a comma or a consonant to be skipped.  And yes, before you say anything, I understand that this is not necessarily the correct or scholarly or even most efficient way to read the Bible; but it is part of my spiritual exercise (or discipline) to read it and to read it all. I also know that this doesn’t make me special; I am informed that there are many people who have read every word of it multiple times and to them I say wow[2]!  My approach is to surrender to the text; whatever God gives me to read each day, I read it.  If it is beautiful and inspiring, I read it.  If it is a simple (and tedious) list, I read it.  My plan is to just follow Him, page by page, chapter by chapter.  At my reading rate, it will certainly take a while (years and years), and I know it will take patience and will-power (which I sometimes lack) and humility; I had to humble myself and read all those laws in Deuteronomy, and all those census tallies in Numbers, and all those details about the ark and the tent and the altar and the bowls and lampstands and ephods in Exodus… Or was that Leviticus?

Barely a ¼ finished, already I am looking toward reading it all again and hoping more sticks the second time around.  But for now, I am just submitting; I am just opening the book each day and reading the next verse, the next chapter, the next page.  Meeting whatever or whoever the Lord puts before me… And learning what I can from it.  My plan is to simply follow the Lord wherever He leads.  And isn’t that a good lesson in itself? 

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[1] At least Nimrod gets a kind of epithet.

[2] I’m impressed.  For me, this effort/exercise is taking a lot more time.  After about 2 ½  years I just arrived at 1 Chronicles (about ¼ of the way through).

Today I set before you two choices: life and death--which will you choose?

As a result of this, many of his disciples
returned to their former way of life and no longer
accompanied him. Jesus then said to the Twelve:
Do you also want to leave?   --John 6: 66-67

How often does life come down to commitment? One question: are you committed or not? Are you all in or just dabbling?  Are we committed or not?  Or the alternative question might be: What are we committed to?  In the words of the old folk song, “Which side are you on?”

First, I will say that I am –I think—someone with commitment issues.  I am always (and much too easily) tempted to just blow things off; it’s kind of my go to reaction to almost any interruption or snag in my plans.

“Dad, we’re out of dental floss!” 

“Honey, cancel those airline tickets; looks like I’ll be heading to HEB this weekend.”

Thursday evening I was planning to go the hospital and volunteer, but by the time I got home from work, I was tired and looking for any excuse to “have to stay home.” This isn’t something I’m proud of, but it is something I live with. I don’t know how much of it is simple laziness and/or how much is a deep-seated psychological problem with commitment. Regardless, it is not always easy to get myself going. But it is always good for me when I do.

When I got to the hospital, I found that the chaplain had forgotten to leave me a list.  My first thought was that this must be a sign from God: Return thou to thy grilled cheese and Dr. Pepper and regular Thursday evening TV viewing habits.  But, something inside me said: probably not. SO,  I walked over to the business office and asked the cashier, showed her my badge, explained the situation and after a brief wait, she gave me a 6-page list of about 40 names (and room numbers). Of course, I couldn’t do them all, but I could do some. So I sat down and looked the list over to see if there were any names I recognized; people I know, or people I have visited before. Nada.  After whispering a prayer, I crossed myself and headed to the elevator. First stop, 3^rd floor; ICU.

Walking through the ICU, you see faces of exhaustion, fear, confusion, resignation; family and friends standing around the edges of a bed, watching a sleeping body, uncertain what to do. Hungering for a word of reassurance.  And in the beds the almost lifeless look of the sleeping patient with the tubes and cables strapped to them, blinking and flashing monitors hovering close by.  As they awaken you a kind of frightened emptiness fills their eyes; an emptiness that seeks only to be filled with comfort, consolation--hope. I have a lot of respect for ICU nurses.

The first two rooms I visit are empty. The beds have been cleared and remade and they await the next round of fear and hope and help.  But in the third, the patient is turned away from the door with her back to me.  She is motionless. Maybe asleep.  And then I notice a sign on the door asking visitors to speak to a nurse before entering.  Of course, this too could be a sign from God. So, I go find a nurse. Instead of telling me that I need to turn back and go home (that Dr. Pepper is still waiting for me…), she smiles and says: It’s okay. Go on in. 

In my heart I was still thinking: it is possible this woman is asleep.   At this rate I could get through all 40 names in less than an hour. Coming back to her door though, I found the patient had turned over and she was looking straight at me. Entering the room, I introduced myself and that was when I noticed the tube coming out of her throat.  Stopping at her bedside, I put my hands on the rail and spoke her name, intending to ask if there was anything I could do for her. But, before I could finish she had reached up and taken my hand in hers and held it so tight it hurt. Her nails digging into my palm, she clutched my hand and waved it slowly in small circles above her. I stood there, just gazing into her eyes, stunned by their fear, their desperation.  She clung to me and I let myself be clung to –there was nothing else I could give her.  We were like that for several minutes. Just staring at each other, holding onto each other; just being there—together—so that we weren’t alone.  And of course, that was when I knew –this is where I am supposed to be. This is exactly where I am supposed to be. Right here. Right now. With this frightened and lonely person, letting her cling to my hand and not saying a word. I was made for this.

As the intensity of her grasp subsided, I could see a calm fill her eyes and asked if she would like me to say a prayer.  In response, the circling became more intense and her head nodded slightly.  So, I did. I can’t remember exactly what I said, but I know I asked the Lord to let His healing and His blessing be ever present through the hands and the words and the touch of the nurses and doctors and all who entered that room. And I asked that the Lord open our hearts to the grace of His love; His will. And then we prayed the Lord’s Prayer together. I saw her lips moving silently softly forming the words.  We were together maybe 20 minutes. I had never met her before, and will probably never see her again; and she never said a word –but she spoke to me like a prophet with her anguished eyes and that desperate grip and those fierce nails.

Too often when life gets hard, or inconvenient, I retreat to safety, sink into the couch of routine: what I know and what makes me feel comfortable.  Too often, I turn away from the challenges and the difficulties; the places where Christ hopes to meet me.  That night I didn’t.  And thanks to that woman, and her wordless message, I hope to change not just my habits, but my heart.  I hope to…

Over the past couple of weeks the Church’s sex abuse scandal has returned to the news.  And now for two Sundays in a row I have waited for the priest to say something about it, and for two Sundays –nothing; instead we have heard bad jokes and spiritual platitudes… I understand that priests are human, and they get anxious and fearful and even lazy at times; much like me.  But, I think when there is a scandal of this magnitude, we --the people in the pews—are in a kind of ICU moment.  We are confused and frightened –like we are awakening from a nightmare—and we need someone to offer us a hand to hold, to offer us a word of comfort, to tell us that they too are confused by it and they too are frightened, but that they aren’t going to avoid it. They aren’t going to go back to their former life and their old ways and pretend like nothing happened.   As Pope Francis made clear, the best way to heal such a wound is not to cover it up but to open our hearts, our lives, our eyes and get it out into the open and let the sunlight and the Lord begin the healing.

For me, that is the real challenge in life –to face it, to open your heart, to open your eyes and to go forth and face the life God gives you, to receive and be nourished by the bread that God gives you to eat each day, and to find in it the Love of God.  Don’t turn away and go back to your former life; that road leads to the couch, and a kind of living death… 

As Peter said when Jesus asked the apostles if they planned to leave Him:

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68)

We are called to be alive; not to be safe, not to be cautious, but to be alive. Yes, life can be hard, the times can be tough.  But a life worth living requires a little effort, and a lot of commitment. Get off the couch and go out into the world and be alive; be a living witness to the love of God.  Don’t hide.  Don’t take the easy way… Don’t play it safe. Each day we have set before us two choices: life and death, blessing and curse…  I say take a risk; make a commitment; choose life. (cf. Deuteronomy 30: 19)

The bread the Lord has given you to eat

“Moses said: that is the bread which

the Lord has given you to eat.”

--Exodus 16:15

“Moses then said: No one may keep any of it for tomorrow.

But some of them took no notice of Moses and kept part of it

for the following day; it bred maggots and the smell grew foul.”

--Exodus 16:19-20

“Jesus said to them: I am the bread of life;

whoever comes to me will never hunger,

and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

--John 6:35

   

I’ve been thinking about the “bread of life.” I’ve been thinking about it in a literal sense: as a way of thinking about life as the bread (or food) that God gives us each day. I’ve been thinking about the joys and difficulties that come in daily life: friends, community, praise, but also labor, discomfort, hurt feelings, intentional cruelties, as well as annoying interruptions and simple day to day tedium. It seems easy enough to see the friend who offers an encouraging word or helping hand as a kind of manna from Heaven.  A friend like that can lift your spirit, ease your tensed brow, lighten your load and leave you feeling refreshed and renewed. Sometimes all they do is stop by your office and make you laugh for a few minutes; it is amazing how renewed I can feel. Truly fed.

But what about the difficulties? How are those food?  They feel more like punishments, than nourishment.  How do they embody the bread God has given us to eat this day?  I don’t know exactly, but I keep looking for the paradox and wondering if that might give us a clue; a clue to how God might feed us through our very hunger, nourish us through that particularly difficult relationship. Or refresh our spirit through even an injury or disease?  Or even a leaky roof or a clogged drain?

What I am saying is… well, not so much saying as proposing… Actually, not so much proposing, as considering, is this: what if the food of each day is the events and people we meet each day? And what if they all (pleasant and unpleasant) are meant to bless us, to nourish us, but not necessarily to make our lives easier or more pleasent (at least not in any measurable way).  What if (for example) the clogged bathtub drain which a few minutes ago stopped my writing and demanded my attention is at least part of the food God has given me to eat this day?  If I believed that to be true, how would it affect my reaction to it?  Would I stand up in a huff (or maybe a minute and a huff?) sighing resentfully and stomping down the hall, Liquid Plumber in hand?  Or would I sigh gratefully and whisper to myself: Thank you Lord, I was feeling a little pekish?  Disclaimer: I certainly did not do the latter.  And when someone mentioned that perhaps we should call a plumber, I reacted not with gentle considered words but with an interior monologue that went something like: Yeah! Maybe someone should do that. Maybe the someone who keeps clogging the drain every time she shaves!

And I know it’s not easy nor is it something our culture considers natural or even admirable.  But that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. The Lord feeds us through His body and blood –and sometimes that body and blood show up in our door looking a lot like that neighbor who is always complaining about our lawn: we never edge, we don’t water enough, and some of my favorite flowers are actually weeds! And yes, I might want to tell him to mind his own business, but –is that how I want to greet Christ when He comes to my door?

Here is the other part: just because we have been given something for our daily food, doesn’t determine how we are supposed to receive it.  You see, we might receive something very difficult for our daily bread because God wants us not to simply accept it—but to grapple with it. We are (perhaps) being called to struggle with a difficult neighbor not because we are to become a doormat, but because we are to witness to that neighbor the presence of God; through our willingness to receive him and our willingness to treat him with compassion, to be loving, to be sincere and respectful toward him. Sometimes our daily bread may be an unfair law or an unjust attitude, and we are being asked to receive that daily bread through working to change the law or change the attitude; through witnessing against it. Perhaps our daily bread is simply a child who wants our attention just when we sit down to write the great American novel.  Both are goods; and to choose one is not necessarily to demean the other.  And es, our daily bread might have been time to write or our daily bread could be the child’s love; but what if the bread is actually that conflict: what if the real bread from Heaven comes not necessarily from one or the other, but in making the choice.  The real nourishment comes not necessarily from the artistic effort (or success) or even from the child who takes your hand and pulls you away from the desk, but in making the choice to go with the child, the choice to put someone else first?  The real food is in the choice to put your own wants or desires aside and give yourself (your time; literally a piece of your life) to another.  To do that feeds our soul, and that is something to chew on.

As I was writing this, I find myself seated at an old school table with too many books on it (only half of them mine) and a cup of cold coffee perched carefully just in reach toward the edge so it won’t get knocked and spilled as I open books and turn pages. This is a place I like to sit in the mornings with my Bible and read a little and then write in my notebook. And most of what I write here, comes out of that notebook.  Anyway, I was sitting there bending over the notebook and scribbling away when I reached for my coffee and knocked my little blue Bible off to the floor. Picking it up I noticed a couple of holy cards (used as bookmarks) had fallen out. As I was putting them back into the Bible I noticed writing on the back of one and thought: I don’t know if I’ve ever read this. The card was a black and white photograph of Therese of Lisieux. I think I picked it up in a church because I liked the picture, and I had probably stuck it right into a book without even reading it.  Anyway, turning it over, this is what I read: 

Everything is a grace, everything is the direct effect of our Father’s love; difficulties, contradictions, humiliations, all the soul’s miseries, her burdens, her needs, everything; because through them she learns humility, realizes her weakness.  Everything is a grace because everything is God’s gift. Whatever be the character of life or its unexpected events, to the heart that loves, all is well.

And I thought—yes. That’s what I meant to say. And much more concise... Everything is grace.

Be nourished by it. Be nourished by your husband’s love.  Be nourished by your wife’s tears.  Be nourished by your child’s laughter.  Be nourished by the litter box that needs cleaning.  Be nourished by the tub that won’t drain.  Be nourished by the quiet moment with the cold coffee and the spilled book.  Be nourished by your needs that go unmet, be nourished by the contradictions and humiliations… not because they are goods, but because they are opportunities for us to be fed by God.  Learn humility by accepting “whatever be the character of [your] life”  meekly and with love.  And remember Moses’ warning about holding onto the manna.  Don’t hold onto the hurts and slights and humiliations. Don’t cling to them, because even manna from Heaven turns sour and breeds maggots when we hold onto it and store it up for tomorrow.

Lord, open my heart to the gift of this day.

let me receive it and be fed by it, nourished

by Your grace descending like bread from Heaven.

Through Your gift, let me be renewed in hope,

Strengthened in faith, and consoled by Your love.

Amen.