a cartoon from Richard

re Job 19

In today’s reading, Job’s worship is an expression of faith so forged by bitter experience that it seeks to chisel the protest of its existence into stone as a testimony for all time. Against the ephemera of what we value in today’s society, there is no doubt in my mind that such faith, chiselled into the stones of our church buildings, can still prompt the search for God.

The 19th-century artist and critic John Ruskin understood something of this when he wrote: “The greatest glory of a building is . . . in that deep sense of voicefulness, of stern watching, of mysterious sympathy . . . which we feel in walls that have long been washed by the passing waves of humanity.”

As we stumble across church buildings that persistently present themselves to us, we might ask: “Why are these Christian buildings here, what is their meaning, and how do we access it?” The remote churches that I visit on the North York Moors present such questions eloquently.

The small and steadfast congregations that worship in them keep alive the light of faith that prompts further enquiry, and challenges the assumption that we live in a post-Christian, secular age. But the same is true of other areas where I work, such as housing estates that are also “remote”, in the sense that they are a long way from access to the benefits of a share in prosperity and of protection against hard times.

This is the witness that challenges the limitations of an age that longs for value, but is obsessed with questions about price.
http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/content.asp?id=103062

Answerizing

When younger, I thought there was an answer to every problem. And for a time, I knew many of the answers.

I knew about parenting until I had children.

I knew about divorce until I got one.

I knew about suicide until three of my closest friends took their lives in the same year.

I knew about the death of a child until my child died.

I'm not as impressed with answers as once I was. Answers seem so pallid, sucked dry of blood and void of life. Knowing answers seduces us into making pronouncements. I still have a few friends or acquaintances who are 100 percent sure on most anything and are ready to make pronouncements on homosexuality, AIDS, marriage problems, teen-age pregnancies, abortion, sex education, or whatever is coming down the pike. But when we get shoved into our valley of the shadow, a pronouncement is the last thing we need.

A friend wrote recently, 'I too get Maalox moments from those who know. I'm discovering that wisdom and adversity replace cocksure ignorance with thoughtful uncertainty.'

More important and satisfying than answers is the Answerer. 'Thou art with me' - that's what we crave. There may or may not be answers, but the Eternal One would like very much to be our companion.

http://www.christiancentury.org/blogs/archive/2010-11/answerizing

The Sadducees

The Sadducees

I have some sympathy for the Sadducees,

for whom there was no resurrection.

They believed that this grounding place

of dust, decay, wind and uncertainty,

was where the true action was;

not in some future and otherworldly realm

where the dead are revived, renewed,

resuscitated and raised to somehow

continue the privileged work of living.

When the body dies, so does the soul.

Angels and other spiritual entities?

They simply don’t exist. Reward or

punishment beyond the grave? Forget it!

It’s what happens here that counts.

They, too. were Jews, these Sadducees:

children of Abraham who took their faith seriously.

They shared the Pharisees’ insistence

that the law must be obeyed,

and that the well-being of the nation depended upon it.

In the temple’s courts one day, these sceptics

enjoyed a spirited debate with one, Jesus,

an untrained teacher from the north.

According to the testimony of gospel-writing

historians, the itinerant rabbi clearly took the points.

Nearby scribes, they also tell us, were deeply

impressed by the power of his arguments,

and concurred. Some of us heretics, however,

are still considering the matter.


© 2010 Ken Rookes

zac 3

Zac again

Zac

How long o Lord?

Which brings us to Habakkuk, our Old Testament prophet of the day. He looks around at the world around him and he see God's failures. Why are the wicked doing well? Why do evil people seem to be gaining ground on God's holy people? Where is God when you need him? Even when Habakkuk calls out his name, he feels like his words are falling on deaf ears.

How long, O Lord?

I have no answers for those great questions. And, if you're a smart preacher, neither will you.

The point isn't to find the answers here.

The point today is that it's ok to ask the questions. An authentic relationship with God means that every once in a while we're going to get teed-off. Every once in a while we're going to look around and wonder where's the Divine? Sometimes we're going to be standing waist-deep in darkness and the Light is going to feel a million miles away.

And an authentic faith prays about that. It says it out loud to God.

Don't just smile and move on. There's no other relationship in your life that you'd do that over and over again. No relationship that's worth it anyway.

Now, God will be there. The Light shines in the darkness, even when we don't see it. And in chapter 3 of Habakkuk God is going to show up in a big way and put on a pyrotechnic display of power that puts George Lucas to shame.

But we still have to say it. And sometimes we need to lawyer up.

How long, O Lord?

http://www.rmcmorley.com/a-garden-path/2010/10/proper-26c-railing-into-the-night.html

Come down, Zacchaeus

Come down, Zacchaeus

The crowd offered no help

to the short-in-stature man, whose face

confirmed their initial impression

that this was one Zacchaeus, chief

among the ratbag tax collectors.

The tree was a sycamore;

its gnarled and twisted branches

offering a convenient means of elevation

enabling the man to rise above his dilemma

and successfully view the teacher,

whose reputation had travelled ahead of him,

all the way to Jericho.

Perhaps the Zac-man’s reputation

had also preceded him. Who can say?

When the teacher looked through the shadowed

leaves and branches he saw the face

of the climbing man, and called him down

with an unexpected invitation.

Hospitality is extended and accepted,

much to the grumbling derision

of the good religious people,

who could offer only sneering observations

about who one should choose as friends.

The teacher laughs them off, captive

to a larger vision of divine friendship.

Unsettled by such disturbing grace,

sinner Zacchaeus offers compensation

and justice to any he has defrauded; a sure sign

that the gospel has been truly proclaimed

and the kingdom has indeed come near.



© Ken Rookes 2010

The Communion of Saints

I have always thought that this day in the church calendar is undervalued. love this quote by Dag Hammarskjold

"Yet through me flashes

this vision of a magnetic field of the soul,

created in a timeless present by unknown multitudes,

living in holy obedience,

whose words and actions are a timeless prayer -

"The communion of Saints"

- and - within it - an eternal life."

The River

Some thoughts from a retreat.

The duck skids upon the river to end its flight.

Flowing, flowing; never standing still.

An old and forgotten friend,

the spoonbill, white and angel-like,

drops by unexpectedly

to greet and to encourage.

By the river the tree puts its roots

deep into the earth;

but what if the tree needed to be transplanted?

The river widens,

its water slows, but never stops.

My spoonbill friend returns,

extends its neck and looks around.

The clouds part momentarily,

releasing the sun.

The ancient roots are exposed, eroded.

One day they will fail

and the tree will be swallowed up.

I am distracted. When I look up

my spoonbill is gone.

He will return one day.

An island intrudes;

the river divides and flows around it

and unites again at the other side.

The river’s mouth is a thousand kilometres away

but still the ocean is getting closer.

One day I will reach it.

© Ken Rookes