...love, with an accent

Lord, your church on earth is seeking your renewal from above;

teach us all the art of speaking with the accent of your love.

We would heed your great commission: “Go now into every place;

preach, baptize, fulfill my mission, serve with love and share my grace.”

---Hugh Sherlock, 1960

I am always interested in the decision of television directors and producers---mainly of news, documentary, and reality programming---to decide to use subtitles to “translate” the speech of characters or interview subjects with broken English or thick accents. I am continually amazed (and amused) by the great diversity of ways that we speak “American English”---cultural, regional, and even generational differences. Yes, generational---I sometimes think folk of a certain age might need subtitles to understand the everyday slang of teens and twenty-somethings, and I know for a fact that lots of the lingo of 'seasoned folk' go right over the heads of young whippersnappers out there! One of the most humorous choices, to a (mostly) southerner like me, is subtitles applied to a thick southern accent---how could anyone have trouble understanding that?!

I think what fascinates me is accent. People who specialize in training actors can sometimes isolate and identify accents not just by country or region, but by city, or even borough or neighborhood in the case of New York City. They can train actors to speak with the dialect of a certain location, a certain people group, a certain era.

Imagine with me what the sound might be of all of us speaking with love’s accent. What would our voices sound like? What words would fill our vocabularies? What tone, what timbre would govern our speech? How does love sound, translated into everyday language? Would the world recognize love’s accent on our tongues?

Would we need subtitles to translate love?

...on being relentless

Let us be a servant people, reconciling, ending strife;

seeking ways more just of sharing and of ordering human life.

Fill us with a glowing vision of this world as it should be;

send us forth to change that vision into blest reality.

---Joy F. Patterson, 1994

To be called to Christianity is to be called to labor. We are to take up a shared yoke, plowing shoulder to shoulder with Jesus in the humble chores of the household of God. We are to serve wholeheartedly, to share openhandedly.

We are not called to be peacekeepers, holding together some uneasy truce between suspicious adversaries with tape and twine and suspect promises. Rather we are to aspire to peacemaking, to the bold and audacious task of reconciling brokenness and doubt with trust built on God’s abiding love. This vision, this dream, is one that can set the world right.

But, sisters and brothers. There are teeth in this gospel call. In addition to the courageous labor of service, peacemaking, sharing, and dreaming, we are called to more. We are called, relentlessly, to the dogged pursuit of justice—the justice we seek out of a knowledge of God’s overflowing love for each and every one of us, least to greatest.

So my friends, don’t you get tired. The vision of a just world is urging us on—and justice can set things right.

...different, together.

God is here! As we Your people meet to offer praise and prayer,

May we find in fuller measure what it is in Christ we share.

Here, as in the world around us, all our varied skills and arts

Wait the coming of the Spirit into open minds and hearts.

---Fred Pratt Green, 1978

Here we are, God. We come to this place with an incredible array of talents, needs, resources, hurts, dreams, and personalities. It is quite amazing that we all keep coming here to make a church, isn’t it? What is it that keeps us coming back, that entices us to search for the things that bind us?

In the midst of our differences --- of need and resource, of faith and fear, of black and white and shades of gray --- we seek the coming of the Spirit of Christ. We await the Spirit, anticipate the Spirit --- to enliven us, to inform us, to enlarge us, to add meaning to our lives.

We pray, we praise, we seek, we anticipate…together

...come to the table

When we are walking, doubtful and dreading, 
blinded by sadness, slowness of heart,

yet Christ walks with us ever awaiting our invitation: 

stay, do not part.

---Susan Palo Cherwien, 1996

This lovely modern hymn, by contemporary poet Susan Palo Cherwien, is a meditation on the story usually called ‘The Road to Emmaus’. I kind of think it should be called ‘The House at the End of the Road to Emmaus’. Because friends, all the real fabulous-ness, all the wonder, all the eye-opening connection happened at the kitchen table in a little house at 223 Emmaus Way right about supper time. The travelers walked with the mysterious stranger all day, discussing current events and even Bible knowledge; but it wasn’t until pulling up chairs around a table laden with a thrown-together, just-got-home-from-vacation, raid-the-fridge-for-leftovers, broke-down feast that bridges began to be built between hearts.

Now, some of you who follow me on Instagram or Facebook know that I kinda like food (ok, I love it), and I especially love being able to share something lovely with other folks. I have two hashtags that I commonly use when posting about food: #cometothetable and #alwaysroomforonemore. These spell out my personal kitchen ethos. Good, good things happen around the table, when we drop our guard to pick up forks and mugs. Spending unhurried time together sharing a common meal lends itself to sharing our inner selves. Sometimes, just sometimes, our private fears and hopes and dreams become common bonds. And around this kind of table, friends, there is always room for one more. The welcome is warm, and the provision is plenty.

Around the table in the house at the end of the road to Emmaus, lingering over a last mug of chai and the heel of a loaf, their eyes were opened, and the travelers recognized Jesus.

Come to the table. Linger. With your eyes and heart open, you never know who you may see.

...let's don't lie

Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love;

the fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above.

We share our mutual woes, our mutual burdens bear;

and often for each other flows the sympathizing tear.

---John Fawcett, 1782

“Hey! How are you?” “Fine! How are you?” “Fine!” “OK, good to see you!” “You, too!”

Have you had an exchange (or a thousand) just like this with friends, family, and other folks who love you? Are you always fine? Are they? ‘Cause, I’ve said the things. And, I wasn’t. Not even close. But I smiled, and I swallowed back truth and tears, and I lied.

And I snatched away from you, my sister or brother, the chance to be real with me in that moment. I kept it safe. And fake. And I diminished the chances that, when your life is going down in flames, and I ask you The Question, you will answer anything but “Fine! How are you?”

And that’s not the way this is all supposed to work. John Fawcett said it in the text of this hymn in the 1700’s. Bill Withers said it in 1972:

            Please swallow your pride if I have faith you need to borrow,

            for no one can fill those of your needs that you won’t let show.

            Lean on me when you’re not strong

            and I’ll be your friend, I’ll help you carry on;

            for it won’t be long till I’m gonna need

            somebody to lean on.

Speak now.

...you've gotta be kidding me

Christians all, your Lord is coming, hope for peace is now at hand.
Let there be no hesitation, walk in faith where life demands.
Bear the word that God has given; share the birth that stirs your soul.
Alleluia! Alleluia! Christ will come and make you whole.
---Jim Miller, 1993

Prepare the way of the Lord. Wait...prepare the way of the Lord? It's struggle enough some days to prepare dinner tonight, or to prepare the presentation for the staff meeting tomorrow, or to prepare to hear the lab results from that medical exam you took last week. But to prepare the way of the Lord? What does that even mean, really, and how in this world are we supposed to prepare for something we haven't experienced and don't really understand?

Prepare? You've gotta be kidding me.

But wait a minute. I can hope for peace: real hope---the kind that puts feet to wishes, and real peace---the kind that surpasses the absence of discord to become wholeness and wellness lived out in whole and well community. And I can listen for the call of life on my life: what is it that calls out my gifts and passions, and who is it that needs the time and efforts I'm capable of? I can share my story with people who want to hear---a love story still in the making of brokenness and healing and pain and joy, and how the God whose best name is Love whispers keeping-on words to me, enough to share.

I can do these things; and you can, too. And in the doing, we may just find we are visited by God born in us, among us, like us. And in the doing, and in the visiting, we may be made whole.

It's a baby. And we prepared the way of the Lord.