Frederick Buechner describes the Lenten journey writing about Godric's visit to the island when he ran into St. Cuthbert, who had died some four hundred years before.
Cuthbert said to Godric, “When a man leaves home, he leaves behind some scrap of his heart…. It’s the same with a place a man is going to. Only then he sends a scrap of his heart ahead.”
Luke shares the journey of Jesus through one town and village after another. It sounds like "here a scrap, there a scrap, everywhere a scrap, scrap!" He is on his way to Jerusalem, and he gives those who come to him an expansive understanding of the nature of God's kingdom. He anticipates with a sense of fascination that "people will come from east and west, from north and south to eat in the kingdom of God."
Then Luke transitions back to the harsh realities of a closed culture in one line, heavy with implications: "At that very hour some Pharisees came to him." They came projecting their stress; threatening him with harm and echoing the story of persons in a nightmare of scarcity; "a defining anxiety," which Brueggemann contends, "focuses total attention on the self at the expense of the common good."
We get that. We know what it is to get tight, stingy in our hearts. We're not sure we have enough of what it takes. We worry about having enough; enough of anything and everything. That's when I need a prayer from the psalter like in Psalm 27. "The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" (27:1).
This prayer with its questions and affirmations is a viable alternative to the perplexing dilemma of scarcity. It challenges us to let our hearts grow in emotional maturity! A confident heart is cultivated by gratitude.
Just after I was born, my mother, two sisters and I, moved into a red brick duplex just around the corner in the shadow of Olivet Baptist Church. They sort of loved us into shape! Because of those folks my life is, oh, so different. It was from them that I learned that God loves each one of us as God loves us all. I am “captured by gratitude” that we lived in close proximity to those free and faithful Baptists. A very real part of my heart is designated for those great souls.
In all times, both high and low, the community of faith must engage in vigorous, active remembering. Gratitude nurtures poise and well-being. I don’t believe you get as rattled when you’re thankful.
You don't forget those who helped you realize that the depth of God’s love reaches down. God envisions the church to be a community where each receives the other as all are received by God.
Keep a good list of those persons who have loved you along the way. You won't carry those names in vain. I like the way Craddock imagines it will be when you come to the pearly gates carrying your list. St. Peter will stop you and say, “You went into the world with nothing, you’ve got to come out of it with nothing. Now, what’s that in your hand?”
“Well, it’s some names.”
“Let me see it.”
“It’s the names of folks I will never forget. If it weren’t for them, I would never have made it.”
“Let me see it.”
He’ll look at your list and then smile and say, “I know all of them. In fact, on my way here to meet you, I passed the whole lot of them painting a great big sign to hang over the street.
It said, “Welcome home!” (Craddock)
Send a scrap of your heart ahead to the place you are going.
Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem. He sent his heart on ahead. He told them, "Today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way" (13:33).
Send a healthy, wholesome part of yourself as a down payment for your future. Decisions today are lived in the future. The positive regard we hold for our future obedience creates a quiet heart.
Leadership consultant, Patrick Lencioni, suggests that a team which fails to commit creates ambiguity about the direction it will take and breeds a lack of confidence and a fear of failure. A team, that’s not afraid to commit, on the other hand, creates clarity about the direction it is headed and develops an ability to learn from even its mistakes.
“So, dear friends, go out from old, tired stuff, go out from fears that divide you, go out from old quarrels unresolved. Go out from old sins unforgiven. Go out from old decisions that have scarred and wounded. Go out from old memories that have become graven images. Go out into God’s new, demanding mission”.
"Believing that you will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living" (Psalm 27) is the basis for a theology of enough. Believe with the newness of father, Abraham, and the delight of mother, Sarah. Believe large about our mission that begins with our obedient human investment.
God’s spirit, ruah, blows newness and promises to bring justice that the world deems impossible (Isaiah 42:1-3).
When our grandson, Tommy, was five years old, he made his first visit to see us by himself. One afternoon Jennifer dropped the two of us at the house. Entering the back screened porch I discovered I didn’t have my keys. We were locked out! Tommy was disappointed in me. He even lost some confidence in me, and said, “Grahampa, I can’t believe it. What were you thinking? Our day is ruined.”
Trying to save face, thinking through our options, I suggested we sit down on the curb and chew a piece of grass. And Tommy wondered, “How’s that gonna get us in the house?”
Then, it dawned on me. We could walk up the hill to the Flassing’s. Jess, a retired game warden, and Helen, a retired grade school principal, were great neighbors. Though in their 90’s, Helen baked the best pies and rolls, and she’d have Jess carry them down the hill to the Graham’s house. That was it. We could walk up the hill to the Flassing’s!
When we knocked on their door, Helen answered, “Well, look who’s here, my two favorite guys. Come in! I’m just icing some warm fudge brownies.” We called Jennifer and took our cold milk and snacks with us while we waited on their porch swing. Enjoying the moment, with Tommy getting lost in his warm fudge brownie. Without wiping the chocolate from his lips, he said to me, “Grahampa, this feels good in my mouth.” Then, with a bit of his confidence restored in his Grahampa, he wondered out loud, “How did you know there’d be brownies?”
I have a hunch that God has newness waiting in the oven for you! I just wonder what might happen if we set down together and chewed a piece of grass and found our way up the hill and knocked on the door to find newness waiting in the oven for the beloved community, Royal Lane.
Walter Rauschenbusch encouraged us to enter "the great quiet of God where big things become small, and small things become great; the near becomes far, and the future is here; the lowly and despised are shot through with Glory…. where God is the substance of all revolutions!"
Gratitude and hope cultivate a quiet confidence that stands in brilliant contrast to the nightmare of scarcity; a confidence that redirects our energy away from ourselves and toward the well-being of the neighborhood.
What must we do to find that quiet heart? "Wait for the Lord, be strong, and let your heart take courage; yes, wait for the Lord!" (Psalm 27:14).