Turns out Pi Guy Day at Maddie’s sorority was a fancy tailgate party before the home football game of the Wittenberg Tigers, go team. Lots of cool food, dads and grandads trying to look like they belonged in among a bunch of college girls - excuse me - young women, and then trouping over to the stadium for a football game. Except Maddie wasn’t interested in the football game so we went shopping.
Well, sight seeing to start with, down the road to Yellow Springs, sort of Ohio’s answer to our Nashville in Brown County, artsy craftsy and distinctly odd little boutiques scattered throughout a quaint little town. From there we went to Dayton because she had to pick up a few things, since the laundry accident (lipstick in the pocket). We found ourselves in a Jefferson Pointe like place and I stood in Victoria Secret trying not to ogle and then to Von Maur (thankfully she can find the sale racks) while she tried on dresses for up coming semi-formal, most of which were gorgeous on her but made the dad in me decidedly uncomfortable.
Still it was a good day. I enjoyed being with her, she makes me proud to be a dad. And there was, as there always is with her and her brother both, this odd little time shift thing going on the whole time I was there with her. As we drove and walked and shopped and ate together, I could see the little girl I first fell in love with twenty years ago when she arrived into our lives and proceeded to take over the whole house, the intense scrutiny those piercing brown eyes give to everything and everyone, even those she loved, but the sparkling smile that melted hearts and the quick wit that often had us all in stitches at a moment’s notice. She was there, the little one who fell asleep - after a bit of a struggle - in my arms, finally at peace in the world. But layered over that is the college young woman who is making her way in the world on her own, connected to family and friends and teachers and mentors yes, but standing on her own feet. She is shaping herself into someone formidable, someone capable, yet someone compassionate and caring, with a heart looking outward to others. Though she doesn’t always see it and the shy little girl hides behind those eyes from time to time, she really is something amazing - I say with honest objectivity.
And even more, though it gives her pause, there is a future opening up in front of her. My mind runs scenarios in which she plays various parts, business owner, teacher, aid worker, wife and mother, innovator, pastor (yeah, I feel she has a call to ministry, though she doesn’t yet, and I’ve been wrong before), and plays them all well. There is a will be in her that is about to burst forth, sooner than she and I and any of us realize. Or are ready for, to be honest.
At least before I’m ready. I tend to live in the now, in the is, with a firm grasp on the was. But that will be keeps showing up. And all of it brings worries, doesn’t it? Some days we feel like we are just getting by. Like our grip on the is slips a little bit with every passing heartbeat. And our is frightens us, too many worries, “fightings and fears within and without,” as the hymn says. Once again, we are presented with the argument that safety has to take precedence over compassion, that security is a greater good than the moral imperative to welcome the stranger and care for the outcast.
Our is has gotten too troublesome. So some of us want to retreat to our was. Let’s go back to the way it used to be, because in our heads it seems so much better, so much safer, so much easier. Even though it really wasn’t. We like to pretend. It was better back in the was. Except then why are we filled with regrets? Why do we replay the words and the deeds that depict us as hurtful or hurt? Why do we wish for a time machine to go back and undo parts of the was, to make a better past, to choose better, kinder, to not pass on opportunities to help and heal, to love and to be loved? If the was really was better, why do we want to change it? Or fix it? Or forget it?
No, stick with the is. Seize the day, carpe diem. That’s the word for us. Except, there’s that will be lurking around the corner. With a hope or a threat, and some times a little of both. Our current election rhetoric is all about fear-mongering, it seems to me. Not about hope, but about what’s wrong, with both the was and the is. And the threat that our will be is heading off the same cliff. And maybe there is some course correcting that needs to be done. Isn’t that always the case? But can’t we do it without all the vitriol? Without all the hate? Why choke out our will be as we fight about our is and misrepresent our was?
It makes us want to throw up our hands in despair. Doesn’t it? No wonder our young people are worried, and dropping out of what we used to think was important. No wonder they are turning away from that which gave us meaning and direction, because it no longer seems to do so. When the best we offer is an is full of a blind nostalgia for the was and a bleak will be with a violent oppressive response, why not turn away to something else? Or even to nothing else. Why not throw up our hands?
That’s John the Evangelist’s response anyway. Well, the throwing up our hands bit. But not in despair. Oh no. John says throw up your hands in praise.
Revelation 1:4-8 NRS John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. 7 Look! He is coming with the clouds; every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail. So it is to be. Amen. 8 "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.
Revelation has a checkered history in the canonization process. It almost didn’t make the cut. It has been a source of controversy almost from the beginning. Too graphic, too bleak, too bloody, too ... weird. Better to admit that we’ve lost the language that allows us to understand this book, some argue. The images of the apocalyptic are too obscure for the modern mind, what might have made some sense in its day now only confuses and leads to outrageous and fanciful speculation that is neither comforting or edifying. Better to just let it go, some argue. A sentiment hard to disagree with. If it weren’t for the beginning of the book.
John starts with praise. With a reminder that God has the whole world in hand. That time itself is a gift from God and that we won’t be abandoned to a random and meaningless existence. Throw up your hands to the God who is and who was and who is to come. The Almighty, strong enough to hold your will be with the same Presence with which God held your was and holds your is right now. Right now.
The early shapers of the worship life of the Christian community realized that we needed a place to begin regularly. So, every year we begin with longing. The longing for more, for completion, for hope. That’s next week, the First Sunday of Advent - coming. But if we need a place to begin, we also need a place to end. And we end in the loving arms of God. Christ the King Sunday is about pledging allegiance, true allegiance to the One who hold us in the palm of a hand. Who was and is and is to come.
And John told us this over and over. Verse 4 - grace and peace (all we need for a life of wholeness) comes from the one who is and who was and who is to come. Verse 5 - Jesus Christ - faithful witness (he was - did what he came to do, proclaim God), first born of the dead (who is, the living eternal one who shows us the way into eternity) and the ruler of the kings (who will be, since not every knee has bowed yet). And who loved us (who was, this was what he was about from the beginning, come to show us we were loved), who freed us (who is the savior, at great personal cost, he gave us a way to live a life of fullness and joy), and made us a kingdom of priests (gave us a mission, a will be, to represent God, to usher folks into the kingdom, to welcome the outcast and build a community of faith).
Our beginning and our end is in God. Our was and is and will be is wrapped up in the loving purposes of God. We are invited to trust in that. Even when the way is murky and the possibilities seem few, we can choose to be subject of the king, the crucified lamb who loves us more than his own life. Like I am trying to love my children and my church, and my world.
When Dickens wrote the Christmas Carol, he knew that for transformation to occur, Scrooge needed to examine his was and is and will be, as painful as that might have been. We too are invited to lay our lives and the lives of those we love into the arms of the One who is and was and will be. And declare with our living that Christ is king.
Shalom,
Derek
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