Tumbledown Farm .9 Acres (give or take an acre or two)

Imagination in Place, by Wendell Berry, Berkeley: Counterpoint, 2010.

This is a coherent collection of essays, mostly of literary criticism (and, because of the author's person, also of cultural criticism). Those who have read my previous reviews of collected works, especially those that are collections of previously published essays, will know that this is high praise indeed. The coherency apparent in this book is not one of shared subject matter (the subjects covered are quite diverse, from the Civil War to Fundamentalism to Shakespeare, to name but a few); and it is not an artificially imposed coherency papered over the surface of what is (if truth be known) actually disparate material. Rather, the coherency arises subtly but unmistakeably from the durable passions and consistent attentions of the author, passions and attentions that have been sustained over a lifetime of work and throughout a variety of relationships--personal, literary and agricultural. Moreover, you are not likely to have encountered many of these essays before--however devoted you are to reading Berry--unless you are a subscriber to The Sewanee Review or are a "professional" literature teacher, because of the places where the essays previously appeared (e.g., multi-author works, literary journals like American Poet, or news outlets like The San Jose Mercury News).

Let us start with a definition of "Imagination in Place" (title essay, 2004). According to Berry, imagination is the attempt to make whole what is experienced in part. "[W]orks of imagination come of an impulse to transcend the limits of experience or provable knowledge in order to make a thing that is whole." "Imagination 'completes the picture' by transcending the actual memories and provable facts" (pp. 3-4). Imagination is a gift, a transcendent gift. Berry says "[m]y experience with imagination has taught me to believe in inspiration, about which I think nobody can speak with much authority" (p. 6). This last statement is humbling for a preacher. According to Berry, it should be humbling not just for the preacher, but also for the atheist, scientist, engineer, economist and businessman, and the politician ("God, Science, and Imagination"). In his reprise of the litany of 20th century destruction in which everyone alive now participates, Berry convicts us first and foremost of a lack of imagination:

• "not one person now living in the United States who, by a strict accounting, could be said to be living an exemplary moral life"
  
• "implicated, by direct participation and by proxies given suppliers"
  
• loss of half our topsoil and most of our forest and prairies
  
• loss of mineral wealth and underground water
  
• pollution of surface water and air
  
• destruction of rural cultures
  
• extinction of plants and animals
  
• wastelands
  
• landfills
  
• industrial dumps
  
• the turning of chemicals of warfare onto the soil in pursuit of efficient production

Berry's constant point seems to be that a moral imagination--one that works against the widespread destruction of our times--is an imagination grounded. The place from which imagination sees that which no eye can see is "irreducible" (p. 12) For Berry this place is the farm; that is where he exercises his imagination. The farm is the "irreducible" mundane or temporal just as God is the "irreducible" eternal (p. 183). Humans share with one another and with their place the same sort of relationship they share with their God. Neither the farm nor God can be simplified and thoroughly comprehended by human effort and human mind without remainder. The moral imagination is therefore an imagination vested in a particular place. But moral imagination requires of human vision not only realism (and its standard, "how things really are"), but also "how things will be, how you want things to be, how things ought to be." Moral imagination tries to envision the world "whole," a whole that is both temporal and eternal--to see how things really are and how they really should be. Imagine!

In "American Imagination and the Civil War" (2007) Berry suggests that ultimate cause of the Civil War (the reason it was not averted) was a failure of moral imagination, specifically a failure of "the prevailing virtue and efficacious operation of lenity" (quoting Burke about that other civil war, the American Revolution). With imagination--with "lenience or gentleness or mercy"--other possibilities than war, possibilities like "reconciliation on terms of justice or amicable separation" could have been opened up (p. 23). Berry says that we should consider not just North and South as parties to that war, but a "third side," that of the dead. Walt Whitman's imagination, as he comes at dawn upon three soldiers lying dead near a hospital tent, allows (requires?) him to see in the face of the third soldier "the face of the Christ himself, Dead and divine and brother of all, and here again he lies" (p. 25). Berry says that our current civil war (that on agriculture, rural communities, and the land itself) is also a failure of imagination: "I have been describing an enormous failure, and to me this appears to be a failure of imagination." We are, Berry says, destroying our country because of our failure to imagine it. (p. 30; "it" being the destruction of our country. We seem to be blind to it.) It is here that Berry provides a working definition of that imagination of which he speaks: "I do not mean the ability to make things up or to make a realistic copy. I mean the ability to make real to oneself the life of one's place or the life of one's enemy" (p. 30). Generalization, like war, is destructive of particular people and local places, but a poet's or novelist's imagination tethered loyally to a particular place and to particular persons can speak also for me and my place (pp. 33, 37). And, exercised well, it may lead to love of neighbor and prayers for enemies.

What follows these two programmatic essays is a series of portraits of authorial imagination. There is no heavy hand here, but everywhere Berry searches the lives and works of writers--contemporary and hoary--for hints, clues, and traces of imagination and inspiration as he has defined it. He seeks in these authors an imagination grounded in place. The good news for us and for him is that it is everywhere in evidence here among these authors who have been most influential for Berry and, where we are conscious of it, also for us.

• Wallace Stegner ("The Momentum of Clarity" and "In Memoriam")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• John Haines ("Speech after Long Silence")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Hayden Carruth ("My Friend Hayden"). I could not help but chuckle at Berry's comment about North Winter that "[i]t told me, at a time when I greatly needed to hear it, that one writer may do life-sustaining work in a place that, to others, would be 'nowhere'" (p. 58). Writing from Indianapolis--long known as "Indiana-no-place" that comes as a relief.
  
• James Still ("In Memory" and "A Master Language")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Gurney Norman ("My Conversation with Gurney Norman")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Jane Kenyon ("Sweetness Preserved"). Here Berry gives expression to what I have often wondered about the folks who would have us consider literature apart from the historical setting and biography of the author, "[h]ow then are we to help knowing what we know?" (p. 88) Here too he gives considerable attention to the notion of exile and place. Given the importance of exile both to biblical and literary themes, this essay in particular is worth some additional attention.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Gary Snyder ("Some Interim Thoughts about Gary Snyder's Mountains and Rivers without End")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• James Baker Hall ("In Memory")
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Kathleen Raine ("Against the Nihil of the Age") Berry rings the changes on this "poet of the Imagination"--both her own poetry and her interaction with the likes of Blake, Yeats, et al. This is an essay to which I shall return many times, Lord willing.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• William Shakespeare ("The Uses of Adversity") comparison of "As You Like It" and "King Lear" with an eye toward their moral imagination, especially as it pertains to the "uses" of adversity.

I will treasure and return to this collection for what it reveals about Berry as much as its revelations about the authors whom he selects for review. It is a window into Berry's own spirit, into his inspiration, or at least into his imagination.

The key word for this week is "Prophet." To say that Jesus is a prophet--or, rather, The Prophet--is to consider him in terms that would have been familiar to most of the ancient world. The Phoenicians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans--every ancient culture had its own version of the prophet. Moreover, the particular prophetic tradition with which Jesus was most readily associated, that of Israel's prophets, already had a very long history that was well known to Jesus' Jewish contemporaries and disciples. Some 500+ times our English translations render Hebrew (nabi`) and Greek (prophetes) nouns in the Bible with the word prophet(s). A quick study of these occurrences reveals much about Israel's prophetic tradition and the things that would have been expected of Jesus the Prophet.

An outside resource to consider this week is The Works of Josephus, as we continue with Part IV of a 12-week sermon series based on Jesus Revealed, a book by Dr. Mark D. Roberts. In the introduction to this week's chapter Dr. Roberts recounts the story of "Jesus the son of Ananias" from Josephus, The Jewish War (6:300-9). He tells the story of this other Jesus to remind us of the extent to which Jesus was a first-century Jewish prophet. Later in the chapter he will quote NT scholar Gordon Fee's reminder that we do not know Jesus at all if we ignore those aspects of Jesus' ministry that are the work of a prophet, especially his preaching of the kingdom of God.

So, what is a prophet? Or, more to the point, how can we better understand Jesus because we know that many people thought of him as a prophet?

The crowds were saying "This is the prophet Jesus, the one from Nazareth in Galilee." (Matthew 21:11) They sought to arrest him but they were afraid of the crowds because the crowds considered him a prophet. (Matthew 21:46) But others were saying, "He is Elijah"; and others were saying "He is a prophet like one of the prophets" [of old]. (Mark 6:15)

Jesus may not have claimed the title "prophet" directly, but neither did he correct those who wanted to call him by that name. And at times he even appears to embrace the designation, at least implicitly: Besides, I must keep on going today and tomorrow, because it is unimaginable for a prophet to be killed outside Jerusalem. (Luke 13:33. See 4:24, "No prophet is welcome in his own homeland.")

So, what sort of people were the "prophets of old"? What did they do? What sort of ministry did they have?

• Messengers. Ancient Israel's prophets were considered messengers, mail carriers (2 Samuel 12:25) and eye-witness reporters, who were privileged (blessed or cursed) to have overheard or overseen (1 Samuel 9:9) something of importance that took place in the divine courtroom or throne room of God. Usually the thing heard or seen (sometimes in dreams, Numbers 12:6) had to do with a divine decree or decision about some person or group of people, often about earthly kings and nations. (For example, see Job 1-2, where Job was not given even the dignity of a prophet to warn him about what is about to happen; or 1 Kings 22:1-38). The message these prophets bring is not their own; they are merely the conduit for a word from the Lord. Hence the opening or closing line of many an oracle, "Thus says the LORD..., the word of the LORD."
  
• Warn-ers and Bearers of Good Tidings. Often the message sent is one of warning or alarm (2 Kings 17:13-23). At other times the message is one of Good News (Isaiah 40:1-9).
  
• Intercessors. Perhaps because of their proximity to the throne room of God, it is presumed that prophets have God's ear. E.g., Abraham (Genesis 20:7) and Moses. Their prayers are part of the routine of divine correspondence, sort of like sending a message express mail, or having a direct access line.
  
• Anoint-ers. Prophets marked God's choice of a person to be king (or prophet, 1 Kings 19:16) by anointing him: e.g., Samuel anoints Saul (1 Samuel 9:16, 15:1), Samuel anoints David (1 Samuel 16:12-13), Nathan (together with Zadok, the priest) anoints Solomon (1 Kings 1:34, 45), an unnamed prophet is sent by Elisha to anoint Jehu (2 Kings 9:1-13).
  
• Anointed. Prophets were marked as God's chosen by anointing, not always with oil perhaps, and in fact most often by the Spirit of YHWH, which could at times result in forms of ecstasy (e.g., Numbers 11:23-30; 1 Samuel 10:5-13, 19:20-24) or illness (the hand of the LORD is upon me). This in turn set prophets up to be the punch-line of many jokes: prophets were sometimes viewed as teched, partly or completely insane (prophecy is akin to madness, Hosea 9:7).
  
• Makers of Powerful Enemies. (Often killed!) It should not come as a surprise that prophets had enemies. After all, "killing the messenger" is commonplace parlance. Some of the enemies of a prophet could be: rivals or false prophets (Deuteronomy 18:20-22, 1 Kings 18-19, 22); those whom the prophets caught abusing their power (Nathan to David, 2 Samuel 12; Elijah and Elisha to Ahab and Jezebel, 1 Kings 18:4); kings and officials who had fallen into disfavor with God, and the like.
  
• Performers of Symbolic Acts. For example, Ahijah puts on new clothes and then cuts the new cloth into 12 pieces, giving 10 to Jeroboam to symbolize the division of Israel into two kingdoms. (1 Kings 11:29-31)
  
• Performers of Great Works. Here we have in mind especially feeding the hungry, healing the sick, and reviving those who were dead. E.g., Elijah with the widow's son (1 Kings 17:18-24) or Elisha with the son of the Shunammite woman (2 Kings 4:31-36).

The Prophet

Jesus' contemporaries expected not just another in a long line of ordinary prophets; their expectation had been enlarged to the point that they longed for a final, extraordinary prophet, who would usher in the Kingdom of God. This expectation had roots in exemplary Hebrew prophets from Israel's "golden ages" and in the promise that God would some day again raise up their equals:

• A prophet like Moses. A prophet from your midst, one of your brothers, one like me, YHWH your God will raise up for you. You shall listen to him. (Deuteronomy 18:15) Perhaps the reminder that God still had not raised up a prophet "like Moses, whom YHWH knew face-to-face" (Deuteronomy 34:10; Numbers 12:6-8) served to increase the anticipation of the fulfillment of this promise.
  
• A prophet like Elijah. Behold I am sending to you Elijah the prophet before the coming great and fearful Day of YHWH. (Malachi 4:5)

The question becomes, of course, how Jesus compared to the expectations of his people. How did Jesus fulfill their expectations and how did he "break the mold" and crush their stereotypes and preconceptions about God's prophets? And how does knowing Jesus as our prophet help us see him more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow him more nearly?

One key may be Jesus' proclamation that the Kingdom of God is near. That sounds very much like the proclamation of some of his predecessors. (E.g., as Dr. Mark Roberts suggests, in Isaiah 33:22, Malachi 1:14, Zephaniah 3:14-20; though, as he also remarks in footnote 15, the exact phrase "the Kingdom of God" does not appear in the OT prophets. Perhaps this is in part because of the pronounced ambivalence of Israel's and Judah's prophets toward the notion of earthly kings and their problematic relationship with God, Israel's one true King. Perhaps it is because the prophets of old viewed every earthly kingdom, especially those of Israel and Judah, as by definition God's Kingdom, though the evidence of God's rule might be hidden, or apparent for a time only in God's judgment against Israel and Judah. The expectation had surely been heightened by Jesus' day and long before that God would some day take the reigns of the world firmly in hand.) Jesus shared his predecessors' notion that God would work God's will on earth--and he announced the message that the time announced by the prophets of old had come. Jesus came into Galilee announcing the Good-News-Message of God and saying that the appointed time has arrived and the Kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the Good-News-Message. (Mark 1:14-15)

By conveying God's message about the arrival of the Reign/Kingdom of God, Jesus is fulfilling the role and cultural expectations for a prophet. So is it any wonder he earned that name? Can we be more specific about the nature of the message Jesus brought?

Dr. Mark Roberts does a good job of talking about the Kingdom of God, what it is and what it is not--and how it both is-and-is-not already here. I'll not belabor the points he makes here, but simply list them: 1) the Kingdom of God is more than internal (interpreting Luke 17:20-21 as "the Kingdom of God is among you"; i.e., Jesus is saying that he is exhibit number one for the advent of that Kingdom); 2) God's Kingdom is "already" (Luke 11:20) and "not yet" (Mark 14:25); 3) Jesus' Mighty Works are evidence of the Kingdom (Matthew 11:3-5; Isaiah 35:4-6); 4) the unexpected politics of the Kingdom (Rome remains in power); 5) the enemy of the Kingdom; 6) from self-rule to the rule of God.

Finally, I enjoyed discovering this week at the prompting of Kathy Rockey an Orthodox podcast on the names of Jesus, one of which is specifically about this week's topic. I thought readers of this blog might also enjoy listening to that broadcast: http://ancientfaith.com/podcasts/namesofjesus/jesus_-_the_prophet.

The Society of Biblical Literature (SBL, founded in 1880), the oldest and largest international scholarly membership organization in the field of biblical studies, has received an NEH planning grant to develop a website called “The World of the Bible." It will be dedicated to exploring people, places, and passages in the Bible. The site is intended for general audiences and will share scholarly views and encourage critical engagement with the Bible, including its ancient contexts and interpretive legacy.

I encourage followers of this blog to take the survey SBL has prepared to explore the interests of people who are not bible scholars. The goal is to gain a representation of the intended audience and to assess their current level of familiarity with and interest in the Bible.

Survey Link:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NH3V5ZZ

If you have any questions about the project, contact Moira Bucciarelli at moira.bucciarelli@sbl-site.org.

There is a connection between baptism (as in the Baptism of the Lord, which we celebrate this week) and birth/re-birth, naming/re-naming. This is Part II of an introduction to a 12-week sermon series based on Jesus Revealed, a book by Dr. Mark D. Roberts.

The subtitle of the book makes clear the guiding impetus for this study: we want to "Know Him Better to Love Him Better." In the Preface (p. xiii), the well-known song from Godspell ("Day by Day"), originally attributed to St. Richard of Chichester, gives voice to this overwhelming longing we have to know Jesus better, and to this irrepressible desire we have to love him more. Our prayer of supplication is that we be able to follow Jesus as his disciples, as nearly as we are possibly able to follow:

Thanks be to Thee, my Lord Jesus Christ
For all the benefits Thou hast given me,
For all the pains and insults Thou hast borne for me.
O most merciful Redeemer, friend and brother,
May I know Thee more clearly,
Love Thee more dearly,
Follow Thee more nearly.



(Image source, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/Richardofchichester.png)

The focus of chapter 2 of Jesus Revealed is "Unpacking 'Jesus'." In other words, the first title or name we will study in depth is the primary one, "Jesus." What does it mean that the messenger of God tells the adoptive father, Joseph, to name the baby "Jesus"? You might say that Joseph has been given a divine assist in one of the more challenging aspects of pre-fatherhood, the question what sort of name to give the kid. Go wrong and you could scar the child for life, as in "A Boy Named Sue." Often these days parents will spend months deciding what to name their baby, not with divine aid, although some prayers may be offered up, but with the aid of a book of baby names to guide them on their quest. These baby name guides often provide variant spellings and other information for 100,000 or more names, citing the relative popularity of the name, along with something about the origins of each name and its meaning.



But the messenger who came to Joseph provided all the information that was needed for this naming: call him Jesus, "for he will save his people from their sins" (Matthew 1:21).

My own name, Gregory, peaked in popularity in the decade 1960 to 1970 as #23 on the list of 1,000 most popular names for a boy. It is a Greek name that means "watcher," but it is used mostly in English speaking countries. By the end of 2008 it had slipped to #454 on the overall list of 1,000 most popular baby names. Maybe that is because after Gregory Peck, the list of famous people with the name diminished significantly. Who can you think of today with this name? Gregory Goyle (Harry Potter) and Gregory House (the TV series "House"). Even the original namesake, Pope Gregory, has lost some cachet. Who wants to be named after the patron saint of students? (Source, Nickelodeon: Parents Connect) Much better now to be called "Barack," "blessing," a Swahili name, from an Arabic root, sometimes confused with the Hebrew name Barak (baraq, "lightning"). The actual Hebrew equivalent of Barack is Baruch or Beracha ("blessed," "blessing"). (Source, Namipedia, the Baby Name Wizard.)

According to the Social Security Administration report of most popular baby names, Jesus ranked #79 out of a 1,000 in 2008 of popular baby names in the U.S. (a Spanish name, it ranked #35 in Spain). Gregory, #236. Barack, #12,535 (2007) and #2,409 (in 2008; doesn't even make it into the top 1,000, though the projection for 2009 was that it would rank well up in the list [Barack climbs the list.]). And Joshua, the un-shortened English equivalent of the Hebrew-to-Greek-to-Latin name for Jesus? #4 in 2008. There is a Facebook app that has been very popular among my "friends" the last couple of days that answers the question "How original are my parents?" It claims that it will find out how original your parents were in naming you. It gives letter grades: A+, A-, B-, D. I've never seen an F on any of the names of my friends in Facebook, but Mary and Joseph might have gotten an "F" for originality in naming Jesus.

There is an astounding debate (internet chatter) these days about the appropriateness of giving a baby born now the name Jesus: for example, one reader says "I dont think that anyone wants to name their child Jesus (as in Christ) that would be saying that your child is Jesus and there was only ONE" (http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=1006050510670; see also the reader comments at http://www.babyhold.com/list/Spanish_Baby_Names/Jesus/details/). As Dr. Mark Roberts points out, "We tend to hear the name Jesus with sacred overtones" (p. 15), so we English do not tend to use that name for our babies, for fear of committing some sort of sacrilege.

But there were many, many babies, both before and after Jesus of Nazareth (Jesus the Christ), who had the Hebrew name Yehoshua. The name was formed from the combination of the Hebrew name for God (YHWH, or Yah, Yahu, Yahweh) and the word for salvation (Yeshu`ah). Sometimes the generic word for God ('el) was used instead of Yahweh, as in the name Eliysha` (Elisha) to mean the same thing: "God is salvation." Before the exile of Israel and Judah to Assyria and Babylon, these names appeared commonly in Hebrew with great variation: for example Yesha`yahu (Isaiah), Yesha`yah (grandson of Zerubbabel; name occurs in Ezra and Chronicles), and Hoshea` (the original name for Joshua). When the name of God (Yahweh) was added to the front of the word for salvation (rather than after the word, as it was in the previous examples above), the spelling and pronunciation of the name would undergo contraction, especially in later usage: for example, Yehoshua` (Joshua), through contraction becomes Yeshua` (still Joshua) in Hebrew/Aramaic, especially in Ezra-Nehemiah and Chronicles.

So how do we get the name Jesus? It comes to us via Greek. The name Joshua (in both forms, and also the name Hoshea`) was translated in the Septuagint (the LXX, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible completed in Alexandria, Egypt, by the exilic Jewish community in the 3rd-2nd centuries B.C.) as 'Iesous. 'Iesous is the Greek name for Jesus in the New Testament. It arrives in our English Bibles via transliteration of the name from Greek into Latin as Iesus. But Jesus and Mary and Joseph probably spoke Aramaic, as is clear from some of the direct quotations of Jesus in the New Testament (for example, his use of the words mammon, talitha coum, and most famously, abba). As Dr. Armstrong (my Aramaic teacher) used to say to his students, "Aramaic is like Hebrew, only different." You can think of Aramaic as related to Hebrew in the same sort of way that French is related to Spanish. So, when Mary was happy she probably called for Yeshu' or Yeshua` and when she was angry for Ye-ho-shu-a` bar Yo-sep! (Though it must be used with care, Wikipedia has a fine article on the name Yeshua.)

What is the point of all this naming? There are several:

• Jesus was a common man, an ordinary man. He carried a common name, one of the most common in the Second Temple period. (For a notion of the commonality of the name, see Pfann's article on the recent controversy over the so-called Jesus tomb.). Jesus was a carpenter; he must have occasionally hit his thumb. It hurt. He must have known what it is to suffer a headache. To cry. Many of us want to respond to such a description of Jesus like this: "Jesus most certainly was not ordinary!" (p. 17) If we aren't careful, we will begin to think that Jesus only pretended to be human or "seemed to be" human. Like the docetists, heretics of old (maybe not so old), we will begin to deny that Jesus ever really knew what life as a human being is like. We'll deny that he wept or was ever angry or ever really sick. We'll say that it wasn't really a struggle for him to obey God, that he could not ever have faced real temptation. (Hebrews 4:15) But this naming allows us to see Jesus' "ordinariness" and to establish a closer relationship with him. After all, I'm ordinary. I have a common name like Jesus. It is the sort of relationship Joseph Scriven writes about in the second verse of "What a Friend We Have in Jesus," a friend who "knows our every weakness," who has experienced our trials and temptations.
  
• Jesus was a Jewish man. His name brings us back to his circumcision, Torah school, and Kaddish. It brings us especially to the meaning of his "people," who aren't Christian or gentile, but Jews, whom he came to save.
  
• Finally, as Dr. Mark Robert suggests, Jesus is a surprise. He was certainly a surprise to Joseph, and if we get to know him well he might just be a surprise to us.

We begin now a 12-week series of sermons and small group studies based on the book by Mark D. Roberts. This series will take us through Lent and up to Palm Sunday and Easter. Copies of the book are available for members of the congregation in the Gathering Place. I encourage families to pick up a copy of the book and follow along, reading a chapter a week to accompany the Bible studies and sermons.

Dr. Roberts starts the first chapter with a list of places where Jesus has been seen lately, "in the water-stained wall of a house," "on a billboard for Pizza Hut," and in the skillet burns on a tortilla. His litany reminds me of "Jesus and Tomatoes," one of the first songs I ever heard by historian-turned-singer-songwriter Kate Campbell.




She is now one of my all-time favorite song writers, a real balladeer.

Kate Campbell page on Amazon.com

As Kate tells the story, the song came together when she saw a roadside sign in North Carolina proclaiming "Jesus and tomatoes coming soon!" This bit of serendipity, juxtaposed with the story of the "nun bun" (the figure of Mother Theresa that appeared in a pastry at the Bongo Java coffeehouse in Nashville, TN), led to the creation of a song in which the image of Jesus appears on a tomato, a "Tennessee Bradley, the best homegrown you'll find!" The owner of the tomato patch makes a killing until someone, either divine messenger or I.R.S. minion, shows up to shut her down.

(Image source, http://www.sustainableseedco.com/images/P/bradley-tomato.jpg)

Perhaps a better title song for this series is "Looking for Jesus," on the 2008 CD Save the Day.


You can read Kate's story along with many others in the book Girls Rock!

The point is

• Longing. There is a great desire on the part of many people to know Jesus. People will go to all sorts of lengths to find Jesus, go anywhere, do anything.
  
• Idolatry. We too often create a Jesus in our own image. We see Jesus where we want to and ban from our imaginations the sort of Jesus who might meddle in the secret places of our hearts and lives, where we hide in darkness hoping not to be found and hoping not to find the Jesus who has all of the time been looking for us. We are all-too-eager to find Jesus in an image on a tortilla and all-too-wary of finding that he wants to transform us into his likeness. We pick and choose those parts of the gospels that fit our own preconceptions and that least challenge our own way of living and make those parts we like into the Jesus we hope to discover.

Many folks have made this point, that we indeed tend to see the image of Jesus that is most comfortable for us staring back out at us from our readings of the gospels. If we are middle class capitalists, we assume Jesus was also a middle class capitalist. If we are socialists, so was Jesus. If we are non-conformists, so was he. Albert Schweitzer is famous for his formulation of this problem in the Quest of the Historical Jesus.



In his Quest, Schweitzer examined the works of more than fifty 18th- and 19th-century authors and scholars and concluded famously that they had made up their images of Jesus out of their desire for a savior who was the spittin' image of themselves. Their Jesus shared their biases and cultural mores. Schweitzer concluded more than that, of course, even contributing his own reading of who Jesus really was (a radical eschatological preacher and Jewish apocalyptic prophet) to the mix of those others he had examined. In other words, Schweitzer was a precursor of the modern questers for the historical Jesus, the Jesus Seminar and their like. What they arrive at in their pictures of Jesus is someone who is fully human (i.e., historical), but not fully divine. For people of faith--or for people who are seeking the Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ--such renderings of Jesus will always be unsatisfactory. Such pictures and biographies of Jesus will leave their longings unfilled.

The characterization of this quest by Dr. Mark Roberts in Jesus Revealed is quite negative, especially his view of the Jesus Seminar and its founder, Bob Funk. Bob, now deceased, was a graduate of Butler University and the Christian Theological Seminary (CTS) in Indianapolis, so Hoosiers may be forgiven for viewing Bob with a kinder eye. Though something of a showman (he was known to drive a pink Cadillac as a company car, if the Scholars Press rumors are to be believed), quite an attention getter, and never at all a shrinking violet, his work has resulted in much serious attention to the subject at hand, Jesus himself, as Jesus can be known from his own words as quoted by his followers in the gospels. It seems to me that there could be worse pursuits. Yes, the pursuit is often done in such a way as to yield results prejudiced against faith, but that needn't be (and sometimes isn't) the case. Orthodoxy asks us to confess a Jesus who is fully historical and fully divine, a paradox that requires us to embrace a Brother Funk as a fellow quester. Christians believe that the very historical, human Jesus was also very God. ...while never ceasing to be fully human and historical. So Funk's work, to the extent that it reveals the "historical" Jesus, reveals something but not all of the Jesus Christ we seek.

The scriptures themselves know about this seeking for Jesus and this great variety of opinion about him. In Matthew 16:13, Jesus himself takes part in the quest: “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?” During his lifetime, people from other nations sought him out (the Magi, only obvious at this season, but also the Greeks, who came to Philip in John 12:20 saying, "Sir, we would like to see Jesus").

The church continued for centuries (we must admit, continues still to this very day) to argue over the person of Jesus, carrying on with the controversies long after his death and resurrection. The Nicene Creed (see last week's blog entry) states the classic, orthodox position: Jesus is "of one substance with the Father," "very God of very God," and "was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man." The Council of Chalcedon later stated that Jesus Christ is perfectly God and perfectly human, having two natures without confusion, change, division, or separation (in Latin translation, in duabus naturis inconfuse, immutabiliter, indivise, inseparabiliter). It may be possible for historians and the Jesus Seminar to divide and separate the human, historical Jesus from the Christ of faith (as per the Frontline questers for the historical Jesus), but the result is not the Jesus Christ of our confessions of faith, not the one with whom we have a continuing, living relationship as our Lord and Savior. Where the historical is separated and divided from the divine, the character and person of Jesus Christ has not truly been discerned and the revelation has been distorted. Historical (German, "scientific") dissection leaves us a Jesus who is dead, not resurrected and living still.

Dr. Mark Roberts rightly points us to the scriptures, and specifically to those "names and titles" for Jesus that are used by Jesus and by his followers to say who he is. These scriptures are our corrective. These "names and titles" for Jesus, as they are found in Scripture, will serve as our guideposts as we begin a quest for Jesus Revealed. Each name or title will serve to point out one aspect of Jesus that we will get to know better so that we can love him more. This Jesus revealed in Scripture is Jesus the Christ, the one in whom we believe, the one with whom we have a relationship. The greater our understanding of these facets of his personality that are named in Scripture, the greater the fulfillment of our longing for him, and the deeper our love for him will grow.

The names and titles to which we will turn in the following weeks are the stuff primarily of Christology, so we will spend our time delving into each title and its meaning and seeing how the names and titles are related to one another; seeing how (for example) the Son of Man, Son of God, and Word of God meet in Jesus of Nazareth.



One of my favorite books for thinking about Christology is Professor Jaroslav Pelikan's Jesus through the Centuries. In the images of Jesus Christ throughout history, one finds a crystallization of the beliefs of our ancestors (and, depending on the age of the image, of our contemporaries) about Jesus Christ, who they knew him to be, and especially how they understood the names and titles used by and about him. I hope to include particularly illustrative examples from the web for each name and title as we go through this series of sermons, being mindful, of course, of the human tendency toward idolatry, toward portraying Jesus as ourselves.

Now for a comment or two about today's readings:

Jeremiah 31:7-14

Ephesians 1:3-14
John 1:10-18

As we continue our Advent series, Rediscover Christmas: Finding the True Christmas Story in Classic TV Christmas Specials, we come to the 1970 animated musical, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, directed by Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin, Jr., narrated by Fred Astaire, and with Mickey Rooney as Santa (Kris). While many will decry the "commercialization" and the "secularization" of Christmas represented by this annual TV special, I think the True story of Christmas is evident in it everywhere and needs hardly even to be pointed out.



Once again we find in the story the usual stock characters: the unreformed evil lawmaker and enforcer, Mr. Burgermeister Meisterburger, and the quickly reformed and warmed Winter Warlock. The plot is also quite familiar to us, as Mr. Kluger proceeds to explain over the course of some 48 minutes everything we've ever heard about the big fat man in the bright red suit.

More about this gift-giver extraordinaire later. For now, let's just say that gift giving has become for many of us the least True aspect of Christmas as it is celebrated today. The way we give and receive gifts may seem to us more a chore or duty than a grace, or worse, a compulsion and addiction. But for most of us, we have been programmed since early childhood (and the stories of Santa) with a gut-level understanding that Christmas is about "stuff." Stuff under the tree, stuff we give to others, stuff we bake, stuff we hand out at the office, stuff we collect, and stuff that is discarded by Easter. As Anna Quindlen put it so perceptively and succinctly in Newsweek last December, "Stuff is Not Salvation." Quindlen was writing in response to the death of a Wal-Mart shopper who was trampled on "Black Friday," the Friday after Thanksgiving (2008): her conclusion, we have "an addiction to consumption so out of control that it qualifies as a sickness."




(Image source, http://www.ashleybristowe.com/weblog/content/binary/The%20ridiculous%20loot%20pile%20-%20SM.jpg)

How do we redeem that? Is there some meaning in gift-giving and receiving that is a bit more sane, a bit less desperate, a bit less an addiction? The gifts of Christmas are too often now to us just so much stuff. Gift giving and receiving feeds our culture of incessant greed, covetousness, and acquisition. We have forgotten the real meaning of Christmas giving, so it is the True meaning of gift giving and receiving that needs more than anything else to be Rediscovered about Christmas.

(Image source, http://guiltycarnivore.com/wp-content/uploads/makenna-xmas.jpg)

First, let's discuss the theme of "giving" in today's scripture selections.
Isaiah 60:1-7

This is one of my favorite scriptures. It provides an extensive elaboration of one of the most significant aspects of the Zion Tradition, a tradition about God's choice (Psalm 78:68 and 132:13) and blessing of Jerusalem as his dwelling place, a tradition best identified with King David and his descendants. Zion is that name we use for Jerusalem when we want to speak of it in terms that are True; it is the theological name for the City of David (2 Samuel 5:7), the real counterpart to the all-too-political city, Jerusalem. According to the Zion Tradition, the fact that YHWH God has chosen to make his home there (Psalm 9:11 and 76:2) means that Jerusalem will be a place of great importance. Though the temple mount is not by any means the highest mountain in Israel, it will "be exalted" to a place of world-wide significance (Psalm 48:2) as the place where international disputes are arbitrated (Psalm 133). Zion would be an ancient U.N. or World Court of sorts (Isaiah 2:1-5), but with God as the sole judge (48:11) and lawmaker by means of his chosen representative, his "son," Israel's king, the "Great King" of all the earth (Psalm 2:6-7 and 48:2). Zion is the place where world peace moves from possibility to reality (Isaiah 2). Zion is the place from which the glory of God shines (Psalm 50:2) and can be seen near and far. It is a place to which pilgrims come (Psalm 84:5). It is a place to which tribute ["gifts"] is brought (Isaiah 18:7, Psalm 68:18, 29; 72:10; 76:11-12; 45:12). Even after Jerusalem has been destroyed by the Babylonians and the people of Judah taken captive, the True meaning of Zion's blessed estate is the refuge of Israel's prophets (Isaiah 49 and 60, Haggai 2:1-9).

The point of "gift giving" in the Zion Tradition is to make public our recognition of God's sovereignty. God is king and rules over all of life. We bring our offerings in humble recognition and acknowledgment of his Lordship and in gratitude for his blessings (which blessings are the original source of the very gifts we bring; we give him what he has first given us, we return to him what already is his).

Matthew 2:1-12

The Zion Tradition shows up in the Christmas story in the form of Magi, "wise men from the east," kings who came to Jerusalem (aka, Zion) bearing gifts.




(Image source, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Magi_(1).jpg)

They stopped there in the big city first, but were then directed to a small, out-of-the-way place, the town or village of Bethlehem, also a "city of David," but more like the place of David's humble shepherd origins, not his later royal situation. This boy child they recognize as God's vice-regent on earth, a king, the "son" of God and they have come to "pay homage" and give tribute ("gifts"). These Magi have been led to Jerusalem by a star (the glory of the Lord shines forth from Zion), which comes to rest over the place where the boy was. Everything that Zion represented as the place where God has chosen to dwell with humankind (Immanuel, God with Us) has now been conferred on a child. Salvation, protection, redemption, the "hopes and fears of all the years" are placed here. This is the place and the one to whom we now bring our gifts. Jesus, the Christ, the baby in a manger--or the young child growing up--is now God with Us, our Immanuel. He is the source of "Peace on Earth" and good will. (In the story of the Magi, Herod plays the role of Mr. Burgermeister Meisterburger, or the Grinch, or Scrooge, the anti-hero, maker of war, etc.)

So, what does all this have to do with Santa Claus? Glad you asked. If we are to redeem some meaning in all this Christmas gift giving, we must start with our culture's gift-giver-in-chief, Mr. C himself. We have to answer that age-old question of childhood, "Do you believe in Santa Clause?" There are, of course, hundreds of other questions asked by kids when they reach 5-7 or 8 years of age: "Why does Santa come on Jesus' birthday?" "Why does he give us gifts?" "Who is Santa anyway?" (You'll find an ongoing list of questions, and the debate about how parents should respond to questions from their children about Santa, at the NYTimes this week.) Those questions are the ones with which the Rankin and Bass TV special begins, with the letters read by "Special Delivery" man Kluger (S.D. Kluger), voiced by Fred Astaire. (Perhaps it is worth noting the recent interruption and restoration of the long tradition of answering children's letters addressed to Santa Clause, North Pole.)

(Image source, http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/christmasspecials/images/thumb/b/b2/SD_Kluger.jpg/282px-SD_Kluger.jpg)

The "point" of the TV special is to explain every detail of the Santa legend by means of a single, convoluted story plot line. But Kluger fails to explain what is perhaps the most significant detail of all, the "Clause" medallion.


(Image source, http://kathleenhalbert.com/resources/Santa.jpg)

If Kluger had bothered to notice the "Clause," the one good, glaring clue to the origin and identity of the mystery man in red, he might have made his way past the accreted traditions and myths to a "real" person, an historical, once living person, known as Niclaus, or Nicholas. Saint Nicholas, to be precise. We Protestants do not "believe in" saints, of course, at least not in the same sense as Roman Catholics do. But even we who hold to the "priesthood of all believers" do recognize that some folks like Mother Theresa of Calcutta and Pope John Paul II represent lives of sacrifice and faithfulness to which we may with benefit aspire. The problem for most of U.S. protestants is that we know little or nothing about the life of Nicholas that would lead us to see him as an example of deep faith and to try to emulate that faith. We do not know much about this once-and-future living legend, but we do know some things more than Kluger reveals. (Note: for a great web site devoted to exploring and explaining the Christian roots of Santa Clause, you cannot do better than The St. Nicholas Center. Another, much shorter and less detailed, "history of Santa" may be found at history.com.) We know, for example that he was born probably around the year 280 in the region of Lycia in Asia Minor (modern Turkey), spoke Greek, and was made bishop of Myra, a place where St. Paul stopped on his way to Rome (Acts 27). He was likely a successor, 5 or 6 generations later, of the leaders Paul would have known.


(Image source, http://lasvegasorthodox.com/images/St._Nicholas_of_Myr.jpg)

During the first part of Nicholas' ministry, it was illegal to be a Christian in the Roman empire. Nicholas was alive and active during the last and greatest persecution of Christians under Diocletian (303-313). He was also a representative to the Council of Nicaea (325), where the church declared its faith by adopting one of only two universal creeds, the one known as the Nicene Creed:

We believe in...one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, Begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light. Very God of very God, Begotten, not made, Being of one substance with the Father; By whom all things were made; Who, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, And was made man.

Nicholas believed in Jesus was our Immanuel, God with Us. Nicholas faced imprisonment and death for holding fast to such beliefs. For this faith he was willing to suffer.



(Image source, http://img2.allposters.com/images/NGSPOD/1033777.jpg)

Nicholas was remembered for his gift giving and compassion. He was a believer full of joy and generosity. The overflowing joy of his salvation expressed itself in him through the giving of secret gifts. It was said that he often left gifts where those who were most in need would be sure to find them, on the hearth, in clothes by the fireplace, in stockings left drying, in shoes at the entrance to the house. (One of the most famous is about his intervention with a dowry for young women whose families could not afford to have them marry.) He often gave money, and for that reason he is often depicted with three golden orbs.




It seems that Nicholas lived life as a joyful response of faith in Christ and the Good News of salvation. The gospel was the center of Nicholas' life, so the gifts he gave were not merely gifts, they weren't just so much stuff, they were a response of praise and worship at the birth of the king.

(Image source, http://www.heqigallery.com/GALLERY%20NT%20A/images/14_the_magi.jpg)

Last week, Ron Rockey preached about "What Rudolph the Red Knows" as we continued our Advent series Rediscover Christmas: Finding the True Christmas Story in Classic TV Christmas Specials.



Ron reminded us of C. S. Lewis's famous formulation in Surprised by Joy, in the autobiographical account (spiritual autobiography, like Augustine's Confessions) of Lewis's conversion to Christ, that every story (or myth) that is even partly true draws in some way on The One True Story. The Story of Jesus the Christ found in the gospels is, according to Lewis, "the true myth, myth become fact."


[With the recent release of the Narnia films, there has been a spike in interest in Lewis. See "Myth Matters" (for an account of Lewis's 1944 essay, "Myth Became Fact," in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics) and see Brent Plate's "Chronicling C.S. Lewis: Marketing and Mythology."]




(Image Source, http://www.nd.edu/~ndethics/images/rotation/inspires/lewis.jpg

Surprised by Joy (the account of 1931, when Lewis would have been 33 years old)
If ever a myth had become fact, had been incarnated, it would be just like this. And nothing else in all literature was just like this. [...] And no person was like the Person it depicted; as real, as recognisable, through all that depth of time, ...yet also numinous, lit by a light from beyond the world, a god. But if a god - we are no longer polytheists - then not a god, but God. Here and here only in all time the myth must have become fact; the Word, flesh; God, Man. This is not 'a religion', nor 'a philosophy'. It is the summing up and actuality of all of them.' (Surprised by Joy, 1955, pp. 188-189.)



As we heard from the parables (stories) in week one, and as we heard again from Ron about the prophet Isaiah's oracle and the Gospel of John's introit last week, the story of Christ is the Story with a difference. It provokes in us a reaction--not always positive--and it makes a claim to truth and a claim on us at the same time. It is "personally threatening" of our present way of life. It has the potential to transform us. In the words of Gary Dorrien ("The ‘Postmodern’ Barth? The Word of God As True Myth"), "[i]f the Christ [story] is true in the way that it claims to be true, it stands to other [stories] as the fulfillment of their promise and truth. It is not an illustration of mythic truth, but the ground of its possibility and the realization of its fragmentary glimpse of the Real. The question is not whether Christianity is fundamentally mythical, but whether Christ became and fulfilled the great [story].... The old [story] of the Dying God, without ceasing to be [story], comes down from the heaven of legend and imagination to the earth of history." If Isaiah's "child" is the back story (see the "back story" to Rudolph, or Wikipedia's article on Robert May) and the parables are the side stories, then this week we've come to the poetic expression of the story. We've come to sing the blues.

As we said in week one, true stories often, almost always, have stock characters and this week's character shows up every Christmas in many guises and is known by many names: Scrooge, McDuck, Linus, and [drum roll] the gold (actually, green) standard, Dr. Seuss's GRINCH.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

The Grinch starred first in a 1957 Dr. Seuss book, How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, then in the 1966 TV classic narrated by the spooky Boris Karloff, and finally in a live-action film starring Jim Carrey (directed by Ron Howard) in 2000. (Wikipedia, "Grinch.") The Grinch opens with a scene in which the narrator tries to explain why the Grinch (gasp) does not love Christmas. Is it his shoes that are too tight? Is it his head that isn't screwed on just right? ...or that his heart is two sizes too small? We are threatened and discomfited by the thought of someone who does not love Christmas. There must, there just must be something wrong with such a person.

(Image source, http://web.mit.edu/jonb/www/animate/grinch.jpg)

We cannot understand people who do not like Christmas. In fact we are scared of them; they appear like monsters to us, all covered with green fur and their eyes shining bright red. We are afraid that if we let them get too close, they will succeed in "stealing" Christmas from us. We are afraid that they'll keep Christmas from coming, not just for them but also for us. We want them to keep their distance. They make us feel uncomfortable, so we avoid them especially at this time of year, afraid that they'll ruin our Christmas spirit and rob us of our Christmas cheer. Especially on this third Sunday of Advent, when the pink candle of Joy is burning bright, we do not want their candle-snuffing scowls to darken our mood. So, we exile such people to their cave on Mt. Crumpit. We banish them from our celebrations. In the words of Isaiah, we avert our faces from them. (Now there's an irony for people who say they want to experience Christmas.) Perhaps if we do not acknowledge the Grinches, so we think, their power over Christmas will be diminished. Their negative reaction to Christmas is, at best, perplexing to us--at its worst, nightmarish; it terrifies us.

(Image source, http://www.pragmatik.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/one/grinch_1206.jpg)

We do not often stop to think what our beloved "Christmas season" does to the Grinch and why. We should begin, as Seuss does, by acknowledging how thoroughly Christmas permeates our world. There's hardly any escaping it in the U.S. The Trifecta of Religion, Culture, and Economics means that the air this time of year is saturated with the sights, sounds, smells, and expectation of Christmas. The rituals of Christmas are all encompassing. Grinches, however much they try to remove themselves from the noise, cannot escape the sound of the singing. Where can they go to be free of the jollies? Certainly not to church. At the job there are Christmas parties or invitations to dinners, and inquiries about their plans for Christmas. Nor dare they go within a mile of a mall. They cannot turn on the radio or the TV. A bookstore is out of the question; even the library displays are Christmas themed. They cannot join polite conversations at school or plan a night out at the symphony. For the next few weeks it is all Christmas all the time--24/7 everywhere you turn. You cannot even drive down the street without being accosted on the right and the left by the bright yard-art lights and inflatable manger scenes. Tinsel, White Christmas and Chestnuts, Ho, Ho, Ho!

There is strong power in this story. Because it is ubiquitous, a part of the air we breathe, it is all-the-more rich and meaningful for those who are able to participate. But it also carries a strong dark side. There's no escaping Christmas for the Grinch. Christmas is coming, like it or not.

Our culture provides a template, a blueprint, for the perfect Christmas. There is snow, of course, and chestnuts roasting. (How many of you have ever really tasted a roasted chestnut?)



(Image source, http://meta-dad.com/wp-content/themes/images/classic_christmas_scene.jpg)

Our culture dictates to us what to do, what to feel, how to act, what to say, what to think about Christmas. At the center of it all is the home. Say it with me: There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays! But that is also where our reality collides with the cultural expectations. Despite what the romantic Christmas tunes tell us, despite Delilah and John Tesh or the Hallmark channel, many of us will not have the Norman Rockwell storybook Christmas. And for those whose reality does not match the cultural expectations, the gap is sometimes painfully obvious. They think about what Christmas "should" be, compare it to what it has been or will be, and they scowl. Though there are many areas in which people experience the gaps between the ideal and real celebration of Christmas--for example, the experience of economic hardship amidst the cultural materialism of the holiday season, or the depression caused by shorter days and longer nights and cold, overcast winter skies--there are three gaps related to our experience of Christmas with family that should be highlighted:

Cultural Expectations vs Reality

• We have the expectation that Christmas will be shared with loved ones, especially close loved ones--mom, dad, son, daughter, spouse, sisters and brothers. But for many of us, especially those who have lost loved ones this year, the reality will be painfully different. Christmas will not bring additional memories to cherish, only the renewed sense of loss. If the loss of a spouse or mom or dad was two or three years ago, friends will expect that the pain of loss will have lessened this Christmas, but all too often the cultural trappings and preparations for Christmas will serve as a sharp reminder that a loved one is not here any longer. We expect such grief to go away after a Christmas or two, but it never really goes away. Is it any wonder that someone who has lost a loved one this year might want to stop Christmas from coming? (These are those who, in Luke's words, "sit in the shadow of death." Luke says the real "reason for the season" is to bring them salvation.)
  
• We have the expectation that Christmas will be shared with the "perfect" family--a mom and a dad, 2.5 children, uncles and aunts, grandpas and grandmas. The reality is that divorce and strained relationships, long distances and cultural divides will shatter the "perfect" family. The group with whom many gather will be smaller than the "ideal" and composed differently than expected. And when ours isn't the "perfect" family, is it any wonder we sometimes respond with a scowl?
  
• We have the expectation, whether our family looks the part of a "perfect" family or not, that we will at least get along for one day. But all too often we do not act the idealized parts. We bring the pain of strained relationships home; we renew old conflicts; we play out old fights. Is it any wonder that some of us greet the prospect of this Christmas with a frown?

Isaiah spoke of the coming one as one from whom others hide their faces. In this season, most of all, we are tempted to stay away--to keep our distance--from the Grinches, scared that they will spoil our Christmas, rather than making it full and complete. We are scared they may really succeed in keeping Christmas from coming! Isaiah sang to those who were in captivity, not about a White Christmas, but a Blue Christmas. What if Isaiah's message about the Christ--that he identifies with Grinches, that he became a Grinch--was more a part of our message about the season? Before Christmas can ever be a story of triumph (as it is in our cultural ideal), it must be one of compassion. Zechariah too sings the Blues at Christmas. God's heart breaks for his children; God knows and embraces their suffering, accepts and embraces those who are suffering, doesn't dismiss them or hide his face from them.

If our Christmas story is only a story of sugar plums and candy canes--if all is rosy and bright--then we have missed the TRUE story, the REAL story of Christmas.

Maybe it will help to remember that the Magi brought three gifts, two of celebration (gold and frankincense), but also one for mourning (myrrh), a spice for burial.






Even at Christmas (especially at Christmas), we must remember that the cross-symbol, a shadowy hint of the brokenness and tragedy of life, already darkens the manger scene.



That's why he comes, to give light to those who sit in darkness. If we do not make space for pain in this holiday, then we miss the richer, fuller, deeper meaning of Christmas. How do we make that space? How do we create that room to enlarge our own hearts? by acknowledging the presence of the Grinches. By acknowledging where they are and how they feel about the season. By being especially sensitive. By having our radar up. (It is easy to hear the holiday sounds, but harder to hear the crying at this time of year.) We must listen, care, try to understand, pray for, make space for, say a kind word to, and send a card to the Grinch. Somehow, some way, we must let the Grinches know that we accept them as they are--green fur, red eyes, scowls and all. You may recall Cindy Loo Hoo. Cindy saw the Grinch as a real person. She did not turn away or hide her face from him. She extended a hand and offered a gift even as he was trying his best to stop Christmas from coming. Cindy Loo Hoo planted the seed that became full-fledged transformation on Christmas morning.

(Image source, http://static.tvguide.com/MediaBin/Galleries/Shows/G_L/Hi_Hp/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas/grinch-stole-christmas4.jpg)

We all know and remember that the Grinch was healed, that his heart grew three times larger and more that day, but the people of the town of Whoville were also transformed. Their hearts were also expanded. They learned a fullness to Christmas that they had never before experienced--a Christmas that included the Grinch.



(Image source, http://craftmemorial.lib.wv.us/images/grinchfeast.jpg)

They learned that Christmas comes with or without the ribbons and bows, that they can sing with or without the jing tinglers and floofloovers--that it comes both to Whos and to Grinches. That it comes whether you are saying "I can't wait" or "I wish it wouldn't."

Grinches, those who are in darkness and pain, are the reason Christ came. The well do not need a physician.

Luke 1:67-79

It is to those "who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death" (1:79) that the light of Christmas comes. It is to those who, for whatever reason, don't want Christmas to come--who want to keep Christmas from coming at all--that it comes relentlessly, because they need it most. They cannot stop his coming. To them peace, hope, love and joy are promised. They are the ones Surprised by Joy, by love's irresistible force.

Isaiah 53:1-5

The one who sympathizes with those whom society labels as villains, outsiders, oddities, and sociopaths is the one who authors Christmas. He is the one who shares the experience of many who are quietly among us. He knows the gap between the expectation of happiness and the reality of tears, pain, sorrow and grief. He knows what it is to have people hide their faces from his suffering, to be ignored, avoided, and shunned. He is "acquainted with infirmity."

Other Preachers' Themes:

It probably does not come as a surprise that this sermon and similar series have been done many times and is not original to me and my Covenant Group (see previous blog entry). So, I did a little investigating and found other preachers using the Grinch story to good advantage. For example,

• The Grinch as an example of transformation
• Against the rampant materialism of Christmas
• Against the hustle and bustle of Christmas
• Christmas does not need saving (despite the rampant materialism)
• Herod as the Grinch, and Herod and against commercialism, and another Herod, and another Herod
• Lots of preachers want us to Learn from the Grinch (video)
• Christmas Joy for Everyone, and another Christmas Joy.
  

Rediscover the True Meaning of Christmas in the Classic TV Christmas Specials



(See Midnight Oil, below.)

Some of my pastor friends will accuse me of having crossed over to the dark side to join in the crass commercialization of Christmas, but I beg to differ. The idea for this sermon series, and the series itself as it has thus far been developed, was the brainchild of one of the pastors in my *covenant group. It has since been preached by all of us (or almost all) except me--and, purportedly, with good results. As the pastors in our group have taken it on in turn, the ideas and resources have accumulated (including some from pastors who have independently developed similar series, and now there are also some available from professional media resources like Midnight Oil Productions), demonstrating what fertile ground there is here. Another pastor friend of mine is always reminding me to meet my congregation on any given Sunday "right where they are." At this time of year, we are completely inundated with media messages about Christmas. Very soon, each and every TV special in the series will be shown, most more than once, on multiple TV broadcast and cable channels. A quick walk into the local department "super-" store (WalMart [TM], Target [TM], etc.) will reveal that these movies are the ones at the top of the shelves--they are the moving images and sounds that create the atmosphere, the context and background for our holiday preparations and family celebrations for the next month. They will be the source of late night jokes, casual references, and allusions in news stories.

Not that we'll be buying everything they are selling. We aren't and we won't. But if we needed some legitimation for preaching the gospel in this mode, we couldn't do better than appeal to Jesus himself. The stock characters and situations in many of Jesus' parables likely originated in the moral and ethical culture in which he was born and grew up. If there had been classic movies in Jesus' childhood, I'm sure he would have used them. When Jesus began to tell the story about the profligate (prodigal) son, for example, everyone around him probably nodded their appreciation, perhaps even predicting that the boy would wind up in a pig pen.



(Image source, http://d1shzm2uca9f83.cloudfront.net/large/remb_vz_varken.jpg)

They had heard this story before. The recognized the characters and the plot. Maybe they could even predict the young man's remorse, his repentance and his return home. But I doubt very much that they predicted the reception with which his father greeted him, or the upheaval in the older brother's expectations. (Luke 15:11-32)



(Image source, http://www.jneiman.com/images/058-prodigal-son.jpg)

Or, to cite another, when Jesus started out a story by telling his audience that "a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho,"



(Image source, http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2121/2314500564_fc8ff751a6.jpg)

they may have been able to finish the first sentence without any help: "and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead." People traveling that road were always being mugged. But how many times had their version of the story ended with a Good Samaritan's good deed? (Luke 10:30-37)



(Image source, http://www.wwoaw.net/The%20Good%20Samaritan%20after%20van%20Gogh%20and%20Delacroix%201024%2080.JPG)

As we pursue the telling of the Advent Gospel of expectancy as it appears in the characters and situations of the TV Christmas Classics, we will be on the alert, identifying both where the movies have and, perhaps more importantly, where they haven't followed the twists and turns of the Christmas Story from which they often draw their inspiration.

There are too many such classic movies for any one 4- or 5-week sermon series. I have seen all of the following movies suggested and used more-or-less to good effect: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, It's a Wonderful Life, Frosty the Snowman, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Santa Claus is Comin' to Town, Jack Frost (a character in several of the animated classics), The Year without a Santa Claus, The Little Drummer Boy, and A Charlie Brown Christmas.

This year, we will be looking at 5 of the classics (4 Sundays of Advent + Christmas Eve).

November 29, It's a Wonderful Life

Zephaniah 3:14-20, Matthew 20:1-16

December 6, What Rudolph the Red Knows

Isaiah 9:2-7, John 1:1-18

December 13, Sympathy for the Grinch

Isaiah 53:1-5, Luke 1:67-79

December 20, Santa's Cause is Something Profound

Isaiah 60:1-7, Matthew 2:1-12

Christmas Eve, 7:00 pm

December 24, A Charlie Brown Christmas Eve

I'll blog a few ideas about the series each week, beginning now with the 1936 Frank Capra classic, It's a Wonderful Life (60th Anniversary Edition), starring James Stewart and Donna Reed.


Plot Summary, Wikipedia Summary.



What themes from the true meaning of Christmas appear in the movie?

• Humility and Self Sacrifice, for the sake of others. (Philippians 2:5-11)
  
  Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430), in a famous Christmas Sermon (Sermon 187), rings the changes on this aspect of the Christmas story in his own inimitable way: "Maker of the sun, He is made under the sun. In the Father he remains, From his mother he goes forth. Creator of heaven and earth, He was born on earth under heaven. Unspeakably wise, He is wisely speechless. Filling the world, He lies in a manger. Ruler of the stars, He nurses at his mother's bosom. He is both great in the nature of God, and small in the form of a servant." (Translation source, "Reflections," Christianity Today, Vol. 41, no. 14, Dec. 8, 1997)
  
  
  
  
  No less a preaching light than C.H. Spurgeon could fill a whole sermon (and then some) with reflections on the fact that there was "No Room for Christ in the Inn." Many others have done the same, drawing on images old and new to illustrate the sort of humility that Christ took on.
  

  In the movie, George Bailey planned all his life to travel the world, to go to "Italy, Greece, the Parthenon, the Coliseum.” He plans when he returns from his world tour to attend college. Then, he’s going to “build things… airfields, skyscrapers a hundred stories high…bridges a mile long.”
  
  
  
  (Image source, http://nighthawknews.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/its_a_wonderful_life_02.jpg)
  
  One by one, George turns all these things down. Eventually he also turns down Mr. Potter’s outrageous offer of a lucrative $20,000/yr. salary – a salary that would more than have provided for his future wife and children.
  
  
  
  (The evil millionaire, Mr. Potter. Image source, http://avltheatre.com/ruben/potter.jpg)
  
  On the day of his wedding/honeymoon with bride Mary [!], on his way out of town [once again!], there’s a run on the bank. People are panicking like it's 1933, and they want their money.
  
  
  
  
  
  (Jimmy Stewart in "It's a Wonderful Life, image source: http://open.salon.com/blog/megan_stewart/2009/01/07/files/jamesstewart4601231343406.jpg)
  
  (Oh, wait, it probably is 1933 or thereabouts, because of the flashback from the final setting: Christmas Eve, 1946; George and Mary married in 1928.) The evil millionaire Mr. Potter sees this as his opportunity to take over the bank, and the town. Once again, George lets go of his rights and lays down his life so he can serve the townspeople – by using all but $2.00 of his honeymoon money to save the bank from collapse. In other words, George Bailey spends his entire life giving up his big dreams for the good of Bedford Falls.

  
  
• Why do bad things happen to good people?
  
  OR
  
• Does my life really make a difference? Does it matter at all that I lived? (Job 3:3)
  
  The title, or subtitle of this sermon might be, "Living a Life that Counts for All Eternity." The movie was, after all, loosely based on the short story "The Greatest Gift" by Philip Van Doren Stern. On Christmas Eve of 1946, George is broken and suicidal over the misplacing of an $8000 loan (lost by his Uncle Billy while bragging about brother Harry's accomplishments and recognition in the war) and the evil schemes of his nemesis, Mr. Potter. George crashes his car into a tree during a snowstorm and runs to a nearby bridge to commit suicide, feeling he is "worth more dead than alive" because of a $15,000 life insurance policy.
  
  
  
  
  
  (Image Source, http://esl-bits.net/scripts/WonderfulLife/images/wl_100208.jpg)
  
  George's guardian angel, Clarence, comes to earth to show George how his town, family, and friends would turn out if he had never been born. George has meant so much to so many people; should he really now just throw it all away? The angel, Clarence, shows George throughout how his town, his family, and his friends would have turned out if he had never been born. George meant so much to so many people; should he really just throw it all away?
  
  
  
• A Reversal of Fortune (Zephaniah 3:14-20, Matthew 20:1-16)
  
  After Clarence shows George what life would have been like for so many others if he had not been born (Bedford Falls = a slum, Pottersville; Mr. Gower in prison; Uncle Billy in an insane asylum; Harry dead), George prays to live again. Meanwhile the whole town has also been praying for George. His friends and family have collected a huge amount of money to rescue him. His brother Harry arrives just in time to propose a toast to his brother, "the richest man in town." Seeing how many lives he has touched, and the difference he has made, George Bailey truly does have "a wonderful life."
  
  
  
  (Image source, http://www.calendarlive.com/media/photo/2006-12/27020557.jpg)
  

The comparisons with the parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard in Matthew 20:1-16 are somewhat obvious. Jesus' parable is bracketed (19:30 and 20:16) with statements about reversals of place and situation in life: "the first shall be last and the last shall be first." Like an oldest male child (and like George), these first disciples--and especially Peter, James, and John (20:21)--are acutely aware of what they have sacrificed to take on the responsibilities they hold. ("We have left everything to follow you, so what will we have?") That is the set up, the context for Jesus' telling of the parable. The eldest child, the first disciples, and the first workers understand there to be an implicit agreement that the return will be commensurate with the investment of time and labor, that those who work and give more will also get more. But Jesus says that the one who bears ultimate responsibility will also pay the ultimate price (20:17-18). The reward, resurrection life, only comes after crucifixion death. It is this promise--the turning of bankruptcy to restored fortune, shame to praise, oppression to benefaction, mourning song and funeral dirge to festival music and dancing, rejection to acceptance, exhaustion to renewed and inexhaustible capacity for living, hate to love, sorrow to joy and gladness, conflict to reconciliation, judgment and condemnation to redemption and grace, enemies to friends, and disaster to salvation--that is the theme of the song of joy in Zephaniah 3:14-20. The last scene of the movie, the last page of the story is one of restoration and salvation for Job, for George, for Israel, for us, for the disciples--all because also for Jesus himself, crucified and resurrected.

*My covenant group is made up of four great friends from seminary days at PTS, David Casson (Sandia Presbyterian Church, Albuquerque, NM), Jeff Chandler (First Presbyterian Church, Bakersfield, CA), John Hartman (Wake Forest Presbyterian Church, Wake Forest, NC), and Stephen Oglesbee (Clear Lake Presbyterian Church, Houston, TX). We meet every year for conversation, study, prayer, ...and sermon series idea exchange! Thanks, guys.

This is Part II of a two-part review of the book. (Read Part I of the review of Eric Toensmeier's Perennial Vegetables.)

Toensmeier, Eric. Perennial Vegetables: From Artichoke to 'Zuiki' Taro, a Gardener's Guide to Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles. Chelsea Green Publishing: White River Junction, Vermont, 2007.

Part II of the book begins with a caution about sampling too much of too many new food plants for the first time. This is an important caution, given the prevalence of food allergies. Sample slowly! I was also a little taken aback to see how frequently some of these perennials have poisonous cousins and look alikes. Exercise caution and know what you are eating before you taste!

After that brief caution, Part II plunges into the meat (OK, the vegetables) of the subject in earnest. What follows is a list of edible perennials, accompanied by a map of the U.S. climate range for the particular plant (similar to the maps in bird-watching books); shaded pink where the crop is perennial and yellow where it might be grown as an annual. Along with the Latin name of the plant and known common names, Toensmeier provides the following for each entry (as applicable): Overview, Crop Description, Climate, Tolerances and Preferences, Naturalization, Pests-Diseases-Weeds, Propagation-Planting-Cultivation, Harvest and Storage, Uses, and Related Species and Breeding Potential. Wow! These "notes" on various plants are alone worth the price of admission. (However, I should note that Toensmeier breaks his pattern sometimes and treats some plant in a cursory manner, e.g., Lovage, pp. 86-87.) I cannot wait to try a few new plantings and report on the results this year. But, of course, I live in what Toensmeier calls the "Cold Temperate" section of the country in Zone 5b Indianapolis. I'll not be able to plant anything now until the ground thaws. We woke today to a temperature of 16F in an area that regularly experiences temperatures as as low as -16F. It will be March 2010 before I am able to plant, and many of the perennials will likely take a full year or more to become fully established. So, my sampling of new vegetables will be slow. As indicated in the previous review, though Toensmeier discusses growing tropical perennials in some locations as annuals, I plan, because of my particular climate, to ignore the tropical plants and those for the warmer Southeast and review the book with an eye toward its greatest usefulness to me here in the Cold Temperate Midwest.

So, what can I and will I plant? Herewith, my personal list of potential perennials, with an asterisk beside those I plan to try in 2010:

Onion Family, Alliaceae

Arrowhead, tubers cooked like potatoes.

Multiplier Onions

*Ramps (wild leek)

Perennial Onions

The Celery Family, Apiaceae

*Lovage

Water Celery

*Skirret

The Aroid Family, Araceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Spikenard Family, Araliaceae

Udo

The Aster Family, Asteraceae

Chicory and Dandelion

Sunchoke (Jerusalem Artichoke)

Fuki

Scorzonera

The Malabar Spinach Family, Basellaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Cabbage Family, Brassicaceae

Turkish Rocket

Sea Kale

Watercress

The Cactus Family, Cactaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Canna Family, Cannaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Papaya Family, Caricaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Goosefoot Family, Chenopodiaceae

*Good King Henry

The Morning Glory Family, Convolvulaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Squash Family, Cucurbitaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Sedge Family, Cyperaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Yam Family, Dioscoreaceae

*Yams (D. japonica and Chinese yam)

The Wood-Fern Family, Dryopteridaceae

Ostrich Fern

The Spurge Family, Euphorbiaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Pea Family, Fabaceae

*Groundnut

The Mint Family, Lamiaceae

Chinese Artichoke

The Lily Family, Liliaceae

Asparagus

Camass

Daylily

Giant Solomon's Seal

The Mallow Family, Malvaceae

Musk Mallow

The Neem Family, Meliaceae

Fragrant Spring Tree

The Mulberry Family, Moraceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Moringa Family, Moringaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Banana Family, Musaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Lotus Family, Nelumbonaceae

Water Lotus

The Wood-Sorrel Family, Oxalidaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Pokeweed Family, Phytolaccaceae

Pokeweed

The Grass Family, Poaceae

Running Bamboos

the Smartweed Family, Polygonaceae

Rhubarb

*Sorrel

The Nightshade Family, Solanaceae

Wolfberry

The New Zealand Spinach Family, Tetragoniaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Linden Family, Tiliaceae

Linden

The Nasturtium Family, Tropaeolaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Nettle Family, Urticaceae

Stinging Nettle and Wood Nettle

Remember, I have listed above ONLY what Toensmeier has claimed is hardy as a perennial to Zone 5b. Part III of the book is entitled "Resources" and includes lists of perennial vegetables for each climate type (similar to what I have done above, but for all of the plant hardiness zones and with greater detail, including variety names and Latin names). He also includes a list of recommended books in the following categories: useful plants, permaculture and edible landscaping, history-ecology-native/non-native species, garden climates, and gardening techniques, water gardening, pests-diseases, and propagation. There is a short, but excellent list of organizations and web sites, and lists of plant and seed sources and garden suppliers. Finally, Toensmeier includes a bibliography and helpful index.

I heartily recommend the book. It is well worth the $35 list price. The only downside is that the cultivation of perennials as garden vegetables is so new that the details are sometimes sketchy at best, because sketchy details are all that is available. Toensmeier has done us a great service in drawing so much information together under one roof. It is now our turn to do the hard work of collecting, propagating, and breeding these plants--and introducing them to our friends and neighbors--until they become successful, mainstream garden varieties. I for one wish winter would hurry up and end so that I can get started.

[Note: The above title was provided for review by the publisher. No remuneration was received for the review.]

2 Samuel 23:1-7

It seems somehow fitting that we end the Christian year with the "last words" (dibrey ... ha'acharoniym) of David. If we begin the reading just a verse earlier (2 Samuel 22:51), we also clearly pick up the theme of Christ (meshiycho) the King (malko). God is a tower of salvation for his "king," one who shows steadfast mercy (chesed, loving kindness, covenant loyalty) to his "anointed one." This statement of fact is born out by what follows. David is Israel's quintessential messiah, or anointed king. Now, at the end of his life, the question is whether his last words will bear witness to the truth of the statement about God's faithfulness in 22:51.



(Image Source, http://www.astarte.com.au/assets/images/sketch.jpg)



(Image Source, http://www.astarte.com.au/assets/images/Temple2003.JPG)

The LBA "migdol temple" at Pella provides a glimpse of the concrete "tower" of protection provided by the LORD to his anointed, David. (See 1 Samuel 21:1-8, etc.)

David's "last words" are uttered more as a prophet's oracle (ne'um, or like the Wisdom speeches in the Book of Job) than as a king's command. And it is clear that the power of these words is derivative. David is simply "Jesse's son," who has been raised up, anointed, and loved by Israel's God. The words David speaks are not originally his; they are breathed by the LORD (ruach YHWH) and placed like food on David's tongue. David is merely the chosen and anointed messenger, a singer of divine songs, if you will.



(Image Source, http://iamyouasheisme.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/eat_the_book.jpg)

The Spirit of the LORD who speaks through David's lips here (23:2) is not a stranger to the leaders of Israel. The Spirit came upon Othniel and Jephthah, on Sampson and even upon Saul, who was David's predecessor. But none of them was so thoroughly marked by the Spirit for kingship as David. David was Israel's king and anointed one par excellence.



(Dura Europos, Syria. Source: Gill/Gillerman slide collection. Image Source, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/Samuel_e_david.jpg)

1 Samuel 16:13, "Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the presence of his brothers; and the spirit of the LORD came mightily upon David from that day forward. Samuel then set out and went to Ramah." (NRSV)

Even for kings there is a higher authority to whom they are accountable. There is a right way and a wrong way to rule. Those who rule in accord with universal human rights (ba'adam tsaddiyq) and with reverence toward God (yir'at 'elohiym) are gladly received because of the blessing they bring to their subjects. (23:3)



(Image Source, http://cache.virtualtourist.com/2318769-Morning_light-Walpole.jpg)

Such kings are like the morning light; their advancing presence clears away fear and darkness. Their presence means a day without clouds overhead, a day in which the morning mist glistens on the grass as a brilliantly sparkling display of God's blessing. The morning light allows the dew to linger a while. A morning sun warms but does not scorch. It is a welcome ray that drives away the chill of night. (23:4)

David asks, rhetorically, "Is my house [= my royal family; see II Samuel 7:11-12] not thus with God?" The answer he seeks is "Yes! Of course it is! Long live King David!" And David lines up evidence to support his claim of royal benevolence:

• God has made an everlasting covenant (beriyt `olam, II Samuel 7) with David and with his descendants. (Would God do that, if David had not been a good king?)
  
• God has kept things orderly and rule-y while David has been on the throne. (Despite attempts, there has not been a coup d'état. David has reigned a good long time.)
  
• God has (or will) prosper David's help (salvation) and desire (wants).

(23:5)

A worthless [king], on the other hand, is as welcome as a thorn. (Judges 9:7-15)



(Image Source, http://www.hubbo.com/images/2002-05-22/thorny-shrub-close.jpg)

No one wants to get close. No one wants to keep them. (Or their children who come to the throne after them.) Everyone throws them away, because they cannot be held in the hand without getting hurt. (23:6)



(Image Source, http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_ek86iFPWOeU/Sehx-5GVEHI/AAAAAAAABRo/pO5OQ00kHZM/s1600/thorns.jpg and http://www.rosegardeninghelper.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/3104TSX418L._SS400_.jpg)

To touch them at all, one uses metal tools, military tools, that can be manipulated from a distance. (23:7)



(Image Source, http://i.ehow.com/images/GlobalPhoto/Articles/4592155/Prunerosebush_Full.jpg)

They are then burnt "on the spot" (bashebet, where they sit: i.e., on the throne).



(Image Source, http://oaksavannas.org/photos/brambles-burning-013.jpg)

David is surely the former rather than the latter sort of king. David has lived, after all, to give his "last words." He has not been deposed and there is every reason to think that his heir will sit on the throne of Israel. The only question is which heir and whether the heir will follow in David's path as a good king or become thorny. But perhaps David's last words protest too much. There were times when David's actions--and those of his heirs--had brought calamity on his subjects. (With Uriah and Bathsheba, for example, 2 Samuel 11 and 12.)



(Image Source, http://restorationupdates.com/advice-tips-and-hints-to-be-restored/repentance-is-absolutely-important/)

But overall the judgment of Scripture is that David was a good king, a good example for future kings, for "rulers" of all sorts (e.g., elders and pastors in churches), and a prophetic glance at what comes next.

Revelation 1:4b-8

The revelation of Jesus Christ makes as clear as can be, as clear as flesh-and-blood, who is the authority behind all earthly authorities, the king of all kings, the "ruler of the kings of the earth." There is a right way and a wrong way to rule. His is the right way. His rule produces for his subjects:

• Grace
  
• Peace
  
• Life (from the dead)
  
• Faithfulness (the equivalent of chesed, covenant loyalty)
  
• Love
  
• Freedom

We expect this of a good king, the very best king. We expect that his reign will be long. An eternal covenant or politic can only be maintained by a king (or royal family) who is and was and will be the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega. What may come as a bigger surprise to us is that we all are his subjects. We are his kingdom. (1:6) We, like David, are his "last words" to the world, priests (more so now than prophets).



(Image Source, http://frmarkdwhite.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/crown.jpg)

The question is whether we, Christ's heirs (or co-heirs with Christ), will embrace our crown (3:11) and our calling, bringing grace, peace, life, faithfulness, love, and freedom to our world, so that he may be welcomed by all.

John 18:33-37

This scene hardly needs an introduction. Jesus stands in Pilate's headquarters, in front of Pilate's judgment seat (throne), a good ruler under arrest by tyrants. Pilate, an earthly "king," claims to stand outside Jesus' jurisdiction. ("I am not a Jew, am I?")



(Image Source, http://www.cts.edu/ImageLibrary/Images/story/pilate.jpg)

Pilate claims that Jesus' own subjects (your nation and your chief priests) have handed Jesus over to him. The implication seems to be that Jesus is a bad king, if he is indeed a king at all. But Jesus objects that his kingdom is not of this world, not from here. The venue for Jesus' trial--and vindication--is elsewhere. That where seems to be a place where kings embrace thorny subjects and undergo severe punishment so that those they rule may go free. Pilate, perhaps thinking that he has trapped Jesus, says "So you are a king?" Jesus does not answer directly. (Nothing new about that!) But he appeals to the primary attribute and calling of a good king, the ability to judge his subjects on objective (Truth) grounds. A good judge is just ('adam tsaddiyq) and has a great reverence toward (fears) God. Unlike David, whose jurisdiction is limited to Israel, Jesus' reign extends to all who recognize the truth of his "last words."

This is Part I of a two-part review of the book.
(Read Part II of the review of Eric Toensmeier's Perennial Vegetables.)

Toensmeier, Eric. Perennial Vegetables: From Artichoke to 'Zuiki' Taro, a Gardener's Guide to Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles. Chelsea Green Publishing: White River Junction, Vermont, 2007.

If you are a gardener interested in sustainability, the "holy grail" must be a more-or-less stable perennial polyculture. (See Wes Jackson's work with perennial grains at The Land Institute, for a related example.) In other words, you want a garden that mimics nature. The problem is that most of our food gardens are the opposite: we grow lots of annuals, mostly of a very few varieties. That is why, if you are anything like me, you already know what artichokes are--and even the difference between artichokes and Jerusalem artichokes--but you may never have heard of 'Zuiki' Taro or any of the "Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles" heralded by Eric Toensmeier's subtitle. His goal is to introduce people who garden for food to 100+ new food crops, all perennials. He wants to ring the changes on perennial vegetables from A to Z! Does he succeed? Yes, in my opinion he does. My only caveat to the readers of this review is that my experience with these plants is very limited. For that reason, and because I have gardened for food avidly now for a decade, I think I am directly in the bulls eye of Mr. Toensmeier's target audience. For far too many of the plants that Toensmeier names I cannot provide an independent evaluation of his recommendations. Most of these plants I have never grown or tasted, or even seen with any recognition! And that is what is so exciting. I cannot wait to devote sections of my garden to this new (to me) kind of vegetable next year. Already I grow lots of perennial fruit, so the addition of perennial vegetables is only natural. The key questions, it appears, will be where to find good varieties of the vegetables Toensmeier names ("Only a small number of nurseries and seed companies offer even the best perennial vegetables!") and whether I agree that they are palatable. (This latter appears to be a point of much debate.)

Part I: Gardening with Perennial Vegetables

Before we take a look at a few examples of the many new varieties that will be on our Zone 5b purchasing list for next spring, let's review part one of the book. I'll call this the "How to Garden" section. It is devoted to general information about gardening, with an eye toward the gardening of perennial vegetables. If you already have experience with perennial ornamental plants, fruits, and nuts, there will not be much new in this section. You already know much that is required to plan the garden, choose the plants, prepare the soil, and plant and care for your new "babies." You know how agonizingly long it can take for your plants to "grow up" (especially if more mature specimens are not readily available for planting), how to watch for and mitigate problems with species that are "aggressive," and all about plant pests and diseases.

Given the relation of perennial vegetable growing to the concept of permaculture, it isn't surprising that a whole chapter of the book is devoted to "Design Ideas" (chapter 2). I must admit to a bit of bias here. I have never quite been able to swallow the whole permaculture ideal, especially as presented by Introduction to Permaculture. It has always seemed a little bit Rube Goldberg to me. Permaculture as a system and movement just seems a bit too complicated and totalizing. The idea that humans can so totally plan and design every aspect of their environment without something going wildly a muck seems to me to smack of the same sort of hubris that afflicts rampant development. Too much talk of "conscious design" and the "harmonious integration" of the elements of a garden make me want to say, "you haven't seen my garden!" And, when I look at such fully detailed plans, "you don't have my limited budget." My garden is a constant flux between chaos and order, with chaos always on the verge of gaining the upper hand. All that having been said, the great thing about this chapter (and the whole book) is that Toensmeier doesn't present a "system" so much as real, good, reliable information. With regard to permaculture, for example, he merely provides a few drawings of exemplary garden layouts and recommends several resources for further study, including Edible Forest Gardens (2 volume set), which he co-authored. He also recommends The Complete Book of Edible Landscaping: Home Landscaping with Food-Bearing Plants and Resource-Saving Techniques, Designing And Maintaining Your Edible Landscape Naturally, and Food Not Lawns: How to Turn Your Yard into a Garden And Your Neighborhood into a Community.

For the purposes of "Selecting Species" (chapter 3), Toensmeier divides the country into "eight basic climate types." The climates are

• Extreme Cold: High Mountains and Frozen Northlands
  
• Cold Temperate: East, Midwest, and Mountain West
  
• Cool Maritime: The Pacific Northwest
  
• Hot and Humid: The Southeast
  
• Arid and Hot: The Southwest
  
• Mediterranean and Mild Subtropical: Southern and Coastal California
  
• Tropical Lowlands: Hawaii and South Florida
  
• The Hawaiian Upland Tropics
  

Indianapolis at Zone 5b is in the Cold Temperate section of the country. Though Toensmeier discusses growing tropical perennials in some locations as annuals, I plan, because of my particular climate, to ignore the tropical plants and those for the warmer Southeast and review the book with an eye toward its greatest usefulness to me here in the Cold Temperate Midwest. A subsection of this chapter is entitled, "You Might Be Surprised by What You Can Grow." While I trust that Toensmeier knows whereof he speaks, I'll want to verify that before sinking a lot of money into plants that may not be hardy in my zone. For example, Toensmeier lists the groundnut (Apios americana, aka Potato bean) as "extremely cold-hardy..., being hardy to Zone 3." However, the only source I've found for them as of now (12/01/2009) is in the Edible Landscaping catalog. Edible Landscaping lists the plant as recommended for Zones 6-8. At $15 for the quart or $25 for the gallon, I'll think twice before going all out. Maybe a quart first just to see whether I can get them established? My hunch is that the catalog is playing it safe with the USDA Hardiness Zone info and that Toensmeier may be stretching. At any rate, Zone 5b is close enough to Zone 6 for this gardener to gamble, what with global warming and all that jazz.

One potentially controversial aspect of the book should be mentioned. Toensmeier advocates a rethinking of the whole issue of nonnative plants. Following David Theodoropoulos (Invasion Biology: Critique of a Pseudoscience), he suggests that the whole "native" vs. "nonnative" plant issue has been overblown, or that the native plant movement has become too rigid. More to the point, he advocates the use of some non-native perennial vegetables.

Toensmeier offers an extensive section on plant propagation and breeding in chapter 4, "Techniques." Throughout the book he advocates that we backyard gardeners must once again regain this significant part of our gardening heritage to become effective plant breeders and propagators once again. We seem to have lost that art, especially the art of breeding, and with it some of the variety that used to characterize food gardening. More to the point, many of these perennial vegetables are still very hard to come by. Propagating them ourselves, and improving the available varieties, will for a while be our best and sometimes only choice.

[Note: The above title was provided for review by the publisher. No remuneration was received for the review.]

1 Samuel 1:4-20
Mark 13:1-8

This passage immediately follows the scene of the widow with her two coppers. (Last week's reading, Mark 12:28-34.) For a while now Jesus has been teaching in the temple, saying some provocative things. In Mark 11 he makes his not-too-subtle entry into Jerusalem, borrowing a colt for his purpose with hardly a "by your leave." ("The Lord needs it...," 11:3.) He curses the fig tree. ("May no one ever eat fruit from you again," 11:14.)



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He drives out those who are buying and selling in the temple, overturning the tables of the money changers, not allowing anyone to carry anything through the temple, 11:15-16. When he does finally start teaching, Jesus accuses those to whom he is speaking of turning what should be a house of prayer for all nations (gentiles and Jews) into a den of robbers.



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Jesus so angers the leadership with his words and deeds that they want to kill him. Perhaps Jesus is tailoring his message to the crowds (11:18), to provoke their leaders, but the message in private to his disciples is equally provocative (to Peter [11:21ff.], "believe!" and "forgive!"; in private [13:3], some will claim "I am he!"]). Jesus is blatantly confrontational, even combative, seeking to "divide and conquer" the leaders who come to question the authority for his words and actions. His question is designed to produce a civil war. Riddle me this: "Was John's baptism of human origin or was it from God?" And the question produces its desired effect. (11:27-33)

Jesus attacks the leaders obliquely, obscuring his meaning momentarily with parables, but they understand all too well that he is "telling the parable against them." (Mark 12:12) Again they want to arrest him, but put it off. They send instead some smart folks to try to trap him using his own methods, asking him a divisive question: "Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor or not? Should we pay them or should we not?"



(Image Source, http://www.romancoins.info/h2005-mint-tiberius2.jpg)

Jesus' answer to their question, based on an inspection of a denarius, punts the ball back to them: "Give to Caesar what belongs to him and to God what belongs to God." After so deftly handling this dispute between the Pharisees and the Herodians, in which he leaves them bickering still about whether to pay taxes, Jesus is asked another litmus-test question by some Sadducees: which of seven brothers will have the barren wife on the day of resurrection? This time Jesus tells his questioners bluntly, not once but twice, that they are quite wrong--and ignorant of the Scriptures. (Mark 12:24, 27)

Another person, a professional, overhearing this dispute between Jesus and the Sadducees, brings to him yet another divisive question: "Which is the greatest commandment?" It so happens that this person agrees with Jesus' answer completely, verbatim. Yes, yes, Jesus, you are so right! And so what does Jesus say? Does he congratulate the man? No. Jesus says, "almost there! You are very near the Kingdom, not very far at all to go now." In other words, "close, but no cigar!" (Mark 12:34) That shut them all up.

Now Jesus, in the temple, turns his attention to the widow woman with two coppers making her way toward the offering plate. (See last week's Bible blog entry.) You might ask how Jesus could ever possibly make a controversial statement about a widow's offering, yet he does: "She has given more than all the rest," he says. (Mark 12:43)

Thankfully, time has now come to leave the temple, before Jesus can stir up even more animosity and trouble. That's where our reading today began.



(Image Source, http://jameswwatts.net/REL%20302%20notes/2TempleModel1.jpg)

On their way out, the disciples remark on the edifice and the stones that went into it; and Jesus, unable to let their comment pass, says "Not one of these stones will be left standing on top of another. All of them will be thrown down flat on the ground." (13:2)



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Their shock at Jesus' words is evident in the way Peter, James, John, and Andrew huddle with Jesus, expressing their concern. Tell us when; what will be the sign that the things you have said are about to happen? But instead of telling them when it will happen, Jesus gives them a list of signs that the end has not yet happened. (Mark 13:7, 8) There are miles to go before we sleep. Jesus seems to be saying that until the end comes, conflict will be ubiquitous. Wherever we look in our relationships--between nations, between families (and within families!), with nature, in church (wherever!) there will be disagreement, conflict, strife, natural disasters, suffering, pain, and loss. These things will be with us, unavoidably, until the very end. If Jesus, the Son of Man, the Messiah, did not escape it or avoid it but endured it, persevered and even embraced it--where does that leave us, his disciples? If Jesus is headed toward the cross, perhaps his increasing assertiveness in these last few chapters of Mark in the face of those who oppose him is a model for how we are to live in these contentious times. Where and how are we called to account? Asked divisive questions. Pursued with malice because of the way we answer? And especially, where are these things true not just because that's the way life is, but because we follow a troublemaker who isn't willing to let the status quo ante (i.e., death) prevail?

Wendell Berry, Leavings: Poems, Counterpoint, Berkeley, CA, 2010. (132 pp.)

I have been living for the past few weeks with Wendell Berry's latest anthology of poems in my backpack and have decided it is time to share a few thoughts about it. The book is in two parts: the first part is a potpourri, an all-too-short assortment of letter poems, occasional pieces, and brief reflections (the 20 titled poems in the collection are here); the second part is entitled "Sabbaths 2005-2008" and carries the tag line, "How may a human being come to rest?" (54 numbered poems make up this section.)

The title Leavings is not the title of any of the poems, but seems to sum up the book, as if Berry were deliberately taking leave of his readers. "It is hard to have hope. It is harder as you grow old." (2007.VI) "In time a man disappears..." (2007.VII) "I know I am getting old and I say so,..." (2005.VII) There are other leavings here too, other than the merely personal, predominantly that of the descending water that flows out from a lowly stream named Camp Branch. Falling tones, falling leaves (literally), falling steps, falling stones, falling snow and falling rain transport the reader to the Kentucky countryside where we see the place that has meant and still means the world to Mr. Berry. This small collection takes the reader on a painful but beautiful journey, a shared pilgrimage down familiar paths measured in ever slower and more halting steps, made all the more valuable for the fact that the reader is not required to leave his native place to join Mr. Berry except in imagination. "So many times I've gone away from here, where I'd rather be than any place I know.... It is death." (2008.X)

One of my favorite poems in this collection, one I know I'll return to many times, occurs early in Part I and is entitled simply "An Embarrassment." The severe economy of language--3 or 4 word lines mostly, mostly 1 or 2 syllable words--conveys the embarrassment of friends who regularly offer thanks for a meal when they eat alone but who are now trying to decide whether to do so when they are together. One of them, having decided to make a go of the prayer, leaves (!) them both embarrassed as the prayer falls awfully flat. I'll not ruin the ending for you, but it is a Berry-esque show stopper. For someone who makes his living as a pastor, that one poem was worth the price of admission. But there are many others from this book that will now join my ever growing list of Berry favorites: e.g., "A Speech to the Garden Club of America," which admonishes us to go "back to school, this time in gardens." Or "While Attending the Annual Convocation of Cause Theorists and Bigbangists at the Local Provincial Research University, the Mad Farmer Intercedes from the Back Row." (If you've read The Mad Farmer Poems, you'll appreciate the appropriateness of this addition to the corpus.

I have been reading (and re-reading) Wendell Berry's work for quite a while now. That means I've heard many of the words and seen many of the ideas before. But these poems are new, encountered for the first time like today's bracing walk in a familiar woods I've visited many times. In that sense they are very gratefully received; it is, after all, November and there are too few such walks left to me ...and to you.

It wouldn't be right to end the review without a full list of Wendell Berry's poetic works. Check your shelves! If you do not have all of these, you'll want them on a shelf close by when the winter winds begin to blow the snow around.

The Broken Ground: Poems

Clearing









Farming: A Hand Book







Openings: Poems (Harvest/Hbj Book)

A Part (Part Paper)

Sabbaths


Sayings and Doings





The Wheel

In today's texts we meet two "poor providers," Naomi (and her foreign daughter-in-law Ruth) and the unnamed woman who cast the Widow's Mite into the temple treasury.

Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17

The widow Naomi declares that she will seek "a resting place" (manoach, NRSV says "some security") for her widowed daughter-in-law, Ruth, so that everything will be OK for Ruth. (She had already blessed both Ruth and Orpah with rest, releasing them to find husbands in their native land; see Ruth 1:9.) Now, until and unless there is a change in Ruth's circumstance, she (and, for that matter, Naomi) is and will continue to be like the dove that Noah released from the window of the ark after the flood, "to-ing and fro-ing," but finding no resting place because all of the landing places are still covered with water. (Genesis 8:9)






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Ruth, the foreigner from Moab, will be lost in Israel just like the people of Israel were once lost in Egypt--and just like exiles who have been dispossessed for reasons of disobedience: scattered from nation to nation, worshiping with strangers, finding no ease, having no resting place, constantly walking without stopping, moving on to avoid the authorities, life constantly in doubt, with heart murmurs, blurry eyes, depression, and a total lack of confidence. Her desperation will become so great that she'll try to sell herself as a slave, but find no takers. (Deuteronomy 28:62-68; see Lamentations 1:3; return to the Land of Promise and settlement there is rest, Joshua 21:43-22:8.)





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Ruth will be like the driven-out Lilith, finally finding a place of repose. (Isaiah 34:14)





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(Image source, http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/christian/images/JeanFrancoisMillet-Harvesters-Resting-Ruth-and-Boaz-1850-53.jpg)



Ruth will be like the simple person, inexperienced in the ways of wisdom, who gets into trouble. In desperate straits, in mourning, she will be like the Psalmist who calls out, "the sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow." (KJV, Psalm 116:3) She will be brought low and then saved by God--in this case, Naomi's God--and by Naomi. But when all is said and done, when Naomi has helped her find "some security," Ruth will also be able to pray the thanksgiving portion of the Psalm: "Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the LORD has been good to you." (Psalm 116:6) Naomi and Ruth together are like the ark of God--which travels here and there, and is sometimes captured in a foreign land. It may be viewed as a curse in Philistia, but it scatters blessing wherever it may go in Israel, until it comes finally to rest in Jerusalem during the reign of Ruth's descendant, King David. (1 Chronicles 6:16)

Naomi knows, and shares, the desperate plight of her daughter-in-law Ruth. Given the cultural milieu, Naomi is in fact poorer and more desperate than Ruth. Naomi has an additional disadvantage, her age, which prevents her from childbirth. (Ruth 1:11) But Naomi also has an advantage; she is a native widow. Therefore it takes their cooperation, the sharing of their relative strengths and assets (Ruth's youth and Naomi's pedigree), to move the story toward its redemptive end. Nevertheless, it is Naomi who takes the initiative to provide protection for Ruth (and for herself), an initiative that should rightfully have been taken by the man in the story, the go'el, or near kinsman and redeemer. (Boaz is referred to as "our 'kin,'" moda`at, which is not so precise a connection as to invoke the law of the Levirate Marriage. But note the strong connection to the story of Tamar in Genesis 38; see Ruth 4:12.) Naomi tells Ruth to take advantage of the showers at the shelter in order to make herself presentable, perfuming (How much did that cost? Mark 14:3, John 12:3), and going by night to the threshing floor, concealing herself in a cloak until Boaz has eaten his meal and drunk his wine. (Ruth 3:2-3)





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Given the well-known Hebrew euphemisms ("feet" = sexual parts [see Exodus 4:25, Isaiah 6:2] and "lie down" = have sexual relations [too many to cite]), there is clearly a strong sexual innuendo in Ruth 3:4. But the writer never tells us explicitly "what actually happened on the threshing floor." [Gray, Joshua, Judges, and Ruth (New Century Bible), p. 309] That makes for a better story, it holds us in greater suspense.

When the suspense is resolved, Ruth has born a child--for Naomi (Ruth 4:16; compare Hagar and Sarah, Genesis 16). Each woman has been for the other the conduit for God's blessing, receiving in the process more than she has given. There are royal overtones (Psalm 2:7, Isaiah 9:6), which carry through directly (Ruth 4:17) to David and indirectly (Matthew 1, Luke 3) to Jesus. Through each poor widow God has blessed the other, and through the both of them together God has blessed the nation, and indeed the world.

Mark 12:38-44

One of the foremost indictments in Jesus' teaching against the Teachers of the Law is their appetite: they routinely devour the resting places of widows like Naomi and Ruth. They eat the hope of the poor for lunch. According to Jesus, there are certain visible signs of their ilk to beware: fancy dress, the use of honorifics ("The Rev. Dr. ...") in public (especially when wheeling and dealing), seats on the governing board of the church, V.I.P. invitations to awards banquets, and the like. These are things we might expect, but they also pray long prayers, which might come to us as something of a surprise. Jesus' conclusion is that such people will get their just desserts: just as Naomi and Ruth were blessed beyond all rightful expectation, so these Teachers of the Law will be cursed (judged guilty) to excess.

Then begins the story of another widow. Jesus sits down to watch people give their temple offering, throwing coins into the collection plate. ("According to Mishnah, Shekalim , 5 there were in the temple 13 such receptacles in the form of trumpets." BDAG, gazophulakion) The clatter must have been noticeable when the rich folk [the aforementioned "Teachers of the Law"] threw in large amounts. It is hard to think of such an act--giving freely to the temple coffers, and thus to the support of the poor, as in any way destructive, but Jesus has already judged it so. He says they are eating the lunch of the woman who appears next in line. But this unnamed widow has the last laugh. Her two coppers together amount to less than a penny; they hardly make a noise as they hit the plate. The disciples, their attention drawn elsewhere, must be summoned to pay attention to the widow. She has given more than all the others who are throwing coins into the plate, Jesus says. They gave the overflow, the parts they didn't need or want. Every cent she gave, she needed. As a homeless person, she gave up her last little bit of security, her last place to rest, her very life.

(Image source, http://www.romanorum.com.au/Info/Articles/Forming%20a%20Collection/Forming%20a%20collection/Bolden-Widows%20mite.jpg)

It is hard to see how, or where, or when this woman has her life restored to her. Certainly the "Teachers of the Law" are not going to help her. I think Jesus must be looking after her like Naomi looked after Ruth, one homeless person helping another, one penniless sojourner staying awake, guarding the underpass while the other catches a moment of sleep. Like Ruth looking at Naomi, Jesus sees something in this widow that reminds him of his Father. By sharing, like the boy with the loaves and fishes, miraculously all are loved: saved, healed, and fed by God's grace.

(Image source, http://www.wcg.org/lit/images/b9/WidowsMite.jpg)

Where does that leave us? In part, we are surely indicted like the "Teachers of the Law." Very few of us by any stretch of the imagination are "widowed" in the sense that these widows were, without even a place to rest, without "some security," Social Security or otherwise. But we are all also experienced in loss and are more or less aware of the severe limits placed on us in this life. As such, we need the sort of help that Naomi gave to Ruth, the help of others who share our plight, and the help of one other in particular, Jesus the Christ.