Go West, Old Man, Go West

“Life’s a long journey in the same direction,” said some philosopher long ago. And for me, the direction is west.
I had preached my sermon at chapel the day I had to catch the train. I took a chance on “mountains”. I had already preached on Bones in the Bible, with some success according to feedback.
So I took as my text the last chapter of Deuteronomy. “Old Man Mose done gone up de mountin.’ His eye warn’t dim nor his strength abated. And dat is sumpin’ given he was 120 at the time.”
Nebo is almost 3000 feet above sea level, right smack dab in front of the lowest lake on earth—the Dead Sea. 100 miles north he could see a white patch—snow-covered Mt. Hermon over 9000 feet in elevation. But he could see Mount Tabor, too. He didn’t know it at the time, but that’s where he and Elijah would come back some 1400 years later to talk with Jesus before he started the last lap of his race with our race.
Moses saw Mount Moriah, where Abraham had won the test of faith when he raised the dreaded knife over Isaac, the son of promise. David would later take the citadel of the Jebusites there and make Jerusalem the forever capital of God’s earthly kingdom. And just outside that high place Moses had predicted that a greater prophet than he would come. That prophet would be the lamb that would, unlike Isaac, actually be slain for our redemption.
On the long lonely trek up the trail Moses must have mused on the promise that God would give Abraham a land, a seed, and a blessing for the world. The seed was now several million souls. They had done well on that part. But they possessed not a single acre of the land. Moses wanted at least to see it before he died. And God had said, OK.
So God took Moses and buried his body somewhere on Nebo—no one knows just where. I think Moses died content. And so may we if we trust God. You see, people don’t just croak like frogs. God sends for us—maybe with angels, I don’t know. But we don’t just die. It says, “precious on the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”
Meanwhile there’s work to be done. Moses perhaps sees the camp of the Israelite hordes a few miles from their first challenge. Jericho is the first walled city—the oldest one on earth. Ahead were lots of valleys to go through and battles to fight. But as for them, so for us, God is going before us. Since Jesus, the land cannot be the geography of Palestine—that’s way too small for the billions now in the kingdom. Jesus changed the kingdom to the places where God rules as king. And that is in the hearts of those who like Moses, leave the privilege and wealth of the world to seek for the city whose builder and maker is God. Hebrews 11 tells us what we are in for if we join the king. Really tough going. But worth every tear shed and drop of blood that we spill in solidarity with the tears, groans and blood of Jesus.
I had a good time preaching that one to those precious brothers and sisters who are going out to serve in India, come what may.
One of those is Ashish Kandelahar, whom I met five years ago. He wanted to go into the hills where Christ had never had a presence and start a church. He came to campus the day before I left and told of the school he has now with about 100 kids and several small house churches. Wow! His wife was a student of mine. Preema and Ashish have a year old girl and are just full of joy in the work far off in the primitive towns a six hour drive from the college. (Preema is no slouch either. She got one of the highest marks in all India after she finished New Theological College.)
I thought back on all these blessings as I took the 6-hour train ride through the darkness to Delhi. Upon arrival I wave off the red-turbaned porters eager to carry my luggage. I had no idea where to go if I had used their services. I am waiting for Premji to come into the coach to help with the bags. But he doesn’t come. I struggle to the platform and sit on a bench. It’s midnight. Thankfully there are a few souls nearby, as I have almost no money, no way to call the office, and the platform is not a friendly place to park for long. I keep telling myself he’s stuck in traffic. Every five minutes seems like a long time. I keep whistling in the dark, so to speak, to keep up courage. Half an hour later, sure enough, he shows up and we are soon in the little van and off to the airport.
I have five hours to wait. Not enough time to have gone for a room. So I snooze, do sudokos, and snack on some nuts and an apple I took along. I’m thinking lots of people would think me nuts, floating in a faraway land like that. But in due time I am on the flight. And—I got an upgrade! Whoo-hoo! One of those larger seats. And by the window. I found out that when you wander to that forward galley usually forbidden to us peons, they have juice and snacks and chips and real fresh fruit that you can just help yourself to! And I do. I never knew how well these wealthy travelers made out. I wonder what its like upstairs in First Class?
I’m by the window, too. I get to see the barren land of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the other “stans.” I could see tiny squares on the dry hills that marked settlements—far from any roads it seems. Snow-capped ranges in the distance. Beautiful!
But what’s this? My seat mate is an Indian who works in London. He tells me he goes back for month each year to visit family. He thinks India is the most beautiful place on earth. I choose not to challenge that. However, he is antsy. Restless? Man—he was all over, hoggin’ the armrests. Jumping in my window seat went I went to the lavatory. O well—he was pleasant and I did doze off a dozen times for about ten minutes. After all, I had been up all night.
We flew over the Netherlands. It was fairly clear by then, with the morning sun slanting in under the clouds. We had early morning sun for 8 hours, the pace keeping the full moon on the horizon for hours as we chased it westward. I waved at granddaughter April Gustafson living now in Amsterdam. I doubt she noticed. But it was a nice gesture. I’m all for gestures!
And as I write this at Heathrow (London) I have been up nearly 40 hours with a flight across the ocean still ahead. I expect Ellie to be at Logan with chauffeur Jim Herrick. She never comes to see me off—only on return. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder. Wait ‘til I get home from my trip to Kenya next January. She’ll probably hire a brass band!
As I sign off the blogs for this excursion of four weeks, I thank all for their prayers and thoughts. My heart is full. God, as usual, does wonderful things that make it a joy to venture forth, doing a tiny bit in the sweeping events that will come to a crescendo when the King comes back.
So whether we die on Mt Nebo or whether God takes us from bed in old age, we are the Lord’s. Meanwhile—we have work to do, knowing that in the Lord our labor cannot be in vain.

In the Wilderness

Nearly four weeks of listening to Hindi and I think I am finally figuring out a tiny bit. Not only do I recognize “Yeshua” as Jesus, but I can pick out a word here and there and guess what the prayer or the conversation is about.
For example, in chapel today the congregation was invited to mention requests to add to the list given by the worship leader. I stood to ask prayer for friend Debbie in Virginia who is very ill and whose doctor has disappeared due perhaps to legal difficulties. As sister Hemlata took the cordless mic to offer the prayer, I could hear when she said “sister Debbie” and knew that my request was presented before God. It was no trick—she said “sister Debbie” even though she was praying in Hindi.
Getting home after chapel, I went up to the upper room to make my bed. Yes—even I have some admittedly minimal standards. Egad! An inch of water on the marble tile floor and the sound of H2O going down a drain. But obviously not all going down the drain. Throw rug saturated, bedroom filling up. Since a plastic supply pipe had burst downstairs just the other day I knew where to look. Sure enough. A hose busted open and hot water flooding. I turned the shutoff, found a broom and started sweeping out onto the balcony.
Soon I heard Uncle George downstairs and shouted to call the plumber guy. Meanwhile I shut off all the other lines in two other bathrooms before going downstairs. Here’s a maintenance guy now—plunger in hand. Uncle is talking to him about “pipe-kay” and “replace-kay” and “leak-kay.” Bingo! My Hindi just went from 5 words to at least 50. Never mind Rosetta Stone. Just take a word that is used for technology or education and add “kay.” I can now point to the ed building and say “class-kay” and the cook will know I can’t stop for lunch now because I have class. “Exam-kay” is the next word I’ll try out. That should strike fear into all hearts. It’s my way of combating that nasty put-down that goes like this.
“What do you call a person who can speak three languages?” Trilingual. “Two languages?” Bilingual. “One language?” American!
Now get set for a terrific segue.
In life our supply pipes can burst and leave us floundering in a flood or drained dry in a desert.
That’s what our chapel senior preached on today. She took her text from Luke 4—the wilderness experience of Jesus.
I don’t know how this well-worn text can keep bearing fruit. How many sermons have we heard on the temptation? How many have I preached? Quite a few.
She reminds us that if we follow Jesus we will have the wilderness experience. We will be in the desert and tested to the max. After all, our baptismal commitment will be tried just as Jesus’ was. There’s no other way to refine and deepen our faith in God.
Not by chance, it is the Holy Spirit who brings us into the wilderness, knowing full well that our Accuser will meet us there. We will suffer weakness due to hunger and thirst. Without testing our faith is shallow. James and the other apostles say the same thing many times. “Count it all joy when you come under trials.” Are you kidding? Does that make sense? No—unless you have decided to follow Jesus, expecting that the Holy Spirit is the One who leads you into all these unpleasant situations. Why is it so hard for me to learn this? Is it God’s will for you to be going through the wringer? Answer: absolutely yes. God has ordained it.
“Turn these stones God has thrown at you to something that will benefit you.” The Accuser of the brethren (and sistren) points at all these stones God puts in the path. It’s like hiking Mount Lafayette last spring. My old limbs were getting tired yet ahead of me were more ledges and piles of stones I had to negotiate. Ever feel like quitting? Sitting down in tears saying it’s too hard—I can’t go on? That’s life in this world for the Christian.
So Satan suggests we turn those stones into something better. You’re hungry for change. Take charge. You can avoid these cold stones that block your way. You can think of a way. Maybe it’s a relationship that won’t yield to your will. Maybe it’s opposition or some temptation you cannot overcome. It could be a lot of things that God has allowed into your life that is just too much. But Jesus says, “Let those stones remain stones. I’ll provide in God’s way for you. Don’t give up.”
Satan suggests that the world God once controlled is now his. “I’ll give to you, if….” Wouldn’t it be easier to accept that and go along to get along? Just bow to me and I’ll give you your share of the world’s rich treasure of power and pleasure. Just do it my way and you can do it your way. So much easier.
And the Accuser is not totally lying, either. It is easier. The way of the cross means suffering and loss of the most painful kind. But Jesus knows Satan is tempting us with a short-term relief that will be paid for in spades in the end. No—we’ll worship God though we are going through hell. Better to go through hell now than to be in hell forever.
Lastly Satan whispers for us to put God to the test. Put out a fleece. Do something drastic to see if God really cares about you. He’s got angels at his command. What good are angels if you don’t call for them? Force God’s hand. This is really a call for us to manipulate God. Make him show up for us when we think the time is right. Doesn’t work that way, says Jesus. The heroes of faith of old suffered long and hard but would not cave in. Hebrews 11 recounts their wilderness experience.
So Jesus won the victory in the desert place and went on to live an easy life. “Victory in Jesus!” Wrong!
Here’s the challenge that came to me.
Try to think of one period in the life of Jesus when things got better for him.
I come up blank. His holy life was wholly in one direction: bad to worse. No exception. Hated in his hometown. Pestered by people more interested in health and wealth through his miracles than in his call to repentance. (Make no mistake, we would have gotten tired of this Galilean preacher whose mantra was repent, repent, repent.) Misunderstood by his disciples, maligned by his colleagues. Even the triumphal entry was tinged with sadness because Jesus knew it was just euphoria of a fickle crowd looking for a Son of David who could knock off the Roman Goliath for them. Holy Week was one holy horror after another for Jesus.
And Satan keeps whispering, “Don’t you deserve better than this?” Come over to my side. Go get that divorce. Go for the money and ease. Give in to the lusts every person has—it’s just being human. The Accuser often uses modern counseling as a tool to pry us away. You have your needs. You deserve more. Take it into your hands—God will understand your disobedience. He’s forgiving, isn’t he? What’s one more going to hurt, when it can give you so much relief?”
I get to the bottom line. Am I going to follow Christ into and through this wilderness or am I going to climb out of this canyon where I am so thirsty and hungry and in pain and just relax in the Devil’s Playground?
The speaker asks us to close our eyes and think on all this. I decide I am going for the gold, with the strength God offers. I am going to follow him right down the trail of pain and deprivation and suffering and even death. He told me upfront it was going to be like this. It’s the only way there is—straight through the wilderness. Embracing the pain as he did. That’s what it means to take up the cross, to deny myself. The other way is to seek to save my own life. The result is to lose it.
I’m asking God to sustain me in the desert experience, trusting in what he deems best.

Does HQ Know What Going on Down Here?

Will someone please tell God?
I’m sitting once more in morning chapel, absorbing the quiet reverence the community here observes, wondering what the Lord will say through the next student preacher. I muse on how the disciples took Jesus aside once to give him some practical advice. I must confess I have been tempted to the same foolishness now and again. After all, does he really know what he's doing? Especially in areas where we think he might tweak his strategy a bit to the left or right? I cannot remember the specifics off the top of my head, but my impression was that Jesus did not take kindly to their counsel. Was that when he told Peter to stop being Satan’s mouthpiece?
Anyway, the preacher and translator take their places at the pulpit to call us to prayer and preparation for the Word. Yikes! They are both women! How can this be in a society where only high caste women count for much? She is dark-skinned—low caste.
Will someone please inform Headquarters? Women are supposed to be silent in church. And a preaching role for females is definitely contrary to proper theological grasp of the New Testament.
And look at the text she takes! It’s Hebrews 10:26-31. This is one of the most challenging passages for those of us who believe in the sovereignty of God in regard to salvation. People who truly know Christ are not supposed to fall away into divine retribution.
She probably has a weak grasp of the text, right?
Wrong! She is rattling off Hebrew and Greek terms in a way that indicates she has done her homework. She refers back to Hebrews 6—another troubling text for Calvinists like me. It tells of how those who are enlightened and have tasted the gift of salvation and the powers of the age to come cannot be brought back to repentance because they are crucifying the Lord all over again.
The text in Hebrews 10 only makes it worse. Those who make a conscious choice to keep on sinning (about salvation by Christ alone) put themselves under God’s judgment. It is well deserved because they trample the precious blood flowing from the cross. They bring upon themselves a “fearful expectation of judgment and the raging fire that will consume God’s enemies.”
She bids us to examine our hearts to see if we are just going on autopilot or are truly repentant for our sins and mistakes. God knows the heart. He is ready with mercy. But we must be sincere in our repentance.
She asks us to stand for the benediction and grasp our neighbor’s hand as we stand in the presence of the God who searches hearts.
Why does God pour out his power through such a humble and, some would say, unqualified vessel as T.G Pushpam?
Uncle tells me later that her dark skin tone signals her origin. She is a low caste—one of the many untouchable jatis in India. But God has gifted her. She will serve with Wycliffe translating the Bible into a language in the remote northern hills. India has over 400 languages!
One thing that brings tears to my eyes (as a far possible for a guy) is to see the interactions here. People are fellowshipping warmly together from groups that Indian society says should not be talking together, nor sitting together, nor eating together, nor worshiping together. The caste system is a pernicious curse. But here the curse has been broken. We are all the same before our God, who created of one blood all the ethnicities of the earth. If you want to see a miracle, this miracle of grace is huge. We are “one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord.”
On second thought, do not alert HQ. Jesus knows what he is doing.
As I think about this college I shake my head in amazement. It is only twenty years old. But God has raised it up in a forbidding environment here in North India. Thirty full time faculty give second to none education in Bible, theology, music, missions, and culture.
Uncle George, the founder, stands amazed that a kid from a poor family in Kerala could be used for such a ministry. He gave his life to Lord at age 19 and was called from political ambition to ministry. Attending Fuller Theological Seminary in California, he became an officer in Ted Engstrom’s “World Vision” program, designed to help the orphans in Korea after the war there. World Vision has become one of the premier Christian relief ministries in the world.
But George Kuruvilla Chavanikamanil felt a call to return to India—to north India. He resigned his position and shared his call with some friends who soon formed a board to see what could be done.
As he traveled about looking for a place to start a training school, he and his nephew came to the Dehradun area. Land here—as in most of India—is very costly. India, as you know has about one billion souls on land about the size of a third of the USA.
As a fundraising tool one of the board members suggested making a model of the college they were dreaming of. He needed a sense of the “lay of the land.” We have no land as yet.
So he said he would pray that the Lord would help him think of something appropriate. This is where God shows up!
This man had never been to India. But he produced a model of a future campus. He placed it in a flat area with a small hill to the right of the proposed buildings. The hill had a series of terrace-like “steps” that made a height of land.
As George and his nephew Babu explored leads, his wife Leela was praying with church folk back in California that they would find five or more acres of land at half the going price, $25,000 the limit. But land here is more than that for a single acre. Nevertheless, they prayed.
The searchers at last came to Dehradun but nothing materialized. They were about to go elsewhere. They prayed, “Lord, you have to show us the way—we are out of options.”
That day they were told of a local man who had heard of their search for real estate. He sent word that he had a mango orchard off the Kulhan Road that he was willing to sell—the trees were dying and he could get no profit from that land. So George and Babu went out to look. It was nearly dark. They couldn’t really see anything. Unpromising. They went back to the hotel. Babu joked: Did you see any hill, Uncle?”
In the morning the two sensed that the Lord wanted them to go back and look one more time. As they came through the brush to the edge of the dry riverbed they could not believe their eyes. There was a terraced hill across the riverbed. George and Babu raced ahead of the others to stand on this hill and claim it as an answer to prayer. It was exactly as the architect 10,000 miles away had sculpted it on the model!
Price? “It is no good to me--$25,000 and its yours.”
This was the first of many unusual answers to prayer, resulting in a large campus training several hundred young people for evangelism and missions in a very hostile region of India. More of that another time.
I sense that I am living for these weeks on holy ground, the gift of a God who answers prayer in astounding ways.
And by the way—the mango trees all began to thrive once the deed was registered.
I think Headquarters knows what it is doing.

Of Oil and Water

You should hear the student preachers.
This morning another senior gave his 15-minute exhortation, taking as his text Psalm 133. Seemingly a ho-hum 70-word poem by King David. What can come out this, the last Song of Ascent? Sure—it’s about unity among the pilgrims coming from all corners of the land to the great festival in Jerusalem. But what can we squeeze from this old lemon that’s relevant to 21st century Christians?
The young man hinted at allegory. O my, thought I—not an auspicious start. But then he skillfully noted that this is a poem, a song, and should be understood accordingly. What does David intend by the poetic license he uses with these striking images of oil on the beard of the priest and dew on the snowy peaks of Syria? To us, oil is oil.
We know Bedouin tribes used oil to replenish parched skin—the ancient equivalent of Oil of Olay. So the image of it running down from head to beard to collar makes some sense. That’s the part exposed to the sun. Sort of like us in winter jumping into a cozy bubble bath after a day on the icy slopes.
But here the Bible scholar earns his keep. You see, the emulsion used was a special concoction of oil and spices from the secret recipe of God himself. It was not to be used except to anoint priests. Exodus 30 details the sacred formula: myrrh, cinnamon, cane, cassia to be blended in specific proportions by a perfumer to anoint the Tent of Meeting and its utensils, as well as the priests. It is not to be used for any other purpose. It is a Holy Blend. The harmony of God’s people is thus holy and unique in a world torn by divisions of nation, creed, caste, race, and language.
The dew of Hermon to the peoples of Palestine was a pure and perpetual source of life, feeding the streams that nourished the plains below. Mount Zion in Jerusalem to the south is arid in comparison. Mount Hermon is lofty; Zion is lowly. But the poet imagines the life-giving action of the perpetual moisture of Hermon falling on the people of God as they gather to worship. There the Lord commands life to flourish—life forevermore. In that life humans come together as one before the Living God.
Our preacher now sends the arrows to the mark—straight to our hearts. India is wracked with divisions hard for us in the USA to grasp. While we have discrimination lingering in the background, here it is in your face every day. Caste and color count for much here—it’s the curse of thousands of years of Hindu worldview. Poor and uneducated people have little hope of deliverance from their grinding condition. Gender bias is stronger here also. You see it everywhere—so obvious.
Sad to say, it is present in the churches, along with doctrinal divisions. This is not what God intends. By creation God made but one human distinction: man and woman. None besides. Yet we have a thousand divisions in society and even in the body of Christ. We must get rid of this ungodliness. The connection? The spices lose their individual identity as they meld into the fragrant composite. The two mountains become one in the single mountain range whence the life-giving waters flow, replenished from the dew that falls from the heavens.
The Duke of Wellington, a century or more ago, went to the altar in church to receive the sacrament of the Lord’s body and blood. He came down the west aisle and knelt down to receive the host. At the same time a poor peasant came down the east aisle and knelt. Someone touched the man and whispered for him to arise and wait until the Duke was served. But Wellington, grasping the intent of the touch and whisper, grabbed the man’s hand so he could not rise. “We are all equal here. Stay where you are.” His words carried to the congregation and thus are known to us.
As we rise for the benediction, he asks us to hug the person to our right and left while saying, we are one in the Lord. Now this may seem easy. But for some in this audience it may be a stretch to actually act out across a socially ingrained barrier to that degree. Sitting next to someone not your background and speaking to him or her is one thing. Touching them with an embrace of unity is another.
But the dew of Hermon was among us this morning. “How good and pleasant it is when brothers and sisters live together in unity!”
Sitting in the “seat of the skeptical”—the backbench faculty, I notice that even we hardened old warhorses are actually moved. Good preaching informs the mind of new things mined from the Word of God. But it must also move the heart and energize the will to reach for a new level with God.
Well done, senior preacher!

Food for the Soul

Today is Sunday. Up early, shower, breakfast and I am waiting for Joel Joseph, a lecturer in Old Testament at New Theological College. He has invited me to go to his church beyond the southwest side of Dehradun at Jamunkhata. I have suit and tie and, most of all, my Bible—the big one that I could preach from for a lifetime if need be.
He comes 25 minutes late. He was trying to call me about the delay. I was out here enjoying the morning sun and waiting for you. No problem. “Oh, by the way, would you bring the message this morning?” Again—no problem.
You see I am experienced in these venues. I have learned, first in Romania then in Kenya that a pastor is expected to have something at his fingertips with no notice. That’s why I told Dale Brown, when he asked me how much warning I needed to fill the pulpit replied, “Fifteen seconds.” During the time it takes to walk up to the platform, I’ll have something come to mind.
As we wait for sister Debbie Sudheer (Professor of English) I begin to thumb through, coming across John 4—the woman at the well of Sychar. That will be good. On the hour ride (it’s 30 miles) I have time to jot a couple of notes on a bookmark.
At 8:45 AM the roads are sparsely dotted with walkers, bikes, scooters, cars and trucks. Surprising, since Hindus do not have a day for worship. It’s every man for himself, so to speak. Joel tells me most offices and all government installations are closed Sundays. I assume it’s a holdover from the British Raj of previous centuries.
We drive by the prestigious Military Academy, equivalent to West Point. The grounds are beautiful as I peer through the gates. Dehradun is also home to dozens of colleges and universities. Reminds me of Boston in that way.
Now the road is narrowing as we turn off to a side track. Fields of sugar cane. Mango groves. Here is the little church building on a tiny plot of land. Joel tells me that the owner of the rice fields and mango orchard to the rear is willing to sell as much land as the church wants. And they need land to move a small orphanage into the site as the building they rent further down in the town is having the rent doubled. The kids are distinguishing themselves in school exams, so there is demand for the school to grow. The new land here will be sold them at a discount. But it’s still about $50 grand an acre.
We park, slip off our shoes and go in. Two NTC grads (in the one-year ministry certificate program) have the place open already. He introduces me to one man who came out Hinduism and is an evangelist. Not by profession. He just helps people in need, prays with them. The locals respect him and he wins some to Christ. I sit up front on one of the few chairs. Around 10 people start to drift in. Singing and an opening prayer get us underway.
The men all sit on the left, women on the right. By 10:30 the young man with guitar is getting things going. Joel moves to the drum set. The volume rises, everyone clapping. There is a woman in front near the wall. Joel had told me she was a Hindu. When she converted, her husband kicked her out and her family shuns her. There is a movement going on as we speak in much of Hindu India protesting religious conversion. I guess there is freedom of religion as long as you don't change - stick with your heritage. This woman cannot carry a tune or stay on key. But there’s nothing wrong with her lungs. She is soaring off pitch to a crescendo of praise to Jesus. In a while she will be doing like jumping jacks and raising her hands. You can see Jesus is all she has. But obviously he is enough. The rest of the now 50-60 worshipers are really into it, too.
I cannot grasp a word, with the exception of "hallelujah." That word is the same everywhere in the world among Christians. But I am smiling with joy. How can you help it when you know the background of these people?
It’s after 11 now. Time for testimonies. One young woman mentioned Special Olympics and special needs as she rattled on. Some words are just grafted into a language from English. After the service she greeted me in English, so I asked her what her testimony was. She works with disadvantaged and handicapped children. She mentioned that she is praying for her Hindu family—she is the only Christian. So we paused and I prayed with her about that.
Joel told me later that another testimony was from a sharp guy about 35 who tries to help poor kids get an education. He was praising God because someone has donated a laptop to one boy, enabling him to get into a technical college.
Now it’s my turn. Joel interprets. I bring greetings from the family back home, our church, and all USA believers. Then into John 4, using one verse. (I have 30 minutes, but half of that will be Joel’s translation into Hindi.) Jesus said to the disciples, “I have food to eat you don’t know about.”
The upshot is that there are two groups Jesus is dealing with. The woman at the well, who has had a troubled life and is probably the target of gossip about town, on the one hand and the disciples—Jewish guys not at all comfortable going through this land of the heretics: Samaria. But the second class—the local people, get the blessing—coming to know that Jesus is the Messiah. The disciples are all hung up about food and why Jesus won’t eat, since they knew he was exhausted from the journey. Jesus has something that has suppressed his hunger and energized his weariness. He has gotten through the defenses of woman in need. He has the joy that comes when God turns on the light in a searching soul.
The more orthodox disciples just get annoyed about hanging around that place for another two days. So Jesus has crossed many barriers to reach us in India and the USA. We are now one in him. We belong to each other as we work for the kingdom until we sit around the table above celebrating the victory of our wonderful Savior.
This is so precious to me. The music was a bit loud for my ears. The floor was cold to my stocking feet. We were there going on three hours and I could grasp almost nothing. But I didn’t care. I was in a place where faith was real. I could feel the intensity of their attention. They wanted to thank Jesus and hear his word and pray for each other. Rough around the edges, yes. But perhaps as genuine as any worship on earth this Sunday in November.
After the congregation leaves, we go upstairs to the small apartment. There three guys have their base for ministry. Just a kitchen and couple of bedrooms. They are cooking rice—in an old-fashioned pressure cooker I haven’t seen since my childhood. A veggie sauce (dall), some chapattis, yogurt, and a plate of sliced red onions. Nice meal.
Joel asks me to pray before we go. This little congregation has already spawned several small daughter churches in the area. It’s hostile territory here. God seems to be ignoring that. PTL
So it’s back through the city. Lots of clogged roads now. Time to put a bag over mt head and just pray.
I think I understand what Jesus said in that text.
"I have food to eat that you do not know about"
Satisfied, though tired. A blessed place to be.

Grinning Like an Idiot

Why am I grinning like an idiot?
There is no reason for it. It’s sort of like when you get the giggles and can’t stop even though the stimulus is long past. Still—it’s a pleasant experience. As Norm Kuehne often says, it’s better than a kick in the head.
Maybe it’s the setting.
Today as I sit on the balcony upstairs in Uncle and Auntie’s house with the mountains of north India surrounding, the setting is about as perfect as it gets. Wall-to wall sunshine, hardly a whispering zephyr, temperature caressing me like a perfectly drawn bath. The college is off on a picnic miles away. No hubbub coming from the road up the hill with its hectic buzz of traffic and its construction sites. So I sit here with devotional book in hand (its has a gentle leather smell), looking at nothing in particular, and grinning from ear to ear—out loud, so to speak.
This is not me. My mind always races here and there like a squirrel on steroids. So to have my mind alert but calm is a treat. I can almost see the smile of God. Sense his nearness. God is my Father in heaven, my mighty protector and warrior king. But today I am just his friend. The kind of friend you often just sit with, looking into the fire or gazing at the clouds, not needing to say anything. Just being together, that’s all.
Maybe it’s the guy in me. You recall the story of two guys who spent the evening watching the game. The wife comes home from time spent with “the girls,” full of chatter and laughs. “Did you have a good time with Ned, dear?” Yup. “What did you do?” Nothing, really. “OK – talk about anything interesting?” Nope. We just sat and watched the game. “O, I’m sorry….” No—it’s OK—we had a great time!
So here I am smiling, having a great time. God isn’t saying much. I’m saying less. Great time. I can’t stop smiling out loud.
There’s a tree a few feet away and the balcony puts me about half way up. It is broad-leaved, but the branches come out in whorls like pine trees do. Half the leaves have dropped by now. Here comes a bird the size of a cardinal but grey with blue accents and a perky crest. Sits there in the sun just singing. Sparrows and a warbler like bird groom the twigs, while a squirrel splays himself head down on the trunk, soaking up the sun on his back. He is so well camouflaged you wouldn’t see him if he didn’t move. Seems like I’m just another creature motionless in the shade of the balcony. I am hardly breathing.
Here comes that idiotic smile again. Good thing no one is taping this.
A hundred meters away a score of boys is grooming a flat bit of ground—apparently for an alternate playing field. I can barely hear their quiet banter. A pair of girls walks off toward the chapel building, their saris adding a splash of color against the distant hills.
I’ve been here half and hour now—God and I—just being friends. There I am—grinning again!
I am feeling good, too. Rested. No aches and pains today anyway. I have no urgency, no deadline for the day. That helps. Even so, to be at ease like this is a rare gift. I’m not even worrying when it will leave me, though I know it will. Once again God will become my commander-in-chief and I’ll have to strap on the full armor and go off to battle. But that is not troubling me. It’s part of the rhythm of our life in Christ.
There goes another leaf spiraling to the ground below me. A big bee buzzes around my head—noisy little guy.
I pick up the red leather Guide to Prayer. Two quotes catch my eye. “It is so hard to be silent, silent with my mouth. But even more, silent with my heart. There is so much talking going on within me. It seems I am always involved in inner debates with myself, my friends, my enemies…, my colleagues and my rivals. You, O Lord, will give me all the attention I need if would simply stop talking and start listening to you.” Henri Nouwen in A Cry for Mercy.
“Jesus’ relationship to his disciples was that of friendship, chosen friends; he was rather critical of familial ties. His friendship transformed their lives….” Ann Carr.
Maybe that’s why I am smiling so unabashedly. He’s a friend.
Even after the resurrection Jesus took the stance of friend. Those two who were walking dejectedly on the road to Emmaus from Jerusalem, where all the horror had taken place, found a new friend walking along with them, talking current events and Scripture. The three decided to take a room at the inn and to have a meal together. No big deal. Happens all the time in our travels, doesn’t it?
But there was something strange yet familiar in this new friend. He was such an enlightening conversationalist. You just loved to exchange ideas with him. But what is it about him—so familiar yet not? Then he prays over the bread, over the wine. Bingo! He’s gone. The two stare at each other in stunned shock. Silent. Not a word passes between them. They just sit shaking their heads, grinning from ear to ear.
“So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heaven,” wrote Phillips Brooks.
Troubles of tsunami proportions lie ahead. But for this hour, this place—peace on earth, goodwill to the friends of God.
I’m still smiling ear to ear, grinning like an idiot, sitting on the balcony with our mutual Friend.

Simple Things

We are in chapel again. Our speaker is from Sri Lanka originally, But he was a student here in Dehradun many decades ago at Doon Bible College. Later he got a PhD from Fuller—as you may know the seminary home of Uncle George, our sainted founder, and of myself and many friends.
He took the mic in his hands so he could wander a bit as he spoke. He made some comments in sympathy with the students, recalling the 1000s of pages he had to read each 10-week trimester and the 20 page research papers, that sort of thing.
He lit a candle on the pulpit as an object lesson for his remarks on John the Baptist, likening our ministry to the wax (our gifts and talents given through the image of God in us), the stand (our character), and the flame that burns for the Lord (our passion for ministry lighted by our love for people.) Twice he had us doing hand gestures to underscore certain points about leadership in ministry.
He sprinkled in some jokes and used a light touch. Students were definitely with him and applauded after the benediction.
I saw something of myself there. And frankly I did not like what I saw.
What a contrast to the plain earnest proclamations of student preachers we have been sitting under these past days. No gimmicks, no cute stuff, no studied tugging on the audience. Just from the heart, in stilted English. No shooting from the lip. No trying to impress.
I know this man is a true servant with years of accomplishments here in India. But somehow God failed to move my heart. In fact, God told me quite plainly—you are that man in some respects. So my unease with him was in reality unease with myself. I can easily give a good sermon. But that does not mean I have been used of the Holy Spirit.
I am reminded of a parallel.
Leo Tolstoy, that superlative Russian novelist (War and Peace; Anna Karenina, etc.) remarked about the effect music had on him. He was a guest at a grand evening with the nobility. They had dined on the finest in a magnificent setting. A live chamber orchestra had performed the latest Beethoven masterpiece—brilliantly executed and applauded by all.
Traveling home by carriage, Tolstoy passed by peasants harvesting grain. As they bent their backs to their work they were singing a folk song to keep their rhythm. As the sun lowered in the west, soon to mark the end of another day, they sang their way through the hours, toiling by the sweat of their brows.
It struck the great author how moved he was by their simple melodies, hovering pure and clean in the hazy air, in contrast to the busy almost tortured cacophony of the great Ludwig van Beethoven, the toast of every European salon. He found in the peasant song authentic beauty and even truth that moved his soul towards them and towards God. Beethoven may have been an impressive showman of what man can do with sounds and rhythms. But something profound and even ethereal came to his heart through unaffected music, conveying emotions of universal brotherhood.
Tolstoy has a point. It came clear to me in contrasting the polished Fuller grad and the eager students. Some messages are powerful through cleverness; others through the Holy Spirit.
St. Paul, undoubtedly a gifted orator, bypassed his talent when he went to the great city of ancient Corinth. Here’s how he put it.
I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom but on God’s power. I Corinthians 2:2-5
I had heard a well-executed message by a real pro, but left flat, and thinking in a way that I may have heard myself. Lord save us from our gifts and talents. God is working on me, and I am thankful.
Item: I am also thankful a safe return from a cycle excursion to Grace Academy.
As we were at morning tea, Shivraj offered to take me with him to fetch his 6 year old (I can tell cuz she has no front teeth) from school about noon. Otherwise she has to wait for the bus and get back at 3 PM. “You have a helmet?” I ask. “O Yes.”
So he comes on his Prisma to pick me up. “A helmet?” I ask. “We only need one for the driver as the law requires.” OoooooK.
“Hold these,” he says pulling four books wrapped for mailing out of the mesh on the back “seat.” So I hop on, holding the books in one hand and using my best knee grip from Ellie’s college horsemanship class of yore. Off we go.
Pretty tame, as top speed with me on back is 25 mph. We only had to lurch off pavement once to avoid a triple passing play on the opposite lane. I’m thinking, “If anything happens I know I’ll be a grease spot.”
“We’re going the back way to avoid traffic,” he shouts over his shoulder. Real nice drive on a posh private road, free of debris and smoldering trash piles. As we slow for the Speed Breaker (bump, to you) I can read the markers we pass every 100 yards. George Everest headquartered his survey work here in 1846, when he measured the highest of the Himalayas. Makes sense—Mount Everest. Another marker says something about 20 years of trigonometric measuring. He started at sea level a thousand miles south and triangulated from there.
Shivraj parks at the academy and disappears to find his little one. Other parents are picking up kids—all on scooters or bikes. One goes by with a pint-size kid clinging to Dad’s back like a monkey on its mother.
Here’s little Smriti now. “Say hello to Uncle.” “Hello Sweetie,” says I. She grins. He turns the bike around. Sweetie is on the gas tank in front of Shivraj, with her little backpack near the handlebars. I am on back once more, still clutching the books and the grip behind my seat. “Too much traffic to go downtown to mail the books. We’ll go back the same way we came.”
As we part, Shivraj asks if I would like to go again some day next week. Sure—why not?
Perhaps I should pray about it. Some of the weekend ministry teams were cancelled today. Hindu militants are now in this area—an incident a few miles away a few days ago. “Using wisdom”—that’s how the brass put it.

Zelophehad's Daughters

I couldn’t believe it.
This morning in chapel the message is given by a senior student—part of the requirements for graduation. He announces his text from Numbers 27:1-11. It’s the account of the daughters of Zelophehad. How many sermons have we heard from this passage? For most of us—zero.
How is this going to propel him to the top of his class?
The hymn he chooses is “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.” Does he sense that’s about the only friend he will have at the end of his 30 minutes? And his prayer focuses on the comfort of the Holy Spirit for those most despised and rejected in society—soldiers, HIV/AIDS victims, homeless kids, widows, outcastes. I must say I am a bit nervous for him.
Then he begins to preach. Energy and passion. That’s as it always should be. Preaching is not a lecture on the Bible or its theology. There is a place for that, but not in the pulpit.
He lays the background by inviting us into the story. The congregation is no longer fidgeting. He is preaching as Jesus did—telling a story, a real life account, appealing to our imagination, painting a picture with words. The lessons will be embedded in real life rather than three abstract “points.”
The five daughters are descendants of Joseph, once the prime minister of the super-power of the day—Egypt. Their father has died without any male issue. And this is the basis of their rejection by the Israelites. You are somebody if you have an apportionment in the land about to be possessed. And that land is passed from father to son.
They come, in fear yet boldness as Esther would later do to her king, approaching the ageing Moses—a man not to be trifled with. Their case? “Our father died in the desert.” That means he voted No on the referendum about going up against the giants. He was no Joshua, no Caleb. But, to his credit, “he was not among Korah’s followers. He died in the desert for his own sin.” Korah’s clan had been cursed for open insurrection against Moses, and thus against Yahweh. Yet the people were rejecting these daughters as rebels who had no standing—no right to an inheritance of land, assuming their father had taken part in that rebellion. In other words, society was telling them their plight was all their fault—they deserved it.
“Our father had no son. Give us property among our relatives.” Cheeky women.
In those days other nations acknowledged that the king owned all the territory with his favorites serving as landlords. No one dared claim acreage as his own. Israel, by contrast, was ahead of the times. Their king was God Almighty—he owned everything. And God decreed that all his subjects should have a piece of land they could call their own and thus live in dignity and independence. And every 50 years, if property had been bargained away to pay debts, all of it should revert to the original owners—the Year of Jubilee.
Moses decides to ask Yahweh, God Almighty, about it. The answer is shocking. “Give these fatherless and brotherless sisters property among their father’s relatives.”
The preacher has us engrossed; his word painting is gripping, even though his English is at best so-so. The story is sweeping us along.
Next he applies it to Indian society, where women, if poor, are nothing—often treated as mere sex objects. Children are street kids. Low castes are dirt. The church must stand for these, for God favors their rights to an inheritance of Indian soil.
Then his conclusion. Always end with a story within the story if you can.
“When I was a youth, my Mom and I went to a church service for New Year, invited by some Christian neighbors. We came home late and went to bed. About 3 AM I awoke at the sound of crying. Arising, I followed to the sound. It was Mom. Dad was beating her. “Are you going to choose this Jesus or your family? Not both—choose!” But she could not reply. She was unconscious. I said to Dad ‘What you are doing is wrong.’ But he turned and said he would kill me. I expected I would not see the sunrise again.”
“In a few days my father’s wealth began to fade. He soon lost the house and we had to rent. His business collapsed. Soon he was down to 50,000 rupees. But when I decided God was calling me to train as a pastor God changed his heart. Dad provided half of all his assets—25,000 ($12,000) for my fees and boasts to everyone that his son is going to be a pastor.”
As we bow in prayer we hear a soft reprise of the hymn, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. “Do thy friends despise, forsake thee? Take it to the Lord in prayer. In his arms he’ll take and shield thee. Thou wilt find a solace there.”
We rise for a benediction.
Today’s daughters of Zelophehad populate so much of India and the nations—rejected like so much rubbish by the world. But Yahweh says, “What they are saying is right. Give them an inheritance among their Father’s relatives.”
It’s matter of justice. And God is watching.

Doubts and a Dead Dane

This about how a dead Danish philosopher came to my rescue. He was kind of an odd duck—as Danes tend to be. This is how it came to pass.
One of the women students came up after class and confided, almost in a whisper, as though she were hesitant to say it, that she had—brace yourself—doubts. Gasp! My first thought is “What have I done?!?!?”
Evidently she was sharing with the girls—oops, women—in the hostel some questions that the philosophy class had stimulated. They were telling her not to doubt things. Just believe. We are supposed to believe. So, was she wrong to have these doubts and questions?
What to say….
Then the melancholy Dane, as he was called, came to my rescue.
The odd duck I refer to was Soren Kierkegaard who was writing his brilliant essays about 100 years ago. He had some aspects of genius, even though his life was a bit, um, shall we say, different?
He was raised in a Lutheran home that was very strict and even dark. You know—sort of Wuthering Heights dark, if you have read that Bronte novel. He fell in love but would never bring Regina to the altar because “he was unworthy of her.”
His dad had a secret never talked about. A sin. Though never mentioned, it dominated the mood of his youthful home. Sin was bad. You were a sinner. God was not pleased with you. All that sort of existential pain.
And Kierkegaard is acknowledged to be the founder of that movement in philosophy known as existentialism. Life, for the Christian, is wrestling with God like Jacob. Or even more, like Abraham, toiling up the mountain with Isaac—the most precious gift God gave him in his old age. The only begotten of Sarah through whom all the promises would be fulfilled. And the lad asks a question.
“Father, I am carrying the wood. You have the fire and the knife. But where is sacrifice?”
You know the answer. But how can you tell the boy he is to be the target of the knife of sacrifice? Now THAT is an existential moment. No glib theological answer is going to cut it. Can you imagine Abraham saying something like this?
“Well, son, you see God is sovereign over all things, even the things we cannot understand, for His ways are not our ways neither are his thoughts our thoughts. So God has told me to kill you. Maybe he can raise you from death, for our God is an awesome God and nothing is to hard for him. Besides, Romans 8:28 says….blah, blah, blah….”
Of course you can’t go on a theoretical excursion into the mysteries of the divine nature. The kid asked an honest question. He deserves an honest answer. No bull.
In fact, no lamb, not even a couple of birds. Say something, Father Abraham!
OK. Here goes. “God will provide the sacrifice, my son.” That may be true but you know it’s not full disclosure. You just pushed it off for an hour or two.
Now stick with me here.
Abraham is in a heck of an existential situation. Theology is nice when you are sitting around with friends having tea. But actually LIVING with a God you cannot see (no idols allowed) in real life is incredibly stressful. We all know how the story turns out. But can you imagine being Abraham?
So Kierkegaard dismissed the smug theology of Lutheran Christianity and showed what real faith demands. It’s not yawning through the Apostles’ Creed once a week. It demands wrestling with confusions that have no pat solutions. A Christian walks with God in fear and trembling.
Getting back to what I am going to say to my student.
The opposite of faith, says Kierkegaard, is not doubt. Doubting, questioning, wondering if the Gospel makes sense, is essential to robust faith. The Gospel is too good to be true. Think about it. The God who created and sustains every atom in a universe this size, cares about a speck known as planet Earth? More—he cares about a handful of bipeds who have poked their fingers in His eye? He himself becomes one of these ugly creatures? Dies for them? Makes them his beloved children and invites them to live with him forever? C’mon! This is crazy. Who wouldn’t have doubts?
The contrary of faith, the Dane said, is indifference. Faith is something you decide to embrace. It is a self-made care about these matters. It is not theory. It is the heart of your life. Am I, an individual toiling up the mountain of sacrifice, going to will myself to believe that God speaks and that Jesus Christ is the savior of the world—more, is MY savior? That is the existential question. And it must be answered in the midst of struggle, disappointment, and anguish of soul.
So I confess to her how often I go down Doubt Lane. The disciples did, too. When people were going away from Jesus and he asked the Twelve if they too were going to take off, the answer was “To whom shall we go—you have the words of eternal life.”
Nor did Jesus berate Thomas for his doubts. He gave Thomas what he needed to satisfy his understandable skepticism about a dead man come back to life.
So it’s OK to question, to doubt, for it prods one to think more deeply and in the end to worship more profoundly. The real danger is when we don’t really care any more. We just go back to the petty pleasures of life and give up wrestling with God.
The final question is not theological. It is this. Am I, a specific person in a specific time and place, walking with the God who loves me even though I cannot understand his ways?
“Where is the sacrifice, Father?” The answer is not “Shut up, I’m your Father!”
The answer is, “Come, touch my hands and my feet, and be not faithless but believing.”

This and That

Item: Today’s Hindustan Times ran a story that cuts close to home here. It happened in greater Dehradun—a city of several hundred lakh (that’s thousand to you) where this college is located.
Members of the local HVP—a pro-Hindu party with elected officials and substantial support, set upon a priest and some Christians. While the men escaped by fleeing, the mob broke into the church and confiscated literature. The photo of the church showed it unfinished. Just undressed brick walls and a roof, some windows and doors.
As usual the charge brought to the police is “converting Hindus to Christianity,” by promising money and other benefits. The police refused to do anything—the Indian constitution allowing multiple faiths.
So the mob took matters into their own hands, burning the literature and ransacking the church. Ugly—but no loss of life. Not yet.
K.J. Kuriakose, Director of Student Ministries, mentioned this at tea time. He urged students to be respectful when engaging local people, witnessing in discreet ways. He was not saying to mute the Gospel but simply to use wisdom and tact. No one seemed too concerned.
That’s remarkable to this American. Parents are not rushing here to pull their kids from the college and whisk them to safer sites as most of us gutless Americans would do. It’s just a risk you take when you are in the trenches for the King. As Patrick Henry put it, when advocating the much lesser cause of American independence, “Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchase at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God!” We used to sing “Onward, Christian Soldiers.” But that concept has been spiritualized now. No one of the Christians I know at home is really ready to put life and limb at risk. Are we wimps or what?
Christians here are prudent, of course. But they are not about to cut and run. Run for temporary safety, sure. But they do not quit the battle zone. As said some days ago, we can learn a lot from these believers.
Item: I notice no overweight Indian Christians here. Well, not zero. A few middle-aged women and an occasional man may be 10-15% over ideal weight. No young people or children are, however. I have never seen a single obese person in all my travel in India. So what’s up? Is it genetic? The expense of food here? A social expectation? All of the above? Yet their diet is starchy. Lots of white rice and sauces. Maybe the hot spices in their curry burns the calories. I don’t know. But it highlights something really bad in the USA. Our self-indulgence mostly. We have a hard time “just saying No” to any craving that comes over us. Relate that to my earlier question about why we ignore Jesus’ call to “fast and pray.” We’d rather enter into temptation, it seems. I was struck with this at morning tea assembly here. The students get a cup of chai. The faculty gets in addition a single Ritz cracker. No one goes back for seconds, either. Be content with what you have seems to be the Scripture verse in force here.
Item: Yet this is no paradise, either. K.J. displayed a key ripped out of a keyboard, ruining the instrument. These are hard to get out, so it was no accident. He appealed for respect for the property used here in God’s service and hoped that the person responsible would own up to it.
I talked later with Jacob Joseph, the music professor about it. He said that someone in America had given him gift money when he was studying there. (He has a degree in music from Southern Baptist University in Texas. He is also doing a D.Min. at Gordon-Conwell. I recall his visit to West Church a few months ago, checking out our worship team.) He used the money to buy 3 good keyboards for the use of students here. Naturally he is very distressed.
NTC’s music program is unique among colleges here. And they are attracting real talent that will be a powerful ministry asset for the churches, I’m sure. Music is the universal language.
Item: Professor George Oomen greeted me last morning by the moniker assigned me by Uncle George the first year I came here: Dr. G. He asked if I knew what that conveyed in India. I had not clue other than no one on this continent could pronounce Gustafson. (I recall allowing the youth of our church to call us Mr. and Mrs. G when we came to Haverhill in 1959. It avoided hearing our name mangled all the time!) No, no, he said. “Gee” is a word used here to denote respect. (Maybe it is short for guru or something.) Dr. G has a ring to it here in India!
Hmmm... “Dr. Respect….” Hmmm….
Fuhgedaboudit—it ain’t gonna fly!
Item: Solomon’s Psalm. I had forgotten that the Psalm that closes Book II: The Prayers of David, son of Jesse is attributed to Solomon. It sounds a bit like Solomon. A bit self-congratulatory, bordering on arrogance. He is sure he is ruling for God, bringing justice to the crushed and prosperity to the kingdom—getting tribute from tribes and nations far and wide. Nations will bless the ruler in Jerusalem because he gives the credit to God, “who alone does marvelous things.”
How unlike our nation’s attempts to raise the downtrodden and bless the nations. We conduct our good intentions under allegiance to an abstraction—a humanitarian ideal of liberty and justice for all. Solomon, with all his flaws, did it in the name of Yahweh. “ Praise be to his glorious name forever. May the whole earth be filled with his glory.” Psalm 72:19
As I post this the presidential election is about to be declared. It’s nice to be a continent or two removed. No phone calls! No hoopla! Like the old days when we all went to bed and saw the outcome in the morning newspaper. (You know something, there was life before TV, good life. I was there then.)
No matter who, things are not likely to change much. And most of the changes will only make things worse. Defeats will be touted as victories. Declines declared to be advances. Lies lauded as truth. Depravity masked as liberation. It will be ballyhoo of substance.
I remind myself I am only loosely invested here on earth. I have two clear duties, come what may. One is to trust not in human power, wisdom, or values, only in Jesus Christ, the only King worthy of allegiance. A second is to pray for those in authority over us that we may live in enough peace to get the message of deliverance and hope to those who are seeking a better way than anything this world can offer. This in spite of our leaders, for the most part.
I am rejoicing with great peace of heart. God has everything under control. Everything.

Election Dread

November 4, 2008
Election Day starts a half-day earlier here in India, where sunrise comes before midnight arrives on the east coast of America. So I get 36 more hours to worry, to hang by my fingernails?
Waking early and still in bed, I turn to prayer. This is a critical time for our nation, perhaps a defining time.
It’s stressful for me, because I love the USA. My uncles, cousins, and my brother served in WWII. As a kid I saw the Gold Stars replace the silver stars in windows in my neighborhood—stars for families whose sons would never again sit around the Sunday dinner table to talk and laugh as families do. “For God and Country.”
In those days every school day we listened to our teachers read a Psalm and pause for prayer before we all stood with hand over heart to salute our flag and pledge our allegiance. Something was ingrained in me then. Something that still insists I vote in every election, even if by absentee ballot.
I do not believe in prognostication. But I will admit that when the RED Sox went down before that team in BLUE (Tampa Bay) I wondered if that meant the blue states would take the coming election. Then when the red uniforms of the Phillies knocked off the blue uniforms of the Rays, would that mean the red states would be victorious? I know, I know. This is nonsense.
So here I am in India. Here the US presidential election is not paramount. Terrorists are killing scores almost every week somewhere in this country—not to mention the murder of Christians. That’s what the headlines are about—life and death, literally.
Like the Psalmist who was wracked with anxiety over what was going on around him, as the wicked seemed to get their way, I too went into the House of the Lord, so to speak, and got another perspective. (Read Psalm 73, and note verse 17.)
Can I by being anxious add an hour to my life span? If my hopes are not realized, should I be in despair? If my hopes come true will that make much difference?
As I lay in the pre-dawn darkness God began to remind me of our position as citizens of his kingdom. This world is not my home. I am in it but not of it. Does God care who wins an election and takes earthly power?
Perhaps he searches for motives more than results. Where are our hearts? Either way, God is in control, working his plan. And we know that plan is for the good of those who love him and for the destruction of all earthly powers and opposing heavenly dominions.
So now I have a broader perspective as I pray for “Election day USA.”
The long-range prospect for the kingdoms of this world is not good. Judgment is promised for a fatally flawed human race. We have it coming. We have mocked justice despite the worldwide chatter about the oppressed. Violence is rampant. Sin abounds.
As I muse on these obvious truths, I am in contrition. The problem is not really “sin out there,” but sin within. The question is existential. It is not “why is the world such a rotten mess?” It’s “why am I contributing to that rotten mess?” The problem is not them but us.
There was no hope for me personally aside from the mercy of God. I know that full well. There is no hope in our world at large aside from the mercy of God. As a species on earth there really is no hope for us. We have a spiritual cancer that may be suppressed for a while. In the end we’ll succumb, no matter how we try to ignore the symptoms. No one is going to win this human race. None of us get out of life alive.
So I understand that God is not mocked. We sow; we reap. Our cultures of death will end in death. God is on track as he promised. It’s not as though God has not forewarned us. The Bible outlines it most distinctly. Just read the epistles at the end of your Bible. I, for one, can see it coming.
I guess you could say my expectations are low.
How society treats the powerless is a test of its goodness. We do not protect our own babies, even when they are born, unwanted but alive. We give them a blanket and then toss them in the trash when they expire. We do not do justice for those in prison, for those in economic straits, for the ill. Rather than care for them personally as communities of faith, we commend them to the tender mercies of a government program, faceless and impersonal, so that we can get on with our projects and pleasures. We’d rather “pass by on the other side.”
Wealth obsessed, we as a nation have forgotten God. Pleasure crazy, we have perverted our souls. Why should God stay his hand—his “terrible, swift sword?” Our God is marching on.
But God is not an American any more than Jesus was a Zealot. Who wins elections and takes political power in this world is of little account to God. No final solution can come from this election. Don’t get your hopes up, I say to myself. I am not invested in this quest for power.
So I sing not the songs of Zion in this foreign land. I am to pray for whomever rules over us, as our Lord commands. But even as dark clouds gather on the horizon of history I will not fear. I will pray. I will serve as long as God permits.
I will not be red. I will not be blue. I will be walking in the light of the kingdom that is my true and final and blessed dwelling place.
But did I vote? Yes.
Go and do thou likewise….

Bones

How can a two-hour worship service be so satisfying?
After a not-so-great night—my Suez Canal a bit rumbly—I dressed my best and ambled to the Chapel just before 9. It is the Lord’s Day.
It all begins with a song or two, followed by an exposition of Psalm 122. That psalm is one of fifteen Songs of Ascent, probably used on pilgrimage to Jerusalem by Israelites going up for the annual festival. It speaks of their delight in God, thanking God for the privilege of being in his presence. Our leader exhorts us with excitement to let our joy be known. To let our thankful hearts overflow.
Next the music team comes to the high platform behind the pulpit stage. I recognize the leader as one of my students. He has some Asian features to his face, and a huge smile. For 30 minutes we segue through songs in English and Hindi, contemplative and exuberant. Saving my strength I am sitting, but he soon has the congregation on their feet, expressing their joy. Then it calms down to more introspective tones.
Following this the leader asks for people to stand and say their testimony or prayer requests. Two gophers with wireless mics get to those who speak one after the other so there is no awkward waiting between. Requests for ailing parents, for one who met with a car accident, and thanks for the girls who were stricken with food poisoning two nights ago and are doing OK now. Soon a brother in the congregation is requested to offer the prayer, which he does in Hindi.
Next it’s the offering. The “plates” are actually stainless rods about two feet in length with red velvet pouches on the end—like the ones we have in our antique collection, not used in over a hundred years.
Children are dismissed to kid’s church. And I am in the pulpit. It’s 10:15. We have already been in God’s presence over an hour. My message will be 25 minutes. But with the translator it will use up more than double that time.
I had selected the theme of bones—something I had never thought of preaching on.
But bones in the Bible are significant. We know our bones will outlast any other remnants of our bodies. And we want them to be placed respectfully in an appropriate place. We are people of a particular time and place. Ruth told Naomi, “where you are buried, there will I be buried,” when she chose another people as her own. Joseph, though he lived over 100 years in Egypt, insisted his bones be brought back to the land of his people. He may have lived in Egypt but Egypt was never his home. Do we resonate with that?
Jesus took on the flesh and bone of Mary, even though his home was in another world. Yet he came to unite us with himself. After the resurrection he assured his disciples he was not an apparition: “see, a ghost does not have flesh and bone as you see I do.” As we become part of His Body we no longer belong to this world. We insist that on the Great Day our bones be brought to our new homeland. As Hebrews puts it, they could have returned whence they came but they sought a better homeland—a heavenly one.
The first mention of bones in Scripture is in Genesis 2. After the Creator anesthetizes Adam, he makes Eve out of the same DNA. “This is great – she is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”
Adam went into the darkness of a deep sleep and came out with a bride!
Jesus went down into the darkness of tomb and came out with His bride—the bride of Christ.
I Corinthians 15 describes this in some detail. We shall all be changed. But we’ll still have flesh and bones, now glorified, grafted to our Lord himself. And of course Jesus, according the remarkably inspired Psalm 22, was poured out like water, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth, able to count all his wasted bones while others mocked and gambled for his stuff. Yet not a bone of his was broken, despite the fact that Roman soldiers routinely broke legs to hasten death. He made the ultimate sacrifice. Therefore God exalts him above every name, and we get to sit alongside on the throne he alone deserves. He will not forget his bride, the church.
Just as a band of brothers in a military unit, no matter how fierce the battle, promises to leave no man behind, so our Commander in Heaven leaves no one behind.
Bones and all, we shall be forever with the Lord in the new heaven and the new earth.
I give a benediction. The gathering begins to slip quietly away—another Lord’s Day done—spent in the sweet presence of the One who loved us and gave himself for us.
So here I am now, in Uncle George’s house, having been able to eat a modest lunch of rice and veggies. I sit in the sun in my T-shirt with one of his devotional books. I seldom enjoy such long periods of solitude—many hours at a stretch. It’s a beneficial change from the frenzy that life is at home.
Workmen are here working on the walls, digging a trench with pick and adze. For Hindus this is just another day to do another day’s work. Very little machine work here. More laborers are in demand and more mouths fed by hand labor. The clink and clang of their tools, along with leaves falling from the thirsty trees, provides a pleasant patina for meditation.
While this is no Egypt, I am not truly at home here in India in the final sense. I say to myself— “when God sends you aid, take these bones back whence they came.”
In New England I was born, there shall I be buried—awaiting the trumpet call for the final leg of our journey together.

Fast and Pray

If you got the news, more tragedy rocked India today. Blasts killed close to 100 innocent people in various targeted areas. The Hindustan Times had it all over the front page.
What an appropriate day for the fall semester Day of Fasting and Prayer here at New Theological College.
I have been part of several such days. The first was in Kenya about 10 years ago. When I returned from Scott Theological College that year I hosted a similar day at our church. We had a wonderful time. But, like every prayer effort we attempt as a congregation, it went nowhere.
The rest have been here in India. I admit it is easy to have such a day here where we all live in one campus. Classes are cancelled. What a gift. Here’s how it went down.
After personal devotional time in at home the chapel opens for the day’s events.
I tuck my Bible and a devotional book, published by Upper Room, that I found in Uncle George’s library under my arm and amble along the walkways to this new building that sits on the height of the campus’ acres. The sun warms the earth as it lifts over the rugged hilltops a few miles to the east.
Palm and mango trees host birds that seem to be enjoying the sparkling air. Bougainvillea is in bloom, along with marigolds and many more flowering annuals, as well as those plants with showy leaves.
I am one of the first, not realizing that the service will start about an hour later than a class day chapel service. No mind. Who could help but enjoy pulling a chair to the window, with the sun warming one’s back, and praising God for the mountains to the north, its tiptop houses white in the morning sun? They look like teeth that have been treated to a whitening process.
I have been asking God to show me a text for my Sunday morning sermon, now just two days away. After thumbing here and there, as usual something starts to click and Scriptures lead one to another. It will have something to do with bones, I think. But that’s for another day.
I rise to take a few photos of the breath-taking scene. What a location for a house of worship! We can see in every direction.
Wait! What’s that catching my eye? A 5-inch lizard scoots along the window ledge—a ledge that goes around the whole perimeter of the room, probably 500 feet of it. Zoom the Canon and snap a shot.
I recall the Scripture that speaks of how lizards live in the palaces of kings, doing their share of house-cleaning, I suppose.
I hear something tapping on the windows. It’s a jay-like bird clinging to the frame of these metal windows and tapping gently here and there. Are they sharpening their beaks or just being playful? I hope the shot comes out—they flit about energetically. They may not be sparrows in the taxonomical sense, but they have made a nest for themselves even near the altar, as the Psalmist noted 3000 years ago.
The worship team assembles yards away to get instructions from Professor Matthew, who is leading the first session. Men, women, faculty, and their families are drifting in.
Once again—silence. Beautiful silence. No tapes playing. No whispering let alone talking. Heads are bowed, Bibles open. I sense the presence of God.
Matthew and the translator take their places at the pulpit. Quietly we begin. He previews the day. We’ll be praying the ACTS sequence. We will break up into small bands of 7 or so by turning our chairs at the right time. We’ll spend 15 minutes in pure Adoration of who God is. After a song we’ll focus on Confessing our own and also corporate sins. Then it will be time for Thanksgiving. Supplications will come in the afternoon.
The time flies by.
Then the worship music team leads us in another time of singing—mostly Hindi songs, but a few English—Shout to the Lord, Above All Kingdoms, Blessed Assurance are among those I can do more than hum along with. But humming is fine, too. It lets me watch this community swaying to the music or clapping to the beat, raising the occasional hand. Pretty much like home—so far.
I think how privileged I am to be adopted as a member of this band of believers.
We leave for an hour break. It’s half ten.
Coming back, we are ready for the preaching service. Professor Thomas Cherian, an Old Testament scholar, begins his hour long exposition of Joshua taking the city of Jericho. It’s a slow start, and he is struggling to get into the English mode. (I don’t know how these folk switch, usually with fluency, from Hindi to English. By the time he is twenty minutes along he is getting his rhythm. He is applying the text to our situation, too. And while some of his exegesis is a bit of stretch, he makes four points as the walls come tumbling down—the first walled city Joshua captured with 30 still to go. God can bring down walls that seem too big for us to conquer if we trust and obey.
It’s a standard type of sermon, really. But as we are running toward the one-hour mark, he kicks for the finish line. His voice is elevating and quickening its cadence. Soon he is praying and exhorting us to cast our troubles onto the Almighty and to believe for healing of our fears, our disobedience, our aliments and our sufferings.
Now the congregation begins to pray aloud, crying to the Lord. It’s not chaotic, mind you, or edging toward excess. I feel caught up, but not more than you would expect from a philosopher and congregational Calvinist minister. Up until today I have been perhaps more expressive in chapel than most of these charismatics. Today, however, they pull ahead of me and show their stuff.
Now don’t get me wrong. This is not over-the-top Pentecostalism by any means. Nothing like the questionable shows you see on religious TV. But they are showing their love in an enthusiastic way.
Time for 2-hour break for private prayer and rest. No food has touched lips so far.
I will confess that I had a Wasa bread at the earlier break and a small breakfast at noon that I fixed myself. But then, I’m in a strange land trying to keep well enough to do what I came for without chancing a problem. I prayed about it and got what I took to be a green light. Full disclosure here.
The thing that impressed me most about the morning, however, were the prayers of confession in our group, mostly faculty. Not shy about asking the mercy of God on our many offences and compromises. Why is this so rare back home?
At 2:30 we are back for the communion service, presided over by Professor George Oomen. He is wearing a collar-like shirt and using a prayer book as well as his Bible. He gives a brief homily from the I Corinthians, exhorting us to eat and drink worthily. I find the crafted wording of his comments beautiful to my ear and heart alike.
The attendants come up to help. Four men on one side; four women students on the other. The first holds a plate with bread pieces, the second a tray of cups. We file down the center aisle, beginning with the front rows—men to the left, women and faculty to the right. Take the bread piece. Drink a cup and return it right to the tray. And move away in a circle.
But here is the unusual part. Rev. Oomen has explained that there is a voluntary foot washing to remind us of what Jesus did for his disciples in John’s Gospel chapter 13. We had already left our sandals under our chairs.
In the side sections to right and left of the main auditorium, chairs have been set by twos, facing each other, with a basin in between. A towel is on the arm of one of the chairs.
As I stand waiting, one of the girls motions me to a chair. I see no partner moving with me. But I sit down. The man who appears at this station is Simon Samuel, the principal of NTC. He smiles, kneels down, pouring water from a pitcher over my feet, then drying with the towel. This man is a top scholar and godly man whom I respect greatly. I sense how the disciples might have felt when Jesus himself stooped to this lowly service.
I do the same for him. We rise, embrace with joyous smiles and return to our seats.
As we are coming to the end, it is time to greet one another with a holy kiss—men to men, women to women. (This is India.) So we all mix about, embracing the way you see people in the middle east do when heads of state meet together.
Now its time to go down for tea—this time everyone gets a large semi-sweet bun to break the fast.
As I am walking back to the guesthouse I muse on the beauty of this refreshing day spent with the Lord and his dear ones.
At home we have lost the art and discipline of fasting and praying, even though Jesus commends it. Why is that, I wonder?
I have only a possible answer.
Our brothers and sisters in India, China, Iran, Arab countries, Africa and other like places are under obvious attack by the enemies of Christ. To stay true to the mission to love their enemies they seek a deeper level than most western churches do.
When we get to the place where bombs are killing believers within our borders and mobs are torching churches, then perhaps we’ll become faithful to the Lord in this matter.
For Jesus did say, when asked why his disciples did not fast, that they would fast when “the Bridegroom” was taken from them. Hence the early churches fasted as well as prayed as a matter of course.
What a shame that we are so weak on corporate prayer and totally absent when it comes to corporate fasting.
These brothers and sisters have a lot to teach us.

What A Friend

Come, walk with me this morning.
I had a good sleep last night. How about you? For a week I have been fighting sleep starting at about 7 PM—like you do when driving late at night and your eyes keep fending off micro-bursts of sleep. Last night I gave in and “went under” at 8 PM When I woke it was still pitch dark. I listened for sounds that would clue me what time it was. I didn’t flash the light at my watch for fear it would show 1 or 2 AM as it had other nights. So I lay there listening for clues. Diwali fire crackers (still the wee hours), the wren in song (close to dawn), or the early traffic out on the Kulhan Road. No sounds at all.
Nothing.
I hate to get up when it’s the middle of the night, don’t you? It re-starts your brain so that it’s hard to get it back into sleep mode. But there was no putting it off. Up. "Heigh ho, heigh ho, it's off to go I go." Consult the watch. 5:30 AM! I couldn’t believe it. I actually slept nearly 10 hours!
So let’s go! Find shoes. Take key. Sling the stretch cord around my neck. Out the door.
The hills are etched against the sky to the east, north and south. Look—there’s Orion’s famous belt. We must be looking southwest. It’s cool but not cold. Walk faster, we’ll warm up soon enough. I flex the squeezers on the end of my exercise stretch cord. Keep those hand and arm muscles toned. Use it or lose it. At my age if I lose it it’s not coming back!
Night lights on the buildings blink off—must be dawning. Lights in the Women’s Hostel appear. Its 6:00 now—time for their corporate devotions prior to breakfast.
Wash up. Dress up—long sleeve shirt today. Breakfast at 7:15. Grab a Bible. Over the ups and downs of the men’s walkways (girls take a different path and enter the Chapel through a different stairway to sit in the women’s block of seats) and into the new chapel.
Not a sound can be heard even though there are already over 100 present. This chapel is so huge compared to the first chapel, which is now used for music classes. If they roll in more plastic “Walmart” arm chairs over 1500 can be seated, as for a graduation.
Not a sound as we sit in the faculty/staff section and read from the Bible or meditate upon the rising day.
A bell sounds a single tone. The music team files onto the platform to pick up their guitars or to stand at the mics for singing. The speaker and his interpreter take their stations at the pulpit.
This month the seniors are doing the services by turns. A tiny video cam stares at the podium. The ministry professor will do a re-run in preaching class later in the day. But now we are here to worship not critique.
He begins—as they all do—thanking the professors, his sponsors, the founders of the college—but he does not mention his parents. He also thanks his fellow students, since as a freshman he felt lonely and now he has seen how many have befriended him. (This is significant—hang on.)
Our preacher, after we sing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” announces his text from John 11, the raising of Lazarus from the dead. His sermon is Jesus as Our Friend.
Do you notice how hard it is to get his meaning? English is his second language and he has a long way to go. But having every sentence paused by the rhythm of the translator gives us time to dig out the words from the sounds we have just heard that pretend to be English. God must be helping us, because we can follow his train of thought.
His simple message reminds me of the one I preached as a candidate for the pulpit at West Congregational Church on October 25, 1959—Christ, Our Redeemer the title. So also our speaker has the three obligatory points early pulpiteers are encouraged to adopt before they get experience enough to be more creative.
Jesus is a friend. Jesus is a good friend. Jesus is a mighty friend—three points.
Jesus loved Lazarus, Martha and Mary. He was always welcome in their home as a haven from his stressful ministry. Martha loved people by action, serving them. She goes out to the edge of town to meet Jesus as he chats at the gate with the elders. Mary, the shy contemplative who loves by listening, has to be sent for. They all meet at the tomb, along with scores of neighbors gathered to help the sisters mourn.
Then the shortest verse in the English Bible—John 11:35. (In confirmation class at the Swedish church back in 1945, I recall how cousin Harry Carlson selected that verse when the pastor told us to come with a verse of our choice memorized next week.) “Jesus wept.” Jesus truly cares. He weeps not out of sorrow like the other mourners, but out of anger that death should despoil life when God created us to live endlessly in fellowship with him. Yes, Jesus is a good friend.
Then he raises Lazarus from the dead and restores him to his sisters and neighbors. Jesus is a mighty friend. So when we go through sorrows and sufferings in life we know he has not abandoned us. “What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.” He has us rise for a benediction. We are dismissed.
We have been truly blessed, don’t you agree? Sure, this word was plain, even homely. The speaker is a beginner and stretching to deliver his word in English. But God has spoken to our hearts.
Did you like his bit of humor? Always a good thing in any sermon.
This mullah is arguing with his wife at an ever-increasing decibel level that all the neighbors can hear. He demands she change her ways or he will divorce her. (Muslims can divorce a wife by simply saying three times, I divorce you.) A friend knocks on the door and is invited in. “How is everything going with you? How is the wife?” the visitor asks. “Just fine, thank you—everything is fine.” He tells his wife to prepare a cup of tea for their friend. “You are divorcing me, so get yourself a new wife and have her make your cups of tea!”
As we break up, I notice that the faculty and staff are not signing the attendance register today. The side desk is empty. There has been a bit of sickness going around so maybe the staff woman didn’t make it to chapel with the book. Last night four girls were stricken with stomach bugs—probably from some Diwali festival food brought in from off campus. In a few hours they were OK. We queue at the stairwell. (Can you imagine if there were an emergency how 1500 people would get out using two single-file stairways?)
I see Simon Samuel, the principal, and remark on the sermon. Did you catch what he said about the preacher’s background? This student had been brought as a small child to a Hindu temple and offered to the god. He was raised by the priests and never saw his parents again all during his growing years. He still suffers from the scars of abandonment, for even when he located his parents no relationship was ever established.
So when he preaches on Jesus, Our Friend, the community hears a profound testimony. There were tears in some eyes, Simon says. When he urged us to remember we have a mighty friend in times of sorrow and even death, he is not mouthing a platitude. The friendship of Jesus and of the community has changed his life. He now belongs to a Father who will never abandon him to some god in this world. He now has a beloved community of brothers and sisters who support him.
We descend the stairs in a thoughtful mood.
Once again God has spoken through the lowly ones. The more homely and halting the messenger, the more powerfully the grace and glory of God shine upon the hearers.
God chose Mary, not some princess, when he came into our world. He chose to send to us a Savior via a peasant home in a hamlet, not a grand villa in upscale Jerusalem. He still speaks through halting speech to arrest our attention, not the slick oratory of the teleprompter.
God knew I needed to hear that. What about you?

Terrors of the Night

Terrors of the Night.
When you are away from home it’s the nights that get to you. Sleep patterns are askew.
Especially during a Hindu festival week. No noise ordinances here. Not that the night firecrackers were overpowering. They were just relentless—like a toothache that is not that excruciating but it just won’t let up.
On my early morning walk the day previous I noticed the crescent moon coming over the mountains just before dawn. Must be new moon tomorrow, I said to myself. I did not have the wit to know that many cultures center significant events around the new moon. Tonight I figured it out—at 3AM. All day yesterday crackers were banging away, echoing off the hills that circle the college in a green crescent opening to the south.
Stumbling out of bed I fire up my trusty MacBook to call up Wikipedia from the digital deep. Ms. Wiki had this to say about Diwali. (Or Divali – have you noticed Indian speakers of English pronounce all v’s as w’s and vice versa?)
"Festival of Lights," where the lights or lamps signify victory of good over the evil within every human being. Diwali is celebrated on the first day of the lunar Kartika month, which comes in the month of October or November. In many parts of India, it is the homecoming of King Rama of Ayodhya after a 14-year exile in the forest, after he defeated the evil Ravana.[4] The people of Ayodhya (the capital of his kingdom) welcomed Rama by lighting rows (avali) of lamps (deepa), thus its name: Deepavali. This word, in due course, became Diwali in Hindi. There are many different observances of the holiday across India.
Firecracker Concerns
Nowadays there is a significant growth in campaigns on creating awareness over the adverse impacts of noise and air pollution. Some governments drive to keep the festival less noisy and pollution-free. The Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board has banned production of crackers with noise levels of over 125 decibels.[14] In survey of UP Pollution Control Board, it was revealed that the emission of smoke was found more in the light illuminating fire crackers. Levels of SO2 (Sulphur dioxide) and RSPM (respirable suspended particulate matter) was found marginally higher on Diwali day. Crackers, which use large quantities of sulphur and paper, spew out sulphur dioxide and charcoal into the air, also lead and other metallic substances are suspended in the air causing respiratory problems.[15] Considering these facts, bursting of crackers is prohibited in silent zones i.e. near hospitals, schools and courts.
Notice it does not mention theological colleges nor monasteries. Just over the wall from this house there is a Tibetan Buddhist monastery. So we are not in a quiet zone. “Good over Evil—my foot! Robbing a man of his sleep!
OK. No problem. It’s not much different from Fourth of July back home on Liberty Street where the Mahoney’s next door light the sky for an hour or two—except here there are only “bangs” with nothing to see in the night sky. And they go on for hours—in many homes and hovels of the Hindus surrounding us. Background noise all day and into the night. You’d think you were in a Los Angeles gangland.
Then the neighbors all went to bed, I guess. The noise stopped and woke me up. That’s a strange phenomenon—but it happens. At home I hear the refrigerator every time it stops, but not while it’s running. Bizarre.
So what goes through the mind in these night watches?
Let’s start with prayer. OK – but I’m not trained as a monk, so that lasts only a few minutes.
We move on to people. Nice. People back home like you. Family. And then there is my wife, the idol of my life, singing, “Roll a ball a bowl a penny pitch.” You’re too young to remember that silly ole top ten tune from last century. But my brain is idling and things like that pop up from the depths of one’s depravity.
I think how my dear Ellie is facing the stealthy encroachment of winter in New England all alone. Heavy frosts creep into her garden each night to nip another rose bloom. She is stoking fireplace and wood stove, hauling wood from the porch. All my jobs, piled onto her sagging back while “her man” is basking in Indian summer in his shirt sleeves and T’s.
How come I am smiling now? I should be feeling guilty. But I’m not as good as I should be at guilt. More depravity, I guess.
Ah, Ellie. Whatever things are noble and praiseworthy, think on these things the Good Book says. So I think….
Her new novel, already in the womb of the publisher and scheduled for a C-section the first of the year, brings to mind scenes from the life of King David as she so colorfully portrays him—warts and all.
I meanwhile am lying alone in bed. I should be in bed with my mate-with-the-icy-feet. Another opportunity for guilt—but it doesn’t quite break to the surface. I recall her portrayal of David when the old guy was my age, shivering in what would be his death bed. They had to bring in the young Abishag to be the king’s hot water bottle. That sounds good—but my hot water bottle is a continent or two away.
I begin to muse on age—a cheering thought. We all try to deny it. Botox, face lifts, emoluments of all kinds, enriching the entire vanity industry. Go on. Spend your money—it won’t stop the ravages of time.
My mind goes one more step down into the cellar of the soul.
If Ellie were to write a sequel to her David novel (The Stones), I wonder if Abishag would show up? What became of that girl who warmed the dying king? My drowsy mind comes up with a poem Ellie can use to portray the once ravishing Abishag as she suffers (as all protagonists in novels do) rejection and sinks into a tragic last chapter. Her cruel husband looks at her at his side in bed. He’s no king, but he is a guy. And all guys (in this sequel’s view) are the same, right?
Turn to the last page. He is looking at her as dawn breaks after a dark and stormy night.
“What becomes of Abishag/now that she’s a shriveled hag? She no longer warms my bed/Better off if she were—DEAD!”
That’s a true-to-real-life ending if ever there was one. I can’t wait to see how Ellie will build up to this immortal climax in Bible novel II! Maybe she can title it “The Pebbles.” Law of entropy in one hot water bottle’s life and all that….
See what I mean by the terrors of the night?
And you, dear reader, are the beneficiary of this diseased mind, the Phantom of the Guest House. Blame Diwali.

The Light of His Presence

Why is it one sometimes senses God’s presence more palpably in a special environment?
People do differ on how they relate to God most powerfully. I recall a sermon series by pastor David Midwood on the various pathways to God. For some it is through prayer. For others it’s activity—doing a service for others in God’s name. Or it may be through music and the arts, and so forth.
Being one whose primary orientation to life is through ideas, I find awareness of God difficult. Often I envy those who seem close to God without any apparent effort—they breathe God in as easily as their lungs take in air.
But when I am in a close-knit believing community, as I have been the last few days, God seems to “be there” in an almost palpable way. For me, orientated to reality mostly by intellect, this is refreshing.
As Pascal and others have noted, it is hard to find God by using your head. Proving God exists simply gets you to another idea of God, not to God himself. God is not an idea, even though we humans all have some idea about him.
(Now before you tune me out, give me another few lines, please.)
As you likely know, I have been teaching philosophy for forty years. Philosophy tries to give an intellectual formulation to life—a worldview. A worldview is a set of ideas that makes sense by explaining what is real and what our place is in that reality. A good worldview provides a reasonable, though incomplete, understanding of the human condition enabling us to make sense out of our life experience.
Some can live successfully never thinking about the worldview that lies under their outlook on life, guiding them in their decisions. They just live. They don’t much think about living. That sounds appealing to me when ideas constantly whirl around in my head.
But in philosophy classes we have to bring all this to the surface so we can look at it and make adjustments. Sort of like the surgeon who pulls half your guts out to have a look and do repairs. Only he puts you under so you are not aware of what he is doing. Worldview repair requires you operate on yourself—consciously. Painful!
(Are you still with me? I know I’ve lost most of you by now. Ah well. C’est la vie.)
The biggest question humans ask has to do with God. If God is, that has got to be the ultimate reality that frames everything else. If God is not, then everything is on a different footing. So how do we know?
Many of my online students are skeptical of God’s existence because “no one can prove” God exists. The proof they are referring to usually is some kind of tangible proof, scientific proof. They would believe if they could see God. Absent that, God is just an idea we have imagined for some reason—a crutch in a scary world, a leftover from our ancestors’ superstition—that sort of thing.
(Now be patient. I will pull this all together, I promise. But you have to hang in there with the other 20% who are still pulling on the oars, 80% having clicked off to watch TV.)
To ask to see God is like asking to hear a color. It doesn’t make any sense to come at it that way.
God (if God exists) is not a physical thing (corporeal as philosophers would say). God is an incorporeal spiritual reality. He has no size or weight, for example, any more than the thoughts you are now thinking have size or weight. (Learning lots of new ideas does not make you gain weight, even though we speak of heavy thoughts.) So of course we cannot see God as we see the moon or “see” an atom.
God is known through spiritual awareness. This is tough for many of us who live in a materialist society. (Jings! As I wrote the last sentence the electricity went out here! Scared me, too. I felt for a second like the kid who kicked the light pole in New York City the same instant that the famed blackout of the entire northeast USA occurred back in 1970-something. “What have I done?” Thank God for laptops! And sunlight. Although we haven’t gotten God into our worldview yet.)
Where was I? Oh, yes.
God can only be experienced by spiritual apprehension, not sensory experience.
We know God as we know the mind and heart of another person. We cannot “see” another person, only their skin, so to speak. While the senses may be the medium through which we enter into their presence (words spoken, gestures seen), who they are cannot be a physical “thing.” (Here come the lights back on! Is Someone playing games with me? Cut it out!)
No one can see an idea. Even though ideas must be shared through some physical medium—perhaps bytes or marks on a page, the bytes and marks are not the idea. To ask to see the idea with your eyes as you see the marks of writing on this page is silly. Your eyes see the marks that make up the words but when you “see” what I mean (the ideas) it’s a different kind of seeing. A book has no mental content as such. The story is apprehended by your mind. You cannot see the story by peeking into the book’s pages. You have to grasp the story in a “spiritual” sense. “Romeo and Juliet” exist even though no one ever spoke with them physically.
Here’s what I am driving at.
God has made himself known to me here in north India in a fresh way. He is spirit—a person who exists in himself. And God exists also in those whom he indwells. Not all of God, of course, for God is infinite in his immensity, as theologians phrase it. But God is there in the hearts of those who love him, just as air exists in those who breathe.
(Those blasted lights just went out again. Aaaargh! I can no longer see my notes. But I can still “see” my train of thought.)
So if one wishes to experience God, he opens himself to God by spiritual means. Prayer/meditation is perhaps the standard avenue to God.
For me, however, I find I am in the real presence of God by visiting him in this community of his people. This theological college, hard by the foothills of the Himalayas, has some 300 souls concentrated in a compact five acres of land. All of them love God and are filled with the Holy Spirit of God. I am experiencing God through this high dosage 100-proof distillation of the life of Jesus in the hearts of his people here. The invisible Christ is mediated through the visible Body of Christ in this place. It is not the entire body of Christ, but it is Christ nonetheless, similar to my connection to all earth’s atmosphere through the tiny sample that I breathe.
In any healthy portion of the Christ-community the reality of God is experienced. God dwells in the hearts of his people, just as the ancient prophet observed millennia ago. But I say “healthy” because the body of Christ on earth is a work in progress and suffers spiritual maladies. Some of these are hardly noticeable to us, sort of like when we have the sniffles. Others are moribund, torn by deadly conflict that infects the community in question. In fact, some such congregations are pruned away in the end-amputated, if you will.
I know that this community of Christians at New Theological College, as every other Christian community, is not without impurities. It has members who are in process, who are more in doubt than indwelt. They hopefully are seeking. But they may not be there yet.
Notwithstanding, if my philosophy student wants to “see” God, go to a community like this one, where God’s Spirit is dwelling. Focus not on the imperfections or on those who are mostly still searching for a relationship with God. When you visit a church look at those who have walked a long time in the presence of God. Listen to their conversations one with another.
You will see and hear God’s presence, though not with perfect clarity. There will be static in the transmission. But you will experience God. You will see. You will hear. And through the medium of sight and sound you will become aware of God, who is seeking you out all the while. But you must be sincere, not cynical. Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure in heart—they shall see God.”
(The lights just switched on again as I was typing those last thoughts! Hmmm...)
So here I am in an empty house on a quiet Saturday, alone with God in a semi-monastic setting, set apart from the bustling world just a few miles downhill. It is a gender-blender monastery, because the sisters and brothers live in the same community. Many of the older ones are married and have children. All are walking in God.
It's a bit like the concentration of energy in a sports arena. Almost everyone is a fan of the team and the team spirit can be overwhelming. As we say, you can almost cut it with a knife.
It’s refreshing for person like me to “see” God’s presence so manifest here. I close my eyes and can sense the reality of God’s nearness.
Thus we taste and see that the Lord is good. Someday we shall see our Lord and God “face to face.” We shall know him fully even as we are fully known by him.
Meanwhile we treasure days like this when God is not behind the clouds of our often-stormy lives but shining brightly on us.