What’s with the blue naked guy?
Jim Berkley, of IRD infamy,* was the first person to point out, to my surprise, that I had a picture of naked guy at the top of my blog.
Several weeks later, my mother asked over the phone, ever so delicately, when I was going to change the picture on my blog, “It’s just... kind of ... weird,” she said.
And then, when I relayed mom’s comment to the wife, she said, “Yeah, what’s with that? I’ve been meaning to ask.” Proverbs 31, no doubt about it.
It just goes to show, one can completely miss what’s in front of ones’ own eyes. What other’s can clearly see, I might be blind to. Especially when I’m really close to it. When I’m familiar with it, perhaps overly so.
When I was scouring the web for a picture that spoke to me about ‘bearing witness in a place of exile’ the blue guy said it all. I never even noticed he was naked. All I saw was some serious existential angst. A powerlessness in the face of large events, and a determination to stand as a testimony to some even greater reality, invisible truth. Hope in exile.
And Berkley saw a naked guy.
And I completely missed that fact.
Currently, I’m reading Lost in the Cosmos, by Walker Percy. Percy asks and explores the question (he doesn’t answer it), How is it that western man can know so much about his environment, and yet not know himself? Even though we’re only ever with ourselves.
We have cell phones, we have the internet and we can fling a probe to Saturn and hit the target within a hundred yards, yet we still don’t know ourselves any better, perhaps less so, that Plato did. Percy is both wickedly funny and terrifyingly insightful in his revealing questions. I commend him to you.
Its the week after Easter, and I’m in what has become a familiar part of my life after Advent and Lent, Christmas and Easter, post holy day funk. Easter was a smashing success, by every outward metric -- the sanctuary was more full than empty, the choir sounded great, there was a lot of joy in the room, a friend from India spoke on Ez. 37, the valley of dry bones- which is really the valley of resurrection and new life. And that before we can introduce others to the resurrection life, we must experience it ourselves, God’s Spirit in our lives. Clear gospel stuff.
Yet... yet, does the church reflect what we sang three days ago? Powerful hymns penned by Wesley and Watts, on the resurrection of Christ, ‘ours the cross, the grave the skies- Alleluia.’ Do we believe this, and does it effect our lives in any meaningful manner? Are we changed? Are we different from anyone else in Sparta, IL?
The church is a very human organization. People get angry and leave without so much as an explanation. Looking to the past, glorying in what never was, but perceived to be the good ol’ days.
I ask Percy’s question- Do we know ourselves? Do we want to? Are we so afraid of the future, so uncreative, so lacking in hope, so unaware of what God has done in Jesus, that we miss it? The tomb is empty. The blue guy is naked. Does an over-familiarity with the gospel story, mean that we run the risk of missing its meaning and import?
Sunday, my sermon is entitled, “Reflections on the empty tomb.” We’ll pick up on the Angel asking the women the rhetorically obvious question, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” and Peter’s wondering, upon looking into the tomb, what had happened (Luke). Peter responded to the empty tomb, by returning home to Galilee and fishing (John), but it was only after encountering the risen Lord at breakfast on the beach- right in front of their eyes, yet none recognized him- and being given the responsibility of feeding the Lord’s sheep, that Peter and the rest begin to get what happened. Who they are, now. In light of the empty tomb.
Do we know ourselves, who we are as resurrection people? A people of the future for the present? Or do we keep looking into the tomb, to dead things, hoping to find life there? These are communal and personal questions.
Do we wonder what happened at the tomb like Peter did that first morning, sitting on our bums in the pews week after week, year after year, taking it all in- but choosing not to take meaning seriously, in light of last week’s events? Can we even know what Jesus resurrection means, if we’re not willing to enter into it, if we’re still searching for life among the dead? If we’re not willing to re-orient our lives and our churches around Christ’s purposes for us?
It’s only Wednesday, the sermon will get refined. And I’m in my post Holy day funk. If this has been overly personal or critical or, well, cryptic, thats ok. Its my existential angst, not just a blue naked guy.
* ( the infamy crack is an inside joke, btw Jim and me and all sane people. If you click on it you’ll be introduced to one seriously deluded individual, who seems to earn his keep on monitoring the vast right wing conspiracy. I’m just sayin’...)
blog 137
Wednesday, 11 April 2007
