The B-I-B-L-E

My mother began working outside the home when I was nine years old. She had a job as a secretary in a local insurance office. Work schedules were arranged with a half day off on Wednesday and work on Saturday morning. All the businesses in town, including banks, followed this time table. This allowed working people to come to town Saturday to do their business tasks, pay bills (we paid bills in person then to real people), shop for groceries, see an afternoon movie and still get home in time for chores. Gayle, my sister, and I would go to town with mama on Saturday mornings.
Mama would park at the McKey Tillman Insurance Agency and we would walk the five blocks to our Carnegie Library. We spent most of our morning there with tolerant librarians who didn’t care if I stayed in the adult section. After I read every biography that appealed to me, I moved on to fiction. O Frabjous Day!!! Murder mysteries, poetry, murder mysteries, novels, murder mysteries, history, murder mysteries... No one censored or regulated my reading. Every week I would check out the limit and return them, read, the next Saturday. With no T.V. and no phone, reading was my main entertainment and an open door to a wider world. I became a word junkie... can you tell?
I perfected the art of reading in a moving car without getting car sick so I could read on the bus while traveling thirty minutes to school. At every plopping spot of mine in the old farmhouse, a book waited for me... plastic covered... full of wonderful, glorious words... new words... old words... words I didn’t understand but words I loved.
One of our favorite family games was the Word Power game in Reader’s Digest. Every month, we would take turns stumping each other with those words and definitions. Mama was a crossword puzzle wizard. We would do the crossword with a timer... each one got only one minute to fill in as many words as you could, using your special colored pen, and then it was someone else’s turn. The one who got the most words right, won.
The richness... the texture... the options... the poetry...the sayings... the sounds of our language ripple through my soul like the mountain creek that runs through the farm...Lord, have mercy... bless her heart... fought like cats and dogs... a tad shy... tilted toward Tildy... I’m fixin’ to go home... set a spell...if wishes were horses then beggars would ride... wonderful, lyrical, descriptive words that paint pictures in our minds and hearts.
I remember the first time I read a version of the Bible that wasn’t the King James version. It was the Good News version in modern English. Published for the first time in the mid-sixties, it transformed my image of the Bible... of the Holy Writ... of the words themself and the soul of those ancient words. When I sat in my first (and last) New Testament class at Southern Seminary and heard Dr. Frank Stagg read the Bible, I was stunned to see he was reading from the Greek and translating as he read. I briefly, very briefly, considered taking Greek. I love to read three or four versions of one verse because each has a new image... a different understanding... calls out something new in me. What a precious opportunity, what freedom to explore the nuances of each interpretation... different voices in a choir that blend into a beautiful whole.
My Bible fell open to Hebrews 2 this morning. I read it first in KJV, then three other translations. Here are the verses that caught my ear as I read it aloud (reading the Bible aloud is a lot of fun... try it... it changes your perception of the words).
" Forasmuch (what a lovely word) then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he (Jesus) also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil: and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage... For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted".
"Since therefore, the children share flesh and blood, Jesus likewise shared the same things, in order to destroy through death the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death... Because of having been tested by suffering, Jesus is able to help those who are suffering".
"Since, therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook (love that word, too) of the same nature that through death he might destroy him who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage... For because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted".
"Since the ‘dedicated band’ were frail mortals, he himself became one, too, so that by dying he might break the grip of the one who controls death- that is, the devil- and set free those people, who all their lives, have been dominated by a fear of death... Since he himself has been tempted and has suffered so deeply, he knows how to sympathize fully with those who are also being tempted".
Each version of these same words reaches me in equally powerful but different ways. The images invoked by the translators... the words, those beautiful words, have such richness and depth ... frail mortals and children... bondage, slavery, domination...but in them all, the fear of death... they all used the same words there... wonder why? So, bring on the words... all the words... Like my librarian in my long ago South Georgia library, let me wander among all the translations... all the books of the Holy... looking for the words that speak to me of freedom and love and hope and joy and peace and forgiveness and no more fear of death... Thanks be to God for Jesus who became a frail mortal, for Lenten disciplines that free me from the fear of death, and for the help, succour and sympathy that are available to me in my relationship with Jesus.

daddy God and my daddy

My daddy was a complicated man and a difficult father. His childhood, much of it wiped from his memory by the pain, was spent suffering at the abusive hands of his father, Daddy Vance. My Uncle Harold has told us stories of beatings daddy received... his running away from home several times... his refusal to let his spirit be broken by the pain inflicted on his body. When it was his turn to be a father, there was no healthy model for fathering in his memory bank. So I grew up with a father who loved me... I knew that... but a father who was driven by inner pain neither he nor his children could understand or speak.
When daddy got mad, silence descended upon the house. You never knew whether you or someone else was the cause and as a child, you were afraid to ask. My mother would ask... she wasn’t afraid but often would not get an answer. Sometimes daddy’s anger with us would be more than he could manage and he would whip us with a belt. Mama put a stop to that after one whipping that came close to a beating. Her parents did not use whipping and she refused to let him do that again... I remember.
Daddy could also be fun... charming... outgoing and friendly. Mama’s shyness kept her from feeling comfortable with many people outside the family so when we had company for dinner, it was at daddy’s urging. You could never find a more faithful friend or steadfast father. When the chips were down... when all else failed... if you had enough nerve to ask, daddy would come through for you... a small man in size but a large man in every other way.
As a child my image for father and my feelings for fathers were confused, as you can imagine. It would have been easier if daddy had been a thorough going son of a bitch... but he wasn’t. He was a man who loved children but was terrified to hold a baby... didn’t have a clue how to talk to a child but would teach his grandson, at age nine, how to drive the old Dodge pick-up out in the hay field... loved having his daughters and grandchildren come home to the farm to spend two weeks canning and freezing from the huge garden he grew for us. This same man offered frequent opinions and rendered judgements on how fast we were speeding down the road to hell in the way we were rearing our children.
During one of our twice a year revivals in the church of my childhood, I was caught by the visiting preacher’s description of a prayer from Jesus when he called God "Abba"... daddy. Suddenly I had a new place to find a daddy... one whom I need not fear... one who knew me before I knew myself... one who would always be present when I was in need or happy or sad... one who would hear my small, determined voice that, like my father, refused to be denied. My daddy, damaged and hurt, might not always be able to be the father I needed (no father can ever be) but Daddy God could. The strength... the safety... the assurance of my essential value as a girl child... the joy in my being... came from both Daddies... Daddy God was my safety net when my daddy couldn’t be there.
Daddy endured several crucifixions that transformed his soul. One crucifixion was the suicide of my sister. It ripped him asunder... his daughter in such pain and she couldn’t tell him or mama... For weeks and months, his co-workers at the paper mill had him under their watchful eyes, fearing he would take his own life to end the pain and grief he felt. Another crucifixion came at the end of his life as he lived with a terminal disease for three years. Each of these experiences helped crack the hardened shell daddy had built around his heart and soul for protection until the real person was able to shine through. He lived the last years of his life with grace and dignity... and love. We laughed, cried, told stories, apologized for hurts, hugged, spoke of our love for one another, made up for lost time...
So, somehow, by the grace of God, I was able to find healing for my hurt at the hands of my father... forgive him... forgive myself.... forgive God... I could never have found my way through my childhood without a Daddy God... could never have seen another way to be father without the identification with the masculine part of God. I needed and still need a God who represents the whole of the human being... male and female we were created in the image of God. To remove the feminine and masculine from our understanding of God is to deny the joy of our creation as men and women... wonderfully and fearfully made in His and Her image... our Father and Mother God... different and yet the same... what a paradox of grace and puzzlement.

speaking in tongues... and the language of love

I played the Bible game this morning... sometimes it really amazes me. The Bible fell open to a passage in 1 Corinthians where Paul is writing about speaking in unknown tongues... the charismatic gift of verbal prayer in an unrecognizable language. Paul defines the gift, ranks it, and then offers a discourse on the pros and cons of this type of religious language. What fascinates me is how this passage coincides with a discussion our worship committee is having (again) about language used in worship. Which pronouns do we use... are we slipping in our vigilance to root out all offensive language in hymns and Bible passages... how do we honor the different voices and accents and languages of the soul in our community? Must we always use only inclusive language or is there a place to read the words from our history... King James Version... Greek version... Hebrew version... Cotton Patch version... Good News Version... Revised Standard Version... Paul nails it, as he often does, to my dismay. I would rather dismiss him as a male supremacist but I can’t, dadgum it!
He begins by saying "Pursue love and strive for the spiritual gifts"... first things first... pursue love... chase it down and hold it fast while you work on your spiritual gifts. If you don’t have love for God, for your companions on the journey, for yourself, there is no hope of acquiring your highest spiritual gifts.
This one really punches my buttons. After our journey through the wilderness of living with Baptist religious fundamentalism, I am acutely aware of language that requires orthodoxy of any kind before I can be accepted and affirmed. In our congregation we are often in the middle of a discussion of acceptable language and theology. It makes me laugh sometimes when I watch us be open and affirming of other very different religious traditions and language... bring on the Muslims, Jews, Pagans, Ba’hai and Hindu...then see how we struggle to find a common descriptive language for ourselves when we are more alike than not. The key to the use of unknown tongues... Lord, Father, Master, Goddess, Mother, Savior, Buddha... is first of all love... not judgement or even affirmation... just love.
Paul goes on to say "Now, brothers and sisters, if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I speak to you in some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? It is the same with lifeless instruments that produce sound, such as the flute or the harp. If they do not give distinct notes, how will anyone know what is being played... If I do not know the meaning of a sound, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker a foreigner to me".
Here it is... unless we know each others’ stories and voices and language... where do you come from... who were and are your people... where are you going... where have you been... the language can never be correct enough to be understood. We are searching for the language of the heart... the language of the Holy... listening for the sound of Love coming among us like a rushing wind, blowing all our differences away and helping us see each other as we really are... children of the Spirit all needing the same God, whatever names we use to describe the Infinite Loving One who holds us in arms of tender, loving care.

lenten worms and easter butterflies

We moved mama back to the mountains this week. As I moved through the home of my teenagerdom, I was caught off guard by the pictures of me showing the progression of different hairdos that marked my growing into adulthood.
Those were the days before curling irons, hot rollers, hand held hair dryers... those were the days that required serious commitment to the ideal of hair perfection. I routinely slept on rollers... wire brush rollers that had no give... and perfected the art of sleeping with my neck suspended above the pillow, supported by those prickly cylinders. When sponge rollers were invented, all the girls tried them and dismissed them because the curls weren’t uniform... were squishy just like the rollers. Some of my friends whose daddies drank beer ( there weren’t many) rolled their long hair on beer cans and used the beer as a setting lotion. I was envious of their long, sleek, shiny hair that smelled faintly of beer. Sometimes on Saturday night, my sister and I would haul out the hair dryers we got with green stamps... soft vinyl hoods attached to a base that blew hot air over your wet head until it was dry... then slept on the rollers so our hairdos would be fresh the next morning. After teasing our hair into the desired shape ( teasing was the process of back combing sections of hair until they were uniformly stiff... a forerunner of dreadlocks), we would spray it with hair spray until it would stay in place through whatever windstorms came our way.
I went to the cabin behind the main house to get some canning jars to load on the trailer. My gym shorts that I wore in college were lying on the kitchen counter. I went to a state school... Valdosta State College... and P.E. was required. I was the only person in my tennis class passed as a mercy to my teacher. My nearsightedness made it impossible to co-ordinate eyes and hands in time to hit that little ball. Golf was my best P.E. class... that ball stayed in place until I hit it. We had to change into a special uniform for P.E.... navy blue Bermuda shorts with an adjustable waistband... a white blouse with the school insignia in navy blue... tennis shoes. When we walked to the gym or on campus in this outfit, we were required to wear a raincoat over it. I always saw myself as chubby in those shorts... felt bumpy rather than sleek. But when I held those faded blue shorts up, they were small... a size 6.
I was a butterfly who saw herself as a worm... I was both worm and butterfly... not one or the other but both. I was beautiful... I was awkward... I was like my hair... smooth on the surface and knotted underneath by teasing... I was slender... I was overflowing with my insecurities and unease... I was full of promise... I was an empty vessel slowly filling with knowledge and grace... I was my past, present and future looking through a darkened glass at the uncertain image of myself... an image only God could see clearly. As I look at those pictures and gym shorts, I can see now what God saw and I weep for all that was and all that was to come... and I give thanks for worms and butterflies.
My Lenten prayer, an old hymn... Alas, and did my Savior bleed? And did my Sovereign die? Would He devote that sacred head for such a worm as I? At the cross, at the cross where I first saw the Light, and the burden of my heart rolled away. It was there by faith I received my sight, and now I am happy all the day.