While You Were Sleeping...

On Good Friday, one of our worship guests fell asleep. At first, I was pleased to hear this. As many of you know, I have recently come out in favor of sleep during sermons, since there seems to be strong, Scriptural endorsement of this (Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and so forth). I thought of this latest sleeping incident (and I don't want to boast here, but what can I say...) as another notch on my pulpit.

Unfortunately, I had opportunity for closer inquiry with the individual who fell asleep, and learned to my disappointment that she had actually fallen asleep so early in the worship service that she never saw me enter the pulpit, heard nothing that would have made her somnambulent, and only awoke at the final tympany drum-roll.
Now, I know that there are a great many other Christians who, existentially speaking, are also embodying this, but in all honesty I cannot claim credit either for their spiritual inertness, or for this woman's nap.

I am sorry to say I was not responsible for her sleep. True, nothing I said during the sermon woke her, but I don't think that really counts one way or another. Hers was a pre-existing condition! May God forgive me, she would have slept whether I labored in the vineyards or not. Therefore, I drop my claim to this latest sleeping event. Pope John Paul II may have miraculously healed that nun of Parkinson's while she was sleeping, but I am still not there. The sleeper from my church, as far as I can tell, is no better person after her nap than before.

A Room with a View

Friends, Mary Lynn and I are taking our intended 25th anniversary trip to Italy just in time to celebrate our 29th anniversary.

Yup, it has only taken us four years to get this together; that would be pretty representative of many of our plans as a couple! Anyway, we're looking forward to the journey together, and to the short (two-week)suspension of our usual routines and pleasures, including blogging.

We will undoubtedly be thinking of you on some moonlit night as we dine al fresco , or gaze from the small balcony of our "room with a view" over the tiled rooftops and the Duomo (cathedral) of Sienna.

Ciao, ciao,
Clay

Silent Saturday

Beret Griffith forwarded this message from a friend, Janice Ulangca, for our reflection on the silent Saturday between the day of crucifixion and the day of resurrection. Beret notes that SHIRLEY ERENA MURRAY (b. 1931) the author of the poem/hymn below, is a hymn text writer and a former editor with the New Zealand Hymnbook Trust. Her work has appeared in more than 100 collections worldwide and been translated into several languages (Taiwanese, Swedish, German, Spanish, French, Estonian, Portuguese, Korean and Braille print.) She has also worked with Dr. I-to Loh, musical ethnologist from Taiwan, in paraphrasing Asian hymns into English.

The themes of her hymns range from social justice, peace and human rights to the sacraments, the Church year, eco-theology, and the voice of women.

She is married to the Very Rev. John Stewart Murray, a former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa/New Zealand. They have three sons and six grandchildren, and live on the coast near Wellington, New Zealand.


Janice Ulangca's invitation to read this hymn today follows:

To dear Colleagues,

A poem for what one Catholic priest friend calls "the day between" - between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, when according to tradition Jesus is in the tomb. He believes that we should not neglect the experience of this day... Our choir sang Carlton Young's hymn setting of this for the Good Friday service.--Janice Ulangca

God Weeps

By Shirley Erena Murray

God weeps
at love withheld,
at strength misused,
at children's innocence abused,
and till we change the way we love,
God weeps.

God bleeds
at anger's fist,
at trust betrayed,
at women battered and afraid,
and till we change the way we win,
God bleeds.

God cries
at hungry mouths,
at running sores,
at creatures dying without cause,
and till we change the way we care,
God cries.

God waits
for stones to melt,
for peace to seed,
for hearts to hold each other's need,
and till we understand the Christ,
God waits.

Good Friday's Wounds

Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote, We know full well that the marks of the passion, the wounds of the cross, are now become the marks of grace in the body of the risen and glorified Christ....If we would have a share of Christ's glory and radiance, we must first be conformed to the image of the Suffering Servant, who was obedient to the death of the cross.

I have a friend with physical wounds which, literally, will not heal--or they heal very, very slowly. My friend yearns to have these wounds heal completely, but this has not happened. Instead, there are setbacks from time to time. This companion in Christ is forced to live with both living and dead flesh. I am distressed with my friend, and I am distressed for my friend. Sometimes I think of these wounds as the stigmata, the wounds of Christ imposed upon my friend. There is still suffering and distress, but it is purposeful. It is part of the body, the life and death, the suffering and distress of Christ.

Come, tonight by 7:00 for our Good Friday service, if you can, to pray with us for this friend, and for so many others, who strive to follow Jesus, or who struggle to endure what he endured, or who are wandering and wondering where spiritual help may be found. We've all been wounded. Those very wounds may also be the "marks of grace".

I Won't Leave You, Darlin'

Holy Week. My wife, Mary Lynn, used to call it "holy hell week", and now she just avoids her husband during these sacred days! This year, for Holy Week, I've decided to go into country-western music. I here post the lyrics for my first gold record. All I need is a contact and a contract in Nashville--and a tune to go with the lyrics. Also, a good female vocalist or two. And someone who can manage my career. Do you know anybody who can help me with this? It just seems like a good idea during Holy Week.
--The Reverend Mister Clay Oglesbee

I Won't Leave You, Darlin'

I won't leave you, darlin',
When you're weepin' or upset.
And I won't leave you, sweetheart,
When you've just lost a big bet,
And I won't leave you, honey,
In the middle of the night,
No, I'm gonna leave you, darlin',
When you think everything's alright.

I won't leave you, darlin',
When you're feelin' kinda low,
And I won't leave you, sweetheart,
When you've had an awful blow,
And I won't leave you, honey,
When you're put up on a shelf,
No, I'm gonna leave you, darlin',
When you're happy with yourself.

I won't notice, darlin',
When you flirt with other boys/girls.
And I won't notice, sweetheart,
When you treat me like those toys/false pearls,
And I won't notice, honey,
When you're lyin' to me sweet,
No, I won't notice, darlin',
I'm the rug beneath your feet.

I won't leave you, darlin',
When you cry or when you moan,
And I won't leave you, sweetheart,
When you're feelin' all alone ,
And I won't leave you, honey,
When you're hurt or in disgrace,
No, I'm gonna leave you, darlin',
When there's a smile on your face.

"I came as a guest..."

Here is a part of today's reading from the "The Rule of Benedict"

On the Reception of Guests

Let all guests who arrive be received like Christ,
for He is going to say,
"I came as a guest, and you received Me" (Matt. 25:35).
And to all let due honor be shown,
especially to the domestics of the faith and to pilgrims.

We had a request today from a friend for a group of people to help "host" a banquet that is coming up in a month or two. It is the kind of volunteer request it's easy to overlook or neglect dealing with. Still, when we saw how much effort would need to expended to find workers, and the worth of the gathering, we just said, "Don't worry; you need 20--we can offer nine volunteers from our church. It's our pleasure to serve." The next challenge will be to receive all the guests like Christ. There's the difficult part--to serve, yes, but to serve with exuberant love, honor and affection for others? May it be so.

I read the news today, oh boy

from Thoreau's Journal, April 3, 1853
The last two Tribunes I have not looked at. I have no time to read newspapers. If you chance to live and move and have your being in that thin stratum in which the events which make the news transpire,—thinner than the paper on which it is printed,—then these things will fill the world for you; but if you soar above or dive below that plane, you cannot remember nor be reminded of them.

We admire the newspapers and news channels so much in these times that Karl Barth is still widely and favorably quoted in the churches as recommending that we should live with the newspaper in one hand and the Bible in the other! I know he was praising either the Bible or the newspaper, but I am not sure which or why.

Thoreau had a hunch that the papers report little that is essential to the core tasks of authentic life, so if he is right, to give them the weight of the Bible in our lives is overdoing it more than a bit. The realm of the Scriptures, while it includes the stream of "world events", whatever those are, is really more concerned with the things which "soar above or dive below". The Scriptures wear real shoes and walk real roads, but they also have wings and air-tanks, to enable us to "comprehend...what is the breadth and length and height and depth (of)...all the fullness of God" (Ephesians 3:18,19)