Cavorting Kids

The other day, I was watching the goat kids in our pasture.  They were racing around, playing chase, leaping up in the air, cavorting and having a great time.  They started a game where they ran as fast as they possibly could out into the pasture, suddenly turned around, and sprinted back.  It simply is so exciting to be alive! Back and forth, back and forth, zooming as fast as they could, jumping and leaping, and all just because they can.  

God of the sparrow, God of the whale, God of the whirling stars:

How does the creature say “Awe?”  How does the creature say “Praise?”

It reminded me of St. Iranaeus’ teaching that, “The glory of God is humanity fully alive.”   Baby goats are bursting with life.  You see it most when they finish nursing, and the sugar hits their blood stream.  They shake, and shiver, then suddenly spring straight sideways, legs flying with minds of their own.  Four laps around the barnyard, and suddenly it is nap time, and down they plop in a heap of brothers and sisters and cousins.  They snuggle close to each other, pushing for the best spot under the heat lamps inside, just because they can. 

God of the neighbor, God of the foe, God of the pruning hook:

How does the creature say “Love?”  How does the creature say “Peace?”

On days when the craziness of the world weighs heavy upon me, when turning on the computer seems to be an act of masochism as the news scrolls by, and the TV is even worse -- going and sitting on a log in the goat pen is perfect therapy.  There is no pretense, what you find is what there is.  Sometimes they are contentedly laying and chewing their cud, other times pushing and shoving for the best spot at the feeder.  Sometimes they are just a ton of work, I'm hauling heavy hay bales in snow and mud, the wind blowing hay into my eyes and ears, my gloves making working gate latches a chore, yet handling the icy latch barehanded sears like an iron.  But even if I'm cussing them under my breath as just an endless series of chores, I still come back to Irenaeus:  being responsible for them reminds me that I am still alive -- to the glory of God.  And I breathe a prayer of thanks, just because I can.

God of the rainbow, God of the cross, God of the empty grave:

How does the creature say “Grace?”  How does the creature say “Thanks?”*

*Stanzas quoted from “God of the sparrow, God of the whale,” by Jaroslav Vajda, Hymn 32, New Century Hymnal.

Adapted from an article in The Plymouth Placard, June 2010

The Hope of Spring

Yesterday, I saw a crocus bloom.  This unexpected stretch of unseasonably warm weather has given me the chance to do some garden chores, picking up last season's soaker hoses, rolling up plastic mulch, and enjoying the sunshine.  But seeing the first crocus of spring always brings me back to another time and place.

I was in my early 20's and was living in the Chicago area, going to my first seminary, Trinity (aka TEDS).  As a highly conflicted gay-and-evangelical when never-the-twain-could-meet young man, they were some of the worst years of my life.  I didn't know who I was.  What I suspected I was I didn't want to be, and my lifelong strategy of holding off my feelings with my theology and my intellect was breaking down.  I was ferociously depressed, and life and death hung in about equal attraction.

The one lifeline was my friend Maggie.  I had met her and her husband (a professor at the evangelical Wheaton College) when I was working in Sequoia National Park while in college.  She was my parent's age (so then in her mid-40's), had children my age, and for one of those inexplicable reasons that really only God can tell, took me under her wing.  In Sequoia, she and husband Paul taught me how to do inductive Bible study, to appreciate their gracious and generous hearted Calvinism, and to relish the intellectual stream of evangelical theology.  I also came out to her -- even though I'd never met another gay person (that I knew of), I knew what I felt and feared.  We corresponded for the rest of my time in college, had many long phone calls, before I moved to the Chicago area for seminary.  There, I enjoyed the refuge of their home on many occasions.

Their home backed to a large forest preserve, and we would take long walks exploring the rills and thickets.  Midwestern forests were entirely different than the Sierra forests I knew, with a whole understory of plants I'd never seen.  In winter, you could see quite a distance, and summer closed in with shrubs and vines to an inpenetrable maze.  But in the early spring, we had one main quest:  to find the first crocus.

The first crocus of spring:  a hope, a promise -- the depths of winter are ending, spring is but around the corner!  To my fear, Maggie assured me, "The grace of God will never abandon you." Of my pain, she promised, "This too shall pass."  She was right on both scores.  It is not too much to say that her love, prayers, care, and patient ear was what kept me alive for a couple crucial years.  We kept contact in the years since that difficult time, until she passed away a bit over a year ago.  But the care and wisdom of this mentor remain.

Who taught you to search for the first crocus of spring?  Who did God bring into your life at crucial times?  Or, who do you take under your wing, listen to, and share your wisdom?  And take crocus hunting?

(adapted from the version first published in the Plymouth Placard, March 2015)