FALLING INTO PLACE
Rev. Dr. Kathy Fuson Hurt
FBC, January 10, 2010
Readings: Luke 3:15-22 and Words for Silence by Gregory Fruehwirth
The morning we prepared to pack up our house in California and head for Granville, we discovered a white dove in our backyard. Because we knew that a magician lived in our neighborhood, we quickly deduced that the dove had escaped from his home. We notified the magician, and in short order the dove was returned.
But for a long time afterwards, we remarked upon the significance of being visited by a white dove at that particular moment in time: perhaps it meant that our departure for Granville was divinely ordained, or that we would discover a blessing in the process of leaving California, or simply that God was in the area and had decided to drop by, unfortunately choosing a morning when we had little time to give to a sacred visitation. Because the next several weeks turned out to feel more harrowing than blessed, as the movers disappeared with our belongings and the sale of our California home seemed poised to fall into the real estate abyss that opened up just then, the dove’s appearance often felt less like a divine affirmation and more like an ironic joke (or, simply a dove that had escaped its owner that morning, nothing more).
The gospel reading today takes pains to emphasize, in the familiar story of Jesus’ baptism, that the Spirit descended upon Jesus not just feeling like a dove, or reminiscent of a dove, but in actual “bodily form like a dove,” an emphasis unique to Luke’s version of the story. I wonder whether Jesus came in time to interpret his own visitation by a dove as being less blessing and more burden, moving as he did from the affirmation of his baptism in short order to the wilderness temptations and a first sermon that elicited not a rousing chorus of “Amen!” but threats to throw him off the nearest cliff. It is enough to make one wish never, ever to be visited by any sort of dove, white or otherwise, spiritual or literal.
In spiritual narratives, doves show up as symbols of approval, as signs that let us know a certain action or decision has met with God’s approval. All well and good—but as Jean and I discovered, it gets tricky when one shifts from stories to actual life experience and a dove shows up. Is that interpretation, of seeing in the dove a divine blessing of one’s latest move, justified? What if things do not go swimmingly once the dove has left the scene: then what was the meaning of its appearance? Or suppose no dove shows up to point the way: then how do we know we have made a good choice, a choice, to use traditional language, that is in keeping with God’s will, a choice, to use nontraditional language, that will contribute to the continued unfolding of our lives, that will carry us further on our spiritual journey? And when obstacles show up, as they always do, how do we know whether the obstacles are best dealt with by renewed effort on our parts to surmount them, or whether we would do well to choose a different route?
Though all the Christmas decorations are by now packed away, in terms of the church calendar we are still in that particular aftermath season called the season of epiphany, a time in church life when stories of journeys like that of the wise men are told, and when the Jesus story jumps from his birth to the launching of his ministry. When Jesus last showed up in a Sunday reading, he was a small child; today the reading depicts him as a young man preparing to respond to his calling. As for what happened in his life between those readings, scripture gives us nothing.
But novelist Ann Rice, best known for her vampire series, has been working on a series that is part fiction and part historical about the life of Jesus. The first in the series, titled Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, imagines Jesus growing up from early childhood to adolescence, experiencing himself as somehow different from others but not sure what that difference means, discovering that he had special powers and learning to use them properly, and concluding with him hearing the story of the slaughter of children perpetrated by King Herod in response to the threat Jesus’ birth posed. The second book in the series, The Road to Cana, takes Jesus through early adulthood, as he becomes clear about his calling, wrestles with his family’s concern that he is neither getting married nor finding a steady job, and launches his ministry with his disciples and his first miracle. While Rice’s books are clearly products of the imagination, they nonetheless ring true for me as they suggest all that may have happened to Jesus during the first decades of his life. Even more, the books highlight an important truth that gets lost in the reverential tone of the scripture accounts, namely that all humans, from the noblest to the most ordinary, struggle with our unfolding, with the choices we make that irrevocably shape our lives and impact the lives of all those we love. For Jesus, the journey seemed to lead him away from the usual course of life events from the outset—a very different journey from that outlined by Joni Mitchell, where life events are common to us all, the journey is the same for all, and the journey goes in only one, circular direction. Journeys go forward, backward, in circles, out from the community, back into the community, lead off on tangents that seem to have no meaning, double back and resume, start and stop. And while we may sometimes like to believe that our journey towards salvation, or self-actualization, or any particular level of accomplishment is finished, the reality is, as Gregory Fruehwirth’s reading observed, that our journey is never finished in this lifetime. Never.
Our congregation is presently in the throes of figuring out where our collective journey will head next. This is a church that historically has committed most of its energies to justice work, usually pursuing one especially compelling cause, often in the face of considerable resistance from the larger community. If that journey still is true for us—where is our next compelling cause to be found? This is also a church that has lived out its calling in this particular building. In these days of dwindling size and financial resources, at a time when the earth needs our good stewardship more than ever, does it still make sense to live out our calling in this same building even though the congregation and the building, at least at present, seem not to fit one another? Where is that dove when we need it to confirm a decision, to bless a course of action, to point the way for us?
Ann Rice’s imaginative recounting of the life story of Jesus sees him caught in tension over his calling virtually from the beginning. His family treated him differently than all his siblings; even neighbors made clear that there was something about Jesus that had set him apart. From time to time he overheard whispered conversations between his parents about what should be done with him in terms of education and vocation, and his older brothers would make indirect comments about extraordinary events that had occurred when he was born. Jesus also knew, in Rice’s novels, that a special ornately carved chest was hidden away containing exotic gifts that had been birth presents for him, and that were to be given him when he reached adulthood. And Jesus himself, when he would go on walks to pray, seems to have sensed a relationship with God that felt different from what he saw happening in community prayers and synagogue services. As Rice unfolds Jesus’ story over time, this experience of himself as being set up, destined for some particular work by God before he had even been born, intensifies.
Which is why the version of his baptism in Luke’s gospel is interesting in its contrast with this pattern, and with the other gospel accounts of the same event. As Luke describes it, Jesus did not step out from the crowd and head to John for baptism, nor did everything grind to a halt like a movie scene when the hero finally appears. Rice envisions hordes of people heading for baptism because of a growing belief that John was the long-promised Messiah, and Luke concurs: “the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John” (3:15). John tries to deflect these expectations, but the longing for a deliverer was so strong that he seems not to have been believed. So the crowds keep coming, and one day those crowds include Jesus, not coming for baptism as anybody special, but coming for baptism along with everyone else, carrying the same longing in his heart, the same excitement about the possibility of God finally fulfilling the promise of a Messiah, the same hope that at last, at last, fortunes were about to turn, oppression was about to end, justice was about to come.
Jesus wades into the water with everyone else, quietly waits his turn to be baptized, and no one notices anything remarkable. Given all the hype that had surrounded him since before he was born, this could have been a very different scene, with all the attention focused on Jesus. But not so: at this crossroads of his life, he joins the line of all the other poor, struggling, broken down people who are hoping for something new.
Baptism over, Jesus continues standing with the crowd on the riverbank, praying. Now the dove shows up “in bodily form.” Luke’s gospel will unfold such a scene often, with the Spirit manifesting in literal or symbolic form at a time of prayer. Jesus experiences the moment as one of affirmation and blessing—and also as an experience of Fruehwith’s dislocation, of being set apart. Now he steps away from the crowd and heads for the wilderness, to spend time in discernment, coming to terms with exactly what his lifelong sense of being different and called is going to mean. In Rice’s account of this event, Jesus learns that being the Son of God is not going to bring him any special treatment, no power or wealth or fame, nothing of the perks we associate with being somebody special. Rather, being the Son of God for Jesus will be about compassion, radical care for others, and living fully present in each moment. When Jesus returns from his wilderness time and begins gathering his disciples, Rice envisions his family wanting to know what his game plan is, exactly how he intends to pursue his ministry. Some of his relatives who have joined the Jewish Zealot movement and are agitating for a revolution against the Roman oppressors present themselves to fight under Jesus’ command. To all these pressures that seek to have him follow the usual journey the world offers us, to conform his life to the usual values of accomplishment and acquisition and success, Jesus replies with an unsettling alternative: as Rice phrases it, Jesus intends to live “from one adventure to another,” wherever God might take him. No game plan whatsoever, beyond following the call of the Spirit each day. Hardly a recipe for success or happiness; small wonder that such a journey seemed to end in failure with an execution.
Because my experience in Granville continues to bring ongoing challenges, I will be disappointed if I want to interpret the dove’s appearance as a blessing of my actions or some sort of sign of success. If Jesus understood the dove’s showing up at his baptism as confirmation that his ministry would result in accolades and a rapid ascent to ruling the country, he would soon be shown drastically wrong. If we take any particular marker, such as increased membership or a budget surplus or even having every volunteer position filled as our own congregational version of a dove’s appearance to confirm the rightness of our path, we will rapidly find ourselves frustrated and confused.
The dove does not show up in our lives to signal a direction or ensure success or tell us we are doing the right thing in God’s eyes. Rather, the reason for a dove, whether literal or symbolic, the reason for any sort of spiritual sign, is to remind us that whatever direction we have taken, whatever decision we have made, wherever we find ourselves on life’s journey, we do not travel alone. Another is always with us, as a dove, as a friend, as family, as spiritual companion, as the light and comfort we need for the long haul, as the Spirit who promises to be with us no matter what. May our journeys go well, and may we know the dove is there for every turn and each step.
Called not to success, but faithful; quaker quote; not consistency.
