The weight: crosses, calls, and kindred spirits

For those of you aware of my most recent meltdown last week, I feel somewhat obligated to try to offer a bit of explanation if I may.

I suppose, in a way, it's kinda like one of my all-time favorite songs: The Band's classic "The Weight." If you're not familiar, HERE is a clip of it from the movie The Last Waltz. According to the wiki site, "The Weight" takes the folk music motif of a traveler, who arrives in Nazareth in the Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. Once there, he encounters various residents of the town, the song being a story of these encounters."

Although, according to Robbie Robertson (the song's composer), "The Weight" was somewhat inspired by the films of Luis Buñuel, about which Robertson once said:

He did so many films on the impossibility of sainthood, people trying to do good in Viridiana and Nazarín, and it's impossible to do good. In "The Weight" it's the same thing. Someone says, "Listen, will you do me this favor? When you get there will you say 'hello' to somebody or will you pick up one of these for me?" "Oh, you're going to Nazareth, do me a favor when you're there." So the guy goes and one thing leads to another and it's like, "Holy shit, what has this turned into? I've only come here to say 'hello' for somebody and I've got myself in this incredible predicament." It was very Buñuelish to me at the time.

That's the part that connects with me. See, being a pastor was not my idea. Especially being a pastor in a small traditional-looking country church. Not that I don't think it's where I'm supposed to be, but... let's just say that following Jesus almost always results in some incredible "predicament's." I guess that's why it requires a child-like faith, otherwise we would never go there. I'm not sure how you can read the Bible and think that surrendering yourself to God is ever going to be easy. Whether it's as a pastor, or living up to whatever "calling" you have received in life. I think at some point every Jesus-follower finds themselves thinking, "Holy shit, what has this turned into?"

I thought it interesting that while thinking about all this I happened across the program from my ordination service (July 23, 2000). On the back I printed this quote from Frederick Buechner's, The Alphabet of Grace (109):

The most crucial thing is always the thing that is not said. They are simply getting on with their lives, and it is not so simple. Maybe that is the most crucial thing.

"I hear you are entering the ministry," the woman said down the long table, meaning no real harm. "Was it your own idea or were you poorly advised?"

And the answer that she could not have heard even if I had given it was that it was not an idea at all, neither my own nor anyone else's. It was a lump in the throat. It was an itching in the feet. It was a stirring in the blood at the sound of rain. It was a sickening of the heart at the sight of misery. It was a clamoring of ghosts. It was a name which, when I wrote it out in a dream, I knew was a name worth dying for even if I was not brave enough to do the dying myself and could not even name the name for sure.

"Come unto me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you a high and driving peace..."

Buechner became one of my favorite writers during seminary. That piece, along with "The Weight," seem to unexplainably put everything into perspective for me.

Sometimes I think we think the "rest" that Jesus talked about, and the "peace" he gives, is something that will come easily, or that it means a life without predicament. But filtered through the cross and our call... it would seem it's rarely if ever a swift journey. And just like with this latest fall o' mine, maybe the "come unto me," isn't some sort of prayer we don't vocalize... it could very well be something like a public blog post (that opens us up to our kindred spirits). For, even though I am still fairly weak, it is those of you who offered prayers, and emails, and comments, and hugs and looks and shaky-voiced calls who have helped get me through. Maybe you meant to, maybe you didn't. But I think it's things like that that make the church the church. It's when we hum, "Take a load off Fanny"; we say some "hello's"; we pick up a few things here and there... and it's not at all found in thinking about ourselves, but simply following, and serving, and being mindful of others. And the risk is that sometimes we will find ourselves in a quandary and we need to share our load... and that's what we do, until we can get up again.

I don't know... this probably doesn't make much sense. It wasn't my idea anyway. But I think it's why this walk we call faith isn't meant to be done alone. I appreciate those of you who have allowed me to join the journey with you, or you with me. Mmmm... whatever. I dunno.

Peace out, peace in.