The Mercy of Divine Pranks

There is a prank we used to play. You press a penny onto someone's forehead for thirty seconds, then you tell them that the game is to see how many whacks to the back of the head it will take to get the penny to fall off. The prank is in the sleight-of-hand. You remove the penny when you pull your hand away from their forehead. So... they go on whacking the back of their head until either humiliation or uncontrollable laughter ends the prank. Yes, it's cruel. If you do this to a real friend, you eventually really want them to "get it."
(Mind that in college my best friends & I shot each other with homemade blowdarts. Guy stuff.)
Wicked transition - let's ask a question: Where is God?

The Christian response is that God is everywhere. We call this "omnipresence."
However, most Christians also believe that God is more fully manifest in some other realm than the one that is apparent to us every day.

So, where is the realm of God's more complete manifestation?
At this point I think most Christians would say, "I have no idea."
That sounds like the best answer to me.

Other answers might include something about a "spiritual realm."
Fair enough. I think I generally imagine a multi-dimensional universe, most of which eludes us, and some dimension/s of which is the "place" (if we can call it that) that allows fuller communion between God and the world. I believe someday that dimension will break in on this one in a unprecedented "revelation." I'm not sure I would call it the "spiritual realm," because that seems to imply that the world we live in is not spiritual while I think of it as more integrated.

Simpler question: Does anyone think that the realm of God (or "heaven") is "up"?
If we could just travel vertically far enough, trangressing solar system, galaxy, etc. would we get there? I hope most Christians would say "no." Again, I think that's the best answer.

That being the case, here's a harder question:
Why did Jesus "ascend" into the heavens at the end of his physical time on earth?
A friend's answer was: "What do you want him to do, go left?"
Funny, but its not a matter of what I would "want him to do."

Let me suggest another answer.
If Jesus had sort of disappeared (In the manner of Star Trek "beaming") to "break on through to the other side" that would have communicated impermanence to his disciples, when he had just told them, "I am with you always."
Based on limited research, I think most pre-moderns did imagine that "up" was the direction to go to get to the realm of God/s, from Babel, to Mt. Sinai, to Mt. Olympus, to sun, moon and star worship, "up" seemed like the logical direction to direct worship, or to locate the presence of the divine, though obviously, this was far from exclusive.

So, when Jesus ascended, God was doing something that humans could understand. I'm suggesting that it was a concession to the particular human finitude of that time, as well as being a slightly theatrical way of communicating majesty. It wasn't a cruel "prank." It was a sort of "divine sleight-of-hand."

I wonder: What else did God do, that scripture records, to communicate, via a concession, with the people of that time and place? Are there senses in which scripture itself becomes a sort of "divine sleight-of-hand" that communicates WELL but necessarily "inaccurately," because accuracy would take the conversation way beyond us?

Would it honor God if we insisted that traveling vertically from Israel at a particular point in the earth's rotation and orbit (and who knows what else?) would ultimately get us to the throne of God?

I don't know anyone who thinks that, but are there other things that we are still clinging to, when it would now please God if we let go?

Maybe God really wants us to "get it" and stopped whacking ourselves in the back of the head.

The Gospel According to Gran Torino

Walt is doomed.  When Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino opens, his character is recently widowed, bitter, foul-mouthed, violent, borderline alcoholic and very sick.  His kids don't really care about him and he thinks they are self-absorbed and ridiculous.  But, maybe the worst part of it is that he hates his neighbors.  Like Dirty Harry, Walt is isn't a "racist," he hates everybody, but as a Korean War vet, he especially hates southeast Asians who remind him of the things he did there.  He is destined to die, coughing up blood on the floor of his garage, feeling guilty and alone.  And no one will care.  Let me try to lay this out without giving too much away.

His fresh young priest tries to get him to come to confession, but Walt constantly and vehemently rejects him.  The priest character is great.  Initially, one is inclined to feel about him exactly as Walt does, but as the movie develops, we see that he is also 3 dimensional and has something to offer.

Walt's life begins to change when the son of his Hmong neighbors gets in gang trouble.  In a classic "Dirty Harry as Grumpy Old-Man" scene, Walt inadvertently saves this young man by wielding his M-1 and growling "Get off my lawn!"  The Hmong community responds by showering him with gifts.  Eventually, the older sister Su befriends Walt, seeing past his tough-guy bluster and sort of integrates this racial-slur-spewing crust of a person into her family.

The major text of the film becomes a commentary on manhood.  Walt ends up mentoring Tao, the teenage boy next door and trying to "man him up" in blue-collar Detroit "Greatest Generation" style.  Though his version of manhood is basically comic-relief at this point, Tao eventually does become more confident and assertive and Walt becomes more warm and human.  Still, he turns to violence to try to stop the gang-intimidation and learns a lesson he should have learned in Korea.  Violent begets violence.

Ultimately, Walt has to stop the cycle of violence and he lands on a creative solution.  He goes to confession to fulfill his wife's last wishes.  Then he confesses the things that have TRULY haunted him to Tao.

He drives over to the gang-house and calls them out.  They emerge, brandishing their pistols.

He talks tough for a minute or two until all the eyes of the neighborhood are on the scene.  They wait, and so do we, for Walt to rain down lead-vengeance on these neighborhood terrorists.  Through lips clenched on a cigarette, Walt snarls, "Got a light? (pause) I've got a light!" Then he enacts his plan.  

What does he do?  Oddly enough, Walt sort of pulls a WWJD.

Throughout this film, Walt is the hero saving the Hmong family, but at the end, it seems clear that they have saved him from dying alone, bitter, uncared-for and uncaring.  

Walt has changed, though his language still leaves a great deal to be desired.  

He loves his neighbors as himself.  He is honest about his pain.  He is reconciled.  

In the last moments of the film, he is literally an icon of Christ. 

He is very nearly a new creation.

How many of us can say the same?

In Ephesians 2-3, Paul says that the mystery of Christ is when Christ on the cross broke down the wall of hostility between Jews and Gentiles and made them one.  It is a work of reconciliation.  

When someone goes from hating his neighbors, to loving them, God is at work.  It may not be the whole picture, but it is a picture of salvation and redemption.

Connecting to God - II

Another way of trying to connect to God is by trying to set the tone for the day with some sort of meditation or conscious commitment of one's day to God.


In college a friend of mine and I decided we would spend (I think it was 20 minutes) meditating each day. This posed 3 problems. First was finding a quiet place of solitude. My apartment was completely out of the question. The library was a pretty social place sometimes. BUT, in the basement of the college building next door there was a rarely used classroom and an almost never used restroom. I had my spots! This leads to the second problem, which was my narcolepsy. I am not clinically diagnosed, but I have fallen asleep in the car at red-lights (never on the motorcycle, which is why I may be the only person for whom a motorcycle is actually a safer mode of travel).

I tried the classroom first. Walked in, closed the door, sat down at a desk and discovered problem 3: I had no idea what I was doing. I just sort of tried to quiet myself, figuring that meditation could not be just praying (talking to God), nor could it be reading something thoughtful and thinking about it. Of course it could have been, but I didn't think so at that point.
I woke up in the dark, embarrassed but alone. I waved my arms around to get the motion detector to turn the lights back on and left.

For my second attempt, the next day, I entered the restroom, entered the single stall in the restroom, put the seat-cover down and settled into what I thought might be a good meditating position.

This time, when I woke up, it was pitch black and I didn't know where I was. I waved my arms around but since I was in the stall, nothing happened. Then I stood up and ran into each wall of the stall before I came to my senses, managed to feel my way to freedom and gave up on "meditating."
I think the reason that I don't make it a priority to connect to God some days is not a lack of time. Time is there (see below). I think it is because I don't always believe that it will matter, or make a difference for me. This means that I am seeing the connection to God as a self-serving device for my gratification or assistance, rather than the possible benefit that might be passed on to those around me. Sometimes, it is because I am experiencing what Buddhists have called "monkey-mind." I try to settle into a mental and physical posture of connection, but my brain won't stop grabbing at things (that I "need" to do, want to do, or am worried about).

Interestingly, the bathroom is still the primary place I go to make a brief connection with God every day. It is really the only place where my children MIGHT respect my privacy and need for quiet. It also has a fan, which creates great white noise. I no longer have the narcolepsy issue in the same way, though occasionally it still strikes.
The following "advice" could make me sound like a "real spiritual person" but I assure you...
Well, lets put it this way... I didn't really do any of the following this morning and when Beth got up, she looked at me and asked: "Are you mad about something?" The nice thing about being alive is that there is always another day to get some small thing right - like in Groundhog Day.

My daily connection with God usually amounts to 4 things.
In the morning:
1. Try to be aware of God's presence. This often involves willing myself to belief that God is truly everywhere, no less in my bathroom than in my favorite church or on my favorite hiking trail. It involves rejecting an impulse to look upward for God or to direct my thoughts in some direction.

2. Submit my day. I say something like: "God, take my life today to use as you will. Free me from bondage to self so that my life will show others your love, your power, and your way of life.
Give me wisdom and insight to know you, sense your presence and do your will."

3. Read something thoughtful and think about it. For me this means scripture or something related to scripture.

At night:
4. Thank God for the day and recite either the 23rd Psalm, the Lord's Prayer or something else I have committed to memory, until I fall asleep.

You could also build other connection points into your day:
1. Make it a habit of connecting to God as you go in or out your door. Religious Jews often keep a text of scripture in a small box or mezuzah, that they touch upon entering or leaving. You could buy one or create your own practice. Think to yourself "Let's go!" as a way of reminding yourself that you aren't leaving God at home. Your family members or mates might also appreciate it if you reminded yourself upon arriving at home, that God is still with you all.
Put meaningful statements on your dashboard, refrigerator or bathroom mirror.

2. While you're waiting for anything. Why not just offer up your anxiety or impatience? Some people like the serenity prayer: "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference."

3. With friends (and maybe enemies). C.S. Lewis, keeping in mind the idea of being created in the image of God, said, "You will never meet a mere mortal." I certainly experience God through other people, whether they know it or not. When you are with other people, briefly invite God to be present also. God IS present. Inviting God is just a way of reminding us and setting our mind to the "welcoming" position.

4. Taking a breather. Is it possible that the frenetic pace we keep is less productive than a pace that allows us to step back, breathe and say a b'racha before we continue?

5. Twitter God. Just whatever you might feel like saying. God can handle it. Your friends might not "get it" but who cares? It might be the most interesting twitter all day. If you don't Twitter (I don't) just write whatever you might want to say to God in reply to the most annoying spam email of the day. The point isn't to publicize, and certainly God knows what's going on with us. The point is to be mindful of God by actively directing our thoughts to God at various points in the day.
6. On the drive home. What else are you doing? Minimally, you could say a b'racha for the music you are enjoying or ask for God's mercy and grace to enter whatever situation you are hearing about on the news.

I hope some of this inspires you to set the bar LOW. You don't need to "meditate" for 20 minutes a day. Maybe someday you'll want to (and so will I), but it is said that God says:
"When a child of mine comes to me walking, I am already running."

and:
"The Lord knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust."

Give yourself, your loved ones and the world a gift today by trying to make some sort of connection to God.