“Come bow beneath the flowing wave. Christ stands here by your side

and raises you as from the grave God raised the crucified.”

– Thomas Troeger

Beloved of God,

When the crab boat Scandies Rose went down in frigid Alaskan waters last week, rescuers managed to save two of the seven crew members, plucking them from a life raft in the middle of the night in high seas and a -10 wind chill.  As hard as it is for me to imagine crewing on a crab boat it’s even harder for me to imagine being on a Coast Guard rescue crew that would be called to action under conditions such as these.  (The year I tried out for the high school water polo team quickly led me to the conclusion that water was not my medium for athletic success!)  The truth is the Coast Guard’s rescue diver training program is the toughest and most demanding of any branch of the military.  The attrition rate for the training program hovers around 50%.  The base physical fitness requirements are daunting—performance minimums include:  50 push-ups, 60 sit-ups, 5 pull-ups, 5 chin-ups, a 500 yard crawl swim in 12 minutes, a 25 year underwater swim (repeated four times), a buddy tow of 200 yards. Recommended fitness metrics are even higher.  Add to these the need to think clearly and perform challenging tasks while submerged, holding your breath, and getting tossed around my 10-20 ft. waves; then mix in the harsh and frigid conditions that are the norm for boats plying Alaskan waters in the winter, and my awe and admiration for those who feel called to this work grows ever higher.  A high level of discipline is required of those who take on these physically and psychologically demanding roles.

In her book on the Rule of Benedict, Joan Chittister writes about another kind of discipline; the discipline of the spiritual life:

“The spiritual life is not something that is gotten for the wishing or assumed by affectation. The spiritual life takes discipline.  It is something to be learned, to be internalized.  It’s not a set of daily exercises; it’s a way of life, an attitude of mind, an orientation of soul.  And it is gotten by being schooled until no rules are necessary.”[1]

She retells a story from the ancients:

“What action shall I perform to attain God?” the disciple asked the elder.

“If you wish to attain God,” the elder replied, “there are two things you must know.  The first is that all efforts to attain God are of no avail.  The second is that you must act as if you did not know the first.”

Chittister concludes: “The secret of the spiritual life is to live it until it becomes real.”

If you’re experience is like mine, the challenges that were present in 2019 are still present in 2020.  As in years past, events both within and beyond our control will demand a response from us.  How will we respond?  For my part, I believe the best strategy for attending to these challenges is to follow the path of Jesus within the context of community.  This Way has its origins in the waters of baptism—waters that both drown and save us; waters that claim and name us; waters that follow us, wherever we go, our whole life long.  When two of our young people, Austin and Kimberly, come forward to be baptized on January 12, let’s “bow beneath the flowing wave” with them and join the refrain of all the baptized through the centuries:

Water, River, Spirit, Grace, sweep over me, sweep over me!

Recarve the depths your fingers traced in sculpting me.[2]

With you, on the Way, Pastor Erik

[1] Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict: A Spirituality for the 21st Century. (New York: Crossroads, 2010) p. 21

[2] Thomas Troeger.

“Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.  Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly.  But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream…”

– Matthew 1:18-20a

Beloved of God,

This month we enter the Year of Matthew. Not that we won’t also hear from Luke at Christmas—and a good deal from John, too, especially during Easter. But Matthew is our gospel of reference as Advent and the story of Jesus’ birth begin to unfold.  And Matthew’s take on the story is decidedly different than Luke’s.  In Luke’s story—with which we’re most familiar, the one we hear told every Christmas Eve—Mary holds center stage and the narrative follows her encounter with God’s messenger Gabriel, her visit to her pregnant elder cousin Elizabeth, her journey with Joseph to Bethlehem and the circumstances which attend Jesus’ birth there.  But in Matthew’s story Joseph has a much more prominent role in the drama:  it is he rather than Mary who has the encounter with God’s messenger (in a dream…like his ancestor and namesake Joseph, the son of Jacob); it is he who takes in and trusts the news that the Holy Spirit—and not some other guy—is responsible for his fiancée being pregnant.  Matthew takes us inside Joseph’s process of discerning what he should do when Mary tells him she’s expecting.  He’s described as a “righteous man,” one willing to go the extra mile and unwilling to expose Mary to public disgrace.  In a Middle Eastern culture highly focused on honor and shame, that’s saying something.

In countries throughout the Middle East and South Asia even today one hears of fathers who undertake to preserve their family honor by putting their daughters to death for real, assumed, or rumored transgressions.  If a woman or girl in these places is accused or suspected of engaging in behavior that could taint her family’s status, she can face brutal retaliation from her relatives that often results in violent death.  The United Nations estimates that around 5,000 women and girls are murdered each year in so-called “honor killings” by members of their families.  According to Amnesty International these so-called “honor” crimes are rooted in a global culture of discrimination against women, and the deeply rooted belief that women are objects and commodities, not human beings entitled to dignity and rights equal to those of men.  Women’s bodies, particularly, are considered the repositories of family honor, and under the control and responsibility of her family (especially her male relatives).  Large sections of these societies share traditional conceptions of family honor and approve of “honor” killings to preserve that honor.  Neither is America immune. This narrative found its way to our shores ten years ago in the case of Noor Almaleki, a 20 year old woman of Iraqi heritage who was run over and killed in Phoenix, Arizona, by a car driven by her father, Faleh Hassan Almaleki. (He was later convicted of manslaughter and is serving a 34 year sentence for her death.)

In the culture in which Joseph was raised the penalty for adultery was death by stoning. This leads me to ask: How difficult was it REALLY for Joseph to choose not to expose Mary to public disgrace and scorn and potential violence, but instead to let their betrothal go away quietly?  This high stakes tightrope of a story, told so sparingly by Matthew, beckons us to reflect more deeply on how it is that the Creator of the Universe would tread so closely to the edge of chaos in order become Emmanuel—God with us. As the Year of Matthew unfolds, we’ll return to that question—and many others, again and again.

“O Come, O, Come, Immanuel!”

“As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”

– Colossians 2:6-7

Beloved of God,

My first Call brought me and my young family to the Redwood Coast of Northwestern California where I remember the excitement of exploring those ancient forests.  Driving south on Highway 101 along the Eel River we entered Humboldt Redwoods State Park, one of the last remaining refuges for the great trees, and took the exit for FOUNDER’S GROVE.  Stepping out of the car in that majestic grove was like stepping into a cathedral.  The sheer scale of the trees left us slack jawed and tongue-tied.  Within a ten mile radius of where we stood were some of the largest and most accessible Redwood giants on the planet—trees that towered over 350 feet, with trunks measuring 15 feet or more in diameter, some of which were seedlings when Jesus was a boy. Redwoods were turning soil, air, and water into leaf, branch, and trunk eons before human beings made their appearance on planet Earth.   So ancient is the trees’ lineage that the footfalls of dinosaurs once echoed between their trunks. And now here we were standing in their shadows, craning our necks in awe, hushed and humbled by these greatest of living beings.

What allows these majestic trees to achieve a longevity that other tree species cannot? In a word: their root system. But it isn’t the depth of the root system that makes the critical difference—even the greatest giants have roots extending only 6-12 feet deep. It’s the breadth of the root system that’s key. Redwoods create the strength to withstand powerful winds and floods through the centuries by extending their roots more than 50 feet from the trunk and by living in groves where those roots can intertwine. Recent research into forest ecology has shown that interlocking root systems like these provide not only physical support; the healthier trees actually share nutrient resources with the younger and more vulner­able trees with which they are connected. Trees, it turns out, know something about living in a supportive community.

When measured against the lifespan of an ancient Redwood, the 75 years the Peace Lutheran has been around is a brief moment in time. Yet in human terms, it’s not insignificant. The same principle that contributes to the health and longevity of Redwood trees contributes to the health and longevity of human communities—namely our ability to extend our roots outward, to cultivate shared commitments and shoulder shared burdens, to grow strong and interdependent from the name we receive at the Font and the nourishment we receive at the Table. The congregation we know as PEACE grows stronger when we promote a healthy interdependence and attentiveness to needs and opportunities which exist within our community and this neighborhood at 39th and Thistle where God has planted us.

During the run-up to our 75th Celebration all sorts of new gifts and givers have surfaced—one of the great outcomes of this whole process!  Our yearlong celebration of God’s steadfast accompaniment with us over three quarters of a century has brought renewed energy.  A good deal of that energy has been focused on updating our physical structure so that it better reflects the vibrant nature of our community.  But the energy must not stop there.  It must spill out beyond these doors and walls and windows into our neighborhood; the roots must continue to grow outward, seeking new connections.  This is always the journey which we’re about.  A joy filled and thanksful 75th dear Peacefolk!  I can’t wait to see what God will be up to next.

With you on the Way,

Pastor Erik