too little too much just enough

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I am knee-deep in writing my doctoral thesis. Actually, it might be more accurate to say that the water is just beginning to lap at my ankles, but nevertheless, I wade into the muck of words on a regular basis and try to move forward. Moving forward is sometimes a bit complicated. A few weeks ago, our air conditioner did a very good impersonation of Niagara Falls and and spewed water all over the stairway. After taking the machine apart and fixing it for the eleven-hundredth time (it is old and needs tender loving care on a regular basis), I checked out the storage space underneath the stairs and found that the water had seeped through the floor and specks of mould were beginning to form on the drywall. Oh oh! It was the day before we were leaving for vacation, so we couldn't deal with it immediately.

This past week we removed everything from the storage room (who knew such a small space could house a gazillion boxes of stuff that I didn't even remember we had?), dried out the wet stuff, went through everything, and decided whether we should keep it, sell it, shred it, or simply toss it in the garbage.

I used the past tense there because it makes me feel better. In truth, this process is very much in the present, continuous tense. Much of the house is taken over by boxes and plastic storage bins containing financial records, old files and photo albums, vinyl records, cassettes, VHS tapes, a hammock, and 28 small drinking glasses, all in various stages of drying, being sorted, being sold, or waiting to be thrust into the dreaded shredder. It's kind of like moving without actually going anywhere. Oh, and did I mention I have house guests arriving next week? Surprise!

In theory, I like surprises. As surprises go, this one is not so bad. After the initial sharp intake of breath and the natural reflex of tightening one's shoulders to brace for disaster, I am taking it in stride. I have found that I can actually work on my thesis surrounded by half-packed boxes and general untidiness, at least temporarily. And one of the wonders of nature is that things just naturally dry out after being exposed to fresh air for a few days. In addition, we have lovely large garbage bins at the back of our parking lot which are hungry for all kinds of moist cardboard and smelly refuse. Best of all, we are simplifying life a bit and that is actually one of the reasons why I like moving every few years: it keeps life from getting too cluttered. This situation has once again brought up two challenges which I continue to face.

First, I am one of those people who can be prone to feeling like I lack something: I don't have enough love, enough patience, enough smarts, enough energy, enough cats ... you catch my drift. It is helpful to remind myself that Jesus is enough. I read the Matthew account of Jesus feeding the five thousand this morning and it became an invitation to peace, to rest, to thankfulness, to not panicking. The story shows us that contrary to our urge to accumulate things (Hey! We need more fishes and more loaves!), Jesus's way is to take what we have and show us that it is enough. Not because we are enough, but because Jesus is enough.

Second, I am also prone to feeling like it is all too much. I get short of breath when my house is cluttered, when too many people are talking, when I am faced with multiple tasks that demand action all at the same time, and when there is very little silence or space to move. Many times I don't want more (unless it is popcorn), I want less. That same story of Jesus feeding the five thousand begins with Jesus receiving the horrible news that his cousin, John, has just been killed in a gruesome manner. Jesus retreats to have some alone time, but people follow him and soon there is a crowd, eager for miracles. Jesus does what I find nearly impossible to do: he has compassion on people when he is the one who needs compassion. He spends all day healing the sick and then he feeds the crowd. Jesus takes "too much" and makes it really simple. He has compassion. He takes care of the people in front of him. And then he goes to the mountain and talks to God. (See Matthew 14)

Where I have lack, Jesus is enough. When life is too much, Jesus can make it simple. This is my prayer today.

Names of God

The Hebrew word "YHWH" (read from right to left) This past Sunday I gave a talk on the Names of God, the beginning of a series on this topic. This first talk was to be a gentle introduction so I thought it wouldn't take too many hours of preparation. Well, I quickly discovered that the research is almost bottomless; every time I thought I had a somewhat definitive list of names, I found another source which added a few more or gave a different twist on some of the names I had already come across. After several hours I was getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data (and that was only looking at the Hebrew Bible). I wondered how I could present this to people in an orderly and accessible fashion and within a reasonable time frame. Not everyone is up for a 3-hour lecture crammed full of detail on a Sunday morning. So I took a break and spent a bit of time meditating on this problem and asking the Spirit for guidance. And then I thought that being overwhelmed by Go

it's a mad mad mad world (of theology)

The mad dash for the end of term has begun. I have finished all my required readings and have jumped into research reading. One of my papers is on the madness of theology (the correlation seems more obvious to some of us than to others). Truly inspiring stuff, I am finding. Let me share a few quotes here: There is a certain madness in Christianity – in a desert God who is jealous and passionate, in a saviour who speaks in apocalyptic terms, in a life of sacrificial love, in the scandal of particularity. In principle, a confessional theology should bear the mark of this madness, but the mark or wound must constantly be renewed. - Walter Lowe, "Postmodern Theology" in The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology , 2007. “In the Scriptures the odd phenomena constituting the ‘Kingdom of God’ are the offspring of the shock that is delivered by the name of God to what is there called the ‘world,’ resulting in what I call a ‘sacred anarchy.’ Consider but a sampling o

comedic timing

Comic by Joel Micah Harris at xkcd.com One of my favourite jokes goes like this: Knock, knock. Who's there? Interrupting cow Interrupting cow w--- Moooooooo!! Timing is important in both drama and comedy. A well-paced story draws the audience in and helps it invest in the characters, while a tale too hastily told or too long drawn out will fail to engage anyone. Surprise - something which interrupts the expected - is a creative use of timing and integral to any good story. If someone is reading a novel and everything unfolds in a predictable manner, they will probably wonder why they bothered reading the book. And so it is in life. Having life be predictable all of the time is not as calming as it sounds. We love surprises, especially good surprises like birthday parties, gifts, marriage proposals, and finding something that we thought was lost. Surprises are an important part of humour. A good joke is funny because it goes to a place you didn't expect it to go. Sim

outWORD by Matte Downey

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