Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and
again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such
grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls
us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it
is grace because it gives a man the only true life. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters from Prison
Yours are the heavens;
the earth also is yours; you laid the foundations of the world and all that is
in it. Psalm 89:11
So
really I am sitting on the steps of a back porch in Carmel-by-the-Sea watching
extra big and bright stars fade into smeary golden lavender sunrise. Bink bink
bink. One at a time they, albeit an incongruous oxymoron, click off silently.
And God shook me awake while it was still dark because He wanted to talk to me.
And
yesterday after Manuel fiddled with the google.maps he plugged his phone into
the speaker system of Uncle Ted’s now low rider crushed velvet and bedangled
Cadillac and out poured Bob Marley and
Every Little Thing Going to Be Alright as we swung into the Highway 101 merge
lane.
And
I have been thinking a lot Uncle Ted this morning. The Manuel and Christy road
trip is going to take us through Death Valley and somehow its harshly
contrasting beauty spoke to the soul of Ted. I am not sure of the veracity of
remembered details but the family oral tradition has him making an annual
pilgrimage of sorts to the god of irony in a three-piece suit and perhaps a
swirled martini.
And
really life is a Death Valley pilgrimage for each of us, and I will fear no
evil. Because the heavens are Yours. And the earth. And all that is within. For
Thou art with me.
And
You prepare a table for me, and fill the hungry with good things. And we talked
about pilgrimages last night over yet another filled with good things moment of scallopine sprinkled with gremolata and a dusting of freshly ground Parmesan
around the table of Michael and Eva.
And I guess at lunch yesterday too, with the artists Anthony
and Beryl that we met in Lugo, nestled in their San Francisco rooftop vegetable
garden taken over by a voracious passion fruit vine and the glorious spread of
lox and bagels and goat cheese and reddest and sweetest fresh-picked tomatoes
ever. And their journey to notice beauty and somehow capture it on canvas stacks
in vivid color.
And I thought about Marco yesterday as Manuel and jolted up
and down the hills by cable car after we visited the de Young modern art museum
and swooped up into the elevator of the tower so we could say we had seen all
of San Francisco. And how I can really see California beach towns now because Marco
took time to notice the beauty through a camera lens so many years ago. Otherwise
it is so easy to pass the door stoop sitters by.
And
while it was still dark Michael talked to me about life over cappuccino just
before he headed off to the hospital this morning. About beauty and peace in
the midst of a hard world. And he told me to go outside and watch the stars, so
I did.
Just
before I left home I was reading Bonhoeffer’s last reflection on life, Ethics. And for him the ideas of ethics
is an ironic oxymoron of sorts as well. For him, Ethics is all about man’s
attempts to be god, to slice and dice good and evil. For a philosopher kind of
guy, at the end of it all, he was not so much about flights of ideas.
Rather Bonheoffer calls us to action. To do the will of God.
Just do it.
Do and dare what is
right, not swayed by the whim of the moment. Bravely take hold of the real, not
dallying now with what might be. Not in the flight of ideas but only in action
is freedom. Make up your mind and come out into the tempest of living. God’s
command is enough and your faith in him to sustain you. Then at last freedom
will welcome your spirit amid great rejoicing.
And
Ethics is a book pasted together from
the bits and pieces left behind, hidden in shoeboxes, after the Gestapo
arrested him but they could not imprison his spirit. Or silence his pen.
And our Monday night
book club finished up Life Together. We talked a lot about confession because
that is not so much a part of the basic evangelical practice these days. We are
a lot more about covering up with pointing fingers. One of my kiddos reminded
me last week, “Remember, Miss, when you point, three fingers are pointing back
to you.”
Life Together is one of confession.
And forgiveness. And in Letters from
Prison Bonheoffer had these words of truth: In a word, live together in the forgiveness of your sins, for without
it no human fellowship, least of all a marriage, can survive. Don’t insist on
your rights, don’t blame each other, don’t judge or condemn each other, don’t
find fault with each other, but accept each other as you are, and forgive each
other every day from the bottom of your hearts.
And
my prayer for this odd little trip to fetch the car to Tucson was this: Open, Lord, my eyes that I may see. Open,
Lord, my ears that I may hear. Open, Lord, my heart and my mind that I may
understand. So shall I turn to you and be healed.
The will of God is even more piercingly clear than the fog
drifting away from the horizon in front of me.
Again and again because I am such an eyes-on-the-waves
instead of Him who walks on the waves storm-tossed follower: Insist not. Blame
not. Judge not.
See. Hear. Understand.
Only in action is
freedom.
And you will be healed.
And
yep that dorky-little-eight-year-old me claimed for her life verse, Rejoice always, I say it again rejoice.
Be
happy.
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