A savior's a nuisance to live with at home

I've always liked that line from Joan Baez's song.  It speaks to me now in the context of my most common manic symptom. 

Would that I might be a savior, the suffering would be redeemed, and in the end it would all make sense. 

"While divorce is always the consequence of sin, the sin itself is not the divorce, but all those actions leading up to the breakdown of the relationship.  To the contrary, when a couple gets to the point that there is nothing "holy" about their "holy" marriage, divorce can be a gracious act of God whereby they are set free from the former sins, and are able to be born again."

I preached those two sentences in my first parish.  About six weeks later one of my parishioners shared with me that she had left her husband after 25 years of  marriage.  My immediate response was "Oh no, what happened?"  She went on to say, "Well, you preached that sermon, and talked about divorce being an act of God's grace when a marriage is no longer holy.  I realized that it has been a long time since my marriage was holy, and your sermon set me free from the guilt that I had to stay, and so I left."  Sermons can have profound consequences.

What I learned was that her marriage had been highly abusive.  As she broke free, she blossomed.  Life became joyful for her again.  Grace abounded.

"For unto you is born this day a savior. . ."

Now a preacher is trained to say "That was not me, but the Spirit working through me. . ."  Proper humility is the expectation.  The truth is it feels good to be a savior.  That's the ego speaking, and we all have one.  Not only that, we deeply yearn for some validation of the work we do.  And even if it is the work of the Spirit, there is a reward in believing that the Spirit 'worked through you'.  God's voice.

A savior.  Having experienced that, it became a vocational goal.  A lot of things factored into that.  To many to mention here.  But I embarked on the quest.  Other situations would arise.  I learned a couple of things.  First, I learned that helping abused women to break free rarely has the immediate and clear result that it did that first time.  In one case, what happened was not that the woman broke free, but that at the very least she came to realize that her husband's anger issues were his problem, not her's.  In that there was healing, and the marriage was saved.  In time I realized that this outcome was good, though I might have wished that the anger had gone entirely away.

But the second lesson I learned was that if you aspire to be a savior, you had better be prepared to be crucified.  People, in general, do not like saviors.  They are a nuisance to live with at home, and a significant problem to deal with elsewhere. 

In hindsight, I learned other lessons as well, such as if you're going to go down that path and save women, you'd better have a clear understanding about emotional transference and tread very carefully. 

Oh, and there is also this thing called mania.  "Some people with bipolar disorder become psychotic when manic or depressed -- for example, hearing things that aren't there. They may hold onto false beliefs, too. In some instances, they see themselves as having superhuman skills and powers -- even considering themselves to be god-like."

Ok, well, there is that.  I would suppose that self identifying as a 'savior' might qualify as considering oneself to be "god-like", but that kind of takes the fun out of it.

The thing that is so attractive about seeing one's self as a savior is that it provides a framework within which one can interpret one's suffering, and add a redemptive value to it.  There is even a tinge of the savior mentality that goes into writing this blog.  "If I through sharing my experience can help others, then there is great value, redemptive value, to all I have suffered." 

My savior aspirations became more varied.  Establishing "12 Step" congregations base on the spiritual principles of AA.  Utilizing senior housing as a means of church growth.  And others. 

The difficult thing about being bipolar in one's moods and thinking is that it is difficult to find that middle ground.  Its either manic, or depressed, and the healthy middle is often illusive.  The medications I am on tend to manage the moods better than they do the thought patterns.  I see the two as quite distinct. 

If I am not a savior then the suffering is just suffering.  Rejection is not seen within the context of the way the prophets have been rejected before, but rather as just deep personal failure.  Self doubt becomes paramount.  The manic side says I can be the best pastor ever, the depressed side feels a total failure. 

It's a matter of faith, I would suppose, to believe in a healthy way that while not a savior, I've made a difference in a positive way.  I say it's a matter of faith, because often this disease prevents one from confidently seeing that and affirming that.  Faith helps me to believe that neither the highs nor the lows are reality.  It's alright to not be Jesus, but that doesn't mean one is thereby Judas, either.  Maybe Mark, as in the Gospel of Mark, is someone to aspire to follow.  Tradition tells us Mark's Gospel is the record of Peter's preaching.  Perhaps.  The point being that we are witnesses, not the main character.  We tell of the work of the Savior, without becoming the savior. 

Today I will lead worship at my little congregation.  The savior mentality within me sees this as an opportunity to redevelop and grow the congregation into one that is thriving, against all odds.  The depressed side tends to envision it as merely a matter of time before the congregation will have to close.  The healthy middle ground may be something more like, "Today, I can care for these people, at this time, and they will be spiritually fed, today.  The Word will be preached, the sacrament shared.  That I can and will do, the rest is up to God."

It may just be, that in the end, God will prove to be a better savior than I. 

Sacred Time. Sacred Space.

Sacred time.  Sacred Space.

Jacob declared of Bethel, where God renewed the promise he had made to Abraham:

"How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven."

Perhaps we don’t appreciate the sacred as much as we should.  Everything and everyplace is so ordinary to us. 

One of my favorite stories is about representatives of the Native American community that were constantly showing up at hearings and objecting to opening up more forest land with logging roads.

“This land is sacred to my people”, they would declare at each and every hearing.

“Is there any place that is not sacred to you and your people?” one logging company executive finally replied in exasperation.

“Now, Sir, you are finally beginning to understand my people”, was the response.

I’m thinking about the sacred these days. 

We have our sanctuaries.  And in time they become sacred to us.  The stairs at the entry are visibly worn from the flow of people in and out for generations.

When we traveled to Russia we were able to visit the Cathedral of St. Sophia in Novgorod which has been a place of worship throughout its 1,000 year history.  It is so ancient there are archeological digs within the sanctuary, revealing the original floor.

As is typical, the icons painted on the walls follow a progression from the earth below to the heavens above.  One cannot stand in such a place without having one’s head bend backward as your eyes are drawn up to the heavenly scenes above.

I think also of the little Egland Lutheran Church out on the prairie of NE South Dakota, near the farm of our family.

There, surrounding the church is the cemetery.  There we laid to rest one family member after another.

Grandma Louise played organ in that church for decades.  How many times “Holy, Holy, Holy” welcomed people to worship one can never know, but it’s as though the walls themselves could sing the song.

“This is the gate of heaven.”

My desk now sits in our living room, having been moved from its former place as we remodeled my office to make a bedroom for Dad.

And this morning, as I write, both Mom and Dad’s ashes are in the urn on my desk, waiting to be transported back to Kalispell, and then to the cemetery in Polson. 

I am anticipating moving my desk back to where it used to be, and reclaiming that room as my office.

And yet it has changed.

It has become a sacred space, for there, right where my desk will stand, my Father died. 

“This is the gate of heaven.”

There Dad came face to face with his Savior, and was drawn from this earth into the heavens above. 

And the Divine light will always cast a shadow on the walls.

Sacred Time.  Sacred Space.

The question was raised about whether we should scatter some of Mom and Dad’s ashes at their lake place in Elmo, MT.   I objected.

My concern is that the future of the lake place is still up in the air, and should we have to sell it, it will be much easier if it is not the place where our parent’s ashes are scattered.

Scattering the ashes creates a sacred space.

The irony is that my own home has become such a sacred space.

I anticipate the move back into that space in our home.

There I will study the word.  Sermons will be written.  And through the Word, Jesus’ face will be revealed.

There in that space that Dad saw Jesus face to face, I too will encounter my Savior.

There Angels will ascend and descend on the stairway to heaven, messengers speaking the Divine Word into our ordinary world.

That place where I have often wrestled with God through times of depression and despair will now be a sanctuary. 

No, I don’t plan on erecting an altar there.  There are other places for that.

But I will remember.

I will remember that for one brief but shining moment, it was there that my Father saw the face of God.

I find myself wondering about the future.

Will one day a bed be made there again, only this time for me as I take my final breaths on this earth?

Only time will tell.

For now the Sacred will be found in the ordinary.

A few feet away from that holy space where Dad died, is our dining table.

There we break bread together.

There we gather with family and friends.

There we teach our grandson to pray.

And there amid all that ordinary stuff, we encounter the hidden God.

And the angels sing “Holy, Holy, Holy!”

Killing the savior

"The Zen Master warns: “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him!” This admonition points up that no meaning that comes from outside of ourselves is real. The Buddhahood of each of us has already been obtained. We need only recognize it."

I am not Buddhist.  But I heard this saying back when I was in seminary and I've remembered it.  I won't attempt to interpret this from a Buddhist perspective.  But it causes me to think of  my own situation and experience of being bipolar, and stimulates yet another thought.  Perhaps the opposite thought.

"If you meet a savior within yourself, kill him!"

If there is one word that best describes my manic side it would be 'savior'.  It's wrapped in a sense of a holy calling, a mission to make a difference, a conviction that "I can fix that", and a sense that many depend on my fulfilling this purpose.  If I don't do it, who will?

"Who will?"

There's an obvious answer to that.  As a person of faith I believe deeply in the one and only One who is the Savior of the World.  

Believing this leads me to the conviction that whenever that savior mentality enters my brain, I must kill it.  I relate to John the Baptist's statement, "I am not the Messiah."  That is a confession of faith in the one who is.

Christmas Eve services.  Always a highlight of the Church Year.  Typically the largest attendance, and this held true for us as well.  But there was disappointment.  I have been experimenting with using Facebook advertising to try and extend the outreach of our little congregation.  Our invitation to Christmas Eve services went out to 1241 households in the Otis Orchards area.  1241.  Our attendance was 41. That's approximately double our normal attendance, fairly typical for a Christmas Eve service, especially when we know that some of our regulars are attending elsewhere with their families and others probably stayed home because of the icy roads.  But I must confess I had hoped that my efforts at outreach would have netted a lot more.  Especially because my family alone accounted for nine of those in attendance.  I dreamed of a standing room only crowd.  

Kill the savior.

This morning I'm thinking of a strawberry patch.  The thing about strawberries is that you can plant and nourish those first starts, but it is the strawberries themselves that send out the shoots that grow the patch.  I would say that we sow the seeds, but the growth comes from God.  But even that is too much.  The seeds of faith are sown by the Holy Spirit.  Not us.

Kill the savior.

In the end, faced with the decline of the Church in our country, and the challenges of growing my own little congregation, perhaps the most faithful response is simply to recognize that the responsibility for revitalizing the Church is God's alone.  God's alone.

There is no reason to get depressed about 'our failures', cause it wasn't our responsibility in the first place.  I would like to counsel God about a reasonable direction forward, and the need for real growth in our Church and congregation, but alas, God does not need my counsel.  Whatever God is doing, God is doing.  

Kill the savior, and let the Savior live.  

694

I was blown out of the water this morning.  As I opened up my other blog page, wanderingsthroughtheword.com the statistics on the home page surprised me.  Over 700 page views this week.  A little research and I discovered that 694 of those were from the nation of Israel.  

I had written a post about Psalm 137.  Perhaps that's what stimulated the surge in readers.  I don't know.  I wonder though.  My mind races.  And I am ever conscious of my own manic tendency toward a 'savior' mentality, and/or 'grandiose' thoughts.  

This is the way that works.  A simple fact that there were 694 page views from Israel.  It could be that something I wrote simply was picked up by the Google search engine, and resulted in the hits.  Did 694 people in Israel do a Google search on Psalm 137 and my post came up?  Could be that simple.  

But then I begin to wonder who those 694 people are.  Are they Christians, Jewish, or Muslim?  And is what I'm writing resonating with them.  From that my mind moves toward the question of ministry.  Have I stumbled into a new calling?  Has my blog become a platform for my own foreign missionary work?  Most of my page views come from the USA.  A sizable amount have come from Israel, and almost as many have come from the Ukraine.  
And then I wonder how I might make a significant difference.  My mind races. . .

Rein it in, Dave, rein it in.

I am not Israel's savior.  I am not destined to be the next Billy Graham.  

And then the verses come to mind, shared with me many years ago by a patient I came to know when I was serving as a hospital chaplain:

So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;

it shall not return to me empty,

but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,

and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Isaiah 55:11

This is the thing.  Amid all the concerns that I might be headed in the direction of mania, there is this hope that to the extent I am a minister of the Gospel, God's Word, not mine, might have an impact in the lives of those who hear it.  I am not the savior (as my manic side would like to believe), but at the same time there is a Savior, and of him we bear witness.  

One final thought:  Could it be that God harnesses and uses the gifts of bipolar people for the sake of a bold witness to the world?  Can it be that this disease that could destroy me, might also be a gift to empower me?

A second 'final' thought:  Coming out of depression does not necessarily mean that a manic episode is imminent.  It's quite possible that an extended period of mood stability and a healthy balance is actually what is being experienced.  That would be alright.