Just Enough Grace for Today

I finally finished The Wounded Healer by Henri Nouwen. (If I told you how few pages it is, you would all know how truly slow a reader I am...)

This is my last post on this book, at least for now.

In the last chapter, Nouwen introduces (to me at least) an idea that I found interesting. He is talking about the important role that hospitality plays in effective ministry. Think about the most gracious hosts you have ever met. Didn't they invite you in and do everything in their power to see to your comfort and make you feel welcome? Didn't they make you feel as if you were the most important person in the room? And didn't they somehow manage to make an entire room full of people feel this way? What a quality! But what does this have to do with ministry?

"The minister who has come to terms with his own loneliness and is at home in his own house is a host who offers hospitality to his guests. He gives them a friendly space, where they may feel free to come and go, to be close and distant, to rest and to play, to talk and to be silent, to eat and to fast. The paradox indeed is that hospitality asks for the creation of an empty space where the guest can find his own soul."

Nouwen goes on to say that this type of "hospitality" in ministry does not attempt to take away the pain and suffering of others, but invites the wounded person to recognize their suffering on a level where it can be shared. (Not sharing as in gripe session, but sharing as in ... releasing.) Nouwen says it is in the sharing of the suffering, and the affirmation by the minister that we are all a part of this human condition, that liberation begins. (And now I will paraphrase and generalize wildly...) This is not to say that we all live a life so pitiable that we should all go about gnashing our teeth and crying out "Woe is me!" But rather, it is the idea that whatever the baggage is that each of us carries through our journeys, it is most likely "average" and "normal" on the overall human scale of unfortunate events.

In other words, suffering is to be expected. Or to quote the medical profession (and apply it to life) "You may experience some discomfort."

Nouwen writes, "The Christian way of life does not take away our loneliness; it protects it and cherishes it as a precious gift. Sometimes it seems as if we do everything possible to avoid the painful confrontation with our basic human loneliness, and allow ourselves to be trapped by false gods promising immediate satisfaction and quick relief. But perhaps the painful awareness of loneliness is an invitation to transcend our limitations and look beyond the boundaries of our existence. The awareness of loneliness might be a gift we must protect and guard, because our loneliness reveals to us a n inner emptiness that can be destructive when misunderstood, but filled with promise for him who can tolerate its sweet pain."

To constantly be in search of healing or comfort or relief from suffering (Nouwen here speaks specifically of loneliness, but I am applying the concept more broadly) is somehow to deny that pain and suffering are a natural part of life. It is to deny ourselves the full experience of life, if you will. It simply is not feasible to expect to be set free from all that ails us. And perhaps an inability to accept this fact is what keeps so many of us enslaved by our "suffering." But it is more than just accepting loneliness or suffering as "to be expected." Nouwen suggests it is very useful in our ministry to others as an aid in coming to a profound understanding of the human condition. And I believe he is exactly right.

(I am laughing at myself for going off in a direction I had not intended. I originally wanted to post about an idea Nouwen shares about creation, which is the foundation of his "hospitality" argument ... and so I will do so now.)

Nouwen quotes counselor and speaker James Hillman, director of studies at the C.G. Jung Institute in Zurich, as saying, "For the other person to open and talk requires a withdrawal of the counselor. I must withdraw to make room for the other ... This withdrawal, rather than going-out-to-meet the other, is an intense act of concentration.... God as omnipresent and omnipotent was everywhere. He filled the universe with his Being. How then could the creation come about? ... God had to create by withdrawal; He created the not-Him, the other, by self-concentration ... On the human level, withdrawal of myself aids the other to come into being."

I liked this idea of "withdrawing myself" in order to allow the person I am ministering to to come into being (this is what Nouwen describes as hospitality), but more fascinating, the explanation that this is how God went about creating everything. It makes sense to apply the concept of creation to ministry. How could I possibly hope to do anything that God himself has not already done, and on a grander, more magnificent, mind-blowing scale than little old me?

The wounded healer ... is not to be pitied or discounted, but to be embraced. It is a fascinating and accurate description of effective ministry.

It is brutally, oppressively hot in Houston. I'm talking fry an egg on the sidewalk hot! I find myself drinking bottles and bottles of water in an attempt to stay hydrated.

Yesterday, while teaching at Bonita House, I suddenly realized I had left my bottle of water in the car. Zoot! My throat gets very dry while I teach, not to mention that drinking water during class is a nervous tic I have.

I kept absently reaching for a bottle of water that did not exist. At one point, I walked out of the classroom and lapped up water from my hand from a nearby hand washing station. I was just that thirsty!

One of the ladies had her son with her in class. He was probably 8 or 9. I didn't see him walk out, but suddenly he appeared holding two bottles of water. I could tell they were cold because the sides of the bottles were sweating. My mouth literally watered. I thought to myself, "Where did he get that water and where can I get some?"

Then something amazing happened. The mother instructed her young son to hand one of the bottles to me.

I think my surprise as well as my gratitude registered pretty clearly on my face. I don't know why, but I was amazed that at that very moment in time, that mother saw my need and decided to take care of it.

What a cool cup of water, on many levels....

My latest reading installment of The Wounded Healer by Henri Nouwen has the author providing a scenario in which a young, inexperienced hospital chaplain attempts to counsel and comfort a man facing surgery the next day; a surgery he may not survive (and in fact he does not). Nouwen examines the exchange and asks, what could the chaplain have done differently? One answer was to assure the man, who said at one point that "nothing and no one" were waiting for him once he left the hospital, that he DID matter; that he, the chaplain would be waiting. The implication, Nouwen says, is that this "waiting" would go beyond this life, into the next.

When people I have grown close to move away, I often comfort myself and them by saying, well at least we get to spend eternity together! Thinking about this habit of mine, and Nouwen's writings, had me imagining a scene that might take place in the next life.

I often wonder what happens to all my rehab ladies. They come and go. I see a spark in many of them and pray they go on to bigger and better experiences, including wholeness. It is so strange to feel such a tug of the heart toward people who, in essence, are complete strangers to me and eventually have them torn from the pages I call my life.

I wonder ... in the next life, will they come to me and say, "Hi Ms. Tammy!" Will I finally remember their names? Will I look at their faces and in a split second "see" what became of their lives? What became their history? I wonder ... will I experience some sort of completeness if and when all of this comes to pass?

I had a discussion about death with my eldest son the other day. I made a comment to the effect that I was ready to die; you know, had my life in order so that at any time, meeting my maker would be a pleasant encounter. He told me he would never be "ready" to die. Oh sure, he understood what I was saying, but he said he looked forward to every single day he had on this earth, no matter how many or how few they might be. He is determined to live life to the fullest and I applaud him for his passion.

I doubt I will cross over today. I assume it will be many, many years from now. Regardless, I hope I can leave an impression on another person's life every day; a fingerprint of hope. I hope when they drift off to sleep at night, they might think of our encounter and smile faintly, saying to themselves, if nothing else, she seems to think I matter. I don't think that's a lofty, idealistic goal on my part. It seems like a perfectly natural way of living...

Sometimes I think of something I want to write about and have to pause and consider, which blog does it really belong on? I try not to be too dogmatic about it, although I confess it often comes down to, "God" = "Just Enough Grace" and "Humor" = "Why So Serious."

OK, so today I guess I'm blurring the lines a little, which every writer should do from time to time. I was downloading music from itunes today. Every month, I make a music CD for the rehab ladies. So one of the songs on this month's CD is by an artist named Bishop Larry Trotter. The song in question wasn't what made me smile. It was the title of the album it appeared on: "Tell the Devil I'm Back."

I started strutting around the house, repeatedly calling out in a less-than-politically correct, black preacher's voice, "Tell the devil I'm back!" "Tell the devil I'm back!" "Tell the devil I'm back!"

To say I got a few interesting looks from my teenagers is an understatement. I think they think there Mom is pretty bizarre. Hey, I'm just trying to keep it real for them, too.

"You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." -- Psalm 51:16-17

The Psalmist makes it pretty clear that God desires for us to understand our shortcomings; to feel sorrow when we fall short of his calling. That doesn't mean we are to take whip in hand every time we fall short of perfection. (No, that is setting the bar awfully high.) It means being honest with God and saying with as much sincerity as we can muster, I shall do my best for you.

In a song called Free to be Me, Frances Battistelli sings,


She is an artist in her early 20s, but already she has hit upon a truth that has taken me twice as many years to fully grasp. The "dents" and "rips" only prevent us from approaching God when we demand perfection of ourselves and punish ourselves accordingly when perfection is not achieved.

Now don't get me wrong, John Wesley, the founder of the United Methodist Church, and the Apostle Paul (and most theologians) put a great deal of pen to paper concerning the concept of sanctification -- that process by which I live my life with the goal of perfection in mind; going on to perfection, Wesley called it. How is it then that perfection becomes my enemy? When I practice a certain cruelty toward myself in the way I react to my own struggles or failings in the process of sanctification.

In other words, cut yourself some slack!

17th century Catholic theologian St. Francis de Sales writes in Introduction to the Devout Life:

"One important direction in which to exercise gentleness, is with respect to ourselves, never growing irritated with one's self or one's imperfections; for although it is but reasonable that we should be displeased and grieved at our own faults, yet ought we to guard against a bitter, angry, or peevish feeling about them. ... All this anger and irritation against one's self fosters pride, and springs entirely from self-love, which is disturbed and fretted by its own imperfection. What we want is a quiet, steady, firm displeasure at our own faults. ...

"Believe me my daughter, as a parent's tender affectionate remonstrance has far more weight with his child than anger and sternness, so, when we judge our own heart guilty, if we treat it gently, rather in a spirit of pity than anger, encouraging it to amendment, its repentance will be much deeper and more lasting than if stirred up in vehemence and wrath. ...

"So then, when you have fallen, lift up your heart in quietness, humbling yourself deeply before God by reason of your frailty, without marveling that you fell; there is no cause to marvel because weakness is weak, or infirmity infirm Heartily lament that you should have offended God, and begin anew to cultivate the lacking grace, with a very deep trust in His Mercy, and with a bold, brave heart."

In other words, be honest about the dents in your fender and the rips in your jeans, but otherwise surrender the whip. It's OK. It's who you are. Realize God is never surprised or aghast by anything you do. His love for your is constant, no matter what.

Go on to perfection, with God's help. But don't crucify yourself in the process.

I smiled an evil grin at Dorothy, one of the residents of a homeless shelter where I eat on Wednesdays.

She had just told me "not to waste my time" talking to her roommate, who, in her words, hated everyone and was a pagan.

"Do you mean pagan as in atheist or pagan as in somebody who worships nature and creation?" I asked.

She replied, as in atheist.

I smiled again. "Well that just makes me more determined," I said.

Dorothy tried to convince me her roommate was a hopeless case. Little did she realize she was goading me on, practically baiting me. I was getting ready to leave, but delightful little thoughts danced through my head of attempting to engage this "hopeless pagan" on another day.

When they say, be nice, here comes the "church lady," I laugh.

When one guy inquires, "How's your cult?" I giggle.

When I ask, "How's it going?" and one woman mutters under her breath, "Better if you weren't here," I smile big. "Oh, you'll have to do better than that," I say. "I grew up with 3 big brothers. You'll have to be much meaner!"

I don't even know what hopeless pagan roommate's name is, which is a direct contradiction of our "no name ministry" at the homeless shelter. That's OK ... I'll find out soon enough, and I'll probably get an interesting ear full as well.

I dare her to try to spurn my attentions.

Once the gauntlet has been thrown down, I can be quite determined...

In his song "Dive," Steven Curtis Chapman writes/sings,

I’m diving in, I’m going deep in over
my head, I want to be
Caught in the rush, lost in the flow,
in over my head, I want to go
The river’s deep, the river’s wide,
the river’s water is alive
So sink or swim, I’m diving in

and so on and so forth. The song is based on Romans 11:33-36 and Ephesians 3:16-19. Hmm ... what do those passages say? Let's see...

Here's the Roman's passage:

33Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! 34"Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?" 35"Who has ever given to God,
that God should repay him?" 36For from him and through him and to him are all things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.

Here's Ephesians:

16I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Both passages speak to a saturation of sorts; an heightened experience of God's presence, through exposure to the wisdom and knowledge of God and the power of the Lord's Spirit.

What I want to suggest or propose in this post is that experiencing God's presence in this manner is essential to our spiritual growth, but will actually bring about a limited amount of fruit as well as progress where the Kingdom of God is concerned if we do not also dive in to ministry. I use the phrase "dive in" to suggest that true ministry happens when you close the gap between you and those you serve.

I've been reading Henri Nouwen's The Wounded Healer. Nouwen writes, "... pastoral conversation is not merely a skillful use of conversational techniques to manipulate people into the Kingdom of God, but a deep human encounter in which a man is willing to put his own faith and doubt, his own hope and despair, his own light and darkness at the disposal of others who want to find a way through their confusion and touch the solid core of life. In this context preaching means more than handing over a tradition; it is rather the careful and sensitive articulation of what is happening in the community so that those who listen can say: 'You say what I suspected, you express what I vaguely felt, you bring to the fore what I fearfully kept in the back of my mind. Yes, yes -- you say who we are, you recognize our condition...'"

I do not believe Nouwen is suggesting that we monopolize opportunities for teaching and witnessing with endless anecdotes from our own lives, which, whether intentionally in our motives or not, can cause people to remark, "Wow, I had no idea; poor dear; truly, you have suffered." No, somehow there is a way of accomplishing this "articulation" in an authentic manner that I simply define in my mind as "keeping it real."

I will tell you that one of the by-products of keeping it real can be a dangerous, self-righteous attitude of, "Those of you who are not in the trenches as I am have NO idea what it's like to be me..." In its purest form, keeping it real can produce an intense need for validation or confirmation or affinity from others similarly engaged; it can also lead to feelings of isolation if you don't become extremely intentional in finding ways to soothe and feed your soul with like-minded and like-occupied individuals.

Yes, there is a cost associated with diving in. But truly, at least for me, I find I cannot approach ministry in any other fashion. And I pray you will forgive me for coming off as egotistical or super-spiritual in my attempts to express what is foremost in my mind these days. I assure you quite the opposite it true.

Jesus told his followers, where your treasure is, your heart will follow. He was speaking of monetary treasure, but surely the concept can be applied to that which means the most to us.

I can write checks all day long. It's just money (or at least that's what my husband says). No, my treasure is time. It was a lesson I was reminded of this past week, during a youth group mission trip to Matamoros.

I've been reading a book called A Minute of Margin, by Richard Swenson. It's a "devotional" version of his earlier book, Margin, which refers to "breathing space" in our lives. Clearly, most of us live with very little margin.

In Mexico, it was so simple. Get up, eat, drive to the work site, shovel sand to make concrete, drink, rest here and there, eat some more, shovel some more, go home, shower, eat again, sleep. There were three Mexican workers helping us at the work site. They never seemed to be terribly concerned about what time it was; or rather how long particular activities took. We were using a concrete mixing machine. One day, it was being very temperamental and would not start. Over and over and over again, they wrapped a piece of rope around the starter and yanked it hard. Just about the time us Americans would begin staring at our watches and bemoaning all the time being wasted, with almost comic timing, the foreman, Ines, would begin to sing this silly tune he sings all the time. The comic relief was perfect. But even more perfect was his understanding of American anxiety about the passage of time.

In today's reading, Swenson explains that the Bible uses two words to denote time. One is chronos, which refers to the linear measurement of the past, present and future -- the hours. The other is kairos, which refers to significant experiences or events and not linear time. Jesus, he says, lived more in kairos than in chronos. OH that I could do the same!

Every day, I wake up and begin to think to myself, what do I have to do today? It's as if the stop watch begins ticking. I feel the pressure of the constraints of time squeezing me from all sides. Even now, I know I need to finish this post so that I can do some other reading I need to do, run some errands and work on Monday's lesson.

In the 70s, musical artist David Bowie sang, "Time may change me, but I can't trace time."

Ah yes, try as we may, we cannot hold onto time. Like water being poured into our cupped hands, it slips through the cracks and trickles to the ground, never to be retrieved again.

"The gods confound the man who first found out how to distinguish hours! Confound him, too, who in this place set up a sun-dial, to cut and hack my days so wretchedly into small portions" -- Plautus, 200 B.C.

Kairos. Beautiful, peaceful kairos. My soul longs for kairos; longs to be free of the ruthless demands of chronos.