Home Repairs 7/25/1993

First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan

Scripture: Luke 10:38-42

There once lived a couple, a man and his wife, in a small house in the city.  One day the man noticed that a tree, a sapling really, was starting to grow through the living room floor. He thought about mentioning it to his wife, but he didn’t for fear of feeling foolish.  For who had ever heard of a tree growing through the living room floor.  His wife noticed the tree also but she didn’t say anything either.  With each passing day the tree grew larger.  It grew taller and its trunk thicker. Pretty soon it was no longer a sapling, but a sturdy young tree. The man and his wife watched the tree grow but they never mentioned it, for who had ever heard of a tree growing through the living room floor.

Time passed. The tree grew more quickly. Every fall it would shed its leaves on the living room rug. Insects would fly about and burrow in its bark. Birds began building nests in its branches. And the living room rug was really quite a mess, what with dead leaves, twigs and bits of bark lying all around. The man and his wife had to spend a good deal of their time cleaning up around the tree. But they never mentioned it to each other, for no one had ever heard of a tree growing through the living room floor.

Time marched on. The man and his wife spent more and more of their time cleaning the rug, ducking lower and lower under the branches, and walking in greater and greater detours around the trunk. On one side, the trunk almost touched the wall, forcing them to suck in their stomachs in order to get from one side of the room to the other. Both were thoroughly unhappy with the situation. But neither saw fit to mention it, for who had ever heard of a tree growing through the living room floor.

As time went by, the trunk grew thicker and thicker. Every day the man and his wife had to make a bigger and big­ger detour in order to go from one side of the room to the other. As the branches grew and spread every which way, they also had to bend their heads in walking about the room. But neither mentioned the tree to each other, for who had ever heard of a tree growing through the living room floor. 

One day, however, the man said to his wife: “It seems that there’s a tree growing through the living room floor.” His wife said that she, too, had noticed it and wasn’t very happy about it, because she had to spend so much of her time cleaning. And the man said that he was tired of sucking in his stomach to squeeze from one side of the room to the other. And his wife said that she didn’t like making greater and greater detours around the trunk. And the man said that he was tired of ducking and bending beneath the branches. So the next day they had the tree removed. The man and his wife were much happier. After that, whenever a tree started growing through the living room floor, they removed it before it got to be too much of a problem.  

*     *     *     *     *     *

I do not know who this couple is. Neither do I know where this couple lives. I do know the man who tells their story. He lives in Connecticut.  His name is Steven Pearce. He is a rabbi. I find myself wondering if the good rabbi Pearce has been looking in local living rooms lately. For I suspect that there are a good many trees to be found in the living rooms of Birmingham as well.

Sometimes people let me see their trees. Sometimes they even ask my help in cutting them down. But before a tree can be surgically removed, there must be some prior acknowledgement that the tree exists. And the point of the good rabbi’s story is that it is a lack of acknowledgement, rather than the growth of the tree, that lies at the root of the problem.

This brings us to our first truth about trees growing in living rooms. The tree is not the problem. In fact, notice the relative ease with which the tree is removed, once the man and his wife acknowledge its presence and admit that it bothers them. What is the tree, you ask? Let me be a bit like Jesus and answer one question by asking another. What is it that you are not talking about in your living room, that is beginning to cause difficulties in some significant relationship in your life?

A very lovely lady died a few months ago because of a tree that was growing in her face. Only it looked like a mole. People had noticed it for years. While far from offensive, it was certainly no beauty mark. A few friends, recognizing that it is sometimes kinder to be candid, asked: “Why don’t you have something done about that?” I’m not sure that she ever answered them honestly. Just recently, someone told me what the real issue was. The issue was that she didn’t like doctors.... at all. So she didn’t go to them.... at all. I do not know what her husband and children felt about doctors, or about her mole. I suppose that, over time, the subject became another one of those “trees” that is easier to ignore than remove.

For decades the mole was as dormant as any discussion about it. Until one day it wasn’t.... dormant, that is. It went from nothing to something. It went from dormancy to malignancy. And a couple of months ago, they did something about it. They buried her. But for years, the mole was not the problem. The problem was her refusal to see it, face it, or talk about it.

Lots of trees that grow through living room floors relate to matters of the body. There is the check-up we do not have....the diet we do not follow....the symptom we do not treat....and the signal we do not heed. Some of the trees relate to the alcohol that we consume or the pills that we swallow. But, again, the problem is not the tree. The problem is in the denial of its existence.

Almost anything can be denied. And almost anything will be denied, provided that it relates to an issue of sufficient magnitude, so as to have its revelation threaten the security and serenity of the household. Some people do not talk about money and how it is made or spent. Other people do not talk about jobs and how they are lost or found. Still other people do not talk about the self-destructive personality patterns exhibited by one of their children. Many people avoid expressing doubts about their faith. Still others steer clear of voicing dissatisfaction with their circle of friends, or acknowledging a growing sense of drift and boredom with life itself. And sometimes the most difficult tree to acknowledge, is about love that is not being made in the bedroom, or the fear that love is perhaps being made in someone else’s bedroom. But the point is still the same. The tree is not the problem. 

Which leads to a second truth about trees. Most trees thrive on neglect. One of the most amazing things about relationships is how seldom things go away as a result of being ignored. This is a hard truth for me to acknowledge. For I am the kind of person who would like to believe that just the opposite is true. I would, by nature, rather skirt things than face them. I would like to believe that you really can let sleeping dogs lie, and either they will never wake up or, if they do, they will arise with marvelous dispositions and faulty memories. I would like to believe that time really does heal all things, even though I know that there are very few things healed by time, and that most things are healed by people. Trees thrive on neglect.

This introduces a third truth about trees in the living room. We delude ourselves if we think that denying their existence means that they will have no power to affect our lives. Recall that the tree in the good rabbi’s story extracted enormous concessions from two people who could never acknowledge its presence. They had to clean up after it, detour around it, and duck under its branches.

Think of the family members who can never acknowledge that one of their number has a drinking problem, but who never invite anybody over because of the possibility of unpredictable behavior on the part of the person who is drinking. Or think of the family which is afraid to take a vacation because of a teenager in the household who will not go, yet cannot be trusted to stay at home. Still, in these and similar issues, the problem is not the tree. The problem is the way the tree is hidden, particularly if people deceive themselves into thinking that its existence takes no toll.

Let me hasten to add that I am not a terribly public person. Like most people in my generation, I was schooled in the art of concealment. Dirty linen was never to show. And recognizing that, I am not saying that it is imperative that everything be laid out for all to see.  So if you are among the more reticent types who do not bleed easily on cue, that’s all right. But do not delude yourself into thinking that unacknowledged trees take no toll. They do. They take an enormous toll. And the reason consists in the fact that it takes great personal energy to maintain a system of denial for very long. And nobody has that much energy. Nobody. If you don’t believe me, just ask yourself how easy it is to pretend in front of people. And if it is so easy, why do you gradually stop going places where you feel you have to pretend. And what happens when the place you have to pretend the most, is the one place you can’t get away from....the place where you live.

With that idea nailed down, are you ready for a fourth truth about trees? If only one person in the house sees the tree, it is no less real. Sightings of trees in the living room do not require cross-verification.  Sometimes those who refuse to acknowledge the trees are teenagers. “Things are fine,” they say. They have told us a hundred times that things are fine. Why do we keep trying to make problems where there are none? Why don’t we stay off their backs? But what do we do when we sense that things are not fine? I once heard an absolutely wonderful speech by a teen sexuality counselor. Somewhere within it she recited the three classic parental laments:

How do you help when help is resented?

How do you guide when guidance is rejected?

How do you communicate when attention is perceived as attack?

Sometimes the one who refuses to acknowledge the tree is the spouse. One common scenario, in this time of emerging consciousness on the part of women, is a desire on the part of some wives to redefine the nature of marriage itself. When I once made reference to this in a sermon, a woman paused to speak to me at the door. She said: “My husband’s response to all of this is to shake his head and proclaim, “You certainly are not the same woman I married.” “To which I customarily answer (she said) I certainly hope not.”

I suppose that a lot of women (and no small number of men) are not the same person. Which means that the same marriage will not work. But people tend to become uncomfortable with that. And the people who feel the greatest discomfort are usually male. A man has a hard time seeing trees growing through the living room floor. “I have no problem,” he says. “I am fine. We have no problem. The marriage is fine. You have a problem. You are not fine. Go find someone who will help you with your problem.”

But that’s not true. A marriage is a very delicately balanced system. There is no such thing as one person having a problem. If it is a problem for you, it is a problem for us. And if I delude myself into thinking that I bear no responsibility for it and that you should go fix it, I have no right to be surprised when someday you just go.

Truth number five may seem strangely paradoxical. But hear me out. The truth is this. Talking about the tree may, in some cases, actually do more harm than good. But how can that be? Haven’t we been talking about communication all along? Isn’t “better communication” the twentieth century panacea for everything that ails us from the boardroom to the bedroom? How, pray tell, can talking about the tree do more harm than good?  Well, communication is just a tool. And tools can be misused. Besides, it is a myth to think that people in struggling marriages and families don’t talk. They talk a lot. Some of them talk endlessly. They talk until three o’clock in the morning before falling into bed exhausted. Then they get up and resume talking at breakfast. They say everything, over and over again. But they don’t solve anything. That is because they hold “press conferences.” They present their position. They state their case. They tell their side. They describe where they are “coming from.” But I have yet to find anybody who ever solved a problem in a press conference. 

All of this leads to a final and concluding truth about trees. Truth number six is this. A willingness to talk about the tree must also imply a commitment to do something about it. In the last analysis, there is only one basic ground for divorce. And it is not adultery, addiction, or even abuse. It is, instead, a consistent unwillingness (on the part of one or both parties) to address and begin working on the problems that threaten the relationship. Such problems, of course, may include adultery, addiction, and abuse.

And the idea of "working on" a problem implies several things. First of all, it implies mutuality. It is extremely hard to work on something by yourself. I suppose it can be done for a while. But private work on a relationship issue becomes, over time, a very poor substitute.

"Working on" a problem also implies negotiation. It means that in the midst of stating my case, I will be willing to surrender something of my case, the better that I can accommodate something of yours.

And in addition to mutuality and negotiation, "working on" a problem also implies a willingness to forgive and be forgiven. Walter Wangerin puts it so beautifully "Communication often magnifies a sin. Forgiveness, alone, puts that sin to bed."

Is any of this biblical? Gosh, I hope so. Especially since there is a terrible scarcity of good biblical material on how to be married and raise a family. In the New Testament, all that we find are a few lines from Paul, who neither married nor raised a family. What's more, he didn't think it was a good idea. And concerning marriage, Jesus said that once you get that way you ought to stay that way. But the Bible makes you do a whole lot of reading between the lines in order to figure out how.

But as concerns trees growing through living room floors, there is ample evidence that Jesus thought you ought to spot them, face them, and cut them down. I challenge you to read the stories that describe Jesus in the midst of conversations with other people. Pay particular attention to those encounters wherein Jesus is talking to one or two individuals rather than a crowd. Read them carefully. Then tell me what you read. Do you read any hint of avoidance, denial, or pretending? Can you picture Jesus not bringing something up because of its difficulty? Can you picture Jesus skirting "touchy" subjects, the better to ensure that all conversations will be harmonious? Or do you read, in Jesus, a style that is both compassionately honest and lovingly confrontational? Listen!

….. Peter, you are probably the best friend I have in the world. But sometimes you are so incredibly dense, to the point that you say things that border on the satanic. When those things happen, I find myself wishing that you'd stand a long way behind me, even to the point of getting out of my life.

….. My young friend, I find myself drawn to you. I like you a lot. It is clear to me that you have a great deal of money. But it is also clear to me that your love for your money is greater than your love for anything else.... including me.

….. For heaven's sake, Martha, I only get through Bethany every once in a blue moon. So will you please sit down and stop fussing with the pots.

….. Zacchaeus, this is by far and away the best meal I have ever eaten in Jericho. But it doesn't obscure the fact that you are a crook.

….. Come off it, lady; we both know that you have already had five husbands.

I've got ten more lines, just like those, in my notes at home. But the key thing to remember is that this somewhat confrontational style drew more people to Jesus, than it drove away. In fact, the lady with multiple husbands went back to her hometown that night, marveling that anybody could know so much about her and still care so much for her.

I simply do not know what Jesus would say about the day-to-day workings of marriage and family life. What I do know is that it was very much in the nature of Jesus to call a tree a tree.

Life is Lumpy 11/21/1993

First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan

Scripture: I Thessalionians 5:12-19

Thirteen years ago, America was turned on to the subject of “spiritual formation” by psychologist M. Scott Peck and a best seller entitled “The Road Less Traveled.” Many of you read the book. The FLAME Class studied the book. I joined forces with Don Hadley, a local psychologist, to lead a nine-week exploration into the contents of the book, meeting around the Youth Room fireplace on Wednesday evenings.  Don and I were reminiscing about that group yesterday while sitting in the rain with 106,000 other people at Michigan Stadium, watching a “Magic” show.

You will, perhaps, remember that the very first sentence of Peck’s book is but three words long: “Life is difficult.” Peck would claim that those three words are more important than all the rest of the chapters put together. For unless (and until) we master them, there is little possibility that we can become mentally healthy human beings. “Life is difficult.”    That is the  first great truth, Peck says. But many do not believe it. Instead, they moan about the enormity of their problems, their burdens, their difficulties, as if life were generally easy, and that (somehow) their life was an exception to the easy-life rule. Peck even concluded that paragraph with a personal confession, saying: “I know about such moaning because I have done more than my share.”

I continue to marvel at how obvious and trenchant Peck’s truth is.  Life is difficult. It’s a rule. There is no such thing as an easy-life rule. No one lucks out. No one skims through. No one escapes unscathed. So when your life becomes more difficult than it has been on other occasions, it ought to bring you some measure of comfort to know that there is nothing unusual about this changed state of affairs.  You have not been singled out. You have not been dumped on. Neither have you been pinpointed for dethronement from the state known as “easy existence.” There is no such state. Appearances suggesting otherwise are more illusory than normative.

With that truth established, it was only a matter of time before someone attempted to improve upon it. And it now appears that someone has. That someone is Robert Fulghum, who is fast becoming America’s favorite pop philosopher. Fulghum emerges from the pages of his newest book to suggest that life is not only difficult, but  lumpy. And as with every idea that Fulghum advances, there is a story behind it that literally cries out to be heard.

Apparently, in the summer of 1959, Robert Fulghum took a job fresh out of college as the night desk clerk of a lodge in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of northern California. Like every 22-year-old fresh out of college, Bob Fulghum figured that he knew more about running a mountain  resort than did the owner, an Italian-Swiss innkeeper, who managed the place with what Fulghum considered to be a certain Fascist flair for authority and discipline.

Clearly, owner and student failed to get along from day one.  Fortunately, the owner was seldom around at night, and the student stayed out of his way by day. All remained tolerably stalemated until the “week of the weiners” came along. That was the week when lodge employees were served the exact same meal seven days running, a meal consisting of two weiners, one mound of sauerkraut and a stale roll.  On Friday night of that awful week, Fulghum went into the kitchen to get a midnight snack, only to see a memo to the chef on the refrigerator door announcing yet two more days of the same employee menu.

Angry at such colossal insensitivity, our boy went back to the desk fuming and proceeded to unload his wrath on the only audience available, a solitary night-shift bookkeeper named Sigmund Wollman.  But let Fulghum tell it.

I declared that I was quitting....that I had had it up to here....that I was going to get a plate of weiners and sauerkraut and go wake up the owner by throwing it on him....  that I was sick and tired of putting up with such crap, and who did he think he was anilyway_...that nobody could make., me eat weiners and sauerkraut’ nine days running when I didn’t even like weiners and sauerkraut and eating it was probably un-American in the first place and ought to be looked into ....and that it really made no difference anyway, given that the hotel stinks, the guests are idiots, the horses nags and the boss is a fool. So why wouldn’t it make more sense to pack my bags and head for Montana where they never heard of weiners and sauerkraut and wouldn’t feed it to pigs if they had.

On and on he raged, a good twenty minutes worth, punctuated by desk pounding, chair kicking and much profanity.  All the while, Sigmund Wollman sait quietly on his stool, smoking a cigarette, looking (for all the world) like a sorrowful bloodhound in a coat and tie. As it turned out, Sigmund Wollman had good reason to look like a sorrowful bloodhound. Survivor of Auschwitz. Three years.  German Jew. Thin. Consumptive. Coughed a lot. Probably screwed up on the insides for life. He liked working nights, where there was peace....quiet....freedom from hassle....an unending supply of weiners and sauerkraut (which he actually liked) and, most important, nobody around to tell him what to do. It was a death camp survivor’s dream, except that he had to put up with a 22-year-old who knew it all and didn’t care who he told. At the conclusion of the tirade, Sigmund Wollman said:

Fulchum, are you finished?

No, why?

Lisssen, Fulchum. Lisssen  me. Lisssen good.  You know what’s wrong mit you? It’s not weiners and kraut. It’s not the boss or the chef. And it’s not this job.

So what’s wrong with me?

Fulchum! You think you know everything. But you don’t know the difference between an inconvenience and a problem. If you break your neck. If you have nothing to eat.  If your house is on fire. Then you’ve got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience. Life is inconvenient. Life is lumpy.  Learn to separate inconveniences from problems. You will live longer. And you will not annoy people like me so much.  Good night.

I find myself hoping that the conversation went exactly that way.  Because, if it did, that has to be one of the great conversations of all time. That’s truth hitting you with the subtlety of a two-by-four. 

For  there are problems that are deep and vexing. And then there are inconveniences ....irritations.... annoyances.... lumps. Life is lumpy.  Which mecans that it isn’t 4r.i’t smooth. But there Flit th,Pr,=, are lumps and there are lumps. There are lumps, as in the oatmeal. And there are lumps, as in the breast. One ought to be able to tell the difference, and respond accordingly.

Every one of us could illustrate this principle in spades. I will illustrate it by telling three stories. The stories will be followed by three points. Then we will all go home and thaw turkey. All three stories are less than a week old, really the only thing they have in common.

Story number one. It is late last Sunday afternoon. Kris sends me to buy eggs as Kroger. The parking lot is full. Hundreds of people must be out of eggs. I circle the lot until I spot an opening space.  Notice that I did not say an open space, but an “opening” space.  There’s a difference. I pull into it. Someone honks at me. That same someone rolls down a window, screams at me, and then salutes me (sort of). That someone is a she. Wondering what I have done to invoke her wrath, I suddenly realize that she (coming from the facing direction) was eyeing the very space I had just pulled into. So I backed out and gave it to her. I thought it would make her happy. It didn’t. She still glowered at me as if I were pond scum. 

We had succeeded at irritating each other... I, by beating her to the space.... she, by failing to appreciate my gracious gesture of concession. I carefully avoid her by taking a short cut to the eggs.  Two dozen grade A larges in hand, I approach the check out line.... the express check out line....which is backed halfway up the frozen food aisle. There must be thirty people in it. The lady in front of me must have 30 items in her basket. And a checkbook in her hand. In my boorish, younger days, I had been known to gently point such things out to such people. Now that I am older, I realize that no one died and appointed me God. So I stew silently.

Meditating on lumps in the fast lane, a neighbor pulls up behind me in line. I have seen him around. That is, I have seen him in the neighborhood.... not in church. He goes to a different church. He goes to a church pastored by a friend of mine. Which was where my neighbor was earlier that Sunday morning, when it was announced that his pastor (and my friend) had surrendered his ministerial credentials, that very weekend, in response to a deep and vexing ethical crisis. I swallowed hard as I felt my previous irritation melt slowly into insignificance. 

Story number two concerns a girl who blames her mother for the fact that she is doing poorly in school. It is the mother’s fault because the mother will not buy her a car. If she had a car she could stay after school and get help from her teachers. Without a car she has to take the bus or catch a ride with her friends. Staying late and walking home is out of the question. It’s less than a mile from school to house. But only geeks walk. Her mother could pick her up forty five minutes late, but the girl doesn’t want to wait that long.  Her mother could also take her in early. That way she could see her teachers before school. But she can’t wake up that fast. And even if she could, she’d hate to have her friends see her being driven by her mother.

Fortunately.... or perhaps unfortunately.... she is not related to the boy who went totally out of control the other day when his father showed up at school. Which may have been because there is good reason to believe that the boy is being sexually abused by that very same father. But, for all I know, the boy may have a car. 

Story number three concerns Lomas Brown. Lomas is the gigantic left tackle of our stalwart Detroit Lions. Lomas did not play last week against the Rams. But he says that he will play this week against the Vikings. He will play, even though his shoulder (which has been paining him) has not improved all that much from one Sunday to the next. He will play, he says, because Mike Utley can’tcan’t ....ever ....  again. Mike Utley is Lomas Brown’s running mate at offensive guard.  Last week, Mike Utley broke his neck against the Rams. He will be a paraplegic for the rest of his natural life. Looking at Mike Utley, Lomas Brown figures that what Mike’s got is a problem. What he’s got is an inconvenience.

Life is lumpy. Not all lumps are the same lump. I like to think that I have a high tolerance for inconvenience.... that I don’t get irritated easily.... that I put up with a lot. But then something that is really quite minor will get to me.  It will be one lump too many, causing me to choke on it. And after humoring me for awhile, Kris will play Sigmund  Wollman to my Robert Fulghum, saying something like: “Ritter, it’s no big deal.” Sometimes this is all it takes to heal me. But 4 sometimes she just adds more fuel to my fire, especially if I have not reached the point where I am not willing to surrender to her the right to decide between the big deals and small deals of my life. 

Which leads me to point number one. The best way to get a healthy perspective on life is to look at the big picture. And you can’t see the big picture if you’re standing in the middle of it. Young Robert Fulghum allowed his irritations to become his world. Then, when they became his world, he couldn’t see anybody else in it....including Sigmund Wollman.

I think therapy is a marvelous thing. I wish I had the skill and the time to be a crackerjack therapist. Yet one danger of the therapeutic process is that in encouraging you to give voice to everything that happens in your life (what you did....what you said....what was done and said to you....and how you felt about it all), you become the center of a very closely examined universe. And when the therapist suggests that there is nothing too small or too insignificant to mention, there is danger in thinking that every piece of life’s data is of equal magnitude. It’s not, of course. And good therapy will help sort out the major deals from the not-so-major deals. But I sometimes think that if people spent one hour working in a soup kitchen for every hour spent in a therapist’s office, such lessons might be hastened, and a better self might be found in the process.

 Point number two focuses specifically upon gratitude and the spirit of the season. If you believe that the only life worth being thankful for is a smooth one, then you probably aren’t going to find many occasions for giving thanks. The fact that oatmeal has lumps in it does not preclude its ability to nourish. Which is equally true of weiners, sauerkraut, and most other things. The Apostle Paul, in scripture’s most famous line about gratitude, tells the Thessalonians that they should “give thanks in all circumstances.” That line is sometimes translated: “In everything, give thanks.” It doesn’t mean that you are supposed to feel equally good about everything, especially the bad stuff. Life does not lack for bad stuff. But in the midst of that which is unneeded, unwanted and unhelpful, you need to find those things that are sufficiently sweet, so that even the terrible taste left by the rest cannot diminish the sweetness. In the midst of life’s general lumpiness, you need to ask yourself what (or who) is so lovely and precious, so as to bring a lump to your throat when you speak of them (or to them) about what they mean to your life. 

Point number three follows. In this world, where none of us are going to get out alive, how many hours are you going to allow inconveniences to commandeer from what may be the precious few you have left? Some of the lumps in you r can kill you. But not every lump should be given that opportunity. When Sigmund Wollman said to his young friend, “Learn to separate the inconveniences from the real problems, and you will live longer,” he was speaking more truth than he knew. 

There is a line, only vaguely remembered, from a Neil Diamond song, that reads: “Pity the poor ones, the shy and unsure ones, who wanted it perfect, but waited too long.” I think I remembered that line all 5 these years, because I know that life will never be perfect. Troubles will come. Lovers will disappoint. Friends will fail. Illness will cut you down to size. And always, there will be lumps in the gravy of life that cannot be strained out or filtered away. Life is difficult.  Smoothness is elusive. Yet don’t wait too long for what may never be and, in the process, miss what is. Learn to give thanks.... in all circumstances.

6

I Don't Remember Growing Older 8/29/1993

First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, MI

 Scripture: Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, Mark 1:16-20

In case you tried to reach me during the first three days of the week just passed, I wasn't here. I was taking my second child, for her second year, to a university seven hundred miles to the south of here. Julie is the child's name. Duke is the university's name. And while this is far from her final year there, she is very much my final child. And therein lies the tale.

If you have read the cover notes in the "Steeple Notes," you know how last year's trip went. It was powerful. It was painful. It was emotional. Her mother and I were not quite ready to take one so young, so far.... and then just drop her there. But we did. And my description of the journey back to Michigan is one that you can read for yourself, if you haven't already. This year's trip was every bit as long, made every bit as fast. But there were far fewer tears and far greater acceptance. We knew what to expect. What's more, we like what is happening in her life, as a result of her being where she is. And as a strategy of coping with the memory of last year's emotional return to Michigan, Kris decided to shop away the pain in advance. With the van suddenly emptied of Julie's things, we hurriedly filled it with North Carolina antiques. Our goal was to test the ancient theory that while it's always hard to let the last child go, it feels a bit better if you can say that you traded her for furniture.

But all humor aside, you and I know that it's far from an even trade. Letting go is hard, no matter how much stuff you come home with in return. Still, I wasn't going to preach about it this year. Having preached about it last year, I figured I should have made my peace with it by now. Which I had.  Sort of.  But that was before everything else changed. For when the "girl child" first went off to college, the "boy child" was still home. And home was still the same old place. As was the job. As were the friends. As concerned my life one year ago, all the words applied.... "same".... "old".... "predict-able".... "comfortable".... you finish the list.

Then everything happened at once. The old job went. And since the old house was attached to the old job, the house went too. And while friends will always be friends, the lions' share of them were part and parcel of the old job. So prudence and protocol dictated that friendship's pool be cooled. Meanwhile, my son Bill got a new job, a new apartment, and moved on. Even my sister Gail got very sick in a very short period of time, and passed on. Which is a lot of change for anybody to absorb. And I am far from superhuman. In fact, I would probably be blowing smoke if I told you that I have put it all behind me and am ready to move on. I haven't and I'm not. Progressive and forward-looking though I may seem, there is a part of me that has always wanted to hold onto things. And it is that part of me that is talking to you this morning.

There is a name for the life-situation I am describing, and the name is "separation anxiety." Where parents and children are concerned, it begins at an incredibly tender age. My former office was located immediately across the hall from the rooms that were used by a church-based community nursery. And each time September rolled around, I would pay close attention to the new three-year-olds beingfreshly integrated into the program. The same thing will happen here about two weeks from now. And I am certain that if I but walk down the hall, I will be able to view the same familiar drama being played out. The door will open and the child will be ushered in. The door will close and the parents will be ushered out. There will be no malice intended in any of this. Everyone agrees to the closing of the door. But then I'll see parents squatting, squinting, and trying to peer through the keyhole. They are hopeful of catching a glimpse of an all-right child.... praying that on the other side of the door there exists an all-right child.... yet feeling ever so slightly betrayed when later on, over lunch at McDonald's, the question, "Did you miss mommy and daddy?" is met with the kind of stare that suggests that the question must rank among the dumbest questions in the world, and that any parent daring to ask such a question must rank with the dumbest parents in the world.

Or consider the fathers who, at the back of the church (with the organ swelling), turn to their daughters and say: "You know, you don't have to go through with this if you don't want to."  I'm not kidding.  A lot of fathers really say that. Or something very much like that. Do they say it in jest? Of course they do. Pretty much. But maybe there is one small part of a father's heart that says: "How in the world did we get here so quickly.... and would it really bother anyone if we just sort of put this on hold and went home for a year or two?"

Parents don't say such things seriously, of course. For every parent knows that the teaching side of love is never complete until you teach people to leave. And good parents start those children early, so that the harder "leavings" will come as second nature later, when the distances are further and the stakes are higher. As Bob Hawkins shared with me between services: "First you teach the child to walk. Then you teach the child to walk away." Love releases.... in a slowly unfolding symphony of goodbyes. Most of which are natural. Some of which are painful. Virtually all of which are necessary. And fortunately few of which are final. Although some are.... final, that is. Which is why giving someone you love (and desperately want to hold on to) your personal permission to die, may be the most powerful (and poignant) releasing of all.

All of which is as biblical as it is essential. Moments ago you heard the words of a wise (albeit occasionally cynical) old Hebrew sage named Koheleth, who (writing under the pen name of Ecclesiastes) suggests that there will be seasons when we shall seek, laugh and embrace, but that there shall also be seasons when we shall lose, cry, and refrain from embracing. I suppose he might also have gone on to say that for every season of holding fast, there will also be a season of letting go.

And then there was that other reading of Mark's story of Jesus calling the sons of Zebedee to be His disciples (surely a strange choice for a sermon like this). But I recently had it pointed out to me that the one thing Mark's story doesn't say is what old Zebedee thought about his two sons walking away from the family business to follow an itinerant Galilean rabbi they had just met. Not only does the story fail to say what old Zebedee thought, the story doesn't care. To which my source added: " I suppose that, in his own way, Jesus broke the hearts of many a first century Jewish family."

So why is It so hard? I'm not completely sure I know. But I would propose, for your consideration, that it has something to do with a pair of fears. The first has to do with the fear we parents hold for the future of our children. We want so much for them. But we can't guarantee anything to them. In a recent reflection on the college graduation of his youngest daughter, Tom Mullen (my Quaker colleague) wrote: "Doesn't Ruth know how tough the world is? She's ready to conquer it, but the world has its ways of counterattacking. And she's ready to set it on fire. But what if her matches are wet?" Then, reflecting on the fact that little Ruthie from Richmond (Indiana) was about to begin her journalism career in New York City, he added:

My little girl, who used to sleep with a night- light, was entering the real world for sure. And her future was certainly no longer in my hands. Which is why it has taken a while for my wife and me to accept the fact that we have run out of little kids whose hands we need to hold. Twenty-five years (and four children) ago, we were convinced we had a lifetime supply.

We never quite lose that "protector mentality," do we? It's funny.  Children grow out of childhood,  but parents never grow out of parenthood. It's something of a biological miracle. The umbilical cord gets cut, but it stays connected to the parent.

And Tom Mullen is right.  Life has its cruel face, which it occasionally shows to even the fairest, the finest, and the blissfully invincible. Last Tuesday, while moving Julie into her new room at Duke, I saw an endless stream of wonderful kids. They were strong. They were vital. They were energized. They were capable. But, along with studying a ton, working a little, maturing a lot, and (every now and again) even darkening the door of the chapel, these kids (over the course of the next several months) will also do some wild and crazy things that will strain their endurance, test their limits, and contribute to the raising of what has been euphemistically called "a little hell." And most of them will survive it, laugh about it, and live to tell stories about it forever.

Kids are invincible. Right? Wrong! Most, maybe.... but not all. Sometimes, perhaps.... but not always. For at the very same time I was moving among Duke's undergraduate finest and fairest, messages were being left for me all over Durham. The subject? A funeral. The deceased? A twenty-six year old young man back here in Michigan. Himself, fine.  Himself, fair.  Himself, as invincible as he was resourceful. And it was that resourcefulness that led him, last Saturday night, to climb into his Royal Oak house through a window, given that he had gone off to a wedding hours earlier without being certain of the whereabouts of his key. It wasn't the first time he had forgotten his key. And it wasn't the first time he had entered by the window. But it was to be his last. Somehow he shook the window loose from its moorings, just as he was pulling himself head-high to the sill. The window came down on his neck, pinning him with his head in the house and the rest of his body outside. Which is where the neighbors saw him hanging (with his feet eighteen inches above the ground) come Sunday morning.

But I ask you: "Who among you never forgot a key? And who among you never climbed in a window? And who among you (in those days when life was ripe and ready for the picking) never slept too little, partied too late, drove too fast, or chanced too much, without giving a thought to the potential consequences?" Alas, life has ways of bruising its most tender fruit. And, as the trees responsible for bearing much of that fruit, we parents know that better than anybody. Which is why I want to hold my kids close, even though I would never want to be accused of holding them back. For I know the degree to which life can fail them and people can hurt them.

But the other fear which makes it hard to "let go" has more to do with me than with them. For every act of letting go is a reminder that not only is part of my life changing, but part of my life is ending. Holding fast to my children's past is one way of holding fast to my own past.

A few minutes before making last year's trip to Duke, I decided I'd better take one last trip through the house, looking for potentially forgettable items which might later be needed. In the basement I found a portable electric fan. Necessity! In the basement I also found a child's table and chairs, along with several Barbies. No longer necessities! But I remembered buying every last one of them, and felt suddenly old. It also took me a few extra minutes to come up from the basement.

During the last few of my child-raising years, people regularly said to me: "Treasure these days with your kids. They go by incredibly quickly." I always listened and nodded, figuring that what they meant was that kids get old before you know it. It never occurred to me that what they meant was that I would get old before I knew it.

On our first Sunday here in Birmingham, I looked down at Kris (sitting in the front row with Dale Parker), and suddenly saw that her lip was no longer singing, but quivering. Later on she told me the reason. For it was at that moment it occurred to her that, as churches go, this might be the very last time we would ever say "hello" to a new one. Which was a bittersweet reminder (in a month that didn't need more reminders), that "goodbyes" were likely to be our horizon's long suit, and "hellos", our horizon's short one. One can be grateful for the moment, but still recognize (out of the corner of one's eye) how fleeting it all is. After all, it was at his child's wedding (a glorious occasion, if ever there was one), that old Tevye, my favorite Russian milkman, first sang "I don't remember growing older.... when did they?"

So what do you do? I mean, really, what do you do? I trust you will pardon me this morning if I am longer on analysis than I am on cure. I can make very few suggestions. What I have personally tried to do is remember that new occasions teach as many pleasures as they do duties. Some of my pleasures include:

-          a pair of kids who are proving to be every bit as interesting as adults, as they were as children (and sometimes more so). In fact, in the wake of my sister's death and my newly-assumed responsibilities for a pair of twenty-two year old nephews, it has been my son's legal acumen and his familial sensitivity that have come to both my rescue and theirs, time and time again.

-          and then there's my wife, with whom there is the refreshing thought that the "empty nest" may offer more time for quiet dinners, uninterrupted conversations and private pleasures. Realizing now that (on most days) we're all we've got, it feels good to know that what we've got is more than enough.

-          And then there's you (the people of this congregation) for whom the song "Getting to Know You" seems to have been most fittingly written. Over the course of the summer, many of you have found ways to tell us that not only are we welcome here, we are needed here.

And I think the other thing one does (as a means of coping), is to better trust the God one preaches. And one does that by taking seriously the promise that "goodness and mercy really will follow you all the days of your life".... and that if yesterday was so wonderfully full of meaning, why not tomorrow? After all, if all our days come from the same source, why can't the Maker of the "good old days" be trusted to provide a few good new ones?

And as for my kids, it is good (this morning) to feel... with all my heart.... that both of them belong where they are. And that while neither of them belongs with me, there is little doubt that each of them belongs to me. The ties that bind are no less real for being elastic. And although (once upon a time) Kris handled the initial matters of gynecology and delivery, all four of us come proudly equipped with stretch marks.

Where is King Solomon When We Really Need Him? 8/22/1993

First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan

Scripture: 1 Kings 3:16-28

This sermon could start almost anywhere.... Blairstown, lowa.... Ann Arbor, Michigan.... or even in the royal court of King Solomon in Jerusalem. But for the time being, let the sermon begin in a remote country village of northern Yugoslavia, where a 17 year old girl is boarding a train that will take her to a boat, on which she will sail to a land known only to her as the "New World." She is the first child in a large family.... whose mother is dead and whose father is old. Four years earlier (at age 13) she left home to take up residence in an adjoining village, cooking meals and watching children for a family considerably better off than hers. As regards the trauma of separating at such a tender age, she said: "It beat staying home and going to work making bricks."

But this is not four years ago and America is not the next village. This trip, once made, will never be made again. Her passage is being paid by a well-to-do Jewish couple in New York, who have agreed to pick up the tab for her crossing in return for 6 months service as a live-in domestic in their Central Park apartment. The couple's name is Rubinstein. The family business is jewelry. And the arrangement works to a tee, given that (upon her arrival) the Rubinsteins keep their promise and the village girl keeps hers.

Eventually, the debt of passage is paid and a small salary is earned. The village girl meets a few people and makes a few friends. And it is through this growing circle of contacts that she meets a young man who is not only from her country, but from a neighboring village less than 10 miles away. She admires his strength and industriousness. He admires her beauty, her sweet singing voice and her talents in the kitchen. In time they marry, leave Manhattan, and rent a tiny apartment in New Jersey. A child is born....a little baby girl. They call her Lily.

One day the Rubinsteins call, inviting them to visit the following Saturday. So they pack up their little girl, cross the river, and make their way to the Central Park apartment she once knew so well. There are coffees and cakes, not to mention oo's and ah's, as the baby is passed along with the plates and cups. And after everyone is properly warmed by good talk and good food, a checkbook is produced and an offer is made. The Rubinsteins share the fact that they have never been blessed with children, nor do they expect to be. But they deeply desire a child and have much (in the way of advantages) that they could give to one. To the young villagers, they point out: "You are young and just beginning. You will have many more children. We can help you get started in life. You, in turn, can help us realize a dream we thought was dead." In short, they wanted to buy "Lily."

To whatever degree the offer may have been "considered," I do not know. All I know is that it was graciously rejected. Whereupon the man and his wife (scarcely more than children themselves by today's standards) wrapped the baby in a blanket, said "thanks, but no thanks" to the Rubinsteins, and headed across the Hudson to their meager rented quarters on the Jersey shore. The strong industrious man was named Anton.  His sweet singing young wife was named Agnes. Two generations later, they became my grandfather and grandmother. For their little "Lily" (short for Lillian.... who, as it turned out, was the only child they ever had), is my mother.

I didn't know that story for years. And I haven't told that story in years. But I tell it now as a way of reminding you of something you probably already knew (but may have forgotten), that when it comes to children and who ought to possess them, every story is different.... every story is personal... and every decision is experienced emotionally, however much it may have been considered rationally or rendered legally. Scarcely a day has gone by this summer without the folks who bring us the news forcing us to consider yet one more controversy over custody. And there is scarcely a one of us who doesn't want to avert our eyes, lest in reading too far, or watching too long, we come to care too much.

I know I was doing quite well with the matter of Baby Jessica.... debating her case in polite social circles like the lawyer my son is, the caseworker my wife is, or the theologian that I am. It was pretty much a "head" thing with me, like it was -a "head" thing with you. Until she screamed, that is, when they took her from the home of Jan and Roberta DeBoer to be reunited after 2-1/2 years with Dan and Cara Schmidt. For it was her scream that made Jessica something other than an issue. And it was her scream that pulled her problem from the lofty environs of my head and drove it south to the soft and mushy repository of my heart.

I found myself feeling sad for her.... and just a little bit mad at everyone else. Like you, I could probably work up a small amount of righteous indignation against everybody involved.... against the Schmidts (who pushed things), the DeBoers (who prolonged things), the courts (which couldn't get together on things), and the media (which surrounded things with cameras, and is now dousing them with money) .... to the degree that the whole thing began to smell like the circus it wasn't, rather than the human tragedy it was.

You all know the story. In February of 1991, 28 year old Cara Clausen of Cedar Rapids, Iowa gave birth (apart from anything resembling wedlock) to the little girl we eventually came to know as Jessica. Whereupon she, and some other man named as the father, signed releases allowing Jan and Roberta DeBoer to take the little girl home to Ann Arbor. Within 30 days of that release, however, Cara Clausen had identified another man, (Dan Schmidt) as the child's father, and instituted legal proceedings in the state of Iowa requiring Jan and Roberta DeBoer to bring the baby back.

Legally, the Schmidts were in the driver's seat from that day forward. As the baby's father (which he was clinically proven to be), Dan Schmidt had never signed away his rights.... and (to his credit) moved immediately to assert those rights once he learned of Jessica's existence, further buttressing his case by marrying Cara and amending his lifestyle, thereby suggesting that the two of them, at long last, were getting their act together.

Meanwhile, Jan and Roberta DeBoer balked, claiming that whatever rights Dan may have been denied and Cara may have signed away, Jessica should not be uprooted from a place where she was happy. And they got a Michigan judge to agree. Alas, in a jurisdictional dispute, a Michigan court would not have the last word. An Iowa court would. The only hope the DeBoers ever had was that if things dragged on long enough.... and Jessica got old enough.... somebody, somewhere, would forget about what the law said and would think about what being uprooted might do to Jessica. And while it was a gamble that won the hearts of nearly everybody, it clearly failed to win the day in court. And Jessica is back, where any seasoned court-watcher could have predicted she would be all along. She is somewhere in Iowa, with the two people who reproductively, albeit perhaps unintentionally, brought her into the world. Biology won! Public sympathy lost!  Or so it would seem, from reading the avalanche of mail that has found its way into the Op/Ed pages of our local daily newspapers.

There are hundreds of arguments made between disagreeing adults in cases like these. But it seems that each argument always boils down to the issue of “First Claim” vs. “Best Claim.” Those who stand beneath the "First Claim" banner argue that creating life is an incredibly serious business.... initiating an incredibly powerful bond.... which ought to be honored and protected by an increasingly tight series of safeguards. Meanwhile, those who group themselves under the "Best Claim" banner, argue that giving life involves far more than creating life.... and that parenting is not nearly so much about reproducing as it is about loving, nurturing, and supporting. And both positions are eminently arguable. The Bible (for example) treats birth very seriously. But no less seriously than it treats one's responsibility to a child, once that child is born.

Strangely enough, one is forced to debate the issue of "First Claim" vs. "Best Claim" in a strangely different arena, every time one goes to visit the nation of Israel. It becomes clear (at least to many of us) that certain towns currently controlled by Israel in the occupied West Bank, have Arab roots that run ancient and deep. (First Claim). But, in some of those towns, the Israelis have placed massive numbers of Jewish settlers, many of them Russian, with the result of that occupation being an incredible improvement (by Western standards) of the land. I have seen places where the desert has literally been made to bloom, as a result of Jewish energy and ingenuity. (Best Claim). To that degree it becomes tempting to say: "I don't care whose it was.... as compared with who is doing what with it now."

You feel the tug of war, don't you? And you see its application to the present predicament. Of course you do. Which makes it hard to know who to back.... in the occupied territories of the Middle East, or in the child custody battles of the Middle West. In the case of the Schmidts versus the DeBoers, I felt myself leaning ever so slightly in favor of the DeBoers, reasoning that they would probably be the best parents, if not the first parents. But, then, given their maturity and the vast resources at their disposal, perhaps the Rubinsteins might have been able to make the best claim for custody of my mother. Who knows, I could have been a rabbi.

The complexity of the Jessica controversy was reflected by how few sermons were preached on the matter, and how few church pronouncements were made. Most preachers found it easier to pray for those involved rather than speak on behalf of them. But even more interesting were the number of letter writers who made reference to this little story in 1 Kings, read to you earlier. Solomon was the king. And custody was the issue. You remember how it went. A pair of prostitutes came to see the King of Israel. (One wonders how in the world a pair of prostitutes got to see the king. Or perhaps one doesn't wonder at all).  Whereupon their story unfolds. Both women live in the same house. Both women give birth 3 days apart. Both women have boys.  One woman's son dies because his mother rolls over on him in the middle of the night. The second mother claims that a switch was made.... with the first mother taking her dead child and substituting his lifeless body beneath her breast, for her living, breathing child. (Apparently these babies must have looked pretty much alike).

So each mother makes her case before the king, arguing that the sole remaining child is hers. And each, no doubt, hurls enough insults in the general direction of the other, so as to make a sailor blush. Unable to decide the merits of one claim against another (this being prior to the days of genetic testing, mind you), Solomon simply says to his servant: "Bring me a sword. We'll send each of these mothers home with half." (I've always wondered whether he was planning to slice the child from top to bottom, or from side to side). But, of course, he doesn't have to slice the child at all, because the real mother offers to give the child to the impostor. And Solomon knows that only a love that is genuine and true would inspire such an act of sacrifice as that.

Alas, in the case of the Schmidts and the DeBoers, nobody seemed willing (apart from a court order) to make such a sacrifice. So the law spoke, echoing George Will's trenchant observation, that it is the twilight of the gods which has brought the dawn of the age of the attorneys. For when frightened people no longer have a faith to instruct them, they will inevitably turn to the courts in an attempt to stave off the chaos.

But the point of the Solomon story should not be lost. For (apocryphal or not) what it does is refocus the issue, not on the relative legitimacy of the claims of either parent, but on the very real needs of the child. In an ironic and allegorical way, Solomon's sword cuts right to the heart of the matter. Had a "Consider The Child First" rule been in the thinking of everybody two years and five months ago, Dan and Cara Schmidt might have given her up then. The DeBoers (seeing the handwriting on the wall) might have given her back then. Or the courts (seeing the impasse) might have appointed an independent attorney for Jessica, placed her temporarily in a foster home and streamlined the appeal process to reach a swift and certain conclusion.

Which, of course, could become future policy in the cases of future Jessicas. For the mark of a maturing culture is how much we learn from our mistakes, not how many fingers we point in the wake of them. Earlier I said that (on any given day) I could probably work up a fairly good case of righteous indignation against any of the grown-ups involved. Unfortunately, however, grown-ups aren't likely to stop making such mistakes any time soon. Which means that the challenge for preachers and lawyers is to figure out ways to insulate children from the consequences. Otherwise, it's the kids who are going to be torn in two.... even if no one is so crude as to put a sword to their body.