27 April 2014
Getting very excited...
...to see the finished results in St. Paul's. Walked through after early Church today before heading over to Worden. Some of the ceiling work had been begun and the painting was really beautiful. The sanctuary is going to be so amazingly improved when this whole thing is done.
22 April 2014
Contacts
I had about sworn off them, but thought I'd give the doctor one last try. I'm back in mono-vision, so one eye is for distance and one eye for up close. Unlike previous tries, this one gives the dominant eye to distance, since it was the fuzzy distance vision that was driving me batty. I thought as I drove over to the Crowne to lead devotions today: "Dang! Perfect!" Then I walked inside and tried to read the music on the piano. ACK!!!!!!! A thousand ACKS!!!!!!!! Dr. John did encourage me to give it a week. I was ready to call and tell them to order them. But I definitely need to see if I can resolve the "middle distance" problem. Up close is fine. Distance is fine. But middle distance is a mess!
18 April 2014
And is there a better way...
...to wrap up the closing hours of Good Friday than listening to some of Bach's St. John's Passion. So beautiful. The tenderness at "Woman, behold..." The fervent joy at "It is finished." The closing chorale: "Lord, let at last..."
St. Romanos
Pilate fixed three crosses on Golgotha: two for the thieves, and one for the Giver of life. When Hell saw it, he said to those below, “My ministers and powers, who has fixed a nail in my heart? A wooden lance has suddenly pierced me and I am being torn apart! My insides are in pain, my belly in agony, my senses make my spirit tremble, and I am compelled to disgorge Adam and Adam’s race. All men were given to me by the Garden’s tree–but now a tree is bringing them back again to Paradise.”
When he heard this, Satan, the cunning serpent ran crawling and said, “What is it, hell? Why do you groan for no reason? Why produce these wailings? This Tree, at which you tremble, I carpentered up there for Mary’s Child. I suggested it to his enemies for our advantage, for it is a Cross, to which I have nailed Christ, wishing by a tree to do away with the second Adam, just as I did away with the first one. So do not be afraid. It is dry and barren. It will not harm you. Keep hold of those you have. Of those we rule, not one will escape again to Paradise.”
Hell replied to Satan, “You have lost your senses–you, the cunning snake of old! All your wisdom has been swallowed up by the cross, and you have been caught in your own snare. Lift up your eyes and see that you have fallen into the pit you dug! Behold that Tree, which you call dry and barren, bears fruit: a thief tasted it and has become heir to the good things of Eden. Moses’ rod led the people out of Egypt, but this tree brings mankind back again to Paradise.”
Satan answered, “Wretched hell–cease this cowardly talk! Your words reveal your thoughts. Are you afraid of a cross and of the Crucified? Not one of your words has shaken me, for these deeds are part of my plan. I will also open a grave and entomb Christ, so that you may enjoy your cowardice doubly–from his tomb as well as from his cross. When I see you, I will mock you. For when Christ is buried I will come to you and say, “Who now brings Adam back again to Paradise?”
Then hell spoke back, “Now is the moment for you to listen, Satan. Now you will see the power of the Cross and the great authority of the Crucified. For you, the cross is folly. But the world sees it as a throne, on which, as though seated, Jesus is nailed and hears the thief cry to him, ‘Lord, remember me in your kingdom.’ Listen now as he answers, kingly, ‘Today, poor beggar, you will reign with me. For with me, you will go in again to Paradise.”
At these words, Satan began to wilt, and what he heard he saw: a thief witnessing to Christ crucified. And so, amazed, he struck his breast and said, “Christ did not answer his accusers, and yet he speaks to a thief? To Pilate he never spoke a word; but now he addresses a murderer, saying, “Come, live in pleasure”? What is this? Who has seen words or deeds done by this thief, by means of which he goes again to Paradise?
Again the devil called out, “Receive me, Hell. I turn to you; I submit to your views, I, who did not believe them. I saw the Tree at which you shuddered, made red with blood and water. And I shuddered, not, I tell you, at the blood, but at the water. For the blood shows Jesus’ slaughter, but the water shows his life, for life has gushed from his side. For it was not the first but the second Adam who carried Eve, the mother of all the living, again to Paradise.”
Now Hell and Satan cried out together, “Let us lament as we see the Tree which we planted transformed into a holy trunk, beneath which thieves, murderers, tax collectors and harlots will find shelter, and reap sweet fruit from what seemed barren. For they cling to the Cross as the Tree of Life. Pressed against it and swimming, through it they escape, and come again as to a harbor, again to Paradise.”
Hell said to Satan, “Swear, tyrant, finally to crucify no one.” And Satan replied, “You take an oath to kill no one. We have had our experience, let us draw back our hand. Let neither of us ever again tyrannize the race of Adam, for it has been sealed by the Cross, it has been given life, like a treasure of a precious pearl in a fragile pot; life, which a thief, well-suited to his trade, took on the Cross. For stealing he was nailed up to die ; and having thieved he was called again to Paradise.”
O most high and glorious, God of fathers and of youths, your willing outrage has become our honor. For in your Cross, we all may boast. To it we have nailed our hearts, that on it we may hang our instruments and sing to you, the Lord of all, from the songs of Zion. The ship from Tarshish once brought gold to Solomon; but to us your Tree gives back, every day and every moment, wealth beyond price. For it brings us all again to Paradise
When he heard this, Satan, the cunning serpent ran crawling and said, “What is it, hell? Why do you groan for no reason? Why produce these wailings? This Tree, at which you tremble, I carpentered up there for Mary’s Child. I suggested it to his enemies for our advantage, for it is a Cross, to which I have nailed Christ, wishing by a tree to do away with the second Adam, just as I did away with the first one. So do not be afraid. It is dry and barren. It will not harm you. Keep hold of those you have. Of those we rule, not one will escape again to Paradise.”
Hell replied to Satan, “You have lost your senses–you, the cunning snake of old! All your wisdom has been swallowed up by the cross, and you have been caught in your own snare. Lift up your eyes and see that you have fallen into the pit you dug! Behold that Tree, which you call dry and barren, bears fruit: a thief tasted it and has become heir to the good things of Eden. Moses’ rod led the people out of Egypt, but this tree brings mankind back again to Paradise.”
Satan answered, “Wretched hell–cease this cowardly talk! Your words reveal your thoughts. Are you afraid of a cross and of the Crucified? Not one of your words has shaken me, for these deeds are part of my plan. I will also open a grave and entomb Christ, so that you may enjoy your cowardice doubly–from his tomb as well as from his cross. When I see you, I will mock you. For when Christ is buried I will come to you and say, “Who now brings Adam back again to Paradise?”
Then hell spoke back, “Now is the moment for you to listen, Satan. Now you will see the power of the Cross and the great authority of the Crucified. For you, the cross is folly. But the world sees it as a throne, on which, as though seated, Jesus is nailed and hears the thief cry to him, ‘Lord, remember me in your kingdom.’ Listen now as he answers, kingly, ‘Today, poor beggar, you will reign with me. For with me, you will go in again to Paradise.”
At these words, Satan began to wilt, and what he heard he saw: a thief witnessing to Christ crucified. And so, amazed, he struck his breast and said, “Christ did not answer his accusers, and yet he speaks to a thief? To Pilate he never spoke a word; but now he addresses a murderer, saying, “Come, live in pleasure”? What is this? Who has seen words or deeds done by this thief, by means of which he goes again to Paradise?
Again the devil called out, “Receive me, Hell. I turn to you; I submit to your views, I, who did not believe them. I saw the Tree at which you shuddered, made red with blood and water. And I shuddered, not, I tell you, at the blood, but at the water. For the blood shows Jesus’ slaughter, but the water shows his life, for life has gushed from his side. For it was not the first but the second Adam who carried Eve, the mother of all the living, again to Paradise.”
Now Hell and Satan cried out together, “Let us lament as we see the Tree which we planted transformed into a holy trunk, beneath which thieves, murderers, tax collectors and harlots will find shelter, and reap sweet fruit from what seemed barren. For they cling to the Cross as the Tree of Life. Pressed against it and swimming, through it they escape, and come again as to a harbor, again to Paradise.”
Hell said to Satan, “Swear, tyrant, finally to crucify no one.” And Satan replied, “You take an oath to kill no one. We have had our experience, let us draw back our hand. Let neither of us ever again tyrannize the race of Adam, for it has been sealed by the Cross, it has been given life, like a treasure of a precious pearl in a fragile pot; life, which a thief, well-suited to his trade, took on the Cross. For stealing he was nailed up to die ; and having thieved he was called again to Paradise.”
O most high and glorious, God of fathers and of youths, your willing outrage has become our honor. For in your Cross, we all may boast. To it we have nailed our hearts, that on it we may hang our instruments and sing to you, the Lord of all, from the songs of Zion. The ship from Tarshish once brought gold to Solomon; but to us your Tree gives back, every day and every moment, wealth beyond price. For it brings us all again to Paradise
Tenebrae
There is something that is so compelling beautiful about that simple Vespers. Four psalms. "Sacred Head." St. John's Passion. Responsory. "Jesus, I Will Ponder Now," Sermon (and such an amazingly comforting and powerful sermon from our dear Pr. Gleason), Kyrie, Our Father, Collects. Through it all, the candles extinguished. Then leaving in the darkness, and yet leaving with such a sense of peace and serene joy. It IS finished, after all, and we can walk into our own darkness then, unafraid. For we know Who walks with us and where He will finally lead us. "He was delivered up to death, He was delivered for the sins of the people!"
I think it's been a long time
since we had such a beautiful Good Friday. Nature celebrates Triduum with us this year here in southern Illinois.
All the fair beauty of earth
from the death of the winter arising.
Every good gift of the year
now with its Master returns.
All the fair beauty of earth
from the death of the winter arising.
Every good gift of the year
now with its Master returns.
17 April 2014
O Sacred Head
Bekah and Cindi on soprano, Amilia on alto, David on tenor, me on bass. We practiced tonight for the liturgy tomorrow. Amilia mentioned tonight that she told her mom she's used to doing this with her family. I didn't even think of it, because Cindi and Amilia have sung together so often, but the alto part would be the usual spot for our Lauren to sing with us! Well, that's the way the Body of Christ is: we're family too each other wherever we are. What a gift from the Lord, the way life binds to life! I think we need to get an alto duet when Lauren is here so she and Amilia can sing together too.
And so Triduum begins...
..."When You Woke that Thursday Morning"...Corporate Confession and Absolution...St. Thomas Aquinas' Collect...The Passover...Gradual...First Corinthians 11...Tract...O Lord, We Praise Thee...Sermon...Prayer of the Church (DS V)...Offering...Preface (DS V)...Our Father...Verba..."Isaiah Mighty Seer"...Pax..."Lamb of God, Pure and Sinless"...Distribution...Collect...Psalm 22 and the Altar Stripped...
And so we enter into the holy three days. And this year an extra service: the funeral for Bud on Saturday morning.
The intertwining of the death of Christ and the death of His people. As Christ sanctified the tomb and then rose in triumph, so we can entrust our dead to the tomb and know that they shall yet live again on the joyous day of Resurrection.
Last year's Triduum, we were grieving for Jo. This year, we grieve with Judy and family for Bud. Yet the Triduum offers us such unspeakable consolation and hope.
"Because I live, you will live also."
So deep breath and onto the liturgies for Good Friday and entering into the darkness unafraid, for we enter it with Christ.
And so we enter into the holy three days. And this year an extra service: the funeral for Bud on Saturday morning.
The intertwining of the death of Christ and the death of His people. As Christ sanctified the tomb and then rose in triumph, so we can entrust our dead to the tomb and know that they shall yet live again on the joyous day of Resurrection.
Last year's Triduum, we were grieving for Jo. This year, we grieve with Judy and family for Bud. Yet the Triduum offers us such unspeakable consolation and hope.
"Because I live, you will live also."
So deep breath and onto the liturgies for Good Friday and entering into the darkness unafraid, for we enter it with Christ.
15 April 2014
The Lent that Almost Wasn't
As a pastor in a parish I could never understand the slightly less than enthusiastic greeting that the extra Lenten services received from so many. Oh, folks would show up. But they never seemed as excited about Lent as I was. Now that I'm sitting on the other side of the nave (so to speak), I begin to understand.
This Lent I've had to miss any number of Lenten services with sickness or being out of town, but I find it very difficult to focus on the ones I've been able to attend. I'm usually headed to bed come 8:30 and so I'm just plain tired, out of focus, and struggling throughout the services. Granted, worshipping in the wretched gym doesn't help one bit. Still I get it now.
Yes, the services are worth it. Worth every bit of it. But the effort involved isn't little for those with early mornings. It's hard to stay up, to yawn your way through the beautiful service, and to try to focus. I feel badly for thinking folks were just lazy. Tired is not lazy. It's just, well, tired.
This Lent I've had to miss any number of Lenten services with sickness or being out of town, but I find it very difficult to focus on the ones I've been able to attend. I'm usually headed to bed come 8:30 and so I'm just plain tired, out of focus, and struggling throughout the services. Granted, worshipping in the wretched gym doesn't help one bit. Still I get it now.
Yes, the services are worth it. Worth every bit of it. But the effort involved isn't little for those with early mornings. It's hard to stay up, to yawn your way through the beautiful service, and to try to focus. I feel badly for thinking folks were just lazy. Tired is not lazy. It's just, well, tired.
ACK! Those are DIFFICULT!
Well, yes they are: the chants for the Easter Vigil. But here comes Fr. Sean Daenzer to the rescue and you have a couple days worth of practice: Chants for Vigil.
13 April 2014
12 April 2014
Happy birthday to my beautiful wife!
Which is all to say: I love you very much and I thank God He gave you to me as a traveling companion on this crazy journey of life. And I wrote all of that without telling the world you were 54. Amazing! :)
09 April 2014
Another Genealogy Post
Chancellor Weedon was my grandfather. He was born in 1879. HIS father, John Isaac Weedon, was born in 1828. So, well, yeah, my great grandfather was born in 1828, I knew my grandfather and he knew his father. How weird is that? My great grandfather was 51 when his youngest son, my grandfather, was born. My grandfather was 41 when his son, my father was born. My father was 40 when I, his youngest son, was born.
Nor is my great grandfather merely a name in a genealogy. You see, my great Uncle Isaac wrote a poem about his father that makes me love my great grandfather dearly:
MY FATHER
My Dad, how I have missed him
In all these sixty years,
His company and counsel
In all my hopes and fears.
I remember well one evening
When I was in distress
And thought my lost condition
I must to him confess,
Expecting when he heard me
He would give up as lost
And think I was another
Deceiver he had crossed.
But when I heard His answer
To my very great surprise
He seemed to think my troubles
Were linked with Christian ties.
Christ said he came to seek and
To save that which was lost,
To heal the broken-hearted,
The weak and tempest tossed.
Whene'er one's lost condition
Is openly confessed
It shows some revelation
Of God that is expressed.
To look alone to Christ is
To look away from self;
This is the Gospel lesson
My father used to tell.
Daddy, dear old daddy,
Affections, how they bind,
His sayings, how they linger
And dwell within my mind.
The hope that God has given
Most highly do I prize
That I may meet my father
Beyond the vaulted skies.
Now I ask you, could John Isaac have given his son Isaac better counsel?
Nor is my great grandfather merely a name in a genealogy. You see, my great Uncle Isaac wrote a poem about his father that makes me love my great grandfather dearly:
MY FATHER
My Dad, how I have missed him
In all these sixty years,
His company and counsel
In all my hopes and fears.
I remember well one evening
When I was in distress
And thought my lost condition
I must to him confess,
Expecting when he heard me
He would give up as lost
And think I was another
Deceiver he had crossed.
But when I heard His answer
To my very great surprise
He seemed to think my troubles
Were linked with Christian ties.
Christ said he came to seek and
To save that which was lost,
To heal the broken-hearted,
The weak and tempest tossed.
Whene'er one's lost condition
Is openly confessed
It shows some revelation
Of God that is expressed.
To look alone to Christ is
To look away from self;
This is the Gospel lesson
My father used to tell.
Daddy, dear old daddy,
Affections, how they bind,
His sayings, how they linger
And dwell within my mind.
The hope that God has given
Most highly do I prize
That I may meet my father
Beyond the vaulted skies.
Now I ask you, could John Isaac have given his son Isaac better counsel?
08 April 2014
Bekah is doing a
project on some family history for school. In looking through old papers I came across two items that I'd been looking for for a very long time. One I'll share today. A poem (loosely speaking) I wrote about my brother after his death 29 years ago:
In Memoriam J.F. W.
The long hours have fled us by—
you and I are sundered by the tideless sea.
And now, left behind, how can I express
the weight that presses hard upon me?
The weight wrought by your loss?
A beginning came on a day in March
as you and I walked the temples of the
Great City, the city immersed in cherry blossoms,
the city covered by a carven azure dome.
Yet for all the beauty of day and place,
the beauty that transfixed me was the
discovery of my brother.
The tenderness with which you touched
that day and gave it to me
belied all your gruff exterior.
You loved. You cared. And I, I had
been given a great gift:
A brother, a friend.
The years crept away and so did you.
Gently you fostered in me that which
taught me to hear you aright.
Gently, did I say? Through tear and
anger and argument momentous over matters
the most part trivial and less than noble,
You forged a person who could think.
And our years and days were parted again
until the death of one that we loved
beyond the telling of words.
Though the days were evil and fraught with sorrow,
yet we stayed together as a family. And you,
dear brother, were as a mighty
magnet to us all.
The warehouse days ensued.
Oh, what agony and sweat!
And how I thought you cruel again and
bitter hard. Yet for the joy of our conversation
one day I should endure it all again—all again.
It was but three when we began. We talked and
shared and risked the great risk.
We spoke of who we are and of what we feared.
We shared our dreams and heartaches and our tears.
We spoke of things that have been and things that yet may be.
We spoke as sunlight died and even grew. We spoke and spoke away.
Your face and voice tinged with laughter
and almost with tears,
remain indelibly etched upon my memory
down the corridor of the years.
And after that a change. For we had
probed our simultude and stood in curious awe
of the image mirrored each in each. So
different, so distant, yet so much the same.
We grew to an understanding, and almost I came
to worship you. You were to me an image
greater than life. So perhaps began
the downward trip to the tideless sea
that sunders even now
you and me.
To keep the image untarnished, immovable, strong,
you hid yourself from me
and for long I guessed, but did not know...
until you were not.
Alone now I stand upon the tideless shore and
in my mind and heart I probe,
trying to see through the thick sea mists,
but I am daunted.
O fallen idol! I loved you and I do and shall,
but for who you were, not for whom you dreampt of being.
William Weedon, May 1985
In Memoriam J.F. W.
The long hours have fled us by—
you and I are sundered by the tideless sea.
And now, left behind, how can I express
the weight that presses hard upon me?
The weight wrought by your loss?
A beginning came on a day in March
as you and I walked the temples of the
Great City, the city immersed in cherry blossoms,
the city covered by a carven azure dome.
Yet for all the beauty of day and place,
the beauty that transfixed me was the
discovery of my brother.
The tenderness with which you touched
that day and gave it to me
belied all your gruff exterior.
You loved. You cared. And I, I had
been given a great gift:
A brother, a friend.
The years crept away and so did you.
Gently you fostered in me that which
taught me to hear you aright.
Gently, did I say? Through tear and
anger and argument momentous over matters
the most part trivial and less than noble,
You forged a person who could think.
And our years and days were parted again
until the death of one that we loved
beyond the telling of words.
Though the days were evil and fraught with sorrow,
yet we stayed together as a family. And you,
dear brother, were as a mighty
magnet to us all.
The warehouse days ensued.
Oh, what agony and sweat!
And how I thought you cruel again and
bitter hard. Yet for the joy of our conversation
one day I should endure it all again—all again.
It was but three when we began. We talked and
shared and risked the great risk.
We spoke of who we are and of what we feared.
We shared our dreams and heartaches and our tears.
We spoke of things that have been and things that yet may be.
We spoke as sunlight died and even grew. We spoke and spoke away.
Your face and voice tinged with laughter
and almost with tears,
remain indelibly etched upon my memory
down the corridor of the years.
And after that a change. For we had
probed our simultude and stood in curious awe
of the image mirrored each in each. So
different, so distant, yet so much the same.
We grew to an understanding, and almost I came
to worship you. You were to me an image
greater than life. So perhaps began
the downward trip to the tideless sea
that sunders even now
you and me.
To keep the image untarnished, immovable, strong,
you hid yourself from me
and for long I guessed, but did not know...
until you were not.
Alone now I stand upon the tideless shore and
in my mind and heart I probe,
trying to see through the thick sea mists,
but I am daunted.
O fallen idol! I loved you and I do and shall,
but for who you were, not for whom you dreampt of being.
William Weedon, May 1985
04 April 2014
Homily from this Morning's Chapel on John 6:1–15
Jesus tosses Philip a hot potato, a problem that he cannot solve. “Where can get bread for these to eat?” Philip is one of you numbers people. He sizes up the crowd and figures out that having 200 days wages would not be enough for each one to get a bite. His attention is captivated by the huge size of the need. Andrew is a tad more practical, I suppose. He checks out the resources at hand: five loaves, two fish. He comes to Jesus shaking his head: “What are they among so many?”
Dismay and despair over the huge need and the meager resources and so the disciples fail the text. For they don’t look up from either to the face of Jesus. “Give them to me,” he says and then He offers His thanks and praise to the Father who loves His children and provides them with all they will ever need. Then Jesus takes those meagre resources and sends the disciples forth: “Go give it away.”
Can you see Peter… then the look of surprise… no matter how much he gave away, the chunk in his hand didn't diminish. From shock to the joy of giving it away to the hungry crowd!
Now ask yourself IF they had used their noggins and kept the food, how much would they have had at the end of the day? Their measly five loaves and two fish? Probably not even that, because they'd have eaten it! But because they did what Jesus told them to do: give it all away. What did they come away with at the end of the day? 12 baskets full of left overs.
No, makes no sense at all. But this is God’s arithmetic. And it is the arithmetic of Jesus’ own life. We fear if we give our lives away, we won’t have anything left for ourselves. But Jesus, who can take the bread and bless it and give it away and come up with more than you could ever dream, this is the Jesus who does the same with HIS LIFE. He spends His life in love for others, for you and for me. He pours Himself out till He’s all spent and theres nothing left but a corpse to put in a tomb. And yet raised from the dead on the third day, He shows how His Father vindicates such a life. Love is as strong as death, says Solomon in his Song. Jesus shows: No, love is stronger than death.
Don’t be afraid, people loved by God, to spend and be spent in loving service to others. You don’t come up the loser. You can’t. Jesus invites you to look away from the vast need, to look away from your meagre resources, to look to Him and to dare with Him to venture all on God’s amazing economy where love triumphs. Amen.
Prayers:
Let us pray for the whole Church of God in Christ Jesus and for all people according to their needs, saying: “Let us pray to the Lord: Lord, have mercy.”
For the grace of trusting in God to provide for every circumstance of our lives, let us pray to the Lord: Lord have mercy.
For deliverance from all fear that we might walk with Christ the path of loving service and mercy, let us pray to the Lord: Lord, have mercy.
For those who cry out for Christ’s healing upon their lives, and especially for all we have been asked to remember: for Timothy and his family, for Maggie and her family, for Deborah, Felicia, Marcia, Baby Thomas, Cindy, Brian, Cindy, Mike, Charlotte, Karen and Ed, let us pray to the Lord: Lord, have mercy.
For the ministry and work of LCEF and for God’s richest blessing upon their service to His people, let us pray to the Lord: Lord, have mercy.
For all the students of the Concordia University system and especially for those gathered here that they may be filled with the Spirit’s wisdom and serve His purposes in this generation, let us pray to the Lord: Lord, have mercy.
Finally for all our needs of body and soul, let us pray to the Lord in the words our Savior taught us: “Our Father…”