PreacherMike

For Matt as you enter another week of tests . . . .

Rachel Naomi Remen had just lost a breast cancer patient who was only 37. She spent some time later with the woman’s husband and four-year-old daughter. As they visited, the child reached into her pocket and pulled out a heart. “It’s a feelie heart,” the dad explained. “She never goes anywhere without it.

Dr. Remen discovered that the heart had been sent from a bereavement center in Tacoma, Washington that ministers to children who’ve suffered the death of a loved one. “No two hearts are exactly alike, and each has a life of its own. . . . It is common for children who have grieved to give their feelie heart to other children who are going through hard times. One little girl gave her heart to her father when her parents divorced. A small boy sent his to his teacher when her own little boy died.”

Remen thought about all the physicians she worked with who came through her Continuing Medical Education program to help them deal with death. They’re trained to be ashamed of deaths or not to talk about them, but many of the best doctors carry around their repressed losses for years. Here’s what she did:

“Some time ago, I wrote to the women who make the feelie hearts for Bridges to tell them about this work, about the oncologists, emergency-room physicians, surgeons, and internists who have spent time with us and about the fifty first- and second-year UCSF medical students who take our course on the art of healing every year. They sent us hundreds of little velvet hearts. They fit into the pocket of a white coact perfectly.

Several of the students have told me that they find that if they hold their feelie heart while they study, it relaxes them. But perhaps it does more than this. The first- and second-year medical students at our school and at every medical school are remarkable young people, on fire with the spirit of service. They are people who care deeply and passionately. Research at medical schools throughout the country shows that often this passion does not survive the rigors of the training. Sometimes I think of one of these young people, late at night, struggling to memorize the countless facts on which the scientific practice of medicine is based and holding on to a little velvet heart. The image fills me with an irrational sense of hope.“

The One Egg Special.

For fourteen years, I’ve been having breakfast most Wednesday mornings at the infamous Towne Crier. It’s been a wonderful time to be with preachers from other Churches of Christ in town.

As members have drifted back and forth from one church to another over “major differences,” we’ve just smiled, enjoyed our friendship and remembered that what goes around comes around.

It’s rare for anyone to order anything other than the One Egg Special. (Yes, it may remind you of the Blue Plate Special that Barney used to order at the diner in Mayberry.)

One egg, meat, and bread. It’s $2.19 for the breakfast. Yes, those of you in Manhattan, you read that correctly. It’s less than you pay for a gallon of gas. (I know there’s an easy response based on double-entendre, but don’t go there.)

We get the same thing. But we order it SO differently!

I’m the “normal” one egg special guy: one egg over medium, bacon, and a biscuit — with water. No bells and whistles. Just pass me the strawberry jam.

Eddie orders the same thing, except that he has iced tea. That’s right: iced tea for breakfast. When the waitresses see him coming, they know it’s time to pour the tea.

Terry’s one egg special goes like this: one egg scrambled, bacon, and a pancake (believe it or not, they’ll substitute a pancake for the biscuit). Water.

Don’s order adds an interesting twist: “I’d like the one egg special with an extra egg.” Now I’m not Einstein, but wouldn’t that be a two egg special? Apparently not. Coffee.

Phil is Mr. Atkins. He asks for extra bacon instead of the biscuit. Bring on the protein; hold the carbs. Diet Dr. Pepper to drink.

So there you have it. We place five “one egg special” orders. But they look very different.

It’s funny to us that some of our members probably think our churches are vastly different. But we’re all just one egg specials. One may be low carb, one may have the extra egg, and another is downing iced tea.

But we’re way more similar than most people suspect. In small worlds, minuscule differences can look VERY LARGE.

Can you imagine how much energy is burned in many communities by members of various churches talking in outrage about what another church is teaching or doing?

I’d like to think that in those communities, one morning a week the ministers are getting together for a bit of Towne Crier Koinonia: a one egg special, trust, deep concern, and a little humor.

After writing about how the primary human predicament is often described through either a medical model (where the human problem is illness and what’s prescribed is therapy and medicine) or a legal model (where our problem is lawlessness and crime and what’s needed is punishment), Barbara Brown Taylor has these insightful words:

“Contrary to the medical model, we are not entirely at the mercy of our maladies. Even within a fallen creation, we still have pockets of God-given freedom. However impoverished our circumstances, however badly we may have been used, we may still choose–for good or ill–how we will respond to what has happened to us. We may learn how to live with our tragedies or we may spend all of our time dying from them. We may decide to forgive our enemies or we may allow them to run our lives by continuing to hate them. In theological language, the choice to remain in wrecked relationship with God and other human beings is called sin. The choice to enter into the process of repair is called repentance, an often bitter medicine with the undisputed power to save lives.
Contrary to the legal model, sin is not simply a set of behaviors to be avoided. Much more fundamentally, it is a way of life to be exposed and changed, and no one is innocent. But that fact need not paralyze anyone with fear, since the proper response to sin is not punishment but penance. . . . The essence of sin is not the violation of laws but the violation of relationships. Punishment is not paramount. Restoration of relationship is paramount, which means that the focus is not on paying debts but on recovering fullness of life.
. . . Sin is our only hope, because the recognition that something is wrong is the first step toward setting it right again.”

Thanks to James Wiser for providing this blog on Harding’s recognition as one of the ten most politically conservative schools in America. It was written in a kind spirit with recognition of the many wonderful people at my alma mater.

Thoughts?

Please, PLEASE don’t tell Bill Rankin. But I’m thinking about purchasing a Mac. Yep, I’m looking at the possibility of getting a Powerbook–especially for ease in video editing.

You’re either a PC person or a Mac person. I’m the former; Bill is the latter. And we’ve been around-and-around about this many times in the last, oh, decade or so. (Note: it was mostly in jest since Bill knows a lot about technology and I don’t.) But my technology intern (Matt Maxwell) tells me it’s time to take the plunge.

So — mum’s the word.