st
Sunday, I
was returning home from Montana where there is blessedly no phone reception-
just pheasant, horses, and a lone coyote on the horizon. I walked off the
plane, turned on the phone to call Kate, and my blackberry is going dink ta dink ta dink ta dink ta dink
downloading email. It kept going, so I finally stopped and looked at the
screen. It was a lot of addresses I didn't recognize and I thought we had a
spam problem. I get to the food court and punch on one of them to see what it
is…
“Dear Rev.
Rush, thank you for that article… my daughter is at West Point and I have found
myself rehearsing the day I will say goodbye to her… I realize now just how
anxious I am about it.”
“Dear Rev.
Rush, even though I oppose this war, I am deeply impressed by our young men and
women that serve on our behalf. Please forward my heart felt thanks”
“Dear Rev.
Rush, I just have to know what happened to your son. I pray that he is safe and
will return to you soon. May God bless you and your family.”
“Dear Rev.
Rush, this may sound strange but my son has become addicted to drugs and we
cannot find him. I would give anything to hug him again. I don't know why I'm
telling you this but you are lucky to have the relationship with your son that
you have…”
“Dear Rev.
Rush, I am not a religious person but I will pray for your children.”
Dink ta dink ta dink ta dink…
Whew! I had to
stop reading. It was just overwhelming. I had accidentally inched into the edge
of a spiritual river, the collective concern- our fears and hopes, anxieties
and our loves- all surrounded by prayers to the Almighty, wrapped in good will,
the petition for blessing to cover us and blanket our life. It was very
powerful and so immediately real. Even though there is a good deal of pathos in
what people share, I was still almost faint, the way you are the moment your
children are born. Milan Kundera had a wonderful turn of phrase to describe
those moments in your life. He said they are filled with the ‘unbearable
lightness of being'.
There is this
great river of prayer and blessing that is always going on, even if you only
tap into it once in a while. I'm glad I don't experience it more often because
I couldn't get anything done. It is a profound power. You wade into it and
pretty soon you are giddy with gratitude.
I'm coming to
realize that gratitude is the fundamental spiritual disposition. It is true
that we are surrounded by real threats and dangers. The root causes for most of
our anxieties are quite real. Illness and tragedy miss us all too often by just
a degree or two of separation. All too regularly we walk through the ‘valley of
the shadow of death'. And when these anxieties that attend us are suffused with
a community of love, when they release communal blessing and good will from all
of these people praying for us, the poignant dimension of human existence just
blooms. It is right in the midst of our anxieties and fears that we can say,
‘surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life'…
In those
moments, you silently think to yourself, ‘my life has been a gift. My life is a
gift.' It is in those moments that you can really feel, ‘my family is a gift.
My spiritual family and friends, they are all gifts'. There is a wonder to it
all.
And the
response to gratitude on our part is generosity in all of its manifold aspects.
Compassion, caring, loving, nurturing, understanding, appreciating. It is
something of a spiritually instinctive response that when we are blessed, we
turn around and spread the love.
Perhaps you saw
the PBS documentary on the Berlin airlift right after the end of the Second
World War. As soon as the war ended, Russia and the United States effectively
divided Europe into the spheres that would become the Iron Curtain. Berlin was
occupied by the Americans, though it was behind the Iron Curtain, and the
Allies decided that they would keep West Berlin a free, non-communist city. But
there was no way to get supplies to the city, so the U.S. decided that they
would fly in all of the food and supplies necessary for the city to stay free.
It was an enormous mission that would eventually require a continuous air lift
campaign all day and all night.
This mission
had its own challenges. The war had just ended. The Germans were a defeated
nation. We were reaching out to our former enemies, difficult in itself, no
matter what the circumstances. In this case, it had only been a few weeks since
the end of the war. Just before the end of the war, the American bombers had
been flying missions over Berlin blowing up huge parts of the city day and
night. Now that the war had ended, those very same Air Force was again flying
over the city night and day in a mission of reconciliation and aid. But, you
hear those sounds of planes in the air at night after living through something
like that, and you jump in a panic before you can control yourself. The
instinctive response to trauma can stay with you for years after the trauma
itself is gone, we know that. So ordinary Berliners were quite distressed about
these missions, even as they were glad for the food and supplies.
On the American
side, we had to call up a whole bunch of pilots to make this happen and most of
them had only recently finished their tours running bombing missions across
Europe to help end the war. I wonder what that was like for those guys. We
never asked those questions of that generation and they weren't too big on
talking about it. But you have to wonder. After bombing and of course enduring
being shot at, I wonder what it was like to be offered the opportunity, right
on the heels of the wars end, to be able to fly missions that heal not hurt and
to fly them in safety not fear. I wonder if they weren't glad to be part of
something like that out of a fundamental gratitude over surviving the war,
winning the war, and living free.
One of the
pilots, Gale Halvorsen, decided he was going to do something that he could do
to help ameliorate and trauma of the American planes flying over head for the
Berliners below. He got a few buddies to help him make little wee parachutes.
They attached candy bars to the parachutes. Right as he was closing in to land
his plane, he would open the pilots
window and drop a few dozen parachutes with candy bars. It took all of a couple
days for word to spread throughout the city and kids started looking for his plane.
In between
flights, he'd go to the end of the airfield and meet kids at the fence and hand
them out some candy. He was a big hit and soon he had to have some help, so he
called his church in Texas, told them what he was doing. Again, you have to
wonder if the ordinary Americans who just saw the end of that incredibly
difficult war weren't spiritually thrilled to have the opportunity to be part
of the healing. We can't know exactly because we didn't ask back then. But they
boxed up a boat load of chocolate bars with parachutes and the missions
expanded.
The Commanding
officer heard about it through the grapevine, thought it was a public relations
breakthrough, and got a line item for the purchase of chocolate bars and wee
parachutes. The thing took off and someone did a story on Radio Free Europe
about Colonel Gale Halvorsen and the chocolate missions that he flew.
A 9 year old
girl in Berlin heard that interview and decided to write Colonel Halvorsen. She
described her house in detail and asked if he might be able to fly over her
house and drop some chocolate for her and her brothers. Colonel Halvorsen got
that letter and had to write back that
he couldn't really change his route, so that was not possible. However, he
included a few candy bars in his letter and wished her well.
She is an old
woman now. Someone found her and asked her what that was like for her. She was
reflective. She said that at the time, she obviously thought like a child. She
said that her father had gone on a mission for the German Air Force near the
end of the war and he never came back. So that when Colonel Halvorsen answered
her letter, it was like she was getting the answer from beyond that she
couldn't get from her father and she projected on to him all of those things
that she needed from a father.
Gratitude-Generosity-Gratitude…
Simple and profound… I'm grateful that Colonel Halvorsen got to hear that story
50 years later. He bloomed this child in a way he never would have imagined
simply because he allowed himself to respond to his gratitude with a generous spirit.
His generosity of spirit had a radial effect that multiplied itself. Like war,
reconciliation must be waged, and that is what he was about. He got caught up
in a conspiracy of goodness and frankly, it surprised even himself.
That is what I hope
happens to you this season. It hasn't been the greatest year. But I hope you
open yourself to the awareness of all that you have to be grateful for. In this
next week, I hope you make a space to reflect upon that. Make an early walk.
Find a space of solitude for a short while. Call some things to mind. It is
great to be alive. Even in an off year, we drink in blessing. Name some things
out loud to the Almighty when no one is around. List a few people. Picture
them. Remember. Put it back front and center.
And tell a
couple of them, maybe even write them a note. See how that goes for you. And
open yourself with your extended family. You know that there are at least a
couple people in your family that are challenging to be generous with, so just
skip over them in the beginning. Put yourself in a space where you can allow a
spirit of generosity to fill you. Envision a couple people in particular. How
could you bless them? What can you give to them that they really need from
someone? And as you spend some time with your family, keep asking yourself, how
can I give? How can I be a blessing, in things small, perhaps in ways large.
Let the meaning of the season begin in you… no need for reciprocity, no keeping
score… this is about you.
Become a
conduit. Live for a while in the spiritual key of life.
And, support
your spiritual community too. I have to say a word to my Christ Church people.
We need more support. We had a number of families in the congregation who
weren't certain about how the year was going to go and were reluctant to give
earlier in the year. So we are behind. It is not the end of the world but we
are behind. Now, I need you to make an investment here for this year. We need
everybody to make an investment here.
This is your
spiritual family. This place is the catalyst for a lot of radial good things in
your life, in our community, and beyond. Don't take it for granted. Pitch in,
do your part, so that we can remain healthy and a productive blessing for
others. In gratitude, allow the spirit of generosity to fill you. This piece is
not about how much money you have or how many obligations you fear. This piece
is about you and who you are courageous enough to become. The funny thing about
generosity is that when you genuinely open yourself to it, things have a way of
taking care of themselves. They have a way of working out because you are in
the right space, or, as Jesus used to say, you are not simply living, you are
living abundantly.
Somehow, when
we open that hand, we end up having enough. It ends up being okay. We still
have our anxieties. We still have our fears. But wrapped in our love and good
will, released with the hope of blessing, amazing changes happen all around us
and we find ourselves in the midst of something profound. And this is why we
live. This is what we hope for. It is what gives us meaning.
"Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear
not, for thou art with me,
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies,
Thou anointest my head with oil
My cup runneth over
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life"
May peace be upon you. Amen.
© 2009
Charles Rush.
All rights reserved.
