In the middle of the night

I am writing this at 2:13 in the morning.  I went to bed at 10 PM and woke and found myself thinking about Jacob - encountering God in the night.

I am preaching about this in 10 days and spent some time today reading, pondering, and struggling with the story of Jacob and how God came to him in the night.  Twice.  The first time we have the story of "Jacob's Ladder" as dreamed about angels going up and down.  And realized that God was with him in the night.  The second time he wrestled with an angel or a man or God and came away limping with a new name.

I have read several commentaries and found a couple of sermons I have written about Jacob in the past.  He is quite a subject.  His family was the original dysfunctional family as he mother  - who loved him best - helped him to fool his father, Isaac, into giving him the blessing and the birthright.  So that the promise and the covenant went with him and not Esau.  As I lay in bed this night I kept thinking about the detail that the Bible gives right from the beginning about Jacob - he was a twin born second with his hand on his brothers heel.  A striver trying to be firs.  The man who was a cheater and conniver and trickster in beating out his brother.

What strikes me in this story is that he was born this way - he was wired for this!  I ponder that we all are born with parts of ourselves that are almost baked in the cake.   Strivers, or pleasers, or peace makers.  There are parts of us - our personalities that just are.  And they may be helpful and they may be problemmatic.  He was who he was.

The story that I get to struggle with for a while is Jacob whose striving led him into exile - he got what he wanted he thought.  And then for 20 years was away from his family because his brother wanted to kill him.  That is when he has the first encounter with God in the night.  He is sleeping outside with a stone for a pillow.  another interesting detail.  He is - as we all are - vulnerable in the night. Maybe more open to God's presence. And God comes in the night in the form of a dream.  Not rejecting him or condemning him.  Coming and communicating with him.  Saying I am here

¹⁵ Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you

As God comes to me in the night tonight.  I was woken up with a dream.  And that led me into this genuine ruminating.  And wondering about how God never stops wanting to be in relationship with God's people.  The bottom line of these stories from the Bible is about God.  Who is beyond simple cause and effect explanations.  Who is mystery and love and grace.

Last Sunday John preached about Genesis chapter one - the creation story -  and said a simple fact - that God created - the world and us - because he wanted to be in relationship with us. It struck me about how often most people - myself included - do not really think much about God in our day to day life.  Don't look for or notice the presence, the blessings, the moments, the nudges, God created us to be with him - and we often ignore and are mostly self referential. . I remember reading in high school a poem by James Weldon Johnson  called creation that started like this:

 And God stepped out on space,
And he looked around and said:
I'm lonely—
I'll make me a world.

It is a poignant and vulnerable understanding - I am lonely. God is lonely?  For us?  For me?

 So I write these words tonight having been awakened in the night.  Wondering if God is saying to me - let's spend some time together.  I'm here with you.

And these words written in this blog are a form of prayer.  Me saying - I am here to be with you.

 

Remembering

Sitting here thinking about and remembering.  8:46 am September 11, 2001.  The first plane.

We remember.

I sit in my living room and see a picture of my hand in Chuck's and it is dated, December 24, 2018

I remember his death

I see the angel Susan bought me fifteen years ago on a cruise to the Caribbean

I remember the fun

I see another angel my mother gave me that was in her living room

I remember our family time in that room.

I see the piano that was purchased in 1966 when we moved to Birmingham Michigan.  And then my parents gave it to me in the 80's.  

I remember playing alot of Mozart

These memories are here always represented by token,s souvenirs, pictures, furniture.  The memories of twenty years ago come every time I look at the TV or the news on the phone.

It is the fulness of life to remember the tragedies, the deaths, the life events.  I sit and remember and know the blessing of having loved deeply and enjoyed friendship and family life.  There is also a blessing in being an American in times of shared loss.

Twenty years ago I was pastoring the church in Bowling Gree.  When I heard the news I immediately know taht we had to meet in the church that night to pray.  We did and continued every Tuesday night for a year with a prayer service. I remember spending that week writing a sermon in my head and finally delivering it on Sunday.  I still have it - about Jesus response to evil.

I will live this day with an awareness of that event that shaped so many lives - leading to war and more loss.  Our country carries grief and trauma that continues to this day.

And yet - like my life - there is always an undercurrent of goodness and love that is flowing. The media tells stories of heroism in the moment and changed lives and circumstances afterward.  Evil never has the last word - nor does tragedy or death.

I listened several times this week to a podcast by Rob Bell about "How to open your heart."  He said we close our heart when we believe we can't start over and we open it as we receive the goodness of life.

So, I remember today.  I dip down again into grief and I come up to gratitude for the gift of this new day and the blessing of remembering all of it.

I found this poem by Mary Oliver.  It speaks to today

“The Uses of Sorrow”

(In my sleep I dreamed this poem)

Someone I loved once gave me

a box full of darkness.

It took me years to understand

that this, too, was a gift.