Last night, in the dread of today, I read a sermon, “The Calling of Voices” by Frederick Buechner. The text was Isaiah’s vision in chapter 6 with the culmination of “Here am I, send me!”

My sons and I had driven clear across town for this book. No library near us had it. So we went. Them, to spend time with their dad. I, the same. The rain had just stopped and the grass and the trees were a green I’ll never forget. Azaleas and Dogwoods lined the streets we slowly traveled for to get this book.

He sets up three scenarios – a phone call for help in the night, a seagull carrying a mussel in its beak and then dropping it to the rocks below, a young boy realizing “with a kind of panic almost” his kindness to a handicapped boy is like “Christmas morning and a rocket to the moon.”

And he says about the young boy and anyone else these events might happen to…

“It was the summons that he had to answer somehow, or at considerable cost, not answer. Or in the year that King Uzziah died, or in the year that John F. Kennedy died, or in the year that someone you loved died, you go into the temple if that is your taste, or you hide your face in the little padded temple of your hands, and a voice says, “Whom shall I send into the pain of a world where people die?” and if you are not careful, you may find yourself answering, “Send me.” You may hear the voice say, “Go.” Just go.”

The rest of the short sermon is worthy of reflection. And maybe that will come. But it was this section that struck like lightning in the night. The kind of lightning you never forget, the brightest of all bolts in the darkest of all nights. The kind that pushes away fear if even for a moment so you can take a step in the right direction.

On Tuesday, I attended my uncle’s funeral. The dark blue suit was bought for the pastor-to-be but has of late been worn by the banker, was worn. Worn. And there it hit me how much more comfortable I was there among the mourners than I was at the bank, behind the desk. The wrong desk.

Whom shall I send into the pain of a world where people die?

I would not have planned to read this sermon just before attempting sleep had I known. I might as well be honest, it does no one any good for me to talk in code or veiled allusions. I dread each day of work and rarely sleep less than fitfully. Could I have ever known two years ago when I began to walk away from vocational ministry, this darkness would come? I don’t know. But it has happened and now I’ve read these words.

And last night’s sleep was sweet. Like a death itself. For I have not been careful.

Yesterday I was asked to be “sneaky” at work. My conscience reeled. And I asked again, “How did I get here?”

Fitful sleep and awaking with dread, while getting ready for another day of it, I turned on the cd I’ve been listening to every morning on the way to work. And then I realized I’d been praying this each morning…

“You who live in heaven
Hear the prayers of those of us who live on earth
Who are afraid of being left by those we love
And who get hardened by the hurt
Do you remember when You lived down here where we all scrape
To find the faith to ask for daily bread?
Did You forget about us after You had flown away?
Well I memorized every word You said
Still I’m so scared, I’m holding my breath
While You’re up there just playing hard to get

You who live in radiance
Hear the prayers of those of us who live in skin
We have a love that’s not as patient as Yours was
Still we do love now and then
Did You ever know loneliness?
Did You ever know need?
Do You remember just how long a night can get?
When You were barely holding on
And Your friends fall asleep
And don’t see the blood that’s running in Your sweat
Will those who mourn be left uncomforted
While You’re up there just playing hard to get?

And I know you bore our sorrows
And I know you feel our pain
And I know it would not hurt any less
Even if it could be explained
And I know that I am only lashing out
At the One who loves me most
And after I figured this, somehow All I really need to know

Is if You who live in eternity
Hear the prayers of those of us who live in time?
We can’t see what’s ahead
And we can not get free of what we’ve left behind
I’m reeling from these voices that keep screaming in my ears
All the words of shame and doubt, blame and regret
I can’t see how You’re leading me unless You’ve led me here
Where I’m lost enough to let myself be led
And so You’ve been here all along I guess
It’s just Your ways and You are just plain hard to get”

– Rich Mullins’ “Hard to Get”

1) I prefer swallowing 100% organic pollen.

2) Pretty sure last night at Regions Field was an example of the already/not yet of the Kingdom. At least an apt metaphor.

3) “…covered in wilderness, covered in stain…”

4) Went to my uncle’s funeral this week, worth the vacation day I had to take.

5) Whip me, beat me, and call me a geek, but I picture Viggo Mortenson when I read the book of Revelation.

6) No time for grief, gotta start a cause.

7) Most people sit in front of me and think money is the problem and solution. I see so much of myself in them, it’s painful.

8) Ran this morning. Glad there was a handle on fridge door to hang on to when done.

9) The pace of a baseball is rebuke against our hurried lives..

10) The reign of our King will never end.

As I continue to read slowly through the final book of the NT in the original language, I look for help.

What was John thinking and feeling when he wrote these things down?

What were the thoughts and emotions of the first hearers?

It is possible all my assumptions are wrong but I cannot help but imagine John is writing to those who are on the edge.

The edge of trouble.

The edge of faithfulness…faithlessness.

The edge of apostasy.

The edge of failure.

The edge of life, with death below.

And so the words in the greeting are not to be passed over as quickly as I would normally. They are the words of the Lord himself. Their Lone Hope is addressing them. And for those wavering, the hope they are tempted to forsake.

I have felt the jagged edge before. Nothing like what they are dealing with, I know. But I’ve wondered about the quality of my newborn wired to so many machines in intensive care. I’ve had all the doubts. I’ve felt the pressure of others pushing against the tender parts of my faith.

I’ve stared at the future and strained to see the light in the darkness.

As some of you have.

Our contexts are different from those in the first century, but our hearts beat the same.

So when I read these words over and over again, familiarizing myself with each word, I had a thought – only those who have need will want to be reminded that Jesus rules over the kings of the earth. The ones who wonder when all the pain will end will be glad to know he is the Alpha and the Omega. And only those who have suffered from those who trade in power will be glad to hear he is all-powerful.

Twice he says he is the one who is and who was and who is to come. It’s a reminder that this word of prophecy is about what he has done and what he is doing and what is coming. And he is the ruling King over all of it.

And for those who seem to be suffering from time’s relentless march and the year’s thieving demands, knowing the One who has bought us with his blood, is beyond time itself is grace.

Many of you are worried about what is coming. You are worried about your family. You are concerned about your health. You are frightened about the world that is changing before your eyes. The future is dark and you feel as if you are on the edge of something. I know the feeling.

So hearing he loves us is great. Sure. But hearing he is at once loving and all-powerful and not bound by the same things that constrain us is a good reminder when you are on the edge.

The darkness becomes less.

Yesterday, a sobering event.

I sat with an older gentleman as a customer. He looked like I felt. Tired, ready to move along. In being faithful to my job, I asked him a number of questions, made suggestions.

He seemed squeamish as I continued. Averting eye-contact. I had pushed too far. This is my daily fear.

Finally he made it clear. He was only worried about “getting his house in order” and taking care of his hospital bills so his wife won’t have to worry about them. He made it clear he had gotten a diagnosis from the doctor putting all monetary concerns for himself at bay.

A few days ago I began reading Eugene Peterson’s memoir. I haven’t read it since being a pastor ceased to be my job. The night before I read the story of the artist who taught him the difference between vocation and a job.

Peterson learned from artists the two do not have to be the same.

One can have a job and have a vocation that is entirely separate. The job keeps the lights on and fills the stomach. The vocation brightens the life and sustains the soul. Both are important, but they are not, nor need be the same.

So yesterday, this all became very real for me as the two intersected. They were not running parallel like when I was paid to pastor people. I knew what to say as a pastor, instinctively. But as someone with a customer in front of me, with sales goals hanging over me…I don’t know, the two stood in stark relief before me like never before.

I stuttered and stammered and simply did my best to put at him ease as he rose and told me he’d let me know if he needed anything else.

The job was glad for him to go. The vocation wished for more. the job had nothing else to sell him. The vocation wanted to comfort him on the edge of eternity.

I hear from a number of men who deal with this tension. It’s not easy and sometimes has all the psychological drama of the Scylla and the Charybdis. And we veer always towards one or the other and rarely are ever able to keep the two in balance. Some are bivocational. Some are on their way to paid ministry. Some long for it.

And there are others of us, who were once pastors only, and now have a job set apart. We wanted to escape the tension but it has followed us.

Maybe we are supposed to feel it. Maybe the ideal is to always feel the tension between what we get paid to do and the vocation.

Makes it hard to leave the pastoring behind. No matter how hard you try.

1) The car makes me think Job. But usually it all feels like Jonah.

2) I may need counseling after this fantasy baseball season.

3) Doing something at the end of May I was not sure I’d ever do again…preaching.

4) We’ve been listening to a lot of hymns lately. Most sound dated. Not cool. And that’s fine by me.

5)Trying to eat less and run more for bathing suit season. Not going well.

6) (knocking on rib cage of whale) “Anyone else in here?”

7) Yesterday I was driving home after a particularly hard day at work…

and the rain fell gently
and the young leaves were a supernatural green
and the mountain I live on
swung steep before me.
And my cynical eyes heard “This. All this.”

8) Actually, my wife may need counseling after this fantasy baseball season.

9) Haven’t been sleeping well. You know what doesn’t help? Counting bacon cheeseburgers.

10) I have never been more hungry for the words of John the Revelator.

“So what you are trying to tell me is the you will lend me money only if I don’t really need it?”

“You who have no money,
Come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
Without money and without cost.”

Some books just stay with you for years on end. You can see the lines on the page. The shade of the paper. The typeface. Even the original emotion can return in a memory.

Before I knew there was a list of acceptable books and authors, I read everything written by Phillp Yancey. Books. Articles. All of it. And then when I got to Seminary, I continued reading him, even though he seemed a little suspect.

I think about his book, What’s So Amazing About Grace? all the time. The stories mainly. But the book’s tone and message stay with me. More than anything he helped me see — we live in a world of “ungrace.”

It’s not only an indictment. It’s a statement of fact. The laws, the rules and the expectations recoil in the face of grace. Conditions upon conditions. We have to look for loopholes as we make our through the marketplace. All is to be traded. Gifts are given but with strings attached. And even when they are given freely, we naturally ask, “What’s the catch?”

We often speak of the glories of God’s grace in Jesus in the context of relationships. Which is right and true. But our world spins on what is earned. At least the world we have created. And we’ve created it in our own image.

I don’t know that the call is for businesses and governments to be more gracious. I’m not sure. But I do know the good news of grace in Christ stands askew to the ungrace they trade in.

This is the world I work in now. This world of numbers and bottom lines and earnings and bait disguised as free products.. While full of good people, they must like myself, wield the hammer of law on an anvil of hard cold ungrace.

Not so much an indictment as a statement of fact.

The Kingdom of God is a shot across the bow of our hearts. Hearts that list toward toward ungrace. Hearts too comfortable with the world of ungrace. Preferring it. The church becomes a marketplace of trade because our souls are mired in the marketplace’s ideals.

And then there’s the Kingdom of God, where the poor in spirit have reason to be happy. It’s a different economy altogether, where the laws of supply and demand are turned on their head. Every capitalist must check it at the Kingdom’s door.

Needing grace with nothing to offer is the position of the Kingdom. The King offers it freely. The one thing the world values above all other things is lack of need. Having something to offer gets the attention of bankers and merchants. And everyone else.

The King knows our need better than we do, sees it for all it is. And then with lovingkindness provides all and then some.

I think I’ve been had.

Everyday I have people sit in front of me and tell me far lass then the truth. It is one of the few carryovers of the pastorate into the world in which I work. Another carry over is talking with people in vulnerable situations needing a kind smile and listening ears and eyes.

Let’s call her “Cheryl.” I believed every word. And prayed for her. I even gave some advice on how to find some help, which she thanked me for. She repeatedly put her face in her young hands and said “oh God” over and over and over. She even told me God was the only reason she was surviving.

Now it is possible most of the story she told me is true…how she had been mistreated by a soon-to-be-ex-husband. It’s possible. But I still think I’ve been had. It could be she sat down at my desk and did not tell me the whole truth out of desperation. That’s certainly possible.

My first reaction? I don’t like being taken advantage of.

But then I thought for a few more moments. Why?

The one part of my job that I love is the opportunity to be kind when people least expect it. To go the extra mile to make sure people know that I am not there to take of advantage of them. Put them at ease. I’m pretty good at it.

I’ve been reading through Eugene Peterson’s memoir again. And last night I read his words on how people are not a problem to be solved but a story to be entered into. It’s good advice even when you aren’t a pastor.

So would I rather be taken advantage of when trying to help someone…or be so hard-hearted and cynical that kindness is the exception and not the rule?

While I understand the need to be as wise as serpents and innocent as doves, I also would prefer to be kind and deceived than cynical and defensive. I’ve had enough of that over the past couple of years.

I’m no hero here. I have to really fight anger and keep my natural inclinations at bay. The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

Look, this is probably old hat to most people. But we’ve been a little guarded over the past couple of years. Being tender-hearted has not been easy when you feel you’ve been taken advantage of and been the recipient of unkindness, you tend to want to dish that out.

So no heroes here. Just some realization.

Last night I had one of those parental moments I don’t think I’ll ever forget. Not so much for what it taught my son, Knox, but for what it taught me. Reminded me of.

I turned out the lights and prayed with Knox and Dylan. Then as I went to kiss Knox good night, I realized he was upset.

“But I don’t want Easter to be over.”

He does this for every holiday and birthday. Some is exhaustion. Some is real disappointment that the long-awaited event is coming to a close. It was too brief.

So I asked him what it was he loved and would miss. And we ran through the list.

Hiding and looking for eggs? We can do that tomorrow when I get home from work!

The candy? We can eat some after dinner tomorrow night!

The prizes y’all got? We will put the net on the basketball goal and shoot baskets with the new ball until the $6 ball bursts!

And what about celebrating Jesus rising from the dead? Knox, that’s a everyday event. We don’t have to fear death and we have forever with the King of the Universe to look forward to.

Both of us had teary smiles. I kissed him again and quietly thanked God for the reminder. And for a church where I know the importance of the resurrection is not limited to an annual event. And I immediately looked forward to celebrating communion next Sunday.