Have you been struck by the reality of Jesus lately? Have you noticed that the Kingdom of God is always preaching itself: that there can be the revelation, an encounter, as a seam of gold, glimpsed at first then bursting forth with marvelous connections, all the way back and all the way forward. When one is in this reality, this disclosure, one is dancing in the heart of God.
Each year we pray about what gift we can send to thank our friends who support us financially. Last year it was the picture of the oak tree at Summerfield Farms, taken by an intensive retreatant and accompanied with a note describing his connection to the tree and his experience of Isaiah 61. This year, we are sending Oscar Romero’s book, The Scandal of Redemption, along with this Highway letter which includes the story of my discovering the book. My hope is that the connected stories in this letter alert us to a larger awareness of the Kingdom in our midst, transforming moments in time and urging us to stay the course of seeking, knocking, asking, listening, and celebrating. A way of prayer.
Early in January, I started my annual three-day solitude retreat at St. Francis Springs Prayer Center. I go there to reflect upon and write up the prior year and to listen for direction in the year now beginning. As I have reread the journal entries from these silent spaces, I sense there is the possibility of encountering a juncture, a moment, a connection that preaches the presence of God.
In a journal entry from an eight-day retreat at Eastern Point in 2016, I revisited a Scripture that my spiritual director had recommended for contemplation. The first verse is this: "The word of the Lord came to me.” - Jeremiah 1:4. Then the liturgy in the Eucharist emerged: "Just say the word, Lord, and my soul shall be healed". These verses coalesced in prayer and then a third: “Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God." - Luke 4:4. Listening, I began to focus on the word "word." Through what means will this revelation come? I re-read the verses given to me from Jeremiah.
The word of the Lord came to me saying. Before I formed you
in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart...
Jeremiah 1:4,5.
The word of the Lord came to me: "What do you see Jeremiah?"
"I see the branch of an almond tree," I replied. "You have seen correctly
for I am watching for my word to be fulfilled." Jeremiah 1: 11,12.
The faculty of seeing is a major avenue in the Spirit for the word of the Lord to come.
Paul prays for the Ephesians that the eyes of their heart would be opened. Ephesians
18a. And from the devotional Give Us This Day on January 3rd, I read:
To see clearly comes to those with a deep prayer life and openness
to God's presence in our midst.
I am reminded that the word of the Lord may come to me as I listen and read and
it may also come to me through seeing something I need to receive: the adventure of solitude and prayer.
I stay in the Oscar Romero cottage or Hermitage at St. Francis Springs. Romero was a Roman Catholic archbishop in El Salvador (1917 to 1980) during a time of great oppression and violence. Speaking boldly from the pulpit to the people but also to the government officials, soldiers, and to those in violent opposition. He was assassinated while preparing the Eucharist in the Carmelite Chapel of the Divine Providence hospital where he lived.
I stay in that cottage in honor of my two grandchildren of Salvadoran blood and of their grandfather, Rosalie Rivera, a full-blooded Salvadoran who laid all the beautiful and extensive stonework at St. Francis Springs. Recently, he set in place a columbarium which I could see through the window from my chair. What did I see? The place where I want my ashes to be placed. It was quite extraordinary and unexpected to sit in that space.
January 4, afternoon, I walked over to a bookcase. My eyes immediately focused on a brightly covered paperback with a man's facial image, The Scandal of Redemption, by Oscar Romero. Whether it had been there on other visits I do not know. It is a collection of sermons by Romero delivered in the teeth of the violence. The word came to me, and I sat down to read a portion but ended up transfixed by it and read it right through. It stunned me that this priest poured out the reality of Christ, the life of following Christ, and the place of the Church in the midst of that time. He powerfully expressed to the government, the opposition, and the people caught in the trap, the third way of Jesus. Not under the banner of liberation theology but under the banner of Christ. I knew immediately that we needed to gift this book to our support team in the midst of our times. It was that fresh and powerful and cost him his life. It is all Christ. And the word came to me. What a gift.
I had planned to go to the National Prayer Breakfast in early February but was derailed by complications from hip surgery. The morning of the breakfast I stayed in bed to watch it unfold before an attentive crowd of Senators and Representatives and the President. The intimacy of the statuary room at the Capitol was the venue. Over at the Washington Hilton, hundreds gathered in support and prayer. That is where I would have been. I later found out that they only saw a portion of the morning which did not include the main speaker.
The President and the Speaker of the House were seated next to each other on the front row. Andrea Bocelli brought the music. Tracey Mann, one of the friends over the years, now a Republican Congressman too, co-hosted the time with a Democrat colleague. Chaplain Black, the Chaplain of the Senate, gave the main address. An African American, a retired Admiral from the Navy, and Chaplain of the Senate for over twenty years, he brought his sonorous voice to the podium. Like with Romero, the word of the Lord came to me as Chaplain Black spoke and went out from there after cascading over the leadership of the United States. With power, humor, personal story, and marvelous grasp of the Scriptures, he laid out the third way of Jesus, calling for the discipline of fasting and prayer throughout the world. Calling the leaders, the people (me), to weekly fasting and prayer. I was so excited I started calling everyone. It is available on YouTube here. (Cue to minute 30.) It was the most timely and impactful address that I have heard at the NPB over many, many years. These two men of the cloth are bringing it in the here and now and I felt God had set me aside, in solitude, to receive it.
God was not finished stringing these pearls for me, all the way back and all the way forward. I will close with this story so clearly connected in the Spirit to the other two. Our friend, Peter Radtke came to Greensboro on a business matter and later joined Todd Lipe and me on my porch to fellowship and share a cigar. I knew Peter had been to the NPB. I asked what he thought of Chaplain Black's message which he had been able to watch. Peter replied: "I was getting chill bumps." He proceeded to tell us that two years ago he was prompted to try to contact Ukrainian President Zelensky to call his people to prayer in response to the overwhelming force attacking and killing the people. Peter did not know a path for making contact, so he enlisted Tony Hall, a former Congressman and ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture. Tony is well known for engaging a fast in response to critical issues. Peter drafted a letter for Tony to sign. The letter referred to the same Scriptures Chaplain Black explicated and communicated the same message to a leader. By now, Peter was close to tears and the presence of the Lord thick upon the porch. We immediately got up and celebrated the Eucharist. We prayed that whether or not the letter got through, these messages would encourage Peter and Tony to continue the effort and that other strategic people would join in.
Folks, I will never know how many people will read Romero's sermons, watch Chaplain Black's message, or even work their way through this lengthy letter. But I do know this: God is pouring out streams in the desert, manifesting and proclaiming the ways of the kingdom and letting us in on it. When we turn aside to the burning bush and take off our shoes in awe, we acknowledge his work is "continuous in time" and stand in the
rushing river of sacramental reality, not deferred but now.
Blessings,
Trip and Laurie