Spring Lake Evangelical Lutheran Church
A monthly message from Pastor Sean - August 2008
So many moods to this scene, as many or more than my own. Last night, I had to stop by the church building just for a minute before turning in at our new house around the corner. When I exited my car in the parking lot, I took a look behind me -- like I usually do -- and beheld the sight of the marshy meadow completely covered in a low fog. The effect of the moonlight on the misty blanket caused me to catch my breath just long enough to let a soft "wow" escape my body before wheeling about in a twitch and heading for the back door to get my business done.
Since my early childhood, I've had a fearful relationship with the dark...especially when I am alone. At times it seems that this line of work can keep me intimately stuck in this irrational state of mind, with amny of the tasks that need attention coming to completion during dark and lonely hours. In my own home, with my family safely tucked in and dreaming, I find it easy to stay alert -- "sentinel mode" as I call it -- and difficult to lay down the day and sleep. There always seems to be something just beyond the reach of the lights: beckoning, making feints and false charges, but never completely revealing itself. Very often those moments breath-holding, eye-widening, ear-tingling attentivelness compel me to recall so many simialr scenes in the scriptures where we read about someone else's "encounter at the edge." During these times whin I am cought in another uneasy dance with "what's out there" I feel particular sympathy for Jacob, when he twists and frets at the Jabbok (Gen 32); Hagar, as she sits down to weep a bowshot aeway from her dying son (Gen 21); Cain, as he faces a lifetime of threats and punishment as a murderer (Gen 4); and Moses, in so many encounters with God in the remote mountains (Ex 4, 24,and 33).
Perhaps a country church sanctuary isn't as scary as I imagine it at 11:30 pm when no one else is around. After all, it isn't all that remote, and much of what happens here in the daytime has to do with comforting people. But I think it will still be a good long time before i can stroll easily in and out of such places without being set upon by my own instinct to remain ready for something extraordinary to happen.
"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me." John 14:1 NSRV