Shalom

This past Sunday at church, my congregation welcomed a pastor who hailed from central city Chicago. (I have retained my lesson from college courses to avoid using the racist term "inner city.") His sermon stood out because it was delivered passionately, in a style that usually is reserved for orators from the Central City. He was talking about "Shalom."

Shalom, which means peace, which as far as we know, is something like the Hebrew "aloha."

But Brother Kenety was not going to allow us to walk out of church without learning about the word, and hearing it pounded into our conscience. Shalom, it turns out, means so much more than just "peace." It goes deeper, is richer, and has a longer life than "peace." Here are some words that better describe "Shalom": completeness, wholeness, health, peace, welfare, safety soundness, tranquility, prosperity, perfectness, fullness, rest, harmony, the absence of agitation or discord.


Shalom. Shalom. To those struggling with loss. To those seeking but not finding. Brother Kenety mentioned that people in his parish, some don't even know who their father is. Shalom. Shalom. 


Many years ago, I contacted my friend and told him that it was the National Day of Prayer, and asked him if he needed me to pray for him for anything. Nope, he couldn't think of anything. He was fine. 


Shalom. Shalom for those who can't think of anything that is pressing, pulling, testing them. 


And then, Shalom for my home. Stretched and pulled and tested. 


Shalom to my sister Heidi. She lands in China tomorrow to begin a two week stay that ends, God-willing, with her returning with a little baby girl. Shalom, Heidi and Anna. May we all find it and seek it and hear it. Let it fill our homes.

Selah Turns Teen

My daughter Selah turned 13 yesterday and her birthday became a little bit of the old days. We grilled hamburgers and cheesedogs (Selah loves cheesedogs) and had pasta salad and cheesecake. Outside, Elise whipped the softball around with whomever she could find and Selah and Kellen played horse.

Entering this teen era with Selah gives me a lot more fear and trepidation than the other kids, who seemed to be breaking down a door together. Selah's age and the bizarre placement agreement* foisted on us has me more thoughtful about who she is and what's to come.

Selah is gentle and introspective. She's always been able to get herself worked up beyond what she needs to. She's almost always the best athlete on her team and the consummate little and big sister - respectful of her two older sisters and relentlessly bossy of her younger siblings.

Yesterday the big kids and I thought of the universe of words and terms she had created that we all still use: "match/match" to indicate, of course, that two things can be worn together; "fashion" (as in your clothes are so fashion, or Your hair is so fashion); she thought of imaginary friends like Libey (an unfortunate imaginary friend who kept, like Kenny, meeting an untimely death) and Kellen's nickname, Parmus.

Selah bridges the gulf between three adult kids and three tiny kids who haven't met the toothfairy yet and one kid who never will celebrate another earthly birthday. Sometimes I sense that she has a teen's world on her shoulders, and all of the tension of a divorced family. Sometimes, I see her free, laughing uncontrollably. And sometimes, I see her burrowed into the corner of the sofa, at rest. She's a curious, beautiful young woman I have had the pleasure to meet and watch grow.

Christa Returns From The Holy Land

...no, not Germany. The actual Holy Land.

Despite threats from Israel's neighbors to "wipe Israel off the map," Christa was determined to return to the Holy Land, and set out about ten days ago with a group from her church.

Jet-lagged, full of stories, and some snafus regarding her camera, back safe and sound. I'll work the trip into some kind of recorded conversation soon.

Phase 1 of Leaving Eden Completed

Jen and I worked hard on our performance of "Noises Off" that we produced, directed and starred in last fall. Jen, her brother Josh, and my buddy Dave Sapiro (heretofore referred to as "Sap") blew the roof off of the place with their acting. It was a great play done super well.

The overall reaction we got was: "Wow! That was good!"

See, they were surprised at the high level achieved because most thought they were coming to a cute little play put on by a nice couple and their friends. And it wasn't. It was actually good.

We're at it again.

I wrote a pilot for a web series we hope to shoot and produce called "Leaving Eden." I made sure to run it by a number of folks, and I really like it. We've even talked about the shooting style we'll employ, what it will take to shoot it, and discussed characterizations, the music, all kinds of things. We hope to start some test shooting in April.

The series will focus on a pastor of a Lutheran church, his wife, and a vicar that has just arrived. Our goal is to make it about the Bible like Friday Night Lights was about football - it's a necessary part of the story, but the goal isn't to make a show about the Bible. It's about these people and their lives.

I'm hoping to employ a variant of the handheld, documentary style used in Friday Night Lights (sense a theme?)...which means somehow figuring out how to get cameras that can achieve that look and feel.

We're really committed to this and I can't wait to share what's going on with it.

Grace And My Father's Birthday

Today's my father's Birthday. He would have been 20. They count better in Heaven than they do here.


Once a month, I'm allowed to help lead worship at my church. It's an honor for a lot of reasons, and I'm confident it's also what I should be doing. God has given Jen and me the pipes to sing, a heart for worship, and I have a pedigree for it. My dad taught me all I know about theology, and my brother went to Seminary. And now I have a nephew in the Sem. It's the family business.


For those of you who knew my Dad, perhaps his greatest ministerial gift was teaching. Any one of his confirmands could conjure up the heart he'd draw on the chalkboard to represent God, breaking down the most complex concepts into simple images.


So, a few weeks ago I submitted the songs to be sung for that week's worship. I learned that the text was going to be about the Transfiguration, and after a lot of searching around, I found myself cornered. I really wanted to sing "Show Me Your Glory" by Third Day, but that would cause some work for us as a group. It would end up being a special music song, and that was something we had already decided on.


So Jen and I began searching for music that focused on revelation, seeing, opening our eyes. Jen began searching through versions of music, listening to types of songs and she stumbled across this video (I'd embed it but YouTube forbids it for this particular video.)


It was very different, but it solved a different dilemma we were encountering - no drummer - and it was just quirky and different and repetitive enough to work. Plus, it included a bit of eschatology in it with the inclusion of "I'll Fly Away." Might be fun. I submitted the service and set about prepping the group to do it.


A few days later, I received an email telling me the lyrics to that song were not appropriate for worship, because it implies that we choose to let Christ in.

I wandered so aimless

Life filled with sin

I wouldn't let my dear Savior in

Then Jesus came

Like a stranger in the night

Praise the Lord I saw the light

CHORUS:

I saw the light

I saw the light

No more in darkness

No more in night

Now I'm so happy

No sorrow in sight

Praise the Lord

I saw the light

Just like a blind man

I wandered along

Worries and fears

I claimed for my own

Then like the blind man

That God gave back his sight

Praise the Lord I saw the light

CHORUS (2x)

Some bright morning when this life is over

I’ll fly away

To a place on God’s celestial shore

I’ll fly away

I’ll fly away, oh glory

I’ll fly away.

When I die, hallelujah by and by

I’ll fly away

I’ll fly away

CHORUS

hmm. I pulled the song, but I did let them know the author clearly chooses nothing but sin and to walk away from the cross. I quote scripture and Luther and made my case. I was disappointed it was dealt with that way.

It's an image my Dad drew for us over and over. Of a cross with a sinner facing away from it. The only direction the sinner would walk, Dad would draw, is away from the cross. He would never turn around.

I wandered along

Worries and fears

I claimed for my own

 "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. " 1 Corinthians 2:14

"The carnal mind is enmity against God." Romans 8:7

It isn't, Dad would draw/teach, until the Holy Spirit turns that person around that they can actually even see the cross. See the light.

So, yeah, I took and still do take it personally. My Dad taught me well. I know the difference. I'm glad I have his drawings of His love on my heart, and understand grace and Lutheran theology.

Well, That Worked

I left this domain to go start a new blogging experience at Batiansila.com. It didn't go well. I wrote probably one meaningful post, and then lost every post I'd written on the new domain.

In the meantime, a year and a half has transpired since anything has been written here. It might be time to get this going again.

Braelyn Vogues

This weekend marks a confluence of crazy events: this is the Sunday closest to Dad's birthday, so for years, we've gone home to go sing in Church. In the old days, that meant practicing a half hour before Church and then sprinting across the parking lot driveway to the balcony at St. Paul's, making eye contact with Jean Doell that we were indeed going to sing something, and then waiting until Dad would look up from reading in the lectern to see that his children were standing at the ready to sing.

It has always sounded good, though, without fail. Always. And now, the only thing that's the same is the people singing - and even they aren't the same. We're all obscenely old - older than our parents were when we started considering them old. We plan on singing at Mom's church, shepherded by the Sainted-By-Christa Pete Speckhard. And...we have no idea when we'll practice or what we're singing. Ok, so not everything is different.

At the same time, my Isabel has returned to Wisconsin. Izzi was down in Fayetteville, NC with her husband, Andrew and it turns out he's almost done with this three year enlistment. Instead of completely leaving the Army, Andrew was able to find a very appealing job (by that, we mean "a position that likely exists only because the armed forces are a huge bureaucracy and didn't realize they probably don't need the position) in the reserves, and figures that's the route God has for him.

Oh, and by the way - BT Dubbers - Izzi's daughter Braelyn came home. Braelyn is six months old, super alert, beautiful, and is the little girl I've missed holding for a few years. Braelyn spent a good amount of time yesterday trying to determine who Teia is and why she looks like her mom and if indeed Teia is her mom.

AND, Heidi and Phil will be home. It's the first time I've seen Phil since we were all praying for him last year....and the last time we'll see their family before they adopt their little girl, Anna.

Anna Will Soon Call Minnesota "Home."

I won't let the fact that Anna and Braelyn - Anna being Braelyn's aunt - will play together for a good part of their lives blow my mind. I won't. I won't.

I won't.

New Home

I've been working on migrating this blog to a new spot, www.batiansila.com . I am sentimental about leaving this url. It's just that there's so much more for me to do at the new url...please follow me if you can.

www.batiansila.com