Dear Fiona:
Yeah, this week it's in the form of a letter to you.
Despite the fact that I was engaged at length yesterday with the attempt to get something posted on this blog to amuse you as you sit there in your room in China, I missed completely the fact that it was your birthday.
Happy Birthday!
Oh, I know that you will appreciate the birthday wish despite its tardiness. That is one of the things that makes you a wonderful friend. It is the awareness of your friendship which acts as a salve to the cut that my ego has taken by virtue of my having missed wishing you "happy birthday" yesterday.
I had made up my mind to write this entry in the form of a letter to you before I realized that yesterday was your birthday. I decided to do this because your recent e-mails had emphasized the way your reading the entries in this blog provided you a connection to aspects of your life here in the States.
I had actually written an introductory rhyme and some lengthy text (which I was in the process of editing and finalizing) on the subject of worldviews. This was because it is a subject as to which I was still receiving some reverberation because of my comments on September 18 regarding the conflict I felt sitting in a self-denominated "Christian" Sunday school class, listening to some extremely jingoistic comments lauding very nationalistic perspectives which were felt on the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center towers. I had tried to temper the impact of my comments by expressing my appreciation for the American experiment in government and the results therefrom which benefited me personally as well as every other American living within the protections to, and quality of, the society existing in the United States today. Yet, I am not surprised to have had it reported to me that not everyone took well my expressing (1) that God is not a Republican or a Democrat -- not even an American -- and (2) that some of the comments which I had heard made in a group of people calling themselves a "Christian" church seemed to me to be in direct conflict with the text of Matthew 5:43-48.
In developing the idea, I had wanted to include the text of a Facebook comment by a friend, which I felt opened the door to some further discussion on the subject on a very personal or family one-to-one discussion level. However, I had attempted to do some housekeeping on my Facebook account, and I managed to lock myself out of my Facebook account for a period of time (which the pop up on my computer said would be 24 hours but which turned out to be significantly longer before I could reenter my Facebook account to retrieve the comment by my friend.)
Further, while I was sure that my friend would ultimately accept the point that I was going to try to make, I felt it would be best to ask her permission before using her comment in this blog. Discretion makes me realize that, as Penny has pointed out to me in the past, I sometimes have a way of expressing myself which tends to be perceived by the person to whom I am talking as the equivalent of "where did you get such a silly idea," even when I do not mean it to sound so blunt or demeaning and even when my relationship with the person is such that, as in Penny's case, she usually comes back in good humor after having considered my comment and in doing so having found herself echoing with a bit of a smile "where did you get such a silly idea."
My timing was not the best in attempting to obtain my friend's permission to quote her here. So, I found myself late in the evening of your birthday having failed to wish you "Happy Birthday" and having failed to get something posted here for you to read.
But, it gets better! In the middle of the night last night, after having engaged in some research reading and a lengthy "discussion" with God about the nature of interpersonal love in general, the nature of interpersonal love in the age to come, and the nature of God's love in se and as the foundation for the former two, I was awakened from my sleep by a litany of words echoing in my mind almost poetically developing a series of thoughts specifically related to that researched reading and my prayer time. As words came to mind, they formed a vague shapes which demanded better words to refine them into more clearly recognizable concepts.
Without thinking twice about it, I found myself hooked to the computer, dictating to a blank screen something far more interesting (at least in the immediacy of its impact on me) that I wanted to share with you via this blog site. However, the rhyme which began last night is not in finished form – not finished enough for me to be comfortable posting it on this more public forum – and the text to accompany the rhyme is at this time still a series of words on the screen acting more as reminders of what things I want to make sure get put into the text than as anything structured.
So, even though I did not express "Happy Birthday" on your birthday, I was thinking of you on your birthday.
I am not sure if Penny shared with you the fact that she told your story about the elevator not working in your building and your having to walk down and up 16 stories to take your dog for its necessary walk. I am not sure that members of a Sunday school class should so readily find humor in this situation let alone come up with the comments making light of your plight. I, of course, remained appropriately somber throughout the jocularity. No. Really!
Just so you know, it is my understanding that Jim was not able to record today's lesson. Penny tells me that at least one person expressed disappointment at not being able to hear my rambling again during the course of the week. By way of a status update for you, earlier this week, Penny told me that it was Week 5 of my time to cover the text of Hebrews and that I better cover some verses from Hebrews this week.
I sincerely hope you're enjoying your time in China. Penny assures me that things at the County Counsel's Office are just not the same without you there sharing the presence of God in your words and conduct. Me? I just miss sitting at the table with you, Bible open, listening to you raising questions and making comments in a manner not unlike Talmudic pilpul.
Oh, by the way, "Happy Birthday?" <<Hmm. I wonder. Have I said it enough to make up for not having said it yesterday, especially since it will probably be the Chinese equivalent of tomorrow before she sees this?>> As always, my prayer for you is that you be permitted to be constantly aware of the blessings of God in your life and of the blessing of God that your life is to others.
Your friend,
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