Shadows and Light

“You must forgive me, I am confused by shadows,” says the somewhat delirious, but endearing, character Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha. After a life full of chasing windmills, seeing in others what they could not see in themselves, and even calling one by another name, he struggles to find his home between the world he knows and the one he dreams, as impossible as the latter may be. In the end, like us, he is confused by shadows.

One of the occupational hazards of being a preacher is you remember some of your sermons. One that stands out for me was delivered in a gymnasium that served also as the chapel and theater. Lights were set up for a production later that week, and I asked that the spotlights be turned on and pointed at me as I delivered the sermon. The woman I asked to do this must have thought my ego had finally won the day, but my purpose was not to shine light on me so much as to create shadows behind. Facing the congregation of students and faculty, I spoke of shadows and light, and with each move I made, walking across the stage or moving my hands, my shadow did the same on the wall behind. I can still remember the look of amazement in the younger students’ eyes as they pointed at my shadow and made the connection between what I was saying and what was going on behind me. “As long as I face the light,” I said, “I can’t see the shadows.” 

I still believe that’s true, but it sure is hard. There are many sources of light, and each casts its own shadow. Like Peter Pan, we can turn and play with our shadows, but, in the end, we’re liable to get confused. Shadows can seem so real, when, in fact, they exist only because of the light. Sometimes I look at others and see their shadows and not the light on their faces, just as they sometimes look behind me. 

What a less-confusing world it would be if we learned to turn from our shadows (and the shadows of others) and faced the light.

Limps and Blessings

There is a vivid story from the Hebrew Scriptures about a man, named Jacob, who wrestled with an angel through the night. He was to cross a river in the morning to reconcile with his brother on the other side. Having acted shamefully in his past, he was anxious about how the encounter might go. The angel awakened Jacob and they wrestled throughout the night. Once Jacob recognized his opponent as an angel,  he refused to let go until he received a blessing.  When it was given, his name was changed to “Israel,” which means one who wrestles with God. He was also given an injury which causes him to limp for the rest of his life.

I remember sitting up in church when the story of Jacob's late-night wrestling match was read. The action and drama were tonics to the boredom I felt sitting in church.  It wasn’t until many years later that I felt drawn to the truth underneath all the action and drama. It wasn’t until I had wrestled with an angel and been given a limp of my own that I began to understand how much more there was to this entertaining story.

Last week, one of my children asked to meet with me. I could tell it was serious, and we talked for over an hour about what in AA they call “the wreckage of my past.” She wanted to ask questions about things I’d done and express her feelings about them. It was a difficult, painful conversation, but we wrestled through, and, as I sat there in my discomfort, I prayed she would receive the blessing that comes from saying what she needed to say. I, however, limped home.

The next morning, I sat in a circle of recovering alcoholics. A newcomer shared a difficult conversation she’d had with her mother. Like the one with my daughter, things were said about her past and she was left struggling to walk through another day without picking up a drink. The group surrounded her with what experience, strength, and hope we had as we limped together down the happy road of destiny.

To finish the week off, my wife and I attended a number of large social gatherings where people welcomed Spring rambunctiously. Standing with my bottled water, I listened and participated in the lively conversations until the others began to slur. Walking home at night, I thought back to my life on the other side of the river. I was tempted to romanticize the way I once walked, but an email waiting for me at home from a long-ago friend asking for help with his drinking problem reminded me not only of my limp I received , but also the blessing I was given. 

Climbing Down the Stairs

Princeton Univerity Chapel. 

Whenever our babysitter was with us on weekends, she took us to the Princeton University Chapel for church. It was a radical change from our usual parish and ignited a passion for Gothic architecture that remains. I remember the way it felt to sit under the vaulted ceiling, with colors from the stained-glass windows glancing my hands and pant legs. It was a magic place, one that made me feel small, and God big. In other words, it was a perfect church.

Half way through the service, as we sang a hymn, the minister would stand and climb the many stairs up into the pulpit. For me, the pageantry said as much as the sermon, and I remember thinking, “I’d like to do that one day.” While my friends were thinking about being famous hockey players, or accomplished surgeons, I wanted to climb the stairs and preach sermons. Although I’ve never climbed those particular stairs, except when no one was looking one Saturday afternoon, I have climbed many others and delivered a fair number of sermons. What I didn’t know then was that climbing up the stairs was easier than climbing down.

To climb up the stairs, all you need is a desire, some additional education, something to say, and a bit of skill. The hard part is climbing down, because when you reach the bottom of the stairs you need to live out what it is you just said. It’s a challenge that’s not unique to ministers, but somehow it seems more pronounced. Suddenly what we do is measured by the faith we profess, and, for me anyway, that has proven the greatest challenge of my life.

It’s much easier to talk about God, than to talk to God, to talk about caring for others, than it is to lend a hand, to talk of forgiveness, than to forgive, to talk about the wonders of creation, than it is to care for the earth, to talk about being a Christian, than voting like one.

It’s all about living our faith “not only with our lips, but in our lives,” as they say in the Episcopal tradition. There are two journeys we need to make, to climb up and say what we believe, and climb down and live it out. If you’re like me, you’ll find the journey down the stairs is much harder than the one up.