Week's end.

Knee problems

I have this sore knee after I run. You can feel grating sensations when I flex it. I have tried to rest it, but it has not recovered. I finally went to the Doctor. He looked at it, felt the grating sensations, pushed and pulled the leg, then told me to go for an Xray. What got me was that he said, "Probably the beginning of osteoarthritis. We wear out you know, it is part of the aging process." It was like he was saying, "What else do you expect at your age?" But I don't want to wear out! I have to wait two weeks till I get the Xray. I have reconstituted a home gym in my garage. I have a home built weights bench I welded up, a push bike on a wind trainer, some free weights, a punch bag and gloves my son left behind, and another couple of exercise machines inherited from children. I will use these rather than run regularly to manage my knee pain. I have installed a TV and my first session happened when I was watching the evening news yesterday. It makes sense, catch the news while exercising for an hour. I need to be disciplined and get out there regularly!

Time...

I come to the end of the week aware that I have still left some things undone that I should have done. I just have not been able to fit everything in. I have been hoping to have some flexible time at this time of the year, but already I seem to be able to fill my days. I think I am going to have to make adjustments, but what to cut out is very difficult?

Winding back the clock...

During January I have decided to spend Saturday mornings doing some repairs around the church building. We have had a cistern above the urinal that has often failed to shut off and has wasted water, flowing for hours. I have generally just given the cistern a big thump and it has come right, but most people are not as innovative as I. Yesterday I took it off the wall, pulled it all to pieces, cleaned every part, straightened everything up, put it back together and replaced it and it is going fine now! I also changed a washer on a tap. I decided I enjoy plumbing. Next week some spouting.... why did I give up being a plumber? It is quite enjoyable simply problem solving physical, mechanical things. People are much more complicated.

Jesus is like iron filings.

Last Sunday when we turned a corner on our run some graffiti on a wall read, "If we are all God's children, what's so great about Jesus?" .. I think there was an expletive there too. (I went back to photograph it on Tuesday and somebody had painted it out.) My running friend saw it first and turned to me and said, "What's your answer Mr Minister?" I fobbed it off, but here is the way I see things. I guess the writer was saying if we are all sons and daughters, what is so special about calling Jesus the Son of God? I agree we are all children of God. Here is how I see Jesus. He came and lived his life. People listened to his teaching, spent time with him, saw his values and lifestyle and sensed that there was something special about him. Marcus Borg suggests that there are "spirit people" whose quality of life enables us to see the sacred, and that Jesus was such a "spirit person". In Hebrew religion and in Greek religion there were traditions of calling special people "sons of God". Hebrew kings were referred to in this way, emphasising their role as representatives of God. In Greek mythology and in Roman thinking "Son of God" was often used for special people... emperors and such. The disciples of Jesus and the early church in trying to describe their experience of Jesus as a "spirit person" picked up the term "Son of God" and applied it to Jesus. It was the highest term they could think of, because for them, Jesus seemed to show them what God was like, and most truly represent God. When I call Jesus "Son of God" I am not thinking in "genetic terms", I am using a metaphor to say that for me, Jesus encapsulates what I sense the sacred to be.

Let me give an illustration. If I have a magnet I see the metal bits. But there are unseen force fields buzzing around those metal bits that are important. They are there. I can see their impact if I put a pin near them. They are important in electric motors and so many other things, but I do not see them. "God" for me is like those force fields. Not stuck in heaven, but an unseen reality in the midst of human life. He is the ultimate truths that tug at our heartstrings. He is the perspective and wisdom that guides people, groups and nations. He is the "collective conscience" that is a part of society. He is the compassion that wells up inside of us and the urge for justice. Etc. etc. With a magnet, if I get a sheet of paper, put the magnet on the other side, and sprinkle iron filings over the paper, suddenly the patterns of the force fields are revealed! These otherwise unseen lines are seen clearly. For me, Jesus is like iron filings. He reveals to me, not a God up in heaven, but the "force fields", the directions, the values etc. of the unseen sacred layer of reality that is a part of life. I look at Jesus and somehow I sense "the sacred", the "eternal" or "God" in life. Somehow I sense God addressing me in Jesus. The ancients experienced the same thing and said, "He is the Son of God". The modern man like Marcus Borg says "He is the 'spirit person' I choose to follow".

To finish I leave you with a quote from Albert Schweitzer. I love this quote because it describes my experience. Somehow it is when we respond that Jesus becomes "real" and an unseen partner in life. I used this quote in worship this morning.

He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lake side, He came to those men who knew Him not. He speaks to us the same word: “Follow thou me!” and sets us to the tasks which He has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal Himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is. (Concluding paragraph, Quest of the Historical Jesus.)

Photos:

Some pictures from my walk up Mount Cargill on Tuesday. I got soaked but I loved the moods of the mountain.

And a picture of iron filings revealing magnetic force fields.