Month: March 2021

Righteous Anger: Cymbal or Symbol

by Steve Harsh, posted in Uncategorized

We are half way through March, and I can’t remember a day this year that I have not have read about another shooting in Columbus every time I open the local newspaper or turn on the local news.  Gun violence in upscale malls and communities of color, hate crimes against my sisters and brothers who are Asian Americans,  the pain of illness and aging my family members are going through!  I’m mad and I don’t know what to do with my anger.

The violence became more personal this morning when a beloved Asian American sister and friend invited our church staff to a prayer vigil tomorrow to pray for an end to the fear and violence against Asian Americans.  And yes I am angry at Donald Trump and those who cannot see or refuse to see the harm they are doing.   I know I need to love them and forgive them, but this crap lies squarely at Trump’s feet for his racist speeches about the pandemic and China.  Forgive 70 x 7?  He’s gone way over that total years ago, and I feel helpless about letting that anger eat at me!

But I don’t know what to do with the anger that would be constructive.  I want the temple-table turning-over Jesus right now, not the “love your enemies” one. And yet that same Jesus says “put away your swords” to those who would protect him, who forgives his executioners and their ignorance.  It’s too much.  I can’t love like that, and I’m ashamed to admit it.  If I cannot be part of the solution I am part of the problem.  If I can’t confess my white privilege and witness against the systemic racism in our country “I am a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal” (I Corinthians 13) instead of a symbol for love and justice.

I’m so longing for Easter but know we are a long way from the empty tomb, and the path that leads there goes through Gethsemane and the place of the skull.  Isn’t there a short cut, a way around the passion and suffering, a way to avoid the mess and the command to take up a cross and follow Jesus?

I know the answer to that question.  So I just keep praying to the source of all being to “Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, for the living of these days1” and for the faith and strength

“To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go

To right the un-rightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star.2”

  1. “The Impossible Dream,” Mitch Leigh and Joe Darian
  2. “God of Grace and God of Glory,” Harry Emerson Fosdick

Patience

by Steve Harsh, posted in Uncategorized

Many years ago my grandchildren were big fans of Thomas the Tank Engine. I still remember from those days a song that I heard multiple times from that show which said “Patience is a virtue.” I wish all of us pandemic-weary people could take that advice to heart.

Biblically two of my favorite verses proclaim the same advice. “Be still and know that I am God.” (Psalms 46:10) And “Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength…” (Isaiah 40:31)

Be still and wait; two things that we instant gratification Americans are very poor at doing, especially 12 long months into a pandemic. I get that, and I too am tired of masking and sanitizing my hands every whip stich. So I understand why some impatient governors have lifted all restrictions even as health experts urge them not to.

I understand why we cold northerners want to flock to warm, sunny beaches for spring break. I get it, but it is too soon. We are able now to see the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel, but it is still a long way for us to journey before we get to the light.

One of my literary heroes is Zorba the Greek by Nikos Kazantzakis. I wish I could be more like carefree and adventurous Zorba, but it is Nikos, the narrator of the story and Zorba’s companion that I really identify with.

There’s a moment in the Zorba story where Nikos finds a cocoon with a butterfly just beginning to emerge. Seeing the butterfly struggling to be born Nikos holds the cocoon in the palm of his hand and blows his warm breath on it to speed up the process, which it does. But then to Nikos’ horror the beautiful butterfly struggles to unfurl its wings, but because it has been born prematurely its wings are stuck together and will not spread out. The butterfly dies there in Nikos’ hand.

In the musical made about Zorba it is there that Nikos’ sings a lament called “The Butterfly” which includes these lyrics:

“Every man/woman has a moment and I’m waiting for mine, when I’m finally free.
But I mustn’t be hurried.
Give me light…give me time.
Like the butterfly…
Not too fast, not too fast,
Let it grow, let it last,
Nature knows when and why… Think about the story of the butterfly.”

Here’s the rest of what Isaiah says in 40:31: “but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk and not faint.”

This is one of those times when we need to be still and wait patiently.

From Lament to Repent

by Steve Harsh, posted in Uncategorized

My church is using “Lament” as the theme for worship this Lenten season. I wrote the following piece as one of the daily devotions for this Lent.

Most of the times I lament it is because of something painful or unjust (at least in my mind) that has happened to me or someone I care about.  But recently I had an experience that reminded me that sometimes laments can also lead to confession of something wrong I’ve done or a good thing I failed to do. 

I am part of a group from our church that is studying a book called “Be the Bridge: Pursuing God’s Heart for Racial Reconciliation” by Latasha Morrison.  We’ve just read and discussed the first chapter so far, but Morrison has already challenged me with some provocative and uncomfortable questions at the end of Chapter 1.  For example, “Have you studied the history of non-White cultures in America and how those cultures came to be here?  If so, what books and articles have you read and what videos and documentaries have you watched about the history of those cultures prior to their forced migration?”  I am embarrassed to admit that my answers to those questions were very short.

That experience reminded me of one of my favorite stories in the Hebrew Scriptures (II Samuel 12) where the prophet Nathan confronts King David with his sin in taking Bathsheba from her husband Uriah in a most diabolical manner.  Nathan approaches David with a parable about a rich man who takes his poor neighbor’s sheep instead of killing one of his own large flocks for a big dinner party.  David of course recognizes the injustice and says, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die; he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.”   And Nathan simply says to David, “You are the man!”

I like that story because I’ve always seen it as someone else getting his or her comeuppance, but this time the shoe was on the other foot. Through reading this book I heard God clearly saying to me “Steve, you are the man!”  It took my laments over the systemic racism that has infected our American history for 400 years and how I have blamed others for that horrible injustice and held a mirror up to my own guilt.   So now I can lament my own failure to do more to address this critical mistreatment of God’s beloved children of color. 

The hope in that process is summed up this way in “Be the Bridge:”  “I have seen awareness lead people out of denial and ignorance, into lamentation, and ultimately into racial solidarity.”