Loading...Training season has started. Yesterday I headed out to Geist Creek Lake in Shelbyville to swim. As of today I am going public with the news that I am committed to swim the English Channel in September of 2021. More details about that will follow later. For today I am just letting you in on a glimpse of my journey.
It started in 5th grade when I learned about Gertrude Ederle. She was the first woman to swim the English Channel. Up until then everyone had used the breast stroke to swim the 21 miles from Dover to Cape Gris Nez, but Gertrude used the crawl stroke instead. She beat the winning time by a whopping three hours.
I don’t know if it’s the story itself or the way the teacher told it to us but I immediately knew I wanted to swim the English Channel too. The spirit of Gertrude captured me on the spot.
Then ‘life happened’. And I tucked the spirit of Gertrude safely into a hope chest as a nostalgic dream I planned to take out and look at on a day called ‘someday.’ Someday didn’t come but other dreams, planned and unplanned, came and went until one day everything went. Down the proverbial toilet. The short version can be summed up in two words: He left. And the reason why can be summed up in four words, “I don’t know why.”
And there I was without a hope chest, without nostalgia, without a foundation. What I did have was water and the spirit. I had the spirit of Gertrude in me. And I had the Holy Spirit from my baptism and other various places where I’ve been captured by it. And I had water.
Perhaps the 5th grade version of me welcomed Gertrude’s spirit so eagerly because of a rare gift my mother gave me. She put me in the water. Any chance she could get. The best memories of my early years are those spent in a swimsuit. Putting it on in the early morning still cold from the night before. Going out into the first light of morning. My brothers and I would swim all day long until dark when we had to be dragged indoors to dry off and start the whole thing over again the next morning. Ocean, lakes, pools. It didn’t matter. Water was the answer to every question. What are we doing today? Put your suit on you’re going swimming. Swimming was not competitive. I never swam with a team. There was no goal. There is only the feeling that I am at home in the water.
That’s what it feels like when the Holy Spirit captures you isn’t it? Home. Look at Acts Chapter One again. Acts gives us a glimpse of the disciples’ journey. They are promised that the Holy Spirit is coming to comfort them. Did they tuck the promise in a hope chest for someday? You and I know what happens in Acts Chapter Two. But they didn’t. Some thought they understood all the dreams in God’s hope chest. Some may have thought Jesus was God’s dream come true. Then Jesus leaves. I know he says “why”, but, why? There stand the disciples without anything but a promise. And a cloud. And the instructions to wait. And wait they do in devotion to one another and to prayer. Until chapter two.
And then who comes with a mighty rushing wind and a display of fire but the Holy Spirit. Pentecost doesn’t wait for someday, it surges in. In all its confusing splendor Pentecost proves God’s dreams can’t be contained in a hope chest. God has tucked all of God’s hopes and dreams into our chests.
After Jesus ascends, God sends Holy Fire to live on earth and as far as I can tell God’s Fire feels right at home in our hearts. Just look at the many homes in which God has resided over the years. In Eden. On Mount Sinai. In Solomon’s Temple. In the mouths of the prophets. In Mary’s womb. Then in the disciples and now in us. We are as odd an address as any for a divine home. God likes the neighborhood. And who can evict God’s Holy Spirit. Or keep it closed in a box. Or insert it into a smart strategic plan. In my experience, the Holy Spirit, like Gertrude’s spirit, is more about capturing people than cajoling them.
St James’ campus has been busy with spirited events this week. Wednesday evening the preschool hosted graduation. This room was filled and the children sang Jesus Loves Me and This Little Light of Mine. One boy’s shoe was untied and went I knelt to tie it each student came up and gently hugged me and said, “Thank you for tying his shoe.”
Yesterday, the Episcopal Church Women put on a successful plant sale which you will hear more about at announcements. I baptized a baby named Oliver whose whole family came and celebrated him getting all splashed by water and the Holy Spirit. Then I walked down to Gleason Hall to meet the group who was renting it for their marriage retreat. I have no idea what the retreat was all about because it was a celebration of an Indian custom and I couldn’t understand all the glimpses of the story I was told. That didn’t matter. I could understand the spirit of the people, warm, open, loving. And they sat me right down and fed me a large and spicy meal served on a banana leaf. It was delicious and I ate with my fingers. It’s the third time this group has rented Gleason Hall for a special occasion and they expressed their gratitude and how much they like it here.
Gleason Hall looks like a nice room in which to celebrate a festive occasion. The preschool is a bright and welcoming space for students. But the connection between all these spaces is something that can’t be analyzed or rented. The same spirit of hope and endurance and warmth and openness and gentleness that moves in this room is moving in every square inch of this campus.
For our preschool students, for our Indian guests, for you and for me every season is training season. This campus serves as a training ground like Geist Creek Lake serves my swim. We come into this building to train our hearts so we can navigate the waters of life outside this building. Sometimes those waters are smooth and sometimes those waters are storm-tossed. You might come to a moment when it feels easy to flush trust down the proverbial toilet. Before you push the handle trust your training, trust the glimpses of God’s fidelity in the stories told here. I don’t know if it’s the story itself or the way I see God’s story being told here at St James but I love the Spirit here. Amen.
