From 1700s France to Gold Rush Colorado in a Single Weekend

Last week was another work travel week for Jeannene. She arrived home on Friday, St. Patrick's Day, in the late morning. After a long conference call, she took the rest of the day to recuperate from the very early morning required by her air travel. Since it was Bear's day with his nanny, we took advantage of being freed from childcare duties to go have drinks and a snack at The Copper Rail before taking in a movie. She had a green beer, much to my amusement, and I stuck with iced tea. We shared the hummus platter, which starred very good, creamy hummus and was accompanied by warm, soft pita triangles and very fresh veggies for dipping.

I love Disney's animated version of "Beauty and the Beast." What bookworm girl can't identify with Belle and her love of reading? Naturally, then, I've been eagerly awaiting the live action version since I first heard it was in the works. I was even happier when Hermione Granger---oh, I mean, Emma Watson---was cast as Belle. What usually happens, though, when I can't wait for a movie to come out, is that I end up not even seeing it in the theater. We just don't get out to the movies that often and, when we do, it's usually a Marvel blockbuster or some iteration of Star Wars. Those are fun, of course, but I would cheerfully go to the movies once a week or more, given my druthers. So, I was quite happy when Jeannene offered to take me on opening day! I'm not sure I've ever been to a movie on opening day before. It was a wonderful version, beautiful to behold and well-cast. One of my favorite things about it was that there were several interracial couples in it and it wasn't part of the storyline that they were interracial couples. They just happened to be.

After the movie, we spent an inordinately long time looking at refrigerators to replace ours, which keeled over mid-week. We finally decided on one and headed home, where I made Guinness stew, champ (which I have always thought was colcannon, until a friend of a friend pointed out that colcannon has kale, while champ has cabbage), and soda bread. Neither of us is very keen on corned beef and cabbage, so this is our traditional St. Paddy's Day supper.

Saturday was an astonishingly summer-like day, with blue skies, sunshine, and the mercury reaching 80 degrees! We had breakfast at a little mom & pop place here in town called Billie's. We enjoyed huevos rancheros, a green chile slathered breakfast burrito with chorizo, and some pancakes. Bear was not impressed with the biscuits & gravy we ordered for him, but he was wild for the sausage. In fact, we ordered him another patty because he gobbled up the first with such joy and enthusiasm.

We thought we were going to the zoo to see the new tiger exhibit, but traffic was backed up for blocks near the zoo and the parking lots around it were jam-packed. I don't know if everyone was headed for the zoo. Perhaps there was a special exhibit at the nearby science museum? Anyway, I had a great plan B in mind that would get us outside and also serve as the C date we'd been stuck on for ages. Without telling Jeannene where we were headed, I reset the Waze app for the Denver Botanic Gardens (C is for Conservatory and Children's Gardens). She was pretty pleased with my choice.

We started with the children's gardens, where Bear had a blast playing in the dirt, feeling all kinds of new textures, making friends in the kitchen, learning to use a drinking fountain, and making a plush mountain goat knock wooden blocks off a stump. This naughty goat got put in time out on another stump each time, with Bear saying, "Naughty goat!" Our wee boy was also completely terrorized by the existence of a swinging bridge. It was a very modest motion, when compared with the swinging bridge of my youth, but it really worried him. He refused to walk over the bridge, insisting on being carried. He remembered it Tuesday at school, too, and refused to have anything to do with the bridge on campus.

Across the road, we wandered through the tropical rainforest conservatory. I was astonished to see what a ginger plant looks like. We sniffed our way through the orangerie, where citrus trees were blooming with a scent that took me straight back to the Florida road trips of my childhood. From there, we progressed through the Japanese gardens and the more Western gardens. There wasn't much blooming, but it felt wonderful to be out in the sun and to see what was blooming. I will be glad to go back in another month or two and see more blooms. There is the promise of dozens of lilacs and peonies to lure me. There's also a beautiful house that I hope I someday get to visit for an event.

We ended our visit with lunch in the cafe, a ham and brie sandwich for me, a caprese sandwich for Jeannene, and a ham and cheese pinwheel sandwich for Bear, who slept through lunch, but awoke in time to eat lunch before we got in the car. We also visited the gift shop, where I had a very hard time reining myself in and not buying all kind of lovelies. I walked out with absolutely nada. Bear would like to have gotten some of the swirled blown-glass balls we saw there.

Sunday morning, my longtime online friend, Cathi, had invited us to her congregation in Golden to see her daughter in the children's program and to meet her in person for the first time. The people at the church were warm and welcoming---enough so that we felt completely comfortable leaving Bear in the church nursery for the first time. He had a blast! We really enjoyed the program, which was all about standing up for others and doing the right thing. It gave both of us quite a bit of hope for the future, if there are lots of kids like these, being religiously educated in such a way. Cathi was as delightful in person as she is online.

After church, we headed to downtown Golden to have brunch at the Table Mountain Cantina and Grill. We passed the Coors brewery and were astounded at the magnitude of it. Jeannene's run some pretty large and productive plants, but this dwarfed anything she's done. We plan to return sometime to take the tour.

Golden is very focused on its past as a gold rush town and definitely plays up the old Colorado feel. The hotel in which the restaurant is located reminded me a great deal of Santa Fe and I got even more excited about our upcoming anniversary trip there. I can't wait to show Jeannene around. Bear was pretty sleepy. He was intrigued with the stuffed (real) bear in the lobby, but I think he was even more interested in pulling the Southwest-patterned cushions off the couch and onto the floor, so he could rest on them.

When we were finally summoned to our table, any trace of sleepiness vanished and he was full of beans (literally and figuratively) the entire meal. That didn't prevent us from enjoying the food immensely. They brought toasty warm cinnamon rolls right away, which was much appreciated by all three of us. They also brought Bear things to keep him amused---gigantic coffee filters to wear for hats, crayons and wiki sticks that he found quite delicious, and condiment cups for stacking. The meal was quite wonderful and he shared my food, biscuits and chorizo gravy, with gusto. He was not as impressed with his Momma's chicken chimichanga, but he was wild for the black beans that came with it. I got to have the best mimosas I've ever had, as well. I don't know if they slipped a little vanilla in the orange juice or what, but they were out of this world.

After lunch, we strolled around town a bit more and found a world map to go on Bear's wall alongside his U.S. map. I was sorely tempted toward an ice cream cone, as it seemed everyone in town was walking around licking a scoop, but I was full enough from brunch that I resisted. We had a really pleasant afternoon. I mused on the oddness of spending the last day of winter walking around in the sunshine, wearing a tank top. You won't hear me complain!

Pumpkin Season!

Our weekend effectively began on Friday, with my wife arising at 3:30 in the morning to fly back home to us from Maryland. Elij and I picked her up about 10:30 and we stopped for brunch at the Moonlight Diner. The view of the snow-capped mountains was lovely! Our food was very good. Jeannene chose banana walnut pancakes and I opted for a traditional fried egg/hash brown/sausage/toast combo, which was great, while Elijah enjoyed scrambled eggs and bites of our meals. The diner itself was fun, with all kinds of Halloween decorations to add a little seasonal fun to the vintage soda shop type decorations all around us.

From there, we stopped by her office and a couple other places for a brief time before heading home. When we got home, we hung out and watched some t.v. and played with Elijah's new blocks, his souvenir from Maryland. I love them---traditional wood blocks with uppercase & lowercase letters, sign language, numbers, and pictures of things starting with those letters.

By the time dinnertime rolled around, neither of us felt like cooking or going back out, but we figured going out would be the easiest. Jeannene expressed a preference for something Asian, with tofu. I started checking out what's available---and available for delivery---and discovered that one of the local Vietnamese places delivers. So, we got scrumptious noodle dishes and some really great hot & sour soup and Vietnamese pork egg rolls. We were in bed by 9 or so.

Saturday morning, I woke up hungry for pumpkin bread and hot apple cider. I decided to make a loaf of bread, along with the chocolate bark I was going to make to take to our neighbor's house. We'd been invited to dinner and wanted to contribute something. However, we ended up deciding it'd be fun to go to a pumpkin patch and scrapped the bark idea, as it entailed a trip to the grocery. I quietly hoped the pumpkin patch would also have pumpkin bread.

We headed out to Rock Creek Farm and had a really good time checking out the pumpkins in one of their fields. Elijah wasn't too sure about the whole thing. He tends to get very, very serious when in new circumstances and it was certainly different to be on a farm! He was really interested, however, in the pumpkins and, especially, the vines. We got some cute pictures, too. We chose two pumpkins and headed to the area with booths to pay---and see what kinds of baked goods they had. Elij got to sit on some hay bales and have more pictures taken while he played with a gourd. He was fascinated by the shape. I picked a caramel apple, a loaf of pumpkin bread for our hostess, and a fabulous pumpkin bar with cream cheese icing and festive sprinkles. Jeannene opted for a couple of jack o'lantern cookies---one to share with Elijah and one to take home. Lunch was a concession stand hot dog and some of the best spiced hot apple cider I've had in years.

We walked around, enjoying looking at the activities for bigger kids. We met another little boy named Elijah, also 11 months, who adorable, with light caramel skin and ridiculously long eyelashes. We had a nice chat with his folks at the pig pen before moving on to let Elijah get cow snot on his hands. After strolling around some more, we headed for Michael's with our trunk full of farm loot.

It turned out they were having a huge "doorbuster" sale at Michael's and we got a fun trick or treat wreath, a bunch of craft supplies, and a cool birdcage. Then, we had to rush home and get ready to go next door for dinner. Gloria is the neighbor who showed up with a loaf of zucchini bread when we first moved into the house. It was so lovely to be invited to dinner. Gloria had expressed concern that Elijah might be afraid of the Halloween decorations in her house, but he was actually enchanted by the hanging witches and glowing ghosties. Me, I loved the murder of paper crows parading up her staircase. Jeannene and I were both really impressed with the beautiful murals she'd had painted, as well.

We started the evening with drinks outside. One of the men was a baby whisperer and took a great liking to Elijah, who spent much of the evening exploring the yard and house with him and playing. Gloria also very graciously offered him a seat in her grandkids' exersaucer, which he completely loved. After a meal of baked ziti, salad, and garlic bread, we all sat and talked for a long time over dessert. We got home at 10:30 and went right to bed.

In the morning, Jeannene got up early to greet the guy who built our custom baby gates. He'd asked if he could install them at 8 Sunday morning, which seemed like a weird hour to me. We're usually either asleep or getting ready for church then. But, we'd been waiting for the gates for awhile and definitely needed them, as Elijah has become incredibly proficient at stair-climbing and is sad when a mom isn't available to chaperone his upward trips. The guy and his cousin didn't arrive until almost 10, which was frustrating. We'd hoped to get the gates installed quickly and check out one of the area churches. Ah, well, we definitely needed them. Shortly after lunch, Jeannene took a nap while Elijah and I unpacked boxes. When he was ready for his nap, I settled him in on me and watched "Cujo" while he dozed. Jeannene joined me for the last part of it.

After that, we headed into Denver and picked up my cousin Lisa's husband, Alan, for dinner. He's in town for a work trip and we were excited finally to meet him! He turned out to be really nice---I would expect nothing less of Lisa's choice for a life partner---and we had a great time talking with him over pizza, calzone, & salad at The Mellow Mushroom.

When we got home, it was time to program the coffee and head to bed, another weekend in the books, another debate avoided.

Vancouver and Butterflies

Among the food plants my wife oversees, one is in Vancouver. I spent a week in Toronto every summer of my teen years, visiting friends, and I've been to Niagara Falls a number of times. When I was tiny, I suspect I went other places in Ontario. I had never, however, been to Vancouver. Many of her business trips are short bursts of 2-3 days, not worth the extra money for me to tag along. However, last week, she was due there for an entire week. So, our Elijah's first international trip turned out to be to Canada. He's a great traveler and continued to be for this trip.

Jeannene went in very early on Monday and was done early, so we got to go poke around Granville Island's Children's Market (where we picked up a Good Night, World board book illustrated with Pacific Northwest First Nations art and a cute pair of high tops featuring the British flag for our boy) and the Granville Island Public Market (where we scored scrumptious maple yummies, a fab vanilla macaron, brie de meaux & 9-year cloth-wrapped cheddar, wonderful bread, and fragrant local strawberries). We also stopped in some neat shops, including DragonSpace, where I saw scores of fairies I wanted to take home. I did get a coloring book, a gorgeous pendant of silver and rainbow moonstone, and a wee dragon for Elij's Enchanted Forest room. We also got to spend time on the quay, eating meat pies and listening to a street performer's renditions of James Taylor songs, among other singer-songwriter type music. He was quite good. Supper was across the street from the Westin, at the Boathouse, where we had some quite good seafood and, more importantly, the best Pimm's Cup I've encountered.

Tuesday, Jeannene had the car for work, so Elijah and I just hung out in the hotel room, playing and resting---and eating too much room service! We had the car Tuesday evening, but I didn't feel like venturing out at night in a city I don't know at all with a baby.

Wednesday, we did get out, driving down to the Gastown tourist district. However, upon arriving in the area, I looked around and determined that it didn't look like much that would be interesting at midday for a 10-month-old. He had fallen asleep, anyway, so it was better not to rouse him for nothing. So, I turned around and drove back to Richmond, where we were staying. By the time we arrived, he was awake. So, we had lunch at Dinesty Dumpling House. I'd been wanting to try soup dumplings and theirs turned out to be excellent! Elij was not as big a fan. I was happy to see spicy green beans with pork on the menu. That's one of my favorites. However, I was concerned that it might be too hot for him, so I asked the waitress. She shook her head and said, "Oh, no! Too hot, for sure, for him!" So, I also ordered rice noodles with pork and veggies, which turned out to be good, if bland. Elijah enjoyed eating the noodles, but his favorite thing was, if you can believe it, the green beans! He was looking at them so longingly that I decided to suck all the sauce and chile flecks from one and let him try. It didn't seem particularly spicy to me---and I am a spice wuss---so I thought it would be fine to let him try. He ate a bunch of them with great gusto and no ill effects! For dessert, we nommed on some red bean paste buns. I love me some red bean paste. Elijah was impressed, as well. 

For dinner that night, we tried to go to Espana for tapas. However, it was slammed and tiny. Luckily, I'd read good Chowhound reviews of Banana Leaf, just down the street and they had a table for us. We had roti with coconut curry sauce and excellent chicken satay with less-excellent, but still yummy sauce. I was not a fan of the roti, as it was a bit too sweet for me and I wanted it to have condensed milk on it if it was going to be sweet, but Jeannene and the boy were. I ate too much chicken to be very hungry for the pork side ribs I ordered, but the small portion I ate was good and the jasmine rice was perfect. Jeannene's rending beef curry, with coconut rice, was just right, as well. Okay, I need to be perfectly honest here. I could cheerfully have eaten my pork, had I not been intent on saving room for mango sticky rice. Am I ever glad I did, too! It was completely delectable. The mango was perfectly ripe. Oh, man. Elij adored it, too. We all three did. He'd had parts of both our dinners, but this was his fave, for sure. That boy is a huge mango fan. 

Thursday, Bear and I went exploring the Kitsilano neighborhood while Jeannene worked. We stopped in for lunch at Nelly's Grill, where the waitress was so very kind. She even offered to bring some blocks or other toys for Elijah. He was perfectly happy just eating, though. He had pancakes for the first time ever, fluffy silver dollar ones shaped like Mickey's head and bursting with plump blueberries. I had an omelet full of delicious meats & veggies. I did not take my sweetie boy to the beach there, even though I am dying to introduce him to the ocean. I want Jeannene to be there for his first time. I'd also like it to be in warmer climes so he can put his wee toes in!

Thursday evening, we planned to have dinner at Thierry Chocolaterie, Patisserie, and Cafe. We found parking right across the street, a table indoors, and everything. Sadly, they were out of sandwiches and savories. Deciding not to allow that to put a damper on things, I suggested we simply eat dessert first. So, we did---and it was great. Jeannene had a shortbread cookie with a coconut liquid chocolate. I had a glorious palmier with Basque chile liquid chocolate. Elij had a vanilla macaron---well, a great deal of one. His moms did pinch off a piece or two. Then, we ventured out into the streets to find dinner. 

We ended up at Pacifico Pizza, after considering and rejecting a number of other places. As soon as we walked in, we were swarmed by women who worked there, exclaiming over the baby. That was really sweet, but what really made an impression was the way it smelled in there! I knew immediately that our pizza would be stellar---and it was. We had terrific service and dinner was so, so good. We shared a pizza that was half margherita and half capriccios, with Genoa salami, ham, artichoke hearts, mushrooms, and olives. The toppings were high quality and the crust was thin and chewy and delicious. 

Jeannene's conference was over Thursday, so we were able to enjoy one more day touring the city as a family. The event planner (me) had Stanley Park and the Vancouver Aquarium on the agenda. We ended up buying a membership at the Aquarium before we even walked in, since Jeannene's going to be spending a decent amount of time in the city. Elijah and I will be back, as well. We had a bite to eat before exploring. Elij really dug the black bean burger! He was less keen on the sea lions, once we started looking about the aquarium. I think the crazy roaring sort of noises made him nervous. He was, however, interested in the dolphin show. I think Jeannene's and my very favorite thing to see was the belugas. It was a great time! In the gift shop, we found an adorable sloth onesie for Elijah, a red jacket for Jeannene, and a pewter necklace and earrings with a First Nations artist's depiction of Raven on them for me. 

After the aquarium, we took a horse-drawn trolley tour of the park, with a stop at the totem poles (which were fascinating---each had a sign explaining the history and meaning) and a drop-off a lovely stroll through the woods from our car. We set our GPS for The Tomahawk Barbecue, assuming all the park's restaurants closed at 5. However, I decided, on a whim, to follow the "restaurants" sign further into the park, rather than the GPS' preferred road. It was a great whim to follow, as we ended up having a wonderful dinner (a shared cheese plate and roasted chickpeas as an appetizer, halibut for Jeannene, beef tenderloin for me, and a beautiful chocolate mascarpone cake with an almond wafer crust---some of everything for Elij, whose favorite was, by far, the chickpeas) at The Teahouse in Stanley Park, right by the water. Lovely service, cozy atmosphere. We'll definitely go back. 

Saturday, we flew home. I'd been spoiled by our not getting to sit together on the way there---affording me the opportunity for a nap and several chapters of my book, while Jeannene kept our wee boy entertained. I assumed I would be entertaining him on the way home, but he surprised us and slept almost the whole way, after looking out the window with great interest for awhile. We were also surprised not to have anyone else in our row! What bliss, in this age of consistently overbooked flights!

Jeannene very energetically made us supper Saturday night. I'd assumed we'd just grab something on the way home from the airport, but she made us country-fried steak with white gravy, mashed potatoes, and corn. A homey dinner for our first night home. 

Sunday, she had to work for several hours from home, so I hung out with the boy quite happily. At 2:30, though, she said she was ready to go on our B alphabet date, if we had time. We did, indeed. We spent the rest of the afternoon checking out Butterfly Pavilion. I've started a blog just for our alphabet dates, so you can read more about that at abcfrolic.blogspot.com. After our date, we came home and I made a pot of chili, corn muffins, and apple slices to dip in caramel.

Messy Church

Last night, our church held our first Messy Church. I've been interested in the Messy Church movement, which originated in the UK and has been gaining in popularity, for awhile now, but have never had the opportunity to experience it firsthand. You can learn more about it here. When I heard our fabulous faith formation director was taking it on, I was delighted!

Our wee one, at 4 months, isn't really old enough to participate in the activities of Messy Church, so he spent the time sleeping and being passed around the room. My wife had a committee meeting, so she wasn't able to join the Messy fun until after dinner. We all ate together (I am thrilled the menu planners chose pigs in blankets) and had questions for conversation around the table. Dessert was fascinating, stained glass Jell-o. I'd never seen or heard of it and was amazed at its appearance. It's white (sweetened condensed milk mixed with plain gelatin) with squares of different Jell-o colors in it! You can find directions here.We also heard the story of Holy Week, as presented through the use of objects hidden in eggs we got to choose and open when cued. My egg contained a die to represent the lots cast by the Roman soldiers for Jesus' clothing as he hung on the cross. I love dice!

After we ate, there were activity stations available for us to play. I first went to the station where Melissa was teaching us to make "resurrection rolls." You wrap a piece of crescent roll dough around a marshmallow (making sure there are no gaps through which you can see the marshmallow), then dip it in melted butter, then cinnamon sugar. Melissa wrote our names on cupcake papers and baked them for us (10-12 minutes in a preheated 375 degree oven will do it). Through the magic of the oven, the marshmallows "vanished," leaving the rolls as empty as the tomb on that first Easter morning. The rolls, however, were a lot yummier, although God's bringing good from a terrible tragedy was just as sweet.

Next, I went to the station Lisa was womanning, where we got to use fusible beads to create tiny crosses. I started out trying to make a cross that was all matchy-matchy, carefully choosing the colors. However, I decided I didn't like that look, so I undid my work and started again, randomly grabbing beads of various colors. You put the beads on a plastic sheet with bitty spikes to hold the beads in place, then you place some wax paper over the whole shebang and press down with a hot iron until the beads melt and fuse together. You could make all kinds of cool designs!

I watched (and greatly enjoyed) the little kids flinging paint around rather like Jackson Pollock, but opted not to participate, as I had not come dressed for serious messiness. Next time, I'll have to wear some paint clothes! My favorite thing about this was seeing Marilla, with flecks of paint all over her face, happily immersed in making her resurrection roll.

Next, I got to do one of my all-time favorite activities, coloring eggs! Jeannene joined me for this one and made a blue egg that said "Elijah" on it and had lines around it. It turned out really nicely. I drew a dragonfly on mine before dunking it into the purple dye. It's so hard to make a decent picture with a white wax marker on a white egg! I'm no great artist, but it's especially interesting when you can't see what you're doing. Matthew helped us by making sure our eggs didn't get messed up while drying.

Once we were done with art time, the kids got to whack the piñata, which looked like Mike Wazowski from Monsters, Inc. It was an extraordinarily sturdy piñata and it took some cheating by Lisa to get to the candy inside. She talked about the sweetness of Jesus' willingness to go to the cross in order to spread God's message of unconditional love and radical inclusion. The children were encouraged to share that sweetness with other people.

Finally, we gathered in a circle, everyone holding part of a length of green ribbon/rope. There was a basket of shorter ribbons for people to use for individual prayers, tied onto the large ribbon. We closed with prayer and then dispersed early enough that we could still swing by the grocery for the week's provisions. A wonderful time---I'm looking forward to next month's session!

On Coffee (an unedited 20-minute freewrite)

When I was a kid, the only coffee in our house was instant. I can’t remember what brand we had---I think Maxwell House---but my mom lived on it. She worked a hard schedule and then had to take my stepdad to work and pick him up, then start all over again, catching a few hours of sleep here and a few there. All while managing also to spend time with me and tote me to wherever I needed to be. What a woman! Seems like she at least deserved to have some good coffee. We never had a coffeemaker in our house, unless you count the stovetop espresso pot that I am not sure we ever used. I think that was actually mine. I have a newer version of it now, a sleek red, in which I can brew up some Cuban coffee when I’m missing Miami. If only Cuban bread were so easy to come by up here. When we were last in New Jersey, I got a loaf, but it’s just not the same up north.

My grandparents, on the other hand, had a Mr. Coffee drip coffeemaker when I was a kid and on up until they died. They retired fairly early and I remember coffee at a much more leisurely pace at their house. We’d all sit around the breakfast table talking in the mornings. My grandmom would make pancakes on her big griddle on Saturdays and there would be orange juice from concentrate for us kids. When I helped make it, the final product was always a little less intense, I think, because I loved to nibble on the still-mostly-frozen juice can contents before dumping them into my grandmom’s Tupperware juice container and mix, mix, mixing it up. I always thought juice glasses, those petite things, were ridiculous and took mine in the bigger green glasses or in one of the anodized aluminum cups in bright colors. We also had some plastic toy soldier cups, but mostly we used those in the tub.

Back in those days, my cousins lived close enough that we got to play together all the time. It was like having brothers. That was a good and a bad thing. They were fun to play with and they also tormented me, as most brothers do, summoning me to come see something cool they found (which would turn out to be a snake) or challenging one another to contests of who could pee farthest off the flat garage roof, a challenge I couldn’t take on.

When I was older, I would stay weekends and whole weeks with my grands. In seminary, I would sit at the breakfast table watching the birds with them. My granddad and I would tell each other what we’d dreamed about. Unlike my mom, who was strictly a black coffee girl, they both took it with cream. When I was a kid, I recall them having a cow creamer container, although that may have actually been for the milk. When I was breakfasting with them as an adult, they had milk for the cereal (very frequently some variety of Chex) in a speckled blue and white pitcher. It went into coffee, too. We would, if not having cereal, munch on toast with my granddad’s favorite orange marmalade.

Sometimes, they had to rush off to table tennis games, water workout, Ruth Circle or Bible Study at church. Other times, my granddad would head down to the basement to talk to his ham radio buddies or tinker away on some project of the house or car. I was always fascinated with his basement work room, lined with shelves full of old metal coffee cans, the sort we used to take on road trips to pee in. I once peed in a Folger’s can on the way up Pike’s Peak.

Anyway, Clydie’s cans were full of all kinds of interesting bits and pieces. Nails of every size and variety. Nuts and bolts. Magnets. Random small items he could magic into place to create all kinds of useful household items. He once made a toothbrush holder from PVC pipe and his cars all featured some kind of jerry-rigging he’d come up with to improve function. My mom still drives his old silver Ford Taurus, the one with the tricky bypass switch you have to turn on at just the proper time, in order to be able to start the car. Now, though, her coffee comes from a French press.

Water and Fire, Wheat and Chaff

Water and Fire, Wheat and Chaff 

A Sermon for Baptism of Christ Sunday

Offered at First Congregational Church, Rochester, Michigan 

January 10, 2016

Luke 3:15-22

¹⁵As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, ¹⁶John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. ¹⁷His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” ¹⁸So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people. ¹⁹But Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother’s wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, ²⁰added to them all by shutting up John in prison.

²¹Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, ²²and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 

As many of you know, Jeannene and I have a new little baby, Elijah, in our household. He didn’t get out much before he had his first round of shots, but we did take him to the Christmas tree farm with us. There, a somewhat astonishing thing happened. One of the owners, who looked a great deal like the real Santa Claus to me, greeted us and admired Elijah. He talked to us about giving Elijah lots of love and thereby changing the world. The not-the-real Santa who was there also talked to us about how love, joy, and security, given to our baby, would give him the tools to change the world---the messages were very strong and beautiful that day.

Just before we left, the maybe-the-real Santa called us over for a hug. We talked more about Elijah and he introduced himself as Frank, Francisco, and said he was from Sicily and has traveled all over the world. Perhaps because I am a fan of the Latin American literary genre of Magical Realism or because I read too many fantasy novels, I actually pondered whether he could be St. Francis in disguise, even though Assisi is actually in Emilia-Romagna & not Sicily and, well, Francis is long-dead. Yes, silly, I know. But even if he was simply Frank, the tree farmer, his words of wisdom were taken to heart, as was his next action. This lovely man asked if it would be okay for him to bless Elijah with some water he brought home from a pilgrimage that included a visit to the River Jordan.

Well, who am I to refuse a blessing? We waited while Frank ducked inside to get his Jordan River water. Upon his return, he very gently and kindly anointed Elijah’s forehead and said a prayer of blessing over him. The end of the prayer touched my heart most deeply, as he asked that God make Elijah an instrument of God’s peace, a phrase from my beloved grandmom’s favorite prayer, the Prayer of St. Francis. We drove home with an extraordinarily beautiful Christmas tree and hearts full of gratitude for the kindness of this disciple of Christ.

Of course, when I started thinking about today’s story of Jesus’ baptism in the River Jordan, by his cousin John, the Jordan water blessing given to Elijah immediately came to mind. It wasn’t a baptism, but a simple blessing, asking that God use our wee boy to be a disciple, too. He’ll be baptized later this winter, but we already know that the Holy Spirit is with him and that he is God’s beloved child. The baptism will be our human recognition of the work the Holy Spirit is doing in Elijah. It will be our welcome to the community of the church and our promise to help him grow in his faith and learn to walk the path assigned by Jesus. It will be our recognition of him as a disciple.

You see, the term “disciple” doesn’t refer simply to the Twelve who walked with Jesus in his earthly ministry. It means, “one sent” and all of us who are baptized in Christ are sent to spread God’s message of love for the world. We’re all disciples, all God’s beloved children.  Some of us are lucky enough to have been given the gift of affirmation by our earthly parents. Others have never been affirmed by earthly parents. Know this: whatever you have heard or not heard in the way of affirmation from your earthly parents, you are beloved of and affirmed by God, just as you are.

Baptism, then, isn’t fire insurance. Baptism is a recognition of the working of the Holy Spirit that is already going on in each of us. It’s also initiation into the community of Christ followers seeking to do justice, love neighbor, be kind, live in humility. Look at the promises parents, godparents, and congregations make when an infant is baptized. Show love & justice, encourage her or him to renounce the powers of greed, hatred, selfishness, and oppression, receiving new freedom in the life of Jesus.

Baptism means we aim to live into God’s audacious vision of the world as it could be, rather than cower in fear at the world as it currently is. We are not only baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection, but into his way of being human, a way that defies cultural expectations and norms, a way gracious and loving to those on the margins, a way that basically turns things as we know them on their heads.

While the world around us sensationalizes all the things we have to fear, all the things that are wrong today, Christ would remind us that, as Tod O.L. Mundo states on his “Saturday Night Theologian” blog, because “God is seated on the throne, bringing order to the world, we do have hope, and we can share our hope with those who view the world as meaningless. In the midst of a world of poverty, war, terror, AIDS, unemployment, and hunger, followers of God must bring a message of hope to those who are suffering. Though things look chaotic now, and life seems to have no meaning, God is in control. In the name of God, let us proclaim a message of hope and make it our purpose in life to demonstrate that life has meaning for every inhabitant of the planet.”

If we, like Herod in the Epiphany text, are listening too closely to the voice of our fear, we can miss God’s still, small voice reminding us of all that love given to us, all the work to which we are called for the benefit of the kingdom of heaven. If we are looking too hard for danger and threats, we can miss the shining stars God places to light our paths. Our baptism calls us to tune out from fear and tune in to God’s voice.

Now, I’m not even going to pretend this is easy. It isn’t. Not at all. But it is necessary. Just as the fire of turmoil appears to be necessary. In today’s scripture, John the Baptizer speaks of Jesus as one who comes with a winnowing fork. He speaks of wheat being separated from chaff and Jesus’ flame ready to burn the chaff into nothingness. This passage is used by a lot of hellfire and damnation preachers as a warning to those of us who, in their eyes, need to straighten up and fly right, for fear of being burned when we are discovered not to be wheat, but only chaff, after all. For them, the burning is the deepest fires of hell (they must not have read Dante, who envisions the deepest circle of hell as frozen. He must have lived in Michigan in January and February) and God is sending all the unworthy there.

The God I know through the life of Jesus, though, is infinitely merciful and wise, so I don’t really believe that’s the intention of the burning of the chaff. Further, I did some research on the threshing process. First, the wheat heads are beaten to remove the grain from the stalk and to loosen the hard, dry protective shell from the outside of the grain. Then, they are (or were, back in Jesus’ time) tossed in the air with the winnowing fork to allow the wind to blow the chaff off the grain heads. The chaff was often burned, as the most expedient way to deal with it, since it isn’t digestible by humans. However, it is digestible by livestock, so it was sometimes added to their feed. It was also sometimes ploughed into the ground to enrich the soil. So, chaff isn’t even all bad. It can be useful.

My theory is that the chaff is the parts of ourselves and our lives which no longer serve us well and which hinder our participation in the work of discipleship. Sometimes, we need that hard shell of protection to keep us safe. Sometimes fear, to name just one characteristic that can be helpful or hindering, keeps us from doing something dangerous. Other times, fear can paralyze us or even spur us into taking harmful actions our rational brain wouldn’t take. When we have matured enough, like wheat grain, and grown out of the need for a particular fear, having Jesus winnow it out of our lives is a pretty great thing. It’s not a thing to be feared or a sign that God disapproves of us. Quite the opposite. God sees the potential we could reach, if the things that are not serving us well were removed. God loves us and loves the world, so we are given opportunities to grow and shed our chaff.

Another example comes from my blacksmith mama’s forge. Steel must be heated in order to make it hard enough that it doesn’t simply wear down quickly with use. However, when it’s not properly tempered, going through only one heat and then cooled rapidly by a plunge in the slack tub (a pretty gnarly tub of water kept in blacksmith shops for the purpose of cooling metal), it will be plenty hard, but too brittle. It won’t wear down from use, but it will break easily. Steel, heated twice and allowed to cool slowly and naturally on the anvil, becomes softer and stronger.

Think of that! Softer means stronger for metal. I think it’s the same for us humans. We need to have some hardening so we won’t just wear down---crisis, hard times, and tragedy are pretty good for hardening us, as are repeated news stories about horrible realities. I don’t for a moment believe that God creates these things to temper us, but they are a reality of life in our imperfect world, with all its free will. So, if we are able to take our time and fully recover from trauma and grief, rather than forcing ourselves---or being forced by society---to “get over it” more quickly than is natural, we become stronger.

However, if we are simply hard and not at all resilient, we become brittle and can break too easily. In order to be good, strong, durable tools employed by God in working for the kingdom of heaven here on earth, we have to also lose some of that hardness and allow some softness and vulnerability. Jesus, by asking to be baptized, is continuing to make himself vulnerable, as he did with his willingness to experience incarnation as a human baby. His baptism is another immersion into openness, into making himself one with us humans, into vulnerability. Jesus’ entire ministry, indeed, is built on vulnerability. Talk about turning the ways of society on their heads! To submit to baptism is to begin to live quite dangerously, to shed some of the protections of defensiveness and to live with open hearts.

Something else magical happens in the fire of the forge and under the hammer of the smith. Even in today’s world of steel that has supposedly had the impurities worked out of it before it hits the blacksmith’s door, some (as my mom says) “pretty wonky” steel, rife with impurities, comes through the blacksmith’s shop. However, forging forces the impurities out and, in my mom’s words, “they go zizzing out, as the hammer is striking, as miniature fiery comets.” As alarming as I find the prospect of metaphorically being put in the fire, then pounded between the steel of the hammer head and the steel of the anvil, I love the image of all my impurities being forced out and flying into the air as tiny comets, all ablaze. Perhaps I am, after all, okay with a certain level of trial by fire. Not so much it destroys me. Just enough to make me strong, soft, and resilient.

Jesus didn’t live a safe life, did he, avoiding conflict and following the rules? He didn’t keep his heart and his person armored so he would never come to harm. We don’t get that luxury, either, not if we are to follow him truly. So, in remembering and affirming our baptisms, we are reminded that, as Christians, we are called to act against injustice, strive for peaceful hearts and loving interactions with all (this takes practice!), and work to end oppression wherever we see it. A tall order, but one for which we are created, stronger than we realize, softer than we might be comfortable being, resilient enough to make a difference.

With Ears to Hear and Hearts Wide-Open

I guest preached last Sunday---and joked with Jeannene as I was writing my sermon that I could see why our pastor would have avoided the text! It's a difficult one, indeed. Jesus not only gets it wrong, but does so while uttering a racial slur, getting it really wrong. The text is Mark 7:24-37:

²⁴From there Jesus set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, ²⁵but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. ²⁶Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. ²⁷He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” ²⁸But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” ²⁹Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” ³⁰So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

³¹Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. ³²They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. ³³He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. ³⁴Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.” ³⁵And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. ³⁶Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. ³⁷They were astounded beyond measure, saying, “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.”

After the service, I had one guy tell me he really needed to hear my message and said he got tears in his eyes. Another woman said she hopes I'm saving these so I can collect them in a book. So, I thought I'd share this, in case any of you needs to hear it: 

Any Wonder Woman fans in the congregation? Anyone else a bit disappointed that she doesn’t have her own movie coming out next year, but is instead relegated to being part of Batman Vs. Superman? (Take heart, I hear the Wonder Woman movie is in pre-production!) I have loved Wonder Woman since I was a little girl. She is just so cool, with her invisible jet & her Lasso of Truth. Yep, she could make anybody tell the truth when she twirled the rope and lassoed them. Definitely awesome.

I’ve been kind of immersed in superhero stuff lately (big nerd), so when I read today’s passage from Mark this time around, the Syro-Phoenician woman reminded me of Wonder Woman. Usually, in stories about Jesus, Jesus is pretty much guaranteed to be the hero. In this story, well, he doesn’t look so heroic. We don’t really feel comfortable with a Jesus who comes across as less than heroic. We’re good with it if the heroism isn’t the kind of dashing, riding in on a white stallion and taking over sort of heroism first century Jews were expecting. We totally get that sometimes heroism looks meeker than we expect, gentler, milder. We’re cool with that.

What we aren’t so comfortable accepting is a Jesus who’s outright mean, even prejudiced. Wow. What in the world do we do with that? Did Jesus really just basically call that woman and her daughter dogs? Yup. He sure did. Doesn’t sound much like our Jesus, does it? Believers look for ways to make this ethnic slur, very common at that time among Jews, not really mean what it meant. The suggestion that maybe Jesus just messed up, that he was, in addition to the “fully divine” part, also fully human and, therefore, to some degree, a product of his culture, though, makes people pretty uncomfortable. In this culture, both women and foreigners were seen as pretty dang low, in fact, unclean. Touching or associating with them could spell trouble. So, Jesus was working with a common cultural assumption of his time. But declaring that Jesus was wrong? That can be a tough sell. My dear UCC seminary buddy, Adam, posted the following words to Facebook as he prepared his sermon for today: “This Sunday, come watch me tap-dance through a field of heresy and come out smelling like orthodoxy, with a message entitled: ‘When Jesus Got it Wrong...and Other Phrases that Will Get Your Minister Fired...’ (This event is BYOP -bring your own pitchfork- torches, tar, and feathers to be provided...)”

While I’m not very interested in a BYOP event with my immolation as the featured entertainment, I’m not your pastor, so I will just say it. Jesus was wrong. He was a product of his culture, so it’s not 100% his fault. We can’t expect the “fully divine” part to kick in all the time, if he’s also to be seen as “fully human,” can we? To take a step further in his defense, sort of, Jesus had just traveled to Tyre for, basically, a vacation. Immediately prior to this trip to what is now Lebanon, Jesus managed to completely shock and outrage the establishment by declaring all foods clean. He proclaimed that it isn’t what goes into our mouths that defiles us, but what comes out. This totally, completely flew in the face of everything that had been established, practiced, long believed in his culture.

So, he has withdrawn to recharge, regroup, maybe even to consider the response of his people to his teachings. He’s looking forward to a few days among foreigners who won’t be pestering him for miracles or castigating him for, basically, heresy. He’s been under a lot of stress and all he really wants to do is sit on the beach under a palm tree, piña colada in hand, and let the ocean do its healing thing. He has a little time off, a little time to breathe, and then along comes this woman who knows of him and his miraculous works. She has actually had the audacity to come into the house where he has been trying to keep a low profile and not have to deal with people. And she wants him to do more work. And when he does that work, he just knows, more people will come and demand his energy, his time, his attention. And, suddenly, there goes his much-needed vacation. Really, what would you do? Especially if you happened to be not only exhausted, but maybe a little hangry?

We may think Jesus’ response was harsh, but don’t we all know about faithful Christians who still today think certain people or classes of people are unclean or unworthy? Aren’t there plenty of Christians now who see outsiders as undeserving of even our crumbs? Friends, there are still churches in our lovely, open-minded UCC---I imagine even in our conference---that would never tolerate a woman pastor, places where a woman may as well not even submit her profile to the search committee. Or where a person with brown skin will hear that churches “have other candidates that are a better match for our church” after submitting a ministerial profile. This in the UCC. And don’t we ourownselves sometimes think people are unworthy?

So, when the very common, but very unpleasant, racial slur pops out of his mouth and he refuses to help her, it is clearly not his finest moment. Now, here’s an ugly story about me. At my last church, there was a really lovely woman, an artist, whose husband and son had died. So, she was quite lonely and had developed the habit of, if she saw I was free, coming into my office and talking for 45 minutes at a time. I really loved talking with her. That is, when I had the time. When I was frantically trying to pull together a confirmation pilgrimage, though, or hard at work on a sermon, or girding my loins for a contentious Council meeting, my heart sank when I heard her voice in the main office. Now, no slurs about her person came immediately to mind, but I’m pretty sure some salty language did. And I was often tempted to hide under my desk or pretend to be on the phone. And this was a woman I really liked and respected a whole lot. It was nothing at all to do with her and everything to do with my stress level and my lack of time. 

So, I can see why an exhausted, agitated Jesus might respond automatically and unkindly to this woman, this foreigner, this person who should never have had the temerity to approach him, since his ministry has heretofore been specifically for Jews. But here’s where the story gets really interesting. The woman, rather than showing that she was offended or just giving up, stands her ground and speaks her mind. Desperate to gain a cure for her daughter, whom no doctor could help, she likely would have done anything to restore the girl. Who cares what Jesus thinks of her, as long as her daughter is back to her normal self soon? Wouldn’t you parents do the same for your kids?

So, rather than insisting that they are not dogs at all, as she may have wished to do, she calmly and quietly, using her love for her daughter as her source of strength, uses a logical argument in an attempt to persuade Jesus that they deserve his help. Using her words, her steady gaze, her best manners, and all the dignity she can muster as a kind of Lasso of Truth, she captures Jesus with her argument. She owns the dog label, if it’ll get her what she wants. I mean, you never see Wonder Woman arguing that she’s not whatever the villain chooses to call her. She knows who she is, no matter what anyone says. She simply works toward her objective.

So, too, this Syro-Phoenician woman. As Harvard professor and historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich famously said, “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” Making history, this woman is most definitely not well-behaved. She speaks up and her words convict Jesus. He sees her clearly, his own ears are opened by her words, and he is forced to speak the truth, that, yes, even the dogs do get to eat the crumbs. So, why not expend the smidge of energy, no more than crumbs of his power, to give this woman what she has requested? He changes his mind, heals the daughter, and, in that one act, that one piece of willingness to listen and change, his whole ministry is changed. Can you imagine her joy, as she returned home to find her darling, precious daughter restored? Jesus said yes to her and her whole life changed. It reminds me of a poem by Kaylin Haught:

I asked God if it was okay to be melodramatic

and she said yes

I asked her if it was okay to be short

and she said it sure is

I asked her if I could wear nail polish

or not wear nail polish

and she said honey

she calls me that sometimes

she said you can do just exactly

what you want to

Thanks God I said

And is it even okay if I don’t paragraph

my letters

Sweetcakes, God said

who knows where she picked that up

what I’m telling you is

Yes Yes Yes

Jesus said yes. Then, when Jesus returns to Galilee by way of the Decapolis, a Greco-Roman area in what is now Jordan, Syria, and Israel, his ministry opens up and he begins to work with and heal Gentiles, as well as Jews. With her courage, born of desperation, the Syro-Phoenician woman brought great benefit not only to her daughter and family, but to many. Jesus may have been saying to her, “No” or he may have been saying, “Not yet.” Either way, her refusal to take no for an answer, her persistence, created an earlier onset of Jesus’ ministry to a broader audience. In that way, really, we here in this sanctuary today may very well have the unnamed Syro-Phoenician woman to thank for our own relationships with Jesus. How about that? I think maybe she needs her own movie. And isn’t it marvelous that even God’s crumbs are more than ample to feed all God’s children?

I find it interesting, too, that the first healing miracle he performs after this is to open the ears and release the tongue of a man who is both deaf and mute. Yes, this was of great benefit, I am sure, to that man. But the symbolism of opening ears and loosening tongues? Well, my friends, that is one of the greatest gifts we have to gain by being in relationship with Christ. We have ears to hear---and we’re called to hear the cries of the needy, the chains of the oppressed. We have tongues to speak, to refuse society’s no to cries for justice, and to demand a better world for us and for our children, indeed for all God’s children. These loosened tongues, by the way, are excellent for speaking love and reconciliation to one another, as well.

So, what does it look like for a congregation to have ears to hear, tongues to speak, and hearts open wide? Well, God’s realm breaks down barriers & invites us to do the same. How do we embody our faith both within the church and beyond? We are challenged to leave our comfort zones, as both Jesus and the Syro-Phoenician woman did, not only beyond the church walls, but also our comfort zones within the church. Sometimes, that will be messy and uncomfortable. It might mean adapting to worship practices we might be leery about, like doing communion by intinction rather than tray. It could mean not looking askance at a teen who doesn’t fit traditional gender norms or not wrinkling our noses if the person in the pew next to us really needs some deodorant---or if the pastor wears jeans and a Wonder Woman t-shirt, like I almost did today. One of my favorite pastors, Nadia Bolz-Weber of House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver, is tattoo-covered, leather-clad, and completely unconventional---and her words are life-changing, in a very good way. You should Google her, if you are not familiar with her work. Whip out your smart phone now, if you want. I won’t be offended. Nadia rocks.

Strangers and those who are different from us can teach us a whole lot---can even change our lives for the better---but only if we have ears to hear. And mostly, they’re not going to approach us from the margins, so we have to reach out and ask to hear their stories. In the line at the grocery, while serving dinner at The Ruth Ellis Center, at a cocktail party, heck, how about during coffee hour, instead of sitting with our friends? Who can we, as a congregation, identify as people who are perhaps not being heard or included and make sure they are listened to & included? And, for those who feel like they’re not being heard or included, remember the power of the Syro-Phoenician woman standing up, speaking out, and not only asking Jesus for help, but challenging him when he said no.

How willing are we to be open and expectant and flexible? If we congregations are willing to do that, Luther Seminary New Testament professor Matt Skinner reminds us, it may pay off in the discovery of grace flowing in new directions this Autumn here at FCC and in our own personal lives. I encourage us all to flex, and stretch, and grow, even when it’s scary or stressful. Even when we don’t wanna. Let’s take up our Lassos of Truth and use them wisely, with ears to hear the truths of others, and hearts wide open to receive them with love. Amen.