December 22, 2009

Snowflake Lane

Bellevue Square was packed.  I stood outside in the small square on the east side of Macy’s, just in front of the old Baskin-Robbins (closed).  The brisk air seemed right, and what seemed to be multitudes had gathered.  I didn’t manage to crowd-surfed out to see the numbers on Bellevue Way, but several hundred lingered in our little spot, eagerly awaiting the arrival of that particular form of holiday entertainment known as Snowflake Lane.  We know Snowflake Lane well in our house; Daniel sang and danced on one of those very same platforms several years ago.   Back then, we were the proud parents (still are) of one of the performers and of course, had a wonderful time.  And last night was fun enough, if (as I often say) you like that sort of thing.

I don’t remember a lot of what Daniel did during the show, but it seems he actually sang and danced along with various Christmas tunes, much as they did last night.  But they’ve gotten rid of everyone but the drummers.   The announcer said that we were going to experience one of the largest drum lines around, and I suppose we did, although frankly, my experience was no more than a cool half-dozen.

It’s not easy to brood in the midst of such high energy frothiness, but of course, I found a way.

My brooding was set off by the fact the fact that the drummers weren’t particularly skilled drummers.  In fact, they were playing along with canned music, hitting a few eighth notes on the rims and on the downbeat of every measure, they would whack the drumhead.   That’s about as good as it got (though I’m being a bit more tacky than these enthusiastic young people deserve).   Truth is, I appreciated and enjoyed the high-stepping dance they all did; fun to watch.  It’s always cool to see young people dancing like crazy people.   The only drawback was they danced the same simple dance for 20 minutes, whacking the drums as they did so.

And we hundreds seemed to think it was a really cool thing.   We drove an hour in traffic, braved all manner of pushing and shoving both coming and going, and barely escaped with our lives.  Give us marching band dancers in red whacking drums, throw in a little fake snow, and I guess we’ll do about anything.

I guess it just struck me as odd.

Children were delighted, of course, but then, my kids were always delighted to pull pans out of the cupboards and whack ‘em with spoons.   In other words, it didn’t take much to get them excited.  Maybe I’m being a bit Scroogish, but after our Taize service at church, and after taking time to reflect on the need in culture for depth instead of width, this particular drum line conceptually struck me as shallow, superficial, and fairly antithetical to the deeper strains of Christmas, even the excitement of gift giving and love.  Pop Culture seems largely about distraction, and that was about the most concentrated bit of distraction I’ve seen in awhile.   Now don’t get me wrong–I’m the first person to defend the right of an event to be nothing but fun, nothing but delightful, and delight can come from many arenas.   So to argue with myself, I suppose the delight of the people standing along Bellevue way night after night to experience this manufactured holiday cheer is fine enough–stop complaining, Jeff.  Maybe I’d've been happier if some snowflakes had hit my particular spot in the lane.

It was good to be with family…Grandma and Grandpa, Aunt Betty, Amy, Daniel, and Anjie.  We all stood gaping, remembering when Daniel danced along.   Maybe I’m just getting old.   Maybe I’m tired.   Or maybe my brain’s kicking in again, and things are getting clearer.    If nothing else, I’m hoping 2010 is about going deep.

…just the mood I’m in, probably…

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December 3, 2009

Run, Lola, Run / Choices, Chance, Outcomes

My small film group watched Run, Lola, Run last night, a 1998 German film in which a young woman receives a desperate phone call from her boyfriend.  He has lost 100,000 Deutsche Mark, and unless he can deliver this enormous amount of cash to his drug-dealing boss within 20 minutes, he will most likely be killed.  Lola, determined to help him, springs into action.   Without spoiling the fun too much, suffice to say that the outcome of this race against time is the heart of the story, and when the result of the “first run” isn’t good, the filmmaker decides to tell the story all over again, and then again a third time.  With each “run”, Lola’s journey varies slightly early on, and as you might expect, those small variations play havoc with the outcomes.  A friend said afterwards that it made him think “butterfly effect”, referencing the well known idea that runs something like this:  a butterfly’s flapping wings in a particular place might play an important role in the creation or prevention of a tornado half a world away.

In other words, stuff matters.

This isn’t a movie review, but is instead a brief meditation on the way we think about our action, our prayers, our lives, and the lives of others as we trundle down the path.   What do we control?  How do we know what we know?  As the film suggests, do all our questions roll down into one question that’s the same for all of us? And are there really that many answers, or is really just one answer, that leads back to the question, and we go back and forth between the two as long as we live?

Well, I don’t know about all that, but here’s the question I have:  how do you think of the equation that is choice + others’ choice + Providence + Evil + chance (luck) + prayer?   I’m sure those terms aren’t accurate or exhaustive in the equation, but you see what I’m getting at.   Most conversations tend to hover around which one of these is key, which one determines the rest.    Are our choices, born out of personal responsibility, the lynchpin?  But what of when we are “acted upon” by others?   Outcomes are changed by that action, yes?   And the prodding of temptations and “promptings” (sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference), what of that?   And does chance play any role at all?   And there’s prayer.   The language of scripture about prayer is diverse and provocative and strange, and we drive ourselves a little crazy trying to figure out how God goes about orchestrating things.   I know what people mean when they say that “everything happens for a reason”, but my sense is that it’s more accurate to say that “meaning can be made from everything that happens” or “I trust God to sort out the meaning and purposes of my life’s events.”  We are desperate to understand our lives, to make sense of them, to retain a feeling of control, power, and predictability.

Run, Lola, Run is a pretty elegant reminder that life, like football, is a high-pressure game of inches.   Of course, we can’t really think that much about it or we’d lose our minds, frozen into inactivity wondering what alternate future would unfold if I left the house 5 minutes earlier, or had done this rather than that, or if…fill in the blank.    Paul’s reminder that all things work together for good for those that love the Lord is as good a final word on the subject as I can think of.   Ultimately, we trust that God set up this chaos-theory world, and that while our actions don’t determine everything, and control little, nonetheless, they are the part of the equation we can directly impact, and therefore, a deep responsibility.   But grace seems just in such a world, and just as you’d expect, grace shows up as a major player in God’s dealing with the world.

Get the call, respond, run for all you’re worth, trust God with the rest.   Not a bad way to live.

Another hat’s off to the mystery…

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December 2, 2009

Ceasura

It’s a pause in a line of verse or meter.   It implies, and most frequently, demands, a breath.  It’s an between-moment, a brief stop in a journey.

So I’m trying to catch the breath offering itself in this particular ceasura.

2010 holds new promise, new possibilities.  The season of full-time ministry is waning, though not complete, and as I’ve spent more time in my home office lately, I can feel the old demands of ideas looking for forms, looking for homes.  Questions on hold now pull up chairs, begging for a hearing.  Books dusty with neglect cast longing glances in my direction like old friends not much noticed.  New projects remind me of old ones, and I rummage back through old CD’s and DVD’s, pondering the road so far.  All those songs so few have heard, all those words laying flat on so many pages, floating out in cyberspace amid the galaxies of ethereal stuff known only to God and whatever spirits roam down the fiber-optic backbones now spreading over the planet.   Blah, blah, blah, as they say.

But, there’s coffee-shop warm on 34 degree Wednesdays, white Christmas lights swagging along tall window panes, two-part harmonies dropping out of black boxes in corners in tones surely meant for kings.  Beauty is a gift everyday, sitting easily on a woman’s shoulders and smiles, a woman who graces me with her presence each day, a woman of power and lush kindness, who years ago lost her mind for a moment and agreed to hang out with me for the rest of her life.   Across the country, beauty frolics in red dresses and crazy faces, courtesy of a daughter with head thrown back all crazy for life, howling for joy and grief, depending on the day, the role, and the great gifts raining on her head.   An actor, she does what they do…takes action, the world looming up to greet her in all its New Yorkish frenzy; she gathers herself for nothing but sprinting.   Then there’s the state a little further east, and beauty hovers in a boy’s lungs and throat and heart, waiting.  Just waiting.  Waiting for the jaw to unhinge, the lungs to gather, and the heart to spring to life, and suddenly, like prisoners rushing for open fields, notes of sheer grace pour into the world through the music this boy has been gifted to make.   As beautiful as those sounds are, though, his spirit outstrips his voice, the gift of soul comparatively reducing angelic music to that of a bent penny whistle.

Hyperbole, maybe, but if I think with any clarity at all, how can life be anything but glorious when three humans such as these hold my heart?

And that’s not all.  What of Mother and Jody, Nikki and Julie and Sam and Mike and Scott and (add 10, 20, 50 names), my companions on the journey, our shared lives, so harrowing and unpredictable (except that they won’t go like we thought), and all the times and possibilities yet to come.   Thanksgiving, indeed.

So much can be in a ceasura.  The pause, the silence, the great quiet creating the bed from which next beauties rise.

And yes, I know suffering. (Others have seen more.)  I know loss.  (Perhaps you’ve lost more.  Probably.)   I’ve even seen death go by.   (Go ahead and say it, “Jeff, you have no idea.”)  But just now, it seems I’ve given far too much of my quota of days to darkness, depression, and grieving.   And they’ll all come visit me again tomorrow, or the next day.  And I’ll roll around in them, bend words to pull down everyone in sight.   But today, in this ceasura, as a new jazz tune comes wafting from the black boxes in the corners, and the coffee-shop banter turns to the lost and crazy man who killed four policemen in Lakewood the other day, I’m just pondering the season, the coming of the Christ, wondering why God ever bothers with me.  With us.

Pause.  Breathe.

What comes next, after the ceasura?  We watch, we listen, we engage, and sometimes we sprint.

Whatever is coming, God will be in it.

All grace…

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December 1, 2009

Advent, Morning Light

I missed lighting the candle on Sunday.   I know…we of evangelical ilk (I originally had “elk” – ha!) don’t always do such things, but the Episcopalian side of me really likes to light the light.   November was a busy season with a couple of events at church, not to mention all the planning related to Christmas Taize and Christmas Eve, and on top of that, I just didn’t feel well.   So somehow, I missed the planning of lighting the first candle of Advent.   Does that leave me out of the season completely?  Is it too late?

Probably not.

In fact, I woke up this morning with “light” on my mind.  More specifically, I John 1, and the whole idea of walking in the light as he is in the light.  And for some reason–probably just an oddness on my part–as I lay in bed, I realized both my hands were raised, palms facing each other.  The bedroom window is to my left, and the light streaming in created an interesting thought even as I was mulling I John 1.  The palm of my right hand was facing the window, and I could see it plainly.   My left hand was completely dark, nothing but.   It occurred to me that we are much like that.   Completely dark when our back is to the light.

I resolved to turn more directly toward the Light.

And blog more.

Sometimes I just don’t have much to say…

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October 27, 2009

Our First Date 32 Years Ago

October 27, 1977.

Abilene, Texas.  Mid-afternoon, I get a call from my sister who is working for a local radio station.  She’s got two extra tickets for the Doobie Brothers concert at Taylor County Coliseum that night.   Would I like them?  Sure, I say, sounds fun.  The girl I was semi-dating at the time was nowhere to be found, and at dinner, in “The Bean” at Abilene Christian University, I saw a freshman girl that I didn’t know very well, but that I’d thought about a bit, mostly because she had an electric smile.  So gathering up my courage, I made my way over to the table, knelt down and told her the story of the tickets and asked if she wanted to go to the concert.   She thought about it, flashed that smile and said, sure.

If I remember correctly (and I may be making this up), it was blustery night, maybe a bit of rain, and I have an image in my head of us running through the parking lot, heading for “Will Call.”  The tickets were there under my sister’s name, and we went in.  Details escape me, but I remember us talking easily about things, wandering around the coliseum, at one point ending up behind the band, constantly changing perspectives.   We even ran into her brother, who was at ACU as a pre-med major.  The music was great, the night flew by, that smile of hers so easy to fall for, and before we knew it, I was taking her back to Gardner dorm.  There would be no first-date kiss, but as she climbed out of the car, she said something to the tune of “I was a fun date.”   I watched her run to the covered sidewalk (it was raining by now), and she turned and waved, giving me one last smile to float home on, and I as I drove back to Mabee dorm, I reflected on the simple joy of the evening.   I had a thought that this was a girl I could marry, and if I remember correctly, it was either later that night, or perhaps on a night after the second or third date, that I declared rather lightly to my roommate that I would indeed marry the girl with the dark hair and joyous smile.

As it turns out, three and half years later, after some ups and downs (the downs were all my fault), I did just that.   I married her.

I could not be more thankful for that simple decision to walk across the cafeteria and inquire of the girl with the electric smile.

If I had to do it all over again, I’d walk a little faster.

Happy “First-Date” Anniversary, Anjie.

And that smile?

As electric as it ever was…

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October 26, 2009

Enchanted April’s Closing Weekend

Friday morning, as I stood with Scott and Pam Nolte in the Gordito’s parking lot watching water cascading into the lobby of Taproot Theatre, one thing was very clear: there would be no performance of Enchanted April that night.  There would be a mountain of work, sorting everything out, getting the theatre back on its feet, making the decisions needed to make the path back to normalcy clear.  But as the minutes ticked by, the staff of Taproot began to show up one by one, and the game was afoot…Enchanted April would continue…somehow.

I can’t give you the blow by blow of how the morning went at the administrative offices of Taproot Theatre as calls and emails went flying through Seattle’s theatre community.   I know there were mulitple offers of spaces from various theatres, and the machinery to move all the costumes and sets (the set pieces that could be moved) from Taproot to a new space was somehow cobbled into place.   (Examiner.com credits a Twitter campaign centered in the offices at A Contemporary Theatre downtown for getting the word out that help was needed.)   A touring show that was scheduled to play at a school Friday afternoon managed to get what they needed from the theatre and that show went on as planned, and there was another performance that afternoon featuring two members of the Enchanted April cast for a convention event of arts professionals.  Sometime late in the morning, the decision was made to accept that generous offer from Seattle Children’s Theatre to use one of their spaces, The Charlottle Martin Theatre, a beautiful 500 seat proscenium space.   The staging of the play would require adjustment–Taproot’s stage is an intimate 220 seat thrust space–so Friday night’s performance was cancelled in order to restage the play for two performances on Saturday.

As costumes were being dried (amazingly, the fire sprinklers in the dressings rooms had not turned on, though they had turned on in the adjacent green room) and treated (they reeked of smoke), as sets and props were being moved, every patron that had tickets for the weekend shows received a call detailing the situation and the options.  Friday night’s ticketholders would have their choice of shows on Saturday, and though some couldn’t make the change, most did.   We had no idea what audiences would be like on Saturday, but whoever was going to be there, we figured they’d bring a lot of love.

The rehearsal Friday night was smooth and fun.  The hospitality of SCT floored all of us; baked treats, well-wishes, kind hand-written notes, and lots of work on their part to help prep the space with lights, sound, and props.  And of course, it also meant altering their own work schedule in preparation for their upcoming production of Peter Pan.   As it turns out, one of the primary concerns about this whole event has turned out to be the inability for Taproot to ever be able to adequately thank or repay SCT and the rest of the Seattle theatre community.

The new digs for the show both demanded and created a new energy among the actors.  The performances had to grow in size to fill the larger space, and it was just great fun making the physical adjustments necessary for the new actor-audience relationship.  Saturday’s shows went beautifully, and as actors, we were thrilled to have the chance to experience a new life in these old lines we knew so well.  The discovery of new nuances, the happy realization that the production could indeed translate the experience well in a completely different venue, and the deeply satisfying confirmation of the support and love Taproot Theatre enjoys among its patrons and the larger Seattle theatre community all made for a rich and satisfying–and memorable–closing day.

Looking back on the experience from a bleary Monday morning, knowing that the Taproot staff is meeting even now to make huge decisions about what the immediate future holds, I count myself so fortunate and blessed to know these good people, and to be a part of this larger community.  In an age of technology, the live actor on a stage in front of the live audience can still deliver an experience that is unmatched and unparalleled by the best of films, the best of TV shows.  I know, it’s just different, but…

Film and TV I enjoy.

Theatre moves me, calls to me…

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October 23, 2009

The Near-Taproot Fire

So I’m sitting at the coffee shop at 6:10, when a prayer request from one of the women at church comes across my desktop.  Something about a 3-alarm fire near 85th and Greenwood, and that my good friend Scott Nolte is being interviewed.   It takes a minute to register.  I go to KING 5 News’ website, and there’s a notice about the fire, along with a picture.

I called Anjie, and headed out.

Taproot is a kind of home to me, a place, an ensemble that has given me more opportunities to work than I deserve, and I have such great respect for their longevity, their resilience, and their mission.  Artistic Director Scott Nolte and I get burgers regularly, I go to church with Associate Artistic Director Karen Lund, her Taproot Scenic Designer/Tech Director husband Mark Lund, Costume Designer Sarah Gordon, and others that work there.   I’m just an actor, but I wanted to be there with and for them.

There were fire trucks everywhere, and the first thing I noticed as I approached the neighborhood was the smell of smoke.  I pulled into the Fred Meyer parking lot, called Scott, found out he was in the Gorditos parking lot across from the theatre, stepped over a couple of yellow-tape barriers, and found Scott, his wife Pam, and their actor-son Peter all standing there looking across at the space.

Pho Tic Tac, the Green Bean, and the other two restaurants to the east of Taproot were gutted, black holes in the side of the old brick building.  A water cannon high above 85th was pouring cascades of water onto the roofs, concentrating on an area close to Taproot.   Soon water could be seen dripping from the ceiling in the lower lobby, and we watched at one point as a firefighter took an axe to one of the walls in the upper lobby.   Insulation from the ceiling soon started appearing on the stairs and pretty soon it looked as if it had snowed in a couple of places.

The only flames I saw erupted at the eastern edge of the building, down near the Teriyaki place, a place where I’ve eaten countless times.   The firefighters’ response to those flames was calm and even, which made sense to me given the amount of water they were pouring onto the place.

Our quiet conversation touched on the small business owners whose livelihood had literally gone up in flames.   It’s a testament to the heart of Taproot that this seemed to be the major concern.   Another topic was where to perform three sold-out performances of Enchanted April.   It looked as if it was pretty certain that while the theatre itself had escaped the fire, there was sufficient damage to keep the play from happening in that space tonight and tomorrow.  (No official word has come at this hour, so if you’re reading this, and you have tickets, stay tuned.)   Concerns of next steps, figuring out logistics for a touring company performance for a school scheduled for the afternoon (all the props and costumes were in the basement, status unknown), memories of other crises that have been a part of the Taproot Theatre tapestry over the years…the talk was quiet, thoughtful, hopeful.   Perhaps Pam Nolte said it best as she talked to a friend.  Citing her usual realist approach to things, she said “In crisis, I’m an optimist.”

And there was prayer.  A prayer request is how I found out about the situation, and I would bet nearly as many people found out through prayer request channels as did through news channels.   God has been extremely faithful to this band of people over the 30 years of their existence, and their faith (and mine) is that He will continue to do so.

There was nothing to do, really, at that time of day, but stand and watch.  Eventually, gray light replaced the dark, and the gathered Taproot staff left the Bartell’s parking lot and headed to the Administrative offices down the street to come up with a game plan.  I had a sermon to finish up (I’m preaching Sunday–the new guy is out of town), so I headed to the car.  That’s when the rain started in earnest.

Say a prayer for the whole block.  Some have lost their livlihoods, and the Green Bean, a non-profit ministry/outreach, has lost its opportunity to provide a third-place for so many Greenwood patrons.   Greenwood has a lot going for it, and this now-gutted building was a part of it.

For a report from an earlier perspective, along with some video from the fire, see PhinneyWood.com.

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October 1, 2009

Seeing a Master – Andrew Wyeth’s Helga

Braids

So we’re taking one day a month for spiritual retreat and renewal, and I hadn’t gotten to mine yet, so yesterday, I took half a day.  I spent the early morning reading from the prophet Isaiah and from Matthew’s gospel, then went on to Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton, and then to poetry by Rilke.  Then some extended time of prayer, meditating mostly on the nature of God, His immeasurable -ness and the seeming absurdity of our own smallness.   To Him Who Stands Outside of Time as I try to figure out my next paltry move, be all the Glory.

I love going downtown.  I parked on 2nd just outside of Benaroya Hall, and stepped out of the van to confront the long wall memorializing the war dead from WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan.  These names, so precious to their loved ones, yet so small in the great hoards of people streaming through the city.  Again, reflecting on the smallness of our -ness next to God’s.   I wandered past SAM (Seattle Art Museum), and realized the Andrew Wyeth exhibit featuring the Helga series was still on.   A huge Wyeth fan, I’d wanted to see the exhibit–I just figured I wouldn’t get the time.   It didn’t open until 10:00, so I wandered up 1st toward the market, heading for a favorite thinking spot I rarely get to anymore.   The Crumpet Shop at Pike Place Market holds many great memories for Anjie and I and the early days of being in Seattle back in the mid-80’s and then later with our kids in the mid-90’s.   A small counter looking out at the sidewalk, a freshly baked crumpet with raspberry and butter and coffee alongside a journal, and you have what I consider some prime thinking real estate.   (It would help if they would move the strip joint directly across the street.)   I jotted a few thoughts about presence and purpose, the blinding nature of sensation, and how Beauty calls to a Christ-essence inside us, even as we realize all is dust and smoke, the “hevel” (smoke) of Ecclesiastes.

Then it was 10:00 a.m., I was headed up the escalator at SAM.  I asked the first person I met to point me to the Wyeth exhibit.  It was down the hall, past the gray room, on the left.

I turned the corner.

These paintings will be marveled over for a thousand years.

Maybe that’s overstating it, but that’s what I kept thinking as I looked at Wyeth’s mastery.  There are 5 paintings from the Helga suite and two others from his other work.  I am no art critic, but I recognize power and mastery when I see it.   I say “power”…what power is there in a canvas covered in watercolor paints?  Or a piece of wood covered in tempera paint?  It doesn’t change the world, really.  It doesn’t remap the health-care system, and no children will be fed by it.  But there it is.  Oddly, civilizations will pass, and these paintings will continue to call to people, coaxing them to reflect on meaning, beauty, humanity, nature, and in my view, even God.   Yes, we can wonder, even lament and complain, over the relationship Wyeth had with Helga, his subject of over 15 years, and those of more conservative bent will cry foul over Helga’s state of undress in some of the paintings, but yesterday, as I looked at Wyeth’s work, I couldn’t help but think “how amazing.”  The painstaking labor of stroking enough lines to create the fine nature of human hair in Helga’s famous braids, the insight and control of material such that light spills across the canvas in such glorious value and contrasts, the capturing of the distinctively American landscape near Chadd’s Ford, Pennsylvania.  There is deep love in these paintings, and Wyeth’s technical skill serves that love well.  No wonder he is one of the masters of our time.

I left thinking of the work still to be done in my own life.  Knowing that every breath is a gift, every day another bit of grace directly from God’s hand, surrounded always by both brokenness and beauty, I wondered how best to spend my days.  The work of making…I’m sure of that.  Making life, making relationship, making moments, making art.  In the heart of God, may we strive to make moments of work and play as masterful as Wyeth’s art.

Then I did two peformances of “Enchanted April”…

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September 25, 2009

Opening Enchanted April

Another opening night tonight.  Enchanted April, at Taproot Theatre, opens tonight at 8:00 p.m.

It’s been a good process, a nice re-entry back into the world of acting after a two year hiatus.  My role is small, but has enough in it to make it challenging, and I’m pretty sure I’m not really hitting the mark yet, at least not like I’d like.  That being said, the experience of being on stage with long-time friends has been a God-send.   The process of preparing a role is a much different process than preparing a sermon, and it’s nice to know that the message of the play is not up to me, though my role in it contributes to an audience’s overall understanding.   Letting go of the final result, I can concentrate on the moments of contact with my acting partners, concerning myself with the moment-to-moment interchange that builds a single scene.  There is a concentration in it that seems so familiar, a level of focus that I find exciting and freeing.  So often I am grappling internally with the ongoing profundity of things, but in these moments, it’s just about the other, the emotional exchange, the physicality, and the lines.  No need to save the world; just get to the next moment, responding to what it’s front of me.

Of course, all of this is predicated on getting cast in the play in the first place.   And then there was the choice to move and live in the world of theatre and art, and before that, there was the training that begin leading in that direction.  In other words, the freedom of the living in the moment is built on a series of decisions that are based on whatever I think it means to “save the world” from the context of who God has made me and what I think He is calling me to.

My point is simple:  the moments of the day in regular, walk-about living are no different than my moments on stage, really.  Letting go of results (leaving them to God), my role is respond to the demands and the needs in front of me, as God reveals them.  Whether they are with family, friends, or strangers living in a poverty-stricken land half a world away, the moments present themselves one at a time, and as I have been prepared, I meet them.  My trust in the director is paramount.  In Enchanted April, I trust Karen Lund, the director, to lead me where she wants me to go.  I also trust that I cannot see the whole play, therefore it is up to her to direct me and give me feedback that will help me stay within the world of the play.   And while there are moments when I might disagree with a certain note she will give me, it is not my job is not to do punch holes in what she’s trying to do.  My job is to bring the play to life according to her vision.   However, I am no slave.  There is collaboration.   Karen depends on her actors’ nuance and creativity and discovery to contribute in ways that she cannot always predict.   Her faith is in us as ours is in her.

I don’t know how far the analogy holds, but I know that as I go through my day today, I am not the director.   And my notes from God might be somewhat different than my notes from Karen, but my trust is that they’re there.  And as hard as I work to deliver on what Karen gives me to do, that effort should probably pale in comparison to the work I put in making sure the notes of God are put into play with the nuance and directions He tells me.

What I like about acting is that I don’t have to be in control.   It is so clear that I am not.   Life isn’t much different.

Just playing my part…

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September 23, 2009

A Reputation for a “Yes Face”

This was a question we asked at church on Sunday.  It’s a different way to phrase the old question of legacy: what do you want to be remembered for?  What heritage do you want to leave your kids?  After all is said and done, what will your legacy be?

One man had a fascinating answer in that he said he wanted to be known as a man who had a “Yes Face.”

A yes-face.

I knew immediately what he meant.   He was referring to that moment when someone in need asks you for help, and you’re caught in that dilemma of responding or not.   He wanted to have a face that always said, “Yes.”

The reason I knew what he meant was that too often I have a “No Face”.  And it’s interesting to think of a “No Face” being no face at all, in that the selfish human loses something of themselves and eventually disappears.   Do we find more and more of our true face as we open it with yeses for those around us?  And do we move toward having less face, less identity, less true self, when we present those who need us with a “No Face?”

What kind of face will we bring today?

I said I wanted to be known as someone who knew how to love…

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