"Trailer Park Boys" has been around for ten seasons. (Please note that TPB is NSFW--no sex or nudity, but the language might even be worse than mine.) Yet, I just learned about it from my sons. My son James told me that his favorite episode is "Closer to the Heart" (named after the Rush song of the same name), and it's mine as well. For someone who grew up in the rock era of the 70s and 80s and attended many concerts, I can understand why the Rush concert is so important to one of the main characters--Bubbles. Having graduated high school in 1979, this is a song that brings memories of that era of my life rushing back.
While high school brought many hurts (mostly in the area of love--I hardly had any dates), it also brought moments of wonderful camaraderie. When I finally got a date to the Homecoming Dance (I was SGA president and was largely responsible for the dance), she then dumped me for her older sister's boyfriend. Her older sister and I were both left out in the cold. It took me years to get over this.
The camaraderie was as special as that found in Stephen King's works. My favorite memories from high school revolve around our church league softball team--only, it wasn't composed of many church-go'ers. I've never been much of a fan of church go'ers, or maybe more correctly, they've never been very enamored with me! We were kind of like the Bad News Bears. We even had one player who, like the character played by Matthew McConaughey in "Dazed and Confused," had already graduated high school. We would stop by his apartment after practice for a Busch beer and to watch baseball on the TV. We took our softball seriously and like the Bad News Bears were ultimately pretty successful.
Like my high school experience of camaraderie, that found between the three main characters of TPB is both endearing and unlikely and, therefore, that much more endearing. The three protagonists (Julian, Ricky, and Bubbles File:Trailer_Park_Boys,_April_2009.jpg) couldn't be any more different, but they love each other--they have each other's back--no matter how idiotic the other's conduct.
They were drawn together, because they all grew up in the trailer park--not because they had anything else in common. Julian is sort of the swashbuckling, good-looking one. He constantly, literally in every scene, is holding a cocktail (a rum and coke) yet he's never drunk. It's Julian's way of appearing cool. Julian is also the one who drives a sports car, although each one that he drives is antiquated--just plain old.
Bubbles loves cats, really loves cats. (I think he's called Bubbles, because his glasses are so thick. File:Mike_Smith,_Bubbles,_April_2009.jpg)
One of my favorite episodes involves Bubbles starting a cat daycare. Bubbles creates a merry-go round and other rides for the kitties. Over the years, I've gone from hating cats to loving cats. So, I love Bubbles' love for the cats.
Ricky is the one who is probably most like me. He's always willing to start a fight, or to get in the face of someone. Ricky is always trying to grow a new marijuana crop or otherwise come up with a way to sell drugs and make money--whether its selling drugs to the prison guards or selling at the Rush show. However, importantly for his character, the most potent drug that he ever sells is hashish and that's just a one-time sale. You are left with the idea that Ricky wouldn't sell anything harder, because he does care for people.
Each's loves and personalities is brought to the fore in my favorite episode "Closer to the Heart"--named after the Rush song of the same name.
Let's start with the introductory scene and song to set the stage. Trailer Park Boys Theme and Opening Credits - YouTube
How could anyone create a nostalgic mood concerning a trailer park? Yet, the creators of TPB nailed it--at least for me.
In this episode, Bubble's love of cats is almost his undoing. Rush is coming to town, and Bubbles wants to buy a ticket. But his sick cat takes precedence, so he has Ricky PROMISE to buy him a ticket. Ricky's confrontation personality is always creating problems. In this episode, his nature creates a series of events which leaves Bubbles without a ticket.
Yet, given their love for Bubbles, Ricky and Julian go to great lengths to get Bubbles into the Rush concert. As it turns out, their efforts are recognized by the lead guitarist (Alex Lifeson) who lets Bubbles act as his guitar tech during the show, because he recognizes the lengths to which Ricky and Julian went to get Bubbles into the show.
The episode ends with Bubbles and Alex Lifeson playing together: Greatest Trailer Park Boys moment - YouTube
So, this is where Tomas Halik comes in. Halik says that:
"I can't help thinking that God doesn't particularly care whether we believe in him or not. What really does matter to him, however, is whether we love him. Or more precisely: he doesn't care about our faith in the sense that the term is often used, namely that to 'believe in God' is to be convinced of God's existence."
"To assert that Christianity is not primarily about faith in God but about 'love'--love of God (and one's neighbor)--might come as a surprise. . . One doesn't become a Christian be believing that 'God is' but by believing that 'God is love.'"
Halik points out that Augustine and medieval theology asserted that "when people truly love anything, they are ipso facto already on the path to God, even when they don't realize it."
Halik says that "only in the experience of love do we find the space to glimpse the meaning of the word 'God.'" "Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love." 1 John 4:8.
If Halik is right, then Julian, Ricky and Bubbles are on the path to God, whether they know it or not!
Fortunately, over the last 20 years, I've shed many of my dogmatic views about Christianity and come to love my neighbor so much more. God had to wrestle those dogmatic views out of me. He replaced it with a sense of wonder at and about the love that God has for His created beings and order. This newfound love 'in God' has given me a greater love for my fellow man. Halik says that, in loving our neighbor, we love God. Amen to that!
Saturday, March 18, 2017
Lenten Discipline versus "It is Finished"--which leads to sanctification?
The only time I've heard of a true Lenten discipline was when a friend of mine read Forde's "On Being a Theologian of the Cross" for Lent. He had started it two previous times but couldn't finish it, because of its devastating diagnosis of the human condition. He found that the Good News is the Best News Ever once we are confronted with and apprehend the libidinal, recidivistic nature in all of us. Then the proclamation from the Cross of "It is finished" rings like the bells on our wedding day with the hope of everlasting love.
Forde's book dealt with Luther's Heidelberg Disputation of 1518 which is simply daunting, yet breathtaking. It is both the greatest insult to human freedom, to our thought that we can change, to our desire to control our lives to make them good; and the Best News Ever--Christ has done it all--there is nothing left to be done. According to Luther, sanctification comes when we experience thankfulness for the love that God has bestowed upon us while we were yet and are yet a sinner. Luther said that we were and will be unto our death "simul justus y pecator"--simultaneously "justified" and "sinner." As we recognize again and again that this is true, we actually become more and more thankful to God for his acceptance of us in our sinful condition. This leads to sanctification over time--to an ever deepening understanding of our own fallenness which leads to empathy and love for others who are "sinners like us" (remember the Chase/Akroyd flick). Indeed, we are all sinners--we are all together in this "thing called life." (Prince)
At a recent Mockingbird Conference, a former seminary student of Paul Zahl's introduced him by telling a story about the first day in a class that Zahl was teaching. The class was entitled "Spiritual Formation 101," so it was filled with students eager to learn how to become more spiritual, how to become more holy, how to become closer to God, and (whether they acknowledged it or not) they were seeking favor with God.
Zahl's student said that Zahl started the class by saying: "It is finished." You would have thought that Zahl had uttered an expletive-laced diatribe, the response from the students was one of such offense. They were offended, because it is hard for human ambition to die--particularly for those who think they are sacrificing to do "God's will." Needless to say, I wish I had been there to see it. Like those students, Zahl and Luther had the same effect on me. Like the students, Forde's book had the same effect on my friend who had to force himself to read Forde's book as a Lenten discipline.
But my friend and I both agree that this theology saved our lives. In fact, at the Mockingbird Conference, person after person told stories of how this theology changed their lives.
After Paul spoke Friday nite, a woman sitting by herself got up during the Q&A and asked: "I've been in church all my life, why have I never heard this before?" Debbie and I went to dinner with her afterwards. Her husband had passed away this past summer, and she was devastated and didn't know where to turn. She found Mockingbird online, and it gave her a way forward. She drove several hours to be at the conference. It gave us such joy to hear her story--how the pure, unadulterated Gospel had given her a reason and the sustenance to live.
We then had lunch with a couple of sisters in their early to mid-20s from Houston. We happened to have a couple of extra seats at our table for lunch, and the restaurant was packed. The older sister teaches at UofH, and she had found Mockingbird online. So, she and her younger sister had driven the four hours from Houston for the conference.
During Sarah Condon's talk, she talked of coming very closing to quitting seminary when she became frustrated with the primary focus being that of social justice and social programs, as opposed to Christ. Then a friend suggested she attend the Mockingbird conference. She did and stayed in seminary and now is an Episcopal priest. Now, because of this message, she's one of the best young preachers in the country (maybe one of the best regardless of age).
Finally, the gentleman who started holding a Mockingbird conference in Tyler, Texas, told a similar story of suffering a setback in his life, not knowing where to turn, and then finding Mockingbird.
The founder of Mockingbird, David Zahl, chose this title for his ministry, because a Mockingbird sings the same song over and over and over again. That's the job of Christians--to tell the "old, old story of Jesus and His love" over and over and over again.
This is the power to save. This is the power to sanctify. This Best News Ever has saved people for millennia--it certainly saved me.
One final note. When Paul Zahl spoke, he said that his 40 years of parrish ministry had taught him that everyone has some deep down hurt, some deep down issue which, if unremedied, can plague us for our entire lives. He queried: "What's the greatest movie ever?" Matt Magill responded: "Citizen Kane." That movie illustrates what Zahl is saying. Paul went on to say something to the effect that he has heartburn towards God, because so many, many people go through life with their issue unremedied. A woman queried: "What happens when you find your issue?" Zahl: "Just finding it is about 75% of the work. It will resolve itself thereafter."
I found my deep down issue in the early 2000s. God, thru Paul Zahl's teaching and preaching, brought me face-to-face with my issue. Then, through PZ's preaching and teaching, God gave me great liberty from this issue. Not that I will ever be truly free from it, but I'm so much better.
So, what gives me heartburn about God is that, like the lady from Houston, I wonder why this message of God's radical grace to inveterate sinners is so seldom preached. It's this message which brings liberty and life.
I'll close with this. From the Cross, Christ said: "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." Christ was forgiving those who hoisted him up on the Cross. He was forgiving the religious leaders, the political leaders, and the crowd--the crowd filled with people like me and you--who chose to kill Jesus over Barabas. My hope for my readers is that this sounds like the Best News Ever and that you get to hear it more and more and more. And that this will dredge up whatever deep down issue has been plaguing you and give you abundant life.
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