May 2020 – dannypeck.net

A Pile of Rocks

I’ve been re-reading the histories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob this week. A big chunk of the Bible is written about these guys, and the things they did. And one of the things they all spent a lot of time doing: stacking up rocks. The did this when they built altars. Now we see the word “altar” and think about the large wooden tables we have in sanctuaries. In the places we’ve set aside (made Holy) and regularly revisit for a time and place of worship. But these three left altars all over the place.

Abraham builds an altar where God chooses to appear to him and makes Abraham a promise.
Abraham builds an altar where he calls on God’s name this time
Abraham builds another altar where God has called him to be and where God renews and specifies His promise
Isaac builds an altar when he meets God.
Jacob sets up a pillar when he realizes he’s already been in the presence of God all along.
Jacob builds an altar where he has plans to stay
Jacob builds a final altar in the place where God calls him to be

Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob didn’t hop on a camel to go worship on a schedule in the temple (which wouldn’t even be around for several hundred more years), but they built altars when and where they met God throughout their own journeys. And the descriptions we have of the kind of monuments these men were building were more like “Let me grab the tallest rock in my immediate surroundings and stand it upright,” or “I’m gonna just make a pile of rocks right where I stand.” Rocks. I mean, come on, really? Rocks? They were ordinary. But so were the moments before any of these guys simply realized they were already in the presence of God. Their altars were built from what they had. From what God provided for them, really. If worship is a response to God, then our responsibility is to be aware of just how much we are surrounded by His presence, providence, Grace, and love at all times. It’s to make altars from God’s gifts, ordinary as they may seem to us. From the arts, from friendships, from coffee, and from the very rocks and ground upon which we stand right now. God’s is present all around us even when we’re not in the sanctuary. Let’s pile up some rocks.

That’s Not Going Back Like It Was

Yesterday was the first day of Preschool Drive-By Parades to celebrate the end of the school year. It was cold and it was rainy, and it was the first thing on my schedule for the day, so I brought my coffee mug outside with me. The parade itself was great, and it was wonderful to see all our preschool students who we’ve been missing since March. But in my haste to “catch” an air hug from one of the kids, I dropped my coffee mug. It cracked into three big pieces, and even though I eventually picked it up and tried to fit the shards back like a 3D puzzle, my first thought was “that’s not going back like it was.”

The preschool teachers (and probably many of you) have all seen me walking around the building in the mornings with my Dunkin’ Donuts coffee mug. I’ve used it pretty much every morning Sunday-Thursday for years. And I’ll miss it. But it turns out it was pretty easy to shrug off that tiny change. We’ve all had to be adaptable lately, and I think we’ll all have to continue being adaptable for a long time. Even as our state slowly reopens, we’ll be looking around at a lot of things and thinking “that’s not going back like it was.” When Paul says “the old has passed away,” he does so with excitement. And when the changes around us are bigger than our coffee mugs, I hope we remain adaptable and choose to celebrate what is rather than mourn what was.

You Haven’t Quite Got This Figured Out Yet

One of the places I always take my short-term teams in Ecuador is the Artisan Market between North and Central Quito. There are rows and rows of stalls where vendors have all kinds of handicrafts: blankets, paintings, sweaters, dishes, tablecloths; all kinds of woven or carved or painted objects to use or to have as souveniers. Even in a market that takes up an entire city block (it’s entertainingly on the corner of Jorge Washington and Reina Victoria streets in the gringolandia neighborhood… they know their target demo, I suppose), I know after all this time exactly where some of the vendors are. Who is selling what, and who will give you a good deal. And reliably just outside the market on the sidewalk, every day of the week, is a man who sells flags. He has all different sized flags sticking out of a backpack, and he’s usually carrying around an oversized flag in his arms. A few will have the Quito soccer team logo, but most are the Ecuadorian national flag.

All over the market you can hear people shouting what they have for sale. “Sueters!” “Cobijas/blankets!” “Camisetas/ t-shirts!” Vendors who are energetically trying to get your attention and your dollars. But the flag guy just leisurely paces up and down the sidewalk, slowly saying, at a volume just barely above a normal speaking voice, “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeecuador! …Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeecuador!” Not “flags!” Not even “banderas!” (the Spanish word). Just “Ecuador” over and over again. If you wanted a flag of the city of Quito or of the Liga soccer team, you would have to happen to know that he has those. He does the worst job advertising for himself of anybody in the place. And yet, I’ve been going there since 2007 and I have never once not seen him. And as much as I always want to say to him “Dude, you have not got this figured out,” he seems to keep making sales after all this time.

Nine weeks into stay-at-home orders and social distancing and online everything… we don’t all necessarily have this whole thing figured out. But I hope that we all continue with endurance, recognizing the Grace that covers our weaknessas we all go on to Perfection.