There are curious profundities in insignificant things. We Presbyterians are especially proud of our strong, unassailable logic in all things theological, as if God was easily codified into neatly established linear categories. More often than not, we are working out our salvation with coffee and donuts as much as fear and trembling. Our responses to sermons regularly find their way into coffee pot conversations. They just don’t sound so fancy pants.

For all our strengths, those of the Reformed persuasion too often miss the point in a mad dash to convince everyone of big boy doctrines like the virgin birth or the divinity of Jesus. It seems that it will remain an impossibility to perfectly describe the indescribable. I often wonder if we would do his divinity a big favor by paying more attention to his humanity; the way he did.

Jesus never shied away from recognitions of or statements about his place in the Godhead. It just wasn’t his primary focus. Instead, he spoke endlessly about wheat and lilies, goats and sheep, wine and bread, coins and widows and sand and sea and doubts; the kind of stuff we talk about in our unguarded moments together. Jesus didn’t want to raise our level of conversation with polysyllabic words fit for Scrabble champions. Nor did he really care whether or not we came out of this with a shiny box set of matching, picture perfect doctrines fit for wrapping and placing under the Christmas tree.

He wanted to find himself with us caught up in the load of laundry that contained a red crayon or the fifty-dollar bill Dad had been desperately looking for last week. He desires to find his way into our thoughts when we’re changing the oil in our car or swapping out a toilet in the master bathroom. Will our most private, reckless moments contain bits of light, truth even? Would we speak from the pulpit what we just spoke to our swollen finger, freshly hammer-smashed? Does the name of God find its way to our thoughts as often or as vividly as does the business page of the paper or the latest political wrangling?

These considerations are not to add to our already bursting guilt quotient. But maybe they can help us find our way out of the morass of conversations thick and heavy with theological brain goop in favor of the spiritual tarpaper of mutual sojourn with the Jesus who knows how we do our laundry. Our theology should lead us to the laundry room as readily as the church library.

He knows that we’re often more delicate than the stuff presently in the dryer.

What are some of the out of the way places Jesus might find you today?

If you were to converse with Jesus in the most mundane moments of your day, what would you say? What might he say to you?

Think of the most boring thing asked of you this week. Try picturing Jesus there with you. Remember, Jesus did grunt work, too!

I posted this originally on the Spring Arbor University MSFL micro-site. I also wanted to share it here. Join me in either place and we’ll talk Tolkien among other stuff…

In a conversation with Gandalf the Grey, Bilbo Baggins, elder statesman of Bag-end in Hobbiton, anxiously complains that he is feeling “thin, like butter spread over too much bread.” Uncharacteristically, Bilbo had been the first hobbit ever to venture outside the safe, recognizable confines of the Shire. There, life was well planned, neatly cropped and decently fitted to those more inclined to an afternoon of tea and scones than giants, goblins and dragons. How distasteful.

“Butter spread over too much bread”, I quite relish cryptic statements like this. There are any number of ways to parse his meaning. Bilbo might just have easily said that he needed less bread upon which to spread his limited butter. It means basically the same thing, doesn’t it?

Maybe.

His original statement suggests that there isn’t enough of Bilbo to accommodate all that life throws at him. He was verbalizing the fact that, under any circumstances, he was always the same person; a hobbit of limited emotional and physical resources (the latter being especially true of Shire folk). For hobbits, adventures are unsightly, unnecessary inconveniences. What had changed were the additional demands his world imposed upon those limitations. Sound familiar?

As we consider Pentecost, this should invite the question, “is the Spirit-empowered life intended to prep us for a world that makes no allowances for the spiritual needs of its inhabitants? In other words, do we, by God’s strength, bend to suit the frenetic nature of the world around us? Conversely, is the Christian life designed to provide us with the tools necessary for us to discern such demands and, in response, live counter-culturally? That is, do we, by that same grace and power, embrace a just-say-no policy to insane living?

Mindy Caliguire, founder of Soul Care, a spiritual formation ministry, (and committed non-hobbit) places we Pentecost people into two broad categories: jet-fuel drinkers and candle lighters. At first glance, I envision those type-A, scale the world with bare hands types to be drawn to the former option. They already tend toward a win-through-perseverance philosophy in most things. Thus, they might be more inclined toward the more is better motif – praying, believing and living in ways that hint at the deeper well from which the Christian may draw. Pentecost to them means that we are given more than adequate resources to meet the challenges imposed by a frenetic culture. More butter to meet the demands of much bread.

The second scenario might be considered more the domain of the candle lighters. They are those who see the inherent dangers to an integrated wholeness within the prevailing culture and risk either apathy or antipathy in their subversive, counter-cultural response to that same milieu. They seek freedom from the imposed insanities rather than power over them. In this ideology, Pentecost provides the inner sensitivity that allows for careful discernment of our crazy predicament. Less bread given our limited butter.

What then is the biblical alternative for he or she who seeks to live as a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ? As I read the scriptures I am forced to concede that the best answer is…both. From the Bible’s earliest pages, one discovers jet-fuel drinkers and candle lighters dwelling together in a veritable stew of divergent sojourners.

Matthew, the greedy, upwardly mobile corporate yes-man intent on being all he needs to be to dominate the system: jet-fuel drinker.

Intimately acquainted with the rhythmic beating of the Savior’s heart and writer of the most mystical Gospel, John: candle lighter.

Gideon, the mealy-mouthed Mama’s boy who ultimately becomes a savage warrior: jet-fuel drinker.

Samson, more aptly named Testicles, a small-minded man whose thoughts are more guided by testosterone than thought: jet-fuel drinker.

Mary, the simple (Martha might suggest, lazy), young lass intent on soaking up the warmth of Jesus’ intoxicating presence without thought of consequence: candle lighter.

Peter, run-at-the-mouth-foot-in-the-mouth-has-a-big-mouth, and yet ever repentant, never enervated follower of Jesus: jet-fuel drinker.

Elijah, self-pitying purveyor of God’s power over pagan parlor tricks: candle lighter in a jet-fuel drinker’s body.

So, what does all of this have to do with Pentecost? My original query was whether or not the promised Spirit sent to those expectant, wondering disciples was primarily for the purpose of preparing ill-equipped weaklings to become stronger than their environments. Or, is the Spirit’s primary purpose to help discerning disciples say no to the soul-killing environment in the first place and build the new society of love envisioned by Jesus?

Jesus enjoyed company with all manner of strangely broken, frustratingly naïve individuals. The hand of God extends to all who are found clinging to the hem of the Savior’s garment. The chill-out, be happy, hippy version of faith together with the git-er-done, live like ya mean it suit ‘n’ tie types.

How does Jesus’ example help us interpret Bilbo’s complaint? Does Jesus, by the Spirit, primarily present the victorious life of the jet-fuel drinker, thereby modeling the ideal spiritual life as the power-to-rise-above? Conversely, is Jesus, by that same Spirit, to be viewed more as the perfect version of Martha’s whimsical sister, whose strength for service came at the feet of her Savior and friend, the candle lighter? Was Jesus drinking jet fuel or hot wax?

Yes. Any questions?

To follow the Pentecost road with Jesus is to live rightly and well. It guarantees that our butter will last and that the constant stream of toast demanding our butter will never be more than our butter can manage. Let us rise to thank Bilbo Baggins for his good, but unintended, spiritual counsel.

I need a sandwich.

Lord of all things new,

we come to you in prayer this morning as family.

We are many and we are different.

But those things that make us happy or confused or sad are similar.

Lord, this is the prayer

…of the man, recently laid off from work,

whose job has provided his identity for decades;

…of the lonely housewife aching for adult conversation

at the end of long, arduous days of laundry, diapers,

fighting children and a barrage of thankless tasks;

…of the college student who recently discovered

she is pregnant six months before graduation;

…of the teen-age boy whose unchosen sexuality promises renewed bruising

and rejection from his father.

…of the businessman who sees his many years of hard work

building a business crumble and disintegrate

in the hands of greedy men who care little

for his sacrifice of time, sweat and pain;

…of the teenage runaway, whose only remaining options for survival involve

things too shameful to mention.

…of the young boy or girl forced to live in isolation,

fear and chaos because of abuse;

…of the elderly man or woman who faces the increased pain and frustration

of watching their spouse descend into the dark abyss of dimentia;

…of the forgotten senior who can’t possibly face another day

without companionship;

…of the family faced with the prospect that Daddy may not survive

his heart surgery or that Mommy’s cancer may not go away;

…of the family torn apart by bitter divorce;

…of the person who, for any reason, is furious with you

for not coming to rescue and making the pain stop.

Lord of hope,

we come to you in prayer this morning

as family.