Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned.
-William Butler Yeats
Author: Jason Kanz
I am a neuropsychologist at the Marshfield Clinic and author of Soil of the Divine (2017), Living in the Larger Story: The Christian Psychology of Larry Crabb (2019, editor), and Notes from the Upper Room: Lessons in Loving Like Jesus (2020).
Approaching Storm
My latest watercolor–Approaching Storm
Repost: Boanerges
When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a vilate of the Samaritans, to make preparations for him. But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But he turned and rebuked them. And they went on to another village.–Luke 9:51-56
I was struck by this passage this morning. Jesus and his disciples are not received in a Samaritan village and James and John, the “Sons of Thunder,” offered to call fire down. They wanted to seem some action. Imagine this scene.
Weary from a long day on a hot, dusty road, Jesus and his disciples entered the village as the sky was growing dusky. A band of rag-tag men, unfamiliar to the townsfolk, aroused suspicion. Jesus asked his disciples to inquire if there might be a place for them to rest for the night. At each door, they faced hard stares and firm nos. Some of the disciples were disappointed, some anxious, and some angry. All of the were tired. James and John were once again riding the waves of their feelings. With fire in their eyes, they asked their teacher, “Do you remember the story of Sodom and Gomorrah? Do you want us to call down fire like that?”
Jesus turned and caught both of their eyes. Looking back and forth between them with a mix of conviction and compassion, he rebuked them. “Guys, you are going to face disappointments and even downright attack if you follow me, but mine is not the way of retaliation, but the way of love. If you want to be my disciples, you must move beyond your desire for retribution and power and instead begin to practice compassion and peace.”
Something shifted in John that day. He had always been sure that the Messiah would be a man of might, come to set things right by his power, but it was dawning on him that perhaps his understanding of power was all mixed up. What if ultimate power resided not in destruction but in love? As he continued to learn to live the Jesus way, he embraced love as the way to live.
When we pay attention, the stories in the Bible show us that people change because of Jesus. If we listen to him, we can change too, from angry, retributive victims, to loving, peaceful servants.
Instructions for living a life
“Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
― Mary Oliver
An acorn planted
becomes a towering tree
but not today.
Our Love Has Grown Up Together
I can hardly fathom
the passage of years.
Is it truly two
decades since we vowed
to love one another
until death should part us?
It was a fairy tale day,
meeting the eyes of
my beautiful bride
walking the aisle
on the arm of her father.
When asked “who gives this woman?”
your dad responded
“her mother and I do”
through tears.
Then we stood before God and family
witnesses
to our promise
to love and cherish
each other.
No doubt, Pastor Ray had fine words
though twenty years later
I remember none.
In the presence
of your radiance
I was blind
to much else.
A lunch of cake and sandwiches,
prayers and well wishes,
Several crystal dishes,
and we were on our way.
Bright eyed and hopeful,
but the years have proven that
fairy tales exist
only in fantasy.
Reality is so much better.
In real life, we have encountered
pain of loss,
sorrow of unfulfilled expectations,
anger toward corruption,
fear of losing loved ones,
bitterness of betrayal,
confusion about God’s plan,
but in all things, joy.
In fairy tales, the couples
(allegedly)
live happily ever after.
Not so in real life.
In real life, we live joyfully ever after,
regardless of circumstance.
Fairy tales are static things
unchanging,
but real life matures
ever changing.
Amidst the years–
sorrows and the pains,
sunshine and rains,
joys and strains–
we grew
deepening roots
as we stretched our branches.
The years have been kind to me.
I left that church newly married
to a luminous bride
eager to make a home
and love her husband well.
She did.
But like a giant tree
her love for me has ever expanded
growing ever more solid
but new branches welcoming
children, friends
and some unknown,
a wise and welcoming beauty
whose love roots deeper into the dark
bringing light to people’s hurt.
A fairy tale it is not; it is better.
I am not fully myself with her, nor she without me.
To know me, you must come to know her,
and to know her, you must know me,
for our love has grown up together.
Protected: Audio Archive
Rustling Leaves
So many rustling leaves
brittle and devoid of life.
They congregate in piles
not long for the earth.
Their burial clothes–
crimson, yellow, and burnt umber–
are beautiful
but retain no power for life.
It is those leaves
who remain connected
to the Branch
in whom life dwells
and who, in return
breathe life into the world.
Pick the Flowers
In a world of LOLs and LMAOs
of baes and YOLOs,
we have not lost our vocabulary,
we have bastardized it.
Each of us
has rolling fields from which
we choose our words.
Though some fields
may be larger than others,
all contain verbal blossoms
ready to unfold in beauty
and bless.
Yet we choose weeds–
thorns and thistles–
who not only inhibit goodness
but actively corrupt it.
In a world
of so many weeds
pick the flowers.
Jason Kanz 