The Internet Monk Archives

Mike the Geologist: On the Grand Canyon and the Flood (7)

Passing Storm, Grand Canyon. Photo by ccho

Previous posts in the series:

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The Grand Canyon, Monument to an Ancient Earth: Can Noah’s Flood Explain the Grand Canyon?
By Gregg Davidson, Joel Duff, David Elliott, Tim Helble, Carol Hill, Stephen Moshier, Wayne Ranney, Ralph Stearley, Bryan Tapp, Roger Wiens, and Ken Wolgemuth.

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We now come to Part 4 of the book; the carving of the Canyon. Chapter 16 is an assessment of the most common flood geology arguments for rapid carving of the canyon. Chapter 17 covers the conventional geologic understanding of how the canyon was carved. Chapter 18 focuses on what we can tell about the canyon’s history since the time of the carving.

Chapter 16 — Carving of the Grand Canyon: A Lot of Time and a Little Water, A Lot of Water and a Little Time (or Something Else) deals with the false dichotomy of the flood geologists. Was it a lot of time and a little water or a lot of water and a little time as if these were the only two options? As it is shown later in the chapter, an important third option is left out.

Perhaps the most intriguing question regarding carving the Grand Canyon is how the Colorado River managed to cut a channel through the Kaibab Arch.

The crust at this location bows upward creating an arch that rises 3,000’ above the land on either side. How did a canyon form that allowed the Colorado River to flow though it instead of around it. Flood geologist posit that large lakes were impounded behind the arch (when it was uplifted) with water left over from the flood as shown on Figure 16-1 from the book. They say the lakes contained over 3,000 cubic miles of water; 3 times the amount of Lake Michigan. At some point after the flood the dam burst and the water spilled carving the canyon in a matter of days. Now, to be fair, non-flood geologists have proposed a “spillover” model (although at a much smaller scale) that was presented in the symposium on the Origin of the Colorado River in 2000. The ancient lake in question is Hopi Lake on the figure above also referred to as Lake Bidahochi located in the region where the Little Colorado exists today. Of course, flood geologists immediately seized upon it as confirming their breached-dam hypothesis. Although seriously considered for a time, most conventional geologist now reject it as the bulk of the evidence does not support it. The problem with the breached-dam hypothesis is that extensive large-scale lakes leave readily identifiable evidence by the characteristic deposits that form when sediment carried by rivers flow into a large lake, slows, and deposits. There is a lack of evidence that these lakes were extensive as claimed, or that some of them even existed at all. Recent studies of the Bidahochi sediments show that the lake pictured as Hopi Lake by flood geologists was not one big lake at all, rather a series of playas (lakes that seasonally dry up) that were never able to spillover or breach a dam. In fact, evidence for a spillover or failure point for this proposed lake has yet to be found.

Figure 16-4 from the book illustrates what we should expect to see for a raging flood in soft sediment versus a multiple cycles of seasonal floodwaters gradually incising through layers of hard rock. In the first scenario sand and lime will wash away much more easily than clay, so the massive burst of water should leave clay layers sticking out. As the water recedes the weight of the overlying layers will cause the clay and lime to extrude like putty in the channel, resulting in thinning and sloping downward near the edge. Finally slumping should leave piles of mixed sediments at the base of the exposed embankments. In the second scenario, rivers should carve downward into the already hardened rock, leaving vertical walls behind. Erosion of the weaker rock layers during seasonal flooding should undermine the cliff faces (step 2b) and result in collapse and widening of the canyon (step 3b). The layers should not thin or slope downward near the cliff edges because the layers are solid rock. Shale, being much softer than sandstone or limestone, erodes faster resulting in the collapse of overlying harder layers and producing an ever widening canyon with shale benches and sandstone and limestone cliffs (step 4b). Debris from the higher layers will be common on the benches but less common at river level, where seasonal floods wash it away.

So what is observed? None of the expected features for the flood geology model are observed. All the expected features from the conventional geology model are observed. Furthermore, even if the dam water could cut through 4,000 feet of soft sediment layers left by Noah’s flood, by that time most if it would have drained out of the Grand Canyon area and the remaining water would not have enough erosive force to cut through another 1,000 feet of very hard metamorphic and igneous basement rock to form the Grand Canyon’s Inner Gorge.

The inner gorge of the Grand Canyon, a sight that cannot be seen from either rims.

Fortunately, we do have an example of where a megaflood carved a landscape. We have already talked about Lake Missoula, the glacial ice-dammed lake that spilled out catastrophically over Washington and Oregon. Lake Missoula may have contained 500 cubic miles of water that abruptly emptied – likely several times as the ice formed, breached, and re-formed. This megaflood created the Channeled Scablands of eastern Washington, a vast landscape of erosional features overlain on lava rock. Figures 16-6 and 16-7 from the book show aerial views of the scablands.

So what does a megaflood do when it spills out? It doesn’t create a grand canyon, it creates multiple wide, shallow channels, which fan out over a large area- not a deep, narrow single channel. Additionally, note the total absence of any sharp bends or meander loops in the eroded channels. Megafloods spill over the top of tightly bending channels, carving a new channel that cuts off the bend. Go to the beach (I really want to go), take a stick and cut a meandering line in the wet sand. Take a 5 gallon bucket and throw the water at the line. Did the water follow the line and deepen it, or did it wash over it creating something that looks like the figure above. The landscape of the Channeled Scablands is a compelling argument against a megaflood origin for the Grand Canyon.

Small canyons and gullies carved into soft ash deposited by Mount St. Helens eruption in 1980

When Mount St. Helens erupted on May 18, 1980, nearly a cubic mile of hot pumice rock and ash slid off the north face of the mountain and filled the valley below. 22 months later a small eruption melted the deep snow in the mountains new crater and sent a large flash flood of water and mud rushing into the North Fork Toutle River Valley. This flash flood immediately began cutting a new network of channels in the loose ash. These rapidly forming canyons are offered as evidence supporting rapid formation of the Grand Canyon by flood geologists, but little attention is given to anything other than how fast they formed. The numerous U-shaped small canyons cutting into the ash do not look anything like the single, massive, V-shaped Grand Canyon. As vertical walls formed in the soft ash, the unsupported ash slumped and dropped piles of loose material down into the stream channels. In great contrast, the Grand Canyon walls remain vertical at heights of hundreds of feet, with no evidence of slumping and no piles of un-cemented sediment at the base of the cliffs. The striking difference between Mount St. Helens and the Grand Canyon provide strong evidence the Grand Canyon layers were rock when they were carved, not soft deposits like Mount St. Helens.

So was the Grand Canyon carved in a lot of time by a little water, or by a lot of water in a little time? But as the book said; that is a misleading question. If you do the math assuming the average annual precipitation that falls on the drainage area now (and bear in mind there may have been more rain during wetter periods in the past), we would estimate that 61 million cubic miles of water has been eroding the Grand Canyon during the last 6 million years. That is a lot of water and a lot of time!

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Photo by ccho at Flickr. Creative Commons License

Another Look: It’s a Wonderful Gospel

What do you need when you have spent your whole life giving to others, sacrificing your dreams to do the responsible thing, being the person others count on when the chips are down; when you are tired of being “that guy” that everyone looks to but no one appreciates?

What do you need when you are plagued by a continual low grade sense of frustration, disheartened over the mediocre hand life has dealt you, discontent with feeling stuck on the treadmill of a pedestrian, insignificant life?

And what do you need when, in a moment, out of nowhere, it looks like it might all fall apart; when you face a crisis, when it looks like you will lose everything you have worked for, when all the powerful elements of life are conspiring against you and you are backed into a corner from which you see no escape; when you realize that all the good you have done is impotent to help you now?

You need the Gospel.

That is right where George Bailey found himself on the fateful night portrayed in Frank Capra’s classic Christmas film, It’s a Wonderful Life.

Bailey was a giver. He was the ultimate Boy Scout, giving to others and helping his family, neighbors, and community. As a boy, he saved his little brother’s life when the lad plunged through a hole in the ice while sledding. Working at the local pharmacy, he helped avert a tragedy when he caught a mistake made by the alcoholic druggist. When his father died unexpectedly, George Bailey took over the family business, abandoning his own dreams in the process. As the head of the local savings and loan, he was generous to a fault, assisting neighbors in need and in trouble. When the bank rejected loan applications, George would approve them in order to help workers in the community make a life for their families.

This is not the life George had planned. He longed to travel, see the world, break out of the small town isolation of Bedford Falls. He wanted his life to count for something big. He longed to pursue great accomplishments and make a name for himself. He dreamed the American Dream.

However, one day an employee somehow lost a bundle of money while going to make a deposit. The business couldn’t cover the loss, and the money was nowhere to be found. It looked like the end of the savings and loan, bankruptcy, embezzlement charges, prison, scandal and shame. George Bailey became so desperate that he even went begging for a loan from Mr. Potter at the bank, his family’s long time hated competitor. He found no help from the old man, only mocking and scorn. Potter’s searing words, “You’re worth more dead than alive!” echoed in the beleaguered man’s head, and soon, George found himself standing on a bridge, contemplating a suicidal dive into the icy waters below.

And then . . . Gospel. Christmas-like good news, akin to that spoken by the angels to the shepherds concerning the Nativity, came to George Bailey.

As at Christmas, the Gospel came to him in disguise. The angels in Luke’s narrative spoke good news of a baby lying in a manger, wrapped in swaddling clothes. How simple! How surprising! At the heart of Christmas is a God who comes to us in disguise to be with us that we might have abundant and eternal life.

In It’s a Wonderful Life, the good news comes to George Bailey in the form of Clarence, AS2 (“Angel, Second Class). A funny old guy, he grabs George’s attention by splashing down into the river and appealing to the downhearted man’s natural personality and instincts to help others. George rescues him, but in the process embraces the one who will ultimately bring God’s salvation to him.

And so we learn that God’s ways are not ours. When humans design a plan to change the world, we pull out all the stops and engineer huge projects for maximum impact. God visits us in the form of a baby. He sends a messenger we easily miss for his mundane appearance. As the song says, this is such a strange way to save the world.

As at Christmas, the Gospel came to George Bailey to bring him forgiveness and restoration. The angels told the shepherds that the baby would be the world’s Savior. Matthew’s account tells us they would name him “Jesus,” for he would save us from our sins. Of all the gifts we need from God, we need this most. Our sins have separated us from God. No matter how good and responsible we have been at sacrificing for others and fulfilling our duties, we all fall short. We need the word of forgiveness. We need to be restored. In our poverty, we need the riches of God’s grace and acceptance.

This poor man George Bailey was in crisis. Under his watch, the business had fallen apart. No matter how it had happened, the buck stopped with him and his name would be forever associated with crime and failure. Guilty. He had lost his temper and mercilessly berated the employee who made the mistake. Guilty. He had flown into a rage in the presence of his wife and family, frightening them and saying words he would forever regret. Guilty. He had angrily denounced a local teacher, taking out his inner chaos on her by falsely accusing her of neglecting his daughter. Then later got into a public spat with the teacher’s husband. Guilty. He sought refuge in a local bar, got drunk, and drove his car into a neighbor’s tree. Guilty. He prepared to end his own life rather than face the consequences of his actions. Guilty.

All the good deeds he had done were of no avail now. All the sacrifices he had made in the past could not make up for the failures of the present. No one could or would help him. He saw only one way out. Guilty, helpless, and hopeless.

He didn’t count on God intervening. Through a process of “conversion” that his angel buddy Clarence walked him through, George Bailey came to appreciate that God’s riches were available to reverse his poverty and transform his life.

As at Christmas, the Gospel came to George Bailey in the fellowship of others. The shepherds who heard good news went together to Bethlehem to see what the Lord had done. They went together, they saw together, they rejoiced together, they shared the good news with others together, they returned to their flocks together. The news that came to them from heaven bound their hearts together on earth.

The story of George Bailey’s downfall is the story of his gradual separation from the people in his life. His personal and spiritual crisis played out as a relational crisis. By the time he stands on the bridge in the blowing snow, ready to end his life, George is utterly alone. Step by step, he has shut out everyone around him — his employees, his neighbors, even his own wife and children. It takes a messenger from heaven — in human form — to restore this lonely man to fellowship with God and his human community.

The ending of It’s a Wonderful Life is one of the iconic scenes in movie history. How is George Bailey’s financial crisis averted? It happens through the generosity of his friends, who come to his house and give of their treasures to help the one who has been such a friend to them over the years. Fellowship is restored. A renewed appreciation is gained for the people in his life and how wonderful they are and how much they mean. Clarence says to him, “Remember George, No man is a failure who has friends.”And his younger brother raises “A toast to my big brother, George, the richest man I know.”

Finally, as at Christmas, the Gospel gives George a new perspective on his vocation. In the Christmas story, Luke tells us that the shepherds “returned,” that is, they went back to their work, to their flocks, back out into the fields to take care of the sheep. Their work hadn’t changed. They had. They still had the same calling for their work in the world. Now they approached it as transformed people. What had formerly been mundane and ordinary now became the arena in which they lived out their new life in Christ.

It’s possible to imagine George Bailey never did leave Bedford Falls. He had always dreamed of a wonderful life somewhere else, but his “conversion” experience helped him realize how truly extraordinary his ordinary surroundings and circumstances were. One imagines that he went right back to work at the savings and loan, that he sought forgiveness for his churlish behavior from those whom he had hurt, that he became an even more generous and giving man than he had been before, and that he and his family lived out a “wonderful life” for the rest of their days in that small town.

Life hadn’t changed. George Bailey had. And that made all the difference.

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“I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people.” (Luke 2:10) — good news of God who comes to us in disguise, to bring forgiveness and restoration, to transform our relationships with others, and to send us back to our “ordinary” lives with a renewed sense of vocation.

It’s a wonderful Gospel.

Another Look: The Imagination of Faith

Cherry Blossoms in the Snow. Photo by Mike Licht

What part does imagination play in faith? Can “truth” be communicated through legend, folk tales, poetry, and music?

Many Christmas songs have little to do with describing detailed historical facts. Instead, they evoke images from nature, the Biblical narratives, and the cultures from which they arise to help us not only understand but also feel the meaning and significance of the Incarnation.

One of my favorites is “The Cherry Tree Carol.”

Joseph was an old man,
And an old man was he,
When he wedded Virgin Mary
In the land of Galilee.

Joseph and Mary walk’d
Through an orchard green,
Where were berries and cherries
As thick as might be seen.

Then bespoke Mary,
In voice so meek and mild,
“Pluck me one cherry, Joseph,
For I am with child.”

O then bespoke Joseph
In a voice most unkind,
“Let him pluck thee a cherry
That brought thee with child.”

O then bespoke the babe
Within his mother’s womb,
“Bow down then the tallest tree
That my mother may have some.”

Then bow’d down the tallest tree
Unto his mother’s hand:
She said, “See, Joseph,
I have cherries at command!”

Additional verses of The Cherry Tree Carol are more of a “child ballad” than a Christmas carol. Mary takes the baby Jesus on her knee and he speaks to her of his eventual death and resurrection.

On the “Hymns and Carols of Christmas” site, an excerpt from The Penguin Book of Carols explains its background.

This delightful carol, which transports Mary and Joseph from the Holy Land to an English cherry orchard, is of considerable antiquity and is found in early printed broadsides from many different parts of the country. No two versions are the same but the essential theme of what for obvious reasons has become known as The Cherry Tree Carol is unmistakable.

There are several theories about the origins of the symbolism in this carol. Some folklorists point to the widespread use in folklore of the gift of a cherry, or similar fruit carrying its own seed, as a divine authentication of human fertility. . . .

The legend of the Cherry Tree is the lingering on of a very curious, mysterious tradition, common to the whole race of man, that the eating of the fruit in Eden was the cause of the descendant of Eve becoming the mother of Him who was to wipe away that old transgression. In the carol this tradition is strangely altered, but its presence cannot fail to be detected.

. . . Versions of The Cherry Tree Carol are found in virtually all the major collections made of traditional English carols in the nineteenth century, including Sandys’ Christmas Carols, Ancient and Modem (I833), Rimbault’s Collection of Old Christmas Carols (1861), Husk’s Songs of the Nativity (1864), Bramley and Stainer’s Christmas Carols, Old and New (1871) and A. H. Bullen’s Carols and Poems from the fifteenth century to the present time (1886). The longest and the earliest text in a printed book is in William Hone’s Ancient Mysteries Described (1822). The eighteen-verse version I give here, which follows that in The Oxford Book of Carols and is also the one printed in W. J. Phillips’s Carols: Their Origin, Music, and Connection with Mystery Plays(I921), is the longest known and is made by putting material together from several different sources.

Others maintain that the origins of the story told in this carol go back to the apocryphal Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew which recounts how during their flight into Egypt, Mary, Joseph and the infant Jesus rest under the shade of a palm tree. Mary asks Joseph to pick her some of the fruit, only to be met with the tetchy response that there are more important things to attend to. At this point, Jesus speaks and immediately the tree bows down to enable Mary to gather fruit from its branches. Joseph is filed with remorse and asks Mary’s forgiveness. The Cherry Tree Carol may also draw on another apocryphal gospel, the Protoevangelium of James which describes Joseph’s doubts about the paternity of Jesus and recounts a walk that he takes, while Mary is in labour in a cave outside Bethlehem, during which he encounters an angel.

This carol appeals to the imagination by portraying intimate human experience and feeling in a folk tale setting with miraculous elements and references to the gospel accounts of Jesus. It moves me deeply. As a child of Adam and Eve, who ate forbidden fruit, my heart rejoices in Him who, born of Eve’s daughter, tasted the fruit of death for me and opened the door to Paradise once more.

I believe one reason Christmas has such wide appeal is that there are so many ways the message of Christ comes to us during the season. Of course, at the root of it all is God’s word in scriptures, telling us how, “when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman.” (Gal 4:4) But think of all the other aspects that speak to our senses and imaginations — from candles and Christmas trees, to carols and stories and colors and songs. The season serves up a sumptuous feast for the senses that touches us through and through.

Here is my favorite version of The Cherry Tree Carol, performed by Judy Collins.

• • •Photo by Mike Licht at Flickr. Creative Commons License

Sermon: Advent III – A season for doubters

3126983231_3ea33c4fb6_b — Blue Christmas. Photo by Y-Not

Sermon: Advent III
A season for doubters

When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples ³and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” ⁴Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: ⁵the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. ⁶And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”

⁷As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? ⁸What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces. ⁹What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. ¹⁰This is the one about whom it is written, ‘See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.’ ¹¹Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

• Matthew 11:2-11

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A Season for Doubters (Matthew 11:2-11)

Today’s Gospel text reminds me that the Advent and Christmas season is for doubters.

Which means it is for all of us. There is not one among us with perfect faith. When we go through life with all its challenges, there are natural ups and downs. Sometimes the path of faith is clear, at other times we find ourselves to have wandered far off course.

There are moments when we feel the so-called “Christmas spirit,” and the world seems magical, generous, and full of kindness. But churches in recent years have also found it a good practice to hold what they call “Blue Christmas” services, because the holidays can be excruciating for those who have lost loved ones, who are alone, whose health is precarious, who face financial stresses and struggles, or who have to deal with family conflicts and concerns, which drain them of any sense of comfort and joy.

Last week, we talked about one of the most powerful people of faith the world has ever known: John the Baptist. Today we see him sitting in prison doubting Jesus, doubting his faith, doubting his calling, wondering if he will ever feel that sense of strength and conviction that once marked everything he did and said.

There he is, sitting in the darkness, and he sends messengers to Jesus, asking, “Are you really the One?” This is the same man who baptized Jesus, who saw the Holy Spirit descending upon him in the form of a dove, who heard the voice of God thundering, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” But now, he is filled with doubt — “Are you really the One?”

Have I missed my calling? he’s asking. Have all those sermons and baptisms been for nothing? Has my faith led me to a dead end? Has the work I’ve done for God’s kingdom yielded no results? Has this whole Jesus thing meant nothing?

Does that say something to you? It surely does to me.

One of the best books I read this past year was called “The Sin of Certainty.” It was written by Pete Enns, who happens to be one of the finest O.T. scholars in the world, and I am privileged to call him a friend. In his book, Pete writes,

For many of us, faith is our rock-solid source of security and hope. It provides the map and values for how we navigate the world. But life has all sorts of everyday and ordinary ways of upsetting our thinking about our faith. I believe that, in these moments, God invites us to deepen and grow in our relationship with and our understanding of God.

Pete Enns talks in his book about how we all create religious systems for ourselves in our minds to help us feel safe. These can become fortresses of certainty, which keep us from questioning, wondering, and growing in our faith.

We call ourselves “Christians” and we think this means that we will not, cannot, and must not ever have thoughts like John had about Jesus. Nevertheless, who among has not ever thought:

Does God really exist?
Is what I believe the right way?
Why am I here? Is there really purpose and meaning in life?
If God is here, why does he feel so far away?
Why aren’t my prayers answered?
Why does life seem so unfair?
Why is there so much suffering?
Is there really a heaven after death?

We do have those thoughts, don’t we? Don’t we? We think that having faith means never thinking those kinds of thoughts, but I’m here to tell you, it just isn’t so.

Pete Enns suggests that modern Christians have changed the meaning of the word “faith.” We tend to think that having “faith” means we wrap our minds around a list of truths and adhere to them, and that the goal from that point on is to become so certain about them that we’ll never doubt them again.

Instead, he says that we should always think of the word “faith” in terms of the word “trust.”

Though having right beliefs is important — after all, we confess our faith in the words of the Creed each Sunday — faith is not simply always having certainty in a list of truths. It is rather about trusting a Person, even when in our weakness we doubt the certainty of the truths we confess. Pete Enns says we can easily fall into the trap of putting faith in our own thoughts about what’s true rather than really trusting God.

I can tell you from my own life and from a lifetime of pastoral ministry that there are times when we all have more questions than answers. We won’t feel sure about the tenets of our faith. Our neat little systems of thinking and behaving will get upset, with pieces of them rolling all over the floor. The expectations we have about how God will or should act will get shattered. We will find ourselves in dark places where it feels like it’s all a cruel fairy tale. “Jesus, are you really the One?”

That’s where John the Baptist found himself. After all his strong words. After all his sacrifice and devotion. After persuading so many people to welcome the coming Messiah. After baptizing Jesus himself and sending him out to inaugurate the Kingdom of God in this world. There he was, after all that, wallowing in a pit of doubt and despair.

But I want you to note something in our text — Jesus did not scold John for having those doubts. Instead, he sent back John’s friends to comfort him and encourage him and give him news that a lot of good things were happening and Jesus was still there, going strong, bringing God’s promises to pass.

Jesus also strongly affirmed John himself and encouraged others not to think badly of him simply because he was going through a rough patch in his faith.

When Jesus heard about John’s doubts, he didn’t turn his back on him. He encouraged him. He affirmed him.

My friend Pete Enns went through a similar experience when he resigned from the school where he taught after several stressful years and found himself at home and out of work for over a year. This is a man of faith, a seminary professor, but this is what he said his life was like during that year:

I felt adrift at sea, treading water with no shoreline in sight, not knowing where the tide was taking me — and just as often not even caring. My faith had transformed from ‘I know what I believe’ to ‘I think I know.’ Then, as if bicycling down a steep hill with no brakes, it moved more quickly to ‘I think I though I know, I’m not so sure anymore, I don’t really know anymore. Honestly, I have no idea. Leave me alone.

That’s a hard place to be, and it’s especially hard during this Advent/Christmas season, when everyone is singing songs of comfort and joy while you are sitting there feeling miserable in your doubts, wondering where all the comfort and joy is for you.

If you’re there, remember John the Baptist this Christmas. It can happen to the best of us; in fact, it happens to all of us. But I believe that’s exactly why Jesus came — to be with us in both the darkness and light.

And that’s also why we’re here as a church — to be there for each other, even when our doubts and difficulties imprison us. To rejoice with those who rejoice, and to weep with those who weep.

May God help us trust, even when we find it hard to believe. Amen.

• • •

Photo by Y-Not at Flickr. Creative Commons License

Advent Pic & Post III

ADVENT III

Two Bach cantatas are associated with the third Sunday in Advent. Both are “lost” cantatas.

The first is BWV 186a, “Ärgre dich, o Seele, nicht” (Fret not, O soul), a later version of which is played on the 7^th Sunday After Trinity.
The second is BWV 141, “Das ist je gewißlich wahr” (This is now the gospel truth), which is recognized as having been composed by someone else (perhaps George Telemann).

Therefore, we will focus our attention on other things this Sunday.

• • •

As we light the third Advent candle today, we thank God for his gift of joy.

This is Gaudete (Rejoicing) Sunday. In the midst of Advent’s long journey, our worship on this day calls us to lift up our eyes, focus anew on our destination, and find renewed strength and refreshment from realizing that“our redemption draws near.” To mark this day, the liturgical colors are changed from deep purple or blue to rose-pink. That is why the third candle is different than the others on the Advent Wreath.

This day has a counterpart in Lent: Laetare Sunday. Both come just past the midpoint of a penitential season and are designed as merciful reprieves from the demands of fasting so that the Church might be encouraged in the feast to come. In Lent as well, the purple vestments are swapped out for pink or rose-colored ones, and the theme is joy and rejoicing.

The introit for Gaudete is Philippians 4:4 — “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” Today’s text from Isaiah graphically pictures the joy of the new creation and how this message of hope can bring rejoicing to our hearts even now:

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad,
the desert shall rejoice and blossom;
like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly,
and rejoice with joy and singing.

…And the ransomed of the Lord shall return,
and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
they shall obtain joy and gladness,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

• Isaiah 35:1-2a, 10

Joy is best expressed through singing! Here is the group Libera, singing the 16th century Latin carol, “Gaudete.” The repeated refrain proclaims: “Rejoice! Rejoice! Christ is born of the Virgin Mary! Rejoice!” The verses proclaim that the time of grace has come, God has taken flesh, the world has been renewed, the light has been born, and salvation has been found because of Christ’s coming.

Gaudete!

Saturday Ramblings: December 10, 2016

1619362-a — John Glenn during his space flight in the Friendship 7 Mercury spacecraft

RAMBLER OF THE WEEK

This week’s Rambler of the Week is a no-brainer, as far as I’m concerned. This week we witnessed the passing of one of the greatest heroes of my generation: John Glenn.

It is hard to express what it was like to see rockets and astronauts and to watch on our black and white and early color TV’s as Mission Control counted down to lift-off and we saw those blazing missiles soar into the sunlit skies over Florida. To imagine what it must have been like to look down on our planet from above for the first time in the history of the world. To express the breathless anxiety we felt as we awaited the return of our space heroes to splash down and be recovered at the end of their journey.

And it all started here in the U.S.A. with John Glenn. Fellow astronauts Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom had achieved suborbital missions previously, but it was only after ten launches were postponed because of weather and mechanical problems, on February 20, 1962 that John Glenn finally made it into earth orbit, catching up with the achievement of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who had made the journey not quite a year earlier. On that historic day for the U.S., Glenn launched 160 miles into space and orbited the world three times at 17,500 miles per hour.

Our own Jeff Dunn is himself an Ohio boy (and the American hero who founded these Saturday Ramblings). He grew up in those glory days of the space program, and has written a heartfelt paragraph of tribute for his greatest hero.

As I walked to meet John Glenn in July of 2003, I struggled in my mind as to how to address him. Colonel Glenn? Senator Glenn? Both were appropriate, but neither seemed enough. After all, this man was the first American to circle the earth in space. He was one of the most decorated fighter pilots of both WWII and the Korean War. He had served my state as a senator for 24 years. What should I call him?

I was meeting him in advance of introducing him on stage to a crowd of thousands who came to hear him speak during Ohio’s celebration of the centennial of flight. I walked up the door of a small house where a security person was standing talking to a woman with a clipboard. Maybe one of them would know how I should address this living legend. But as soon as I gave my name I was taken inside and ushered into a room with an elderly man and woman standing hand-in-hand. The man reached out his other hand to shake mine and said simply, “Hi, I’m John. This is my wife, Annie.” It was as if I were talking to them after service in the Baptist church a block down the street where I had attended for years. He was kind, genuine, warm—every bit the gentleman. “Just call me John.”

John Glenn was my greatest hero. And I would dare say he was my generation’s last hero. He traveled where no other American, and only one other human, had gone. Yes, seven years later another Ohioan would set foot where no other human being had walked. Yet there was something about John Glenn that set him apart from Neil Armstrong. Armstrong returned from the moon and withdrew to a farm in my hometown of Lebanon, Ohio. Glenn wanted to return to space, but President Kennedy ordered that he remain on earth lest something should happen to America’s hero. So instead he invested his life into helping people through politics. I remember voting for him in the 1984 presidential primaries. I knew he wouldn’t beat Reagan if he received his party’s nomination. A ticket of George Washington/Abraham Lincoln wouldn’t have beat Reagan in his re-election bid. So why did I vote for Glenn? Because he was John Freakin’ Glenn, that’s why.

One story out of a million that could be told about Glenn involves another of America’s heroes, the great Ted Williams. Williams took time out of his brilliant baseball career to fly combat missions in both WWII and Korea. While in Korea, he served as Glenn’s wingman, and credited Glenn with saving his life after his plane was hit by enemy fire. Williams was not known to be a religious man and admitted that he didn’t pray. At least, not until February 20, 1962 when Glenn lifted off into space. “Then,” said Williams, “I did say a prayer for John Glenn.”

Our last hero. There are certainly many great women and men who are alive today, saints-in-the-making, who have great stories to tell. But none who lived as great a life as John Glenn. Godspeed, John Glenn.

More about John Glenn:

Here is John Glenn’s obituary from the Columbus (OH) Dispatch.
Here is an image gallery of Glenn and his remarkable career.
Here is a nice piece from the Washington Post about John’s relationship with his wife Annie. And here is another, offering tribute with regard to their “great marriage.”
Here is an article from RNS about Glenn’s faith and how he reconciled that with his scientific endeavors.
Here is a touching tribute to his boyhood hero from former Cincinnati Enquirer reporter Howard Wilkinson, which was written in 2012 on the 50th anniversary of Glenn’s first space flight.
Given our cynical age, is it possible John Glenn was the last great American hero?

Finally, here’s an video overview from the BBC on our Rambler of the Week and great American hero. GODSPEED, JOHN GLENN!

• • •

THE CHURCH LOSES A “CLASSIC”

We must mention another death this past week. Theologian Thomas Oden, who coined the term “paleo-orthodox” and advocated a “classical Christianity,” died at age 85.

I encourage everyone to read this 1990 interview with Christopher Hall at CT called, “Back to the Fathers,” in which Oden explains how he moved from advocating more trendy theological positions and perspectives to appreciating and affirming the faith represented in the Church Fathers and the consensus of the early church.

In that interview, this description of how he would like to be remembered:

CT: You have told about a dream in which you were walking in the New Haven cemetery. You came across your own tombstone and the epitaph read, “He made no new contribution to theology.” Were you happy or distressed to read that?

TO: In my dream I was extremely pleased, for I realized I was learning what Irenaeus meant when he warned us not to invent new doctrine. This was a great discovery for me. All my education up to this point had taught me that I must be compulsively creative. If I was to be a good theologian I had to go out and do something nobody else ever had done. The dream somehow said to me that this is not my responsibility, that my calling as a theologian could be fulfilled through obedience to apostolic tradition.

• • •

BRRR! GET READY FOR THE POLAR VORTEX

I just returned from Scottsdale, Arizona, where I spent a few days basking in the sunshine and temperatures around 70 degrees. Then I flew to Denver, where the temperature was 8 degrees. And now I read that a very unwanted visitor is about to invade the Midwest where I live next week, bringing cold I don’t want to even imagine, must less negotiate every day.

The dreaded Polar Vortex is about to attack.

According to USA Today:

After a chilly, snowy weekend and a brief stretch of slightly milder weather early next week, the next cold blast will invade the northern Plains and Upper Midwest by the middle of the week. The frigid air will eventually make its way to the East Coast and Southeast by week’s end.

The cold will be similar in scale and magnitude to the infamous January 2014 Polar Vortex, meteorologist Ryan Maue of WeatherBell Analytics, tweeted Wednesday.

The Polar Vortex is a large area of cold air high up in the atmosphere that normally lives over the poles (as its name suggests) but — thanks to a meandering jet stream — parts of the vortex can slosh down into North America, helping to funnel unspeakably cold air into the central and eastern U.S., like what’s forecast next week.

Just how cold could it get? High temperatures may only reach the single digits for much of the upper Midwest, including Chicago, on Wednesday and Thursday, the Weather Channel said.

“If the GFS were to pan out, we would be in record territory for cold,” the National Weather Service in Chicago said, referring to the Global Forecast System, one of the many computer models that forecasts weather.

“If you have not gotten your hats and gloves and scarves out yet … this is time to do it,” the weather service said in an online forecast.

I wanna go back to Arizona!

Please? Pretty please?

• • •

NO, NO, NO! STOP DOING THIS, PLEASE.

Brian Moss is senior pastor of Oak Ridge Baptist Church in Salisbury, Maryland. He blogs at Next Level Leadership. In attempting to reach out to the “unchurched” in their community, Brian and his church came up with the following list of general characteristics they need to keep in mind. Not every family, of course, fits all these, but these are general trends in the culture of families that they have noticed. In his article, Moss suggests that these represent a “radical cultural shift” in the past 16 years, when they began making these observations.

They are a blended home.
They are spiritually mismatched.
They are financially strapped.
They are “over-calendared.”
They are biblically illiterate.
They are ethnically diverse.
They have a special-needs child.
1 in 5 have experienced some form of trauma in the home.
They want to be successful.
They are spiritually hungry.

Well, Brian (and a multitude of other churches who look at their unchurched neighbors like this), allow me to respond with some observations of my own.

All of these (except often #6) are the exact same characteristics we see in “churched” families. Do you know your church families?
I have no idea what you mean when you say there has been a “radical culture shift” in the last 16 years that has given birth to these characteristics. With a few changes in emphasis (#4 is certainly more pronounced where I live, for example) this list sounds like the majority of American families I’ve observed during most of my adult life since the 1970’s. But in some ways it fits the notion of “American decline” that makes many Christians nervous about the changes in society they perceive.
“1 in 5” have experienced trauma? What world are you living in? Maybe 3 in 5. Maybe 4.
Since when has wanting to be successful and being spiritually hungry represented a “radical cultural shift”?

In brief, this is another one of those white suburban evangelical faux-analytical approaches to “trying to ‘understand’ our neighbors so that we can make them like us.”

Please, for all who look at their communities like this and think, “This is what ‘THEY’ are like,” get out of your church buildings and start spending the majority of your time in the real world. Please!

Stop “strategizing.” Start living in your actual community. Listen well. Get to know real people and their stories.

• • •

OH, DINOSAUR FEATHERS!

Unearthed by amber hunters in Myanmar (Burma), a specimen has finally provided a link between feathers and identifiable dinosaur bones. Amber is the hardened resin from trees, and in this case it not only trapped feathers in its ooze but also eight vertebral segments as well as soft tissues of a dinosaur.

Ben Guarino at the Washington Post reports:

Artist’s rendition of a coelurosaur. (Chung-tat Cheung/Yi Liu)

X-ray images revealed that no ancient bird grew this tail. The tail tip belonged to a two-legged dinosaur called a theropod. “We can tell that this specimen came from a theropod dinosaur because the tail is flexible and the vertebrae articulate with each other, instead of being fused together to form a solid rod — which is a characteristic of modern birds and their closest relatives,” [Ryan McKellar of the Royal Saskatchewan Museum in Canada] said. Specifically, the researchers hypothesized the animal was a type of dinosaur called a coelurosaur, and likely a juvenile.

Scientists like McKellar are hopeful that spectacular fossils will continue to be pulled from Burmese amber mines, granting us more insight into these and other ancient creatures.

• • •

QUESTIONS OF THE WEEK

Whither the hotel Bible?

Were Neanderthals religious?

Perry Noble, church consultant?

What do surveys say about Americans’ support for assisted suicide?

Should Southern Baptists who are Calvinists just get honest and become Presbyterians?

What happens when an evangelical church welcomes LBGTQ members?

• • •

IT’S THE MOST <AWKWARD> TIME OF THE YEAR

Time for another round of “family Christmas photos you can’t turn away from because they are so much like a gruesome traffic accident…”

“Oh, deck the fam with holiday towels, Fa la la la la, la la la la…”

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“All I want for Christmas is my own tombstone, my own tombstone…”

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“Bells on alpaca ring, making spirits bright…”

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A scene from the Stephen King Christmas movie

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A scene from the Gene Kelly Christmas movie

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A scene from the Ingmar Bergman Christmas movie

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Elves on a shelf?

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“All is calm, all is [not so] bright”

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Maybe, if Christmas were “Buddha-mas”

Fridays with Michael Spencer: December 9, 2016

Note from CM: At the end of this week when I have been involved in a training for bereavement caregivers, I thought this eloquent statement of faith by Michael Spencer, “In the End, God Knows Us,” appropriate for our meditation.

• • •

But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God…

• Galatians 4:9a, ESV

I’ve been teaching Galatians for over a year, and I happened to cross this verse this week, a week marked by the passing of one of my most significant mentors. She exemplified many things in my life, but one of the most significant was her amazing hunger for the teaching of the Word of God. She had a quick and focused mind that was always taking in a sermon or a book of theology or Biblical teaching. Right up until her last few months, she was accumulating knowledge about God.

It’s interesting to me that Paul interrupts himself in Galatians 4 — almost corrects himself — to say that the better way to describe the Christian experience is coming to be known rather than coming to know. People who make this kind of distinction can be a bit irritating.

But there’s a reason to make such a distinction, and it’s very important we make it.

Paul is making a reference to the incredible sea of God’s love and grace in which the believer finds himself. He may be learning about God, but when he looks up, the God that he is learning about has, in fact, dropped a few crumbs of knowledge onto his plate. Surrounding the believer is a vast ocean of God’s immensity, sovereignty, omniscience, omnipresence and goodness. In a lifetime, we see a speck of God in our tiny brains, but the God in whom we live, move and have our being surpasses every measurement and comparison.

This God knew us in eternity. He knew us before birth. His knowledge preceded us and meets us no matter where we find ourselves. His knowledge of us is encyclopedic, utterly honest, complete and compassionate. He will know us a million years from now in the same way, and we will only have begun to know him.

As the universe dwarfs our measly attempts at knowledge, so God overwhelms all the combined knowledge of every knowing being in the universe.

Our knowledge is a grain of sand, and yet we strut proudly. Our knowledge of God is the first crayon’s mark on a page to his million times magnified Shakespearean greatness. And yet we brag.

My friend would have been the first one to agree. What God has graced us to know of him in this life should be our passionate study, but God is not measured by what we know. That is why the most knowledgeable among us may, in the end, be the most humble or the most mystical. What God shows us is true, as true faith is based on truth. But our little books of God-knowledge are documentaries on a few caught reflections from a Sun we cannot bear to see.

If our hope comes to what we know of God, our knowledge has led us astray. What our knowledge has shown us is the wonder of being KNOWN.

The Bible is full of persons who believe they know God and are surprised to discover how little this matters compared to God’s knowledge of them. The lost sheep knew the shepherd, but how little he knew of the shepherd’s love for him. The prodigal knew his father, but never realized his his father knew and loved him.

My uncle was another of my mentors. He was a deep and insightful pastor with a mind that absorbed the scriptures. But the last year of his life, his mind betrayed him. He became someone else. Angry. Profane. It was a terrible time for his wife and friends. We could hardly stand to be near him. What happened to all he knew? What happened to that mind that taught all of us so much?

His brain was dying, as all of us should know. Many of us, sadly, will come to a similar place, often for much longer. What we know will be locked away or gone entirely. We may lose the knowledge of our spouses and children.

What will matter is this: Does God know us?

Many years ago, an aging pastor came to talk to me. He also was a very intelligent man. He taught Latin at our school. He wanted personal counsel. Age was affecting his mind and emotions. He doubted if God loved him. He was afraid of hell and frightened of death. He thought God had abandoned him for his sins. His mind had become a frightful and dark place, filled with paranoid thoughts. I tried to assure him of the love of God; the God he had known, proclaimed and believed in for so many years of faithful ministry.

His mind could not take hold of my words. All that was left were the fears and doubts he had suppressed throughout life. Now he was a caricature of himself, terrified and afraid of God.

A few months later, he was gone.

These were my friends. They read the books. Thought the theological thoughts. They taught, read, preached. They had knowledge of God.

In the end, their minds weakened, rebelled or turned on them. Knowledge disappeared.

But God did not. God knew them and God was with them.

This is the Good News. We are privileged to know God, and he reveals himself to us. But the God we come to know releases us from the trap of holding onto knowledge as our salvation. He comes to us as a Father, lover, mediator, gracious and all-embracing savior.

“I know you.” He said those words to my mentor, my uncle, my co-worker. They were never left to experience what they knew. They were taken hold of by one who loved them before, behind, around and to the uttermost.

An infant does not know anything about his/her parents. Knowledge will come, but life begins in utter vulnerability and trust. It is the love of mother/father for child that dominates our beginning. Recognition will come, but not at first.

So at the end, things are much clearer. Know God in the present and give all of mind and heart to the study of his Word and good thoughts about Him. But, in the end, lay down and rest. Lay down in him and go home.

A few months ago, we adopted a puppy. We had to drive 7 hours in the pouring rain to get home. All the way, she huddled herself in my wife’s lap, and never moved. She did not run, bark or panic. She rested in us and we brought her home.

You do not need to know the way home. Jesus is the way. He knows and loves you. You will be safe.

Mike the Geologist: On the Grand Canyon and the Flood (6)

Previous posts in the series:

• • •

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In Part 2 the book addressed fossils in general terms as a dating tool. In Part 3 fossils get center stage with attention paid to the particular story revealed by ancient organisms in the Grand Canyon. According to the YEC view, almost all fossils must be from Noah’s flood, since there was no death before Adam’s fall. I suppose there could be some fossils that date from the fall but prior to Noah’s flood, but I don’t recall that idea being very developed in YEC literature. To the flood geologists fossils represent the “all flesh” of Genesis 7:19-20 that perished in the year-long global flood. But do fossils support that view? Modern geology says fossils represent the remains of plant and animals that lived many millions of years ago and lived and died and were buried in close proximity to the environment where they lived.

So, Chapter 13 –Fossils of the Grand Canyon and Grand Staircase addresses primarily animal fossils and Chapter 14 considers plant fossils.

It was eventually recognized that the oldest fossil-bearing rocks contain the remains of the simplest organisms- bacteria and algae- and younger rocks contain fossils of increasingly more complex body plans. This is known as the Law of Faunal Succession.

Here is Figure 13-1 from the book, a great summary figure of the fossil life represented in the Grand Canyon. The most important aspects of this table/figure are:

This tale of fossils is not hypothetical; it’s what is simply there. Anyone can go and observe the fossils in these rock formations. Proponents of either viewpoint (flood geology or modern geology) must explain this sequence of fossils in order for their claims to be considered valid.
The increase in complexity and diversity from the lowest (oldest) to the highest (youngest) rocks is readily apparent. In Precambrian rocks only simple algae are found, but as one goes up the entire sequence, the age and character of the fossils change from dominance by invertebrates (Paleozoic), to the appearance and proliferation of dinosaurs (Mesozoic), to the appearance and proliferation of mammals and birds (Cenozoic).
This table also denotes the major extinctions that have occurred over the history of life on planet Earth. After each extinction, fossils from the major taxonomic groups appear or disappear in the Grand Canyon-Grand Staircase sequence with the same order and timing as observed globally. This is a conspicuous trend in the history of life, and, in fact, boundaries between several geologic eras or periods are defined by the disappearance of one or more types of life forms.

The other major thing to realize is that if you follow the Colorado to the sea today you will find all types of modern life: tuna, grouper, swordfish, sea turtles, dolphins, whales, etc. And shell-forming creatures as well such as diatoms, forams, and cocolithophorid algae. If we look for fossil examples of these creatures in the Grand Canyon, how many do we find? The answer is not just a low number – it is ZERO. Because they did not exist when the Grand Canyon rocks were formed- period- end of argument (Mike drops the mic), Fi-ne’, Auf Wiedersehen, Sayonara, 再见.

From the perspective of flood geology, all major categories of organisms living today were present prior to the flood, so the pre-flood deposits, which according to flood advocates are all the Supergroup layers below the Great Unconformity, should contain all major categories of organisms. Yet the only evidence of fossil life- in thousands of feet of accumulated sediment- is colonial algae and plankton. Now think about it, plankton is floating algae. How is it that only plankton, but no other floating organism or multicellular organisms at all, are there- when Genesis1 states that there were multicellular plants and animals including fish that existed in pre flood days. This not only violates a literal reading of the Bible, it violates common sense.

Many of the Mesozoic layers in the Grand Staircase contain ONLY terrestrial fossils (land and freshwater organisms). In the Chinle Formations there are insects, scorpions, freshwater fish, tetrapods, and early dinosaurs. There are no marine organisms of any kind in the Chinle. That is baffling if one holds to a scenario of these rocks having been deposited in a worldwide oceanic flood.

Flood geologists have called upon some sort of hydrodynamic sorting due to earthquakes or currents or something to separate deceased organisms based on size or density. However, abundant microfossils are well mixed both above and below layers with larger fossil bones. What would be the pattern of fossil organisms emplace in a single, violent catastrophic flood that ripped them out of their life environment and were carried vast distances by powerful tsunami-like currents and dumped into layers of sand and mud that were rapidly being deposited? Shouldn’t we expect that all kinds of living communities would be jumbled together? Instead what we see are samples of discreet ancient living communities or ecosystems. Deep water marine to shallow marine, near shore bays and estuaries, beaches, deltas, freshwater lakes, and even deserts succeeding one another. They succeed one another because during the immense time it took to deposit the layers the environment changed.

The next chapter, Chapter 14-Tiny Plants-Big Impacts: Pollen, Spores, and Plant Fossils, is even more devastating to the YEC positions because plants, unlike big animals, couldn’t run to higher ground during the flood which is the typical argument for the Faunal Succession that is witnessed in the animal fossil record. For example, pollen and spores (and our ability to identify what plants they came from), by their very small size, are broadly distributed by even gentle wind and currents. In a violent global flood, we should expect a thorough mixing of all types of these tiny particles in all the different flood layers and we should expect to have mismatches between the pollen and spores and the macroscopic plant fossils. So what do we see?

We see the same principles of succession in the Grand Canyon and the Grand Staircase that the animals follow. Cambrian and Devonian rocks (Tapeats Sandstone to Temple Butte Formation) contain only simple three-lobed spores from now extinct simple spore-bearing plants and algae. Spores from lycopods (club mosses, horsetails, scale trees like Lepidodendron) and ferns are plentiful in rocks above the Temple Butte Formation.

Conifers are the dominant plants in the Triassic and Jurassic rocks of the Grand Staircase and their pollen is readily distinguishable from flowering-plant pollen. Significantly, the absence of any macroscopic fossils of flowering plants in Grand Canyon rock layers is matched by a complete absence of fossil flowering-plant pollen. Flowering plants don’t appear in the fossil record before the Cretaceous age (about 140 million years ago). Flowering plants make up 80% of all plants today. The flood model would predict that plant remains, especially pollen, that were present prior to the global flood would be distributed throughout the geologic column. As the book says (page 151):

Yet such remains are conspicuously absent from all rocks older than Cretaceous age. Said another way, in spite of hundreds of square miles of exposed surfaces throughout the Grand Canyon, not a single unambiguous pollen grain from a flowering plant has ever been discovered in any unaltered rock layer below the rim. This alone should be enough to categorically reject a global flood explanation for the Grand Canyon.

Chapter 15- Trace Fossils; Footprints and Imprints of Past Life covers a third category of fossils found in the Grand Canyon. Trace fossils are tracks, trails, burrows, borings and other structures made by ancient organisms that are preserved in the fossil record. Trace fossils differ from body fossils in that they are a record of the animal’s behavior rather than part of the organism itself. Go to the ocean beach (I would like to go right now), walk down by the water in the zone where the waves are gently washing up and receding. Make some footprints. Watch the waves gently wash over the footprints. How long until the footprints are gone? How long would the footprints last in a RAGING TORRENT? Exactly.

The Coconino Sandstone is a thick sequence of sandstone that is well exposed in the Grand Canyon. The Coconino is evidence of an enormous desert sand sea (called an erg) like the Sahara, the Sonoran in northwest Mexico, and the Arabian Peninsula. No remains of animals have been found in the Coconino, which is typical in desert environments where scavengers, wind, and hot sun remove flesh and bones rather quickly. The Coconino Sandstone also contains no evidence of aquatic organisms of any kind that might support an argument for deposition in a deep-water, flood environment as has been proposed by flood geologists. The trace fossils consist of large to small vertebrate tracks and also include tracks and burrows very similar to those left by spiders, scorpions, millipedes, and other arthropods in modern desert environments.

Some flood geologists have claimed that vertebrate tracks in the Coconino were made by amphibians walking or running underwater in an attempt to escape advancing flood waters. Studies were performed in tanks of water and sand to prove that the tracks can be made underwater. Of course, they do not replicate the presence of running and galloping gaits that are only possible on dry land. Ironically, the experiments were performed in gentle currents of 0.25 feet per second- hardly the raging torrents required by flood geology. Maybe this is because the experimenters knew that even mild currents of 1.0 feet per second would wipe out the footprints. Go to the beach… Oh nevermind.

As the book says (page 159):

Although flood geologists claim that this sandstone was deposited in rapidly flowing water that was hundreds of feet deep, the presence of raindrop impressions, desiccation cracks, and well sorted frosted sand grains, along with the angle of the slope in cross-beds, the absence or scarcity of body fossils, and preservation of footprints, are all clear indicators of a sand desert. Asserting an aquatic environment for the Coconino Sandstone requires ignoring nearly all the geological and paleontological evidence. Truly, as one flood geologist has said, “I wouldn’t have seen it if I hadn’t believed it.”

• • •

Photo by Joe Jiang at Flickr. Creative Commons License

People need friends, not fixers

My job is not to fix you. Nor you me. Nor is it our collective calling to fix one another. To be “our brother’s keeper” does not mean that we are responsible to do for our brother what he can only do for himself by God’s grace.

This is one of those areas where American culture hurts us. We are “can do” people, fixers who see most everything as a problem needing to be resolved.

Now I will be the first to admit, this has taken us a long way and served us well in many aspects of life. The drive and ability to mend broken things, solve thorny dilemmas and find answers to persistent problems is not something to be discounted. I don’t look down my nose at ingenuity, creativity, skill, and innovation that makes our lives better. I am happy to live in an “age of miracles and wonders” in the most productive and prosperous nation the world has ever known. Productivity is a good thing. So is solving problems.

However, when ministering to people and trying to offer true help, counsel, and support to them — especially those who are hurting and/or experiencing loss — nothing could be more counterproductive.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I am attending a training for bereavement caregivers this week in Scottsdale, Arizona led by Dr. Alan Wolfelt. Dr. Wolfelt advocates “companioning” people in their grief, not “treating” them in order that they might “resolve” their grief, as has been the common model.

This treatment approach by which we “help” our fellow human beings is insufficient in this arena, though it is still promoted. In the medical field where I work, on the common template we follow we have to list a person’s problems, the goals of treatment, and the interventions we use to help achieve those goals. It doesn’t really fit what I do as a chaplain in hospice, but I have to chart my work in that fashion.

Even though they wouldn’t put it in those terms, this is also a common perspective Christian people and churches rely upon when trying to “help” hurting people.

What’s the problem?
What’s the goal (or, where does God want them to be)?
What steps can we help them take to reach that goal?

They have the problem. We have the answers. Let’s give them the answers and when they apply those answers they will be fixed. Then we move on to the next problem case and solve that one.

The companioning model urges us to do something different. Instead of taking the role of teacher or leader, we should let the person who is grieving be our teacher. We walk with him and let him tell his story and guide us in understanding what the loss has meant to him and how it has impacted his life. Whatever “help” or “counsel” we give will grow out of earned trust and it will be organically related to an ongoing conversation between people who give and take with each other in a context of hospitality and sanctuary.

On the Center for Loss website, the following approach is presented as appropriate for helping those who are grieving:

Listening: Helping begins with your capacity to be an active listener. Your physical presence and desire to listen without judgment are critical helping tools. Don’t worry so much about what you will say. Just concentrate on listening to and empathizing with the words that are being shared with you.

Having compassion: Give the griever permission to express her true thoughts and feelings without fear of criticism. There are no right or wrong feelings; whatever she is thinking and feeling is precisely what she needs to think and feel. Don’t try to take her feelings away by judging them, denying them, or offering simple solutions. Also, never say, “I know just how you feel.” You don’t. Not exactly. Think about your helper role as someone who walks alongside the person who is mourning.

Understanding the uniqueness of grief: Keep in mind that each person’s grief is unique. While it may be possible to talk about similar thoughts and feelings shared by grieving people, everyone is different and shaped by experiences in their own particular lives.

Being patient: The grief process takes a long time. Allow your loved one to proceed at his own pace.

Being there: Your ongoing and reliable presence is the most important gift you can give to someone who is grieving. While you can’t take the pain away (nor should you try to), you can honor it and bear witness to it by being there for him. Remain available in the weeks, months, and years to come. Remember that the griever may need you more later on than at the time of the death.

Being a helper in grief isn’t easy. It may test your patience, your character, your fortitude—and your deepest reserves of compassion. But it is also one of the most rewarding roles you can undertake in this life. Helping a fellow human being heal and go on to live and love fully again—what could be more meaningful than that?

Then, in this article, Dr. Wolfelt describes some of the practical things that might be involved in such a companioning approach.

You see, what people want (and truly need) is genuine connection with other human beings who will love them and honor their individuality and the unique experiences they have had. People need friends, not fixers.

They don’t need well intentioned (or not) people throwing Bible verses and simplistic clichés (that almost always represent bad theology) their way. They don’t need “helpers” who too easily dismiss the reality of their suffering, minimize its significance, or suggest that it is just a bump in the road they need to get past. Grieving people need folks who are willing to be truly present to them, pay attention to them, truly listen, patiently care and keep caring no matter how long it takes or even if they never “get over” their losses.

As Dr. Wolfelt says repeatedly, loss is rooted in love, not logic. The “answer” therefore is not to find a logical “solution” to the “problem.” It is rather to love and to keep on loving in such a way that the person feels safe and has room to mourn the loss that is, at its very heart, defined by loving attachments which have been broken.

The role of “helpers” is to provide hospitality and sanctuary for our brothers and sisters who are hurting. In such places of refuge, we “help” by allowing and encouraging them do their own unique work of mourning the losses for which they grieve.

Dispatches from the Wilderness of Grief

Dispatches from the Wilderness of Grief
Scottsdale, Arizona. Dec. 5, 2016

This week I am in Scottsdale, AZ attending a training given through The Center for Loss and Life Transition and presented by Dr. Alan Wolfelt.

Dr. Wolfelt is a grief counselor and one of North America’s premier authors and educators in the area of grief and loss. He champions an approach called “companioning” mourners, in contrast to the “treating” model that has been common. Wolfelt founded and directs the Center for Loss and Life Transition and he presents numerous educational workshops each year for hospices, hospitals, schools, universities, funeral homes, community groups, and a variety of other organizations as well as trainings for bereavement caregivers like the one I am attending.

The training is not only excellent in terms of its content, but also with regard to the personal interaction that takes place during the sessions. Many skilled and compassionate people from all over North America have gathered and part of what happens is that we learn each other’s stories of loss and vocation.

Here’s a woman who unexpectedly lost her husband to a series of unanticipated infections a few years ago. They were deeply in love and the wound was deep. She found she couldn’t just go back to her former way of life without him. So she retired from her work as a special education teacher and is taking personal sabbatical time to travel, study, and explore the possibilities of working in a place where she can serve others who are grieving.

Here’s a man whose wife died of breast cancer. They too had been inseparable. Providentially, he was downsized out of his job and was able to care for her during her last months at home. Now he volunteers at a cancer center, providing support to others who are on similar journeys.

And then there is the story of a Roman Catholic woman who moved to a southern state when she got married so they could live near her in-laws. The first thing that extended family let her know when she got settled was that they understood she wasn’t really a Christian and that they were going to make her their project. In time, she became pregnant but lost the baby at full-term. In the midst of her grief, she received a card from the family church. Its message? “Maybe this is what will finally bring you to Jesus.”

This is akin to another who shared that when their baby died, the pastor visited them at the hospital and informed them that this had happened because the father worked for a brewery.

On a ledge in our conference room is a shelf where people have brought pictures and mementos of their loved ones who have died to honor them and keep them in mind as they take the training. There’s a picture of a little girl there with her dad. She described him as one of the kindest men she had ever known. Then in the next breath, she said, “And he was also an alcoholic who became abusive when he drank.” What a complicated mixture of memories and feelings she had to face and work through.

Another woman had a younger sister who had been ill from the time she was a little child. This woman had always been her sister’s caregiver, had always looked out for her, had always been there when she needed support or assistance. But a time came when she wasn’t available. An unexpected death in the family prompted a crisis in the younger sister’s life right at the same time the woman in our group had another family emergency. Unable to handle this death, her kid sister died by taking her own life. This woman had always been there to help her. But she wasn’t there that time. Now she’s dealing with the grief and regret of that. At the same time, she had always found her identity in caring for her sister — now who was she? She no longer knew who she herself was or who she might be in days to come.

Dr. Wolfelt talked today about the “ripple effects” of grief. Grief is not just about being sad that a loved one has died and is gone. Yes, we miss that person and mourn the loss of his/her presence, but we also grieve other losses that are organically connected to the relationship we had with that person.

We grieve the loss of our self-identity. Part of our own self-understanding was grounded in the relationship that has now been changed forever by death. The important people in our lives are like mirrors who reflect who we are back to us. But now one of those mirrors has been removed. Who am I now? we ask.

We grieve the loss of security. “I never knew how much grief felt like fear,” C.S. Lewis wrote. The people in our lives are anchors that give us a sense of stability and security. When one or more of them are removed from our lives, we can easily lose our bearings and begin to question whether anything is safe or solid.

We grieve the loss of meaning. When we lose someone who has made a significant contribution to our lives, other things may seem rather unimportant when he/she is gone. The technical term for this is “anhedonia,” the inability to experience pleasure in things we’ve usually found enjoyable or meaningful. We also may lose meaning in the sense that the order we previously thought present in the universe has been shattered. We may find ourselves losing faith in things or people or beliefs or practices in which we previously put great stock. Loss can provoke a true existential crisis.

Usually we think of grief as it is related to death and bereavement, but grief is not confined to what we feel when we lose a loved one. We all face losses in many areas of life. And these same “ripple effects” — loss of self-identity, security, and meaning — flow over us with those losses too.

My own most significant loss was the loss of my vocation as a parish pastor before I found a new path through hospice chaplaincy. When all of that happened some twelve years ago, I didn’t know who I was anymore. I had always been a pastor, now I wasn’t. It affected our family as well. My wife had always been a pastor’s wife, my kids PK’s. Our community, our networks were shattered — in other words the fundamental context in which we had lived our life for a quarter century was no more. Who was I? Who were we?

And I was scared. I had devoted myself to the church and in turn the church had always provided for me and my family. Now I was gone from the church through circumstances I didn’t choose. I had no idea what I was going to do. And there wasn’t a lot of time to figure out how I was going continue to do my part in taking care of a family of six plus a grandchild. I had fallen off the tightrope and there was no net in sight. Frightening.

As for the loss of meaning, this was the critical juncture that put me squarely in no-man’s land, in the post-evangelical wilderness. All the questions that had nagged me for years about evangelical doctrine, pastoral ministry, and church practice rose to the surface like a thousand barracudas and began eating away at my flesh. It hurt, it made me angry, and I felt badly let down by a world that had defined “God” and “faith” and “the meaning of life” for me through the first part of my adult life. Now the one thing I knew was that I could not go back to the way I had previously practiced my faith. But what next?

Who am I? Can I trust anything to keep me safe? Where do I go?

What I’m learning through this conference so far is that what we grieve, we must mourn.

Grieving is the complex inner response to loss.

Mourning is made up of the outward expressions by which we acknowledge our grief and work through it until it becomes more and more integrated into our lives.

We never stop grieving, but our losses can become part of our lives in such a way that we can carry them with us and move forward into a new normal. We can forge a renewed identity, find more peace in the midst of life’s uncertainties, and discover a broader and deeper sense of meaning than we ever thought possible.

In many ways, I thank God through Jesus that I am on that path.

As the poet said, however, “miles to go before I sleep.”