testimony of the rocks
As I drive across the country, I’ve been thinking about erosion. There are examples of erosion everywhere we’ve been, from the Painted Desert of Arizona to the Flint Hills of Kansas. One such place is the In-Ko-Pah Gorge, a small stretch of residual boulder piles in southern California …a testament to the power of erosion and friction—water and wind and sand rubbing and blasting against rock.
Erosion is impossible to stop, but that doesn’t mean that it’s all bad. Sometimes erosion achieves a beauty that wouldn’t have existed without it. The drive from San Diego to Phoenix was bleak and so hot. There was almost nothing interesting to look at along the way. At times dust devils rose like the pillar of cloud that led the people of God across the barren desert to the Promised Land. To suddenly enter the In-Ko-Pah Gorge was a relief from all the blandness of the rest of the day.
There are all kinds of erosion beyond the physical erosion we witness in nature. There are also civil and moral erosions. Many of us, maybe all of us, feel we live in a time of such erosions. It doesn’t matter whether we are on the right or the left politically. Everyone sees the other side as doing the eroding. But perhaps it is the very friction of these days that is necessary. Just as the sharp edges of stone are softened by natural forces, people rubbing against people is one way that we evolve and grow. If we only listen to the voices that agree with us, our corners stay sharp and hard, our backbones stiff with moral rectitude.
Jesus was a friction agent. He spent time with outcasts and the powerless, unsavory to the religious authorities of his time. Among his friends there was only one who was fiscally responsible…Judas who as treasurer kept the money for the disciples. But John 12:6 also tells us that he was a thief, taking money from the bag and caring nothing for the poor. As bad as that was, Jesus saved his harshest words for those who thought they were morally superior. He called the Pharisees white-washed sepulchres, looking beautiful on the outside, but inside filthy.
When David and I were traveling the country performing our Family Bible Jamboree!, we generated some friction. After one performance in a church in Kansas, a man was overheard saying about us, “The Devil and his wife were in our church tonight.” For telling Bible stories for children and families!
Additionally, David wrote eight plays that were produced by Lamb’s Players Theatre in San Diego. One of his plays was a drama graphically describing the persecution of Roma gypsies by Cossacks in the 15th century. A pastor’s wife saw it and said, “Mr. McFadzean is a sick and depraved man.” For a moving and truthful portrayal of history. Following Jesus, the friction agent, is seen by some as moral erosion, even now.
Maybe if we approached our differences as the friction that smooths and softens us, so that we cherish all of God’s creation and do not belittle or despise them, their rights, their voices, despite our differences. Erosion of our pride, our self-satisfaction is the kind of erosion that beautifies our souls. Thanks be to God.
Love, Liz
