|
MISSIONARY LISTENING TO THE EARTH
It
is a bountiful autumn day. The sky is bright blue. The grass still
glistens a brilliant green in the crisp fall air. The landscape is
splashed in spectacular red, yellow, orange and rust by the great Master
Painter. Overwhelmed by such beauty, I cannot but turn to the Creator God
in praise and joyful celebration.
Just now as I look out the window two arrogant blue jays land on the feeder,
greedily grabbing the choice seeds while scattering the less delectable to the
ground to be gleaned by the smaller less aggressive birds. My thoughts
immediately go to the peoples of Africa, to the impoverished and exploited
millions in the developing world who are forced to survive, if survive they can,
on the less desirable leftovers from the rich tables of the West. As I
muse, I hear distant flocks of geese gabbling their way South in strung-out V’s
led by wise old ganders, thus allowing each of the great birds to have an
unobstructed view forward. These splendid honkers fly free, just as their
Lord made them to be, searching for a better life in the more difficult days
ahead.
Having been back in the States for some months, I experience tension in
attempting to live in two very different worlds. Africa and her peoples
have taught me so many, many more things than I could ever have presumed to
teach them. They taught me the joy of discovering what I could live
without. Many times each day something cries out inside me:
“Simplify, simplify!” And I yearn for an experience of a deeper reality.
The peaceful blue sky, the gently falling leaves, the scampering squirrels
getting ready for the long winter, the trusting abandon of the migrating birds
convince me that life could be much happier by embracing a more simple way of
life. Is that not the fundamental message of God’s creation: “Let it
be”?
It
is true, of course, that we must spend our lives in search for the wherewithal
of life. But so much of what we give our lives and minds and hearts to, in
truth, bring little real happiness. So much is sacrificed to convention
(What will others expect of me? What is acceptable social behavior?
What is the latest fashion?) , and so much is sacrificed for effect (Will this
make me look good? Will that help me to the top?) So much we work
for eventually enslaves us. Time is too short, we say. Yet these
are the very things which steal our time and our thoughts and our hearts from
the things that are vitally important and enduring. The more we are
surrounded by walls and boundaries, the farther we move away from creation.
Losing touch with creation means losing the desire for quiet reflection.
Africa has taught me how God’s gracious gifts of nature provide us a joy far
exceeding the imbalanced load and onerous responsibility of possessions that
isolate us from creation and from one another. We are so sure that tomorrow the
sun will rise that we fail to welcome it with reverence and joy when it does.
Just because it is there we pass it by and perversely deny ourselves. Do
we only feel gratitude when we feel the obligation?
One morning I was walking down a path near my compound in Mkendwa, Kanyakwar in
Western Kenya, when suddenly I was surrounded by a cloud of unbelievably
gorgeous butterflies. Gently I reached out to capture a particularly
lustrous turquoise-black-orange “flying flower”, wanting only to possess it for
a moment. At once it occurred to me that nothing is gained through
possession. I realized in that instant that what belongs to everyone
belongs to no one. I thought how foolish we are to look at what
pleases us with more regret than pleasure because we do not possess it.
When we do possess we imagine that we are satisfied. I had learned in that
simple experience that the spirit of delight is as intangible as the iridescence
brushed from the wings of the butterfly I had tried to possess.
Oftentimes friends wondered how I could endure the loneliness of so many years
in Africa. Yes, I often felt lonely, but I quickly found that I could
renew myself in solitude with creation. How is it possible to feel lonely
in one’s own element? The same warm and understanding earth from which
I am made and to which I will return belongs as well to the trees and flowers
and animals who are my blood brothers and sisters. We all live
together under the same sky, warmed and rejoiced by the same sun, loved and
redeemed by the same God.
How well Africa has taught me that in the beautiful works of creation around me
I am close to life and death, to reality that is sane and simple. Africa
has taught me that until I have simplified my life and found out by myself what
is truth for me, I will always remain on the edge of it. I have learned
too that to live on that edge is really the greatest loneliness.
There is a saying often heard in Africa: “God is there in every creature”.
The Book of Job, written some six hundred years before Christ, says it like
this:
|
But now ask the beasts to teach you,
and the birds of the air to tell you;
Or the reptiles on earth to instruct you,
and the fish of the sea to inform you.
Which of all these does not know
that the hand of God has done this?
In his hand is the soul of every living thing,
and the life breath of all humankind.
(Job 12:7-11) |
fr. Bert Ebben, OP
13
November 2008
|
