The Graves of Wright’s Chapel

Then the Lord said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your fathers and to your kindred and I will be with you.” (Genesis 31:3)

Every Memorial Day weekend members of my family along with others from the small, rural community of Ben Lomond, Arkansas gather together for a potluck dinner at Wright’s Chapel.  Wright’s Chapel is the small, community-run, local cemetery.  After the potluck dinner we walk the graves, cleaning the grounds and placing flowers as we go.  There are members from both sides of my family buried in this small cemetery.  I have cousins, uncles and aunts, grandparents, great-grandparents, and even great-great grandparents buried at Wright’s Chapel.

I love going to Wright’s Chapel, especially on Memorial Day weekend because of the stories.  As I walk the graves at Wright’s Chapel with my family I hear stories about those buried there—scandalous stories about wives and husbands, heroic stories about war vets, countless tales about country living, people who grew up in a distant time which is so foreign to my modern world, babies who died at birth, people who lived over a century.   

In telling stories and placing flowers I am always consciously aware of the timeline of the graves; the older graves are at the entrance while the more recent ones are near the back.  Somewhere at the midpoint of the walk I begin to notice people who died during my own lifetime.  As I continue walking deeper into the cemetery I begin to notice markers of people who are still alive; my grandmother who will be buried next to my grandfather, plots owned by living aunts and uncles and cousins who are not that much older than I am.  Like clockwork my Dad always points out the space that he has purchased for he and my Mom.  I begin to think about which space will be mine.  I realize that I want to buried at Wright’s Chapel with my family. 

I begin thinking how weird it is that I want to be buried here in the middle of nowhere Arkansas.  As I process these thoughts I think, “Why do I feel this way?”  I feel this way because I value my family—being around them, celebrating life and death with them.  I love hearing stories of family members.  Wright’s Chapel is a part of those stories.  I want to be a part of those stories.

What is it about having a place among the graves at Wright’s Chapel that is so romantic to me?  Maybe it’s the desire of belonging—I want to belong somewhere.  My family has a place.  I want a place. 

I am definitely a part of a young generation that is becoming increasingly mobile.  We are a generation with temporary places, temporary connections, and temporary stories.  I long for something more.  I long for a connection which lasts, a connection which has a past, a connection which tells me from whom I come, to whom I belong.  Wright’s Chapel is that place. 

As I reach the back of the cemetery and reflect upon my the day’s events I feel the warm embrace of belonging that only a place holding the flesh of my ancestor’s could provide.  I feel like I belong.  I feel like I am home.  I feel like I am a part of something…a part of a larger story.  I have returned to the land of my father’s.

Helping Out Mennonites in Virginia

My friend and excellent Mennonite pastor of Chapel Hill Mennonite Fellowship in Chapel Hill, NC, Isaac Villegas (his blog is at http://www.rustyparts.com/wp), sent me this following email: "I thought you would like to know that a Mennonite pastor in Harrisonburg, VA, talked about your essay in his sermon. Who would have thought that there are Mennonites out there who listen to anything you would say?  :)"  My response: awesome.  


Here is a portion of the sermon which is in print, audio, and video at http://www.pvmcsermons.com/2010/10/phil-kniss-marriage-as-call-to-ministry.html:

In an essay titled, “Marriage in the Fellowship of the Faithful”

John Thompson asked an important, but very basic question:

Why does anyone today get married?

Why would otherwise sensible people give up our individual lives,

and unite with another person?

Well, society gives us certain financial advantages to do so.

There’s a tax break. There’s shared expenses. There’s inheritance.

But most people, Thompson suggests, and it rings true,

marry mainly to reduce the fear of loneliness.

He writes, and I quote,

“Through marriage we secure a family

that keeps us from living and dying alone.

Many churches today merely echo

this secular and pragmatic function of marriage

with their extreme focus on family and family values.”

Then he points out what really ought to be obvious.

Christian marriage is not intended to serve this purpose

of providing a supportive family.

If Christians ever feel a need to marry to overcome loneliness,

then the body of Christ isn’t doing its job.

The gospel word . . . the good news on this matter . . .

is that in Christ, even strangers become family.

In fact, marriage could even hinder life in the family of God,

as our energies and time get redirected

from our family of faith to our biological family.

That’s the point Paul was making to the Corinthians,

when he said, in 1 Corinthians 7:32ff,

“I want you to be free from such anxieties.

The unmarried man is anxious about the affairs of the Lord,

how to please the Lord;

but the married man is anxious about the affairs of the world,

how to please his wife, and his interests are divided.”

And then he said the same thing

about married and unmarried women.

Three things.  First, I love how he compares me to Paul.  Second, the article he is quoting from is in Christian Reflections (2006) at Baylor's Center for Christian Ethics.  Please feel free to call them up and request copies.  Third, check out the sermon.  It is worth your time.

On Cats and God

On Cats and God: Living the Divine Adventure

The thief comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy but I come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly

John 10:10

The most dangerous enemy of Christians is apathy. Let me explain. We Christians have been lulled into what I call a “sleepy Christianity.” Christianity is the story about the amazing life of Jesus, the God-man, the powerful movement of the Holy Spirit and the early church, the martyr’s blood that was to be, according to second century Christian theologian Irenaeus, the seed of the faith, and centuries of faithful followers of Jesus Christ who shared his love through living and proclaiming the gospel, feeding the poor, clothing the naked, and visiting the sick.[i] The Christian faith might be aptly deemed an epic filled with heroes and villains, courage and vice, love and hate, life and death. It is a story in which every strand pulsates with the presence of the mysterious, transcendent, merciful, gracious God who called all of creation into being. Now, I am not naïve enough to think that my writing has inspired every reader to exclaim, “Eureeka! He’s right!” (yet, I optimistically imagine that scenario as I write). But my hunch is that we all sometimes need to be shaken out of our sleepiness, to be reminded of the incredible nature of our faith. We must realize once again the remarkable beauty and greatness of our God who is Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer. We must once gain cry aloud with the Psalmist, “Bless the Lord, O my Soul.  O Lord my God, you are very great. You are clothed with honor and majesty. I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have being” (Psalm 104:1, 33; NRSV). We must once again understand that Christianity is an adventure.

At this point I must confess that I have never been accused of being a charismatic, “on-fire-for-God” Christian. I often am quiet and stand in the background while other more captivating Christians express the wonders and splendor of the Christian story through sermon, prayer, and song. My life, my joy, my ministry in the Church comes from reading and writing with the hope that some small effort I make might in the slightest bit praise God and call others to service and praise of God. There has always been a place of service in the Church for those more studious Christians from St. Augustine to C. S. Lewis. Men and women who can not sing an inspiring hymn or preach a dramatic, soul-moving sermon, but could write about the Christian faith with words so powerful that they could, do, and will withstand the eroding sands of time. While the “superstars” will never be forgotten, lesser known figures, who nonetheless shine just as bright, are often overlooked. It is one of these figures that constantly reminds me of the glorious, remarkable character of Christianity. That man is Christopher Smart.

Christopher Smart was a British scholar and poet in the 18^th century. He was regarded as a rising literary star in 1730s and 40s, that is until he was gripped by what his contemporaries referred to as “religious mania”—defined by one of his associates as “a preternatural excitement to prayer which [Christopher Smart] held it as a duty not to control or repress.” If Smart had been content to pray in private, his life might have been happier, but Smart insisted on keeling down in the streets, in parks, and in assembly rooms. Soon he became a public nuisance and the public took its revenge. For most of the next seven years Christopher Smart was confined, first in St. Luke’s hospital, then in a private psychiatric hospital. Here, cut off from his wife, children, and friends he began to write a large amount of bold, daring, beautiful poetry. After Smart’s release from the psychiatric hospital (1763), he fell into debt and died in a debtor’s prison, forgotten. However, in the 19^th century his reputation revived, and since the publication of his A Song of David and Jubilate Agno (“Rejoice in the Lamb”) his poems have become newly famous. The spirit that informs Smart’s poems is praise and celebration of God. His poems impart an intense vision of the divine presence shining through ordinary life. It is one of the sub-sections from Jubilate Agno, “My Cat Jeoffry,” through which Smart reminds us that the world has been called into being solely to pay homage to its maker and that we Christians are called to be ministers of praise—to provide a voice of praise for the whole creation. In short, that God invites us into His great adventure.

“My Cat Jeoffry” is a beautiful piece of lyrical poetry told in the first-person about the actions of the poet’s cat. The poem might be broken down into two sections. First, it describes in striking detail a day in the life of Jeoffry the cat. The poet interprets each action that cat makes as a praising God: “For at first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way. This is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness. Then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his prayer.” Next, the poet praises the attributes of the cat, praising their design and the designer who formed Jeoffry: “For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature. For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in music. For he can jump from an eminence into his master’s bosom. For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.” The entire poem is a story of how Christopher Smart’s cat praises God in his mundane actions and his very being. Jeoffry the cat is indeed a “servant of the Living God duly and daily serving him.”

What can we learn from Smart’s homage to his cat Jeoffry and the God he worships? Well, the most immediate lesson learned is also the most remarkable one: Christopher Smart reminds us that all creatures have their being, their source in God. Smart teaches us through explication of his cat Jeoffry’s daily routine and characteristics that we should see every action, every moment of our day as an opportunity to praise God. This is what it means to be in an adventure. It is a way of looking at the world that awakens us to the glory and beauty behind every moment. It is recognizing that the diastolic and systolic rhythms of the world reverberate the greatness, love, and mercy of the divine God who makes himself known to us, who joins himself with us in our adventure. That is the great value of reading Smart’s poem (aside from being a nice poem for cat lovers). Christians need not fear any external threat, it is only the inside threat of apathy, of a lackluster joy that can truly destroy the passion of a follower of Christ. A cerebral reminder and recognition that God is to be praised in every action is not enough, you must put this knowledge into practice. There is no better time to begin praising God in everything you do and everything we are than right now—to live out the great adventure.[ii]

---

[i] While these events are indeed the Christian story, in no way do I mean to insinuate that these events tell the entire complete story of Christianity.  That rich, diverse story would be difficult to summarize in a short article such as this one, but for those interested I would recommend Gonzalez, Justo, The Story of Christianity (2 vols., Harpers, 1984) or Olson, Roger, The Story of Christian Theology (Intervarsity, 1999).  Yet one need look no farther than the Old and New Testament’s to grasp the fact that Christianity is an amazing adventure which God calls us to, an adventure of which he himself is a part.

[ii] For further reading about Christopher Smart see Curry, Neil, Christopher Smart (Gardners Books, 2005) and “Christopher Smart,” in The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English, Ian Ousby, ed. (Cambridge, 2006).  For a classic book on how to praise God, even in the mundane routine of life see Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God (Whitaker House, 1982).

My New Blog

Alright, in a world awash in blogs, tweets, and everything else....I have started this site.  Mainly it's for me to work on my writing and to think through my own issues of my faith.  Will it help anyone?  I don't know, but I hope it will help me.  The posts on this blog will be an eclectic hodgepodge of theological musings, pastoral encounters, spiritual seeking, and moral questioning.  Feel free to let me know what you think and let's learn together how to be a more faithful follower of Christ, to be a stronger witness to God's great grace in the world, and to understand more fully how that graced faith can be lived out in this world.