Calm in Our Storms

Mark 4:35-41
After Hurricane Katrina. In New Orleans, in one of the cemeteries, the many monuments and gravestones ended up as ruble, small broken pieces of stone, with the remarkable exception of a tall statue of Jesus, intact except for one hand. A great image for the familiar story in Mark 4: 35 - 41. Here we see Jesus in a boat, going across the sea of Galilee, asleep in the storm, literally a great storm, with the disciples, even the experienced fishermen, afraid for their lives. What does this say to our churches today? Corporately, we are afraid for our churches as many believers die off from old age and we have difficulties attracting younger people to our congregations. Let's look at where Jesus and his followers were headed? Away from the familiar to the "other side," where the excluded, the Gentiles, lived. We in the church need to reach out to the unfamiliar, to the unchurched or to immigrants or to those from different backgrounds? We are called to this? Is it scarey? For sure it is! But what church in our Presbytery is drawing in young families? Nuevas Fronteras but many of them don't even speak our language! In very recent research reported in the New York Times June 19, across a wide variety of communities, areas of increased immigration had economic revitalization and lower crime. So connecting to the unfamiliar has benefits.

Let's look back to Mark to learn more about what happened when Jesus and his friends went to "the others." Massive storm, terrified disciples, woke Jesus, who revealed his power over wind a wave, like God over the chaos at Creation. Result -- great calm replaces great storm. What about the disciples? Do they respond in gratitude and faith like Psalm 107:29-30? No, great fear! Phobos like phobia. Repeatedly in the Bible, God's presence or an angel's brings fear and "Do not be afraid." Have faith in God's presence, the answer for our congregations today in scarey threatening times.

October Nor'easter???

We have 14 trees on our property so we were badly hit by the freak October Northeaster with very heavy snow added to the weight of the leaves. We had 5 or 6 big branches fall in the front and a huge branch is hanging onto our back 2nd story porch, held by a thread. Even if we could pull it down, it might take out our garage. We will wait a month or so until prices for tree men come. One major artery, Martine Avenue had trees down in four places last night.

Reflections on Barcott's It Happened on the Way to War, Prologue and Part I, #1.

Reading this book reminded me of conversations with my son, Huck. This young man, Rye Barcott, is serving in the Marines while at the same time running a NGO in Kenya. My son, Huck, is in the Navy, going to Medical School and running a startup web-based software company while being married and having a new son. Barcott learned Swahili so he go to Kenya. My son tried to learn Farsi and Arabic before he went to Afghanistan and brought back a translator. Both have fierce love of the military and patriotism, while being aware of all their negatives.

Barcott went with his family to Africa in high school and realized he wanted to go back later, including doing research to "give back." His mother encouraged his learning Swahili, because "research could be seen as being simply extractive" and "Learning a language was a sign of genuine commitment." (20) His language knowledge serves him well on his first visit to Nairobi where some local "hardcores" (7) are threatening, until he speaks to them in Swahili and Sheng, a mixture of Swahili, gangsta rap and local languages, which disarms them and brings him respect. This story reinforces my current desire to learn to speak Spanish well. Doing so is a way to show respect, both to the vibrant Spanish-speaking Presbyterian community, Nuevas Fronteras, and to family members from George's side of the family. Why hasn't this thought occurred to me and other Americans before. I find his word choice of "extractive" so meaningful. We who possess affluence, white privilege and education can so easily objective others and use them for our own benefit or entertainment. Making the effort to enter their culture on its own terms by learning the language seems a first step of respect.

Another powerful passage concerned Barcott's receiving advice from another young man who studied abroad as an apprentice to unique door carvers in Zanzibar Island in Tanzania. The advice was to be flexible and persistent in contacting people. "Reach out to a bunch of people and eventually a few, maybe five percent, will give a damn. That's enough, though. When they respond, you ca follow up and start pulling it together." I need to keep this in mind in any novel pursuits that need others' backing. This could be included in preaching to a church engaged in outreach and/or transformation.

Barcott writes about falling through the ice in a pond as a young boy (27-28) and coming close to dying. He returns to the spot and has an experience of light and God, and realizes how close he came to dying. He then goes through a period where he has a premonition of dying young, by age 30, but sees this as freeing and leads to an intense life. I wonder how many young soldiers and suicide bombers both have any such mindsets as he describes.

Works Cited.

Barcott, Rye. It happened on the way to war: a marine's path to peace. New York: Bloomsbury USA, 2010. Print.

Irony in the naming of Chief Joseph Dam

CHIEF JOSEPH DAM

In central Washington the second largest dam in the United States is located. It is named for Chief Joseph of the Nez Pierce Indians. The dam's name, however is ironic, given this quote from Chief Joseph: "I have carried a heavy load on my back ever since I was a boy. I realized then that we could not hold our own with the white men. We were like deer. They were like grizzly bears. We had small country. Their country was large. We were contented to let things remain as the Great Spirit Chief made them. They were not, and would change the rivers and mountains if they did not suit them." Naming the dam for him, thus, seems a dishonor, not an honor.

I saw an article in ASCD on what brings success to schools where many students are economically disadvantaged and why it is rare.

High-poverty Texas school finds formula for success

"Reaching such an achievement isn't because of one single factor. Bowling said she's selective in her hiring. Many teachers will stay as late as 5:30 p.m. to work with children. "...
"The twice-monthly parenting lessons address topics such as preparing children for the transition to middle school and teaching the adults math lessons so they can teach their children."...
"Bob Sanborn, president of Children at Risk, a Texas-based research and advocacy group, said many factors go into successful poor schools. He calls such campuses "outliers" because of their rarity.Other factors he listed are strong parent involvement, small class sizes, good hiring practices and high attendance rates."

"We tend to see they have good leadership," he said. "It's either very experienced leadership that knows the community or engages parents or very young and energetic with lots of ideas. It's not normal leadership – it's extraordinary for many reasons." ...

Everyone wants success for all students and most believe in magic bullets, like charter schools, merit pay or more money, but rather hard work, experience and community connections, engaging and training parents, and passion that leads staff to giving their all seem to be what makes a difference regardless of the economic strata of the students. There are no cookie cutter assembly line approaches that automatically make a difference. Knowledge of strategies that have worked elsewhere is invaluable, but the will to implement them and keep trying until success is attained (persistence) are needed.

A second article about teacher merit pay reinforces this.

Study: Paying Teachers for Student Performance Doesn't Raise Test Scores

Vanderbilt did a study in Tennessee that found that bonuses up to $15,000 for teachers whose students received higher test scores had no effect on student achievement.

What does all this say to the millions of dollars just given to Newark schools by the founder of Facebook? Time will tell if it will make any difference.