Today’s theme is growth.
Is it not true that there are so many ways to grow?
We grow from birth into childhood and adolescence and then beyond that. But how is it that we might complete our birth?
This morning I wish to tell you the story of Peter. I came to hear of this extraordinary young man through a colleague who worked as a chaplain in a nearby correctional facility. Peter had done 5 years of hard time in three different countries and had been subjected to extreme brutality. And yet, I was told, he had undergone some sort of spiritual transformation. Now he stood at the threshold of being released.
We tried to organize a 24-hour pass for him to spend Christmas in my home. We were successful and Peter arrived, shaken but strong, into my care on Christmas Eve. I was happy but terrified and hardly slept all night. Oh, God!
It was the most beautiful Christmas I have spent while abroad. Peter was open and gracious and, within the short time I had the honor of his presence, he changed my life. He spoke of spiritual liberation, of the joys of being human and of holding onto a higher power – a “conversion” which had occurred independent of having ever been visited by clergy, independent of church or religion. At the end of his visit he pressed a book into my hand called “We’re all doing time.” (Bo Lozoff and the Dalai Lama) It was a guide to inner freedom. I was baffled. It was the only copy he had. Could all this be true?
In the short time left before his release, a few of us got to know him well. Peter was the hard copy, the real McCoy: no pretensions, so slick words or fake halos, just pure authenticity and growth. Upon finishing his sentence, the authorities brought him to the border and, with a little cash in hand, he was banned from entering this country ever again. He had left our lives forever, so we thought.
Not at all. Peter has always remembered. I have seen him on several occasions since then, each time taking up where we left off. Tellingly, he found life again. Two years ago, I was able to attend his wedding to the beautiful Anna. And as her daughter sang Leonard Cohen’s “Halleluja,” I lost it. All of us, in that moment, had come home.
Yes, we are all doing time.
Silence
God, who you are we really cannot know. And yet we pray and hope and grow. Release us from all that holds us captive. Come to us now. Amen.
“This one thing I do: forgetting what lied behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead.” (Philippians 3:13)
