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Saturday, September 20, 2008
Hear Those Harleys
The voice on my answering machine was the groom from my most recent wedding. I thought he wanted to talk about my messing up the wedding license (which I had corrected with the county recorder, by the way).
But no, when I called him back he told me his father had died suddenly a couple of nights before. At the age of 52. (I'm way older than that, for God's sake!) What he thought was heartburn at bedtime turned out to be a heart attack waiting to happen in the middle of the night.
I remembered the father, a big burly guy full of life and oh so proud to sport a tuxedo for his son's chance of a lifetime wedding. Handlebar mustache, full head of unruly hair, bright eyes and a monster grip of a handshake.
Robert Allen Blackburn, Jr. was his name. His son, the groom, was Robert Allen Blackburn III, known affectionately as Bud (which I learned only on the wedding day itself).
So Bud called to see if I might officiate at his dad's funeral service. I said an immediate Yes to the invitation and set up a meeting with the grieving family. From there we laid out the plan for a viewing, a funeral, and finally the burial at a cemetery up on the hill above the city of Hayward.
Entering the mortuary for the viewing, I walked in on about 70 people seated reverently among the pews -- about 40 of them in Harley Davidson tee shirts, Levis, and not a few do-rags. Talk about your handlebar mustaches, unique facial hair, and assorted tattoos.
Turns out Buzz (the dad's preferred ID) was a most serious Harley devotee. And here were his brothers and sisters of the road, gathered to honor his memory in their own unique ways.
I felt like a fish out of water, dressed up in my suit and tie, reading from my prayer book and all. But I inwardly thanked every person there for opening my eyes and my heart to the bigger story of Buzz's life and what it meant to so many who valued his meaning in their own lives.
Next morning, we held the funeral service at 10:00 sharp. One man accepted my invitation to say a few words in honor of Buzz's life, by reading an eloquent prayer he'd written longhand, asking God to guide, protect, and make good use of Buzz cruising around heaven on his Harley. Several others spoke or had me read aloud words they weren't quite up to reading for themselves. Then off we drove to the cemetery.
The procession was led by about 20 Harleys in front of the hearse, followed by at least as many cars including my modest pastoral sedan. I parked a good city block's distance away from the gravesite, in front of which, at curbside, stood Buzz's beautiful charcoal gray hog in all its gleaming glory.
I said a few words, read a few scriptures, said a few prayers. Then, just before the benediction, a Boy Scout honor guard presented the flag to Buzz's widow Linda. Not a United States flag, mind you, but a smaller black banner bearing the famous Harley Davidson logo. God bless those scouts, they treated that flag with just the kind of respect they'd have given the stars and stripes in a military ceremony.
After I gave the benediction, the workers began to lower the casket into its final resting place. But...
One of the biker dudes called out, "Wait a minute! We're gonna do one more thing before you lower that coffin!" And he gave instructions to every person who had ridden a Harley up that hill that morning.
Buzz's brother would lead the way, he said, by revving up the engine on Buzz's bike. And every other rider would join in at his or her bike, until the casket was finally as low as it could go.
And that's just what they did. For what my memory tells me was at least three minutes, all you could hear was 20 or so Harley engines roaring out their own kind of blessing on Buzz, dead and gone all too soon, and on his wife and kids and extended family and scores of friends who'd come to say one last goodbye.
The earth trembled beneath my feet, registering at least a 2.0 on the Richter scale. Looking around, I caught sight of all those bikers revving the throttle with one hand and holding the other high in a full-fist salute. I also saw the ear-to-ear smiles on all their face, and the tears streaming down their wizened cheeks. And I laughed with them, and cried a little with them, too.
From the cemetery I drove to San Francisco for the first autumn meeting of our Presbytery. Sitting there in the stained glass splendor of a historic sanctuary, I took in report after report and I cast my vote on any number of important matters of policy and procedure.
Even so, every now and then my face went a little crooked with a quiet grin, and I could almost hear again -- and vibrate with -- the surprisingly angelic sound of 20 Harleys pronouncing one of the most profound benedictions I've ever received in all my life.
Vroom and amen!
posted by Jack Buckley at
4:24 PM
Thursday, September 11, 2008
True Love, Tough Love
Exodus 12:1-14; Matthew 18:15-20
"God loves you and so do I," the man said to me with a huge smile on his face. Nice, very nice.
But this was a man who opposed me out loud now and again, and under his breath or whispering over in the corner much of the time.
He was obviously trying to make nice. So I made nice back, since this wasn't the time for a heart to heart conversation about our relationship -- or lack thereof.
What he was doing, I feared, was falling for a sentimental idea of love. Hoping that some soft soap would, if not wash clean the discord between us, at least make it more comfortable.
But hard experience teaches us that true love is also a tough kind of love. Not so much an emotion as an attitude -- a commitment to do the right thing for the well-being of the person you love. Sometimes that means standing firm in order to protect, correct, or strengthen that person.
This tough kind of love lies between the lines of Jesus' instructions in Matthew 18 about church discipline. When things go wrong between church members, he says, we need to begin dealing with it at the personal level in hopes of a quiet reconciliation. Failing that, take someone with you to advocate for peace. If that still doesn't work, then get the whole church involved. Still deadlocked? That's when the dreaded E word comes into play: Excommunication!
Not like the Inquisition, though. As in, "We torture you for your heinous errors in sincere hope that you will recant your heresy and amend your evil ways. If you die in the process, well, our mission still succeeds -- for you are then saved from additional damnation for sins you surely would have continued to commit."
No. No.
Jesus has a much better idea.
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
5:09 PM
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Bad News... Good News
1 Corinthians 15:3-10, 30-34; Matthew 16:21-26
The subject was absolutely serious, but I couldn't resist a sermon title that conjures up a bunch of corny jokes.
Matthew's story has Peter taking Jesus aside and trying to set him straight on how a Messiah should do his messianic thing. Imagine! And Jesus' answer stops Peter in his tracks -- you and me, too, as we listen in..."Get behind me, Satan!"
That's the Bad News. But the story concludes with a piece of Great Good News.
Meanwhile, warming up to a sermonic stab at interpreting and applying its meaning for us today, I began by reviewing some popular joke styles I've known and loved in my lifetime.
Like: Knock-knock jokes; Moron jokes, segueing into a variety of ethnic putdowns; Elephant jokes; Elaborate stories with painfully punny punchlines; and the ever popular Good news - bad news jokes.
Fortunately, nobody got up and walked out on me. But I did feel partway through like doing Johnny Carson's old soft-shoe "I'm bombing here" routine.
So, you wonder, exactly what is the Bad News and Good News for Peter and us?
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
11:58 AM
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