“It happened, late one afternoon when David rose from his couch and was walking about on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; the woman was very beautiful.” – 2 Samuel 11:2.
It happened? Oh, yes, and Oh, no. It happened that you noticed. It happened that you looked closely. It happened that you inquired. It happened that you sent. It happened that you raped. It happened that you sent the victim home. It happened that she conceived by you. It happened that you tried to cover it up. It happened that her husband had more integrity than you. It happened that you sent him to the army. It happened that you ordered his death.
It happened, David, every step, because you chose, decided, acted, harmed, and hurt, and murdered.
A pity that you couldn’t have heard Jesus’ words, which were, it’s true, a thousand years away: “If your eye causes you to sin, tear it out.” We’d read about a mystery of how you lost your eye, not how you raped and killed with scarce a thought.
I hope Bathsheba’s presence smote your heart with guilt on each remaining day you lived.
A poem/prayer based on 2 Samuel 11:1-15, the Revised Common Lectionary Alternative First Reading for Year B, Proper 12 (17).
After the eggs have hatched and the chicks have learned to fly, many of the birds of the ohi’a and koa forest will come together in mixed flocks of ‘apapane, ‘amakihi, ‘akepa, and ‘alawi. They stay together to find ohi’a and mamane trees in blossom, which would also have attracted some tasty bugs.
It was the custom of one flock on the slopes of Mauna Loa to select a leader each week to keep the flock together and organize a watch for dangerous or suspicious creatures like cats, ‘io, pueo, and, well, people. The leader would look around for trees bright with flowers and guide the hungry birds toward them, while making sure nobody got left behind. It wasn’t the easiest thing for a bird to do, but most of them handled it pretty well.
One ‘apapane had been eagerly awaiting his turn to be flock leader. He was no longer that young, having seen a few summers and winters. He was something of a silent critic of the weekly leaders, silently scoring them on his own checklist. That one didn’t spot the mamane tree in blossom as fast as he had. This other one had been slow to get the birds moving. And this other one hadn’t properly spotted the watcher birds for ‘io. They’d spotted the hawk in plenty of time anyway, but it hadn’t been right.
At last came the week when the birds in the flock chose him as their leader for the next week. He was proud. He was excited. He was also… going to do something fairly complicated for the first time, and he was absolutely convinced that he knew exactly what should happen.
The result, the next morning, was a lot of birds screeching at one another, with their purported leader screaming the most and the loudest. He screeched at the ones who were supposed to be watching when they perched on a branch other than the one he’d selected. He screeched when they were ready to head to a new set of trees, and screeched when one or two birds headed off in the wrong direction. He screeched when a bird remained behind, and nearly pecked his tail as he flew right behind him to get him to the rest of the flock. He screeched when it was time to nap. He screeched when it was time to settle down to sleep.
When he turned about, one of the older birds, an ‘apapane kupuna, was perched behind him. He opened his beak to screech at her, but shut it quickly. He knew better than to screech at her.
“What have you been doing?” she said, “and don’t screech at me.”
“I’ve been leading,” he said, “like I’m supposed to.”
“You haven’t been leading like you’re supposed to,” she said rather severely. “You’ve been driving like you’re not supposed to. You’ve had birds who know perfectly well what to do confused and upset. Some of them went hungry today. While you were chasing that one bird there were two others that set off in the wrong direction and I had to go get them.”
“They should have listened to me!” he said.
“How could they,” she asked, “when you didn’t give them a clear direction?”
He was silent for a moment.
“You’ll try it again tomorrow,” said the kupuna ‘apapane, “and tomorrow you’ll plan, and you’ll chirp softly, and you’ll listen to the birds who know what they’re doing, and you’ll keep an eye on things and let other birds know when there’s a problem that they can help you with.”
“Be wise,” she said, “and attentive, and assuring. That will keep the flock with you, and fed, and comforted, and safe.”
Oh, it took some work, I tell you. But she was nearby the next day whenever he opened his beak to screech, and only one or two screeches got out. The day after he didn’t screech at all. By the time his week as leader was over, they followed him gratefully and gladly. Because he learned from his mistakes, and he learned how to lead.
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
I write these stories in full and in advance, but I tell them from memory and from improvisation. What you hear in the recording is not what you read above it.
“As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to teach them many things.” – Mark 6:34
Bring your compassion, Jesus, for our shepherds howl like wolves. They lay the rod of law with harshness on the poor and spare the ones in power.
Teach us, Jesus.
Bring your compassion, Jesus, for our shepherds carelessly use words that others hear, and hearing ponder. Pondering, they set themselves to violence.
Teach us, Jesus.
Bring your compassion, Jesus, for the shepherds cannot find the way that leads between our Scyllas and Charybdises, and lost, we founder in moral morass.
Teach us, Jesus.
Bring your compassion, Jesus, and teach us many things, like how the shepherd cares first for the sheep, whereas the predator consumes them.
Teach us, Jesus.
We are sheep without a shepherd. Teach us many things. And may we, by God’s grace, learn.
A poem/prayer based on Mark 6:30-34, 53-56, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year B, Proper 11 (16).
You wouldn’t think it, if most of your experience of honu is when they’re napping on the shore, but they were the ones who got it started. They started the dance.
Which one it was nobody remembers, because it was a long time ago, and sometimes the beginnings of things get forgotten, like the way children really want to forget who broke the peanut butter jar. The story simply says that a honu looked up at the stars, and saw the clouds lit by the moon above, and felt the water splashing gently on his shell, and he said, “Gotta dance.”
Now, a napping honu looks like a clumsy thing, but a honu in water can dance circles around a human swimmer. He glided, and he shook, and he made tight circles, and he whirled in place. When his head broke water an ‘ulili on the shore called out, “What are you doing?”
“I’m dancing!” replied the honu. Then, after glancing about, “Lots of us are dancing!”
Sure enough, the water teemed with the shells of honu breaking the surface, and their flippers waving as they dove back down to soar below the waves.
“Why are you dancing?” asked the ‘ulili.
“With the world as glorious as it is, what else should I do?” called the honu, and then he glided beneath the water again.
“What else indeed?” said the ‘ulili, who took her next steps with even more bounce in her long legs than usual. It didn’t take long before she and the other shorebirds were highstepping and bouncing and gliding along the rocks.
“Are you dancing?” asked a myna, perched in a low tree.
“Of course we’re dancing!” said the ‘ulili. “Wouldn’t you?”
“I suppose I would,” said the myna, and he took off to do his own dance in the air. He was soon joined by other myna, and by mejiro and saffron finches. And because what one myna knows soon other mynas will know, because they’ve got loud voices and they use them, the word spread along the beaches and up the mountain slopes. ‘Apapane danced to the music of their songs. Noio made their dives for fish with flair and grace. Even the pigs in the forest hopped back and forth to their own private rhythm.
They all danced like the only ones watching were the ones dancing with them. They all danced with a deep sense of being the one and only star of their dance, and a deep sense of dancing in the biggest dance group ever. They danced, and I’m sorry to say that the only ones who didn’t recognize it, and didn’t join the dance, were the people. I grant you that most of us were asleep at the time.
As dawn approached, the creatures from the summits of the mountains to below the waters ceased their rhythmic movements. They stretched their wings or flippers and they took at look at tender feet. Without a sound, they settled into the activities of the day.
I’m afraid they heard no applause, but there was One who applauded, and that was God. God had made them to rejoice in who and what they were, from the ‘io to the ‘apapane, from the noio to the honu. God applauded, and if they didn’t hear as they sorted themselves into a good nap, they settled into rest with glad hearts.
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
I write these stories ahead of time, then tell them from memory. As a result, the stories I tell aren’t precisely the ones I prepare.
Photo of an ‘ulili (a Wandering Tattler) by Eric Anderson.
David danced before the LORD with all his might… – 2 Samuel 6:14
Kick your heels up, David, send the linen skirted ephod swinging. Wheel and circle, drum your feet in time with tambourines and cymbals.
Some will scorn you in your very house, and some will watch in silent disapproval. Some will wonder how you dance when death struck down a helping hand last time.
What else to do but dance? you cry. The presence of the LORD has blessed the places where the mercy seat has paused. So what to do but dance with joy as it comes home?
Whirling skirts and pounding feet. Flying fringe and soaring hair. Kick your heels up, David. Dance! And bring us blessing in our heart and home.
The image is Transfer of the Ark of the Covenant by David by Paul Troger (1733), a fresco in the Altenburg Abbey Church, Altenburg, Austria. Photo by Wolfgang Sauber (2018) – File:Altenburg_Stiftskirche_-_Fresko_David_und_die_Bundeslade.jpg, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77865740.
I like honu (green sea turtles). How about you? It’s just so comforting to me watching those sea turtles raise their flippers to the surface to breathe and look around, and then taking them down to snack on the seaweed, then turning themselves about like the most agile of dancers, then hauling themselves out on the shore to get a good solid nap in the sun.
I like honu.
It’s hard to believe that one could be a bully, but I’m afraid this story is about a honu who did become a bully. He’d shove smaller turtles out of his way as he grazed on seaweed. He knocked shells with honu who were in the spot he wanted to sunbathe in. Actually, he’d knock shells with a honu just to get it to move, then he’d nap somewhere else. He slapped other turtles with his flippers, he nipped them with his mouth, he’d slide over them when they surfaced to breathe, he… well.
He was a bully.
I’m sorry to say that, mostly, it worked for him. He didn’t have a lot of friends, and I guess part of the reason he was mean was that he didn’t have a lot of friends. But he ate a lot, and he got comfortable spots on the beach, and other honu didn’t pick on him, no they didn’t. So, as I say, it mostly worked for him.
Until, one day, he decided to bully the ocean.
The winds were strong and the surf was high that day. Rain lashed down from overhead so that even a honu found it difficult to tell where the sea top ended and the air began. Spray flew in sheets. Wavetops tossed careless fish into the air.
And this honu decided to go nap on the beach. I don’t think he expected to find sunshine there, but when somebody expects to get things his way all the time, who knows?
The problem was that the waves at the surface tossed him about, and when he dove down, the currents underwater dragged him back to sea. He was trying to get to one specific part of the beach, but the wind carried him along past where he wanted to go, and when he tried to swim back against it, he couldn’t – at least not from where he was. He lashed his flippers at the water both at the surface and deeper down, and in neither place could he make much headway.
Eventually he let the underwater current carry him back out to sea, where he surfaced and howled in rage – which is very rare for a honu – at the winds and the surf.
An older honu drifted by and said, “What’s the matter, youngling?”
He wasn’t that young, but she was a lot older (and bigger), so he didn’t quite yell back when he said, “The stupid wind and waves won’t get me where I want to go!”
“Watch the youngling there,” said the older honu, and he did. A younger, smaller turtle, one that he’d bullied any number of times, had positioned himself in a place where the combination of wind, waves, and current would carry him toward the beach. He made just the smallest of adjustments with his flippers as the water bore him along. Just at the beach, he dipped down to slow himself in the current going back and to avoid being thrown onto the shore from the top of a wave. Then he slid onto the shore, and slowly moved up on his now-active flippers.
“You can’t bully the sea, youngling,” said the older honu. “You shouldn’t bully anything, but especially not the ocean, which won’t notice you at all.”
It took him a long time to learn that lesson deeply, I’m afraid, and he spent a number of storms tossing about in the surf. Eventually, though, he learned that sometimes you don’t fight, you follow. And when he did, he fought less with other honu, and a bully learned to do better.
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
Due to a technical error, the story was not recorded this week.
Photo of a honu (who showed no signs of being a bully) by Eric Anderson.
This song is based on the intercalated stories of Jesus healing the woman with a hemorrhage and the raising of Jairus’ daughter in Mark 5:21-43. It also reflects the ideas I considered in the poem “Twelve Years.”
Twelve years is a long time to suffer, to be pallid and drained, to be aching and strained. Twelve years without hope to be healed, ‘till a Teacher came by but you don’t dare to cry.
[Chorus]
Reach out a hand to a new life. Twelve years and a moment is here To shed all the pain and the torment And to celebrate a thirteenth year.
[Verses]
Twelve years is a short time to blossom, To be merry on Earth in your childish mirth. Twelve years, but the hope to be healed has risen and died like a deceitful tide.
[Chorus]
Twelve years, and the moment has come to set illness away to give healing its day. Twelve years and a moment have made all the difference for two and it could be for you.
The image is of the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage from theTrès Riches Heures du duc de Berry. Artwork by the Limbourg brothers (between 1411 and 1416) – Photo. R.M.N. / R.-G. Ojéda, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17443172.Somewhat unusually for images of this text, Jairus’ daughter is visible at right in the upper image.
He was the oldest pueo in the nest. He was the best. He did things right.
At least, that was his opinion.
It wasn’t his younger sister’s opinion, but that frequently happens with younger brothers or sisters. They tend to think an older (or a younger, come to think of it) sibling can’t do anything right. Oldest children, however, or oldest fledglings in this case, tend to think, “I’m right. I’ve got this. Depend on me.”
And before you ask, yes, I was the oldest child in my family.
To his sorrow, it turned out his mother didn’t think he did everything right, either. She wasn’t like his sister, who didn’t think he did anything at all right. No, Mother was far more specific. She didn’t like the way he flew, or hunted for food, or caught it. “You’re beating your wings too fast,” she’d tell him. “You’re not paying enough attention while you’re circling,” she told him. And, of course, “You’re coming down too fast.”
The problem was that everything she told him happened to be correct. He was an overeager flier, and he tired himself out. In that fatigue haze, he didn’t look carefully for mice on the ground, and he’d miss them. So far his dives to catch prey hadn’t been complete disasters, but they weren’t getting better, either.
“I’m doing fine,” he hooted at his mother.
“No, you’re not,” she hooted back.
Exasperated, he flew off alone, without his mother or his sister, to avoid her steady barrage of corrections.
That worked. Well, it stopped the criticisms. At least the ones he could hear with his ears. His mother had succeeded, however, in creating some mother memory in his head, and he could still hear her telling him to fly slower, look more carefully, and for pity’s sake, control your dives.
But he didn’t change any of that. Which is why, after missing several swoops and getting hungrier and hungrier, he made a desperate dive for a mouse and crashed right into a bush. He crawled out, leaving behind several feathers in the process, and found his little sister waiting for him.
“Are you OK?” she asked, and she meant it.
“Mostly,” he said, feeling rather bruised.
“You need to talk to Mom,” she said. “Actually, you need to listen to Mom.”
He knew he did, but he also knew how much he’d annoyed her. “I don’t think she’d help me after all I’ve put her through,” he said.
His sister shook her head. “She absolutely will,” she fussed at him. “Go ask Mom for help. Say you’re sorry. But ask her for help. She will.”
They flew back together, and he did say he was sorry, and he did ask for help, and he finally started following her instructions, and he finally started to learn.
His sister couldn’t resist telling him, “I told you so,” but he was grateful to both of them anyway.
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
I write these stories in advance, then tell them from memory. I improvise a lot.
A poem/prayer based on Mark 5:21-43, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year B, Proper 8 (13).
The image is of the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage from theTrès Riches Heures du duc de Berry. Artwork by the Limbourg brothers (between 1411 and 1416) – Photo. R.M.N. / R.-G. Ojéda, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17443172.Somewhat unusually for images of this text, Jairus’ daughter is visible at right in the upper image.
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