Baptism Of Repentance
Stories
Object:
Contents
What's Up This Week
A Story to Live By: "Baptism of Repentance"
Shining Moments: "Coventry Story" by Jody E. Felton
Good Stories: "The Wrath to Come" by John Sumwalt
Scrap Pile: Excerpts from Mark Twain's War Prayer
What's Up This Week
Peace, repentance, and hope are the standout themes in the readings this week. Jody Felton's beautiful "Coventry Story" in Shining Moments offers a little bit of each: "The people of Coventry have learned the fine balance of remembering and forgiving, allowing God to transform memories into a movement of reconciliation. They remember not so they can hold a grudge, but so that they may be instruments of God's action in the world. Their understanding of their mission is summed up in the words found under the glass wall in the new cathedral, 'To the glory of God this cathedral burnt November 14, A.D. 1940, and is now rebuilt 1962.' "
Devotions for each day of Advent are available on the website of the Wisconsin Conference of the United Methodist Church. Click on http://www.wisconsinumc.org/mfsa/reflections/advent2004/reading2004.html. Look for John's contributions in week four.
If you appreciated the "Not Left Behind" material in last week's StoryShare, you may want to add a recent piece by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof to your Left Behind file. Kristof writes:
"The Left Behind series, the best-selling novels for adults in the U.S., enthusiastically depict Jesus returning to slaughter everyone who is not a born-again Christian. The world's Hindus, Muslims, Jews, and agnostics, along with many Catholics and Unitarians, are heaved into everlasting fire: 'Jesus merely raised one hand a few inches and... they tumbled in, howling and screeching.' ...If Saudi Arabians wrote an Islamic version of this series, we would furiously demand that sensible Muslims repudiate such hatemongering. We should hold ourselves to the same standard." ("Apocalypse (Almost) Now," New York Times, Nov. 24, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/24/opinion/24kristof.html)
A Story to Live By
Baptism of Repentance
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming "repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near."... "I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire."
Matthew 3:1, 11
Dateline: Washington, December 6, 1991
"President Bush is expected to express regrets at Pearl Harbor this weekend for the U.S. internment of Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II.... Bush said he will not apologize for the atomic bombs the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end the war. But apologizing for the internment of 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry, mostly in camps in California and other Western states, is another matter.... In his remarks at Pearl Harbor, Bush will say, 'The whole thing is something that offends our own principles of justice, and it won't happen again.'... The government has made $1.25 billion in financial restitution to survivors of the camps after a 1988 finding that the government violated their civil rights." (Associated Press, December 6, 1991)
Dateline: New York, December 5, 1991
"Russian Foreign Minister Shevardnadze said: 'We violated the norms of proper behavior.... We went against proper human values. I am talking, of course, about the dispatch of troops to Afghanistan. We committed the most serious violations of our own legislation, our party, and civilian norms.... The decision with such serious consequences for our country was taken behind the backs of the party and the people.' ...as well as taking the lives of more than 13,000 Soviet servicemen, the Afghan war left deep emotional scars and undermined the public standing of the military." (New York Times, December 5, 1991)
Dateline: Victory, Wisconsin, December 8, 1991
"Sac and Fox Indians received an apology Saturday from the state of Wisconsin legislature for the 1832 Bad Axe Massacre, during which hundreds of their tribal predecessors were killed while trying to flee armed pursuers... Gunfire on the banks of the Mississippi River 158 years ago ended a trek of hundreds of miles by men, women, and children. They were led by Chief Black Hawk after white settlers evicted the combined tribes from their ancestral land near Rock Island, Illinois." (Associated Press, December 8, 1991)
"To repent is to come to your senses. It is not so much something you do as something that happens. True repentance spends less time looking at the past saying, 'I'm sorry,' than to the future and saying, 'Wow!' " (Frederick Buechner)
Shining Moments
Coventry Story
by Jody E. Felton
The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.... They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:6, 9
Terror fell from the sky. For hours during the night of November 14, 1940, the bombs fell on Coventry in central England. As November 15th dawned, the whole city was ablaze. Coventry Cathedral died in the flames that night.
For the first time in history a whole city was destroyed from the air. There would be others, but Coventry was the first. The work of that night produced a new word, "coventrated" -- meaning to "utterly destroy."
The aftermath of that night was silence... shocked, horrified silence. The survivors stood in the ashes of the rubble, numb and bewildered. What had once been a prosperous industrial city lay in ruins, the buildings flattened, the streets buried in rubble, the whole city center razed to the ground.
What kind of hatred could produce such horror? More importantly, how was such hatred to be answered? Jesus said, "You have heard it said, 'an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, do not resist evil. If one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." Would the people of Coventry be able to hear those words? The city was utterly destroyed. Did they even have another cheek to turn? On the morning of November 15th the future of the people of Coventry hung in the balance. Would they meet hatred with hatred, or hatred with hope? Would the city remain razed to the ground or raised to reconciliation?
The answer came when the cathedral caretaker, Jock Forbes, found two charred beams from the cathedral's 14th-century roof. Tying the two beams together, he formed a cross and set it up in the rubble. In planting that cross, Jock Forbes identified the mound of rubble with Calvary, the death of Coventry with the death of Jesus on the cross.
The Rev. A.P. Wale, a local priest, restated that understanding when he made a cross out of three nails from the cathedral roof. The Cross of Nails has become the symbol of reconciliation for Coventry.
From those two crosses has grown the ministry of Coventry Cathedral, a ministry of hope and reconciliation. From those two crosses, made from the destruction of human hatred, a renewed understanding of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus has emerged. The people of Coventry discovered that forgiveness lies between crucifixion and resurrection, between hatred and hope, between death and new life, between being razed to the ground and raised to reconciliation. Out of the rubble an altar was made, inscribed with the words "Father Forgive."
Today a new cathedral rises up next to the ruins, a cathedral filled with light and color and life. The light streams through the many stained-glass windows, making deep pools of color on the floor. The artwork and beautiful chapels speak of God's call to humanity, a call to love and wholeness.
The cathedral congregation is active, with many diverse ministries, giving the cathedral not only light and color but life as well. They have refused to allow evil to turn their lives into bitterness and hatred. They have learned to forgive, but they do not forget. The whole back wall of the cathedral is made of glass, etched with haunting figures of patriarchs, saints, and angels. That glass wall looks out onto the ruins of the old cathedral. The people of Coventry have learned the fine balance of remembering and forgiving, allowing God to transform memories into a movement of reconciliation. They remember not so they can hold a grudge, but so that the may be instruments of God's action in the world. Their understanding of their mission is summed up in the words found under the glass wall in the new cathedral, "To the glory of God this cathedral burnt November 14, A.D. 1940, and is now rebuilt 1962." The new cathedral rises up next to the ruins, but what is left of the old cathedral still stands, an empty shell open to the sky with its broken and scarred walls. The altar is still there with replicas of the original Charred Cross and Cross of Nails.
The old cathedral, empty, open, broken, and scarred, is transformed into a place of dignity and peace by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the hearts and minds of the people of Coventry.
Jody E. Felton is the pastor of First United Methodist Church in The Dalles, Oregon, just east of the Cascade Mountains on the banks of the beautiful Columbia River. Her congregation of about 70 members consists of teachers, farmers, and businesspeople, many of whom are retired. She is a member of The Dalles Community Covenant Task Group that seeks to strengthen the community spiritually, emotionally, and physically. She has previously been published in Alive Now under the name Jody Wegener.
Good Stories
The Wrath to Come
by John Sumwalt
Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"
Matthew 3:5-7
He went very much unnoticed at first: a solitary voice sounding off on the high-numbered cable channels late at night, when air time was cheap. "There was a time," he always began, "when we lived in a world of unlimited resources and great beauty; we breathed unfiltered air and drank unprocessed water straight from streams and wells. Fresh fruit and vegetables were shipped directly from the fields to the market. There were no poison control centers, no radioactive islands, no mutant cities fenced off for the genetically deformed. Our ancestors walked outside without breathing devices or sun-protective clothing. They could see the stars and moon at night, and they required no special operations to enable them to reproduce. Now we are a dying race, clinging to a decaying planet; the last generation to live on the earth. It will not be long now. The time is short. The new world may come at any moment. It could come tomorrow; it may be next month or next year. It may happen yet tonight, before the sun rises on another day."
It was at this point that he always held up the two-liter plastic bottle of pure, artesian water pumped directly, he said, from virgin springs in underground caverns deep in the earth. No one outside his small circle of disciples and employees knew for sure where the water came from, but it was widely reported that it had healing and restorative powers. The camera zoomed in close so the viewers could read the large blue letters scrawled in a bold cursive script full-length across the label: Maranatha, it read in ancient Greek. Printed beneath in smaller red letters were translations into several world languages -- French, Russian, German, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, and English -- "Our Lord Come."
"Act now to purify your body and soul," he said. "You can be among the thousands and thousands who have already prepared themselves for the coming new world." Then, as the 800 number appeared on the screen along with the price of the water, his voice would become softer and softer as he invited everyone to call now, because tomorrow might be too late.
He became known as the Pure Water Prophet. Orders came in from all around the world. He sent planeloads and shiploads of his special water to nearly every city in every nation. The clergy and lay leaders of all of the major denominations condemned him at first. But after the great earthquake in 2034 that shook every continent and killed over a hundred million people, many of them called, asking if they could become purified believers too. But he would not fill their orders. He always saved his most scathing rebukes for them near the end of the program. "You pampered snakes," he said, "living in comfort in your antiseptic cathedrals while the poor are poisoned in the streets. Who told you to flee from the wrath to come?"
Scrap Pile
Excerpts from Mark Twain's War Prayer
They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:9
Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory --
An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister... the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued with his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, "Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!"
The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place.
"I come from the Throne --- bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import...
"You have heard your servant's prayer -- the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it -- that part which the pastor -- and also you in your hearts -- fervently prayed silently... Listen!
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief... Amen."
(After a pause) "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!"
It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.
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Twain apparently dictated this story around 1904-05; it was rejected by his publisher, and was found after his death among his unpublished manuscripts. It was first published in 1923 in Albert Bigelow Paine's anthology Europe and Elsewhere. The story was a response to the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902, which Twain opposed.
(To read the full version of "The War Prayer," click on http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/warprayer.html)
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New Book
The third book in the vision series, Shining Moments: Visions of the Holy in Ordinary Lives (edited by John Sumwalt), is now available from CSS Publishing Company. (Click on the title for information about how to order.) Among the 60 contributing authors of these Chicken Soup for the Soul-like vignettes are Ralph Milton, Sandra Herrmann, Pamela J. Tinnin, Richard H. Gentzler Jr., David Michael Smith, Jodie Felton, Nancy Nichols, William Lee Rand, Gail Ingle, and Rosmarie Trapp, whose family story was told in the classic movie The Sound of Music. The stories follow the lectionary for Cycle A.
Other Books by John & Jo Sumwalt
Sharing Visions: Divine Revelations, Angels, and Holy Coincidences
Vision Stories: True Accounts of Visions, Angels, and Healing Miracles
Life Stories: A Study in Christian Decision Making
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle A
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle B
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle C
Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit: 62 Stories for Cycle B
You can order any of our books on the CSS website; they are also available from www.amazon.com and at many Christian bookstores. Or simply e-mail your order to orders@csspub.com or phone 1-800-241-4056. (If you live outside the U.S., phone 419-227-1818.)
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About the Editors
John E. Sumwalt is the pastor of Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church in Milwaukee, and is the author of eight books for CSS. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Dubuque Theological Seminary (UDTS), John received the Herbert Manning Jr. award for Parish Ministry from UDTS in 1997. John is known in the Milwaukee area for his one-minute radio spots which always include a brief story. He concludes each spot by saying, "I'm John Sumwalt with 'A Story to Live By' from Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church."
John has done numerous storytelling events for civic, school, and church groups, as well as on radio and television. He has performed at a number of fundraisers for the homeless, the hungry, Habitat for Humanity, and women's shelters. Since the fall of 1999, when he began working on the Vision Stories series, he has led seminars and retreats around the themes "A Safe Place to Tell Visions" and "Vision Stories in the Bible and Today." To schedule a seminar or a retreat, write to jsumwalt@naspa.net or phone 414-257-1228.
Joanne Perry-Sumwalt is director of Christian Education at Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church in Milwaukee. Jo is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, with a degree in English and writing. She has co-authored two books with John, Life Stories: A Study In Christian Decision Making and Lectionary Tales For The Pulpit: 62 Stories For Cycle B. Jo writes original curriculum for church classes. She also serves as the secretary of the Wisconsin chapter of the Christian Educators Fellowship (CEF), and is a member of the National CEF.
Jo and John have been married since 1975. They have two grown children, Kathryn and Orrin. They both love reading, movies, long walks with Chloe (their West Highland Terrier), and working on their old farmhouse in southwest Wisconsin.
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StoryShare, December 5, 2004, issue.
Copyright 2004 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503.
What's Up This Week
A Story to Live By: "Baptism of Repentance"
Shining Moments: "Coventry Story" by Jody E. Felton
Good Stories: "The Wrath to Come" by John Sumwalt
Scrap Pile: Excerpts from Mark Twain's War Prayer
What's Up This Week
Peace, repentance, and hope are the standout themes in the readings this week. Jody Felton's beautiful "Coventry Story" in Shining Moments offers a little bit of each: "The people of Coventry have learned the fine balance of remembering and forgiving, allowing God to transform memories into a movement of reconciliation. They remember not so they can hold a grudge, but so that they may be instruments of God's action in the world. Their understanding of their mission is summed up in the words found under the glass wall in the new cathedral, 'To the glory of God this cathedral burnt November 14, A.D. 1940, and is now rebuilt 1962.' "
Devotions for each day of Advent are available on the website of the Wisconsin Conference of the United Methodist Church. Click on http://www.wisconsinumc.org/mfsa/reflections/advent2004/reading2004.html. Look for John's contributions in week four.
If you appreciated the "Not Left Behind" material in last week's StoryShare, you may want to add a recent piece by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof to your Left Behind file. Kristof writes:
"The Left Behind series, the best-selling novels for adults in the U.S., enthusiastically depict Jesus returning to slaughter everyone who is not a born-again Christian. The world's Hindus, Muslims, Jews, and agnostics, along with many Catholics and Unitarians, are heaved into everlasting fire: 'Jesus merely raised one hand a few inches and... they tumbled in, howling and screeching.' ...If Saudi Arabians wrote an Islamic version of this series, we would furiously demand that sensible Muslims repudiate such hatemongering. We should hold ourselves to the same standard." ("Apocalypse (Almost) Now," New York Times, Nov. 24, 2004, http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/24/opinion/24kristof.html)
A Story to Live By
Baptism of Repentance
In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming "repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near."... "I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire."
Matthew 3:1, 11
Dateline: Washington, December 6, 1991
"President Bush is expected to express regrets at Pearl Harbor this weekend for the U.S. internment of Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II.... Bush said he will not apologize for the atomic bombs the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end the war. But apologizing for the internment of 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry, mostly in camps in California and other Western states, is another matter.... In his remarks at Pearl Harbor, Bush will say, 'The whole thing is something that offends our own principles of justice, and it won't happen again.'... The government has made $1.25 billion in financial restitution to survivors of the camps after a 1988 finding that the government violated their civil rights." (Associated Press, December 6, 1991)
Dateline: New York, December 5, 1991
"Russian Foreign Minister Shevardnadze said: 'We violated the norms of proper behavior.... We went against proper human values. I am talking, of course, about the dispatch of troops to Afghanistan. We committed the most serious violations of our own legislation, our party, and civilian norms.... The decision with such serious consequences for our country was taken behind the backs of the party and the people.' ...as well as taking the lives of more than 13,000 Soviet servicemen, the Afghan war left deep emotional scars and undermined the public standing of the military." (New York Times, December 5, 1991)
Dateline: Victory, Wisconsin, December 8, 1991
"Sac and Fox Indians received an apology Saturday from the state of Wisconsin legislature for the 1832 Bad Axe Massacre, during which hundreds of their tribal predecessors were killed while trying to flee armed pursuers... Gunfire on the banks of the Mississippi River 158 years ago ended a trek of hundreds of miles by men, women, and children. They were led by Chief Black Hawk after white settlers evicted the combined tribes from their ancestral land near Rock Island, Illinois." (Associated Press, December 8, 1991)
"To repent is to come to your senses. It is not so much something you do as something that happens. True repentance spends less time looking at the past saying, 'I'm sorry,' than to the future and saying, 'Wow!' " (Frederick Buechner)
Shining Moments
Coventry Story
by Jody E. Felton
The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.... They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:6, 9
Terror fell from the sky. For hours during the night of November 14, 1940, the bombs fell on Coventry in central England. As November 15th dawned, the whole city was ablaze. Coventry Cathedral died in the flames that night.
For the first time in history a whole city was destroyed from the air. There would be others, but Coventry was the first. The work of that night produced a new word, "coventrated" -- meaning to "utterly destroy."
The aftermath of that night was silence... shocked, horrified silence. The survivors stood in the ashes of the rubble, numb and bewildered. What had once been a prosperous industrial city lay in ruins, the buildings flattened, the streets buried in rubble, the whole city center razed to the ground.
What kind of hatred could produce such horror? More importantly, how was such hatred to be answered? Jesus said, "You have heard it said, 'an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, do not resist evil. If one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." Would the people of Coventry be able to hear those words? The city was utterly destroyed. Did they even have another cheek to turn? On the morning of November 15th the future of the people of Coventry hung in the balance. Would they meet hatred with hatred, or hatred with hope? Would the city remain razed to the ground or raised to reconciliation?
The answer came when the cathedral caretaker, Jock Forbes, found two charred beams from the cathedral's 14th-century roof. Tying the two beams together, he formed a cross and set it up in the rubble. In planting that cross, Jock Forbes identified the mound of rubble with Calvary, the death of Coventry with the death of Jesus on the cross.
The Rev. A.P. Wale, a local priest, restated that understanding when he made a cross out of three nails from the cathedral roof. The Cross of Nails has become the symbol of reconciliation for Coventry.
From those two crosses has grown the ministry of Coventry Cathedral, a ministry of hope and reconciliation. From those two crosses, made from the destruction of human hatred, a renewed understanding of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus has emerged. The people of Coventry discovered that forgiveness lies between crucifixion and resurrection, between hatred and hope, between death and new life, between being razed to the ground and raised to reconciliation. Out of the rubble an altar was made, inscribed with the words "Father Forgive."
Today a new cathedral rises up next to the ruins, a cathedral filled with light and color and life. The light streams through the many stained-glass windows, making deep pools of color on the floor. The artwork and beautiful chapels speak of God's call to humanity, a call to love and wholeness.
The cathedral congregation is active, with many diverse ministries, giving the cathedral not only light and color but life as well. They have refused to allow evil to turn their lives into bitterness and hatred. They have learned to forgive, but they do not forget. The whole back wall of the cathedral is made of glass, etched with haunting figures of patriarchs, saints, and angels. That glass wall looks out onto the ruins of the old cathedral. The people of Coventry have learned the fine balance of remembering and forgiving, allowing God to transform memories into a movement of reconciliation. They remember not so they can hold a grudge, but so that the may be instruments of God's action in the world. Their understanding of their mission is summed up in the words found under the glass wall in the new cathedral, "To the glory of God this cathedral burnt November 14, A.D. 1940, and is now rebuilt 1962." The new cathedral rises up next to the ruins, but what is left of the old cathedral still stands, an empty shell open to the sky with its broken and scarred walls. The altar is still there with replicas of the original Charred Cross and Cross of Nails.
The old cathedral, empty, open, broken, and scarred, is transformed into a place of dignity and peace by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the hearts and minds of the people of Coventry.
Jody E. Felton is the pastor of First United Methodist Church in The Dalles, Oregon, just east of the Cascade Mountains on the banks of the beautiful Columbia River. Her congregation of about 70 members consists of teachers, farmers, and businesspeople, many of whom are retired. She is a member of The Dalles Community Covenant Task Group that seeks to strengthen the community spiritually, emotionally, and physically. She has previously been published in Alive Now under the name Jody Wegener.
Good Stories
The Wrath to Come
by John Sumwalt
Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"
Matthew 3:5-7
He went very much unnoticed at first: a solitary voice sounding off on the high-numbered cable channels late at night, when air time was cheap. "There was a time," he always began, "when we lived in a world of unlimited resources and great beauty; we breathed unfiltered air and drank unprocessed water straight from streams and wells. Fresh fruit and vegetables were shipped directly from the fields to the market. There were no poison control centers, no radioactive islands, no mutant cities fenced off for the genetically deformed. Our ancestors walked outside without breathing devices or sun-protective clothing. They could see the stars and moon at night, and they required no special operations to enable them to reproduce. Now we are a dying race, clinging to a decaying planet; the last generation to live on the earth. It will not be long now. The time is short. The new world may come at any moment. It could come tomorrow; it may be next month or next year. It may happen yet tonight, before the sun rises on another day."
It was at this point that he always held up the two-liter plastic bottle of pure, artesian water pumped directly, he said, from virgin springs in underground caverns deep in the earth. No one outside his small circle of disciples and employees knew for sure where the water came from, but it was widely reported that it had healing and restorative powers. The camera zoomed in close so the viewers could read the large blue letters scrawled in a bold cursive script full-length across the label: Maranatha, it read in ancient Greek. Printed beneath in smaller red letters were translations into several world languages -- French, Russian, German, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, and English -- "Our Lord Come."
"Act now to purify your body and soul," he said. "You can be among the thousands and thousands who have already prepared themselves for the coming new world." Then, as the 800 number appeared on the screen along with the price of the water, his voice would become softer and softer as he invited everyone to call now, because tomorrow might be too late.
He became known as the Pure Water Prophet. Orders came in from all around the world. He sent planeloads and shiploads of his special water to nearly every city in every nation. The clergy and lay leaders of all of the major denominations condemned him at first. But after the great earthquake in 2034 that shook every continent and killed over a hundred million people, many of them called, asking if they could become purified believers too. But he would not fill their orders. He always saved his most scathing rebukes for them near the end of the program. "You pampered snakes," he said, "living in comfort in your antiseptic cathedrals while the poor are poisoned in the streets. Who told you to flee from the wrath to come?"
Scrap Pile
Excerpts from Mark Twain's War Prayer
They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:9
Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory --
An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister... the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued with his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, "Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!"
The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside -- which the startled minister did -- and took his place.
"I come from the Throne --- bearing a message from Almighty God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import...
"You have heard your servant's prayer -- the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it -- that part which the pastor -- and also you in your hearts -- fervently prayed silently... Listen!
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief... Amen."
(After a pause) "Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High waits!"
It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.
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Twain apparently dictated this story around 1904-05; it was rejected by his publisher, and was found after his death among his unpublished manuscripts. It was first published in 1923 in Albert Bigelow Paine's anthology Europe and Elsewhere. The story was a response to the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902, which Twain opposed.
(To read the full version of "The War Prayer," click on http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/warprayer.html)
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How to Share Stories
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We invite you to forward this offer to all of your friends who are looking for good stories.
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New Book
The third book in the vision series, Shining Moments: Visions of the Holy in Ordinary Lives (edited by John Sumwalt), is now available from CSS Publishing Company. (Click on the title for information about how to order.) Among the 60 contributing authors of these Chicken Soup for the Soul-like vignettes are Ralph Milton, Sandra Herrmann, Pamela J. Tinnin, Richard H. Gentzler Jr., David Michael Smith, Jodie Felton, Nancy Nichols, William Lee Rand, Gail Ingle, and Rosmarie Trapp, whose family story was told in the classic movie The Sound of Music. The stories follow the lectionary for Cycle A.
Other Books by John & Jo Sumwalt
Sharing Visions: Divine Revelations, Angels, and Holy Coincidences
Vision Stories: True Accounts of Visions, Angels, and Healing Miracles
Life Stories: A Study in Christian Decision Making
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle A
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle B
Lectionary Stories: Forty Tellable Tales for Cycle C
Lectionary Tales for the Pulpit: 62 Stories for Cycle B
You can order any of our books on the CSS website; they are also available from www.amazon.com and at many Christian bookstores. Or simply e-mail your order to orders@csspub.com or phone 1-800-241-4056. (If you live outside the U.S., phone 419-227-1818.)
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About the Editors
John E. Sumwalt is the pastor of Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church in Milwaukee, and is the author of eight books for CSS. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Dubuque Theological Seminary (UDTS), John received the Herbert Manning Jr. award for Parish Ministry from UDTS in 1997. John is known in the Milwaukee area for his one-minute radio spots which always include a brief story. He concludes each spot by saying, "I'm John Sumwalt with 'A Story to Live By' from Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church."
John has done numerous storytelling events for civic, school, and church groups, as well as on radio and television. He has performed at a number of fundraisers for the homeless, the hungry, Habitat for Humanity, and women's shelters. Since the fall of 1999, when he began working on the Vision Stories series, he has led seminars and retreats around the themes "A Safe Place to Tell Visions" and "Vision Stories in the Bible and Today." To schedule a seminar or a retreat, write to jsumwalt@naspa.net or phone 414-257-1228.
Joanne Perry-Sumwalt is director of Christian Education at Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church in Milwaukee. Jo is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, with a degree in English and writing. She has co-authored two books with John, Life Stories: A Study In Christian Decision Making and Lectionary Tales For The Pulpit: 62 Stories For Cycle B. Jo writes original curriculum for church classes. She also serves as the secretary of the Wisconsin chapter of the Christian Educators Fellowship (CEF), and is a member of the National CEF.
Jo and John have been married since 1975. They have two grown children, Kathryn and Orrin. They both love reading, movies, long walks with Chloe (their West Highland Terrier), and working on their old farmhouse in southwest Wisconsin.
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StoryShare, December 5, 2004, issue.
Copyright 2004 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503.
