Kill Your Darlings? (a Steve Orr scripture reflection)

I stopped reading The Game of Thrones after finishing the first book, never to pick up another.

 

The novel’s title refers to the often terrible things people will do in pursuit of power, the alliances they make and break, the terrible acts they perform to feed their all-consuming need to rule. As bad as those things can be, I didn’t stop reading the series because of them.

 

Among the foundational things writers are taught, there is a maxim: "Kill your darlings." It's supposed to be an editorial act. The author is encouraged to eliminate his/her personal favorites—those that, quite often, actually detract from the story being told. The best writers do it all the time. And it is very rare for those assassinated darlings to ever return. 

 

But I didn't stop reading The Game of Thrones novels because the author was killing off his darlings. I stopped because he was killing off mine! He had killed off so many of my favorite characters by the end of the first novel, I couldn't go on. As I have come to learn, he kept killing them off through all seven books.  

 

I am not naive. In real life, the "game of thrones," whatever form it takes, is serious business. The desire to rule can be very intoxicating to those who "play." It's just that I believe there is someone else in the picture, someone not present in those Game of Thrones novels. 

 

Consider this week’s 1 Samuel scripture. God makes it clear to the prophet Samuel that He is very serious about who leads His people. He expects obedience and loyalty from the one who occupies the "throne." But God is patient. God gives leaders chance after chance to get it right. Still, God may already have laid the plan for who will replace them.

 

In the 1 Samuel passage, we read that God removed His spirit from King Saul and bestowed it on Jesse's youngest son. David was the last person any contemporary would have picked for king. That is, if they had thought of David at all, something which his own father failed to do. David was the runt, the youngest, the smallest—how could he become a king? Then, even though David was hand-chosen by God to lead God’s people, the story took a surprising turn. 

 

David did not immediately ascend to the throne. 

 

God allowed King Saul to occupy the throne for quite a long time after deciding to replace him. Now, why would God do that? Why not remove Saul immediately? When we stop and think about it, we realize why God gave Saul such a long lead time—so Saul might choose true repentance. 

 

Sadly, the throne meant more to Saul than his relationship with God. For Saul, the game of thrones was over. He just didn’t know it. God had already decided to take the throne from him. But for a good long while, Saul still could have chosen to relinquish that throne, with all the games surrounding it. He could have returned the throne to God, Israel’s original king, and sought forgiveness for his disobedience.

 

“God doesn’t look at things like humans do. Humans see only what is visible to the eyes, but the LORD sees into the heart." 

—1 Samuel 16:7

God extends grace, even toward those who have broken covenant with Him, patiently waiting, giving them a chance to repent. Therein lies the true difference between many an author of fiction and the author of our salvation: 

God wants His darlings to live. 

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GRAPHIC: Adobe Express

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SCRIPTURES FOR SUNDAY AND THE COMING WEEK 

Find them here: 

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=206

 

Print them here:

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/pdf//Bx_Proper6.pdf

 

1 Samuel 15:34 - 16:13

Psalm 20

Ezekiel 17:22-24

Psalm 92:1-4, 12-15

2 Corinthians 5:6-10, (11-13), 14-17

Mark 4:26-34

Proper 6 (11) (June 16, 2024)

Join us Friday morning for DaySpring’s Lectionary Breakfast. We meet on Zoom** and in person at Our Breakfast Place. We kick off at 8:00, visiting and catching up, followed by prayer, reading scriptures, and discussing how we can live by them. It’s a wonderful hour. 

 

Blessings,

Steve

 

**Zoom link: (NOTE - Zoom allows you to mute the camera and the microphone if you don’t wish to be seen or heard.)

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89947678414

 

 

 

The Frio River Paradox (a Steve Orr scripture reflection)

The Frio River is cold, really cold, take-your-breath-away cold. Its headwaters are in a valley a bit west of San Antonio, Texas—and that’s where we find the paradox. On the west side of those headwaters is a cliff that towers over the little river; its crevices, notches, and caves, starkly etched by the morning sun, are all but invisible when the sun slips away at end of day. 

That cliff is the site of the paradox.

 

You see, there are hawks above the Frio. Hawks do a lot of gliding. They catch the lift of rising thermals, warm thrusts of air that allow them to gently spiral up, up, up—until they finally tilt over to glide or dive. Hawks are hunters. They repeat this process, over and over, to help them spot and then claim their prey. This is how they get their food.

 

Above the Frio, the hawks perform as expected. They corkscrew up on those elevating winds alongside the face of that cliff. Then, when they reach the end of that thermal, they either glide along the cliff face in a long, slow decent, or they dive hard and fast toward their target. As they near the bottom of their passage, those hawks catch another thermal and start a new ascent. I’ve watched them do this for hours: gliding above the length of the Frio, swooping back toward the headwaters, searching for that next thermal to carry them aloft to their hunting height. 

 

The paradox: How can there be thermals?

 

It’s counterintuitive. The Frio remains shockingly cold all year round, even though the Texas heat usually exceeds 100° Fahrenheit throughout the summer months. The air above that river should not even be warm, much less hot enough to lift hawks above the lip of the cliff—and yet there they are. Somehow, God has contrived to place extreme Texas heat and extreme cold next to one another and make them do wonderful things. Neither appears limited by the other in any way. How? God only knows.

 

God does some amazing things, and we can observe them—even participate in them—if we’re open to paradoxes. There’s a great example in this week’s scriptures. 

 

With its talk of life after death, inner expansion, and seeing what cannot be seen, the 2 Corinthians passage is a treasure trove of paradox. What ties it all together is this formula: Expansion of Grace = Increase in Thanksgiving (to the glory of God). As each person is extended grace, the result is more than the addition of thanksgiving. Somehow, thanksgiving increases exponentially when grace expands. It’s counterintuitive. Mysterious. Beautiful. 

Like those hawks above the Frio, grace increases thanksgiving in ever-rising spirals. 

And God is glorified. 

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PHOTO: Steve Orr (cliffs above the Frio)

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Friday morning is when we gather for DaySpring’s Lectionary Breakfast. Join us via Zoom** or in person at Our Breakfast Place for fellowship, scripture discussion, and some real joy. We start at 8:00. 

 

Blessings,

Steve

 

**Zoom link: (NOTE - Zoom allows you to mute the camera and the microphone if you don’t wish to be seen or heard.)

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89947678414

 

 

SCRIPTURES FOR SUNDAY AND THE COMING WEEK 

Find them here: 

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=205

 

Print them here:

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/pdf//Bx_Proper5.pdf

 

 

1 Samuel 8:4-11, (12-15), 16-20, (11:14-15)

Psalm 138

Genesis 3:8-15

Psalm 130

2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1

Mark 3:20-35

Third Sunday after Pentecost

Proper 5 (10) (June 9, 2024)

 

 

 

Sharpening the Saw (a Steve Orr scripture reflection)

The problem was the saw.

 

Building the sets for a large stage production takes a lot of wood. Each piece must be cut to exact specifications and then assembled into walls, floors, stairs, furniture, etc. Anything that slows down the flow of those precisely cut boards is a serious problem. 

 

That’s what was happening. Our radial saw, the main equipment used to produce our needed wood pieces, had become a bottleneck. With almost every piece, the crew-person on the saw was having to stop and back out the blade because it was getting stuck part way through. More than a couple times, a piece had to be thrown out and the process started over because the cut wasn’t straight. 

 

We had finished assembling a few of the larger all-wood set pieces and platforms, and now had nothing to do until more wood arrived. At the rate we were going, we were not going to meet our deadline. We had to meet that deadline. If we didn’t get the sets built, the actors in our annual college musical were going to be singing Camelot tunes on an empty stage!

 

Into this situation stepped Mr. Starnes, one of our drama instructors and the Technical Director on this musical production. He took it all in with one long glance, and then he walked straight over to the person running the saw. From a distance, I saw them remove the saw blade and replace it with another. As he walked back past me, I asked Mr. Starnes about it. He said, “We’ve used that blade too much. It’s grown dull. We put on a new, sharp blade. We’ll have the other one sharpened.”

 

It was as simple as that. In short order, wood production increased, pieces began to flow out to the various working groups, and we were soon all engaged—turning wood into dreams.

 

I recalled that memory when I read Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. There, nestled among some excellent habits, right at the end, was Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw. Habit 7 is not about saw blades: It’s about renewal. It’s about renewing people in four dimensions: physical, mental, spiritual, and social/emotional.

 

If that rings a bell, it’s because it sounds a lot like something you may have come across in the Bible. Many of Covey’s “habits” are remarkably similar to Biblical exhortations. Habit 7 aligns perfectly with this week’s Deuteronomy and Mark passages about the Sabbath. 

 

The Deuteronomy passage repeats one of the Ten Commandments. God tells people it’s important to take a day of rest following every six of working—so important, God makes it a commandment! Add in what Jesus teaches in Mark—that God made the Sabbath for people, not people for the Sabbath—and you realize taking a Sabbath rest is not about following a rule that restricts activity and movement.

 

The Sabbath is truly about renewal. And if done properly, taking a Sabbath rest renews us in all four of those dimensions defined by Covey. It’s not enough to stop our work activities just to replace them with some other equally-frantic non-work activities. We need real rest, real renewal. Taking a Sabbath rest is the opportunity to “sharpen” those essential areas of our lives.

 

After all, as I learned all those years ago building sets for Camelot, you can’t really be productive with a dull saw.

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PHOTO (and short article about sharpening saw blades):

https://www.sawtrax.com/how-to-tell-if-your-saw-blade-needs-to-be-sharpened-or-replaced/amp/#

SABBATH RESOURCES

Catch Your Breath: God’s Invitation to Sabbath Rest —Don Postma

Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives

—Richard A. Swensen, M.D.

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DaySpring’s Lectionary Breakfast meets Friday morning at 8:00. We gather on Zoom** and at Our Breakfast Place for food, fellowship, Bible discussion, prayer, and laughter. All are welcome.

 

Blessings,

Steve

 

 **Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89947678414

 

 

NOTE: Zoom allows you to mute the camera and the microphone if you don’t wish to be seen or heard.

 

SCRIPTURES FOR SUNDAY AND THE COMING WEEK

 

Find them here: 

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts.php?id=204

 

Print them here:

https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/pdf//Bx_Proper4.pdf

 

1 Samuel 3:1-10, (11-20)

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18

Deuteronomy 5:12-15

Psalm 81:1-10

2 Corinthians 4:5-12

Mark 2:23-3:6

Proper 4 (9) Second Sunday after Pentecost (June 2, 2024)

 

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