I wasn’t supposed to read it, but I’m glad I did.
I was eleven years old and exploring under the eaves in our attic when I found the book. It was A Stone for Danny Fisher by Harold Robbins. To say it was inappropriate for an 11-year old would be an understatement. This was definitely an adult book.
The story: A Jewish boy in the Great Depression of the 1930s learns he can use fighting (his one “skill”) to bring in some money for his family. While pursuing elevation and increasing rewards in the boxing ring, he falls in love with a beautiful Catholic girl. But, his boxing prowess also brings him to the attention of organized crime. I'll let your imagination take over for the rest of it. Suffice to say, Danny Fisher had many troubles in his life. Robbins’ ending could well make you cry.
What I will say about the novel is this: I've read it three times. And each time I've found depths I somehow missed on the earlier readings. I'm planning to read it again, soon.
The one mystery that eluded me for years was the meaning of the title. There is nothing in the novel about stones. No one gave one to Danny. Then one day, I read this week’s passage in Luke 11: “What father among you, if his son asks for a loaf of bread, will give him a stone; or if he asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?" Suddenly, I got it: Robbins thought someone, likely God, had given Danny a raw deal, a "stone" of a life rather than one filled with good.
Sounds bleak.
Except, that Luke passage is part of a longer section where Jesus answers his followers' request to teach them to pray. In answering them, Jesus made exactly the opposite argument as Harold Robbins. Jesus tells them that God loves them and will meet their needs. This is the ask-seek-knock section; the Lord's Prayer section. We tend to slice this section into separate parts, but Luke delivers them all together so we can understand the real point.
Our lives are not about what we want or need. Sure, those things are important, even necessary. But at the heart of it, we have a loving Father who desires good for us; a Father who, in his answers to our prayers, far surpasses both the eventual responsiveness of a pestered neighbor and the loving intent of an earthly father.
We face the same challenges as those early disciples, though, in understanding prayer. Yes, we ask for our daily bread when we pray, as we should. God is the giver of good gifts. If only we can also grasp the greater values to be had in prayer; our affirmation of God's sovereignty, the relationship between forgiveness we extend to those who need it and the forgiveness God extends to us, the guidance away from temptation and unnecessary trial, rescue from evil. And crowning all of it: the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Maybe Danny Fisher did receive a stone instead of bread, but I reject that it came from God. Tough times come to every one. We believers, though having just such tough times, measure our lives by our relationship with God, not by our circumstances.
We get the bread, every time.
_________________________
PHOTO: Adobe Express and Steve Orr
How A Stone for Danny Fisher became the Elvis Presley movie, King Creole:
https://themysterytrainblog.com/2013/06/08/king-creole-a-stone-for-danny-fisher/
_________________________
https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/pdf//Cx_Proper12.pdf
Hosea 1:2-10
Psalm 85
Genesis 18:20-32
Psalm 138
Colossians 2:6-15, (16-19)
Luke 11:1-13
_________________________
No comments:
Post a Comment