Conquistador (a Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr)

In the novel, Conquistador, S. M. Stirling tells an exciting and thought-provoking tale of a North America that never saw the arrival of Europeans. Through a clever device, he has his characters travel from 1946 California to another California, one that is filled with various Native American groups, none of whom has ever seen a Caucasian.

Many adventures ensue for these "conquistadors" and the many men and women who followed them from our world to that still unsullied new one. There were no highways, no man-made aquifers, no super cities (LA, for instance). There was no smog.

The early crossovers, these Conquistadors from "FirstSide," made the most of the pristine nature of things; they brought over horse's, camped out, went hunting. Eventually, they hatched a plan to mine precious metals from what they knew, from FirstSide history, to be untouched sources. They used it to build wealth back on FirstSide. Their goal? To establish an infrastructure that would keep that new "new world" (and the gateway to it) secret, to maintain its treasures for themselves and their progeny.

And in time, they succeeded. For that story, and the challenges they faced from FirstSide in the 21st Century, you'll need to read the book.

One of the many aspects that puzzled these new invaders was how the newly discovered "new world" came to be. How could it be that that history contained no European discovery of the Americas? It took many years, but they eventually saw enough of the new world to piece together the chain of events. I won't go into that, but suffice to say it started with Alexander the Great not dying in 323 B.C.E.

One of the twists posited by the author is that this changed timeline led to Christianity never forming. He lays it out quite logically, and without any sympathy that I could detect.

In this week's Lectionary scriptures, there are two resurrections: one facilitated by Elijah and one performed by Jesus. Both involved raising the sons of widows. Both freshly alive young men were returned to their mothers and received with joy. Both acts led to people drawing closer to God.

How strange to think that someone could imagine a world where redemption lay forever beyond the reach of humankind, where salvation was not even a concept, much less a reality, where the conqueror of death never came.

Here on FirstSide, in our real world, Jesus came from another world to walk ours. Over two millennia ago, he conquered something far more important than a country or even a continent. By bringing life in the form of himself, he conquered all that separates us from God.

He is our conquistador.

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READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/

Third Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 5 (10) (June 5, 2016)

1 Kings 17:8-16, (17-24)
Psalm 146
1 Kings 17:17-24
Psalm 30
Galatians 1:11-24
Luke 7:11-17

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We are more than conquerors. Join us Friday mornings for Lectionary Breakfast and find out why. Still meeting at 8:00 at the Waco "Egg and I" restaurant.

Walk-ins welcome.

Enjoy the week!
Steve

The Snow Queen (a Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr)

From the very beginning, when the writers, animators, and directors first started crafting Disney's Frozen---and for a very long, long time after that---Elsa was the villain of the piece.

When they started, they were telling the story of "The Snow Queen," Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale of the evil woman who captured a boy's heart and kept him prisoner in her icy realm. And they relished the possibility of creating a new, iconic Disney villain; someone to join such evildoers as Ursula, Scar, Captain Hook, and Cruella de Vil.

Everything was in place to do that. The Snow Queen has formed the basis for many a literary villain. Author after author has used her evil for their variations on the theme. Take C. S. Lewis' White Witch in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: she was so evil she had transformed Narnia into a land where it "was always winter, but never Christmas."

But, as anyone who has seen Frozen knows, that is NOT what happened in the movie. Elsa did NOT become the villain of Frozen. And now that we know the disparity between the original plan and the eventual outcome, we have to ask: what changed?

It was the song.

Animated movies, particularly Disney animated movies, are complex enterprises with many pieces, most of which move along on parallel tracks at the same time. Story writers, song writers, artists, etc., are all working on the same project, but are not in contact with each other every day. So, perhaps it is understandable that those helming the movie did not hear the song "Let It Go" until later in the process. But when they finally heard it, well . . .

It changed everything.

Suddenly, based on the lyrics of that song, Elsa was no longer a two dimensional villain, but rather a complex person who had reasons for freezing everyone out. You've heard the song and you've seen the changes it wrought.

We are like Elsa. As it says in this week's Lectionary selection from Romans 8, we are in suspense until God fulfills our hope for redemption. We find we must await the work of the Spirit in our lives; "to help us in our weakness," to intercede for us while we are still in flux, to lead us through the process of becoming.

When they started, Elsa was the villain. When they finished their work, she was the redeemed.

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READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu

Day of Pentecost (May 24, 2015)
Acts 2:1-21 or Ezekiel 37:1-14
Psalm 104:24-34, 35b
Romans 8:22-27 or Acts 2:1-21
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

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How great it would be to see you at Lectionary Breakfast this Friday morning! If you can, meet us at 8:00 at the Waco "Egg and I" for a hearty breakfast, enjoyable companions, and life-changing scripture.

No one gets the cold shoulder.

Enjoy the week!
Steve

Tom Swift and the Amazing BRIC!

I'm pretty sure that, for me, it all started with "Tom Swift and His Flying Lab." I mean, I knew about Sputnik--had even lain out at night in our backyard to watch it pass by overhead--and I had certainly read my share of space operas, but I was no Rocket Boy. Up until then, it had always been more about the adventure and less (near zero) about the technology used to make the adventure possible.

I had read some Tom Swift adventures, but they were the older novels, books like "Tom Swift and His Motorcycle" (1910). Before me on the shelf that day (circa 1960) was the first adventure of Tom Swift, JUNIOR. Standing there in the store, I goggled at the cover art for TSaHFL. That giant, jet-powered VTOL airplane--even bigger than the Spruce Goose!--with normal-sized jet planes flying out of its onboard hangar, the Earth hanging below it and the blackness of space above it; that's the moment I was hooked.

I wanted to be an Astronaut.

I begged my parents for the money to buy that book (There were no NEW books of this type in any lending library to which I had access. See earlier reference to TS and his motorcycle.). Suffice to say, some time passed before I was able to read it all the way through. Eventually, though, I did read it, and reread it, and again a few MORE times until I could just see myself working in that lab, circling the globe at near orbital heights, studying everything below . . . and above.

So. It has now been more than half a century since that pivotal moment. And, no, I am not (nor do I expect to be) an Astronaut. Nor am I a credentialed scientist. But my inner Rocket Boy still lives. And he was delighted to tour the Baylor Research and Innovation Collaborative (BRIC), recently . . . especially when our tour brought us to the Space Sciences Lab (Mission Design & Data), Satellite Integration, and the Dusty Plasma Simulator. I was in heaven :-)

The BRIC, housing all sorts of scientific projects and activities, is partly research lab central and partly business incubator. If you ever have the opportunity to tour, I highly recommend it. For the kind of fascination where hours feel like minutes, it ranks up there with The Armstrong Browning Library & Museum.

One of the more interesting aspects of the BRIC (among hundreds) is the story of the facility, itself. In addition to what goes on inside it, this massive, 300,000 square foot building is also architecturally fascinating. What now houses cutting edge science was once . . . a tire factory.

General Tire opened the plant in Waco, Texas in the early 1940's. And it was a thriving operation. Until it closed its doors for good. Sure, the "bones" were still there; they were always substantial. But what do you do with a tire factory when there is no longer a need for one? So, for decades, it sat; empty, abandoned, useless, worthless. Circumstances had brought it low. For the longest time, it was lost.

And no amount of wishing was going to change that. And it would still be just like that if some folks had not decided to redeem it, reshape it, re-task it. What was old has passed away; it's now a new creation.

All of this week's Lectionary selections are about redemption. Read them and experience a quiet joy spreading across your thoughts and emotions. These Bible passages are about being brought back from the brink, having new life breathed in, being rescued from evil, coming home.

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http://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu

READINGS FOR THE WEEK
Fourth Sunday in Lent (March 10, 2013)

Joshua 5:9-12
Psalm 32
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32

If you're in Waco on Friday morning, join us at 8:00 for breakfast and the pleasure of talking about how the words of the Bible actually work in our real lives. We'll be at The Egg and I (on Franklin behind The Outback).

Enjoy the week!
Steve