I Samuel 3: 6-8; John 9: 35-41

Profoundly disorienting

There are two stories that are constantly in the world news the last few weeks in addition to the tragedy in Washington State.  One is the disappearance of Malaysian Airlines flight 370.  The other is the Russian annexation of Crimea.   The family of Malaysian Airlines passengers have trouble understanding that there is so little information about what has happened to the plane.  Understandably they are very upset.  In an age of satellite technology that allows us to see what kind of kebab sandwich a person on a balcony in Kabul is eating and in an age when we have proven the existence of the smallest particle and in an age when we have heard the big bang taking place millions of years ago, how come we can’t find that information on our own globe?  This is profoundly disorienting.  The search was moved north fifteen hundred miles just several days ago.  It is almost as if we have run into a section of the oceans that we didn’t know existed.  Profoundly disorienting. 

At the same time most of us are baffled by the actions of Vladimir Putin who is suddenly acting just like Hitler did when he started to invade Eastern Europe and he is even using the say fake arguments Hitler used: to protect the people of his ethnicity.  Both men were resentful over the outcome of earlier wars, World War I and the Cold War to be exact.  Russia is the nation that gave us Tolstoi, Dostoyewski, Pushkin and great composers.  Why would they behave that way?  It is profoundly disorienting.  It is almost as if we woke up a century ago one morning and a leader acted like European leaders did centuries ago. Profoundly disorienting.

The young Samuel hears someone calling. He thinks it is his master Eli. He responds but it turns out Eli is not calling him. This happens three times.  Finally Eli figures out God was calling the boy.  This was profoundly disorienting. Samuel has an experience he never expected and it pushes him toward leadership and actions he had never anticipated.  It is almost as if his disorientation serves a purpose.  God gets him going where he did not expect to go, because it is God who spins him around.   In the Gospel of Jesus heals a blind man.  After being healed he is peppered with questions about this man who has healed him.  The blind man is new to sight and of course he never saw Jesus before he was healed.  He is profoundly disoriented.  Jesus then uses this whole event to talk about sight and blindness in a metaphoric way, the same way he spoke about water last week.  He goes into an explanation of how those who cannot see can have sight and those who do have sight can be blind.  While the Pharisee want to question his validity, Jesus turns the whole discussion upside down.  Profoundly disorienting.   In the process their eyes are opened and they have a chance to learn about faith.

In the movie Temple Grandin Claire Danes plays an autistic young woman by that name who is trying to make it in the world with the help of her mother.  The world to her is profoundly disorienting.  She cannot think abstractly, she cannot bear close physical contact.  She doesn’t like crowds. She thinks in images and mathematical proportions.  This makes her very helpful to her- blind- roommate. Temple can tell her very clearly what she sees on television, producing with words the pictures that the blind young woman needs to reproduce in her mind.  Temple finds a connection with animals and understands how they too think in pictures.  She wants to work with cattle.  She learns what cattle see and experience. She distinguishes the different type of mooing and observes the cattle like to move in circles. She winds up designing cattle runs and slaughterhouses.  Half of the ones in the US have been designed by her we are told.   She turned her disorientation into insight, although I know it is not an insight the vegetarians among you are well served by.

Friends, we are often disoriented by life. That is clear.  We are also often disoriented by the Bible and its stories about our faith.  Although the suffering that comes with disorientation is a bad thing, the fact that we are disoriented does not have to be bad.   It is okay to be at a loss sometimes.  As long at it makes us better and wiser, kinder and more compassionate.  There is goodness in allowing ourselves to be baffled and puzzled and stunned, if it leads to new ways of seeing.  In other words, not understanding is nothing to be ashamed of. Jesus knew what He was doing. He knew He was confusing the people around Him, but He had a purpose with that.  He knew people had to be disoriented sometimes to reorient themselves toward God.  So, friends, allow yourself to get spun around once in a while may God give you direction.