Theo of Golden – Revisited (1)

 

 

I don’t think I’ve ever read a book three times in one year, yet I’ve just returned to Theo. As I recall writing in an earlier reflection, Theo of Golden by Allen Levi is a lifelong companion – little I did know at the time I’d be spending so much time with my new friend.

 

I first read Theo on the hardy recommendation of my friend, Michael Daily. After I completed reading Theo, I next read it aloud to Vickie. Since then I have often thought of Theo, and Vickie and I regularly speak of the folks we met in Golden.

 

I have returned to Theo of Golden because I want to touch some gracious humanity, I need a good dose of kindness, I need some inspiration, I need some hope. I need to be reminded that even if the world, and much of the professing church (at least in the West), has lost its mind, that one or two people, or a small group of people, can still make a difference.

 

Faces still matter, no matter what the color of skin, citizenship status, social or economic background, intellectual or emotional capacity, religious adherence (or not), no matter what, no matter what, no matter who…faces still matter – individuals still matter, they are loved by God in Christ and the possibility of sainthood lies within the image of God, no matter how defaced.

 

As I write this I am reminded of David Wilkinson and Nicky Cruz. While Wilkinson may have gone off on tangents later in life, he had one thing right in the beginning, that Jesus loves us. Relying on my fading memory, when Nicky Cruz threatened him with a switchblade, Wilkinson responded with, ‘Nicky, you can cut me into a thousand pieces, and every piece will say, ‘Jesus loves you.’”

 

Wilkinson’s call to share the Gospel with gangs in New York City made no sense, no sense at all. People thought he was crazy, and I suppose he was, he was crazy for Jesus and love for others.

 

There are things in Theo of Golden that make no sense, as Pearce Glissen would likely point out, but they sure make sense to someone like Theo who knows what it is to have misplaced loves and priorities, and who has learned to look into eyes, to look at the lines on faces, and see into souls, to see the potential of saints.

 

I need a good dose of compassionate humanity – not the caricature we see in violence and hatred and vitriol and in worshipping the god of money and possessions and fleeting pleasure. I need to be reminded of the beauty God has given us in literature, and music, and art, and acceptance and forgiveness…and within each other.

 

If you haven’t yet read Theo of Golden, I hope you will. You can purchase it, and also learn about its author, at Allen Levi

 

Love,

 

Bob

 

Theo of Golden - Reflections (6)

 

Author Allen Levi is a Tiffany in developing memorable characters as jewels and in placing them in relationship with one another as a master of stained glass. When light penetrates the glass, the sum is greater than the parts – there is holistic beauty. 

The Federated Church of Becket, MA has a beautiful stained-glass window at the entrance to the church, the centerpiece is Jesus the Good Shepherd. There were Sunday mornings when I’d ask the congregation to turn around and ponder the window in order to make a certain point – as a pastor I could not go wrong by having us keep our eyes on Jesus, our Shepherd. 

One of Allen Levi’s many gems in Theo of Golden is Ellen. Ellen communicates innocence, wisdom, pain and suffering, joy, beauty, kindness, and humor. The scene in St. James Church on a certain Sunday morning is a healing and humorous balm following the tragic account of the best day of her life. This is a remarkable juxtaposition by Mr. Levi, and I wonder if we don’t especially see the merging of Allen Levi the musician and song writer with Allen Levi the author in this orchestration. 

Ellen challenges me. 

To begin, I wonder if there isn’t some Ellen in all of us. That is, I wonder if we aren’t all just a bit “different” than we let on. I wonder if perhaps the main difference between Ellen and most of us is that we have learned to hide the parts of us that are “different.” Could it be that we have learned how to evade the goons from Columbia by hiding and conforming and saying and doing the things that are expected of us? Perhaps we have had stage moms and dads who were just doing to us what had been done to them? 

Was not Ellen’s problem that she didn’t know how to “act”? 

This is not to say that expectations and norms are all wrong, but it is to suggest that what is below the surface may just be more vital to life than what we superficially observe. Mrs. Ocie Van Blarcum, an unforgettable character among other unforgettable characters, reminds us that while man judges by appearance, God looks upon the heart. As the narrator of Theo points out, Mrs. Van Blarcum recognized the “least of these, my brethren.” 

A few years ago I made the acquaintance of a pastor from another region of the world who was born an albino; since he was born in a population with mostly deep dark skin, his albinism stood out. There was an unfortunate belief among some of the population of his home region that albinos ought to be sacrificed to traditional gods. As you might imagine, this led to a certain anxiety on the part of his family. Growing up, he restricted his travels to population centers within his home country. 

I’m not sure that we in America are much different that this pastor’s home country. When people don’t look like us or act like us or think like us or speak like us, is it possible that we are too ready to sacrifice them to our traditional gods. This is a powerful motive for conformity, whether as children or as adults. It is reason to keep our differences hidden; in families, at work, at school, in church. 

Sadly, often when we hide our differences we hide our giftings, our special talents, insights, the particular beauty that our Father has placed within each one of us. And here is another thing…I don’t understand it but I know it is true…we need one another to pull the beauty out of us. Theo saw beauty in others that they didn’t see in themselves – and rightly so – and beauty of beauties – Theo saw beauty in Ellen and Ellen saw beauty in Theo. 

Many of us, looking back over our school years, can likely recall a boy or a girl who was “different” in our class, who didn’t fit in, who didn’t participate in activities the way most of us did – whether we wanted to or not. I wonder what we all missed by not paying attention to all of our classmates? 

While many of us admire C. S. Lewis, I wonder if we would have been good classmates to him. Lewis did not care for sports, he did not fit in with the crowd, throughout his life he considered himself “all thumbs.” Yet, he loved extended walking trips, he loved engaging in projects around the Kilns, what he and Warnie termed “public works projects,” so it wasn’t as if he didn’t enjoy physical activity – he just wasn’t into football and cricket and rugby. Lewis may very well have been too “different” for us. We may have missed the opportunity of enjoying an enduring friendship.

Ellen also challenges me in that she confronts me with the cruelty of society. Our society steam rolls over those who are different and who cannot speak for themselves. Often, if people do not have economic value they do not have intrinsic value, and they certainly don’t have political value. Is it possible that we prefer those like Ellen to be out of sight so that we need not confront our attitudes and actions?  Do we really want the Ellens of the world in our worship services? After all, if we welcome them to morning worship they may expect us to invite them to afternoon tea, or chicken dinner, or to watch a football game in our home. Can I be honest enough to ask myself about my own heart in these matters? Will I ask God, by His grace, to help me? 

I’m not sure.

Is it possible that we have learned to hide our differences to such a degree that we may die never knowing who we really are? Is it possible that I may never know you, that you may never know me, and that I may never truly know who I am…who my Father created me to be? 

The Ellens of this world have blessed me so much more than I have ever blessed them. 

Joe was a disabled veteran who lived in our small town of Becket. The nature of his disability affected his speech and mobility, and while in many communities he may have been invisible, to his neighbors in Becket he was a beloved figure. Joe’s movement was slow, his speech was slow, and conversations with him could not be hurried. To a person outside Becket, Joe might be viewed as “different,” within the Becket community Joe was Joe. 

One morning I was in my office feeling a bit depressed, I suppose we could term it “pastoral isolation.” It was cold outside; it was cold inside. My office was cold, the building was cold, and I suppose my heart was a bit cold. I had a space heater in my office and the door was closed to contain the heat. I was the only person in the old drafty building…or so I thought. 

There was a “tap, tap, tap” at the door. 

“Come in,” I said.

The door opened and it was Joe. In his hand was a brown bag.

“Reverend Withers, as I was walking to the General (the Becket General Store which was next door to the Federated Church) I was thinking of you. I saw your car outside and thought I would bring you a coffee and a muffin from the store. I don’t know if you take cream or sugar but I brought them too. I hope you like them.” 

Out of the bag Joe brought the coffee and the muffin and the cream and the sugar and placed them before me on my desk along with a napkin. 

“O Joe, thank you so much. I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

“You are welcome, Reverend Withers. I hope you have a good day.” 

As Joe left and closed the door, my heart was overwhelmed and a sacred warmth invaded my soul; Joe had bestowed a holy blessing upon me. Perhaps this is what Theo experienced when Ellen gave him a featherwood. 

Yes, Ellen challenges me. 

Theo of Golden - Reflections (5)

 Theo of Golden – Reflections (5)

I read the last words of Theo of Golden to Vickie yesterday evening. At points my voice was quivering and my eyes were moist; like playing a piece of music, I honored the “rest” symbols. Better yet, the rest symbols forced themselves on me. As Vickie listened, her face was in motion, her eyes bright one moment, sad the next, her expressions many.

If we could speak with Lamisha, perhaps she would tell us that experiencing Theo is like experiencing music at the Bet. At the Bet the notes fly up into lights hanging from the ceiling, later to appear once again. In reading Theo the words enter our souls, bringing images and conversations and joys and sorrows and hopes and challenges, appearing again and again. On a bench by a fountain we see and experience heaven and earth kissing, we see the Face of God. 

In Psalm 27:8 we read, “When You said, Seek My Face, my heart said to You, Your face O LORD, I shall seek.” O that we would know that our kind and loving heavenly Father desires us to see His Face. Do we not see His Face in Jesus? Jesus says, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9).  

Our loving God’s promise to us is that we will indeed see His Face in its fulness and that His Name, His Nature, will be in us, we shall be One with Him, and in Him One with one another (Revelation 21:1 – 8; 22:1 – 5; John Chapter 17). No wonder Theo is looking forward to heaven.

Theo of Golden helps us visualize how seeing the Face of God, and being the Face of God, might look on this journey; it presents possibilities as to how we might experience the Presence of Christ with others in this life. Perhaps Theo is a romance, a dance of heaven and earth, heaven and earth kissing each other on a bench at the Fedder. 

“Lovingkindness and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Truth springs from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven” (Psalm 85:10 – 11). 

Is there not a sense in which every face is the Face of God? Are we not all created in His image and likeness? Shall we be like Cleave and desecrate faces, or shall we be as Theo and honor the people around us, serving them, encouraging them, seeing beauty and potential in them…no matter how different from us they may be? (How different are we really from one another? Do we not all have hopes and dreams and pain and worries?)

In honoring the faces around us, are we not honoring God? I use the word “honor” in the sense of acknowledging worth and preciousness, of recognizing the image of God in humanity…as messed up as we may be. 

Jeremiah laments, “How dark the gold has become, how the pure gold has changed! The sacred stones are poured out at the corner of every street. The precious sons [and daughters] of Zion, weighed against fine gold, how they are regarded as earthen jars, the work of a potter’s hands!” (Lamentations 4:1 – 2). 

As Jeremiah surveyed the destruction of his beloved Jerusalem, the gold appeared as earthen rubble, but the prophet knew that he was really looking at gold. Theo knew that he was seeing gold in Golden; he was experiencing a golden year with golden people in a city named Golden, why even the leaves dropping from the trees were golden. Furthermore, out of the suffering and pain of the people around him, indeed out of his own pain and suffering, life and hope and love sprouted, grew, and bore healing fruit; fruit to be shared with others. 

I am challenged not only to see the Face of God in others, but also to desire that I present the Face of God to others. Aren’t we called to say with Jesus, “He who has seen me has seen the Father?” Aren’t we called to be conformed to the very image of the Firstborn Son (Romans 8:29)?

If we are indeed the Body of Christ, then shouldn’t those who see us see the Face of Christ? Ought we not to be collectively portraying the Face of Jesus Christ? Ought we not as individuals, by God’s grace, to be seeing others through the eyes of Jesus? Ought not our hearts to be beating as Jesus’s heart? 

As much joy as I find in Theo of Golden, I must say that I also find much challenge and godly conviction. 

The New Jerusalem seems to be primarily made of gold, holy and pure and transparent gold. Perhaps Golden is a pathway that leads to that eternal city, perhaps Golden is a reflection of that City as it unveils itself in our lives, on this earth. There are precious stones in the New Jerusalem, there are precious lives in Golden. 

We all have our own Goldens, and there are precious lives in them. We all have our own Promenades, with their communities, with their disparate people. 

Wherever we are, our Father has placed us there. Shall we find our fountains, shall we find our benches, shall we drink from our chalices, and shall we be Jesus to others? 

O yes, and will we allow others to be Jesus to us? 

Theo of Golden - Reflections (4)

 

Yesterday evening Vickie and I were reading about Clarise, and while we meet her well into the book, I want to write about her while a memory associated with her is fresh.

The coffee shop which displays the portraits that Theo purchases and presents is The Chalice. It is located at the corner of Broadway and Light streets and is owned by Shep and Addie Carlile. There is much in the previous two sentences.

We all have our Chalices, we all have people in our lives whom our Father has placed for us to “see” by His grace. Why, we may very well see folks who have never been noticed by anyone, never really been spoken to by anyone, never prayed for by anyone, never cared for any anyone. Our neighborhoods, workplaces, families, schools, civic associations – they are all chalices. They are cups which our dear Lord Jesus has given to us to drink, He is the barista, and He chooses the drink of the day. Will we sacramentally accept and honor those whom He presents to us?

What else do you see in the Chalice? 

Now to Clarise…and Cleave. 

When I was a young man, I was employed by a national homebuilder in a project office in Waldorf, MD. We were building 5 or 6 subdivisions in the area and I worked with a great group of people. My boss Dave was one of the best ever, he was considerate, hardworking, kind, loyal, and knew what he was doing. He was a great teacher. My job was a bit of everything, purchasing, estimating, troubleshooting, budgeting, cost accounting, and playing practical jokes. It was a wonderful work environment. 

A time came when we needed to recruit a project bookkeeper so that I could focus on other areas. After a few interviews we hired Brenda. 

While Brenda had once been in the workplace, at the time we met her she was a stay-at-home wife and Mom and had not worked for about ten years; she was about 35 years old. Like Clarise, she was attractive; also like Clarise, there was pain in her eyes. 

When Brenda began working with us she was tentative about everything she did and she seldom spoke except to ask and answer questions. However, as time went on she opened up, enjoying her new surroundings and coworkers. She freely engaged in conversations, she laughed, she learned, and she was quite good at her job. She smiled a lot, she relaxed; she worked hard, and she loved her job. Brenda had a bright future with our company.

However, one morning about five months into her time with us, Brenda came into the office crying. Her husband demanded that she quit her job and stay home. It seems that Brenda’s newfound joy and confidence was a threat to her husband’s control of her, and a threat to his own sense of security.

The crushed flower that had opened, had been crushed again.

That was 45 years ago and I can still picture those five months, I can still picture Brenda’s evolving joy, and I can still see her sorrow and fear as she resigned. 

When I was reading to Vickie about Clarise and Cleave, images of Brenda came flooding into my heart and mind, and while I have told the story to Vickie before, I referenced it again.

This was not the last time I met Brenda, in the sense of meeting people in similar situations. There are women and men and children all around us who have been crushed by others, controlled by others, and who know what it is to have the millstone of circumstance grind hope and joy and peace from seemingly every pore of their soul. 

But consider the passage that Jesus reads in His home synagogue:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord” (Luke 4:18 – 19). 

This passage so infuriated Jesus’ audience that they tired to murder Him. 

It seems to me that there are those who desire to control others, and those who want to see others set free. The former often cloak their motives and actions in noble sentiments, such as, “I want what is best for you. I don’t want you to be hurt. I just want you to learn.” However, it is really about control, about controlling people and situations and about being the center of the universe. 

I have seen this in marriages (much of my marriage counseling has dealt with this), in extended families, in congregations and church leadership (in which emotional blackmail and tyrannical control is not unusual), in businesses, and in civic and political groups (I know, you are thinking, “You can’t be serious”).

In short, an element of fallen humanity is our insistence on controlling others.

Yet, we have the choice to stand with Jesus and, by His grace, seek to set others free. We have opportunities to play the role of Theo of Golden in the lives of others, affirming them, acknowledging their pain, sharing the love of their heavenly Father with them, and calling them home to Him, which is where they belong, which is where they have always belonged. 

“I will proclaim Your Name to My brethren” (Hebrews 2:12).

May I gently suggest that if we are honest, that most of us have likely played both roles in the lives of others, we know what it is to attempt to control others, and we also (hopefully) know the joy of seeing others set free. We can learn and grow from both experiences, let us not waste either of them. Jesus can redeem our foolish attempts at control, He can teach us from our errors, and we can learn to serve and care and love…perhaps as we’ve never thought possible. 

 In closing this reflection, has it occurred to you that every portrait by Asher Glissen is also a portrait by Allen Levi?

You may purchase Theo of Golden from Amazon or from www.allenlevi.com

Who can we share freedom with today? (Galatians 5:1).

Theo of Golden - Reflections (3a)

 Good morning,

I received a note from a reader in response to my recent post on Theo, in which he said that he needed to "fix" some things in his life; he was particularly referring to relationships. 

After pondering his note for a day or so this is what I wrote back:

If you and I were to take a walk of a thousand miles, and rehearse our lives in conversation along the way, at the end of our journey would we have found anything in either life that we had truly "fixed"?

Much love,

Bob

Theo of Golden - Reflections (3)

 Theo of Golden – Reflections (3)

Why did Theo wait so long to come to Golden? What was he thinking with each advancing year as the pages of the calendar turned from December to January?

We have three wall calendars in our home. One is in our office, this could be any theme, this year it is one mailed to all residents by our local chamber of commerce. Another, in our eat-in kitchen area, has songbirds on it this year. I always give Vickie a calendar for Christmas, last year had beach scenes, the year before that folk art, this year songbirds. The third is a perpetual calendar, made of wood. Every month you rotate the numbered blocks and so it goes from year to year. There are special blocks with painted images for holidays – Labor Day shows a pregnant woman. 

Every January I wonder if my date of death is written with invisible ink on the calendars. Like many of us, I have lost friends and loved ones before their time – or before what I think should have been their time. Vickie writes dates of passing on the calendar, May is a crowded month.  I don’t wonder about my date of death morbidly, I look forward to being in the greater Presence of Jesus and to being with friends, family, and our puppies. After all, we are seeking that City whose Builder and Maker is God.

I tell people that I am in stoppage time. That is a term for the time a soccer (football to the rest of the world) match is extended to account for time during regulation in which play was stopped for one reason or another. I sure would like to score a goal or two during stoppage time or perhaps make a nice defensive play. 

Theo waited a long time before coming to Golden; we also know from the story that Theo was looking forward to heaven, something Tony grappled with, for Tony had been to hell and couldn’t imagine anything but hell. 

What did it take for Theo to finally travel to Golden? What was happening within Theo?

I don’t know and I won’t conjecture right now because I don’t want to give elements of the story away. However, I will ask if there are relationships and questions and matters in our own lives that are unresolved. If so, how long will we wait to seek resolution? Theo was pushing the limit at 86 years old, that is serious stoppage time. 

One of the most saintly women I have known, Elizabth Furlong, when she was in her 80s said to me, “When I look back, I could have done better. I could have treated people better. I could have done more for others.” The important thing about Elizabeth at this time was that she was most certainly being a blessing to others, including as a ministry companion to me, her younger pastor, as I made home visits and engaged in office counseling. 

I can say what Elizabeth said, I could have done better, many times in many ways. It is not a comfortable realization. Having acknowledged it, what shall I do? Hopefully I can respond to the grace of Jesus every day when I meet others, whether it is for a brief moment or in an extended conversation, affirming God’s love for them and His desire for an intimate relationship with them. 

Are there things within me that need to be put to death through the Cross of Christ? Are there things in me that ought to be transformed into the image of Jesus Christ? Old age is not the time to coast, but to keep the finish line in sight and run the race God has given to us. 

The grace and affirmation that Theo was pouring into others flowed from a dual awareness within Theo; one was a sense of God’s blessing and mercy over the course of a long life; the other was a sense of missed opportunity, a sense of what might have been, a sense of misplaced values. (I’ll not be more specific than this right now.)

What can we do with these conflicting thoughts and emotions but give them to Jesus and trust Him to redeem our ups and downs, to cover and forgive our sins, and to give us grace to be a blessing to others? Nothing we have done has ever surprised Him. 

Theo blessed others out of his joy, his pain, and his bittersweetness. We see that his joy in music and art allowed him to connect with others, encouraging them, sharing the joy of artistic creativity. He drew from his joy in creation, in birds, rivers, sunsets, trees, in blessing others. From his pain and sorrow he connected with Kendrick, Tony, and Ellen. And from his bittersweetness a bond was formed with Asher. 

Are we allowing our kind heavenly Father to take our life experience and use it as a source for blessing others? In 2 Corinthians Chapter One Paul writes about a terrible time of suffering he and his friends experienced, he says that it was like a death sentence. But then he also says that the comfort they received from God during that time enabled them in turn to comfort others. I express it this way, “Our pain, for others gain, to Christ’s glory.”

We see this in Theo.

We are never too young or too old to live this way. We who are older, however, have a special opportunity to do so, our stoppage time can be our golden time. 

Let me please say a word about “resolution.” Not all difficulties can be resolved, not all loose ends can be tied up, not all wrongs can be made right. Theo learned this in a certain letter he once received, if he didn’t already know it. However, later in life Theo did what he could, and much more, much more by God’s grace. What Theo may have thought was his one mission, turned into something so much more. A grain of wheat, dying the ground, can bring forth quite the harvest. 

What can we do with those things that cannot be resolved? I think we must give them to our dear Lord Jesus and trust Him to work redemptively in our lives and in the lives of others – including those whom we have hurt, and who may have hurt us. What else can we do? 

Beyond that, we can be good stewards of our experiences, the good and the bad, the joyful and the terrible, asking our Father to use them in us and through us for the blessing of others. Why waste such experiences? They could not have come into our lives had they not passed through the hand of our Father; let us trust Him to use them to bless others, so that others may see His Face in us and through us. 

Let me please close with an example. I have a friend my age whose father was an alcoholic. When his Dad was sober he was outgoing and personable, but when he was drunk he was vindictive and mean, often beating my friend’s mother. My friend’s childhood was filled with uncertainty, sometimes terror, and fear. As my friend grew to adulthood his relationship with his father was complicated, and within my friend was an element of loathing and disgust for his Dad. 

Then one day God spoke to my friend’s heart and asked my friend if he was willing to allow God to use the pain within him to touch others, to be gracious to others, to bless others. At the same time my friend wondered what it was like for his father to live the way he had, it could not be a good experience, it must be miserable. In Christ, my friend learned to use his pain, for others gain, to Christ’s glory. 

This was not to excuse the father’s behavior, but it was to cast it in a different perspective, it was to introduce the element of redemption into a story of total despair. In this particular instance, a time came when my friend and his father had a sweet relationship, and toward the end of the father’s life he came to know Jesus…so we never know…we never really know how the story will end. 

Why…our stories may be like Theo’s…they may just keep going. 

Theo of Golden - Reflections (2)

 

I am encouraged that Theo is 86 years old. It isn’t often that the center of a story is an old man or old woman, especially one who still has his or her faculties and who is engaged in a meaningful endeavor. As someone who is not that far behind Theo, Theo says to me, “It is never too late to make a difference in the lives of others.”

When I was pastoring, one of the decisions I made early on was to treat older people with respect by not letting them off the discipleship hook. In other words, I challenged them with following Jesus, sitting on the bench and growing moral and spiritual fungi was not an option. It disgusts me when churches have “programming” for seniors that solely consists of playing games, going to buffets, and attending estate planning seminars. (If they really want to have relevant programming, why not have someone come and clip our toenails?)

Theo does not wait for life to come to him, Theo pursues life. Furthermore, it is not so much about what Theo does, it is really about who Theo is. What Theo does is a result of who Theo is. 

Theo pays attention to people. He looks deeply into the portraits at the Chalice coffee shop; the eyes, always the eyes, then the fuller face, but always coming back to the eyes. Asher’s gift of capturing the eyes, and Theo’s gift of connecting with those eyes…a fruit of Allen Levi’s masterful brush. Asher sketches and paints with pencil and brush, Allen Levi paints with words.

Theo does more than pay attention to others, he acknowledges others, but he more than acknowledges others, he affirms others – he sees things in others that they do not see in themselves, and he helps them consider the possibility that they have treasures within themselves to give to others. In other words, as Theo affirms others they are given the opportunity to share their treasures with others, to be more open to others, to pass on to others what Theo is passing on to them. 

Theo presents the idea of sainthood to people of all walks of life and backgrounds, to men and women who have known suffering, hurt, disappointment, and despair; but who also have dreams and visions and desires, as latent and forlorn as they might be. 

Theo says, “Do you see what I see? Do you see who you really are?”

I think this is the Gospel. We’re told that Jesus came to declare the Name of the Father to us, His brothers and sisters. Our Father’s Name speaks to us of His Nature, His desire to draw us to Himself in love through our Lord Jesus (Hebrews 2:9 – 18).  For some reason we fight this. I know that when I pastored that many folks would much rather I treat them as miserable wretches than as the sons and daughters of God. Even though the New Testament uses the term “saints” more than any other word to refer to followers of Jesus, people fight that image – even when we make it clear that this is about us being in Jesus Christ and not in ourselves (2 Corinthians 5:14 – 21). 

Theo says, “Let me tell you what I see in your portrait. Now you look at it. Do you see what I see?”

The story goes that many sculptors rejected the block of marble that would become Michelangelo’s David, it had too many flaws. Aren’t we thankful that Michelangelo saw David within David? Aren’t we thankful that Jesus sees the image of God deep within us? Weren’t those folks who sat for a few minutes on a bench with Theo thankful for a new way of seeing themselves, of seeing who they really were? 

It is of course a process, but the process must begin somewhere, and in Theo of Golden it begins for many on a bench with an old man with a foreign accent and with a portrait which the old man had paid a price to give to them. 

Since the name Theo is from the Greek word for God, can we see the incarnational nature of this old Portuguese man? Can we see the treasure in the earthen vessel? Can we see Theo living in and through Theo? 

Perhaps more importantly, how is God living in us and through us to touch and affirm the lives of others? For no matter how old we are, no matter where we live, we can always look into the eyes of others and ask, “Do you see what I see?”

Theo of Golden - Reflections (1)

 

Authorial Intent

A week or two ago I mentioned Theo of Golden, by Allen Levi. I am now reading it aloud to Vickie and it is not only working its magic upon her, but my own enjoyment increases with each page. There is something about reading aloud, and I think particularly reading aloud to another person. Tears, laughter, amazement, irony, character; it is like a 3-D viewer or movie. Plus, in my case, rereading gives me the added pleasure of seeing connections I didn’t see before and more deeply appreciating the author’s masterful tapestry. O yes, and reading to another person allows the reader to see and experience and share the wonder of the book, in this case Theo, with a friend, a spouse, a brother, or a sister.

One of my friends mentioned that at 399 pages it is a long book (I have my copy on Kindle). I love a journey. Beyond that, the story moves quickly and Mr. Levi is an artist who draws the reader into the story, the people, and the town of Golden. I can visualize myself sitting on a bench by the fountain, having a coffee and pastry, watching Theo engrossed in conversation on another bench, with a wrapped flat package across his thighs. 

I want to share some reflections on Theo of Golden, but, at least for now, I’m going to share them in such a way as not to give certain elements of the story away, for the spell of discovery permeates the book and I don’t want to deprive anyone of it, at least for now. 

Before I begin, I want to mention how I read this book. I covered this in my reflections on C. S. Lewis’s The Last Battle, but I think I should touch on it again, perhaps especially because, unlike Mr. Lewis, Mr. Levi is still very much alive and I wish him a long, fruitful, and joyous life. There is a tension in this subject, as there ought to be, I don’t purpose to relieve the tension, when we dissipate tension we lose energy. 

I begin with a statement intended to create attention and tension, “I don’t care what Allen Levi’s intent was when he wrote Theo of Golden.” In other words, I don’t care about authorial intent, at least as it is commonly understood. 

C. S. Lewis, Dorothy L. Sayers, Tolkien, and others maintained that a creator’s work should speak for itself, should stand on its own, be judged on its own. They scoffed at the obsession that authorial intent was critical to interpreting a text, as they did with other forms of textual criticism. 

For example, based on textual methodology employed by “scholars” in their time and in ours, Lewis could not have been the author of the Narniad, Miracles, The Discarded Image, Till We Have Faces, Mere Christianity, An Experiment in Criticism, and Out of the Silent Planet. He might have been the author of one or two of these, but he could not have been the author of them all because their genres are so different and their vocabularies so diverse. 

Tolkien wondered at the attempt of critics to read autobiographical and political statements into The Lord of the Rings. Sayers had no patience with people who wanted details of her personal life so they could better understand her writings, nor did she suffer those who did not understand the difference between her mystery writing, her plays, her theological writing, and her academic writing.

There are times when the work is greater than its creator. There is, I think, only one exception to this, and that is with the True and Living God, He is always above His work, yet He remains in His work, and we see Him through His work – whatever that might mean. For those of us created in His image, we don’t know about our work, we create what we create by His grace. I suppose the best we can say is that whatever we create flows from jars of clay, fractured in many ways, some flaws obvious, some not so obvious. The Maker’s mark is what matters.  

Lewis, Sayers, and others have insisted, “Let the work speak for itself. Judge the work not the creator, the author, the artist.”

Authors don’t always know what they write, though sometimes they’d better know, such as lawyers and judges and medical people, and this reminds us that we had better know what genre we are writing within and what genre we are reading – though there are times, and I think Theo is one of these, that we may not exactly know what genre is touching us. (Theo has led me to use the term, sacramental writing.) And yes, if you receive a letter from an attorney or physician you had better be sure you know the author’s intent!

Creative writing, and I think this encompasses more than we are aware of, has a life of its own well after it leaves the author’s hands. It has been said that Philip Schaff’s History of the Christian Church has a soul. I agree with this description, and thankful I am since it is 8 volumes. Bruce Catton’s 3 volume Army of the Potomac is written in such a sympathetic and poetic voice that after 50 some years I still enjoy its passages and often play them in my head. This is to say that we can experience creative writing in both fiction and nonfiction. Apart from technical and legal (maybe?) and medical writing, it is probably fair to say that there is fiction in nonfiction and nonfiction in fiction – but of course those are not genres as much as broad categories that are primarily useful in organizing libraries. 

The reason I don’t care about Mr. Levi’s intent in writing Theo of Golden, or in why he developed the characters, connections, and challenges, is that I want to experience the story directly, I want the story to capture me, to draw me into it, and to let me participate in it. Yes, it has already done this, but it continues to do so and I don’t want to lose the charm, the challenge, the magic or the mystery. 

Perhaps at some point I will watch or listen or read what Allen Levi says about writing Theo, but not now.

On the other hand, I do care about his intent! I care about whether I can trust Mr. Levi, but once I’ve established that I can trust him I move on from there, I leave the question of intent behind. I very much trust Allen Levi…and so now I can dispense with intent. 

I’ll try to explain. A few years ago there was a bestseller on Christian and non-Christian book lists, it was number 1 and people were raving about it. I was pastoring at the time, and for not the first time I read a book because “everyone” else was reading it. It did not take me long into the book to realize that I could not trust the author or his story, I realized he had an agenda that was inimical to the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ. The story used Christian words and symbols and purported to portray God, but it was a spider’s web of deceit coated with honey, poisoned cotton candy. 

Not for the first time did I disappoint parishioners and colleagues by not going along with popular thinking.

I can enjoy and savor Theo because I trust both Theo and Allen.