Currents of Faith: Open and Unfolding Reflections

Adrienne and I were driving home from an early September visit with our daughter in Seattle. Two mountain passes separate Seattle and Wenatchee and we had crossed Snoqualmie Pass and were approaching the ascent to Blewett Pass. It was early evening and darkness was setting in. The brightness of the headlights of several cars coming  toward us limited my vision. As the last car went by I noticed movement ahead, some vague figures on the highway. I quickly pumped the brakes, slowing from the speed limit I had been traveling. There loomed in front of us a herd of elk crossing the road. I cried out, “Oh, God,” clenched the steering wheel and jammed the brakes even more forcefully. The tires squealed as we were thrust forward in our seat belts. I could not stop in time. The huge animals were as shocked as we, suddenly startled and blinded by our oncoming headlights.

There was no open space. Elk once moving slowly, now in a panic state, filled the entire roadway. I braced for a collision and hoped that we would not be badly injured. I knew that our car would be damaged, probably totaled. I was trapped! Turning a hard right off the highway to the downward side would send us flying, continuing forward would throw us into the midst of a mass of large bodies any one of which was capable of destroying our car. I kept pumping the brakes, searching for a next move. I swerved and straddled  the yellow center line. There was not enough room for our car, but at least there was a small space between two elk. I do not know what guided my arms as I moved swerving one way then banking the other, all the while the squealing sound of the brakes roared in my ears.

I experienced a kaleidoscope of frightened dark figures twisting, turning, lurching, the yellow line before us and tall evergreen trees rushing by on either side. I clenched my teeth, tightened my muscles and braced myself for the collision. No crunch! No crash! No elk flying through our windshield! Unbelievable! Somehow we passed through untouched!

I wrestled with the car for a long distance as it recovered from the sudden braking, swerving from one side of the road to the other, listing and rocking one way then the other. I flashed on the thought that though miraculously missing the elk, ironically we might now careen off the road into the forest. Finally, I brought the car back under control, pulled over, stopped and turned off the ignition. The acrid smell of burned rubber and steel on steel surrounded us. Only now could we move from numbness into fully feeling our racing hearts and our clenched tightened muscles. We sat, unable to move, shocked and drained. Next came disbelief, followed by grateful relief.

A car which had been following us, pulled up behind us and stopped. A young man came to my window and asked, “Are you all right?” We all agreed that it was a miracle that he had not slammed into the back of us as we careened and swerved into what we thought was certain disaster. He may as well have been an angel for we felt blessed by his concern—our second blessing!

We heartily thanked him and gingerly stepped out of the car, looking back to see emptiness where moments before there was a catastrophe in the making. Not a single large figure could be seen. From a cacophony of sound and movement, the evening was now still and calm. As we were able to think and talk, we reasoned that one elk must have instinctively reared back while another lunged forward, leaving us the blessed passage. We could see no injured animal on or near the highway. We were safe, the animals were safe, our car was safe.

I recall this event with relief and thankfulness. Our experience was compounded by recalling in the summer large stains of blood on Interstate 90 marking where an elk herd was smashed by swiftly traveling vehicles. We were painfully aware of several people from Wenatchee who had been severely injured or killed on the passes by a collision with a deer, a much smaller animal. It led to a profound decision. We will take care to avoid travel on the mountain passes after dark whenever possible. Our second decision was to not tell Adrienne’s mother, as she already worried each time we travel the two passes.

Could I have known in advance what would happen on Blewett Pass that September evening? Could I have known my own future moments? I think not. That would be to know something which did not yet exist. The past exists, the future is possibility. If I had been asked before the trip what I thought would be the highlights, I would simply refer to my thirty-eight year history of driving over the passes. I would assume that the trip would be a pleasant time to see the beautiful mountain sights of evening, to easily maneuver the well known curves on the highway and to talk quietly with Adrienne. I would rely on my past experiences to imagine a probable future.

In fact, what did I know? As I drove I knew the familiar sights and my usual bodily feelings of a driver as they unfolded. The primary quality of those creative events was  “sameness,” experiencing what I had seen and felt many times before. The Bobs I created were routine. When I saw the oncoming headlights it was a cue to dim my own, a frequent and familiar action. I knew by our surroundings that we were about an hour from home. That is all I knew up to this point. That is all that existed.

Seeing the movement and vague figures ahead brought new circumstances in which I was required to create myself in radically new ways. No longer was it familiarity and sameness, but now alarm and alertness. The word circumstances became literal; elk were standing or slowly walking. I could have known none of this before, as they did not yet exist for me. Likewise, if we had not been present, the elk would have had, like us, an uneventful and familiar crossing of the highway that evening. In each of those rapidly passing seconds, I knew only a limited amount, that which I could see, hear and feel. No more.

I knew only the events which had been completed and the possibilities emerging in my awareness. I was required to urgently and rapidly create myself as driver facing a crisis in those fleeting moments, braking, shifting directions, straining to see and swerving again. Each of those emerging Bobs was created by my extremely limited awareness of rapidly changing circumstances. Split-second decisions and raw instinctive moves were punctuated by images of a mangled car, two badly injured people, bleeding and dying elk sprawled on the highway, an iron jaw removing our car door, and emergency personnel placing us on gurneys and wheeling us to the waiting ambulance.

Each of my tiny centers of creativity is composed of relationships. There were a number of relationships converging within me which contributed to the creation of this flow of events: “I,” my past as a driver, the herd of elk, the dryness of the highway, the absence of any oncoming traffic, the driver following us, the condition of our car, the darkness surrounding us, and God’s ever-encircling possibilities. Some contributed more than others, but all were present to influence each new creation.

The theological vision which I embrace proposes that a future event is not known until that event has been created. Before that creation, future is possibility. The idea of “the future” is an abstraction, event is reality. I would not know about the dark figures until all the events of the oncoming headlights were completed. Nor, would I know what would happen when I reached the herd until all the events of arriving there had occurred, leaving uncertain whether I would crash into the elk, propelling a large animal through our windshield or pass through. I could not have known in advance the outcome of the car erratically swerving and rocking after passing through the herd of elk. The events of passing though had to happen before these new actions could occur.

“I dwell in possibility” writes Emily Dickinson. This quote, with an accompanying  flower in watercolor, resides in a frame hanging on the wall of our study. As I look in the other direction I see my special plaque, “Bidden or not Bidden God is Present” and a wood carving of St. Francis of Assisi beside his well-known  prayer, “Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace….” I include all of these icons and words in my chosen “council of wisdom,” those persons, words and actions I hope to emulate.
When considering the future, I look to the wisdom of Emily Dickinson.

I embrace the vision that future is possibility. At best, all futures are probabilities. There is no fixed known future. What happens in the future is the result of a multitude of centers of creativity composed of a number of committee members. Only after the committee decides will anything be fixed or known. Possibilities and influences from many sources converge to create an actuality.    

As I review my past I ask how well I could have known my own future. Did I know at age sixteen as I entered the school of pharmacy that I would graduate four years later in an entirely different major? Did I know when I completed college that I would next attend the University of New Mexico rather than Garrett Biblical Institute, where I had already been accepted? Did I know in Albuquerque late in the summer after completing my Master’s degree that I would attend Michigan State rather Ohio State where I had been admitted? Did I know early in the first year there that after a year of study I would leave the sociology department and walk down the hallway to the counseling and guidance department?

Did I know that I would enlist in the Marines as I began my visits to the other branches of the military? Did I know before I met with a number of employers at a national conference that I would choose a counseling center position with Washington State, not the University of Nevada or the University of Texas? Did I know as I began my faculty career at Washington State that after four years I would once again decide to enter a theological school? No, No. No, No, I did not! I did not know my own future. I was unable to predict my future. My future depended on events which were yet to be created. I am convinced that no one else knew, not even God. “Whoa! Hold On! Just one minute here!” some would say. My conviction would be soundly rejected by those who vision an omniscient God who knows alpha to omega. God would know a fixed future which already exists.

My theological vision contrasts with a long train of deeply held beliefs which wends its way through many centuries in classical Christianity and Western culture. This is a vision of an all knowing God who knows past, present and future. Our everyday language reflects this vision: “God only knows,” or “We’ll be there, God willing.” A popular song in my youth also reflects the vision: “Till the end of time….” Cartoons show the bearded disheveled man carrying the sign, “The End is Near.” This vision asserts that there is a known future so that we can know with certainty that given events will occur. In some belief systems the actual time of God’s mighty actions is also known. God is in control of the future. Simply stated, God knows the final score of the game before it is over.

I am very aware that this notion of future as possibility flies in the face of these many cherished beliefs, including the apocalypse, armageddon, judgment day, the end of time, the second coming, and prophecy of the future. I have rejected those beliefs and say rather, perhaps this could be our future, one of many possibilities.

Scripture does not speak with one voice about the future. In some passages, people bargain with God, on the other hand people consider that God has set the future. A known future under God’s control began in the Hebrew Bible, which we have named the Old Testament. The apocalyptic passages of Daniel and Revelation speak with great conviction of God’s coming acts which will right many wrongs. Prophets in early Israel have been portrayed as predicting the distant future, although today most scholars see them as speaking only to their own times. The Revelation of John, the final book in the New Testament, continues the apocalyptic tradition with a glorious drama in which God judges the nations with righteousness and wipes away every tear of the saints. Even Jesus is portrayed as predicting mighty acts of God in The Little Apocalypse of Mark 13.

Nostradamus, Michel de Notre Dame, sells well today. The predictions of this 16th century astrologer and physician in his 1558 publication, Centuries, remain popular. He must have been a truly charismatic figure who understood the deep interest people have in knowing the future. In the 1970s the writings of Hal Lindsey gained a similar popularity as he described the future in The Late Great Planet Earth. In more recent years the Left Behind series of Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins describes in the genre of popular novels the rapture which dramatically takes the holy into the sky, leaving the unholy behind on earth.

Jerry Falwell describes the rapture vividly in Nuclear War and the Second Coming of Christ. The fixed future is described in detail: “You’ll be riding along in an automobile. You’ll be the driver perhaps. You’re a Christian. There’ll be several people in the automobile with you, maybe someone who is not a Christian. When the trumpet sounds you and the other born-again believers in that automobile will be instantly caught away—you will disappear, leaving behind only your clothes and physical things that cannot inherit eternal life. That unsaved person or persons in the automobile will suddenly be startled to find the car suddenly somewhere crashes.”

In the secular arena Jean Dixon, using astrology, wrote a syndicated column for many years in newspapers, giving clues to our future based on our astrological sign. Conferences designed to predict the major trends of the future have concluded with mixed results, often making serious mistakes because of not weighing the importance of  more obscure happenings.

In film, armageddon and apocalypse are popular topics today, as is travel to the Holy Land. I cringe when I hear of religious groups visiting Israel to promote the viewpoint that by inflaming the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis to a violent crescendo, armageddon will be ushered in. I cannot abide the idea that we should be wishing, hoping and praying for violence between two peoples so that God will bring about the end of the age and judgment day. . The opposite seems the loving thing to do!

While living at College House at Michigan State University, I recall a group which met  regularly to prepare for the end of the world, a cataclysm which was predicted within the next year. That year was 1955! I expect they were deeply disappointed and disillusioned when that day came and went as normally as most other days in East Lansing.
I can still recall all the dire predictions surrounding the millennium, 2000, none of which came to pass.

I am caught short in worship by the ritual of Holy Communion: “Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again.” I cannot honestly agree with that affirmation. I place it, as with so many other predictions of the future, as possibility. This may well be one of many possible futures which will occur.

I do bring my reasoning to bear on the vision that the future is a realm of possibilities. The image of a center of creativity requires this conclusion. If God and all other relationships composing this center of creativity are persuasive and influential, then there is no known future until that center creates itself. This is a logical outgrowth of seeing reality in this manner. Philosophers state that an adequate theory must meet the requirements of being consistent, coherent and relevant. If one takes these criteria seriously, there cannot be centers of creativity and also a fixed known future. The two are inconsistent. Those two pieces of the puzzle cannot be forced together.
 
I visualize a universe filled with bursts of creative energy, each contributing to the next moment of our existence. Not one of them knows in advance where their creativity will lead. They create from that which is given and the possibilities offered by God. The bursts are clearly more attractive to me than a fixed future that God has determined and knows and we do not know.

I am totally open to and respectful of those persons who have a sixth sense which allows them a special capacity to feel the “potentials” of the future. Some have this unique awareness and sensing of the events of the universe. From their deeper connections they feel the converging events and share the possibilities ahead. I would not be open to any statement which claimed that this awareness and sensing categorically will be the future. We never know what unusual new creative event may radically change what appears to be a nearly certain happening. I presume that many wagering on the outcome of the Kentucky Derby have had such surprises.

As I reflect on my own history I am totally amazed at how my own life has unfolded in ways I could never have imagined or predicted. I think of the Scaredy Cat ever believing that I would complete Marine boot camp, The Kid imagining that I would one day be addressed as Doctor, The Coward visualizing his future self as teacher, preacher and writer. Those transformations could only occur through the process of one event following another, one self emerging and offering the possibility of another self. Isaac Newton said, “I stand on the shoulders of giants.” Only when those shoulders were created in earlier stages of my life could I then begin to stand at a new height.

With Emily Dickinson, I dwell in possibility!

This is the ending of the major subject which I called, “Making Sense of Me” and the beginning of another section, “Informing My Faith,” which focuses upon the ways in which the process vision has influenced my spirituality. I conclude this discussion of the center of creativity with a summary statement. It represents my reply when in February, 2003 I was asked, “What is process theology in twenty-five words or less?” My response later appeared in our book, Dancing with the Divine. Alas, my word count clearly shows that I failed, but came close as my answer is slightly over one page. All I can say is, let this be a lesson to those who are brash and naïve enough to pose the challenge of twenty-five words to a preacher!

PROCESS RELATIONAL THEOLOGY

Process theology proposes that we are made up of our relationships. We are related to everyone and everything: human, animal, vegetable and mineral. Take away our relationships and all that is left of us is a creative process.

We live our lives in events, one moment following another. Each of our events has significance. We affect all other events in the universe just as all other events, no matter how tiny or far away, affect us, sometimes slightly and sometimes greatly.

We are persons who create ourselves in each moment from the complex influences of our personal past, the world around us, the condition of our body, and the persuasion of God. The past pushes us, the present impinges upon us, and the future calls us. Within the limits of these pushes, walls, obstacles, gates, and persuasion, we have the freedom to create ourselves. We are free to repeat the familiar once again or risk something radically new.

God is a presence both within and beyond each of our events. God feels each event just as we do, suffering when we suffer, rejoicing when we rejoice. God knows us  more intimately and tenderly than our parents, siblings, spouse, or friends. Because of God’s depth of feeling with us in our past moment, God can whisper to us a realistic possibility of who we might become in our next moment. God’s dream for us is that we continually transform into more complex, intense, beautiful, and loving persons who  desire this transformation for all creation. The possibility, the call, the dream, the vision that enters our being from the divine is equally for us and for the common good.

Our calling is to co-create with God. We are lured to cooperate with God’s vision of a universe that is beautiful—richly complex, embracing wide diversity, intensity, love, and harmony. In each moment we are beckoned to live within a realm in which God is the poet of the universe, God is the fellow sufferer who understands, God is lover of all creatures great and small, and God is the one who invites us to “come, dance with me.”

For Christians, God is revealed to us through Jesus Christ. Jesus knew God in the intimate terms of “Abba,” “Dadda,” Jesus lived within and spoke of the realm of God, and Jesus invited others to join him in this kingdom of God.

Our lives have meaning and significance as we adventure with God, knowing that neither we as a person nor anything we do is ever lost. The drink of water that we give becomes a gift to the one who thirsts and to those who live beyond us in this world. That same gift is embraced tenderly in all its fullness in God’s own life everlastingly. Our memory may fade that we gave the gift, yet for God it is as fresh as the morning dew. Our deeds and we are gathered into the colorful quilt, the beauteous garden, the lovely symphony, which is the growing, deepening, enriching life of God.

This is the wondrous, mysterious, rich, awesome, unfathomable God toward which process relational theology can only point!

Living in Process: My 43 Years in Process Theology is an interactive eBook by Robert Brizee, Th.M., Ph.D.