I wrote a blog about the postponement of the Popple Ridge Picker Concert at the All Faiths’ Chapel because of the snow. The blog came off kind of funky and I don’t know why. Postponing something is never fun and always difficult and there are a lot of internal calculations that take place. When will the snow stop? What if it gets worse while the concert is going on and people can’t leave? What if the snow stops about the time we postpone? Can we get the word to everyone? All the preparation and work involved and all the work in setting this up and now we have to get ready all over again.
The concept is an interesting one – postponement, delay and how it works. Man proposes and God disposes is axiomatic but just because it is axiomatic does not mean we have to like it. Luther talks about planning and working in terms of Psalm 127 – “Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. 2 It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.” Luther comes to the conclusion that our job is to do the best we can – what ever our hands finds to do, do. He says that we are to prepare and work “as if God did not exist” and yet never rely on our work but on God’s care. We are not to seek to control or master what things or relations will be in the future. Luther states these things because of a particular way of translating this passage. Luther says that the translation “for He gives His beloved sleep”, should be translated as “He gives to His beloved while they sleep”. Oswald Bayer has written that if we can get that concept through our heads we can really understand what it means to live by faith.
So now we well begin again to plan for the Popple Ridge Picker Concert at the All Faiths’ Chapel. Whatever our hands find to do we will do. At the same time we trust that God will guide and lead and disclose working possibilities. Thanks to all who worked so hard to prepare for the concert we had to postpone and the rest of you get ready to come and join us.
