Thursday, December 11, 2014

What is a preacher to do when he cannot preach?

"It was impossible for me to say to others: speak louder; shout! for I am deaf. Ah! was it possible for me to proclaim a deficiency in that one sense which in my case ought to have been more perfect than in all others, which I had once possessed in greatest perfection, to a degree of perfection, indeed, which few of my profession have ever enjoyed?"
Ludwig von Beethoven, Heiligenstadt Testament, 1802

I cannot speak.

Now, that is not entirely accurate; I have not been struck dumb or rendered mute. There was this pain in my neck, which turned out to be not just some colorful metaphor, but a degenerating disc, serious enough to require Fusion Surgery, which is almost as painful to contemplate as Fusion Cuisine.

Southwestern Eggrolls? REALLY?
How is that even a thing?

During such a procedure, it is necessary to move all one's neck goodies - windpipe, esophagus, and whatnot - out of the way so they can remove the disc, insert the zombie bone, screw a plate to the whole thing and call it a day. But in my case, when they put it all back, one vocal cord didn't work. So now my voice is a ragged, breathy whisper; think Kathleen Turner in Body Heat, only...

Actually, scratch that. Thank about that screaming goat, only not screaming.

Yeah that's much better.

I guess they told me this might happen; I seem to recall one of the interns reciting something that sounded like the end of a Viagra ad - something about a possible side effect being death, and so on. Nonetheless, I was really unprepared for my surgeon to say, 'Yeah, that happens some times,' as he discharged me.

After a week with no change, it was off to the ENT. "It's a stretched nerve," Dr. Treebeard says. "Wait a month or two," he says. "It could take six months - maybe a year," he says. "It may never come back," he says.



"You've got to be kidding me," I say. Only I don't, because I cannot speak.

Get it? Kidding? KID? Goat?       
 I still crack myself up. 

It has been more than three weeks now, and still my voice is a ragged breathy whisper - a voice wholly unsuitable to the things I do best: preaching, teaching, pontificating, prevaricating, guffawing, bellowing. 

I am bereft.

Being a theologically minded person, I have reviewed several subscription options, many of which are offered by well meaning friends and acquaintances.

First, there are the arguments based somehow on the will of the Almighty:

This is part of God's inscrutable plan.



God has done this to punish my many and varied sins.

And, behold, thou shalt be dumb, and not able to speak,
until the day that these things shall be performed,
because thou believest not my words,
which shall be fulfilled in their season. Luke 1

God has done this for no reason, or out of spite.



For the record, I don't buy any of these.


Then there are what are technically referred to the $#@! Happens arguments:

There is no God. Random chance has simply caught up with me.


We are here because one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform into legs for terrestrial creatures; because the earth never froze entirely during an ice age; because a small and tenuous species, arising in Africa a quarter of a million years ago, has managed, so far, to survive by hook and by crook. We may yearn for a ‘higher answer’– but none exists.  

Stephen Jay Gould, famous scientist and dead person

        
It's Karma.


        
The world is just...broken.



Our sin broke the world. God cares, but can't do anything about it.



In the end, I prefer to believe our sin broke the world, 
but God is right here, with us, in the midst of the brokenness, 
putting it back together through us.

The Incarnation is the ultimate reason why the service of God 
cannot be divorced from the service of man. 
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Theologian and generally heroic guy


Through you.

What is a preacher to do when he cannot preach? I don't know, and frankly, that scares me. There are a lot of practical concerns, about how I go about doing my job when I can't do my job - and I'm more scared every day. But your warm thoughts and prayers, your love and support show me every day that I am not alone. And that's something.