Henri meets Forrest

My time with the church yesterday could almost be characterized as Henri Nouwen meets Forrest Gump.

My chosen scripture was Psalm 30 where my focus was on the idea of how the psalmist has gone down into the pit but has been transformed from “mourning” (King James Version) into “dancing” and “joy”.   It seemed to me that part of the message was that the psalmist had been transformed by his own acknowledgement of "mourning" that he could help others with their own transformations.  

My approach was to talk to an element of the human condition, spiritual brokenness, and see how Nouwen and Gump simultaneously speak to us.

The chosen Gump scene was Jennie and Forrest encountering her home where she was exploited and abused by a father who knew no boundaries.  As she sees the house she remembers and in anger confronts her demons and starts to throw rocks at the house, and eventually she runs out of rocks.  Forrest as narrator tells us that sometimes “there just aren’t enough rocks.” 

My big idea was that at times we are all Forrests (healers) and we are all all Jennies (the wounded).  Nouwen calls us “wounded healers” and he posits the idea that it is from our woundedness that makes us better healers.

Nouwen writes:  What we see, and like to see, is cure and change. But what we do not see and do not want to see is care: the participation in the pain, the solidarity in the suffering, the sharing in the experience of brokenness. And still, cure without care is as dehumanizing as a gift given with a cold heart.

The issue is in part the seeing.  It is in the seeing, through our own life experiences, that we become healers. 

Forrest is a simple soul.  He operates off wisdom like proverbs, i.e. “stupid is as stupid does” and “life is like a box full of chocolates.”  Our spiritual maturity often pulls us from this world of “do this and that will happen” simplicity into the more Job-like world where we don’t understand why we suffer. 

Our journeys requires both:  simplicity in conversation with complexity.  Forrest Gump meets Henri Nouwen.  Forrest throughout the movie is an unapologetic care provider:  to his mother, to Bubba, to Lieutenant Dan, to Jennie and finally to little Forrest.  He lives a complex, care-providing life framed in a vision of simplicity.  This isn’t a simple story.  But he helps people move from despair to a joy where they can metaphorically dance. 

Forrest is an instrument of God’s Grace.  He is touching people, Jesus-like.  Don Bubna writes:  Jesus didn't have to touch lepers. He could have been just as effective from a hundred yards away. But he touched them.   

We are all called to be Forrests:  touching care providers.

We are all called to be Jennies:  prepared to be touched by others when it is necessary for our healing. Letting others touch us in love requires letting our boundaries down, maybe just a little., maybe a whole lot.  

Sometimes, as healers we are asked to be a quiet presence when those who are compelled to throw stones at old memories just need someone to hold them in love, at least until they decide that there aren't enough stones in order to make them whole.  I wonder if that isn't moving from mourning to dancing?  

Selah.