In the summer of 1969, the summer of Neal Armstrong & walking on the moon, the
summer of Chappaquiddick, the summer of Woodstock, the summer of the breakup of
the Beatles (that won't matter to some but for some others of us it was
devastation), and the jungles of Vietnam were ablaze, that summer i was tucked
away in isolation in Basic Cadet Training (BCT = BEAST) at the US Air Force
Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado .... only the news of the Apollo landing
reached us .... we all watched it in our dorm common room (that we "doolies"
weren't allowed to use EVER -- this was special dispensation) and we all saw it
together, 40 or 50 of us cadets, as Neal Armstrong set foot on the moon & we all
cheered .... 20 Jul 69 .... but the other stuff, we didn't read papers, watch tv,
listen to the radio so we missed all that ....
The Academy was couched in a spectacular spectacular effluence of the beauty of
God's mountains and skies .... i cannot possibly describe it .... even in the
hardest moments of BCT i was still bathed in the overwhelming presence of both
of them, the mountains and the sky, backdropped behind the Academy buildings as
we ran or marched or even occasionally were still .... i remember doing pushups
looking at the peaks above, or running miles in formation in the dawn surrounded
by mountains just beginning to be visible as black shapes as light seeped over
them, and the brightest & clearest stars you've ever seen giving way gradually
to the dominion of the day ....
We lived three weeks in the field, away from the campus, one of them in
"survival training," (though it was hardly as rough as the regular troops get),
in the Pikes Peak forest, on top of the mountain range above the Academy, maybe
9 - 10,000 elevation .... we spent Monday - Saturday in the forest, "surviving,"
and hiking some 30 or so miles to our pickup point .... (since there were
several hundred of us out there in the woods at one time, in groups of 12, each
of us supervised by an upperclassmen, they weren't really taking any chances
that any of us would starve to death or get eaten by wolves, but i lost about 20
lbs in that week, so that should tell you something) .... i saw the stuff of the
dreams of my childhood on that hike, though, the mountains of the West, where
the Indians had run down their prey, and where mountain-men, cowboys &
cavalrymen had explored & settled & made it their own .... beaver dams,
mountain rivers, high mountain meadows, boulder-filled evergreen & white-barked
aspen forests ....
We were trucked into our location in groups of 12 & each given a "survival
packet" that supposedly a downed pilot would have, containing a few energy bars
and toothbrushes & toothpaste, and we were given a parachute & sleeping bags &
canteens & water purification tablets .... we camped in the same location for a
couple of days while we got some training, though i don't remember what they
trained us in .... then the third day we were given a live rabbit to kill & some
beef strips to make jerky out of .... somehow i got the job of killing the bunny
.... that's really not my thing, as i found out .... won't tell you how i did
it, but once it was done, i couldn't eat any of bunny, even though the rest of
the guys said it was great, and we were starting out on a 30 mile hike the next
day ....
Still, turned out i loved the jerky (i didn't have to kill that cow) and some of
the other guys didn't .... so i ended up trading toothpaste for jerky, toward
the end there ....
The last morning, at the end, the pickup point, all the hundreds of us converged
where they had set up fire pits & were grilling steaks .... i remember standing
in line with hundreds around just salivating for that steak, you could smell 'em
cooking long long before you got there .... i finally got up to the grill & they
slapped my steak, texas toast, & orange on a plate & handed it to me & i took
one bite and ....
Too rare ....
Ok, ok, i'm finicky .... yes, i'd been out on survival training for 6 days & had
had virtually nothing to eat, and & long since ceased fantasizing about things
young men that age frequently fantasize about & only dreamed of
double-cheeseburgers & fries from McDonald's, but, darnit, my steak was too
rare, & i just couldn't eat it ....
Unfortunately, in that particular circumstance, one cannot call the manager
over, nor return one's steak to the grillmaster .... one is stuck with what
steak one is given .... so i passed it on to someone who had no qualms
whatsoever about eating raw meat, kept the orange & the texas toast, and so
broke my "survival training fast" ....
I made up for it that night, however .... coincidental with the last day of our
survival training, there was a big rodeo that night in Colorado Springs .... it
must have been a pretty big deal, because Michael Landon, Little Joe Cartwright,
was riding in the parade as Grand Marshall .... our whole class went to the
rodeo that night, all 1400 of us .... the upperclassmen gave us strict orders,
for our own protection, to those of us who had spent the previous week in
survival training & whose stomachs were shrunk, to "not spend more than $2.00 on
food," (that was a lot more money in 1969) and as the children of Israel told
Moses, we all said, "All that thou hast spoken unto us we will do" ....
and we all though that was what we would do ....
until we got to the rodeo ....
There were no upperclassmen around, and there was cotton candy, hot dogs,
hamburgers, candy bars, popcorn, french fries and soft drinks .... all brought
by vendors walking through the bleachers shouting their products .... the
revenue generated that night from the 1400 cadets had to far exceed $2800 i
sure, because we were all food-deprived and we bought everything we saw .... i
don't remember much of the rodeo but i remember i ate everything any vendor came
down the aisle with and then we all spent the next few days in mortal fear we'd
be asked how much we'd spent at the rodeo and we were under the "honor code"
("we do not lie, cheat, or steal, nor tolerate among us anyone who does), which
is SERIOUS business at all the service academies, & we knew if we were asked if
we'd spent more than $2.00 at the rodeo against orders, we'd have to answer in
the affirmative .... (being caught in the least lie would get you kicked out)
....
That was the law side of things there .... but the grace side of things
culminated for me one particular night ....
We had been training in map-reading, and one day we were put in the field to put
our map-reading skills to use .... we were in groups of four .... each group was
given topographical maps of the area, compasses, and map coordinates of
particular locations in the area, which we were supposed to find merely by
map-reading (this was a wilderness area), go to each point we were supposed to
find, pick up the proof of our having found it, eventually finding our way back
after dark ....
It was another of those wondrous days .... my group made our way through the
forests and foothills with the high peaks of the eastern side of the Rockies
towering above us always .... we slowly found each map coordinate we were
supposed to find .... we rendezvoused with the larger group for lunch at midday,
brought on hottrucks from the Academy dining hall, and we all ate as much as
they would give us, and then back to our quest for the rest of the coordinates,
which had to be found by things like compass-headings & mountain formations &
creeks, etc. .... it seems somehow we found them all and it was getting to be
nightfall ....
The last portion of our hike took us to a clearing, and when we walked to the
edge of the clearing, we saw that we were on a high plateau above the back
portion of the residential section of the Academy grounds .... below us
cascading down the foothills and into a valley were the lights of the dwellings
of men, the laid out rows of the streets, the streetlights, the driveways, the
occasional cars moving slowly down the streets .... to the east above us and
beyond the range of the lights below lay the whole panorama of the western sky
and the vast infinity of space filled with sparkling white lights that seemed as
if they were blazing against the total blackness of the sky behind them ....
below that high view was the land stretching out equally as infinitely into
blackness and they merged together, sky & land, into that darkness ....
I stood & paused there, i think all of us were taken by it, because i'd never
been taken with such immensity before .... something so beyond me, something so
noticeable, something so "there" and we found ourselves with nothing to say
except "wow" or "God" or "Man, will you look at that?" ....
It was only a sky, it was only a landscape draped in the darkness of night ....
but no, it was more .... it was "wow", it was "God" (meant as an adjective, or
expletive), or "Man, will you look at that?" ....
In all this speaking of God being "us," we are safe in Him because it is always
with this panorama behind us .... we are ever overtaken by the immensity of the
Living God .... we cannot help but worship Him, night & day praising God in the
inner sanctuary of our being, ascribing inwardly to Him all honor and glory &
majesty & righteousness & holiness & joy & wisdom & Love .... we have been
billowed over by Him, Him WHO IS completely beyond, HE Who is above all that we
ask or think, HE WHO answers before we call, HE of whom we ask, "What manner of
man is this, that even the winds & the sea obey Him?", HE who asks us, when we
are the most forlorn and distraught & think we can go no further, "Will you also
leave me?" and we answer, "How can we, Lord, YOU have the words of eternal
life?" ....
Maybe we met Jesus by the side of the road while we were fishing or collecting
taxes or working at a gas station .... but whatever we were doing, He walked by
and turned & looked at us, and we couldn't help but get up from whatever it was
& walk on with Him .... we couldn't understand Him always, we weren't quite sure
HE was doing the most prudent thing always, and He seemed to say things that
really riled some pretty important people that we wish sometimes He hadn't said,
but we couldn't help ourselves, darnit, we found we loved Him no matter what
.... He had the words of eternal life .... somehow behind Him and in Him was the
infinity of the stars, the immensity of Being, the Reality of Life, and though
we often hadn't a clue as to what He was talking about, we found ourselves so
encompassed about with His Love that even if we tried to escape it because we
thought we weren't worthy of it, there were no outlets to be found and we were
hemmed in on all sides with a Love so BIG and a love so MAGNIFICENT and a love
so WONDROUS and a love so STEADFAST and a love so UPLIFTING & a love so
FORGIVING that as we steadily realized it we ceased being so much petrified
rabbits caught in the hunter's flashlight beams that we suspected it was, and
instead took off our garments and basked naked unashamedly in the Sunshine of
His Love because HE revealed Himself in us as ONLY LOVE, and nothing else ....
"We love Him, because He first loved us" .... he Loved us to awaken Love in us
.... the only reason He wants to be "loved back" is because for us to Love Him
in the Mystery of His Person, to live in perpetual thanksgivingness for the
gracious bounty of the Father, to tearfully wonder continuously at the immensity
of His Love, is His Love going full-circle, propagating Love, creating Love,
Love loving giving birth to love .... to Love God with all our heart & soul &
mind & strength is to see that He is ALL of that, He is the Only Love there is,
there is no other, and when we Love Him we are not loving with some "separate"
love that somehow exists outside Him, but joining in the subterranean love-flow
that is the foundation of the universe, which IS God manifesting Himself, that
we ourselves are mere forms of HIM WHO IS ALL, and we thus gladly, joyfully,
tearfully, thankfully, with great wonder and awe as to how such grace should
happen to us, fall on our faces before HIM in adoration & weakness, because when
the heavenly vision of WHO HE IS overtakes us we cannot but help say, with the
prophet, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I
dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the
King, the LORD of hosts." (Isaiah 6:5)
we ARE undone, because in HIM we have lost ourselves, and see only HIM ....
there is ONLY ONE LOVE, and we are enraptured that HE is the ALL and that He
fills all ....
lovers know and recognize & sense each other, even from afar .... we don't love
God as some old white-haired man sitting on a throne way up in some heaven far
away -- we love Him when we see Him & know Him where He is .... we recognize Him
everywhere we look, we see Him peeking out from the most unlikely places, we
fall in love with His mountains and flowers and oceans and flocks of quail
bursting above a field in the dusk .... we see Him in beggars and thieves ....
we see Him in politicians and soldiers .... we see Him in little babies who've
lost their mamas and live in camps, and in little children who grow up in the
warm nurture of loving parents who can provide all they need ....
How can we not love Him more than anything? .... because He is MORE than
"anything"!!! .... there is NO OTHER but He, and He has so overtaken us, so
filled us, so overflowed us, that He has burned in the fire and heat of His
passion anything in us that was contrary to His kingdom, and wrenched us WHOLE
from the inside-out by the inundation of His Spirit into the very spiritual
molecules of our existence & person, so that our love is turned around the right
way .... before it had been turned around in on ourselves, but in the inflow of
His love into our inner being He turns that love the other way, outward, and we
begin increasingly to know His river of everlasting Life flowing from our
bellies ....
"And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel;
The Lord our God is one Lord:
And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first
commandment." (Matt 12:29,30)
Paul's exhortation to "pray without ceasing" ceases to be something we strive
for but becomes instead our permanent state of being ....
"And he said, I will love thee, O LORD, my strength.
The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in
whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower."
(Ps 18, 1,2)
What wondrous grace, what bounteous love, that should foreordain that we should
find ourselves hidden in Him Who is beyond all, yet all, that against the
panorama of sky & land fading in the distance together into infinity, we walk as
Him in this world ....
Psalm 150
1 Praise ye the LORD. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament
of his power.
2 Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent
greatness.
3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and
harp.
4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments
and organs.
5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.
6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD. Praise ye the LORD.