It is finally summertime. With many opportunities to be outside, it is also a great time to pick up a new book. Check out book ideas [0] from your staff and add your reading suggestions to the forum on our website.
One of the best books I have read recently is Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. The book is a true story about former mountain climber, Greg Mortenson, who stumbles upon his calling in life--working to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The subtitle says that it is "One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations....One School at a Time," but my favorite quote from the book questions the "one man's mission" part. It is the part from which the title of the book comes when Greg is all-consumed and concerned that the building of a school is not going fast enough in the small village of Korphe. At one point, the village chief and Greg's mentor, Haji Ali, intervenes: "Haji Ali waited until Mortenson caught his breath, then instructed him to look at the view. The air had the fresh-scrubbed clarity that only comes with altitude....Haji Ali reached up and laid his hand on Mortenson's shoulder. ‘These mountains have been here a long time,' he said. ‘And so have we....You can't tell the mountains what to do,' he said, with an air of gravity that transfixed Mortenson as much as the view. ‘You must learn to listen to them. So now I am asking you to listen to me....You have done much for my people, and we appreciate it. But now you must do one more thing for me.' ‘Anything,' Mortenson said. ‘Sit down. And shut your mouth,' Haji Ali said. ‘You're making everyone crazy.' ‘Then he reached out and took my plumb line, and my level and my account book, and he locked my things [in a cabinet]... and asked Sakina to bring us tea.'....When the porcelain bowls of scalding butter tea steamed in their hands, Haji Ali spoke. ‘If you want to thrive in Baltistan, you must respect our ways,' Haji Ali said, blowing on his bowl. ‘The first time you share tea with a Balti, you are a stranger. The second time you take tea, you are an honored guest. The third time you share a cup of tea, you become family, and for our family, we are prepared to do anything, even die,' he said ‘Doctor Greg, you must make time to share three cups of tea.'
‘That day, Haji Ali taught me the most important lesson I've ever learned in my life,' Mortenson says. ‘We Americans think you have to accomplish everything quickly. We're the country of thirty-minute power lunches and two-minute football drills. Our leaders thought their ‘shock and awe' campaign could end the war in Iraq before it even started. Haji Ali taught me to share three cups of tea, to slow down and make building relationships as important as building projects. He taught me that I had more to learn from the people I work with than I could ever hope to teach them.' "
We all need a Haji Ali in our lives telling us to make time to share three cups of tea. This seems especially important during the summer weeks as many of us have a break from the packed schedules of the school year. The temptation is to fill up every free moment. And yet we hear words from the beginning of the Biblical narrative embedded in creation: even God took time to rest and refresh. We hear these words in the third commandment as well: remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. We have this command so that we make finding time to reconnect with God and one another a priority in our lives. We also hear Jesus say to his disciples (and to us) in Mark:
"Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while." For many were coming and going and they had no leisure even to eat. Mark 6:31-32 [1]
So I encourage you to invite someone new over to your home this summer and share a few glasses of iced tea with them. Then invite them to come to church with you where together we will find rest for our souls and share the Holy Cup in the meal that unites us all.
Cheers! Pastor Beth