Preaching with a Crayon

June 4, 2024

Beloved:
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    I never get tired of looking at David Hayward’s art.  I give little prints and coffee mugs as gifts.  This print is new to me, and I love it for how fun it is to think about Jesus surfing, skimming the wave of LGBTQIA+ inclusion as if God invented this sport called Love.  “Love, without the fine print,” as Hayward says.  PRIDE Month is another of heritage months we ought not need but do, months marking the existence and contributions of people we have marginalized, despite Creation’s full inclusion of them.*  Hayward treats human differences as natural, as ordinary as the wind which gives rise to the water upon which the surfer rides.  While his artistic nudges against religious bigotries and prejudice are whimsical and funny, we are not let off the hook of our own responsibility, spiritual and moral.  Be better Christians, be better human beings.  He preaches with a crayon.  On a coffee mug.

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    Being a human being is really hard, isn’t it?  Puzzling out the prejudice bred into us is slow and difficult, yet the difficulty does not relieve us of Jesus’ call to love our neighbor as he first loved us.  Never.  Nor is our difficulty near as heavy as the burden borne by people this prejudice has harmed.**  Hard as it has been at times, coming to terms with the myopia of my own upbringing as a white, church-attending, middle-class person in the western hemisphere is an experience I wouldn’t trade for anything.  Comparable from moving from black-and-white to color photography.  The world is so much more vibrant in every possible way.  So much more interesting and exciting.  So much more unpredictable.  Faith too, packaged in language and flavor certainly not original in Southern Indiana, where everything begins with corn, and no one ever puts Jesus on a surfboard.
    I pray summer is coming on kindly for you, that you have work you love and people who love you within reach.  I’m grateful for your great kindness to me these days.
~peace & prayer, 
pastor annette

* US History Heritage Months:

• January (Martin Luther King, Jr. History)
• February (African American/Black History)
• March (Women's History)
• May (Asian American and Pacific Islander History)
• June (LGBTQ+ Pride)
• September (Hispanic Heritage)
• October (Disability Employment Awareness)
• November (Indigenous Heritage Month)

**More than 1.8 million LGBTQ+ young people (ages 13-24) seriously consider suicide each year in the U.S. — and at least one attempts suicide every 45 seconds.
https://www.thetrevorproject.org/resources/article/facts-about-lgbtq-youth-suicide/