At the end of the day, from nightmares here and coming, there can only be one answer for one called as I am ... here sung by the incomparable contralto Marian Anderson from Mendelssohn's Elijah:
Now the prophet Elijah has an oratorio about him because he is remembered as the prophet of fire ... but what happens when heroics are possible but will not work? Elijah himself had to confront that devastating question, as he only partially succeeded in changing the hearts of his own people. One might say that one learns to be content with success where it can be found, but what exactly does one do when there is nothing left to do? Maybe Donnie McClurkin has an additional idea...
So, two hundred years backwards to Hoffnung, our little village of dreams in Hoffnung ... with pictures of a sun-drenched walk at Alta Vista Park here in San Francisco to break up the text ... the beauty of hope, shining still brighter ...
As Diane Matthaus, I opened my eyes on a Sunday morning, church bells ringing ... another Advent sermon on tap at the Lutheran church ... Herr Gurnemanz Kantor in the pulpit, being wonderfully acted by the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past getting to show off his acting chops without doing as much singing ... but that was quite a voice, long before electronic forms of amplification, to be filling an old-style cathedral with an Advent sermon, with all his famously radiant joy, and failing not to be musical while doing it... just carrying the room as ever as he read how Joseph came to understand he was going to be stepfather to the long-awaited Messiah, and explained what the cost of belief was, but also the reward, and reminded the congregation that the world will always despise the act of faith that does not explain itself in terms the world values.
"But remember how it was said of the Lord Himself, Who submitted Himself to the humiliating death of the cross, despising the shame, for the joy that was set before Him. We must remember that He will share that joy with us ... so we wait and work and rest in hope, and go faithfully toward what is set also before us."
No conversation about coming nightmares there! He turned our eyes far beyond that, and then shared with the congregation that the Lutheran rector and the Catholic father at Sicherwald both were requesting prayer for their village, and for their neighbors under threat of the breaking dam in the village of Eitelkeitsmesse. This was a subtle move. Sicherwald was leading the rescue, meaning much more distant Hoffnung would not bear the burden, also meaning that the mutual enemy of Herr Kantor and Prince Solomo in Eitelkeitsmesse would have no cause to lash out at the rector in Hoffnung because he could not get to the prince.
Simon Zischen, rector at Eitelkeitsmesse, was the grandson of the last of the hammer (mill) lords on the Eitel River made possible by the Eitel Dam. He had used his position as rector to restore himself and his family to the status and influence his grandfather had enjoyed before Prince David had shut down the hammer mill because there was no more without deforesting up to Sicherwald and beyond. He had literally led his village to pray for the death of Prince David when the by-then aged ruler had surveyed the situation around the Eitel Dam and was considering ordering Eitelkeitsmesse evacuated -- abandoned.
Prince David had soon enough died, leaving no remaining individual to outshine Herr Zischen ... but in just two months, internationally famous Gurnemanz Kantor had become rector in Hoffnung, and taken over as the most influential and sought-after Protestant cleric in the region by 1824 because of taking down Edward von Schadenfreude. Never mind the details there ... the point was, Herr Kantor had eclipsed his peers entirely, and that big bass voice echoed through every religious and civil matter in the region in a way a hammer lord ... or his grandson ... might envy.
Prince Solomo had warned Herr Kantor, and I noticed Herr Kantor in the following days disturbed by it. Those big dark eyes would flame up, but then he would look at Frau Kantor his wife, their three darling yearlings Ulrike, Ulrich, and Ursula, and then at me, who he considered his eldest daughter by adoption, and then calm himself down ... somewhat ...
"I know that any heretic can preach his congregation straight into hell," he said in prayer one day, "but, Lord, I pray Thee -- open the eyes of the people, and return their hearts to Thee!"
Meanwhile, people were coming into the realm to go to Eitelkeitsmesse's famous Christmas markets like nothing was wrong. Those who came up by the highway came up through Hoffnung, and would thus eventually go down by Sicherwald ... very few saved themselves the journey by listening to the news those in Hoffnung knew.
"Oh, if they were in danger, they would have closed the markets!"
So they went up, but came back singing an entirely different tune, having seen the massive ice jam pressing against the Eitel Dam from Sicherwald. And so it was, in two weeks, that everyone in Prince Solomo's realm and those around it knew that Eitelkeitsmesse was as good as gone except the people of Eitelkeitsmesse.
"Simon Zischen must be very good at being a very bad preacher," I said to Frau Kantor, and she scowled.
"A sorcerer!" she said, referencing Simon the sorcerer from Scripture who had his town bewitched until Deacon Phillip came and shared the real gospel message.
Which led, inevitably, to folks beginning to look at Herr Kantor ... he had delayed the asking of the question by following the lead of the clerics at Sicherwald, but there he was with his prepossessing size, good looks, voice, and reputation ... if he went down and spoke on the matter, might not that wake people up?
But he, even with his great heavy voice and fiery delivery, knew and stood on the fact that he was not who this aria from Elijah describes ...
Apparently, the word of the question being asked got down to Eitelkeitsmesse, but also with the rector of Hoffnung's perplexing answer: "I will not be the occasion for a case of mistaken identity." The Zischens were not sure what to do, but their spies in town noticed: the rector of Hoffnung made no move in the direction of Eitelkeitsmesse, and said nothing about it publicly except in the prayers he led his congregation to daily for the people of Sicherwald and Eitelkeitsmesse.
"Explain to me this parable," I said at last, and he smiled.
"You are an attentive student," he said, "so you know that I echo One greater when I say to most it is not meant to be understood, but to you I will explain."
"It is a nice day for a walk, and if we wanted to, even in Hoffnung, it would be a mere 30-minute walk downhill or a ten-minute ride to the Eitel River, and even here we might notice that the flow is higher than it ordinarily is in winter. But that would not suggest anything to us unless we tracked the river, and we generally don't. Our lives do not depend on that river.
"But suppose we stood in Eitelkeitsmesse? The sound of the river roaring in December, when it is usually silent under the ice, and the sound of the mill wheels going at top speed must be apparent. They know that all of the sluice gates must be open, and they have heard why Prince Solomo has said they are open. They can go on a mere 5-10 minute walk to see the dam itself, and if someone cared to take a glass and look, ice is surely already visible over the top of that dam.
"Also, there is Prince Solomo himself in all his royal bearing, having declared the situation and his decree that Eitelkeitsmesse is to be evacuated, and his gracious provision to assist all that do so. Without leaving Eitekeitsmesse, there is all the evidence available.
"But suppose one had an hour from Eitelkeitsmesse to walk or twenty minutes to ride up to Sicherwald? The view from there of what is happening over the Eitel Dam is perfect. So too the testimony of friends and relatives coming down from there to confirm everything Prince Solomo has said is happening and is going to happen. So too the testimony of those that came by the highway to go to the Eitelkeitsmesse Christmas markets and have returned here looking as if they have seen ghosts in advance!
"But even further and more deeply than this, meine Tochter, Germany prides itself on its rich Christian heritage. The Scripture says the Spirit bears witness with us, and will lead us into all truth. Now, do you not think that the Spirit would bear witness to the truth of the situation at the Eitel Dam, no matter what scratching of itching ears there well may be? And yet, for any group of people that have despised deeper spiritual truth for 30 years in favor of having their itching ears scratched, it may well be that they are perfectly deaf by now."
He paused, and then I saw a tear come into his eyes.
"You account me as having a beautiful, powerful voice," he said, "and it is true that I do. But there is nothing I can do for the deaf. I am not the Spirit of God, who can open stopped ears; if they refuse to hear Him, and refuse to hear all the evidence all around them in Creation, then they will refuse to hear me. They and others may be entertained by me playing the great hero so many imagine me being, of course, but this is no time to play."
"So you are not going down to Eitelkeitsmesse," I said.
"I shall not risk my life to no purpose," he said. "But suppose I went and played the hero, and suppose I succeeded in moving some out of Eitelkeitsmesse to Hoffnung in time? They merely would have swapped one idol for another named Gurnemanz Kantor. Then what? Again: I will not create occasion for mistaken identity. I am not God, and so am not the Savior, and must not allow people to use me as the substitute. I can make ready for those who hear the truth, and pray for all the rest, but I may rightly do no more."
"I do understand," I said. "It is so sad."
"It is," he said. "There is nothing sadder than a tragedy that is completely preventable. However, I can employ my time and strength better than the fit of weeping that is not far from overcoming me whenever I think on the matter. There will be time for that later. Meanwhile there is much to do here to make ready for those we will not have to weep over. I anticipat, although we are some distance away, that many from Eitelkeitsmesse will come here at least for a time, because it will be a long time before they desire to live in any valley, but they also will not want to stay in Sicherwald or higher along the fall line of the Eitel River and be reminded of the disaster that will have overtaken everything they love."
"You're right," I said. "We are just a day's ride down the highway, and still above the real descent into the local valleys. We also have room to expand, and we also have many empty houses here in slight disrepair because people did not come home from the wars -- we can build them up again at need!"
"All of that and more," he said. "That is the easy part, and Prince Solomo will pay for that. The hard part is my portion to work on."
I did not understand what he meant until listening during the food distribution the next day.
"I hope not many of those people from Eitelkeitsmesse end up here!" one person was saying to another while putting out some bread. "They are proud and vain and just the type to tell us how poor we are while having no home to go back to. They are not going to make good neighbors!"
"Well, they had better learn -- we don't have to make them comfortable here!" the other said. "Hoffnung is not for overgrown spoiled children!"
Herr and Frau Kantor stood there and smiled and handed out food like they weren't hearing anything but angels singing ... and then the next day for the mid-week service Herr Kantor went up into the pulpit for another Advent service and talked about how the Lord becoming Immanuel -- God with us -- meant moving in among some very bad neighbors, people who lied, cheated, stole, gossiped, and despised each other with and without cause, because that's humanity in general, and yet, because of His love, God submitted to that!
I just watched people's faces turn every shade from pink to red and was glad that I was bronze in hue as the rector drew the analogy of what a privilege it was at Advent season, while we awaited the Lord's return, to be able to love our neighbors as ourselves, and thus be like Him, a Good Neighbor to those who did not deserve it, Who welcomed His enemies who turned to Him in faith into the family of God. About the fate of Eitelkeitsmesse he did not utter a word, but he did not have to.
"We are Christians," one said to another on the way out of church. "I don't want those people here ... but we are Christians ... we cannot say we love God, Who loved the undeserving, and do the exact opposite toward the people from Eitelkeitsmesse."
"I wish the Spirit of God would stop telling Herr Kantor what we are saying in our houses," the other said. "I felt like that whole huge voice was just preaching at me and my wife!"
"Well," said another, "we don't have to worry about the folks from Eitelkeitsmesse staying too long, because our rector doesn't scratch itching ears, and they are not used to that!"
The other two cracked up laughing.
"You're right -- about one good Sunday, and they are going to go right back up the highway!" the first one said.
"We live here, and we hear him all the time, and we can hardly take it -- like today!" the second one said.
"And, maybe those that stay will, like us, change," the third one said. "I can remember when we were much more afraid and angry and unsure than we are even now."
"It has been quite some two years," the first one said, "and maybe ... well, we know God is good enough to have others blessed the way we have been, to have the daughter of our old rector who loved us marry our new rector who loves us and have them both pouring into the people here ... maybe a few more people will be able to stand the fire, and be blessed!"
"And the thing is," the second one said, and started laughing, "it's not like Herr Kantor ever lets himself get as loud as he can. He keeps it down so you can hear that Voice behind him ... it's like he is just the echo!"
"Listen," the third one said, "he could blow us all clear out of there with that voice, every day, all day! Whenever he is by himself, he tends to start singing, and soon enough everyone in town knows -- he literally can be heard from one end of town to another! We can track him walking -- Frau Kantor never has to worry because she literally can hear him singing on his walks all around the hill country and know exactly where he is at all times!"
"But you are right," the first one said, "and that's why we have to get ready to receive our new neighbors ... it's not about Herr Kantor telling us with that big voice what we need to do. He humbly keeps it in check in the pulpit for just that reason. He's just the echo; we all know what Christ requires us to do, and we just got reminded."
"Yes, indeed," the other two said, and they passed on.
I looked around and thought of all the other conversations I couldn't hear. Every person there was someone with their own thoughts and feelings about what was happening at Eitelkeitsmesse, and every one of them, daily, was getting used to the idea of being a good neighbor... daily coming to prayer, and hearing what it was that God expected during Advent season ... and when the people came from Eitelkeitsmesse, the work would continue with them. It was enough to do without adding anything else. As Stephen Stills of Crosby, Stills, and Nash put it "you gotta love the one(s) you're with."
Yet the situation was already turning, because in reality, there were already people from Eitelkeitsmesse there, listening to the conversations, knowing the danger they and their families were in, knowing their village's reputation and thus the cold reception they were likely to receive, but hearing that at least in Hoffnung, the people were being led to give them a fair chance. Word of the welcome of Hoffnung got down the highway quickly!
That week, some of the families of Eitelkeitsmesse began to arrive, and with them, Prince Solomo's gracious provision for them and with them for Hoffnung. It was a blessing all the way around!
"Is this an Advent miracle becoming a Christmas miracle?" I said to Frau Kantor about it a week further on as the sounds of construction and new little children filled the cold streets with life.
"I do believe it is -- a miracle of hope and new life," she said, "all made possible as we do what the One we say we believe in bids us do, and love our neighbors as ourselves."
However, the spies of the Zischen family were still in town, and the patriarch of that family was furious. We were flabbergasted when we found out why from people arriving from Eitelkeitsmesse; one man came to speak with Herr Kantor at the parsonage about it.
"Prediger Zischen has become old, and the old sometimes struggle with change," this man said. "He is saying that it is the betrayal of the village in that people are fleeing and not praying for the ice to be miraculously removed -- and that if the dam goes, it will be the traitors' fault because of their lack of faith. I think it is all too much for his mind, that the village where his family has lived since before the Holy Roman Empire may not survive."
This was a compassionate take, and there was possibly a great deal of truth to it ... but ... .
"What did you say?" Herr Kantor said, his voice half-choked with horror. "He said what?"
"He is preaching that if the dam breaks, it will be because of the lack of faith of the people leaving the village."
Herr Kantor stood as still as a stone for a few moments, and then said calmly, "If it is as you say, then indeed we should pray for him, that God forgive him, for he knows not what he is doing."
The two knelt down, and Herr Zischen's former parishioner prayed earnestly for him, for he could not believe the minister he had known all his life could be so wicked except that his mind had snapped. Herr Kantor, in his great compassion on his new parishioner, had not leaned hard upon, "If it is as you say." So, his new parishioner went away relieved and rejoicing, glad that his new rector was concerned and compassionate and approachable.
Herr Kantor turned around with a face white with horror, succeeded by the color of the center of a flame: blue-gray, as his dark eyes flamed like live coals. He was livid with anger, and that was a terrible face to have in such a state. He did not speak, still being enough in command of himself that he would not give us that nightmare, but he was shaking with rage as he sat down, and it took ten minutes and a huge stein of Frau Kantor's mulled cider before he was calm enough to speak ... and then the midday bells rang at the church ...
It was time for prayers for those in Eitelkeitsmesse, so across we went once we had bundled up the snoozing little Kantors ... on the way, so many from Eitelkeitsmesse were going with their new neighbors to pray for their old neighbors ... there was unity and love and hope ... and I realized the lesson was being taught again ... looking away from what could not be changed or saved to what was being changed and saved and putting energy there was the key.
Herr Kantor's jaw had clenched for restraining the passion of his fury just twenty minutes before, but that passion burst out in gratitude for all those from Eitelkeitsmesse who had trusted in God and come to His welcome in Hoffnung, and then to God Himself, for being a God Who spoke blessing and peace to His people in Christ, and would never leave anything they needed to fall to the side just because they still needed to grow more in trusting Him, but always filled the gap with His own love and grace. This prayer would be heard of throughout the realm -- such a voice, employed in such a way -- and when he began to recite praise from the Psalms because there was just nothing else that he could do for joy, that whole church went up as much as a Lutheran church can be said to go up by an African American woman's terms!
Now, there were things that had to be done in village life before the sun went down, and thankfully the bell-ringer remembered his job at 3:00pm! Everyone was behind, but all hands pitched in, all friends and brothers and sisters old and new ... no one was at a loss when the sun went down, and the village at large was rejoicing.
"Well, just another day not being overcome with evil, but overcoming evil with good," Frau Kantor said with a merry laugh as she and I saw Herr Kantor coming down the road from the other direction toward the parsonage. "This is it, Fräulein Matthaus -- this is it!"
Herr Kantor should have been exhausted after all that praying and reciting and singing and then heavy physical labor, but he was so overjoyed that he didn't know how tired he was until he sat down in his big chair to tell his triplets a bedtime story and all of them ended up smiling and snoring together, he having put all four of them to sleep with his deep voice in its gentleness.
"And still doesn't know how tired he is," I said as Frau Kantor shook her head with a smile.
"He never does," she said. "From the day I met him until now, once he gets up in his joy, the weariness of this earth can't touch him until he slows down -- then, it jumps him like robbers, but, any good hitter of heads keeps you from knowing until you wake up with the headache!"
We had a good laugh about that as Frau Kantor tucked her husband and their children in right where they were. Since it was full dark, Frau Kantor insisted that I stay with them and not walk down to my cottage, so we sat around and drank hot cocoa and gently talked and laughed until we were ready to go to bed. Somewhere in there, Herr Kantor woke up, and he was tucking in the triplets as we came from the kitchen ... and so, a warm embrace for us three before the Kantor parents went to their room and I went to mine.
As I lay down I realized I had forgotten entirely to be worried about what might be for almost that whole day ... I was seeing people coming to safety, and participating in welcoming and establishing them there, and I had no time to be concerned about what not yet had happened ... then I remembered another lesson, given almost two years earlier:
Do not allow the anticipation of future grief to cause you to overlook present joys.
That lesson was now growing deeper ... and there was still more to learn ... meanwhile, I heard footsteps in the streets ... down into the valley roads ... the spies of Simon Zischen were on their way back to Eitelkeitsmesse ... for no story with an analogy to Christmas would be complete without someone to fill in for King Herod ....
To be continued...
