Our Refuge

Today, I took a walk through the Superdome and I felt the pain. You see, I'm in New Orleans, Louisiana as part of the team that will put on the ELCA National Youth Gathering — an event for more than 33,000 Lutheran high school students and their chaperones that occurs once every four years. And this year, as in 2009, it is being held in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.

So, today, during the course of my duties (I was writing something to accompany a performance piece), I left our busy, noisy little office to breathe and collect my thoughts. I headed up to the second bowl, which was largely deserted. Just me and the empty seats. Rows and rows.

The phrase "what if these walls could talk" popped into my head. If I was very still, I could almost hear the walls weep. Their story was one of desperation; of dehydration; of starvation. It was a place where thousands of people waited for rescue or death.

During Hurricane Katrina, over 20,000 people took refuge inside the stadium. They waited out the storm here, on these cement floors and in these folding chairs. For six days, they waited, while babies ran fevers, trash and toilets backed up, lights went dark and the only running water poured through holes in the ceiling and trickled up through elevator shafts. It was hell at its most tangible.

When the last bus of refugees rolled out, the concourse where I stood was overflowing with more than a foot of garbage and human waste. Imagine the horror of it all. These walls are still crying, still bleeding for the poor of New Orleans.

In several Psalms, God is likened to a shelter. "The Lord is a refuge for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble," the psalmist says in one. In another, the people of Israel call out to God, "Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me." In the storm, God is the shelter. Isaiah proclaims that the Lord has "been a refuge for the poor, a refuge for the needy in their distress, a shelter from the storm, and a shade from the heat." God does not abandon those in need. He was there, in the Superdome, wiping sweat off his brow with the people of New Orleans; he suffered through their nightmare.


It is easy to forget the story behind the flashy exterior, but if you stop to feel the divine presence in the Dome, it is undeniable. If those walls could talk... We are called to hear the story — to feel the pain and love the scars.


I hope my brothers and sisters who come to this event understand that the Spirit is at work in this place. Jesus was crucified in the Superdome just as surely as he was at Calvary. And God provided a refuge from the storm.


If this is not a sacred place, then I don't know what is.

- Jonny Eberle, Dome Creative Team Member. I live in Flagstaff, AZ and blog here and at www.jweberle.com/blog.

The Economy of Grace

"Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food." 

- Isaiah 55:1-2

Today, in the midst of a meeting of the Dome Creative Team for the ELCA's Youth Gathering, we happened across these verses from the prophet Isaiah and it got me to thinking. In our everyday lives, we are so caught up in the material — the market economy, the exchange of goods and services, the global systems of cash and credit — that we forget that God doesn't play by our rules.

In a nation hit hard by a recession and very possibly heading into another one, we are acutely aware of the difficulties of surviving in the secular modern world. According to the latest figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the national unemployment rate was 9.1% in September. Concerns about how to repay student loans, pay rent, and put food on the table dominate our thinking and guide our choices. In captalist society, someone usually has to lose for others to gain.

God's economy doesn't work like human economies. Through Isaiah, we are invited to enter the marketplace. Everyone is invited to buy, but God doesn't take cash, credit, or debit. You buy without money. There's never a bill or an invoice. To the western mind, this sounds like gibberish, but for God, it makes perfect sense, because God is far beyond the acquisition of wealth. Grace is a priceless gift — literally priceless.

We have difficulty fathoming this economy, but that is only because our worldview is so narrow. We can barely see beyond our own wallet. We are consumed with paychecks and car payments and in doing so, we have missed the point of our existence. Why do we spend our money on that which is not bread and our labor on that which does not satisfy? Is this not the perfect critique of modernity? We do we do all these things that ultimately do not fill the emptiness?

In the 16th century, Martin Luther rebelled against the Church's practice of selling indulgences, proclaiming that we are saved by grace, not any earthly institution. He saw that God expresses no interest in our money. God is selling something infinitely more real: this mysterious, intangible thing called grace. We have been invited to eat was is good and delight ourselves in rich food. Even if we are unworthy, God forgives us free of charge. If we are unable to pay, God picks up the check. That's good news.