Last week a parcel arrived from my friend Rev Rebecca Maccini, all the way from Henniker NH, in the US.
A supply of Constant Comment tea, available only in US, a blend mixed with spices and citrus which with a wee half teaspoon of sugar, makes this tea my default beverage.
But.
Also.
Well.
A book.
Not just any book.
But a book of Brueggemann's sermons.
And.
Inside it is inscribed to me by the Prophet Emeritus of Columbia University himself 🙂
Yes I like an author's signature in a book, especially those given me by people I know. But then there are those one or two signed books by authors I've never met. One friend brought me back one of Moltmann's books on Jesus, duly signed.
Now I have Walter's signature and good wishes. To complete this more or less holy trinity, I did actually meet Eugene Peterson in Crieff a dozen years ago and he gave and signed for me, a copy of his wee books of prayers and reflections on the Psalms. I had missed the conference he was taking due to a family funeral; I'd phoned ahead to see if he was still there and found that if I got a move on, on my way back to Aberdeen he'd hang around and I could meet him at St Ninians. We had a blether, a stroll, a coffee and a book signing all inside an hour.
But this isn't only a quite outrageous name-dropping post. I think what I'm trying to say is how such encounters occasionally come as unlooked for blessing. A Brueggemann signature and greeting, and though we will almost certainly never meet, he yet wishes blessing on my ministry; a signature from Moltmann, one of the living theologians to whom I owe most in my mature theology, and inside the cover of a book entitled Jesus Christ for Today's World a greeting; and a wee Psalm prayer book which at different times Sheila and I have both used over the years, finding there words of orientation – a term I learned from Brueggemann's work on Psalms. Oh, and today I finally, at last, after a prolonged delay, got an email from a bookseller that Brueggemann's new commentary on Psalms is ready for collection. And is now duly collected and perused and is now being read daily.
Thank you Rebecca for a gift that is its own testimony to the communion of saints, that ultimate network of relatedness, connectedness and communication, held together in the Body of Christ, enlivened by the Holy Spirit, and gathered and scattered in the rhythms of worship and witness.
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