EASTER: Chopped Clams

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”  Matthew 5:8

“There are holy sparks in every occasion …”   David Brooks

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It’s the little things. 

“Are you out of chopped clams?” I called to the grocery worker as she dashed past me on her way to somewhere. She stopped and turned toward me.

“The shelf is empty,” I said, gesturing to where the chopped clams ordinarily live.

“Chopped clams,” she muttered. “Chopped clams.” She spoke softly, almost reverently.

 “Tell you what,” she said. “You go live your life for about three minutes, come back and try again.”

I did as I was told. I spent the next few minutes of my life, happily, in the produce section, fruits mostly. You guessed it. When I returned, there they were. My chopped clams had come home.

Little things.

It never fails. I send out a church email that someone made a prayer request. In minutes or a few hours at most, I hear from Sally. “Prayers for …,” she writes, including the person’s name.

Simple words, Sally’s, but reassurance of a connection made, of prayer’s quiet power felt and shared, of a promise that the circle would be unbroken (“by and by, Lord, by and by”). 

Whether they knew it or not, someone just got blessed, maybe healed. Maybe forgiven. Maybe their heart got strangely warmed. Who knows? We just know it’s good to get prayed for, right?

Small stuff.

Years ago, when my kids were little, I needed childcare for a few days when I had to be out of town. I hated to do it because of her age, but I apologetically asked my Aunt Lou for help. 

She fussed in her irascible way. “I’m not too old to cut the mustard,” she quipped, “but, like the ol’ boy says, just too tired to spread it around!” Family comedian, that Lou.

Finally, to my relief and gratitude, she consented. “Okay, send the little stinkers over, we’ll survive.” By all accounts, they improved quite a bit on mere survival!

Really, it’s the little things.

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The first reports about Jesus after his crucifixion started small — so small, in fact, that they first showed up as literally nothing: an empty tomb. Then some chit-chat while walking on the road with an out-of-town stranger. Later, while eating a bit of fish broiled over charcoal by the lake. 

Steadily, though, with growing deep certainty, his followers became aware in such moments of a presence so big, so stupendous, so overwhelming. The only way they could see it was in fleeting flashes of the ordinary, caught unawares, like reflected sunlight glimpsed in a minuscule grain of sand. Once they saw it, though, they knew.

Jesus lives, it was true! As Mary at the tomb sensed, grasping the reality of death defeated may be more truth than humans can absorb head-on. It’s too big for mortal minds, too bright for doubting eyes, too outrageous to believe, too extraordinary to fathom. Yet, there he was, risen, vibrantly present in the earthly, earthy and small. 

In glimmers of grace, sparks of humor, a smidgen of bread, wisps of prayer, a touch of love—suddenly, like sun on sand, the absent-but-abiding presence of the Risen One glistens, gloriously. Somehow we then know that which we don’t understand. He lives. It’s the truth.

So, tell you what: Go live your life for three minutes. Maybe the shelf appeared empty the first time you looked. Come back, look again. Who knows? A whole lot of truth can show up in a re-stocked can of chopped clams—not to mention a prayer text or the love of an impish aunt.  If you smile when it happens, so, I bet, does He.

Then, forget what the ol’ boy said and spread it around! It’s the truth.

— Pastor Steve