The night before my first gig I dreamed I spent the entire set breaking things
Mr. Bean and the Widow’s Mite
The night before my first gig — a Friday night coffeehouse event in a small Vineyard church, 1997ish — I dreamed that I spent the entire set breaking things, knocking things over, whacking people in the head with my guitar, falling off my stool, and tripping over amps and cables.
Finally, without having played a single note, I apologized to the audience for being “a female Mr. Bean.”
A couple of years later I dreamed that Jack Hayford (a radio preacher) listened to my songs and told me they were too depressing.
It’s interesting how our fears, hang-ups, and maladaptive behaviors show up in our dreams. Of all the weird ones I’ve had in my life — the end of the world, giving birth to squirrels, flying, drowning, showing up at work naked, my mom turning into a caveman — these are the two that surfaced in my memory as I thought about sharing music from my new project.
The Mr. Bean dream appears to be about clumsiness, awkwardness, stage fright — probably a pretty normal dream, given the circumstance — but I think it is also about a kind of self-sabotage that happens when you are forever “getting situated.” You keep changing your mind about how you want to do things. You agonize over details. Life puts some obstacles in your way, and you trip over them. (Interestingly, the obstacles in my dream were “tools” — i.e. amplifiers, cables, etc.) And you spend all of your life going from one crisis to the next, trying to manage the chaos, or waiting for the conditions to be right before you act.
The Jack Hayford dream — the disapprobation of an authority figure — has to do with self-doubt. I suspect that most of us struggle with self-doubt in some form; and I think that, when we pursue the things that mean the most to us, we are forced to confront ourselves — our limitations, our traumas, our baggage — in ways we would rather not. (In my case, there is my poor brain and its low serotonin levels.)
Two Bible stories come to mind as antidotes for my two dreams and the fears they represent. The first is the story of the widow’s offering. The “widow’s mite” — that which she gave out of her poverty — was not likely to accomplish much in a pragmatic sense. It wasn’t likely to go very far to maintain the temple, to feed and clothe orphans, to put an end to sex-trafficking, to fund cancer research, to boost your friend’s Go Fund Me campaign, or to help any other worthy cause. The gifts given by the wealthy people had the capability to do all these things. And yet, it was the widow — with her ineffectual offering — who was praised by Jesus.
It is important to note, I think, that the widow was a person who had suffered. Quite possibly, she had lived in a state of suffering for many years — from bereavement, from poverty, from her social status — and yet, here she was, showing up at the temple, giving all that she had to give.
Aside from being publicly praised by Jesus (and don’t get me wrong — I am certainly not knocking being publicly praised by Jesus), there is no mention of any miraculous outcome of the poor widow’s offering. For all we know, it could have gone to the ancient Judean equivalent of the local preacher’s gas station cappuccino.
However, in the story of the feeding of the multitude, we do see such a miraculous multiplication — the feeding of 5,000+ people using one boy’s lunch. In this case, we also have what one might consider an “ineffectual offering.” It would have been easy for this boy to reason that he could best put his lunch to use by eating it himself. Some might have admonished him, saying that, in handing over his lunch, he showed both poor judgment and poor math skills.
Another interesting aspect of the story is the demand that Jesus makes on the disciples’ faith. “You give them something to eat,” he tells them. There is no waiting until they are ready. No waiting until they somehow procure all the necessary resources. He doesn’t say, “I am going to do a miracle and feed them.” He calls them — in the present moment — to participate in the miracle: he gives them a directive, and when the need exceeds their resources, he multiplies their resources to fill the gap.
I think that the challenge here, for each of us, is to give what we have to give, no matter what we’re doing, no matter how much we suffer, no matter how small or imperfect the gift. To have the humility to go out there and play the gig the best we can, even if we happen to knock over a mic stand or two. To give our best at work, at home, at life, even when we feel like ineffectual or superfluous human beings.
This doesn’t make sense unless we believe in a reality that is greater than the numbers — unless we believe that somehow the widow’s mite means something in the scheme of things — even if it doesn’t seem to accomplish much in the world of strict rationality or utility alone.
Sometimes we may see a miracle take place as a result of our poor efforts; other times, we may just have to imagine Jesus looking into the offering plate, saying “This poor [widow-teacher-truck-stop waitress-whatever-you-happen-to-be] gave all that she had.”
