January 30, 2006
Serendipity
It was like the best of times back in my naval aviation days when the instructor would taxi us up to the end of the runway, climb out of the plane, and say, “Okay, it’s time you took her up by yourself.” The other day I was sent on a rare solo mission to our green grocer’s. Being free like that, I wandered out of the usual meat-and-three and routine household aisles over into the display in the gourmet corner.
Whenever CP and I are in tandem at the market, which, as I’ve implied, is more often case, it’s usually less gourmet and more gourmet not. That is, we rarely, if ever, frequent this area, but it always tweaks my curiosity. Being thus more or less free, and also, like a good wannabe investigative journalist always looking for a story — with dreams of maybe a by-line — I simply couldn’t resist. The corner was dripping with serendipity, and I was not to be denied.
The first thing I discovered was more than enough to reward my enthusiasm. The Schmaltz Brewing Company of New York, keeping pace with this increasingly faith-based society, has come out with an appropriate lager: “He’Brew — The Chosen Beer.” The type in stock is “Messiah Bold — a rich and robust dark brown ale.” The label, not to lose a single messianic how-long stroke, continues, “It’s the beer you’ve been waiting for.” On the other side of the demo kiosk, one goes even further back in time to find “Genesis Ale.”
I have never enjoyed my seminary education quite so much since my first day in Bible 101 when we were asked to take out a sheet of paper and write the names of all the books in the Old Testament — in order. I could think of only five, and two of those were First and Second Corinthians. Seminary, not altogether unlike old Sisyphus’s saga, as you might imagine, was pretty much uphill from there on.