Monday, March 22, 2010

Sunday evening post

The pasta is baking in a 400-degree oven--hot enough to send a slightly smoky smell through the house, thanks to the grease that is burning away, grease left behind by a chicken recently roasted at that high temperature.

What else is burning away?

We celebrated the Annunciation in today's Bach Cantata Vespers. Wie schoen leuchtet der Morgenstern--beautiful Jesus imagery, with horns and oboes. And "The Canticle of the Turning," a metered paraphrase of the Magnificat. And a sermon that left me a little confused about whether I should "be not afraid" when God's angels show up, or be very afraid because God is doing things all the time because that's what God-- who has nothing else to do--does.

Sometime this week or next I'll take the battery out of the smoke alarm, lock the oven and set it to clean itself. I'll run the fan in the stove hood, so that the smoke mostly goes outside. I'll do this when no children are home to complain.

That roast chicken was really good. Three or four cloves of garlic, chopped up small. Rosemary--the dry, sharp needle-y kind. Mash and crush it all together with some salt. Add some pepper, loosen the skin of the chicken, and rub the salt mixture underneath. Then roast the chicken at 400 degrees until it's done. Make a mental note to clean the oven later.

God however is in continuous-cleaning mode. Scraping, burning, making all things new. Bringing that new kingdom into being. Oh, the tension between God's world and our crummy, greasy smoky one.

1 comment:

Perverse Lutheran said...

Does this even make sense?