Of Monkeys, Grace and the Hunger Games

On Thursday, I woke up thinking about grace.

To be honest, I had a dream about it. And I would like to tell you about the dream. But isn't that one of the most frustrating and annoying experiences in life - to listen to someone going on about something they dreamed??

"Well, it was LIKE my old grade school but inside it was more like a shopping mall. And my kindergarten crush was there, but he had a beard and a pet monkey. He asked me, 'Why are you wearing pajamas to school?' I looked down and realized he was right!! I was wearing one-piece footie Barney pajamas at school...so embarrassing! I tried to run away from him but it was like my feet were buried in wet cement. I couldn't move so I just stood there and cried. Then his monkey offered me a Kleenex." 

You can find pictures of ANYTHING on the internet. It fascinates me beyond words. 
Photo by Indiadee in Happy in Hampi

So I promise to leave out all the wonky bits and just cut to the point.

First, the back story:

The past few days, I've been dealing with some frustrating situations. These are not life and death problems; honestly, there have been no serious offenses and no big harm done. No need for apologies or heavy duty forgiveness.

The best way I can describe these situations is that they make me feel like someone is taking a giant piece of sandpaper and slowly, even somewhat gently, rubbing it over me. I'm irritated. I feel scratchy and annoyed and really fed up.

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Now here's where the dream comes in.


In my dream, I was talking to one of my sandpaper-y people. And sure enough, I was getting that scratchy, uncomfortable feeling that I have been suffering in real life. But in the dream, as I listened to this person, it slowly dawned on me that all the annoying and irritating words coming out of her mouth have also bounced around in my brain. Word for word. She was quoting my own thoughts, and in doing so, reminding me that I am no different from the people who annoy me.


Which means...I am annoying too.


Wow. Good solid slap across the face.


And when I woke up, I realized what I need to feel better. 

Grace. 

To me, grace is that tender quality of seeing the best in others and choosing to believe it, no matter what. It's that gentle, kind feeling that we all crave, that tells us that everything is going to be alright. 

But here is the slippery thing about grace: we all want it. But we can't get it. We can only give it.

In his fine book, Wishful Thinking, Frederick Buechner says it like this: 

Grace is something you can never get but can only be given. there's no way to earn it or deserve it or bring it about any more than you can deserve the taste of raspberries and cream or earn good looks or bring about you own birth.

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And this quote nails it too:

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. -Philo

I hunger for grace for my own life. 


And on this day before the movie premiere of The Hunger Games, I found myself thinking a lot about hunger. In this red hot book-turned-movie, hunger refers to the literal lack of food suffered by most citizens of the post-apocalyptic nation of Panem. Chosen teens, known as 'tributes' are selected from every food-deprived distitrict of the country, and forced to fight to the death in the Hunger Games. While this annual last-man-standing competition provides an extra measure of food for the victor's home district, it mostly serves to amuses the citizens of the capital and reminds everyone of who's in charge.  Our hero, young Katniss, boldly takes on the challenge and eventually satisfies her hunger for food as well as justice.

It's a really solid story. 

And while the word 'hunger' in the title may be a reference to our need for food, on this day, it reminded me over and over that in this life, we hunger for much more than food. 

We hunger for love.

We hunger for acceptance. 

We hunger, maybe most of all, for grace. 

But we can't reach out and take it. We can only offer it to others and trust that they will offer it back to us.


Amen.