Backdraft
by Frank Fisher, Obl OSB


<<Bang Bang Bang Bang>>

From the door
directly to your right,
the banging sound
reverberates
 through the smoking wood
and echoes
down the long,
steaming hallway.
The sound increases in urgency
and then
tapers weakly off.
It's the weakness
that catches your attention
as your mind flashes back
through the day's events.

For a change
your day began quietly.
As usual,
you arrived
at your fire house,
and put your bunker gear
on the hook and ladder.
Then you sat down for a cup of coffee
as you awaited your officer
and the department's plans
for your day.

By the time your coffee was finished
you'd learned
your company was due
at the academy
for training.
That time of learning
occupied
most of the day.
Much of the material
was quite old to you
and often
it was very dry.
But you paid attention
for you knew
your life
might depend on it
some day.
Particularly,
you paid attention
to a discussion of backdrafts;
the explosive reaction
of a smoldering fire
when its suddenly gifted
with a new source of oxygen.

Now,
as you crouch below the smoke
in the sweltering hallway,
the discussion of backdrafts
comes quickly to your mind.
For you reach out to the door
where you heard the knocking sound.
And you find,
it almost burns you
through your protective glove.
Instinctively
you know that means
there's fire
on the other side of the door;
fire
that could explode outward
if the door was opened;
fire
that could cause a backdraft
consuming everything
in its path.

Quickly.
you radio for help.
But you find
help can't arrive
for several minutes.
And a quick survey
shows you
there's no other entrance
to the apparently occupied room.

You've just about decided
to wait
until an officer,
and other firefighters arrive,
when the knocking sound
 comes again.
This time
its combined with a weak cry.
"My baby!
Help!
My baby,"
gasps a voice
from directly behind the door.

The time
for hesitation's over.
You stand upright
into the smoke and haze,
brace yourself
on the left hand wall
and lift your feet
to smash down the door.
Your feet
tear into the wood.
The hinges start to give way.
And you know
your life
may be about to end
in an instant.

But you
are a firefighter;
sworn to protect
the people
on the other side
 of the now splintering door.
And for you
to be
the person you are called to be
there are moments
when you must dare
to rush
into the heart
of the fire.

<<Bang Bang Bang Bang>>

From the windows of the room
the banging sound
reverberates
and echoes
throughout the hidden
upper room;
the room
in which you
and your friends
are hiding.
The sound
 constantly increases in urgency.
And it brings your mind back
to the events
of the last few weeks
and months.

All in all
you still feel a bit dizzy
as you think
of all that's happened 
in your life.
In your mind
tt felt just like yesterday
when the Master
rode into Jerusalem
at the head of a triumphal procession.
It was a wonderful day.
But all to quickly
it was followed
by the trial
and then by the crucifixion.

All of you
had stayed limp and numb
for three days
until Mary burst into the room;
shouting the wonderful news
of the resurrection.
Your whip sawed emotions
had barely had time to recover
when the Lord was off again.
This time,
as you'd watched the ascension
into the clouds
you had a feeling
the Light of the world
had gone away for good.

Of course
there had been a promise;
a promise
of God's continuing presence with you;
a promise of power
allowing you to tell the whole world
the wonderful good news.
But now
as you hide here from the Romans
 and from their collaborators,
a promise
seems an empty replacement
for the physical presence
of the Living God.

So all of you continue 
to huddle about the table
while you talk and wonder aloud
about that promise.
"When,"
you all ask each other,
"will this promise
be fulfilled?"
But your talk and questions
are interrupted once again
by the knocking sound
reverberating
from the windows.
"Could it be the Romans,"
you gasp out?
"Could this be . . ?"

A vast booming noise
catches your words
in your throat.
The windows
all blast open together
as something like a wind
rushes into the room
and sends anything lying loose
flying into the air.

Your hair stands on end
as you look up
into the face of the gale
and see the ceiling
covered
in something like flame.
Then the flame
swoops down ward
and something like tongues of living fire
reach out
to touch your head
and the heads 
of each person in the room.

The gift
the Master had promised
has arrived.
All around you
your friends rush to the doors
and burst through them
without bothering
to throw open the latches.
They're shouting
and speaking
in languages you never heard.
All of them
you somehow know
are joyfully bellowing
the still living story
of Jesus the Christ.

But somehow
the gift
has touched you differently.

For to you
it brings not new language
but the courage
 to rise from your hiding place,
and to bravely explain
 to the bemused crowd outside
just what
was going on in their midst.
You hesitate
just for a moment.
You know
to go
outside the door
and tell of the Lord's
life, death, and resurrection
will one day
bring about your own death.
It will be like
opening a door
to a fire
that will burst out
and consume your  body
in a devouring flame.

Your hesitation,
however,
lasts only for an instant.
Then you race through the door
and you hear your voice shouting,
"People of Jerusalem,
these are not drunk
as you suppose . . . . "

The fire
will consume you.
This you know,
and this you accept.
For you
are a follower
of Jesus the Christ.
You live and breathe
through the wind and flame
of the Spirit of God;
Christ's blazing gift
to Christ's people.
And for you
to be
the person you are called to be
there are moments
when you must dare
to rush
into the heart
of the fire.

<<Bang Bang Bang Bang>>

From all around you
the knocking sound reverberates.
It echoes
down the hallways
of your memories
and rebounds
through the pathways
and hallways
of your life.

You began
to hear it
when you first moved
in your mother's womb.
You heard it sing
at the moment of your birth
and felt it dance
when the Baptismal waters
washed over your head.
Through all your life
its been there
though you may manage
to ignore it for a time.

"Follow me,"
it knocks and calls to you!
"Tell the good news!
Speak it
and live it
in a way
that all may hear and see.!"

The knocking
is Christ's gift to you;
the same gift
that burst into the room
at Pentecost;
the same gift
that changed a group
of frightened women and men
into the transforming church
of Jesus the Christ;
the same gift
that can transform churches
and turn about lives today.

You may hesitate
to answer the knocking
when it comes calling
deep within your soul.
And hesitate
you should.
For when you open the door
the gift will burst through
as a devouring fire.
A fire
that will drive you
to go where the Spirit bids you go
and to speak
as the Spirit bids you speak.

Do you dare
to open that door?
Do you dare
to take this part of your life
so seriously
that it will define who you are
and who you will be?

It is your choice to make.
For the Spirit
will push hard
but does not often compel.
But in your choice,
remember,
you've declared yourself to be
a disciple of Jesus Christ.
And for you
to be
the person you are called to be
there is a moment
when you must dare
to rush
into the heart
of the fire.

To God alone be glory.
Amen.

(Comments to Frank at f.fisher.obl.osb@comcast.net.)
Interim Pastor of First Presbyterian Chuch of Fairbury, IL
Oblate of St. Benedict's Abbey in Bartonville, IL