Broken Chips/Broken Body


Broken Chips/Broken Body

This blog has been on hiatus since March 6, the day we left for a two-week trip to New Zealand.  Over the next few weeks, I will be sharing and reflecting on experiences and observations from this marvelous trip.
One morning I walked down to the waterfront in Queenstown.  Queenstown is in the middle of the South Island, surrounded by mountains and sits on a lake. (Several scenes from the Lord of the Rings movies were filmed near here.) As I was looking at the lake and watching the seagulls fly around, a guy walked up to me. It didn’t appear that he had had a bath in several days and was accustomed to sleeping outdoors.
He asked if I wanted to feed the seagulls out of my hand. I said, “No, thank you,” basically as a polite way to distance myself.  He said, “You can offer them these chips in your hand, and they will eat out of it.  It’s pretty cool.”  He extended his hand to me and opened it.  In the palm of his hand were some broken potato chips.  “Try it,” he said. I looked at him and thought “why not?”  I extended my hand.
He poured some chips into my hand and we walked over to the ledge of the seawall.  Seagulls were flying all around. I put my hand on the ledge and opened it.  The seagulls landed on the ledge near me but did not come to my hand.  The guy was standing next to me and opened his hand, to show me how it is done. He said, “Put some broken chips on the ledge near your hand.” He did this and the gulls moved in and gobbled up the chips.  I followed, putting a few chips on the ledge near my hand and keeping some in my hand. The gulls attacked the chips on the ledge, then one gull pecked at a chip crumb on one of my fingers, then leaned over and ate the chips out of my palm. “That’s so cool,” the guy said.
He then turned to me, looked me in the eye and said, “we’re given them broken chips, the broken body, our broken body.”  I was not expecting that. Did I hear him right – broken chips, broken body, our broken body?  He was using words from the Lord’s Supper.  We were communing with these birds, given them broken chips. But broken body? I looked at him, a guy who hadn’t bathed in a few days, who sleeps outdoors.  He is the definition of broken by our society’s standards.  Yet he was the host and inviter to this communion I had with sea gulls. He reached out to me and brought me into a communion unlike I have ever experienced.
            Our broken body? How am I a part of this brokenness?  Because I have greasy chips in my outstretched hand?  I think back to what Jesus said at the Last Supper, “this is my body, broken for you.” He was headed to the cross.  He was giving himself on behalf of this broken world. What was this homeless guy inviting me to do? 
He invited me to enter into this experience, into this moment, not as a tourist or observer, but as a participant.  He invited me into a communion with these birds that is more than chips.  It involves my participating in the broken body of this world, to share in his brokenness.  He may not have known this, but he was inviting me to participate in the broken body of Christ for the salvation of all the world. In this one brief sacramental moment, his words asked me to see that I am invited to risk a yes, to reach out my hand, to see the brokenness, and to share my own broken body with the world, which is far more than just other humans.  I am not separated any more from him or the seagulls or the life that is around me in this moment. We have become one in broken chips.
            This whole trip to New Zealand was an invitation into communion with abundant life and with brokenness. More reflections to come.

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