A Valentine To a City: Bringing Worship From Plaster to Concrete

It was 1915. The first decade of the new century had come and gone, but not without leaving it's mark on the city of San Francisco. In 1906 an earthquake had stricken the city, and soon after, fire burned it down. The city was being rebuilt, much like New Orleans today. Hope was alive, and $16 million had been made available through donations, state bonds, and taxes to put on a ten month World's Fair called The Panama Pacific International Exposition. It was to be a joint celebration of the discovery of the Pacific by Balboa, the completion of the Panama Canal, and to signify the formal resurrection of San Francisco. The city waged an advertising and campaigning effort to win the exposition against their primary competitor, New Orleans, and in 1911 it was awarded the opportunity to host the event by President Taft.

Now they needed a place to put it. They decided to fill in the mud flats to the north of the city, by the bay. It was a 635 acre area located between the Presidio on the west, Van Ness on the east, from the bay on the northern border to Chestnut Street on the South. They filled the new fairgrounds with amazing courtyards, foreign buildings, an amusement park, halls for everything from science and industry to food and farming. There were nightly fireworks, biplane rides, dare devils, parades of every kind, celebrities and heads of state; even the Liberty Bell was carted in for display. People had to spend at least a couple of days just to take it all in.

They built structures, like the centerpiece, "Tower of Jewels", which was a 43-story building covered by more than a hundred thousand hanging "jewels" (Bohemian glass backed by mirrors) which all moved individually when the wind blew giving an amazing spectacle along with the liberal use of the incandescent bulbs and search lights.

(If you want to see what it all looked like, it has been preserved on film and a 25-minute assembly of newsreel is viewable from this website: http://www.exploratorium.edu/history/palace/index.html )

The crazy thing is that you can drive around this part of town today, called the Marina, and none of these structures exist today except for one. They were all primarily wooden structures covered with plaster mixed with type of burlap fiber. These amazing structures that held such gravity and heart rending beauty were actually burned to ashes when they tore the place down. It was opened on February 20, 1915 and it closed December 4, 1915. The structures were only designed to last for one year.

The one building that remains was a remarkable structure called "The Palace of Fine Arts". It was designed as a Valentine to the city by Bernard R. Maybeck, a French educated architect from New York who had settled, nicely into California because of his brilliant but non-conformist bent. For the fair he designed this structure to look like overgrown, Roman ruins, partially to show "the mortality of grandeur and the vanity of human wishes...", and partially to give the visitor a wonderful experience. It was large rotunda with a colonnade on either side, with a beautiful lagoon to reflect the amazing beauty of the design. The scale of the palace is immense and the design is a freely interpreted, Romantic expression of Roman architecture, with Greek decorations. Started December 8, 1913, it was the last major structure to be constructed.

The people who came to see it were so impressed with it that before great the exposition was even over, a campaign was already underway to preserve this incredible landmark. Through the years many efforts were taken to preserve the site, but because the original materials were simply not going to withstand nature for very long, at various times the palace fell into disrepair. Federal funds were used to repair some of the decorations and from 1934 to 1942 there were eighteen lighted tennis courts placed at the site by the Recreation and Park Department. During World War II the site was used as a military motor pool.

From 1947, when the military gave the site back to the city, until the late 50's, the area sat in disrepair. At that time it was decided that it would be fenced off and scheduled for demolition as a pubic hazard. Then, some concerned citizens, led by philanthropist Walter S. Johnson decided to start a drive to bring the site back to it's former glory, and preserve it for future generations. In July of 1964 the funding was in place and the contract was awarded. The original design elements were carefully removed and molds were made of them. It was taken down to the steel framework and concrete castings were made. A stripped down version of the original was ready by 1967. As a gift to the city and the people by Walter S. Johnson, the final colonnades were put in place, and finally finished in January 1975.

I picture going to the World's Fair and seeing these amazing sights. No doubt, my untrained eye and the sheer immensity would have faked me into believing that these structures were timeless wonders that would remain permanent in this newly reborn city. It was a hoax. Not a hoax designed to harm anyone but a hoax nonetheless. I would even argue that it was a necessary hoax, meant to inspire faith among the people of the city and among the wealthy companies that would bring future business to San Francisco. Possibly a dream that might inspire the continued re-growth and healing of the economy and society after the great tragedy that threatened to destroy the whole place.

Like an anthem of great ideals sung by mere slobs. They cannot possibly live up to the high ideals they are singing about, so in a way, the song is a hoax. But, if the song is sung without irony, and the ideals upheld and fought for, the song can affect the outcome of thousands of lives. The lives that are lived, daily to aspire to these ideals, to great bravery, to fight for justice, to have faith in the face of doubting; those lives are the thing that transforms the artifice into the actual.

The burlap and plaster becomes concrete.

The tearfully sung songs of faith in God become effectual in generosity and mercy.

Without love's response, the most sublime moments of worship become nothing more than the grand "Tower of Jewels", great for a moment, even dazzling to the ear, until the whole wobbly structure is ripped to the ground and burned.

Instead, listen to the only substance in the songs that really matters, the Word of God. It's the steel structure at the center. It doesn't go away. Allow genuine materials like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control to replace the artificial man-made materials. Be careful, because a proud heart, jealousy, greed, and lust can easily masquerade in church clothes. See for yourself how beautiful and lasting a life of faith, genuinely lived and freely given will stand the test of time and become a monument to God. He is the master architect and he designed you to be breathtaking in beauty and scope.

You are a masterpiece!

Mundane Beauty: The "Ought"

I was sitting in Panda Express today, eating lunch. As I watched the lunchtime crowd quickly move into the place, through the line and out of the restaurant, I saw an older Caucasian woman, with brilliant white hair dressed for an energetic day of errands. She came up to the glass to see what they were offering. I work near an area with a large population of retirees, so there was nothing strange about seeing her there, but she caught my eye for some reason. I wondered if she knew her way around the Panda or if she was new.

She looked at the food as the businessman in front of her absently ordered food while simultaneously setting something up with a contractor on his cell phone. She stepped in front of him in the line to see what kind of entrees they had and he walked around her, chatting loudly on his phone and pointing at food to the server. She hadn't bothered him at all.

Another server came up to help the woman, asking her if she knew what she'd like.

"I've never done this before." I noticed that the woman's head and neck rhythmically shook. "I want two entrees like that man just ordered, but I am not sure how it works." Even through her bold, clear voice I couldn't help but feel her vulnerability. I sensed that in the past she was a woman who got things done and that she wasn't going to let this new experience intimidate her.

"Okay," said the kind-faced, Hispanic-American woman, "You can just order a side first, and then you can choose two entrees."

"I am not sure which things I am choosing from." She showed a bit more of her weakness, but she asked without asking. Her dignity was still intact.

"You can choose from fried rice, Chow Mein, or steamed vegetables", the 20ish year-old server said with sweetness and patience without a hint of a patronizing tone.

"Hmmm," she gazed carefully at the choices, "I think I will have Chow Mein." Some spittle flew onto the glass as she spoke, "And now for my entrees!" She pronounced it like it was spelled (like "entry" with an s at the end).

She pointed to one of the entrees and said that she wanted that one, then she asked for Kung Pao Chicken.

"Oh, that one is pretty spicy, would you still like it?"

The woman pulled a face, "Oh, no! Certainly not!" Her eyes darted around to see what else she might like, but not recognizing any of them, she paused.

The server quickly offered another choice, "The mushroom chicken is not spicy, would you like that one?"

"Yes, I think I would," grateful for the help of the nice server.

One minute later I saw her hurrying out the door with her plastic bag, toward her car, ready to take on the rest of her day.

Something struck me in that moment and made me stop and thank Jesus that I got to witness it. I am not sure what it was but it brought a tear to my eye. I am pretty sappy, but I felt something deeper in that moment. Maybe it was one of those teaching moments where my heavenly Father points out something as we walk together.

I think it had something to do with the idea that to have and maintain dignity as an older person, there must be a societal framework in place that honors us as we age. The fact is that most of the time, I don't see dignity afforded to the weak and elderly by the young. Mostly, I see people treating them like the bother that they can be, and not like the image of God that he created us all to be.

I am sure, I have given this conversation fifty times the attention that these two women did, and that makes it all the more beautiful. I was afforded the privilege to witness evidence of what Ravi Zacharius calls the heaven-born "Ought" as it is expressed towards human frailty. Where does kindness towards the weaker among us have it's place in the Darwinian mindset of secular American Culture? There is no logical reason, other than the in-born thumbprint of the Almighty, that there should be any such thing as everyday, mundane kindnesses towards those among us who no longer work a job or can help us to evolve to the next phase of humanity.

But, we ought to...and we know it. There is no escaping it, and that "Ought" will have its day in court. The "Ought" is where heaven first touches the soul of man. It's where the heavenly Marine Corps first hits land and starts it's base of operations. If you don't shy away from it, but listen to it and walk in that wisdom, you are embarking on a wonderful journey to meet the one who made you, face to face.