The Story of the Rooster
Inevitably, when the topic of Jim’s personal history come up, someone asks, "Why aren’t you a minister anymore?" (Jim was a local church pastor for fifteen years before becoming a futures speculator.) The short answer is that while he was a good preacher, he was always more of a scholar than a people person, a very private guy rather than a social creature. The result was that as a pastor he was always a fish out of water.
For many, if not most, people who are seriously involved in a local church, this history raises a number of questions. “Why did you really quit?” One question that’s not often verbalized, but lies close to the surface of other queries is, “Did you lose your faith?” (The answer is, "No.")
On the flip side,
there are interesting questions and assumptions surrounding his entry
into the field of commodity and currency futures speculation. One woman
asked with incredulity, “Are ministers allowed to do that?” (Of course,
implied in the statement is that there is something inherently
dishonest and self-serving about being a commodities trader and that
there is something inherently virtuous about being a minister. Both
assumptions are wrong by the way.)
It is into this milieu that the rooster brings its significance. The Hungarian Reformed Church adopted the rooster as its symbol, in favor of the more traditional cross, after a period in which they felt they had betrayed the Christ they had confessed and promised to follow. The rooster said something about their past and about the future they intended.
Jesus prophesied that Peter would deny him three times “before the cock crows.” In spite of Peter’s strenuous disagreement, that’s precisely what happened. But embedded in that prophecy was also a promise. The implied promise was that no matter how badly Peter messed it up, Jesus knew, Jesus understood, and Jesus would forgive. The rooster is therefore a poignant, if painful, picture of human failure amidst God’s victory in Christ.
But the rooster also looks forward. The crowing of the rooster marks the beginning of a new day. Furthermore, roosters crow with attitude, as if they own the day. One might say that the rooster is the herald and guardian of the coming day. This is what the Hungarian Reformed Church dedicated themselves to be: guardians of the new day.
Jim Nelson has no sense of being a guardian of the future, like the Hungarian Reformed Church, but he is very much a forward looking person. He is a student of culture, and from that perspective he is very much interested in how the future will unfold. As a student of the past he has an eye for the future (because the two are inseparably entwined). As an artist he is able to express what he sees in simple detail. This is the job of the rooster. Furthermore, his life is full of interesting contradictions, failures, fits and starts. To this God offers the gift of the rooster.
Copyright © 2004 James E. Nelson (Just Another Jim). All Rights Reserved.
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