Twenty years ago today, the unthinkable happened. I remember the horror of hearing that an airplane had crashed into one of the towers of the World Trade Center. At first we thought it was an accident, but when another airplane crashed into the other tower, we realized that we were under attack. Then a third airplane hit the Pentagon and a fourth crashed in Pennsylvania, and we started to wonder how many more airplanes would be crashing. I remember getting a phone call from my sister saying “America is under attack; you need to leave work and come home right now”. I remember watching the news that night on TV, and seeing the horror as thousands of people began running through the streets of New York City, trying to get away from the area of the World Trade Center as quickly as possible, while the rescue workers were trying to rush in. I remember the fear as people waited to hear from their loved ones, and the sorrow when some of them started to realize that their loved ones would never be coming home. I remember the sorrow and the pain. Now is the time to take stock of where we’ve come since then, what lessons we’ve learned, and what lessons we still need to learn.
On September 11, 2001, we learned that we are much more vulnerable then we ever realized. Similar to the feelings generated by the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, and to the feelings generated by the COVID pandemic, we felt vulnerable. Nothing feels safe in a world where airplanes intentionally crash into buildings killing thousands of people. Nothing feels safe in a world where terrorists hold that much power. America and all of humanity had to come face-to-face with the fact that we are all far weaker and far more vulnerable than we had been telling ourselves. In my opinion, our response to the events of 9/11/01 was both good and bad. Good— Many people gathered in churches and homes to pray. Many people realized that it was time to pray. We (temporarily) acknowledged our weakness. We (temporarily) realized that we desperately needed God. Bad— The prayer meetings slowed down after a few weeks. Once the initial shock started to be alleviated, the prayer meetings stopped. Good— People banded together. There was a sense that “We’re all in this together”. Most of us knew someone who knew someone who was killed when the towers came down. We (temporarily) learned to “weep with those who weep”. Bad— We developed clearly-defined in-groups and out-groups. The in-groups were the patriotic Americans and the conservative Christians. The out-groups were all Muslims and many Americans who were of a less patriotic and more liberal and progressive bent. We were quick to draw a dividing line between the “good guys” and the “bad guys”— “us” and “them”. Good— President Bush helped us to not see ourselves as defeated, passive victims but was able to rally us into bounce-back mode. Bad— President Bush waged a war against terrorism that could never be ended. (When Bush gave his speech several days after 9/11 I remember thinking to myself “If we wage a war against terrorism, how are we ever going to end it? How will we know when the last terrorist cell has been defeated? And why is he bringing the wonder-working power of the blood of Jesus into a speech about waging a war?”). Violence begets violence. War begets war. Every act of aggression guarantees that there will be an act of revenge, which will trigger another act of aggression, which will trigger another act of revenge. The cycle of aggression and revenge never stops. What one side sees as an act of revenge the other side sees as an act of aggression— like two children who refuse to stop fighting because they both insist “He hit me first”. There is no way to end it. That is the way that war and violence work. That is the way of this world. This God-rejecting world sees no other way to solve its problems than to shoot guns and to drop bombs. Perhaps this unending cycle of aggression and revenge will never end until Messiah returns to the earth. Perhaps the planet has chosen its course and will not relent until the Day of the Lord— but that doesn’t mean that Christians should go along with it. We shouldn’t be cheering the Enemy’s tactics. Jesus said “For all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword” (Matthew 26:52). Jesus knew and taught that when we go to war against another, we bring war against ourselves. Jesus said “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust”. (Matthew 5:43-45). Many Christians ignored these teaching of Jesus in the aftermath of the events of 9/11/01. We should have led the world in loving our enemy, but we could not. We were too angry. We were too offended. We were too hurt. We were not able to love our enemy. There was too much pain. We were not able to forgive. God knows our weakness. He knows that it is hard to do the right thing when we are in extreme pain and sorrow— but now it’s twenty years later. We need to deal with this now or it will continue to return to us, haunting us at every turn. I am not expecting the United States of America to forgive Al-Qaeda and to act like nothing happened, but I am asking myself and my fellow Christians to search our hearts. What are we harboring in our hearts? Does our remembrance of the events of 9/11/01 fill our hearts with anger and desire for revenge, or do we beg God to help us to love and forgive our enemies? What do we really want? Peace or war? Yes, there will be no peace until Messiah returns, but what do we want? Do we join in with the rest of America in a spirit of anger and a thirst for revenge, or do we act according to who we are: A counter-cultural Church of the redeemed, who represent Christ on earth, who are leaning to love and to forgive those who don’t deserve it, just as Christ loved us and forgave us, though we don’t deserve it? Are we showing the world Christ Jesus, or are we showing the world an odd blend of American nationalism and patriotism with a little Christianity sprinkled in? Jesus called us to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth. This means that we have to be different from the rest of the world. They hate; we ask God to help us to love. They seek revenge; we ask God to help us to forgive. They seek war; we seek peace. Peace may not be possible until the Messiah returns, but peace represents who we are. It should be the condition of our hearts. If the coming Kingdom of God is a kingdom of peace, and if the Church has been set up by God as a billboard pointing to the coming kingdom, then we should be a people who seek peace and not war; we should be a people who seek forgiveness and not revenge. Otherwise we are not being who we are. We are not being who God called us to be. Jesus would call us light that has been hidden under a bushel, and salt that has lost its saltiness. When we march with the rest of the world instead of marching against it, we betray our calling as representatives and ambassadors of the coming Kingdom of God. “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, says the Lord” (Romans 12:19). Some day God will set the record straight, but that is his job, not ours. God know the hearts of all people, and only God can judge righteously. We don’t need to worry about vengeance, as that will be taken care of by the only One in the universe who has the right to vengeance. We don’t dare ask for vengeance upon others while we plead for God’s mercy over ourselves. Sinners who deserve God’s wrath don’t pray down God’s vengeance on other sinners who deserve God’s wrath. Instead, we trust God to do whatever is right, and we pursue the things that Jesus taught us to pursue: Loving our enemies and forgiving those who persecute us. This is what makes us the Church. This is what makes us ambassadors of the coming Kingdom. Remembering the events of 9/11/01 should not make Christians more patriotic, more nationalistic, and more filled with anger and the desire for revenge. That is the world’s way, but that is not our way. God calls Christians to march in a different direction. We need to learn to say with King David “I am for peace: but when I speak, they are for war” (Psalm 120:7). A descendent of David who is greater than David will come to reclaim the throne of David, and He is the Lamb that was Slain, the Prince of Peace. We will spend eternity worshipping the Prince of Peace. We need to be becoming now what we will be forever. Vulnerability is not a bad thing. It is a good thing. When we acknowledge our vulnerability, we place ourselves rightly before God. A surge of American nationalism and patriotism and a show of military strength is buying into the lie that we are strong and not vulnerable, that we can solve our own problems through military might and political power, that “they” are bad and “we” are good, that we automatically have God’s favor because we somehow think that we are a Christian nation and that God will bless our military and political chauvinism. This sets us into a collision course with God and His ways. This positions us to become the enemies of God Himself. Jesus said “Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away”. (Matthew 5:38-42). This is not the American way, but it is the Jesus way. We’ve got to make a choice. We can’t have it both ways.
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The scene is horrific. 20,000 people packed into an airport— angry, frightened, desperate people, all with the same cry: “Get me out of here!”. Children crying because they can’t find their mothers. Families pushed apart by the crowds, unable to find each other. “Will we ever find each other in these crowds? What if we end up on different planes taking us to different countries? What if we never see each other again?”. People getting on whatever plane taxis up next, having no idea of which country will be their final destination. Wherever it goes, that’s their fate. “Kids, just get on any plane; wherever it takes you, it’s got to be better than here. If we get separated and if we never see you again, we pray you’ll have a good life. If you end up together, take good care of each other. Wherever you end up, behave yourselves, remember everything we’ve taught you, remember to say your prayers, and don’t forget us”. Stampedes inside the airport. Stampedes outside at the gate. People being trampled by the crowds, some trampled to death. Plane after plane takes off, like an old black and white World War II movie, but the people keeping flooding into the airport, coming in faster than the planes can carry them out. “What if we miss the last plane? What if we are stuck here? What will happen to us?” 20,000 human beings, all of whom had plans for tomorrow, now lost and confused, as sheep without a shepherd, all hope of a better life tomorrow quickly fading with every airplane that takes off, leaving them behind.
Tragedy unfolds in Kabul, and the world feels helpless. What can we do? What can we say? The people in the airport feel helpless, as the watching world feels helpless. There is one thing we can do. We can pray. Lord, we pray for the masses of people who are inside Kabul airport, and for those who are waiting outside at the gate, trying to get in, and for those trying to make it into Kabul from the surrounding areas, and for those who want to make their way to the airport but have no means of getting there. You are there with them. You walk among them. You feel their pain. We pray that a sense of your peace would fill that airport. You who made order out of chaos when you created the world, come into Kabul airport and turn chaos into peace. We pray that a calm awareness of your presence would fill the atmosphere of that airport. Help the people to know that you love them. Help them to know that you know their fear and their heartbreak. Help them to know that you feel their pain. Help them to know that you care. We ask you to reunite family members who are looking for each other. Help the crying mothers and crying children to find each other. Guide them onto the right airplane that will take them to the right destination where they will find compassionate people who will care for them. Make it possible that there will be enough planes so that every last person who wants to leave will be able to do so. Still the stampedes. Calm the crowds. Give hope to every hopeless heart that tomorrow will be better than today. Lord, we pray for those who are unable to leave. We pray especially for the women and children. May the new regime not treat them harshly. May they be treated with dignity and respect. May they be able to live their lives without fear of oppression. Give them dignity and strength and courage. Help them to know that many around the world are standing with them. Lord, we pray for the persecuted Christians in Afghanistan. Give them wisdom, strength, discernment, courage, and a deep awareness of your presence. Help their light not to be snuffed out. May their light shine brighter as the day draws darker. Send them helpers and protectors who will speak up for them when they cannot speak up for themselves. Keep them safe. Encourage them when they are weary. Preserve their lives. Lord, we pray for those of us who are on the outside looking in. We pray for ourselves, the watching world. Help us to not feel powerless. Remind us of the power of prayer, and of prayerful action. Help us to be both compassionate and effective. Show us how to pray and what to do. Make all the wrong things right, and use us as tools in your hands. In the words of Francis of Assisi, make us instruments of your peace. In Jesus’ Name, Amen. Organized Christianity has lost its identity. Christendom has lost its way. To the extent that Christ has been replaced by Christendom, we no longer know who we are.
Christianity was once defined by its orthodoxies. The Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church were defined, at least in part, by the creeds that they affirmed and by their opposition to “the other Church”. After the Protestant Reformation, the Protestants and the Catholics were defined, at least in part, by their opposition to each other. As Protestantism splintered into competing denominations, each denomination become defined by its opposition to the other denominations. Christianity became defined by competing claims of “We are right and you are wrong”. Defining ourselves by what we oppose is not a good idea, because it gives us nothing to affirm. It gives us something to hate, but nothing to live for and nothing to die for. It makes us cranky cynics who protest everything and affirm nothing. We fight, therefore we exist. If all we have to pass on to the next generation is something that we oppose, then we will have given the next generation nothing that is of value. The tendency to define ourselves as being the opposite of what we hate is one of the reasons why Christianity evolved into Christendom. Christendom is Christianity that seeks to hitch itself to political and cultural power because it has forgotten who it is and why it exists. It’s the agenda that says that if we attach ourselves to the powerful, then we may gain some of their power. If we attach ourselves to something or someone powerful, whether it is an empire or a nation or a movement or an ideology or an institution or a president or a king, if it succeeds, then we succeed, but if it fails, then we fail. Christendom is Christianity that tries to be in charge of society. It’s Christianity that refuses to be pushed to the margins. It’s Christianity that insists on being at center stage, under the floodlights, surrounded by an admiring audience of the rich and the famous and the influential and the movers and shakers of this world. It’s Christianity that seeks to gain control of the masses by means of political and cultural domination. What happens when Christendom dies? Do we desperately try to revive it? Do we abandon it and move on to something else? Both are wrong answers. When Christendom dies, then that is the opportunity for true Christianity to re-emerge. Who are we? We are followers of Jesus. Jesus said “Greater love has no man than this, than a man lay down his life for friends” (John 15:13). There is nothing power-hungry about a man who gives up his life for his friends, and who invites others to do the same. Jesus said “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me” (Matthew 16:24). There is nothing power-hungry about a man who denies himself, and invites others to do the same. Jesus said “If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all” (Mark 9:35). There is no quest for power here. Jesus came as a servant, and invited his followers to be servants, following his example. Jesus went on to say “You know that they which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and their great ones exercise authority upon them. But so shall it not be among you: but whoever will be great among you, shall be your servant: And whoever of you will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all. For even the Son of man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:42-45). These are not the words of a power-hungry man who desired to start a power-hungry movement. Jesus may have been the author of what we now call Christianity, but he was certainly not the author of Christendom. Hear the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount: “You have heard that it has been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say to you, that you resist not evil: but whoever shall smite you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue you at the law, and take away your coat, let him have your cloak also. And whoever shall compel you to go a mile, go with him two. Give to him who asks of you, and from him that would borrow from you turn not away. You have heard that it has been said, You shalt love your neighbor, and hate your enemy. But I say to you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them who despitefully use you, and persecute you; That you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven: for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:38-45). Those are not the words of a man who seeks power. His followers should be anything but power-seekers. According to the Gospel of John, “Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come that he would depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end” (John 13:1). Jesus went all the way to the cross. He allowed sinful men to nail him to a cross. He allowed his enemies to kill him. He was doing it for them. It was for their sins that he died. He paid the penalty for their sins because he loved them— the very ones who killed him. Were those the actions of a man who was hungry for power? He surrendered his right for justice, his right for a fair trial, his right for life itself so that his enemies could be forgiven, so that they could have eternal life, and so that they could be loved by his Father. That is how Jesus lived and died, and that is how he calls his followers to live and to die. This is the way of Jesus. This is not the way of Christendom. What will happen when Christendom falls? The Left and the Right will rush in to try to fill the vacuum. The capitalists and the socialists will rush in to try to seize the moment. Numerous religions and spiritualities, both new and old, will be competing for the attention of the masses. People will find some way to try to satisfy their spiritual hunger, and they will have many competing voices from which to choose. They will grab whatever seems to be the coolest. They will grasp for whatever it is that glitters the most. They will listen to their most influential voices. They will assume that the people whom they admire the most will know what they are talking about. They will assume that whatever seems attractive at the moment must be true and right— at least true and right for them. This is happening now, and will only accelerate in the days ahead. How should those of us who are Christians respond? The worst possible response would be to try to revive Christendom. Christendom has become the enemy of Christianity. Let Christendom die. Its death is long overdue. Trying to hitch ourselves to power (whether on the Left or on the Right) will destroy our witness for generations to come. No one will take us or our Gospel or our Jesus seriously. We’ve got to stop trying to be the loudest voice with the most power. Instead, we give up our power. We give up our privilege. We stop trying to run society. We repent for allowing ourselves to be sucked into this world’s power-hungry way of doing things. We repent for being very bad ambassadors who have tragically misrepresented Jesus. We repent for dragging the name of Jesus through the mud, all in the name of Christendom. We lay down our weapons. We surrender our quest for power. We allow ourselves to be marginalized, as Jesus and his small group of humble followers were marginalized. And from the margins, we quietly and humbly follow Jesus. We learn to forgive. We turn the other cheek. We become humble and kind and gentle and Christlike. We learn to love, to give, and to bless those who oppose us. We become attractive to those who seek truth and beauty and goodness, and we become despised by those who love the pursuit of power and the pleasures and privileges of this world. Those who are drawn to the light will join us. Those who run from the light will despise us. The goal is not to control society. The goal is to follow Jesus from the core of our being, in humility and sincerity and truth. That is the only kind of “Christianity” that will draw people to Jesus. It is the only expression of Christianity that is worth living for and dying for. It’s what Jesus came to live for, and it’s what he came to die for. Jesus didn’t shed his precious blood on the cross so that Christendom could rule society. Let Christendom die, so that followers of Jesus will have nothing to hide behind. Let Christendom die, so that followers of Jesus might live lives that are so authentically Christlike that others will want to join us as we follow Jesus. The voice of Jesus is heard most clearly, not when we yell the loudest, but when we take our rightful place at the margins of society and learn to be suffering servants who love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. At the end of history, it is not the powerful who will have the last word. It is the Lamb of God, who gave up his life for those who hated him, and despised him, and betrayed him, and mocked him, and killed him. The Jesus way is not the way of power, but the way of surrender and the way of servanthood. Happy are we if we are called to follow in his footsteps. When I was a Catholic I remember repeating the words of the liturgy of the Mass every Sunday: “Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy of us; Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us; Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, grant us peace”. May we be very grateful to our Catholic brothers and sisters for keeping that refrain alive for so many generations. May those of us who are Protestant join in the refrain. Christendom is all about the quest for power. True Christianity is all about abdicating power and following in the self-sacrificial footsteps of the Lamb who was slain. This is the only expression of Christianity that is worth saving. Who are we? We are followers of the Lamb who was slain, who seek to become more and more like him every day as we walk out the lifestyle of our faith with great authenticity and deep gratitude, as we trust in his death and resurrection and wait for his return, as individuals, as local churches, and as the global Body of Christ. That’s who we are. As a Christian, I never quite know what to do with the Fourth of July. I love picnics and parades and fireworks and days off from work and trips to the seashore and the sunny days of summer, but I’m not so sure that I can buy into the narrative behind the holiday. If it’s about signing a declaration, then while I can certainly celebrate the ideals that are set forth in that declaration, those signatures cost the lives of 6,800 Americans and between 24,000 and 25,000 British soldiers who were killed during the Revolutionary War. I’m not so sure that the Jesus who said “love your enemies” would approve of putting together armies and training soldiers to pick up guns and start killing other soldiers for the sake of thirteen colonies that wanted to be independent of their mother country. If it’s about liberty and justice for all, we haven’t yet achieved that. America is a work in progress, and we still have a long way to go, so the celebration is premature. If it’s about celebrating an ideal that has not yet been realized, then OK, let’s celebrate, but let’s not celebrate the war that was fought in order to try to make it happen, and let’s not celebrate as though the ideal had already become a reality. This world tells us that the way to fix the world’s problems is to pick up guns and start killing each other. This world tells us that if picking up guns and going to war doesn’t work, then we pretend the problem doesn’t exist and we celebrate anyway. This world tells us to pledge our allegiance to our flag and to defend our flag with war if necessary, while Jesus calls us to love our enemies and to pledge our allegiance to Him. Followers of Jesus have been called out of this world, and we shouldn’t be buying into the lies of this world. We Christians should know better.
“The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor.”— Proclamation made in Galveston, Texas, June 19, 1865
I wonder how the slaves who had kept Galveston running felt when they woke up on the morning of June 19, 1865 and found out they were free. Joy at finally being free? Anger that they should have been freed two-and-a-half years earlier, but their masters never told them? Fear over how their treatment at the hand of their former masters would change, or not, now that they were considered hired employees and not purchased property? Did their masters even know how to treat them as fellow humans and not as property to be bought, used, and sold? Surely they realized that it wouldn’t be as easy as flipping a switch. They knew that there would be difficult days ahead. I wonder what it felt like showing up for work on the first day of this very new arrangement. How did the former slaves and the former masters treat each other? Was their day characterized more by angry words or by icy silence? What was it like going back to their dwellings that evening, no longer as slaves but as freed men and women? I wonder what stories they told and what songs they sang and what prayers they prayed as they sat around their campfires on that hot summer night in Texas. I wonder if they were laughing or crying, joyful or bitter, fearful or celebratory. I wonder if they had heard a peep out of their former masters. I wonder if the mosquitoes were biting. I wonder if the moon was full. Were there children running around, laughing and playing? Were there babies crying? Was the air filled with the scent of something really good being cooked over the open campfires? Were there angry young men planning to storm out of town at the crack of dawn while their weeping mothers were pleading with them to stay a little longer and wait for the dust to settle? I wonder what June 19, 1865 was really like in Galveston, Texas— 156 years ago tonight. It is fitting that we think about these things. It is fitting that we remember. It is fitting that we try to understand, as best we can, what can only be truly understood by those who experienced it— and perhaps by their children, and their children’s children. Behind every holiday there is a story, and behind most stories there are heartbreak and sorrow and fear and anger and despair as well as joy and hope. That’s just the way it is under God’s heaven. That being said, the slaves were freed, and a celebration is in order. Happy Juneteenth! We celebrate, but not without the pain of remembrance, and not without the heavy awareness that there is much work that is yet to be done. “Truly He taught us to love one another; His law is love and His Gospel is peace. Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother; and in His name all oppression shall cease.” — Lyrics to the Christmas carol “O Holy Night” by Adolphe Adam and J. Dwight “Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?” — Isaiah 58:5-7 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)
Frederick Buechner says of this verse “That is to say that God so loved the world that he gave his only son to this obscene horror; so loved the world that in some ultimately indescribable way and at some ultimately immeasurable cost he gave the world himself. Out of this terrible death, John says, came eternal life not just in the sense of resurrection to life after death but in the sense of life so precious even this side of death that to live is to stand with one foot already in eternity”. (Frederick Buechner, Listening to Your Life, Harper One, copyright 1992, p. 98). This verse of Scripture has captured the imagination of Christians for over 2,000 years. I want to explore the meaning of these words from the Gospel of John, for in these words and in the message that they carry there is hope, there is meaning, and there is life. For God so loved the world… God glances across His unspeakably glorious universe that had exploded into the magnificent burst of colors and sounds and shapes and rhythms and throbs of matter and energy by the mere utterance of a Word from His mouth, and He focuses His attention on one little blue speck, this planet, this world, this broken and violent and strife-filled and war-torn world where people fight and argue and criticize and condemn and fear the ones they hate and hate the ones they fear, where injustice rules the planet, where people try to solve their problems by picking up guns and killing each other, or by dropping bombs one each other’s countries, or by exterminating people by the millions, where deceit is common and truth is scarce, where people would rather hide themselves behind behind the fig leaf of convenient lies than deal in naked honesty with uncomfortable and self-incriminating truth, where the common good is sacrificed on the altar of personal and partisan agenda, where love of God and love of humanity are shoved aside without a moment’s hesitation by the scheming and manipulative mechanisms of both those who want to stay in control and those who want to seize control. For God so loved the world-- that world— that He gave His only Son. For God so loved the world that He gave… Why would He give to a world that knows nothing of giving and only of taking? Why would he come to a world whose inhabitants would only reject him? The Pharisees didn’t like Him because He didn’t follow their rules. He wasn’t religious enough for them. The Sadducees didn’t like Him because He believed in too much. He threatened their intellectual snobbery. The Romans didn’t like Him because He believed in love and mercy and forgiveness and compassion and spoke against revenge and proclaimed a Gospel of peace and non-retaliation. He was too soft for them. The average Joe on the street didn’t like Him because He exposed Joe’s sin and selfishness for what it was. He took away Joe’s fig leaf. He had a brief moment of popularity on what we now call Palm Sunday, when he was acclaimed by the crowds in the streets of Jerusalem as the coming Anointed One, but his popularity didn’t last long. He hadn’t come to bring them the kind of kingdom they were expecting— the kind where “we” are the good guys and “they” are the bad guys and “we” get to rule over “them”. Jesus came to oppose that kind of kingdom-building, not to build that kind of kingdom, and so the admiration of the crowds quickly morphed into a toxic cocktail of collaboration of Church and State in an underhanded plot to kill the Son of God, with his small band of followers cowed into silence. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son… Without trying to explain the intricacies of Trinitarian theology, let’s just cut to the chase and let the theologians attempt to explain that which is ultimately inexplicable. When God sent his Son to visit the planet, God visited the planet. A might army of soldiers wouldn’t have been able to fix the problem. A brilliant band of theologians and scientists and ethicists and politicians and artists and poets wouldn’t have been able to fix the problem, even if they could all agree on a common solution. The problem ran so deeply into the systems of human society and into the fabric of human hearts that any solution they could have possibly proposed would have served only to place an awkward band-aid over a gaping wound. The band-aid would soon fall off, leaving the gaping wound even worse than it was before. Only God could solve the problem, and there was only one way that that He could do it— by coming to planet Earth as a man. That man was both God and man. He was the Son of God and God the Son. That man was Jesus. By coming to the Earth, He showed us how to relate to God as our Father. By dying on the cross, He reconciled us to God by taking upon Himself the penalty and punishment for our sins. By rising from the dead, He abolished sin and death forever, conquering them decisively and victoriously. He came to bring healing and peace to a wounded and war-torn world. He came to bring healing and peace to our wounded spirits. He came to give us a way out of isolation and self-absorption and into relationship, with God and with each other. He came to forgive us of our sins and reconcile us to God, enabling us to live the kind of life He had intended for us to have all along— eternal life, both qualitatively and quantitatively. Eternal life is knowing Him. For God so loved…. It was all motivated by love. What else would we expect from a God of love? He didn’t come to fix the world and then move onto another project on some other galaxy in some other corner of the universe. It was love that prompted Him to come, and it’s love that will prompt Him to come again, so that He can be with us forever— which is exactly what He has wanted all along. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16) If we human beings are all sinful, then it stands to reason that everything we build will be corrupted by sin. Sinful men and women build sinful structures. Would we expect sinful human beings to build sinless structures? If we as a fallen human race have an inclination toward prejudice and racism in our hearts, if our sin nature inclines us to suspect, even in very subtle ways, that those who are not like us are probably in some sense inferior to us, then it stands to reason that we will build structures that will reflect and are corrupted by this sinful inclination, whether we do so intentionally or not. So why are some Christians trying to say that institutional racism doesn’t exist? When people speak of institutional racism, rather than disputing them, we should high-five them and congratulate them for finally catching up with what the Bible has been teaching for millennia. What an odd situation we have here. Secular thinking is recognizing what we Christians call “sin”, and many Christians are denying its existence. Instead of denying its existence we should be saying “Yes, racism is real, both in our hearts and in our institutional structures. It’s sinful, there is no excuse for it, Christ died for that sin, and it’s a sin of which we must all repent continually, asking God to search our hearts and reveal to us our wicked ways, both as individuals and as a society”.
Let’s talk about the situation in which the Hebrew slaves found themselves on the day when they were released from Egyptian bondage. They were free, joyful, able to worship and serve and obey God without Egyptian interference, but they were also unemployed, unskilled except in doing tasks that no one else was willing to do, living among a people who were used to thinking of them as their own personal property. Suddenly, the whole society had changed. The Egyptians had to learn how to function without their Hebrew slaves. The Hebrews had to learn how to function without their Egyptian masters. Thankfully God got them out of there quickly, split open a sea for them, gave them Moses as a leader, gave them the Ten Commandments and the entire Law of Moses, a whole sacrificial system, a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, manna, quail, water from the rock, not to mention His Presence in the Tabernacle. God had a solution that saved the Hebrew people from a lot of chaos that they would have otherwise experienced had they stayed in Egypt. Much chaos was averted because God quickly removed them from the situation. The Hebrews were freed, the angel of death passed over, and that was cause for great celebration! The Egyptians were judged, the angel of death did not pass over, and the consequences were great. Now let’s try to imagine what would have happened if the freed Hebrews had stayed in Egypt— no longer as slaves but as free man and women, still living within the society that had previously enslaved them. That makes the situation far more complicated! While the Egyptians are learning how to survive without their slaves, the Hebrews are learning how to survive without their masters— and both groups are trying to learn different lessons in the same place and at the same time! It would have taken many generations for everything to get sorted out. Even after several generations, it’s easy to see how the Egyptians might think that everything was now OK while the Hebrews would feel that there were unresolved problems that still needed to be addressed. Now let’s transpose this situation into our American context. The Civil War had been fought. Slavery had been abolished, but freed slaves were living in the same society as those who had previously been their masters, and racism and prejudice did not suddenly disappear overnight. Jim Crow laws kept the old patterns of racism and oppression going. Eventually the Jim Crow laws were abolished, but the old patterns still persisted, perhaps in more subtle ways. The Civil Rights Era made some more progress, but some of the old patterns still persisted. When we talk about institutional racism, we are saying that the problems have not yet been resolved; the old patterns still persist, not only in the hearts of people but also in the structures of our society. Becoming defensive and dismissive of the whole concept of institutional racism is very much the wrong approach. The right approach is to listen, listen, listen to those who are still being ground under the wheels of institutional racism, listen to their stories, listen to their pain and frustration, and then listen for the voice of God. If we listen, we may just hear and understand. It is possible for a society to repent corporately. Didn’t Ninevah repent at the preaching of Jonah? They even put sackcloth on the animals (see Jonah 3:8). God holds societies accountable, not only individuals. If a society can repent corporately, then a society can sin corporately. We can’t begin to dismantle systems of racism until we are willing to recognize that racism exists, both on an individual level and on a systemic level. When we acknowledge, then we can confess, repent, and take action. If those in society who don’t know God can’t or won’t repent, then at least the Christians living among them can and should repent— even if they are not personally guilty of the sin of the surrounding society. Didn’t Nehemiah confess the sins of his people, even though he personally was not guilty of the sins they had committed? (See Nehemiah 1). We can’t take steps to remedy the situation until we admit that the situation exists, and that we are probably in some way complicit with the sins of our nation. If we have seen the problem and have done nothing about it, or if we have refused to admit that the problem even exists, or if we have refused to ask God to shine his searchlight into our own hearts to reveal to us any traces of prejudice or racism for which we must repent personally, then we have been complicit. I fail to see how the concept of institutional racism contradicts biblical teaching. We never sin in a vacuum. The consequences of sin affect not only the sinner and the one sinned against but also many other people in the surrounding society. Sin has ripple effects that go farther and wider than we ever realize. The term “institutional racism” is a secular attempt to label what the Bible describes as the effects or consequences of sin. If we refuse to admit that institutional racism even exists, then how can we ever appropriate the biblical solution of the cross and the resurrection and confession of sin and repentance and faith, coupled with the injunction of Micah 6:8 to “do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God”? The secular world admits that there is a problem but doesn’t have the solution. Christians have the solution, but some Christians don’t recognize that the problem exists. Sounds like some deception is at work here. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9) “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting”. (Psalm 139:23-24) “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. (1 John 1:8-9) “Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God”. (Psalm 90:1-2) The Hebrew and Christian Scriptures tell about a God who knows what He is doing. He creates a magnificently beautiful universe according to a master plan, with great precision. Everything connects with everything else in a massive complex of myriads of causes and effects. Somehow, everything works. According to the Scriptures, we live in a predictable universe where the galaxies don’t go crashing into each other, time doesn’t suddenly start going backwards, matter doesn’t suddenly morph into some new and foreign substance, time and space continue to be time and space, and the laws of mathematics and chemistry and physics are constant. This is the case because an intelligent God brought the universe into existence and sustains it according to His plan, supervising the execution of the plan right down to the minutest detail. If that is our starting point, then how do we account for war, violence, injustice, cruelty and oppression? And how do we account for natural catastrophes, diseases such as cancer, viruses such as COVID-19, and death itself? According to the Scriptures, God granted to humankind the gift of free will. Humankind chose to rebel against God. We call this rebellion “sin”. If God were to eradicate all of the war, injustice, cruelty and oppression in the universe, He would have to eradicate humankind, for all of humankind is sinful. The rebellion of humanity somehow knocked the earth out of sync, resulting in natural catastrophes, diseases such as cancer, viruses such as COVID-19, and death itself. God is still in control, but He has ordained that these be the tragic consequences of humanity’s rebellion against Himself. Actions have consequences. Sin against God brought a curse upon humankind. It’s the way God has set up His universe. The Scriptures also speak of what Judaism calls the tikkun olam, the “healing of the world”, which is associated with the coming of the promised Hebrew Messiah. For example, 2,700 years ago, the prophet Isaiah foretold: “And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD; And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious”. (Isaiah 11:1-10) This is the point where Judaism and Christianity start to move in different directions. According to the teachings of Judaism, the tikkum olam has not yet arrived because the Hebrew Messiah has not yet arrived. According to the teachings of Christianity, the Hebrew Messiah comes twice. He came the first time as the Lamb of God, to provide an atonement for the sins of humankind by dying on the cross as a substitutionary atonement for our sins, to rise from the dead, and to ascend into heaven. He will return to the earth in the future to establish the tikkum olam, the Kingdom of God upon the earth. (Not all Christians agree that there will be a literal Kingdom of God upon the earth, but that is a topic for another blog post). The Christian narrative is not properly understood in a vacuum. It makes sense only if we embed it into the larger Hebrew narrative. There is a reason that Jesus had to die. There is a reason that he had to rise from the dead and ascend into heaven. There is a reason that he is coming back. It’s all part of the plan; it’s written into the script that God wrote before the universe ever came into existence. It’s all about restoring what God had originally intended. Humankind has become so corrupted in our rebellion against God and His ways that it is impossible to remedy the dilemma in which we find ourselves and which we have brought upon ourselves. All we can come up with is a long series of attempts at trying to fix the problems of our world that may yield some limited success at managing our dilemma at certain times and in certain places, but that cannot ever eradicate it. Our best efforts to eradicate war tend to lead to more war. Our best efforts to fix our societal problems tend to lead to more societal problems. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to do what we can to make the world a better place, but it does mean that the best of human efforts can only take us so far. Humankind can try to manage the effects of sin as best we can, but there are limits as to what we can accomplish. Only God can eradicate sin and its effects. God had to take the initiative to heal the earth, and he did it by coming to earth Himself to live as a man and to die, taking upon himself the judgment and curse of humankind, and then by rising from the dead in a victorious celebration of over the destruction of sin and death, paving the way for the long-awaited tikkun olam, which will be established upon the earth when He returns. The Thursday-Friday-Saturday-Sunday narrative that Christians celebrated this past week is not just a series of pretty stories about the death and resurrection of a charming but controversial young rabbi. It’s God’s explanation of the cosmic order of things. It’s God’s analysis of the situation, and it’s God’s remedy. You may not believe it, but if you are an open-minded person you will at least need to consider that fact that it may just be the truth that explains everything, because it is the truth the flows from the mind of the Author of the universe, who is the Creator of reality and the Definer of truth. So what difference does all of this make on Monday morning? The difference is that the tomb is still empty. God has intervened. God has come to the planet to put into motion the plan that will eventually effect the tikkun olam. There is a solution to war, violence, injustice, cruelty and oppression. There is a solution to natural catastrophes, cancer, COVID-19, and death itself. God has intervened, and God will intervene. That is the meaning of the empty tomb. That is what gives us hope on Monday. It’s not a quick fix solution, but it’s a narrative that gives meaning to the whole. It’s not for the faint of heart. it’s not for those who would insist on finding an illusory sense of momentary happiness right here and now rather than find meaning in suffering over the long haul as we wait for and collaborate with God in the working out of His perfect plan, in His perfect way, in His perfect timing, steadily and consistently and persistently moving toward God’s magnificently glorious appointed destiny for the universe, for humankind, for His Church and for ourselves as individual believers. We do not bring about God’s Kingdom through the political and social mechanisms of our society, but we point to it as a future reality, living as citizens of a Kingdom that has not yet been established. While we participate in the affairs of this world, we do so in a way that models and points to Jesus, and we give our allegiance to another King. God doesn’t repair the world but ignore the individuals, but He also doesn’t repair (we prefer to say “redeem”) the individuals without redeeming the earth. The hope for the world and the hope for individual believers are tied together; they are both part of God’s great plan of redemption. What God began in the world he will complete, and the result will be glorious! What God began in me he will complete, and the result will be glorious! The empty tomb proves that God is still at work, and that nothing can stop God from accomplishing His magnificent work of redemption and restoration, both in the world in general and in the lives of individual believers who give Him our allegiance as our Savior, Lord and King. Those who want a quick fix will not find the Christian Gospel attractive, but some will understand and believe. In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gave a description of those who would inherit the Kingdom of God: “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you”. (Matthew 5:3-11) Rather than dismissing the events of the death and resurrection of Jesus as quaint though maybe-inspiring fables, it would be wiser to seem them as parts of the larger narrative. As the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle don’t make sense until we can see the whole puzzle, the death and resurrection of Jesus don’t make sense until we can see the larger narrative of which they are a part. For those who are struggling with believing that the events that Christians celebrated this past week really happened, consider the larger narrative, and you just might be more open to accepting the parts that are harder to accept. The tikkun olam has not yet arrived. How do we live in the meantime? We live as people of the Monday Perspective. We learn to love God more deeply and to walk in His ways more fully. We continue to learn how to love one another. We continue to ask God to help us to become more like Jesus. We become people who care. By living as compassionate people who love God and who love each other, we point forward to the coming kingdom and we model it, as citizens of a kingdom that has not yet been established on the earth. We do not try to force the kingdom of God on those around us as though we could bring it about through human effort. We become a people who are known for our love, not for our politics. We offer the water of life to those who are thirsty. Those who are thirsty will come. For those of us who have come to know Him, the world doesn’t need for us to be angry, militant culture warriors who are trying to remake society in our own image. The world needs for us to be a joyful company of humble, gentle and courageous men and women who are forever marked and defined by the cross and the resurrection, people of hope in a hopeless world, people who point people to Jesus by being like Jesus, people who dare to believe that the joyful declaration of Resurrection Sunday didn’t end on Monday morning. After all, the tomb is still empty! We came to the tomb, and it was empty. Where was the body? Did someone come and steal it? Is this someone’s cruel idea of a practical joke? This isn’t funny. First they kill him, then they steal his body. Did we come to the wrong tomb? Can someone please tell us what is going on here? We demand an explanation!
We came. We found the empty tomb. We went home. Mary stayed behind. Is there more to this story than meets the eye? Why is this Sunday so perplexing? “So the disciples went away again to their homes. But Mary was standing outside the tomb weeping; and so, as she wept, she stooped and looked inside the tomb; and she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been lying”. (John 20:10-12) This is getting really strange. Mary saw two angels? And the way that they were sitting sort of reminds us of something from the law of Moses. What was it? “And thou shalt make a mercy seat of pure gold: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. And thou shalt make two cherubim of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them, in the two ends of the mercy seat. And make one cherub on the one end, and the other cherub on the other end: even of the mercy seat shall ye make the cherubim on the two ends thereof”. (Exodus 25:17-19) So let’s try to connect the dots. Where the body of Christ used to be is now something like the mercy seat that existed in the ancient tabernacle? Things are starting to get really complicated… “And they said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ When she turned away, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, and did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to Him ‘Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to Him in Hebrew, ‘Rabboni!’ (which means, Teacher). Jesus said to her, ‘Stop clinging to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I ascend to My Father and to your Father, and My God and your God.’ Mary Magdalene came, announcing to the disciples, ‘I have seen the Lord,’ and that He had said these things to her”. (John 20:13-18). Everything changed for Mary the moment she heard him call her name. “Mary!” It was all she needed to hear! She knew it was him! Bit by bit, it all started to make sense. Jesus had told us that he would die and rise from the dead, but it didn’t make sense to us, so I guess we sort of pushed it out of our thinking. But then, it really happened! He arose from the dead! He defeated sin and death! He is risen! He is risen indeed! The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is God’s checkmate to all the plotting and scheming and evil and sin that the world could ever dish up against God and against all that is good and beautiful and right and holy and good. It’s God’s victory over sin and the grave; It’s God’s victory over death itself. The day that began with such great perplexity soon turned into a day of victory, of joyful celebration. Sunday is a microcosm of the human dilemma. We are born into what seems to be a mysterious and confusing universe, and we wonder if there is any purpose to it all. We cry out to the heavens for an answer, and the heavens remain silent. All that we see is a dark and mysterious and silent universe with a myriad of unanswered questions, and we wonder if there is anyone out there to answer them, or if we are condemned to live in the futility of a universe where there are many questions but very few answers. But there are some people at some times and in some places who look out across the universe and we see something very different; the light is turned on, something pierces our souls, and we realize that there is an answer, that God and heaven and truth and beauty are real, that the universe makes sense, that “the heavens resound with the glory of God”, that everything has a purpose, that we have a reason not only to be alive, but to celebrate with joyfulness! Coming to grips with the reality of the death and resurrection of Jesus is the key. While it may seem foolish to many to believe that a man could actually resurrect from the dead, many of us have discovered that the resurrection of Jesus is the key that opens our understanding to the things of God and to the meaning and purpose that we seek. “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ is coming again”. It’s an old refrain that has been repeated by the Church for two millennia, and it is true— more true than many will ever realize. Sometimes the things that seem the least credible are the things that are the most true, but we have to be willing to look foolish in order to discover them. We have to be willing to question the things that seem most obvious. When we make the so-called “discovery”, then we realize that we have not really discovered anything at all, but that God has revealed these things to us, because He wanted us to know the truth that would set us free. We didn’t find the light; God turned it on and focused it in our direction so we couldn’t miss it. Blessed are those who have eyes to see and ears to hear! “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”. (1 Corinthians 15:20-22) “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ”. (1 Corinthians 15:55-57) If we could get beyond our pretty traditions and see things from a higher perspective, we would understand that Resurrection Sunday is a declarative celebration that is the kind of celebration we would have if war and violence and injustice and poverty and racism and discrimination and cancer and COVID-19 and all of the other issues and diseases that inflict and affect humankind were eliminated on the same day, times infinity, because it marks the defeat of all the enemies of God and of humankind, forever. It marks the defeat of humankind’s two greatest enemies, sin and death, out of which all the other of humanity’s problems flow. It marks the breaking of the curse of sin and death. The head of the serpent has been crushed by the wounded heel of the woman’s seed. God had created an unspeakably beautiful and glorious universe, humankind had rebelled, sin and death had reigned for a season, but in the resurrection of Jesus, God has the last word. Checkmate. God will accomplish his purposes. Sin and death and their consequences have been abolished. God is at work restoring his children, his earth and his universe to their original wholeness and beauty, He is carrying out his purposes toward His intended ends, and all obstacles have forever been demolished by the One who died and arose from the dead. God can never be defeated, and his purposes are good. In the proclamation of Resurrection Sunday lies our hope and our joy: He is risen! He is risen indeed! The message of Sunday is that our deepest moments of futility and perplexity and despair can be turned into our greatest moments of joy and victory and meaning once we start to get a glimpse of the God-perspective. We find meaning in the universe by getting to know God and to understand His ways. We get to know God by getting to know Jesus, which involves repentance and faith. We get to know Jesus as we wrestle with the implications of his death for us and his resurrection for us, but we have to move from the global to the personal. His death was for the world, to reconcile a sinful world to God, but in another sense it was specifically for me, to take away my sins. His resurrection was for me, that I also might be raised, as he was. He came to give me forgiveness of sins, eternal life, and a life that has meaning. These things are all wrapped up in his death and resurrection, which took place for me. They are for the world, they are for me, and they are for you, too, if you will receive them— if you will receive him! May God open our eyes and show us the truth that will set us free! We came to the tomb. We looked inside. We saw. We understood. We believed. We still believe, and that belief has rocked us to the core or our being, and transformed our very existence into something very different from what it was before we met him— and that has made all the difference. Those of us who are Christians are people of the cross, and people of the empty tomb, and people of the soon return. These are the things that define us. These are the events that tell us who we are, because they tell us who God is, and how we can be in right relationship with Him, and how we can know Him, and how we can find our place in His universe as His beloved children, with His design, and with His appointed calling, purpose, meaning, and destiny. These are the things that can start to happen once we dare to look into the empty tomb. Look into the empty tomb at your own risk. Look away at your own risk. There is no way to avoid the risk. Whether we choose to look inside or to look away, the consequences are immense. There is no way to play it safe. Choose wisely. Choose carefully. Sunday! Victorious Sunday! Death conquered, sin defeated, hope restored, curse broken! The power of sin and death has been broken, and hopelessness can never again be an option. The hands that were pierced are now raised, though still pierced, in the joyful “Yes!” of the Victor. He’s alive! God is real, God is alive, God is victorious, and God can never be defeated! The universe is singing its song of celebration, though not every heart is tuned to hear the song. God hears the joyful sound, and His heart is made glad. I want to join in the song; I want to share in His gladness! Humanity, open your eyes, your redemption is here! Look, see, believe, rejoice! We had such high hopes. We thought that the Long Awaited One had finally come. We could sense it when we were with him. Something about being with him made our hearts beat faster. We knew he had a special relationship with Ha Shem that no one else had. He understood the heart and mind and will of God, he understood the ways of God, and he was so eager to teach us and to show us! He wanted us to know God the way he knew him, as his Father! When he spoke, there was not only rock-solid confidence and uncompromising authority in his voice, but also profound love and deep compassion in his eyes, unlike anyone we had ever met before. He taught us how to walk through life without fearing the future, for he knew that God’s plan was unfolding— and somehow, he was at the center of it! By being with him, somehow we were at the center it! We were sure he was God’s Anointed One. We could feel it in our bones, and we could see it in his eyes. How his eyes sparkled when he spoke about God as his Father! He was the One who would usher in the coming age, the tikkun olam that was spoken of by the prophets — we were sure of it!
Remember when he sent us out, two-by-two, to proclaim the Kingdom of God in all of the surrounding villages? Remember when we came back and gave him our report? Remember how excited he was— he even saw the evil one as lightning falling from heaven! Those were amazing days, to say the least! The things that he taught us made our hearts beat faster. When we were with him, the things that we saw with our own eyes and heard with our own ears made it impossible for us not to see the fingerprints of God all over his life and all over his teaching. When we were following this man, it felt great to be alive! Life was an adventure! The present was exciting, the future was secure, our joy was full, our hearts were overflowing. How great it was to be alive, walking the streets of Galilee with Yeshua! How we loved being with that man! And then they killed him. No, they didn’t stone him, the Jewish way. That would have been too kind. They crucified him, the Roman way. They had to make it as drawn out and as shameful and as excruciatingly painful as possible. And now he’s gone. How can we go on without our friend? How could we have been mistaken about his identity? Is there no coming tikkun olam? Were we believing in myths all these years? Has Ha Shem forgotten us? How can we have hope when there is no hope? As far as we are concerned, yesterday, on that cross, when Yeshua died, hope died. How can we go on? Truth be told, we don’t want to go on. We have no reason to go on. Hope is gone. Hope died on Friday. Today is Saturday, and we suddenly have nothing to live for, nothing to hope for, nothing to die for. It all happened just that fast. He’s here one minute, gone the next, and with him, everything we had ever hoped for— all gone in an instant. And now he’s in the tomb, and the tomb is silent— and the silence is a very loud silence. The silence is deafening! I guess we could go and visit the tomb, but what good would that do? Remember, it’s the Sabbath, so we can’t walk very far, and it’s the Passover, so we don’t want to defile ourselves. Besides, we’re supposed to be at home with our families celebrating the Passover— but the angel of death did not pass over Yeshua, and Elijah’s seat is still empty. We could reminisce, but that would just make us feel more sad and more hopeless. Where do we go from here? What happens after the Passover? What is the “new normal”? We could go back to our old jobs and our old routines and pretend that it was all just a dream, but we really can’t do that, and we really don’t want to. We can’t go back to what no longer exists. The world has changed, and we have changed— or so we had thought, but now we don’t know what to think. We sit here in silence. There’s nothing else to do. Saturday is the day of silence; the day of pause; the day of waiting for we know not what. It’s the day of suspended animation. It’s the day when the world waits. It’s the day when the world holds its breath. It’s the day of the drumroll that we think we may hear rumbling faintly, many miles off in the distance— but no, that must be our imagination. Nothing good is going to happen here any time soon. What can we do on Saturday? We can learn to be silent. We can learn to lament. We can learn to pour out our souls to God in utter honesty, as King David did in the Psalms and as Yeshua did in the Garden of Gethsemane. We can learn to listen to what is really going on in our own hearts and minds and souls. We can be honest. We can face our deepest fears and doubts. After all, God already knows how we feel, and there’s no reason to hide ourselves from ourselves when there’s nothing left to lose. You can’t get much lower than rock bottom. What can we do on Saturday? We can listen for the still, soft voice of God, as did the Prophet Elijah. We can strain our ears to hear what God might be telling us. It’s easier to hear when the world around us is silent and there is nothing left to distract us. What can we do on Saturday? We can learn to be less like Martha and more like Mary, as Yeshua taught us. We can’t surround ourselves with a flurry of activity and noise in a frenzied effort to keep ourselves occupied, distracted, too busy to think and feel. That doesn’t work when there is nothing left to do or think or feel. All we can do is sit and wait— sit at the feet of God and try our best to listen— but isn’t that exactly what Yeshua told Martha and Mary? Didn’t the “comforters” of Job sit with him in grief and silence for seven days and seven nights? Didn’t the psalmist say “He makes me to rest in green pastures”? Perhaps God is making us rest. After creating the heavens and the earth, didn’t Ha Shem Himself rest on the seventh day, the Sabbath? Dreams die on Friday, but if we are listening for the voice of God, new dreams and new hopes can begin to be stirred on Saturday. Nothing very solid, no “aha” moments, no amazing revelations from the heavens, no lightning or thunderbolts or visions in the skies, but the smallest stirrings of the faintest hope of new beginnings. That may be all we get on Saturday, but that is enough. A little flicker of hope is all that we need. Even if we can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, at least we can begin to suspect that the light is out there somewhere. Maybe we’ll see it tomorrow. Didn’t the psalmist of old remind us “You have allowed me to suffer much hardship, but you will restore me to life again” and “Sorrow may last for a season, but joy comes in the morning”? Is it possible that we can have joy again— maybe not today, but eventually? We remember what Yeshua taught us on that last night when we were all together— could it be that it was only two nights ago? He taught us “In this life you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world”. Something is stirring. A still, small voice is speaking. The smallest flicker of hope is being born. Dare we believe it? Dare we trust it? It’s not over. When we cannot see the hand of God, then we must learn to trust the heart of God— and the heart of God toward us is good. Yeshua taught us well, and he was right. The heart of God toward us is good. Sometimes the voice of God speaks the loudest when everything else is silent. Sometimes we hear the voice of God most clearly when we are lamenting in silence, too sad and too stunned and too weak and to numb to be able speak or to fix or to repair or to distract or to blame or to argue or to defend or to criticize or to rationalize or to analyze or to strategize or to give an opinion or to even have an opinion. That’s when we learn that today is not the end of hope. It’s the day of waiting. It’s the day before the day of new beginnings. It’s Saturday. |
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