Advent Three: Questions. Fruit.

Here we are again, in the dark time of the year. 

And once again, I've turned off my radio, rather than hear the minute-by-minute replay of the story of young lives lost, of misguided hands grabbing publicly sanctioned weapons to assuage the pain of damaged heart and mind.

Death is always near and children are never exempt. Ask the parents in Syria, weeping over the collateral damage of the al-Assad regime's death struggle. Ask the grieving siblings of Pakistani and Yemeni children caught in the precision strikes of US drones.  Or ask the children scooping water from dirty waterways. More than a million will die this year of waterborne diseases, 5,500 a day; which would you choose, to die of thirst, or diarrhea?

Sitting on the couch in my comfortable living room, I hear the jarring sirens of our local fire engine, weaving along the roads not far from my house. This is the day that Santa rides through town, Santa and his firemen assistants, throwing candy to children who run out to greet them, spreading cheer, confusion, and sugar, setting off every dog in the township until the day becomes a cacophony of sirens, honking horns, and dog song. 

O come, O come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive IsraelThat mourns in lonely exile here . . . 

I had meant to write this week about the fruit of metanoia. I came across the Greek term last December, a rich, intriguing word too often flattened into “repentence,” when what it points us toward is a new mind, a new way of seeing, “the mind of Christ” -  a mind no longer conformed to the tame, tired patterns of this world.

But the unsettling disaster at Sandy Hook Elementary School set my thoughts spinning in new directions. I graduated from high school just half an hour from Newtown. My heart jumps up in grief for the twenty children dead, for the committed principal, the other school staff, the families torn and trust destroyed. But my heart jumps up in grief as well for the young man who thought a gun might solve his pain. He’s the guy I sat next to in my junior math class, the troubled loner who showed up at my church uninvited, the socially awkward misfit who didn’t get the hint when I told him twenty times I was too busy to go out.

John the Baptist, from Isenheim Altarpiece,
Matthias Grünewald, Alsace c 1515

I had thought of writing about John the Baptist's exhortation to “produce fruit in keeping with metanoia.” Last week’s Synchroblog held some wonderful examples of fruitful, generous exploration of the mind of Christ. A mom, still working her way through a cross-country move, puts together gift bags for the homeless, and is working hard to provide Christmas joy to a woman and child starting over after escaping an abusive household. Another woman found her friendship with a homeless mom became the impetus to start a furniture ministry to families moving from shelters into homes, then launched a neighborhood support center, and is starting yet another. Their stories challenge and excite me: fruit in keeping with metanoia.

But I find myself spiraling back to questions that haunt me:

Why am I so much more troubled by the death of twenty children, in a school I can picture, in a community like my own, than the deaths of thousands upon thousands in countries I've never seen?

Why am I spending money on eggnog and ornaments when I could pay for clean water for children who walk miles a day for water, knowing the water they collect will most likely make them sick?

Why do we allow our gun control discussions to be dictated by gun manufacturers and the organizations they fund, instead of insisting on real conversation about what’s best for our communities and homes?

How would I comfort a grieving family? 

What does my faith have to say in the face of tragedy? 

 O come, O come,
Thine own from Satan's tyranny
From depths of Hell Thy people save
And give them victory o'er the grave
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.  

Hours before I heard of the deaths in Connecticut, I met with friends for our monthly time of prayer for Emily, a woman struck by lighting. When we meet, we bring food to share, and spiritual food as well. Often we’re amazed at how clearly God speaks to us. Sometimes we have the same passage to share. Sometimes a common theme appears.

This week I was feeling discouraged. As I told the group, the passage I had to share, from Psalm 86, reflected my own sorry state:

Hear me, Lord, and answer me,    for I am poor and needy. Teach me your way, Lord,    that I may rely on your faithfulness;give me an undivided heart,    that I may fear your name. 

I’m the leader of this little prayer band, the one who organizes it, and I was feeling conflicted: what’s the point? What if God really doesnt hear us? Do I even know how to pray? 

One of the others in the group pulled out her journal and read what she had planned to share from  1 Corinthians 12:

There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work. Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.

She was insistent: God has called us to gather and pray, and each time he gives what we need. He speaks through us all, for the common good.

Christ in Gethsemane, Michael O'Brien, Canada

While I puzzled over what that might have to say to my own discouraged state, another of the group shared ways God has been at work, dramatically, with precise timing, with visible grace. Her words brought tears to my eyes: God does hear us. But then she went on to read a passage I blogged about last fall, a passage I shared with her at a time when she was struggling:

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).

She went on, sharing her own heart, her own experience of grief and comfort, as she read: 

We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself.  Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many (2 Corinthians 1:8-11).

Her conviction comforted me, as I know mine has comforted her at other times in the past. This path isn't easy, doesn't unfold in straight lines, no matter how hard we try to make the crooked road straight, the rough ways smooth. The story is still unfolding.

O come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheerOur spirits by Thine advent hereDisperse the gloomy clouds of nightAnd death's dark shadows put to flight.Rejoice! Rejoice! EmmanuelShall come to thee, O Israel. 

A friend asked me recently: “What are we supposed to do with what you write?”

I wasn’t sure what she meant, so she tried to elaborate: “I read your blog, but I don’t know what to do with it.”

Do?

Like a checklist? An easy application?

I'm reminded of the question to John the Baptist: 

"What should we do?"

His answer: "Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same."

I"m not sure what it means, today, here, to share my shirt with the one who has none. I do know I can buy a bag of groceries when I visit a friend with too many hungry mouths to feed

Here’s my prayer, for myself, my friends, those who read my blog:

Set aside easy answers.

Question voices motivated by power and profit.

Work out together what it means to follow Christ, what it means to share our gifts, our experiences, our burdens and joys, today, every day, for the common good.

Wonder.

Grieve.

Think.

Ask God to teach us his way, to give us undivided hearts, to reshape our minds so we see beyond the boundaries of the visible to the mysteries of the real.

Pray for fruit in keeping with metanoia –  for the grace to grow in generous friendship, sacrificial worship, transparent, humble, respectful witness. 

Wait together, with expectation, for that kingdom we long for, the place where death has lost its sting: 

O come, Thou Key of David, come,And open wide our heavenly home;Make safe the way that leads on high,And close the path to misery.Rejoice! Rejoice! EmmanuelShall come to thee, O Israel.

The Call of the Cross

Black Crucifixion, Fritz Eichenberg

And God held in his hand
A small globe. Look, he said.
The son looked. Far off,
As through water, he saw
A scorched land of fierce
Colour. The light burned
There; crusted buildings
Cast their shadows: a bright
Serpent, a river
Uncoiled itself, radiant
With slime.
On a bare
Hill a bare tree saddened
The sky. Many people
Held out their thin arms
To it, 
As though waiting
For a vanished April
To return to its crossed
Boughs. The son watched
Them. Let me go there, he said.
  ("The Coming," R. S. Thomas)

There is something familiar about the story of Palm Sunday. Crowds gathered to cheer a likely candidate, one of their own who could draw a crowd, who could take back Jerusalem from the evil empire, who could promote their agendas and ensure their safety.

It’s easy to picture the crowd. The palm fronds might be different, but the energy is the same.

It’s not so easy to picture Jesus, riding the donkey through the crowd. Luke says, "as he approached Jerusalem he wept.” Did the crowd notice? Did they wonder why?

With the cheers of the adoring crowd echoing in his ears, Jesus went on to the temple, where he upset the economic order by throwing over tables: money changers, merchants of sacrificial doves, commerce sent scrambling. The accommodating religious leaders were enraged: how dare he?

From there, he went on to tell a series of stories meant to alienate the insiders, the holders of power, those most convinced of their own righteousness.

Then the Passover meal, with talk of sacrifice and death, and the embarrassing scene with the bowl and towel.

There’s nothing in the story that sounds invented. In fact, it’s told in each of the gospels with a sense of quiet amazement, with a raw honesty unexpected in religious text. Facts outlined, dialogue sketched, strange stories reported as the best candidate for coming king deliberately dismantles the grand expectations of friends, followers and crowd.

Christ Dying between the Two Thieves: The Three Crosses
Rembrandt van Rijn, 1653

Vinoth Ramachandra, a Sri Lankan who has written and lectured extensively about pluralism, world religions, and the uniqueness of the Christian faith, notes in The Scandal of Jesus: Christ in a Pluralistic World:

"If you wanted to convert the educated and pious people of the empire to your cause, whatever that cause may have been, the worst thing you could ever do would be to link that cause to a recently crucified man. To put it mildly, that would have been a public relations disaster. And to associate God, the source of all life, with this crucified criminal was to invite mockery and sheer incomprehension! This was indeed the experience of the first Christians.

"This message, if true, subverted the world of religion. For it claimed that if you wanted to know what God is like, and to learn God’s purposes for God’s world, you had to go not to the sages, the lofty speculations of the philosophers or to the countless religious temples and sacred groves that dotted the empire, but to a cross outside the walls of Jerusalem. The world of the first Christians was every bit as pluralistic, if not more so, than ours- culturally and religiously. But for the Jews a crucified Messiah/Saviour was a contradiction in terms, for it expressed not God’s power but God’s inability to liberate Israel from Roman rule. For pious Greeks and Romans, the idea that a god or son of a god should die as a state criminal, and that human salvation should depend on that particular historical event, was not only offensive, it was sheer madness.

"This message, if it were true, also subverted the world of politics. It claimed that Rome’s own salvation would come from among those forgotten victims of state terror. Caesar himself would have to bow the knee to this crucified Jew. It implied that by crucifying the Lord of the universe, the much-vaunted civilization of Rome stood radically condemned. The Pax Romana was a sham peace. Like all imperial projects, it was built on the suffering of the many. And God had chosen to be found among the victims, not the empire-builders. Little wonder that the Christians’ ‘Good News’ (‘Gospel’) was labeled a ‘dangerous superstition’ by educated Romans of the time.

"Now, it is the madness of this ‘word of the cross’ that compels us to take it seriously. I am a Christian today because there is something so foolish, so absurd, so topsy-turvy about the Christian gospel that it gets under my skin: it has the ring of truth about it. No one can say that this was some pious invention, for it ran counter to all notions of piety. And nothing was gained by it. All who proclaimed it suffered as a result."

White Crucifixion, Marc Chagall, 1938

Ramanchandra goes on to explore further the subversive nature of the cross: it subverts not only our ideas of religion and political power, but of self, autonomy, family, tribe, national identity:

"When illustrating what it means to belong to the kingdom of God, Jesus takes as his
paradigmatic examples those who had least status in his contemporary society. In a world where children had no legal rights, economic possessions or no social standing, he makes them the model for those who receive the kingdom of God (Matt.18: 1-4; Mark 10: 13-16). When, on the eve of the crucifixion, he washes the feet of his disciples like a household slave, and requires them to do the same for each other (John 13:3-15), he makes slaves the paradigms for leadership in the kingdom of God. If the kingdom of God belongs to people such as slaves, the poor, and little children, then others can enter the kingdom only by accepting the same lack of status. The cross brings all human beings, men and women, rich and poor, religious and irreligious, to the same level before God. It is at the foot of the cross, that all human beings, without exception, are revealed as the objects of God’s forgiving and re-creating love. This is the egalitarian politics of grace."

Jesus doesn’t invite us to Palm Sunday, to a triumphal politics of power, a proud exclusionary religion of exceptional righteousness.

He invites us to the cross, to the foot of the cross, to align ourselves not only with him, but with every marginalized, forgotten, condemned person who ever lived.  He calls us to set aside status, entitlement, self-justifying argument, self-protective agenda, and find a new home in his family of grace.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, struggling to understand the call of the cross in the face of Nazi fascism, wrote: “The Cross is not the terrible end of a pious happy life. Instead, it stands at the beginning of community with Jesus Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” (from  Discipleship and the Cross )

Come and die. Jesus said “greater love has no one than this than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. . . This is my command: Love each other.”

Christ's Body is Removed from the Cross
Anna Kocher, 2006

The Christian faith is more than words, buildings, organizational structures, theological frameworks, philosophical exposition, like-minded people sharing like-minded values. At its core, the Christian faith is a community of deeply broken, deeply loved people, knit together by allegiance to a dying friend on a distant hill, choosing each day to sacrifice personal preference and self-fulfillment for the needs of a deeply wounded world.

Come and die. Not great ad copy. Not a catchy campaign slogan.

Yet that call sounds across the centuries, and we can trace the outlines of history through the lives of those who have understood and answered that call.

On a drizzly April morning, sipping tea to ease the fever and sore throat shared by some kids I’ve been spending time with while their single mom works evenings, I picture the globe, the son holding it gently in his hands, the people with thin arms still waiting to hear the echo of good news, and I wonder: can we go there? Where will the call of the cross be leading me today?

This is the last in a seven week Lenten series:

     Looking toward Lent
     Lenten Sorrow : Lament and Nacham
     Lenten Silence: Charash, Be Still
     Lenten Sweetness: Tasting Towb    
     Lenten Submission: Rethinking Hupotassō
     Lenten Song: Remembering Ranan


For more about the cross and its meaning and significance: Thank You for the Cross

As always,  your thoughts and comments are welcome. Click on the   __ comments link below to post.

What the Magi Found

Journey of the Magi, Francesco Pesellino, 1446, Italy

This is written as part of a post-Christmas synchroblog: "So Jesus came . . . did you get what you expected?"  Other synchroblogs on this topic are linked at the end of this post. 

       *******************

During this Advent season, I’ve been thinking about expectation, waiting, what we look toward, what we regret. Along the way, I’ve been reminded of T. S. Eliot’s "The Journey of the Magi", printed in 1927 just weeks after his baptism into the Anglican church at the age of 38. 

"'A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The was deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.'
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires gong out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty, and charging high prices.
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly." 

The Journey of the Magi
James Jacques Joseph Tissot, France, 1894

In the weeks leading up to Christmas, I found myself repeating “A hard time we had of it.” I had committed to a variety of adventures, and all had jolts and detours along the way.

I drove a friend home from her first semester of college, had great conversation along the way, then found myself driving in unfamiliar urban neighborhoods, trapped by one-way streets, wondering how I got there, wondering how I'd get home.

I went to drop off clothes for a friend in a half-way house and found myself driving in circles in an industrial wasteland, then standing toe-to-toe with a hostile security guard convinced I was attempting to defy contradictory instructions.

A morning I had set aside for Christmas baking vanished as I went to the second funeral in a matter of weeks. A trip to pick up a relative turned into a wrestling match with a defective refrigerator. Attempts to answer the call of welcome, hospitality, and sharing of others’ burdens seemed to take strange directions, until, like Eliot and his magi, I found voices singing in my ears, “saying that this was all folly.”

But the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight, and what seems folly can be wise in ways we can’t explain. There were moments I regretted, and days I knew it would have been easier to stay home, but as Eliot's poem reminded me, the journey toward knowing Christ always has a cost.  

"Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory." 

Adoration of the Magi,
Edward Burne-Jones, 1887, tapestry, England

Eliot’s poem captures a vision of almost surreal significance, a place of unexpected beauty, of flowing water, and three trees that suggest the three crosses ahead. The vine-leaves call to mind Christ’s insistence that he is the vine, but spread over the lintel, they also call to mind the story of Pentecost: the death of a sacrifice that protected God’s people from the death of their firstborn sons. The silver echoes the exchange of silver at Christ’s betrayal, the wine-skins hint at the new wine Jesus promised. The white horse in the meadow: is that a promise of something still to come, Christ on a white horse? Yet the horse, free as it is, is old. It doesn't line up neatly, but neither did the prophecies. 

The magi, looking back, remembers that sense of seeking ("there was no information"), of arrival ("not a moment too soon"), of certainty – a certainty that can only be hinted at, not explained: “it was (you may say) satisfactory.”

The description of the magi’s arrival brings to mind other passages from Eliot: the moments when time seems to stand still, the sudden bursts of clarity that defy words, yet illuminate all that went before and after.

Eliot’s biographers describe a moment from his own faith journey that seems to echo the magi’s experience. The year before his baptism, Eliot and his wife Vivienne traveled through Rome with her brother and his wife. In St. Peter’s Cathedral, they encountered Michelangelo’s Pieta, and Eliot, to the surprise and embarrassment of his companions, sank to his knees in apparent adoration.

I find myself wondering – what did Eliot see in Michelangelo's work that cut through his skepticism? And what did the magi find when they came to the end of their journey? How did they know they had found the one their ancient prophecies promised? Artists like to put halos around the heads of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. I’m sure there were no halos. Instead, my guess is they found an ordinary-looking child, a simple mother, a non-descript dad, piecing together life like the rest of us, washing dishes, sweeping the floor, wondering what to do next.

Sarcophagus, 3rd century, Rome

That’s how my Christmas came and went: lots of cooking, cleaning, quick conversations, wondering how the floor could be covered in crumbs when I just put the broom away. And in the middle of the mundane, the luminous moments: lovely little girls dancing to “Mary Did You Know?” Our delightful smallest family member, belting out “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Thoughtful cards to every family member, with a first-grader’s carefully printed “I love you.” Unexpected laughter. Inexplicable tears. 

The refrain, behind, around every interaction: "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life.” “The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.”

"All this was a long time ago, I remember,

And I would do it again, but set down

This set down

This: were we lead all that way for

Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,

We had evidence and no doubt. I have seen birth and death,

But had thought they were different; this Birth was

Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.

We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,

But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,

With an alien people clutching their gods.

I should be glad of another death."

Literary analysts have had a field day with Eliot’s poem, the unexpected regret, the description of difficulty, and wonder if the poem suggests ambivalence on Eliot’s part regarding his conversion and baptism. What’s all this about birth and death? About being ill at ease? About looking toward another death?

Did the magi find what he expected? Did Eliot?

Did we?

I find the magi's sense of displacement strangely familiar. Those who think Christianity is simplistic or straightforward have somehow missed the journey. It starts in simple expectation, travels through doubt and difficulty to death, then leaves us strangers where once we felt at home. We set aside one set of gods, only to see ourselves clutching others. Free of one kingdom, we camp out in another, not yet to the place we were hoping to find, not yet the people we were hoping to be.

The deeper my faith goes, the greater the questions. Why did God allow the slaughter of the innocents, triggered by the magis’ search? Were those infant deaths part of the plan, “Rachel crying for her children, because they were no more?” How could the prince of peace also bring a sword?

The Magi, He Qi, 2001, Nanjing

And the longer the journey, the more need I see for death of the kind the magi discovered: death to the old gods, the old self, the old dispensation. Death to wanting it my way. Craving my own peace, that has nothing to do with love.

But that death is a birth. 

If you need it wrapped neatly with a bow, forget poetry. Forget mystery. I'm tempted to say - and will - forget faith.

As the old year dies, as the new year emerges, I wait to see what God has in store. I wait to see what will need to die next, what expectations will be set aside.

“The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.” “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”




Blog posts by others asking "Jesus came: did you get what you expected":

     Glenn Hager – Underwear For Christmas

     Jeremy Myers – The Unexpected Gift From Jesus

     Tammy Carter  - Unstuck

     Jeff Goins - The Day After Christmas: A Lament

     Wendy McCaig – Unwanted Gifts: You Can Run But You Can Not Hide

     Christine Sine – The Wait Is Over – What Did I Get?

     Maria Kettleson Anderson – Following The Baby We Just Celebrated 

     Leah – Still Waiting For Redemption

     Kathy Escobar – Pain Relief Not Pain Removal

     Ellen Haroutinian - December Synchroblog: Jesus Came: Did You Get What You Expected?

Please join the conversation. Your thoughts and experiences in this are welcome. Look for the "__ comments" link below to leave your comments. 

All Comfort

 from Drawings by Van Gogh

By expenditure of hope,

Intelligence, and work,

You think you have it fixed.

It is unfixed by rule.

Within the darkness, all

Is being changed, and you

Also will be changed.

. . .

Nothing

Is given that is not

Taken, and nothing taken

That was not first a gift.

I had thought to write this week on thanksgiving. I had been mulling over a great quote about the subversive nature of gratitude, and had ideas about where that might lead.

But it’s been a difficult few weeks. An email from a friend asking for prayer for painful dynamics in a over-burdened family. A facebook post, then email, from another friend trying to serve a beleaguered community, beleaguered herself by endless health concerns and the resultant financial weight. A call about someone I love, back in the hospital, battling unrelenting mental illness.

Weave through that the endless headlines about child sex abuse in State College. At every new revelation, I grieve again. After my years of doing all I could to safeguard the young people in my care, I find myself sick at heart at the thought of all those men protecting their jobs, their reputations, their programs, at the expense of children who most needed their protection.

Add alarm and grief at the fracking debacle unfolding in the hills and valleys of our beautiful state. As participant in organizations concerned with the health of our water and air, I receive emails with updates, too many updates. A fracking blow-out in one town. More dead cows in another. A pond bubbling with methane. More children with unexplained, scary symptoms. And I find myself talking with people affected. Moms afraid for their families. Farmers worried their safe, organic crops are no longer safe, but not sure what to do.

Ten days ago I came across a passage I had never really seen. I’m sure I’d read it, but it hadn’t registered. 2 Corinthians 1:3-7: 

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. 

It’s kind of an extreme passage – with nine uses of the word comfort in one short paragraph.

That passage came to mind again when the phone rang last Sunday with word of another grief. A young man we knew through involvement with our urban partner church died of a brain aneurysm early Sunday morning. He was a senior in college, a hard-working kid determined to do his best. No drugs, no alcohol, no foul play. And yet he’s dead, and a whole community is grieving.

What does comfort have to say in light of a loss like that?

What does it mean that God is “God of all comfort”?

It was part of my job, for over a decade, to say the right thing in times of trouble, to kids, families, young adult leaders. But sometimes there is no right thing to say. Sometimes the best we can do is sit in the dark of difficulty and despair, grieving, with those who are grieving. And wondering, with those who are wondering: Why? How can this be right?

In fact, it’s not right. There’s nothing  “right” about our young friend's death. It’s an outrage.  As the abuse case at State College is an outrage. As fracking, as it’s currently done, is an outrage.

Yet, here’s the puzzling thing: none of this is a surprise to God. The lightening strike that shattered our friend Emily, three years ago, wasn’t a surprise to God.

We live in a battered, broken world. Death’s grip is strong, and pain is inescapable.

We work hard to build our defenses: If I do the right thing. If I live the right way. If I pray the right prayers. If I avoid all risk.

Or, as Wendell Berry says in his Sabbath poem, “By expenditure of hope, Intelligence, and work, You think you have it fixed.  It is unfixed by rule.”

Christ in Gethsemane, Michael D. O'brien, Canada

Sometimes I wish I knew Greek. Some words for suffering in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians suggest persecution for the Christian faith. Others suggest any kind of anguish, distress or trouble.

In other places, even later in this same chapter, Paul suggests some of those kinds of distress: lashings, beatings, stoning, shipwreck, imprisonment, hunger, betrayal by coworkers and friends.

And yet he dares to say God is able to comfort in the midst of all suffering, that in fact, as the suffering grows, the comfort grows. As suffering “abounds,” comfort overflows to others.

Again – what’s this word “comfort”? It brings to mind “comfortable” – which has little to do with the kind of grief and suffering Paul is describing. It’s not “comfortable” to experience loss, illness, injustice. To speak of “comfort” in the face of great loss feels a little simplistic, maybe even insulting. 

Some words are sadly flattened in translation, and “comfort” is definitely one of those.

Parakaleo (the verb form) carries all of this:

to call to one's side, call for, summon

to address, speak to in exhortation, entreaty, comfort, instruction

to beg, entreat, beseech

to strive to appease by entreaty

to console, to encourage and strengthen by consolation, to comfort

Paraklesis (the noun) suggests exhortation, admonition, encouragement, consolation, comfort, solace; persuasive discourse, stirring address: instructive, admonitory, conciliatory, powerful hortatory discourse.

Even with all the defining words, we don’t quite get there. “Exhortation” and "hortatory discourse" sound kind of preachy. The real meaning is much deeper, more sympathetic. We don’t have a word for it. "Parakleo" suggests something that speaks to the deepest part of us, with insight and encouragement that goes far past words.

Maybe a better way to explain these words would be to say they’re drawn from the same root as "Paraklete", a word used to describe the Holy Spirit: advocate, helper, encourager, consoler.

Why struggle to understand Greek words from a very old book? What help are they in the face of today’s sorrows?

Sometimes words fail. And our interpretations fail. But there’s something Paul is saying that he’s seen to be true: in our sorrow, as we open our hearts to God and to others, something happens that goes beyond words. God’s kindness, mercy, comfort, presence, fill us in ways we can’t explain. And as we wait with others in their grief, as we speak with others of their sorrow, that same comfort can move through us, overflow from us, filling others, bringing real comfort to us all.

“Within the darkness,” Berry says, “all Is being changed, and you / Also will be changed.”

Christ and Adam, Michael D. O'brien, Canada

In the dark places of grief, our simple answers are painfully stripped away. Our childish belief that we can control things melts.

And in the dark places of grief, if we call out to God, we can come to know him in a way far beyond words. We can feel his presence pressing in close – love, warmth, understanding, mercy, hope, peace. Those words are only hints of what transpires in those places of sorrow as God comes near and our defenses melt.

And in that place of darkness we are reshaped, into people who can grieve with others, hear the pain of others, call on God on behalf of others.

Sometimes, not always, we can become agents of that deep comfort God offers: his warmth can flow through our own burning hands. His love can be heard in our own words of blessing.

I don’t have space to tell of the times I’ve felt God’s presence in my own broken places, but I have. Sometimes through others – strangers, friends, family – calling to God on my behalf. Sometimes all alone, knees on hard floor, tears flowing, grace surrounding me with courage, hope, even joy.

And I don’t have space to tell of the times I’ve seen God move in others: melting icy places of bitterness. Lifting heavy loads of guilt. Speaking words of kindness and love past walls of doubt, anger, grief. 

Nothing

Is given that is not

Taken, and nothing taken

That was not first a gift.

So I do come, despite the sadness of the day, to a place of thanksgiving. These lives that circle mine, these fragile, precious lives, these lives are gifts. Gifts given, taken. Thank you for these gifts.

The land I love and grieve for – mountains, valleys, rivers, streams. Beautiful, enduring, groaning. Gifts given. Thank you for these gifts.

And the deeper gift: the knowledge, beyond words, reason, questions, grief, that God is near. A gift I would give to others. The comfort from the God of all comfort. That, too, is a gift. Thank you.