To understand reality is not the same as to know about outward events. It is to perceive the essential nature of things. The best-informed man is not necessarily the wisest. Indeed there is a danger that precisely in the multiplicity of his knowledge he will lose sight of what is essential. But on the other hand, knowledge of an apparently trivial detail quite often makes it possible to see into the depth of things. And so the wise man will seek to acquire the best possible knowledge about events, but always without becoming dependent upon this knowledge. To recognize the significant in the factual is wisdom.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
To the flight attendant that never came home
To the beautiful smile lost to Auschwitz
To the young life cut short by a drunk driver
To the loving mother shot by a random bullet
To the strong father lynched for social order
To the brother with life bubbling over, dead at 20
And the sister like none other, beaten by her lover
To all that see and do not understand, to all who feel it deeply in comfortless pain, and know the thin line of life making sadness, to the one who has given up, agreed with hopelessness and found their hearts slipping into madness - To all overwhelmed by a world in meaningless pain. To you I write this...... this is my journey
I do not know you but I know your experience it cuts at My heart too and I do believe it is an experience all who live have lived. I too find no solace in the pat answers. Those churchy knee-jerk answers which come on the heals of some tragedy: "It was God's will", "God worked it for good", "four kids came to Christ because of this". At times I even find myself in my self-exalting autonomy getting mad as hell at the thought that God would kill people to manipulate others. While not turning a blind eye to the unrelenting fact that God's Lordship is never passive. And while up holding the truth that ..the possible.. passes before his throne and is made existence by his authoritative nod. I affirm that Gods means to His good are never that temporal and humanly as to make him a Tyrant.
What then are we to do? We are to love that God..s passion is for his glory but we must remember His ways are never so mysterious than in the moments glory and pain intertwine. We must not let the problem of pain fill our minds with the fruitless searching for why? Job in his seeking asked why and was greeted with two who..s. God said, Job, who are you? And who am I? In the end, God is God and I am not. It is Job that repents confessing, He now sees in a new way.
But what of this deep meaningless pain at the bottom of human existence? What of the senseless, pointless, pain in all of life? We need not turn our fist at God in defiant accusation but look inward in humble refection.
Reader, I believe that the nagging in your chest, that milky sickness you feel in your stomach at the first sight of tragedy is a God-given sense of injustice. A knowing that the reality that is, ought not be! To put it another way, we live in the in between: Between the age that was and the age that will be. It is a world that is both sometimes good and sometimes shitty. We live in the days after the garden, but also after the resurrection both like springs filling our wells with equal douses of hope and despair. At best we can say, we live in the twilight hour and it often feels like night is coming strong. Personally, in similar moments, I have responded with anger, unending tears, and even worse unaffected detachment, so self-absorbed that all I could respond with was, Glad that is not me! Through it all I came to see life differently, my vision expanded and I saw things newly framed. It is true that adversity even observed introduces a man to himself. You see, I believe that Humanity is not the innocent or the victim and thus undeserving of a right to be worthy of anything. We are a people in-between good and evil thus fallen. So How do I justify times of meaninglessness? Well, I don..t. It is meaningless too try. But I have the courage to see meaningless and hopeless feelings as felt injustice. A sense that bounces my eyes to see what ought not be will one day be no more. A sense that moves my feet and reaches out my hands to help, for the bush that Moses saw never stopped burning and God never stopped calling people to help those whose feet are burning in the sands of this world.
Embodyed Gospel
So what do I do? I act, I take action. Calvin wrote, "The gospel is not a doctrain of the tounge, but of life." Embodying the gospel is the call of every christain to action because the gospel is not just a life giving story, but a story we live in as our new life. But we must heed the advice of John murray, who reminds us that, "Activity which lacks thought is blind." Our action take the shape our thoughts give them. So as we deeply feel this call to act we must deeply reflect the best God-honnoring action. My first action each time is to exist with others, to be human with there humanity. I have learned when I see pain, I let myself hurt with those that hurt. 0ther times I enter the joy of those rejoicing. Turning event into worship and life into an alter.
Live with redeeming vision
I thoughtfully redeem the moment as best I can - I have courage to see the day when all will be right with the world. The courage to see the One that will reinvent this world has shown himself as faithful love, unfailing grace. So I can hope. I often remind myself that though it feels like twilight, though I live in this twilight hour, the sun is not setting. It is on the rise!
In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world. -- Jesus Christ
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.
- Rev 21:1-5
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