Hearing the Music

Celestial City

In John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, "Christian" and "Hopeful" are two main characters who finally reach the "Celestial City" at the end of their pilgrimage. As they make their approach, they are met by a couple of "shining ones" who seek to give them a vision of what is to come that they may be spurred on their way and given courage to cross the river (death) that every person must cross. As a congregation we have recently seen so many either arrive at that river, or have already seen those we love cross over; I thought it might be good to fill our minds and hearts with Bunyan's allegorical vision:

The talk that they had with the shining ones was about the glory of the place; who told them that the beauty and glory of it was inexpressible. There, said they, is “Mount Sion, the heavenly Jerusalem, the innumerable company of angels, and the spirits of just men and women made perfect.” You are going now, said they, to the paradise of God, wherein you shall see the tree of life, and eat of the never-fading fruits thereof: and when you come there you shall have white robes given you, and your walk and talk shall be every day with the King, even all the days of eternity. There you shall not see again such things as you saw when you were in the lower region upon earth; to wit, sorrow, sickness, affliction, and death; “For the former things are passed away.”

 “You are going now to Abraham, to Isaac, and Jacob, and to the prophets, men that God hath taken away from the evil to come, and that are now “resting upon their beds, each one walking in his righteousness.” The men then asked, What must we do in the holy place? To whom it was answered, You must there receive the comfort of all your toil, and have joy for all your sorrow; you must reap what you have sown, even the fruit of all your prayers, and tears, and sufferings for the King by the way. In that place you must wear crowns of gold, and enjoy the perpetual sight and vision of the Holy One; for “there you shall see him as he is.”
 
“There also you shall serve him continually with praise, with shouting and thanksgiving, whom you desired to serve in the world, though with much difficulty, because of the infirmity of your flesh. There your eyes shall be delighted with seeing, and your ears with hearing the pleasant voice of the Mighty One. There you shall enjoy your friends again that are gone thither before you; and there you shall with joy receive even every one that follows into the holy place after you.

“There also you shall be clothed with glory and majesty, and put into an equipage fit to ride out with the King of Glory. When he shall come with sound of trumpet in the clouds, as upon the wings of the wind, you shall come with him; and when he shall sit upon the throne of judgment, you shall sit by him; yea, and when he shall pass sentence upon all the workers of iniquity, let them be angels or men, you also shall have a voice in that judgment, because they were his and your enemies. Also, when he shall again return to the city, you shall go too with sound of trumpet, and be ever with him.

May the Lord give us eyes of faith to see that death is only an end, it is not the end. To be with our King forever is THE end for every believer!

HUG w/o RESSQ

As we turn the corner from Advent and the promise of the Incarnation, we are reminded that we are still in-between, still longing for the second Advent when Christ will come again to make all things new.  (We are actually going to take up this theme of all things new a bit this Sunday with a look at Revelation 22:1-5) But being in between means that we still are fighting our battles and dealing with the effects of the fall as we await the final chapter of the story of renewal. We certainly have felt this reality acutely as a congregation of late. Of course, these pains are always with us: loss, cancer, chronic illness, old age, depression, divorce, racism, war, children orphaned, displaced people, and the list goes on and on.

But how do we engage a world with its pain? How do we best interact with those around us going through the deep waters of brokenness? How do we respond, both immediately and over time in ways that heal and bring life, rather than unintentionally causing further hurt and discouragement? I ask these questions because this is hard work, and it is not always easy to know how to respond to those in the midst of the struggle. We all know, from our own experiences, that some responses meet us just where we need to be met and bring life, while other responses, though well intended, seem to drain us. There are ways of responding that communicate affirmation that the individual in front of us is created in the image of God. These responses seek to listen with the heart and connect with the heart of others. Ultimately these responses re-clothe the vulnerabilities of others with grace.

But what does a grace-filled response look like? In the book of Job we are told the following: Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place,...  And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great. (Job 2:11, 13) Now we know that ultimately Job's three friends become sort of synonymous with bad counsellors and not the sort of response that we would want to have. But their failure comes when they open their mouths. Here in chapter two all is well. As indicated above, a good responder sits with the hurting and listens.

Something that has been helpful to me in seeking to be a good listener (and I am still very much in the school of learning this art) is a mnemonic device used as the title of this update: HUG w/o RESSQ (Hug without Rescue): 

• Hear - allow the hurting one to describe what is bothering them in their way and in their words without assuming you know what is going on.
• Understand - listen past the words to the fears or potentially underlying hurt that is informing the experience of the hurting.  
• Give Words to Grief - speak back words that demonstrate that you have heard your friend and you are with them.

When we are able to truly listen to those is pain, we give dignity those suffering, validate the wrongness of their pain, and offer grace that covers potential shame. But there are well intended ways that we often fall into when seeking to be good listeners/responders that are less helpful and sometimes even hurtful, especially in our earliest responses. I share these thoughts not to shame anyone who sees themselves in these five things to be cautious of, but rather that we might learn together how to care for one another better, from the narthex to our living rooms.

• Reassure - we must be cautious not to make promises or give assurances that we simply can not be sure of. Sometimes as much as we hope that things will turn out OK in the end, they do not.  
• Explain - This was a major part of the failure of Job's friends. They thought they had the answers as to why Job was suffering. They of course, could not fathom what was going on in the cosmic sphere, and most likely neither can you.
• Solve - This is the trap of many good people. We see our friends hurting and we immediately want to ease their pain by providing solutions to problems real or imagined. Often we do these well intentioned things, because we want to do something. Most often just being is what is needed.
• Share Your Own Story - Another trap that many fall into in an effort to help and connect with those who are hurting is sharing a story that is seemingly related and usually triumphant. At some point in the journey, these stories may be appropriate to share, but in the early stages they actually disconnect you from sharing the pain of your suffering friend by turning the attention from them to you or your friend or relative that your story highlights.  
• Question Unnecessarily - Again, down the road there may be space to ask about insurance, housing accommodations, or other such mundane details.  But when connecting, the goal is to keep the person in view, unnecessarily questioning again diverts from that goal.

I have gone a bit longer this week, because as we turn to 2025, we have much in front of us that calls us "bear one another's burdens" (Galatians 6:2). In union with our Savior, who was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief (Is. 53:3), with the help of the Holy Spirit who can interpret our groanings (1 Cor. 2), we can truly be the body of Christ for one another!  

Dawn on our Darkness

The title of our Advent series is "Dawn on our Darkness", a line taken from the hymn Brightest and Best of the Sons of the Morning. It captures this frequent Advent theme of light breaking into our darkness. One of the verses often associated with Advent puts it this way, "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone (Isaiah 9:2)." 

As we make our way toward Christmas this year, I have been acutely aware of how desperate we are as a people to have light break into our lives. From health struggles to heart struggles, darkness threatens a stranglehold in our lives. Whether it is the self sabotage of allowing created things to become greater than our creator, or the invasive corruption of a world crumbling around us, we find ourselves groping in darkness, longing for light.

This is why the message of the Gospel writers is so staggering! As we heard Sunday, Mark's opening line, "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God" is more than just an easy on-ramp into telling the story of Jesus. Rather, it is a bold infusion of light into a world cowering in the darkness of Roman Imperialism. It is a proclamation to counter the "gospel" of the would-be son of god, Caesar Augustus, with the declaration that the real Son of God has come, not bringing more taxes, slavery and crosses, but with the intent to go to THE CROSS himself to truly set his people free. When Luke tells the story, he introduces us to the angels, these majestic heavenly creatures who live in the presence of the Almighty, who burst on the scene with this message, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord (Luke 2:10–11)." A light shines in the darkness.

We all know the darkness is real -- health, relational strife, financial hardship, loneliness, depression, besetting sin, controlling idolatries, creational decay and the list goes on. But Advent reminds us that true Light always dispels darkness (cf. Jn. 1:5)!

Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you (Isaiah 60:1).