A Coronavirus Gathering | 6. Living in the YET!
In his book, Dark Clouds: Discovering the Grace of Lament, Mark Vroegob describes the paradox of life in the Kingdom — the experience of beauty and terror — in the word “yet”.
In the biblical study of lament, I’ve come to love the word Yet. It marks the place in the journey where pain and belief coexist. It is how we get the confidence to ask boldly, despite the sorrow and grief we feel. Yet means I choose to keep asking God for help, to cry out to him in our needs, even when the pain of life is real and raw.
In the age of Coronavirus, during our lifetime, I can’t imagine a place of pain more real and raw. This Yet feels not like a new normal but a terrible new different.
I have always loved Jeff Buckley’s Hallelujah in the way it captures the bittersweet nature of love and life in the Kingdom. When Tim and Genell Allmond volunteered to cover the song for this blog, I was ecstatic. While recording, Tim says, The Spirit fell.
Just as King George the VI, the stammerer, overcame his fear in preparing a speech calling his nation to war with Nazis, we are tempted to shrink back from the dancing shadows of unemployment, poverty, fear, hate, hunger and death on the horizon of our once prosperous nation. Suddenly, Yet has become YET!
King George found his voice through the discovery of his identity; we, the children of a greater king, must do the same.
As we rediscover who we are, we find courage in three core realities:
We are strangers in this world.
We are loved eternally.
We are transformed through suffering.
As Tim and Genell just reminded us —
It's not a cry that you hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
Many of you already know what it’s like to suffer profoundly — the death of spouse or child, the pain of divorce, violence, or ravaging disease. My dear friend Becky Morgan has learned what it means to transform through suffering. She has graciously agreed to tell a little of her story.
Becky’s transitional understanding of the story of Jairus’s daughter instructs us what it means to be strangers in the world. Mark 5 tells the strange narrative.
Jairus, an official of the local synagogue, arrived, and when he saw Jesus, he threw himself down at his feet and begged him earnestly, ‘My little daughter is very sick. Please come and place your hands on her, so that she will get well and live!’
Just as Jairus issues his desperate request, Jesus feels power leave him from the touch of an impoverished woman suffering from chronic disease. As he engages an extended conversation with her, a servant of Jairus arrives with terrible news — his little girl has died.
In her own story, Becky could imagine the pain Jairus felt at that moment. In her own loss of a loved one, compounded by further suffering, she eventually realized pain had driven her to a bitter and toxic disbelief, resulting in physical and mental illness. She laments her lack of faith and finds healing.
As strangers in this world, moving through the fog of Covid-19, we must resist the temptation to see God twiddling his thumbs in heaven, wasting precious time or, even worse, acting against us.
Romans 8:28 offers the promise —
We know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.
The Deep Deep Love of Jesus
Admitted to a psychiatric hospital, Becky comes to grip with the deep deep love of Jesus. Death couldn’t hold the daughter of Jairus because the love of Jesus let death take him. I love what she says in the video:
On the cross, Jesus let go of his father’s hand and the father let go of his hand, so we could have his infinite love forever. Death was undone.
Because of the cross, the story of Jairus ends in great joy.
In the book of Ephesians, the apostle Paul reminds us —
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Even in the worse-case scenario of Coronavirus, the Gospel story reminds us that our identity remains as beloved children of God. Romans 8:35 —
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
Or Covid-19?
Redemptive Suffering
In the sequence of the Gospels, Dr. Alexander J. Shaia, psychologist and spiritual director, finds a rhythm to the process of redemption, the cycle of Kingdom transformation.
Matthew: Surprise
Mark: Suffering
Luke: Joy
John: Service
In the movement, God equips us for greater participation in the Kingdom, the subterranean river rising up in unexpected springs of redemption.
What was intended for evil, God transforms into good.
We are drawn to the stories: the child of an abusive father works against human trafficking; the pharmacist, after losing a son to overdose, exposes the role greed plays in the Opioid epidemic; the mother of a child lost by a drunk driver, inspires a harsher law, saving lives.
I recently was inspired by the story of Britten Olinger, an Asheville track coach paralyzed in a 2017 car crash, on his return to coaching others how to run a race well.
We all could tell stories of how adversity shapes new redemptive possibilities.
Of this mysterious and painful process, Pope St. Paul II instructs —
In bringing about the Redemption through suffering, Christ raised human suffering to the level of the Redemption. Thus each man, in his sufferings, can also become a sharer in the redemptive suffering of Christ.
Writing to the early church facing waves of deadly persecution, the Apostle Paul encourages —
My friends, don’t be surprised at the painful things that you are now suffering, which are testing your faith. Don’t think that something strange is happening to you. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.
Just before the order came to shelter at home, a team of our artists began collaboration on a music video for the Switchfoot song, Yet.
Encouraged by Jon Foreman’s lyrics through my battle with depression, I wrote a script/storyboard for a music video. Will Osigian, a talented young filmmaker, shot the video; Tim Allmond acted and provided a really cool space; Irene Beamish impeccably played an other-worldly woman, and Brad Hutchinson provided technical support.
Our desire was to create a visual metaphor for life in the Kingdom — how God pursues us in ways mysterious, invisible, supernatural, and redemptive.
As we eventually emerge from our homes, blinking against bright light, we face a choice: Return to life as normal, dysfunctional as it was, or choose a new life in service of the King.
Let us pray that our experience with this terrible virus and learn a deeper dependence.
Let us pray that the idols born out of greed, pride and control continue to die so we can come alive.
Let us pray to hear the words, Talitha koum —
Rise up
Restored to a new perspective and priorities, an ongoing dependence, a heart filled with the love of God, let us move into new Kingdom opportunities.
Let us pray that the Gospel story, the really good news, goes viral.
As Frodo laments the horrors of the age of Middle Earth, Gandalf offers sage advice for all those who suffer.
As a Gathering, assured of the sovereignty of God, we return to where we started, the promise of how the Gospel story ends — Blue skies will come again.