The Promise Of The Spirit.2

"If you love me, then keep my commandments. And I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another comforter to be with you forever. His is the breath of truth. The world does not accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you will know him, for he will dwell with you, and in you."

--Jesus

"I'm glad," sighed the retiring elder, "to leave ministry to you younger men...it's just getting too complicated."  As an upstart know-it-all, I easily brushed aside the remark with a careless thought: "ministry is probably glad to see you go, you old dinosaur".

Today, I'm the dinosaur.  And ministry is complicated a hundredfold. Just yesterday I ran into a former parishioner who, after an obligatory "how are you?", proceeded to unload her laundry list of grief.  A list that reflects the damage of a sin-torn world, and the frustration of not finding satisfying remedies - inside the church or out.

And as a former pastor I no longer have the vantage point of

dishing out my sage wisdom, pearls of advice and keen prescriptions perched upon my lofty branch of Doctrinal Purity.  The branch is broken and the "I told you so's" have lost their bluster.

The pain of sin manifests itself in so many ways

• destructive relationships
• destroying disease
• debilitating deadening of hope

Can there be any comfort outside of Truth?

This is the Truth we cling to: 

"I came that they might have Life!"

"...let us arise and live! 

-arise even in the darkest moments of spiritual stupidity, when hope itself sees nothing to hope for. Let us not trouble ourselves about the cause of our earthliness, except we know it to be some unrighteousness in us, but go at once to the Life.

Never, never let us accept as consolation the poor suggestion, that the cause of our deadness is physical/circumstantial.

Can it be comfort to know that this body of ours, because of the death in it, is too much for the spirit-which ought not merely to triumph over it, but to inspire it with subjection and obedience?

Let us comfort ourselves in the thought of the Father and the Son. So long as there dwells harmony, so long as the Son loves the Father with all the love the Father can welcome, all is well with the little ones.

God is all right-why should we mind standing in the dark for a minute outside his window? Of course we miss the inness, but there is a bliss of its own in waiting. What if the rain be falling, and the wind

blowing; what if we stand alone, or, more painful still, have some dear one beside us, sharing our outness; what even if the window be not shining, because of the curtains of inscrutable good drawn across it; let us think to ourselves, or say to our friend,

'God is;

      Jesus is not dead;

           nothing can be going wrong, however it may look so to hearts unfinished in childness.'

Let us say to the Lord, 'Jesus, art thou loving the Father in there? Then we out here will do his will, patiently waiting till he open the door. We shall not mind the wind or the rain much. Perhaps thou art saying to the Father, "Thy little ones need some wind and rain: their buds are hard; the flowers do not come out. I cannot get them made blessed without a little more winter-weather."

Then perhaps the Father will say,

"Comfort them, my son Jesus, with the memory of thy patience when thou wast missing me.

Comfort them that thou wast sure of me when everything about thee seemed so unlike me, so unlike the place thou hadst left." '

In a word, let us be at peace, because peace is at the heart of things-peace and utter satisfaction between the Father and the Son-in which peace they call us to share; in which peace they promise that at length,

when they have their good way with us,

we shall share."

Adapted from The Creation In Christ, Unspoken Sermons III, George MacDonald, emphasis added. 

The Blessings.3

"Blessed are you, who are acquainted with sorrow, for you will be appointed great comfort and courage."--Jesus

Laura Just talked to my daughter-in-law, Laura.  She is a remarkable young woman and we are a blessed family to have her!  Not only has she obtained her bachelor degree while raising her children she's taken on the added responsibility of caring for her sister's son, Carter.  She walks a tight rope between running the family affairs while Steve is deployed, maintaining good relations with her sister (hoping & helping her to grow into a serious & responsible parent for her other child), providing security, stability and identity for Carter, doing girl stuff with Vanessa and boys stuff with the boys while trying to maintain her own sanity!  Oh, and making sure Gus (the roomate dog) gets outside to pee...Oh, and did I mention she's a huge Detroit Lions and Piston's fan--a burden nearly unbearable in itself!

Today she received a blow.  Carter's biological father called.  He has never seen nor had not an atom of influence nor given a penny of support for Carter.  Now suddenly decides he wants custody of Carter.  Could it be that after five years, when the bill for child support finally found its way to his door he had a change of heart?  Were it a neighbor whose struggles with responsibility were well known, we might applaud his move to maturity and wish him well, little our lives will be directly impacted by his success or failure.  But a man for whom others have been burdened by his failings, have picked up the pieces of his brokenness, feel less enamored with his pronouncement of sudden enlightenment!  I'm not saying we shouldn't give everyone a chance to prove they are moving toward true manhood, but its a discussion for another time.

Jesus, the Man of Sorrows intimately acquainted with humanity's grief, always spoke to truth essential to making sense of the senseless and sorrowful.  Other translations use the word "mourn" in place of "sorrow" which makes us think of those attending a funeral expressing the pain of their loss & grief.  Sorrow is the heart's response to discomforts, disease, destruction, duplicity, unfairness, foul play, helplessness, the evils of life.

"Mourning is a canker-bitten blossom on the rose-tree of love. Is there any mourning worthy the name that has not love for its root? Men mourn because they love. Love is the life out of which are fashioned all the natural feelings, every emotion of man. Love modelled by faith, is hope; love shaped by wrong, is anger-true anger, though pure of sin; love invaded by loss, is grief.

The gladsome child runs farther afield; the wounded child turns to go home. The weeper sits down close to the gate; the Lord of Life draws nigh to him from within. God loves not sorrow, yet rejoices to see a man sorrowful, for in his sorrow man leaves his heavenward door on the latch, and God can enter to help him."-MacDonald, The Hope of the Gospel

The promise to them that sorrow is that their sorrow will end with comfort.  Comfort is the doorway into God's great heart where we find grace to help in time of need, wisdom for response, strength in the inner man to stand shoulders squared ready for whatever comes pulling us back from the brink of bitterness, the edge of despair, the chasm of chaos!

Take comfort all ye that sorrow!