Because Jesus

A missionary who my church supports died this past week. He was a crazy-in-love-with-Jesus guy who had devoted his life to serving his Saviour in Togo. He was a doctor, the head of a hospital there that serves thousands of sick people each year, and is seeing many people come to Christ. He was a colleague, a friend, a son, a son-in-law, a brother, a husband, a father of four boys. Within less than two weeks, he got sick with malaria and typhoid. He did not respond to treatment. He was medevaced out to a hospital in Germany, where he died shortly after his arrival. He was 46 years old.

We prayed for his healing. This man was loved and needed. He was serving God faithfully in a hard country. So why would God allow him to die? Indeed, if we take the sovereignty of God seriously, why would God take him? As followers of Jesus, we want to believe there is a reason, and we want to know it. If I could only see some vast, eternal plan, it might make me feel better about the fact that this fine, fine man died, leaving behind a crater in his family, in his ministry, and in his country of service. If I could only look at the situation and see how God is going to be glorified in this, as I believe he will be, it might make me feel better.

There are no answers. There rarely are in heartache and tragedy. There's only the throbbing pain of loss and the desperate clinging to the notion that somehow, in all of this, God is still good, that he is still worthy of my love and trust, and that there is a vast, eternal plan that will lead to his glory.

But I've been thinking about it a lot. Good friends of mine served with Todd in Togo several years ago. They had to come back to Canada because of a medical emergency. Now Dr. Todd is gone because of a medical emergency. And in several months, my church will send another family to Togo. I don't want them to go. Togo is a country that chews people up and spits them out. (It might not be, really, but that's the impression I'm getting.) People go to Togo and they get sick and die of horrible infections and illnesses. Togo isn't safe.

And then I thought, That's why Todd died. He died because he lived in a country that wasn't safe. He took a crazy risk - moving himself and his family to a country where disease and death are rampant, and health care is limited to the extreme. He died because he and his family lived and served Jesus in a country where malaria and typhoid and all sorts of other horrid nasty things that want to kill you live, and just because he was a believer and a missionary did not make him immune to the natural risks and consequences of living in that place, any more than just because I am a believer doesn't make me immune to cancer, heart disease, or traffic accidents on the 401. It's not so startling that he would die from malaria and typhoid in a country where those diseases are rife.

What is startling is that he was there at all.

Why would anyone leave the relative safety of life in a developed country (a relative safety that is probably largely illusory) to live in the relative danger of an undeveloped country (a relative danger that is probably somewhat exaggerated)?

Because Jesus.

Because Jesus called him there. And because he understood that the glory of Jesus was of far greater consequence than his own comfort and safety.

Because Jesus, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising its shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. And Todd, for the joy set before him, endured malaria and typhoid, despising its shame, and is now rejoicing in the presence of Jesus.

And what is startling is that anyone who is still there, knowing the risks, would stay. Or that anyone new, knowing the risks, would go. What is startling is that anyone at all who had a choice, knowing the risks, would voluntarily accept those risks, laying down control of his or her own life, potentially laying down his or her life.

For Jesus.

That is startling. For this fat, comfortable, prosperity-gospel-tainted North American believer who is used to my padded pew and my Starbucks coffee, that is startling. For this kingdom-of-me Westerner who has the mindset (however I try to deny it) that serving Jesus ought to come with some special compensation, some kind of free pass-out-of-bad-stuff-that-could-happen, the thought that laying down my life to follow Jesus might mean actually laying down my physical life is startling.

But this is the fact: laying down my life to follow Jesus could mean actually laying down my physical life. If I am truly living for Jesus, that is the reality, just as much here in North America as in Togo. If I am truly following Jesus, my life is no more in my control here than it would be anywhere else in the world. And the hard truth is that, conversely, if I am grasping for control of my own life, if I am more interested in staying safe and comfortable than I am in the glory of Jesus, if I am not willing to actually die for Jesus, even right here in North America, then I am not following Jesus at all.

I think Todd knew that. I think that people who grasp the notion that following Jesus means laying down one's life, who truly understand it at the deepest level, stop seeing things and places and people as "safe" or "unsafe", "developed" or "undeveloped", "comfortable" or "uncomfortable". They go against all the self-seeking, self-serving interests of the sinful human heart. They stop investing in the Kingdom of Me, and begin to invest in the Kingdom of God. They recognize that God's glory is of infinitely greater value than safety and comfort and ease. They don't just talk about it with words. They actually live that way.

They see Jesus.

And they follow. Wherever they are. Wherever he calls them.

And he is glorified.

Using Words

Facebook has come out with new "reactions". Now, instead of just "liking" a status update, we can "wow" it, "sad" it,  "ha-ha" it, "love" it, or "mad" it. According to Mark Zuckerberg, "People wanted to express empathy and make it comfortable to share a wider range of emotions."

I have an idea, people. How about using words?

I know, I know, I'm largely alone in my disdain for this new feature on Facebook. I am aware that I am a lone voice in an echoing silence that now needs even fewer words than it did ever before.

Have you noticed that? We don't talk to each other anymore. Not even on social media. Each person throws his or her words out there into the wind, and all we get back are "reactions". There is no conversation. We don't talk face-to-face. We don't even phone each other anymore. We post on social media. We text. But we don't hear each other's voices anymore. And now, we don't even use words. We just "react".

Before Facebook reactions came into effect, I could either "like" something, or write a comment. I might post this: "Got into a car accident this morning. I'm so thankful I wasn't hurt, but my car is a wreck." You read it. Goodness, emotional dilemma. Do you "like" this? After all, you do like that I wasn't hurt. But you don't like that I was in an accident. So what do you do? You ignore the like button, and you use words. "Wow, so glad you weren't hurt, but how awful about the car!" But now Facebook has solved your emotional dilemma. You can "wow" my status, or "sad" it, or "mad" it. And let me figure out what on earth that means. She "sadded" my status. (Never mind the horrors this is going to introduce to our already-beleaguered English language - welcome to a whole bunch of new nerbs - nouns that have been forced to act like verbs.) Does that mean she's sad I wasn't hurt? She's secretly hoping I had been hurt? She's sad about the accident, but happy I wasn't hurt? How am I supposed to interpret her reaction? Why is she indicating surprise? Is she surprised I wasn't hurt? Surprised my car is wrecked? Surprised I haven't gotten into an accident long ago? Surprised I'm not dead yet?

Reactions tell us nothing. Our world is already full of people who expect others to understand them without having to actually articulate what they want or need. What do you mean, you bought me a blender for my birthday? You should have instinctively known I wanted jewelry, even though I told you it didn't matter what you got me, and I've been complaining about my cruddy blender for ages! What do you mean you didn't know I was angry at you? I know I said I wasn't angry at you, but you should have been able to flawlessly interpret my door slamming, bitter silences, and the fact that I cooked the foods you hate most all in one meal, and discerned the reason for my anger! And now we'll just carry that on to social media.

We'll just create a black hole of non-community, people living parallel lives without ever truly connecting, people who walk around reacting without ever responding.

I know I'm alone in my concerns. I'm getting used to that. But it grieves me. It truly does.

Over a year ago, I pledged to myself not to use the "like" button on Facebook anymore. That means I couldn't respond to everything I see and hear on Facebook. That was ok; I can't respond to every person in the world, either. But it has meant that I would actually respond to a few things. I would not just react. I used words to tell you that I'm praying, or that I think your child is adorable, or that I am sad about the bad news you've shared.  I would not react to all your photos, but I tried to respond to a few of the ones I loved best. Which means I actually looked at them, and decide on which ones I liked the best. I tried, in some small way, to be a real person behind the photo. A person who uses words.

We are allowing ourselves to be reduced to "likes", "loves", "ha-has", "wows", "sads", and "mads".

Please. I plead. Use words. Jesus did.

"In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God,

and the Word was God. . . . 

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,

full of grace and truth" (John 1:1, 14).

Classics

I have a confession to make. Ready for it?

I have never read most of the classics.

I am a literary failure.

I have never read Jane Austin or anything by the Brontes. I have read very little of Dickens or Shakespeare. I have read Mark Twain and John Steinbeck, but Alexandre Dumas is a stranger to me, and this guy - Fyodor Dostoyevsky - well, I can't even read his name, let alone anything that he's written. Atwood, Eliot, Fitzgerald, Tolstoy, Woolf, James, Shelley, even Carroll are complete unknowns to me.

Oh, it's not that I'm not a reader. I love reading. I am an avid reader. I'm a good reader. Thick books with complicated language don't intimidate me. I have read loads and loads of books. It's just that I've never read many of the books that many people consider to be classics, and whenever those "100 Books You Must Read Before You Die" lists appear somewhere in my social media, I feel vaguely guilty, because apart from a few of them that are just jolly good yarns (like Lord of the Rings, The Narnia Chronicles, Sherlock Holmes, and To Kill a Mockingbird), I have read almost none of them, and I'm running out of time.

So I've set about to rectify that.

I discovered that many classics are available as free downloads on Kindle. So I downloaded one and read it. The Good Soldier, by Ford Maddox Ford. #43 in the list of 100 novels everyone must read before he or she dies. What was it about, you ask? Well, the plot is basically this. There is this guy, and he is sitting in a chair recounting the story of his life, or, at least, the last 10 years or so of his life. The end. It may have been the weirdest book I have ever read (although the book of Judges in the Bible is pretty weird, too). Despite that, I quite enjoyed it, when I wasn't hating it. It's not a "nice" book. It's haunting, actually, in a sad and tragic sort of way. But, still, in the end, I felt bolstered in my quest to conquer the classics.

My next choice has been Pride and Prejudice. #9 on the list. Plot line so far? A bunch of air-headed girls trying to win over a bunch of dandies, with lots of giggles and gossip and parties. I have to say, I'm bogging down. I'll be honest: I'm not finished the book yet. I'll finish it; I'm determined to classify myself. I'm way too early in my journey to give up yet.

But it's made me think: what makes a classic a classic? What makes a story great? (Other than Colin Firth in a top hat playing Mr. Darcy, of course). Why do some books make it onto top 100 lists, and others do not? Why do some paintings qualify as "art", and others are not? Why does one artist's red stripe on a blue background (or blue stripes on a red background) hang in the National Art Gallery, but your kid's similar magic marker wonder that bled through the paper and stained your coffee table is just a childish scribble? Why do some songs classify as "classical" while others fade away as mere noise?

I don't know that I have an answer. I know why I read. "We read to know that we are not alone." Some people say that C. S. Lewis said that. I don't know if he did, or not. I haven't read enough C. S. Lewis to know. But it is why I read. I look for some kind of hook, some way of being able to say, "Oh, me too!" Pride and Prejudice, so far, classic though it may be, is not doing that for me. I cannot imagine spending my days attending fancy parties and plotting ways to capture a man. Not even Colin Firth in a top hat.

But it's more than that. I read to feel big feelings, to know that there is good and courage and decency and justice and heroism in the world, and that ordinary people can make hard choices and do hard things, even sacrificial things, because of those virtues. I read to learn, to discover worlds not like my own, places I will never visit, times in which I will never live, issues and world events I may never face: Middle Earth, Victorian London shrouded by fog, Alabama in the 1930s . . . perhaps even Pemberley at the turn of the 19th century.

So what makes a classic? Maybe it's all a great joke, and long ago, some stuffy, dandruffy people with very bad senses of humour compiled lists of the thickest, hardest, most boring books they'd ever read, and called them "classics", and told the poor, unassuming public (beginning with hapless school children) that these books ought to be read, and that if you haven't read them, you're part of the great, unwashed masses of culturally illiterate, thereby inflicting a load of bad books upon generations to come. So we read them and we claim to love them and we talk sensibly (or pretentiously) about them, desperately attempting to rise above the common fray, while all along, we secretly think, "What a load of drivel this lot is!" and none of us dare to say, "I hated that book. I though it dreadfully boring."

Or maybe a classic becomes a classic when enough people read it and say, "Oh, me, too!" Or enough people read that book and feel big feelings, feelings of courage and decency and love and justice and heroism, and realise that small people can turn the wheels of the world (Tolkien, sort of, from Fellowship of the Ring). Or maybe enough people read that book and were intrigued by or wrestled with the world or events the book portrayed, and they told other people to read the book, and eventually the book became a classic. Or maybe there are, tucked in some of those thick volumes, some rollicking good tales that I have not discovered yet.

I haven't decided at this point. I'm still part of the unwashed masses. But I'll keep at it for a while.

Mr. Darcy may intrigue me yet.

Navigating Squalls

Over the last few days, southwestern Ontario has been hit by snow squalls. Snow squalls develop when northeastern winds blow across large bodies of open water in sub-zero weather. The winds pick up enormous amounts of moisture from the open lakes, and then dump the moisture, in the form of snow, deep inland. The snow squalls form long, narrow bands called streamers, and within those streamers, the snow falls hard and thick. Outside the streamers, the sun might be shining. The all-knowing Weather Network might be predicting a paltry 1-3 cm of snow, but inside those streamers, snow can fall at an enormously fast rate, and places in the path of the streamers can get 30 cm of snow falling in a period of several hours, even while the Weather Network blithely indicates that the area is expecting a mere dusting of snow. 

So yesterday, I drove home through snow squalls. When I left the school, the sun was shining, and I felt foolish about leaving early because of bad weather. But I've lived in southwestern Ontario long enough to know that when there are snow squalls, what I see out of my window might not be what is happening 3 km away.

Driving into a snow squall can be terrifying. One minute, the sun is shining. The next minute, I drive into a wall of snow. It hits without warning. One minute the road is clear and dry, and I'm cruising on cruise, singing along to the radio, and all is bright and cheerful. The next minute, the road under my tires is completely snow covered, I cannot see past the windshield of my own car, and every other vehicle on the road is swallowed up in that impenetrable world of white. The road, which I have driven countless times, which I know like the back of my hand - every dip, every turn, every river and tree and farm - is lost in a confusing morass of whirling snowflakes. I hit the brakes, and feel the skid of tires that have lost traction. I squint and lean forward, trying to penetrate the sudden wall of white that is blocking my vision. Slower and slower I go, peering ahead, trying to find some point of reference, all the while fully aware that there are transport trucks behind me, travelling much faster than me, about to roar into that same wall of snow. They cannot see me any more than I can see anything else, and I am in a small car.

There is great comfort in spotting a double-pinprick of red tail lights ahead of me. There is even greater comfort when I spot, in my rear view mirror, the hulking form of a transport truck, slowing down, keeping back. Suddenly, I am not alone in my blindness. I am surrounded by people in the same fix I'm in, and we creep forward together, forming an instant community on the highway. We navigate the storm together, until, just as suddenly as it all started, we drive out of the wall of snow, and the sun is shining again.

As I navigated this last batch of snow squalls, reflecting on my day, I thought, How like life. Sometimes, I can tell that the sky is clouding over. I can feel the coming threat in the air. I can brace myself for it. There are storms of life that come with warnings. But so much more often it seems, the storms just hit out of a blue sky. One minute, all is well, and the next minute, blinded by tears, I can't see my way forward. With my emotions twisting and turning like the snowflakes, I've lost my traction. I've lost my vision. I can't see God. I've lost all sense of perspective. I can no longer see where I've come from, where I am, or where I'm going. The phone call in the night, or in the day. The bad news. The pink slip. The slip-and-fall-and-break-something. The car accident. Whatever it is. Boom. Snow squall.

When I hit those storms, there is something in me that wants to just charge ahead, to get through the storm as quickly as I can. I don't like this blinding, confusing miasma. I hate the feeling of loss of control. I fear slowing down, fear that those around me will not understand my sudden hesitations, and I will be crushed under their exuberance. I want to be through it post haste, back in the sunshine and the open roads and the moving forward on cruise. I know that there is sunshine ahead, so I'll just plough through recklessly.

Instead, I am forced to slow down. Slower and slower. The staggering halt, tears streaming, heart pounding, looking around for some landmark, some sense of normalcy in the chaos of the storm, praying to God that those around me don't overrun me and crush me in the haste of happy-clappy and sunshiny ways. It will pass, I know. I always drive through the squalls. God is still there, I know, just as I know that the sun is still shining, though blotted out with snow. But knowing that there is sunshine just up the road doesn't help me when I have no idea where the road even is. What will help me get through it is acknowledging the storm and slowing down as much as I need to be able to find some sort of orienting landmark. Sometimes, the way forward is found by slowing down and stopping.

How comforting it is, then, to find myself travelling with people who understand. They don't try to minimise the storm. They don't tell me that if I just fixed my eyes on God instead of on the storm, I'd be able to see. They don't get impatient with my creeping along. They don't tell me my faith is weak and run me off the road. They don't charge past me with their high-powered life, splattering me in their wake, and leaving me to grope blindly on my own. Pfft, not MY storm! Shoulda got a 4-wheel-drive Hummer like I did! Good luck, sucka! Instead, they slow down, too. "It's ok. I understand you can't see. I understand it's confusing and frightening. I know why you've slowed down. Let's do this together." They become those pinprick red lights shining through the confusion, helping lead the way back to the sunshine. Oh, how grateful I am for those kind and patient souls in the storms of life.

Yes, the storm will pass. Sometimes, like a grey, rainy day, the clouds will break up slowly, with a ray of sunshine here or there. Sometimes, like in snow squalls, the storm will be over as quickly as it began, leaving me weary and wary for when the next squall will hit. But it will pass.

Until it does, I'll move slowly. With all the rest of us who are travelling through the storms of life.

Forgiven

One of my favourite books (and favourite movies) is Les Miserables. I read the rather massive tome when I was in my early twenties (and ambitious). I must admit, I skipped over some of the descriptions of the Parisian sewer system, and others of Hugo's lengthy descriptions, and I focused my energies (still considerable) on the wonderful story of Jean Valjean.

I first saw the musical on stage with my "little" brother, starring the incomparable Colm Wilkinson in the role of Valjean. Most recently, I sat spellbound through the screen production starring Anne Hathaway and Hugh Jackman. It is the only movie I have ever watched twice in the theatre.

Why does this tale grip me so? Because it is the story of a wretched sinner, saved by grace. It is the story of forgiveness and redemption and a life reborn. It is the gospel.

"Take an eye for an eye, turn your heart into stone.

This is all I have lived for. This is all I have known.

One word from him, and I'd be back

Beneath the lash, upon the rack.

Instead he offers me my freedom. 

I feel my shame inside me like a knife.

He told me that I have a soul. How does he know?

What spirit comes to move my life?

Is there another way to go?

I am reaching, but I fall, and the night is closing in

As I stare into the void, to the whirlpool of my sin.

I'll escape now from that world,

From the world of Jean Valjean.

Jean Valjean is nothing now. Another story must begin."

And so it does. The hardened sinner is reborn into a man of grace and compassion. The man forgiven becomes the one who forgives, even when it means great personal sacrifice. In a story replete with angry people who are disappointed with each other and with God, Valjean shines like a star in the darkness. It is a beautiful, beautiful tale. I love the story, because I want it to be mine. I want to live that kind of life of forgiveness.

But living that kind of life is hard. Forgiveness is hard. It is one thing to see it played out in the pages of a book, or on a theatre screen. It is entirely different when I am the one who has to look into the eyes of those who have hurt me, and let them go free. That is hard. So hard, in fact, that sometimes I think it is impossible outside the cross of Jesus Christ.

Let's face it; there are wounds, and then there are wounds. There is the careless word that cuts, and then there are the words deliberately spoken to wound and destroy. There is the moment of forgetfulness, and then there are the moments of neglect and abandonment that pile up like thick scabs over bruised and bleeding hearts. There are the unintentionally broken promises, and then there are the promises that are deliberately thrown to the floor at my feet, where they shatter into shrapnel that penetrates deep and festers. There are the misunderstandings, and then there are the blows of abuse that rain down on us, drowning us in an ocean of pain and tears. "Take an eye for an eye. Turn your heart into stone." It sometimes seems like the only way to survive. To retain a tender heart feels too costly. It seems right, logical, sensible to prevent further injury by locking my broken heart behind a fortress of bitterness and unforgiveness where it cannot be further blighted. Forgiveness feels impossible.

But God says, "Forgive one another, just as God in Christ forgave you."

I've heard all kinds of nonsense about this. I've heard people say things like, "If you really understood the depth of what you have been forgiven, you'd realise that the sins committed against you are nothing." Do we really want to look at the atrocities which fill our newspapers daily and call them nothing? Hardly. I've heard people say, "Forgive and forget. If you haven't forgotten, you haven't forgiven." Do we really want to suggest that somehow forgiveness means a purging from our memories of the travesties committed against us? Do we really think the Holocaust survivor will ever be able to forget the memories of the camps? Do we truly want to suggest that the abuse victim will have no recollection of the abuse committed against him? Are we really going to believe that, one day, the grieving widow whose husband was kidnapped and brutally murdered will one day wake up and "forget" that he had been murdered? It's not even logical. To remember her husband is to remember how he died.

And yet, God says, "Forgive one another, just as God in Christ forgave you."

There is something in forgiveness that drives me back to the cross. Back to the cross, again, and again. And it is there, at the cross, that I find my answer.

It is not that if I truly understood the magnitude of what I have been forgiven that forgiving others would be a cake-walk. It is that when I look at the cross, I recognise the supreme all-sufficiency of God's grace to cover sin. ALL sin. My sin toward God. And the sin committed against me. Christ's sacrifice on the cross is not sufficient only to cover the overwhelming cost of my debt to God. It is sufficient to also cover the considerable cost of others' debt to me - and my debt to others. Christ's sacrifice on the cross covers ALL my debt - and leaves me debt-free. With everyone.

So forgiveness becomes possible. Not because your debt to me is insignificant - it may be vast. Not because I am simply "forgetting" the debt, as if it never happened. No, forgiveness is possible because the debt has already been paid in full. But not by you. Forgiveness means that I am driven not to you to cover your debt to me, but back to the cross. When I look at Jesus' broken and bleeding body, I am compelled to recognise that "grace is enough" to cover not just my debt to God, but your debt to me, however big that debt may be. I don't need you to pay me back the debt you owe, because I am no longer wanting. When I stand at Jesus' nailed feet and look up into that battered dear face, I must have the humility to stop demanding that you pay me back for the debt you owe me, and accept from those pierced and bleeding hands the grace-payment that covers all debts.

And that's why Jesus can say, "If you do not forgive others, you will not be forgiven." It isn't a threat. He's not saying, Do this, or else. It's simply a fact. I either accept the all-sufficiency of his sacrifice on the cross, or I do not. I don't get to pick "part-sufficiency". I don't get to pick "sufficiency to cover my debt to God" but walk away from "sufficiency to cover your debt to me". There is no part-sufficiency. It's all or nothing. Either grace is enough, or it is not. There is simply no in-between. So when Jesus says, "If you do not forgive others, you will not be forgiven," it is because if I don't recognise the sufficiency of his sacrifice to cover those horizontal debts, then I don't recognise the sufficiency of his sacrifice. Period. I have walked away from his grace.

Valjean understood grace. He knew his soul belonged to God. He knew his debt was covered. When the Spirit comes to move your life, there is another way to go, and he had found it. So, when he had the opportunity to revenge himself against his pursuer-through-the-years, instead, he set his enemy free. He forgave. He stood eyeball-to-eyeball with his accuser, in a situation where he had all the power, and his enemy had none, and he cut the cords which bound the man he feared, and set him free, and walked away. Forgiven. And forgiving.

Because when your soul belongs to God, his grace fills you so that no debt remains. None at all.

"One word from Him, and I'd be back

Beneath the lash, upon the rack.

Instead He offers me my freedom."

All debt. Forgiven.

And I walk free.