― Frederick Buechner
I stood before her body. I had watched her waste away towards this moment. Watched grief spread its heavy quilt upon us all. This magnificent woman was no longer going to walk the face of the earth with us and we were left to deal with that reality.
I received texts as others remembered an anniversary of a day that all would rather forget. Other's sorrow, grief, confusion, anger being spilled out. Other's looking for wisdom or understanding or relief. Remembrances of those days flooded my own soul. Pictures of when I crumbled to the peddles on a path in the dark of night as weeping and anguish overtook me as the knowledge of events rippled through my being and tore it to shreds.
I see the world's reality as blow after blow land..... Not just world headlines but the ones that saturate the inward reality of The Body. I can not be an ostrich and put my head into the sand. Nor can I ever be flippant again with my words and just let trophy truth spill forth from my lips. He paid such an immense cost to change the reality of the spiritual realm, I will not cheapen His sacrifices nor His grace with petty cultural language.
So I have journeyed and not known where it is that I am going. I did not know about that quote that I started this post with nor did I know nor do I know why or what it is in regards towards. But 6 days ago the Lord asked of me "grant me a "yes" for 100 days". Then came the quote... Then came today..... Those "yeses" that now spill out are not cheap, they are choked out with confession and tears... and then I found the quote... and I can taste the no in my throat but it is the yes that He asks for and while I have known the cost of so many other yeses still I say yes...
My eyes have beheld too much, my soul borne up under too much, and such is the cost of the apple. The knowledge that was so totally desired. Death was the price we would pay for such understanding.
Say "yes" to this... Say "yes" to that... before you know you are wrapped up in a world or a life that is nothing.... SO these yeses are different. I know not how but they are... and they are only towards Him... Yes to Him... Without knowing.. without knowledge... But a yes none the less. Because of who He is... He asks and I say Yes .....
We have our pat answers and our quips; we get to sound smart or spiritual, we get to touch the holy and experience and be looked at as if we are some grand conduit. And I say it is all foolishness and am thought to be burnt out or cynical. But I say I am neither.
I am more awake.
More awake to the fact that pain and suffering and sorrow will always saturate creation and time. And being of faith does not cause that to cease. Endings and death and fear are some of the seeds the ruler of this world sows has he relishes in destruction. Christendom and where we have tread with trendy this or that have made us impotent against his wiles. Buying wares that are cheaply sold with flash and fan fare.
The Kingdom will never be like this world. It is so other that we are lucky if once in a while we actually touch it for its sake and not our own. Yet we look to ideologies of this existence to help propagate that one and we lose every time. Rest and sabbath and silence and stillness and trust and Him under estimated every time. And in lieu of them we take up noise and bright and shiny perfected models and cast them before His people week after week. Tables and offerings ready to be toppled and rejected. All the while He stands and waits. Rejecting our desire to make Him king for He knows He is King and needs not our crowns.
What was it that the people possessed as they grabbed at the Christ wanting to make Him king? Nothing within them was willing to see the crown of thorns. What did their crown look like? He had fed them, healed them, made things right... Of course He should be their king. Our king.... Feed us, heal us .. make things right.... Can we see the crown of thorns? Or just that which we want Him to wear?
But when we look at the headlines and watch death and destruction and sin have its way then who do we embrace as king... in those moments when the headlines are glaring and the heart beat line is flat, do we cry hosanna or crucify.
Are we honest? Can we be honest? I know there are times I cry each.... Looking at Him and knowing that He is all powerful and yet the circumstances of this world seem to crush Him under their feet instead of the promised other way.
The perky quip can no longer cross its way through these lips. The quick witted come back for any one human faltering in faith tastes like vomit in my mouth. Rather I will sit still and in silence in a world that is darkening while my eyes look to the Heavens from where my help comes from.... I know there is a light that penetrates all and I know what crown the King wears at the end of the story and what happens to all other crowns....
Maybe that is the tale and the lesson to behold. Remember whatever crown a man or woman upon this earth will be granted it will be set upon His feet one day... may we use that understanding as a lens when we want to lift up any other. Especially when the other is ourselves.
Yes to Him whether He is healing or the blind remain unseeing and the deaf unhearing and the lame in wheel chairs, Yes to Him whether He is feeding the thousands or thousands are starving, Yes to Him whether Lazarus emerges from the tomb or the tomb contains a body of one who has passed. My no is my humanity and my yes is His.
He does not need me to make Him king .. He is king....
