With the Royal Wedding, the NFL Draft, and the NBA and NHL playoffs, how does anyone have time to do anything else? Being the father of two toddlers, I haven’t found time to watch any of these events, and I haven’t regretted a minute.
The other night the family gathered to play the Wii, which is quickly becoming an evening tradition in our household. In one game on Wii Fit, I was tight rope walking in order to work on my posture and balance (both of which are in desperate need of some intervention). About halfway on the rope, which is suspended between two tall buildings, I lost my balance, and my mi plummeted to the earth. My daughter was quite upset. She started crying and holding onto me. I tried to convince her that daddy was ok, but I’m not sure she bought it. For the rest of the evening, during bath time and bedtime story reading, she kept repeating, “Everything is fine, everything is fine.” My heart sank. I didn’t expect that she would take what was happening on the screen so literally. It gave me great pause.
We all handle tragedy differently, whether real or imagined. My Uncle passed away on Wednesday, and every member of the family has handled sorrow in his or her own particular way. My aunt thought about heaven. My sisters and mother wept. My father was pretty silent. I’m very much like my father in this respect (and tons of others ways for that matter). I don’t like to talk when my emotions are in a knot.
It’s not that my uncle’s death was unexpected. He had suffered from Lou Gehrig’s disease for nearly a decade. It’s a terrible and senseless disease. While watching my uncle slowly fade away, my aunt has remained a hopeful realist. Hopeful about heaven, but a realist toward human finitude and frailty. Early in the diagnosis, some of her friends said that they would pray for a miracle. She declined their offer, not because she’s faithless or bitter, even though she has great reason to be; rather she’s theologically savvy enough to know that escaping death is a promise God never made.
Faith in God is not believing in the impossible, it’s trusting in God’s promise. God does not promise that faith will make us immune to suffering, or that through faith we will escape death; rather God promises that death will not be the final answer of our life. God promises to be with us, to transform suffering into hope. Oh how I wish faith was immunity. I imagine Jesus prayed the same in the garden, “If I don’t need to drink from this cup . . . but thy will be done.”
Those who promise that trust in God saves us from suffering, or that our fidelity is rewarded with prosperity, health, and wealth, make God out to be an Idol who maintains a cosmic exchange rate, allowing our faith to be cashed in for our earthy desires. This is not the God Jesus reveals in his life, suffering, death, and Resurrection. The God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the God who dwelled in the flesh of Jesus, is the God who promises to suffer with us, the God who promises to be present in the breaking of bread, the God who promises that death has been defeated so that it is no longer a period, but a comma in our life’s story.
So, please watch the Royal Wedding. Keep tabs on the NFL draft. I’m not so bitter to be blind to what these events offer . . . a future. After all, isn’t that what God promises?
Love this post
Thanks Brother!