All our Sins and Griefs He Bears...

APRIL 11. 2011

Do you need anything. If you need anything. Can I help you in any way? Do you want anything? If you need anything I am right here. I'm here for you. So... I am unable to answer these questions. What would you say? 

HERE is my thoughtful answer. Yes, I say, Here is what I need: I need everything. I need a companion, a mentor, a teacher, a steady rock in my life, I need a good listener, a brother, a lover, a handyman, a wise man, a coach, a theological guide, a pain in the neck, a coffee friend, a joker, a taskmaster, a vision builder, a prayer partner, a hard headed friend, a silly man, a gardener, a priest, a lover of God, a friend to the Mexicans, a loser of wallets, a messenger of the good news, a proclaimer of truth, a pioneer, a church planter, a revealer of mysteries, a bright light in the dark, an apostle to the poor in spirit. The loss of Hans takes all this away from me. How many will it take to replace him? 

In the morning next week or whenever, I will wake up to find that he is not here anymore. Yes I can picture him in heaven, dancing with Jesus, nor would I remove that from him, but I am here and he is not. I think grief is really about carrying the weight of your own heart.  But we do not grieve like the world. Yesterday at Memorial Pines, our next home, we were reviewing the grounds again, when we saw a young couple laying on top of a grave. The man was holding his wife while she sobbed in his arms. It must have been their child's grave. We sat silently in the car and watched them, our hearts filling with grief for them. I remembered my dear sister Judy R. words,—that Jesus also knew the pain of separation, the loss and the dearest grief a human can endure. I cried when I read those words, because I knew, by the Spirit,  that my great friend and redeemer shared in the human experience of loss and deeply understood. I knew that Jesus' beautiful brown eyes were tender with love toward those who suffer in this unique way.  

 Our hearts tender from the display such such intense emotion,  sobbed for them and with them. None of us spoke for a full twenty minutes as we drove away from the cemetery, our hearts so shaken by their grief. Oh,.... the fall again. What treacherous grief commenced that day. 

Then I also remembered that Jesus did not only sympathized with us, he actually experienced our own unique suffering when He hung upon the cross. It is not only that He understands, but that he "knows" in an experiential way what we uniquely feel, not only because He lives within us, but before we were ever born, he took it upon himself and died for it.   "All our sins and griefs he bore." It was so much more than just sympathy. So much more than just empathy, it was the transfiguration of the human condition, it was the exchange between God as priest and man as worshipper. I shall be your God and you shall be my people. This is what it means to be loved by God and to be healed by God, the lover of our souls and redeemer kinsman of our tribe. This transaction allows me to go on, to lift my eyes to the hills and say once again, "The mountains and valleys are ripe with harvest. Live on!" 

I will pray for this couple, that Jesus will loose them from their bonds of grief and set their hearts free again to live and to hope to and to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.