Meeting Jesus on the Road to Die

Paul met Jesus. Crossing a plain in the fiery sun, he fell under the piercing reality of heavenly light. He encountered Jesus in ways that time and space cannot contain, and Paul’s word could never fully explain.

Paul met Jesus.

He communed with Lord of all creation in the crushing blows of affliction. Beaten, stoned, left for dead, this broken man despaired of life, assuming his body had been given over to death.

Paul met Jesus in the cruel betrayal of trusted friends. The loved ones that he had invested his life into abandoned, rejected and turned their backs on this weak fool. As a humiliated captive paraded before a jeering world, Paul lived the words, “My God, My God why have you forsaken me.”

Paul met Jesus—not simply in third heaven visions of rapturous glory but in the embodied communion of suffering. As he fell forward into a lived death, Paul discovered another, deeper, richer communion. Beneath the pain of the cross, Paul met Jesus in the living comfort of God’s ever-consoling Spirit.

There is a life discovered only in death.

In the midst of affliction and comfort, Paul met Jesus in the prayers of God’s people. Even as Paul entered into a communion of love with the Savior, he discovered another communion as well: the sweet and mysterious communion with the frailty of God’s people. For the Spirit of Communion bound Paul with God and with God’s people.

In his journey to far country, Paul discovered a mystery the Savior prayed for his disciples before leaving. were called out of darkness and into light. They were called to be the friends of God.

The friending of God and God’s people is revealed in the weakness of suffering, of betrayal, of loneliness, of the cross. For we truly must love one another as Christ loved us. In his gracious love, the Spirit of God leads us to the place of the skull.

This is not a cruel joke, but a mystery of love that frees us from an exclusive self love that can never know the sweet bonds of communion. In weakness and death, we can finally embody the reality of a love that cannot die, that cannot be quenched, that cannot fail. We discover a love the Savior calls “everlasting life.”

In both agony and ecstasy, we are bound to the Lord by the Spirit, and yet not to the Lord alone but to the Lord’s people.

Each of us are graced to know Judas and Peter. The fellowship of God, the Holy Spirit, ministers to us the wounds of the cross through Judas and Peter. And yet one, in the mystery of love, will become the friend who sticks closer than a brother. The betrayer will become the lover.

The mystery of this gospel is that it is not carved in stone. It is not forged in immoveable forms that cannot change. Rather, it is stamped on the weakness of the human heart. The same heart that is fickle, untrustworthy, deceitful, and selfish. And onto this weak form is stamped the beauty of a love that will survive death and burn eternal.

As we stumble toward Golgotha, let us embrace those who have forsaken us. Some like Judas will run away. But others like Peter will become the rock upon which a communion that cannot be shaken will be formed.

Let us know the bonds of communion in suffering and comfort, in joy and sorrow, in betrayal and love. May the Spirit of Communion fulfill the great and wondrous prayer that we all might be one even as the Father, the Son and the Spirit are one.

Recognizing People

Restless and fidgeting, my thoughts drifted away to the Disney movie I was missing as my body prepared for another long sermon. The pastor stood to welcome our visiting evangelist. He proudly exclaimed that we were honored to have such a man speaking at our church and preceded to list off a wide range of accomplishments. Even then, I resisted the praise and silently wondered, “Why is every evangelist that comes to our church the greatest one that has ever come?”

Sometimes I find it difficult to recognize people.

I recognize faces. Sometimes I even remember names. But recognizing the person poses a challenge. Douglas Knight suggests that an essential part of our human calling requires us to give recognition and honor to one another.

Created in the image of God, we enter and leave this world dependent on other people to care for us and sustain us. These fragile states reveal our true condition, our true nature. Even when we feel strongest and most self-reliant, we really never become independent. Humans need other humans to survive.

Or as the Lord says in Genesis, “It is not good that man should be alone.”

In our fragile condition, we desperately need to be recognized, to be acknowledged, to be confirmed, to be validated. In spite of our personal flaws, we still need to be received. John Eldridge compares the delight of heaven to the delight we feel when we walk into a room and someone jumps up with excitement to welcome us. We put welcome mats outside our front door, and we would do well to keep welcome mats inside our hearts.

Each person we encounter, whether they acknowledge it or not, needs to be welcomed. Jesus welcomes marginal people from shifty tax-collectors to the scorned Samaritans to morally questionable women. Jesus intentionally honors the dis-honored. He doesn’t deny their flaws. In fact, he challenges their sinful actions, but he also speaks value and worth to the heart.

Each of us, like the Samaritan woman, encounters Jesus at our weakest point. He meets us in our desperate need for forgiveness and acceptance, for redemption. When we read the words of Scriptures about God’s love for us, or when other people speak those same healing words of love and affirmation, we feel welcomed, we feel valued, we feel recognized.

Yet this same treasure that heals and renews us is sometimes difficult to give back out. I realize that I want to pick and chose the people I recognize. If someone is selfish or prideful or too busy magnifying himself, I want to deny him recognition. I want to refuse him value. I withdraw the welcome mat and immediately resist him.

But grace compels us to love. Those who hype their own accomplishments (whether they’re a visiting evangelist or a proud co-worker) may be the people in the greatest need of a good welcoming. They may be the very ones who struggle at the margins (even while they put up a good front). St. Paul was a Pharisee of Pharisees, and yet he needed redemption. When he encountered the love of God in Christ, he abandoned everything to pursue the lover of his soul.

I rejoice that Christ has welcomed me to the marriage feast: in spite of my endless flaws. Expressing my deep gratitude for his welcoming and redeeming Spirit, compels me to go and welcome others.

And so I pray, “Lord grant me grace to recognize and honor all the people around me as humans created in your image. May my words and actions reveal the welcoming and restoring love of Calvary.”