| | Life flies on heedless, a train with the gear stuck at all ahead. And yet, sometimes it lingers slowly, on and on, a snail oozing across the white horizon. Everything is different, everything is the same. Nothing is the same, yet everything is. We are the same. The same problems, the same quarrels, the same things that divide us, the same things that unite us. You think that when you cross that line, get that title, move to that new place, that things will be different, everything will change, and all the demons that you keep frantically stuffing back into your box will miraculously get zapped off into oblivion. But as my mum sagely remarked, “It’s pretty much the same, except you live together.” And you know what, mum, not for the first time—though perhaps not as many times as you think—you were right.
Hope springs eternal from the human breast, hope of a way that does not involves tiredly dragging your feet on beyond the limits of your aching muscles, your palpitating heart and your throbbing temples, hope of an instant cure, a miracle drug, a panacea that will take away all ills and make us happy. Make us happy. What is happiness? Is happiness never being angry, never being hurt, never having to endure grief, loss or pain, and always wearing an irrepressible smile on one’s face? Is happiness having all our needs, wants, and every little niggling itch scratched, pampered and powdered? Is that what heaven is about?
We are always seeking another way, another place, another path that does not involve all the discomforts and annoyances of this life, and yet is there another way? There was another human who asked the same question about 2000 years ago, three times, “Father if it is possible, take this cup away from me.” Jesus himself, the God-who-became-man, asked the same question that haunts our kind, “Isn’t there an easier, better way?” It was a question that pierced his very soul, for his was a path that would sunder the fabric of Love itself, tearing apart the Three who are from all eternity One. And yet there was no other way. No other way for even the One for whom all things were possible. No other way other than the road to Calvary.
The Author and Finisher of our faith, has run the race ahead of us and he beckons, “Come. Take up your cross and follow me.” Lord Jesus Christ, let not our will but yours be done.
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burning
throbbing
wild and
strong
icy
rigid
proud and
fey
hot and cold
tender and hard
smoldering
simmering
melting
aching
hollow yet proud
spark and grind
flame and steam
we will ever be
iron against iron
till we are soft
enough to be his clay
broken enough to be whole and
His enough to be one.
19.8.06
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| | Posted 8/29/2006 1:08 PM - 106 Views - 2 eProps - 2 comments
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