My
heart started aching when I heard the news the other night about the shooting
in not one, but two mosques in New Zealand.
The cry for 50 of our Muslim brothers and sisters lost in this massacre
and those fighting for their lives and for those who lost their loved ones --
is stuck in my chest, unable to escape.
It isn’t even a cry of “not again.” Nor is it a cry for changes in gun laws or
immigration laws. It’s not a cry
bemoaning intolerance, racism, bigotry or hate speech. Though it could be any one of these things.
It is a cry, lamenting the inability for people to allow
those of us who pray to God to feel safe in our sanctuaries.
It is an ache that can only be described as lament. Lament that requires crying out from my heart
to God, “How long? How long until we
feel safe again, until our Christian brothers and sisters, our Muslim and Jewish
sisters and brothers are able to feel safe to gather in our places of worship?”
How much longer must we wait?
This is not an unfamiliar lament to God. We hear it throughout the stories, like today’s
story of Abram’s wait to become a father.
God had promised Abram and Sarai that they would become parents. They kept living their lives, waiting for the
day, and when they were wealthy and old, God finally fulfilled his promise to
provide them ancestors enough to fill the sky with stars.
Their story continues with the birth of two sons, Ishmael
and Isaac. The story goes this way: Sarah was impatient with God and taking
matters into her own hand, she gave her handmaid, Hagar, to Abraham, and
together, they had Ishmael. When that boy, was a few years old, Sarah gave
birth to Isaac.
Because of Sarah’s jealousy, Ishmael and Hagar would be
banished into the wilderness. Dying from
thirst and hunger, Hagar lamented,"Do not let me look on the death of the child.' (Genesis 21:16) And God
sent a messenger to Hagar in the wilderness and promised her that from Ishmael
would come a great nation. That nation
is Islam.
God listens when we lament.
It is in our lament that the depth of our pain, our fear, our sorrow, cry
out with an honesty and a rawness that can only be described as primal.
When we allow ourselves to express lament, we are letting
God have our deepest emotions.
The second half of today’s Psalm is one of lament. Of pleading with God for protection, of
begging God to be in deeper relationship, of the desire for more instruction,
of seeking God’s compassion and comfort.
It’s interesting to note that the first half of the Psalm
is one that expresses confidence and trust in God.
I wonder if this represents the process of prayer. This psalmist began with confidence, perhaps
building up his nerve to allow the depth of his most basic, most heartfelt needs
to spring forth.
I tell you what. When
I heard about the shooting in Christchurch, I did not spend time beginning a
prayer expressing thanksgiving or confidence or trust. No. Those
first moments were lament, they were ache, they were anger and frustration.
God needs us to show those painful emotions so that God can
know that we are deeply affected by some of the things that happen in this
world. God needs to see us weep and cry
out when the world is suffering, or when we are suffering.
I know. I know. The best prayer is to say thank you. And I truly believe that we should always
thank God. But sometimes I wonder if we
get so wrapped up in what we are thankful for, we forget that we need to also
pray to rid this world of suffering, to rid this world of hate.
Maybe some of what I was feeling was due to the impact
social media has on so many of us. It is
so easy to see a meme and to share it without considering the far-reaching effects
it might have.
This week I was frustrated and worried about the Islamophobia
I witnessed on Facebook. The level of
intolerance and the amount of misinformation that is expressed is painful to see.
That it is so easy to spread intolerance and hate with the
click of a mouse breaks my heart. That there
are those so wedded to one side or the other that there is no way for
discussion, for compromise, for fact-checking, raises my fear that hate, and
intolerance are winning. I wonder, when
will we accept others as children of God?
Where is the love?
And then the no-longer-unimaginable happens and a place of
worship, a place of peace, a place of sanctuary, becomes a target.
Schools, churches, malls, movie theaters, all places we
want to believe are safe are no longer safe.
And I cry out to God, “Why?”
Jesus teaches his followers how to live in this world,
reaching out to those who are left on the margins, helping others, no matter who
they are, or how sick they might be, not worrying about what or how they
believe, what they do for a living, no matter their gender, sexual orientation
or age. Jesus shows us how to love them,
even when we don’t understand them or agree with them. Why are we unable to follow his teaching?
We live in a broken world, full of broken people, broken
relationships, broken hearts, broken minds, broken spirits. Sometimes, we are the ones throwing the
stones, doing the breaking. Other times,
we are the broken ones. Most of the
time, we are both.
This is my lament.
We are broken, we are flawed, we are afraid. We break.
We scar. We illicit fear. We don’t want to talk with one another when
we need to talk with one another, because sometimes, when we do talk with one
another we hurt more than we heal. We
don’t know how to love without placing conditions on that love. And if we are
able to love unconditionally, we are afraid we will be hurt. Sometimes it is easier to live with walls
guarding our hearts. Sometimes we should
live with clamps on our tongues and shackles on our arms so that we cannot say
or tweet or email or share things that intentionally, or could potentially
harm.
This is my lament.
That I am not strong enough without God to get beyond my brokenness, my
flaws and my fears. That I need to be
reminded, daily, that God is my fortress, that God is my strength, that God is
my comfort.
It is through lament that I can let go of thinking I can
control this world, even just a little part of this world, and I can open
myself to letting God work through me.
For as Paul wrote in his letter to the Philippians: …our
citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ. He will transform the body of our humiliation that it
may be conformed to the body of his glory, by the power that also enables him
to make all things subject to himself. Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom
I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my
beloved.
Together, let us pray the Prayer for the Human Family.
O God, you made us in your own image and redeemed us through Jesus your
Son: Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the arrogance
and hatred which infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us;
unite us in bonds of love; and work through our struggle and confusion to
accomplish your purposes on earth; that, in your good time, all nations and
races may serve you in harmony around your heavenly throne; through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen. BCP p. 815