Strong at the Broken Places

"Strong at the Broken Places"--May 25, 2017

"But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. For while we live, we are always being given up to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our mortal flesh." [2 Corinthians 4:7-12]

There is a line of Ernest Hemingway's, from A Farewell to Arms, that is now increasingly well-known.  Hemingway writes, "The world breaks everyone, and afterward, many are strong at the broken places."

There is something stark, maybe even brutal, about that first half: the world breaks everyone.  There is no pain-free option.  There are no heroes who escape untouched.  There is no life that goes without cracking at some point--from the stress of sorrow, the raw energy of anxiety, the weariness of just being run down.  The world breaks us all.

Well, it turns out that there was a weary world traveler about nineteen hundred years before Hemingway who voiced a similarly blunt assessment.  "We are afflicted in every way... perplexed... persecuted... struck down... carrying tin the body the death of Jesus."  And even though Paul was talking first and foremost about his own literal life experiences, his words could be spoken over any Christians, because we are called to enter into the suffering and broken places of this world--this same world that breaks us--and to speak the news of resurrection for broken bodies.

Any time we imagine that Christians should, or might, or will have an easier time at life because of our faith, we are missing something important and essential: we are called to go where Jesus goes, and Jesus always goes right smack into the middle of the world's aching.  Despite what TV and radio preachers have been selling, being followers of Jesus does not give us a right to expect more secure lives, less danger, less trouble, less heartache, or more creature comforts.  Just the opposite--we are called to bear the signs of death and brokenness into the world, because we are called to share the grief of others, to share the hunger of others, to share the outrage of others who have been hurt or taken advantage of, and to share the tears of others.... because that is where we have learned from the storytelling to find Jesus.

You can hear the protest formulating in someone's mind now, can't you, though?  (Maybe it is even forming on your lips right now.) The objection comes back, "Well, if Christians really spent so much of their lives and their time sharing the sorrows and troubles of the world around us, the communities around us, and the heartaches of people around us, we wouldn't have time to look out for ourselves! What about me, after all?  Who will look out for my needs? If I am spending all my energy attending to someone else's broken places, I won't be able to shore up my own!" 

Yes... that is exactly right.  That is exactly the point.  For the followers of Jesus, the way we get pulled out of ourselves, out of fear, and our self-pity parties is to be pulled into sharing the sufferings and broken places of others.  And sharing those with others--sitting in silence in their grief, working on their behalf when they are in need of help, speaking up for them when they are too afraid to open their mouths, sharing from our own abundance to meet them in their need--doing any or all of those things will leave us feeling... spent.  Perhaps we might even say... afflicted, perplexed, persecuted, or struck down."  Perhaps that is exactly the point at which we become witnesses to a power that is greater than our own ingenuity or resources.  And perhaps that is exactly the point at which we can best become the conduits for the amazing resurrection power of Jesus (so that his life can be seen in us... even at the points when we are running on fumes).

I am not a science expert, by any means.  On many scientific subjects I know just enough to be dangerous.  But I recall reading at some point along the way a bit of the background to how superconductors work.  Certain substances, which might do a half-decent job of conducting electricity at room temperature, all of a sudden lose nearly all their electrical resistance when you cool them down to very, very low temperatures, and at that point they become able to let electrical current flow through them with virtually no loss or waste or resistance.  Oddly enough, though, in all the superconductive materials scientists have discovered so far, the material has to be made extremely cold--within just a few degrees of "absolute zero". In a sense, that is like saying their own internal heat energy has to be taken away, and at that point, they lose all their old resistance and become able to let another power (electricity) flow through them without their own atoms getting in the way of the flow of electrons.

Something like that, I think, is what the apostle Paul envisions for us, too.  We can spend our lives trying to shore our own resources up, plug the holes we see in ourselves, defend our own interests, and hold back to take care of our selves... but then we will always have a pretty sizeable part of ourselves that is actually resisting God's power and love flowing through us.  On the other hand, at the point where we surrender it all, the point where we give our energy, passion, strength, minutes, and love back into God's movement to reach all people with love, in that moment, our own internal resistance dissipates, and we become conduits of God's resurrection power.  It is at the point where we feel we are carrying around the death of Jesus in our bodies that the witness of resurrection really has any true power--it is, to borrow from Hemingway, at the point where the world breaks us that God's power can make us strong in the broken places.  But it means that our posture in life changes--instead of looking out for me and my own, my comfort, my wealth, my reputation, my preferred traditions and customs, we begin to look out more and more for ways to spend ourselves in the service of loving the people around us who are feeling struck down, afflicted, or perplexed.

At the point where I quit spending and holding onto my own energy to keep for myself, I can become a superconductor for the power of God--but that means seeing that the path of the resurrection life runs through my own self-surrender.

So today, part of practicing resurrection--part of letting Mercy lead us out of the tomb--is, surprisingly, not by psyching ourselves up or shoring up our own supplies of power and energy.  But rather, it is about daring to step into a world that breaks us all and doesn't bat an eye while doing it, and then to share in the sufferings of others, spending ourselves and our love until we feel we are almost all used up--and then discovering that right in that moment, the power of the living God who raised Jesus from the dead is most fully able to flow through us, bringing the rise life of nail-scarred Jesus into the midst of a world aching for his presence.

Lord Jesus, let us live the resurrection life... by surrendering ourselves and our resources for the sake of others.  And do not let us go.