Grieving in the Garden

Posted on September 15, 2022 by spottingtreasure

Sometimes a passage in the Bible just hits differently.  Perhaps it’s because the longer I live, the more opportunities life has to hit me in different ways, from different directions.  When I revisit a passage, after life has done just that, the words on the page hit differently, too.  That’s what happened this week when I came to Mark 14:32-42. Instead of reading it as a lesson on Jesus’ agonizing obedience to his Father, or shaking my head at the disciples’ continued cluelessness, I read it as a lesson in grief.

Less than a year ago, one of my dearest friends lost her husband to an aggressive form of cancer.  This year has been a lesson in grief – the stages of grief, the unexpected moments of grief, the overwhelming sense of grief.  I’ve watched as members of her family have handled the grief differently, each in their own way.  I’ve realized how hard it is to walk alongside someone, and try to help shoulder the burden of grief, not quite knowing how to do it well.  I’ve coached one of my teens as he struggled to walk this road with his young friend, both too young to be learning this hardest of life’s lessons.  Sometimes we stumbled into doing it well.  Other times we stumbled badly.  Grief is a hard, unrelenting road.

This week, I came to the passage where Jesus agonized in the Garden of Gethsemane, my journal next to me awaiting my notes. For days the page set aside for the entry remained empty. What new insight was I going to write? I mulled all week, then read the passage again, and the lesson jumped off the page.  It hit me as a lesson in grief.

Jesus knew grief.  He let us share in it with him.

“My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” (v. 34)

Sometimes we come to moments in life when sorrow crushes our souls.  Jesus knew that kind of grief – the kind of grief that makes us just want to die, that makes us feel like we’re already dead, that makes us ask, “Is life even worth living if this is how I’m going to live it?”

“Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him.” (v. 35)

Sometimes deep sorrow knocks us off our feet.  Jesus didn’t kneel to pray. He fell to the ground. He knows what it feels like to fall to the ground in a wave of grief, sit on the floor of your room sobbing, or slump on the kitchen tile with tears streaming.  If you are his, and he is yours, Jesus is with you when you fall to the ground, every time.  He has fallen to the ground alone.

“Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping.” (v. 37a)

In his state of grief, his exasperation came tumbling out.

“…are you asleep? Couldn’t you keep watch for one hour?” (v. 37b)

Those words hit me with a lamentable conviction. He was speaking to Peter – the same Peter who had vowed, in verses 29-31, to never fall away from Jesus.  What I had loved, specifically, about the previous passage, was how Jesus had quoted Zechariah 13:7.  I didn’t love that the shepherd was going to be struck and the sheep scattered.  I loved that Jesus, even knowing what was to come, and how he was going to be abandoned by his most devoted friends, still loved them enough to refer to himself as their shepherd and to them as his sheep.  I had marveled, in my journal, at how he loved his disciples in their weakness, even knowing that they would let him down.

But a few verses later, as Jesus wrestled with his grief, he showed the frustration that came from feeling abandoned by those who claimed to love him most.  The sheep metaphor didn’t play here.  Exasperation came out instead.

Jesus experienced the loneliness of wrestling with grief alone.  He wanted company in that garden. He had taken his disciples with him for a reason.  He needed them to show up and be present. Three times that night, he found them sleeping.

Never underestimate the power of your presence in the life of a grieving friend.  Sometimes, simply being present and sharing in the tears, is all that you can do, and is all that’s really needed. 

There came a point that night, when Jesus’ disciples, having been caught sleeping again, “did not know what to say to him.”

That sentence hit me two ways this time around.  The first was a realization that the disciples had let Jesus down so badly that they didn’t know what to say to him.  It was a sheepish type of response – a response you never want to have to give to a grieving friend. Trust me. But I’ve learned that those can be powerful words as well.  It’s okay to say to someone, “I don’t know what to say.”

Sometimes, there are no words.  There’s nothing we can do to lift the sorrow.  There’s nothing we can say to dispel the grief. But there’s power in showing up, even in silence.  It’s okay to say, “I don’t know what to say.”

Jesus had work to do.  After the moments recorded in this passage, he turned his attention to what was to come.  And that happens with us when we grieve.  There is still life to live and work to do, as hard as it can be to do it.  If you are his and he is yours, he will give you the strength to make it through each day, even if you have to crawl. If you are walking this road with a grieving friend, praying him or her through each day is a powerful act of love.  You can do that from anywhere, but don’t forget that sometimes, you really do just need to show up.

Posted in Grief, Spotting Treasure, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Misery and Hope at the Opera House

Posted on April 24, 2019 by spottingtreasure

It felt a little strange going to a Broadway show on Good Friday. Having gone to the Maundy Thursday service at our church the night before and meditating on Jesus’ anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of his arrest, it seemed a little sacrilegious to spend the evening of Good Friday eating dumplings in Chinatown and taking our seats for an 8pm show at the Boston Opera House. When I bought the tickets back in October, I didn’t quite catch that I was buying them for Easter weekend.

But as the first notes of the opening song thundered in my chest, I was once again swept into a story of humanity that brought me back full circle to Thursday night. I have loved Les Miserables since I first saw it at the Geary Theater in San Francisco, years ago. I’ve seen it five times, if you include the movie. I’ve listened to the sound track ad nauseam. I know every note and every word. And it still moves me to tears.

Its brilliance lies in its depiction of humanity – every facet of the human experience – and every response we have to God. Those who cry out to him. Those who mock and reject him. Those who discover his grace and are forever changed. Those who are confronted with his grace and can’t fathom it at all. Woven through all of that is a multi-faceted story of the human experience. Of the human struggle. Of human anguish. That’s what brought me back to Thursday night.

Our pastor had given a message driving home the depth of Jesus’ anguish in that garden. And he said something I’d never really thought about before. Jesus knew that he was headed to the cross. He knew that he was on a path to crucifixion. And he would have seen many crucifixions in his lifetime. That was a punishment of choice by the Romans. It wasn’t uncommon and it was well known to the people of the day. As he struggled in that garden, pleading with his Father to spare him from his fate, Jesus did so with full knowledge of every gruesome and gory detail that his own crucifixion would entail. He’d seen it all before. I’d never really thought of that. Never mind that his physical anguish would only be surpassed by his spiritual agony when his Father turned his face away, leaving him completely alone.

So it makes sense that witnesses to his experience that night describe him as being “deeply distressed and troubled.” (Mark 14:33) He was “overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” (Matthew 26:38) He fell to the ground praying, his face in the dirt. (Matthew 26:39) He was in “anguish…and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.” (Luke 22:44) Can you imagine?

The lyrics that stood out to me from Les Mis last Friday night were from one of my favorite songs. Having lost all of his friends in a fruitless battle, Marius shares his heartache with us, opening with the line, “There’s a grief that can’t be spoken…there’s a pain goes on and on.” I imagined Jesus in the garden, barely able to speak – words escaping his aching throat, forced out in a rasped whisper. And then I thought of another, similar, lyric from the musical Hamilton: “There are moments that the words don’t reach. There is suffering too terrible to name….the moments when you’re in so deep, it seems easier to just swim down.”

The greatest works of art are great, not just because of the masterful talent behind them, but because of how they touch us in our humanity. They speak to the human existence. And they connect. For me, Les Miserables is one of those great works of art. Hamilton is another one. And the Bible is another one. For some, the Bible is simply a great work of art. But it’s more than a work of art. It’s the story of God’s love for his creation. It’s the story of how he’s weaving his love and grace through the history of humanity. And the recording of Jesus’ last night in the garden is an integral moment in that story. It was a moment in which he connected with us in our anguish…when he, too, endured a moment that words couldn’t reach, as he faced a suffering that was too terrible to name.

But here’s the thing. The stories that inspire me the most, take me through the anguish, but are laden with hope. There’s hope in Les Miserables. And there’s hope in Hamilton. But the greatest hope can be found in Jesus Christ, who willingly took the sins of the world upon his shoulders, endured the rejection of his Father, and died a brutal death, only to conquer it all on the other side. The anguish of Thursday night led into the brutality of Friday, only to give way to the glory of Sunday, when he was raised from death to life. Jesus paid it all, so he could break the power of sin in our lives and lavish us with his love and grace. His anguish became our hope.

I love these lyrics from Hamilton: “There are moments that the words don’t reach. There’s a grace too powerful to name. We push away what we can never understand. We push away the unimaginable. Forgiveness. Can you imagine? Forgiveness. Can you imagine?”

For some of us, Jesus’ death and resurrection are too difficult to understand. And we push them away as unimaginable. For others, forgiveness is too difficult to understand. And we push it away as unimaginable. But Jesus’ anguish in that garden was all about his coming death. And his decision to carry through with the plan was all about forgiveness, motivated by love.

Have you discovered Jesus’ love? Have you been touched by his grace? Have you let him meet you in your anguish? Is that something you can even imagine?

If you’re intrigued by Jesus at all, then Jesus’ death and resurrection, his love and his grace, and his power to walk us through the darkest hours of our anguish are all worth investigating for yourself. There is no anguish you can walk through that he will not walk through with you. He’s been there. He understands. And he cares – more than you know, more than you can imagine.

We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help. (Hebrews 4:15-16)

Posted in Hope, Spotting Treasure | 2 Comments

The Authentically Identifiable and Wonderfully Colorful Christmas Tree

Posted on March 17, 2017 by spottingtreasure

Paints

It was one of those cold, snowy days, when mothers of young children, shut indoors for far too long, start pulling out craft supplies. I’m not normally one for crafts, but out of desperation, came up with what I thought was the perfect snow day project with my children. I decided to cut out two four foot tall Christmas trees from butcher paper, and have the boys paint them so we could hang them on their bedroom doors. Then we were going to decorate the trees with their own hand-made ornaments. Brilliant. Surely I could parlay this into a business on etsy.

I cut out the trees and pulled out brown and green paint – brown for the base of the tree, of course; green for the leaves – because these were going to be evergreens, and evergreens are green.  I thought that much to be self evident. A no brainer. That’s the way it is.

The boys immediately got to work.  Soon I noticed that my 5 year old was rummaging through the paint box.  “What do you need?” I asked.  “I’m looking for purple,” he said.  “Um, no…we’re using brown and green. These are Christmas trees,” I said. “But I want purple,” he said.

“No, no.  No, no, no…,” I said, “That’s not the plan. The plan is make these into Christmas trees. You can decorate them with colorful ornaments later.”

He wanted purple…and yellow and red and blue and orange. As I stood there clinging to my plan for the project (it had been my idea, after all), I heard a little voice of conscience whisper in my ear.

“It’s his tree.”

“Yeah, but the tree was my idea.”

“But it’s his tree.”

Yes, I was talking to myself. Mothers of young children often do that. Who am I kidding? I still do that.

My older son, the one painting his tree green, per his mother’s instruction, proudly announced, “I’m making my tree look real.” And my younger son, whose tree was rapidly starting to look like a tree shaped bag of skittles responded, “I’m making my tree look colorful.”

Fine.  I let my perfect idea of the perfect Christmas tree project go. At least I thought I did.

But then I saw Leyton rummaging through the box again. 

“What are you looking for now?” I asked.

“Fingerpaints!” he replied.

“Oh my gosh, no! We’re not fingerpainting. We’re using brushes…that was the plan!”

“But I want to fingerpaint.”

“Okay, but at least swirl your hands around so you can cover the tree.”

“No, Mom, I want to do this.”  Stamp.  Stamp.  The tree now had handprints all over it.

That’s what you do at Thanksgiving when you’re making turkeys! We’re making Christmas trees!

Again, I heard the little voice whisper, “It’s his tree.”

But it was my idea! 

I gave up.

I sat down next to my sons and just started painting with them. We never got around to decorating the trees. But after we finished painting and let the paint dry, we hung them on their bedroom doors.

That’s when I realized how much I loved both trees. In my eyes, they were both absolutely perfect.  Let me show you why.

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This is Cameron’s tree. This could only be Cameron’s tree. When I look at this tree, I see his personality. Cameron follows the rules. He colors inside the lines. He likes boundaries. He likes the world to work according to what he knows and understands about it. He would only ever color a Christmas tree green. I look at it and I see him. And I love it. If I had not seen him paint that tree and was presented with both trees and asked to guess which one was his, I would know, immediately, that he had painted the green tree. It’s authentic to who he is.

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This is Leyton’s tree.  This could only be Leyton’s tree. Leyton thinks outside the box. He tests the boundaries. He marches to the beat of his own drum. He would use every color in the paint box on his Christmas tree. I look at it and I see him. And I love it. If I had not seen him paint that tree and was presented with both trees and asked to guess which one was his, I would know, immediately, that he had painted the colorful tree. It’s authentic to who he is.

But do you know what makes this tree especially beautiful to me?  When I look carefully at this tree, I see Leyton’s hand prints all over it. It bears the hand print of its creator and reflects the delight he took in creating it.

Do you know that you bear the hand print of your Creator and that he took delight in creating you?  Genesis 1:26-27 says, “Then God said, “’Let us (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) make man in our image, in our likeness…So God created man in his own image…’”

In Psalm 139:13-15, David wrote to God, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.”

God made you in his own image. He knit you and wove you together with great care.  But that’s not all.  He also made you unique – just the way he wanted you to be. In 1 Corinthians 12:15-19 Paul writes about the way that God has uniquely gifted the members of the church to do different things, but a general principal that we can take away from it is that God values diversity and so created each one of us uniquely, on purpose:

“Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body.  If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.”

I love that last line: “But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.” It makes me think of Leyton insisting on the colors that he wanted to use on his tree. It makes me think of the deliberate way that he stamped his hand prints on the tree. And it makes me remember the delight he took in painting that tree.

The God who created the spring flowers may have made you an artist.  The God who built all that we see by stacking atoms and molecules and cells together may have made you a scientist.  The God who placed the physical laws into the universe may have given you the mind of an engineer. The God who loves deeply and with great compassion may have given you a heart for social work. I don’t know how he made you, but he made you…your husband…and your children – uniquely. For every facet of God’s character and personality, he has a unique hand print to leave on his creation. He has left one of his hand prints, as a reflection of who he is, on each one of us. Why would we try to live up to anyone else’s standard?

But that’s not all. There’s an additional hand print he stamps onto our hearts when we choose to love and follow him. Jesus tells us that when we put that hand print on display, we tell the world that we are authentically his: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Love.

It’s the authentic hand print of Jesus. When people see it in us, Jesus wants them to identify us as authentically his.

Love. It’s not always easy, but for authenticity as a follower of Jesus Christ, it’s always required.

Are you struggling to live authentically today? If you are, stop for a moment and pray. Ask God to direct you according to the unique way that he made you and to put his hand print of love on display in your life. Then head out into the world and live authentically, as his unique creation and his loving ambassador, today.

Posted in Authenticity, Spotting Treasure | 2 Comments