Every Story is a Love Story

As I sit here in my prayer snug, I am aware that I am being invited to be part of the re-turning that is taking place in our garden just outside the window. It is a fairly typical autumn day. The sky is low and gray blue with just a bit of a breeze reflected in the silent flutter of the remaining leaves. It looks cold. Yellow-brown leaves restrained by the fence protect the failing plants. Most of the flowers have dropped off, the last of the sturdy vibrant yellow marigolds are dry orange mustard. The vibrant zinnias, roses, caladiums and petunias are done. But in the midst of the fall pallet – and you need an observant eye and a spark of imagination –is the vibrant purple/blue of the volunteer lobelia. She was this summer’s delight – a complete surprise bringing joy to my gardening heart. In a quiet moment I re-call the garden at its best and brightest! My gardening heart rests if only for a moment in the beauty that was, is, and will be.

Last evening I watched a play on our local PBS station – Yahweh on trial for not having lived up to the terms of the Mosaic covenant. It was set in the Auschwitz camp during the Holocaust. Prison men spoke in defense of Yahweh while others spoke condemning him. Where is our God? Why would God let/make such things happen to ‘his people’? Look at our history, some said, he has abandoned us time and time again. We have lived from captivity to captivity. What have we ever done to deserve this? What have our women and children done to deserve this? The faithful among them could hardly bear to hear such blasphemy. Others knowing that in morning they would be gassed only wanted to live their final hours in prayer. Those educated in the words of the Torah spoke on behalf of Yahweh recalling his abiding faithfulness and presence.

There is no doubt that the Jewish community has walked in times of great pain and seemingly endless darkness. Not only recent recorded history, but Hebrew Scripture recounts the pain of the Jewish community as it grew, struggled in relationship with Yahweh. Through the centuries up until today, God’s people, all of God’s people, - women, men, children, communities, entire nations have asked the same questions: where is our God? Why do we suffer such tragedy? Why do our innocent wives and children suffer such indignities? Has our God abandoned us?

Today’s first readings are in direct response to such desperate pleas. The words of Zechariah and of Revelation offer hope to a people full of despair. In the bleakest of times, when the soul is in profound darkness it can be tempting, even inviting to doubt the existence of God; a God one once knew, loved, obeyed and honored. How could one not question. How could one begin to imagine the existence of God when apparently nothing speaks of God’s presence? When there is little or nothing to stir the imagination, to move one beyond the darkness.

During the Auschwitz trial there was a prisoner who spoke on Yahweh’s behalf. He was the father of 3 young boys who had been physically separated from him. He had been given the option of choosing one of them to remain with him. His little boys begged to be the chosen one. It was this man who spoke on behalf of Yahweh. He said that he not only believed God was present, but had experienced God’s presence in this place. He was scoffed and silenced by the others. They wanted enlightened, learned, educated answers. They wanted to be convinced more that to be reassured. They did not want to hear about this man’s hope for his sons. They did not want to hear about his desires and longings or about his experiences of God in the darkness.

The final act: Yahweh is convicted of not abiding to the terms of his own covenant and of abandoning his ‘chosen people’. Frightened, abused men are marched to the gas chamber. A father pleads to be taken in place of his son, pleads to die for his son; a son he has accused of blasphemy and unfaithfulness to Yahweh. His plea is granted. The son looks incredulously at his father.

When the doctrines, dogmas, philosophies and treatises fail to comfort or persuade, we re-turn, we re-member the stories. We are a people who, at times, walk in bleak darkness. We are a people who wait for the Light. We are a people who re-member our stories – stories of light and darkness, laughter and tears, despair and hope. We are God’s people. We are God’s people re-membering, re-telling and continually re-turning to our life-giving stories.

Today’s readings remind us as we walk in personal or communal darkness that we are not abandoned. Our God is a loving and faithful God. In tune with the liturgical season, Advent is a time, an invitation to re-turn to my core experience of God. A time to retell and listen to the age old stories of my faith. Scripture invites and encourages me to use my imagination in re-turning to God. Our God who has labored in birth with me, who has died in ignominy with those we love, who has walked the dangerous roads to freedom with our brothers, who has sat with our sisters as they comfort the dying, with our mothers as they grieve their fallen sons and daughters, and who nourishes the bloated bellies of our world’s children.

“God’s temple in heaven was opened…..Now have salvation and power come, and the Kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed.”