I should be studying, but had to post something for this
resurrection day. We are still trying to fathom what happened that Sunday
morning. The blinding sun struck diamond and split into thousands of dancing sparkles.
I hope that this short reflection (or should I say refraction) will one more dancing light of gratitude.
During a very hard time, life wasn't working well for me,
and it kept my mind and stomach in knots. One day I was carrying a hot dish
from the oven to the table where my kids were waiting for dinner. I had snatched
the bubbling casserole out of the oven using a nearby dishtowel. Thin spots in
the towel passed fiery pain into my fingers. I began to run towards the table
hoping to set the dish down before my fingers blistered. I had to run around
three sides of our breakfast bar to get there, but I made it. Slamming the dish
down hard I danced around waggling my fingers in the air, much to my kids’ delight.
I was angry with the dish, the distance to the table, and my life in general.
That display of misapplied tenacity opened my eyes. I saw
that my greatest pain was caused by my unwillingness to set the dish down. The
breakfast bar had been beside me during the whole race to the table. My
fixation on reaching the table blinded me to the relief that was constantly beside
me. Then it dawned on me that I carried my psychological pain in much the same
way. Pushing for resolution, replaying the agony of my situation, hoping and
wishing; it was all a way of pressing ahead with my soul in blisters.
That kind of tenacity is not necessary. There are some
burdens we shouldn’t continue to carry. The cross is God’s promise that we can
afford to set them down. Anything that sears our souls can be set down so that
we can rest and heal. The cross is a reminder that there is One who knows more,
cares more, and sees farther than we can. When we set our burden down, whatever
it is, our pain subsides and His joy increases.
But we don’t set our burdens down, because we are angry. We
have been wronged and we will set things right even if it kills us. “In fact,”
we must subconsciously reason, “if this burden crushes or chars us, it will
only show them how tragic our life really was. It will show them how
unspeakably thoughtless they were to stand by while we so heroically got
flattened and incinerated.”
It’s called self-pity, but it is only an adoptee into the
family of pity. Its biological parents are anger. We pity ourselves because we
are enraged that everyone else is too blind to see, too deaf to hear, and too calloused
to lend a hand. So we destroy ourselves as though we were our tormentors, the
ones we would wish to punish.
I recently saw the statement that no animal, even at the
point of death, seems capable of self-pity. We humans have a corner on that,
and it torments us.
The cross reminds us that there is One who cares more than
the ones we are venomously trying to punish through our stoic self-abuse. When
we understand even the basics of the cross, we see that there is nothing left to
prove. No one left to punish. It has all been done. Not only did Jesus take our
guilt and pain, He took them because of the worth He sees in us. We need no
other audience for our travails. We could hope for no better solace, no better
victory, no better Companion.
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