Songs or Sneers
I was in a dollar store buying plastic Easter eggs, and I overheard a little girl belt out this joyous mish-mash of songs I’d taught my daughter:
A, B, C, D…W…
Like a diamond in the sky!!!! |
Then I went to check-out. I was behind a man whose head was wrapped in an American flag bandana.
He looked at me harshly and said, “It’s so commercialized. Don’t need presents at Christmas. Don’t need eggs at Easter. Parents stuff kids with so much garbage today. I was raised with a different perspective.”
He huffed out of the store, and I realized I tend to think he’s right, and I feel more often like him than I feel like the singing girl.
That’s dangerous if I’m seeking peace.
In John’s Gospel, shortly before he’s arrested, Jesus concludes his last speech to his disciples: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
It’s a sad speech because it’s colored by his death.
But, it’s much more hopeful than sad.
Jesus knows he’s returning to the God he calls Father, he knows the disciples will see him again, and he knows the disciples themselves will be deeply connected to God through the Holy Spirit.
So Jesus closes with words about having courage in the world.
This is the world God created and loves. It’s also a broken and hostile world.
It’s the world we each live in; the world that lives in each of us.
It’s a world caught between between kindness and cruelty, between crucifixion and resurrection, between a child’s song and a middle-aged sneer.
Which do I choose to put at my core? Which do I choose to live out? You?
He looked at me harshly and said, “It’s so commercialized. Don’t need presents at Christmas. Don’t need eggs at Easter. Parents stuff kids with so much garbage today. I was raised with a different perspective.”
He huffed out of the store, and I realized I tend to think he’s right, and I feel more often like him than I feel like the singing girl.
That’s dangerous if I’m seeking peace.
In John’s Gospel, shortly before he’s arrested, Jesus concludes his last speech to his disciples: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
It’s a sad speech because it’s colored by his death.
But, it’s much more hopeful than sad.
Jesus knows he’s returning to the God he calls Father, he knows the disciples will see him again, and he knows the disciples themselves will be deeply connected to God through the Holy Spirit.
So Jesus closes with words about having courage in the world.
This is the world God created and loves. It’s also a broken and hostile world.
It’s the world we each live in; the world that lives in each of us.
It’s a world caught between between kindness and cruelty, between crucifixion and resurrection, between a child’s song and a middle-aged sneer.
Which do I choose to put at my core? Which do I choose to live out? You?