The Unseen Here and Now . . .
Stuart
Revercomb
Stuart
Revercomb is a marketing consultant and joyously married father of four
children. He seems to remember someone once telling him he ought to be
a writer. "The Unseen Here and Now" -- Thursdays.
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September 13, 2001
Hidden Within The Horror
In the wake of this week's tragedies there are no words. Only the deep and hollow and bottomless feeling that rings shrill like a siren in the farthest depths of our souls. We have been wounded, and the wound is deep.
The world changed this past Tuesday - like the skyline of New York City it will never be the same. Life will go on to be sure, but our sense of security and of place and of our common humanity is not what it was. It has and is being re-formed in the fire that is one of the most horrific acts of terrorism imaginable.
But if the whisper of our faith could be heard above the din and confusion of our sorrow, perhaps it would remind us that the God of creation can take the worst we have to give each other and make something extraordinary of it. Even the humiliation and abandonment and physical execution of that part of him that represents his greatest love for us, was not enough to separate us from his will and presence in our lives and in this world.
The humiliation, abandonment and physical execution of a great many of us likewise can never do the same.
To the contrary it would seem that it is only within the depths of such horrible moments that we are given a true glimpse of our "selves" and the eternal - that in the fiery suffering of them and the dreadful silence that follows that something of the greater vision of who we are, and who God is, is given.
It doesn't make our immediate sense of loss any easier to bare, but perhaps such brief glimpses can allow us to trust, knowing that new life can one day begin again through the grace and mercy of a God who shares our grief and who's love is beyond our imagining.
It will take time - perhaps a very long time, but ultimately the promises of the ages will be fulfilled.
Those who wait on the LORD
Shall renew their strength;
They shall mount up with wings like eagles,
They shall run and not be weary,
They shall walk and not faint.
- Isaiah 40 :31
In the meantime we can only pray and trust, knowing that our view is surely not God's view, and that our understanding of the events of this world, outside of such moments of Grace, are not a measure by which we can attempt to make sense of the eternal.
May God bless the small corner of his creation that is this great country, and may we all know a more perfect peace in the coming years - a peace that in moments like these seems so very far away.
Lead on, O King Eternal, Till sin's fierce war shall
cease,
And Holiness shall whisper The sweet Amen of peace;
For not with swords' loud clashing, Nor roll of stirring drums,
With deeds of love and mercy, The heavenly Kingdom comes.
Ernest W. Shurtleff,
"Lead On O King Eternal"