Out of the Resurrection, Into the World (Week 34, Apr 16)

Reading

  • This week, it comes at the end.

Silent Reflection

Remarks

This week, now always rooted in the Resurrection, as we look out of it into the future, I want to share a poem by Evan Linville, a friend I met in college (who also happens to be a brilliant artist—you can find him at thedailyparade.com).

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall
Humpty Dumpty had a Great Fall
All the King’s horses and all the King’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again

Then the King himself walked out of the castle
And knelt in the dirt, though it seemed quite a hassle
He took the pieces from right and from left
And awed all the crowd, who had been quite bereft
Then he melded the pieces into new, perfect shell
Which sent some screaming, those Pushers from Hell
Then Humpty stood up, exploring his head
And the egg was amazed, he was no longer dead!
He jigged and he jambered, and he had a great time
But then he stopped short, in his dance-scrambled mind
“Where is the King? This one who has healed?
I must search for him—mountain, tavern, and field.”
Then in mid-thought he whirl-turned around
To find that the King still knelt on the ground

He met the eyes of this man in the dust
But some from the wall hollered and cussed
The King turned in his head and in thundering roar
“Better leap from those stones! I am making a door!”
As he walked to the base of those tall mockers’ perch
He blew from his nostrils, the True Breath of the Church
The rocks quaked and jostled and started to crumble
Then down like old Babel, that wall took a tumble
Those swine who had all been calling their jeers
Ran ‘cross the lawn of teeth and of tears
They couldn’t have handled that breath getting hotter
So they covered the distance to get to the water
Soon after seeing their dark wall fall down
The pigs found the river, and fleeing, were drowned

Then back through the rubble returned the King
He was the Jesus, the Hero, and he wore the ring
And walked back to Humpty, said “One of my Bride,
Give up the hurt in your heart and your pride.
Give up this wall and all its gray stones
And walk life with me, and save the Alones.
It’ll be rough, this King-issued duty,
And you yourself have to die, and that’s the real beauty
I’ve saved you once, and I’ll do it again
It’s perpetual rescue, if you choose to step in
It may seem hard-fought, your place in the story
I promise, much greater are True Love and Glory
It is much simpler, and you will see
That the answer for all is just being with me.
If you can’t take the darkness, and your heart is just hollow
Then leave all this life, and with me, come follow.”

And Humpty’s eyes closed, he took a deep breath
And in came the Wind of the Light to his chest
Then he opened his eyes, his heartbeat still quickened
There standing with Jesus: egg’s clothing! A chicken!
Then the two walked along, on down the road
The Master and chicken, without the egg load
They gathered the horses and men with their call
And forever helped Fallers down from the Wall.

Some of us wonder: how could I be the one to help anyone? Who would listen to my call? I stumble over my words. My voice quavers. I am a person of unclean lips. I don’t see chiasms. I know a fraction of what Marty knows, if that. I miss all the remezim in the Bible. I didn’t even know I was supposed to call them remezim (I thought it was remezes).

No, I am not the person for this job.

There’s a story I love in Acts 4. Peter and John have somehow helped to heal a crippled man, and because of their preaching large crowds have come to believe Jesus is the risen Messiah (more things we assume we could never do). So, they’ve been arrested and brought in for questioning by the experts and the officials. The apostles’ response: “Hey man, this is happening because of the Risen Jesus. We’re just following his orders.”

And then Acts says this:

“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were ____________, ____________ men…”

What words would you use to describe the first apostles? What kind of men were they? What were they like? What do you guess is written here?

Unschooled, ordinary.

That’s it. When the experts perceived that these fishermen from the backwoods of Bethsaida were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished.

Sometimes we put a gap between ourselves and these people in the Scriptures, or between ourselves and the best Christians we know, thinking if only we were more this or more that and less, well, ourselves, we might be able to be used by God to do something great for His Kingdom. But listen to this story—they were uneducated, common men. To go out and proclaim this message and do (with Jesus!) the work he wants to do to heal the world doesn’t require some kind of supernatural calling. It doesn’t take a seminary degree from an Ivy League school. It doesn’t take letters after your name on a fancy piece of paper.

What stands out about Peter and John other than their very unremarkable ordinariness?

The experts recognized that they had been with Jesus.

In the campus ministry I work at, we tell our leaders: don’t aim for having an impact. Aim for intimacy with God. And then you will have an impact. Devour the Scriptures, be devoted to prayer, and spend time serving the least and lowest, which is where Jesus said you’d find him. In all these ways you can be with Jesus, and that doesn’t take anything more than you putting a foot forward and doing it.

And when you have been with him, this is what happens: what is true of him will start to become true of you. “Love one another as I have loved you.” What I have done, you will do. The way I have loved, you will love. That can turn the world upside down, and it can come from anywhere.

Silent Reflection

Response

  • Read Acts 4:1–21.

  • Is there anything in your heart that you need to give up as you hit the road with Jesus through mountain, tavern, and field?

  • Do you know some Alones? Who are they?

  • What would it look like for you and Jesus to gather them with your call?