When you are lovers in a dangerous time, nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight. You have to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight.
~ Bruce Cockburn
Thus says the LORD: For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness. I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed. They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity, for they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the LORD, and their descendants with them. Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain.
~Isaiah 65:17-25
Oh beloved, it is true. We often scramble about in vain. The work we try to do on our own, often falters into nothingness and waste. For the work we are trying to do is work that is nothing but works based principles that are fading away. So, even as the pyramids will one day disappear, any work we do based only on the things we think, see with our own eyes and make with our own hands is destined to fail sooner or later.
Then though, there is work that does not fade nor falter nor fail. This is the work He puts before us, and enables us to do. And the simplest way to tell the difference is to know that the work we do is not really to serve any purpose but worship of the One who really matters. For we no longer have any illusions that our meager attempts to change the world will have any effect.
However, we have become convinced that The Person, who has so mightily saved us, is able to save everyone. And so, in serving a Person rather than trying to fulfill or carve out some purpose in life, we finally begin to effective. And in yielding to His work in and through us, something amazing happens. Giants get slain:
The hungry are Fed.
The ignorant gain Knowledge.
The sick are Healed.
The widow and the orphan get a Husband and a Father.
The sinner is Made into a saint.
The rebel finds a Master.
The alone find a Friend.
The rejected receive – and now Live in – Love.
The slaying of giants, though, is not pretty. As the process of birth is often a dark, painful and bloody affair. The bringing of true Life always includes the precursors of sacrificial death and pain and labor and struggle and battle and prayer. So, as we do the work He has created us for, we often have difficulty seeing the positive effects. People are still dying in droves around us, and the pain of this fallen creation screams so loud that we sometimes just want to cover our ears and eyes and drop into a fetal position like some shell-shocked soldier in the trenches of battle.
Can we see it? Even in doing the work He has for us, it is not us who brings about the work’s effect. We are indeed the workers, but we are not the ones doing the work. We are His instruments and weapons for righteousness – if indeed we have wholly presented ourselves for such a purpose. And an instrument may not understand the notes being played upon it. Nor, may it have the insight to understand why the music does not seem to be going or playing as it should. And these sometimes (actually most of the time) leaves us feeling confused if we begin to think we should be plucking our own notes on our own strings – or cutting our own path with our own edge.
However, when we let go of our own foolishness and willingness to be confused about the astounding and manifold wisdom of G_d, we begin to see that He really is smarter and better and bigger and more wonderful and more Loving than we could imagine. We begin to see that His Love really can work everywhere; that the suffering in this world has nothing to do with its Creator, but rather lies squarely on the shoulders of the creatures. Said simply: Love works if we let It.
So, those of us who do let Love reign in us, do begin to see the seeds of the Kingdom sprouting around us. The work we allow Him to do in us and through us actually has an effect on the darkness. And as His Love grows in us, we do indeed struggle as a baby passing through some traumatic birth. However, as surely as we struggle, we know that The Love pushing us through the seemingly endless process of birth, will one Day deliver us into Light which will never end.
Victory is sure beloved. Fight the darkness. Serve Him. Our battle is not in vain. An eternity of eternities, where Light and Love and Joy and Peace and Righteousness reigns, is but a few more pushes through this rough labor we are in. We are to be born into Life Himself – and this Life will never end.
To live is to fight, to suffer, and to love.
~Elizabeth Leseur (1866-1914)
