WHAT SHOULD I TELL HIM? (3)
Susie M. Best put it like this in her lovely, truth-drenched poem, The Miracles Dreams.That night when in the Judean skies
The mystic star dispensed its light,
A blind man moved in his sleep—
And dreamed that he had sight!
That night when shepherds heard the song
Of hosts angelic choiring near,
A deaf man stirred in slumber’s spell—
And dreamed that he could hear!
. . . . .
That night when o’er the new born babe
The tender Mary rose to lean,
A loathsome leper smiled in sleep—
And dreamed that he was clean!
That night when to the mother’s breast
The tender little king was held secure,
A harlot slept a happy sleep—
And dreamed that she was pure!
That night when in the manger lay
The sanctified who came to save,
A man moved in the sleep of death—
And dreamed there was no grave!
That’s
what I told this profoundly hurting sinner who was so close to despair.
It’s what Susie Best says to me when I’m burdened with a heavy sense of
my own sinfulness; not burdened so much with a sense of outrageous sins
(though I’m very capable of those) as with my truly pathetic response
to a gospel that drives angels to speechless wonder and reflection.
These
dreams are the work of God! The agony that strong, persistent,
unconquerable sins and sinfulness generates in the hearts of sensitive
believers is the work of God. The certainty that we
can’t overcome the evil that pillages and ravishes the lives of so many
of us is one of God’s strange gifts. The dreams are his work! He will
not generate in us dreams of selflessness, dreams of purity and of
gallantry, dreams of health and wholeness, dreams of unbroken peace and
joy—he will not generate such dreams in us and not fulfil them.
My
guess is that it isn’t God we great sinners worry about—it’s the people
around us. We fear their scorn, their coldness, their demand that we
quickly and definitively stop! No, not just “quickly”—immediately! We
fear the shame we’d be subjected to by the self-righteous, the shame our
loved ones would feel should it all “come out”. So many of us are afraid for you to know us and so we hide. “But he/she should have told us; could have told us and we would have helped!”
Really?
Do you think we’ve made that clear? Bless me, many of us are afraid
even to seek help from the assembly regarding the sad waywardness of our
children, or the scary turn our marriages have taken. [I don’t believe
in blabbing but somewhere in all our Congregational
life and relationships we must attempt to develop a culture where we can
freely speak our pain with a view to being helped over it. A culture
where we acknowledge that we are all—no exceptions—fellow-sinners and
see one another as under threat from an alien power and band together for
one another. How long would it take to develop such a culture? Who can
say, but what has that got to do with it? If it’s ever to be developed
in some righteous and loving assembly it will have to make a beginning
at some point! If our brother or sister has “cancer” we’ll adopt the
best treatment and they will know it. If the “sickness” is not as marked
as some others we’ll adopt the right approach to that. But we will work
for each other!]
It’s a mistake to think that
we dream wondrous dreams of holy freedom which would come true if only
God would help us to make them become reality. The dreams are
reality! The longing to be free is as real as the spikes they drove
into his hands and feet! [There are those insolent and tragic souls who
have no such dreams and they're happy that they have none.] The lovely
dreams aren’t our dreams alone—they’re the dreams God fills us with and
will he who enables us—despite our awful losses—to continue to dream
dreams of triumph not give us the victory? Paul prays for a little
church, assuring them that God will “make you holy through and through”
and then he says, “faithful is he who called you and he will do it!” 1
Thessalonians 5:23-24.
And he will do it!
So, agony, weariness, fear, tears, shame, sleeplessness—but no despair!
He will do it!
And
you, praise God, who know no such agony because your life is blameless
(not sinless!)—don’t make it harder for the rest of us. Click here.
[To be continued, God enabling.]
