Emily Schaming
When Alice started walking into the forest in Wonderland she came across two paths and the smiling Cheshire cat. She asked the cat, "would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
LIGHT
Sometimes the darkness in our world seems so intense that we are unsure what we should do. We cannot even begin to answer the question "Why do bad things happen?" Why are there wars and disasters? Why are there droughts and famines and little children with AIDS? The darkness seems ever present. The world isn't perfect, so which way do we turn? As the Cheshire cat tells us, that depends a great deal on where we want to go. If we don't have an objective, we are simply walking in darkness.
Sometimes it is hard to believe in the light. Isaiah tells us "the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light." But we look around us and ask, if the lights are on, why is it still so dark? Sometimes we don't know where to look for the light. "Your search is over!" proclaimed a billboard I saw recently. "Perfect yogurt at reasonable prices." Now anyone who knows me will attest that I am a yogurt lover, but perhaps in the consumerist confusion that surrounds us, we have set the standard of what we're seeking (a little) lower than it should be. Perhaps it is not enough for us to seek the light; perhaps we are called to be sources of light. We have much to share in the blessing of Jesus Christ. His eternal presence is a source of life and light for a world caught up in darkness and the bondage of death. It is Jesus who gives us light as freely as we experience the sun rising each morning. Jesus gave and is still giving of himself for our benefit.
So how then do we spread his light? Is the gospel we are preaching light in darkness? Is the gospel we are proclaiming life in death? Are we silent or are we answering God's call by working in hope toward light and unity in the world? We must turn on floodlights of God's grace wherever we are able. The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. said that, "we will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and action of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people." If we are to experience the light of Christ, we must not be afraid of walking into the darkness and the challenges of life.
HOPE
One of the most powerful tools against darkness and oppression is hope. There is a Korean word, "Han". It doesn't have a direct translation in English, but communicates the feeling of sadness so deep that it is impossible even to cry. And yet within that sadness there is hope.
When I was working with refugees in Montreal, I met people whose entire lives centred around little more than hope. One man I know, Eric, has a wife and two small children who live in the Congo and because he is going through the appeal process for his refugee claim, he is not able to work in Canada. With no money, far from home, and uncertain if he will be sent back to a country where he has been persecuted, he could feel hopeless. But instead Eric is full of joy and kindness. He loves playing the piano at the church, and frequently expresses his happiness and gratitude for being a part of the congregation, even though he speaks only a few words of English. He says that he lives in hope because he knows that people of the church are there to support him and help him. His hope comes from the people of God.
The second Vatican council spoke about the light of the church saying that,
"The Church…serves as a leaven and as a kind of soul for human society as it is to be renewed in Christ and transformed into God's family…the Church not only communicates divine life to men, but in some way casts the reflected light of that life over the entire earth."
UNITY
If hope of God's light in the world is to be real, it is essential for Christians to be united in mind and purpose. (one start may be a Mennonite quoting the Vatican). This morning's reading from Corinthians is about unity within the church. A friend of mine who is currently working in Washington DC emailed me this week. She mentioned that she had two days off, one for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and one for George Bush's inauguration. She then said, "how can two such utterly disparate holidays be in the same week?"
A recent poll says that 49% of Americans think President Bush unites their country, 49% think he divides it and 2% are undecided. When I read Paul's letter to the Corinthians where he appeals to them to "be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose", it seemed to be a reflection of the current political division. But Paul tells us that we are to be united.
How can that happen when Christians are so divided? Often the bitterest political enemies are Christians against Christians, persecuting one another over slight differences. Perhaps it is because our division springs from the politics of people instead of the glory of God. God transcends our human politics. Grace is not a political tool. Love is not a right. Faith is not a campaign strategy or a commodity. Justice, kindness, humility. These are not left or right wing ideas. These are the ideals we read of in the Bible. To seek justice, to love kindness, to walk humbly with God. As much as religion seems to be entering politics these days, true Christian precepts are apolitical. No political party has ever built a platform around love or humility because they cannot deliver these things. God work starts within, not without, and it is only when we use what God has planted inside us in the world, instead of taking the things of the world and imposing them on God that we are can truly live in Christian unity.
Our culture exalts "being your own boss", being independent. Even -- or especially -- those who seem to be closest to those goals often discover that they are illusions. The kings of this world answer to the kingmakers, the kingmakers to bosses of their own. Having Jesus as lord -- as one's only Lord -- frees us from the web of empty ambition. Working for and with Jesus, we can cast a different kind of net -- one that frees and empowers rather than binds and dehumanizes. Answering Jesus' call, we start to hear the world's cries; we are drawn into relationships as we serve as Jesus' light in the world. It's not easy work, but it's the work we were born to do. It's the vocation that makes us more fully human and helps us understand how the divine is at work among us.
CALLING
So when do we start? Matthew tells us that we should go immediately. Jesus spoke to the fisherman on the lakeshore and immediately they left their nets and followed him. We've had two thousand years and we can still think up excuses. We're too busy, work is crazy right now, the refrigerator guy is supposed to come sometime today between 8 and 6, I called my mother last week. We can be sources of light, hope and unity in the world, but only by responding immediately on God's call. Many before us have been a light in places of darkness they experienced in the world. Martin Luther King Jr. lived with the injustice of the dark days of segregation yet he said,
"I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless night of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become reality. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word."
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; you have enlarged the nation and increased their joy; you have shattered the yoke that burdens them, for unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Unlike Alice in the woods, we care where we are going. Walking on God's path, we can shatter the yoke that binds us in the starless night and follow the Prince of Peace into a world of light, hope, and Christian unity.
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where—" said Alice.
"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.
1 All quotations of Scripture, unless otherwise noted, are from the New Revised Standard Version.