How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I bear pain in my soul,
and have sorrow in my heart all day long?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?"
--Psalm 13. 1-2
Jesus falls.
Jesus wept.
Jesus was tempted.
Jesus was hungry.
Jesus was angry.
Jesus prays: why?
Jesus was nailed.
Jesus dies.
All his efforts, it seems, have come to nothing.
All the miracles
and the kindness
and the love
and the outstretched hands to them all...
No wonder we don't spend much time on this fall
or that other fall and if that were not enough--
still another fall.
He never did fit our categories.
He never did confirm our prejudices.
Or vote for our candidate.
Or wave our flag.
Along this road Jesus falls a third time.
It seems excessive.
Until we think back over our own Via Dolorosa--
our way of sorrows--too.
God knows we have fallen.
Still fall if we are honest.
"They all were looking for a king
To slay their forces and lift them high;
Thou cams't, a little baby thing
That made a woman cry."*
No wonder we didn't know who he wuz.
Still don't some days.
For from then until now he has stood
with the fallen
and the broken
and the hungry
and the homeless
and all those who stand outside
the plate-glass window always looking in.
This is not the end of the story.
Thank God.
But these fallings are part of the human journey
They cannot be ignored.
Stopping here there is a catch in our throats.
Maybe a tear too.
For we know despite it all
Along our road we are not alone.
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| photo by Ron Zack / flickr
* Poem by George McDonald
--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com |
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