Recently I attended an art exhibition at Wellington Cathedral called "Hope for the Child of War" (look it up, go see it if you have the chance). The artwork was done by kids who live in internally displaced peoples camps in North Thailand. Without exception these kids have all had to flee their villages in Burma as the Burmese army ruthlessly exploits the ethnic minorities in it's own country - with forced labour, violence, rape, and murder. The art itself was made as part of an art therapy initiative meant to help the kids express what they have been through, and what their hopes are for the future. The latter tended to follow similar themes - peace between the different peoples of Burma, or a picture of their village restored and equipped with hospitals and schools. The former were invariably pictures of violence, death, villages burning, soldiers with guns, people lying dead on the ground, and next to their pictures there was often a photo of the kid who painted it, as well as a caption describing some of what they had been through.
Some things are worthy of tears I think. Some things demand them. This was one of those moments. But I didn't cry. I felt deadened and depressed. This is worse than tears I think, when you are grieving but unable to have that release. But perhaps my greatest emotion at the time was frustration. I mean, honestly, how the hell are you meant to respond to something like that? To pictures of horrors you can't imagine, painted by children who have actually been through them. I was frustrated at myself, because i felt my emotional response didn't reflect the magnitude of the suffering I had just been enlightened too. I was frustrated at my own impotency and inability to do anything about the suffering these kids have to endure. Despite the paintings of hope that were mixed in with those of suffering, I left struggling with feelings of despair.
It is in light of this experience in particular that I have been reflecting on "hope". I realised as I looked at the photos of some of these kids, that many of them still clung to hope, that many had an amazing inner strength, evident in their smile and in their eyes. They had not lost hope, so how dare I? I also realised that my hope needs to grow at the same pace that my apathy melts. Unless is does, I am left depressed and despairing at the suffering around me. Crippled into inaction. In order to be equipped to deal with the pain that caring brings, we cannot let ourselves be content with an anaemic understanding of the power of God's love, with the perfection of God's justice, and the pure incredible-ness of our eternal hope in Jesus Christ. As always, strength, wisdom, and comfort is found in God's word.
It is astounding how much suffering the apostles went through, and yet still had joy and hope in God. Take Paul, who cared so much about his fellow man that he could wish that he himself be accursed from God, if it would mean his kinsmen would come to know Him (Romans 9:1-5). I am struck by his first letter to the corinthians, the way he speaks about the weakness and foolishness of the cross, and those who live by it. After having told them that the wisdom and strength of God is in the foolishness and weakness of the cross (1 Cor 1), he brings an indictment against the corinthians saying "we are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor. To this present hour we are both hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clothed and are roughly treated, and are homeless; and we toil, working with our hands; when we are reviled, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure; when we are slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become as the scum of the world, the dregs of all things, even until now" (1 cor 4:). Here is a man who lived by the cross. He suffered. It was in the cross and only in the cross that he boasted. He could say that through it he was crucified to the world, and the world to him, and that the scars on his body testified to his devotion to Christ and his willingness to suffer (galatians 6:12-18). And yet, he could write in many places of the amazing joy he possesses. He was, if nothing else, a man brimming with life, and life to the full. What profound mystery of God that a man could exult and rejoice in suffering, his suffering only serving to strengthen his hope and the love of God that overflows his heart (Romans 5:3-5)! I don't pretend to understand all that Paul writes (far from it!), but it is abundantly clear that here was a man strengthened by his own weakness, by full dependency on God, by God's love, and by a hope that is triumphant and unquenchable. The antithesis of myself, a man crippled on the one hand by apathy, and on the other by despair. Paul was a man who knew that no amount of suffering he could endure could ever compare to the glory of his future hope, that even death itself could not separate him from God's love, that death itself has no victory over him whose hope is in Christ, who could look death in the face and say "where is your victory?! Oh death, where is your sting?!" (Romans 8:18, 35-39; 1 Cor 15:54-55). "Be imitators of me, just as i also am of Christ", he said. God help me to live these words.
And so this is my hope. That I may share this hope with those that don't have it. Or at least, that I may grasp it and be an example of it. I pray that this hope would become so entrenched in my heart that I could face death daily without fear, that whether looking down the barrel of a Burmese rifle, or facing the future without knowledge of where the next meal may come from, or whatever suffering it is that God has in store for me, that I, and hopefully those around me, may keep a wistful smile and a gleaming eye, knowing that death has no victory here.
- "When they come for the innocent without crossing over your body, cursed be your religion and your life" - Source unknown.
Amen brother! This is an entry filled with God's truth. It made me cry!
ReplyDeleteOne things that I would add, though the prayer at the end is a large and noble request, I would say that it is only possible when coupled with the discipline mentioned in your previous entry. "Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God." Heb 12:1-2 Run with perseverance CJ, and I believe that the hope you pray for will come to pass.