Meditation on 7, 8, 9
7 Jesus falls
the second time beneath his cross
8 The women
of Jerusalem mourn for the Lord
9 Jesus falls the third time beneath the cross
For the City of London Interdenominational Act of Witness,
15 April 2015.
Luke 23:27-30 A great number of the people followed him, and
among them were women who were beating their breasts and wailing for him. 28 But Jesus turned to them and
said, "Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves
and for your children. 29 For
the days are surely coming when they will say, 'Blessed are the barren, and the
wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.' 30 Then they will begin to say to
the mountains, 'Fall on us'; and to the hills, 'Cover us.'
Can
you think of a time
when the weight of the world on your
shoulders
has caused you to stumble and fall?
Can
you think of a time
when you have been so overwhelmed by
grief and loss
that all hope seems to have gone
from your world?
Can
you think of a time
when you have been brought to your
knees,
and have wondered whether you will
ever be able to rise again?
If
so, you are in good company.
Because
you are in company with the poorest of the poor in our world,
you are in company with those who,
weighed down by the burden of poverty,
stumble
and fall, as they struggle through life,
towards an ignominious and
unmarked death.
And
you are in company with those in our world
who have seen their own children die
of malnutrition,
those whose hopes of a future
have been ripped away by
disease and starvation.
And
you are in company with those
who have seen their sons and
daughters travel to London
on the promise of a
better life
only to discover that living hell
awaits them when they get here.
And
you are also in company with those
who have had enough of inequality,
who have had enough of oppression,
who have had enough of domination,
subjugation,
persecution, and
repression.
You
are in company with those
who have been weighted down for so
long
by the burdens that
others have required them to bear
that they long to throw off the
shackles that bind them,
and will do anything to
rise up, to stand tall, to be free.
You
are in company with those who take up arms against their oppressor
because they will not be cowed
forever.
You
are in company with those who sit in mute terror and shock
as they hear the news of another
bombing, another attack,
another terrorist
outrage.
You
are in company with those who have lost children, husbands, and wives,
to sectarian and ethnically
motivated violence.
You
are in company with those who bear the weight of grief
and share the cry of Rachel in
Ramah,
unable to be comforted,
weeping for her children who are no
more.
You
are in company with the women of Jerusalem,
wailing for their friend as he went
to his death,
as
the world sought to silence the one
who had spoken into being a world of
liberation and justice
and peace and equality.
You
are in company with all those who wish that life was ended,
and yet have to find the strength to
stumble on another step,
and then another, and then another.
Falling
and failing, and weeping and wailing.
You
are in the company of saints and sinners,
and martyrs and victims.
You
are in company with Christ Jesus,
the Lord of life,
who
carried his cross, and bore the burden,
and turned to the women
and spoke of despair.
You
are in company with the one who stared death in the face,
and stumbled, and cried out,
and stood up, and stepped on,
towards
life, towards hope,
towards forgiveness, towards
reconciliation.
No comments:
Post a Comment