Tag: lament

The Covenant

Let me begin my being really clear on who this post is for: These words are for people who consider them Christians and are committed to the tumultuous and risky calling of discipleship. If you’re in the midst of figuring, or oftentimes refiguring, faith out, these words are not for you. These words are also for the people who have taken the time to grieve. If you haven’t, take a wander through the Book of Job. Meditate and chew on it. I have a series on suffering, and a playlist for lament if you’re looking for further resources.

When I was thinking and praying about what to speak into this moment, what kind of answer can even be given in the midst of yet another mass shooting, yet more innocent little children killed, yet another trans person who is the shooter, at a time of already unimaginable grief and tragedy for the queer community as bill after bill after bill limits trans individual’s ability to exist, I needed some time and some inspiration. What can be said, accurately and honestly, in the midst of all of this complex tragedy?

The word that God put in my mouth was not an immediately helpful one. It was the end of Joshua 24:15:

… but as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.

Joshua 24:13 NRSVue

This verse comes towards the end of Joshua, a semi-historical book documenting Israel’s conquering of Canaan, with the help of their leader Joshua and the hand of God. Chapter 24 comes at the end of a warning Joshua, in his old age, gives to the Israelites. He urges them to preserve the purity of the people of God and to preserve the Hebrew God as the only God worthy of their adoration. He reminds the Israelites that the land of Canaan has been given to them, not earned, an important distinction to keep the Israelites humble and obedient. Then, in an act of obedience, Joshua holds a covenanting ceremony to renew the people’s promise to God, and in turn, God’s promise to the people. In chapter 24, Joshua begins by retelling the story so far:

Then I sent Moses and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt with what I did in its midst, and afterward I brought you out.

Joshua 24:5 NRSVue

The story of IAM setting God’s people free has become a frequent source of comfort and challenge for me since July of last year. It began as a testament: God can do impossible things. Then, it changed into a celebratory reminder: there is nothing a tyrant can do but grasp at earthly power.

How do we respond to life under tyranny? First, we should give the tyrant an opportunity to free us on his own accord. In Exodus 5, Moses and his brother Aaron give Pharaoh the first of God’s message to him: Let my people go. In response, Pharaoh not only refuses, he makes the enslavement of God’s people harsher.

That same day Pharaoh commanded the taskmasters of the people, as well as their supervisors, ‘You shall no longer give the people straw to make bricks, as before; let them go and gather straw for themselves. But you shall require of them the same quantity of bricks as they have made previously; do not diminish it, for they are lazy; that is why they cry, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ Let heavier work be laid on them; then they will pay attention to it and not to deceptive words.'”

Exodus 5:7-9 NRSVue

Don’t miss this first lesson, friends; when the tyrant tightens the reigns, freedom is imminent. But it’s also important to note here that asking the tyrant for freedom is acceptable in the sight of God. By all means, call your representatives and demand a more just world. With hope and humility, they will relent. But we also shouldn’t be surprised if the heart of a tyrant hardens into repeated refusal.

After numerous plagues, the Israelites flee Egypt. In a last-ditch power grab, Pharaoh and his men pursue the fleeing Israelites. The Israelites turn on Moses, enraged that they’ve escaped just to die in the wilderness. But Moses replies:

Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance that the LORD will accomplish for you today, for the Egyptians whom you see today you shall never see again. The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to keep still.

Exodus 14:13-14 NRSVue

Friends, I am as sure as I have ever been that God is a firm foundation to build your life on. I am as confident in the shadow of the tyrant as I was in the Promised Land: God frees and God conquers enemies. All we have to do is suppress everything our brains tell us not to do: be still, rest in the assured deliverance of God. Pslam 27 reminds us of the same war tactic: we become brave by being still. We are children of the Almighty God; we do not need the weapons of the world to conquer. Our victory is assured.

The issue with politicians and Pharaohs is that they earnestly believe their earthly power is enough to make us afraid. Maybe they’re right, maybe you are afraid.

I am.

Some person in a suit genuinely believes they know your body better than you do. They are passing laws to sentence people to death, to force people to come out, to stop taking life-giving medication, to stop being who God has called you to be. Just like the Israelites, we find ourselves backed up to the edge of impossible water, watching our captors pursue us, certain we are going to be slaughtered in an unfamiliar land, or even worse perhaps, an unfamiliar body. This is a death and a violence worth being afraid of.

And yet, in the midst of our fear, we hear the whisper of Moses, the whisper of David’s song, the whisper of our very God: Keep still, hide in his shelter, Know that I Am God.

As you move through these next few weeks and months and years of increased transphobia, gun violence, and chaos, rest assured that the God who created you is also fighting for you. The tyrant doesn’t win.

Let us also cast our minds to Easter: death itself doesn’t win. What fear can these feeble, power-hungry men offer us, especially in the end:

Then comes the end, when he (Christ) hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and very authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”

1 Corinthians 15:24-26 NRSVue

Point #1: How do we respond in this moment of overwhelming grief and anger? We remember that the authority of death and of ruler hold no true power over us, just power that is tangible.

After Joshua reminds the people of the power and faithfulness of God, he instructs them to revere and serve God:

Now, therefore, revere the LORD and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness; put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt and serve the LORD.

Joshua 24:14 NRSVue

If you’re struggling to embody the first point, friends, it’s about to get a lot harder. I’m not preaching to you; I’m preaching to myself and hoping some of this self-talk is useful to someone besides me. Paul, in his letter to the Romans, offers some thoughts on how we as Christians can respond faithfully to persecution, how we can sincerely and faithfully serve the L-RD.

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be arrogant, but associate with the lowly, do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine; I will repay, says the LORD.’ Instead, ‘if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink, for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

Romans 13:14-21 NRSVue

As I read this passage over and over again, I want the way of Jesus less than ever. To be a disciple of Christ is going to cost us everything. Every intuition, every comfort, every morsel of food and drink and sense of fairness. To put this back in terms Joshua could understand, we have to put away the gods of our ancestors. We have to choose a different path than vengeance. We have to want peace more than we want justice, because we know that true justice flows out of peace. Again, I say: I want the way of this Jesus less than ever.

And yet I am simultaneously convicted of little else in this moment than that the world needs more Jesus. We need more of his gentleness, more of his submission to suffering, more of his counter-cultural peacemaking.

If we want to sincerely and faithfully serve our God, we have to feed our enemies. There isn’t another path. We have to overcome the vast and deep and profound evil in our world and faith communities by viciously committing ourselves to self-sacrificial good.

Here is another thing I am convinced of in this moment of profound suffering: I do not have control over very much. I can’t solve gun violence. I can’t cure transphobia. I can’t eradicate suffering in all of its forms from the face of the earth. Joshua acknowledged the limitations of his ability to commit the tribes of Israel to the covenant of the L-RD:

Now if you are unwilling to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served in the region beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living…

Joshua 24:13 NRSVue

As I picture this scene play out in our modern context, I can hear Joshua name different gods: social media, guns, mental illness, {political party}. You can choose, right now, to serve that god. If the fight is too difficult, if the thought of feeding a gunman or a politician is too much for you to stomach, go find a different god worthy of your worship. I can’t make that choice for you, or for my senator, or my president, or my pastor.

But as for me, and as for my future house and family, queer and complicated and beautiful, we will serve the L-RD.

We’re going to do some rejoicing in the midst of celebration, and we are going to mourn alongside those who mourn.

We’re going to try to not repay evil with evil. We’re going to try to make peace and live peaceably even with the tyrants who live above us.

We’re going to heap some burning coal on the heads of some people.

Come, Lord Jesus, and make a way for us in this barren wilderness. Give us our daily bread, that we might remember our place and have the tools to be peacemakers in this wild world.

Point #2: How do we respond in this moment of overwhelming grief and anger? We decide that whatever god our nation and our neighbor is serving, we will serve the LORD.

Scripture quotations are from New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition Bible, copyright © 1989; 2021 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America and are used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page).

Like him on Facebook or follow him on Instagram and Goodreads.

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The Tyrant

We’re supposed to give up our love for them?

Knock at the Cabin

It is not enough only to have martyrs for the faith, people willing to die for the thing they believe in. We also need people willing to live under the threat of death, to endure a long life of suffering. Martyrs receive maximum suffering over the shortest amount of time. The ones who live endure varying amounts of suffering over a long amount of time. In evangelical America, many are willing to die for their faith; few are willing to live, to stomach what it means to endure.

You have heard in said in recent weeks that there is a revival in America, a reawakening of the Spirit on this land. I believe this is true; I can feel it in that hollow space carved into my heart. The Tyrant is tightening his gallows. Laws are being passed and censorship is sweeping our communities. The limits of grace have been set forth by human hands. The Tyrant is getting anxious. It is always, has always been like this. Darkest before the dawn. Defeat makes tyrants desperate.

I believe that there is a revival in America. I believe that God’s about to free some captives and fell some tyrants. I believe that I’m about to find myself in the wilderness, but that my children are going to feast on milk and honey. I believe that freedom is coming for the captives and I’ve felt it for a while.

For too long, though, I believed that captivity would be coming for The Tyrant. I needed to believe that my righteousness and my rightness and my rage would be redeemed. In Matthew 21, we see Jesus’ rage as he flips over the tables in his Father’s temple, condemning in righteous rightness. Rage has a holy and celebrated place in our worship. But rage is not the thing that saves the world.

Don’t miss this, friends. Rage cannot save any of us. Rage is balm for the suffering, a reminder that they are seen. Rage is a warning to repentance, a reminder to The Tyrant that human authority is just animated dust waiting, again, to crumble. Rage is important. Rage is necessary. Rage is not the thing that saves the world.

“While we were still sinners,” Paul writes, “Christ died for us.” The rage of God was righteous. It was right. It was deserved. It is only because the rage is inflicted on the undeserved. It is only because grace is undeserved that the world is save. Sacrificial love, which is a fancy way of saying suffering, is what saves the world.

God is on the way to loosen chains. God is on the way to set the captives free. God is on the way to fulfill good promises.

Promises that require suffering. Good that requires love. Freedom that requires the purging of righteous rage for peace and love that make no sense.

To follow Christ is to surrender everything – even rightness.

I don’t want to live in an equitable world or a just world. That isn’t enough for me. I want to sit at the same table as my captor. I want to look in his eyes. I want to know him as my brother.

Rage can’t do that. Only love can save the world.

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page).

Like him on Facebook or follow him on Instagram and Goodreads.

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The Bittersweet Answer

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It feels as though, more often than not, answered prayers are bittersweet. From my mortal lens, I can’t tell if it feels this way because it’s true, the frequency of bittersweet answers outpaces the saccharine ones, or because we in our mortality are more likely to notice when things don’t go how we planned more often than we are to notice when everything is going exactly as we’ve planned. I suspect the reason may be the latter. The reason why is worth reflecting on but for now I want to talk about why the bittersweet answer stings and where we go after.

On the surface, we all claim to want clarity. Whether or not you’re a person of faith, we’re searching for answers on why we feel this way and what’s coming next for us. For example, just the other day, one of my friends asked the astrological expert of the group what the start of Gemini season means. “It’s bad. Probably fine for you, but not for us Pisces” she responded. Whether it’s the star season, or a closed door, clarity is sobering. It forces us to face a long awaited answer with the fullness of its truth. Sobriety, as any recovering addict will tell you, is great, but there’s a reason addictions are so common and why they last so long. We don’t really, truly want to face the world sober. It means the pain is in focus and we have nothing to buffer it.

A bittersweet answer can be the death of a dream. Maybe you have feelings for someone and you get the call that they’re moving away. Maybe you’ve been interviewing for that dream job and you get a rejection email. Maybe you miscarry a pregnancy. If we live our lives as instructed in Proverbs 3:5-6 then we bring all things to the Godhead and live according to the answers They provide. Yet that doesn’t always feel like good news.

In Isaiah 54:8 we are reminded that the Lord’s ways are not our ways. That disconnect often stings because we are so sure about that person, that job, that life, that plan and path for ourselves. And for some reason, even though we’ve thought of everything, even though we’ve seen how good and right that path is for us, God’s ways are higher and God disagrees. And it stings. It’s allowed to. The death of a dream is deserving of our grief for it. That’s the bitter.

A bittersweet answer can also be the belaboring of a nightmare. Maybe you’re in a relationship that makes you feel suffocated more often than held, but God asks you to stick through it. Maybe you’re at a job you hate or feel abandoned at, and while God is telling everyone else Go, God’s telling you, Stay. Maybe your kids are extra challenging these days and while all your friends are enjoying time with their kids, yours feel like a chore, and God is saying keep working. Things will get better, you’re certain, if you can find someone else, take a different position, or have healing for your kids. Yet God’s higher ways leave you where you’re at. The nightmare bites and it hurts and it’s allowed to. That’s the bitter.

The sweet is that God is answering at all. In the moment of clarity, it feels like slap in the face, and yet the alternative – abandonment – is not kind either. Recall the words of the Psalmist in Psalm 13. When God is silent, we are also stung by the silence. We long for God to deliver us and speak balm into our souls. The sweet is that even in a bold, red-lettered, capitalized no, God has heard us and answered. There is a miracle in that. Now that we have an answer, we can begin to pick up the shards of our broken dream and reimagine what they might form instead. Now that we have an answer, we can plant our feet to stay in the fight. We have a direction again. We know despite our circumstance we will see goodness while we are alive.

We can be confident of this goodness because after God tells us that Their ways are higher and better than our ways, God says:

For as the rain and snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Isaiah 55:10-11 NRSV

The closed door does not mean God is done working. God is just not done working yet.

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We are not alone in this tension between the bitter and the sweet. If you’ve been following along on Instagram, you might know that my morning devotional has had me in the Old Testament for a while, specifically Leviticus and Numbers, books I typically don’t read. As I’ve been going through, I’ve noticed a recurring theme: The Israelites constantly have their mouths full. They are either stuffed with heavenly manna (God’s provisions and fulfilled promises) or complaints (human anxiety that God will not deliver on said promises). I see so much of myself in that tension, caught between the dead dream and the hope for the new one. Throughout these two books, the Israelites have repeatedly complained to their leaders that they should have been left to die and rot in Egypt. They are so consumed with the promise not coming at the right time, not being the right thing, that they are willing to trade in the coming glory for the devil the know.

It is a timeless human temptation to cling to the dead dream and bemoan the continuing nightmare. Yet I believe that the love we invest in unrequited people and stillborn babies is not wasted. I believe that the interviews and the jobs we endure will teach us skills for our career. I believe that the patience we give our children will make the waiting worth it. Our dreams are dead, yes, but they taught us to reach for more. Their fantasy gave us a taste of the coming glory and for that I am thankful. Our nightmare continues yes, but the struggle will give us the tools to climb the mountain so that we may enjoy it when we reach the top.

I leave you with two reminders from the Psalmist about the relationship of sorrow and joy. Sorrow is defeated by joy in the morning and sorrow is used to water the plant that brings joy. Mourn for your dream for those tears will fertilize an even better one. Endure the nightmare because the morning always wakes us from our slumber. The bitterness and the sweetness.

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page).

Follow him on Facebook, Instagram, or Goodreads.

Curious why we don’t use he/him pronouns for God in this post? Click here.

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This Meaningless Life

Background photo from Tyler Callahan. Series header designed in Canva.

Editor’s Note: This is the fourth part of a four-part series on suffering. Click here for part one. Click here for part two. Click here for part three. Click here for a playlist full of songs from this series and inspired by the messages.

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It’s a wild world, we’re all trying to find our place in it.

It’s a wild world and no one seems to understand it.

It’s a wild world but there ain’t no way I’m gonna quit it.

Love is all I’ve got to give away.

Wild World, Drew Holcomb

As our series and Ecclesiastes winds down, I have the ninth chapter playing in my head. “So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God’s hands, but no one knows whether love or hate awaits them. All share a common destiny – the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not.” (9:1-2b) We spoke of this during week 1. Life is meaningless and it ends in death. We do good and we do evil. Good is done to us and evil is done to us. What is the point?

I have a chronic, perhaps terminal disease: depression. It is part of what lends me to speak often about lament; my brain is better at processing sorrow than joy. I think often of death, what it might mean to finally be done with the river of time. If you missed my Easter message from this past spring, I’d encourage to read it and then come back. The notion of heaven is wonderful because it provides us with some sense of relief, an opportunity to sit without our anger and division, to simply be under a tin roof as the rain falls and covers us like a hug in the sound of peace. There is some joy in what the author tells us in verse 6 “Never again will (the dead) have a part in anything that happens under the sun.” We will no longer have to toil under the sun or wear masks or bury our loved ones. Yet, in the context of the chapter, the author is not joyous as I am reading it; he is sad.

The full context of that verse is this: “Anyone who is among the living has hope – even a live dog is better off than a dead lion! For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even their name is forgotten. Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun.” Perhaps, then, there is still something worthwhile about the human experience. Our joy molds the meaning of our suffering and our suffering gives us context by which to judge our joy as good. Perhaps our names label more than our bodies but give voice to our experiences. We toil so that we may rest. Sometimes we ebb. Sometimes we flow.

We spoke of this during week 2: life is a river that we just have to jump into. As much as we try to mold our experience, our plans turn to dust. Indeed we know what is written in verse 11 is true: “I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all.” Life shapes our context; we do not shape our lives. Life happens and our task is to make the meaningless life meaningful. “Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for God has already approved what you do. Always be clothed in white and always anoint your head with oil. Enjoy life with your (spouse), whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun – all your meaningless days.” (9:7-10).

One way in which we make meaning out of our meaningless days is through our walk with people. We spoke of this during week 3. We are to suffer together as one body, to root out the nature of suffering rather than our enemies in each other. As we learn to see the face of God in every person we encounter, we find people to bring to our tables to feast beside and get drunk with. Our lives are ash sifting through an hourglass. Let’s enjoy it by enduring it as long as we can.

The war has already been won; our bodies are destined for relaxation under a tin roof. Yet here we are for now. I will raise my cup to drink with you, pick up my knife only to give you bread. I will try to fight for liberation for the best of us and I will try to fight for liberation for the bitter worst. I will suffer under the toil of my labor and I will stretch out under the joy of my harvest. Better days are behind and ahead of me. Better days are all around me.

Thank you for being stuck in this meaningless river at the same time as me.

(Breathe in)

Give us this day our daily bread

(Breathe out)

As I seek to enjoy this life

(Breathe in)

Surround me with people I love

(Breathe out)

As I make my way toward a feast.

Notes

Verses quoted in this post come from he NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible published by Zondervan whose notes were helpful in writing this post. Notes in the NRSV The Harper Collins Study Bible published by Harper One were also used. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page). Like him on Facebook or follow him on Instagram or Goodreads.

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My Brother Who Suffers

Background photo from Tyler Callahan. Series header designed in Canva.

Editor’s Note: This is the third part of a four-part series on suffering. Click here for part one. Click here for part two. Come back next next Wednesday for part four.

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Open up our eyes

To see the wounds that bind all of humankind

May our shutter hearts

Greet the dawn of life with charity and love.

Brother, The Brilliance

I write this next entry in our series with a bit of trepidation. Yet, as Mike Donehey writes, “It’s gonna take myself to cultivate the kind of life that others haven’t seen yet.” If you were to ask me if I want suffering, I would tell you no with honesty. I would tell it to you emphatically. I would tell you no because it is true: I do not long for suffering for anyone. And yet I have found myself living a life incongruent with that ideal as I look back at the sum of it. I do not long for suffering and yet I accept and advocate for suffering when it is deserved and when it is minimal compared to something else. I have witnessed this throughout the pandemic and testified to it in the first week of this series and in conversations with friends and mentors over the past few months.

I am struggling to grieve for the obstinate that have died from COVID-19. I was reminded again of the depths of the injustice of mourning when a friend texted me that her critically ill uncle couldn’t get a needed ICU bed because unvaccinated COVID patients had filled the ward. How deep is that pain and how righteous is that anger. And yet, I was convicted by theologian Mason Mennenga’s retweet of a Fox News headline detailing Jimmy Kimmel’s call for the unvaccinated to give up their ICU beds in which Mennenga wrote “The thing about being a universalist is I want liberation for even the worst people in the world.”

I do not identify as a universalist, but the call he mentions moves as though I do. By far the hardest thing about being a Christian is that we are bound to the offensiveness of grace; it is deeply inescapable on both ends. We can neither outrun the limits of grace nor can we pull the cover of grace out from our fiercest enemies. Perhaps you find yourself at another point on the political spectrum that makes my confession about the unvaccinated sting. Perhaps it reinforces everything you’ve thought about the cruelty of people who look or think like me. I can’t blame you and I’m sorry for the harm I’ve caused and the harm I will inevitably continue to. A less controversial example involves something I’ve written about on this blog before. I was friends with someone in childhood who eventually went on to commit a school shooting that affected many of my adult friends. He is in prison now where he suffers and where he will continue to suffer for over a thousand years as dictated by his sentence. My inclination is that this suffering feels justified to you, just as many argued in the replies to Mennenga’s liberation tweet. Consequential suffering like prison just doesn’t sting the heart like the random suffering of an earthquake. I think if most of us are honest with ourselves, in our quiet, faceless parts, we might find we’re perfectly acceptable with some suffering. Perhaps earned suffering isn’t really suffering.

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When I look into the face of my enemy

I see my brother, I see my brother.

When I look into the face of my enemy

I see my sister, I see my father, I see my mother.

Brother, The Brilliance

I think often of Christ’s words on the cross in Luke 23:34 and the response Noah Gundersen spits back in his song Jesus, Jesus: “And I know you said, ‘Forgive them for they know not what they do’ but sometimes I think they do and I think about you.” When we are given grace, it feels like the loosening of bondage. When others are given grace, it feels like a slap in the face. It feels like a boot on your chest. This is what I mean by the offensiveness of grace. Grace is painful.

Here, on the cross, intentional, unrighteous violence against the God incarnate is still met with forgiveness. Even as they nailed his hands and beat him and watched, laughing in mockery, Jesus claims their ignorance. When it’s abundantly clear they know what they’re doing, the Christ asks his creator to forgive them.

What of consequence do I know? What do I mean when I say they had it coming, that they deserved the suffering they are reaping? Why does my mouth form those words in spite of all the grace I have received?

These questions lead to that same, all too familiar pit. In Ecclesiastes 4, the author is writing about oppression when he goes on to say: “And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.” (4:2-3) In my suffering, I feel the truth of these verses. In our cultural and contemporary moment, in this seemingly endless sludge of tragedy, I feel these verses. I cry out a little like Job that I wish I had never been born.

Yet, they also resonate when I think about the suffering it often feels I’m forced to endorse. The nature of our society in its current systems mandates suffering. Endorsing consequence requires endorsing suffering. Our binary political systems mandates suffering. Our allegiances mandate suffering . Is it possible to imagine a society in which prisoners are given liberation? Is it possible to imagine a healthcare system that sustains itself on wellness? Is it possible for us to be a people who can stop asking how much suffering is acceptable and start believing in the absolution of all suffering? Is systemic change overwhelming? Perhaps those who are never born are truly blessed because they never receive or endorse suffering. They escape the false dichotomy of pain. Yet, we are alive. How should we live in this suffering life we have found ourselves in?

The author goes on to write “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: if either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” (4:9-12). This text parallels the Epic of Gilgamesh, a prevalent story at the time. Gilgamesh encourages Enkidu about the value of friendship and the author of Ecclesiastes extolls us of the same, both using the example of a three-strand rope and the power of two over one. How revolutionary might it be for us to suffer together, to decide that the cause of the suffering does not matter, that the target is unimportant. How revolutionary might it be for us to make suffering, instead of each other, our enemy.

This, then, is perhaps our focus. We cannot change the world, break systems, redefine justice in our courts, on wall street, and everywhere else that injustice flows like a river. And yet we are not powerless. Augustine of Hippo wrote, “‘The times are bad! The times are troublesome!’ This is what humans say. But we are our times. Let us live well and our times will be good. Such as we are, such are our times.” You cannot break systems but you can break yourself: who do you need to free from justice so that they may have mercy? My answer is long but here is where I am starting: on my knees praying for the healing of someone I know in a hospital bed, unvaccinated, suffering a consequence. No, that’s a lie. Here is where I’m starting: on my knees praying for the healing of someone I know in a hospital bed, unvaccinated, suffering.

May our pride be broken into mourning. May we have the courage to walk alongside every living thing in their moment of pain, no matter how deserved it was. May we be the gift of grace we have received.

(Breathe in)

Blur my heart

(Breathe out)

That I may not tell friend from foe

(Breathe in)

Faced with suffering

(Breathe out)

Break my pride into mourning.

Notes

Verses quoted in this post come from he NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible published by Zondervan whose notes were helpful in writing this post. Notes in the NRSV The Harper Collins Study Bible published by Harper One were also used. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™ Augustine of Hippo quote from the Book of Common Prayer: A liturgy for ordinary radicals, page 466.

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page). Like him on Facebook or follow him on Goodreads.

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The Weight of Time

Background photo from Tyler Callahan. Series header designed in Canva.

Editor’s Note: This is the second part of a four-part series on suffering. Click here for part one. Listen along to our soundtrack of suffering here.

I do not understand your ways

Yet still I know you are the keeper of my days

Though I am lost I know you hold my hand

Keeper of Days, Jon Guerra

Étienne Loulié was born in 1654 in Paris, the son of a sword-finisher. He would go on to live a life filled with music, one of the few of his era who wrestled with the theoretical underpinnings of music alongside practicing and performing it. In 1696, Étienne used Galileo Galilei’s pendulum to produce the first metronome but, unlike the ones of today, the invention made no sound. Instead, a musician used the metronome like they used a conductor – visually watching the pendulum to stay on time. It would take almost two hundred years to produce what we think of today as the metronome, developed in Amsterdam by Dietrich Nikollaus Winkel in 1814 before the idea was repackaged with a scale and sold by Johann Nepomuk Maelzel two years later. Ever since, musicians around the world have utilized metronomes to develop their own sense of timing and remain on tempo, much as large orchestras do with conductors. But the tool is not without its controversy. Many musicians and musical scholars value the metronome for its mathematical perfection, restraining the human tendency to speed up or slow down over time and as a consequence of passion. Others are troubled by the perfection of the metronome. Music, in their view, should be felt instead of perfected. Delivering music across aesthetics and cultures involves more than timing; it requires swings, grooves, and creativity. Life, according to Ecclesiastes, also involves timing. And like the metronome proponents and critics, understanding time’s relentless rigidity and creative swings may help us navigate our seasons of suffering.

I have had a lifelong obsession with the third chapter of Ecclesiastes. It begins this way “There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.” The text goes on to list a time for each thing and its opposite: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to shut up and a time to speak. Life is not something we produce inasmuch as it is something that occurs to us. The choices we make, the works we produce, are like a metronome, giving structure to the music that plays without ceasing around us, the river of time that flows from death to birth to death. We learned last week that life is meaningless, that sometimes it is better to endure our joy and our suffering rather than to question it. This week, we are learning that perhaps all seasons are endured without reason. That time moves as we makes sense of it; our sense of it does not make time move.

I mentioned last week that I have been hearing a call to live more into today than worry about what is coming tomorrow. I am also learning to avoid the temptation of yesterday. I have restarted the practice of praying occasionally with prayer beads. The serenity prayer that accompanies the Anglican beads prays the last cruciform beads with this excerpt: “Let me live one day at a time and enjoy one moment at a time.” This is a countercultural notion of living life. Everything in our Western life requires and revolves around a plan. You may be familiar with the interview question “Where do you see yourself in five years?” From a young age, we are taught to set goals and see our lives on a path that we help lay the foundation of. You go to school so that you can do well and pass to the next grade. For most of us, those grades eventually led to another building, full of new people: the transition from elementary to middle school or middle to high school. When we graduated high school or left early, we were faced with choices. Do we continue on an educational path, electing to go to college or trade school? Do we raise a family? Do we enter the workforce? Where do we eventually want to end up? What do we see ourselves doing when we’re grown up? Whatever path we choose comes with new paths. How will we parent our children? What products will we use to clean our home? What promotions are on the table? What ladder do I want to climb and how far do I want to ascend? What classes should I take and how should I integrate this knowledge and these skills into my post-educational life?

Everything is on a path and, if you’ve lived long enough, you’ll know that those plans, like our bodies, can crumble to dust far quicker than it takes to make them. Our children respond differently to our chosen parenting practices than we had anticipated. The economy tanks and we get laid off. We choose a major, graduate with a degree, and realize we find so much more joy in a completely different field. We have no control over the river of time yet we plan as though we do.

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All life is yours

All death is yours

Keeper of days

I give you praise

Keeper of Days, Jon Guerra.

A few verses after the lists in chapter 3, we receive this word: “(God) has made everything beautiful in its time. (They have) also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end” (3:11). I think some of our suffering results from this incongruence. We find ourselves out of time, struggling to be creative against the rigidity of the river. We find ourselves too creative, struggling to be rigid against the creative whims of the river. We know that there is victory in the end and yet we find ourselves living through the middle. We want to live each day as it comes and yet we know that our culture requires us to have a plan. We look anxiously each day toward the Coming of the Kingdom; We want to enjoy the bread we eat today.

The weight of time is this: that God is the one with hands on the clocks, deciding when we start and when we stop, that we are the ones whose feet are on the ground. Again, I am left with this query: what if we live our life? What if we exercise neither creativity nor rigidity? How might our lives look if we slouch into the river? I’m not sure what this will look like for you but I encourage you to dig into the slouchiness of it. What regrets from your past might God be calling you to let go of? What dreams of the future are keeping you from enjoying the moment? What joys from the past are you reliving that is preventing you from seeking joy today? What worries about the future are stealing your sleep?

The truth is this: what has happened has happened. What will be will come. Everything is meaningless. We are incapable of knowing the reality of tomorrow, incapable of changing what has passed. When we begin to craft our lives around the seasons we are in, I believe we may be equipped to endure our suffering in its time and endure our joy in its.

(Breathe in)

Keeper of Time

(Breathe out)

Let me surrender my claims to it

(Breathe in)

Let what is coming come.

(Breathe out)

Let what has passed pass on.

Notes

Wikipedia entries for the metronome, Étienne Loulié, and Dietrich Nikolaus Winkel were helpful in crafting and understanding the hisotry of the metronome. Verses quoted in this post come from he NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible published by Zondervan whose notes were helpful in writing this post. Notes in the NRSV The Harper Collins Study Bible published by Harper One were also used. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™ See here for notes on how we utilize God’s pronouns.

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page). Like him on Facebook or follow him on Goodreads.

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Reframing the Question

Background photo from Tyler Callahan. Series header designed in Canva.

Editor’s note: This is part one of a four-part series on suffering. Come back next week for part two. Listen along to our series soundtrack here.

I have many questions for you

My mouth is so full I cannot chew

Are you listening? Are you listening?

My friends are hurting, they are hurting.

Mindful, Tow’rs

It takes very little these days to feel the sorrow dripping from the world like sap; it sticks to everything. I’ll admit I’ve been a little disconnected these past two years, floating more than walking through life, surviving more than living. Perhaps you can relate. I started grad school last fall in the middle of a worldwide lockdown. I started my second year as a war came to an end and a different one took its place, as an Earthquake killed thousands, as ICU beds filled to capacity yet again. It’s been a little too much if I’m honest. I’m still struggling to find words to name the experiences, still wondering whether the words matter at all. Yet, I’ve felt myself chewing on a few words these past few weeks as I watch the world end again, feeling a little like the Pharaoh in the year of the plagues, wondering in my pride when it will all just stop, wondering when we might get a morsel of relief. Over the next four weeks, we’ll wrestle our way through portions of Ecclesiastes, in search of meaning for the suffering embedded so deeply into our skin and screamed so loudly in the world around us.

I want to start with a question exemplified through a story of my own small suffering. I know that in a world of existential, collective trauma the broken heart of one man is a little selfish to focus on. My hope in bringing it up, though, is two-fold. Perhaps you will be encouraged to claim and name the personal tragedy that has afflicted you even in spite of the need to honor and acknowledge the much bigger grief around us. Even if it doesn’t matter to most, what matters to one still matters. Secondly, I want to disentangle us from the political nature of global suffering, the weaponry that suffering arms us with against presidents and kings, even against our better judgment. We’ll unpack that more in week three. I want to disentangle us from the political nature as much as possible because I’m utilizing my story and my story is built on my body and my body is politicized and debated.

I had discovered that the guy I was seeing was cheating on me, a betrayal that felt devastating to me because a few days prior I had confided in him a great vulnerability that exposed an insecurity I had brought into our relationship. I had wanted to work on it to be a better partner for him. I felt stupid for wanting to invest even more into something he had already, at least partially, let go of. I was wanting to fix something about myself and now I had evidence that so much more of me was broken than I had originally thought. Something about me was not enough for him and the essence of who I was and what value I brought to his life was not worth the truth. When I confronted him, he denied it. Worse, he explained it away, made me feel bad for thinking that I knew what I knew. So, I stayed and doubled my pain when 17 days later I walked out of his house into a snowstorm after he stopped even trying to hide his various affairs.

I felt the weight of it for months. I felt the weight of loving someone I didn’t know, of loving someone who didn’t love me. I felt the weight of not being enough, of being so tangibly unworthy of love and of truth. I felt the weight of doubt. And I felt the weight of the timeless question I had asked multiple times before, the weight of the question I still ask, the weight of the question I have no doubt I will ask until the day I head Home.

This experience was the perfect example of this question because, as I suffered, he did not. As I questioned if I could be loved, he was in a new loving relationship. The childhood adage “cheaters never prosper” sits uncomfortably next to the nature of reality. Cheaters always prosper. The situation is fully in their control and when the relationship ends, they already have their next relationship lined up.

The question, of course, is why is this bad thing happening? And why is it happening to me?

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Who are we that you are mindful of us?

Who are we that you are mindful of us?

Is this the part we just have to try and trust?

Mindful, Tow’rs

Why do bad things happen? Why do bad things happen to me and the people I love? This problem has plagued scholars and theologians for centuries if not millennia. I’ve had a lifelong fascination with lament, a theme you’ll have no doubt noticed if you’ve read any of my prior work, so these questions have been foundational to who I am. They are worthwhile questions, deep and meaningful ones. But they have become less meaningful to me recently because the weight of the bad is over and beyond what the weight of the good has been recently. Although, there is still good.

I was on a zoom call with five of my friends the other week. It was the first time all six of us had been together in some time, each of us scattered around the country. I found my mind blissfully empty. I had no questions. I was only there in the moment, full and drunk on the laughter. We were trading stories about our lives recently, trips back home to visit family, big milestones like births and engagements. We were trading questions and shock at revelations from parents and siblings.

Not once on that call did I ask myself why there was a good thing happening to me. It isn’t as though I’ve never questioned the presence of goodness. In fact, a few days after our zoom call, I was texting with a friend about a mutual friend who had posted a picture of him and his boyfriend. It was a little difficult to see him smiling because this friend had caused us each a lot of pain in the relationships he had had with us. We both remarked that we hoped he was a healthier person, that he had grown and begun to make better choices for the sake of his boyfriend. And yet, I texted her “But idk it’s also kind of hard to think about him being happy I guess.”

I have, then, felt very comfortable questioning goodness and joy, just never when I was the recipient. I wonder if I were honest with myself, if I would discover that the problem of good is as compelling as the problem of evil. I wonder if the question of why something good has happened to me is just as elusive as the question of why something bad has happened.

Ecclesiastes is sometimes read among Jews during the Feast of Sukkoth, a feast that takes place in the fall in remembrance of the exiled years on their way to the Promised Land. The feast is joyous in spite of the pain, a reminder of God’s provisions. Many Jews celebrate by building huts in their backyard or sleeping underneath the stars, exposing themselves to the elements and exist solely underneath the provision and presence of God. As Chief Rabbi Dr. Jonathan Sacks remarked at the feast following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, “We call Sukkot our festival of joy, because sitting there in the cold and the wind, we remember that above us and around us are the sheltering arms of the divine presence. If I were to summarize the message of Sukkot I’d say it’s a tutorial in how to live with insecurity and still celebrate life.”

I wonder if we are to endure suffering the same way we are to endure joy – with experience over interrogation. Lately, I’ve been feeling the call to simply live in the day I woke up in, to worry a little bit less about tomorrow, to be a little less excited about it. In the middle of a climate crisis and a global pandemic, I am more than aware that tomorrow is only a dream, only a hope. The future is not tangible; it may not even exist. The point of Ecclesiastes is that life is futile. We are told that work is meaningless, that everything we accumulate will fall away. We are even told that we will fade away: “All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.” (3:20). In the very beginning we are told this plainly: “‘Meaningless! Meaningless!’ says the teacher. ‘Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.'” (1:2).

When I read that in preparation for this series, it felt a bit like balm on the wound. The questions I ask are meaningful to me because, as I mentioned, lament is an important spiritual practice for me. But I’m beginning to wonder if the answer would change anything for me. If I found out why my life has been one of repeated suffering, endless trauma, would it matter? If I discovered why just sitting in the presence of my friends meant so much, would I appreciate it more? Would I discover I didn’t deserve it? Would I be stuck in the same life, only now I would have heavy answers instead of questions?

A few chapters later we are told: “When times are good, be happy; but when times are bad, consider this: God has made the one as well as the other.” (7:14a). Moving forward through the endless suckage, the darkest, forlorn night, I’m still going to ask questions because, as Semler wrote, “I’m giving this my all,” but I am going to be mindful of the questions I am asking. That if I am going to ask “why suffering?” I need to also ask “Why joy?”  Next week, we are going to talk more about what it might mean to live in life rather than to live life. But for now, I want us to think about the questions we are asking, and to question whether asking them is helpful. Maybe we’re in a season of exploration and we need to be asking. Or, maybe we’re in a season we need to simply experience because the answers, whatever they could possibly be, wouldn’t make a lick of difference to our wounds which just simply hurt.

(Breathe in)

As I question

(Breathe out)

God, question with me.

(Breathe in)

As I release my questions

(Breathe out)

Christ, sit beside me.

Notes

Verses quoted in this post come from he NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible published by Zondervan whose notes were helpful in writing this post. Notes in the NRSV The Harper Collins Study Bible published by Harper One were also used. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

About

Bryce Van Vleet is the #1 selling author of Tired Pages and Before We All Die Let’s Have One Last Chat by the Fireside. He also hosts the podcast Death in Dakota and sells poetry art here. You can support him by clicking through blog posts or donating (scroll to the bottom of the page). Like him on Facebook or follow him on Instagram or Goodreads.

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The Cure for Wellness

Yellow, tan, and orange flowers in front of a brown and green field.

Originally, this was going to serve as an intro to a series on hungering for Emmanuel – seeing God with us in the spaces we find ourselves in. What I’ve realized after the following conversation with a friend, and similar subsequent ones, is that the message I have for these people who approach me with trepidation in admitting their hatred for God, for the Church, and for the people who claim Christ as their savior is not one of hope and joy and stick-with-it platitudes. There are simply no adequate words that can convey to them that God, a good God, is responsible for all of these things that have been taken from them and continue to.

And I have no answer for the countless non-believers who approach me with trepidation as they say, “hey, no offense, but you have to be out of your mind to associate with such terrible people who care so little for the world around them.” I usually just shrug and tell them I understand.

For too long, the burden of Kingdom building has been on the people who have had their homes torched and their ways of life desecrated. For too long, the Church has invested in the alienating of non-believers to coddle those who tithe. It is time that the people who proclaim the so-called Good News with sharp tongues and daggers are confronted with the inequities we perpetrate and the violence we unleash upon the children and Lamb of God.

This is not the feel good story of God with Us; it’s the story we preach and ask others to say: God Against Us.

“I don’t want to be guided into anything; I just wanted to tell someone that I was struggling.”

Sometimes, I’m asked why my writing is bent towards the sad and seemingly hopeless depravity of existence. My book is full of stories of people who die and struggle. My holiday reflections are framed for those who find themselves unable to get into the “holiday spirit.” Messages I preached when I was on a university ministry staff were often about the pieces of my life that were heavy to carry. This year, my posts have almost exclusively focused on the theme and practice of lament. The quote above, which I stole from someone I’m lucky to know, I think sums up why I’m drawn into this good and dark work.

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Far too often we (the Church, America, etc.) run so quickly to grab a cure that we miss out on the power of speaking truth into the hurt. We launch into the guiding, not so much to be guided, but to escape the vulnerability of struggle. It’s an understandable urge, made even more understandable in the middle of a global pandemic. What would you give to have a cure for COVID? To never wear a mask in public again? To never argue on Facebook with someone about masks? To live life as we did in July of 2019?

Yet, we also know from our relationships how powerful it is to speak our pain, and how deeply hurtful it can be to be denied the opportunity. Think about a time when you vented to someone, maybe a partner or a parent, a friend or a teacher, and they immediately jumped into problem-solving mode. In some instances, when we’ve been reaching out for help and for resources and have constantly been denied, this is the perfect response. Often though, it is during our first time speaking the pain that we’re met with help when all we really wanted was validation that our pain existed. That it breathed deep in our lungs and sat in the inmost part of ourselves. That it demanded to be brought to the surface. More than we want to be cured, I think we mostly just want to be seen.

When I feel overwhelmed with the depths of our world’s current suffering, I drive or I write. On one such drive, I found myself contemplating the familiar songs on my lament playlist. The song Worn by Tenth Avenue North came on and I suddenly found myself screaming the lyrics underneath Mike’s voice.

Let me see redemption win. Let me see it, God.

Let me know in my bones that the struggle ends.

Let me know a world as frail and torn as this one can be mended.

I found myself shaking a fist at God and challenging Them to do something if They were going to do something. End the world. Rip us off the face of it. Or get down here and start sewing up at least one or two of this gaping holes. I desperately want a cure.

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I came home and starting writing a letter to my soul, which turned into the poem I linked above and here. What I realized towards the end of it was that, as upset as I was about all of the problems we’re facing in the world right now, I’m more upset at the lack of acknowledgement, at the active refusal of suffering. I want a cure, I want it for myself and for the people I love, but before I want a cure, I want to be acknowledged as someone who is sick. I don’t want to be told that I am well when I am not. When I came across that quote from my friend, I swallowed it.

“I don’t want to be guided into anything; I just wanted to tell someone that I was struggling.”

There is so much beauty and power in lamenting, in declaring to yourself and another human that pain is real and difficult to live with.

When you search Google that you’re struggling with your faith, a whole list of articles and blogs come up with easy advice: ask God for guidance, pray, seek encouragement, discern what lesson God may be teaching you. But what might God be teaching us about the world that we’ve made in our suffering? And how can we start seeking guidance if we have no awareness of the problem?

If you’re the type of person who needs permission to feel, I’m giving it. Feeling sick is part of how you get better. There is, after all, no cure for wellness. Lament is so holy they wrote a few books on it. The Christ literally sat in a garden and just cried for a while. You’re doing a good work if you’re lamenting.

And if you’re not lamenting, maybe it’s time you started learning why we should. Over the next few weeks, we’ll explore why people hate us, and why this hatred is reaping what we’ve sown.

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