Because They Love

 

Sunday.

The 5th grade girls have written "Nepal" on one side of their rocks, uncharacteristically quiet as they draw on the other side. This morning, the silent scrape of marker on stone is the rhythm of our prayer. Safety. Courage. Comfort. Healing. I don't know what their hearts are lifting up before the one who hears, but I know that they are heard.

Rocks go into pockets. Markers back into the bag. And, they request to play, "that one game." Our mutant version of Shipwreck that has them running up and down the hill, calling out the names of spiritual gifts and scrambling to complete the proper actions. Because, I have a thing about covering spiritual gifts with outgoing 5th graders.

Notebooking, treasure hunting in the storage room, telling stories, running up and down this hill.

Late spring comes, and we talk about Spiritual Gifts.

One of my 8th graders is down the hill and across the parking lot, running slow circles in the play area as he is chased by laughing tinies. The girls confuse him for one of the senior guys an older sister used to date, and, for a moment, we're talking about relationships and dating, and pet rocks and Nepal all at the same time, and then they remember that it's entirely possible that boys still have cooties, and we're back to getting ready to play our game.

They aren't giggly today. Thoughtful, perhaps. Too full of earthquakes and protests and grandma's with cancer. Joyful still. Looking to the end of the school year. Content in this community. Competitive, but with no bite behind the competition. There is something underneath. So, they smile, and they talk big and bright the way that Gryffindor classes do, but they don't giggle.

The 8th graders are full of endings, full of questions about dates and events and changes that are staring them straight in the face.

And, it's the sort of strange, irreverent, passing conversations about Jesus' humanity and language and wearing masks at church that only fourteen-year-old boys could get us into and out of in three sentences or less. The rambling 'problem solving that borders on gossip' of fourteen-year-old girls with a protective need to not leave messes for younger siblings to walk into at their respective schools.

There's hurt here. Raw and just under the surface. Present for a hundred different reasons. But, they are trying so hard.

And, I can't help but be proud of these rapidly growing humans. These ones who live out memories with their actions just as often as their words.

I'm back with them again in the evening to fill in for a missing leader, playing a game that is glowsticks and running and proof that teamwork is one of their more well developed instincts. Talking about anything and everything. Wandering through the grass. Climbing trees.

Watching as they watch these high schoolers who have come to visit, weigh options, listen for the truth behind words.

They clamber up into branches, high and close to the high school gathering, as if the perspective will grant understanding, the way that it used to, back when I would sneak their whisper quiet selves into the balcony to peer down on what the middle schoolers were doing, all fifth grade ninja skills and nervous energy.

They're more grown up than that tonight.

We post pictures afterwards, as if proving to ourselves things that are real, and they confidently declare that they are going to kick butt in high school.

And, they will.

If they stick together like this, these kids will be a force to be reckoned with. If they learn to work with the soon to be seniors, who are so much like them, I am fully confident that they could find the stubborn grit and courage to move mountains - even if they have to do it spoonful by tiny spoonful. They'll wrap a few more leaders around their finger on the way, and, they will move mountains.

Not because they are bigger, stronger, faster, smarter. But, because they are convinced of a Grace that covers. Because they have the eyes to see Beauty and Light and Joy in the midst of Pain. Because they climb trees and create and learn and listen when the universe plays her Creator's song.

These kids will kick butt because they Love.

Faithful

(different set of kids on a different night of the week)

"Line up in front of the teachers."

I barely have to give the instruction before little feet are scrambling into place, pushing, jostling, counting each other into equal-ish groups with all the authority of small dictators. It's Monday afternoon Bible club at one of the public elementary schools. We practice the verse over and over again. "He who called you is faithful; He will surely do it."

They fall backwards into our arms on the emphasized word, one after another, a giggling picture of a God who will aways catch them when they fall.
Faithful.
To the dark haired one who came with worried eyes today and leaves his small group to show me how he can rap the fast part of a song by L*crae, intentionally shutting out anything or anyone but this moment, right here, right now, pulling my attention until it is on him like a laser.
Faithful.
To his step brother whose 5th grade fingers will spend the lesson time twisting my hair into whatever shapes his imagination can come up with, over and over and over again, as if his mouth can only be silent when his hands are moving, when that touch is physically tethering him to this place.
Faithful.
To the second grader whose braids click together gently as she falls into the arms of the teacher next to me and the kindergartener who might stay awake and fidgeting with my watch or my bracelet or my wrist for the whole story or might pillow his head on his arms and fall fast asleep instead.
Faithful.

The littlest ones take a faltering step backwards when their brain begins to scream that they are falling, "Falling!"  wanting to trust, but not quite certain. And, I am reminded for the thousandth time how much this Jesus thing is all about relationship. Because, some of them fall without question.

The 5th graders who were once tiny 2nd graders, eating their lunch behind trash cans to avoid other people and circling up in the sunshine to beg bracelets and leather and string; 3rd graders with their playground drama and increasingly complex projects; 4th graders who would pull me into their classroom just to eat lunch and listen to their stories. They line up right in front of me and wait for their turn to fall back into waiting arms.

There is trust here. Long, slow, marked by a hundred outside hurts. But, trust.

Because, this is church.

This stretching out long so that there is space for three little bodies each side, tucked up close to the hip to ankle line of my blue jeans. Two or three behind me with whisper touches to my hands or my hair.

These too often hungry bellies that we fill with animal crackers and apple slices.

Music and trinkets to form memories. Tiny toys that are scooped back into their bag when we are waved over to the center of the room. Rhythm.

The liturgy of this thing.

Because, maybe pockets full of animal crackers and apple juice that crunches out between your teeth are communion. Community. God with us. Emmanuel. Resurrection in our blood stream, these words that cling like crumbs to their lips.

"Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do," they lisp it back to me around mouthfuls of crackers, last week's verse that they will into each other, as if this Christianity thing is no good if it doesn't make space for everyone, "do it all to the glory of God!"

We punch tickets and give hugs, and their heads already know these answers.

"Who will always, always catch you when you fall?"

Their hands shoot up into the air, even the dark haired one.
"God!"

Later, when I brush that hair out of just lighter eyes and tip up his chin to get a better look at the truth that hides there, he will tell me that he didn't hear much of the story, because he was distracted by worries from "real life." I won't ask for an explanation, and he won't offer one. But, he will melt a little just the same.

They will circle around before the official start of club for Heads Up on my phone or to sing along to Fix My Eyes in this tight clump of little bodies and voices, and, somehow, they will tell us that they know that God is here. Right here in the midst of our mess and our beauty and the moments where the adults manage to make the Divine sound much more boring than it ever ought to be.

The little first grader who wrinkled her nose last week at the allergen free cookies that were offered for snack will break into a smile at the pile of slender apple slices that they devour before club and the bag of C*rn Nuts that they bring home afterwards.

"I can eat those!" She curls in a little tighter and makes this space just a little more her own.

A kindergartener will cradle my compass in his hands, dutifully spending the story time staring down north, as if he can burn it into his memory for a day when he might ever forget.

They will fall into our arms. We'll catch them. Repeat truth. Live truth.

He who called you is faithful; He will surely do it.

God on the Road

(Friday game night)

Traditionally, the second Sunday after Easter is a day where the Divine breaks through into the mundane.

Eastern Orthodox readings focus on Thomas, Roman Catholic readings on conversations along the road, Protestant readings on the blinding of the apostle Paul and fish for breakfast by the sea shore. 

Emmaus. Damascus. 

Doubts soothed. Bellies filled. Eyes opened. Eyes closed. Pathways and water. Glory that comes unexpected. In the midst of life and travel and work. And, sometimes, right in the middle of our huddled fear.

"Courage, dear heart."

Lion's breath is warm in my ear, in the memory that is pure imagination. Because, there is sunshine here, climbing temperatures and summer kissed faces on desert kids who don't know how to do anything but soak up the light while it lasts. And, Glory comes unexpected.

"The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever."

And, I think that forever might be a little bit like this, a little bit like the thing that we call church. Surely we will run up and down hills, laughing and goofy as we learn about the gifts that we have been given. It might be a bit less slippery, because, maybe, in the New Earth, grass won't die over the winter. But, maybe it will, and we will still laugh anyways, because God is there, and even these strands leaching nutrients back into the soil can be bright in the light of glory.

Surely we will sit afterwards, with our bodies pleasantly tired, and share around whatever happens to come into our hands. Because, in a kingdom of plenty, why would we not?

Because, already, not yet, God is here.

God is in the little ones who watch carefully to ensure that I mark off each blonde head on the dog eared check in sheet. In the overtired attempts at a pout. In the worried watching and tracking and keeping the time. In the almost complaints before they realize that they have nothing to complain about.

God is here when they wrap Kenyan scarves around their shoulders and when they tell me about the bake sale they are planning to help an older sibling raise money for Haiti. When one who wasn't here pops in between services just because. When middle schoolers make their slow way from one end of the church to the other, God is here.

This is church. These are the called out ones.

This rainbow of 8th graders who seem to have collectively decided that this is the week to show the persistence of their courage. That this is a week for stories with endings. Because, in the irony of faith, endings help us to grasp the idea of an end that isn't. Eternity somehow makes sense against the temporal-ness of the mundane. Fish. Fire. Late night work. Early morning feast. Long walks and the screeching voices of kids who are staring high school straight in the face.

They have been called to a purpose and a passion that is greater than any of us. Greater than the watching of this careful dance that we do, words and actions that circle round and round until we finally intersect, find the places where, for a moment, everything is right. And, there are echoes of it in everything that we do. Stories are held, carefully, gently, as if the past were a living thing, a tiny heartbeat inside of our cupped hands. "I saw you," Grace whispers into the silent spaces between words, "I see you," "I remember who you are."

I remember that time that you...broke your collar bone just before the last event; crawled under the obstacle course to hide; ran wild playing tag; came as a 4th grader. I'll hold those stories for as long as you want, pass them back to you in the moments where you need a little extra courage. I know when you are here, and I miss you when you are not. Let me remind you. Remind you that you are known. You are seen. You are loved.

Eternally.

They are proud of themselves and full of energy and bright with sunlight, and I can't help but smile. Because sunshine around here is contagious.

It leads to high schoolers up trees and just inside the door, phone in one hand and chalk in the other as they carefully mark the wall in Circular Gallifreyan. Games go a little sideways and teenagers somersault across the grass. "My Redeemer lives," they sing the lyrics that are older than half of them, but, this week, we don't just sing. Instead, they link elbows, skip and twirl, hoe down to the chorus. And, it's chaotic and noisy and always just a little lopsided, off kilter. Our Redeemer lives. We are a people who believe in the impossibility that is Resurrection. Why shouldn't we dance?

Dance and laugh and talk about the tangled concepts of non-linear time as we try to wrap our minds around the sovereignty of God. Listen as they tell stories of the times that God stepped into their lives in the messy, everyday ways that the Divine often does. Washed passports. Injured shoulders. Changed schools.

It's the second Sunday after Easter. This is Christ broken into the mundane. This is Aslan on the move.

Resurrection

"He is risen."

"He is risen indeed."

"Why do we have to say that?"

Two hours in a row I hear the questioning response to this phrase that is so deeply engrained in our version of Christianity. Why do we have to say that? Why, on this day where we have given more press time to the cross than the resurrection, do we declare over and over again that He is risen indeed?

The first time, it is one of my fifth graders who asks her question of the air as we make our way into another song that they don't remember ever hearing before - quite possibly because they never have - and I answer with small group time spent hiding and searching for paper eggs with results of the resurrection scrawled across them in washable marker.

"Peace, hope, freedom, fellowship...[...]...equality??"

They stumble over the word, look at me funny when I pronounce it for them, wheels spinning as they try to come up with a definition for the word 'equal.'

"Half and half?"

"No..." The one who asked her question of the air shakes her head, fingering the edges of the Kenyan fabrics that we throw onto the ground for color and warmth.

"The same as!" A third girl sits up a little straighter against the pillow that she has claimed.

"Good. Look up Galatians 3:28 for me."

They flip through their Bibles a little haphazardly, this one starting in Genesis, that one starting in Psalms, but we get there quickly enough.

There is no longer Jew or gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.

After a little explanation they get it, but in the same disjointed way that one would understand Pluto's fluctuating planetary status. It's there, but it doesn't really mean anything.

"Why do we have to say that?"

The second time is one of the eighth graders sitting behind me as the response echoes out from the entire congregation. And, I have to admit that I was a little distracted by the red lights on the wall as we're singing about the blood. They might be flowers? Clouds? But, they look an awful lot like platelets.

Do fancy light show lights come preprogramed with an option for platelets, or is that something special that you download for Good Friday services and Easter morning?

His question, though, pulls me a little closer back to focus. Why the Resurrection? Why this day, when we mix up rabbits and crosses and graphics of clean, pale hands with a tidy mark no bigger than the head of a construction nail? If Jesus died for our sins on the cross, if it was finished, then why does Easter matter?

Why?

Because, holy cow, do we ever need the Resurrection.

When my twitter feed is littered with #reclaimholyweek at the same time that these ten-year-olds are first twisting their tongues around the word equality, I need to know that the Resurrection is real. I need to know that the humanity that was crucified on the cross did more than lie on the pavement while people took video to post on YouT*be in hopes of justice.

If my Jesus was lynched, crucified, killed by the state, killed by my hands, then I also need to know that He rose again, conquering sin and death and giving us victory as well. I need to know that we struggle against death, not because we fear it, but because it has already been defeated.

We need the Resurrection. I need the Resurrection. When throwing rocks escalates to a killing not too many miles from my current home. When 147 university students die just a few kilometers from a previous one and a nation spends Good Friday grieving. When the grave seems to be winning every time that we turn around, there is power in being a people who declare that the story isn't over yet.

Because, a story that ends today, tomorrow, fifty years from now, isn't one worth giving everything for. And, no, that isn't heresy, the apostle Paul said the same thing.

But, our God is big, bigger even than we have thought to imagine when we talk about the vastness of the universe or the wonder of a God who exists outside of time and space. Divinity did not allow humanity to be bested by the chaos of the universe. In the Resurrection, entropy runs backwards, time turns sideways, and we are reminded of the More that is already and still to come.

The question isn't, "Why do we have to say that?" but, "Why don't we say that every day?"

He is risen.

He is risen indeed.