Jack Hardaway
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Nothing really lasts does it? Everything is temporary.
There are deep still places in our lives where we can anchor for a while, people and places of stability, a constant. When these end, the grief knocks us down, we lose our balance.
Swing low sweet Chariot gather us together again.
Hope and strength visit us, the horses and chariot of God, when we are tattered.
Some people treat faith like an escape from the world, salvation becomes a way to avoid the mess and pain of life.
That is the great heresy.
The heresies of hate and purity are an ancient and false faith that we so often fall for when life is too complicated, too painful, too inconvenient.
That urge to distance, to divide, to scorn, to mock, to hate comes from that toxic religion of forsaking the world.
The faith of ancient Israel, the faith of Jesus, and the faith of the body of Christ, the Church, is a faith that is different, it lives in the world, redeeming, healing, restoring.
That is why Christians have always fed the hungry, and built schools, and hospitals, planted gardens and cared for the land, engineering clean water and air. The world is being redeemed not abandoned.
The Horses and Chariots of God come to us, taking us home, not to escape but to serve.
It’s like when Elijah and Elisha go on their last walk, and Elijah is taken up in the great fiery chariot and whirlwind.
Elisha reaches up to the sky yelling out, “Father, Father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” until he can no longer see him. “Father, Father!”
He tears his clothes in grief. He picks up Elijah’s mantel and asks, “Where is God?”
He then strikes the Jordan River. The waters part.
He has his answer.
Elijah has ascended. And the work of God continues, Elisha is tattered, grieving, and full of the Spirit.
Where is God indeed.
Not in escaping the pain and confusion.
God is found in the wounded places, with the power of love, overflowing with the Spirit of God.
Where is God indeed.
Swing low sweet chariot, with hope and strength, the horses and chariots of God.
The times of falling apart and being off balance. They are holy, they are full of God, bringing the fire and whirlwind of God into our lives.
It is like we are cracked open and God can finally enter in.
It changes how we see the world.
It changes how we live.
It changes how we keep faith.
It changes how we sing.
Hand to the plow, don’t look back.
Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem, he has turned his face toward the cross.
No turning back, no more waiting, he is on the way.
No more delays.
The train is pulling out. Climb on. Now. Later is too late.
Facing the pain in the world is a matter of urgency, not convenience.
The cross is not an escape. The cross is the whirlwind and flame of God entering the world, not abandoning, not forsaking, not escaping, rather God embracing and restoring.
Elijah leaves Elisha full of the strength and hope of the Horses and Chariots of God, to keep doing the work.
Jesus’ cross, resurrection and ascension leaves us that same fire and whirlwind to keep doing the work of redeeming this day, this moment, right now.
The gospel is that God is embracing the world in Jesus.
Swing low sweet Chariot.
Grieving leaves us tattered and full of the Spirit.
Grief changes us. It leaves us with the power to part the waters that separate us.
Swing low sweet Chariot.
Come forth.
Carry us home.