WHEN BAD NEWS IS GOOD NEWS.
’We played the pipe for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’ Matthew 11: 17.
Gladness and sadness typified the life of Jesus. His opponents called him a winebibber and a glutton. They saw him smack his lips when the wine was to his liking, when the food was just cooked to perfection, when jokes were told, and his laughter filled the room.
Jesus’ words were implemented in his life. His sense of humor, his feelings of compassion was almost an embarrassment to his disciples, but not to the women always in his company who saw in him the real human he was. So, it was no wonder that, in John 10: 10, Jesus urged us to live life to the full: dance when the occasion called for joy and exuberance, and mourn when circumstances required genuine sorrow, when matters go bad, when things go down, when life falls apart and sickness and death overwhelm people’s emotions.
Jesus’ life is a good example for us: When Jesus wandered in the outdoors, he marveled at beauty of creation, and exclaimed: “Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.” Luke 12: 27. Yet, when his friend Lazarus, Mary and Martha’s brother, died, Jesus wept, even though he knew that in the next instance He would call him back to LIFE. I think, ‘Jesus wept’ because he was confronted with ‘death’, the end of things, something abnormal in His state of being in the Kingdom.
When my mother read this Lazarus story to me as a 4-5 years old, in my innocence and frankness – brainwashed with heaven – I asked my mother, “If life in heaven is so wonderful, why would Jesus deprive him of that pleasure?” I then was thoroughly indoctrinated about the beauty of heaven, with songs such as “In the Hemel is het schoon” (In Heaven everything is just perfect), and “Sluit u aan wie mee wil naar de hemel gaan” (Get in line and follow the ‘to heaven’ sign).
My mother had no answer there, but when she was on her death-bed, she asked me “What will happen when I die?” She wasn’t so sure anymore. What was my answer? Then, at her very end of life, it was no time to explain to her about the New Heavens and the New Earth, so I simply said, “You will be with Jesus.”
CHANGE ABOUNDS
We live in times of immense change, opportunity and finality, a time where we are tested as never before in history, as ‘endings’ are everywhere, endings that call for new beginnings, endings that should make us reflect on what comes next in human history. There is, in the ‘world out there’, increasing agreement that matters cannot go on for much longer anymore, that THE END is near. Yet, just as in Noah’s days, when he and his family were building the ARK, Noah’s actions were ridiculed and declared pure lunacy, so too today, we ignore Climate Change, are blind to the rapid extinction of species, bypass the godlessness of people in power – think Trump and Putin and Netanyahu – are willing participants in our insatiable thirst for earth-destroying fuels. We rather not look at John 3: 16: “God so loved the world he entrusted to us for whose restoration he sacrificed his beloved Son”. It is well worth mentioning that in Matthew 24: 36, the ‘sinners’ were taken away by the Flood, while the believers remained on earth: please note this, you Rapture adherents!
Love LIFE.
If we really loved LIFE – as Jesus did – we should go in mourning and dressed in ashes, and sing death dirges, because, through our way of life we have sealed the doom of God’s beloved world. Jesus once cleaned out the temple, trying to eradicate ‘Commercialism’ there, without success. Our feeble actions to stem the planet’s perdition, now too have become impossible, as, from the beginning, at the very root of society, we went wrong, and ignored the basic ‘holiness’ of creation: God’s gift to us.
Now, for a short time still, the TRINITY OF EVIL, consisting of Putin, Netanyahu and Trump, is calling the shots. All in God’s plan to speed up his reign of everlasting PEACE, the Shalom that has been prepared for us from the beginning.
This bad news really is the good news. Even though the LIE is fast, in race with TRUTH it comes in last. Remember 2 Peter 3: 10:
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare, heralding the onset of the RENEWED COSMOS.