Conversation Point

The Most Important Step

It has been a very long week.

The victims of Monday's shooting rampage at Virginia Tech are on their way home. Their parents, families, friends and colleagues have grieved with dignity before us and now are due their privacy to continue that journey.

For myself, I have stopped watching the news and reading the articles about that day. I am numb with the retelling, but also the senselessness of questions that appear to inspire insight, but instead are aimed directly at our fears and our need to rest blame. Did the president of Virginia Tech act in time? Should the Blacksburg police have sealed the campus into lock down? Why was there no system in place to deal with such a potential situation? Should the shooter's now obvious problems have been dealt with differently when they arose? Sometimes we simply need to stand in the pain and confusion, the unknowingness of what is before we can begin to understand what the next best step will be.

Through the din of voices discussing this horrific event, a little bit of hopeful sense has gleamed, a light in a dark tunnel. A young man whose sister died at Columbine High School eight years ago has spoken eloquently about carrying his sister's legacy of love and compassion to schools all across our country. His belief is that had he not been able to forgive his sister's killers his own anger and grief would have consumed him, perhaps pushing him to kill someone else. Focussing on those who lost their lives, not what the shooter did to cut those lives short, is something he also stressed. Who they were still matters very much. His work has prevented numerous acts of violence that would have otherwise only come to light after the fact on the evening news.

Another young man, Garret Evans, was in Jamie Bishop's Intro to German class on Monday when the gunman entered the room. Evans was shot in the leg and is thankful that three of his classmates held the door against the gunman's attempt to reenter the room. While discussing his experience with Harry Smith of the CBS Morning Show, Evans said he didn't blame his attacker. He wished he had met him before this happened so that he could have reached out to him in some way. Smith asked, "Do you know how crazy that sounds?" Evans replied that he did, but he had forgiven the shooter because the most important step is to forgive.

We have a hard time with forgiveness, whether it comes to call between friends in the middle of a heated disagreement or a situation as grave as Virginia Tech. We see it as giving in, giving something undeserved, and giving up our own power to continue the grievance. Often, people will say they forgive, but will not forget. A devotional I receive from a United Church of Christ radio ministry pointed out that a lot of people think this is a Biblical tenet. But no, it is not. The only thing the Bible says about forgiveness is that when we forgive God forgives us.

The Amish of Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania, testified to this most basic portion of our Christian theology when their children were gunned down last year. I remember a newscast from those sad days as well, sharing the profound moment of a man called out of his fields to tell the world that, "We believe we must forgive or Jesus won't forgive us." That night, a group of people from this deeply wounded community went to the family of the man responsible for their grief to offer their forgiveness and embrace them as among their own.

When we forgive we are forgiven and we can heal. Then we can go on to live and grow and change the world for the better. Forgiveness takes courage, wisdom and strength. But it also demands letting go of destructive, limiting, paralyzing fear. Forgiveness is necessary at the most inconvenient times, and required when it destroys us not to. When we forgive we are assured that we are forgiven. It is another moment to remember that forgiveness is the most important step. Forgiveness is everything.

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 8:19 PM 1 comments

They Who Now Mourn

The Virginia Tech web site simply states: "Two shootings on campus today have left 33 dead. Thirty-one, including the gunman, died at Norris Hall; two died at West Amber Johnston Hall."

Where to begin? With prayer, I think.

Prayer for families who are about to hear or have already heard that their child died this morning at the hands of an unknown gunman. Prayer for the wounded and their families. Prayer for the people who witnessed these attacks and came out alive. Prayer for the faculty and staff and students who will be back on this campus in the days to come. Prayer for the medical teams who cared for those who lived and attended to those who died. Prayer for law enforcement authorities who will be investigating and sorting through the pieces of information to understand the whole of it, what happened and why.

Prayer is where we must start because it is too soon for anything other than making our way to the love of God from which nothing can separate us. We must pray for those touched by this tragedy because they may not be able to pray for themselves. This is our time to carry their burden of sorrow and grief until they can carry it for themselves.

Tonight we pray and tomorrow the Virginia Tech community will gather to begin the process of healing. The university's president, Charles Steger, has said this is what must come first so that they can decide what must come next. We will be with them in prayer through whatever comes next.

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 9:14 PM 0 comments

Public Stoning

Don Imus may or may not have a job by the time you read this. While still clinging to his long-running morning radio show, albeit on a two week suspension, his MSNBC simulcast program is gone, along with most of his reputation. You probably already know why, but in case you don't, Mr. Imus directed a comb platter of racial and misogynistic slurs against a Rutgers University women's sports team last week. More than one public personality has called for retribution. Firing is almost too good in their eyes. There seems to be a theme requiring his suffering and humiliation in equal or greater measure to what he inflicted on the women who were his targets. What he said was wrong and he has made other comments in his years on the air that were also wrong. Up until this point he has been tolerated by some, enjoyed and encouraged by others. Clearly, times have changed.

Interesting that times have always been changing. "They went each to his own house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple; all the people came to him and he sat down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, 'Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?' This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, 'Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.' And once more he bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the eldest. Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus looked up and said to her, 'Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?' She said, 'No one, Lord,' And Jesus said, 'Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again (John 8:1-11)."

We do like a good public stoning, don't we? Imus' behavior makes us feel superior because we would never be so stupid and hurtful. We can add Isaiah Washington, Mel Gibson and Michael Richards to that list too. They made equally questionable choices in their behavior and have suffered the consequences. We do like a good public stoning. We like complaining about people, judging behavior, language, parenting styles, clothing selections and assorted attitudes so very different than our own. But in the end, they are not so very different than our own.

Two thoughts occurred to me in watching the Imus situation unfold that Jesus also dealt with at the temple that day. The first is how willing we are to call for swift, exacting punishment when someone's behavior morally offends us. The second is that if we were held up to the same scrutiny we would have few choices but to turn and walk away, hopefully with enough time and awareness to hear Jesus' final words of grace.

Think how far that simple understanding would carry us if only we chose to hear and believe it. We are not condemned. We are directed to continue on, unified with God and God's purpose. Choose not to sin. Instead, choose God's mercy and grace. We can receive these gifts from God for ourselves, and then continue God's purpose by extending these same gifts to each person we meet who is in need of them. And really, who wouldn't welcome grace and mercy into their lives if given the chance?

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 6:29 PM 0 comments

Easter Morning

The Passover travelers to Jerusalem were starting to pack up to go home. The crowds from the last week had already thinned significantly, enough to make the tragic events of the last few days seem distant. Sunday morning had dawned as usual. More people and animals on the streets as those leaving town got an early start, but not like last Sunday. Was it only a week since Jesus had entered Jerusalem, greeted by people praising his name as the next King of Israel? It was only a week, but also a lifetime ago. Jesus was dead, his body still waiting for a proper preparation before final burial. The disciples were still in hiding and Jesus' many followers had carried their fear and grief to the privacy of their homes.

Although Jesus' preaching, teaching and healing had inspired hope and new faith in so many, he would now become a part of the oral tradition that held his cousin, John the Baptist, and other Jewish leaders who had served their God and died in the process. Life would go back to the way it had been before Jesus became known as a public figure. He wasn't the Messiah they had hoped for, but he had kept their hope for that Messiah to come alive for a few years. Whatever happened next, at least they had that, that and the hope that God hadn't forsaken them and would still be with them while they waited. The quiet sadness was palpable and the steady stream of people leaving Jerusalem that day seemed to carry with them what little energy and life the city had left in it to keep believing and keep going.

But, daily life is what gives us the structure and support to get up, face each day and keep going, especially when we are grieving. The women who had been a part of Jesus' life knew that better than most. It was they who would now gather at the tomb where Jesus had temporarily been laid after his death late Friday afternoon to prepare his body for permanent burial. With so little time before the beginning of the Sabbath at sundown, this had bee the only choice. Perhaps it had been a good choice for them as well. The horror of Jesus' death was overwhelming. A few days of distance might make their task a little easier. Regardless, the time had come to honor Jesus and what he had meant to them in the only way left to them.

"When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary, the mother of James, and Salome, bought spices so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, 'Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?'

When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. But he said to them, 'Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go tell the disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you (Mark 16:1-8)."

It was a new day in a new world of possibilities. God had not forgotten them.

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 10:20 AM 0 comments

Good Friday in Jerusalem

Do you remember waking up one day in June 1968 to the news that Robert Kennedy had been shot and was near death? Having just finished a triumphant speech to support his run for the United States presidency, Kennedy embodied the hope the country craved after years of escalating military involvement in Vietnam, the assassination in April of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the shadow of his brother's violent death only a few years before that. The news from California didn't reach the Midwest until that morning because the last speech of Robert Kennedy ran late into the evening on the West Coast, and we had all assumed that the worst was over and the best was yet to be. The cheering crowds anticipating Kennedy's speech were the last television image most of us remember from that night. While his brother, John, had led the country through the Cuban Missile Crisis and set the vision for the moon landing that would come the next year, Bobby represented a far greater hope: equality and justice for all. Lyndon Johnson had signed the Civil Rights Act into law and the presidency Bobby Kennedy envisioned included making this law a part of the fabric of American life.

Robert Kennedy died later that day. His passing was one more blow to the country that felt like the death of hope itself.

The grief of that June morning is as close as I can come to grasping what Good Friday in Jerusalem felt like to Jesus' disciples and followers. Having welcomed Jesus back to Jerusalem with joy and excitement only days earlier, the city now faced a very different rendering of Jesus as a public figure. While the most holy of Jewish holidays was celebrated around the Seder table the night before, Jesus had been arrested and would be executed that afternoon. How did the City of Jerusalem hear the news? Word of mouth would carry the news quickly, particularly among travelers who may have sensed the tension between the Romans and the Temple priests over Jesus' influence among the crowds. Matching history's lessons to the powerful impact of Jesus' message meant it wasn't a complete surprise that this latest preacher's life would end violently at the hands of Rome.

But as families awoke that day, having just remembered in the Passover how their ancestors had been brought out of Egypt, many of them could not have helped but hoped that Jesus might be the Messiah, and that hope of a new Jewish redemption may be near. Gathered with family and friends, celebrating the Passover in a place and time of such great hope for the future was an incredible gift. But soon the news of what had happened the night before would travel from house to house, family to family and heart to heart. In this time of chaos and confusion people also had to be asking themselves and each other what had gone so wrong so quickly.

The morning presented the stark reality of how Jesus had spent his Passover. The people of Jerusalem poured into the streets as they heard the news about Jesus and were confronted by Jesus himself, clearly having been beaten and tortured, dragging a heavy timber across his shoulders as his Roman captors taunted him with verbal abuse, sarcastically calling him "The King of the Jews." His disciples were no where around. The crowds filing the streets weren't waving palm branches and shouting hosannahs anymore. They were joining in with the Romans, yelling and screaming at Jesus, spitting on him and kicking him when he collapsed under the weight of the timber. The crowds knew he was carrying the beam onto which he would be nailed as soon as he reached the crucifixion site outside of the city. Whoever did care didn't speak up too loudly.

Walking this day out, step by step, cannot have been anything less than a horror show in slow motion. We frequently complain about the world moving too fast today, wishing it would slow down to a more manageable speed. Perhaps some days this speed could be a blessing, the days we want to forget and not ever relive in the gruesome detail that still takes us apart from the inside out. How did these people who had known and loved Jesus, having hoped against hope in his message, decide how much they could bear that day? Would they run away at seeing Jesus struggle on the street? Would they follow, staying at a distance in case the Romans were looking for more people to execute? Would they turn back to the safety of their homes and families until Sabbath worship that evening? Could they draw on their courage to go to the cross on the hill and let Jesus see them there so he knew he was still loved? What would Sabbath be like that night? How could they worship God, wondering if their Messiah had just been murdered before their eyes?

How does anyone keep living when they believe that hope has died, and the future has died with it?

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 6:31 PM 0 comments

Wednesday Evening

Scripture tells us that Jesus and his disciples worked in and around Jerusalem from Palm Sunday through the early part of that week.

Much of their work remained as it had been for all the years they had shared their journey. Preaching, teaching and healing those who came to hear Jesus, to experience his authority and power, filled their days and continued on into their nights. Perhaps there was a greater sense of urgency on Jesus' part. But between the increased numbers of people in town for the Passover and the tensions brewing among the Temple authorities which added to their own ever-present exhaustion, the disciples could easily have brushed aside any concerns they had that something felt different, not quite right, even ominous. Jesus' messages focused on servanthood, the kingdom of God and watching for the trials and tribulations to come, all of which were well-received, Chief Priests and Pharisees excepted, of course. Jerusalem was their territory. Confrontations between them and Jesus were inevitable and had been expected. Having faced violence here before it had been a risk to come at all. But Jesus had insisted, here they were and any potential threats seemed to be at bay. It was unlikely any troubles would erupt with so many followers of Jesus close at hand.

Then something unexpected happened.

Unlike so many times before, as the daylight neared its end, Jesus rounded up the disciples and led them to Bethany, just outside the city, to rest privately for the evening. No crowds, no fitting themselves into a gathering of strangers filled with tax collectors, laborers, shepherds and tradespeople, sitting around a table eager for refreshment, both physical and spiritual, after another long, grueling day of life. They would have time together to eat, rest and pray with Jesus by themselves. None of them could remember the last time this had happened. It felt good to be away from all the noise and excitement, all the people jammed into the narrow streets of the city. Many of the twelve had families with whom they would not be spending this sacred time. To be able to pull back from their work, if only for an evening, was a luxury they didn't think they would be afforded, especially tonight. They would savor it, cherish it, for a long time. Who knew when they would have this chance again?

As Jesus and his disciples walked along, several of the twelve began to feel the shift. They glanced back at Jerusalem, then looked to Jesus, and a new awareness took hold of them. But only for a moment. In an instant, it was gone. Jerusalem was loud and bustling and Jesus was simply as worn out as they themselves were.

Tomorrow evening the Passover would begin. Who knew what miracles Jesus would perform? Perhaps this would be the night Jesus claimed his full power. Maybe they would witness the Messiah of God coming into his glory and see God's kingdom established on earth before their very eyes. What would that be like? What would the Chief Priests and Pharisees say to that? What would Rome do in the face of God's almighty reign? Time would tell.

But for tonight, they would rest.

posted by Cory L. Kemp @ 10:12 PM 0 comments