Sometimes the darkest events are an opportunity for people to shine. Before the mass murder of Muslim worshippers in Christchurch on 15 March I would not have been able to tell you the name of the Prime Minister of New Zealand. With all due respect I think for many people she may have been close to a Pointless Answer. That is certainly not the case now. In the aftermath of the horror she emerged as the embodiment of the shock, the anger and the compassion of her nation, providing a rallying point for every positive quality that sought to lead to healing. Her words were measured but heart-felt and carried the confidence that her people could move on from that moment and rebuild.
What she said at the National Remembrance Service was particularly memorable:
‘We each hold the power, in our words and in our actions, in our daily acts of kindness. We are not immune to the viruses of hate, of fear, of other. We never have been. But we can be the nation that discovers the cure.’
What interests me is where we can find ‘the cure.‘ In an interview published in the Guardian last Saturday she was asked what she would like to see other nations draw from New Zealand’s experiences. She replied: ‘Humanity. That’s it. Simple.‘ It would have been good to hear her expanding on this because I am assuming that this is where she sees ‘the cure’, in ‘humanity’, that we realise our common humanity and learn to care and wish only the best for one another. Those impulses are certainly alive across all nationalities and ethnicities and their freer flow would result in a more just and peaceful world. The problem is that ‘humanity’ is equally capable of the darker impulses that bring destruction and death into our experience. The man who murdered fifty people in Christchurch is a human being, part of the human family, and yet chose a path that drew millions men and women into their worst of times.
My point is that we cannot make ‘humanity’ our final appeal as we seek to build a better world. We are too complex, too prone to choose the wrong path, too easily seduced by what will satisfy our own needs rather than those of others. The Biblical analysis of humanity is of a ‘fallen‘ community in need of restoration. We can go so far along this road with projects and programs for improvement but inevitably we will be faced with circumstances and events that scream that ‘the cure’ is beyond us. Something needs to happen to us that will deal with the core problem of humanity which the Bible calls sin, our tendency to turn our backs on God.
Jesus spoke about the the need for men and women to be ‘born again‘. (John 3: 3) I know that the idea of being ‘born again’ has become overlaid with a certain kind of evangelicalism which demands a particular kind of conversion experience in the life of a believer. The original Greek of the New Testament, however, can be translated as ‘born from above.‘ If we are to be part of God’s great project to renew creation, to build His Kingdom, to push back the darkness in the world, then something radical needs to happen in the depths of our being. We need to recognise our own limitations and turn decisively towards God for our values, for our motivation, for our salvation. We need to look ‘above’. Of course the Church has often failed in this and in truth has sometimes contributed to the darkness but the great purpose still stands and the call to step into that purpose is as urgent as ever.
Just this morning I read in Psalm 105 verse 4:
‘Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always.’
Simple words but they contain ‘the cure’. The need of the hour is for a growing people who are oriented ‘above’, who keep company with God through prayer and meditation on His Word, who will face their own personal failure and trust in His forgiveness, who are open to His values even when they conflict with those of the world, who find in Him the strength and conviction to work out those values in the world as it is.
One of Jesus’ healing miracles struck me with new force this morning. I have always felt that these stories are there not just to show us that Jesus had power of heal but also to teach us something about life in the Kingdom. This man was deaf and mute. Jesus touched the man’s ears and tongue, looked up to heaven and with a sigh that came from the depths said: ‘Ephphatha!’ which means ‘Be opened!‘ Mark says: ‘At this the man’s ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.‘ And those who witnessed were ‘overwhelmed with amazement’. (Mark 7: 31-37)
Something happened ‘from above’ that we all need. Ears opened to hear the Truth, tongue loosened to share what we know to be true, faith to believe in the impact a life lived in the Spirit can bring to a community. Henri Nouwen once wrote:
‘Truly ‘born again’ people always desire to be renewed continually precisely because the Sprit keeps on revealing, in and around them, places of darkness that have not yet been transformed by the light. For as long as we live, we need to be reborn and deepen our spiritual understanding , as we walk together in the light.’
