& my kingdom has fallen

i can't take it anymore

I don’t know about you, but Spring can’t come soon enough; it’s been a long winter…

Being stuck under piles of snow, as the bad news kept tumbling in has started to get the better of me. 

The week I was glad the gray days only brought rain and not that “S-word.” At the risk of sounding ungrateful, though, I would have preferred some sunny days. I’m ready for a break from all this…

That’s why when the news about the Fort Hood shooting came on yet another wet, drab day; I began worry that perhaps the final straw that would break the camel’s back had been dropped on the pile…

There still aren’t many details, it seems the poor soul who took those innocent lives and finally his own, was wounded in his own right. Apparently he had been seeking treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder.

Regardless of what other details will emerge, though, all it took was one split second and Ivan’s life was forever changed. And only moments after that, in only one more second and his life was extinguished, too… 

That’s the horror of life, isn’t it?

In one weak moment, with only one quick action; this man’s life forever changed.

All it takes is one second of losing sight of who we are; and BANG.

Without making light of this tragedy, I believe it’s fair to say that we can all, in our own ways, relate. That’s why we worry about our kids and grandchildren the way we do - knowing this life is far too unforgiving… 

And although we hate to admit it, we know these threats to our life don’t only come from within. It isn’t only our own bad decisions that can throw our lives in the lurch. That’s why we worry about our savings accounts and insurance policies the way we do - knowing that fate is far too undiscerning to count on.

That’s the tragedy of it all, isn’t it?

That’s why its so easy to lose sight of everything that matters & find ourselves prey to a weak moment…
After all, you could be crossing the street to go to church, only to get mowed over by a careless driver…

We all know how easy it is to make one poor decision and spend the rest of our lives paying the consequences. 

And we all know it only takes being at the wrong place at the wrong time, for a life to be forever shattered or taken. 

For better or worse, we all know how precariously the lives we’ve put together manage to stay in one piece and standing upright. 

If we even have a clue of what our life even is; because for the worse of the better, we spend very little time cultivating our sense of self; instead we spend our time and energy just trying to survive the day.

Truthfully, it does take most of our strength just to make it through the day, though; because, for the worse of the better, we know that this life is no sentimental thing. All it takes is a single careless stroke of fate and we’ll be watching that life we’ve spent so much time and money cultivating, shatter in the wreckage of an accident or diagnosis…

We’ve each seen for ourselves how just one bad decision, just one diagnosis, or just one second too many or few is all it takes to shatter a life forever…

That’s the problem of this life.

We give everything we have to just get through the day, and if we can manage anything more, we do our best to carve our a life as good and honest people. (It is’t too much to ask)

But fate doesn’t give a rip for our efforts;

something happens in a single instant, and everything we’ve managed to build is destroyed.

All our work turns out to have been comically vulnerable to even begin protecting us from that one bad decision, that one diagnosis, that one out of control car…

When we all find ourselves on the wrong side of whatever life has thrown our way, we find ourselves further back than when we started, bending over all those shards of our old life wondering;

“what now,” “what’s left;” finally worrying “who am I now, do I even have a life anymore.”

More than likely, that is probably why poor Ivan finally turned his weapon upon himself; because when we’re all forced to look at the wreckage of our life, the first thought is always, there’s no life left worth living anymore…

That is probably the predominant predicament of our lives; our identity, the life we’ve put together, are constantly under assault.

These assaults constantly threaten to rob us of what we’ve worked so hard to build; they threaten to rob us of what’s closest to us; who we are…

That, really, is the hardest part of our lives;

it isn’t the long hours, it isn’t the difficult child, it isn’t the impossible demands;

it’s the fact, the fact, that just one instance, just one decision can hurl our lives into the waste-bin far too easily…

In the face of life’s catastrophes, we’re all tragically inept to keep the wolves at bay… 

As we come here yet again, with the wolves howling, we hear the words of St. Paul standing on the other side shouting, “to set the mind on flesh is death.”

Yeah, as if we need reminding…

But Paul goes on, incessantly shouting something more, “but you, you are NOT in the flesh. YOU are in the Spirit.”

Paul insists that those of us who find ourselves here, seeking sanctuary from fate; are in the Spirit. 

And not just any old spirit either, sisters and brothers; but The Spirit; The Spirit who raised Christ. The Spirit who calls into existence the things that do not exists, and gives life to the dead.

That Spirit; The Spirit…

In other words, Paul is standing on the other side of a broken life, proclaiming something.

Because Paul has known a thing or two about a shattered life, you know…

Paul had it pretty good, a high ranking job, persecuting pitiful Christians; probably even catching the attention of his bosses by his zeal.

Until one day, out of nowhere, this Christ he was chasing, turned up in the middle of the road. In one incredible collision, Paul found himself blind.

His life as destroyed as his eyesight. 

Persecutor of the Christians?!? Heck, he probably had become one!

That wasn’t all, though.

After Paul managed to put back together some semblance of a life; becoming a preacher of Christ; Paul would still find himself on the wrong end of life’s wreckage: beatings, imprisonment, called an impostor and the like.

Here’s the thing, though;

and it’s why Paul couldn’t keep quiet, couldn’t give up, why his voice still echoes today, even managing to rise above the howling of the wolves of fate;

Paul has come to experience that those lives we spend so much time and money building, are little more than dung! (I’m being polite, Paul wasn’t)

Because the terrible truth we all pretend not to know, is that life is tragically caught under the power of Sin and Death; that’s why all it takes is one decision, one second too many or few, to destroy so much…

See, Paul has come to know for himself that the best life we can put together under the circumstances of Sin and Death won’t, heck it can’t, save us… 

So what are those lives worth?

Paul says flush them down the toilette. Flush ‘em, don’t set your mind on the flesh because this Christ, whose Spirit dwells in you, has gone to the depths, to the worst Sin and Death could do (for you).

Christ hung naked on that cross, his life and identity stripped away with what little clothing he had in the first place;

he died God-forsaken.

This Christ, whose Spirit is in you, life wasn’t shattered to pieces, so much as it was smashed to smithereens.

He finally faced the ultimate destruction of life, as God’s voice was quiet when he breathed his last. 

That, finally, is why we try to build impenetrable lives, because when we take an unflinching look at this life, we know that when life has thrown its very worst at us, we’ll all fall, alone. That we will have to suffer the same fate as Jesus…

And right there; in the ultimate place where we all must finally give up hope,  in that place we must finally admit that these lives we’ve put together can’t give us shelter from all life will throw at us; right there, God said something; 

God said, “Rise.”

& rise Christ, whose Spirit is in you, rise he did…

From there, on the wrong side of forever - the wrong side of too late; God did what all of our efforts finally can’t;

God created life.

That’s what Paul is proclaiming to us today. 

Paul too had found himself on the other side of too late, only to see, blind as he was, that he wasn’t alone. There, on the other side of forever, Paul found the one he’d been persecuting, bent over giving Paul his life life.

There, sightless and identity-less, Christ gave Paul a life that was iron-clad; an identity that couldn’t be destroyed by the bad decision, the diagnosis, the recklessness of chance…

Paul has come to find that we already have the identity we need; it’s what Paul’s been insisting all along!

That’s why Paul can’t stop after he insists that to set the mind on flesh is death; don’t set your mind on those lives we try to assemble, because we, because you are not in the flesh - you’re in The Spirit.

The Spirit that raised Christ from the dead. 

When you find yourselves wondering what we always do after life’s calamities, do I even have a life worth living, that Spirit will raise you too.

That, that sisters and brothers, is where your true identity comes from, your true life that no one, that nothing can take away. 

Amen