Dear St. John's Community,
Here is a word from the Rev. Will Morris, our assisting priest for engaging faith and the workplace:
Reflection on Darkness
I remember less than two weeks after the Indian Ocean Tsunami of December 2004, just as the true extent of the death toll – more than 225,000 people – was becoming clear, I had to preach at an evening Epiphany service in London. Of all the verses in all the readings, the only one that seemed to ring true to me was Isaiah 60:2 –
For darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples.
In that moment, even though so far away, the indiscriminate, random, devastating effects of that disaster shook my faith in a loving God. Darkness seemed to have covered the earth.
Today covid-19, the coronavirus, may be doing the same for some of you. While many seem to be keeping their spirits up, even with physical distancing, and looking to when this is all over, that isn’t true for everyone.
Some of you worry about the disease itself, either for yourself or others. Others worry about the economic impacts of closing down the entire economy – on young people, on the self-employed, on gig economy workers, on those with no savings.
Others, perhaps with depression, feel the impacts of loneliness and fear with especial sharpness. Others, believers in a loving, caring God, ask how it can be that so many bad things are happening to so many good people. All of these are both natural and valid reactions – but, together, we have to make sure that they don’t overwhelm us.
Over the next few weeks, I invite you to explore with me some of these tough issues in what I hope will be a series looking at God and “problem of evil”. We’ll discuss how God can be present in pain and death; how God can allow this to happen; the difference between “hope” and “optimism”; and what comfort can be found in the scriptures.
We are rapidly approaching the Easter season, but this year is a very stark reminder that Good Friday precedes Easter Sunday. Our God understands pain, rejection, hate, fear and death itself – because of the Cross. And we make a serious mistake if we think that Easter erases the pain of the Cross. It doesn’t in any way. Rather, it incorporates it in the glory of the resurrection.
Pain and suffering are very real, right here and now. But as Isaiah goes on to say in that Epiphany reading:
… the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will appear over you.
Nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.
Lift up your eyes and look around; they all gather together, they come to you;
your sons shall come from far away, and your daughters shall be carried on their nurses' arms.
Then you shall see and be radiant; your heart shall thrill and rejoice …
These times may be dark, and you may feel that darkness acutely. But together we can be light to each other – and a witness to the light that will eventually overcome all darkness.
Explore further.
We will have a course to explore theology in troubled times, led by Will, beginning Good Friday. To learn more, contact him
here
.
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