Do you ever find that verses of the Bible that you know so well you can repeat them word for word, sometimes come back to you and you hear them as if for the first time? That’s when the Holy Spirit takes those same words and brings them home to your heart with a new and strange power. Words we have known by heart, are now known in our hearts to be true and real, because they come straight from the heart of God.
Recently I was talking with someone I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic. He was having a coffee somewhere I go, sitting alone, and his face lit up as our eyes met above the face masks. I took my coffee over and we talked for a while. His wife had been in hospital, very unwell, passing through an episode of severe mental illness. This had happened before, but this time so much harder for her, and for him.
We talked a while, there were silences which felt a bit uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as glib words or false assurances would have created. My friend and his wife are mature and thoughtful Christians, and they had been walking some very tough miles these past months.
Sometimes love for others is more about shared silence than spoken words. In making time to be with someone there we can create a conversation of heart with heart, and refuse to assume we are problem solvers. Instead, we sense God telling us to be quiet and let the Holy Spirit be the fellowship and communion, and the bringer of comfort and hope. Only after such willing presence in someone else’s suffering, can we dare to hope that words we speak will be helpful, hopeful and, pray God, part of the healing and strengthening of those we care for, and those with whom we sit.
As I came away words I know by heart came home to my heart, straight from the heart of God.
“Come unto me, all you that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” (Matt 11.28-29)
There is huge courage and immense struggle and cost involved, for those going through times of mental ill health, both for them and for their carers. However much we sympathise, and mean well, and want others to begin again to flourish and live more fully, there are limits to what we can do. Which brings me back to those most humane and compassionate words of Jesus.
I’ve read these words, quoted those words, learned them by heart, preached on them often enough. As they came into my head they formed themselves into a prayer for my two friends. It goes something like this:
Lord, my friends are weary and heavy laden, and in their hurt and anxiety they feel they are far away from you, and you from them. So whether they feel able to come or not, I bring them to you and before you, that they may find peace, rest, relief and a healing of mind and body.
Lord Jesus you are gentle and humble of heart. Give them strength to carry the weight of life as it is. Help them to find in you One who bears their burdens, and One in whom they can find rest for their souls. Compassionate Christ, strong and gentle, through my prayers I bring these your children to be held in the strong embrace of your love, Amen
As we move into the next stages of the pandemic, and its impact on our communities and all those who are our neighbours, there will be many people who find every day a hard mile to walk. As Christian light-bearers, we are called to show the compassion of Jesus to those walking in the shadowlands, to sit with them, to be Jesus’ invitation to those who are weary, weighed down and have lost their way.
One way of doing that is to pray for those we know who are suffering in mind and heart, and to bring before the throne of grace those too weary to come themselves. In this way we become the presence of Christ in other people’s lives, “bearing one another’s burdens, and so fulfilling the law of Christ.”
Having learned a Bible verse every week at Sunday School in the 1960s, my memorised verses are almost all King James' version. But I love those Matthew 11 verses in The Message, where it speaks of "the unforced rhythms of grace". May God bless and strengthen your friend and his wife. I'm sure it was divine grace that led you to meet up in the coffee shop.
Posted by: ANGELA ALMOND | October 05, 2021 at 07:33 AM