Tear the Heavens Open
If you have spent any time at all wandering about in the Old Testament… our version of the Hebrew scriptures… you have probably noticed three things. First of all, God is sovereign. In all things, God is the majestic transcendent creator who is continually worshipped and honored by the people. Secondly, the children of God are suffering. No matter where they are… in Egypt… in Canaan… or in Babylon, these people seem to be constantly struggling for their survival. They seem to be at an enormous disadvantage in terms of wealth… power… and military might when compared to their neighboring nations. And, finally, the people of God are looking for a savior. They are continually praying for God to deliver them… to give them a king … to restore their country … to come to their rescue.
At the dawn of the first century, these things were still true for the children of God. God was still the Almighty… the Ruler of the universe… a powerful, but distant God. Most of the Jews still lived off the land… and life was hard. The land was arid and unforgiving… and people struggled to survive. And, they still longed for the Messiah… the One who would deliver them. But, perhaps worst of all for this proud people, they were no longer a free and independent people. The glory days of King David’s reign were a distant memory. There had been a succession of bad rulers that eventually led to disaster… destruction… and deportation. Even the brief restoration had been cut short by enemy nations. Now, the Romans had swallowed them whole and made them… as a conquered people… second-class citizens in their own land… the land that God had given to them… the Promised Land. Under Roman rule, they never knew what might be demanded of them, for their lives were not their own. Roman citizens could demand free labor from anyone passing by on the street. Young men could be conscripted into military service. There were taxes that must be paid to Rome… and more taxes that had to be paid to the Temple. Worse yet, the Roman Empire was continuing to expand and grow in power. There seemed to be no end in sight.
The question on everyone’s mind was: Where was God? God had been a very real presence in the life of the children of Israel as they wandered through the wilderness… the massive cloud by day and the pillar of fire at night. Even when the two kingdoms had fallen and they were all deported to Babylon in exile, God had sent prophets to minister to them. God had always called them to obedience through the voice of the prophets. But now the prophets had been silent for hundreds of years and the power of their new oppressor was growing, not diminishing. As their lives became more restricted… as taxes increased the burden on each family… as the future looked worse than the present… it was no wonder that they whispered… or cried… or screamed the words of Psalm 22 during their daily prayers: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?”
Where does hope come from when life becomes so overwhelming and discouraging that you do not believe you have the resources to deal with it? Where does hope come from when the present is bleak and the future does not promise any significant change? Where does hope come from when God is so transcendent… so far away… so hidden in the heavens… that there seems to be no connection to earth… no communication… no sign of God’s presence in life?
At various times in my life, I have spent time in conversation with people who had no desire to continue to live. Most of these were telephone calls that came in the wee hours of the morning. At times, the person on the other end of the line was distraught… crying… and begging to be heard. At other times, the person was calm, very articulate, and the conversation was guarded. Of the two, I prefer the former. Crying and distraught people are usually in a temporary place… very discouraged, yes, but reaching out for help. Most of the distraught people I have dealt with needed help to get over a bad bump in the road… or a way to bridge a huge chasm in front of them… and a calm voice of reason and comfort. The crying and distraught ones, after some initial protests, will usually allowed me to go to them… or meet them somewhere.
On the other hand, the calm and articulate people had usually made a careful decision after a long period of reflection and introspection and, for some unknown reason, they chose to share that decision with me before proceeding. These phone calls scare me, because most of these individuals gave up long ago… and their despair is a solid wall built slowly over time… brick by brick. These ones usually not only have the motivation to kill themselves… they also have the means to do so… and, quite often, a well-thought-out plan. Unlike the distraught ones, the calm ones want no face-to-face contact… no interference with their plans. Their only contact is a tenuous… a very tenuous… electronic connection to one person.
In his book, Dark Night of the Soul, St. John of the Cross talks about the soul that cries for God… and the long dark night that the soul wanders through searching for… longing for… a deeper relationship with God… an intimacy that is missing… an intimacy that the spiritual person craves. In this dark night of the soul, the soul finds no pleasure in the things of earth… for God is not present in them. But, ironically, the soul also finds no pleasure in the things of God… for there is a recognition that in many of the ways in which human beings search for… worship… and serve God, God is also not present there. And, while we always seek new ways to study God’s word… and new forms to worship God… and new avenues to serve God, there is no guarantee that we can truly find an intimate relationship with God in any of the mechanisms devised by human beings. And, if the soul cannot find pleasure in the things of this world… nor yet in the things of God… and God seems to be absent… or distant… or uncaring… or completely nonexistent… then, hope dies… and life is not worth living.
What gives people hope? What gives them the will to persevere? What gives them the strength to continue on what is… for them… a long, dark road? I was fortunate that all of those who called me at these bleak times in their lives believed in God … though they believed that God was not present in their lives at that time. There was a God, yes, but God was way up there somewhere… taking care of business in heaven… or helping other people… or at work on the other side of the world… the other side of the universe. For some reason, God was not with them. God was not present in their lives. With all of these individuals, as we talked, our prayer became the prayer of the prophet Isaiah on behalf of the children of Israel, “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down!” We need you...here!
For the spiritual person in such a dark night of the soul, St. John offers a word of hope. Our inability to find pleasure in any path that we choose… whether in the things of God or in the things of this world… is God at work in our lives. Even in those times when God seems most distant, God is at work. In these dark nights of the soul, God is working to sever our dependency on our own intellect… our own reason… our own ability to find a solution. And, so, at every turn, we find nothing. And, as we continue to bump into the walls that separate us from our goal… we devise new and different ways to enter into a relationship with God. And, as each new solution yields results that are equally empty, we become even more frantic in our search. And, after a frenzy of attempts, we give up, believing that God has deserted us… even as we have been so desperately seeking him. Without God, there is no hope… and without hope, the darkness around us seems impenetrable and unending.
Not so, St. John assures us. God is not absent… merely working to sever our dependence upon ourselves. Rather than running around like a hamster in a cage, looking for new avenues of freedom, we need to stop… to stop and wait. The solution is not to do more… but to simply be… and to wait. We need to recognize, as the prophet tells us, that we are the clay. It is the potter’s hand that forms and shapes us… it is the potter’s hands that give our lives meaning and purpose. We can do nothing to form and shape ourselves. Without God, we are nothing. In the dark night of the soul, the spiritual person will recognize that God is still present… and still working… and that the answer is to release that effort to God and to simply wait… to wait expectantly… but to wait… for God.
“Tear the heavens open.” That is our prayer in Advent: “Tear open the heavens and come down.” We need you here. We need you here for the famine in Somolia. We need you here for the ravages of AIDS in Africa. We need you here for the wars in Iraq… and in Afghanistan. We need you here for the earthquake victims in Pakistan. We need you here for the religious persecution in Indonesia… in India… in so many other places. We need you here for the hurricane victims in Florida… Mississippi… Louisiana. We need you here for the religious apathy in Europe… and here in the United States. We need you here… for domestic violence that tears our families apart. We need you here for gang violence that tears our cities apart. We need you here for the hopelessness that leads to the use of drugs to find an escape. And the list goes on and on.
“Tear the heavens open.” What an image that presents… tearing open the heavens! Can you imagine it? Tear open the heavens. Remove every barrier that stands between us… and come down! We are waiting! We know you can save us… you have done so in the past. In fact, according to Isaiah, “no one has heard… no ear has perceived… no eyes have seen any God besides you who works for those who wait for him.”
Confident in that knowledge, we wait for God… we wait for God to come… to come down. But this is not the kind of waiting that we do in the doctor’s office when we are sitting in the waiting room… not the kind of waiting that we do when we wait in line to pay for our purchases… this is different. This is an intense and passionate waiting… the impatient waiting for something long promised, but not fulfilled. It is a waiting that is tuned to the slightest change that signals something different…like a mother who waits for the changes that signal the birth of a child…or like the animals in Africa who wait, smelling the air and listening for the first hint of the fall rains. It is not the empty, passive presence of people without hope. It is the eager… pressing… demanding presence of those who long to see the promise fulfilled. “Tear open the heavens… NOW!”
But this waiting is not outside of us… it begins inside each of us. It begins in the heart and soul of each of us. You see, God longs to come to us… and has, in fact, promised to come to all who seek him. Listen to these words from the Prophet Jeremiah, “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me. Rest in the assurance that God is at work in the world… and at work in your heart. Wait for Lord… eagerly… restlessly… passionately… wait. Advent is a time of waiting for God’s promises to be fulfilled… and so, we wait. Psalm 130 says, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning. Wait for the Lord… eagerly… restlessly… passionately wait. The day is coming. Amen.
Isaiah 64:1-9