Dear Kaleid Women,
Did your heart break this weekend? As you walked through the back to school crowds at Target and as you walked to a restaurant from your car, did your throat catch? We know. Ours did, too.
Our human defenses likely prevent us from really “going there” to take in the horror of being a part of a mass shooting like the ones that happened this past weekend. We watch, and then we turn away. We listen, and then we turn off the sound. We imagine, and then we return our attention to the immediate. More and more, as the stories pour in and become commonplace, this is our cycle and these are our defenses. We are limited. We are human. We turn away.
But God is not like us. He does not look away, turn aside, or shut down. So much so that He entered our deepest brokenness by tasting the kind of death we can hardly bear to imagine. Christ’s death was a vicious hate crime perpetuated in the name of both religion and state. Not only did He imagine extreme human fear and suffering, He went all the way into it so that He could restore life and bring healing. He is limitless. He is Love. He enters in.
Last week we promised you a new series on habits, love, and formation. We told you that we would explore the heart-shaping habits of our faith. One of the most powerful heart-shaping habits of Christian worship is the practice of lament. The Psalms are filled with examples of lament. Job is an attempt at theodicy - at answering the question “why do bad things happen to good people.” Ecclesiastes wrestles with the sorrowful, unjust, and mundane of life “under the sun.” Our Christian faith makes space for lament--for suffering and for suffering with--even when our fast-paced culture does not.
Liz said it well in the Kaleid facebook post on Monday, so we’ll leave you with her words, even as we invite you to take time praying in the Psalms this week, living into the sacred habit of lament and remembering that our God enters in and cries with us:
If you're like me, you may want to quickly scroll through and attempt to move on so as not to disturb the peaceful day you're having or today's to-do list not yet accomplished. But that is dangerous. It will form your heart toward indifference.
Yet, is also dangerous to stop, to see, to hear, to allow yourself to feel, to be disturbed. You will not be able to remain indifferent. It will form your heart toward love.
Your heart is being formed today in dangerous ways...but you are brave. What will you do as you face danger today? How will you choose love over indifference?
We are grateful to stand with you.
Blessings,
The Kaleid Team