The whole world seems to be falling apart and becoming more violent, more hateful. It would be easy to despair if we focused on all the negativity. But Easter is THE ultimate day of hope… and I want to share a story about Lenny – A TRUE story – although I changed some details to protect his real identity.
Lenny was what we would call a “hardened criminal” – and he looked the part: muscular, tatoos everywhere, a thick beard and a scowl told you to give him plenty of room. His mom had died when he was 6 – his Dad had done some bad things… unforgivable things. By the time he was 12, Lenny was fending for himself on the street, joined a gang, got messed up in doing and selling drugs, and at 18 was sentenced to life in prison for a brutal murder.
From all accounts, Lenny was a hopeless case… a sorry excuse for a human being. The system wrote him off. His family wrote him off. Counselors wrote him off. He was as good as dead.
Lenny survived all these years in prison by doing two things: He was purposely mean, thinking it would ‘earn’ the respect of everyone on the yard – and second: every day he fed his anger.
See – Lenny blamed his dad for how his life had turned out. If his dad hadn’t been such a loser, Lenny might have stayed on the path of a normal life. Not only that, for reasons I can’t explain, Lenny blamed his Dad for his Mom’s death.
To put it mildly, Lenny hated his Dad. That hate and anger fueled Lenny to pull further and further away from people – to scowl harder – cuss more violently – becoming ever meaner. Every day, Lenny would wake up with this anger, and lay there feeding it like you’d feed a pet dog - Lenny’s anger was his backbone.
But then a group of men showed up to put on a Kairos retreat. In case you’re not familiar with Kairos, it is a three-day retreat based on the Cursillo method, but it was developed specifically for prisons. Upon hearing that Kairos was coming, Lenny rolled his eyes… whatever – ain’t no blankety-blank, blankin’ Christians blankety blank gonna save me!
But when the retreat started, Lenny was sitting at the table. That’s not totally surprising – I mean – at least for those three days he’d get fed REAL FOOD – and he got to be out of his cell three times as long. He wasn’t there to find Jesus – not a chance - he was just there for a break in the monotony and the cookies.
On the third day of the retreat – at 10 am – Lenny spoke up for the first time all week without cussing. “I want to give my life to Christ”. And this big bear of a man put his head down and sobbed. Amazingly, all these other men who had been avoiding Lenny circled around him and prayed with him – yeah – it’s hard to even imagine the scene. 37 hardened criminals gathered around one bawling gangster talking to Jesus.
Somewhere through the three days, the witnesses that were shared by the team and the other offenders at the retreat led Lenny for the first time to realize that his anger wasn’t his strength – it was his weakness. His unforgiveness of his Dad wasn’t his backbone, it was a poison killing him from the inside. His unforgiveness was his own personal prison in which he had locked his heart. Jesus was able to reach down into that prison – into the hardened heart of a man who had spent his life avoiding letting anybody get close. For the first time since his Mom died, people showed Lenny what love looks like!
I share this true story because – it’s a great sign of hope. Regardless of how hopeless things can seem, the Grace of God can ignite hope from the smallest kindling.
Every one of us here has something in our life that seems hopeless… our marriage, our relationship with a brother or sister or parent, a dead-end job, a teenager on drugs, a spouse addicted to alcohol, an injury or illness that has us sidelined. Every one of us experiences these seemingly impossible situations and it would be so easy to fall into despair…. Yet we dare to keep hoping.
And if you and I would drop whatever anger or pride or unforgiveness we’re holding onto, he can even reach into the prison we’ve made for ourselves and resurrect hope.
We hear the story of the Passion twice a year – on Palm Sunday and Good Friday. Do you ever feel like – Jesus – why don’t you say something? Why don’t you defend yourself? I mean – we KNOW you have the power to convince Pilate and the other leaders – but you say almost nothing. Why don’t you try to save yourself?
I think the answer is ‘Passion’. We normally use that word Passion to refer to the suffering and death of Jesus – but let’s look at it from another perspective. Where else do we use the word Passion? In the love between a man and a woman, for example, they can experience a passionate kiss. They are said to ‘have a passion’ for each other. This may seem weird to be talking about this kind of Passion on Good Friday, but stick with me.
- a firefighter has a passion for firefighting… and doesn’t mind getting out of bed – sometimes more than once in a night – for the chance to help someone.
- Maybe you’re a student learning to be a nurse or engineer or plumber – what drives you to spend all those hours studying?
- Everyone with a job – what gets you out of bed to drag yourself to spend yet another day in drudgery?
- Parents – what drives you to stay up all night with a sick child – and to provide for these little rug-rats who don’t even seem to appreciate what you do for them?
I suggest – if you can answer that question for yourself – you’ll identify your passion – the one thing in your life which drives you to act – to study – to get off the couch or out of bed – to willingly put yourself through the pain.
Jesus didn’t try to save himself because the cross WAS his passion. His greatest desire, his Eros, was to establish the Kingdom of God – and the path to do that led right through the cross – so to try to save himself would have been going against his passion.
Can we love Him as much as He loves us? Can we seek the kingdom with the same unwavering intensity that led him to the cross? The message of the cross is that we only find true joy in life when we identify our deepest desire – our Eros – our Passion.
Our life is complete when we find something – or more likely – some ONE to give our life to.
There’s some back-story to the first reading which we all need to have in mind – Saul was the anointed King of Israel – but he was doing a bad job of it, so Samuel anointed David as the next king. It’s an odd situation where two can rightfully claim the throne. Saul was threatened by David – he was popular – a great warrior – and everybody loved him. Saul was afraid he’d take his throne, so he set out to kill him. David was on the run for like 15-20 years – living in the wilderness with a ragtag group of supporters – basically waiting for Saul to die so he could step into the throne. Today’s Gospel picks up somewhere during that time when David was on the run. The important thing to note is that by every right – David could have killed Saul – remember that. He was anointed by God to be the king, Saul tried to kill him, and apparently God delivered Saul directly into David’s hand… any sane person would agree that David had EVERY right to kill Saul.
We all have someone in our lives who has done us wrong. Picture that person in your mind right now.
Amanda’s Ex cheated on her for over a year before she found out – then he blamed her for the marriage falling apart and in a messy divorce, he left her with almost nothing.
George’s boss has a bad attitude – he constantly demeans him and gives him the least desirable jobs…. Passing him up for promotions and raises.
Don’s classmate bullied him for years – and spread rumors about him so that nobody in the school wanted to be friends with him anymore.
Clare’s mom told her years ago that when she died, she wanted Clare to have her wedding ring – but her sister took it – claiming she had a right to it since she was older.
A drunk driver ran over Jerry’s youngest kid on her bike – leaving her crippled for life. Every day Jerry has to help his daughter deal with the aftermath. Jerry is bitter and angry and simply cannot forgive the man who did this to his daughter.
In all of these scenarios, and the one in your own life, you have every RIGHT to be mad – to hold a grudge – to wish that they would rot in hell. Nobody would blame you one bit for being bitter and withholding forgiveness…. They don’t DESERVE forgiveness.
David was in that kind of situation. He had every right to kill Saul and, in fact, when he passed up the chance, I’m sure the other men were making fun of him for passing up this chance: Besides, maybe this WAS God’s plan that David should kill Saul so he could take his rightful throne. But David did the unexpected: he showed mercy.
We’ve heard these phrases throughout our lives – they’re nice Christians sayings - - but do we live them? Don’t read them as some general ‘love everybody’ statements – let them touch you specifically. Love your enemies – yes – even that person you thought of a few minutes ago – your ex, your classmate, your boss or co-worker, your brother or sister – let this teaching get personal.
You, no doubt, have every right to be angry at that person – they hurt you – and likely are not even remorseful about it. They don’t DESERVE your forgiveness. You have every right to wish them harm – to curse them. Seriously, nobody is going to blame you for striking back at them – because that’s what any other person would do.
But – we aren’t just any other person, we are Christian. Christians do the unexpected.
See – we are called to be Holy – which is simply to try to live like God – to try to act like Jesus. When Jesus met the woman at the well, he could have condemned her as a sinner – but instead he loved her and she became one of the first evangelists. When Jesus met the woman caught in adultery – by every right of the law, he could have joined in stoning her – but he did something unexpected and refused to condemn her.
When you and I sin – and we do that every day – by every right, God can smite us – but God does the unexpected – he shows mercy continually. If God can forgive us, we can forgive others. In fact, if we don’t forgive others, not only are we not reflecting God to the world, but we will live in misery.
Think of a time you had harsh words with someone close to you – how did you feel afterward? Many people feel a pit in their stomache as long as there is unforgiveness. The obvious cure to that stomache pain would be to forgive and move on – but instead – we hold a grudge, don’t we? I know families who have been torn apart for decades because nobody will make the first move to forgive. In our righteous indignation, we conjure up unforgiveness by recalling how RIGHT we are and how wrong they are – ‘well she said this or he did this and they never even felt sorry about it and if they think I’m just gonna forgive them for that then they got another thing coming!’…..and the pit in our stomache grows – and we’re miserable – and people around us are miserable because of us. I heard somewhere that unforgiveness is like drinking poison in hopes that the other person dies.
...but we’re not just any normal person – we are Christians. We do the unexpected.