Do you know what Sleeping Beauty’s name was?
…The following email was sent out to the congregation and friends of pastor Peter Hiett of The Sanctuary Downtown, Denver, the Friday morning he received the news of the Aurora theater shooting…
“Dear Sanctuary,
I’m shocked and saddened by the news from Aurora this morning. Shocked, and yet Jesus told us that things like this would happen. Saddened, but not without hope. In fact, it’s in these places of such shocking evil and deepest sorrow that the glory of God in Christ Jesus is revealed. It’s at the very spot where the most evil of all murders was committed, that God reveals the greatest good. That place is a cross.
At times like this I’m reminded of what Julian of Norwich claims to have heard from the Lord in her famous vision. She heard him say: ‘Since I have turned the greatest possible harm into good, it is my will that you should know from this that I shall turn all lesser evil into good.’
Let’s weep with our friends in Aurora and hope in our Lord. Let’s pray that the world would see that Jesus suffered and died in Aurora and that Jesus doesn’t stay dead, but rises as Faith, Hope and Love in us and the world around us.
This weekend we’ll gather and remember that—it’s the same thing we always gather to remember: That Life conquered death, Light conquered darkness, Faith conquered fear, Hope conquered despair and Love conquered hate at the cross of Jesus Christ our Lord. In fact, it’s that very knowledge that gives us the courage to bear another’s sorrow and feel another’s pain. Jesus bears it with us. And Jesus makes all things new. God Bless You, Peter”
Peter’s words above instill strength, power and courage to face the worst that this life can deliver. This is because God has already faced the worst reality and conquered it: death of a truly innocent person by crucifixion. Yet “in Adam all died but in Christ shall all be made alive.” God has conquered death through resurrection life! Pastor Hiett is equipped with the hope of Jesus’s words: “In this world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer for I have overcome the world.” Jesus has overcome the world. That includes everything. That includes ALL aspects of the incident in Aurora. Do you have that kind of hope?
If you were called to minister to the family and friends of those who lost their lives in Aurora would you have a hope large enough to encompass the scope of the tragedy? Could your hope extend to the family’s loved ones who were murdered? Could you give real hope when they ask:
“Where is my son, my daughter, my husband, my friend, my father right now? Will I see them again? If ‘God is love’ is He taking care of them?”
What would you say? Does your theology allow you to offer hope for their loved one? They undoubtedly want to know if there is a God who is able to trump the magnitude of the destruction of life they just experienced. Can you give that to them? Or would you have to evade the subject and make it about their own “personal hope” if they will just believe the Gospel before they die?
Or is your theology such that you must tell them that their son, daughter, husband or father is most likely irredeemably lost in hell forever and they will never see them again? (As one person felt led to declare publicly in the CNN comments.)
Is there a hope that you can offer these grief-stricken family members and friends that exceeds the world’s? The traditional religious storyline gives no hope to anyone who’s loved ones were not Christians (which is the majority of mankind) and in reality a vague hope for those who “trust in Christ” since it is dependent upon many conditions (leaving many in doubt without solid assurance).
Apparently the Thessalonians were rebuked for not having a very robust “hope in the God who raises the dead” and “grieving as those who had no hope.”
But what kind of hope does the Church actually offer the world?
Interestingly most Christians go beyond what they are supposed to believe and instinctively offer hope to people in these tragic situations by appealing to the Larger Story of God in Scripture where “everything sad is going to come untrue.” Even NYC pastor TIm Keller after 9/11 preached an incredibly hopeful sermon to his congregation that went far beyond what the Church is actually allowed to believe.
There seems to be something that naturally emerges from within our hearts in the face of these inexplicable tragedies: we tend to believe in a God who might just “be able to do immeasurably far above all we could ever ask or imagine… by destroying the works of the devil…defeating the enemy of Death…making all things new…and reconciling all things to Himself”
Thank you Peter Hiett for proclaiming and applying the Gospel of hope and resurrection to a world that is “without hope and without God in the world.” (Eph 2:12)
“Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” (Ephesians 5:15) Did you know that Sleeping Beauty, who ate the poisoned apple, doomed under a curse of sure death until her Prince would awaken her with a kiss, was named… Aurora?
Wake up O Aurora, rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you!
“But we don’t want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who have fallen asleep, so that you don’t grieve like the rest, who have no hope.” 1 Thess 4:13
“For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.” 1 TIm 4:10
“Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” 1 Cor 13:6-8
“There shall be the root of Jesse, and one that arises, to rule over the nations: in him shall the nations hope.” Rom 15:12
“In his name the nations will put their hope.” Matt 12:21
“Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.
For behold, darkness shall cover the earth,
and thick darkness the peoples;
but the LORD will arise upon you,
and his glory will be seen upon you.
And nations shall come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your rising.” Isaiah 60:1-3
George MacDonald:
“It is more true that in the midst of death we are in life. Life is the only reality. What men call death is but a shadow–a word for which cannot be, a negation which owes the very idea of itself to that which it would deny. But for life there would be no death.”
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