'Life is so beautiful. Life is so hard.' - July 15
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 31; PM Psalm 35; Joshua 4:19-5:1,10-15; Rom. 12:9-21; Matt. 26:17-25
Today’s Reflection
Back in May, I printed out two copies of a simple yet beautiful little poster—one for my refrigerator at home and one for my bulletin board at work. The poster is, in fact, a miniature version of a mural that was painted this spring on the side of a building in Durham, North Carolina. On it are just eight words, along with some beautiful flowers and leaves interspersed amongst the words: “Life is so beautiful. Life is so hard.” These are words from Duke professor and author Kate Bowler, someone whose life story and writing I have found especially encouraging since I began reading her books two years ago.
Some of you also have read her books Everything Happens for a Reason (and Other Lies I’ve Loved), No Cure for Being Human, and Good Enough—and some of you read them with us in one of our Saint Stephen’s book groups. Others of you have been encouraged by her podcast, Everything Happens. (The rest of you have heard me quote from these in at least several sermons and Daily Office reflections.)
Maybe we think we would like the poster better if it just had the first four words, “Life is so beautiful.” But based on my own life experiences, I know that if we leave off after the first four words then the poster wouldn’t really ring true and wouldn’t be nearly as encouraging. It’s only when we add the second four words, “Life is so hard” that the poster goes from being syrupy sweet to being both realistic and encouraging.
The focus of Bowler’s Everything Happens Project, based at Duke, is to encourage the practice of everyday empathy. It’s a perspective on life together that holds in tension the beauty to be found in encouraging one another through everything that happens—the hard things, the things we will never understand, the things for which we will never come up with a ‘good reason’ for why they happened (or are happening) to us or to those we love or to the world around us. Let’s be real: $#!% happens. Clearly. But when it does, we must keep showing up for each other—and we know that God, in God’s great love for us, keeps showing up. God is with us. Or as we read today in Psalm 31:
But as for me, I have trusted in you, O Lord. I have said, “You are my God. My times are in your hand; rescue me from the hand of my enemies, and from those who persecute me. Make your face to shine upon your servant, and in your loving-kindness save me.” (Psalm 31: 14-16)
A big part of how God shines God’s face on us is through us shining our faces on one another. How do we shine our face on one another? What does this mean?
Here’s what Kate Bowler learned as she began her ongoing battle with cancer at age 35 and in the several years since: “What I realized when I needed so much was that it was those everyday acts of compassion that were going to carry me. Once I could see it in my own life, I saw it everywhere—in the grocery store, and in the community, and at work, and at the hospital—is that we really do need each other in order to just face the reality of how hard life is. I found myself repeating the same thing over and over again: that life is so beautiful, and life is so hard—for everyone. Everyday empathy allows us to remember the things our culture forgets: that individualism can never carry us, it can never allow us to build bridges that we need to actually carry our lives. Everyday empathy reminds us that we belong to one another.” Which sounds a lot like what we read today in Paul’s letter to the Romans:
Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honour. Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers. Romans 12: 9-13
Seeing the words “Life is so beautiful. Life is so hard” every day in my kitchen and in my office reminds me of what is most important and what is most true. Life is both beautiful and hard—there’s no getting around the fact that it is both. But what makes life beautiful, even when we are constantly challenged and confused by the parts that are hard, is that God is with us (and we are with one another) and that will never change. Thanks be to God.
Becky+
Questions for Reflection
How have you experienced life being both beautiful and hard? How do you (or could you) picture God’s face shining on you when life seems especially hard?
Daily Challenge