The Final Movement: Celebration

It's been a tough few days. 

I'm not one to post lots of personal details on blogs or social media, but we've had some difficult health news in our family, and my thoughts have regularly been drawn back to that reality. I've preached about it for years, and realized it would eventually come, but I still wasn't quite ready for it: All of us are just one phone call, doctor's visit, or conversation away from experiencing suffering.

Not a very happy thought, but a reality nonetheless. What we as a family are experiencing is far less than many experience daily, but suffering is always painful when it's your suffering. Comparing pain with that of others, or trying to gradiate it on a scale, is wasted effort. All pain hurts worse when we feel it personally.

So why start a post on the final movement of the liturgy, The Celebration, talking about suffering? Because our relationship with God is not about a fantasy world. It's not about how things would be if everything was great. Our faith is not intended to be experienced separately from real life. Faith is not excluded from pain.

We approach God by first recognizing that we're part of a larger body, spanning both time and place: The Invitation.

We tether ourselves to the ancient faith and the reality that grounds us: The Proclamation.

We acknowledge that, somehow, the God of the Universe is interested in our lives, and that, in Christ, He's already turned His face toward us: The Invocation.

We agree with Him about our brokenness and the many ways in which we've fallen short, all in the recognition that we're already forgiven: The Confession.

We are intimately connected with Him through His sacrificial and sacramental death. He was not sheltered from pain, but rather experienced it fully and completely: The Eucharist.

We build our lives on the realities of His purposes and His passions, engaging the Truth that guides us into life: The Homily.

And then, based firmly in that reality, we Celebrate. Not blithely or foolishly, but deeply and realistically. The Celebration of the liturgy is not the happy, clappy worship that so often defines modern Christianity within the safe confines of our Western culture. It's not the pasted on smiles of the dreaded fine-itis that has infected so many church communities: "How are you?" "I'm fine. How are you?" "Oh, fine!" I mean, sure, I'm drowning in debt, my marriage is falling apart, my job stinks, and my kids are redefining the limits of rebellion... but I'm fine. 

Rather, the Celebration is a grounded, honest declaration that, despite the reality that we can see with our eyes, we know that God is truly good. We know it through the varied experience of community--we've walked with those who have emerged from suffering with joy, and we're walking with those who are experiencing joy even as they journey through the valley. We know it through the declaration of the nature and character of God--if the eternal God freely gave up His Son, as the Apostle Paul says, how will He also not give us all things? (Romans 8:32) We know it through the sacrifice of Jesus Himself, which assures us of both His favor and forgiveness, however we come and whatever we've done. We know it through the deeply intimate connection with Him at the table, as well as through the solid foundation of His Word.

He is good. We don't always experience it that way, but we affirm it by faith. And so, we celebrate. Sometimes with laughter, sometimes with tears. We don't live in denial or as the naively innocent. We live as those who daily experience suffering, but we know with confidence that our pain is never the end of the story. We will emerge joyfully, even if it's with a limp.

And so, we celebrate. Thank you, Jesus.