Look to the right and see: there is none who takes notice of me; no refuge remains to me; no one cares for my soul. - Psalm 142: 4 (ESV)
I know we say we care. I know that we talk all the time about caring and loving but in the wake of yet another suicide we should pause long enough to not only remember the brilliant career of Robin Williams but the silent killer that took him from us way to soon. The killer knows no boundaries. He affects the rich and the poor. The famous and the obscure. The believer and the unbeliever. Those who think money will shield them from him are sorely disappointed. Those who think public acclaim or success will shield them from him will be sorely disappointed. The killer does not care, discriminate, or show favoritism.
The killer is not depression beloved. Depression is but a symptom. The world likes to focus on the symptoms in every situation. Control them. Cope with them. Medicate them. Learn to carve out a life with them. God never intends for us to live with such debilitating symptoms:
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. - John 10: 10 (ESV)
The abundant life Jesus came to give us does not include the roller coaster of emotions we see so many go through. When we lose people too soon as we did yesterday it is a good time to reflect. For those who do not know Jesus it is a time to reflect upon the saving power of the Gospel which provides the assurance of everlasting life but also a God who cares for us in our "now." For those of us however who already enjoy the eternal life found in salvation through Jesus Christ it is a time to check our priorities. To stop our busy lives and look around us. See what state the people we claim to love are in. Instead of saying, "I'll pray for you" - to actually stop and pray with them. To call up that person you know is alone and ask them to go have coffee. To bring that person you know is struggling with loneliness, grief, loss, or just the struggles of this world into the fellowship the Bible says is critical:
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone?And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him--a threefold cord is not quickly broken. - Ecclesiastes 4: 9-12 (ESV)
We were not meant to be alone but so many of us are. We put on the church mask on Sunday and shout blessed and highly favored and then go home and weep over what this world and this life can often do to us. Afraid to raise our hands in church for fear of judgment, how many people sitting in the pews next to us are exactly where Robin Williams was before yesterday. Smiling on the outside and crumbling on the inside. It is time to put away the trite Christianisms that believe because the joy of the Lord is my strength that Christians should never have to battle. It is simply untrue. Read some of the Psalms and you will find David despondent at many points in his life. Elijah asked God to take his life in the cave. Have we fooled ourselves into thinking that we are stronger than them? Or do we just not want to slow down long enough to get into the messiness of another person's struggles? Do we care?
I buried someone I loved far too soon who struggled mightily. Christian to the core but haunted by the demons of this world and found limited solace within the house of God. Someone who had standing room only at her memorial. I remember thinking how can someone so loved feel so alone? Yet we see it again now with Robin Williams. The out pouring of grief from across the world. Everyone attesting to how much he meant to them. How much he was loved. Yet in the end he still felt alone. In the end, the lies the devil sold him were too strong to overcome; same as my dear friend.
Because that is who the killer really is. John 10:10 says it plainly. He has come to steal, kill and destroy. All he does is lie. It is his native language. He is incapable of the truth. He was a murderer from the beginning and he remains so to this day. Do not fool yourself or loft yourself above people thinking it cannot happen to you because the Bible warns otherwise:
Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. - 1Corinthians 10: 12 (ESV)
For those of us who are standing firm now however, today represents an opportunity. A chance to reach out with the love of Christ to those around us. Those we know are going through tough times. Those we claim to love and care about. Those who we may not even know well but we know are part of the family of God. I am not saying this from any point of superiority but from a place of abject failure. This is God speaking to me first. We all know that we whip our lives into this frenzy and listen to the devil tell us that we do not have time to call that person. We do not have time for their problems. That God is just "leading us on different paths" or some other pseudo-religious phraseology that makes us feel better about the fact that we are woefully inadequate in following through on the love we proclaim to have for people.
It is time to stop - and look around us. Who around us feels the way our key verse expresses. No one takes notice of me! No one cares for my soul! We need to be Christ to the Christians who need us. We need to be the Gospel to the ones who need Christ. If our lives are genuinely too busy to be that then we have isolated the problem. Because this should really be the bare minimum for us no? This is the question haunting me since I heard the world lost such a brilliant mind so soon. Do we really care? Or is it just platitudes and hallmark cards filling up the emptiness we have convinced ourselves is our busy lives? I mean to try beloved. I have buried one person too soon and I do not ever want to do that again wondering how someone who is so loved can feel so alone.
Rev. Anthony.
