War and Peace

On Wednesday evening, I was flying to Stockholm for a long weekend and knowing there would be quite a few hours of useless time in different airports (Sweden was just the first leg of the journey), I took two books with me. One of them was Frederick Buechner's The Alphabet of Grace. It has become a habit of mine to read this book at least once a year. It's an odd one - the first time I read it I barely understood anything. It's so slow and complicated. But there is magic in this book that keeps pulling me back to it, so it has become my annual companion. And some words I found there comforted me in a special way as I was flying out on the last evening before the war broke out. Buechner asks, "What's to be done? And the answer that life gives is: live in the needs of the day. What's to be done? Do what you need most to do this day and what is most needed of you." I have come back to these words again and again over these days. Because the war news can become so depressing and overwhelming that you don't know any more if there is anything that can be done. The whole thing seems nightmarish and paralyzing. But his words have reminded me - do what you can. Live intentionally in this complicated and heart-breaking reality that wants to suck all joy and peace out of you. What you can't do, leave to the mercy of God, but what you can do, do.

I have tried to follow the advice. I have donated more money over these few days than I had done for a long time. I have tried to share information about the possibilities of helping out. I have kept pleading with God to protect the innocent and to make possible what seems humanly impossible. But I have also found that to live in the needs of the day means finding joy in and expressing gratitude for all the good things I have. This is also my obligation. I have to add joy to the sorrow, I have to learn to live in a place where these two intersect. As the terrible and sensless war began, as the Ukrainian people were forced to sleep in shelters, cellars and metro stations, I could wake up in a comfortable bed to clear blue skies in a place where there was no real fear or threat, in a place where bombs were not falling. With my heart aching for these people, I was grateful for what I had. We went out for a walk in nature on Friday afternoon and I couldn't help myself, I kept thinking of all these young women who have had to send their sweethearts to war and who do not know if they will ever meet them again. It somehow made my own luck and the fact that my sweetheart was with me more special than ever. Going to a church on Saturday morning that bombs had not damaged was a blessing I could count. Going to a grocery store laden with all things good was something I saw with different eyes. Warm home and hot water. Medical help. Peace. Do what you can, be grateful whenever possible, live in the needs of the day. 

And now I am in Vejlefjord, Denmark, getting ready for a long week of preaching to highschool kids. On one hand, I want to throw up my hands in despair and throw away all my "pre-war" sermons because I feel so inadequate and I don't really know what to say in these crazy times to the youngsters who will inherit this sick and broken world from us. But on the other hand, I keep reading this quote by Buechner over and over again and I keep reminding myself that even here I need to live in the needs of the day. I will try and share with teenagers the words I have prepared and although I wish so badly I had better and more powerful words to speak, I will speak my small words in my own small way. And if they get anything out of my sermons, it will be by pure grace of God.

And if any of you asks the same question - What's to be done? What's to be done? - maybe you, too, can find some guidance in Buechner's words.