I'll fly a away Oh glory, I'll fly away...wait I can't!

   "I'll fly away oh glory
   I'll fly away (in the morning)
   When I die hallelujah by and by   I'll fly away"

Last week one of the youth we serve at Parachutes (www.ParachutesAlaska.com) went on a road trip for the weekend and then decided to not come back to his life in Anchorage.  He is a young man with a job, an apartment, and a who has been working to finish High School.  He simply got in his car drove to Fairbanks and found himself unable to return to his life - or at least that is what he said on Facebook.  I'm not going to lie, I'm a little jealous.

Don't get me wrong here, I am not indicating that I am fixing to disappear this coming weekend.  I am also not endorsing that type of behavior.  To jump in the car and leave everything, including your clothes, belongings, and bewildered friends behind is something people trying to escape from the law do.  I mean, it sounds like the beginning of one of those overly dramatic Dateline NBC Mysteries.  It is also horribly irresponsible and leaves a pretty good trail of wrecked relationships and burned bridges behind you.

The reason I say I'm jealous is that right about now I'd like to check out.  I'd love to get in the car and drive to a new location and leave it all behind.  My life feels a bit like a vise most days lately with pressure being applied from nearly every angle. I imagine my young friend who took the road trip felt much the same way.

Yesterday I as was writing the concept of the “primacy of Christ” came to mind.  Developed by Franciscan philosopher/theologian John Duns Scotus the “primacy of Christ” means that whatever happened to Jesus must happen to the soul of the believer in Jesus.  Thus, if we are believers in Christ we can expect that our soul will be born, suffer, die and be reborn.  Other thinkers call this the U shaped journey.  We start and end in glory, but in the middle we must travel deep down and in - into the full human experience which is often laden with struggle, suffering, and pain the things that cause those vise like pressures on me (and you).

My trouble is that I feel like I've been going down into the bottom of the U for a very long time now.  Just when I think that this has to be the bottom, that the journey can't get more arduous, that the struggle has to end the a ascent must begin soon the ground beneath my feet leads me further down or seemingly gives away all together.

Psalm 23 is a U shaped Psalm.  The first third of the Psalm David is lacking nothing, being led, refreshed and guided by God.  In the opening lines David is at the top of the U, everything is going well.  But in the middle third he travels into the bottom of the U:

"Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,

I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me."

There at the bottom of the U, in the "Valley of the Shadow of Death," God is still with David.  That is the key.  In our decent, God is present.  While we go down in the valley so does God.  He is comforting in the chaos.  

In the final third of Psalm 23 David is restored.  He is anointed, his cup runs over, goodness and love follow him and he is in the house of the Lord.  In a lot of ways Psalm 23 follows the same story arc as the Book of Job.  Job is blessed, loses it all, still sees God in the middle of the struggle and is restored till his cup is running over in the end. 

So my car will stay in Anchorage and so will I.  I won't be running off to to another place for the weekend only to inform those in my life that I'm not coming back on Facebook.  I will choose to believe that in the bottom of the U Jesus will come and loosen the vise and relieve the pressure.  I will wait for the table set before my enemies.  I will wait for my cup to runneth over. 

Come quickly Lord Jesus.

Joel K