The Four-Fold Path of Lament

Monday, March 31, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! My sermon series at church began as extended reflections on different evils (homophobia, racism, sexism, etc.) and quickly became a slightly different series I’ve been calling “Lenten Lamentings.” Borrowing from the work of Cole Arthur Riley and inspired by a conversation with a clergy friend, I found myself exploring the dynamics of these evils in light of a lament that was simultaneously rooted in mourning and so much greater than sadness. We began discussing a four-fold view of lament incorporating mourning, asking “why?”, hoping, and being compelled to action.

As I noted in my Monday Moment on March 10, “Lament is prophetic because it imagines a different world; a world we hope to see and that we want to see. Lament helps group us in a spirit and place of hope.”[1] Lament begins in sadness and mourning. Something has happened, something has ended, something has changed in ways that surprise and concern us. We should grieve. All too often the very powers which have caused us to grieve tell us that mourning is weakness. By mourning in whatever way is best and most productive for us we name for ourselves that we are not weak. We show that there is strength in sorrow.

Far from being linear stages through which one should move, the path of lament is dynamic. As we continue to mourn the situation, we also need to ask, “Why?” Why did this happen? What forces and people were involved? What happened in the moment, and what is historical and systemic? What could we and can we change based on our capacity? More than gathering and analyzing information, asking “why?” is a powerful tool to rooting out what some force, group, or person might be trying to hide from us.

The third part of lament’s path is hope. The real power of lament is that it helps us see that another world is possible and that our reality can change when people are intentional about making positive change occur. Just as we’re told that grief is weakness, we’re often led to believe that hope is sentimental. In fact, hope is what keeps us going when it seems like the world and everything in it is against us.

This hope, however, is far from passive. Much like how faith without works is dead, hope without action is a dream. The other elements of lament—mourning, asking “why?”, and hope—should compel us to take action and sustain our action however great or small. We can lead the movement, or we can support its work in our own ways, but true lament requires us to act.

What are you lamenting? How can lament drive you to take action?

Let us pray: Jesus, on the night before you died, you lamented that death with great intensity. Yet, you remained steadfast because your death was an action in the liberation of all your people. Use our lament and compel us to action through the four-fold path of lament. Grant us the courage to mourn, to ask “why?”, to hope, and to act in ways that build your Kin-dom in the here and now. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks, my friends. Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben  

[1] “An Invitation to Hope” - https://www.loveboldly.net/post/an-invitation-to-hope

Tell No One

Sunday, March 30, 2025

Fourth Sunday in Lent

Pastor Joelle Henneman (she/her)

Pastor, United Methodist Church for All People

Queer Christian

Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.” (Matthew 17:1-2, 9)

In the letter to the Philippians, Jesus is described as humbling themselves and taking on the form of a man to live amongst us. None of us can comprehend what the Divine is like, no matter how we understand it. However, Jesus had to limit themselves so people could receive and accept them.

But then, there is this mountaintop moment known as the transfiguration of Christ, where Jesus shines like the sun. They are no longer wearing the clothes expected of them, but glowing when glory. When Jesus had this moment of authenticity, their face “shown like the sun.” When I put on a dress that fits me well, I feel powerful and my face shines with the joy of living my authenticity.

Jesus then does an unexpected thing and says “tell no one about the vision.” Jesus turns to their friends and tells them not to out them.

March 31st is International Transgender Day of Visibility. On this day we celebrate transgender people, raise awareness of discrimination, and dedicate ourselves to living in a more just world.

However, we also need to recognize that there are transgender people who do not yet feel safe to be visible. People live in families and work in places that are not safe. The Ohio Legislature continues to limit trans rights, which is not safe. The hateful language of many politicians, and many churches, are not safe. Like Jesus, many transgender people have to hide who they are in order to be accepted.

This week, as we celebrate International Transgender Day of Visibility, include those who go unseen. Remember the closeted transgender person is just as valuable and beautiful as the out person. For Jesus too is one who had to stay in the closet because the world couldn’t receive their glory.

Disability, Part 6

Monday, March 24, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! Today is my last reflection in this intentional series on disability. Inspired as much by reading about disability justice in the course I’m taking on theological anthropology as it was by the promptings of several people who routinely read Monday Moments, this series has been a blessing to produce for you all. Too often, even in social justice circles, disability justice is left out of the conversation and only included when someone visibly identifies with a disability or discloses an invisible disability. As a result, whole academic and practical fields—such as theology and ministry—with robust and growing considerations of race, gender, sexual orientation, and other areas fail to appropriately discuss disability.

For Christians and other people of faith, perhaps one of the least considered dynamics is disability in whatever life comes after death. In Christian theology, we discuss the general resurrection—when the kin-dom of God is fully at hand—and the personal resurrection of each person as promised by Jesus. Consider Revelation 21:1-4:

Then I saw "a new heaven and a new earth," for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and God will dwell with them. They will be God’s people, and God will be with them and be their God. God will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

This and other passages have led some theologians to conclude that each person will have a new body free from the pain experienced in life and ostensibly from any disability experienced. However, that theology assumes that one needs and wants to be “cured” of something that was called a “disability.” Remember that disability is a social construction that says more about how society does or does not accommodate its fellow humans than it says about the differences experienced by humans. Not only does that theology attempt to “cure” people who don’t necessarily need or want to be cured, but it can also be used to argue that any “deficiency” in people will be “corrected” in the new heaven and the new earth. Too quickly, heaven can be totally populated by white, cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied people, which never was and never would be the intention or project of Jesus.

Rather, Jesus offers us the finest clue to what resurrected bodies will look like. In John 20:24-28 we read about Thomas who had not been present when Jesus had visited the other disciples:

Now, Thomas…one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So, the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus is the first resurrected body of the new covenant, yet his body retains the marks and scars of his death. It would make sense that the identities that helped define us in life would continue in death. What changes in the resurrection, in the new heaven and the new earth, in the kin-dom of God is that we care for one another. Yes, heaven and earth will have wheelchair users, people with chronic illnesses, and mental health issues, but other people will accommodate those differences and care for, rather than ignore, their fellow humans.

How do you think you’ll inhabit a new heaven and a new earth? How can we accommodate and care for our siblings now on this earth?

Rather than a prayer, I’d like to tell you one of my favorite stories. A man was given the chance to see both Heaven and Hell. Starting in Hell, an angel showed him a massive banquet hall with long wooden tables and every person in Hell seated along the two sides of these tables. In the middle of each table was a large bowl of soup whose aroma was intoxicating as if one could eat this and nothing else for all eternity and still want more. Each person was restrained to their seat and had a three-foot spoon attached to their arm. However, because of their restraints and the length of the spoons, no one could spoon the soup into their own mouths, and everyone went hungry while constantly smelling the aroma of the soup. Next, the angel took the man to Heaven, where he was once again shown a nearly identical banquet hall. The man asked the angel, “Why is it the same in Heaven as in Hell?” The angel responded, “Look closer.” As the man looked at the Heavenly banquet, he realized that the people were happy and having their fill of the soup. The people took turns reaching the soup and feeding the person across the table. “You see,” the angel said, “in Heaven, people serve each other.”

Blessings on your weeks, my friends. Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben