You Will Be Found

Have you ever felt like nobody was there? / Have you ever felt forgotten in the middle of nowhere? / Have you ever felt like you could disappear? / Like you could fall, and no one would hear?

Dear Evan Hansen is a Tony award winning musical that burst onto Broadway in 2016 to critical acclaim.  Written by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, the songwriters of all the music from The Greatest Showman, it is a deceptively simple story about a young man trying to find his way in a world that barely seems to acknowledge his existence let alone help him find a way to be accepted and loved.  

It is not my intention to provide a review or even synopsis of this amazing show.  Instead I want to listen in on one showstopping song in the midst of the musical.  “You Will Be Found” is a declaration of hope, a belief in the goodness of humanity, even in the face of despair and isolation.  It is a cry for a faith that is often just out of the grasp of many in a selfish and self-centered world.

Well, let that lonely feeling wash away / Maybe there’s a reason to believe you’ll be okay / ‘Cause when you don’t feel strong enough to stand / You can reach, reach out your hand // And oh, someone will coming running / And I know, they’ll take you home // Even when the dark comes crashing through / When you need a friend to carry you / And when you’re broken on the ground / You will be found 

What I’m asking is whether we dare hear the gospel in this song.  Is the world described in “You Will Be Found” not the world that surrounds us out there, but just might be the kingdom we are called to imagine into reality?  Is it a naive view of a kinder, gentler world no one believes in, or is it a radical re-prioritizing of the intention of our Creator God as presented by the Word made flesh, Jesus our Christ?

Luke 6:17-26 He came down with them and stood on a level place, with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. 18 They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. 19 And all in the crowd were trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them. 20 Then he looked up at his disciples and said: "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. 21 "Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled. "Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. 22 "Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. 23 Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets. 24 "But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. 25 "Woe to you who are full now, for you will be hungry. "Woe to you who are laughing now, for you will mourn and weep. 26 "Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets.

Scholars tell us that both Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount and Luke’s Sermon on the Plain are most likely compilations of sayings of Jesus accumulated over a larger part of his teaching ministry rather than one sermon per se.  It is possible that at various times Jesus stood or sat to teach and put together these various thoughts in one larger teaching moment.  It was a technique the rabbis called “stringing pearls.”

The problem is that some of these pearls are hard to hear.  “Blessed are you when people hate you..”  Really?  Is that something we should aspire to?  Something we should work toward?  “Rejoice in that day (that hating day) and leap for joy...”  I don’t know that this is something I really want to claim in my faith.  I know, I’ve been told as a pastor that if people aren’t upset by what I am doing, then I’m not doing enough.  In which case, I’ve done plenty in my day.

But I’m not sure that’s what he was getting at here.  It isn’t that we set out to upset people, that we do whatever it takes to get us hated.  If that were the case, then those Westboro Baptist folks are on the right track.  And there is no way in God’s heaven that that makes sense.

“Blessed are you who are poor”, “blessed are you who are hungry”.  Are we supposed to just let the poor and the hungry live in their blessedness because some day there will be a change in their circumstances?  Or are we called to be a partner in that change?  Are we the promise that Christ gives to those in difficult circumstances?  And what does it mean to promise the Kingdom of God?  Is it, as so many believe, a “someday” kind of promise.  You’ll get your reward one day, when you die, or when Jesus comes back, whichever comes first.  Or is there something else going on here?  If so, what would that be?  Is it something beyond the facile “it will all work out in the end” kind of assurances?  

And why the “woes”?  Why can’t we just celebrate the blesseds and skip the woes?  Matthew takes them out.  Matthew’s Jesus climbs a hill and looks down upon us, calling us to a higher spiritual realm, to aspire to something more, something bigger.  But Luke’s Jesus climbs down and walks among us.  He gets in our faces, He touches us, heals us, drives out the demons from within us.  And most important of all He offers us nothing less than Himself.  

So what do these verses offer those in desperate situations?  Hope?  Well, yes, there is hope.  There is a promise of reversal.  There is resolution for even the most complex, the most broken of situations.  And we who stand in faith must never lose our hold on that hope.  It is what drives us to keep working, to keep giving, to keep loving, even when we don’t see a solution on the horizon.

But these verses tell us that this hope comes packaged in a relationship.  “Yours is the kingdom of God.”  Even the most desperate of people are still worthy of love, of welcome, of hospitality, There is room at our table, room in our inn, room in our circle even for the hurting, even for the weeping.

That is why when folks hurt and withdraw from community the healing takes so much longer.  That is why seclusion is actually detrimental to hope.  The kingdom that is on offer is a community, a relationship of healing and hope.  That relationship is, of course, first and foremost with Jesus the Christ, the author of hope, the source of healing.  But it is lived in the here and now, in the everyday, with the human community we call the church.  A place of acceptance and inclusion.  At least we hope, at least we strive to be that community, that reflection of the kingdom.  

Did you notice that some verses are future tense: you will be filled, you will laugh.  But some are present: yours is the kingdom.  We can be right now the place of filling and the place of healing, or learning to laugh again.  We can’t fix the problems with a snap of the finger, but we can be a part of the solution.  If we hang in there together.  If we remember we who have been found are now in the business of finding.  Someone will come running, and that’s us.  We’re the runners, we’re the finders.  Why, because we have been found, we have been run to, and we’ll never let ourselves forget that.  

So let the sun come streaming in / 'Cause you’ll reach up and you’ll rise again / If you only look around / You will be found (You will be found) // Out of the shadows / The morning is breaking / And all is new, all is new / It's filling up the empty / And suddenly I see that / All is new, all is new / You are not alone / You are not alone / You are not alone / You are not alone // Even when the dark comes crashin' through / When you need someone to carry you / When you’re broken on the ground / You will be found! 

Shalom,

Derek