I walk with you
My son. My heart aches for you. This life is hard, and there are so many voices competing for your attention. I will guide you, teach you, love you and walk with you. We will take the lonely road, leaving the crush of bodies enjoying their broad road. We will turn off to a narrow gate, and we will take a desolate path. What you face is not easy, but you will not be alone.
When the call comes, it sounds big, and it asks too much. You may be tempted to bargain and fuss, to turn your back and attempt to ignore it. But there are others who have gone before, and the call will not be ignored. I will walk by their pattern, and I will walk with you. I must lay the wood upon your back, and we will go together to make the sacrifice. We will both return. For I have met Him, who is the resurrection and the life. I will be patient with your questions, and I will speak to you with hope and assurances, for your comfort and mine. We may lapse into long silences, and we will continue to walk along.
The wood upon your back may make you stumble, and sap your strength. It may become heavy and uncomfortable. Relief may be provided for a while. As the Lamb carried His beam, they tapped Simon the Cyrene to provide relief. This relief will be temporary, and only allows you to keep your strength to come to your destination. The burden must be part of the offering, a heavy reminder of the choice ahead. While I wish I could carry it for you, I can only walk alongside.
You will know when you have arrived at the place and time. An altar, a cross. You have a choice to make. Will you take the way of the beloved son, trusting his father, offering yourself for death? I know it seems scary, overwhelming because of the enormity of the requirement. It is you who must die. I also know there is resurrection and life on the other side. The sacrifice is required, and it must be made. I have read the story to you, and I have offered you my testimony and the witness of others. Now it’s your turn.
I see you look at me. Eyes on the edge of manhood, light with life, but also questioning. I can give you promises and hope, but you must choose to believe, accepting the gift of faith as your own. Go ahead, count the cost. Lay yourself willingly on the altar. Feel the wood scratch and dig into your skin. It isn’t comfortable, it isn’t painless. However, I promise you resurrection, because I have been resurrected. I promise you new and endless life, abundant for the living, because this is where I live. I will take you as far as I can, but just as those before, I am restrained by the calling of my name, just as they heard theirs in the moment of unfathomable pain and fear, “Abraham, Abraham!”, “My God, My God…”
Let the tears roll. This is a devastating thing. But we are not made to be life to one another. Our lives cannot be bound up in another’s to skip out on death. I can not save you, although I walk with you. We can not find life here in each other, we must each pass through death. I have already made the passage. I will pray, and Another will walk with you. Privately, my tears flow too. I must tell you how unprepared I was to see you had received the call. You have stoically met every challenge as if you were born for it. I was unsettled at the trepidation you showed. I have begged and pleaded and bargained, and I simply can not take your place. This is your unique separation unto Him. We must each answer our own call as it comes. Now, we both must set our faces as flint and face the task at hand.
As you lay upon the altar, fix your gaze at the man upon the cross. He struggles to breathe. He knows fear. His blood runs for you, and His body is wounded for you. He will absorb you and your failings, and the life of Adam that slowly kills you. He offers Himself willingly and extends to you His perfect, beautiful and triumphant life. You must pass through your death and His to find His sustaining and everlasting life.
Do you hear the crashing in the underbrush? The One who is the final and complete sacrifice is making His way to find you, little lost lamb. He allows Himself to be caught in the thorns, and He will take your place. Yes, my son, He has taken your place. I know you may think you’re off the hook, like you may rise from the altar and skip away home, but the choice remains the same. To belong to Him, you must offer yourself upon His altar. You must identify with His bloody and broken death. The old you must pass away into death, forever in the tomb, so that the new you may emerge, resurrected entirely in His life; new, fresh and born into His family.
When you rise again my son, I will walk with you. The road will not seem so lonely, but it is still narrow, and often treacherous. We both will walk in the strength of this new life. Life that belongs to the Other. I will be patient with your questions, if you will be patient with mine. We will discover together the full meaning of new birth, resurrection and abundant life. We will talk about your encounter with the Lamb, and we will remember together the pain leading up to death. The illusion of this realm makes death seem final, but you found (like so many others before) how temporary death really is. Now all we look forward to is life. Life and more life, and I will walk with you.
We will travel this road with joy. We do not have to strain or push. The life we are now living comes from Another, welling up as living water inside us. We will not walk by sight, but by faith, listening to the spirit’s truth as it is joined with His. We will be ourselves, original and unique, and we will look with wonder and excitement at the scenery along the path, rejoicing with our whole hearts to have this new life. We will revisit the altar in our memories, and we will laugh with one another as we thank the Maker for His deliverance. He has brought us back into harmony with Himself and each other. What a delight to walk with you, my son.