It was a fearsome sight ... striking terror to the hearts of city dwellers and country-folk alike. Mysterious, unexplainable, frightening. Surely the wrath of the gods had come upon them, and perhaps the end of the world was at hand. Few events in history have penetrated human lives with such universal mystery and fear. As the Greek writer Archilochus described it, "sore fear came upon men," and Theoclymenus notes that "an evil mist has spread over all." People would hide, tribes would dance feverishly, and the eclipse of May 28, 585 B.C. so frightened the Medes and Lydians that they stopped short in the heat of battle, ending a five-year war. People didn’t know ... people didn’t understand ... but surely the gods were troubled. One Greek writer cried out, "Why hast thou perplexed the power of man and the way of wisdom by rushing forth on a darksome track?" And man could well have cried out to the gods, "I’m having enough trouble finding my way. I need all the light you can grant." The word itself in Greek means abandonment, and it was as though the gods had gone away and deserted man, leaving him alone. To coin the song phrase, man felt "lost out here in the stars," with no one to light his way or give him warmth.
But that’s all past now. Science has introduced us to saros, corona, chromosphere, and a host of other terms; and we know quite a bit about the solar eclipse and when it will occur. It’s all figured out down to the minute of the day. All that’s left to do is to sit back and snicker a little bit at the Medes, Lydians, Greeks, and all the other peoples who sensed fear in midday. We know what’s going on, and no eclipse is going to frighten us.
It’s helpful to have a scientific understanding of an eclipse. It saves us needless fear and allows us to walk confidently through any midday shadow, secure in the fact that we know what it is and that it’s not going to hurt us. But at the very moment when we focus our attention on the sky and an eclipse involving sun, moon, earth, or perhaps Jupiter, we’re totally blind and unaware of a more dramatic and perhaps more deadly eclipse. The picture is a bit like someone sitting on a stool, watching an impressive celestial view ... totally unaware that as he watches, termites have just put their finishing gobbles on the legs of his stool which, at that moment, is ready to collapse.
The more deadly eclipse is the more subtle one. It doesn’t broadcast its coming in any grand, celestial way. In fact, there’s really no need for it to broadcast at all because it’s already here and has been here for a long, long time. Christ tried to warn us about it in his description of the lilies of the field. He was asking us to give some thought to how much time lilies spend with concerns, details, and arrangements for tomorrow, the day after, and the month and year after that. And he concluded with the observation that today had plenty within it and even housed opportunity for life if we could pause in our tomorrow-bound rush long enough to give the day the meaning that was there. Christ said it again another way when he indicated that he had come that we might have life and have it abundantly. His reference was not centered on future dividends. He was talking about abundant life now ... today.
There’s a strong possibility that abundant life will be lost in the shadows of the Yestermorrow Eclipse. This subtle event contains two simple, harmless-looking words ... yesterday and tomorrow. As the two words slowly and silently converge upon each other, parts of each word become shadowed, dark and indistinguishable. And the tragic end-product can be Yestermorrow - an eclipse overshadowing the letters that could spell today. Caught between the past and the future, today becomes overshadowed and lifeless. The picture resembles a once-beautiful landscape now cluttered with all the woulds and the shoulds from the past, and littered with all the goings-to-be in the future. The scene has so much clutter and litter that we can no longer find the green grass which is still there ... somewhere ... underneath.
The two distributing agencies responsible for all this clutter and litter go by the trade names Ifonlies and Kinnardlies. Each has a long business history, and each is a deadly enemy to abundant life.
The Ifonlies Distributing Company is better known to most of us as "If only." It centers its business operations upon what we might have done or should have done ... yesterday, last month, a year ago, or even centuries ago. One of the prominent thoughts it sells to its consumers is: "Lord, if only we sinners had not taken your life from you." The picture is darkness, gloom, and a helpless reflection upon a past event. The objective of the corporation is to keep us preoccupied with thoughts of past sins and iniquities. If successful, they can keep us immobilized. And if we buy the entire sales pitch, we subscribe to the notion that a good Christian is someone who spends the majority of his waking hours wallowing in the guilt and sins of mankind. He becomes a sort of "Mankind Muller," obsessed with "If onlies" that go something like this: "If only Cain hadn’t killed Abel ... if only Columbus hadn’t discovered America ... if only my parents hadn’t given me such a rotten start things would be different." The whole process is like a railroad car breaking loose from the train and rolling into a siding. In the case of our "Mankind Muller", it’s a planned break-away - a refusal to be a part of the train because he doesn’t like the way the tracks were put together several miles earlier. The subtle and provoking part of it is that it can look like model Christianity when it’s really a cop-out on today and abundant life.
Another subscriber to the "If Only" Distributing Company buys the product line that is now oriented. This line doesn’t feature the past sins of mankind. A little bit more refined and more subtle, the sales pitch goes something like this: "If only I had a little bit more money ... if only I had a little bit more ability ... if only I weren’t tied down by my present job and my family ... things would be different." Although it sounds a little different from the "Mankind Muller", the end-product is virtually the same. The customer implies that he really can’t be a meaningful part of today for one of a number of reasons. And there are several disturbing features in this particular product line. It implies that a little bit more money or a little bit more ability would make all the difference in the world. And an even more deadly implication is that somehow dollar bills or ten more points on an IQ scale will bring abundant life. It’s a product-line feature all of us get caught up in to some extent - the feeling that abundant life is out there awaiting us $10,000, or $20,000, or maybe $30,000 down the road; and once we get there we can really live. Much of the road to Yestermorrow is paved with blacktop from this "If only" ... the time and effort of today devoted exclusively to reaching the dollar destination we’ve established as our gateway to abundant life. New words get intertwined with familiar ones, and the passage soon reads, "Money comes that you may have life and have it abundantly" - the irony of finding abundant life in a cold, lifeless god.
Another disturbing feature in this now-oriented product line has a somewhat different twist to it. It’s called the "Ain’t It Awful" design, and in spite of its name it gets a lot of sales and repeat customers. Some of the best-sellers in the line include: "Ain’t it awful what’s happening in the world today ... Ain’t it awful what’s happening among our young people ... Ain’t it awful that rose bushes have thorns." What it can do for its customers is assure them that everything outside their door is pretty miserable, and there’s really nothing they can do to change it, so they might as well stay inside and pull the shades. If they do have to venture outside, just do what existence requires and avoid as many of those "Awfuls" as they possibly can. Life becomes a leper ... avoided and abandoned. If ever there had been chance for life today, the chance is totally gone in this version of Yestermorrow.
Kinnardlies Distributing Company is better known to most of us as "Can Hardly". It carries a companion line of products for the convenience of customers already established in the "If Only" product group. In effect, the Kinnardlies line sells itself once the "If Only" products are established. For instance, a customer in the "Ain’t it Awful" line will find it very convenient to purchase products which include: "I can hardly face another day ... I can hardly look up ... I can hardly go on." It’s natural for us to find "If Only" and "Can Hardly" working very closely together. Both companies guarantee satisfaction equal to that we receive from going out to get the morning newspaper and discovering that each one we get is dated the day before the one we picked up the previous morning. And, of course, all products carry a life-killing guarantee.
As we sit on our own hillsides amid the clutter and litter of these two distributing companies, faintly and pointedly from a distance Jesus’ words run competition with the noise in our midst. Close at hand we can hear the "Mankind Mullers" rehearsing their familiar phrase "Lord, if only we sinners had not taken your life from you!" and at times it almost drowns out our hearing Christ as he says, "I lay down my life that I may take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord." With the echo from the "Mankind Mullers" still fresh in our ears, it’s hard for us to realize what we’ve just heard - positive words of giving, freedom to crawl out from under the crushing burden of guilt "Mankind Mulling" can heap upon us, and even a chance to see the brightness of the day.
And as we come upon the day’s newly-found brightness, Christ asks us to consider the lilies of the field. It’s hard to find lilies under all this clutter. "If Onlies" from the now-line have the landscape almost completely hidden in many spots, so we have to make a special effort to discover lilies and to consider them. But if we’re fortunate enough to find one, we begin to see that Christ was by no means haphazard when he selected lilies of the field and birds of the air. Each of them has a simple beauty. And each makes the countryside more pleasant and more appealing.
It’s almost as though Christ is hoping that we can in some small measure be like the lilies and the birds ... bringing simple beauty and life to the day, that others may discover it, share it, and find their own day more meaningful. Few of us ever forget an encounter we’ve had with a true lily of the field or a bird of the air - someone who, from our viewpoint, had very little reason to look toward the day with any enthusiasm ... and yet there was a kind of radiant beauty which the world’s cosmetics could never give and the wrinkles of age would not take away. Abundant life.
Where the distributing companies sell to us, Christ gives to us. While they market in gaudy wrappers, he comes in simple beauty. And when the wrappers are empty and we have consumed their lifelessness, his simple hope for our abundant life remains with us.
Amid the chill shadows of yestermorrow a rose came among us full of life and beauty. While some bemoaned the thorns and kept their distance, others beheld the beauty and shared the life. And as the day grew dark and the shadows heavy, some shivered in chill winds while others felt an inner warmth.
"I came that they may have life and have it abundantly."
"Consider the lilies."