German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was arrested in 1943 for conspiracy against Hitler, wrote the following poem from prison to his friend:
Who am I? They often tell me
I would step from my cell’s confinement
Calmly, cheerfully, firmly.
Like a squire from his country-house.
Who am I? They often tell me
I would talk to my warders
Freely and friendly and clearly
As though it were mine to command.
Who am I? They also tell me
I would bear the days of misfortune
Equably, smilingly, proudly.
Like one accustomed to win.
Am I then really all that which other men tell of?
Or am I onlywhat I know of myself.
Restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage
Struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat
Yearning for colours, for flowers, for the voices of birds
Thirsting for words of kindness, for neighbourliness
Trembling with anger at despotisms and petty humiliation
Tossing in expectation of great events
Powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance
Weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making
Faint, and ready to say farewell to it all?
Who am I? This or the other?
Am I one person today, and tomorrow another?
AM I both at once? A hypocrite before others
And before myself a contemptibly woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army
Fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?
Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, thou knowest, O God, I am thine.
Who am I? They often tell me
I would step from my cell’s confinement
Calmly, cheerfully, firmly.
Like a squire from his country-house.
Who am I? They often tell me
I would talk to my warders
Freely and friendly and clearly
As though it were mine to command.
Who am I? They also tell me
I would bear the days of misfortune
Equably, smilingly, proudly.
Like one accustomed to win.
Am I then really all that which other men tell of?
Or am I onlywhat I know of myself.
Restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage
Struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat
Yearning for colours, for flowers, for the voices of birds
Thirsting for words of kindness, for neighbourliness
Trembling with anger at despotisms and petty humiliation
Tossing in expectation of great events
Powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance
Weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making
Faint, and ready to say farewell to it all?
Who am I? This or the other?
Am I one person today, and tomorrow another?
AM I both at once? A hypocrite before others
And before myself a contemptibly woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army
Fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?
Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, thou knowest, O God, I am thine.
Eugene Peterson writes in 'Christ Plays in 10,000 Places:
Who I am and what people think I am aren’t anywhere close to being the same thing. The better I get as a rabbi and the more my reputation grows, the more I feel like a fraud. I know so much more than I live. The longer I live, the more knowledge I acquire, the wider the gap between what I know and what I live. I’m getting worse by the day …
Seeing the same process in a more positive light, C. S. Lewis commented, ‘When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less. A moderately bad man knows he is not very good: a thoroughly bad man thinks he is all right.’
How did my thinking end up here today? Like most things in life, it was the convergence of a number of seemingly random events: Friends withholding the truth to protect their own fragile souls, enemies withholding the truth to manipulate and control, guilt over my own role and reactions, and the resulting unanswerable questions about human nature and God. How will He unravel this tangled mess of human brokenness? What kind of father would allow his children to do these things anyway?
This Sunday I'll be preaching from Ephesians 1. Last Sunday it was Colossians 3:12-17. One of the questions that I've been wrestling with is this: what kind of man would pen these words? I know that what he wrote was inspired by God. Yet, like all preachers, writers, and teachers he 'received' these truths in the context of his own personal struggles. What kind of life and experiences must St. Paul have gone through to learn these things? As he often writes, his struggles were not merely external, but within his own soul as well.
This left me wondering. If someone were to read my sermons from the past six years, what kind of biography would they piece together concerning me? I trust that my theology primarily reflects the word of God, but no doubt it reflects my experience as well. But can God use both? He can and he does.
I think this is what we see in the life and writings of St. Paul, but also in the writings of Bonhoeffer and Lewis and even living authors such as Eugene Peterson: truth wrestled with and fleshed out in the context of suffering, betrayal, joy, worship and a host of other circumstances in which we find ourselves.
Thinking out loud …
Seeing the same process in a more positive light, C. S. Lewis commented, ‘When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less. A moderately bad man knows he is not very good: a thoroughly bad man thinks he is all right.’
How did my thinking end up here today? Like most things in life, it was the convergence of a number of seemingly random events: Friends withholding the truth to protect their own fragile souls, enemies withholding the truth to manipulate and control, guilt over my own role and reactions, and the resulting unanswerable questions about human nature and God. How will He unravel this tangled mess of human brokenness? What kind of father would allow his children to do these things anyway?
This Sunday I'll be preaching from Ephesians 1. Last Sunday it was Colossians 3:12-17. One of the questions that I've been wrestling with is this: what kind of man would pen these words? I know that what he wrote was inspired by God. Yet, like all preachers, writers, and teachers he 'received' these truths in the context of his own personal struggles. What kind of life and experiences must St. Paul have gone through to learn these things? As he often writes, his struggles were not merely external, but within his own soul as well.
This left me wondering. If someone were to read my sermons from the past six years, what kind of biography would they piece together concerning me? I trust that my theology primarily reflects the word of God, but no doubt it reflects my experience as well. But can God use both? He can and he does.
I think this is what we see in the life and writings of St. Paul, but also in the writings of Bonhoeffer and Lewis and even living authors such as Eugene Peterson: truth wrestled with and fleshed out in the context of suffering, betrayal, joy, worship and a host of other circumstances in which we find ourselves.
Thinking out loud …
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