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Their faces had permanent smiles when I picked them up from their grandmother’s house. The body language of my three younger children -- my second family -- was like they had been juiced with electricity. For Patrick and Eliot it was their first trip to the circus and by the looks of things, they did not plan on it being their last. When all seemed settled, and everyone wasn’t talking at once, I asked them what they liked best about the circus. Patrick and Anne Rachael were trying to reduce the event into a few sentences and when I looked in the back seat, Eliot was sitting there -- like the cat that ate the canary, and I said, "What about you, Eliot, what did you like about the circus." He replied, "I can’t talk, I have too many words, Dad!" Joy inexpressible, too many words, so much so that even to a little boy of almost five, he just can’t find the words to tell it all. I think about those words as I watch the news, read the newspaper, and look at the abounding cynicism. Heaven knows there is enough to be cynical about. Dave Robiecheaux, the detective in James Lee Burke’s Jolie Blon’s Bounce, reflects on such cynicism. Robiecheaux lives at the margins where life seems insane. He deals with drug dealers, murderers, exploiters and every kind of evil, "I wonder if there is any way to adequately describe the folly that causes us to undo all the great gifts of both Earth and Heaven." My oldest daughter, Bethan, sent me an article the other day. When Bethan was small, I took her everywhere with me – trips, games, speaking engagements, etc. I called her “my muse”. Now, what I used to joke about is a fact. She is my muse, sending me notes, articles and messages on the hallows. She is old enough to catch the mood of disparagement pervading our society and is glued to our middle class malaise. It is an article titled, Feeling Gravity’s Pull. In it the author, Tim Porter, muses out loud about the cynical nature of our times and how easy it is to get sucked in. "We’re mired in all kinds of darkness. The kind that results in overwrought adolescent angst. The kind that drives us to chemicals, over the counter and off the street, to make it through our middle class existences. The kind that watches a continent die from a lack of medicine that we take for granted. The kind that straps a bomb to a chest in the name of God. The darkness is overwhelming, and so we shut down." We identify. It is effortless to be overwhelmed with life’s desolation, and our own inability to cause change. The result is we just get contemptuous and smug. In short we become unjustified practitioners in a downward spiraling depression. However, Porter then begins to rail against his own tendencies to go with the flow: "For my part, I am tired of my own swings between malaise and cynicism, stopping off at ennui for a rest. Melancholy sells. Whining comes naturally. The darkness is easy to capture. But what about the rest? The problems are there. To deny them is silly and dangerous. We don’t live in a ‘50s sitcom, and the past has never been as idyllic as nostalgia would have us believe. But to ignore the beauty, to strangle the hope, to neglect to nurture all that is life-giving is more dangerous than all the Pollyannas. The lack of what is good will destroy us as well before the evil has a chance. ‘Grace finds goodness in everything’" [emphasis mine] Did you hear that? "Grace finds goodness in everything." That sounds like the gospel hope we have been given. The only way to beat the cynicism of the age it to "find goodness in everything." As flawed as our circum-stances may be the only way not to become a cynic is to think of what is true, what is good, what is lovely, what is noble. I confess to you often Christians have to be like spies. We have to look for the goodness in things. That suggests volitional activity. We must not be passive; we must set our gaze purposefully in the direction of truth and loveliness. As the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas wrote, "Do not go gentle into that good night,/ Old age should burn and rage at close of day;/ Rage, rage, against the dying of the light." We must tune our ears to hear the music played in nature and with those whom we share life. If you really look around you, you will find beauty and grace that will break your heart. The entire message of the cross shouts in the midst of decay, rot and death, there is always life. If I think long enough and put my cynical mind to it, I always find there is life to be lived and joy to be had. To whine and moan will bring temporal relief, playing the victim will only sustain you so long and then you either wallow in it or you rail to the heavens. God said, "I am making all things new." In reply, we should say, "God open my eyes to see." Then I realize the tremendous evidence that God is working. I see a house full of children, a wife I adore, a congregation I pastor, all being formed by God’s spirit, and the good health to enjoy just about anything I put my hand to. I see good books still being written, music that will heal the soul, and friends to share life’s burdens with. If I ponder deeper I see mercy I don’t deserve, grace I could never merit, and forgiveness that liberates my soul. The words of the rock group U2 are right: "It’s a beautiful day. Don’t let it get away." I think Porter is honest and truthful: "The lack of what is good will destroy us well before evil has a chance." Christianity insists that each of us become artists and strive for a poetic vision about life. All genuine works of creation are fashioned out of a mess. It is only the poet who sees in that mess, the formation of something beautiful. It is becoming a child like Eliot, who says, "I can’t talk, I have too many words, Dad!"
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