The last seven days have been hell. Forgive me for speaking so frankly, but I can’t remember a seven-day stretch of time in which there was so much for us to be sad about- or mad about. And I hasten to add that I’m not talking about bad things striking Kathy and me directly. It’s mostly bad stuff that has crashed into people we care about – which creates a pain all its own.
The only bit of bad news this week that was our own, so to speak, came in the mail last Friday: my first rejection letter from a music publisher. It was Augsburg Fortress, the leading music publisher of the ELCA, and the letter they sent was crisp, cool and to the point: We can’t use anything you submitted. At least there was this line (and in the letter, it’s all in caps, which maybe means they really meant it) that they hope I’ll submit other manuscripts. That sure beats getting a Cease and Desist Letter . . . or a Restraining Order. But it was disappointing all the same.
And then came word later that very day that a Carthage colleague – perhaps the most beloved member of the music faculty – would be gone for the rest of the school year because his wife had taken a dramatic turn for the worse in her long battle with cancer. Suddenly, my little hurt seemed laughably insignificant compared to their heartbreak. And I think it’s safe to say that as my colleagues and I have stepped in to cover this colleague’s classes for the rest of the semester, we feel like it’s the least we can do for someone who means so much to us, who has given so unstintingly of himself over the years, and who does not begin to deserve this kind of heartache.
And then a couple of days later came the stunning news from Kenosha Unified that over 300 teachers – essentially every teacher in the district who has taught for four years or less – were about to receive official layoff notices from the district. There is no way to see this as anything but an awful calamity, not only for these teachers but for the whole district as well. What is especially painful for us is that this involves several young, gifted, committed teachers that Kathy and I count as dear friends- and I can’t begin to put into words how badly we feel for them. . . or how helpless. And even for those teachers left directly untouched by the layoffs, it’s impossible to feel happy or secure.
It was also within the last week that the members of Holy Communion received the stunning news that Bill Grimbol, the son of the congregation who has accepted a call to become our new senior pastor, suffered a heart attack in his home back east. The initial reports are encouraging and suggest that he may very well still be able to begin work at Holy Communion on July 1st, as previously scheduled, but it’s still a bewildering turn of events. It was also about a week ago that I learned that my dad had a biopsy done on his prostate gland, and it wasn’t until Wednesday that the results finally came in (thankfully, it looks clear of all cancer.) My dad, generally speaking, is healthy as a horse (I predict he’ll live to the age of 110) but this just makes it all the more disconcerting when something comes along that poses a very real threat to him and to his health. In the midst of all this, our dear friend Walter found himself in the hospital again.
And on top of everything else, when it wasn’t pouring rain, it was snowing . . . in the middle of April.
If there ever was a year that we need Easter, it’s this year- when it’s coming almost as late as it possibly can. One of the anthems that my senior choir will be singing is a stirring setting by Ralph Vaughan Williams of the Old Hundredth Psalm, the melody which most of us know as the traditional doxology. One of the members of the choir, Kathy Fischer, gave money to the church for an anthem to be purchased to commemorate her fiftieth birthday- and I chose this one because it would be a fun one for her husband Randy (our organist) to play. And then I decided that this was too great an anthem not to sing on Easter, so I decided that we would sing it with the great hymn text “I know that my Redeemer Lives,” which fits the melody perfectly. And now as I look at the text, I’m realizing that the guiding hand of the Holy Spirit may have had something to do with us singing these stirring and comforting words:
I know that my Redeemer Lives.
What comfort this sweet sentence gives!
He lives to silence all my fears.
He lives to wipe away my tears.
A lot of the Easter hymns we sing have texts that are painted with nothing but bright and cheerful colors, but the best and sturdiest Easter hymns offer up more than that. (I’m reminded of Bill and Gloria Gaither lyrics that my high school voice teacher, Cherie Carl, sang so magnificently: Because He Lives I can face tomorrow. Because He Lives all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future, and life is worth the living just Because He Lives.) I’m glad that on Sunday the choir will be singing a text that acknowledges the broken state of our lives and the burdens which we bear even in the best of times- let alone the backbreaking burdens and hurts that come in times as tough as these. And as we prepare to sing this early Sunday morning, I am going to invite the choir to sing it in part as a prayer for anyone and everyone they know who’s in need of hope and comfort on this Easter. So Kathy and I will be singing this for Paul . . . for Rita . . . for Stacy . . . for Rebecca . . . for Woody and Carol . . . for Bill . . . for Walter . . . and for all the rest of us who feel the weight of April snows on our souls and who wait for the warmth of spring and for the possibilities of a new day.
pictured above: Our dogs, Ellie and Bobbi – on one of the mornings when we awoke to the sight of snow on the ground.