Some of the most treasured
experiences Lori and I have enjoyed have occurred in Vermont – that magical
little New England state with which I first became intrigued watching the movie
White Christmas as a child. And when I learned that the real life Von
Trapp family, immortalized in the movie The
Sound of Music settled in Vermont after escaping Austria during World War
2, the mystique of the place only grew. Looking
back, I realize that I had idealized the place – no doubt unfairly romanticized
it – but even as an adult I figured that any state that could and would prevent
a WalMart store from opening within its state lines had to be pretty close to
heaven.
It turns out that Lori had nurtured
some latent infatuation with the state as well, and so predictably we have
created some magical memories there – most recently spending the last two New Year’s
Eve weekends there, and earlier, a fall foliage excursion for our first
anniversary. But it all began with a
honeymoon trip that was memorable for many reasons – like meeting and spending
a long evening with Elizabeth von Trapp at the Trapp Family Lodge; like touring
the Ben and Jerry’s ice cream headquarters and factory; and like checking into
the lodge where we were to stay.
You need to know that I had worked
hard to select the perfect place to stay, and after countless phone calls and
internet searches, had finally made the reservations. It was a Goldilocks sort of lodge – neither
too large, nor too small, but “just right” – just outside of town, containing a
total of 50 rooms. What we learned as we
were checking in was that the other 49 rooms were being occupied that weekend by
the women of a nearby church who were holding their annual retreat in the
facility. 98 church women, my new wife and
me. When we arrived for breakfast the
next morning, the women’s retreat programming was already underway, with one of
their “breakout sessions” utilizing space in the breakfast room alongside of us. We couldn’t help, in other words, overhearing.
“This is usually a 13-week course,”
announced the leader, “and we’ve only got one hour, so let’s get started. First, make a list of all the baggage you
have been carrying around in your life. Next,
get rid of it. Just let go of it all. Next…”
As if to say, “Now with all that
out of the way, we can get down to really living.”
We found the idea preposterously
laughable. If only it were that easy to
just let go of the hurts and disappointments of a lifetime. That said, I’ve thought about that morning a
million times since eavesdropping on her counsel – partly chuckling over the
absurdity of the proposition, but partly as well out of the recognition of how
much garbage we really do tend to carry around with us – and even nurture as
though to keep alive; rather like picking at scabs just to make sure they won’t
heal. Maybe all that’s needed is
for someone to simply give us permission to stop…and move on. Some of the bruises and affronts – both those
inflicted on us and by us – that keep us flopping
sleeplessly in our sheets at night like fish on the sand perhaps warrant the
energy we continue to invest in them. But
how many others have long since passed the time when we should set them aside
as the dead weight they have become, and forgivingly get past?
I think of that as I read the story
of Joseph’s reunion with his long-estranged brothers. It had been a tumultuous relationship almost
from the very beginning. Whether you
have read the story for yourself or know it from the Broadway Musical that
weaves the tale through theatrical song and dance, you know that Joseph wasn’t
an easy brother to have. The clear
favorite of his father Jacob, Joseph had the wincing habit of sharing with his
brothers the various fanciful dreams he would have in which he always played
the starring role while their characters always found themselves scripted to
bow down and worship him. This is not
the stuff from which brotherly affection is warmed.
And so when the brothers first throw
dear brother Joseph into a pit and leave him to die, and later retrieve him
just so they can sell him as a slave to a traveling group of traders, we can’t
quite bring ourselves to commend them, but it’s hard to work up many tears for
the victim, either. It’s one of those
miserable stories in which “good guys” seem conspicuously absent. Eventually, the traders make their way into
Egypt where they sell their newly acquired little slave to the official court –
probably because he continued to annoy his new owners with the same kinds of
dreams that caused his brothers to get rid of him in the first place. But in the years that follow, Joseph grows
up. Not that elapsing time necessarily
leads to maturity, but “time” Joseph certainly had. Joseph was 17 years old when his brothers
sold him off; 39 now by the time of the events described in the part of the
story we read a bit ago. During the
course of those 20+ years, Joseph has gone through several ups and downs that
could have broken him for good, but served, instead, to strengthen and focus
his outlook and also his faith.
When his brothers eventually found
their way into Egypt begging for grain to help them survive the famine that was
apparently crippling the entire Middle East, Joseph has risen once again to a
position of trust and responsibility within the Egyptian government. Perhaps because Joseph had physically changed
as he matured; perhaps because his various experiences had sufficiently altered
his countenance and bearing; or perhaps it was simply because they believed him
to be dead and therefore never expected to see him again, but whatever the
reasons, the brothers failed to recognize Joseph. And, to be sure, he toyed with them a bit –
extracting some mild satisfaction for his years of suffering and abandonment. But he could have done worse. And ultimately, the genuine emotion of the
still-anonymous reunion overcame him and he cleared everyone from the room except
the brothers. And then, according to the
story, he began to weep so loudly that everyone in the house could hear him and
wonder what might be the matter.
And finally, Joseph came clean. “Come close to me,” he implored his
brothers. “Look at me. I am Joseph, your brother whom you sold into
Egypt.” We don’t really know what the
brothers thought or felt at the revelation, but we know what Joseph assumed
was going on in their hearts and heads.
“Don’t be pained or angry with yourselves that you sold me down here,
because whatever your involvement and intention, the truth of the matter is
that it was God who brought me here in order to preserve life.”
And with that out of the way,
Joseph, whose earlier annoying dreams have ironically been vindicated, begins
to give his formerly estranged brothers guidance for the salvation of their
extended families.
There is a part of me, putting
myself in the place of the brothers, that wants to say, “just like that? That’s it?
For 22 years we have been carrying around the guilt of your slavery and
presumed death; for 22 years we have been lying to our father about what really
happened; for 22 years you have presumably nursed along a little fire of
resentment, and just like that we’re brothers again?”
To which Joseph, I suspect, would
have replied, “Yes, just like that. 22
years is long enough; it’s time that we got on with life. Don’t you think it’s time we wasted no more
time and got on with being who we are, and let go of who we were and all we
did? Don’t you think it’s time we made
room for the possibility that God has taken all that happened and fashioned it
into promise and purpose and nourishment and grace? Isn’t it time we accepted the possibility
that, while you meant what you did for evil, God meant it for good?”
And isn’t it possible that there are
some burdens that we’ve been carrying, ourselves, for which the time has come
to set down and set aside? Might it just
be possible that there are some histories, some hurts, some disappointments,
jealousies and resentments that it is finally time to get out of the way? Perhaps it is a family falling-out of your
own. Perhaps it is a personal
disappointment with yourself. Perhaps it
is an aggravation within the church family – something you believed shouldn’t have happened, but did; or perhaps a decision that should have been made, but wasn’t.
Perhaps it is a loss you have no real way to regain; or an embarrassment
that you are weary of feeling. Perhaps
it is a righteous indignation that has frozen your arms from the weight of the
carrying. And perhaps the time has come
to set it down, to shake the blood flow back into those veins, and with that
burden out of the way, to use those arms and hands for something more
redeeming.
The chapter of the story concludes
with the statement that Joseph “kissed all his brothers and wept upon them; and
after that his brothers talked with him.”
A kiss, a tear, and a rebuilding
conversation. Forgiveness. Reconciliation. Tears in the fabric, rewoven. Not a bad days work, I would say. It’s amazing what can happen once a few
things are out of the way.