Saint Thomas More wrote in his own tumultuous time, “The times are never so bad but that a good man can live in them.” We need to live in such confidence and hope: The times are never so bad but that good women and men can live them.
Our calling as children of God is to be who God made and called us to be, women and men with the courage to love and to work for the well-being of all people.
We think of such things these days, especially as election season comes around, but we should ponder such things all the time. It is easy, too easy, to be in despair when everything seems like it is falling apart, the center no longer able to hold. And yet, every small act of courage and kindness makes a difference. Mr. Rogers once counseled children and their parents: When catastrophe happens “look for the helpers.” They are all around. As we go to the polls to vote, look for the helpers who are running for public office.
Stephen Shoemaker
We all have the capacity to lead. Parker Palmer, Quaker educator and spiritual writer, defines a leader as anyone who has an unusual capacity to shed their light or their shadow on another, or others. By that definition, parents, teachers, leaders of nonprofits and businesses, ministers and those in political office are all leaders; all have an unusual capacity to shed their light or shadow.
By that definition, we all are leaders in some sphere of our lives. So Palmer calls us to “lead from within,” to do the necessary inner work, that we may maximize the light we shed and minimize the shadow.
Leadership in any sphere of life is more difficult than any time I remember. Teachers and principals, librarians and pastors and leaders of public organizations are on the front lines of culture wars and political divisions that make every day a challenge.
And yet we must not succumb to the despair of “what difference does it make, what difference can I make?”
I heard Eli Wiesel speak to a group of ministers and community leaders. He, a Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize writer and speaker, said to us: “ I have my reasons not to believe in humanity; I have my reasons not to believe in God. I choose not to use them.”
Church attendance is down, people talk about a “volunteer crisis,” we have an astonishingly small number of people who vote. Is part of the reason an everyday, enervating despair? Sen. Raphael Warnock has said, “A vote is a prayer for the kind of world you want to live in.” So is every small thing we do to make our home better, our church, temple or synagogue better, our community better, our nation better.
The prophet Jeremiah wrote to the Hebrew people in Babylonian captivity. They had been in exile awhile and did not know when or if ever they would return to their homeland. This is what he said to them:
“When the big picture looks dark, concentrate on the little picture.”
“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel. … Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage that they may bear sons and daughters and multiply there. Seek the welfare of the city … and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your own.”
When the big picture looks dark, concentrate on the little picture. Practice everyday faithfulness and close at hand kindness.
In his poem “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front,” Wendell Berry, acclaimed writer and Kentucky farmer, says in words that echo Jeremiah’s embodied hope:
So friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world …
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias …
Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts …
Practice resurrection.
This is time to hope, to invest in what is now unseeable. The times are never so bad.
Stephen Shoemaker most recently served as pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Statesville, N.C. He previously served as pastor of Myers Park Baptist in Charlotte, N.C.; Broadway Baptist in Fort Worth, Texas; and Crescent Hill Baptist in Louisville, Ky.