“Sister, open for us.”
New York Times reporter Christina Lewis Halpern admits to hearing the plea outside her door in a Nairobi convent. She admits to hearing female weeping, male shouting, female screaming.
She admits that she did not open the door.
The mosquito netting tangled her legs as she half-awakened. Fear tangled her mind as she came fully awake. “Surely they would go away. Surely someone would come. Surely they would leave me alone.”
“Sister, open for us.”
The next morning Halpern learned that gunmen had invaded the convent, shot a guard and stolen cash meant for the order’s missions in Uganda and Sudan. She admitted her cowardice and asked for and received the forgiveness of the terrified nuns who had sought refuge at her door. (For the full story, see http://www.nytimes.com/ 2011/10/30/ magazine/at-an-african-convent-desperate-knocks-and hours.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq= sister,%20open%20&st=cse.)
When, drawing on the teaching of Jesus, Paul warns “that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night,” he may well have just this image in mind. Scholars debate whether the “day” in question refers to the end of history (the subject of the preceding paragraph) or, in the Old Testament sense, a time of judgment within history. Certainly the terms destruction and labor pains come from the prophetic vocabulary for the latter.
When horrors overtake a benighted world, God commands Christians to heed their cries. “Let us be alert” – the word does not mean to wake up, but to fend off sleep in the first place. Practical difficulties should not entangle our agile compassion. Personal safety should not anesthetize our ready response. We rush to the rattling doorknob and reject the chattering syllogisms of safety. “Sister, open for us”: Surely they will go away. Surely someone will come. Surely they will leave us alone. But we are the ones Christ has sent.
If we fail we may, in the final undying dawn of eternity, receive the forgiveness of those we abandoned, whom someone else sought out and saved, but better to receive their embrace here in this present crisis. Shakespeare’s Portia, on seeing her lighted home from afar exclaims, “How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world.” May we awaken, and so shine.
Open Up!
Doug
Collect
Lord God, You have appointed your beloved Son as the judge of the living and the dead. Grant that we who see the day of judgment approach may fling wide the doors of salvation and welcome the lost into the safety of Your kingdom, not stopping first to consult our own convenience or security. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Benediction
When the day comes as a thief in the night,
May you be the night watchman.
When the day comes as the pangs of labor,
May you be the physician on call.
When the day comes to drive away the dark,
May you be one who walks in light.
In the name of the Father,
And of the Son,
And of the Holy Spirit,
Amen.
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