The Rhythm of Redemption
The Rhythm of Redemption
We need to be careful, because pooled ignorance only compounds ignorance. We need to let Christ explain the world to us.
Work with me here. I want you to slap the table in front of you (or your lap) with both hands, twice, then clap both hands together. Seriously, go ahead. I’ll wait.
It should have sounded something like:
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
Now, do it a few times, in a row.
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
If you boom-boom-clap in this pattern, even without any music notes or words, it doesn’t take you very long to begin to chant in your head. You would probably remember sports games or even the original soundtrack.
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
“We will-We will-Rock you.."
This beat or rhythm automatically associates your mind with something. In fact, I was writing about this and doing the beat on the table, clapping my hands. After a few times, Laura asked me from the other room, “Why are you doing that?”
Aha! I thought, a test case.
“What does it make you think of?” I asked.
“We will rock you,” she said.
It’s the beat or the rhythm of the song originally recorded by the group Queen and now used in stadiums and sporting events all over the world. It’s a rhythm that practically defines the definition in the dictionary on my laptop. That dictionary says that a rhythm is “a strong, regular, repeated pattern of movement or sound.”
God infused our world with rhythms and patterns that make sense of our world. He put into reality strong, regular, repeated patterns of movement that clue us into the nature of things. The rhythm of the sea. The rhythm of the seasons. The rhythm of a song. He put rhythms into his work of creation, and he also put rhythms into the work of redemption. There are strong, regular, repeated patterns of movement or sound in the song of the good news of Jesus Christ. God has a regular pattern of doing things. Jesus’s own life followed a pattern, and God embedded this pattern into the life of his people, the pattern of his world, and the patterns of our individual lives.
Here’s the rhythm of the world: death-burial-resurrection.
Now, granted, we miss it sometimes. During Jesus’s last night before the cross, Jesus started to subtly tap out the rhythm: “In a little while, you will no longer see me; again in a little while, you will see me” (John 16:16). The disciples (like us) didn’t get it: “Then some of his disciples said to one another, ‘What is this he’s telling us: “In a little while, you will not see me; again a little while, you will see me,’ and, ‘Because I am going to the Father”?’ They said, ‘What is this he is saying, “In a little while”? We don’t know what he’s talking about’” (16:17-18).
We and they are the same. Instead of getting the beat and clapping on 2 and 4, we clap on 1 and 3. We’re out of sync, and we look around to each other to try to figure it out like when we’re clapping in church but have somehow wandered off the beat. It’s interesting that the disciples can’t figure out the solution with just internal discussion. They talk, discuss, question, hold workgroups and ad hoc committees, task forces and town halls, but none of that accomplishes much of anything on its own. True, fruitful community centers on truth and unites in Christ. Too often we talk to each other and we listen to each other more than to Scripture and the Spirit. Christians too often let their curated social media feeds, suggested YouTube videos, or XYZ News reports shape our understanding of the world. We need to be careful, because pooled ignorance only compounds ignorance. Satan loves to distract us, deceive us, and discourage us. He loves to get us off-beat. Instead, we need to let Jesus explain the world to us. He need to listen to him and feel his heart clap out the rhythm of redemption.
The Rhythm of Redemption is Often Subtle
As Jesus clarified the truth and tries to get his friend on beat, he uses an interesting word: “little.” “Jesus knew they wanted to ask him, and so he said to them, “Are you asking one another about what I said, ‘In a little while, you will not see me; again in a little while, you will see me’?” (John 16:19). The Greek word there for little is micron, a word familiar to us. It’s an itsy-bitsy unit of measurement. This is often how the rhythm of God’s redeeming love shows up in our lives. It’s little. It’s subtle. It’s small. It’s slow. In the midst of things, it feels like a long time. It’s like the guy who was told he had one minute to live and decided to spend it planking. “Because it was the best way he knew to make one minute feel like forever.”
But when you look back you realize it was as 2 Corinthians 4 says, “momentary, light affliction.”
Little was actually epic.
Slow was perfect.
Subtle was significant.
Quiet was infectious.
When my wife Laura and I started dating and fell in love, it felt like forever before we could get married. After we got married it felt like forever before God opened a door of ministry. After God opened a door of ministry it felt like forever before God blessed us with kids. And then we blinked and the years have stacked into nearly two decades. The little while Jesus talks about might be a season, might be a trial, might be a lifetime, might be two thousand years and more between his ascension and his return. But when we’ve been there ten thousand years we will look back and say, “It was a fast-passing moment.”
The Rhythm of Redemption is a Rhythm of Reversal
Jesus contrasted the sorrow of his students with the joy of the world. The things that make the world laugh make the Christian cry. “Truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice. You will become sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn to joy” (John 16:20). The things that make the world sing make the Christian sad. The world says, “Live your best life now.” The Word says, “Live your best life later.” He says that they will be grieved/become sorrowful, as a passive, future verb. Sorrow is sparked by something done by others. The disciples were grieved when the authorities hung Jesus on the cross. The disciples were grieved when their friend Stephen was stoned to death. The disciples were grieved when legalistic teachers tried to lie to them about the freedom of the grace of the gospel of Christ. But the rhythm of redemption is a rhythm of reversal. Sorrow will become joy. God will make the future better because of and not in spite of the present suffering. We will rejoice because of and not in spite of our walk by faith rather than sight in this moment. You can’t have resurrection without death.
Jesus illustrates the rhythm of redemption with the image of a woman birthing a child. “When a woman is in labor, she has pain because her time has come. But when she has given birth to a child, she no longer remembers the suffering because of the joy that a person has been born into the world” (16:21). The hour of the woman is an hour of fear and pain. When Laura had our third kid, Livi, she decided she would do it without any anesthesia. She was a rock star, enduring the full fury of the pain of having a human come out of your body. In the ancient world, giving birth was a treacherous experience. Every pain dulled by modern medicine was felt with full fury. Every complication resolved through emergency measures put the life of both mother and child on the edge of death.
This is the rhythm of redemption, a rhythm of reversal.
Pain then joy.
Death then resurrection.
Faith then sight.
Planting then growing.
Rebellion then redemption.
The cross then the crown.
The Rhythm of Redemption Is the Song that Never Ends
You’ve heard the old kids song: “This is the song that never ends…” Many of the songs from our kids’ favorite movies feel that way, don’t they? They dig themselves into our minds so that we find ourselves humming, We don’t talk about Bruno as we’re sending emails for work. Jesus tells his friends: “So you also have sorrow now. But I will see you again. Your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy from you” (John 16:22). The rhythm of God’s redeeming love means that often our portion now is sorrow and waiting. While the world dances in delight we lament in longing. But the song has good news at the end. It promises us not unshakeable joy, but untakeable joy. Our joy can be shaken, but it can never be taken.
Catch the Cadence of the Kingdom
So, catch the cadence of the kingdom of the cross, the rhythm of redemption. God turned a universal sign of death and made it an ever-present sign of salvation. And this rhythm is more caught than taught. Every one of you can clap along to BOOM-BOOM-CLAP because it’s a rhythm you have caught. It digs into you somehow. We catch the rhythm of redemption and stay on beat by spending time with the Spirit, the Word, and the people of God, who conspire together to help us clap on 2 and 4. We catch the rhythm of redemption by clinging to the cross and taking up our cross and following Jesus.
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
Death-Burial-Resurrection
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
Cross-Crypt-Crown
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP
Slow-Subtle-Significant
BOOM-BOOM-CLAP