Jonathan Jumps

His face is a blur, body bobbing up and down at lightning speed, shoulders rising slightly and pulling his muscular torso forward with each hop, willing his body higher. Surely his feet are attached to motorized slinkys.  As the credits roll, the “juddering” drum phrase is center stage in Hans Zimmer’s Dune score, layered with a cacophony of otherworldly voices, war horns and repetitive musical motifs. Jonathan is transfixed. All in.

 As the music ebbs, Jonathan paces back and forth to catch his breath, like an athlete in interval training, then bounds a perfect accelerando to the next wave of percussion.  Oblivious to his surroundings in the dark empty theater, crowds now gone, he performs before an audience of One,  who looks down with joy at His special child.  The Autism and Down Syndrome that limit him are the same conditions that remove filters, allowing him total, delighted abandonment to the music.  Nothing short of awe inspiring.

 I laugh and encourage him, “Good job hopping, Jonathan! Look at you go!” He hears my voice and one side of his mouth turns up. Nick circles with his phone, capturing what he can on video. We know this is a moment to cherish all that Jonathan is. But part of me is afraid to.  What of this grey fog of weariness these past several months, like so many low hanging clouds that threaten to make me forget the sun? Which is real? 
On a recent visit to my son and daughter-in-law, Nicholas and Lexi,  their Rector’s sermon touched me deeply on this point.  Christian shared the deeply personal story of the son born to him and his wife Molly 21 years ago, who lived only moments past his birth due to a genetic condition. The midwives, in support of them, attended a service which celebrated Bryce’s precious life and the life to come where one day his parents and he would be reunited.  Later the midwives came to the couple and expressed concern that they might be moving on too quickly, perhaps skipping the vital grieving process. Christian and Molly reassured them that though there was real joy in celebrating the hope of their Christian faith, they also suffered deeply in their grief.  One emotion did not invalidate the other. The mystery of the already, not yet here Kingdom of God in Christ is the promise that joy is possible in sorrow.  

I can enter wholly into the joy of those moments that glimmer with eternity, then. Relishing Jonathan’s ear to ear, crooked-perfect smile. Admiring his spontaneous surrender to music, to movement, to the moment.  These glimpses of the eternal that will one day swallow up all that wearies me in this life. In doing so, I am responding to the Apostle Paul’s admonition: “...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” (Phillipians 4:8)

This is not some mind trick.  As C.S. Lewis’s character George McDonald in The Great Divorce states,   “Hell is a state of mind - ye never said a truer word. And every state of mind, left to itself, every shutting up of the creature within the dungeon of its own mind - is, in the end, Hell. But Heaven is not a state of mind. Heaven is reality itself. All that is fully real is Heavenly. For all that can be shaken will be shaken and only the unshakeable remains.”

Lord, may I look to what is unshakeable. What is beautiful. What is real.