Canter Bridge

I cannot recall three hours of unalloyed joy that compare with the experience of four thousand delegates to Cape Town 2010 in its closing worship celebration.

For this, surely, we were made.

For this were eyes created, for taking in the images of God’s Lamb that slid across the mammoth screen as the orchestra took up its solemn, giddy task of lightening hearts so that they could soar.

For this did Providence design throats and tongues, for praising the One God, Maker of Heaven and Earth in languages too many to count.

For this did arms occur to their Maker, for lifting praise heavenward in a plethora of shapes and sizes, skin of every hue stretched over them, clothed or bared with all the beautiful idiosyncracy of many tribes, eight thousand human steeples pointed toward heaven while never detaching from earth.

For this tears mimic earth’s first rain, falling from cheeks that tremble with joy and awe.

For this was grain first sown, vineyards first tilled, so that a numerous, polyglot family could take one in hand, dip it in the other, and so remember the body broken for us, the blood of a new covenant poured out like wine.

For this were syllables stitched together to speak word and meaning, so that a hungry people could be taught to live towards glory.

For this was humankind commissioned to fill the earth, so that dispersal would make us not too much like each other, that our common humanity might be expressed with the full, colored range of a Creator’s large pallet.

For this Beauty first saw the light, so that it could shine from the Face and adorn a people too gorgeous to be described.

For this do strength and weakness mingle, so that a strong man like a young warrior could carry the Gospel to the stage, so that African beauties could remake space with their reverent, gusty procession into worship, so that old men and broken hearts could find their way to grace beside those whose strength has not yet failed the dance.

For this martyrs watch carefully, rejoicing in the many and knowing that some of these—before next meeting—will spill blood and join their observant, impatient company.

For this savor came to be, for neither sweet nor sour alone tastes so rich as this.

For this hearts turn towards New Heaven and New Earth, knowing this Jerusalem must descend, this temple fill Earth, this knowledge of Him settle upon its near and far reaches as waters cover the space given to Sea, the song of Seraphs come uninterrupted into full vindication.

For this do words fail, because He who is Holy Love is stronger and more beautiful than they know to speak.

Ascribe to the LORD, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the LORD glory and strength. Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts. Worship the LORD in holy splendor; tremble before him, all the earth.  
Say among the nations, ‘The LORD is king! The world is firmly established; it shall never be moved. He will judge the peoples with equity.’ Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar, and all that fills it; let the field exult, and everything in it. Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy before the LORD; for he is coming, for he is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with his truth.
(Psalms 96:7–13 NRSV)