String Too Short to be Saved

       

     Donald Hall, the poet laureate of New Hampshire, went into his grandfather’s attic one day. Some people are keepers, and some are throwers, and Hall’s grandfather was most definitely a keeper. One of the many boxes in the attic was filled with short pieces of string, and bore the hand-lettered label, “STRING TOO SHORT TO BE SAVED.” Hall later wrote a poem, which states the obvious, that his grandfather saved the string that was too short to be saved.

          Maybe you know what it feels like to be, in your own way, a piece of string too short to be saved.

          Because even with all the emphasis over the past decades on boosting self-esteem, on feeling good about ourselves, I think that deep down we realize that we really just don’t measure up, because we continually finds ways to fall short of living as we know we ought to live.

          The church has a word for that failing to live as we ought to live: sin.

          I think, deep down, we all know the power of sin in our lives. It is not just “out there”, where it is easy to see and label, but it is in here, in me, in you, and it is among us. It is in here, in each of us personally, and it is among us as well, a force and power that infects our institutions and social organizations.

          And we know how impossible it is, really, to ever totally reform and put sin behind us. No matter how many times we resolve not to do it,

we blow up at the kids,

or succumb to road rage,

or refuse to forgive an old slight,

or grudgingly put up with the abuse,

or say to ourselves for the millionth time that I or my needs are not that important,

or give in to the fear which makes us grasp tightly onto our possessions, as if they could save us.

          If you’ve ever felt that you are string too short to be saved, Paul the Apostle’s words for us are bound to be good news for you. “There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.” (Romans 8:1-11)

          God has saved us all – it has happened already, it has already been done, it is not something that you have to wait for – God has saved us all in that great attic. Nothing is ever lost to God.

Not the boy who stepped in front of the train.

Not the spouse that cheated and abandoned their family.

Not the solider who went over the line in combat.

Not the young woman struck down by cancer.

Not the child hurt by the trusted adult; not the adult who hurt the child.

Not even me – and not even you.

We will each appear to be string too short to be saved – and our God will judge us -- and yet God will not be frustrated, and will save us still, will not condemn us. God accepts the unacceptable. God loves the unlovely. With arms wide open, God welcomes you just as you are. You have been set free from the law of sin and death, you have received within you the Spirit of the one who was raised from death by God, so that you, also, might rise to new life through the in-dwelling of Christ.

          A string too short you might think you are, but you can live in the knowledge that you are worthy of storage in God’s spacious attic, where you shall be knotted together forever with all the other too short strings into a seamless tapestry, one with its creator.

So as the Thanksgiving holiday nears we can indeed say, "Thanks be to God!"