leaving

Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
John 19:25-27

Jesus knew the pain and the promise of leaving. He had to look down from the cross, bloodied and beaten, and He had to see the pain of His grieving mother. He knew He had to leave her. He had to go. Knowing He couldn’t stay, Jesus asked His best friend John to step in as His mother’s son.

There was tremendous pain in leaving for Jesus. Yet, there was also incredible promise. Jesus, Himself, said to His disciples:

But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.
John 16;7

It was good that He was going away and returning to the Father because the Holy Spirit could then come and do what Jesus could not do. The Holy Spirit could fill every believer and fill the whole world with the Presence and power of God.

Leaving the people we love, leaving the things we love, leaving the places we love is painful. Yet, there is promise in the pain.

The apostle Paul knew the pain and promise of leaving. On his way to Jerusalem, not knowing what would happen to him there, he stopped by the region of Ephesus to say goodbye to his close friends.

Paul sent to Ephesus for the elders of the church. When they arrived, he said to them: “You know how I lived the whole time I was with you,from the first day I came into the province of Asia. I served the Lord with great humility and with tears and in the midst of severe testing by the plots of my Jewish opponents…And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there…

When Paul had finished speaking, he knelt down with all of them and prayed. They all wept as they embraced him and kissed him. What grieved them most was his statement that they would never see his face again. Then they accompanied him to the ship.
Acts 20:17-22, 36-38

Paul knew he had to go, but it was painful to leave. God had called him to step into the unknown and face an uncertain future. And God had called the elders at Ephesus to stay and step into their own unknown and uncertain future.

There is pain and promise in leaving. The pain is the loss. The promise is that there is a stripping away, a disentangling, that happens which opens new doors and new possibilities. This combination of pain and promise, shedding and possibility, is perfectly articulated by the author of Hebrews.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Hebrews 12:1-3

In the midst of leaving, it is easy for the person leaving and the person staying to grow weary and lose heart. Yet, if we can embrace the pain of leaving we might also be able to embrace the promise. In the leaving a disentanglement happens that allows us to run the race that was marked out for us. We have a race marked out for us that is unique to us, unique to our life. And so we keep our eyes on Jesus in the leaving, remembering that He endured the pain of leaving as He went to the cross. He endured this pain for the joy set before Him. The joy came from the promise on the other side of the pain. We must keep our eyes on Him so that we don’t grow weary and lose heart.

Leaving is painful. Leaving is full of promise. It’s both.

Leaving is loss. Leaving is a shedding that opens new possibilities. It’s both.

Let us grieve the pain of leaving, and, somehow, through the tears, open our eyes to the future we couldn’t see before.

But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.”
Ruth 1:16

These are the profound and powerful words from Ruth to her mother-in-law Naomi. Naomi had lost everything. Her husband and two sons died. She was too old to remarry but she wanted to give her two daughters-in-law a chance for a new life. So Naomi released both of them to return to their homeland to find a new husband and a new life.

Ruth refused. She was going to faithfully stay by Naomi’s side to the very end.

God draws near to those who have this same attitude about Him. When we are willing to say to God, “Where You go, I’ll go” and “where You stay, I will stay,” God can use us powerfully.

For some, saying that we’ll go wherever God wants us to go is the more difficult challenge. It could mean uprooting one’s family, work, friends, home and life in general. For others, saying that we’ll stay wherever God wants us to stay is the more difficult challenge. Sometimes, being the one to stay and faithfully invest in one place while you watch others leave can be really painful.

Whether we are going or staying, in the end, it’s not really about us. It is about staying connected to the One who is asking us to go or asking us to stay. For Ruth, it wasn’t about where Naomi went, it was about staying connected to Naomi. We see Moses say the same thing to God.

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Leave this place, you and the people you brought up out of Egypt, and go up to the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’…But I will not go with you, because you are a stiff-necked people and I might destroy you on the way.”
Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.”
Exodus 33:1-2, 15

Moses didn’t want to go if God wasn’t with him. For Moses, it was more about connection and intimacy with God than it was about the fulfillment of the Promised Land.

Is that true of us and God? Are we willing to say, “God, where you go I’ll go, and where you stay I’ll stay.” And also, “If your Presence does not go with me, do not send me away from here.”

Here is a worship song that expresses this same theme:

Tag: leaving

Where You go I will go