O Captain, my Captain!

August 17, 2014

Genesis 45:1-15

 

In the wake of the news about Robin Williams’ death, Holden and I re-watched Dead Poets’ Society this weekend.  I loved the movie as a teenager when I watched it in the theater.  I was the same age as those young men in the movie, struggling with the same age-old questions of what and who to be, how to be in relationship with my parents and my peers.  Right along with the teenagers on the screen I was not only riveted by the poetry I heard recited with such fervor, but also convinced that I too could seize the day (carpe diem!) and maybe one day even “contribute a verse to the powerful play,” as Robin Williams’ character, Professor Keating, puts it. 

And again this time around, now closer to Robin Williams’ age in the movie, I was spellbound as he looked into the eyes of his students and saw not their stubbornness or meekness or mundaneness or ego, but the uniqueness and possibility teeming within them.  He gently chided the boy who wrote “The cat sat on the mat” for his poetry assignment, urging him not to be ordinary.  He almost danced with the shy and tongue-tied character played by Ethan Hawke as he steadily led him to his inner poet.  And even though he couldn’t save the tragic character of Neil, whose suicide in the movie now feels like a terrible omen, he lovingly opened and applauded the passion within him and gave him a glimpse of beauty and freedom.

Professor Keating - O Captain my Captain – he didn’t tell those boys what to do or be.  He didn’t berate them for what they didn’t or couldn’t do.  He saw them, truly saw them, as unique and full of potential.  And he invited them to become something worth being, something extraordinary, even while everything else in their world was trying to push them into correct and conforming boxes.  He opened the door for each one of them to become a new creation.  And you could see the light in their eyes that resulted from being treated this way; you could feel the joy in their heart as they strove towards the new possibility of being.

Maybe Joseph plays a similar role in our story today for his brothers.

            Before where we come in, Joseph’s brothers have done unspeakably horrible things to Joseph.  Mocked and belittled him, planned to kill him, thrown him into a deep hole, and sold him into slavery.  There was no reason to think they were capable of kindness or generosity or love.  And they probably couldn’t imagine for themselves a world where they did not carry that heavy load of guilt.

            You can imagine many ways this story could have ended.  Joseph was Pharoah’s right hand man now.  He could have ordered his brothers killed, jailed or enslaved in retribution for what they’d done to him.  He could have refused to give them the food they were so desperately seeking.  He could have humiliated them, demanding drawn out apologies and recompense.

            But instead, he weeps and reveals himself to his brothers, enveloping them in his embrace.  He looks past what they’d done to how God had used their behavior for good: "I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life.  God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God.”

            Not only has Joseph forgiven his brothers for the pain they caused him, he assumes they too are part of God’s plan.  He welcomes them into his world and creates the possibility of a new future for them as well.  But the new future that opens for them isn’t just the food and sustenance they need to survive.  It is the possibility of change, a new way of seeing themselves, healed relationships. 

            At the heart of Christianity is an invitation to become more completely the unique person God has created each one of us to be.  God invites us into change (“conversion” in church speak).  We are invited to change our way of looking at the world and our way of living in it. 

But we rarely do it alone.  Usually there are people all along our way that help with our progress by imagining for us more than we can on our own.  People that can free us from the boxes that we build for ourselves or are pushed into by the world, and enable us to step into a new way of being. 

I wonder who those people have been in your life? 

Robin Williams gave a gift to a generation of movie-goers by inspiring us beyond ourselves.  I wish that there had been someone who was able to hold open that door of possibility and new life when all seemed hopeless for him.  I’m sure there were many who tried, many who longed to.   But I’m guessing he felt a lot like Neil’s character in the movie, trapped.  Neil was trapped by a demanding and emotionally abusive father.  Robin Williams was trapped, it seems, by depression and a chronic disease.

His death makes me wonder how we can better be on the lookout for times when we can be those agents of change.  How can we look at the people around us with new eyes?  Not dreading the worst, but imagining the best, looking for the promise in one another, opening the door to growth and new possibility?

Maybe it is by offering unconditional love to a child struggling with feelings of inadequacy.  By understanding a teenager swimming in a sea of pressure.  By giving a kind word to a co-worker who feels alone.  By re-engaging with a spouse that longs to be noticed again.  By sitting with someone reeling from a loss.  By encouraging a friend who feels stuck.

Imagine what the world might look like if we all saw ourselves as part of God’s plan and looked for ways to invite others into that new reality?  What verses might we yet contribute to the powerful play?