'Today you will be with me in paradise' by Kendra Jackson [Retrieve Lament 2021]
I’ve had the privilege of knowing today’s guest her entire life. She’s one of my dearest friends who also happens to be my daughter. As I’ve watched Kendra navigate life in the decade between high school, college, work, and marriage, I'm in awe of the ways she not only chooses to live but flourishes in the tension of the world’s beauty and suffering. Nothing bears witness to her strength more than her choice to stay present to Christ’s family at deep, relational cost. In today’s lament, Kendra communicates complex truths about God, herself, and others in a profound and beautifully nuanced way.
Would you read Kendra's story with me, and listen with an open heart for any words Christ might be speaking to you?
Kenya, summer 2016 (Kendra Jackson)
“One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: ‘Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!’
But the other criminal rebuked him. ‘Don’t you fear God’, he said, ‘since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.’
Then he said, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’
Jesus answered him, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.’”
Retrieve Lament
by Kendra Jackson
I am sitting with the reality that I haven’t left the church, and I think I probably never will. Even though I would be in good company if I did: many people my age have left the church, with valid reasons. Often I wonder if I will be the last one standing. Not in a prideful way. In a terrified way.
This lament is in no way meant to speculate on anyone’s good favor with Jesus or their place in the Kingdom of Heaven. After all, only Jesus himself has the authority to say “you will be with me in paradise.” I’m not here to condemn anyone for their choice to leave the church. I am retrieving lament in my choice to stay.
I am grappling, constantly, with my choice to remain. We as Christians can be quick to praise young people for sticking with the church and to disparage young people who leave the church (not accounting for the weight of a decision to leave something you’ve known your whole life). I don’t want praise. Honestly, I don’t, because most of the time I feel like a coward. I want to stand against the harm the church is causing, while still receiving the fruit that it bears for me personally. I know there can be bravery in standing in the middle if you truly believe that it’s what’s right. But there is also deep loneliness there.
I experienced deep loneliness for the first time when my family moved across the country the summer before my sophomore year of high school. I have been running from any whiff of that same loneliness ever since. I’m not usually one that runs away from strong feelings, but loneliness isn’t really a feeling. It’s a reality, an experience. It’s a chasm.
Here I am now, standing in the middle, in a lonely chasm yet again. Where I feel like I can’t fully stand for the church and can’t abandon it either. And with that loneliness for me comes anger. Anger that Jesus has not thrust schemers, liars, murderers out of his church, and that each of my friends is going instead. That people I came up with within the church are leaving it, with what I honestly feel like are valid reasons. And that I cannot follow.
I was recently invited into the practice of writing a personal Psalm of Lament. No holding back, just an honest cry to the Lord.
Here is an excerpt:
“Father, just tell me that I am righteous!
Just tell me I am doing the right thing!
And tell everyone else I am doing the right thing.
Because now I am alone. All alone.
How am I alone again?
Again?
But now, I am not alone in spite of you.
I am alone because of you.
You are here for me.
But where are you for everyone else?”
In the middle, in the chasm, left behind. Identifying with both sides, unable to fully support either. Honestly, this often leaves me with no heroes other than Jesus. The One who stays with me. The One who is acquainted with all the pain in the world. The fully compassionate One. The One who comforts me even as I am spitting anger at him. I think of this exchange in John 6: “So Jesus said to the Twelve, ‘Do you want to go away [from me] as well?’ Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.’”
Where else would I go?
I can’t state enough that I understand the choice to leave the church, even while still loving Jesus. But that isn’t my path. I’m coming to terms with that.
The rest of my Psalm of Lament goes like this:
“Jesus was alone because of you.
Usually I am supposed to feel lucky when I can identify with Him.
But right now, I don’t.
I just feel alone.
But I will not leave you.
Where else would I go?
I will cling to you, again.
Again.
I will not go.
But Jesus, my brother, how do I stay?”
Kendra Jackson is wife to Jordan and friend of Juliet, her dog. She works for a non-profit in Bridgeport, CT where she helps high schoolers plan for post-secondary education and their future careers. She is deeply committed to her people and to feeling the full range of the emotional life, including lament.
Pray and Read
The Second Word: Today you will be with me in Paradise. (Hodie mecum eris in Paradiso.)*
I love the Lord, because he has heard the voice of my supplication,*
because he has inclined his ear to me whenever I called upon him.
The cords of death entangled me; the grip of the grave took hold of me;*
I came to grief and sorrow.
Then I called upon the Name of the Lord:*
“O Lord, I pray you, save my life.”
Gracious is the Lord and righteous;*
our God is full of compassion.
I will walk in the presence of the Lord *
in the land of the living.
--Psalm 116:1-4,8
One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, “Are you the Christ? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation: And we indeed justly; for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” [Luke 23:39-43]
O Master, Lord Jesus Christ our God, You made a way into Paradise for the penitent thief, and by death destroyed death: Cleanse us, your unworthy servants, for we fall into sin continuously and are not worthy to lift up our eyes and look upon the heights of heaven. Forgive us for departing from the path of righteousness and following the desires of our own hearts. [From the Prayers of the Ninth Hour of the Orthodox Office]