Following Jesus

by Henri J. M. Nouwen

  Let me tell you another story:

  As I mentioned earlier, when I was in Peru the people I was staying with were very poor. They didn’t have anything. I slept on the roof because they didn’t have a room for me. They just put a bed up there. It never rains in Peru. There are always clouds, but it never rains. After several months of living there, I said to them, “I am going to leave next week.” They couldn’t have cared less because since I was still there I wasn’t leaving. It didn’t register. But finally on Saturday morning, I said, “I am leaving in an hour.” I had my suitcase and they saw that I was leaving. Because they loved me and I loved them, Sophia, the mother, gave little Johnny some money and he ran out to the store. It was noon and my bus was leaving in thirty minutes and I started to get nervous. But little Johnny came back and he had a big bottle of Coke and two cookies. He said, “We’ll have a party.” He filled the family’s one glass and took the glass to each person for a little sip. Then he broke the cookies into little pieces and shared them with everyone. Pablito, the boy of thirteen, said, “Let’s have a bit of music.” There was this old, cranky record player, I don’t know where it came from, but he said, “Let’s have some music,” and he made it go. He said, “Let’s dance!” It was twelve noon. I have to leave at 12:15 and we’re having this party. A little Coca-Cola, a little bit of cookie, and a little dancing. They were laughing and laughing and saying goodbye. Then they took my suitcase and everyone walked me to the bus. There was a big farewell and I realized that we had just celebrated the Eucharist.

  What a gift those people had to bring me in touch with joy. I was in touch with their poverty, their issues, their medical care. It was all very real and they needed a lot of help, but in the midst of it they remained joyful.

  Celebration doesn’t mean to celebrate only the good moments. Ecstatic joy embraces all of life and does not shy away from painful moments, departures, and even death. Death is celebrated not because it is desirable but because death has no final power over us. There is never a death that cannot bear fruit.

  We can celebrate pain not because pain is good but because we can pray with it and break bread together. Difficult moments can be lifted up. We lift them up in gratitude.

  Celebration is really an expression of gratitude. Death doesn’t have the final word. Even agony, pain, struggles, war, all of that, is somehow not the final power. God is a God of the living.

  “You shall have life and life abundantly.”

  For people with disabilities, life can be hard. Yet Jean Vanier and the people with disabilities always have something to celebrate. Their homes are filled with little candles, decorations, flowers, and song. There is never a day that isn’t lifted up in gratitude to the Giver of Life.

  The more we celebrate, the more we realize that we are in communion. To celebrate is to create community. It is the first sign of the Kingdom proclaimed among us. Celebration is the way in which faith in the God of Life is lived out, whether there are smiles or tears. Celebration reveals the deep undercurrent of joy that flows beneath all of our ups and downs.

  Jesus rewards us with joy. Not only later, but now. Not only in the happy moments but also in our sorrow. Joy is hidden in our suffering and revealed in our communal life.

  * * *

  —

  THERE IS ANOTHER aspect of following Jesus that might be a little hard to understand right away. Following Jesus does not just mean following Jesus who lived two thousand years ago. Some of us say, “I wish I could have lived then. It is too bad that it was two thousand years ago and I have to imagine Jesus. I have to fantasize about this man who lived so long ago, whom I never met. I will use my memory to follow this man, this Jesus of Nazareth. I will try to do what he told us to do then and apply it to our times now.”

  But following Jesus means much more than following a memory of someone. It is more than following someone we imagine, someone we dream about, someone we try to evoke with our imagination. Following Jesus means following the Risen Lord. Following Jesus means following the Lord who is the Lord of history, the Lord who is with us now and here, at this moment. It is not a sentimental memory. It is not a pious feeling about someone we hardly know. No. It is being guided by the One who is with us here and now. It is being led by the One who is really present among us as the Lord, who rose from the dead and became the Lord who embraces all people, in all times, and is therefore the Lord of the now, the present, the here.

  It is very important to understand this distinction.

  In my house I have an icon by Andrei Rublev that I found in Jerusalem. It is an icon of the Risen Lord. It is not just Jesus of Nazareth. It is the Risen Lord. The Lord who became flesh. The Lord who lived among us in Nazareth, in Bethlehem, and in Jerusalem but was raised up and was given a name, which is above all other names, so that in that name every knee would bow and would praise him as Lord.

  This icon has become the centerpiece of my little chapel at home. I want you to realize that the One you and I are called to follow is the Lord of history, the Risen Lord who is the Gate to Heaven, the Door to Eternal Life, who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, who is the only Son of God, full of majesty and glory, who is the Giver of abundant life, who is our Lord, always drawing us closer into the mystery of God’s life. He is not a cozy friend whom you have a chat with. That is not the spiritual life. He is the Lord who calls you into communion with God.

  If you look at the eyes of this icon, they are quite stern. But beyond those eyes lies the eternity of God’s love. It is not a Jesus that you walk around with to get where you are going. It is someone who leads you into the life eternal. By praying to the Lord of history, and by following the Lord of history, you will be drawn into that mystery of God’s eternal love. You will discover that if you pray with this icon, with this image, you will find that this is the Lord who is stern because he is the judge but also gentle because he is the compassionate Lord. He is the Lord who is full of love and calls you to that love. He is the Lord of truth and of beauty. You will discover that following Jesus is following the Lord who speaks to you day after day and calls you always to a deeper and deeper communion with God.

  Following Jesus is entering more and more into the intimate mystery of God. God became flesh so that we could be led through him, with him, and in him in the glory of God the Father in communion with the Spirit. The icon of the Risen Lord is a reminder of the great vocation that we all have—the vocation to grow closer to that great mystery.

  Lord Jesus,

  In the middle of busy work and many concerns I want to fix my eyes on you. You are the Lord, the Lord who calls me to your kingdom, the Lord who calls me to find rest with you, the Lord who calls me to conversion, to new life, to new hope. I am grateful, O Lord, that you call me here. Help me to be renewed so that through me many can be healed and find new life.

  AMEN

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE PROMISE

  “I Will Be with You Always”

  Jesus said to his disciples, “I must tell you the truth. It is for your own good that I am going, because unless I go the Advocate will not come to you. But if I do go I will send him to you. I shall ask the Father and he will give you the Spirit to be with you forever. The Spirit of Truth, whom the world can never receive since it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him because he is with you. He is in you.”

  JOHN 16:7–15

  He said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore, make disciples of all the nations; baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you. And know that I am with you always, yes, to the end of the time.”

  MATTHEW 28:18–20

  The first time that the Lord God reveals God’s name is when God speaks to Moses in the burning bush. God says, “My name is I AM
. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob” (Exodus 3:6). That means that when God reveals himself to his people, he reveals himself as the God with his people, because “I AM” literally means “I am the one who is with you.” It means “I AM the faithful God, the God who journeys with you,” “I am the God who comes to be with you and remain with you. I AM. I AM myself faithful to you.”

  The words “I AM” mean “the one who stays with you,” “the one who will not leave you alone,” “the one who will journey with you through the desert and help you find a new life.” God says, “I AM your companion, your fellow traveler, the God who loves you so much that I will be with you always. I will be a torch in the night so that you can find your way. I will be a cloud during the day so that you can travel to the promised land. I am your God who will never leave you alone, who will be with you so that you can find your way.”

  One of the most beautiful aspects of the Christian faith is that when Jesus appears, he appears as Emmanuel, as God-with-us. In Jesus, we realize how serious God is about his promise to be with us and to stay with us. In Jesus, the faithfulness of God becomes even more visible because in Jesus, God became flesh and dwelled among us. He pitched his tent among us. He lived among us. He did not want to keep any distance from us. He wanted to be one of us.

  God-with-us. Emmanuel.

  Jesus, therefore, reveals God as a God who wants to be even closer to his people than his people could ever possibly imagine. The great good news of the Gospel is precisely that God wants to be with us to share our struggle, walk our way, suffer our pain, and die our death, so that we are able to say, “There is nothing human that God does not share with us.” That is the great good news. God is with us in every aspect of our lives.

  There is one more mystery that we seldom fully grasp or even think about: Jesus is not the last word. There is something more. There is something that is an even greater way of being with us. Jesus says to us, “It is good for you that I leave, because when I leave I can send my Spirit and my Spirit will be able to dwell in you” (John 16:7). Here Jesus reveals to us that God wants to be with us in a way that is so intimate and so personal that we can say that God dwells in us, that God is most intimately in us. God-with-us is the God who travels with us in the Old Testament and the One who suffers with us. And God is also God-in-our-breath. We breathe the Spirit of God.

  What more intimate communion can you imagine than the breath? It is so intimate, so deep, that you don’t even reflect on it. You don’t say, “I am breathing well today.” You never say that, because it is so intimate, because your breathing is you. And it is that closeness that God chose so that God could become our breath. “Spirit,” pneuma, means breathing.

  Jesus says, “It is good for you that I go, so that I can send you my breath, so that you can breathe my life in you.” We start seeing what it means when Jesus finally says, “I will be with you always until the end of time.” He means, “I will be so intimately with you that you and I are one. You can breathe my breath and you can say, ‘Not I live anymore, but Christ lives in me.’ ”

  You and I are called to become other Christs, to be living manifestations of God in this world. God dwells in us in such an intimate way that we indeed are becoming manifestations of God’s glory in this world. That is the great mystery. That is the great promise. That is the promise of the Spirit.

  How Do We Respond to the Promise?

  When Jesus says, “I will be with you always,” we have to reflect what this presence really means and how it affects us. I want to say three things about it. First of all, I want to speak about the presence of God in absence. Second, I want to speak about the presence of God that creates in us a desire for the future and moves us forward. Finally, I want to speak about a presence that we can practice concretely in our daily life.

  Presence revealed through absence

  Sometimes a person can grow closer to us not only in her or his presence but also in her or his absence. We grow closer to one another not just by presence but also by absence, not only by coming but also by leaving. We grow more intimate by a constant leaving and returning.

  I want us to feel that for a moment, because that is how we might come in touch with the mystery of the spiritual life.

  Let me give you a few examples.

  When you leave your father and your mother, it is only after you have left your home, your family, that you can see your parents in a new way and experience a new intimacy with them.

  I experienced this in my own life. I grew up in Holland, and when I moved to the United States I had to leave my parents, but that absence made me come in touch with them in a new way. We felt a new intimacy, a new communion. It was as if I couldn’t see them when I was with them but needed some distance to recognize how much they loved me. Only by being away from them was I able to see their love clearly and profoundly. When I was home with them in the kitchen or the living room, it all seemed so ordinary, but when I took a step away, I saw something and felt something I hadn’t seen or felt before I left. My relationship with them deepened through absence.

  Let me give you another example.

  We visit somebody and we might have a rather normal conversation with the person, but what is so interesting is that often the memory of that visit is as powerful as the visit itself. The person who was sick might say, “I was sick and he came and visited me.” In the absence of the person who came to visit us, a gratitude, a love, can grow that wasn’t experienced in his or her presence. That is why it is important that we visit one another. Not because so much is happening in the visit but because the leaving might be as important as the being together. When we visit a sick friend we can say, “I can only be with you for an hour or two. I have other things to do. But it is good for you that I leave, because when I leave you might start thinking about this visit as something good for you. I might leave some of my spirit behind with you so that you know that while I am leaving I am also sending something new.” Many of us have had this experience. When a person leaves us we realize how much we are loved by that person. We might not be able to express that in his or her presence, but we can experience it. We can feel that in his or her absence.

  Or take another example: letter writing.

  Don’t you think that in written words we can say things that we could never say face-to-face? We need a little absence to reflect on the person, and then we can sit down and write, “I love you. You mean a lot to me. I care a lot for you.” We wouldn’t be able to say it in the presence of that person because it sounds a little embarrassing, a little difficult, a little too direct. But when we have taken a little distance we can write, “I am thinking about you. I am so grateful that I know you. I want you to know that I care for you.” We realize that while we write the letter an intimacy grows in us. The person who is absent grows more intimately in our heart and we feel in communion with that person as though that person’s spirit lives in us. There is a new intimacy there that is only possible in absence, with distance. It creates a desire to see that person again. Without absence the desire might not be that strong.

  Perhaps the most profound example of presence in absence is our death and the death of those we love. I believe we can grow in love with people who have left us through death. We only know each other partially in life but as people of faith we come to know each other in a new way through death.

  Somehow we have to dare to say, “Brother, sister, it is good for you that I leave, that I die, because when I am dead you will discover me in a new way. When I die I will become present to you in a new way.” I am sure many of you have lost parents, children, or friends. Some of you might recognize that a new intimacy can grow in you with those who have died. Their memory becomes a real, active presence in your life.

  We might discover that all those people who have died in our life have taken up a place in our heart and keep nurturing us. They keep leading us along
, they keep deepening our lives. This is a great mystery. It is a mystery that Jesus reveals to us in the most fulsome way. He says, “It is good for you that I am going, because if I do not leave I cannot send my Spirit. When I leave, I will send you my Spirit and my Spirit will lead you to the full truth” (John 16:7).

  The word “truth” doesn’t mean doctrine or dogma, but a full “betrothal” relationship (“troth” means truth). “I give you intimacy. My Spirit will lead you to the full betrothal with God and only my leaving will make that possible.” The death of Jesus is a death that is for our good, so that the Spirit of Jesus can lead us to that most intimate communion with God.

  Jesus’ leaving was good. He could not be understood in his lifetime. His disciples did not understand him. The disciples didn’t know what Jesus was talking about. All the way to the end, to the death of Christ, they ran away. On the mount of ascension they still doubted it. They said, “Well, weren’t you supposed to restore Israel to power?” “Weren’t you supposed to throw the Romans out?” “Weren’t you supposed to fix the political situation here?” They didn’t know.

  They didn’t know when Jesus said, “This is my body. This is my blood.” They didn’t understand when he said, “I am the life. I am the resurrection. I am the Door. I am the Truth.” They had inklings, but they kept translating it to fit their own limited perspectives.

  But Jesus kept saying, “I am telling you now so that later you will understand. I tell you these things now because when I am gone you will know what I am talking about. You will know because I will send my Spirit and my Spirit will reveal to you everything I have taught you. All I learned from my Father, the Spirit will teach you.”

  It is so important for us to realize that Jesus had to leave for us to understand who Jesus truly was. The disciples were confused. But Jesus said, “Don’t go out. Don’t start doing things. Just wait until the Spirit comes.”