Window in the Skies by U2

Reflection

What is Easter in a picture? As I sort the catalogue of images in my life searching for the perfect snapshot, I don’t have to search long. It’s a dusty little clinic in South Africa. Our hosts explained to us as we waited outside the gates that this is where AIDS patients came to die. There was a heaviness in the air - in our chests. The sky was dark gray with storm clouds threatening. What were we doing here? We were all thinking the same thing. What right did we have to come to this place for an hour or so and even attempt to offer kindness to these people?

It had also been explained to us that the area we were in was a place of spiritual darkness. I have developed a gag reflex for over-spiritualizing things, but I can say for sure that this place did not seem to offer a lot of hope. As we walked into the clinic, we were greeted with weary faces - and I felt like a trespasser. For most of my life I had believed that the hope that Jesus offers can cut through the worse situations life has to offer. And then I started going to places where little girls were trafficked, babies dying of malnutrition was commonplace, and commuters stepped over dead bodies on the sidewalk.

In that moment at the clinic, with dim lightbulbs barely holding off the darkness of the storm brewing outside - I was seriously doubting that we could offer anything meaningful to the people we came to see. We were asked to pray over a group of women and, not so deep inside, I was struggling to muster words. But prayers were prayed and something beautiful happened. Light started to flood the room through the windows - the storm clouds literally parted.

To every broken heart
For every heart that cries
Love left a window in the skies

These words perfectly capture that moment. Remember my gag reflex to over-spiritualizing things? Well, I know that in that moment God was demonstrating his love - beyond a shadow of a doubt. Put another way, I don’t think that the weather man was forecasting a break in the weather that day. Love left a window in the skies - God was making himself known. The mood changed - faces brightened. The heaviness in our chests shifted from burden to gratefulness and for the next 45 minutes we smiled and laughed with our new friends.

That’s what Easter is to me - it’s the clouds of uncertainty, despair, and lethargy opening up to reveal something good, healing, and lighthearted.

The shackles are undone
The bullets quit the gun
The heat that's in the sun
Will keep us when there's none
The rule has been disproved
The stone it has been moved
The grave is now a groove
All debts are removed

The whimsical nature of this song captures the joy of resurrected Jesus perfectly. I need more of that in my life. That day in the dusty little clinic I experienced Easter. I know that the patients there went on to difficult days and I went on to be distracted all over again by the cares of this world. But over and over again throughout my life the clouds have opened up and I am reminded of what took place at that dusty little tomb. And the implications of that in my life are staggering. It makes me want to listen to the chorus of this song over and over again on repeat:

Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
What it's doing to me?

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Lyrics

The shackles are undone
The bullets quit the gun
The heat that's in the sun
Will keep us when there's none
The rule has been disproved
The stone it has been moved
The grave is now a groove
All debts are removed

Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
What it's doing to me?

Love makes strange enemies
Makes love where love may please
The soul and its striptease
Hate brought to its knees
The sky over our head
We can reach it from our bed
You let me in your heart
And out of my head, head

Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
What it's doing to me?

Oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Please don't ever let me out of you

I've got no shame, oh no, oh no

Oh can't you see what love has done?
Oh can't you see?
Oh can't you see what love has done?
What it's doing to me?

I know I hurt you and I made you cry
Did everything but murder you and I
But love left a window in the skies
And to love I rhapsodize
To every broken heart
For every heart that cries
Love left a window in the skies
And to love I rhapsodize