Heaven Help Us All
by Carl Mazza

Heaven Help Us All
(a song by Stevie Wonder)

Heaven help the child who never had a home.
Heaven help the girl who walks the streets alone.
Heaven help the roses if the bombs begin to fall.
Heaven help us all.

Heaven help the black man as he struggles
one more day.
Heaven help the white man
if he turns his back away.
Heaven help the man who kicks the man
who has to crawl.
Heaven help us all.

Heaven help the boy who won't reach twenty-one.
Heaven help the man who gave that boy a gun.
Heaven help the people with their backs against the wall.
Heaven help us all.

Now I lay me down
before I go to sleep.
In the troubled world
I pray the Lord to keep.
Keep hatred from the mighty and the mighty
from the small.
Heaven help us all.

Heaven help us all,
heaven help us all.
Heaven help us Lord,
hear our call.
Heaven help us all.

When Meeting Ground founded Friendship House in Wilmington, DE in 1985 as a thrift store and help center for homeless persons, a sign was hung on the wall with the words of the song Heaven Help Us All by Stevie Wonder:

The original sign now hangs in our chapel at Clairvaux Farm. I have always thought about those words, how true they are. On Easter day I was forcefully reminded of this, and how we are all indeed bystanders when the power of heaven takes over.

That afternoon I bore witness to a true resurrection. I was surprised by it, probably not unlike the great resurrection morning so long ago. I don't think the friends of Jesus were expecting the burst of new life which came so unexpectedly out of absolute, utter death. The very stark contrast of one against the other completely dazzled them.

My encounter came in a most ordinary way. On Easter Sunday we had many visitors at Clairvaux Farm. Former volunteers, residents, families with children returned for the day - a wonderful, sunny day. We had a full chapel and an even more full dining hall afterward! The dinner which Pat and Barb made was festive, abundant for everyone. Children laughed and played with their new Easter baskets among many adults who expressed a lot of satisfaction over being part of such a large, extended family.

It was during a quiet moment after dinner that I spoke with Janice. Almost a year had passed since the last time I saw her. She was struggling mightily at that time, desperately and painfully trying to break off one of the most abusive relationships I had ever known. Her mental and emotional state, already fragile and tenuous, were being pushed and manipulated into the kind of turmoil which leads to total despair. Janice was locked in a spiral circling ever and more deeply downward - we feared for her life.

My last former memories of her were a combination of running off alone down a country road late at night, aching and begging for help, she didn't even know what. At the same time, watching an ambulance take her away, and knowing she would not stay anywhere long - the dangerous streets and the cold world would soon consume her. Yet, here - scarcely a year later - we shared and talked quietly. On this special day, she said, she wanted to return to Clairvaux Farm, the place where she felt her healing had begun.

I listened to Janice's story with much happiness, satisfaction, and wonder. My expectation for her future had been nil. In fact, I feared the worst. Rather, her story was one of blossoming and transformation. She is now living in her own apartment, has regained the custody of her son, drives her own car, and has a good job at a bank. I could make no connection between her former experience as part of the Meeting Ground community and her highly successful transition to a fresh new life. There seemed to be no outward cause and effect, no apparent reason for the dramatic change. What had happened to her in the ensuing months since she had left us? How had she, nearly dead, returned with such power into living?

In this, perhaps, is the true mystery which is at the heart of resurrection. There is no simple explanation. The power and cause of the renewal of life-energy is deeply within, waiting to burst out in dramatic, often unexpected ways. When Janice described her renewal as having begun at Clairvaux Farm, it sounded good to hear - but she was not saying that either Clairvaux Farm or the community of Meeting Ground had accomplished it. Her resurrection began within her, in the tomb of her soul, and in an amazing meeting with the God of all living. Perhaps our community is honored to have provided a bit of the space and time for this to happen, to have been part of the occasion of the event.

It is now our time to plant at Clairvaux Farm. As I write this, many volunteers are hard at work turning up the soil in the garden and carefully nurturing seedlings in the greenhouse. It is hard work at first, the ground is resistant to being tilled, and muscles are still relaxed from a long winter. A lot of energy is going into this work, looking down the road to a good harvest in a few months.

Yet, we can take no credit for the mystery of new birth for which we are so intent in preparing. We did not invent the seed, nor can we even begin to understand the process of birth and life which comes from it. Preparing the soil, and providing the occasion are one thing - the miracle of resurrection is another. As it is written: So neither he who plants nor she who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.

We are humbled by true perspective. As hard as we work, in the end we can only stand aside and watch the great creative work of the Spirit. Nevertheless, we can be vigilant so this incredible call never becomes commonplace, and that it ever renews our faith in the power and endurance of the great love within us all. And we can bear witness: Though the very light around us seems like darkness sometimes, and our prejudice has forced us into a cave of despair and unbelief - yet we can never be driven so far from our true selves.

It can give us some hope to know this. The life of our community can grow very tired and weary, and we lament the exhaustion of hard toil in the resistant soil of everyday life - our soul's muscles aching for retreat. Yet there is this one amazing thought: At the core of all we do is a power so great, and light so bright, that everything in heaven and earth moves at its behest. It is indeed our help.