He doesn’t know.

You know the answer. You want him to know the answer. You know it will help. You know it’s the only thing that will help.

We look around at this crumbling world and we see the hopelessness. Families are pasted together, trying to ignore the tears and scars that will not heal. Boys are lost, scared, and alone among a people that could care for them and teach them, but won’t. Girls are pushed out to search out every dangerous corner on their own, unprotected, unloved, unknown. The humans around us look strong and proud, but their words reveal a decaying corpse balanced on its last breath.

But you know the answer.

When you look at this crumbling world, you hear the hope through the shadows. Broken relationships, sin addicts, a hidden zombie apocalypse wandering the earth. Boys, girls, men, women, trudging on the surface of the greater story beneath their tired feet. A creation that is so close to death, at the same time so close to the only thing that endures.

And you want him to know the answer.

You want him to look down into the dirt and know that there is a new creation coming. You want him to feel the despair and long for the day when his tears will be no more. You want him to stop lying to himself, embrace the raw truth, and trust in a savior. You want him to know that there is a real answer to the unrest, anger, and shame.

You know it will help.

Because the world trusts in the passing dying vapors. The hopeless people cling to shimmering phantoms that cannot last. He is tossed by his every striving after the wind, and yet you have held on to him for this moment. Even now he is beaten up by the storms, and is barley hanging on. You want him to see where you are rooted. You want him to be stand firm, straight, and strong through the changing seasons.

You know it’s the only thing that will help.

Christ has planted you into eternity. Right now, today, you are forgiven and free. You are a saint of God in the face of your own sin and in this crumbling world. You are the hands of God to those around you, even as imperfect as your hands are, and as messy as this life is. Boldly you can say things to this world about yourself, confident in the face of shame and death, because in Christ there is nothing to fear. But how will any of this help him?

Tell him.

Words of reality, words of forgiveness, words that will last. That is how the Spirit causes him to trust. Words of graciousness, words of sacrifice. That is how a Savior entered into the shadows. Words of death, words of resurrection. That is how God sent his only begotten Son. To you, and to him.