1 Thessalonians 2:17-3:13

Worship Guide

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We are nearing the end of the third week of Shelter-in-Place with at least another four weeks to go. We feel the physical absence of family and friends, of teachers and students, of classmates and playmates, of work colleagues. Modern technology allows us to stay connected, but we miss physical presence. We look forward to the day when we can see one another face-to-face in the flesh, not just on Zoom or one of the other video conference or video chat services. We look forward to the Sunday when we can once again assemble together for a service, for the church is a gathered people. We’re experiencing Absence and yearning for Presence.

I know that some of you are experiencing too much Presence. Your kids are all home. Excessive Presence is provoking family tensions. You’re looking forward to some Absence. This is a difficult time for all.

Presence and Absence are poignant realities for me. At the age of 5 I went to boarding school in Malaysia far from my parents who were missionaries in Thailand. It took several days to get there. From our house in rural Thailand, it was a two-hour bus ride to the train station, then a several-hour train ride to Bangkok, where families gathered from all over Thailand. Then we would say goodbye to our parents and younger siblings. I can’t imagine what this was like for them; the pain of sending their young children away for many months. Next came a 28-hour train ride down to Malaysia, changing to a local Malay train for several more hours, and a two hour bus ride into the mountains. Finally we arrived at our mission school in a jungle clearing at 5000 feet. We would be absent from our parents for four months, then make the long trip home again. This trip was much easier because we were all excited that we were going to see our parents again. We were journeying from Absence to Presence. But after two months home we would make the sad journey back from Presence to Absence—a whole railway carriage full of homesick children who were not going to see their parents again for four months.

At ten I started boarding school in England and the Absence intensified. I was at a boys school, my sisters at a distant girls school. During the holidays we lived in a hostel, but that wasn’t really home. It was some twenty teenagers all away from their parents. Plane travel was just becoming cheap enough that we could see our parents in the summer, though sometimes this was one parent coming to the UK. This resulted once in a two-year absence from our mother. Again, I can’t imagine the pain of these absences for our parents. My sisters and I were fortunate. Thanks to the astonishing generosity of some people we saw our parents more than some of our friends who had multiple two-year absences. Those just a few years older had three- and four-year absences.

My parents bridged the absence by writing letters every week. Since my absence continued the rest of their lives, they wrote me for over forty years. These letters conveyed their presence. And my father sent me books every birthday and Christmas: mostly books about Biblical studies which had benefited him and which then benefited me. These too conveyed his presence and helped shape me.

In nearly forty years in Thailand they never had a phone, though the last two years in Bangkok they lived next door to a house with a phone. So the one time I called was when Sue and I got engaged; I called next door and they were fetched to the phone. But my sisters and I got married on three different continents, so we were not all able to be present at each others’ weddings. So Presence and Absence have been a reality for me not just these past three weeks but throughout my life.

Presence and Absence were also poignant realities for Paul. He, Silas and Timothy had to leave Thessalonica at short notice at night. Then Paul had to leave Berea quickly, leaving behind Silas and Timothy. Th