The weight of years

 The Book of Jeremiah is heavy. Long and exceedingly gloomy. One disaster follows another in the prophet’s personal life: called in his youth to a task he felt totally inadequate for, he went out and preached Bad News to the nations and, for all his work, ended up dying exiled in Egypt. Not to mention that his mission was a failure. He persisted in obedience to God (and was, in that sense, deeply successful) but no one repented and the prophesied disasters took place.

Jeremiah warns the people of Jerusalem that unless they repent of their idolatrous ways, the wrath of the Lord will be poured out on “the children in the street and on the young men gathered together; both husband and wife will be caught in it, and the old, those weighed down with years” (6:11). At this point I want to leave behind the gloomy prophet and focus on his definition of old people: “those weighed down with years.”

Talk about heavy! And yet this may not be an exaggeration.

In this retirement community, the older people get, the more they tend to walk with a stoop, as if some vast heaviness is sitting on their shoulders. Walking sticks, canes, walkers, and, in time wheel chairs mark the movement from one stage to another.

The aging body testifies to weight in other ways, with sagging muscles and a spreading out in a strange redistribution of mass. It’s definitely harder to lose weight, diet and exercise aside. And, on the other end of the weight spectrum, many people lose too much weight as they approach the end of life. Loss of appetite and zero energy level aren’t states-of-being any of us look forward to.

The years can weigh us down ways that affect more than the body. Regrets, past traumas, unhealed relationships—these touch most of us from time to time in the journey that is aging. Many people achieve maturity and manage to face the past and move on. Other people live in this dark place, and that is heavy, indeed.

The word weight has other meanings, of course. One is denominational. In my family of faith we have the term weighty Friend. It’s an old term, not used as much in these days. I wish it were; it always makes me smile, in spite of the gravitas it carries. I think, “Fat Old Quaker.” Seriously, it refers to older respected Friends who have proven themselves trust-worthy over time. Their words carry weight and people take them very seriously.

And then we have the association of weight with glory. C.S. Lewis wrote a marvelous essay entitled, “The Weight of Glory,” coming from what St. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 4:16-17: “Even though our outward [being] is perishing, yet the inward [person] is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” Lewis sees the weight of glory as something we shall attain in the presence of God. Glory means “acceptance by God, response, acknowledgment, and welcome into the heart of God.” It also means “brightness, splendour, luminosity.” It’s a golden glory, and gold is the heaviest metal. Yet our transformed bodies will be able to bear the weight of all this glory. That’s certainly something to look forward to, no matter what is going on in our current aging bodies.

I imagine it could make even Jeremiah smile.