I was reading this post by Doug McKelvey and the comments at The Rabbit Room about the depiction of grace in literature and art, and it led my thinking in a different direction. I started thinking not about grace, but about tragedy and the rejection of grace, redemption, and relationship. I began to think of all the stories, songs, and poetry that make me cry, that draw out my emotional response. Most of them have the theme of redemption not accepted, not pursued, or not completed.

I learned a long time ago that a classic dramatic tragedy ends with the hero’s death, usually as the result of some fatal flaw in his character. A comedy, however, ends with a wedding mirroring the marriage feast of the Lamb and the redemptive, resurrection reuniting of Christ with His church. In the marriage feast, all of the errors and mistakes and even sins of the characters are seen as comedy, errors that lead eventually (by the grace of God) to reconciliation and true relationship. Really, though, a story that ends in the death of the hero (and usually others) can be just a beginning, a first installment, that will ultimately end in resurrection. Or it can be a “too late” story in which the hero dies unredeemed and unrepentant. And a tragedy can end, not with literal death, but with the death of a relationship in a way that shows that it’s too late to resurrect or redeem the relationship. The latter story makes for the most heart-breaking ending. Truth is that it can be too late, too late to get forgiveness, too late to resurrect a broken life or a broken relationship, too late to live. And that is the essence of hell and tragedy.

Some examples of too-lateness that make me want to cry:

“–I see only one hope for our country, and that is when white men and black men, desiring neither power nor money, but desiring only the good of their country, come together to work for it.
He was grave and silent, and then he said sombrely, I have only one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving, they will find that we are turned to hating.”
~Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton

“Scarlett, I was never one to patiently pick up broken fragments and glue them together and tell myself that the mended whole was as good as new. What is broken is broken and I’d rather remember it as it was at its best than mend it and see the broken pieces as long as I lived. . . . I wish I could care what you do or where you go but I can’t. . . My dear, I don’t give a damn.” ~Rhett Butler in Gone With the WInd

Saddest movie. No one dies, but the movie is all about the death of relationship.

The king asked the Cushite, “Is the young man Absalom safe?”
The Cushite replied, “May the enemies of my lord the king and all who rise up to harm you be like that young man.”
The king was shaken. He went up to the room over the gateway and wept. As he went, he said: “O my son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you! O Absalom, my son, my son!”
~2 Samuel 18:32-33 (Saddest story in the Bible)

And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them. ~Romans 1:28-32.

It’s too late, baby, now it’s too late
Though we really did try to make it
Something inside has died and I can’t hide
And I just can’t fake it. ~Carole King

It’s not too late now. But someday it will be. Repent. Return. Believe. Love.

The alternative truly is tragedy and hell.