The Person and the Cause

The world is full of zealots. I think the world needs zealots. I’m not anti-zealot. I admire them. I just don’t share their temperament. And that’s good too. But we need those people who see ethics as primary and see them in black and white and have the courage to act on it. It’s an admirable quality, not without qualification, but admirable nonetheless. Not everyone is called to be thoughtful. A world of only thinkers is as inert as a world of only zealots is chaos. Thinking and acting. Acting and thinking. Both are necessary.

I am not a zealot. And this is zealots week. These are zealots times. These are the times when cowards are exposed. And as a thinker, I am all too conscious of how easy it is to make a virtue out of non-action. I won’t do it. There is no perfect choice. Only the one your conscience tells you you must do. Let the judges judge. Let the Judge judge. But do it because it’s right, risking that it might be dead wrong. I think that’s courage.

But to see both sides of a thing is as admirable a quality as sheer ethical action. Moderation is a good virtue too. The excess of zealotry makes a bigger mess than the one it was trying to clean up. The excess of thinking, as I have already said, is inertia, a bourgeois acceptance of injustice, in a word, sophisticated violence through inaction justified by pacifism.

In the wake of the overturning of Roe the zealots have flown from their nests and overwhelmed every form of media, and also the streets and churches. Abortion is an issue that it seems nobody appreciates thoughtfulness about. It’s black and white for everyone. And that’s fine. I’m not trying to say we should all be more gray. I’m just saying. These are zealots times. I’m thinking about the usefulness of thought. Do with that what you will.

What’s so clearly at stake (as perceived by the two sides) are the virtues of  bodily autonomy and the virtue that the right to life is the most fundamental and sacred right. It occurs to me that zealots on both sides don’t wish to cancel the other virtue in the ideal world, but that both are willing to subsume the other in the material world. That I think is worth thinking through.

I now want to take a breif and exciting and annoying detour and mention two mid 20th century French existentialist philosophers. (I see you rolling your eyes. But at this point you’re still reading, so who is this joke on?) I am talking about Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. (Camus was really Algerian and that’s important.) At first they were friends. In the end they parted ways. And the difference was politics. I’ll spare you the (fascinating and worth reading) details.The political difference came down to Sartre being a collectivist and Camus being an individualist. Neither of them were right-wing by any means. Camus was a socialist. Sartre was a communist. They disagreed on the relationship between justice and freedom. Both worked to fight for the little guy. At least both claimed to. Sartre much much much louder than Camus. Sartre’s right hand was unashamedly aware of what his left hand was doing. His revolutionary and Marxist-collectivist ethic was worn on his sleeve. Not many rival the upper middle-class Sartre in the signaling of virtue. On the other hand (see what I did there) Camus, like his hero Kierkegaard, extolled the quiet virtue of the individual, the idea that unseen works done in good will and faith can change the world just as much as a bloody revolution, if not more, though they will never be lauded. What I am about to say is an oversimplification, but this is just a rant. Sartre believed that no one was free until everyone was free and was therefore willing to eliminate (nearly literally) anyone who stood in the way of collective freedom. Sartre was a culture warrior. But Camus believed that justice and freedom were a paradox and that if one person wasn’t free then no one was, or if one person was murdered for the cause, even a good cause, then the cause was compromised. In the end, the individual is the cause. All there is is me and this choice, kindness or cruelty. Camus saw that if you were willing to commit violence to obtain a collectivist utopia that you’ll only get a reign of terror or the Gulag, another regime against which to rebel. It never ends. This cannot be how peace comes. There is no such thing as a Pax Romana if it cannot be preserved except by eliminating its enemies. But Sartre saw Camus’ position as preserving the status quo and so no less violent in effect than a Marxist program. The oppressed remain oppressed under Camusian ethics. The oppressors still have the power. You can’t say you’re for the little guy and do nothing about the big guy’s power. Quick rebuttal. Not seeing immediate effects of small, local, and unheralded acts of kindness does not mean complacency. It’s always a matter of what you give up, whether people see it or not. Who’s to say how much of the world’s frail goodness exists because the cumulative effect of invisible people’s invisible acts of kindness? Does it sound naive? So be it. The written virtues are always misunderstood and bastardized and used to great oppression. So at best it’s a wash.

So who’s right? By temperament I naturally gravitate toward the working class self-made Camus. But I do worry that if we never let the left hand know what the right hand is doing that nothing changes for the oppressed. 

Perhaps Jesus is a good model for ethical action in the world? 

Was Jesus a thinker? Was Jesus a zealot/activist? Was Jesus a prophet? Is prophet just another term for activist? 

Was Jesus a thinker? Yes. Jesus’ parables and sermons show a man who’s spent so much time in thought and meditation that he can speak profound truth and mystery in the same breath and in less than 3000 words. Jesus’ ministry was 1/11 of his life. And there was a lot of time walking in between the parts where he was healing and teaching and getting killed. 

Was Jesus a zealot/activist? Well, he wasn’t like the zealots in his day. He had a completely different idea than they about what the Messianic role was about. Jesus shunned their Sartrean swords. But he was, and publicly so, an advocate for the oppressed, and he spit passive aggressive and aggressive aggressive vitriol on the religious leaders who perpetuated that oppression. But Jesus had no vitriol for Romans, and by Romans I mean the ostensive oppressors. He’s coy, if empathetic with Pilate. He singles out a centurion (an oppressor!) as a model of faith in front of that centurion’s victims! I don’t know what to do with that. Whatever we may say, it seems that Jesus saw individuals more than any utopian vision of revolution around the corner. Yes, he preached the kingdom of God, but that in conjunction with his own tragic death. He didn’t envision a perfect world. He only saw what he had to do for the sake of this broken one. But who will stand here and say with a straight face that someone who was perceived as such a threat to the religious institution and a threat to the State was bourgeois, just becasue he touched lepers without writing out a political treatise or organizing a revolution? My take is this. It’s one thing to scream out your political virtues in defense of the oppressed. It’s one thing to heal the afflicted of their diseases, (which the State or you could do if they or you really wanted to. But at what expense?) It’s one thing to stand outside Pilate’s court and demand justice for the blind, deaf, terminally ill, and socially ostracized, and then go home and watch the game. It’s another thing to extend open invitations to everyone, regardless of who they are, what they’ve done, and what they believe-centurion oppressors, working class rural folk, the kinds that fascists love, sleazy tax collectors, fomenting zealots, Samaritans, Samaritan women, sex workers, and criminals,to be part of the same community together with you and to call that community (What is it?) the salt of the earth, the light of the world, and the kingdom of heaven. (Is this social justice? Is this Mass?) 

Was Jesus a prophet? Yes. But what is a prophet? A pariah who tells the truth. He tells his own people the brutal truths about themselves, the really hard truth they have buried because they are unbearably brutal. A prophet is relentlessly truthful and has zero filter. Jesus had a particular disgust for religious hypocrites and charlatans. All their religion did was justify their lack of compassion and perpetuate the affliction and suffering of their brothers, from which they benefitted. The problem wasn’t at root the suffering, The problem was that religion lost its essence in submitting to power, political advance, and preservation. The worst thing that could happen to established religion is that everyone gets saved. Victims feed the treasury. When the State perpetuates violence it’s not claiming to be righteous Abel at the same time. The way of Cain is laid bare in oppressive government(s). But when the Church perpetuates violence, it’s always in the name of righteousness. Jesus hates that more than anything. More than he hates the imperial state. 

Today’s world is rife with zealots. And today’s Left is mostly collectivist and Sartrean as far as I can tell. Today’s Right however is not truly individualist nor Camusian. It’s groupthink in a cloak of liberty. I hesitate to say Fascist. 

But when it comes to abortion what is the justice issue here? I appreciate the zealots, but am I the only one that can see both sides? If you don’t misrepresent them! Evangelical Christians are amongst the most prolific adopters and the are constantly building and supporting clinics to support women in crisis after the give birth. But I know what their critics mean. Evanglicals aren’t socialists. So they don’t support gov’t programs that help poor people. And they oppose the social justice movement. Individually they care, and they do well caring for (some of)the poor, but politically they advocate for (what I think amounts to) harm. You could say that individually they are consistently pro-life. Politically, it’s just the fetuses.

But let’s look at the ideals before the tangible reality. Because where we disagree as a country is not on the ideological level. It’s when our ideals meet the practical realities of abortion that conflict happens. But we argue on ideological grounds because we are addicted to scapegoats.

Let’s imagine someone stands before everyone in America and says, with no context,  “The government does not have the right to control my body!” Who is going to say, “No! We are State property! Well, at least some of us should be!” (Maybe the State, but what individual without political interest but only ethical interest? That’s who I am asking for.) 

Then someone else gets up and says, “Women should have the right to murder their babies!” 

Murder is wrong. We all agree? Yes. And. We are not state property. I see some heads nodding. Both are true for all of us in theory. The best of pro-life individuals (not necessarily pro-life groups or voting blocs) simply and truly believe that the fetus is a viable human life. It seems to me that pro-abortion people are willfully blind to this very strong point. I remember when part of the pro-choice argument was obfuscating that very point by asking if a fetus can really be considered and equally viable human life with the same rights as humans no longer attached to umbilical cords. Did they lose this debate when I wasn’t looking? I am not a biologist. But I can tell you that if you approach the question of life from a philosophical vantage, it gets murkier quicker than you expect. But if the fetus is a viable human life, that is, if it is endowed with the same kind of feelings and thoughts (call it a soul) as us non-fetuses, there is a pretty strong case that you may not end it’s life.

Unless…

It’s a threat to the life of its carrier. 

But being purely philosophical/hypothetical here. If we draw the line at the life of the mother, that is, if we are willing to allow abortion when it’s a choice between two lives, why is the mother’s life considered more valuable than the fetus’? (That’s rhetorical. It’s always the mother’s life.It’s always only her who can choose. Until Friday) And if we value the mother’s life more than the fetus’, and we ban abortion legally, except in the case of life threatening situations, then somebody besides the woman makes the decision about what life threatening means and can force, even mistakenly, a woman to risk her body and life for a child. We’re never talking about a full ban of abortion. But you know what’s scary? A full abortion ban would be the easiest way to adjudicate abortion.  And that is the problem. Now we’re into the practical, where the ideal always meets its doom. The ideal is always simple. Whether reality is (simple)continues to be debated. Apparently, reality is quite impossible. So if abortion is illegal except for this or that, then who arbitrates? Not the woman. That’s a precedent. And a terrifying one, regardless of the numbers for why women get abortions. I don’t want flippant abortions either, or any. No abortions would be great! We agree. And that’s why I support…(oh nevermind, you know what’s coming)

Pro-life zealots aren’t ready for that kind of nuance. They will call me a murderer and condemn me to hell for anything less than full-on celebration today. They think I’m repulsive for even writing this. With the same moral superiority displayed by those leftist SJW’s that would go immediately from my merely asking questions (not even criticizing) about public school gender education to me being a transphobe who wants to see kids committing suicide. You’ll just have to believe me when I say. As a single individual, someone just like you, someone who wants to live, love, and have health,meaning and purpose in my life-that I should have to say this reveals the ridiculous (if necessary) nature of politics. I am against infanticide. I don’t think any human being is state property. I am categorically against anything that might harm someone. It’s just not always clear what harm is. And we are often confronted with ethical conundrums. I am not a terrible person. I am not a monster. And neither are you. And neither is the person you’re skewering and breaking fellowship with on Facebook right now. They may be the enemy. Such is our times. But never forget that they are human, and that if you set aside their dignity, you set aside everyone’s dignity. Just like if you are fighting for women’s bodily autonomy, you are fighting for everyone’s bodily autonomy, even if they don’t see it, even if they hate you for it. 

Another thing that disturbs me about the Roe decision is the Pro-life evangelical reaction. Actually, I’m surprised at my own disturbance. You have to understand. Though it’s not written on Sinaic tablets, not being ferociously pro-life is grounds for excommunication. Well. Initially, I was surprised at my own disturbance. But a couple days of processing, and I get it now. I see the hypocrisy. For evangelicals, every other social justice issue is dismissed and criticized. But on this one, there are as implacable as all those “radical leftists” they constantly castigate. Like I said, part of the appeal of the pro-life position is that there is a common sense value to it. It’s an innocent life. Let it live. But as someone who grew up evangelical, I can tell you it’s so much more than a sentimental zealous love for the life of babies. It’s a cultural signpost. It’s an identifier. Not being pro-life, for evangelicals, is like losing your sense of you who you are. It’s risking eternity. It’s an issue that galvanizes, centralizes, and unites. It’s the one thin thing they can be self-righteous SJW’s about. For evangelicals, overturning Roe, more than anything else, is a validation of themselves and their entire worldview, which they are terrified is passing away. Winning Roe, psychologically, is survival.  Which is just what politics is. It’s that same adrenalinic feeling that washed over the Left when Obama won in 2008. Yeah, society in your opinion may be more just because of this or that political decision, and that may warm your heart, but I venture the opinion that what brings the tears is different and more powerful than that which tickles the sentiment. Having culture go your way. That’s the drug. Hey evangelicals, you won. (For now) You were right. Godless leftist culture is defeated. And by extension, I guess this means that God won. 

It’s all very human though. I can sympathize with the thrill of political victory because I’m human. But it ain’t Jesus. I grew up naively believing that Christians were people who believed in the power of the Scriptures to move the world. So whatever advocacy we did for others was never political technique and never about politics or culture, (horses and chariots) but about sowing seeds of love and preaching the word and seeing what happens. Of course that will feel like you’re not doing anything. That has never flet like cultural victory.And it might even feel like a cop out.

And you know what? The thing is. Politics works. It took fifty years but evangelicals mobilized ministers who mobilized voters and eventually it happened. Trump was the so called lesser of two evils in 2016 because he was genuinely pro-life and came through on that promise. And now evangelicals can say they’ve literally saved generations. They’ve done the Lord’s work. 

But as a political entity, they’ve opposed every other political effort to improve the lives of their neighbors. They would staunchly disagree with that of course.They would argue that in the long run, their Puritan ethics are really best for everyone. And that’s an interesting (kinda) debate. But all I’m saying  is, on that plane its all politics. Again, no one’s ideal is-the more human misery and suffering the better. (If you think youir enemies think that then… Oh boy.) The effects may go against our intentions. But let’s be clear, we’re debating effects. Not the ideals. We’re all aiming for human flourishing in theory. We’re trying to tell the other that their idea of human flourishing doesn’t actually bring human flourishing. But that’s a tedious conversation. It’s much much easier and quicker to act and react like a teeter-totter. Progressive 1900 and 1910’s gave way to conservative 20’s gave way to socialist 30’s and 40’s led the way to conservative 50’s gave way to radical 60’s and 70’s led to conservative 80’s-2000’s, led to leftist 2010’s gave way to rightist 20’s. Looked at the way, the Jan 6 coup failing is the most hopeful thing that happened in the last 2 years. 

Effective politics is quality socialization. But you can’t tell people you’re indoctrinating or radicalizing or grooming them. You just do it. You appeal to their need for purpose and their fear of alienation, and you push and push and push until your team wins. Better than the middle ages I guess. But where is worship in that? What kind of soul is being formed? The language is spiritual. But the beast it produces is merely political.Nebuchadnezzar’s statue.

Problem is when the faith is indiscernible from the socialization/politicizing/enculturation. When the capacity to really be an individual is lost, so is the faith. A martyr is never the leader of a movement that anyone really understands at the time and can quantify. If they do quantify it, they’ve bastardized it. A Christian martyr is the single individual who threatens and upsets the balanced body politic implicitly agreed upon by opposing sides, the pest who interupts the cycle of violence and pays for it with their life. They aren’t a mere revolutionary. And they certainly aren’t reactionaries.Oppressors and oppressed need each other. They might switch places, but violence is always there. Like your horrible stepdad. That’s the true system. Scapegoats. An endless supply of scapegoats. The two sides offer them constantly. But the martyr volunteers herself. I suppose that’s why every revolutionary eventually becomes the oppressor. But Jesus called everyone to a fellowship that transcends politics. And if you find yourself cringing and wincing at that thought, then you’re starting to understand the offense of Jesus. It wasn’t that he was apolitical, but that he was uber-political, as in beyond political, not super political. He knew that helping the poor wasn’t a political ideology, but a free act by one person on the merit of love, not camraderie. The person transcends the cause. I don’t know if I always believe that. I wrestle. If that’s really what it means to love people, future generations etc… I may not know if it’s true. But I know it’s Christianity. If I believed that the cause transcends the person, then I wouldn’t be a Christian. The person transcends the cause. There is no such thing as Christian culture. There is only Christian community, all the wrong people, should be enemies, breaking bread. I’m challenged and slightly offended too.

Today You Will Be With Me in Paradise

One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”-The Gospel According to Luke 23:39-43 

Only in Luke. For whatever it’s worth. It seemed necessary to mention that first, although I do not intend to write on the uniqueness of Luke’s Gospel, especially its crucifixion narrative, and how that might frame this familiar story. Let it suffice to snuff out any lingering misconceptions that because a story is prominent it is also prevalent. No. The famous, “Today you will be with me in Paradise…” Yeah, only in Luke. And every part of his crucifixion tale is unique to him. And. Luke bears nothing of any of the other gospels’ accounts of Jesus’ crucifixion. Every saying of Jesus on the cross in Luke happens only in Luke. 

“Father, forgive them…”. Only in Luke 

“Today you will be with me in Paradise” Only in Luke 

“Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit” Only in Luke

“Why have you forsaken me?” NOT in Luke. 

And of course, John is unique as well. 

I read, “Today you will be with me in Paradise” this morning and heard it differently than I’ve ever heard it before. (I am sure my observation is not original. I could be, but am not, better read) 

After all, what is “Paradise”?

No, it is not domestic bliss. (Really?!) It is not a Caribbean Island or whatever your own “happy place” is, be it a hiking trail or a golf course.  Should we just let Dante define it for us? Is it heaven, actually or metaphorically? 

The word is used three times in the New Testament. Once in Luke. Once in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, where Paul uses the term interchangeably with “third heaven”. (What is the first and second heaven?) Paul does not give us any interior description of Paradise, like Moses’ vivid and detailed representation of the Tabernacle, down to the exact cubits. Paul relays his personal subjective experience of what must have been a frightening vision of, well, God. And I’m fairly sure that there are no words in any tongue that could describe a vision of heaven itself. It certainly is not a golf course. Personally, I think he’s describing his experience of his own conversion on the road to Damascus. But in any case, he can’t be sure that his vision was more than a vision, that is, he can’t be sure he saw heaven as it actually is. 

The third and final time the word is used is in, of course, the book of Revelation. And I’ll spare you the gory contextual details and get to the point. There, the word is unmistakably related to what we might call heaven, the final state of bliss for the righteous. 

So I don’t think that Jesus means “Sheol” or “Hades” when he tells the thief on the cross that he will be joining him in Paradise. The other two times it’s used in the New Testament, it means. heaven, whatever heaven is. But whatever heaven is, it isn’t some kind of holding tank for the dead like, whether ambiguous as the Jewish Sheol, or little more concrete in conception, as Hades. Paradise is Heaven. Dante was right! 

But Jesus, according to Peter, didn’t immediately go to Paradise, after death. The Apostle’s Creed confesses a very literal interpretation of Peter’s first letter-that Jesus went to hell, whatever that is.  Jesus died and descended to the underworld to rescue the souls of those who had died, and after this, Jesus himself rose from the dead. 

But Paradise isn’t Hades. And Jesus says, “Today, you will be with me in heaven” to the thief.  But according to Peter, Jesus went to Hades that very day. 

Maybe Luke and Peter just have different information. If so, who’s right? (Is that the question?) 

Or 

Jesus and the thief share something incredibly intimate, if common. They’re both dying on the same day, in the same way, as enemies of the State. But the thief recognizes an important truth.  Jesus is innocent. 

How devastating! The wicked and the righteous suffer the same fate. Even for the wicked that reality is an existential and moral crisis. 

If life is a vapor, what is today? If mankind is only a mere breath, what is an age? If Christ’s kingdom, paradise, is everlasting, when and where does it begin? Timelessness is, well, timeless.  For Jesus, the clock that marked the beginning of his kingdom struck first at the cross, then his de-scension into hell, then his resurrection, and then his a-scension. And now we wait for his return at the end of time. But since he died, resurrected, and ascended to the right hand of God the Father, Paradise as of…today… is the thief’s, is ours, especially those who are not offended by his cross, who don’t think it too strange, or too unseemly to request eternal life of a bloodied, beaten, emasculated and humiliated working class enemy of the Temple and the State. 

But what exactly is the thief’s confession? Well, in the spirit of Lent, there is an admission of guilt. (But where is the repentance?) There is a plea for remembrance. But what does that mean? It doesn’t necessarily imply a confession of faith. It’s the ole man with a gun to his head parable. What doctrine does it confess? What do the thief’s words tell us about what he believes about Jesus? 

Are we sure he believes Jesus is the Messiah? Are we sure he believes that Jesus can save his soul? We can be sure that the thief believes that Jesus is innocent. He indicates a belief in Jesus’ possession of a kingdom. But, what kind of kingdom does the thief presume Jesus reigns over? The kind of kingdom that welcomes the guilty, and lets the innocent die? But does the thief even expect welcome? Or is he just asking to be remembered? As if the righteous eat and drink in Jesus’ kingdom and mention the thief’s name, so that in this way, at least he is kept alive in memory? 

Confession is what it is. It’s an outward, always an outward, expression. And thus, it can always be disingenuous. In order for it to work, faith must accompany it.  What happens in the inner man, only the Spirit of God has privy. 

And if Jesus has the Spirit of God in him, then he is able to hear confession from the heart and not from the mouth only. One might say that he heard from the thief’s heart a faith worth rewarding with Paradise. 

But if words are windows into the heart, however foggy, what can we, without the help of the Spirit, glean from sheer observation of the thief’s words to Jesus?

That he’s human. That he’s dying. And though we may not know what that’s like, we know it makes him vulnerable. He is dying, (as are we all) and the fact is as horrifyingly real to him as it ever will be, and in that state, he cries out to a fellow, although unlike him, not a criminal,  that he doesn’t want to be forgotten. He is reaching out to a stranger for a gift. He may really believe that Jesus can grant such a thing. But there is nothing at stake for his being wrong about that. However, Paul says that without faith it is impossible to please God, and that the one who has faith must believe that God rewards those who seek him. From this we may surmise that the thief believed that Jesus could reward him, because Jesus said he was going to be rewarded. And we confess our belief that Jesus knew his heart. 

But what about those who don’t quite believe; who hope, but are also desperate enough to beg? The beggar on the street doesn’t need to believe in my generosity to receive it. And there is no material risk in asking. He can only benefit. Only two things could prevent him from receiving my cash-my refusal, or his pride. What does the thief on the cross have to lose in asking this man who claimed to be Messiah to save his soul, except the pride which dies with him anyway?  But can such calculated “faith” be rewarded? Would it even be faith? 

I think it’s axiomatic to say that one cannot believe what one does not believe. The text, like every text, like all interactions, does not give us irrefutable insight into the heart. We are always taking everyone at their word. We live by faith alone.  

Regardless, we can safely project our own human desires on our fellow human as we imagine the horror and finality of his situation. We recognize a strong will to live, even if only in memory. We recognize the insatiable desire that his life have meaning, even if his head be full of doubt, (it doesn’t seem so)  even if he’s tempted to knock on wood as he declares it.  He still, for life’s sake, makes the attempt, however far-fetched, mystical, or impossible, at some form of eternal life, particularly, remarkably,  in the crucified man named Jesus. 

If he doesn’t fully believe that Jesus is able to remember him in his kingdom; if he doesn’t fully believe that Jesus really has a kingdom. We take him at his word that he truly believes Jesus to be innocent, and having the authority to grant entrance to heaven. But how could he believe that a crucified man, a victim, a convicted criminal, should have that authority? 

Jesus must be fully baptized, fully immersed, in the actual human experience.  The victim is a mirror. And from this truth arises a claim too mystical for moderns. For there have been many martyrs. None of them can lay sole claim to the universe. Luke’s claim is more than-Jesus is innocent of charges worthy of crucifixion. Luke’s subtle claim is that Jesus is innocent of any charge worthy of death, under any law, including God’s and still, Jesus chose to die, and (scandal!) God appointed him to die. Jesus died Knowing that he was purchasing paradise for thieves and murderers and the whole lot of us standing around with the blood of Abel, Zechariah, and on all the righteous on our hands. But was he purchasing and handing out the rights to Paradise on the authority of his innocence? How is innocence authority? And how was he innocent?? Did he not pay the temple tax? How could the spotless lamb not himself be stained by the blood that flowed down every street he ever walked? Born of the Virgin, Christ was not born in sin, but he was a connected part of a world that was. Is his authority nothing but an arbitrary question put to faith? So he is God, and that is that? Or should we just end the charade and admit we don’t even believe John the Baptist was sent by God. 

Why do we insist on codifying, and etching in Sinaic stones, the definitive answers to intentionally impossible questions, questions which bear the infinite quality of divinity? 

If you cannot tell, I resist the bottom. But this, whatever this is, a post I suppose, will have to conclude. 

The point. Whatever kingdoms and utopias swirl and shine in our hearts and minds, whatever hopes sustain us through the minutes, days, and years, we still walk death row as thieves on crosses. And the King of Creation, the I AM, declares by his own death, that entrance into His kingdom, the only lasting kingdom, cannot skip past death. We don’t just pass away. We pass through. And we all know that death is just one moment out of an unknown number of moments. Do we believe that from the moment of our birth we would never cease to experience moments? Death is either a passing or annihilation. Whether you believe that life is eternal is up to you. Either way, the end (of life as we know it) is nigh. We live by faith alone. 

Hanging Socks

One day I was strolling up and down the streets of wonderful downtown Brattleboro, Vermont when a young woman, 23 years old at most, loitering with some friends on the step in front of the “People’s Building” and smelling of cannabis asked me. “Can I have your hat.” 

I like hats. I think they are underrated. I like hats of all kinds. I even like top hats. Though I do not have the courage to wear them unironically or even ironically. When I lived in Scranton there was a hat store called Dietz; named of course after it’s owner, a 400 year old man. His store was open whenever the hell he felt like being there and he overcharged for ratty old man hats, though I once talked him down from $75 to $40 for a Jeffcap, after which he cussed me out and told me never to come back. So I came back five months later, and this seemed enough time for him to have completely forgotten about my existence, which turned out to be the case. 

Dietz didn’t sell sports caps, which is unfortunate because I am a fan of sports and their hats, as well as Mr.Dietz. My favorite teams are from Cleveland. But I have more Red Sox hats than any other kind. The reason is a matter of supply and demand. I currently live in New England in the Southeast corner of Vermont with New Hampshire in the front yard, and while it’s not as if there are no Cleveland hats to purchase, there is no dearth of Red Sox paraphernalia, as you must already know. But the demand, for me anyway, is high too. Because a Red Sox hat is more than just a symbol of fandom, it is a cultural icon. I have them because they’re the coolest sports caps one can don. The “B” is timelessly classic. I believe people will be wearing Red Sox caps in eras far enough removed from ours where they won’t even be able to accurately say what Baseball is, because their bots’ information will come from centuries of slightly misinformed historians. They’ll have Ballpark Fairs like we have Medieval Fairs at which they will sing a mistranslated version of Ryan Adams’ “Sweet Carolina”. 

Equally cool and arguably as iconic is the hanging red socks logo. 

So like I had an old man hat guy in Scranton, when I moved to New England I got a sports hat guy in New Hampshire, and from him I bought six Boston Red Sox hats of various kinds. I prided myself on playing a convincing Northern New Englander with him. I softened my “r” just enough and knew enough about Boston sports history. He never cussed at me, which was a plus. But he was a tougher negotiator than ole Dietz. It was from this New Hampshirite that I bought my very favorite hat ever. The hanging red socks Red Sox hat. It fit perfectly. And I loved it. More than any thing. (I didn’t say any one.) 

When the young woman asked to have my hat, it was this hat I was wearing, the hanging red socks Red Sox cap, my very favorite thing. 

I read the Bible. And the Bible tells lots of stories about God talking to people. One of those stories is about Mary the mother of Jesus and the annunciation of Christ’s birth. My favorite cinematic depiction of this is from the 1978 miniseries “Jesus of Nazareth.” Director Franco Zefferelli chooses to not let us hear anything audibly. We see a faint light come through Mary’s window and we see her react as if someone is speaking to her. And then the light fades and Mary turns to her mother (I think it is her mother) and tells her what the angel said to her.  

I don’t trust anyone who says they have a word from God. I just don’t. Especially if they say it was an audible word. I run from these people. I think you should too. BUT. I still wonder if and how God speaks to us. 

Is it God or intuition? 

Silly question. 

Here is a word from Jesus, who I take to be God, from the Scriptures, which I take to be true. 

“Give to everyone to asks, and do not refuse them.” 

I don’t always live with this consciousness. Usually my consciousness is, what must I get done today in order to survive and ensure my children’s survival? What haven’t I read yet? What is going to be enjoyable? How can I be likable? Shall I make people angry or uncomfortable on social media? What shall I eat? Yeah. I’m pretty self-absorbed. 

You too? Great. Let’s be friends! 

So chances are on any given day, some stranger asks me for my very favorite thing in the whole world, I am going to politely say no. 

Well maybe. It just now occured to me that there is no way I can do a proper statistical analysis because the sample size of strangers asking to have a clothing accessory of mine is, well, one. It’s possible that there are zero situations in which I wouldn’t do exactly what I did, which is snap give her the hat.  But I digress. This isn’t the Matrix. 

Then there is the story of Philip the evangelist in the book called “Acts of the Apostles”. It’s crazy. And wonderful. And beautiful. He is told by an angel to… Well here’s the story.

“Rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” This is a desert place. And he rose and went. And there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning, seated in his chariot, and he was reading the prophet Isaiah. And the Spirit said to Philip, “Go over and join this chariot.” So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?”  And he said, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.”

I love Philip. The angel says “Go”. He just goes. No questions. Just like a normal day. And then he gets there and the Spirit says, “go talk to that super important and rich pagan Gentile non-binary person about me.” 

And Philip’s like, “okay.” 

And then later the non-binary person who has received Christ is like, “I should get baptized”. And Philip’s like. “Ok. Let’s do it.” 

This relationship to the Spirit of God inspires me. This is what I think evangelists are like. Very little time, less than a millisecond occurs between the spirit saying, “talk to that person” and them talking to that person. What is the difference between the Spirit saying to Philip, “go talk to them” and Philip thinking to himself, “I think I’m going to talk to them.” 

How much time occurred between that young woman thinking about asking me to give her my hat and her just asking me to give her my hat? And what’s the difference between the Spirit telling her to ask me, and her thinking, “I wonder if I ask this dude, if he’d just give me his hat.” 

And when she asked me, my immediate thought was, “give to everyone who asks of you.” Jesus, who is God, said that. I found myself in a situation in which my consciousness was not on how to anger people online but completely focused on those seven words of Jesus. But I did have a brief moment with myself “but this is your favorite hat and she doesn’t need it, she just wants it, she just wants to see if you’d do it, maybe she’s running a little street experiment, asking everyone for various articles of clothing/accessories, maybe she’s building a wardrobe, but still there was the voice saying, “give to everyone who asks”, which is the voice that won and so my right arm reached up and grabbed the hanging red socks Red Sox hat and in one swift motion presented it upside down as a gift to the person who had asked for it. And this entire dialogue with myself happened in less than a second, a grand ethical and theological debate worked out in a few milliseconds, but which hardly any of the passers-by even saw or will ever know about. So to the world outside, the whole thing was nothing. Too fast and anonymous to have qualified as happening. 

And yet in that moment God spoke. To two people. About each other.  

And those two people have never seen each other again. One has a hat and story. The other has no hat, but has a story. But if I had a hat, you wouldn’t have a story. 

I wonder if Mr. Dietz remembers me. 

We Will Not Fear, Though the Earth Should Change

November 8, 2016.  It’s evening. I am in my living room in utter disbelief. Donald Trump is going to win the Presidential Election. I got this feeling in my stomach. A bad one. You know the one. This is my first time feeling sick about the result of a presidential election.  Maybe some of you felt like that in 2008 and 2012.  I don’t know.  

I swear this isn’t a trash piece against Donald Trump or Republicans or Trump supporters. It’s a grown man telling you that he had feelings about a presidential election, feelings like the earth had given way,  like the shifting sands unsettling his footing, like mountains shaking in the heart of the sea. The results of that election seemed as ridiculous as this man referring to himself in the third person.  Everything I had seen and heard of Donald Trump from 2015 leading up to that night disgusted and scared me.  I was scared of the culture change that Donald Trump was going to and now has brought to the country.  I’m talking about a zeitgeist, which is a near nonsense word. Vague. But it’ll do. The point is, it feels icky out there (to me.)  Maybe the best adjectives are: anti-intellectual, cheap, trashy, defensive, irrational, over sensitive, brutish, unwilling to reason, prone to lashing out, histrionic, brittle, uncaring, self-centered, manipulative, and really corny but effective sermoning.

I love you Mom. And all my pastors, professors, uncles, and mentors throughout the years! 

Look. I know how this all makes me sound. Smug, self-righteous, and sanctimonious. I will add that it makes me a liar too. My description of the zeitgeist sounds suspiciously similar to what you would (rightly) think is my opinion of Donald Trump is, even though I said this wasn’t a hit piece (I swear, it isn’t. Keep reading).  It also sounds less like a real zeitgeist and more like an invite into my inmost self. 

What can I say? I’m human, therefore I am fragile. I’m not proud of it. I own it. I got issues. 

But if you really want me to be sanctimonious, I could frame my fears and Trump nausea in a concern for human rights. But the truth is, guy pushes all the trigger buttons on my Christian upbringing. He’s the reminder of home I still haven’t run back to. He talks like em. His cadence is perfect for that audience. He tells untruths like em. He has stirred up a certain type of person and revealed how many of them there really are, and how mad they are about the 08-16 zeitgeist, as they felt it. 

And I have to say, the left, four whole years later, still doesn’t seem to understand the real locus of the average Trump supporter’s disgust with Obama’s America. Is it racism? Maybe you could argue that? But what is that debate worth? Where does it take us? These people had that same pit in their stomach in 08 and 12 that I had on November 8 in 16, the same feeling of the earth giving way under my feet. Everything they see in the media (to them) sacralizes what is (to them) sacred. They aren’t (don’t feel) represented on the big screen nor by their gladiators. Even though FOX News is the most watched cable network, they still feel it’s this alternative source of news. You cannot convince them they are not standing outside of popular culture, looked down upon by people in universities, media, and politics, anymore than you can convince white educated liberals that they understand almost zilch about the little guys they are fighting for. (Go watch the underrated Coen Brothers film “Barton Fink”) The deplorables are convinced that they have been the butt of the joke of Hollywood and the media since forever. And I think they might be scared that under Obama, the laughs that turned to cavalier dismissals, which turned to contempt, are turning into to violence soon. And (they think) Trump and the conservative populist movement he ignited, is rescuing them from that. 

That this is how they view progressivism scares me to death. But as I say that I’d really love it if my lefty friends would try and empathize with their fear, if only as fellow humans experience fear, to reach across the aisle, instead of reaching for the memes. But those are my hang ups popping up again. Who is this about?

In a nutshell, I am going to make the claim, admittedly anecdotal and observational, that Trump supporters are not so much scared of people of color, immigrants, and LGBTQIA folk; are not as concerned with policy as they are culture, as they are of the spectre that is (to them) liberalism, now also termed (pejoratively )leftism. (Trump is so good at coinage) They are scared that their way of life is on the way to being a cause for brutality against them. If they grew up evangelical, they’ve been steeped in this mindset. There is this fetishistic relationship right wingers have with persecution. Growing up in right wing evangelicalism, the rhetoric was that we are different, bound to be misunderstood, because we have something the world doesn’t, assurance of our salvation. We are chosen by God, and despised by the world. Someday, when progressivism gets out of hand, Christians will suffer, and be killed for the Christian read: conservative values. As far as I can tell, evangelical culture is locked and loaded in fear. But what subculture is not? The early Christians? 

Ironic that evangelical Christianity would be so steeped in fear of persecution considering the Bible’s take on the topic. That it’s a blessing. Christians aren’t supposed to concentrate their efforts on avoiding persecution. They ought to be focused on living quiet and principled lives, for better or worse. There is no need to prepare for it, or to warn of it. Because it can’t really hurt you. Jesus says, “do not fear him who can only destroy the body.” Persecution can only help you and the world too. (The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.) Christians should welcome (actual) persecution if it comes, but there is no call to invite it. It seems today’s right wing evangelicalism does the opposite. It’s invited, but not welcome. But there is no cause to consciously rattle the cage. Then when persecution comes, it comes to a quiet and principled people, not a loud and fearful one, and the rest of us can tell who the villains are. 

Fear is a visceral and universal emotion. It’s perfectly fine common ground. We mask it in pride. But we can get rid of it with love.. 

Problem with emotions, especially fear, is that it is so close and present in the moment  we are feeling it. It’s the most present thing . We don’t even question it, not any more than we question our own existence. But what if fear is actually, on principle, never, ever the right response to reality.  What if there really is nothing to be afraid of?  Is this foolishness? Is it reckless? 

Or is it  biblical? Could it be true when the Apostle John writes that fear can be cast out by perfect love? 

Psalm 46

God is our refuge and strength,
   a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth should change,
   though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
   though its waters roar and foam,
   though the mountains tremble with its tumult. Selah

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
   the holy habitation of the Most High.
God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved:
God will help her right early.
   The nations rage, the kingdoms totter;
   he utters his voice, the earth melts.
The Lord of hosts is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah

Come, behold the works of the Lord,
   how he has wrought desolations in the earth.
He makes wars cease to the end of the earth;
   he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear,
    he burns the chariots with fire!
“Be still, and know that I am God.
    I am exalted among the nations,
    I am exalted in the earth!”
The Lord of hosts is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore I shall not fear though the wrong guy win, and the world as I know it collapses in front of me. For this country is not my home. I am a citizen of God’s perfect city, and the sooner this world ceases to fight against his love and care, the sooner we will know peace. The only sacrifice we have to make is the sacrifice of hope in this world’s weapons, of bronze, and halitosis laced enamel/twitter. His own perfect voice melts the earth. As scary as that seems, it is just love doing its thing-casting out fear. The ruin in the wake of God’s loving destruction, of his benevolent apocalypse, reveals what was always available to us. The refuge that he himself is. His ever present stillness. The serenity that undergirds the world. If it feels like your world is falling apart, maybe it’s not the time to hunker down for the worst, or lash out like a cornered mammal, maybe the anxiety we think we feel is really the Love that runs the universe at work performing surgery on this damned tumor we call fear, and if we take Love up on his offer, to be still and know, we will see love winning. 

O, Brother, Let’s Go Down

Yeah. I watched the Ted Bundy thing on Netflix. Fascinating stuff. I bring it up for one part at the end of the first season-the part when the mullets and the college bros gather outside the prison where Bundy is to be executed via the electric chair. You can see the lit room where the killing is going to take place in the Florida dusk. The mood for this execution is celebratory. They gather to cheer a (terrifyingly possessed) man’s death, a national terrorist of the most grotesque order, a man who in the most chilling way possible, is still just a man. Nonetheless, they gather in what is either a clear display of humanity’s taste for blood and love of vengeance, or a media hyped excuse to party. I’ll say that it’s both. In any case, they have come together for revenge, blood, expiation, justification, and debauchery. There is hardly a soul that could fail to soothe its self-hatred by comparing itself to a scapegoat of Bundy’s caliber.

 

Thought about in that way, Bundy is a pure anti-Christ. But that merely stretches an already overstretched digression. The point is that I was greatly struck by the bald facts. These collected humans genuinely wanted their fellow human to suffer and die, and they wanted to be there to celebrate it together when it happened. They basically tailgated an execution.

 

As a fellow human, carrying our kind’s universal trait of having a pure, if off-kilter, sense of justice, I find it hard to argue against punitive justice in the case of Ted Bundy. Even those most fiercely opposing capital punishment might make an exception for him. The angels of restorative justice are tempted to make exceptions for devils. (Thou art the man! God forbid!) But what is startling, is how ready everyday folk are to indulge in jugular vengeance, even if vicariously. The gun, or in this case, the switch, in someone else’s hand only makes it easier to let loose the viciousness deep within. What is going on here? Symbolic murder? Catharsis? The satisfaction that comes with revenge without the actual substance? What’s the difference between hating a man and murdering him? (Careful, you probably disagree with Jesus on this point.)

 

Let’s not open an ethical wormhole by asking if Bundy is the exception that morally permits us to oblige our darkest impulses, if only symbolically. We won’t really drink blood. We walk away from the truth tellers who are honest enough to say we will. Rather than venture the wide and winding path of trying to find Esau’s descending ladder of sins, and what punishments correspond, never mind our place on the ladder, let’s limit the observation to this. To varying degrees, we idolize death. This is us.

Addiction in Brattleboro

When progressive Christian Brian McClaren wrote “A New Kind of Christian”, back in the early to mid ots,  I wonder if he knew he was just verbalizing an old kind of Christianity for a new audience. The progressive evangelicalism that emerged during that time eventually came to understand they were late blooming Mainline Protestants. Here in 2019, the Emergent Church no longer seems to be a thing  But not because of change in theology or drop in influence, but because they realized the redundancy of having two labels (Mainline and Emergent) for what really was the same thing, with perhaps the one and only way progressive evangelicalism stands out from the Mainline is the absence of a hierarchical church system. Other than that, let’s be real.  Same thing. So they kinda got absorbed.

A lot of petty infighting over the decade, and it turned out to be about labels.

But to be fair, a lot of the infighting was about what to do with postmodernism, whether to embrace it, accept it, or resist it, theologically and/or missionally. I don’t want to minimize how important that is.

But my question is: has the world gotten better since Christians fled to their respective “response to postmodernism” corners? And whether it has or not, which missiology is best fitted for this new world?

I live in Rural/small town New England. Brattleboro Vermont to be exact. But I would include New Hampshire and Western Mass as part of the same basic cultural landscape. The church culture in small town New England is (to me) unique. The categories are…

1. Embrace Postmodernism theologically and missionally.
2. Accept the reality of postmodernism for the purpose of mission, but do not embrace it theologically, or
3. Resist postmodernism with all our might. For it is the incarnation of Satan.

As far as I can tell, there are no 2’s in Brattleboro, Vermont. Just 1’s and 3’s. In terms of overall population, there are very few professing Christians, and nearly everyone who professes Christ is over 55. But there are church buildings everywhere. Most of those buildings house a few dozen liberal and mainline protestants in them every Sunday. Most of those churches have practiced postmodern Christianity decades before Brian McClaren  thought he was blazing new trails with the Emergent Church. In short, New England culture is postmodern, and the church is too. And if a church is not wholly of the milieu, it’s aggressively reacting against it. So that’s the lay of the land.

So with postmodernism comes outreaches of mercy, and lefty activism. Homeless shelters and food kitchens and demonstrations and social justice groups, and worship services abound. All good stuff. But nevertheless there is an epidemic of underbelly suffering affecting us all; without preference for race, religion, culture, or class. It’s officially called the Opioid Crisis, but I think an equally appropriate term for it would be “the angel of death.”

And that is an area I recently learned is without the presence of our town’s faith community. I don’t really understand why. I could theorize. But that’s all it would be.

And what is the Church’s response to this crisis? We might ask it differently: how does the church appear in Brattleboro as the city on a hill?  But I want to take issue with the question.

The postures of embracing, accepting, and rejecting all carry themselves in a way that says, “the church has the solution.”

I.e. “how is the Church going to be a city on hill?”

The mainliner exclaims, “By feeding the poor. Sheltering the homeless. Fighting for social justice.”

The  evangelical says, “By witnessing/telling our grace stories/being incarnational/doing outreach/properly contextualizing?

So if the church simply did what they were supposed to do then Brattleboro would… what exactly? Get better? Become the kingdom?

I don’t know. The blind cannot lead the blind. And the problem with the blind is that they are always the ones out in the front showing us all where to go-the ones with the answers. (Wait?…)

I can just hear us.

“Thanks Jesus for the cross, the advice, the good words, and the resurrection, but we good-hearted humanitarians, we can take it from here.  We will build a bright shining tower for you. Let’s call it, er, Babel! Yes!…Wait. Is that too on the nose? How about, ‘City on a Hill’. Without a vision the people perish, right?”

But the light of the world is Jesus Christ. And if the light seems dim it’s not due to a drop-off of zeal in the church, but maybe it’s a matter of zeal in the wrong direction, a zeal for something else, a zeal that turns our eyes from the light himself and makes Church into a blind, lifeless, and outdated coping mechanism for boomers, bound in hymnals, Bibles, prayer books, bulletins, and programs.  

I fear our eyes have been dimmed to the ancient truth that the kingdom is realized in darkness, pain, death, and devastation. It is not magically conjured into clean mainstream society by the power of positive thinking, a massive increase in adult baptisms, or egalitarian political agendas. Unless the kingdom is sought in the dregs of acute hopelessness, it will will not be seen.  And until the servants of God lay down their signs and run to the trenches they may never really see the Jesus they speak so highly of at church.

In the Gospels, it was faith in Jesus that healed the hopeless ones. He said to them “your faith has healed you” as if to shift credit from his touch to their faith. Which is odd. (Cuz I do think Jesus is the healer. Duh!) But it was as if our master considered his part to be that of simply being present when saving faith burst into bloom, as if his primary role was to be present to affirm the healing, and into bursting faith he spoke words of life. A missional model? Perhaps…

Last night at discipleship, I was asked to reflect in writing upon who I thought were my angels and messengers and what they were saying to me. I wrote the following.

My angels have human bodies. Jim, Rick, and David. (Not real names). These are recovering drug and alcohol addicts. I have heard each of them confess their need for Christ in prayer. And never were their respective prayers contrived cliched religious utterances, or merely going through the motions.  But I heard them confess their afflictions and their need for Christ in tender, but urgent pleas, as if to a parent that they had hurt, but whom also was their only resort, their only hope of salvation. Hearing these true and pure confessions brought me out of my religious stupor and I realized afresh, in my heart, that I, that we all, need Christ like that. Desperately. And that those who are know that level of need are those who have been caught in addiction.

Until I heard a desperate person in recovery cry out to God, I don’t think I really knew what contrition or Romans 10:13 was about. And to my surprise, hearing real cries for heavenly help helped me finally understand mission. Which is that I have more to learn about and from Jesus than I can teach about him. The missional question is not, how can I be a light, but, where is the light to be found?

In the Gospels Jesus is rarely found behind official podiums, but much too often for his own safety, in the derelicts of the desperate. If mission is to serve Jesus, and to serve Jesus is to serve the least of these, then serve “the least of these”  I must, but the secret of the kingdom is that the desperate turn out to be the teachers. I believe God may be found in Brattleboro’s hidden Gethsemanes, the places that middle classness cannot let tourists see, in the dark and hidden needle laced gardens of our town, where people cry out to God, not as their daily or weekly ritual, but as their real and very present need.

 

Psalm 22: My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me?

Psalm 22

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
   Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer,
   and by night, but I find no rest.

Yet you are holy,
   enthroned on the praises of Israel.
In you our fathers trusted;
   they trusted, and you delivered them.
To you they cried and were rescued;
   in you they trusted and were not put to shame.
But I am a worm and not a man,
   scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
All who see me mock me;
   they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;
‘He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him;
   let him rescue him, for he delights in him!’

Yet you are he who took me from the womb;
   you made me trust you at my mother’s breasts.
On you was I cast from my birth,
   and from my mother’s womb you have been my God.
Be not far from me,
   for trouble is near,
   and there is none to help.”

“My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”

These words set the tone for the whole Psalm. Upon which, by the way, I will take more space than usual to reflect. For here are the very words of Jesus on the cross. And his Jewish audience would have recognized it and they would have understood that Jesus was not just being poetic; comparing his particular pain to a text they memorized as children, but he was identifying his whole person, this whole event  to the whole Psalm, and by extension to the whole of Israel’s, and by extension, humankind’s bloody history. That is how Jewish references worked. Jesus wasn’t being clever or ironic. He was utterly sincere and prophetic. I should point out in addition that being prophetic has little to do with predicting the future, although that may be a feature of it. Future-telling is not intrinsic to the definition of “prophecy”. To be prophetic in the broader sense is to make an overt poetic connection with something from the past or future. Here Jesus’ prophetic words for the cross backward and forward. Backward to Psalm 22 and forward to the Epistle to the Hebrews where it says of him, that he was tempted, that is, he suffered, in every way like us, and yet without sin. And because of this he is able to help those who suffer as he did-afflicted, persecuted, and misunderstood i.e. the “fellowship of his sufferings”.

Another figure whose personal tribulation serves as a template for human suffering is of course Job. Who lost his family, his possessions, and his health, and endured it all without sinning. What is interesting is that even though neither Jesus nor Job sinned through their trials, they both addressed God in a way that might seem to teeter on irreverent or ungrateful.  After all, God is not just anyone. Which is, maybe paradoxically, why he gets the brunt of the complaint. He alone can do something about so much suffering.

Extreme suffering, from now on let’s say affliction, for God’s people, feels like divine abandonment. It’s like staring into nothingness and seeing only more nothingness, like being suspended in nothingness, surrounded by abyss.

It’s like a broken promise.

Other memory verses offer little comfort. For David, the writer of Psalm 22, Jesus, and Job all know the promise, “I will never forsake you.”

“God who never forsakes, where are you?”

It’s bold. It borderline blasphemy. It’s near faithlessness. But it is sanctioned by invisible saving grace. For the suffering of Christ (of God!) is the initiation into the throne of grace which is not entered sheepishly, but boldly. As Queen Esther went boldly but perilously to the throne room of Xerxes, knowing that if the King of Persia refused to extend his scepter it would be at the price of her life, so we enter the Holy God through the body of Jesus. Only an intimate has the right to say to the Creator, because in this case, he happens to be their Father (and brother!)- “Hey, where are you! I thought you were good!” If you’ve ever openly questioned the goodness of God, the man on the cross is with you and for you.

But though the believer dangles over the edge of doubt, and even touches the dragon’s groping claws she is never captured, or taken from the hands of the Father who endures her clueless tongue lashes.  

She always claims the “yet”, which holds a simultaneous tone of slight disdain, open hope, and reverent restraint.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
   Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer,
   and by night, but I find no rest.
Yet you are holy,
   enthroned on the praises of Israel.
In you our fathers trusted;
    they trusted, and you delivered them.
To you they cried and were rescued;
   in you they trusted and were not put to shame

“I am forsaken by you God” cries the afflicted. Yet… (Is she confused? Self-assuring? Sarcastic? Backtracking just a bit before the God she just baldly declared to have abandoned her?” )

“You are holy. Your people lift you up in praise. Our ancestors trusted you. And we have heard how you saved them. We have heard how you answered their cries. We have heard how you rescued them from shame. There is precedent here. Because you are holy, and because you have a history of salvation, we have reason to hold back our despair. “

Desperation sounds bolder than faith. The words  following the “yet”, sound much less confident than the words following “my God”. What kind of grace endures you and I for our boldness in accusation, and meekness in faith?

After a brief, if tepid, affirmation of God’s past faithfulness, the afflicted launches headlong into his own pain again.

“But I am a worm and not a man,
   scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
All who see me mock me;
   they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;
‘He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him;
   let him rescue him, for he delights in him!’”

A worm is a thing trampled into dust and ignored. A earthly belly crawler good for nothing. Modern science knows that worms aren’t good for nothing. But this is poetry, not biology. The point is, the afflicted expresses how lowly he feels, how lowly he is in the hierarchy. He is mocked. His peers shake their heads in shame. They make funny faces at him and mock his trust in God.

Remarkable that they would mock him for trusting God as he has just let out a cry, “Why have you forsaken me?”

Mockery is a shot of dopamine. To the one who mocks of course. That’s why he does it. It doesn’t matter if it’s logical. What matters is that the one mocked is brought down. In this case, the mocker simply affirms the afflicted’s feelings for his own pleasure. He calls the other’s pain for what it is, and in doing so, twists the knife to his own delight-reminds the afflicted that yes, yes, he is indeed forsaken, a hint that he, the mocker, is evidently, nay obviously, not forsaken, but even blessed,  by God who, yes, the proof is in the pudding, hates the afflicted one.

It’s juvenile. But human. It feels good to kick the man whose down.

But in Jesus’ own life, the poetic turns into history. Jesus  made a ministry out of making the self-righteous feel less righteous, less worthy of God. And his dying on the cross, was vindication  to his enemies that God had finally chose them over him. So they spoke the hurtful words out loud, if only that their own ears may hear the justification, for hearing is believing, and repetition aids in learning.

How sweet self-righteousness is!

Next comes the second round of “Yet”. But this time it is not the vindication of God’s goodness, but of his love and favor for the afflicted.

Yet you are he who took me from the womb;
    you made me trust you at my mother’s breasts.
On you was I cast from my birth,
   and from my mother’s womb you have been my God.
Be not far from me,
   for trouble is near,
   and there is none to help.

“Even though my suffering is fodder for the mockers  that I really am abandoned by you God. I still have reason to trust you. For at this point, who else will I turn to? I have known no other God, and I have no one more powerful  or capable to do anything about my affliction.”

Perhaps, after all the poor persecuted one thinks, “I am forsaken by God. I see no reason to trust him. But to whom else can I make my appeal?”

The sinister thought those who are truly afflicted have, if their honest, is that God really doesn’t care about their suffering. It is one thing to let your child suffer something you know they will overcome and be better for. It’s another thing to actually abandon your child.

The most intense and clarifying trials of our souls are those which bring us to a point of decision. as we hang over the abyss-has God really abandoned me?

You will recall that Jesus made the decision before he was risen.

“Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit”. If he believed with all his heart  that God had abandoned him, how could he say that? He made the bold decision to believe that God would not abandon his beloved to Sheol. And  I think he made the decision for us all. “Father, as representative of new creation, of new humanity, into your hands I commit my Spirit, and therefore all creation.”

And what did the Father do with this faith? He blessed it, and raised the Son of Man to life!

Friends. This is really all there is to do in the end. Clamor, kick, and scream, and pray if you will, but this is it. In the end, all there is is a commitment of oneself  to God.

The Comfort of Being Sad

“‘Who then can be saved?’
‘With man it is impossible. But with God all things are possible.'”-The Gospel

“I miss the comfort in being sad”-Kurt Cobain 

Hope is the unseen and therefore to use what is seen in order to induce very present and visible hope is not to induce real hope at all, but to conjure a temporary feeling of hopefulness in the absence, that is, as a substitution, an off-brand, if you will, of real hope. On top of showcasing a temporary hope, such platituding makes for a false hope. For hope which is seen is no hope at all.

Hope springs from the depths of a despair very few of us have ever seen and ends in an eternal ocean of gladness that none of us can imagine, or put to words. We should be blessed to be named with“those who mourn”.

But although “blessed are those who mourn” is true, it would be perverse for one to pursue this blessedness intentionally, as if it can be received in time, in this world.  Perverse it is to think that by praying for a scorpion one may apprehend the mourners blessedness as if it is something he should wish for normally.

It’s like a kid asking his parent to get grounded out of the blue, having done nothing good or bad, yet. Is it as noble as it is stupid? Does it not have an aura of pretension? Of what annoying people call “virtue signaling”?

Pray with moderation. Don’t be absurd  and ask God for tribulation. Don’t be obnoxious and ask him for wealth.

No mourner is sitting on the street in a puddle of wretchedness, begging each of his superiors for fifty of their cents to buy food, beer, chocolate milk, cigarettes, and heroin, wishing that more people could experience the blessedness that is his life.

But Jesus says that addict is blessed.

Which, let’s just say it, is offensive. To everyone. For different reasons. To the addict because it attributes his curse to blessedness. And to the middle class person because it makes very little of his worldly success.

“The prayer of the righteous man availeth much”

What about the prayer of the destitute and afflicted?

Either way, it’s the Lord’s.

“Father, in heaven. Your name is too holy for my unclean lips, and yet here I am. May your kingdom and will come to this place of woe, affliction, and destitution, which we call earth.  I don’t know what to ask you for except I am hungry and you are the provider, so get me through another day. Help me forgive like you forgive. Forgive my many shortcomings. It’s so hard to survive this harsh world without breaking your law. Guide me through the gauntlet with minimal bruises. Without your guidance I am hopeless.”

If that’s the prayer of the destitute and afflicted, Mrs. Job has a suggestion

“Curse God and die.”

Mrs. Job was enlightened.

Call me callous, cynical, and nihilistic, but I don’t need to hear songs of praise for some Christian who is going through some trying situation for not abandoning the faith. Of course he find worldly hopefulness! That’s the beauty of it!

Hope is all we have! I have no problem with made up hopes in and of themselves. We lie to ourselves to survive! This is the great white lie of human history and I think it is beautiful!

But to try to pass off the platitudes that get us through as if these were identical to the heart of this grand faith, this mustard seed planted by the mournful, which is of course Christianity–that is really to put a veil over Christianity!

If Christianity is false, offensive, depressing, and horrid, let it be so in clear sight!

The hope of the Christian is not the message of some best selling preacher, I said, charlatan, nor is it the vision of the sincere but short sighted humanist.  

It is the whimpering of one whose faith in God, should we come right up to it, would not appear praiseworthy, beautiful,  imitable, or commendable, but mysterious and frightening. That’s if it were even visible.

The way people talk about death when they actually face it is proof that they don’t believe in the eternal, that they don’t have real hope. Hopefulness they have. Methods of survival in the midst of earth shattering sadness is theirs, but not real hope. Real hope can’t hide a deep sadness. Condolences sound distinctly like people talking themselves into something. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. Have you ever had these words laid on you? “She is in a better place”.  Did you believe they really believed it? I don’t know about you. But I never believe they believe it. And now I am sitting here trying to imagine what it would be like to be in the presence of a person believing their own (sincere, vulnerable, and heartbreakingly human) condolences. Yeah. It would frighten me if they did. We don’t cry at funerals because we are going to miss our loved ones for a few decades until we get our shot to hang on clouds. Otherwise, the tears shed in funeral parlors would be of the same essence as tears in an airport. No. We cry because we are being forced to face what’s too powerful for us, death. And it is nearly impossible to conjure the raw Christianity to shake off the belief that they are truly gone, or the horror of knowing that one day we will be too.  

Nonetheless, there is a place for hope in this world.  But it looks strangely unlike hope. 

That place is the forgotten Bethlehem, the dark Gethsemane, and the excruciating cross, where God refuses to solve humanity’s woe without joining it.

And in Gethsemane in particular, Jesus, on our behalf, hands us all over to the will of a God who has just refused his hope filled and rational request for earthly reprieve from suffering execution by asphyxiation, and instead directs his only Son’s despairing eyes toward the unseen, unproved, and unbelievable hope of resurrection.

God practically incentivizes doubt and confusion. (Perhaps to make prayer intelligible)

It is a false god whose pure will gives us only warm fuzzies.

But some will protest with sarcasm, “So masochism it is.”

No. You can’t manipulate redemption or suffering.  You can’t carve your own cross without admitting another kind of worldly hope, a hope in your own ability to atone. You can’t offer yourself as a lamb to God  For you are the one who needs saving from death.

Suffering will come. But woe to the man through whom it comes. To pick up a scorpion is unnatural. To make a direct request for one is perverse. But to pray for a genuine  blessing is to be shown a picture of your savior crying out to God with the voice of David, giving you the hope you really didn’t ask for-that of incarnation and resurrection. Meanwhile you sleep. Sword in sheath, your great white hope.

What I have said is this. The joy you seek is supernatural. It is infinitely higher, lower, further, and deeper, than you can imagine, than you can imagine you would want. The Spirit of joy groans deeper than you can imagine. And you are nearer to God the deeper your groans.

Who can say to God what David, and thus Jesus, says, sweating blood in the garden? “Look away from me that I may smile again?”

Heaven is a real hope. I do not deny. But for eternity, not time. The hope of resurrection doesn’t touch feelings in a way that validates it in real time. Heaven and resurrection are  unapproachable in this hopeless temporal world. The highest hope within temporality is not an end to our pain, but is communion with God in suffering, the pure assurance that suffering is meaningful because it is shared in and with God.

What does this mean for “social justice?”  Should we leave the mourners to their blessedness? Why take that away from them?

“Woe to him through whom the stumbling block comes!”

Whether they know it or not, God is present with mourners because he is present in suffering. He has seized captainship of suffering by the cross. Hope is unseen for now. But suffering has meaning with God at the helm. So not only does he suffer in the manner of sufferers. He suffers with them in the present. Whatever you do to the little ones, the mourners, you do to God.

To look at a man in his puddle of wretchedness and think that the call of God is merely to assist in his exit from the puddle is noble, but mistaken. Mistaken not because he doesn’t need help, doesn’t need your help. God forbid! He certainly could use your help! Mistaken not because you are not obligated to help. For you are as obligated by nature to help another as you are to feed yourself. Lack of mercy for your neighbor is a form of suicide. Not because you have to answer to God for how you treated your neighbor, in some empty space where incarnation is absent, but because how you treat your neighbor is itself your answer. But you shall not forget that the decisive element, for your Christianity, if you claim to be a Christian, is incarnation, which is not for the sake of  temporal justice. Because God is present between your mourning neighbor and you, your response to God’s incarnational love for you waits reciprocation, not because God’s love is conditional and depends on your response- it’s not as if God is testing us by putting the poor always among us-it is just the nature of love to of itself demand reciprocation without attaching any strings at all-to the chagrin of familiar sense. The tears of the oppressed seem to all with ears to hear as the love of God, demanding without demanding a response, the mirror response of incarnation.  

I say all that to tell you this. That the mourners are blessed because their inheritance is eternal, and in this eternal kingdom, of which no words can utter the meaning, they will not mourn.

But that is no seeable hope. So we don’t say to the mournful. “Don’t worry poor wretch. Jesus comes to save”. Though it’s the most glorious truth! That is not what they need right now, in the temporal. I mean, it isn’t about what they need. That’s apparent. They need water. Give it to them without pride. But if real hope is what you desire to give them, here is the not so glamorous truth. You can’t! Hope is not a commodity. You can either join them in mourning, or ignore it. You can either seek God or have the pleasure of not seeing people cry. You can believe what they might not believe, what they might even pray to Jesus without knowing, in a place too deep for words, the place of prayers only the Spirit can hear. You can believe, you can hope against hope, that in eternity the mournful are blessed. And in time, mere time, the highest is no hope, but is in fact love-we join the mourners and are together joined with God, a friend to whom you have come so close you may be terrified and astonished on some woeful day to hear these heartfelt but stupid words come uncontrollably out of your mouth, “look away from me”! And God will chuckle with a hint of sadness at the irony as at a child who scraped their knee, thinking her life might be over. For he answered that prayer for only one, that you might never know its full horror.

But let us also not see such a distance between us and those that mourn. Woe to us who think we are rich, who think we see, who avoid or plunge into the pain of others assuming we are outside, beyond, or above, who think we are in the position of giving but not receiving, for if we are not sick, then we cannot be moved to cry out, to seek a physician, to get to know the Son of David. Blessed are the sick. For they seek and find. 

Let the world argue about the duties of the haves toward the have-nots. Let Christians seek to understand what it truly means to have and have not. The blessing of those who mourn is not in this world. But love is. It’s love, not hope, connects woe to God.

 

Hopes and Dreams

I doubt there has ever been a large portion of the younger generation at any period in time that didn’t insist on emotional authenticity. If there is one thing young people hate, it is the awareness or even suspicion that someone is selling them.

But I’m thirty-five now. With a wife and three kids. At that age and life stage where I’m too old to be hip and too young to be wise, and yet both old and young enough to know it.

I don’t presume to speak for my own generation It only ever feels like I’m projecting, so I might as well speak for myself.

So what does myself want? Real, real, real. That’s what I want. I want real spirituality. Not band-aid spirituality.

I feel especially ill equipped to speak for the burgeoning generation behind me.  But now that  I have been the pastor of a church made up entirely of Boomers, minus my own family, and one or two others, I feel I can say, if there is a generation I do feel ready to represent, it is (most ironically to people who know me) the oft maligned generation of my parents.

I can tell you what they want in a pastor. Comfort and reassurance in their waning years, chicken soup for the soul. The older I get, the less caustic and more sympathetic I am toward that sentiment. Still, being younger, it does leave a faint superficial taste in my mouth. But, to put on the other shoe, someday death will seem closer than life, and then I might be in some pew expecting the wide-eyed preacher to just make me feel a little less scared, especially if they are young enough to be my kid. I can’t imagine at that life stage I’d even try to pretend I’m not among the supremely wise, and be able to much tolerate rebukes about my shallowness or cynicism.

I’m also sure there is a balance between chicken soup and raw non-gmo style ministry. But I hate talking about balance. So I won’t. All hedging henceforth aside, I will speak for the one I am most qualified to speak for. In other words, this isn’t about how to get millennials into church by “being more authentic”. This is about, if you take away the salary and the  most literal pulpit I am gifted each week, how to get me into church.  Really, it is about how to get me into a Christian community at all, formal church, with steeples and deacons, or if it’s more your thing, a missional community with candles and hummus, and maybe board games.  

A real Christian community is a group of people who agree that Jesus is the creator and king of the universe, crucified for sin, risen, and coming again to drop heaven fully on earth, and want to have fellowship around these beliefs-by participating communally in the Lord’s Supper, preaching the good news about Jesus, baptism, singing, prayer, confession of shortcomings, and reflection on the Holy Scriptures known as the Bible. Their hope is that through these regular practices of discipleship, along with engagement with their neighbors, especially the oppressed, the beauty and reality of Jesus and his kingdom will be seen and embraced by their friends and enemies, their neighborhoods, and their cities.

If that is too general. I’m sorry. (Not sorry) It’s on purpose. I’m not that picky about the finer points of theology.

The struggle I have with what I affectionately call “Boomer Churches” (Reminder that I am the pastor of one of those) comes down to my inability to determine if church for them is about life, or if it is a pastime, a distraction, a safe space,…a comfort zone. When it has appeared to be the latter, it has no interest for me.

Now people congregate with their friends around common interests and ideals. Largely, that’s a wonderful thing just by itself, especially in the internet age.  However, Christian community is a specific type of community, more than a hangout. It can and should have its shallow moments. But it cannot be constituted as such.  It’s essence is a deep connection to reality.

Spirituality is about connecting with what is real, not escaping from it. I think a church gathering ought to function as a reminder of what is real and as a strong reaction against mere human nature-the felt need to never face the truth straight on, whether it’s thought too painful to bear or too good to be true, to work and entertain the truth away, every day. Either way, the real Christian communal experience is neither a guilt fest nor a feel good party, although on the emotional level, it may sometimes accompany unpleasant feelings and other times express pure joy. Sometimes, the real Christian community may foster all the feelings at once.

But when our expectations of church are the same as our expectations of drugs, food, and entertainment media, we are actively escaping real community.

When the service (to say nothing of the problem of equating “church” to “church service”) is always described as “nice”, “lovely”, “helpful”, “beautiful”, “rejuvenating”, or “inspiring” (which hopefully church is those things) and almost never as “raw”, “difficult”, “real”, “thought provoking”, “provocative”, “healing”, “life changing” or “offensive” it is time to evaluate if we are practicing communal discipleship or medication; if we are connecting with reality or escaping from it.

And this isn’t about preferring deep and melancholy to feel good and happy. Ascetic and liturgical expressions of church can be just as escapist. Not all the truths we run from are negative. Some of the hardest words for me to accept are reminders that I am loved. My fear of failure produces the habit of seeking refuge in the morose; a quality I suspect few understand, and not one I recommend.

That’s because what is great about the gospel is its ability to hold the positive and negative truths together. The truths of life, that it is all suffering, that humans without God are irreparably damaged, that the bad guys get to keep being bad guys, that death is pretty much here.

But also the truth that death has no sting because Jesus is risen, that sin is cured by the suffering of God, that the bad guys time to be bad has a term limit, that the kingdom is even nearer than death.

So when a local Jesus community gathers, it isn’t about escaping or feeling better (or worse.)  It’s about connecting to reality. It’s about connecting to Jesus. It’s about vulnerability. It’s about connecting to one another; being honest and open with one another. It’s about facing the hard, but love filled, joyful, and hopeful words of the good news about Jesus.  It’s about experiencing more than friendliness and a warm heart,  but love. It’s about mourning over the state of the world, while rejoicing in the hope of the gospel. It’s about blessing one another as we scheme ways to bless our physical neighborhoods, not retreat from its suffering, but be present in and with it. It’s not about making charitable donations, its about being charitable donations, which is as much about receiving charity, requiring a certain kind of strange and risky fellowship in the slummy parts of our towns, so foreign to most North American churchgoers

My hope for North America, for New England, for Southern Vermont, is for the existence of vibrant and explicit Jesus communities that have the inspiration and courage to creatively and wisely face the realness of the world with each other,  in all its gore, and mess, its sadness, desperation, and loss, as well as its inevitable redemption, its inherent and breathtaking beauty, its hidden hope, it’s real love, as found in Jesus.

Is this hope, this dream, this prayer, a millennial or Gen X thing? Is it just a “me” thing? Honestly, I don’t presume to speak for a generation or to a generational issue. This is my head and heart laid out. If there are any whose hearts long for the same kind of community in Southern Vermont, join me and my family in prayer. And also, if you can or so desire, dinner.

 

The Perpetual Ruins

Direct your steps to the perpetual ruins”-Psalm 74:3

This stood out. I hope it doesn’t come off the wrong way to say I have read every Psalm at least once every month for 6 years. I say this not to make any point about how spiritual or vigilant I am. I am blessed to do this. I bring it up to make a different point. I know the language of the Psalms. That is pertinent for two reasons.

First, it matters because this turn of phrase just sounds weird. It isn’t normally the way the Psalms speak.

Second it matters because this idea of Israel, Yahweh’s people as “perpetual”, although not often stated in exactly that way is thematic in terms of God’s relationship to his people. As Abraham J. Heschel says it,
“God has permanently attached himself to Israel”.

Yes his covenant is everlasting. God has made a promise to himself that no matter what his people do, he would never stop being their God, he would always be merciful to them, always restore them, never forsake them. He would discipline them in ways that would feel to Israel like abandonment, allow other nations to dispossess them in return for their unfaithfulness to him. But in the totality of his relationship to the children of Jacob, he would honor his everlasting, perpetual covenant, he would always allow, even aggressively draw out repentance. He would always welcome them back. He would always be their God, even when they were less than “his people.” God had left himself no other choice than to stay in familial attachment to this “stiff-necked and obstinate people.”

Parents get it.

The Psalmist is uttering a very common prayer when he says, “Direct your steps…”. Most prayer in the Psalms is asking God to do what he promised. That fact has always made me justify my laziness in praying. If God can’t lie, then the fulfillment of his promises do not depend on my praying. But anyone who is even a moderate novice in true prayer knows that it is not God who depends on our prayers, it is our modest faith which is the needy one. Prayer is like a note to ourselves of truths we easily and always forget, with the added bonus that in it we are connected to the only being in the universe who can do anything about the impossible. There is something about knowing we are not alone in the universe, that there is something, someone beyond the clouds. (I hear your atheist snickers, but you too go mining above the atmosphere. The drive is primal.)

So he says to God, “direct your steps”, “make your way”. Other psalmists might say, “Hear our prayer, O LORD. “Attend to our pleas for mercy”.

Prayer in the Psalms sounds as desperate exasperation. Faith is always full of pathos. Disinterested faith is not a thing.

“Direct your steps (O, LORD) to the perpetual ruins.”

The historical context of Psalm 74 is that the nation of Israel lies conquered. It’s temple and city destroyed. Which to a people who connect God and faith directly to city and place of worship, is not only the defeat of their nation, the enslavement of they and their families, but a crisis of faith, and the seeming defeat of God, if not a renege on his promises.

Deep wound.

But it’s the adjective which caught my eye. That word perpetual. It might be thought redundant to talk of ruins as perpetual. Ruins are perpetual. Even if you can restore to relative similarity, you will ever be able to restore a city to exactly what it once was. Ruins are the perpetual proof of the temporariness and vanity of humanity’s great cosmopolitan efforts.

I can picture my four year old son constructing a magnificent tower of jenga blocks all the way to the ceiling. And if he did, I would condescendingly praise his efforts. Because that’s what good dads do. But the hard truth is that I could knock it down with a breath, if I wanted to. And my son, if he wished, could agitate me enough to want to. He could put a sign next to his artful wonder of the world which read, “Proof that I don’t need anyone.” Anyone would include me of course. And then I would consider it a service to my son, and maybe moreso to the world, to nip the egomaniacal monster waiting to burst forth through him (though us all) by doing what would appear ruthless, and kick that tower down to the perfectly vacuumed floor, a fact taken for granted by the ungrateful little blessing who builds Jenga towers.

Or I could be merciful and correct my son verbally and warn him that if he doesn’t remove the sign and check his pride, I will kick that tower down.

In neither case am I wrong. I would not destroy the tower because I am sadistic and enjoy crushing the souls of four year olds. I would because pride is cancer, and I am not waiting until chemotherapy is necessary.

And in this analogy it would be so easy to prevent a Jenga tower from existing in my house. A perpetual lesson learned with difficulty, if ever, that it only exists in my house if I want it to, and that beauty is temporary and fragile.

If I really wanted to make the lesson clear, I would leave that dilapidated tower on the perfectly vacuumed floor.

The story of Israel is perpetual in two ways. In one way it is the story of the unending love and faithfulness of Yahweh. In another way it is the story of the stubbornness of God’s people.

So we are always asking God to direct his steps toward the ruins because our doomed towers are ever on the floor.

The great paradox of life is that we are all beautiful and we are our all ruined. Nature as we know it groans as a beautiful ruin unto itself, awaiting its redemption, which is inextricably tied to the redemption of humanity.

From birth #1, our flesh and our hearts are molded in the hateful pride of our father Adam, whose tower of anti-neediness has been trying to reemerge in various forms on God’s perfectly vacuumed earth since the beginning, and perpetually knocked down by God, making his attempts to curb the monster within appear ruthless, putting our lives, faith and even his own reputation in perpetual peril that we may learn this lesson-the only strong tower on which we can depend is God himself-the Rock of ages.

The only hope of ending the cycle of ruination is the mercy of God.

“Direct your steps.”

And God answers this prayer in the form of a man named Jesus. (How else can I say it?) Jesus is the tower which is knocked down, and resurrected as the indestructible and and untouchable perfection of beauty.

So now the nature of our towers are exposed because they all are stacked up next to Jesus.

“The one (beyond the clouds) who sits in the heavens laughs…”

Our shortcomings are destroyed with Jesus. The best of us are hidden, and swallowed up, and become one with his unparadoxical beauty. In him perpetuity is transferred from the ruins to redemption. In him, God fulfills his covenant promises, his familial duty to the offspring of Abraham, that is, to every single one of us.

And faith is to prayerfully and passionately remember this perpetual love, as shown in Jesus. God’s salvation is never waiting for us to get life unruined. But for us to reach rock bottom of ourselves that we desperately cry out. “Direct your steps!”

Or we could keep trying to build laughably inferior towers. This will not end well.