"The Voice of the Lord" (Psalm 29)

Avoiding What Needs to Be Done 

I have one friend who complains about the pile of mail that sits on her kitchen counter, waiting to be opened. Another friend who confesses in a slightly guilty tone about the daunting pile of laundry that he always postpones washing longer than he should. And yet another friend who laments the pile of junk growing in his garage, needing to be taken to the recycling center and the dump. All of which leads me to suspect that, for all of us, there is a pile of something somewhere with our name on it.

I say this somewhat facetiously to get at the serious truth that, from time to time, there is something we know needs to be done and yet we avoid doing it. Maybe it’s not the mail or the laundry. Maybe it’s a difficult conversation. Maybe it’s a major change in our diet. Maybe it’s owning up to a behavior that’s hurting ourselves or others. Whatever it is, it will not leave us alone. It gnaws at the edges of our consciousness. It tugs at our heart. We can put it off, sure, it’s at our own risk. For denying it or delaying it is likely to cause it to come out sideways, whether in a burst of anger or a midnight panic or just a slow withdrawal from life.

Racing out of Control

I have a recurring dream that visits me whenever life gets stormy. In the dream, I’m racing on the road, weaving in and out of traffic, always accelerating. (Lest I give the wrong impression that I’m a speed demon on the road, that this dream is a form of wish fulfillment, let me emphatically reject the idea! Although I suppose one could argue my unconscious is having its say….) I have never wrecked in one of these dreams, yet they are terrifying. I wake up frantic, fearful, my heart racing.

As this dream generally visits me in seasons of anxiety, where much is going on and much is uncertain, I take it to be a reminder of what I need. Which is to slow down. Or in the words of Psalm 46, “Be still.” Or, as those same Hebrew words are occasionally used to refer to the slackening of the hands, they could be translated, “Let go.” Down your tools. Step back from your plans. Indeed, it is often the case that my racing anxiety is the result of too many calculations, too many expectations, not enough listening, not enough trust.

I suppose what I mean to say is that sometimes what needs to be done and yet I avoid doing, is not a particular activity but rather a cessation of activity. I am reminded of what Francis de Sales, a sixteenth-century church leader, once said. “Every one of us needs half an hour of prayer every day, except when we are busy—then we need a full hour.”

Of Chaos and Creation

The storm at the center of today’s scripture has led some scholars to speculate that its origins are Canaanite. The Canaanite god Baal is commonly depicted as a storm god, whose voice is like thunder. But even if Psalm 29 was originally written as a song in praise of Baal, it has clearly been edited and repurposed for the faith of Israelites—not unlike how the winter solstice was adapted and repurposed for the Christian celebration of God’s incarnation in the birth of Christ.

Indeed, the psalm now evokes the scene of creation in Genesis 1. Just as the spirit (or wind) of God swept over the face of the primeval waters at the very start of creation (Gen 1:2), so “the voice of the Lord is over the waters” at the start of our psalm (Ps 29:3). In the ancient Near East, water was symbolic for the murky, undifferentiated chaos from which creation emerges. Imagine a storm at sea. That is the biblical image for chaos, the world from which God draws forth creation. In today’s psalm, God is depicted as “over the waters,” and not just that but “over mighty waters” (Ps 29:3). God is depicted as “enthroned over the flood” (Ps 29:10). The psalmist makes it abundantly clear that chaos does not have the upper hand, even when things get stormy.

But God’s power over chaos is not combat, as it is in Canaanite religion. No, God’s creative power over chaos is the same here as it is in Genesis. It is in the word. Repeatedly the psalmist refers to “the voice of the Lord” as what shapes the elements of chaos—breaking, quaking, shaking, whirling, stripping. In case there’s any doubt that our psalm intends to evoke the scene of creation from Genesis 1, where God’s word draws forth creation from chaos, we might take note of how many times “the voice of the Lord” issues in our psalm. Seven times.

The Trinity as Relationship

Today is Trinity Sunday, which always falls one week after Pentecost, when we celebrate the arrival of the Holy Spirit among the church community. It is an appropriate progression, reminding us what the Holy Spirit is about. The Holy Spirit is not a superpower. It’s not like the radioactive spider whose bite turns Peter Benjamin Parker into Spiderman or the radioactive muck that transforms four sewer turtles into vigilante ninjas. The Holy Spirit is part of the Trinity. And the Trinity, whatever else it is, is relationship. The Trinity shows us that God is never an isolated individual, but always already in relationship. God, Christ, Spirit. Father, Son, Holy Ghost. These figures of our faith represent God in relationship. They depict God in dialogue. Indeed, Christ is the Word made flesh (cf. John 1), which is another way of saying that God is the Call and Christ is the Response. And what else is the Holy Spirit but the Conversation, where Call joins with Response?

The gospel of John insists that the Word was “in the beginning” and that “all things came into being through [the Word]” (John 1:2-3). Which suggests that the Trinity is at the heart of creation. That Christ, the Response to God’s Call, is at the heart of creation. Is this not what we see at the beginning of Genesis and also in today’s psalm? At the heart of creation is “the voice of the Lord” and a response. Call and response. “Let there be…and there was….” “Let the earth bring forth vegetation,” and “the earth”—responding to God’s call—“brought forth vegetation” (Gen 1:11-12).

God’s power over chaos, over the murky, primeval waters, is not combat. It is call and response. Conversation, dialogue, relationship. And thus from the chaos comes creation. From the storm comes something good, very good.

Giving Us Strength, Bringing Us Peace

What creation shows us, I think, is that the Trinity is not a closed circle. All of creation is invited into the relationship that is God. We are invited into the call and response, “Let there be…and there was….” Jesus models this for us. Jesus shows us what it looks like when God’s call meets with human response, when God’s word finds flesh.

The end of today’s psalm indicates that the God whose word calls forth goodness from chaos, gives us strength and peace (Ps 29:11). To respond to God’s call, to be in relationship with God as Jesus was, gives us strength and peace. I think this is true. I have noticed that when I’m avoiding what I know needs to be done, the storm intensifies. But when I respond to the call—whether that’s to have a conversation or make a needed change or just to own up to a hurtful reality—when I respond to the call, there is a sense of calm, even in the storm. Just a few chapters later, the psalmist celebrates this calm in the storm, which he experiences after confessing his sin: “Let all who are faithful offer prayer to you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach them” (Ps 32:6). It’s almost as if responding to God’s call draws forth something new and good from among the chaos. Almost as if “the voice of the Lord” really is “over mighty waters” (Ps 29:3).

I don’t mean to focus on what we are avoiding or say that we need to do everything we don’t want to do. I only mean to say this, “Listen closely to your life.” Because I believe God is speaking to us. Perhaps especially on the edges of chaos, where we feel overwhelmed. I can’t say specifically what God is calling you to do. But I see all over scripture, all over the history of our faith, that God’s call empowers people of faith to draw forth goodness from the storm. And I see also that God’s call often begins with a “Be still!” A “Let go!” That God’s call often is not for a particular activity, but for a cessation of activity. And a trust that the chaos, the storm, “the rush of mighty waters,” doesn’t have the final word. “The voice of the Lord” is “over mighty waters” (Ps 29:3). Jesus is in the boat with his followers, to give us strength, to bring us peace...to invite us to join God in drawing forth good from the chaos.

Prayer

Creator, Christ, Spirit,
Whose power is relationship,
Call and response,
Not in a closed circle,
But with all creation—
Help us to be still,
To listen for your voice over mighty waters
…
And never to give up responding,
For in your Trinity, your circle, your family which is our family,
We find strength and peace;
We find goodness drawn from the chaos.
In Christ, crucified and yet risen: Amen.

Book Review: indigo: the color of grief by Jonathan J. Foster

This book throbs with life.

In a nutshell, it is a firsthand account of death and grief and, perhaps most of all, love:

the thing against
which [we are] flattened [in death and grief]
the thing
holding things
together (44-45)

indigo: the color of grief is the best kind of theology, a “lowercase theology” (1), which does not need to shout because it is not defending but exploring. It is not certain but hoping against hope. It is not closed but open.

indigo presents what might be called a theopoetics, the words of which are quite different from the logos of theology, which tries to have the last word. The words of a theopoetics are wounded, vulnerable, exposed. Always exposed. To silence (sometimes there are no words). To revision. To a new word. A theopoetics does not find God as much as it is found by God. Is surprised by God. Writing about the loss of his daughter, Jonathan Foster comments:

it’s weird
absence is nothing
a no-thing
but it’s very much something
a some-thing

it has no form but
it forms me
it has no energy but
it energizes me
i’m full of its emptiness (9)

It would not be an exaggeration to say that indigo was among the easiest and most difficult reads of my life. Easiest because of its honest, plainspoken-but-profound poetry—like Mary Oliver without the botany. Most difficult because nearly every passage employs the fine blade of memory to flay the ordinary of its familiarity and reveal the cross. Music, sunset, soccer. Everything here is intensely incarnated, or particular, and bears within it a certain crucified-but-risen character.

Foster writes about reading a fragment of Elie Wiesel’s Night and having to stop, which could well serve as a description for my own experience of reading indigo:

didn’t reopen the book that day

idk

seemed disrespectful

to move on too quickly

to read further

to possibly forget

what wiesel wanted us to remember (27)

indigo appears to take its title from Foster’s description of a sunset, which comes to serve as a sort of metaphor for the darkness of death, loss, grief. In Foster’s description, indigo is the last color seen “as everything fade[s]” to black (34). By implication, it is also the first color seen when black blushes into life. 

Indigo, then, is the color of life throbbing. And indigo is an inspiring call to life.

Books about grief are often recommended to the grieving, but this is a book I would recommend to anyone. Perhaps especially to those who are not grieving or, for that matter, not feeling much of anything at all. For reading indigo resensitized me to life—to memories long forgotten, to values often neglected, to a hope I too frequently relinquish. Reading it brought me to life.

- - - - - 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the author and/or publisher through the Speakeasy blogging book review network. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

"The Groaning of God" (Rom 8:22-27)

Shared Feelings

If you have ever been to a youth sporting event or concert or dance performance or graduation ceremony, I imagine you have observed (if not experienced firsthand) the special connection between a child and their parents and grandparents. When a child has just completed a special achievement, whether that’s a touchdown or a solo or high school education, and they are beaming like the sun, you can often tell who their parents and grandparents are. They are the ones cheering the loudest. They are the ones whistling with pride or shouting their child’s name.

Likewise, if a serious mishap occurs, they are the first responders. I remember a soccer game when I was thirteen or so, when a teammate went down under a rough challenge, and it immediately became clear he was in great pain. Something was wrong. His parents were among the first people to run across the field, maybe even before the ref blew his whistle. It was as though his pain was their pain. His cry was matched by their breathless, worried dash across the pitch. My teammate had broken his collarbone. But in that moment, it seemed like his parents were broken too. His agony was theirs.

Pentecost and Divine Intimacy

Today is Pentecost, the day that commemorates the Holy Spirit filling the first followers of Christ. Jesus had promised his followers that when he departed, they would not be left alone. He would send the Spirit of God to them, a spirit that he named the paraclete, which can be translated as “helper” or “advocate” (John 15:26; 16:7). The most celebrated story of Pentecost is found in Acts 2, in which “suddenly from heaven there [comes] a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it fill[s] the entire house” where the followers of Christ are gathered, and “divided tongues, as of fire, appear among them, and a tongue rest[s] on each of them,” and “all of them [are] filled with the Holy Spirit and [begin] to speak in other languages…about God’s deeds of power” (Acts 2:2-4, 11). Peter, a leader among these first Christ-followers, stands up and explains that this colorful, multilingual display of enthusiasm for God is a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy that God’s spirit would one day be poured out on all flesh (Acts 2:17). It is, in other words, an opening of the floodgates, a universalization of God’s Spirit. The final words to the prophecy that Peter shares are among the most uplifting in all scripture: “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Acts 2:21).

Lest the miraculous events of this scene make it seem overly distant, lest our never having seen tongues of fire upon each other’s heads leave us feeling left out, I think it is worth asking what is the meaning of this event. What is the significance of this sign? What’s really going on? A good place to start is with Jesus, who promised the Holy Spirit in the first place. Jesus himself had such an experience, you know? For him, it was not with tongues of fire or a violent wind, but with a dove and a voice from heaven, proclaiming, “You are my beloved son; with you, I am well pleased” (cf. Mark 1:11). For Jesus, to experience the Spirit of God is to know our intimate connection with God, to know that we are in fact God’s beloved child, with whom God is well pleased. This is the good news that Jesus went about proclaiming, when he ate with tax collectors and sinners, when he healed the marginalized and oppressed, when he lifted up children and the lowly, when he touched lepers and talked with Samaritans and gave dignity to women who had been shamed and shunned. His good news begins with a simple but revolutionary message, “You are God’s beloved child, with whom God is well pleased.” So he calls the woman who has been bleeding for twelve years, whom countless doctors have failed, who has become an outcast in society, “Daughter” (Luke 8:48). So he addresses the paralyzed man whose friends bring him to Jesus, “Son.” So he calls Zacchaeus, an outcast by way of his occupation, “a son of Abraham” (Luke 19:9).

In many of these stories in the gospels, the good news of sonship and daughtership is accompanied with a miraculous sign. Paralysis disappears. Bleeding stops. A life of greed and fraud turns into a life of gratitude and generosity. The point, I think, is not just the miracle, but the wonderful news that the miracle reflects. We are beloved children of God, with whom God is well pleased. That is what changes a life. That is what makes a world of difference. That is the seed of a new creation. The change that matters most of all is not a material or physical one, but a spiritual one. It is a change in the story we believe and live by. A change in our orientation toward the world.

Pentecost, then, is not just about the marvel of a bunch of people speaking different languages. It is about the marvel that we are sons and daughters of God. It is about the marvel that God is near to all of us, that God’s Spirit is not a privileged possession but belongs to all who would receive it, who would dare to believe the good news. As Peter proclaims, quoting from prophecy, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Acts 2:21).

The Spirit Amid Our Suffering

In his letter to the Romans, Paul describes what it is like to have God’s Spirit dwell within you. His description proceeds in a rather surprising direction. He does not talk about pure, unfiltered joy. He does not talk about a blissful state of perpetual peace. He talks instead about…suffering.

Just before today’s passage begins, he sets the stage for his description: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you” (Rom 8:11). It is telling that Paul describes God’s Spirit, twice, as what raised Jesus “from the dead.” If Jesus’ example is anything to go by, the promise of the Spirit is not the promise that there will be no darkness or death, but rather that God will be with us in these moments. God will be with us amid disease, disgrace, devastating loss, even death—with the power to raise us to new life.

Paul develops this point with a rich and provocative image, which in summary is this: when we groan, we do not groan alone. God is groaning with us. Paul introduces this image in verses 15 and 16, where he says that when we cry out to God, “Abba! Father!” it is not just us crying out to God; it is the Spirit of God within us crying out too. It is as though we hear an echo of God’s cry in our own. He unfolds this idea further in today’s passage, where he says that “the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words” (Rom 8:26).

Now, there’s one minor brush stroke in Paul’s portrait of the Holy Spirit that makes all the difference in the world, and Paul makes it at the beginning of today’s passage: “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now” (Rom 8:22). This is crucial, because a groan can point in many different directions. A groan can be a sigh of despair. It can be the sound of death throes. But Paul portrays it in a very different way. As the sound of labor pains. This groan is not the sound of despair or death. It is the sound of pain, yes, but much more importantly, new life.

Death Throes or Birth Pains

Why is this important? William James, sometimes known as the “Father of American psychology,” points out that faith deals with what is scientifically unverifiable. He acknowledged, for example, that the question, “Is this a moral universe” is scientifically meaningless and unanswerable because morals are immaterial. They cannot be identified and counted and measured in the same way that atoms and molecules can be. Yet he argued against the religious critics of his day, insisting that in fact this question makes a world of difference—to how a person lives. If they answer “No, the universe is not moral,” then they may well live without regard for themselves or others. But if they answer, “Yes, it is moral,” then they might live as though they and other people matter, as though a person’s conduct matters.

In a similar way, the question, “Is our groaning the sound of death throes or birth pains?” makes all the difference to the way we live. If death throes, then what’s the point? Throw in the towel. Abandon all hope. If birth pains, then live with longing, with hope, with fidelity to the kingdom of God. “Wait,” as Paul says, “with patience” (Rom 8:25).

I think back to our youth on the playing field or in the concert hall, whose parents beam when they beam, and groan when they groan. I think back to the parents who raced across the pitch to be with my teammate. I know that their groaning was filled with fear, but even more than that, with longing, with hope, with the will to do everything they possibly could to ensure the safety of their son.

How much more so our heavenly father and mother?

This Pentecost is a day of joy, and as we share in fellowship over lunch today, I hope we can feel God’s smile mirroring our smiles. I hope we can feel in our bones God’s insistence that we are God’s beloved children with whom God is well pleased. But as we leave one another and return to our world…we will likely find ourselves groaning. Diagnoses of disease. Natural disasters. Wars. Hateful words. What would it mean to hear our groans not as quiet, resigned, solitary sighs of despair, but as an echo of all of creation, as an echo of the Spirit of God? What would it mean to hear these groans not as death throes, but as birth pains?

My hunch is, it would make a world of difference. May it be so.

Prayer

Tender God,
Who looks upon us as a doting father,
As a nurturing mother,
Who calls us beloved children—
We celebrate your intimate presence with us,
Your Spirit within us,
A helper in all things
…
Bless us in our joy,
With gratitude for all your gifts.
Bless us in our groans,
With ears to hear in them
Your own groaning
And the sound of birth pains,
So that we long for
And live for
Your kingdom,
Which is at hand.
In Christ, our brother: Amen.

"Far Above" (Eph 1:15-23)

Popeye and the Myth of Redemptive Violence

Did you know that Popeye—as in, “Popeye the Sailorman”—did not appear in creator E. C. Segar’s comic strip for almost ten years? Olive Oyl was a main character at the start, but it took nearly ten years for Popeye to appear, and even then, he was only a minor character. But the audience loved him, so Segar increasingly gave the people what they wanted. It wasn’t long before Popeye was the main man.

The popularity of Popeye is no coincidence, according to biblical scholar Walter Wink. Popeye renders in simple, dramatic form the central myth of our modern world, the key story that explains life. “In a typical segment,” Wink explains, “Bluto abducts a screaming and kicking Olive Oyl, Popeye’s girlfriend.” In the beginning, then, there is chaos. Conflict. Evil. “When Popeye attempts to rescue her, the massive Bluto beats his diminutive opponent to a pulp, while Olive Oyl helplessly wrings her hands. At the last moment, as our hero oozes to the floor, and Bluto is trying, in effect, to rape Olive Oyl, a can of spinach pops from Popeye’s pocket and spills into his mouth. Transformed by this gracious infusion of power, he easily demolishes the villain and rescues his beloved. The format never varies. Neither party ever gains any insight or learns from these encounters. Violence does not teach Bluto to honor Olive Oyl’s humanity, and repeated pummelings do not teach Popeye to swallow his spinach before the fight.”^[1]

Walter Wink and others have named this kind of story, “the myth of redemptive violence,” and trace it all the way back to the Babylonians and neighboring cultures. In Babylon, this myth was told originally as a creation story, known as the Enuma Elish. The myth is simple. Chaos is the original setting of the world, and it is bad, evil. Only through a violent act can evil be subdued and order established. Indeed, violence is how the world is created. Literally. One set of gods kills another set of gods, and with their dismembered body parts, they fashion hills, rivers…and humans. Murder is in our DNA, according to this myth.

This mythic pattern can be found all over the world. From international politics to the playground, it reigns supreme, far above any other story. Nations understand that violence is necessary to secure their interests from a chaotic world (how many nations are formed, or preserved, through war?), just as children understand that justice sometimes requires knuckles and blood. That this myth forms the basis of a seemingly quaint, popular children’s cartoon is only reflective of how deeply ingrained and unquestioned it is in our social psyche. Indeed, one figure cited from research indicates that by the age of eighteen, a youth will have seen on average 15,000 murders on television. This is the way the world works, we are shown and told, again and again and again. (One hour a week of Sunday School, of hearing a radically different story, of a good creation and the redemptive power of love—one hour a week is hardly going to make a dent on this myth that inundates our world. On this Mother’s Day, however, I’m reminded and grateful that the radically different story of redemptive love does occasionally get told outside church—by mothers who know firsthand the power of unconditional love.)

David Lipscomb’s Critique of Christian Allegiance

The power of the myth of redemptive violence became unmistakably clear to David Lipscomb, a 19th-century minister in the Stone Campbellite tradition from which our own Disciples of Christ movement emerged. David Lipscomb was born in 1831 to parents Granville and Ann Lipscomb, who both hailed originally from down the road in Louisa County. David grew up amid the strife and discontent of late antebellum America, and he would later be profoundly troubled by the ravages of the Civil War. He struggled to reconcile the fighting with his faith. How could followers of Christ, the prince of peace, turn on one another in violence? How could ministers of reconciliation employ weapons of division and death? In his view, it was bad enough that his brothers and sisters in Christ had submitted to violence. But it was even worse to see them fighting against one another. He could only conclude that the primary allegiance of Christians was no longer to Christ and the kingdom of God, but rather to their respective nations, to what he called “the government of man.” The great tragedy of the church, he says, “is that the children of God enter into the kingdoms of this world, imbibe the spirit of those kingdoms, bring that spirit into the church of God, defile the church and drive out the spirit of Christ.”^[2] In other words, the war had betrayed the true hearts of most Christians. They might proclaim the way of Christ, but in truth there was a limit, a point beyond which the way of Christ became irrelevant, impractical—perhaps even “unjust,” insofar as it could not quickly enough resolve the perceived injustices of the world. At this point, only violence would do. Lipscomb thought that Christ-followers had forsaken the gospel of God’s redeeming love and drunk the kool aid of the myth of redemptive violence. 

David Lipscomb is a radical. His conclusions may themselves seem impractical. Even so, I am inspired by his example and plan to share his story with you, not only today, but in the months to come, because one thing he does remarkably well is to keep Christ and the kingdom of God in the center of his view at all times. He sincerely asks, “How do I live as a follower of Christ in a world that does not follow Christ? How do I live as a citizen of God’s kingdom amid the kingdoms of this world?” In this way, Lipscomb stands in good company. The early Christ-followers would frequently refer to themselves as “strangers” and “sojourners” and “resident aliens” to distinguish themselves first and foremost as citizens of God’s kingdom rather than citizens of the land where they lived. One of the dangers of our place and time, as I see it, is that we live amid a clamor of cries demanding our allegiance, issuing a call to arms. They can be as diametrically opposed as right and left, liberal and conservative, reactionary and revolutionary, and yet they all share the same foundation: a belief in the myth of redemptive violence. Ultimately, evil is out there somewhere and must be defeated by us, the good guys—if not by the ballot, then by the bullet. To believe the gospel of God’s redeeming love in a world such as this would indeed make a person stick out like a sore thumb. It would make a person a stranger, a sojourner, a resident alien (if not an alien from another planet altogether).

Ascension Sunday

In today’s scripture, Paul shares his prayer for the church community in Ephesus. In a nutshell, he prays that they would put Christ first. In typical Pauline verbosity, of course, he expresses this with a proliferation of ideas and images, conveying his desire that the Ephesians would gain a fuller understanding of their “hope” in Christ, their “glorious inheritance among the saints,” and the “the immeasurable greatness of [God’s] power” for people who trust in God (Eph 1:18-19). But what else is this hope, this inheritance, and this power of faith, than the kingdom of God, the world where Christ reigns? Indeed, Paul concludes his prayer by imagining the risen Christ “seated…at [God’s] right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion” (Eph 1:20-21).

In the church calendar, today is “Ascension Sunday,” which always falls on the Sunday before Pentecost. It celebrates the scriptural account in which Jesus ascends to heaven forty days after his resurrection. It is typical on Ascension Sunday to imagine Jesus ascending into heaven and sitting on a throne beside God. That’s basically what Paul imagines in our scripture today. But lest we mistake this scene as communicating, “God’s in heaven, all’s right with the world,” the scripture passages for Ascension Sunday point emphatically beyond skyward worship to earthy, nitty-gritty responsibility. In Luke, just before Jesus ascends, he addresses his followers and entrusts them with spreading the gospel: “Repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in [my] name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witness of these things” (Luke 24:47-48). It is, in other words, a holy handoff, a passing of the baton. It is not the end of Jesus’ work, but the beginning. And so in a parallel story in Acts, two angels address the followers of Christ who are gazing up toward heaven after Jesus, saying, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” (Acts 1:11)—as if to say, what you are standing around for?

It may be helpful to remember that, in antiquity, vertical representations of “up” and “down” conveyed more than literal position. “Up” conveyed transcendence. It conveyed the superiority of a thing. So when Paul plays with these same images and says that God raised Christ not only “from the dead” but also “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion,” he is actually saying that, for us followers of Christ, Christ is the supreme authority. In today’s way of speaking, where we project the spiritual reality of things less into the heavens and more into the interiority of our hearts, we might say that Christ is enthroned in the center of our heart. However we say it, the result is unmistakable. The kingdom of God is not something that gets imposed from above with force. The kingdom of God, rather, becomes a reality through our making Jesus first, through our flesh-and-blood faithfulness, through our being witnesses to a way other than the myth of redemptive violence. To put it lightly, we follow Jesus, not Popeye. To put it a little more seriously, where the world proclaims, “Evil is outside us, and needs to be destroyed,” we believe otherwise. Sin is within, and the remedy is not destruction but love. Or as Jesus charges his followers just before his ascension, “Repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in [my] name to all nations” (Luke 24:47).

Putting Jesus First:

More Than “Lord, Lord”

I remember in Sunday School and youth group occasionally hearing the call or invitation to put Jesus first in my life, or to give all my life—not just part of it—to God. I appreciate the invitation insofar as it is biblical in origin. We see it today in Ephesians, where Jesus is proclaimed to be “far above” all things (Eph 1:21). But I must confess, making Jesus first in my life was a rather vague idea. To make Jesus first in my life usually just meant being as “Christian” as I possibly could be, which could mean going to church, listening to Christian music, reading Christian books, and having Christian conversations. It wasn’t that different from what’s going on when Jesus talks about the people who say, “Lord, lord,” as though knowing and saying Jesus’ name is the same as living in God’s kingdom. But Jesus says it isn’t the same thing (cf. Matt 7:21-29).

One of the reasons I really appreciate the identification of “the myth of redemptive violence,” is that it shows me where the rubber actually meets the road. It gives teeth to the idea of putting Jesus “far above” all other things, the idea of living as a “stranger” or “resident alien” in this world. It points out one crucial difference (and to be sure, there are others) between the kingdoms of this world and the kingdom of God. For Jesus to be enthroned in my heart means for me to trust and live by his good news that it is love that redeems all things, not violence. It means instead of getting even, I’m called to own up to my part and forgive the part of others. It means instead of looking out for my own good, I am called to look out for the common good. It means instead of taking up arms for the right cause, I lay them down for the kingdom of God, where in the name of Christ forgiveness is proclaimed to all nations. By living this way, I become a witness to the kingdom of God.

When Jesus ascended, his work was not done. It was just beginning. In us, “the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all” (Eph 1:22-23).

Prayer

Dear Christ,
You entrust us with the task of being witnesses
To your way of forgiveness and transformation:
As strangers in our own land,
May we tell a different story
Than the myth of redemptive violence.
May we sing the good news of your redeeming love
And be witnesses to the power of forgiveness and transformation.
In Christ, who longs to gather us all together,
As a hen gathers her chicks—
Amen.

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[1] Walter Wink, Walter Wink: Collected Readings (ed. Henry French; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013), 150-151.

[2] David Lipscomb, On Civil Government: Its Origin, Mission and Destiny and the Christian’s Relation to It (orig. pub. 1866; Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2011), 144.

"The Victory That Conquers the World" (1 John 5:1-6)

School Memories

I remember very few of the specific assignments that I had in primary and secondary school. The only assignments that stand out in my memory are the ones that filled me with excitement and imagination and the ones that filled me with fear.

I remember reading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle in sixth or seventh grade. I loved it. I still remember the characters, the brooding and brilliant Charles Wallace and his shy sister Meg, who becomes the story’s hero. I remember many of the specific scenes, such as the impromptu midnight snack that Meg and Charles share toward the beginning of the story during a terrible thunderstorm. I remember the lesson that the story taught me, namely that love is different than control. I don’t remember my book report or what grade I received for it.

On the other side of my memory, lies the terror of a ninth-grade English assignment, which was to memorize and recite in front of the class a Shakespearean sonnet. I was consumed with fear from the start. I began learning my lines from the first moment and practiced them day and night, even in the middle of other classes. I would freeze up with dread every time I could not remember a word. As it happens, I recited the sonnet perfectly, not missing a single word. I got a 100. A+. My teacher did make a comment about how my recitation lacked any sort of dramatic feeling, which does not surprise me one bit. I was feeling only one thing when I recited that sonnet. Fear. Interestingly, if you asked me which Shakespearean play we read in ninth grade, I couldn’t tell you. I don’t remember the play at all.

I find these contrasting experiences instructive. On the one hand, there is the motivation of fear. It is very effective. It got me an A+. But I don’t remember the Shakespearean play at all. (And to be quite honest, I don’t really like Shakespeare today! Is that a coincidence?) On the other hand, there is the motivation of curiosity and desire. It is very effective too, but in a very different way. I doubt that I received a 100 on my book report for A Wrinkle in Time. But what I did receive was a lasting impression, a story that has stayed with me since, a lesson that has informed the way I understand the world and live in it.

Teaching by Fear and Teaching by Desire

Journalist and teacher Colman McCarthy makes a helpful distinction between two ways of teaching. One way is to teach by fear. He suggests that grading, testing, and homework are all common forms of this way of teaching. Their motivation is fear: fear of failure, fear of falling behind, fear of how others judge you. In this way of teaching, the main question that concerns people is, “What grade did you get?” Not “What did you learn?” or “How were you changed?”

The other way to teach is by desire. Teaching by desire has less to do with results and final product and more to do with questions and exploration and experience. It has less to do with the grade at the end of the course and more to do with cultivating curiosity at the beginning of the course.

I find this distinction between fear-based teaching and desire-based teaching helpful. Maybe it’s a bit simplistic. I can hear some people saying, “That sounds beautiful in theory, but is it practical to teach only by desire?” I don’t know if it’s practical. I have little training in pedagogy. What I do know is my experience. The lessons that have made an indelible impression on me, that have stayed with me long past the course itself, are not the ones where I got an A+ out of fear. They are the ones in which I was genuinely curious and interested.

Obedience Motivated by Desire

“The love of God is this, that we obey his commandments.” (1 John 5:3). When I first read that line in today’s scripture, I paused in my tracks. It sounded a little off to me. I was a little repulsed to hear language of “commandments” right next to talk of God’s love.  What I heard was, “If you love me, you’ll do what I tell you to do”—which sounds a little coercive, a little manipulative. It sounds like teaching by fear. It conjures in my mind the image of an authoritarian God who is less concerned with the spiritual freedom of love and more concerned that I do everything just the way he wants. What happened, I wondered, to my freedom in Christ (cf. Gal 5)?

I’m grateful that I kept reading, because it quickly became clear to me that John’s language of obedience is not coming from a tyrannical teacher. Rather, it is spoken out of care and concern and is addressed to our need—indeed, our desire. “The love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome…”  (1 John 5:3). That is, God’s commandments are not repressive; they are not spiritually constrictive. From this, I conclude that our obedience is not meant to be motivated by fear. Our obedience is not about trying to get it right, trying to get an A+. Rather, our obedience is meant to be motivated by desire for a better life, a desire for freedom from heavy burdens.

I find it telling that Jesus uses similar language, referring to his commandments as an “easy yoke” and promising “rest” from our “burdens”: “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt 11:28-29). This is the one place in the gospels where Jesus explicitly invites his disciples to “learn” from him. And in the Greek, “disciples” is more literally translated as “learners.” So, as “learners” of teacher Jesus, this is our lesson. This is what Jesus wants to teach. And it’s simple: “Learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart.”

Learning Jesus’ Gentle and Humble Heart

We are learning Jesus’ gentle and humble heart. Not because an authoritarian God is coercing us by means of fear and threats. But because we desire to lay our burdens down.

So how do we go about learning Jesus’ gentle and humble heart? Our scripture today talks about obeying God’s commandments. I don’t know about you, but when I hear the word “commandments,” my mind immediately goes to “the Ten Commandments” that God gave to Israel. Certainly these commandments are essential to a good way of life. They are a baseline. But will they alone bring rest to the soul? Will they address the host of burdens we carry, whether it’s our expectations and worry, or resentment and grudges, or greed for more?

Throughout the history of our faith, spiritual renewal groups (from the Desert Fathers and Mothers in 4^th-century Egypt to the Anabaptists in 16^th-century Europe to Stone and Campbell in the 19^th century) have emerged to remind us that as followers of Christ we have a unique set of commandments given to us by Jesus. They’re not numbered in simple fashion like the 10 commandments. But if you do want to get a quick rundown of them, many of these spiritual renewal groups would point you to the Sermon on the Mount, which is Matthew 5-7. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus issues a series of invitations (or “commandments”) that distinguish his way from the way of the world, his adventurous, abundant life from the autopilot on which even good and law-abiding citizens live most of their lives.

If you have some free time this week, I would encourage you to read Matthew 5-7 slowly, thinking anew about what it would look like to obey Jesus’ commandments. “If a part of your life causes you to sin, tear it out, cut it off, throw it away” (5:27-30; my paraphrase). “Do not resist an evildoer” (5:39). “Give to everyone who begs from you” (5:42). “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (5:44). “No one can serve two masters…you cannot serve God and wealth” (6:24). “Do not worry about your life, what you will eat…what you will wear…but strive for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (6:25, 33). “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged” (7:1).

The gentle and humble heart of Jesus—which we are to learn and “obey,” by which we lay our burdens down—is all these things. It is, in summary, a heart of faith. Trust. It is not dominated by the need for results, for a profitable bottom line, for control or success. Rather, it is free from the slavery of results, the hollow quest for control. Thus it can be merciful, non-violent, generous, patient, compassionate to all. It trusts that God is working good in the world through these qualities, even if they do not manifest in the immediate results that are desired (…even if they end up putting you on a cross).

In our scripture today, John refers to this way of Jesus as “the victory that conquers the world.” By now it should be clear that this is not victory in the way our world understands victory. It is not a victory of getting our way. To get our way is usually to fight fire with fire. To get our way is like winning a battle…in a war we have already lost. The victory that conquers the world is a laying down of burdens rather than a taking up of arms. It is, as John says, “faith,” trusting and bearing witness to God’s love regardless of results. It is, to borrow from Paul, “not [being] overcome with evil, but overcom[ing] evil with good” (Rom 12:21).

Prayer

O God, who is love,
We follow you not out of fear
But out of desire:
We see in Jesus Christ
A way, a truth, a life
That we desire to live
…
When the world dullens our heart
And enslaves us to the need for results,
For control,
May we hear the call of Jesus
To lay our burdens down
And learn from his gentle, humble heart.
In Christ, our brother: Amen.