Will The Real God Please Stand Up?

We are made in God’s image, male and female, so says God in the first creation story in the book of Genesis.

Do we also make God in our image? Maybe even more than we realize. The biblical image of God seems two-faced: sometimes faithful, forgiving, peace-filled, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love – just as we are in our best moments. At other times, God seems just as petty, jealous, violent and destructive as we can be. Made in God’s image -- that can be downright worrisome.

How do we make peace with the warring images of God?

Anyone who thinks the New Testament is all sweetness and light has never read the rest of the story. The Book of Revelation is as violent as the rest of the Bible put together, and the violence is from the hand of God.  

We tend to see the Jesus of the Gospels as sweetness and light, offering promises of forgiveness and abundance of life to all of us. And yet, and yet…there is another Jesus. The one who announces that anyone who doesn’t believe will go into eternal fire, with weeping and gnashing of teeth. The one who says he came not to bring peace but a sword. The one who said two swords are enough.

What are we to do with this Jesus? He is like the angry uncle I would never invite to dinner, the vengeful old boyfriend that no one even knows I have. With this Jesus I’m tempted to say, like Peter in the courtyard after Jesus’ arrest: “Who, him? No, I don’t know him. I’ve never seen him in my life.”

How do we make peace with these warring images of Jesus and God?

There is a pattern in the Bible. First there is a divine message of a radically just, merciful and inclusive realm of God. But soon after, that radical message of unconditional love becomes interlaced with unmistakable human impulses of punishment and exclusion.

For example, the prophets Isaiah and Micah incite to nonviolence: “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they learn war any more.” By the time we get to the prophet Joel, the message is warped into an incitement to violence: “beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears; let the weakling say ‘I am a warrior’.”

The same thing happens in the Gospels. In Mark, the earliest and most original gospel, Jesus advises nonviolent protest of any town that rejects the disciples: “if any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them” (Mark 6:11). Threats of violence are added in Matthew & Luke: “on the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon, and you, Capernaum, will be brought down to Hades. (Luke 10:12, 15-16).

When Jesus is asked for a sign, Mark reports “Jesus sighed deeply in his spirit, and said ‘Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell you, no sign shall be given to this generation’” (Mark 8:12). Matthew and Luke escalate the message with name-calling (“this evil and adulterous generation”) and threats of condemnation (“no sign except the sign of Jonah”) (Luke 11:31-32, Matthew 12:41-42).

At times Jesus offers grace and salvation to all; at other times he threatens eternal fire with weeping and gnashing of teeth. This threat, however, is found not at all in Mark and only once in Luke. Yet it is tacked onto the end of five parables in Matthew. Matthew was written at a time when his Christian community was horribly persecuted. Is it possible that their inherited memories of Jesus might have been clouded by their human desires for vengeance?

Or was Jesus a flip-flopper like a crowd-pleasing politician?

Scholars agree that the most historically accurate sayings of Jesus are those from the Sermon on the Mount: love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you, be perfect as your God is perfect. If the Sermon on the Mount reflects the essence of who Jesus was, perhaps we need to judge the accuracy of the punitive and divisive sayings of Jesus by its light.

These incendiary and harsh sayings attributed to Jesus can also be judged against Jesus’ way of life. We could assume that if Pilate believed that Jesus was leading a violent insurrection, he would have arrested Jesus’ followers as he did the followers of the violent revolutionary Barabbas. But Jesus tells Pilate, ‘My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. (John 18:36). He tells  Peter to put his sword away because “all who take the sword will perish by the sword.” (Matthew 26:52)

What about when Jesus says that two swords are enough - is this an exhortation or permission for violence? How could only two swords for eleven men be enough? Does that sound like enough for an armed resistance? No, but it was enough to fulfill prophecy, the grounds for Jesus to be arrested as a violent revolutionary. If there were any question that Jesus would mount violent resistance at the time of his arrest it is answered when the disciples asked: “Lord, should we strike with the sword?’ Then one of them struck the slave of the high priest and cut off his right ear. But Jesus said, ‘No more of this!’ And he touched his ear and healed him.” (Luke 22)

What about Jesus’ words, “I came not to bring peace but a sword”? Jesus was not advocating use of the sword. He was using the sword as a metaphor. He was the sword that divided families, some choosing to follow him, others choosing to stay behind.

Jesus describes himself as:  the Bread of life, the Light of the World, The Gate, The Vine, The Good Shepherd, The Resurrection and the Life, and finally The Way, The Truth and The Life. None of these images carry the slightest hint of violence or vengeance.

Despite being denied, abandoned and betrayed, he ended his life with words of love and forgiveness: “forgive them for they know not what they do.”

This is the essence of who Jesus is, and all other scriptural sayings of Jesus that seem to contradict this essence should be measured according to this true picture:

“I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.”

"Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." 

Sounds like a God of unfathomable love to me.

Joy In The Rubble

It's been a year.

A tree crashed through the roof of my house and a tornado tore off the roof of the church I pastor on the same stormy night last February. God did that, I’m told. Or Satan did. Depends on who you ask.

Some say God was punishing me, or at least warning me, to repent from my sinful ways. They say that God is punishing me for speaking out loud in church (in other words, being a woman preacher), refusing to condemn all LGBTQ folk to everlasting torment, and supporting “those illegal aliens.” They’re broke the law! No grace for them.

Some say that God brought about these events not to punish me but to test my faith, or even to strengthen it.

Others say Satan is responsible for the double disaster dealt to me and mine, to interfere with all the truly Godly work I do as a woman preacher serving the poor and oppressed, including, you guessed it, the LGBTQ community and undocumented immigrants.

Some believe that it was all God’s answer to our church ladies’ prayers for much-needed new carpet!

Interesting theologies, all.

I have to admit, the timing is curious, especially for someone who used to carry the title “Disaster Coordinator.” That title caused me some consternation. Wasn’t it supposed to be “Disaster Response Coordinator?” Were they trying to tell me something?

Anyway, everyday I walk into my crushed house, watching where I step. Shards of glass are everywhere, nails, splintered wood, soggy pink clods of fiberglass insulation, crumbled sheetrock. Oh yes, and trees, tree limbs are still scattered about the house. I make my way through these obstacles trying to find some absolutely necessity to take to rental house where we are staying. Sometimes I stand around in a daze. What’s that roof doing on my living room floor?

Until last Sunday, I must not have looked up. When I did, something I hadn’t seen before caught my eye – and my heart. I saw my Christmas stocking-holders, still standing (yes, they were still out at the end of February), spelling the word J-O-Y. 

Find JOY, the Spirit whispered to me. Find JOY in the rubble. That’s the theology I want to embrace. Whatever the genesis of the storm, God always invites us to find some cause for joy. Some glimmer of hope. Some possibility of redemption. As Wendell Berry said, Practice Resurrection.

As I picked my way through the debris yesterday, I saw something else. My Christmas cactus is blooming again. Find JOY in the rubble.

Stepping carefully through the mess today, I noticed my Valentine’s roses over in a corner, darkened and dried. Thinking that the place needed a little sprucing up, I put the vase of last month’s flowers on top of the collapsed roof that covers whatever is left of my living room. It makes me smile to imagine what the workers will think when they find roses in the rubble.

Holy Yes, Holy No

In some version of the good old days, a contract could be sealed with a word and a handshake. Children were taught, “Your word is your bond.” This was an agreed-upon community standard that made it possible to trust and be trusted. After my father’s recent death, I learned that he had a business partner he trusted so implicitly that all it took was one phone call, one word, one handshake, to agree to a new business deal – no lawyers, no spreadsheets, no documentation, no fine print. It worked, for them.

Our children start out trusting our word completely, believing that our word is gold. They believe that we will do what we say, that we mean what we say, that our promises can be trusted. At some point they learn just how flawed our word can be when we fail to protect them, when we fail to show up for them, when they are left to wait and wonder what happened and why? Much like parents’ experience when their children become teenagers and don’t come home on time, and they are left to wait and wonder what happened and why?

It’s a terrible feeling to be lied to, a feeling of betrayal. But what about when we ourselves are not true to our word? What about when we don’t keep our commitments, even the ones we make to ourselves?

Robert Gass of the Rockwood Leadership Institute challenges us to make our word impeccable. Impeccable. Wow. Like, ‘your word is your bond,’ or something crazy like that.

He says we need to make one big list of all of our commitments, large and small. For some, that means combining several well-organized lists into one. For others like me, it may mean gathering up tattered legal pads, scattered sticky-notes, electronic calendars, under-utilized planning apps and the notes I’ve written on my hand. The end result is not pretty. It quite overwhelming. Gass says that for our word to become impeccable, we have to fully acknowledge to ourselves all the commitments we have made and begin to cross them off our list. Then we need to begin to practice, taking note when we say ‘Yes,’ and practicing saying ‘No.’ We learn to take a breath before saying ‘yes.’ We learn the freedom in saying ‘No.’

At Beloved, we often say that ‘Yes’ can be holy only if ‘No’ is equally regarded as holy. I know I would much rather be told ‘No’ than to be told ‘Yes’ and be let down. I would rather someone tell me that they don’t have time to serve on the Church Council than to join the Council only to miss all the meetings. I would rather someone tell me they can’t help out at an event that to agreed and then not follow through. It leaves a sinking feeling in my stomach and sinking hole in the path to progress. The same is true when I fail to be true to my word.

I tend to run a few minutes late. A member of my family thinks that if you are on time, you are late. He believes that being on time is a sign of love - you never have to doubt that I will be here for you.  It’s a sign of respect – I don’t value my time over yours. It’s a commitment to doing what you say you will do, when you say you will do it – you can rely on me. Being on time is one aspect of keeping your word impeccable.

In the Hebrew Bible, the Hebrew word ‘dabar’ means both ‘Word’ and ‘Deed.’ This has long fascinated me - a language and a culture in which ‘Word’ and ‘Deed’ are the same thing. Perhaps it was based on the fact that God’s people are made in God’s image. When God speaks, things happen. God speaks new creations into existence. God speaks healing into reality. God’s promises can be trusted. So it should be the same with us. We’re not God, but with God’s help, it’s possible.

That’s a promise.

It’s a promise that can be trusted.

Faith Matters

I was stunned to read the results of an AL.COM poll about how people of faith should respond to the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and the failure to indict the police officer who shot him. Here are the results:

  3.9%      Hold a peaceful protest as a statement of solidarity

13.6%      Work to prevent racial violence because it could happen in Alabama too

28.0%      Pray for the Brown family and everyone who is hurting

54.4%      This isn’t a faith issue. It’s a matter of law and order.

Over 54% chose Do Nothing (“This isn’t a faith issue”) over Prayer (“Pray for the Brown family and those who are hurting”)!  Not a matter of faith? In one of the most highly churched, religious, charitable states in the country, what isn’t a matter of faith?

It reminds me of the old knock-knock joke. “Knock-knock. Who’s there? Nunya. Nunya who? Nunya – nun ya business!”

You know when someone tells you that something is nunya business, or bidness, as we say in the south, it means something to the effect of, “don’t you worry your pretty little head about things you don’t understand, which usually means something to the effect of “these are things we don’t want you to understand!”

To say it’s nunya bidness to the church is like saying it’s nunya bidness to God. I’m trying to figure out what in the Ferguson situation could be nunya bidness to God? I’m trying to figure out what in this entire creation could be nunya bidness to God? 

I’m trying to think of a time that Jesus restricted himself to only matters of faith, so narrowly defined. I’m trying to think of times when he chose to stay uninvolved in certain situations because they were “matters of law and order” rather than matters of faith? It seems to me that Jesus saw matters of law and order as urgent matters of faith.

He was deeply concerned about how his people were affected by the Roman occupation, about the oppressive and abusive enforcement of the law against his people – not unlike the experience many communities of color have with law enforcement in our country.  He was deeply concerned with any barriers that caused a people to be treated as “the other,” as less than human – whether they were Samaritans, Canaanites, tax collectors, or people with afflictions physical or spiritual - not unlike the undocumented immigrants in our state.

Why would the most religious people, in the most highly churched state, the most charitable people in the country, say that this urgent matter is nun of our bidness?

Race matters, as Cornell West says, race in the United States is a faith matter. Life and death are faith matters. Hope and despair are faith matters. When something is killing a people spiritually, economically, psychically, physically, it’s a faith matter. For that matter, when one part of the body is injured, all are injured. When one rejoices, we all rejoice together (1 Corinthians 12:26)

Of course the poll forces only one choice, but as a friend of mine recently said, "we have become a tribal people." We defend our tribes. It used to be that Auburn fans would root for Alabama to win every game but the Iron Bowl, and Alabama would do the same for Auburn. No longer – we want our tribe to win at all costs and the we want the other to lose every time. Period.

Maybe that helps explain why, when forced to choose, people of faith in Alabama would choose Do Nothing over prayer. To choose to “Pray for the Brown family and others who are hurting” might suggest we are disloyal to the “tribe” of police officers and people who look like us. We are forced to choose sides.

There is a long sad history in our own families and in biblical families where conflict leads to bitter division and taking sides -- Cain and Abel, Sarah and Hagar, their sons Isaac and Ishmael (which led to Israel and Palestine), Esau and Jacob, Leah and Rachel -- when in truth, the only side should be God’s side.

As people of faith, we are called to choose sides. When we find ourselves in the midst of controversy and conflict, we are called to speak and to stand and to work and to sing and to cry out for justice, as Jesus people, not as Republicans or Democrats or Libertarians or Independents, not as conservatives or liberals, God forbid, or tea partiers, not as advocates for big government or limited government – as Jesus People.

As people of faith, we are called to choose sides, to stake our ground with the least of these – knowing that there is a cost, that it may or may not be in our individual self-interest, it may or may not be in the best interest of our families or “our people” or “our tribe,” whatever that may mean to us.

Which is beside the point, anyway, because Jesus’ words about separating the sheep and the goats – “as you did unto the least of these, you did unto me” -- are not about individual deeds of mercy leading to individual salvation. They are about the destiny of nations, the salvation of societies. Those nations that care for the least of these will thrive; those that trample the least of these will perish. Historically this has been proven – every nation in history that has had extreme disparities in income & wealth has perished.

That isn’t’ to say that the choices we make as individuals don’t matter: of course they do. Our choices make the church what it is, and make the nation what it is.

Part of the lesson is that when we fail to recognize the least of these as our own kin, we cut ourselves off from the Source of all Life. When we share our bread with the hungry, bring the homeless poor into our own house, see the naked and cover them, “we will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.” (Isaiah 58:11)

I know it is not always easy to live as One. We may be kin, but kinfolk don’t always get along. After all, what if the least of these don’t want you to help them?

What if you don’t know their language? What if they don’t know yours?

What if they offend you? What if you offend them?

What if they reject you? What if they feel rejected by you?

What if they attack you? What if they feel attacked by you?

What if they are the enemy you are supposed to love? What if they see you as the enemy?

What if you are afraid of them? What if they are afraid of you?

This I know, from my own sojourns. Jesus is in there, in the midst of it all, in the muck and the mire of humanity. Jesus, Son of Man, the Human One, is there where it is as real as it can get.

It helps to remember when we get stuck in that way of thinking that results in “us” and “them.” We are all a mix of darkness and light, beauty and mess  – we are all sheep and goat.

I take heart from the many images in the Bible that promise that the lion will lie down with the lamb. So it isn’t so hard to believe that the sheep will also lie down with the goat.

Like Jesus said, he was sent that we might all be One.

Giving Up For Lent

For a child who didn’t spend much time in church, Lent was always about what my friends were giving up. Giving up chocolate. Giving up candy. Giving up cussing. Giving up rock ‘n roll. I didn’t get it, but I knew it had something to do with sacrifice.

Now I spend a lot of time in church, but I admit that I still don’t have a full grasp on Lent. Yet I am grateful for these 40 days that remind me to be attentive to the pushes and pulls in my life that diminish me and my relationships with God, the people around me, and yes, even the people I don’t want around me.

So I’ve decided to give up something for Lent. I’m giving up on giving up.

I’m giving up on giving up on the hope that people can change. On the hope that I can change. Because for all the evidence to the contrary, for all the times that I have failed to make the smallest change, for all the times that people I so need to be different have failed to change to my specifications or theirs, for all the stalled attempts at change, people do change. Sometimes slowly, sometimes spectacularly. Addicts quit using, alcoholics quit drinking, cheaters quit cheating, haters quit hating.

I used to lie a lot. As a child, telling a lie was the best way I knew to avoid a big blow-up, and we had enough of those. It was my way of emotionally ducking and running for cover. As I grew up, I realized that this coping mechanism had become a knee-jerk habit – I would say whatever I could to avoid conflict. The words just flowed from my mouth so naturally. It was so much easier than the truth! It didn’t serve me well. I honestly (!) didn’t know how to stop. So I prayed.  And I prayed. And I prayed. And one day I woke up and realized, I had changed. Telling a lie was no longer my default setting. The truth had literally set me free.

Can people change? Ask Anne LaMott:  Every last one of us is dogged by something we given up trying to fix.  A bad habit, a bit of perfectionism or shame or laziness, while at the same time every one of us knows a story of personal change so mighty, so stunning, so impressive that it stands as undeniable proof that indeed people can and do change.

I’m giving up on giving up on the hope that the world can change. When I see no sign of it, I’m going to remember Martin Luther King’s words, “the arc of the universe is long and it bends toward justice.” I’m going to take hope from all the struggles that were waged for years and decades in what must have seemed like hopeless causes, yet when the time was right, overnight, the world was changed forever. Decades of struggle, and then suddenly one night, the Berlin Wall came down. Decades of struggle, and suddenly apartheid was dismantled. Decades, indeed centuries of struggle, state-sanctioned racial barriers one after another came crashing down. Decades of struggle, then overnight, gay couples can be married under Alabama law.

“Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen,” says the apostle Paul in his letter to the Hebrews.

 “Hope is believing in spite of the evidence, and then watching the evidence change,” says Jim Wallis of Sojourners.

Yes, indeed.

I’m giving up on giving up – on God. God has never given up on me, even when I’ve given up on myself. God has never given up on humanity, no matter how many times humanity turns its back on God. We can’t do it on our own, but change is possible because God is always in the mix. Because God is always doing a new thing – can you not behold it?