Mark 7:1-13
The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus 2 and saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. 3 (The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. 4 When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles.)
5 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?”
6 He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:
“‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
7
They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’
8 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.”
9 And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[e] 11 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)— 12 then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. 13 Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”
The word "tradition" appears frequently in the Mark 7 passage.
If you are of a certain generation, think Tevye belting out "Tradition!!" in Fiddler on the Roof.
If you are of another generation, think Emmett and the construction workers singing, "Everything is awesome!!" as they blithely go about the same, endless routine, day after day assembling the pieces of the city in the Lego Movie. [Those of you who right now are rolling your eyes and dismissing this blog-post over a Lego Movie reference have missed a jewel if you've not seen it . . . smart, funny, symbolic, and with several brilliant messages, one of which plays on the song, "Everything Is Awesome!"]
Routines and practices easily become overly familiar, so deeply woven into the pattern of daily life that we no longer ask, "Why do I do this?" or "What fruit does this regimen bear in my life?" No need to ask the questions when you're convinced, "Everything is awesome!!"
Rarely do we think of a daily ritual, a religious practice, or an habitual routine as inauthentic. Mostly, they simply lose their energy over time. Sometimes we persist in the practice simply as a lucky charm, never mind that the ritual itself has become empty for us, devoid of any deeper meaning or significance.
I like the word transcendence. It suggests "beyond" . . . beyond comprehension, beyond explanation, beyond the usual, beyond ordinary experience. For several months now, I've sought to bounce things (including practices, rituals, routines, vocations) off this notion of transcendence. Assuming that God is somehow connected to all beyond us, I ask, "Does this thing . . . or practice . . . or belief . . . or connection . . . or vocation . . . have some sense of transcendence about it?" (Of course, all things are full of transcendence if we see them as so. But rarely do we have those eyes to see. As Elizabeth Barrett Browning pointedly wrote, most of us sit round the flaming bush and pluck blackberries.)
So it was, in Jesus' time, with these "traditions of the elders" and the "human traditions" to which the religious crowd was attached. It wasn't that the traditions were bad . . . and it wasn't that those who engaged in them were purposely deceitful or evil people; rather, the rituals and traditions themselves no longer held transcendent weight. They no longer pointed the persons who practiced them to The One Who is Beyond. Deeper realities were lost. The practices were no longer shaping lives, deepening connections with God, or helping the practitioners open themselves more deeply and receptively to the Spirit.
No longer did anyone ask, "Why do we do these things?" or "What is this practice trying to accomplish in my life?"
New wine was bursting the old wineskins of the traditional religious system.
Who among us has not been here, perhaps accumulating religious practices in hopes that the mere practice, rotely performed, would commend us to God?
Who among us has not clung to some method of prayer or formula for experiencing God which was effective in the past, trying to recapture some elusive emotional impulse which reminds us of God's presence?
Who among us has not piled up a storehouse of lucky charms in hopes that they will shield us from difficulty and lead us to a gilded life?
We have all been there, done that. So how do we engage in life, in practices, in rituals that deepen our connection with God? . . . that allow us to participate with God in what God is doing in the world?
What practices connect me with that which is transcendent? What routines have the gravitas to hold the weight of who I am? . . . to shape me? . . . to open me? . . . to help me see more clearly what is real (in myself and in the world)?
These are not the religious rituals that make me feel better, that confirm who I am, or that are done for the sake of a season. Rather, transformative spiritual practices connect me with something more substantial, something solid, something that can ground me or anchor me. (Hence, Meister Eckhart's phrase for God was "The Ground of Being.") Thus, they are transcendent.
How will I know if some "tradition" to which I hold is transcendent or leads me to transcendence? There are probably several ways to answer. Most simply and straightforwardly, hold your spiritual practice up to the transcendent values of love, compassion, and mercy. Do my daily routines or spiritual practices make me more compassionate? Do they open up space inside me to respond to the world with mercy rather than judgment? Do they allow love to flow through me into the world? Am I better able to forgive, include, accept, and be open to the other?
At the very least, God's project for the world starts with love, compassion, and mercy. Thus, that seems to be the place you and I can start, as well.
Showing posts with label kingdom of God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kingdom of God. Show all posts
Thursday, February 14, 2019
Tuesday, February 12, 2019
You're Not in Control
Luke 5:1-11
One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God. 2 He saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat.
4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”
5 Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
6 When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.
8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” 9 For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken, 10 and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon’s partners.
Then Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for people.” 11 So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.
"Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man." Peter was right, of course. He was a "sinful man," in whatever way you choose to measure human sinfulness. In that sense, he was no different from me or you.
But coming as it does in this part of the narrative, I don't sense that Peter was sharing new information with Jesus about the level of his morality. Nor was Peter reminding Jesus of something he felt Jesus already knew.
Peter's objection is rooted in a much deeper sense of self and in his own theological assumptions about himself and God. His statement gives us a hint about how he sees himself, and how he perceives God working in the world.
[Foreshadowing: The way Peter believes God works in a human life is also the default system many of us carry within ourselves.]
While there are several significant angles within this story of the great catch of fish, I'm drawn to one in particular today. In the narrative, God is depicted as generous, even extravagant. After a full night of fishing in which these professional fishers caught nothing, Jesus instructed them to try again. What changed? Was there a shift in the wind? A change in the barometric pressure? What happened?
[My grandfather had a sixth-grade education, but was the best fisher I ever knew. He could barely read a book, but from a boat on the lake or with a rod and reel in hand on the shore, he could read the weather -- and thus the fish -- with uncanny accuracy. If we were sitting in his living room and said, "Let's go fishing, Granddad!" he would walk out to the porch, stand there for a couple of minutes watching the skies, feeling the air on his skin, and either say, "Okay, it's a good day for fishing," or "They're not biting today . . . we'll go another day."]
What changed that day on Gennesaret Lake? What did Jesus know that these professional fishers did not know?
"Put down your nets again," Jesus instructed, and what came up in the nets were so many fish the nets began to tear. Abundance . . . extravagance . . . taking the little and making it more than enough . . . these are familiar themes echoed throughout God's story in scripture, especially as embodied in Jesus.
But Peter is accustomed to a finite world . . . a world in which we have been taught that we get what we deserve. Thus, as "sinners," we deserve very little. To Peter, the scene doesn't add up. He had done nothing to earn or deserve this massive catch of fish. And he has not been sufficiently versed in God's generosity. So he objects. He has lived inside a pattern that has created dichotomies all his life: deserving/undeserving . . . worthy/unworthy . . . one or the other. By the tone of the narrative, Peter is not ready for Jesus to break open the worthiness pattern under which he has ordered his life.
"Go away from me," he says. I"m not ready for a shift like this. I'm accustomed to being the center of my world. When things, good things, come my way, it's because I've worked for them, earned them, shown myself worthy of them. I'm a sinful man. I will not accept unearned gifts!
[Have you ever received some good gift, something you did not deserve, or some accolade for which you felt unworthy, and then countered that good gift by engaging in some kind of self-destructive behavior? I have, and you probably have, too. It is one subconscious way we say with our lives, "I'm a sinful person! I'm not deserving!" Perhaps we pick a fight with a spouse . . . or engage in some addictive behavior . . . or intentionally create a stir at work . . . all the dynamic equivalent of Peter's pushback, "Get away from me! I am unworthy!"]
How impoverished Peter is! How impoverished we are! Ordering life as if everything depends on me -- my skill, my intellect, my ingenuity, my creativity, my work ethic -- I shut out the possibility of gift, generosity, grace. In that sense, I am not only impoverished, but stunted in my capacity to receive from God and others anything that comes apart from my own making.
We live in God's world, thankfully, in which we do NOT always get what we deserve -- either for good or for bad -- and in which we are not in charge -- despite our feverish efforts at controlling the world.
The worthiness game is a true dead-end, despite how deeply ingrained it is within us and within culture. Ultimately, it shuts you off from God and others, making life all about yourself, your efforts, your own will. There is little future in that, either for me, for you, or for the human community.
So here you go . . . here's your huge catch of fish!!
One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God. 2 He saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat.
4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”
5 Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
6 When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.
8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” 9 For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken, 10 and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon’s partners.
Then Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for people.” 11 So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.
"Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man." Peter was right, of course. He was a "sinful man," in whatever way you choose to measure human sinfulness. In that sense, he was no different from me or you.
But coming as it does in this part of the narrative, I don't sense that Peter was sharing new information with Jesus about the level of his morality. Nor was Peter reminding Jesus of something he felt Jesus already knew.
Peter's objection is rooted in a much deeper sense of self and in his own theological assumptions about himself and God. His statement gives us a hint about how he sees himself, and how he perceives God working in the world.
[Foreshadowing: The way Peter believes God works in a human life is also the default system many of us carry within ourselves.]
While there are several significant angles within this story of the great catch of fish, I'm drawn to one in particular today. In the narrative, God is depicted as generous, even extravagant. After a full night of fishing in which these professional fishers caught nothing, Jesus instructed them to try again. What changed? Was there a shift in the wind? A change in the barometric pressure? What happened?
[My grandfather had a sixth-grade education, but was the best fisher I ever knew. He could barely read a book, but from a boat on the lake or with a rod and reel in hand on the shore, he could read the weather -- and thus the fish -- with uncanny accuracy. If we were sitting in his living room and said, "Let's go fishing, Granddad!" he would walk out to the porch, stand there for a couple of minutes watching the skies, feeling the air on his skin, and either say, "Okay, it's a good day for fishing," or "They're not biting today . . . we'll go another day."]
What changed that day on Gennesaret Lake? What did Jesus know that these professional fishers did not know?
"Put down your nets again," Jesus instructed, and what came up in the nets were so many fish the nets began to tear. Abundance . . . extravagance . . . taking the little and making it more than enough . . . these are familiar themes echoed throughout God's story in scripture, especially as embodied in Jesus.
But Peter is accustomed to a finite world . . . a world in which we have been taught that we get what we deserve. Thus, as "sinners," we deserve very little. To Peter, the scene doesn't add up. He had done nothing to earn or deserve this massive catch of fish. And he has not been sufficiently versed in God's generosity. So he objects. He has lived inside a pattern that has created dichotomies all his life: deserving/undeserving . . . worthy/unworthy . . . one or the other. By the tone of the narrative, Peter is not ready for Jesus to break open the worthiness pattern under which he has ordered his life.
"Go away from me," he says. I"m not ready for a shift like this. I'm accustomed to being the center of my world. When things, good things, come my way, it's because I've worked for them, earned them, shown myself worthy of them. I'm a sinful man. I will not accept unearned gifts!
[Have you ever received some good gift, something you did not deserve, or some accolade for which you felt unworthy, and then countered that good gift by engaging in some kind of self-destructive behavior? I have, and you probably have, too. It is one subconscious way we say with our lives, "I'm a sinful person! I'm not deserving!" Perhaps we pick a fight with a spouse . . . or engage in some addictive behavior . . . or intentionally create a stir at work . . . all the dynamic equivalent of Peter's pushback, "Get away from me! I am unworthy!"]
How impoverished Peter is! How impoverished we are! Ordering life as if everything depends on me -- my skill, my intellect, my ingenuity, my creativity, my work ethic -- I shut out the possibility of gift, generosity, grace. In that sense, I am not only impoverished, but stunted in my capacity to receive from God and others anything that comes apart from my own making.
We live in God's world, thankfully, in which we do NOT always get what we deserve -- either for good or for bad -- and in which we are not in charge -- despite our feverish efforts at controlling the world.
The worthiness game is a true dead-end, despite how deeply ingrained it is within us and within culture. Ultimately, it shuts you off from God and others, making life all about yourself, your efforts, your own will. There is little future in that, either for me, for you, or for the human community.
So here you go . . . here's your huge catch of fish!!
Wednesday, January 23, 2019
Loving the Other
Through Advent I took a break from Only a Sojourner in order to post reflections on the daily Advent readings at https://adailyadvent.blogspot.com/
Now, well into the season of Epiphany, I'll offer a few words related to my two previous posts before moving on.
What does it mean to love another? It may be easy enough to "love" someone we are drawn to, someone with whom we share a close connection . . . family members, friends, those with whom we share common interests and concerns. But what does it mean to love the narcissist, the bully, the abuser, the cruel one?
The previous post of Thomas Merton's thoughts in No Man Is an Island provided some clues.
Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. . . . [No Man Is an Island, p. 5]
To love another person, we seek not our own good, not even the pleasant feeling of having done something good. Rather, we will what is truly good for the other.
I realize that sounds like a subjective standard. I can look at another person and think I know what is good for them, what is best for them, but I have to confess that like you, I never see all the way through another person. I never know what is hidden within the deepest caverns of their being. I never truly know what they need simply by observing them on the outside.
What I do know -- or at least what I believe I know -- is that God's design for every human being is wholeness, that we live fully human lives. (In the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus famously said, "The glory of God is the human person fully alive"). God desires that we each live as fully as possible into the unique personhood for which God created us.
Thus, to truly love another person means that we seek the other's wholeness . . . we act on their behalf that they might become more and more the person God created them to be . . . we act in their lives in ways that are healing, in ways that call forth from them the image of God that is written into their soul's DNA. For as Merton suggests, not only is this person's destiny to be considered, but also the destiny of God's entire kingdom (p. 8). God's work of moving persons toward wholeness is part of God's wider project, what Jesus called the "kingdom of God," to bring all people to this healing wholeness; therefore, to love another person truly is also to love what God is doing in the world.
So given this notion of love, which acts for the benefit of the other in his or her becoming . . . and given that there is a sense of the common good, the kingdom which is coming . . . here are some examples of what love is not:
* Love does not stroke a narcissist and feed his or her narcissism.
* Love does not bow before a bully and enable his or her bullying.
* Love does not have a blind eye toward abusive behavior, excusing it as "he/she cannot help themselves."
* Love does not reward attention-seekers just because their ego wants to be continually in the spotlight.
Perhaps one obvious example will help. No one who truly loves an alcoholic would think of handing him/her a drink when they are trying to get sober. What family members and friends must learn on the road to sobriety is what some call "tough love," the strength to say "no" in order to keep the addict's health, wholeness, and best interest first and foremost.
In loving another, we don't act in ways that keep them imprisoned in the small egocentric self. We want to love them in ways that somehow release them or encourage them to their more expansive, truer, authentic self.
Then how shall we know how best to love another person? Good question. You see by now, don't you, that love is hard work. And because we don't see the inside of the other fully, our love for them is not always clear-cut. Here again, Merton helps.
One who really loves another is not merely moved by the desire to see him contented and healthy and prosperous in this world. Love cannot be satisfied with anything so incomplete. If I am to love my brother, I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for him. . . . The truth I must love in my brother is God Himself, living in him. . . .
In order to love others with perfect charity I must be true to them, to myself, and to God. . . .
If we love one another truly, our love will be graced with a clear-sighted prudence which sees and respects the designs of God upon each separate soul. Our love for one another must be rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom. (pp. 7-9)
In Merton's vision of love, the one who desires to love another must engage in his/her own strenuous inner work, deepening in God, knowing ourselves more fully, seeing our own light and darkness with more clarity. We engage in this work of spiritual becoming ourselves so that we see more clearly, slowly and over time, praying that we increasingly take on the heart and eyes of God within ourselves.
This attention to our own inner landscape is what Merton calls being "rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom."
Merton says I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for the other.
This is difficult work and no one gets it perfectly. The temptation for me -- your temptation may be different -- is to withhold love until I'm "doing it right." When that is the case, I will never love.
So the invitation for me is to begin where I am . . . to give attention to my own interior . . . to see more and more of my own truth . . . and to look on others with compassion, asking, "What does he/she truly need to be whole? How does God see them? Is there some way I can help love them to wholeness?"
Sometimes the answer is tangible food or clothing or cash for a utility payment.
Sometimes the answer is an affirming word, a listening ear, or quiet presence.
Sometimes the answer is a well-timed, well-placed question which allows the other to explore more deeply the implications of what they are considering.
And sometimes the answer is a firm, solid, "No, not now!"
Now, well into the season of Epiphany, I'll offer a few words related to my two previous posts before moving on.
What does it mean to love another? It may be easy enough to "love" someone we are drawn to, someone with whom we share a close connection . . . family members, friends, those with whom we share common interests and concerns. But what does it mean to love the narcissist, the bully, the abuser, the cruel one?
The previous post of Thomas Merton's thoughts in No Man Is an Island provided some clues.
Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. . . . [No Man Is an Island, p. 5]
To love another person, we seek not our own good, not even the pleasant feeling of having done something good. Rather, we will what is truly good for the other.
I realize that sounds like a subjective standard. I can look at another person and think I know what is good for them, what is best for them, but I have to confess that like you, I never see all the way through another person. I never know what is hidden within the deepest caverns of their being. I never truly know what they need simply by observing them on the outside.
What I do know -- or at least what I believe I know -- is that God's design for every human being is wholeness, that we live fully human lives. (In the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus famously said, "The glory of God is the human person fully alive"). God desires that we each live as fully as possible into the unique personhood for which God created us.
Thus, to truly love another person means that we seek the other's wholeness . . . we act on their behalf that they might become more and more the person God created them to be . . . we act in their lives in ways that are healing, in ways that call forth from them the image of God that is written into their soul's DNA. For as Merton suggests, not only is this person's destiny to be considered, but also the destiny of God's entire kingdom (p. 8). God's work of moving persons toward wholeness is part of God's wider project, what Jesus called the "kingdom of God," to bring all people to this healing wholeness; therefore, to love another person truly is also to love what God is doing in the world.
So given this notion of love, which acts for the benefit of the other in his or her becoming . . . and given that there is a sense of the common good, the kingdom which is coming . . . here are some examples of what love is not:
* Love does not stroke a narcissist and feed his or her narcissism.
* Love does not bow before a bully and enable his or her bullying.
* Love does not have a blind eye toward abusive behavior, excusing it as "he/she cannot help themselves."
* Love does not reward attention-seekers just because their ego wants to be continually in the spotlight.
Perhaps one obvious example will help. No one who truly loves an alcoholic would think of handing him/her a drink when they are trying to get sober. What family members and friends must learn on the road to sobriety is what some call "tough love," the strength to say "no" in order to keep the addict's health, wholeness, and best interest first and foremost.
In loving another, we don't act in ways that keep them imprisoned in the small egocentric self. We want to love them in ways that somehow release them or encourage them to their more expansive, truer, authentic self.
Then how shall we know how best to love another person? Good question. You see by now, don't you, that love is hard work. And because we don't see the inside of the other fully, our love for them is not always clear-cut. Here again, Merton helps.
One who really loves another is not merely moved by the desire to see him contented and healthy and prosperous in this world. Love cannot be satisfied with anything so incomplete. If I am to love my brother, I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for him. . . . The truth I must love in my brother is God Himself, living in him. . . .
In order to love others with perfect charity I must be true to them, to myself, and to God. . . .
If we love one another truly, our love will be graced with a clear-sighted prudence which sees and respects the designs of God upon each separate soul. Our love for one another must be rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom. (pp. 7-9)
In Merton's vision of love, the one who desires to love another must engage in his/her own strenuous inner work, deepening in God, knowing ourselves more fully, seeing our own light and darkness with more clarity. We engage in this work of spiritual becoming ourselves so that we see more clearly, slowly and over time, praying that we increasingly take on the heart and eyes of God within ourselves.
This attention to our own inner landscape is what Merton calls being "rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom."
Merton says I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for the other.
This is difficult work and no one gets it perfectly. The temptation for me -- your temptation may be different -- is to withhold love until I'm "doing it right." When that is the case, I will never love.
So the invitation for me is to begin where I am . . . to give attention to my own interior . . . to see more and more of my own truth . . . and to look on others with compassion, asking, "What does he/she truly need to be whole? How does God see them? Is there some way I can help love them to wholeness?"
Sometimes the answer is tangible food or clothing or cash for a utility payment.
Sometimes the answer is an affirming word, a listening ear, or quiet presence.
Sometimes the answer is a well-timed, well-placed question which allows the other to explore more deeply the implications of what they are considering.
And sometimes the answer is a firm, solid, "No, not now!"
Tuesday, December 4, 2018
Love Loves . . . Merton's Thoughts
Before posting my own reflection on, "What does it mean to love another?" as a follow-up to the previous post, "Love loves what is . . . as it is," I want to post some of Thomas Merton's words about love and charity.
These thoughts come from the first section of Merton's, No Man Is an Island. The chapter is called, "Love Can Be Kept Only by Being Given Away." (I have retained Merton's original language, which uses masculine pronouns throughout. Merton was not only a product of his times, he was also the product of an all-male monastic community.)
There is a false and momentary happiness in self-satisfaction, but it always leads to sorrow because it narrows and deadens our spirit. True happiness is found in unselfish love, a love which increases in proportion as it is shared. There is no end to the sharing of love, and, therefore, the potential happiness of such love is without limit. Infinite sharing is the law of God's inner life. He has made the sharing of ourselves the law of our own being, so that it is in loving others that we best love ourselves. In disinterested activity we best fulfill our own capacities to act and to be.
Yet there can never be happiness in compulsion. It is not enough for love to be shared: it must be shared freely. That is to say it must be given, not merely taken.
***********
Love not only prefers the good of another to my own, but it does not even compare the two. . . . Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. . . .
To love another is to will what is really good for him. Such love must be based on truth. A love that sees no distinction between good and evil, but loves blindly merely for the sake of loving, is hatred, rather than love. To love blindly is to love selfishly, because the goal of such love is not the real advantage of the beloved but only the exercise of love in our own souls. . . .
Charity is neither weak nor blind. It is essentially prudent, just, temperate, and strong. Unless all the other virtues blend together in charity, our love is not genuine. No one who really wants to love another will consent to love him falsely. If we are going to love others at all, we must make up our minds to love them well. Otherwise our love is a delusion. . . .
One who really loves another is not merely moved by the desire to see him contented and healthy and prosperous in this world. Love cannot be satisfied with anything so incomplete. If I am to love my brother, I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for him. . . . The truth I must love in my brother is God Himself, living in him.
************
In order to love others with perfect charity I must be true to them, to myself, and to God.
The true interests of a person are at once perfectly his own and common to the whole Kingdom of God. That is because these interests are all centered in God's designs for his soul. The destiny of each one of us is intended, by the Lord, to enter into the destiny of His entire Kingdom. . . .
If we love one another truly, our love will be graced with a clear-sighted prudence which sees and respects the designs of God upon each separate soul. Our love for one another must be rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom.
These thoughts come from the first section of Merton's, No Man Is an Island. The chapter is called, "Love Can Be Kept Only by Being Given Away." (I have retained Merton's original language, which uses masculine pronouns throughout. Merton was not only a product of his times, he was also the product of an all-male monastic community.)
There is a false and momentary happiness in self-satisfaction, but it always leads to sorrow because it narrows and deadens our spirit. True happiness is found in unselfish love, a love which increases in proportion as it is shared. There is no end to the sharing of love, and, therefore, the potential happiness of such love is without limit. Infinite sharing is the law of God's inner life. He has made the sharing of ourselves the law of our own being, so that it is in loving others that we best love ourselves. In disinterested activity we best fulfill our own capacities to act and to be.
Yet there can never be happiness in compulsion. It is not enough for love to be shared: it must be shared freely. That is to say it must be given, not merely taken.
***********
Love not only prefers the good of another to my own, but it does not even compare the two. . . . Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. . . .
To love another is to will what is really good for him. Such love must be based on truth. A love that sees no distinction between good and evil, but loves blindly merely for the sake of loving, is hatred, rather than love. To love blindly is to love selfishly, because the goal of such love is not the real advantage of the beloved but only the exercise of love in our own souls. . . .
Charity is neither weak nor blind. It is essentially prudent, just, temperate, and strong. Unless all the other virtues blend together in charity, our love is not genuine. No one who really wants to love another will consent to love him falsely. If we are going to love others at all, we must make up our minds to love them well. Otherwise our love is a delusion. . . .
One who really loves another is not merely moved by the desire to see him contented and healthy and prosperous in this world. Love cannot be satisfied with anything so incomplete. If I am to love my brother, I must somehow enter deep into the mystery of God's love for him. . . . The truth I must love in my brother is God Himself, living in him.
************
In order to love others with perfect charity I must be true to them, to myself, and to God.
The true interests of a person are at once perfectly his own and common to the whole Kingdom of God. That is because these interests are all centered in God's designs for his soul. The destiny of each one of us is intended, by the Lord, to enter into the destiny of His entire Kingdom. . . .
If we love one another truly, our love will be graced with a clear-sighted prudence which sees and respects the designs of God upon each separate soul. Our love for one another must be rooted in a deep devotion to Divine Providence, a devotion that abandons our own limited plans into the hands of God and seeks only to enter into the invisible work that builds His Kingdom.
Wednesday, November 28, 2018
Love Loves What Is As It Is
Love loves what is as it is.
I have been saying this for years, mostly because it represents a life-stance to which I aspire, not a stance I have attained. Alas, I discover over and over again how far I have yet to travel in order to make this truth my very own.
I wish "Love loves what is as it is" was a comforting insight. Truly, it doesn't offer comfort to me as much as it disturbs me, challenges me, and presses me to a more God-centered stance toward people and situations.
Authentic love is not aligned with certain favorable conditions that are conducive to love and goodwill. Real love is not based on another person changing their ways, and thus becoming more lovable. Transforming love does not withhold itself in protest or make half-baked promises which are conditioned on certain outcomes.
Love loves what is . . . as it is. It does not wait for change. It does not demand the other become lovable -- though for the health of the other and the world, it may be in everyone's best interest for the other to become more lovable! -- before it loves.
Most days I lose touch with this Love early in the morning. I become angry at persons who use power to diminish others or who lord it over those who have no power. I withhold kindness to punish others for the wounds I perceive they have inflicted on me. I wait for wrongs to be righted as a kind of penance before I dare to invest my love and life in a person or situation.
I am frequently called back to Love, however. I am reminded often of my intention to live from an anchored Center, to approach the world from a core of mercy and compassion, rather than judgment and division. I am welcomed back to my foundational belief that those who live from this Center (what Jesus called "the kingdom of God") make a difference in the world simply by their presence.
A few months ago Deepak Chopra was on a late-night talk show. In the midst of talk about the healing power of meditation, the conversation turned to the anxiety, tension, and conflict in the world right now, and Chopra's belief that the turbulence is a sign of society going through a time of transition.
Then the host asked Chopra about inviting the President for a week of meditation, saying, "Do you think you could break him down?" Chopra responded, "You don't need to break him down. Go beyond his wounds to what is really troubling him. He needs love."
I could feel the jolt within myself . . . the air sucked out of my lungs. I was aghast! The loudest part of my being shouted, "Love a narcissist, a bully? Never!"
And the still, small voice within me said, "You KNOW it's true. You must love! This is the path you've chosen. Now walk in it."
I have been saying this for years, mostly because it represents a life-stance to which I aspire, not a stance I have attained. Alas, I discover over and over again how far I have yet to travel in order to make this truth my very own.
I wish "Love loves what is as it is" was a comforting insight. Truly, it doesn't offer comfort to me as much as it disturbs me, challenges me, and presses me to a more God-centered stance toward people and situations.
Authentic love is not aligned with certain favorable conditions that are conducive to love and goodwill. Real love is not based on another person changing their ways, and thus becoming more lovable. Transforming love does not withhold itself in protest or make half-baked promises which are conditioned on certain outcomes.
Love loves what is . . . as it is. It does not wait for change. It does not demand the other become lovable -- though for the health of the other and the world, it may be in everyone's best interest for the other to become more lovable! -- before it loves.
Most days I lose touch with this Love early in the morning. I become angry at persons who use power to diminish others or who lord it over those who have no power. I withhold kindness to punish others for the wounds I perceive they have inflicted on me. I wait for wrongs to be righted as a kind of penance before I dare to invest my love and life in a person or situation.
I am frequently called back to Love, however. I am reminded often of my intention to live from an anchored Center, to approach the world from a core of mercy and compassion, rather than judgment and division. I am welcomed back to my foundational belief that those who live from this Center (what Jesus called "the kingdom of God") make a difference in the world simply by their presence.
A few months ago Deepak Chopra was on a late-night talk show. In the midst of talk about the healing power of meditation, the conversation turned to the anxiety, tension, and conflict in the world right now, and Chopra's belief that the turbulence is a sign of society going through a time of transition.
Then the host asked Chopra about inviting the President for a week of meditation, saying, "Do you think you could break him down?" Chopra responded, "You don't need to break him down. Go beyond his wounds to what is really troubling him. He needs love."
I could feel the jolt within myself . . . the air sucked out of my lungs. I was aghast! The loudest part of my being shouted, "Love a narcissist, a bully? Never!"
And the still, small voice within me said, "You KNOW it's true. You must love! This is the path you've chosen. Now walk in it."
Monday, July 30, 2018
A Consideration on Planting the Mustard Seed
He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which someone took and planted in a field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”
He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable. So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet:
“I will open my mouth in parables,
I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.”
(Matt. 13:31 - 35, NIV)
The two short parables in today's reading, taken from Matthew 13:31 - 35, subtly depict situations of scandal. The mustard tree (or bush, depending on which commentary you read), was an undesirable plant that most persons would prefer to root out of their field or garden.
Yeast was a symbol of that which was unclean and generally unwanted. (Note that the Jewish festival celebrated "Unleavened Bread," not "leavened bread.") The presence of yeast was scandalous.
Yet, these two undesirable elements are likened in differing ways to the kingdom of heaven.
The first image has often been misrepresented in preaching and teaching. Matthew records Jesus' words, not as, "the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed," but as, "the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and planted in a field." While there may be connections between the mustard seed and the kingdom of heaven (the tiny seed having influence beyond its proportionate size), at least here, Jesus connects the kingdom of heaven to the entire process of planting the mustard seed in a field.
In other words, it is not enough to hold a mustard seed in your hands and say, "this is what the kingdom of heaven is like." No, the kingdom of heaven is like holding that scandalous seed, and then throwing the seed where it does not seem to belong, where you would not want it, where the seed does not seem to fit.
As an undesirable plant, one that has a corrupting influence on its surroundings, it will take over. [I wonder if mustard trees/shrubs were the "kudzu" of the Ancient Near East. Kudzu is the invasive vine that has taken over much of the Southeastern United States over the past couple of decades. I saw a couple of acres of kudzu last weekend on a road trip through rural Arkansas, and was reminded of its corrupting, invasive nature. It had overtaken trees, telephone polls, and even houses alongside the highway.]
So the kingdom of heaven is likened to the act of putting something small and subversive where it doesn't seem to belong . . . planted into human lives . . . tossed into political systems . . . sown into social dynamics . . . dropped into vocational decisions . . . this small seed gets thrown into places it doesn't seem to belong and it begins to alter the shape of those realities in what some might consider perverse or counter ways.
The seed of this kingdom is sown in me . . . in humans . . . in the landscape of the world. The act of sowing, planting, throwing, and scattering is an unmistakable part of the kingdom of heaven, so that the scandal of the kingdom is embedded where it does not seem to fit.
He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable. So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet:
“I will open my mouth in parables,
I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.”
(Matt. 13:31 - 35, NIV)
The two short parables in today's reading, taken from Matthew 13:31 - 35, subtly depict situations of scandal. The mustard tree (or bush, depending on which commentary you read), was an undesirable plant that most persons would prefer to root out of their field or garden.
Yeast was a symbol of that which was unclean and generally unwanted. (Note that the Jewish festival celebrated "Unleavened Bread," not "leavened bread.") The presence of yeast was scandalous.
Yet, these two undesirable elements are likened in differing ways to the kingdom of heaven.
The first image has often been misrepresented in preaching and teaching. Matthew records Jesus' words, not as, "the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed," but as, "the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and planted in a field." While there may be connections between the mustard seed and the kingdom of heaven (the tiny seed having influence beyond its proportionate size), at least here, Jesus connects the kingdom of heaven to the entire process of planting the mustard seed in a field.
In other words, it is not enough to hold a mustard seed in your hands and say, "this is what the kingdom of heaven is like." No, the kingdom of heaven is like holding that scandalous seed, and then throwing the seed where it does not seem to belong, where you would not want it, where the seed does not seem to fit.
As an undesirable plant, one that has a corrupting influence on its surroundings, it will take over. [I wonder if mustard trees/shrubs were the "kudzu" of the Ancient Near East. Kudzu is the invasive vine that has taken over much of the Southeastern United States over the past couple of decades. I saw a couple of acres of kudzu last weekend on a road trip through rural Arkansas, and was reminded of its corrupting, invasive nature. It had overtaken trees, telephone polls, and even houses alongside the highway.]
So the kingdom of heaven is likened to the act of putting something small and subversive where it doesn't seem to belong . . . planted into human lives . . . tossed into political systems . . . sown into social dynamics . . . dropped into vocational decisions . . . this small seed gets thrown into places it doesn't seem to belong and it begins to alter the shape of those realities in what some might consider perverse or counter ways.
The seed of this kingdom is sown in me . . . in humans . . . in the landscape of the world. The act of sowing, planting, throwing, and scattering is an unmistakable part of the kingdom of heaven, so that the scandal of the kingdom is embedded where it does not seem to fit.
Friday, June 1, 2018
Another Kind of Kingdom
In my last post, I wrote about a kind of freedom which is quite different from what we ordinarily think of as freedom.
Mark 10:17 - 27 records the encounter of a young man of moral and religious upbringing who in every outward way was a model of propriety. He lived according to the expectations of devout religious life. And he would have been seen as "successful" by cultural norms, which valued wealth as a sign of virtue and God's favor. In short, from the brief description of him contained in the Gospel account, he had everything going for himself.
Jesus saw, however, that he was attached to his wealth, and could not part with that which he had accumulated. By clinging to his possessions, he declined Jesus' invitation both to extend charity to those in need and to follow Jesus as a disciple. His attachment to what he possessed meant he was not inwardly free to move as the moment dictated. His movements, rather, were governed by what he held onto . . . or perhaps better, by what held him.
The man sulks away from Jesus, sad because he has not been able to part with his wealth. He has missed an opportunity to do good for others and to follow the Messiah.
[It may be worth spending time with the story at this point. The man "went away sad, because he had great wealth." What was the source of his sadness? I'm pondered several possibilities:
**Was he sad because he recognized that his wealth had a hold on him?
**Was he sad because he knew he was not inwardly free enough to follow?
**Was he sad because Jesus asked so much from him, something that he was not able to do at that moment?
**Was he said because he truly wanted to follow Jesus, just not as desperately as he wanted to hold onto his wealth?
Why did he go away sad?]
Today I want to say a word about Jesus' editorial comment, offered to his disciples after the man went away sad.
“How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”
The disciples were amazed at Jesus' words, so he said again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
The kingdom of God is not a "kingdom" in any way in which we are accustomed to thinking. For one, it is not a place. Jesus is not describing "heaven," and is NOT saying that it is hard for the rich to get into heaven. The kingdom of God does not equal heaven. It is not a physical place that looks like Narnia, or like a New Zealand-ish Lord of the Rings set, or like streets of gold.
The kingdom of God -- or the kingdom of heaven, depending on which Gospel narrative you read -- is a way of being and seeing and doing life that is characterized by God at the center. It means taking upon oneself a particular stance for life, adopting a particular posture for life . . . a stance or posture shaped by God which has at its core a God-connection which animates all of life. For example, I've heard Fr Thomas Keating talk about our lives as a "lived experience of Jesus", and that gets pretty close to what I'm trying to convey. To enter the kingdom of God means to enter this centered way of doing life on God's terms and in God's way, to take on this life-stance for oneself.
What does it mean to be a God-connected person and then to live out life in a God-animated manner? I'm not talking about our ideas of what being "God-connected" or "God-animated" look like. I'm not talking about what preachers preach or what theologians speculate. I'm talking about the actual experience of entering this alternative way of being, seeing, and doing.
This stance toward life is resisted, for example, by the posture that has our own self-interest at the center, or our own attachments at the core. In the Gospel story we've considered, the man's wealth seems to be at the center of his decision-making and life-choices. He is attached to his possessions and thus, those possessions impact the stance or posture from which he does life. He is not inwardly free enough to enter the kingdom of God, that is, to be, see, and do from his God-center.
Of course, your attachments and my attachments, the things which prevent us from entering the kingdom of heaven, may be altogether different from the money at the center of this man's issues.
I think it is worth noting that while the man in the story is "rich" in possessions, in material wealth, we are all rich in some way -- just as we are all "poor" in some way. Having an abundance of money is almost a ready-made attachment for most people. Even those who do not have much money or material wealth can obsess about having more, so Jesus' saying about riches is not merely for those who have large bank accounts and portfolios.
But in truth, it is difficult for those who are "rich" in anything to enter the kingdom of God. It is difficult, no matter where your own "riches" lie:
** rich in money and possessions
** rich in education
** rich in intellect
** rich in creativity
** rich in talent or skill
** rich in relationships
** rich in ___________
Wealth, in whatever realm, is always heavy. Being rich in anything weighs us down, lures us to trust our riches, and can become a hindrance to living fully the life that God has designed for us. Riches hinder our capacity to say, "Yes!" to entering this life-stance called "the kingdom of God."
So even if you and I do not think of ourselves as rich in possessions, we are invited to hear Jesus' words about the areas of life in which we ARE wealthy.
The camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle reference is outrageously glorious. YOU can't do this, no matter how hard you try. I can't do this, no matter how hard I try. It's just not gonna happen! But God's realm is working in people who live with some combination of wealth and poverty, who are rich in some things and poor in others. What we cannot do, like shoving a camel through a needle's eye, is entirely within the realm of God's doing.
In other words, on this one day the rich man may have sulked away sad because he could not respond to Jesus' invitation; however, on another day perhaps he would return again, this time realizing that his efforts/wealth/money could never outpace God's love, mercy, and generosity.
Mark 10:17 - 27 records the encounter of a young man of moral and religious upbringing who in every outward way was a model of propriety. He lived according to the expectations of devout religious life. And he would have been seen as "successful" by cultural norms, which valued wealth as a sign of virtue and God's favor. In short, from the brief description of him contained in the Gospel account, he had everything going for himself.
Jesus saw, however, that he was attached to his wealth, and could not part with that which he had accumulated. By clinging to his possessions, he declined Jesus' invitation both to extend charity to those in need and to follow Jesus as a disciple. His attachment to what he possessed meant he was not inwardly free to move as the moment dictated. His movements, rather, were governed by what he held onto . . . or perhaps better, by what held him.
The man sulks away from Jesus, sad because he has not been able to part with his wealth. He has missed an opportunity to do good for others and to follow the Messiah.
[It may be worth spending time with the story at this point. The man "went away sad, because he had great wealth." What was the source of his sadness? I'm pondered several possibilities:
**Was he sad because he recognized that his wealth had a hold on him?
**Was he sad because he knew he was not inwardly free enough to follow?
**Was he sad because Jesus asked so much from him, something that he was not able to do at that moment?
**Was he said because he truly wanted to follow Jesus, just not as desperately as he wanted to hold onto his wealth?
Why did he go away sad?]
Today I want to say a word about Jesus' editorial comment, offered to his disciples after the man went away sad.
“How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!”
The disciples were amazed at Jesus' words, so he said again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
The kingdom of God is not a "kingdom" in any way in which we are accustomed to thinking. For one, it is not a place. Jesus is not describing "heaven," and is NOT saying that it is hard for the rich to get into heaven. The kingdom of God does not equal heaven. It is not a physical place that looks like Narnia, or like a New Zealand-ish Lord of the Rings set, or like streets of gold.
The kingdom of God -- or the kingdom of heaven, depending on which Gospel narrative you read -- is a way of being and seeing and doing life that is characterized by God at the center. It means taking upon oneself a particular stance for life, adopting a particular posture for life . . . a stance or posture shaped by God which has at its core a God-connection which animates all of life. For example, I've heard Fr Thomas Keating talk about our lives as a "lived experience of Jesus", and that gets pretty close to what I'm trying to convey. To enter the kingdom of God means to enter this centered way of doing life on God's terms and in God's way, to take on this life-stance for oneself.
What does it mean to be a God-connected person and then to live out life in a God-animated manner? I'm not talking about our ideas of what being "God-connected" or "God-animated" look like. I'm not talking about what preachers preach or what theologians speculate. I'm talking about the actual experience of entering this alternative way of being, seeing, and doing.
This stance toward life is resisted, for example, by the posture that has our own self-interest at the center, or our own attachments at the core. In the Gospel story we've considered, the man's wealth seems to be at the center of his decision-making and life-choices. He is attached to his possessions and thus, those possessions impact the stance or posture from which he does life. He is not inwardly free enough to enter the kingdom of God, that is, to be, see, and do from his God-center.
Of course, your attachments and my attachments, the things which prevent us from entering the kingdom of heaven, may be altogether different from the money at the center of this man's issues.
I think it is worth noting that while the man in the story is "rich" in possessions, in material wealth, we are all rich in some way -- just as we are all "poor" in some way. Having an abundance of money is almost a ready-made attachment for most people. Even those who do not have much money or material wealth can obsess about having more, so Jesus' saying about riches is not merely for those who have large bank accounts and portfolios.
But in truth, it is difficult for those who are "rich" in anything to enter the kingdom of God. It is difficult, no matter where your own "riches" lie:
** rich in money and possessions
** rich in education
** rich in intellect
** rich in creativity
** rich in talent or skill
** rich in relationships
** rich in ___________
Wealth, in whatever realm, is always heavy. Being rich in anything weighs us down, lures us to trust our riches, and can become a hindrance to living fully the life that God has designed for us. Riches hinder our capacity to say, "Yes!" to entering this life-stance called "the kingdom of God."
So even if you and I do not think of ourselves as rich in possessions, we are invited to hear Jesus' words about the areas of life in which we ARE wealthy.
The camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle reference is outrageously glorious. YOU can't do this, no matter how hard you try. I can't do this, no matter how hard I try. It's just not gonna happen! But God's realm is working in people who live with some combination of wealth and poverty, who are rich in some things and poor in others. What we cannot do, like shoving a camel through a needle's eye, is entirely within the realm of God's doing.
In other words, on this one day the rich man may have sulked away sad because he could not respond to Jesus' invitation; however, on another day perhaps he would return again, this time realizing that his efforts/wealth/money could never outpace God's love, mercy, and generosity.
Monday, July 2, 2012
The High Cost of Spiritual Health
I grew up in the day of $.29/gallon gasoline. "Gas wars" in my small, Oklahoma town would drive the price down to 19 cents, or even 18 cents. It was not uncommon to sit in the backseat of my mom's huge 4-door Chevy as she pulled into the local Kerr-McGee filling station and hear the attendant ask, "Fill-er' up, ma'am?"
She would either say, "Yes, please," or, "No, just $2 worth today."
So later, in the 1970's, when I attended conferences with my Baptist student group, the sermon that I still remember, the one that made a deep, deep dent on my heart, was the white Southern Baptist preacher who began a sermon by saying, "I'll take $5 worth of God, please. Not enough to love my black neighbor, and not enough to change my heart. I'd like to buy $5 worth of God. Not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep, but just enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine. I don't want enough of God to make me love the outcasts or pick beets with a migrant. I want ecstasy not transformation. I want the warmth of the womb, not a new birth. I want a pound of the eternal in a paper sack. I would like to buy $5 worth of God, please."
I've reflected lately on the high cost of life with God . . . the enormous cost of growing up . . . the astronomical cost of the spiritual life.
You can track it in the Gospels . . . disciples are asked to sacrifice jobs to follow him . . . the loyalty of Jesus-followers shifts from family and social circles to the emerging inner framework of the kingdom of God . . . Jesus invited men and women to lay down what they have and what they think they know, in order to take on a different way of seeing the world and being in the world.
The price tag is high, and not everyone is willing to go there. In the Gospels, some turn away sad, because they have lots of stuff, and they are not willing to let it go.
This is dicey stuff. On an intentional spiritual path, we change. The way we see and think and feel changes. Much that has been unconscious, underneath the surface of our lives, comes to consciousness. We begin to see our own interior landscape, the motivations and drives that have governed us. We see how we have manipulated people for our own ends, and we notice how self-interested our actions in the world have been.
We notice that for much of life we have been sleep-walking, just going through the motions, blindly accepting what society and popular culture has said was important.
We see the hidden emotional weapons we've kept stored away inside, the weapons we have used on others. Loyalties and allegiances we've never before questioned are seen in a new light over time. That which has been invisible -- and thus, unnoticed -- slowly becomes visible to us.
These growing awarenesses obviously have a huge impact on us. They also have a huge impact on the people around us. In their eyes, we are changing, becoming different people. They can no longer count on us to be in the same place we were when they last saw us. Since we are slowly discovering new landscapes within ourselves, these people don't always know where to find us. We are not where we were when they last put us down. We don't seem stable -- and maybe we're not at this point -- and it feels like we've left or departed. "I don't feel like I know you any more," is one way some express it.
It's a huge shift of equilibrium. The old rules and roles that we had been locked into don't hold us any more. And if persons around us are not exploring for themselves -- if they need us to be like we've always been -- the tension can be almost unbearable.
I don't think I'm overstating this. Do you see how high the cost can be? It threatens division and separation, the division Jesus spoke of that is sword-separating family members and friends (Matt. 10:34 - 39). It is not that anyone goes out looking for separation, but that growth -- any kind of growth -- puts you at odds with others.
I've been on both ends of this . . . resisting the changes within persons around me . . . and having others resist my own change. These are powerful resistances, and they signal the astronomical cost of growing up.
I have no easy suggestions for getting around the cost or the difficulties. In fact, I don't think we're to get around this cost by gathering coupons or looking for sale items. We must each live into these realities in different ways, in ways that are true to God and our most authentic self.
For instance, I know how deeply I hurt and offended persons close to me during some of my own spiritual evolution. My stance toward others during some seasons of my life was not salted well with charity and generosity, but rather hardness and stubbornness. I hurt a lot of people. I didn't necessarily navigate those days well . . . but perhaps I did the best I could with the tools I had available to me then. I have different tools now, so maybe I would do it differently . . . but I can't relive those days based on the place I stand now in life.
Jesus knew the cost was high. He knew it philosophically, and he knew it experientially. That's why he said, "Consider the cost . . ."
And for those of you who have dared to ask for more than $5.00 worth of God . . . you, too, know that the cost is high.
She would either say, "Yes, please," or, "No, just $2 worth today."
So later, in the 1970's, when I attended conferences with my Baptist student group, the sermon that I still remember, the one that made a deep, deep dent on my heart, was the white Southern Baptist preacher who began a sermon by saying, "I'll take $5 worth of God, please. Not enough to love my black neighbor, and not enough to change my heart. I'd like to buy $5 worth of God. Not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep, but just enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine. I don't want enough of God to make me love the outcasts or pick beets with a migrant. I want ecstasy not transformation. I want the warmth of the womb, not a new birth. I want a pound of the eternal in a paper sack. I would like to buy $5 worth of God, please."
I've reflected lately on the high cost of life with God . . . the enormous cost of growing up . . . the astronomical cost of the spiritual life.
You can track it in the Gospels . . . disciples are asked to sacrifice jobs to follow him . . . the loyalty of Jesus-followers shifts from family and social circles to the emerging inner framework of the kingdom of God . . . Jesus invited men and women to lay down what they have and what they think they know, in order to take on a different way of seeing the world and being in the world.
The price tag is high, and not everyone is willing to go there. In the Gospels, some turn away sad, because they have lots of stuff, and they are not willing to let it go.
This is dicey stuff. On an intentional spiritual path, we change. The way we see and think and feel changes. Much that has been unconscious, underneath the surface of our lives, comes to consciousness. We begin to see our own interior landscape, the motivations and drives that have governed us. We see how we have manipulated people for our own ends, and we notice how self-interested our actions in the world have been.
We notice that for much of life we have been sleep-walking, just going through the motions, blindly accepting what society and popular culture has said was important.
We see the hidden emotional weapons we've kept stored away inside, the weapons we have used on others. Loyalties and allegiances we've never before questioned are seen in a new light over time. That which has been invisible -- and thus, unnoticed -- slowly becomes visible to us.
These growing awarenesses obviously have a huge impact on us. They also have a huge impact on the people around us. In their eyes, we are changing, becoming different people. They can no longer count on us to be in the same place we were when they last saw us. Since we are slowly discovering new landscapes within ourselves, these people don't always know where to find us. We are not where we were when they last put us down. We don't seem stable -- and maybe we're not at this point -- and it feels like we've left or departed. "I don't feel like I know you any more," is one way some express it.
It's a huge shift of equilibrium. The old rules and roles that we had been locked into don't hold us any more. And if persons around us are not exploring for themselves -- if they need us to be like we've always been -- the tension can be almost unbearable.
I don't think I'm overstating this. Do you see how high the cost can be? It threatens division and separation, the division Jesus spoke of that is sword-separating family members and friends (Matt. 10:34 - 39). It is not that anyone goes out looking for separation, but that growth -- any kind of growth -- puts you at odds with others.
I've been on both ends of this . . . resisting the changes within persons around me . . . and having others resist my own change. These are powerful resistances, and they signal the astronomical cost of growing up.
I have no easy suggestions for getting around the cost or the difficulties. In fact, I don't think we're to get around this cost by gathering coupons or looking for sale items. We must each live into these realities in different ways, in ways that are true to God and our most authentic self.
For instance, I know how deeply I hurt and offended persons close to me during some of my own spiritual evolution. My stance toward others during some seasons of my life was not salted well with charity and generosity, but rather hardness and stubbornness. I hurt a lot of people. I didn't necessarily navigate those days well . . . but perhaps I did the best I could with the tools I had available to me then. I have different tools now, so maybe I would do it differently . . . but I can't relive those days based on the place I stand now in life.
Jesus knew the cost was high. He knew it philosophically, and he knew it experientially. That's why he said, "Consider the cost . . ."
And for those of you who have dared to ask for more than $5.00 worth of God . . . you, too, know that the cost is high.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
The Mystery of Subterranean Growth
Many years ago while on an extended retreat, the Catholic Sister who was helping me attend to prayer suggested I consider a Jesus-story in my prayer. The retreat came at a time when I was especially earnest about prayer and my own spiritual progress. I was working it hard, pushing to move toward the spiritual goals I had set for myself. This is the parable she handed me:
“This is what the kingdom of God is like. A farmer scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether the farmer sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though the farmer does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain – first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, the farmer puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.” (Mark 4:26 – 29)
For 24 hours I read it, pondered it, asked God what it meant for me, and listened to what God might say to me in it . . . basically for 24 hours I lived with these four verses. Honestly, even after years of preaching and teaching, I don’t remember encountering that text before. But almost immediately, I began to hear God’s voice in it. I heard clearly that spiritual growth and “progress” were not primarily my work, as if I could control it, manipulate it and manage it to fruition. In the short parable, I heard the voice of the Holy Spirit saying that spiritual growth is God’s business, that it happens at God’s initiative and that it is brought to fruition in God’s time and in God’s ways. It was a hard lesson for me to hear, yet something within me intuited its truth.
These many years later, I’m grateful for that parable and for the Sister who invited me into it. Almost daily I see the reality of that Jesus-story lived out in the lives of people who are striving and struggling to make spiritual progress, yet who discover in mysterious ways that God is at work far beneath the surface of their lives in hidden ways they have not considered.
That quiet, beneath-the-surface growth is hard to see. It is not showy and flashy. The prize doesn’t go to the one who manages to look or sound most holy. Spiritual development isn’t sexy and in-your-face eye-grabbing. It happens slowly and gently in the subterranean regions of the soul, down where seeds germinate in the fertile bed of God’s heart.
Here’s the deal: Spiritual growth is happening this way in you! You can’t manage it and you can’t control it. God is doing a work of shaping and reordering within you that you have no idea about. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be intentional about your prayer or that you should neglect spiritual practice; but it does mean that ultimately you can’t force the growth to happen any more than the farmer can hurry along the seed toward harvest. This is interior work, and God is in charge of it.
Then there is a corollary, radical in its simplicity and potential to change relationships: Spiritual growth is also happening in everyone else you see day to day! No one is left out! That includes the person in whom you see absolutely no sign of Spirit, the dishonest co-worker, the arrogant classmate, and the stressed-out family member. This Spirit-work is subterranean in them, also; thus, just as you cannot mark your own interior progress with God, so you will not be able to gauge where others are. You don’t need to.
So be generous with yourself. Extend yourself some grace . . . and do the same with others. There is more going on beneath the surface than you know!
“This is what the kingdom of God is like. A farmer scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether the farmer sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though the farmer does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain – first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, the farmer puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.” (Mark 4:26 – 29)
For 24 hours I read it, pondered it, asked God what it meant for me, and listened to what God might say to me in it . . . basically for 24 hours I lived with these four verses. Honestly, even after years of preaching and teaching, I don’t remember encountering that text before. But almost immediately, I began to hear God’s voice in it. I heard clearly that spiritual growth and “progress” were not primarily my work, as if I could control it, manipulate it and manage it to fruition. In the short parable, I heard the voice of the Holy Spirit saying that spiritual growth is God’s business, that it happens at God’s initiative and that it is brought to fruition in God’s time and in God’s ways. It was a hard lesson for me to hear, yet something within me intuited its truth.
These many years later, I’m grateful for that parable and for the Sister who invited me into it. Almost daily I see the reality of that Jesus-story lived out in the lives of people who are striving and struggling to make spiritual progress, yet who discover in mysterious ways that God is at work far beneath the surface of their lives in hidden ways they have not considered.
That quiet, beneath-the-surface growth is hard to see. It is not showy and flashy. The prize doesn’t go to the one who manages to look or sound most holy. Spiritual development isn’t sexy and in-your-face eye-grabbing. It happens slowly and gently in the subterranean regions of the soul, down where seeds germinate in the fertile bed of God’s heart.
Here’s the deal: Spiritual growth is happening this way in you! You can’t manage it and you can’t control it. God is doing a work of shaping and reordering within you that you have no idea about. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be intentional about your prayer or that you should neglect spiritual practice; but it does mean that ultimately you can’t force the growth to happen any more than the farmer can hurry along the seed toward harvest. This is interior work, and God is in charge of it.
Then there is a corollary, radical in its simplicity and potential to change relationships: Spiritual growth is also happening in everyone else you see day to day! No one is left out! That includes the person in whom you see absolutely no sign of Spirit, the dishonest co-worker, the arrogant classmate, and the stressed-out family member. This Spirit-work is subterranean in them, also; thus, just as you cannot mark your own interior progress with God, so you will not be able to gauge where others are. You don’t need to.
So be generous with yourself. Extend yourself some grace . . . and do the same with others. There is more going on beneath the surface than you know!
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Growing into an Adult Faith
When we were children, we did life the way children do life, in ways that were appropriate to childhood. But as we grew older, the way we did life had to mature as well. Childish ways are appropriate to childhood, but not to adulthood. (1 Cor. 13:11)
There are lots of ways to image the work of God in our lives and in the world. I find a number of images helpful as I consider who God is and what God is about in the world.
I often return to the image of growing up as a helpful way of thinking about the spiritual life. That is, spirituality is about the invitation God extends to each of us to grow up and to have a grown-up relationship with God.
It's not as easy as it sounds. You would think that by virtue of chronological age, we would each grow up appropriately. In relationship with God, though, many of us continue to live long years with the faith-framework of our childhood. We've never questioned the faith of our fathers/mothers or early pastors/teachers. They said it, I believe it, and that settles it!!
[I preached a sermon about 14 years ago in which I said that we each need to have a faith that was our own. I was responding to an old hymn that people loved, which said something about how the faith of the previous generations is "good enough for me." Some folks got very upset. I was told by one person in particular that if a certain belief system was "good enough for my grandpa, it's good enough for me!"]
On the other hand, some of us have discovered by life-experience that the faith-framework of our childhood was inadequate for the real life we were living, so we jettisoned faith altogether . . . we left the Church or decided God was a bunch of hooey or in some other way thumbed our nose at God. Rather than wrestle with other faith-structures or God-images, we walked away and gave up.
In fact, wrestling to come into a faith-framework that is my own, informed by Scripture and my own unique experience of God in the world, is one of the most difficult tasks imaginable. The process is a massive undertaking, really too large for any of us to manage or supervise on our own.
[For that reason, God works inwardly, quietly, and in ways that are beyond our understanding. Read Mark 4:26 - 29 about how God does this work in underground, almost subversive ways . . . bringing us, over time if we're open to it, to be the people we were created by God to be.]
I'm around people sometimes who are highly invested in defending God. Really, they're not defending God . . . they are defending their ideas about God, but they have so merged their own ideas with the nature of God that they cannot tell the difference. They are defending some idea of God that they've held to be sacred. But it's not really God. Their ideas have become God for them, and most of the time, you'd best not encroach on the sacred space of their ideas.
Mostly we don't look at these things easily or enter this territory willingly. We feel much too threatened when someone suggests we hold loosely our ideas about God. Thus, often it takes some kind of life-crisis to reconsider who God is and how we relate to the God who is, not the God of my childhood or the God of my wishful imagination.
And a couple of movements in the process of growing up in our faith can really scare us.
One movement is the process of dismantling or uprooting the old faith-framework, perhaps the one we've clung to from childhood. This is not to judge what our grandparents believed or what we learned from our parents or what we heard Pastor Jack preach when we were teens . . . but too many of us live in faith-houses built by grandparents, parents, pastors, teachers, friends, etc. The only faith we have is the faith they gave us.
It's as if we live in their house. And that house isn't bad, but it's their house, not our own!
So becoming a spiritual adult means that at some point, we take apart the house brick by brick, we look at it and we ask, "Is this my brick? Or is it mom's brick . . . dad's brick . . . Pastor Jack's brick that I've been living with?"
That means dismantling and uprooting ideas about God and life and spirituality and prayer and connection with God that are not your own, but belong to someone else. That they belong to someone else does not make them bad . . . it simply means they are not yours.
A couple of things tend to happen when folks engage in this work of dismantling (or when God does it secretly in our interior, as John of the Cross, Merton, and many of our spiritual writers suggest). First, we feel like we are rejecting father and mother and grandma and Pastor Jack, and who among us wants that load? But really, we're not rejecting them. We're simply saying that in terms of faith, my connection with God has to be my own. I cannot depend on their relationship with God to convey to me relationship with God. Those beloved persons from our past can inspire us and encourage us, but they cannot do the heavy-lifting of faith in God for us.
Second, as we take out the bricks of the spiritual home we have lived in, and as we consider letting them go, it can feel like we're also losing God. Of course we're not losing God. We're only losing our previous ideas about God. But this sense of dismantling the house can be very unsettling, because it feels like we may not ever have anything to replace what we are letting go. We're letting go of dependencies and attachments and ideas about God that were too small for God, anyway, but it can all feel very threatening.
The second movement is the process of rebuilding the house, rebuilding a house that is our dwelling place with God. As the childhood house of faith comes down, God mysteriously and interiorly builds our new house, our house of adult faith.
I can't give you much guidance here, because this work truly is initiated and carried out by God. I can't give you an agenda for it, or map out a strategy for it, or suggest a life-plan for carrying it out. I know that makes some folks angry . . . those of us who want to have some say-so about what this house looks like . . . the ones among us who want to be the project managers of life. Sorry . . . God does this work.
In the process of rebuilding a house that is our dwelling place with God, the most helpful postures are openness and receptivity. Be open to whatever God might suggest to you, to whatever your "adult house" might look like . . . as soon as you say, "I don't want this or don't want it to look like that," you are back in control of the process. Receive whatever God does. Cultivate a willingness to let God be expansive, not limited or bounded by your previous ideas about God. Consider things you had not allowed yourself to think before. Notice the inward tug of the Spirit within you.
I know this is difficult work, and it can be scary. It really is work! But it's the work of a lifetime, the movement toward becoming fully your truest self . . . toward growing into the purpose for which God created you and placed you in the world.
It's the work of becoming fully human, fully alive.
There are lots of ways to image the work of God in our lives and in the world. I find a number of images helpful as I consider who God is and what God is about in the world.
I often return to the image of growing up as a helpful way of thinking about the spiritual life. That is, spirituality is about the invitation God extends to each of us to grow up and to have a grown-up relationship with God.
It's not as easy as it sounds. You would think that by virtue of chronological age, we would each grow up appropriately. In relationship with God, though, many of us continue to live long years with the faith-framework of our childhood. We've never questioned the faith of our fathers/mothers or early pastors/teachers. They said it, I believe it, and that settles it!!
[I preached a sermon about 14 years ago in which I said that we each need to have a faith that was our own. I was responding to an old hymn that people loved, which said something about how the faith of the previous generations is "good enough for me." Some folks got very upset. I was told by one person in particular that if a certain belief system was "good enough for my grandpa, it's good enough for me!"]
On the other hand, some of us have discovered by life-experience that the faith-framework of our childhood was inadequate for the real life we were living, so we jettisoned faith altogether . . . we left the Church or decided God was a bunch of hooey or in some other way thumbed our nose at God. Rather than wrestle with other faith-structures or God-images, we walked away and gave up.
In fact, wrestling to come into a faith-framework that is my own, informed by Scripture and my own unique experience of God in the world, is one of the most difficult tasks imaginable. The process is a massive undertaking, really too large for any of us to manage or supervise on our own.
[For that reason, God works inwardly, quietly, and in ways that are beyond our understanding. Read Mark 4:26 - 29 about how God does this work in underground, almost subversive ways . . . bringing us, over time if we're open to it, to be the people we were created by God to be.]
I'm around people sometimes who are highly invested in defending God. Really, they're not defending God . . . they are defending their ideas about God, but they have so merged their own ideas with the nature of God that they cannot tell the difference. They are defending some idea of God that they've held to be sacred. But it's not really God. Their ideas have become God for them, and most of the time, you'd best not encroach on the sacred space of their ideas.
Mostly we don't look at these things easily or enter this territory willingly. We feel much too threatened when someone suggests we hold loosely our ideas about God. Thus, often it takes some kind of life-crisis to reconsider who God is and how we relate to the God who is, not the God of my childhood or the God of my wishful imagination.
And a couple of movements in the process of growing up in our faith can really scare us.
One movement is the process of dismantling or uprooting the old faith-framework, perhaps the one we've clung to from childhood. This is not to judge what our grandparents believed or what we learned from our parents or what we heard Pastor Jack preach when we were teens . . . but too many of us live in faith-houses built by grandparents, parents, pastors, teachers, friends, etc. The only faith we have is the faith they gave us.
It's as if we live in their house. And that house isn't bad, but it's their house, not our own!
So becoming a spiritual adult means that at some point, we take apart the house brick by brick, we look at it and we ask, "Is this my brick? Or is it mom's brick . . . dad's brick . . . Pastor Jack's brick that I've been living with?"
That means dismantling and uprooting ideas about God and life and spirituality and prayer and connection with God that are not your own, but belong to someone else. That they belong to someone else does not make them bad . . . it simply means they are not yours.
A couple of things tend to happen when folks engage in this work of dismantling (or when God does it secretly in our interior, as John of the Cross, Merton, and many of our spiritual writers suggest). First, we feel like we are rejecting father and mother and grandma and Pastor Jack, and who among us wants that load? But really, we're not rejecting them. We're simply saying that in terms of faith, my connection with God has to be my own. I cannot depend on their relationship with God to convey to me relationship with God. Those beloved persons from our past can inspire us and encourage us, but they cannot do the heavy-lifting of faith in God for us.
Second, as we take out the bricks of the spiritual home we have lived in, and as we consider letting them go, it can feel like we're also losing God. Of course we're not losing God. We're only losing our previous ideas about God. But this sense of dismantling the house can be very unsettling, because it feels like we may not ever have anything to replace what we are letting go. We're letting go of dependencies and attachments and ideas about God that were too small for God, anyway, but it can all feel very threatening.
The second movement is the process of rebuilding the house, rebuilding a house that is our dwelling place with God. As the childhood house of faith comes down, God mysteriously and interiorly builds our new house, our house of adult faith.
I can't give you much guidance here, because this work truly is initiated and carried out by God. I can't give you an agenda for it, or map out a strategy for it, or suggest a life-plan for carrying it out. I know that makes some folks angry . . . those of us who want to have some say-so about what this house looks like . . . the ones among us who want to be the project managers of life. Sorry . . . God does this work.
In the process of rebuilding a house that is our dwelling place with God, the most helpful postures are openness and receptivity. Be open to whatever God might suggest to you, to whatever your "adult house" might look like . . . as soon as you say, "I don't want this or don't want it to look like that," you are back in control of the process. Receive whatever God does. Cultivate a willingness to let God be expansive, not limited or bounded by your previous ideas about God. Consider things you had not allowed yourself to think before. Notice the inward tug of the Spirit within you.
I know this is difficult work, and it can be scary. It really is work! But it's the work of a lifetime, the movement toward becoming fully your truest self . . . toward growing into the purpose for which God created you and placed you in the world.
It's the work of becoming fully human, fully alive.
Friday, September 2, 2011
Rhythms for Receiving and Spending
"Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”
(Lk. 6:38)
A huge crowd took a meal that began with five loaves of bread and two fish. After everyone had eaten there were twelve baskets of food leftover. (Matt. 14:13 – 21)
What do you do with the leftovers? How do you handle the excess? I have to go off-script a bit, because the text doesn’t say what happened in this instance. I think there are realities, though, offered by Jesus in other places, that give me some indication of what might have been next.
As you think about the leftovers, the excess, here is something you might want to consider:
There is no such thing as excess or having too much . . . if your life is a conduit through which what you have is shared with others.
Just to be clear, that’s the Gospel according to Jerry, not Jesus. But I still think it holds true. Maybe you can help me test it out.
However much you have in your hands, whatever it is, whether plenty or poverty . . . when your life is a vessel that conduits what you have to others, there is no such thing as excess or having too much.
For me, the symbol of open hands (and open heart) is a key. Open hands suggest that we are ready to receive, that we have let go of enough of what we think and how we are in order to receive what God is ready to give us.
The Christian mystic from centuries back (I think it was Meister Eckhart, but it may have been John of the Cross) said, “God is always waiting to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them.”
With open hands we release what we hold onto in order to receive what God wants to give. So with open hands we receive.
Too often, though, as soon as we receive, we close our hands. “Okay, now that I have this, it is mine!” We tend to be a clutching, grasping, hoarding, collecting people, and a part of the human condition is that we hold on for dear life to what we think is ours. We acquire and accumulate. We gather to ourselves and hold. It is a significant piece of our human dysfunction.
However, the open hands image does not apply only to the receiving. It also speaks to the other end of the conduit. The same open hands that receive from God then turn outward to give or share with others. Open hands are also the image for giving away what we have, spending it on the world for God’s sake. Whether the excess that we have is money or time or energy or wisdom, the invitation is to receive, then to let go.
In that context, then, there is no such thing as “excess” or having too much, because whatever we have received we then spend on the world.
This is the basic movement of Centering Prayer as a contemplative prayer form. It is a prayer in which we practice this movement of receiving, then letting go.
Thoughts come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
Ideas come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
Noises come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
We welcome whatever comes, then release it. I may have a little . . . still, I receive and then let go. I may have a lot . . . I receive, then let go.
This, then, is the cycle, the movement, the process of life, so that we are always taking into ourselves and then spending it on the world. The wonderful truth is that we may never be more God-like than when we fall into this life-flow, for this is exactly what God is doing endlessly and in extravagance. God generously and with abundance throws God’s Self out into the world, and in doing so is never depleted, never exhausted. In all this Self-giving, God never comes to the end of who God Is.
I think in the same way, when humans spend themselves for God’s sake, there is an endless supply. God continually replenishes what we have to give. But as soon as I close my hands, as soon as I keep what I’ve received as if it were only for myself, I shut down the cycle.
Which leads me back to Matthew’s story of the leftovers . . . and here I have to listen to my imagination. What happened to those leftovers? Did some people take a loaf for themselves out of one of the baskets? Did others take a loaf to share with someone else who was hungry? Were there some who took home several loaves in hopes of having “daily bread” for the next week?
Here’s the other maxim that came to me a few days ago. Try this one out:
"Today’s leftovers become the seed for the next miracle.
Do you see? I wonder if one or five or seven of these loaves became the seed for a miracle the next day – not reported in the Gospels – in which Jesus took these leftovers and created another huge meal to feed a massive crowd. But for today’s leftovers to become tomorrow’s miracle, someone not only has to receive the leftovers today, but share them tomorrow.
(Lk. 6:38)
A huge crowd took a meal that began with five loaves of bread and two fish. After everyone had eaten there were twelve baskets of food leftover. (Matt. 14:13 – 21)
What do you do with the leftovers? How do you handle the excess? I have to go off-script a bit, because the text doesn’t say what happened in this instance. I think there are realities, though, offered by Jesus in other places, that give me some indication of what might have been next.
As you think about the leftovers, the excess, here is something you might want to consider:
There is no such thing as excess or having too much . . . if your life is a conduit through which what you have is shared with others.
Just to be clear, that’s the Gospel according to Jerry, not Jesus. But I still think it holds true. Maybe you can help me test it out.
However much you have in your hands, whatever it is, whether plenty or poverty . . . when your life is a vessel that conduits what you have to others, there is no such thing as excess or having too much.
For me, the symbol of open hands (and open heart) is a key. Open hands suggest that we are ready to receive, that we have let go of enough of what we think and how we are in order to receive what God is ready to give us.
The Christian mystic from centuries back (I think it was Meister Eckhart, but it may have been John of the Cross) said, “God is always waiting to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them.”
With open hands we release what we hold onto in order to receive what God wants to give. So with open hands we receive.
Too often, though, as soon as we receive, we close our hands. “Okay, now that I have this, it is mine!” We tend to be a clutching, grasping, hoarding, collecting people, and a part of the human condition is that we hold on for dear life to what we think is ours. We acquire and accumulate. We gather to ourselves and hold. It is a significant piece of our human dysfunction.
However, the open hands image does not apply only to the receiving. It also speaks to the other end of the conduit. The same open hands that receive from God then turn outward to give or share with others. Open hands are also the image for giving away what we have, spending it on the world for God’s sake. Whether the excess that we have is money or time or energy or wisdom, the invitation is to receive, then to let go.
In that context, then, there is no such thing as “excess” or having too much, because whatever we have received we then spend on the world.
This is the basic movement of Centering Prayer as a contemplative prayer form. It is a prayer in which we practice this movement of receiving, then letting go.
Thoughts come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
Ideas come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
Noises come . . . I receive them, then let them go.
We welcome whatever comes, then release it. I may have a little . . . still, I receive and then let go. I may have a lot . . . I receive, then let go.
This, then, is the cycle, the movement, the process of life, so that we are always taking into ourselves and then spending it on the world. The wonderful truth is that we may never be more God-like than when we fall into this life-flow, for this is exactly what God is doing endlessly and in extravagance. God generously and with abundance throws God’s Self out into the world, and in doing so is never depleted, never exhausted. In all this Self-giving, God never comes to the end of who God Is.
I think in the same way, when humans spend themselves for God’s sake, there is an endless supply. God continually replenishes what we have to give. But as soon as I close my hands, as soon as I keep what I’ve received as if it were only for myself, I shut down the cycle.
Which leads me back to Matthew’s story of the leftovers . . . and here I have to listen to my imagination. What happened to those leftovers? Did some people take a loaf for themselves out of one of the baskets? Did others take a loaf to share with someone else who was hungry? Were there some who took home several loaves in hopes of having “daily bread” for the next week?
Here’s the other maxim that came to me a few days ago. Try this one out:
"Today’s leftovers become the seed for the next miracle.
Do you see? I wonder if one or five or seven of these loaves became the seed for a miracle the next day – not reported in the Gospels – in which Jesus took these leftovers and created another huge meal to feed a massive crowd. But for today’s leftovers to become tomorrow’s miracle, someone not only has to receive the leftovers today, but share them tomorrow.
Friday, August 19, 2011
The Shape of God's World
The "kingdom of heaven" (or the "kingdom of God") is a dicey deal to understand. The Gospels use these terms frequently, yet never are they defined. Most often Jesus used the words to describe the way God orders life that is alternative to the structures of this world.
While not defining or explaining the kingdom of heaven, Jesus told stories to illustrate this alternative framework for life, this radically different God-consciousness. So the Gospels are full of stories that Jesus begins, "The kingdom of heaven is like . . ." Taken together, they construct for us a portrait of "God's kingdom" -- the way life is ordered around and structured upon God -- which helps us to see the vast difference between the way peoples order life (in societies, cultures, governments, etc.) and the design God has for the world.
For several years now I've been drawn to the story of the landowner and the workers in the vineyard as the prototypical parable that sets this contrast before us. In the parable there are persons utterly confused, bewildered because ultimately life is not ordered according to the systems and frameworks to which they have slavishly given themselves. To me, it is a parable that sheds a lot of light on why people -- even religious, Christian people -- resist God and God's shaping in their lives with such defiance.
The parable was the daily reading a couple of days ago, so I've had opportunity this week to sit with it again and listen to it.
Matthew 20:1 - 16
“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
“About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
“‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his supervisor, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
“The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These men who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
“But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
“So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
I'll not walk through the entire parable. There were a few things I noticed this week as I listened to Jesus' story.
1. The parable challenges our ability to receive and to celebrate with others who receive. The word "receive" is used four times in verses 9 - 11.
Sometimes when I'm talking about this passage in a sermon or with a study group, after I read the text I'll ask people to speak out their first response to the story. "What immediately rumbles up inside you when you hear this story?" Very often I hear, "It's not fair" or "The all-day workers deserved more." Many of us tend to hear the story in terms of "fairness" and what we "deserve."
But a few times lately when I've asked the question, I've heard things from the audience things like, "It gives me hope!" or "I'm grateful" or "Woo-hoo!"
I wonder if those who feel uncomfortable with the story because it feels unfair are some -- myself included -- who have been busy working hard "all day" and keeping the rules and showing ourselves diligent. We want to receive our due.
And I wonder if those who hear in the story cause for celebration are those for whom life has been difficult, those who have been ignored, those who have been accustomed to being on the underside of life. For those who live outside a culture of deserving, this is not just "good news" . . . it's "GREAT NEWS!!"
Somehow, my capacity to be open and receive is wrapped up in all that.
2. The all-day workers "expected to receive more." Another translation says, "They thought they would receive more."
In the story, the persons who worked the length of the day were trapped in their expectations, in their "thought" about the situation vis a vis the workers who labored only a part of the day. They were locked into a way of thinking about life, fairness, and reward/punishment that was the filter through which they saw all of life. They thought -- or expected -- to receive more than the other workers, but when reality did not match their thinking -- or expectations -- they got angry and grumbled.
As I prayed with this part of the story, I saw a couple of ways my own life is trapped in my thinking and expectation, in my own perception of how I think life is -- or should be -- ordered.
The landowner, who in the story is the God-figure, demonstrated that he was operating out of a different system or reality or framework, and some of the workers could not handle the alternative structure.
In some way, our thinking and expectation about life has to be de-constructed, with the re-construction work taking place around the ways of this alternative God-reality. Such is the kingdom of God, and such is the challenge for me of "entering" the kingdom of God.
3. "You have made them equal to us." The all-day workers were accustomed to a system of merit and deserving, but were not used to everyone getting a different kind of mercy. "Deserving" is out of the question. It is not a category in this landowner's lexicon.
In this kingdom, the systems of the world to which we are accustomed are thrown out. We are invited into a new reality, a God-reality. So the ways that human systems label and classify and categorize do not apply in God's kingdom. For people who think they have more of this or more of that (money or education or status or importance or whatever) than others, it can be totally distasteful to be made "equal" to everyone around you.
"You have made them equal to us," sounds elitist, and it is . . . and we all -- no matter who we are -- have some egocentric elitism in us.
In this kingdom of heaven, there are radically different structures and systems at work. The kingdom is not built on merit and deserving. It is built on mercy and generosity, and the parable demonstrates that while we all think we want mercy and generosity, we may not want it for everyone. At some subconscious level, we want a system of merit and deserving, not a system of grace and compassion. It's one of the main reasons God's kingdom is so difficult to enter . . . there is so much of ourselves that clings to the old systems because they are all we know.
Lately I've considered again the words Paul Simon wrote in his song, "Graceland." The song is only about Elvis and his Memphis home in a superficial way, it seems to me, but more about this way of being in the world we call "generosity" or "mercy" or "grace" . . . because in the tag line of the chorus Simon sings:
I have reason to believe
we all will be received
in Graceland.
While not defining or explaining the kingdom of heaven, Jesus told stories to illustrate this alternative framework for life, this radically different God-consciousness. So the Gospels are full of stories that Jesus begins, "The kingdom of heaven is like . . ." Taken together, they construct for us a portrait of "God's kingdom" -- the way life is ordered around and structured upon God -- which helps us to see the vast difference between the way peoples order life (in societies, cultures, governments, etc.) and the design God has for the world.
For several years now I've been drawn to the story of the landowner and the workers in the vineyard as the prototypical parable that sets this contrast before us. In the parable there are persons utterly confused, bewildered because ultimately life is not ordered according to the systems and frameworks to which they have slavishly given themselves. To me, it is a parable that sheds a lot of light on why people -- even religious, Christian people -- resist God and God's shaping in their lives with such defiance.
The parable was the daily reading a couple of days ago, so I've had opportunity this week to sit with it again and listen to it.
Matthew 20:1 - 16
“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
“About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
“‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his supervisor, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
“The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These men who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
“But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
“So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
I'll not walk through the entire parable. There were a few things I noticed this week as I listened to Jesus' story.
1. The parable challenges our ability to receive and to celebrate with others who receive. The word "receive" is used four times in verses 9 - 11.
Sometimes when I'm talking about this passage in a sermon or with a study group, after I read the text I'll ask people to speak out their first response to the story. "What immediately rumbles up inside you when you hear this story?" Very often I hear, "It's not fair" or "The all-day workers deserved more." Many of us tend to hear the story in terms of "fairness" and what we "deserve."
But a few times lately when I've asked the question, I've heard things from the audience things like, "It gives me hope!" or "I'm grateful" or "Woo-hoo!"
I wonder if those who feel uncomfortable with the story because it feels unfair are some -- myself included -- who have been busy working hard "all day" and keeping the rules and showing ourselves diligent. We want to receive our due.
And I wonder if those who hear in the story cause for celebration are those for whom life has been difficult, those who have been ignored, those who have been accustomed to being on the underside of life. For those who live outside a culture of deserving, this is not just "good news" . . . it's "GREAT NEWS!!"
Somehow, my capacity to be open and receive is wrapped up in all that.
2. The all-day workers "expected to receive more." Another translation says, "They thought they would receive more."
In the story, the persons who worked the length of the day were trapped in their expectations, in their "thought" about the situation vis a vis the workers who labored only a part of the day. They were locked into a way of thinking about life, fairness, and reward/punishment that was the filter through which they saw all of life. They thought -- or expected -- to receive more than the other workers, but when reality did not match their thinking -- or expectations -- they got angry and grumbled.
As I prayed with this part of the story, I saw a couple of ways my own life is trapped in my thinking and expectation, in my own perception of how I think life is -- or should be -- ordered.
The landowner, who in the story is the God-figure, demonstrated that he was operating out of a different system or reality or framework, and some of the workers could not handle the alternative structure.
In some way, our thinking and expectation about life has to be de-constructed, with the re-construction work taking place around the ways of this alternative God-reality. Such is the kingdom of God, and such is the challenge for me of "entering" the kingdom of God.
3. "You have made them equal to us." The all-day workers were accustomed to a system of merit and deserving, but were not used to everyone getting a different kind of mercy. "Deserving" is out of the question. It is not a category in this landowner's lexicon.
In this kingdom, the systems of the world to which we are accustomed are thrown out. We are invited into a new reality, a God-reality. So the ways that human systems label and classify and categorize do not apply in God's kingdom. For people who think they have more of this or more of that (money or education or status or importance or whatever) than others, it can be totally distasteful to be made "equal" to everyone around you.
"You have made them equal to us," sounds elitist, and it is . . . and we all -- no matter who we are -- have some egocentric elitism in us.
In this kingdom of heaven, there are radically different structures and systems at work. The kingdom is not built on merit and deserving. It is built on mercy and generosity, and the parable demonstrates that while we all think we want mercy and generosity, we may not want it for everyone. At some subconscious level, we want a system of merit and deserving, not a system of grace and compassion. It's one of the main reasons God's kingdom is so difficult to enter . . . there is so much of ourselves that clings to the old systems because they are all we know.
Lately I've considered again the words Paul Simon wrote in his song, "Graceland." The song is only about Elvis and his Memphis home in a superficial way, it seems to me, but more about this way of being in the world we call "generosity" or "mercy" or "grace" . . . because in the tag line of the chorus Simon sings:
I have reason to believe
we all will be received
in Graceland.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Slobbery, Transformation and Sunday School Picnics (Part 1)
During college days, I cut theological teeth on Frederick Buechner, a Presbyterian pastor, teacher and writer. Buechner had a gift for saying deep and layered things in very poetic, straightforward ways. Those books I read in the 1970's, before going to seminary, shaped me. Some of the images he used then still show up in my consciousness when I think about life with God.
One of his images has been with me a lot the last couple of weeks as I've attended to events in the national life of the United States . . . political gridlock in government . . . economic panic . . . the polarization of endless blaming and scapegoating . . . fear and anger among those of us on "Main Street."
I've thought about one paragraph Buechner wrote as I've pondered once again how difficult life-change and transformation is. I want to live a life that orbits around God, yet I resist it with every excuse and ounce of strength I can muster. Most of us seem to resist in that manner. It's hard to see how firmly I am entrenched at the center of my world. It's difficult to let go of the illusions I've grown up with and the illusions to which I cling . . . and not only hard, it's painful as well. It's much more comfortable to rock along blissfully (and blissfully ignorant) rather than face ourselves (and God!) and adjust life somehow.
[Several months ago I was with an Orthodox Christian who said, "Everyone talks about 'transformation,' but no one wants to change."]
Yet, that kind of adjustment seems to be the invitation of Jesus, to adjust life according to what he called "the kingdom of God" (rather than "the kingdom of Jerry").
Buechner wrote an essay about the word "gospel" in which he explained that the word literally means, "Good News." In the short essay he described what God offers to human persons as both "good" and "new." Then, he wrote this last paragraph, the words I have called to mind again recently:
"Thus, the Gospel is not only Good and New but, if you take it seriously, a Holy Terror. Jesus never claimed that the process of being changed from a slob into a human being was going to be a Sunday School picnic. On the contrary. Childbirth may occasionally be painless, but rebirth never. Part of what it means to be a slob is to hang on for dear life to our slobbery."
[Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), 33.]
You might feel inclined to argue his use of the word "slob," but I don't think you can argue his premise that new birth or new life (being changed or transformed) is going to be painful. In fact, Jesus said that this kind of life-adjustment was going to ask of us the death of what we know of ourselves.
We lose ourselves to find ourselves.
We take up our cross daily and die to self.
Jesus did not simply teach this posture with his words. He demonstrated in his life -- and in his own death -- this pattern of losing life in order to find life.
But as Buechner said, part of being a slob is hanging on for dear life to our slobbery.
Part of our humanity means being self-centered and self-referenced . . . and holding on for dear life to our self-centeredness.
Part of our humanity means living in the illusions and frameworks in which we have been raised . . . and holding onto those illusions and frameworks, no matter the cost.
Part of our humanity means thinking that the way we see the world and relate to the world is the only "right" or "true" way to relate to the world . . . so our humanity quickly and easily divides people into "us" and "them" . . . those who see the world the way I do (friends, allies, compatriots) and those who see the world through other lens (enemies, terrorists) . . . and holding onto those labels at any cost.
That's enough for now. In the next couple of days, I'm going to post some thoughts about the challenge of this kind of transformative stance in the corporate life of a tribe or nation. Because the very things that are true of my life and your life in terms of "hanging onto our slobbery" are also true of governments, nations and peoples.
One of his images has been with me a lot the last couple of weeks as I've attended to events in the national life of the United States . . . political gridlock in government . . . economic panic . . . the polarization of endless blaming and scapegoating . . . fear and anger among those of us on "Main Street."
I've thought about one paragraph Buechner wrote as I've pondered once again how difficult life-change and transformation is. I want to live a life that orbits around God, yet I resist it with every excuse and ounce of strength I can muster. Most of us seem to resist in that manner. It's hard to see how firmly I am entrenched at the center of my world. It's difficult to let go of the illusions I've grown up with and the illusions to which I cling . . . and not only hard, it's painful as well. It's much more comfortable to rock along blissfully (and blissfully ignorant) rather than face ourselves (and God!) and adjust life somehow.
[Several months ago I was with an Orthodox Christian who said, "Everyone talks about 'transformation,' but no one wants to change."]
Yet, that kind of adjustment seems to be the invitation of Jesus, to adjust life according to what he called "the kingdom of God" (rather than "the kingdom of Jerry").
Buechner wrote an essay about the word "gospel" in which he explained that the word literally means, "Good News." In the short essay he described what God offers to human persons as both "good" and "new." Then, he wrote this last paragraph, the words I have called to mind again recently:
"Thus, the Gospel is not only Good and New but, if you take it seriously, a Holy Terror. Jesus never claimed that the process of being changed from a slob into a human being was going to be a Sunday School picnic. On the contrary. Childbirth may occasionally be painless, but rebirth never. Part of what it means to be a slob is to hang on for dear life to our slobbery."
[Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), 33.]
You might feel inclined to argue his use of the word "slob," but I don't think you can argue his premise that new birth or new life (being changed or transformed) is going to be painful. In fact, Jesus said that this kind of life-adjustment was going to ask of us the death of what we know of ourselves.
We lose ourselves to find ourselves.
We take up our cross daily and die to self.
Jesus did not simply teach this posture with his words. He demonstrated in his life -- and in his own death -- this pattern of losing life in order to find life.
But as Buechner said, part of being a slob is hanging on for dear life to our slobbery.
Part of our humanity means being self-centered and self-referenced . . . and holding on for dear life to our self-centeredness.
Part of our humanity means living in the illusions and frameworks in which we have been raised . . . and holding onto those illusions and frameworks, no matter the cost.
Part of our humanity means thinking that the way we see the world and relate to the world is the only "right" or "true" way to relate to the world . . . so our humanity quickly and easily divides people into "us" and "them" . . . those who see the world the way I do (friends, allies, compatriots) and those who see the world through other lens (enemies, terrorists) . . . and holding onto those labels at any cost.
That's enough for now. In the next couple of days, I'm going to post some thoughts about the challenge of this kind of transformative stance in the corporate life of a tribe or nation. Because the very things that are true of my life and your life in terms of "hanging onto our slobbery" are also true of governments, nations and peoples.
Monday, May 16, 2011
Imaging the God Who Is Like Me
These words, the voice of God in Psalm 50, caught my eye:
These things you have done and I kept still,
and you thought that I am like you. (Ps. 50:21)
Because I spend quite a bit of time in the Hebrew Psalms, I notice the tendency of pray-ers to identify with God. It happens often in the Psalms. And it happens often in me and others.
My enemies must be God's enemies.
The things that anger me must anger God.
When I am slighted or treated unfairly, God has been slighted.
I seem always to take myself and my outlook as the point of reference around which God orbits.
This seems to be a fundamental human predisposition, to reduce God to my emotions, my limitations, and my potentialities. Though created in God's image, we live as if God were shaped to our image. There is something in the human condition that makes me want to take the limits of my vision for the limits of the world, or the limits of reality.
In short, this thinking reflects the human tendency to see myself at the center, while everything and everyone else -- including God -- floats at the periphery.
"You thought that I am like you," God said. Rather than live into the largeness of God, we shrink God to our size.
Really, it's a ludicrous notion . . . the God of the cosmos, reduced to fit into my pocket.
The spiritual life, as I have come to understand it, is basically a continual invitation into the largeness of God. The expansiveness of God stretches across all that is real and true, and encompasses every aspect of life without exception. Certainly, a small God feels safer, more manageable and controlled. But even when God became one of us -- in Jesus -- he gave up safety and manageability for a radical life of love and generosity.
Jesus lived large . . . expansive. He pressed the borders and explored the great landscape of God.
As Jesus entered into this largeness and proclaimed that expansiveness to others, he called it the kingdom of God.
As for me, I find it much easier to bend God to my liking than to engage the difficult work of entering into God's expansiveness. It's easier to live small, not as demanding. I basically don't have to change a thing.
These things you have done and I kept still,
and you thought that I am like you. (Ps. 50:21)
Because I spend quite a bit of time in the Hebrew Psalms, I notice the tendency of pray-ers to identify with God. It happens often in the Psalms. And it happens often in me and others.
My enemies must be God's enemies.
The things that anger me must anger God.
When I am slighted or treated unfairly, God has been slighted.
I seem always to take myself and my outlook as the point of reference around which God orbits.
This seems to be a fundamental human predisposition, to reduce God to my emotions, my limitations, and my potentialities. Though created in God's image, we live as if God were shaped to our image. There is something in the human condition that makes me want to take the limits of my vision for the limits of the world, or the limits of reality.
In short, this thinking reflects the human tendency to see myself at the center, while everything and everyone else -- including God -- floats at the periphery.
"You thought that I am like you," God said. Rather than live into the largeness of God, we shrink God to our size.
Really, it's a ludicrous notion . . . the God of the cosmos, reduced to fit into my pocket.
The spiritual life, as I have come to understand it, is basically a continual invitation into the largeness of God. The expansiveness of God stretches across all that is real and true, and encompasses every aspect of life without exception. Certainly, a small God feels safer, more manageable and controlled. But even when God became one of us -- in Jesus -- he gave up safety and manageability for a radical life of love and generosity.
Jesus lived large . . . expansive. He pressed the borders and explored the great landscape of God.
As Jesus entered into this largeness and proclaimed that expansiveness to others, he called it the kingdom of God.
As for me, I find it much easier to bend God to my liking than to engage the difficult work of entering into God's expansiveness. It's easier to live small, not as demanding. I basically don't have to change a thing.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Leaving Home as a Prodigal
The younger son got together everything he had and left for a distant country. (Lk. 15:13)
Our growth as human beings, as spiritual beings, is difficult and sometimes harsh work. It takes discipline and diligence. We don't happen upon growth and healthy life-change by accident. Our life-journey as spiritual beings is about engaging this work of becoming fully human, fully the person God created us to be.
Let's connect an image to our situation. Our starting place is something like home. This home consists of all the norms and values that are familiar to us and with which we have become very friendly. While it entails the literal family and the place in which we were raised, home is much more than that. In computer-ese, home is our operating system, the default system from which we operate. It is the life framework to which we return to make sense out of our existence.
Our home may be built upon faulty assumptions, inaccurate perceptions, and coping strategies we have developed to deal with life in all its difficulties. We live underneath the illusion that our home works for us. While it may help us make sense out of life, very rarely is the home we live in expansive enough to cover all of life's uncertainties. We think home is the way life really is. It almost never is.
Because we think our home works for us, we don't have cause to question it or to think that we might need to leave it. So generally, we only begin to question our home or to leave it when confronted with some life-crisis. At some point life begins to fall apart, the old assumptions don't work anymore, and our usual coping strategies don't make sense of life any longer. Generally some kind of crisis pushes us away from home to the far country.
Thus, growing up as a human almost always means leaving home at some point. We generally don't know where we're going, only that where we are is not working. So we leave the constriction of home for the mystery of the far country. (That may or may not mean a literal leaving of mother and/or father. And just because a person physically leaves mother and/or father does not mean that they have truly left home.)
This is the leaving, the going away that is fundamental to the spiritual journey. Many biblical stories reflect this pattern. Most obvious is the story of the young man -- the prodigal son -- who took his inheritance and left home for a far country, leaving behind his family and all that home represents.
All the sermons and lessons about the prodigal son I've heard in the Church for almost 40 years have painted his actions as rash and irresponsible. He was impulsive and reckless, we've said, as we castigate him for leaving a place of safety and comfort.
I find him, though, to be the truly courageous character in the story, the one willing to risk, the one not satisfied to buy blindly into the answers of home, who insisted on asking his own questions and coming to a sense of life for himself. If you want some idea of what home was like in that story, take a look at the elder brother.
So I love the younger son. I haven't always felt that way, but in recent years he has become the biblical character with whom I most identify. With that in mind, a couple of weeks ago I found a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke called "The Departure of the Prodigal Son." The poem begins this way:
Now to go away from all this tangleness
that is part of us and yet not ours,
that like the water in old wells
reflects us trembling and ruins the image;
from all this, which as if with thorns
still clings to us -- to go away . . .
The entire poem is full of images and language about "going away" and what happens to our seeing when we "go away." There are images for the mystery we step into when we finally "go away." The poem speaks to the new life that awaits us when we step away from what is comfortable, known, and "sure." This is how the poem ends:
To take all this upon yourself and in vain
perhaps let fall things firmly held,
in order to die alone, not knowing why --
Is this how new life begins?
Yes, it is.
["The Departure of the Prodigal Son," trans. by Edward Snow in Rainer Maria Rilke: New Poems, p. 39]
Our growth as human beings, as spiritual beings, is difficult and sometimes harsh work. It takes discipline and diligence. We don't happen upon growth and healthy life-change by accident. Our life-journey as spiritual beings is about engaging this work of becoming fully human, fully the person God created us to be.
Let's connect an image to our situation. Our starting place is something like home. This home consists of all the norms and values that are familiar to us and with which we have become very friendly. While it entails the literal family and the place in which we were raised, home is much more than that. In computer-ese, home is our operating system, the default system from which we operate. It is the life framework to which we return to make sense out of our existence.
Our home may be built upon faulty assumptions, inaccurate perceptions, and coping strategies we have developed to deal with life in all its difficulties. We live underneath the illusion that our home works for us. While it may help us make sense out of life, very rarely is the home we live in expansive enough to cover all of life's uncertainties. We think home is the way life really is. It almost never is.
Because we think our home works for us, we don't have cause to question it or to think that we might need to leave it. So generally, we only begin to question our home or to leave it when confronted with some life-crisis. At some point life begins to fall apart, the old assumptions don't work anymore, and our usual coping strategies don't make sense of life any longer. Generally some kind of crisis pushes us away from home to the far country.
Thus, growing up as a human almost always means leaving home at some point. We generally don't know where we're going, only that where we are is not working. So we leave the constriction of home for the mystery of the far country. (That may or may not mean a literal leaving of mother and/or father. And just because a person physically leaves mother and/or father does not mean that they have truly left home.)
This is the leaving, the going away that is fundamental to the spiritual journey. Many biblical stories reflect this pattern. Most obvious is the story of the young man -- the prodigal son -- who took his inheritance and left home for a far country, leaving behind his family and all that home represents.
All the sermons and lessons about the prodigal son I've heard in the Church for almost 40 years have painted his actions as rash and irresponsible. He was impulsive and reckless, we've said, as we castigate him for leaving a place of safety and comfort.
I find him, though, to be the truly courageous character in the story, the one willing to risk, the one not satisfied to buy blindly into the answers of home, who insisted on asking his own questions and coming to a sense of life for himself. If you want some idea of what home was like in that story, take a look at the elder brother.
So I love the younger son. I haven't always felt that way, but in recent years he has become the biblical character with whom I most identify. With that in mind, a couple of weeks ago I found a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke called "The Departure of the Prodigal Son." The poem begins this way:
Now to go away from all this tangleness
that is part of us and yet not ours,
that like the water in old wells
reflects us trembling and ruins the image;
from all this, which as if with thorns
still clings to us -- to go away . . .
The entire poem is full of images and language about "going away" and what happens to our seeing when we "go away." There are images for the mystery we step into when we finally "go away." The poem speaks to the new life that awaits us when we step away from what is comfortable, known, and "sure." This is how the poem ends:
To take all this upon yourself and in vain
perhaps let fall things firmly held,
in order to die alone, not knowing why --
Is this how new life begins?
Yes, it is.
["The Departure of the Prodigal Son," trans. by Edward Snow in Rainer Maria Rilke: New Poems, p. 39]
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Going Away to Receive the Kingdom
Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms. Makes purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Luke 12:32 - 34)
The "kingdom" is not an outer, physical realm, but an inner stance of soul. It does not deny or denigrate the physical or the social or the mental; rather, it informs all of life.
The kingdom, as offered by God and as demonstrated through Jesus, permeates all of life. It is the core from which life is lived in all its physical, mental, and social dimensions.
Jesus told his followers that it was God's "good pleasure" to give them this stance of being in the world. It's what God wants, what God desires for all beings created.
So what are Jesus' next words? God wants to give us this kingdom, this way of seeing life, this way of being in the world . . . then his next words are "sell your possessions" and "give alms." It sounds like we have to clear out some space for what God wants us to have. God wants to give us good things, full life, meaningful existence, but our hands are too full of our own stuff to receive what God gives. There is a requisite "selling" and "giving," in short, an emptying that is part and parcel of kingdom-life.
This is where God can start to rub most of us the wrong way. We had thought that God was about helping us get ahead, helping us have more, helping us have a better life, helping us get things situated to our liking. Many of us came to faith -- or some kind of religious expression -- for just this reason: It promised to make a better life for us.
So when someone says to us that first of all we must empty, "sell," or "give away," we can get defensive. This is not the kind of religion we had bargained for.
There is a reason that the Gospels tell stories about persons who "leave" their nets (work) behind to follow Jesus . . . about sons who leave the safety and predictability of home in order to wander into "far countries" before returning home in a different way. There is a reason Jesus says that you have to lose your life in order to find it . . . that he shocks listeners with words about leaving or going away from family and work and all things well-controlled in order to find your life.
Those who receive the kingdom -- the kingdom God wants to give -- are those who are willing to open up, let go, leave, and go away from what is known, consolidated, and hoarded. In some stories, like the Prodigal Son, it is a literal leaving home, going away from what is known into that which is unknown. It means letting go of what is secure and comfortable, giving away of what one has in openness to what is ahead.
This is the difficulty of the kingdom. It is why many hear the words, but few enter fully into it. I am invited to leave what I think I know for what I do not yet know . . . leaving where I am for where I am not yet . . . leaving who I think I am for who I might be or who might yet arise from within me.
This going away or "selling" in order to receive the kingdom is hard. It takes courage to leave, to walk into something that puts me off balance, something I cannot manage or control.
From time to time it is helpful for me to rehearse my own leavings. In what ways have I left home?
For me, leaving one religious framework for an unknown framework was a leaving home . . .
Taking up a deliberately soulful life-path was a leaving home . . .
Taking on new life-questions -- without having them answered! -- has been a leaving home . . .
Walking away from a job, with its salary, position, and identity was a leaving home . . .
Challenging my underlying assumptions about life's fairness and the place of soul has been a leaving home . . .
Daring to ask tough questions about light/darkness in faith and Holy Scripture has been a leaving home . . .
Living more soulfully, guided more organically by my sense of Spirit than by external codes has been a leaving home . . .
Have these times of "going away" from consolidation and that-which-I-know helped me to receive the kingdom that God wants to give? I cannot say. That's yet another unanswered question I'll have to live with.
I can say, however, that there is an inner tug toward this path, toward the mystery, toward the longing of my soul for this kind of life. In short, something about it feels right and seems authentic. My hope is that it is not simply a stroll into mystery, but that it is a path toward receiving the kingdom that God is pleased to give.
The "kingdom" is not an outer, physical realm, but an inner stance of soul. It does not deny or denigrate the physical or the social or the mental; rather, it informs all of life.
The kingdom, as offered by God and as demonstrated through Jesus, permeates all of life. It is the core from which life is lived in all its physical, mental, and social dimensions.
Jesus told his followers that it was God's "good pleasure" to give them this stance of being in the world. It's what God wants, what God desires for all beings created.
So what are Jesus' next words? God wants to give us this kingdom, this way of seeing life, this way of being in the world . . . then his next words are "sell your possessions" and "give alms." It sounds like we have to clear out some space for what God wants us to have. God wants to give us good things, full life, meaningful existence, but our hands are too full of our own stuff to receive what God gives. There is a requisite "selling" and "giving," in short, an emptying that is part and parcel of kingdom-life.
This is where God can start to rub most of us the wrong way. We had thought that God was about helping us get ahead, helping us have more, helping us have a better life, helping us get things situated to our liking. Many of us came to faith -- or some kind of religious expression -- for just this reason: It promised to make a better life for us.
So when someone says to us that first of all we must empty, "sell," or "give away," we can get defensive. This is not the kind of religion we had bargained for.
There is a reason that the Gospels tell stories about persons who "leave" their nets (work) behind to follow Jesus . . . about sons who leave the safety and predictability of home in order to wander into "far countries" before returning home in a different way. There is a reason Jesus says that you have to lose your life in order to find it . . . that he shocks listeners with words about leaving or going away from family and work and all things well-controlled in order to find your life.
Those who receive the kingdom -- the kingdom God wants to give -- are those who are willing to open up, let go, leave, and go away from what is known, consolidated, and hoarded. In some stories, like the Prodigal Son, it is a literal leaving home, going away from what is known into that which is unknown. It means letting go of what is secure and comfortable, giving away of what one has in openness to what is ahead.
This is the difficulty of the kingdom. It is why many hear the words, but few enter fully into it. I am invited to leave what I think I know for what I do not yet know . . . leaving where I am for where I am not yet . . . leaving who I think I am for who I might be or who might yet arise from within me.
This going away or "selling" in order to receive the kingdom is hard. It takes courage to leave, to walk into something that puts me off balance, something I cannot manage or control.
From time to time it is helpful for me to rehearse my own leavings. In what ways have I left home?
For me, leaving one religious framework for an unknown framework was a leaving home . . .
Taking up a deliberately soulful life-path was a leaving home . . .
Taking on new life-questions -- without having them answered! -- has been a leaving home . . .
Walking away from a job, with its salary, position, and identity was a leaving home . . .
Challenging my underlying assumptions about life's fairness and the place of soul has been a leaving home . . .
Daring to ask tough questions about light/darkness in faith and Holy Scripture has been a leaving home . . .
Living more soulfully, guided more organically by my sense of Spirit than by external codes has been a leaving home . . .
Have these times of "going away" from consolidation and that-which-I-know helped me to receive the kingdom that God wants to give? I cannot say. That's yet another unanswered question I'll have to live with.
I can say, however, that there is an inner tug toward this path, toward the mystery, toward the longing of my soul for this kind of life. In short, something about it feels right and seems authentic. My hope is that it is not simply a stroll into mystery, but that it is a path toward receiving the kingdom that God is pleased to give.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Needle Eyes on the Way to the Kingdom
Mark 10:23 - 27
Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"
The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the rich to enter the kingdom of God."
The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, "Who then can be saved?"
Jesus looked at them and said, "With human beings this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God."
This passage causes concern and a certain nervousness among readers. I've heard persons come to all sorts of interpretations for "eye of a needle" in order to escape its difficulty, things like making the "eye of a needle" a gated opening in an ancient walled city. Even without making the "eye of a needle" some large portal in a city wall, the passage raises concerns. Other folks write off the passage as applying only to the "rich," and most of us -- no matter how much or how little we have -- don't count ourselves as "rich."
The traditional reading of this passage equates the "kingdom of God" with "heaven"; thus, most people think the passage says something like, "It is hard for the rich to enter heaven."
But the "kingdom of God" is not a catch-phrase for "heaven." It refers to an orientation, a framework for seeing and doing life, a way of orienting oneself around God and the structures of God. While humans are made to live fully into this God-oriented life, it is hard for us to do so because so many other frameworks and orientations live within us and tug at us. Jesus mentions one such difficulty. "Riches" and possessions too easily become the center around which life is oriented. And that is not only an indictment on those who have a surplus of possessions. Often, those who have little live out of such an all-consuming desire for more that every part of life is oriented around accumulating an abundance. A life-framework that is oriented around possessions and "riches" is not oriented around God.
It is hard for persons to enter a new way of orienting ourselves toward God and life, something like stuffing a camel through the eye of a needle. It is a life-long challenge.
It is hard for the rich to make this paradigm shift. More than the rich, though, it is hard for anyone to make this shift, because we all have a complex and tangled root-system that serves as our basic life-framework. We carry values and allegiances and motivations that determine our orientation. We justify some of them with labels like "religious" or "Christian" or "God-given." Others simply live within us apart from our recognition of them.
In reality, then, it is hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. It is also hard for the prideful to enter the kingdom of God. It is hard for the self-sufficient to enter. It is hard for those who have titles and status to enter. It is hard for those who blindly love their tribe to enter. It is hard for those caught in the traps of competition and comparison to enter. It is hard for those who feel they have all answers to enter. It is hard for all of us to enter the kingdom of God.
I think it's very possible Jesus mentioned the "rich" as merely one example of the difficulty of entering the kingdom of God. He very well could have mentioned any number of other things that you and I hold onto for life.
And this is what we find very hard. We find it hard to orient life not around any number of other things, but around the radically different values of the kingdom of God. It takes a huge paradigm shift to let go of one orientation in order to adopt another. The old framework almost has to be pried from our fingers. We grasp it, clutch it, hold onto it for dear life because it is all we know. Or if not all we know, it is at least what we know best, what we can control, the rules to the game that we know how to play by.
The kingdom of God presents us with a radically alternative orientation, one that takes a great long time to grow into. It is one which we may not truly want to invest ourselves in, yet this framework is the true and authentic structure of the cosmos. This kingdom's orientation represents how the world was made to function and what the world was made for. The rest of life is an illusion, a huge falsity, until we begin to align ourselves with this orientation. We live false, we live a lie until we come to it.
Living a transformed life, a life being formed by the Spirit of God, means that this passing through the needle's eye becomes a part of our life-long journey. This needle's eye kind of life is the only way toward a life of love, mercy, and compassion.
Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"
The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the rich to enter the kingdom of God."
The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, "Who then can be saved?"
Jesus looked at them and said, "With human beings this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God."
This passage causes concern and a certain nervousness among readers. I've heard persons come to all sorts of interpretations for "eye of a needle" in order to escape its difficulty, things like making the "eye of a needle" a gated opening in an ancient walled city. Even without making the "eye of a needle" some large portal in a city wall, the passage raises concerns. Other folks write off the passage as applying only to the "rich," and most of us -- no matter how much or how little we have -- don't count ourselves as "rich."
The traditional reading of this passage equates the "kingdom of God" with "heaven"; thus, most people think the passage says something like, "It is hard for the rich to enter heaven."
But the "kingdom of God" is not a catch-phrase for "heaven." It refers to an orientation, a framework for seeing and doing life, a way of orienting oneself around God and the structures of God. While humans are made to live fully into this God-oriented life, it is hard for us to do so because so many other frameworks and orientations live within us and tug at us. Jesus mentions one such difficulty. "Riches" and possessions too easily become the center around which life is oriented. And that is not only an indictment on those who have a surplus of possessions. Often, those who have little live out of such an all-consuming desire for more that every part of life is oriented around accumulating an abundance. A life-framework that is oriented around possessions and "riches" is not oriented around God.
It is hard for persons to enter a new way of orienting ourselves toward God and life, something like stuffing a camel through the eye of a needle. It is a life-long challenge.
It is hard for the rich to make this paradigm shift. More than the rich, though, it is hard for anyone to make this shift, because we all have a complex and tangled root-system that serves as our basic life-framework. We carry values and allegiances and motivations that determine our orientation. We justify some of them with labels like "religious" or "Christian" or "God-given." Others simply live within us apart from our recognition of them.
In reality, then, it is hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. It is also hard for the prideful to enter the kingdom of God. It is hard for the self-sufficient to enter. It is hard for those who have titles and status to enter. It is hard for those who blindly love their tribe to enter. It is hard for those caught in the traps of competition and comparison to enter. It is hard for those who feel they have all answers to enter. It is hard for all of us to enter the kingdom of God.
I think it's very possible Jesus mentioned the "rich" as merely one example of the difficulty of entering the kingdom of God. He very well could have mentioned any number of other things that you and I hold onto for life.
And this is what we find very hard. We find it hard to orient life not around any number of other things, but around the radically different values of the kingdom of God. It takes a huge paradigm shift to let go of one orientation in order to adopt another. The old framework almost has to be pried from our fingers. We grasp it, clutch it, hold onto it for dear life because it is all we know. Or if not all we know, it is at least what we know best, what we can control, the rules to the game that we know how to play by.
The kingdom of God presents us with a radically alternative orientation, one that takes a great long time to grow into. It is one which we may not truly want to invest ourselves in, yet this framework is the true and authentic structure of the cosmos. This kingdom's orientation represents how the world was made to function and what the world was made for. The rest of life is an illusion, a huge falsity, until we begin to align ourselves with this orientation. We live false, we live a lie until we come to it.
Living a transformed life, a life being formed by the Spirit of God, means that this passing through the needle's eye becomes a part of our life-long journey. This needle's eye kind of life is the only way toward a life of love, mercy, and compassion.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Kingdom Rearrangement
This morning, praying the Our Father with a body of worshipers, these words met me again. I seldom consider them deliberately, but this morning I heard them:
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
On earth as it is done in heaven. . . .
I mostly was taken aback by my mindless recitation of words that invited God's kingdom to come in my life. Those basic words, "Your kingdom come" are as radical and world-altering as anything I can imagine, yet the words slide from my lips so easily, so mindlessly, as if simply uttering the words were enough to set my heart aright.
I've reflected a lot lately on my own kingdom, the kingdom defined by my ego and controlled by my false self. That kingdom feels so pervasive, so all-encompassing within me, so overwhelming, that I can easily be discouraged. Change sometimes feels far out of reach. That kingdom is firmly entrenched within me, a pillared structure that feels secure and defines how I see the world.
The movement to a God-structured framework is difficult work. The movement to another framework requires a gigantic shift in consciousness, a kind of seismic shift toward an end that I have not yet seen. To invite God's kingdom to come within me means a lot of painful releasing of my own kingdoms and the rebuilding of a structure for life that is ordered around a new way of seeing, hearing, thinking, and feeling.
Old kingdoms die hard. New kingdoms are still harder to come by.
This shift takes place over time. It will be difficult, painful even. Some days I'm eager for it. Other days I resist it with all the strength I have. Still other days I simply get repulsed by my feeble attempts to step into it myself -- yet another illusion of my imposter self.
This morning I prayed sincerely, "Thy kingdom come." I felt my helplessness to get there on my own . . . and at the same time, my deep desire to do life in that kingdom.
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
On earth as it is done in heaven. . . .
I mostly was taken aback by my mindless recitation of words that invited God's kingdom to come in my life. Those basic words, "Your kingdom come" are as radical and world-altering as anything I can imagine, yet the words slide from my lips so easily, so mindlessly, as if simply uttering the words were enough to set my heart aright.
I've reflected a lot lately on my own kingdom, the kingdom defined by my ego and controlled by my false self. That kingdom feels so pervasive, so all-encompassing within me, so overwhelming, that I can easily be discouraged. Change sometimes feels far out of reach. That kingdom is firmly entrenched within me, a pillared structure that feels secure and defines how I see the world.
The movement to a God-structured framework is difficult work. The movement to another framework requires a gigantic shift in consciousness, a kind of seismic shift toward an end that I have not yet seen. To invite God's kingdom to come within me means a lot of painful releasing of my own kingdoms and the rebuilding of a structure for life that is ordered around a new way of seeing, hearing, thinking, and feeling.
Old kingdoms die hard. New kingdoms are still harder to come by.
This shift takes place over time. It will be difficult, painful even. Some days I'm eager for it. Other days I resist it with all the strength I have. Still other days I simply get repulsed by my feeble attempts to step into it myself -- yet another illusion of my imposter self.
This morning I prayed sincerely, "Thy kingdom come." I felt my helplessness to get there on my own . . . and at the same time, my deep desire to do life in that kingdom.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Metanoia and the Kingdom of God
I wrote an article last week for the informational newsletter we send out at The Center for Christian Spirituality. http://www.centerforchristianspirituality.org/newsletter.cfm
I didn't intend to post the article here, but I realized that I have Gen-X friends who will not believe anything they can't find online. (You know who you are -- did you hear my deep SIGH and see me roll my eyes?) So here it is online. It must be true now.
Metanoia and the Kingdom of God
”Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.” (Matt. 3:2, 4:17)
John the Baptizer preached, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand” (Matt. 3:2). Jesus followed, repeating the same message (4:17): “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.”
What did they mean by “repent?” And what was the reality called “the kingdom of heaven/God” to which they pointed?
I read scholar after scholar try to couch the imagery of the New Testament idea of the “kingdom of God/heaven” in contemporary language. Sociologists dissect the political and social context of the first century to come up with contemporary analogies. Linguists try to find vocabulary equivalent to the “kingdom of God” that brings understanding to modern minds. Theologians attempt to place the kingdom of God into the larger movement of God in human history.
I’m still confounded. Their attempts point me in the right direction, but I’m still unclear about what the kingdom of God looks like. If it’s a physical place, I may have missed it.
Further, while the word “repent” is a gospel-word, it also has been used and abused in churches and among Christians. Thus, the word “repent” is loaded with a volatile emotional charge. Some of us may connect it with hell-fire-damnation preaching, or with evangelists preaching revival sermons, or with lengthy altar-calls.
At least in my history, “repent” connoted a change in behavior, especially in areas of morality. “Turn around,” “change your mind,” or “change your behavior” was the message. “Stop doing the immoral thing you’ve been doing and start following God,” the word suggested.
That idea of changing your behavior or turning around comes from the Hebrew word often translated “repent.” The word, shub, literally means to turn around or to change directions.
The Greek word used in the New Testament for repentance is metanoia. The prefix meta carries several possible meanings, including “beyond,” “outside,” “larger,” and “greater.” Noia is from the Greek nous which refers to the mind.
Actually, then, metanoia – or the idea of “repentance” – refers to taking on a different mind, a larger mind. It suggests movement out of a narrow living and seeing in order to adopt a larger frame of reference. We all have a narrow mind, a limited scope, a tunneled vision by which we view God, others, self, and the world. Repentance is the invitation not simply to change our mind or to change our behavior, but to see a larger God-world that is saturated with God’s presence, a world “charged with the grandeur of God” (Gerard Manley Hopkins).
And because repentance is so closely linked to the kingdom of God (by John the Baptizer and Jesus), perhaps within metanoia is the clue to the mysterious language of the kingdom.
I’m beginning to think that the kingdom of God is a state of being, an awareness or consciousness of God’s presence and action within me, others, and in the world. As a state of awareness, to enter or see the kingdom I have to see differently. The narrow, small ways I’ve seen myself, others, and the world have to be replaced by a broader, more expansive awareness. In effect, I’m trading in my small sight for the capability to see the largeness of God’s presence and work in the world.
Metanoia is the movement from the smaller to the larger, into this wider beyond-mind, while the kingdom of God is the state of being in this larger place, this alternative reality.
And those who enter the kingdom of God are those who take upon themselves this way of being that Jesus taught and modeled in his life.
The spiritual journey is about this movement of metanoia and this state of being deeply and intimately connected with God and the God-world. So the spiritual journey is about repentance and the kingdom of God.
Indeed, the kingdom of God is close at hand.
I didn't intend to post the article here, but I realized that I have Gen-X friends who will not believe anything they can't find online. (You know who you are -- did you hear my deep SIGH and see me roll my eyes?) So here it is online. It must be true now.
Metanoia and the Kingdom of God
”Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.” (Matt. 3:2, 4:17)
John the Baptizer preached, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand” (Matt. 3:2). Jesus followed, repeating the same message (4:17): “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.”
What did they mean by “repent?” And what was the reality called “the kingdom of heaven/God” to which they pointed?
I read scholar after scholar try to couch the imagery of the New Testament idea of the “kingdom of God/heaven” in contemporary language. Sociologists dissect the political and social context of the first century to come up with contemporary analogies. Linguists try to find vocabulary equivalent to the “kingdom of God” that brings understanding to modern minds. Theologians attempt to place the kingdom of God into the larger movement of God in human history.
I’m still confounded. Their attempts point me in the right direction, but I’m still unclear about what the kingdom of God looks like. If it’s a physical place, I may have missed it.
Further, while the word “repent” is a gospel-word, it also has been used and abused in churches and among Christians. Thus, the word “repent” is loaded with a volatile emotional charge. Some of us may connect it with hell-fire-damnation preaching, or with evangelists preaching revival sermons, or with lengthy altar-calls.
At least in my history, “repent” connoted a change in behavior, especially in areas of morality. “Turn around,” “change your mind,” or “change your behavior” was the message. “Stop doing the immoral thing you’ve been doing and start following God,” the word suggested.
That idea of changing your behavior or turning around comes from the Hebrew word often translated “repent.” The word, shub, literally means to turn around or to change directions.
The Greek word used in the New Testament for repentance is metanoia. The prefix meta carries several possible meanings, including “beyond,” “outside,” “larger,” and “greater.” Noia is from the Greek nous which refers to the mind.
Actually, then, metanoia – or the idea of “repentance” – refers to taking on a different mind, a larger mind. It suggests movement out of a narrow living and seeing in order to adopt a larger frame of reference. We all have a narrow mind, a limited scope, a tunneled vision by which we view God, others, self, and the world. Repentance is the invitation not simply to change our mind or to change our behavior, but to see a larger God-world that is saturated with God’s presence, a world “charged with the grandeur of God” (Gerard Manley Hopkins).
And because repentance is so closely linked to the kingdom of God (by John the Baptizer and Jesus), perhaps within metanoia is the clue to the mysterious language of the kingdom.
I’m beginning to think that the kingdom of God is a state of being, an awareness or consciousness of God’s presence and action within me, others, and in the world. As a state of awareness, to enter or see the kingdom I have to see differently. The narrow, small ways I’ve seen myself, others, and the world have to be replaced by a broader, more expansive awareness. In effect, I’m trading in my small sight for the capability to see the largeness of God’s presence and work in the world.
Metanoia is the movement from the smaller to the larger, into this wider beyond-mind, while the kingdom of God is the state of being in this larger place, this alternative reality.
And those who enter the kingdom of God are those who take upon themselves this way of being that Jesus taught and modeled in his life.
The spiritual journey is about this movement of metanoia and this state of being deeply and intimately connected with God and the God-world. So the spiritual journey is about repentance and the kingdom of God.
Indeed, the kingdom of God is close at hand.
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