The Choice

Jeremiah 28:9-14

          Politics and religion don’t mix.  Well, they don’t mix well.  Well, they sometimes have to mix.  Well, perhaps it is more correct to say that they need each other, even though they both adversely affect each other.  Today politics and religion are so intermixed with each other that it we may not know where one stops and the other one begins.  But these messages may pull us in different directions.  We may be confused by all the conflicting messages around and all the people who claim ‘God’ is on ‘their’ side.

          God’s and Generals where two soldiers stare at each other across the river.  One is a Confederate and one is a Union soldier.  They look at each other and you begin to notice the marked similarities between them.  Here are two men who were raised in pretty much the same American culture.  They both (probably) prayed to the same God and they both read the same Bible.  One was so adamant that God supported the practice of slavery that he was willing to put his life on the line.  The other was so adamant that God opposed the practice of slavery that he was willing to put his life on the line.  And God, for His part, remained silent on the whole question and let the people fight among it down here on earth.

  There is a powerful moment in the movie

            This passage is very similar to this picture.  We have two prophets whose worldviews and prophesies collide here.  Earlier in the chapter Hanaiah preaches a good word to the congregation along the following lines:

“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: qI have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. 3 rWithin stwo years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the Lord's house, which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took away from this place and carried to Babylon. 4 I will also bring back to this place tJeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and all the exiles from Judah who went to Babylon, declares the Lord, qfor I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.”

Now we have to take a break here to remind ourselves what is happening in this whole situation.  The world of politics and superpowers has caught up to the people of Israel.  Babylon was the sole superpower of the day, they controlled pretty much the entire world and they were coming Israel’s way.  Zedekiah, the king of Judah was faced with a decision: submit to Babylon and live in relative peace or resist and rebel and get crushed in the process. 

            We have romanticized the notion of resistance especially in movies like 300.  If you remember that movie (and if you are really good you remember that it is based in Herodutus) where the envoy of the Persian Empire comes to King Leonidias in Sparta and demands the Spartan loyalty.  Of course, Leonidias rejects him and says, “THIS IS SPARTA!” Part of us wants to be like that guy.  But of course Leonidias and his Spartans died in the rebellion against Persia.  This is not to say that we should not rebel, but that we need to know when to rebel. 

            So Zedekiah is faced with this same choice.  This choice is made more difficult by the fact that you have different prophets going around saying different things.  Some, like Jeremiah, are saying that you need to submit that God is bringing the Babylonians into power.  Others, like Hananiah say that God would never forsake his people and his covenant and so it is necessary to rebel for the sake of holiness. 

            We know what this tension is like.  We live in a divided time in our country.  We have faced the greatest economic downturn in the last 80 years.  The country is divided into two factions and there are essentially two party lines drawn on the issues.  Which one is right? Which one should you commit to? You cannot commit to both? Where is God in this issue? How would you rule if you were Zedekiah? How would you rule if you in charge today?

            You could not necessarily label one of these prophets good or bad, given the context of the day.  Walter Brueggemann suggests “it maybe more correct to see the conflicting political advice given by the two prophets as rooted in conflicting visions of God and God’s plans.”[1]

            Hananiah stresses the faith in God’s covenant with his people.  God will not forsake the people of Israel because He established his covenant with them.  Therefore, they should not worry about things like the giant super power who is coming to invade their country.  God is with them and God has promised that he will establish the people of Israel into a powerful kingdom. 

            We see this type of theology everywhere today.  This is an early version of prosperity gospel or a version of victory in Jesus, where the focus is on the good news that God has promised, not anything that might be difficult.  Sometimes, we are told to sit and be faithful and wait for all the good things that God will deliver to us.  We should not let obstacles get in our way, because God can overcome them and they can not stand in our way.  We are told that if we do not receive good things, then it must be something that is defective in our faith or that we have ‘hidden sin’ in our lives that we must confess before the good stuff can come flowing our way.

            Over against this, we see Jeremiah’s response.  It might be tempting to see his initial reaction as sarcastic, and it might be so, but I am not necessarily convinced that this the case.   He might have truly wished that things would work out the way that Hananiah presented.  After all, who wouldn’t want things to go this way? The problem was that things were not going to have a happy ending.  Things were going to be bad. 

            In the previous chapter, Jeremiah had been preaching to Zedekiah: “Bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him and his people and live” (Jeremiah 27:12).  He announced that it was God (YHWH) who was raising up Nebuchadnezzar to be the ruler of the earth and so to stand in his way would be to stand in the way of God. Jeremiah had been preaching to the people that they needed to repent and be right with God, but the people have not listened.  Now as a consequence, they too will come under the yoke of the king of Babylon. 

            This message as not going over well…and frankly why would it?

            If people today had a choice between what message they would listen to, which one do you think they would?   Imagine if you had a preacher who was preaching that God wanted you to be ‘healthy, wealthy, and wise?’  All you had to do was to trust in God and you could get all the riches you wanted and all the possessions you wanted and all the victory that you wanted.  On the other side you had a preacher who was preaching that God was going to send you into a time of poverty, destitution and desperation.  Which one do you think would become more popular? Well isn’t that what we see when we look out at the modern world?

            None of us want to hear that God’s message for us is defeat, sorrow, or suffering.  WE all try to avoid these things and we say that “God love us and has a wonderful plan for us.” To hear that God’s plan is going to mean for us to give up our dreams, our hopes and our lives destroys us.  It is no wonder that Jeremiah was threatened with death just about everywhere he went.

            When I was younger, I used to believe that God had great plans for me and that ministry was going to be spectacular.  I would preach and people would come to listen to me.  But lately I have had to accept the Jeremiah message that I am not meant for greatness…or even mediocrity.  I am meant for obscurity, exile and to live life at the edge.  To accept this has come at a great cost emotionally, but I think it has deepened me spiritually.  When we have to give up the very core of what our beliefs have been, we must grow to accept a new set of beliefs and to redefine who we are in light of who God is

.

            In this passage, God is calling Israel, His chosen people, to a life in Exile, to a life confined to the edges of society where they will not be important nor influential nor cared about.  They will be ignored, stepped on, beat down and destroyed.  (This is of course the experience of the vast majority…some of them have different experiences, such as Daniel or Esther).  Who wants that?  

            We do not always understand God’s ways in this life…and maybe we don’t in the other world as well.  God never promised that our lives would turn out the way that we wanted them to.  Nor did He say that we would be completely without struggle and without difficulty in our lives.  In fact he never promised that he has a wonderful plan for our lives. 

            Jesus warned about this in the gospels.  In fact, the disciples weren’t even assured that they would have a place to live.  “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head” (Mathew 8:20).  In fact, Jesus’ followers were told that they were to be kicked out of the synagogues (John 16:1) and people will turn against them (Matt 5:11) and they will generally not be places of great importance in the world.  But what is important in the Gospels is the same lesson that was important for the people of Jeremiah: that God will be with them, and no matter what happens, they need to trust in the Lord.

            At the end of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus knows he is going to send his disciples out into the world.  They are going like serpents out into the world, but need to be as gentle as doves.  They are going out to a hostile environment.  The very last thing that Jesus says to His people is “I am with you always…to the end of the age.” (Matt 28:20). 

            Jeremiah promises the same thing to the people of Israel.  Even though God is sending them into the Exile, even though God is relegating them to the edges of society and bringing many of their dreams to an end, he is not forsaking the people.  In the very next chapter we read the most famous verse from Jeremiah, “I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you, to give you a hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11). 

            What is it that God might be calling you to? Might God be calling you to an experience that you would rather not go through? Is God calling you to a desert life, one that is not in keeping with your wishes and desires? 

            I think that of the Church as a whole that is where we are heading. Our doctrines and our values are under constant scrunity and we pushed more and more every day to the edge of society.  We no longer enjoy the privilege we may have at one point in our history and that is hard for many of us to accept.  Whereas church leaders in the past were looked up to and respected, so now we are scorned and ridiculed.  To join the church is almost to put yourself in exile from the dominant culture of the day and to sacrifice much of what can be enjoyed in this world.

            But what about personally? Individually? Are you hearing a message from God that might be difficult for you to accept? Would you rather, like Hananiah, accept the message that everything will be fine and that life is filled with days of endless wonder for you?   Or would you rather hear the message of Jeremiah that God is calling you to a more difficult life?

            This might mean giving up a dream of being a world changer and settling for something less.  This might mean sacrificing the place you want to live at for a different and more ‘dull’ existence.  This might mean not having the career you once dreamed of, but rather working in a job that pays the bills. 

            This is not an easy message, and it was never meant to be.  Remember that God goes with you into whatever the future holds.  But this passage reminds us to listen dutifully and diligently for God’s voice, even if we do not want to hear it.

---

[1] Feasting on the Word Year A vol 3 Loc 5788

“What are you Looking For”

            It was a dark time…a time of civil war.  There was not one region that was not affected by the war.  Life was in constant upheaval and people were displaced.  Smuggling was at an all-time high and crime was everywhere.  Hope was a foreign word that nobody believed in any more.  Death and destruction were at every door.  But there were whispers that something was coming, someone was coming to change the tide of the war and to usher in a new era of peace.  Finally, the long awaited savior arrives on the scene…a dirt farmer from a backwaters planet called Tatooine!

         

   You might be a little disappointed to realize that all your hopes and dreams are pinned on a whiny teenager who knows nothing about the Force, international politics or seemingly anything else of importance.

            Of course we know that in Star Wars, everything turns out to be great.  Luke Skywalker arrives on the scene and takes care of the evil Galatic Empire and restores order, peace and harmony to the universe.  But if it was real life, you might be a little skeptical at first…and nobody would blame you. 

            In fact, that is probably exactly how the Israelites felt about Jesus when he was first revealed to them.

            Imagine the scene, John the Baptist is in the wilderness and people are flocking to him.  There was something about John’s message that connected with people and they wanted to hear what he had to say.  So they came in throngs out to where John was preaching to come and be baptized in the Jordan River. 

            We don’t know exactly how long John was out in the wilderness, other than he was at least out there for about a year.  Day after day, people came and asked him questions, “Are YOU the messiah? Are you the one who is going to end the EXILE? Are you the one who is going to kick the Romans out and restore the holiness of the temple?” And every day, day after day, John would answer the question negatively.  “No…I am NOT the one.  There is ONE  who is coming after me…HE is the one.”  And so the very essence of John’s ministry has been to point to the one who is coming, to draw the attention away from himself and to point to the real Messiah, the one who is to establish the Kingdom of God.

            You can almost sense the anticipation that is building up in the people. 

            Today we build anticipation in a number of ways.  We use ‘Kickstarter’ campaigns to help people find out what is going with different people’s efforts.  We launch movie trailer campaigns sometimes two years out (Batman vs. Superman, anyone?) and we try to build as much suspense as we can.  Presidential campaigns start two years before the actual election and the news is already reporting polling data on potential races, before anyone has announced they are running!. 

            But none of these ways existed back in John’s time.  The only thing he had was preaching and word of mouth.  And this generally worked as people waited and waited and anticipation grew and grew.

            Finally, one day, he announces, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”(John 1:29).  In fact, so excited is the Gospel of John to announce this that it skips over the account of the baptism…John draws all of his attention on Jesus. 

            But for somebody in the first century, we might expect a little disappointment.  “Where? Where is he?  Is it that Nicodemus guy? He seems pretty rich and politically poised to take control! No? Is it that strong looking young Sadducee? No? What about that guy…over there? No?  Then who the heck is it?”

            Slowly the attention gets directed to a young carpenter from Nazareth.  Nazareth? Can anything good come from Nazareth?  I mean this is like saying that the greatest world leader is coming from Jersey…and we know nothing good comes from Jersey. Jersey is the land of Snooki, just as Nazareth is the home of nobodies. It’s the bad news bears of the ancient world.

            We can almost hear some whispers, “Really?  He doesn’t look like much.  He’s a carpenter?  How is a carpenter supposed to get rid of Rome? Or cleanse the temple?”  

            In fact, it doesn’t seem like it ‘stuck’ the first time.  Jesus left and comes back the next day only to hear John declare for the second time, “Look, here is the Lamb of God!” (1:35).  It’s almost as if John is declaring, “um…look, wasn’t kidding…HERE is the Lamb of God!”

            Now, let’s talk about this phrase, “Lamb of God”.  It was probably not the leading description that people were expecting as they talked about the Messiah.  The Messiah was not supposed to be meek and mild like a lamb, but fierce and strong like a lion. When John announces that this messiah is the “Lamb of God”, they may have been confused. 

            A few years ago, there was a great movie called Gran Turino, starring Clint Eastwood.  We all know Clint…he’s the gunfighter, the angry cop, the loose cannon who is just waiting to get even with the bad guys.  I went into this movie knowing nothing other than it was a Clint Eastwood movie, and I was pumped. As I watched the bad guys take over his neighborhood and as I watched Clint make the ‘Clint’ face, I just knew that they were all in for it.  I kept waiting and waiting for Clint to take out his old Colt .45 and light up the night.  Except he didn’t.  This was CLINT EASTWOOD! Where is the gun fights.  Except there are none.  In the end, Clint Eastwood solved the situation without killing anyone or firing a single shot.  He turns into a lamb instead of the lion I was expecting.

           

We have a hard time when our real life heroes don’t live up to the hype.  We expect Tim Tebow to be the best quarterback in the NFL because the media hyped it so much.  We expect all the problems in the country to go away after Barack Obama becomes president.  We feel let down and disappointed when people reveal themselves to be different then our expectations. We lose heart and we lose hope and we find ourselves walking away from the very thing we had been wishing for.

            After this incident, Jesus is walking through the land, and two disciples of John begin to follow him.  They understand that John has called them to follow Jesus, and not John anymore.  So they follow after him. 

            Jesus, looking at them for a little bit, asks them, “What are you looking for?”

            Wow.

            What a loaded question. 

            Notice it’s not, “who are you looking for?” or “What do you want from me?” But rather the entire question is “What are you looking for?”

            I don’t know that if Jesus were to ask me that question that I would be able to give him an answer.  I might try.  I might list all the things that I find wrong with the world and suggest that He fix them.  I might say that I am looking for someone to take care of all things, or I might just say that I am looking for salvation.

            Or I might just go with what the disciples themselves answered.

            “Where do you live?”

            Now this too, is a pregnant question.  Where do you live might mean, “where are you, I’d like to come and visit.” It might also mean, I want to live with you and share my life with you.  More than likely, the latter is meant here because it seems that the disciples are asking to become Jesus’ disciples.  At that time, having a teacher meant more than ‘going to school’.  Students often lived their lives with their teachers and shared day to day existence and chores with them.

            What are you looking for?  I think this is a question that Jesus asks each and everyone one of us.  It’s an important question, especially important when we think of the person of Jesus.

            What are you looking for?

            Are you looking for somebody just to talk to? Are you looking for somebody to give you ‘salvation’ or are you looking for somebody that will help give meaning to life? 

            All of these questions depend on the view that we have of Jesus.

            Currently one of the nation’s bestselling books is on Jesus.  It’s called Zealot by Aslan Reza, a Muslim scholar.  His answer to this question is that Jesus was just another political revolutionary, a zealot

who wanted to free his country from the tyranny of Rome.

            The Fundamentalists have a different view of Jesus, one who has come to destroy the corrupting power of sin and to justify ‘those who believe.’

            The Liberals have a view of Jesus as one who is here to spread the gospel of universal love.

            The Catholics view Jesus as the King of Heaven and Earth, ruling over the universe from his throne in heaven and through his representatives here on earth.

            And the list goes on and on.  For almost every person, there is a different view of Jesus.  Each of us starts the Christian life from a different vantage point and from a different place.  We all begin following Jesus with a different goal in mind.  Some of us just want to get through the day, while others want a companion along the way. 

            When Jesus answered the disciples, he did not give them a direct answer.  This should not surprise us because after all, it is Jesus we are talking about.  Rather he gives them the cryptic message, “Come and see.” (1:39).

            It’s an invitation, not only to see where Jesus lives, but to see who He is.  It is an invitation to life with him. 

            You never really get to know somebody until you live with them.  We all have hopes and dreams about getting married and we dream about how perfect life will be with our intended spouse.  There are many couples, however, who had false and unrealistic expectations.  “What do you mean you leave your socks on the floor?  THERE’s A PERFECTLY GOOD HAMPER OVER THERE!”  We may discover that our spouse’s view on fun is not exactly our own.  We may discover that there are things that irritate us about our spouse.  We find out that this person is different than the one we expected to live with.

            The same is true with Jesus.  His invitation to us to ‘come and see’ will change our lives and our expectations. 

            We will see Jesus in action.  We will see both his call to the righteous and the unrighteous.  We will see him show up in the most unlikely of situations.  We will discover that His reactions are not OUR reactions to things on a great deal many of things.  We frankly discover that the Jesus of our expectations is quickly overshadowed by the Jesus of reality.

            Some of us will have a hard time and we will reject the real Jesus and construct for ourselves a false Jesus.  Others will fully embrace this idea and some will remained shell shocked for quite some time.

            The disciples quickly realize that although this Jesus did not match their expectations, He is in fact the true Messiah.  They come quickly to Peter and they announce to him, “We have found the Messiah”(1:41).

            When they announce that they have found THE messiah, the disciples are announcing that this person, this Jesus, is the one who is to bring about the Kingdom of God.  They don’t know how and they don’t know when and they aren’t sure of all the particulars, but this is the ONE.  This is the one in whom all the hopes and fears were be consolated.  This is the one who will bring harmony back to creation and this is one who will restore the nation of Israel.  All they have to do is ‘come and see.’

            So what are you looking for?  Who are you seeking?

            Jesus invites us all to come and see.  Jesus invites us all to follow him.  In doing so, our preconceptions and our expectations of Jesus will be shattered. We will be surprised, amazed, filled with wonder, at times hurt, maybe angry, but ultimately the reality of Jesus will far outweigh our conceptions of him. 

            My hope and my prayer is that in following Jesus, we will come to the place where we can say with the disciples, we have found the Messiah.

God's Disappointment

I remember when I was a kid experiencing disappointment for one of the very first times in my life.  It was nothing earth shattering, but it had a profound impact on me.  I was in the Magic Kingdom in Disney World (any child’s dream come true!), waiting to see Mickey Mouse.  Mickey of course is the king of Disney World and no visit is a complete success without a hug from Mickey.  Well, Mickey was out there and all the kids were flocking to him, and I realized that I was going to have to wait to see him.  But before I could get through the throngs of kids with their brightly colored shorts and Mickey Mouse hats on, Mickey was gone! I had missed my opportunity to hug Mickey. 

A few years ago, Philip Yancey wrote a book that every Christian should read entitled, Disappointment with God.  In it, he deals with our soul’s struggle with God.  I’ve often wondered if maybe at times we should reflect on the opposite side of the equation, on God’s disappointment with us…or just me in particular.

I have often wondered if it were to be possible to count the number of people I have disappointed in life.  I think it is inevitable that we are going to disappoint.  We can never quite live up to the hype of ourselves, the pure potential we have inside of us, or the image we harbor inside of ourselves.  Most of us so desperately want to satisfy people’s expectations of us that we often live in denial when we fail to meet those expectations.  There is a soul shattering thud in our hearts when the truth of our failure comes to light and there is no denying that we are not the people we imagine ourselves to be.

Perhaps you could say that I was destined to be a disappointment.  Or perhaps I became a disappointment through my life choices and the decisions I have made.  Maybe there was some inherent flaw within me, or that I created a flaw and have acted accordingly.

When I was younger, people would look at me and say that I had great potential.  “You have so much to offer the world,” one counselor said.  “You are going to be great,” my parents would say. “You will impact the kingdom of God,” my churches said.  Only as time has raced on, the potential I had has gone unused or it has atrophied or it has been wasted. 

I disappointed my parents because I could not live up to their dreams for me.  I still at this date do not know or understand what those dreams were, other than I would be great.  Perhaps I was supposed to be a lawyer or a politician to help right the wrongs in the world.  Or perhaps I could have been a medical doctor and helped sick people.  But whatever those dreams were, they certainly don’t match my reality and I am cut off from the world of my past.

My high school labeled me ‘the most likely to succeed,’ but they again never defined what success was.  Was it money, power, or a combination of the two of them? Was it to go on to be a statesman and to come back to my hometown in order to lead future generations in the paths they should go? Regardless of that, I have been the most successful person with the fancy job and the big house.  I have not returned, unlike Hardy’s prodigal Native, to illuminate any path towards success.  I have let them down.

Have I been the best husband? Lord knows that is not the case and how many times have I let my wife down?  How many times have I not been the strong provider and supporter that she was expecting and needing?  How many times…?

I could go on to explain the churches and the parishioner’s I have disappointed?  How many times did I not have the piece of advice they needed or the patience and love they desired?  How many times did I walk into the office, feeling as if I could accomplish everything like Hercules…only when the end of the day came, Ichabod Crane emerged from office door, defeated and scared at every shadow?  How many committees who interviewed me and hired me did I let down when they began to realize my weaknesses and problems?   How many do I currently disappoint who come to my office seeking for answers only to emerge more confused than ever?

And now, sitting on the precipice of life, what do I look forward to?  With a sense of dread, I know the day is coming when I will disappoint my children and they will no longer look at me as that silly man who makes them smile, but will know the reality that I am a fragile, broken and vain little man? 

And with that in mind it is with trepidation that perhaps we should ask the question: is God disappointed with me?

My gut answer would be: OF COURSE HE IS!  How, in fact, could He not be?  What, with my silly prayers and fleeting conviction and lackluster devotion to discipleship and mission?  I can imagine being dragged before the court of heaven, having God Almighty standing there, showing me the wonder of His creation and saying with a disgusted sigh, “I made this for the likes of you?”

Is there any hope for a disappointment like me?

Out of the corner of the Old Testament, there does seem to be a glimmer…and maybe just more than a glimmer.  In the prophet Zephaniah we read this:

                        On that day you shall not be put to

                                    Shame

                        Because of deeds by which you have rebelled against me;

                        For then I will remove you from your midst

                                    Your proudly exultant ones

                        And you shall no longer be haughty in my holy mountain

                                    But I will leave in your midst

                                    A people humble and lowly

                        They shall seek refuge in the name of

                                    The Lord

                        They shall do no injustice

                                    And speak no lies

                        Nor shall there be found in their mouth

                                    A deceitful tongue

                        For they shall gaze and lie down

                                    And none shall make them afraid

                        Sing aloud, o Daughter of Zion

                                    Shout, O Israel

                        Rejoice and exult with all your heart

                                    O Daughter of Jerusalem!

                        The Lord has taken away the judgments

                                    Against you

                                    He has cleared away your enemies

                        The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst

                                    You shall never again fear evil

                        On that day be it said to Jerusalem

                                    Fear not, O Zion

                                    Let not your hands grow weak

                        The Lord your God is in your midst

                                     A mighty one who will save

                                    He will rejoice over you with gladness

                                    He will quiet you by his love

                                    He will exult over you with loud singing

“He will quiet you by his love”

This is said to a group of people who have disappointed God, their families, their ancestors and their neighbors.  This is said to people who have failed to live up to their potential and their expectations.  And yet, God, does not say, “I am thoroughly disappointed in you…” nor does he say, “You have let me down…”  Rather, just the opposite, he will remove these judgments against them and he will rejoice over them with great singing.  Imagine for a second the image of Almighty God, king of the Universe, singing over these rag tag group of people…who have done nothing but disappoint…and you begin to see the amazing truth in the gospel. 

We have to remember that the Kingdom of God is made up of nothing but disappointments.  Which one of us has ever lived up to our potential, who has ever met the expectations of everyone we have met or has lived his life with God to the fullest?

I have days when I remember this truth, but then I have days where the burden of disappointment seems to dominate me and threatens to overwhelm me.  I have days when I can rejoice that God loves me despite my failures and days when the deep threatens to swallow me up. 

The hope is that even though we continue to disappoint, that God will one day overcome all the disappointment in the world and restore His kingdom.

Making Sense Doesn't Make Sense

Tonight, as I write this, my heart…and the heart of the country…is heavy with the news of yet another senseless act of violence.  This time bombs went off in the city of Boston as residents celebrated the time honored tradition of running of the Boston Marathon. Three people, including an eight year old, are confirmed dead with many more injured.  The full extent of this event is only truly beginning to come to light and it may well be months before we know what triggered this event and who was responsible.

The internet is already beginning to respond.  From the vindictive “I hope they find whoever did this and make them pay,” to the conspiracy theories, “we all know this was done to please someone’s god….” The politicians lay in wait to see not only who they can blame, but how they can profit from this terrible crime.  People on the left, including Michael Moore, hope they can pin this on the Tea Party and warmongers on the right are hoping this can lead to renewed efforts in the War on Terror.

In the midst of this are people who are looking for answers.  How do we begin to understand this horrific event?  How do we explain the actions of those who are so consumed by hate that they must destroy life?  How can we believe in a God that would allow such horror?

When events like this happen, the pundits and the counselors await the verdict of America’s new high priests, dressed in their psychological vestments to explain away the horror we’ve seen.  We await the word on the Newtown shooter, Dr. Gosnell, the Aurora shooter to see what was wrong with them.  When the word comes down they suffered an illness, or that they were filled with anger, we are relieved.  There was something wrong with them and this alleviates our minds and the world makes sense once again.  Until the next time.

Christian theologians are also relieved when they can blame a mental disorder, or a unique situation, as it seemingly gets God ‘off the hook’ as it were.  We then ignore the larger and necessary questions of the presence of evil, the absence (or presence) of God, and the responsibility we all play in events like this.  In the days ahead we will hear rehashes of tired old Christian apologies for the presence of evil in the world.

We want so desperately for the world to make sense, to play by some rules.  We want clear cut dividers so that those who do right are rewarded and those who do wrong are punished.  We want to live in a world where we don’t have to explain to our children why an eight year old boy is dead tonight, or why a doctor could be allowed to butcher babies for thirty years, or why a man shot up an elementary school, or why…..well, just fill in the blank.

So we explain and we contort and we try to arrange the world in a way that makes sense.  And I think we need to stop.  I think God wants us to stop trying to make sense.

Think about it…the things we make ‘sense of’ are things we are no longer shocked by, things that no longer affect us, and things we no longer try to rectify.

We make “sense” of homelessness by understanding economic law. This gets us off the hook and we are not longer passionate about helping the poor.

We make “sense” of war and we are no longer bothered by the ethical ramifications of killing people.

We make “sense” of STD’s and sexual behavior so that sex loses the intimacy it was created for, only to become something to do to occupy an hour.

We make “sense” out of the cross by reading Pauline theology and we use big words like ‘substitutionary atonement’ to forget the horror of the cross and the suffering of Jesus.

When we make sense of a thing like Boston, or like Dr. Gosnell’s house of horrors we can retreat back into the fantasy of our world. We can pretend that the world we live in isn’t broken, that there isn’t something fundamentally wrong. 

But the reality is that our world IS broken.  There is a violent streak that runs within people that makes an event like Boston possible.  We may see tidbits of it every day in ourselves: greed, lust, selfishness, anger, and a whole host of evils.  We make ‘sense of them’ too and we explain them away, and say, “I’m only human….” or “I’ve had a long day,” or “It’s not like I’ve killed somebody…”

When we make sense of it, we grow comfortable with it…and that is the one thing we cannot  be.  God does not want us to be comfortable with it, or to make excuses of it, or to make sense of it.

Psalm 120 is one of my favorite Psalms and it is a Psalm that I turn to in moments like this.  It is written by a Jewish person, living in exile away from his home.  He is among a people whom he considers to be violent and is never at home with them.  We are told that he lives in Meshech, a place that he considers less than desirable, because the people who live there are violent and nasty.  This place is not his home and he knows it.  He is reminded of this on a daily basis and we can hear the lament in his words, “woe to me that I sojourn in Meshech.

 At the end of the psalm he writes of the great disparity that he has, “I am for peace….but they are for war” (v. 7).   The psalm leaves you hanging. There is no explanation of why these people are for war, and there is no ‘making sense’ of it.  Rather, you are left with a rather unsatisfactory ending.  You are left with the psalmist, yearning for peace and never at home with your neighbors.

There is no ‘pat’ answers when it comes to evil and suffering in this world.  Even our greatest theological constructions should cause us to reflect again on the world.  God does this on purpose, so that we don’t grow comfortable with the values of this world.

We live in a violent world, as today’s events have demonstrated.  We live in a world in which people are intent on hurting one another and profiting off of that hurt. We cannot allow ourselves to excuse this type of behavior or to grow comfortable with it.  As God’s people, we must strive to live out God’s virtues: to care for everybody, to be a beacon of nonviolence, and to offer people a true sanctity of human life.

We mourn these actions tonight because we know this is not how life is meant to be.  Tomorrow we begin to rebuild once again the broken pieces of this world in a never ending construction project.  Some of us may be tempted to give up and walk away.  Others will be fervent in trying to make sure the pieces never fall again.  Both attempts are wrong. We will strive as hard as we can, never growing comfortable, but knowing that God is with us to help us pick up the pieces once again. 

Too long we have all lived in Mescech…and today is a reminder of this.

The Death of the I-God

Narcissus is alive and well. You know the story...a cruel man is punished by the gods to fall in love with his own reflection. He gazes at his own reflection so much that eventually dies.

In Ayn Rand's short novella, Anthem, the main character's quest for liberation comes to a conclusion when he discovers one word: I. Equality 7-2521 discovers that the most important thing he can live for is himself. It ends with him carving a tribute to EGO ("This god...this one word, I). This is a message that our society and our country has readily accepted.

We live in a country of narcissism. Most of us deal with this issue at several levels of our lives. We live with one thought: It's all about us. We live with the one constant theme of our lives being: get all that I want and don't care about anybody else.

In my line of work, it is not uncommon for me to run into people who want all of their needs taken care of (baby sitting, for example) and yet have no concern to give back to anybody else. This type of person will complain when any expectation is made of them that they should give up the slightest momentary happiness.

This exhibits itself not only in the world, but also, sadly, in the church. Church becomes, not about serving the Living God, but rather...how can I have my needs met. Of course, nobody talks in this type of language...but rather this attitude is displayed in all sorts of different ways. "I didn't like the music." "Nobody thanked me for making cookies for the fellowship." Or however else it may be explained.

I thought that I was maybe just getting older. That maybe everybody had always been the same and I was just getting cranky with age. But then there came empirical evidence--our country is becoming more and more in love themselves. We are become a country of Narcissists.

Dr. Twenge in her book The Narcissist Epidemic details how parents, society, and other factors are feeding into our desires. Increasingly people's lives are centered more and more around themselves. Social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter help others fuel their narcissism by drawing attention to every detail about their lives and thoughts. And, instead of showcasing important thoughts about contemporary issues, the main drive on Facebook seems to promote one's 'hotness,' one's party nature, or popularity.

The effect of this problem is devastating. I know parents who are more concerned with weight loss and working out than their child. They wish to look good for their vacation while their child is neglected and placed in front of a TV. This child will grow up with issues that will take years to deal with. Narcissism is a far reaching multi-generational problem.

For the good work that Dr. Twenge does in her book, she fails to understand the basic thing about narcissism...it is sin. And if we give into our narcissist tendencies, we will share in Narcissus' fate.

Jesus constantly pushes us to look beyond ourselves. In the Bible, there is no command given to 'love ourselves.' Jesus says to the scribe, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart...and love your neighbor as yourself." (Mark 12:30-31). While it is implied that you will love yourself, there is no commandment to do so. Likewise, Jesus says our whole focus is not to be on ourselves, but on God "Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it."(Luke 9:24).

Narcissism and the narcissist tendency to focus on ourselves and our own desires are sin. While we may agree intellectually with Rick Warren's statement, "It's not about me..." we have to learn to put this into practice.

Living in a non-narcissist way involves risk, because you are putting others first. We need to be willing to enter people's lives with an understanding that it might cause us problems. We need to learn not to put our own desires and wants over everybody else's.

In short, we need to learn proper perspective on life: God, others, us. That's right...we do not come first, we come third. This is the way that God wants it to be and we need learn to live with others before us.

As for people who can't live beyond themselves, I feel sorry for them. They are always seemingly mired in depression, frustration, or anger. They don't feel as if anybody is ever doing enough for them and they tend to be the most miserable people I know. I hope and pray that they will stop looking at in the mirror long enough to enjoy the beautiful world around them.