On Being Grown-Ups

On Being Grown-Ups--October 6, 2017

"For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love." [1 Corinthians 13:9-13]

Do me a favor: for a moment, even if just a moment, forget every other time you have heard these words read nervously by someone's cousin or sister or former college roommate at a wedding, nervously rushed through so that the wedding ceremony could skip ahead to the vows and the rings and the reception afterward.

Do me a favor and for at least a few minutes, remember that this passage had almost nothing to do with wedding ceremonies when it was written, and only has to do with marriages and family life insofar as those things have to do with the much wider and deeper realities of life in Christian community.  That is, Paul did not see himself writing cheesy poetry for the inside of Hallmark cards or wedding favors when he wrote these words--he was writing something of a manifesto on how the followers of Jesus live now, as spiritual grown-ups, in light of God's promised future.

See, when these words are read or heard outside of a summery Saturday afternoon in a wedding ceremony, we hear things being said that our brains usually edit out in the forced context of romantic love.  In these few verses from what we call First Corinthians, Paul connects the promised future of God's final Reign in its fullness with an attitude of self-giving and the disciplined practice of putting others first, regardless of how we "feel" about them, and he sees all of these as part and parcel of what it means to be spiritual adults.

Sometimes we miss this bit about "when the complete comes," or "then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known."  Or worse yet, we mistakenly assume that Paul is talking about romance, and about how neat it is to feel like someone else knows you all the way down, and that getting married is what Paul means by "when the complete comes."  It is not what Paul had in mind.  Truth in advertising about marriage: it is still only a partial knowing, and it is still about only partially being known (ask anyone who has ever felt like their spouse didn't really listen to them, or that their spouse didn't pay attention, or has ever felt like even when both people really are trying their best to understand each other, they can still talk past one another).

No, rather, Paul has in mind that when, at the last, God's Reign is complete, we will see face to face the One who already knows us from our inmost selves.  Paul is talking about how we live now as a glimpse of what will be clear and full and complete in God's promised future--in the great Homecoming Parade of the Lamb.

And for Paul, once we start to see life in light of God's promised future--when we see face to face, as it were--we can begin to be grown up in soul.  And what does it look like to be a adult soul?  It looks like self-giving. It looks like keeping no record of wrongs.  It looks like a willingness not to insist on our own way.  It looks like all those things we hear at weddings and assume is "just marriage advice for how to keep things good with your spouse" but that Paul actually sees as the bottom line default setting for all of our relationships.  In a word, it looks like love. To be a grown up in soul is to let love move us beyond childish self-interest. 

If you could overhear a conversation in the back of my car between my kids, the conversation would, I expect, be pretty typical for any six and four year old.  But just for honesty's sake, that age-level can be pretty petty, pretty self-centered, and pretty insistent on preemptive attack to fend off sibling onslaughts.  They are, in a word, childish.  "He hit me."  "I only hit her because it looked like she was gonna hit me first."  "He has two things to play with in the car, and I only have one...oh wait, I guess I do have two... BUT STILL!"  "I have to have this stick in my hand, because I have to keep her afraid of getting a stick herself and hitting me!"  "I wanted what she had, so I just took it!"

Again, these things are hardly odd for young children to say.  But let us take just a moment to unpack what makes these childish outbursts so immature, so... childish.  Underneath all of that backseat bickering (or wherever else they are scrapping with each other and spoiling for a fight) is the underlying logic of self-interest and self-centeredness.  My kids are no different from yours on that count--all of us are born with a chronic case of narcissism--we all assume that we are each the center of the universe, and that only my needs or wants matter at the moment.  Whether it's envy over what someone else has, fear of losing my importance or my place, intimidation to see that someone else is just as good at something as I am, bitterness over someone else's success, or the assumption that everything is a win-lose competition, children are eminently focused only on themselves.  And it becomes its own logic.  To my six-year-old, it makes perfect sense that he should be able to threaten to kick a soccer ball at his sister because, in his mind, she "might" get the idea that she could take his ball.  To my four-year-old, it just seems right that she should be allowed to hit her brother pre-emptively because she is about to brag that she got a lollipop (and he didn't) and she's worried that when he hears that, he'll be upset and want to hit her.  Laugh if you will, but scenes like those are real and are steeped in the childish logic of self-centeredness.  They brag about what they think makes them "great," and in the next breath they refuse to own up to responsibility when they have made a mess, forgotten to do something, or broken a promise.  For children who still have not mastered tying their own shoes, it is perhaps just part of growing pains. 

But when we see that same kind of utterly immature self-absorbed, ego-centric, buck-passing, promise-breaking, insecurity-fueled belligerence in an adult, there is something troubling and sad about it.  It feels like their bodies may have gotten old, but their souls are still childish and immature.

And this is the sum of it all for Paul here as he wrote to the Corinthians: to be a grown up in the soul is to be more and more able--because we are living in light of God's promised future "when the complete comes--to let love turn us inside out...only to discover that we were so bent in on ourselves already that what seemed like "inside out" is really just being put right.  Love, in the sense Paul has in mind, is about letting go of the old childish need to have a stick at the ready just in case someone else gives you a mean look.  Love is about growing past the old immature insecurity that I should threaten to smack you with a hard-kicked soccer ball to discourage you from thinking of taking that ball away from me.  Love is about getting over our fears of having to take responsibility for our mistakes, and getting beyond our neediness to keep patting ourselves on the back for how "great" we are.  When my kids do a little chant, "I won the race... I won the race, nyah nyah na-nyah nyah" it is part of how they learn to be human without being a jerk.  But when adults still use every opportunity, every moment, to shout what a great job they are doing at something (whether that is even true or not), it is a sign of a sadly immature soul in a body that has outpaced the spirit.

It's funny to me (in that way things can be funny and sad) that so often in our culture we ask the wrong question about things like this.  We have a way of framing things in this country in terms of "rights" and what we have the "right" to do (I get it, historically speaking, although I think it requires some retooling theologically), when the way the Biblical writers think and speak is, quite honestly, almost never about "me and my rights" but more about "what kind of person am I being made into--more like Christ, or less?"  So often, our way of seeing the news of the day is, "I have the right to aim this soccer ball at you, because you look like you might want to take it from me some time," and we admit also (perhaps grudgingly) that you also should have the "right" to acquire and aim a soccer ball at me, too, to keep me from eyeing yours just the same.  Sometimes we even say things like, "I have the right to carry around my ready-to-throw soccer ball wherever I go, aimed and ready to seriously womp on someone at a moment's notice, because you never know when someone else might start need to be taught a lesson."  Yes, yes, all this "rights" talk sounds very familiar--I hear it from my back seat all the time.

But you know what?  The Biblical writers, including Paul here, just don't talk or think that way.  Instead of, "We all have the right to threaten to throw soccer balls at each other in order to scare off people who might want to take them," the Biblical writers think like actual grown-ups.  The Biblical question is more like, "What kind of person will I become, slowly and over time, if I am always so worried about someone else being out to get me that I insist on having my soccer ball ready to launch at someone at any time?"  The question Paul asks is more like, "What will it do to my soul if I am solely concerned with keeping myself safe and my stuff secure, rather than the lives and needs of others?"  The question that Love asks is more like, "What lasting marks will it leave on my spirit to go through life more interested in my own wants, wishes, or feeling of security than those of other people around me?"

See--the writers of the Bible are interested in teaching us to act like--and think like--spiritual grown-ups.  That means getting beyond the childish talk of "rights" to instead saying, "I am not going to insist on my own way, or my own benefit, or my own interests--because that is what love does."  Spiritual grown-ups get past the petty and childish insistence, "But I have the right to...!" and instead get to the mature place of saying, "I am not here on this planet for my own interests or benefit--I am here for the sake of others, the glory of God, and as a witness to the way of Christ." 

You know what?  Jesus never held a soccer ball in a threatening pose to throw at someone and discourage them from attacking him.  In fact, Jesus modeled the opposite.  Jesus took whatever angry words, or threatening impulses, or crowds with rocks, or scheming opponents from the religious ruling parties, and he let them lob whatever they had to lob... and he neither returned fire nor threatened to throw something at them first in order to scare them. Jesus was, and is, the consummate spiritual grown-up.  He is the one who never slides into childish talk of "rights" or the insecure need to threaten others.   And really, every time Paul talks about "Love" in First Corinthians, you could substitute Jesus and get a fuller sense that this is the way of life we are all called to.

It's not that talk about "having the right to" angrily carry your soccer ball as a deterrent for your younger sister's ploys is wrong--it's more than the whole category of "rights" and insisting on protecting your own "rights" is the epitome of childishness.  My goodness--let's grow up!  Grown ups know that sometimes things ain't fair.  Grown ups know that it is vastly better not to let someone else provoke us.  Grown ups know that even though we could make a fuss about having a "right" to pick up a soccer ball to be ready to throw at someone else at a moment's notice if they step out of line, the talk of "rights" just isn't how mature people in Christ think.  Love leads us to think less about "what things I have the right to do..." and more about "What is the right thing to do," less about childishly insisting on protecting what is mine and more about sharing beyond any record keeping.  In fact, Paul says, "keeping records" is one thing love doesn't do.

"Now we see in a mirror, dimly," says Paul--and indeed he is right.  We, even when who have been listening to Paul's words all our lives, struggle to grow out of our childish self-interest. We keep sliding back into the immature talk of demanding our rights, defending ourselves, and fussing over our own interest and insecurities. But to hear Paul tell it, the more we are mindful of God's promise future ("when the complete comes"), the more we will be able to grow to adulthood in our souls... which is really another way of saying, "We will be more and more able to love."

It is time today to put away childish things--not merely toys, but attitudes and actions.  It is time to be grow-ups in our souls.

Gracious God, bring us to maturity in your love.