The Catch That Isn't

The Catch That Isn't--April 1, 2019

"For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing." [Gal. 2:19-21]
It seems more than a little presumptuous for me to dare to say much on top of these words--they cut to the chase well enough on their own. But maybe it is worth a moment's reflection on this "for me" business.

Sometimes our religious talk can become quite abstract. The sentence, "Jesus' death effects atonement for sinful humanity," contains deep and wonderfully good news, but buried underneath jargon, you might never know it. To recognize that the Son of the Living God "loved me and gave himself for me" brings God's action much closer to home. That's not to say that Jesus died only for me, or only for people like me. But it does mean he died at least for me, and me as I really am, even in the mess that my life is at this present moment, even in the mess that my life will continue to be down the road.

Now the "catch" for us in all this--which really turns out to be the fact that there is no "catch"--is that if I can embrace the reality that Christ has love and died for me precisely as I am at this moment, and even despite all the darker moments I have yet to muddle my way into, then I have to admit that his loving me isn't based on the number of gold stars I've earned or positive accomplishments in life.

And--perhaps even more uncomfortable for us to face--it means that Christ has loved and died the whole world precisely as it is in this moment, and despite all the darker moments it has yet to muddle its way into. If Christ has loved me without regard to how well I follow the rules, then Christ's love for others needs to be just that free and unconstrained, too.

The "catch" to grace is that it includes the world, with or without my approval. If the cross is Jesus' gift "for me" without conditions or fine print, then it means recognizing that God sets those same condition-less, fine-print-free terms for the whole world, whether I like it or not. The "catch" is that there is no catch... for any of us.

That can be uncomfortable for us to acknowledge, because it means that God loves the unchurched and the riff-raff and the impolite and the ungrateful just as much as God loves church folk who don't like to consider themselves riff-raff or impolite or ungrateful. It means that Jesus' death is for the whole lot of us, even if we don't have the eyes of faith to recognize that it was for the whole lot of us. The scope of God's love is that wide, even if it rubs us the wrong way to see "those people" welcomed in. Sometimes the catch is recognizing the fact that there is no catch.

Our whole day is changed when we can hear the good news as "for me"--"for you." Today, how can you be a witness, even without using churchy jargon, to someone else you encounter today of the love of God that is "for them"?

Gracious God, let us live and die for you today--after all, you have lived and died and lived for us. Open our ears to hear that your love has come really and truly for us, and then open our mouths to let everyone we meet know that they are included in the "us."

When God Surrenders

When God Surrenders--March 29, 2019

"When the ten heard this they began to be angry with James and John. So Jesus called them and said to them, 'You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wish to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many." [Mark 10:41-45]

"We do NOT negotiate with terrorists."

I have heard that line so many times, in so many different action and suspense thrillers, in film and books and TV shows, that it seems cliché now.  We have all heard that storyline before. We have all watched that movie.  The villains take hostages, and then make demands (money, helicopter, etc.) for their release, and the side of Law and Order balks at those demands, or only uses talk about meeting them to stall while they come up with a "real" plan. Instead, the good guys invariably assemble a strike team to mount a secret rescue operation to get the hostages out and take out the bad guys, because, as one of the head good-guys seems required by law to say, "It is the policy of the U.S. Government NOT to negotiate with terrorists."

And because it is all happening in the fantasy world of the screen or the printed page, usually the strike team accomplishes its mission, frees the captives with minimal casualties, and gets the bad guys with extreme prejudice.  A clear-cut victory for the powers of good, and a clear and humiliating loss for the bad guys.  And all perfectly timed as you finish your last bites of butter-saturated popcorn. 

Now, whether or not it really is someone's official policy not to negotiate with terrorists and not to pay ransoms to kidnappers, you at least can understand why that would be someone's policy.  The argument--in the movies and in real life--goes something like this: you can't give into the kidnapper's demands, or else you'll embolden future hostage-takers and create more victims.  You can't legitimize criminals by agreeing to their terms, and you certainly can't expect them to keep their word.  And beneath all of this good, solid, well-reasoned strategic thinking is this underlying assumption: you don't give in to ransom demands because it makes you look weak.  

And sure, it stands to reason. If the villains think they can get away with their wicked deeds, they'll do it again and walk all over you.  Looking strong makes your enemies fear you, and if you give in to the demands of hostage-takers and kidnappers, they won't fear you.  They may give you back your loved ones (it is in their best interests to do so, if they get paid, at least), you will have lost your reputation as the "tough" one.  So in the movies and books and everywhere else, it has become a sort of unquestionable principle that good guys--at least real, tough, strong, non-wimpy good guys--do not negotiate with terrorists, for fear of losing face, losing their absolute right-ness, and legitimizing evil, and losing their reputation so that more hostages could be taken next time.  

I get it. I get that whole line of thinking.  I grew up on those plot-lines, whether was Harrison Ford stalking the hijackers on Air Force One, a Tom Clancy novel turned movie (often also involving Harrison Ford, honestly), or Bruce Willis in one of many Die Hard movies (boy, that guy had some bad luck, didn't he?).  There is a certain logic to declaring--and maintaining--the policy of not negotiating with terrorists so as not to suffer a loss of face or damage to your reputation, even if it is a cold logic.

And yet--and this blows my mind to actually think about it--Jesus seems to see himself in exactly those terms: as God's ransom that secures our release.  Unpack that just a little bit with me for a moment.  It is the Gospel's claim that in Jesus we have none other than God-in-the-flesh with us.  And this same Jesus is offered up--or even offers himself up--as the ransom which secures the release of "the many."  God surrenders.  God doesn't even bother to negotiate or bargain down for something lesser than the immediate demands.  God surrenders to the demands of the hostage-takers and bad guys... and in Jesus, God's own life gets offered up as a ransom.  Jesus doesn't even blush to say it.  In fact, he says it is why he has come.

Doesn't God know?  Hasn't God seen the same action movies we have?  Didn't anybody give God the lecture that you look "weak" if you give into the demands of hostage-takers?  Didn't anyone take God aside and say that God will lose face and seem like a "loser" if the ransom is paid?  And doesn't God know that the really respectable heroes are the ones who scoff at the kidnappers' demands and go it with guns blazing to take out the bad guys and save the victims?

In a word, yes.  God knows it all. And nobody had to say it on a TV screen for God to understand all of that well.  It's just... you were more important to God than God's reputation. Period.  End of sentence.

The logic of the movies is that if you give in to the demands of the bad guys and pay the ransom, you're committing the cardinal sin of looking like a loser, and the fear is that they'll walk all over you all over again and take something even more valuable next time.  But the logic of the cross is that there is no commodity, no treasure, and no reputation more important than you.  God surrendered God's own reputation as the divine Almighty, All-Powerful Lord of the Universe in order to rescue you.  And to hear the rest of the Scriptures tell it, God has never regretted that choice.  You were worth it.  You still are.

This is the heart of the Christian gospel, really--that there is no cost God would not (and did not) bear for the sake of this beloved world.  God was willing, not only to lose it all, but to lose everything publicly in what that same watching world would call "surrender."  God was willing to be mocked by the very world God was in the act of saving, and God was willing to have that damage done to the divine reputation.  Because from God's perspective, a ransom is worth paying if you value the thing (or the ones) held hostage more than you value the money you pay or the cost to your respectability after you pay it.

The loud voices of our culture have a very hard time with this kind of thing.  The loud voices around us--the blowhards who bellow at podiums, the talking heads who give commentary on TV, and the action-movie screenwriters as well--they talk about how the only thing that matters is winning, and looking like a winner.  They talk about how important it is to be seen as victorious (even if you are not) and how you must deny anything that makes you look weak (even if it is true).  The conventional wisdom around us is so afraid of looking like a "loser" that it could never do the courageous thing that God does at the cross--to surrender in order to gain a world held captive in the grip of death.  To be very honest here, we would never have approved the Gospel as a screenplay--there are no heroics where the strike team goes in to shoot the captors and march out as the triumphant heroes. Yes, there is resurrection that comes on the other side of the cross, but it happens while the world is still asleep and the powers of the day are taking their victory lap, smugly bragging about how they killed the troublemaking rabbi.  And at least as Jesus describes his mission here in Mark's Gospel, there is only this scandalous scene of surrender, where the ransom is paid and God takes a very public loss on the nose.

But that is also the evidence of how deeply you are beloved by this same God.  The only reason you pay a ransom, after all, is if you value what is held captive more than you value the ransom money.  That's why the bad guys don't kidnap your enemy or a random stranger, but someone you love dearly--it's the only way they can get a payday. And if Jesus is convinced that he is the ransom, he--the one in whom God dwells in a human life--then there seems to be no other conclusion but that God loves you more than God's own life, God's own reputation, and God's own status as a "winner."

God loves you more than winning.  God loves you more than looking "strong" or "tough" or "great."  God loves you more than living.  That is why, despite the logic of all those action-movies, God in Christ chooses to surrender and lay down his own life as a ransom... for you.

Be careful--if you let that idea sink in at all, it will turn upside down all your old notions of whether it matters to look like you are "winning," to look like you are "tough," or to be called "great."  But Jesus sure is convinced you--and this whole blessed, broken world--were worth it.

Lord Jesus, turn our minds upside down with your way of winning through loss and saving through surrender. And let that change everything else in our lives, too.

How We Are Loved

How We Are Loved--March 28, 2019

"For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us." [Romans 5:6-8]

God is not Miss Hannigan, and we are not Little Orphan Annie.

In case it's been a while since you last saw the musical (whether the 1982 version with Carol Burnett as Miss Hannigan, or 2014's version with Cameron Diaz in an updated version of the story and character), the story of Annie begins with the optimistic title character and a gaggle of other girls living their hard-knock life in a run-down orphanage (the 2014 version with Quvenzhane Wallis as Annie makes it an overcrowded foster home), under the "care" (or apathy) of the mean-spirited and bitter Miss Hannigan.

In any version of the story, while Miss Hannigan does technically provide food (which is barely edible) and shelter (which is hardly adequate) for the girls, she is absolutely ruthless when it comes to rubbing in how "grateful" they should all be that she has taken them in at all.  Miss Hannigan goes out of her way to make Annie and the other girls know they are a drag on her life, that they are wretched and unwanted, and that they are unworthy of the attention and resources she gives them.

There is no love, in other words, for Annie and her friends--only the shame and guilt that they aren't worthy of the good things she does for them (which aren't very good).  Miss Hannigan is bitter, conniving, and self-interested, and only looks for ways to get labor or money from the girls in her care.

And, again, just to be clear--this is NOT how God loves us.  

I need to say that because the notion that Paul touches on here in Romans can either be used to speak a beautiful grace, or mis-used to sound like God only grudgingly saves humanity,  like we are a burden God never wanted and can't stand.  When Paul says that Christ died for us when we were "ungodly" and "sinners," the point isn't to beat us up or exploit us, a la Miss Hannigan.  The movie character lays it on thick that Annie and her friends are unworthy, because she wants to lay guilt and shame on them so they won't ask for any better treatment.  If she can convince them that they don't deserve genuine love, they won't speak up when they don't get it.  But that's NOT how Paul intends for us to hear his description of God's love.  Just the opposite, actually--Paul wants us to know just how precious we are to God, that Christ died for us even when we didn't bring other perks or payback to the table.

Sometimes, to be very honest, we Christians pile on the self-deprecation because we think it is the same thing as holiness.  Sometimes we give the impression that wallowing in talk about being a "wretch" or a "worm" is the truest mark of piety, and that if you don't talk that way about yourself, it is a sign of sinful pride.  But Paul's intention here in Romans 5 isn't to focus on us or our rottenness, so much as it underscore the unconditional love of God.  The difference is important.  

It is the difference between me telling my children, "You're lucky I put up with you, because nobody else in the world would," and saying to them, "I love you already, just as you are, on the days when you are kind and sweet and on the days when you are ornery and crabby, no matter what." 

And that's the vital message Paul is trying to get across.  God's love reaches out to us--in fact, was swallowed up in death for us--even when we (still!) turn our backs on God in stubborn, crabby, orneriness. That is good news to be celebrated, shared, and shouted from the rooftops.  But it does not carry with it the requirement that you have to beat yourself up with melodramatic self-loathing in the name of spirituality first before those words of grace can be spoken.

So, let's say it, loud and clear right now for whomever needs to hear it:

You are beloved, just as you are.  

Whatever you bring to the picture, you are beloved--and you are beloved by a God who sees you fully and loves the real you, not anybody else's cardboard cut-out of you.  

You are so precious to God that there is no price God would not pay to be with you.

And you are loved so completely and deeply that there is nothing you can do (or not do) to make God stop loving you.

That's what the cross is about.  A love that came with no strings or conditions, without a whiff of resentment or bitterness from God's part.  A love that poured itself out without requiring first that we become "more lovable," because we were already beloved.

That's the news worth telling someone.  In fact, you can bet your bottom dollar there's someone you know who needs to hear it.

Lord Jesus, let us simply hear your promise that we are beloved, and let it sink in without our need to add layers of guilt or resentment onto it.  Let your love sink in deep.

A Worthy King

A Worthy King--March 27, 2019

"And when [Pilate] learned that [Jesus] was under Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him off to Herod, who was himself in Jerusalem at that time. When Herod saw Jesus, he was very glad, for he had been wanting to see him for a long time, because he had heard about him and was hoping to see him perform some sign. He questioned him at some length, but Jesus gave him no answer. The chief priests and the scribes stood by, vehemently accusing him. Even Herod with his soldiers treated him with contempt and mocked him; then he put an elegant robe on him, and sent him back to Pilate." [Luke 23:7-11]

It is a too-rarely heeded bit of wisdom that says "You don't have to attend every argument you're invited to."  That's smart.  We would do well to consider that policy in this age of instant outrage, immediate forms of communication, and viral media.  Sometimes people seem to be spoiling for a fight, and they bait you into taking it, because they have been just waiting for the chance to vent their bitterness over whatever has upset them at the moment.

But it's okay to send your regrets instead of an RSVP for that invitation. It's okay not to get baited into the bluster.

The more I think about it, the more amazed I am at that dimension of the trial of Jesus before the Roman governor Pilate and the Roman-installed puppet king Herod.  Jesus doesn't take the bait.  He doesn't speak, not because he isn't the Messiah, but because he is mature and grounded enough as the Messiah not to get sucked into a childish fight on their terms.  There are indeed exchanges in the gospels that Jesus has with the leaders of the Respectable Religious Crowd, and he does trade a few lines with Pilate before all is said and done, but Jesus never lets himself get drawn into a shouting match or a volley of insults.  

And let me make this utterly clear: Jesus' refusal to get drawn into such a petty fight with the powers of the day is evidence of his superior courage and strength, not of weakness or cowardice.  But that will only make sense if we are willing to accept, too, that Jesus' kind of victory is not to out-shout his opponents, nor to intimidate them with threats of force or violence, but rather to lay down his life for them.

If you are still hung up on how people see you, what others think of you, and what your reputation is like (like Herod and Pilate surely are), you are going to get suckered into having to shout back an insult for every taunt thrown your way.  If you are still convinced that the way to "win" in this life is to push your way through, then, yeah, you'll be drawn into answering back every jab with a counterpunch of your own.  But, even if that way of thinking is still popular among the Herods and Pilates of every age, it is still terribly childish, and ultimately self-defeating.  And I suspect that Herod himself didn't realize in the moment how very petty and immature he comes off in this scene.

This, I think, is part of what the Gospel writers want us to see: this showdown is a face-off between two contenders for the title of "King of the Jews."  Herod, on the one hand, claims the title even though he is not strictly Jewish (the Herod dynasty came from the neighboring region of Edom/Idumea), comes from a family of paranoid tyrants like his father Herod the Great who handed him his reign, and seems to be more interested in provoking petty and childish outbursts than in actually leading his people.  And on the other hand, there is Jesus, the homeless wandering rabbi who keeps his cool and won't be baited into answering Herod's goading. Which is truly "King of the Jews"? The contrast is stark--Herod hardly deserves the title, and is clearly beneath the office he has been granted by the Empire, while Jesus embodies a self-control that unmasks Herod's childishness for what it is.

It is worth lifting up that level of self-control here, because it reminds me that Jesus didn't just suffer with strength while he was nailed to the cross.  But every choice not to give into the pettiness of the so-called rulers around him, every decision not to give into their infantile power grabs and threat-making, every instance of Jesus' refusal to take their bait took conscious, deliberate strength on Jesus' part--especially knowing that the Herods and Pilates would take his silence for a sign of weakness or fear.  And yet Jesus doesn't give them the satisfaction of getting drawn into their game of bullying and bellowing.  He won't even let his divine power be turned into a sideshow for Herod by doing a miracle on command like a trained monkey.  Jesus shows a greater courage and integrity all along the way to the cross than the Herods and Pilates will ever understand.

And while it is not our calling to have to die on a cross for the sins of the world, that same strength is indeed a hallmark of the disciples of Jesus.  There are voices all around who seem to think that all that matters is if people "get the job done," regardless of whether they do it with integrity, character, strength, or honor.  They advise us that it doesn't matter if someone is bombastic and petulant like Herod, or amoral and ruthless like Pilate, if they maintain "law and order" and keep the trains running on time.  They suggest that it doesn't matter if you are a childish tyrant like the Herod family dynasty as long as the markets are up and the end of the day.  But that is not our way... because it is not the way of Jesus.

Only Jesus can die for the sins of the world, but all of us who walk in his footsteps are dared to live in the same strength and freedom that Jesus did, which includes the freedom not to get drawn into petty fights that shed only heat but no light.  It does matter, not just who looks like they have come out on top at the end of the day, but how you conduct yourself.  It does matter if we have honor and character, rather than bluster and bullying.  It does matter whether we let ourselves get provoked into sinking to the level of answering hatred for hatred and evil for evil, or whether we dare to trust that Jesus actually knows what he is doing.

Maybe, then, this is the question for this day: between Herod and his childishly petty antics on the one hand Jesus and his measured silence on the other, who seems more fit for the title "King of Israel"?  

Now, follow the path of the one who is worthy of that office.

Lord Jesus, let us walk in your footsteps, even knowing they lead to a cross, as we trust your kind of victory.

Jesus Loses It All

Jesus Loses It All--March 26, 2019

"They were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them; they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid.  He took the twelve aside again and began to tell them what was to happen to him, saying, ‘See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit upon him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days he will rise again.” [Mark 10:32-34]

Jesus had to lose.

And he was willing to do it.  Not that it is ever easy, or anyone's first choice--but Jesus was willing to lose it all.  

Maybe even harder is that Jesus had to lose to someone--to the Respectable Religious crowd, as well as to the Big Deals of the Empire--and he had to endure them all licking their lips and salivating over his defeat.  He had to endure having all the people he had upset by exposing their hypocrisy now thinking that they had gotten the upper hand. He had to listen to them brag about finally besting him, and he had to listen to them mock him while his lungs slowly gave out.  We have been taught by the movies to expect that the hero will find some way in the last minute to pull out a victory in one of those moments when the chips are down, so the bad guys can be exposed and silenced, and so the hero can be vindicated.   We have been taught to expect that the good guys have to win, and the bad guys have to lose--and the world has to watch them lose, so that we can see justice done.

But Jesus has to endure losing all the way, with no quasi-magical come-from-behind secret move, no extra gun taped to his back a la John McClane in Die Hard to overtake the hostage-takers, no revenge fantasies fulfilled or comeuppance for the ones calling for his crucifixion.  Jesus loses, while the world watches, all the way to death.  And after death, the world stops watching.

I think that may be one of the most difficult things, both about what Jesus had to endure, and about the Christian faith as a whole: the fact that Jesus doesn't get a moment to get revenge, or vindication, or even just an "I told you so" to the ones who have brought aobut his death.  Yes, to be sure, there is resurrection on the third day, but there is some part of us that wants there to be a scene for Jesus to get even--some post-Easter appearance where Jesus goes and punches the ones who had mocked him on Good Friday, and to get them right in the face.  And that never happens.  Jesus doesn't get to have a public "win" within the timeline of the Gospels where he gets to publicly shame the people who insulted or turned him over to the Romans.  There is no point in the story where Jesus interrupts their victory celebrations to say, "I'm back."  No--as far as they are all concerned, they won over Jesus, and they got the last word.

And there is a part of me that is just very indignantly upset that this is how the Story goes.  There is a part of me that wants the big showdown between Jesus and his opponents, not just so that Jesus can come out a winner--but because (to be honest) I want to be seen backing a winner, too, rather than following around a... loser.  And yet this is what Jesus knowingly chooses: defeat without a public rematch, loss without a settling of scores, death without getting even.  The resurrection is very much real, but it is not a revenge fantasy.  And some part of me--of all of us, I suspect--doesn't want a savior who really, actually dies and loses in order to save people.  We want a Christ who leaps down from the cross at the last second, a cigar in his mouth like in a Schwarzenegger movie, who delivers some pithy tough-guy one-liner, cocks his shotgun, and puts his enemies in their place--not one whose last intelligible sentence is, "My God, why have you abandoned me?"  But we are given no such movie-star "winner" Christ for a savior--only the Christ who loses it all.

Robert Farrar Capon makes a similar point in a classic chapter from his brilliant book Hunting the Divine Fox where he points out how much human beings want a hero-savior like Superman rather than a cross-bound one like Jesus.   Capon writes, "We crucified Jesus not because he was God but because he blasphemed: he claimed to be God and then failed to come up to our standards for assessing the claim. It's not that we weren't looking for the Messiah; it's just that he wasn't what we were looking for. Our kind of Messiah would come down from the cross. He would carry a folding phone booth in his back pocket. He wouldn't do a stupid thing like rising from the dead. He would do a smart thing like never dying."

On the days when it looks and feels like good is getting hammered, the days when it feels not only like the crooks are getting away with their crookedness but rubbing it in your face that they did, it is hard not to want the kind of Savior to arrive on the scene who gets the upper hand, punches the gloating schemers while everyone watches, and shows that he was never really in danger of losing after all.  But that is not the way of Jesus.  And Jesus doesn't save us from losing. He saves us by losing, even if we don't like it or indulge in hero fantasies that switch out the crucified rabbi with a movie action-hero.

That means there will come times--maybe whole seasons--when arrogant and cocky jerks win the day, and they make no secret of relishing their triumph.  And even though we have a deep hope in the ultimate justice and vindication of God, that doesn't mean that you or I are promised any revenge fantasies ourselves.  And to be honest, sometimes the arrogant blowhards are just looking to get a rise out of you anyway, and really want you to take their bait and attack them back.  That sinks to their level and lets them think they are justified in their bragging over against you.  So, today, we are going to have to do two difficult things: we are going to have to let Jesus be the kind of Savior who doesn't go settling old vendettas for the sake of his sullied reputation, and we are going to have do the hard work of not getting sucked into the shouting matches the braggarts want to draw us into.

Today, as hard as it is, let us dare to let Jesus lose for us, and lose it all.  There is resurrection to come, but not personal revenge.  There is salvation, but not a showdown.  And there is no Savior without a real and honest defeat, which makes possible a new creation.

Lord Jesus, it is so hard for us to swallow our pride and accept that your way of saving us is through loss, and that your kind of redemption comes in what looks unmistakably like loss.  Save us your way, anyhow, and grace us with the willingness to let your weakness become our strength.

Who Gets the Last Word

Who Gets the Last Word--March 25, 2019

"Pilate spoke to them again, 'Then what do you wish me to do with the man you call the King of the Jews?' They shouted back, 'Crucify him!' Pilate asked them, 'Why, what evil has he done?' But they shouted all the more, 'Crucify him!' So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified." [Mark 15:12-15]

Something terrible happened.  Something wicked and crooked and just-plain wrong happened, and there is no covering it over or hiding it behind governmental bureaucracy to make it look like nothing.  No matter how much Pilate wants to make himself look like he has done no wrong (and maybe he even convinced himself!), there is no erasing the utter injustice of the execution of Jesus.

And at the very same time, neither the immoral cruelty of the cross nor the amoral rottenness of Pilate's role in it can undo God's ability to yet bring something beautiful and good from it.

We can say both things at the same time.  In fact, we need to.

Let's start with the part that even Pilate himself doesn't want to face.  He, along with all the other political and religious leaders who figure in the scene, as well as the stirred up crowd, are complicit in the death of Jesus.  Pilate wants to think he is innocent. He can publicly say it all he wants, as he even does in Matthew's Gospel, trying to "wash his hands" of Jesus' death.  And maybe Pilate actually thought that because the idea of killing Jesus wasn't his idea, that he's not responsible.  Maybe this Roman-installed governor actually thought that he could plead his own innocence because the request for Jesus' death started with others coming to him to propose it.  Maybe Pilate even thought if he kept saying, "No complicity here!" it would come true.  Maybe he fooled himself into thinking it was.

But thinking you are exonerated of guilt just because you keep shouting it at the crowds doesn't make it so.  And the bottom line is that Pilate chooses what was politically expedient (getting rid of a troublemaking rabbi) even if he thought that Jesus of Nazareth hadn't done anything worthy of crucifixion.  Pilate, in the end, subverts justice for the sake of what will help keep him (and the Empire) in control.  That's not innocence--that's a perversion of justice.  There's no way around it: Pilate is a crooked, rotten ruler, who appears to be more interested in keeping himself in power than in actually serving justice.  So let's dispense with the charade that Pilate kept trying to toss out: even if he didn't pound the nails himself, he participated in the plot.  He was the authority whose responsibility was to uphold justice, and he willfully ignored that responsibility because it would have made him unpopular.  The buck was supposed to stop with him, but Pilate took the coward's way out by authorizing Jesus' crucifixion and then trying to shrug it off like it wasn't his fault.

So instead of letting Pilate off the hook the way he wants, let's just be absolutely clear: the fact that Pontius Pilate seems to have thought Jesus wasn't guilty of a capital crime, but still has him both flogged and then crucified actually makes him even more despicable and cowardly.  It's not so much that he is immoral--trying to convict someone he knows is innocent, but rather that he is amoral--that Pilate doesn't even care what the truth is, in the end. All that matters to him is what will keep him in control and cover his liabilities.

And the fact that every week in Christian worship, disciples of Jesus recite his name when they confess in the Creed that Jesus "was crucified under Pontius Pilate" is a reminder that the only reason this crook is remembered at all by history is for the way he caved to the pressure of others and perverted justice to kill the Son of God because he thought it would be in his personal interests to do so. Other than that, Pontius Pilate is utterly forgettable... and forgotten.

But at the very same time, the travesty that Pilate authorized becomes the turning point for human history.  The crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth, whose shame Pilate tries to wash off of his hands, becomes the victory that breaks the power of Rome and every other empire since, defeats the juggernaut of death, and rescues a sinful humanity from oblivion. 

Now, to an outside observer, the death of Jesus at the hands of the Roman Empire looked like any other criminal's death.  And to be sure, the Romans crucified a lot of people.  But God intended something beautiful, something redemptive, in this act. And even though it is notoriously difficult to prove intent, the heart of the Christian faith hangs on the claim that this public and shameful death was yet intended by God bring life and restoration, even for Jesus' executioners.  Pilate cannot see that at all, because he cannot even bring himself to admit to his complicity with the other players calling out for Jesus' death.  But that refusal to see the truth is not powerful enough to negate God's power and intention to bring life through that death.

Both are true, then, and at the same time: it is true that Pilate is a crooked and corrupt leader who cannot wash away his complicity in the death of Jesus (even if he insists that a splash of water can exonerate him), AND simultaneously the living God is stronger yet that Pilate and used that act of cowardice to bring about redemption for the world--yes, even though I can't prove God's intent to you beyond a reasonable doubt.

This is how we live all our days, too, by the way.  There are terrible, rotten, crooked things that happen--sometimes by people who are aware of what they are doing, and sometimes by folks who have convinced themselves they are doing right.  The terribleness and rottenness are true and real... and we need to be able to say so.  And at the same time, we are convinced that the God who saves the world through a Roman cross is also able to take the rottenness and death that pervades our daily lives in this world and to bring resurrection and renewal.  The new creation God makes does not make what crooks and cowards do "OK," but it does mean that the Pilates of history do not get the last word.  God does.

And that is a word of good news today.

Lord God, we lift up to you the things we cannot make sense of, the injustices and crooked places of the world in which we live, calling them what they are, but also offering them up to you to transform and redeem. Here... see what you can make of us.

God's Foolishness

God's Foolishness--March 22, 2019

"For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,

     'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,

         and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.'

 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has God not made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolisness of our proclamation, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishess to Gentiles, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and wisdom of God.  For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength." [1 Corinthians 1:18-25]

Let me rattle off a few of the basic tenets of "common sense" that I regularly hear tossed around. There are plenty of variations, but I bet you've heard enough of these that you could sing along, too, if you like. The "pearls" of convention wisdom that we've all heard before go something like this:

"You have to look out for Number One--yourself!--in this life."

"You have to get THEM before they get YOU in this dog-eat-dog world."

"The only people who really matter are the 'winners' of life, and you can tell who the winners are, because they have more money, more influence, more power, more fans, more muscle, and more stuff."

"If you're a winner, you can do anything you want. The losers are forgettable."

If that isn't conventional wisdom, I'll eat my hat.  And it is that kind of conventional wisdom that leads people to bribe admissions official to get their kids into more prestigious colleges or universities.  It's the mindset that shows up when folks bellow and fume in inane and childish fights on Twitter. It's the rationale for always wanting to have a bigger stick... or sword... or rifle... or cannon... or nuclear missile, so that you can get the other guy before he gets you.  We are drowning in the sea of conventional wisdom.

So it shouldn't surprise us that when God sends us a life-preserver on those billowing waves, the watching world thinks that God's way looks weak and stupid.  God knows that's what the world thinks.  God just doesn't care.  And even more significant, God won't get lured into a petty shouting match with the world that thinks God's way of saving the world looks like losing.  God is big enough not to need to answer every childish taunt or idiotic comment from the world, and God won't be baited into sinking to that level.  (This by itself should make it clear that God's way is NOT the prevailing conventional wisdom of the world's so-called powerful and expert classes.)

Now, to hear Saint Paul tell it, that is exactly what the cross is all about--God has chosen to rescue a world full of powerless nobodies and unschooled anybodies whom the world labels "weak" and "losers," precisely by becoming one of those "weak losers" too.  The cross looks like utter defeat, and it sounds like nonsense to say that the way to save anybody (much less the world) is by getting killed by your angry enemies.  The world, both the sophisticated minds of the intellectual crowd, and the folks who want shows of power and greatness, sees a man getting executed and says, "That's a terrible shame--if God had wanted to mount a rescue operation, God should have consulted us for advice and muscle."  The world's assumption is that the way to get things done is by having more force, more power, more guns, more missiles, or more money--possibly all of the above.  It looks at the cross and figures that Rome must be the hero of the story because it killed a troublemaker who was foolish enough to let himself get called "king" without bringing an army to back him up.  Jesus, the crucified one, must be the defeated opponent.

But Paul teaches us to see just the opposite.  Yes, the cross of Jesus doesn't look ANYTHING like what the world calls "greatness." But that's not a design flaw on God's part--it's actually the whole point of everything!  It's the world that's got it all wrong and bass-ackwards, as they say.  It's the loud yellers of conventional wisdom who bark about "winning" who are really so pathetically out of touch.  God's way of saving the world is decidedly NOT to play by the world's rules--those rules about winning and losing, about "greatness" and "weakness," they are at the root of the problem with us all in the first place!   Of course God doesn't redeem the world at gunpoint with an army or a team of lawyers and a pile of money--those things have never worked to solve things.  That would be like telling the drowning man that what he really needs is a lead weight tied around his ankle and a tank of water dumped over his head.  God refuses to use the expected methods of "conventional wisdom" because conventional wisdom is really so often just our way of defending our own sinful selfishness.  What we need--and what God does at the cross--is to rescue us from the terrible death-dealing morass of what the world calls "conventional wisdom" and "greatness."

That's what I think these days when I hear someone make a remark like, "Why would anybody risk letting homeless people stay in their church building, or let strangers into worship once the opening hymn has started?"  It's what I think any time I hear someone say, "We have to put ourselves and our own interests first--that's just common sense!"  It's what comes to mind when I hear parents teach their kids to 'punch the other kid before he punches you' to avoid looking weak." And it's what I need to remind myself of, too, every time I catch that same voice in my head that wants to judge the success of congregations by who has more people or more money or more followers of Facebook.  All of those, from the need to have more missiles to blow up the world than your enemy, to the worry over whether your neighbor will think your kids are "weak," they are all evidence of the conventional wisdom of the world, which is the very thing we need rescuing FROM in the first place.

So of course, the way God mounts a rescue operation will look different from the world's standard operating procedures--they're the thing that's killing us in the first place.  That's why it makes its own kind of perfectly upside-down sense that God's way of saving us is through death, through weakness, and through loss: because the un-ending race to "win" and look "strong" has really been killing us with a slow, terrible death. 

Now, if we dare to take the message about the cross seriously, it is going to dramatically change how we see everything else--including our own lives.  It will mean we care less and less about looking tough or impressing our neighbors. It will mean we no longer need to rely on having more sticks or sabers or shotguns or surface-to-air missiles to feel secure or keep us safe.  It will mean we no longer have to call attention to our titles, our degrees on the wall, our professional status, our tax bracket, or our kids' varsity jackets to make us feel acceptable.  In fact, we won't need to seek our own advantage anymore, because we will see that God's way of saving the world frees us from that tired old rat race once and for all.

Taking the upside-down perspective of the cross is going to mean serious revision to how we evaluate our lives, and that will take work.  Maybe a lifetime of rethinking what has mattered all along.  So maybe for today it is enough to begin to ask the question: what things have we accepted as "the way the world works" that are actually killing us?  What things have we assumed to be true because we were told they were "common sense" but are really at the root of our pain as humans?  And what might it do to the day in front of us to let the Crucified Christ turn our old picture of victory upside down?

What if we just didn't have to care anymore what the world thought "success" or "greatness" or "winning" looked like... and what if instead we could simply look to the cross for a new vision?  What if we dared to be immersed in God's foolishness?

Let's dare it today.

Lord Jesus, turn our old vision of the world upside down in the light of your way of saving that same world.

A Long Day's Dying

A Long Day's Dying--March 21, 2019

"After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), 'I am thirsty.' A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the wine, he said, 'It is finished.' Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit." [John 19:28-30]

"It is finished," Jesus says.  But, to be clear, what, precisely, was finished?  What was brought to completion in that moment?  What was finally brought to its conclusion and fulfillment in that moment?

I mean to ask, is this simply an autobiographical statement from Jesus about the end of his life, or was he saying that this death was accomplishing something?  Was the cross, in other words, just the scene of, to borrow a beautiful phrase of Frederick Buechener's, a "long day's dying," or was something else actually done, once and for all, as this tortured Jewish rabbi breathed his last on a Roman execution stake?

Well, I'll lay my cards on the table here.  It appears that the New Testament insists that this moment is more than just Jesus saying, politely, "I'm dying over here."  The final word from the cross in John's telling (and in the Greek, it is one elegant word, "tetelestai,") is a claim not just about the end of one human life, but about the completion of something that cannot be undone.  

The writers of the New Testament, John here included, are convinced that the universe is a different place because of this life given up--a life that in a very real sense, Jesus was giving away all along, as he healed, preached, taught, lived, and then died.  They are convinced that humanity has a different standing, a different relationship, because of Jesus' death.  And the New Testament would have us believe that this is a change that God has brought about, without our help, or assistance, or jump-starting it.  The new reality brought about by the cross of Jesus is complete on its own, and does not require our prayers to make it effective, our subscription to get access to its benefits, or our trying-hard to keep it from expiring or going sour like milk.  It is a done deal, and there ain't nothing that can undo it.

This, I think, is a really, really important point that the Scriptures insist on, but it's also one that we (at least we respectable religious types) have the hardest time with.  We always are looking to add to the cross like there is more needed to make it effective.  We treat it like yeast you have to "activate" in warm water before you can go putting into your bread dough.  There are lots of religious-sounding ideas of what else has to happen, but they are all variations on the same theme that you need to do your part in order for the good news really to be true.  Otherwise, so the respectable religious voices will say, it sounds like God is just giving redemption away at no charge.

And that, not to put too fine a point on it, is the very crux of the matter.  Literally.  The claim of the New Testament writers is that, indeed, God has given redemption away for free, completely, paid in full, check cancelled.  We don't even have to get the tip.  If Jesus really means something more than "I'm dying now," when he says, "It is finished," then we have to believe that "finished" means "finished"--that when Jesus says he has completed something, it really is complete, and he's not waiting for us to earn what he has already paid for.

The reason we need to be clear about this is that from time to time (I just read a piece with this problem earlier today) you'll hear those very serious sounding religious voices who insist that "You can't say that God has forgiven everything you've ever done and everything you'll ever do--that sounds like you're letting people off the hook and being lax about future good behavior!"  Or they'll say, "Don't make it sound like God's mercy is unconditional--people will never repent properly if they don't think they have to do it right first if they want grace!"  And all of that amounts to saying that on the cross, nothing is really finished--it's just a work-in-progress, waiting for you and me to finish it.  If that's really how things are--if God's forgiveness is only potential, or available, or a possibility, because of the cross--then really what Jesus should have said in his dying breath was, "It is partially started--act now and get your share of this!"

The thing we are going to have to come face to face with if we take Jesus' dying words seriously is that he really seems to think that he has accomplished the great act of reconciliation, not merely that he has begun a dialogue, kicked off an opportunity, or opened a door.  Robert Farrar Capon has a similar train of thought when he considers the opening verse of Romans 8.  Capon says:

"Saint Paul has not said to you, ‘Think how it would be if there were no condemnation;’ he has said, ‘There is therefore now none.’  He has made an unconditional statement, not a conditional one—a flat assertion, not a parabolic one.  He has not said, ‘God has done this and that and the other thing; and if by dint of imagination you can manage to put it all together, you may be able to experience a little solace in the prison of your days.’ No.  He has simply said, ‘You are free. Your services are no longer required.  The salt mine has been closed’.”

Either the cross really does finish something--and we really are already forgiven, reconciled, and justified from God's vantage point--or it is more like the cross is a helpful, but partial, down payment to be followed up with monthly installments on our part so that our salvation doesn't get repossessed.  We, in all of our respectable religiosity, want to keep adding fine print to the transaction in the name of propping up good morals, but Jesus really and truly insists that he has done all that needs doing.  The only question we can ask, if he is right (and I think it is a good assumption that he is), is what we will do with our lives, now that we are freed from worrying if we have done enough. If (correction: when) it turns out that I am still a mess-up, after having been forgiven, Jesus seems to have been willing to take that risk and gave his life up already anyway. Jesus, in other words, was willing to lay down his life for me, even if I never got around to being a better person, even if I struggle with drinkin' and cussin' for the rest of my life, and even if I am a thief nailed to the next cross over pleading, "Jesus remember me" in my dying desperation.  

Jesus really did complete something at the cross, more than a long day's dying. There are no payments left to make.

Today, then, maybe we can quit wasting our time (and Jesus' time) by trying to make the Gospel's free gift sound more reasonable and restrained.  Jesus will have no part of that.  It is either true that Jesus has paid it all in full, as it were, or the whole Gospel is a fairy tale--but there is no room for making the Christian faith into a self-improvement seminar where Jesus gets you started and then you have to pay the balance once the free-trial-offer has expired.  So instead of trying to tame grace by making it subject to the fine-print of showing sufficient moral progress, requiring adequate public shows of repentance, or insisting on a pray-this-prayer-to-make-Jesus-come-into-your-heart, what if we just let Jesus' words stand as they are? 

It is finished.  It really is.

Lord Jesus, let us dare to take you at your word.  Let us trust that you have reconciled us to yourself already, and then to live like that is true.

Scar Revision

Scar Revision--March 20, 2019

"When [Christ] was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed." [1 Peter 2:23-24]

I was listening to someone talking on the radio about our skin.  There was a panel of experts--some talking about proper UV protection and cancer prevention, others about moisturizing and cleansing, and the whole nine yards.  (I don't think I would have chosen this topic on an ordinary day, but I was a captive audience on a longer drive and was waiting for news headlines to come on at the top of the hour.)  Well, after a lot of only half-listening while the panel talked about SPF ratings and the benefits of cocoa butter, there was a medical doctor who talked about treatments that now exist for treating old scars.  And all of a sudden, I knew why I had been listening all along.

The expert on scars said that these days, the specialists don't talk about "scar removal" procedures anymore, but rather about "scar revision."  And at first, her distinction was to say that many times, doctors cannot completely remove all traces of past scars, whether from injuries, surgeries, or grafts.  That is simply not possible with medical and surgical technology at this time, and so most of the time, our bodies hold onto physical marks in some form or another of the hurts we have been through. But instead, the expert said, doctors can "revise" a scar--making things less pronounced, helping the body to heal more fully, making the marks more subtle and less jarringly noticeable.  They do not remove scars, but they revise them.

Well, now the conversation on the radio took a vital turn.  It was not simply about minimizing the physical presence of bodily scars--there was the chance to revise the meaning of the scars people have endured. And the expert said that was precisely what they aimed to do: to help people who had been through terrible, traumatic, even abusive episodes in their lives, to own the scars on their bodies in new ways--no longer as signs of victimhood or weakness or unworthiness, but of strength.  Scars can be revised, and so can their meaning--they can be signs of endurance, of healing, of the power that faces adversity and comes out the other side weathered but hopeful.

And in that moment, it occurred to me that the New Testament makes the same kind of claim for what happens at the cross.  The crucifixion of Jesus looks, to the watching world, like nothing but the ruthless execution of a troublemaking rabbi at the hands of a powerful empire cheered on by a feverish mob.  But the writers of the New Testament, like medical experts of our day, do the life-giving work of scar revision.  They do not remove the death of Jesus from the Gospel's story--not at all!  But rather, they give a radically new way to see what the scars of Jesus mean.  Instead of seeing a loser getting crushed by the victorious power of Rome, voices like today's from First Peter help us to see that the cross is God's way of winning over the powers of death and evil.  What seemed like a testament to the cruelty and near omnipotence of the Empire becomes a picture of the love that does not let us go, does not flinch, and does not give up, even through death.  What seemed like a terrible act of expedient violence to exert imperial control can now be seen as the perfect expression of God's power that is made perfect in weakness.  

In other words, the scars are still there, but they are revised.  The meaning of the cross is NOT that the powerful and the violent and the powers of the day get the last word, but rather that God's way of getting the last word is to outlast and out-love even the worst that Pilate or the crowd or the lynch-mob or the grave itself can do.  The scars of Jesus remain forever--even in the resurrection he wears the wounds--but their meaning is turned inside out.

And if this is possible on a hill outside of the city gates of Jerusalem two millennia ago, then the scars we wear can be revised, too.  Yes, in fact, that is exactly what the Christian life is all about.

For a writer like First Peter, that meant, for example, that when followers of Jesus refused to return evil for evil or abuse for abuse, it wasn't a sign of weakness or cowardice, but of great strength and courage.  The followers of Jesus were strong enough to endure the meanness of the world and not to become infected by it.  Like the civil-rights marchers of the 1960s getting beaten up by the authorities to protest segregation or having the police dogs set loose on them to speak up against Jim Crow, these early Christians showed the strength of their faith and their character by refusing to resort to hatred when they were hated.  The scars were not something to be ashamed of, but rather in revision could be seen as signs of strength and grace.

And today, when we bear scars on our hearts from carrying others' burdens, these are not signs of weakness, but rather of the strength of our love to keep on keeping on, even when it wears on us.  

The frustrated and depressed mother, aching over the pain of her child and sleepless from staying up to attend to fevers and fears, she is not weak or a failure--she is strong.  The dark circles under her eyes are not marks of defeat, but signs of her willingness to endure in love for her little one.

The friends who keep getting cursed out and yelled at by another friend caught in addiction, who gets mean when they get drunk and doesn't want to face the bridges they have burned, those friends who have the courage to confront and hold an intervention may feel like they are failing their friend, but really are revealing the strength of their devotion by having the courage to tell the truth.

For the person who risks speaking up for others who are getting picked on, who are excluded, or marginalized, even if it makes other people roll their eyes or turn their target sights on the one speaking up, that is an act of courage, of love, and of strength, not of failure or weakness.

For the one who calls out the hatred, racism, or bigotry around them where they see it, only to get angry internet trolls piling onto them, or un-friended on Facebook by people who didn't want to have their world shaken up, it is not a sign of weakness to refuse to answer name-calling with name-calling while still speaking up for those who are being treated as "less-than."  Refusing to sink to the level of the trolls is not weakness, even if some think it looks like running away from a fight.  It is a sign of strength to bear the rottenness of their words and still to speak truth and love without becoming poisoned with bitterness.

All our lives long, really, the things the world will look at and call us "losers" for, the cross of Jesus turns into a kind of scar-revision.  When we respond to hatred with love, the hurts we sustain for loving are badges of honor, not sources of shame.  When we carry wounds in our hearts from enduring hardship with others, those become marks of beauty.

Today, perhaps we can hold our own scars up to the cross of Jesus and find them transformed into signs of love and witnesses of strength, carried in our own bodies.

Lord Jesus, revise our scars.  Do not take them away, but change the way we see them, so that love and grace and strength can be worn in our own skin.