A Fierce Kindness--January 20, 2023

A Fierce Kindness--January 20, 2023

"For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian." [Isaiah 9:4]

When it comes right down to it, God chooses to be the One who disarms bullies, frees captives, and stops abusers--not the one who backs the powerful simply because they are powerful.  Knowing the difference not only helps us to see God rightly in the world, but also helps us to know how to navigate the world in the footsteps of God's kindness.

Getting that confused, on the other hand, does a terrible disservice to God's reputation in the world, and makes it harder for people to let themselves open up to the love of that God.  It matters, in other words, how we picture God, how we understand what God is up to in the world, and how we let God break apart the boxes we keep building to try and force God inside.

Let me back up for a moment. In fact, let's shift gears and talk about something entirely separate from God and the Bible for a moment.  Indulge, for a moment, my inner nerd with a bit of Star Wars lore. In my favorite Star Wars movie, The Last Jedi, a young promising student named Rey comes to legendary Jedi Master [now with a salt-and-pepper beard] Luke Skywalker, seeking his training so that she, too, can learn to be a Force-wielding Jedi like him.  Skywalker asks her what she thinks she knows about the Force, and she replies, "It's a power that the Jedi have that lets them control people and make things float."  The grizzled old Master answers back, "Impressive--every word in that sentence was wrong."  The Force, he insists, isn't a power you have that you can compel to do your bidding, but an energy beyond anyone's mastery that binds all living things together.  In other words, she came knowing some of the right words she had heard before ["the Force," "the Jedi," the "Dark Side," and such], but not really understanding what those things meant.  And from there, well, Rey can't help but get every word wrong.

Maybe it's easier to see something like that happening when we are watching it on a screen in a sort of blockbuster space-fairy-tale that takes place "long ago in a galaxy far, far away" than to have to face the ways we so easily do the same with God.  But... we do, in fact, get things terribly wrong with God sometimes, and we end up misrepresenting who God is.  This passage from Isaiah is one of those moments we have a chance to hear carefully and to get it right.

Here's what I mean.  Often, our talk of God starts with just picturing the "Biggest" thing we can--we speak of God as "the Higher Power" or "Supreme Authority" or "King of the Universe" or "Architect and Designer of the Cosmos."  And those aren't necessarily wrong, but it's really easy to start with just picturing God as the power or authority that props everything else up, and from there to say, "Whoever has power or authority or might in the world must therefore have it because God has authorized them to have it."  We end up saying things [as happened for a very long time in medieval Europe, for example] like, "Whoever is king is in charge because God has appointed them to be king, and therefore to resist the king is the same as resisting God."  Or we end up saying things [as happened for a very long time in slaveholding America, for example] like, "Slaveholders are backed by God's authority and ordering of things, and so the enslaved should not seek their freedom or question The Way Things Are."  Or we come to conclusions like, "Everybody who is in a prison cell is getting their just punishment, and they should rot in jail behind bars forever for doing whatever bad things they did, because God's authority rubber-stamps whatever punishments or sentences our systems come up with."  We end up just picturing God as the Cosmic Muscle that enforces human authorities.  And we end up with terrible theology that says things like, "The bombs destroyed your village because God willed for that more powerful neighboring nation to invade you," or "God wants you to stay in an abusive relationship because God endorses The Way Things Are," or "It's wrong to work for release and rehabilitation for those who are imprisoned, because God's justice demands they suffer enough."  We start by just picturing God as the "Power Behind the Powers of the Day," and don't realize how far afield that leads us from who God actually is revealed to be in the Scriptures.

Here in these words from Isaiah, for example, God's kindness shows up as God disarms the bullies who have harassed the listeners, as God breaks their weapons and stops the enemy armies who have attacked them.  God's kindness takes a side to stop the abuser, to let the oppressed go free, and to break the weapons used by bullies to intimidate the people.  God takes a stand with those who have been intimidated and hurt, and God chooses to stop the ones who have made them afraid.  That's who God is, to hear Isaiah tell it.

That's a big deal, because like I say, sometimes in history--including very much in Christian history--we have made the colossal mistake of defining God first and foremost as the one who props up all the other powers, armies, generals, tyrants, dictators, and bullies of the day.  When we start there, we are always going to end up confusing God for an idol of "order" that preserves "The Way Things Are," rather than recognizing how often the real and living God shakes things up by releasing the captives, disarming the bully, and breaking the power of the oppressor.  It's God standing up for the enslaved Hebrews against Pharaoh and delivering them through the Sea... and God listening to Hannah's prayer and giving her a son, Samuel... and God preserving Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace against Nebuchadnezzar... and God saving Daniel in the lions' den... and over and over and over again.  If we actually read the Scriptures we get the picture of a God whose heart is turned in kindness toward those who are threatened, rather than God as the Source of Power for the powerful.

And what's more, God doesn't intend for the ones who have been picked on or bullied to just in turn become new bullies or oppressors, either.  God doesn't say, "Your enemy has a rod, so I'll give you all some weapons, too, and you'll just fight it out and we'll see who comes out on top."  God doesn't believe that the way to fight an oppressor with a rod is to give more rods, sticks, swords, and spears to the oppressed ones, so they'll turn around and abuse in return.  Rather, God breaks the weapons of the enemy and disarms the bullies.  God is fierce, to be sure, but it is a fierceness that comes from a place of kindness and love for those who are most easily forgotten or ignored.  That's who God is.

I wonder, where are there places in our own lives where we have been living with illusions or confused mental pictures of God?  Where have we settled for thinking of God as just the Authority Figure who backs up all the other voices who claim to have "power" and "authority," and where have we missed God's actual presence in the world as the One who stops bullies, makes abusers cease, breaks weapons, and disarms the aggressor?  Where might we need an Isaiah [or a Luke Skywalker] to speak with honesty and love, "Every word in that bad theology of yours is wrong," and maybe show us a clearer picture like this one from Isaiah 9?  And if we do come face to face with the realization that we've been getting it so wrong for so long, will we dare to let go of our idols and imaginary pictures of "God" so that we can be drawn closer to the living God whose heart is kind?  Or will we choose to dig our heels in and hold onto our illusions because they are familiar, and don't require us to change?

There's the choice, today and every day.  God is pretty clear here about who God chooses to be--the one who disarms the enemy and breaks the weapons of the oppressor, so that nobody has to live in fear anymore.  Where will we go from here?

Lord God, help us to see you honestly, beyond our illusions and idols, and to be a part of your work of kindness and release in the world for all who live in fear.