[Jesus said:] “Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets." (Luke 6:26)
For what it's worth, this is the only Bible verse I have posted up on the bulletin board in my church office, right above my head where I can't miss it.
It looks like this:
These words, which many of us heard in worship this past Sunday from the Sermon on the Plain, are a sobering but necessary reminder that the calling of Jesus' followers is not to merely say things that people want to hear, but to speak what fits with the character of Jesus. And even more challenging, Jesus suggests that if nobody is ever made uncomfortable by our voices, we may have stopped speaking from his vantage point and substituted it with our own. Apparently, Jesus is of the opinion (and I think we should believe him) that the perspective of God's Reign will always be out of step and out of sync with "conventional wisdom" in some way. God's priorities will always rearrange ours. God's methods will always run counter to our culture's mindset and its mantras like, "You gotta look out for Number One," or "Me and My Group First," or "Hit them first before they hit you!" If all we ever do is parrot back those slogans because we know they will be popular among many, Jesus says we have lost his message.
One of things that is particularly tempting and troubling about the moment in history in which we live is that inventions like the internet, and tools like social media, have the capacity to fragment us into little echo chambers who never have to hear things they disagree with or face facts that do not suit their preferred narrative. For all the ways that the internet is great, and all the positives that come with our ability to communicate instantly across continents, for endearing things like family photos to silly things like cat memes to profound things like compelling quotes, one of the curses that comes with those potential blessings is how easily our technology puts us into silos of like-mindedness. And once we have gotten sucked into them, it becomes harder and harder to say something that runs against the accepted view of the rest of the group. It becomes harder and harder to find other voices who don't sound like everything else the algorithm has pre-selected for you. It becomes harder and harder to even see information or hear a perspective that might have a valid point, and which might just change your mind... or color your current perspective in a new way... or at least compel you to consider someone else's point of view or where they are coming from. Once we get pulled into those echo chambers, like we have been dragged across the event horizon of a black hole and can no longer escape, it becomes very tempting only to say things that you know will be met with cheers from "your group."
In fact, sometimes we can even forget that there is anybody else out there who doesn't share our view. In those situations, we may want to pat ourselves on the back for how "Everybody I talk to agrees with what I say!" because we assume there's no one else who thinks differently or might offer critique. When we think that "all speak well of us," it may well be a sign that we have closed ourselves off in a little bubble, which we cannot see outside of--and therefore fall into the delusion that there is no beyond the circle of "my group" nodding in agreement with me. And once again, Jesus warns us here--something has gone wrong if I am convinced that everybody is in full agreement with me. It's either a sign I'm stuck in an echo chamber, or I have lost the message and perspective of Jesus (which always challenges us and pinches us at some point), or maybe both. To be faithful to the message of Jesus will always mean running into a certain amount of pushback from the world--either because grace sounds too good to be true, or God's welcome of outcasts and sinners seems too scandalous, or because the cost of discipleship sounds too steep to ears that want to be merely casual fans. If we are speaking from the perspective of our faith and it's not ruffling feathers somewhere, somehow, we have likely lost the living Word from God and have replaced it with safe, generic platitudes from the inspirational self-help bookshelf.
All of this begs a question, then: how do I know when I'm supposed to be provoking people, and how will I know when people's agreement or support is a good thing? Should we be suspicious of every "like" on a social media or every compliment we get from someone else? Should we deliberately run away from everybody who agrees with us? Maybe all of those unlikely suggestions mean that we need to be asking, "What does the character of Jesus lead me to do and say?" rather than worrying about whether we are liked or not, popular or not, or even "trending" or not. In other words, the way to discern how we speak, think, and act isn't by asking whether everybody around me agrees with it; rather, we look to the way and character of Jesus. Jesus had both throngs of cheering crowds and deep controversies with other people, and he wasn't swayed by either. Jesus neither avoided confrontation nor tried to be merely a pot-stirrer for the sake of sowing discord. He didn't set out to please people or acquire popularity, but neither did he avoid speaking words that gave people hope. Jesus' message and perspective were not defined by the question, "What will other people think?" but rather, "What does the perspective of eternity say about this?"
In our own lives, then, the challenge involves several things for us. For one, it's worth it to deliberately resist the algorithms and social media silos and to listen to people you don't agree with, as well as to practice having respectful but honest conversations in which you say things you know the other person will disagree with. It's worth it to get good practice at speaking in ways that can be open about where our perspectives differ--and how our faith leads us to the conclusions that it does--while being civil. And every time we do that, we offer an alternative to the world's ear-covering, silo-dwelling echo-chambers. Every time we show to someone the respect of listening to what they have to say as well as speaking honestly about what we believe, we remind them that it is possible to consider new information or different perspectives. Every time we engage people with both authenticity and decency, we model for anybody else who sees or overhears a different way of being in the world. And every time someone insults us and we do not respond by speaking insult back, or when they assume the worst about our position and we give them the benefit of the doubt in return, we are responding to that hostility in a way that points to Jesus. That's the goal no matter what: to point to Jesus, not just when people agree with what we have to say, but in the way we respond when people don't.
So please hear me clearly: I don't at all believe that it is our goal to be perceived as jerks or jackasses in the wider world. But at the same time, we should be prepared that if we are speaking and acting from the vantage point of the Reign of God, there will absolutely be times when others criticize, belittle, or reject what we have to say, and our awareness that it will happen should not stop us from speaking where Jesus directs us to speak. We may well be headed for good trouble if we are speaking the way Jesus did about God's surprising habit of blessing the poor, lifting up the lowly, welcoming the outcast, and giving away the farm for free. If that upsets others, so be it. As Jesus also reminds us, it was the false prophets of ancient Israel's memory who only said what people wanted to hear.
How will you and I speak words that flow from the character of Jesus today? And will we be brave enough to speak them no matter how they are received? That sounds like something to pray about.
Lord Jesus give us both your words and your courage to speak them with your kind of love, regardless of how they are received.
No comments:
Post a Comment