Escape from the Spiritual Zombies--May 7, 2020

Escape from the Spiritual Zombies--May 7, 2020

"We know that we have passed from death to life because we love one another. Whoever does not love abides in death." [1 John 3:14]

The terrible thing about being a zombie (aside from that whole "eating brains" thing) is that you don't even know you're dead.

I'm no expert on the whole catalog of zombie movies and shows, but I think I get the basic premise. Whether they are "the living dead" like in the George Romero movies, or caused by a supernatural curse, or the result of a <gulp> global pandemic like in 28 Days Later, the gist of being a zombie is that you pretty much lose self-awareness and can only exist to feed the endless hunger for more.  To be a zombie, in the storytelling, is to be not exactly dead... but you're certainly not truly alive, either.  And as both your body and your mind decay, your whole purpose becomes centered only on self-preservation--eating to keep on moving, and moving to feed again, without end.

As I think about it, that's probably the scariest part of zombie movies--it's not so much that you could die if a zombie finally got a hold of you; it's the fear that once they do you in their grip, you become one of them...forever.  That's what keeps you up at night after the movie is over--the fear that you could be reduced to such a terrible, wretched state of being where you can no longer recognize others as anything but food for your unfillable belly, and where you can think of nothing else but your own gnawing hunger.  That sounds like a fate worse than death to me.

And honestly, I think that's the point of stories, shows, and movies like these. They make a point about just how truly awful it is to reduce our lives to an animalistic self-centeredness. They are exaggerations, to be sure, but zombie movies are meant to show us something about ourselves, and about the ways we let ourselves become dead inside.  And a silver-screen zombie is really just a caricature of the life that is lived centered only on itself... only on consumption... only on looking out for "me and my interests first."  It is the sort of existence that does not consider the good of the neighbor around you... and maybe even more piteous, that cannot any longer think in terms of the good of the neighbor.  It's like you forget how to do it... almost like the way you see in a classic zombie movie these moments where the walking dead show hints of the humanity they used to have, but no longer are capable of showing.

That is, in so many words, what the book we call First John says about our existence, too:  when we attempt to live our lives oriented inward--that "me and my interests first, and who cares about you?" mindset--we lose something essential to our humanity.  We lose something of being fully alive, and, not to put too fine a point on it, we become spiritual zombies, who lose more and more of the ability to do anything but feed our own endless hunger.  It is not even really a "life" anymore, but a state of being dead inside.  As First John says it, "whoever does not love abides in death."  That's exactly it.

Maybe all of us, at some level, have been abiding in death somewhere inside, and we haven't even realized it.  By definition, you can't "feel" when you start to go numb, right?

The worst part of it, of course, is that you don't even realize when it has happened.  Nobody ever sets out to become dead inside.  But it happens slowly, sometimes imperceptibly, as our compassion deadens and we lose the capacity to care about others, like neuropathy of the soul.  It happens subtly, usually presenting itself as something good and decent.  Nobody goes carrying banners that say, "I want to be dead inside!" or even, "I don't want to care about other people!" but it starts with mottos like, "Me and My Group First!" or "Nobody Can Tell Me What To Do, Because I'm Free!" and it just snowballs.  And from there it becomes easier and easier to decide that some other people just don't matter... and I become less and less willing to be inconvenienced for the sake of others' well being... and I become more and more inclined to treat the lives of others as disposable if it gets in the way of what I want.  

And the next thing you know, I have become numb to how cut off I have become from others... and how I have let my world shrink down only to a narrow view of me-and-my-interests.  That sounds like being a spiritual zombie to me--it sure ain't being "alive," even if all your efforts are focused on self-preservation.

Over against all of that is this vision we are given of life in Christ--of having been brought back from death to life, and of how that little resurrection within us draws us into love.  Not schmaltzy romance--which, so often, is really just a means of dressing self-interest up in eveningwear--but love for all, love for neighbors, love for faces and stories of both saints and stinkers alike.  That's what happens because of our life in Christ.  These verses from First John make the connection clear--when you have been pulled from the old deadness into life, it leads you to love your neighbor, because you are finally freed from that old deadness in your soul that was only focused on you.  Part of what assures us of the resurrection of our bodies beyond death is that Jesus has begun a resurrection of our hearts from their old zombie-like self-centeredness into a new way of being fully alive.

I think part of our contemporary problem is that we are unwilling to consider that we have been taught by some voices around us to call "success" or "freedom" or "the good life" actually requires some level of being dead inside, because we are taught to seek after our own personal interests, comforts, or whims before the needs of our neighbor.  And then to discover that it never leads to the abundant life we had been promised, well, that sets us up for a letdown.  I know it may seem a bit cliché, but there's wisdom in that line from the last Harry Potter novel, where J.K. Rowling writes, "Do not pity the living.  Pity... above all those who live without love."  It seems like something of an echo of the line from the Eagles' classic song, "Desperado," which rings in my ear, too: "And freedom?  That's just some people talkin'... your prison is walkin' through this world all alone."  

Look, it's probably a pretty rare occurrence in this world to have George Romero and his zombies, J. K. Rowling and her wizarding world, and Don Henley and the Eagles all adding their voices in chorus as back up singers for the same tune the New Testament is singing.  So when it happens, maybe we should give them a listen.  Maybe each of us has been dead inside at some deep dark place in our hearts, and we were taught to ignore it, or to think it was just a way of "standing up for your own independence."  And maybe we need to surrender that deadness again to Jesus, who keeps resurrecting our zombified hearts to full life again, every time we keep running back into "me-and-my-interests-first" deadness.

Maybe today's another day for a little resurrection.

Lord Jesus, in all the places we have let ourselves become spiritual zombies, call us back to life, and free us from just living for our selves, our comfort, and our convenience.

Quality of Life--May 6, 2020

Quality of Life--May 6, 2020

"Finally, all of you, have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind. Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for abuse; but, on the contrary, repay with a blessing. It is for this that you were called--that you might inherit a blessing." [1 Peter 3:8-9]

There's an old joke I love, framed as a complaint about a restaurant: "The food is terrible there--and the portions are so small!"

I know, I know--insert your own rimshot on the drums here.  And I know that it ruins the humor of a joke to dissect the way it works, but in this case, that's OK; it wasn't very funny as a one-liner in the first place.  The thing I value about this joke is how it reminds me that quantity isn't enough.  Quality is essential.  After all, having a huge portion of terrible food isn't appetizing.  What you want is a satisfying amount of genuinely good food.

Now, the reason I mention this is that sometimes religious folks talk about the kind of life we are given in Christ only in terms of quantity, rather than being a different quantity of life, too.  Too often, we hear talk about "eternal" life only in terms of a length of time, rather than understanding "eternal" as a different kind of life, too.  Jesus also talks about bringing "abundant" life in similar terms--and we can make the mistake of hearing that only as an amount of time, rather than hearing it as a differnt way of living our lives even now as well.

Now, as anyone who has lived through watching a loved one suffer through an extended illness will tearfully attest, sometimes it seems like modern medicine is only able to prolong death, rather than to restore the quality of someone's life.  And if you have been in that place before, enduring the suffering of someone you love, you know that just keeping a person's heart beating or lungs breathing isn't much of a quality of life.  The Gospel doesn't just offer us an infinite number of years of existence--the promise we are given is of, as another New Testament writer would put it, "the life that really is life."

And that's what I want to spend a moment exploring here.  I think somewhere along the way we allowed those "religious" voices to turn the Gospel message simply into, "Follow Jesus and you will get to live for an infinite number of years even after you die," while saying next to nothing about how Jesus' WAY of life was better, even now.  But that came at the cost of hearing how many times and ways in the New Testament we were given descriptions of how our quality of life changes because of Christ.  We turned Christianity into, "Believe these facts about Jesus so that you can still be a selfish, vindictive jerk forever in the afterlife," rather than, "Follow Jesus so that you are freed from the cycle of hatred and rottenness that runs rampant in the world around us, both in this life and beyond death, too."  And here in what we call First Peter, there is a reminder about how our lives in Christ are different, not just in quantity, but in quality.

At the heart of what First Peter says here is the core teaching of Jesus that we not respond to evil with evil, hatred with hatred, or reviling with reviling.  And we are taught not to do those things, not as a way of earning some other prize called "eternal life," but rather because it is an essential part of the new way of living life that has a Jesus-quality to it.  See, refusing to answer evil with evil isn't a means toward some other end--it is the way itself that Jesus gives us.  The life freed of the cycle-of-rottenness is itself a gift of grace.  It is the thing we are freed for.  It is the better kind of life--the life of blessing and blessedness--"to which we were called," as First Peter puts it.  Like Catherine of Siena wrote, "All the way to heaven is heaven, because Jesus said, 'I am the way'." 

So much of what passed for Christianity in the world around me over the last four decades of life has said something like, "Christianity is about how you get to life-after-death."  And everything was framed in terms of what necessary steps had to be taken in order to unlock the reward of some post-mortem prize called "eternal life."  Within that framework, all the different branches of Christianity were just seen as differing answers to "how you get to heaven after you die."  Some said, "You need to recite the correct answers from the creed," and others said, "You need to have had a moment where you invite Jesus into your heart and accept him as your savior," and still others, I was told, said, "You have to do a certain number of good deeds, or follow a sufficient percentage of the rules for a sufficient amount of the time," and some said, as if to cover their bases, "You need to do all of the above--doctrinal orthodoxy, righteous deeds, and a born-again-experience moment in your life when you specifically invited Jesus into your life."  And against that backdrop, First Peter's talk (and Jesus' talk, mind you) of not answering evil with evil was usually relegated to one of the good deeds you could do, like an optional merit badge project for Boy Scouts, or as something you could skip as long as you could recite the Apostles' Creed without flinching.

But that's just not how the writers of the New Testament themselves actually saw things.  They recognized that the life Jesus gives us is not just something that starts after your heart stops.  It is a kind of life we live now.  And it is not simply a matter of doing enough good deeds now, in utter misery and suffering, in order to reserve our spot in glory.  It is about a different kind of life that, by its very nature, is freed from the weariness of unending cycles of tit-for-tat getting-back-at-one-another.  It is a life freed from that hamster wheel of always attacking back... and then always looking over your shoulder to see if someone is going to get revenge for your act of revenge.  It is a life that feels more like an adventure and less like a treadmill, because we don't have to keep walking on the same old track of answering evil for evil and hatred for hatred.

I wonder, how might my day, my week, my year, my life, be changed if I could simply step out of that rut of always needing to "get back," always lashing back out when someone has been rotten, always seeing every interaction with others as a contest to be won?  What might I be freed from if I didn't let other people's rottenness determine my course of action in the day?  What could happen if I let love, compassion, humility, and kindness be the hallmarks of my life, rather than a constant drive to win arguments, demean people, or shut others down?

I have a hunch I would feel more alive, even right now.  I have a hunch I would call that kind of life, even now on this side of the grave, "eternal" and "abundant."  And compared with the petty smallness of needing to answer every insult with an insult back, I would say that kind of expansive, grace-filled, loving life sure feels like a little resurrection.

Lord Jesus, don't let us settle for the old way of living with bitterness and hatred, but pull us into your new kind of life even now, and let us dare to believe we can live your way of life beyond death, too.

Grief and Hope--May 5, 2020

Grief and Hope--May 5, 2020

"But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope." [1 Thessalonians 4:13]
The last phrase in that sentence makes a world of difference, and we need to spend some time with it. We Christians do not grieve as others do, Paul says. But that does not mean we do not grieve--it is simply that we grieve differently. We do not grieve as though we "have no hope," Paul says. But we do grieve. We do feel loss. We just cling to the conviction that even that loss does not get the last word with us.

You really need both halves of that to get a complete picture of how we Easter people think about death--it can't be just one piece or the other, or else you'll lose something important. On the one hand, we don't believe that death gets the final say over us. We all constantly lean on the promise that God does not let go of us even through death--as Robert Farrar Capon says, in death, all we lose is our ability to hold onto our own lives, but Jesus emphatically does not lose his ability to hold onto them. We are convinced--at least on the days our faith has not taken a beating--that we will be reunited with those saints who have gone before us. And we are further convinced that those "saints" are simply all those who have been loved into faith in Jesus, not a special elite class or a select few. So, not because God owes it to us to reunite us with those we love, or because the human spirit is somehow just unthwartable and keeps coming back, buoyant as ever, but rather because God is just deteremined not to let us go, we believe that death is not the end of us. And that means death is not the end of our relationships with others. We await both the resurrection of our friends, and the resurrection of our friendships, which is to say that we believe that even when death separates us, we will one day be able to relate to and love those we have lost. Once again, we will be reunited and rejoined to those we love, and so our memories of them do not have to have the despairingly heavy weight of finality. We are never at the end--at least, so we have come to believe, because we believe in the God of Lazarus, the God who raises the dead. And so, just as Paul says, we don't grieve the way the world grieves--we do not grieve as people who have no hope. We do have hope. It is real, and we bank on it.

But that said, we do grieve when death separates us from those whom we have loved. That's important to hear--it's not that Christians don't grieve, but that we grieve differently. That keeps us honest, because it does hurt when we are separated from those we love. It does hurt--it rips us open--to lose a loved one to death. We may eventually land and settle in a place of peace about the God who promises to raise the dead and to roll away the stone, but the way to that place of peace is through honesty about our loss. There's just no way around it. So it's a distortion of our faith if we tell those who grieve, "Don't feel sad. They're in heaven now." We have that confident hope, yes, that our loved ones, those "brothers and sisters" in the faith whose lives God has not let go of, are indeed in the presence of God. But we still feel sad. We feel sorrow. We feel helpless. We feel hurt--and to be honest, it is precisely because "they are in heaven now" and we are in our lives as usual. It is the separation, our being pulled away from them, that makes us sorrowful, even if not the thought that their lives are lost. Easter people still weep for those they love and have lost--there were tears, after all, on that Easter morning on the way to the tomb, and there were still sorrows even on Easter evening as those two walked the Emmaus Road.

In fact, it is because people matter, and matter so deeply, that we grieve when we are parted in death. It is because we believe a human life is so precious and valuable that we hurt so much when their lives are separated from ours. Even when we know full well by faith, even when we have rock solid confidence, that we will be reunited at the last with those whom we have loved in Christ, we hurt to be pulled away from them, exactly because they matter so much to us and we have loved them. You could say it this way, I suppose: it is because people matter to us that we grieve, and it is because we are convinced that people matter to God that we have hope.

That surely gives a different spin to our way of talking about death and separation as Christians. If all we had to offer the world was a forced, candy-coated, smile and the insistence that we are happy all the time even when we lose people we love, the world would see right through it and know it was a lie. And for that matter, the watching world would ask whether we really cared about those for whom we grieve, even with our hope of seeing them again, if we never let our guard down or never admitted that it hurt.

But that cannot be the last word for us, either--Christianity is not just a program for learning how to be sad honestly. There is hope--the hope that as much as we have loved those we have lost, the living God loves, and continues to love, them even more deeply, and has an even tighter grip on them. That is how we talk about our hope and our grief together--with the honest confession of our wounds, and with the truthful hope, not just that there is one who will tend to our wounds, but who will never let go of those who have been pulled from us, and who indeed, will mend us all back together, on that day when "God will be all in all," as Paul says elsewhere, at the last. Whatever of each of those two, grief and hope, you bring with you today on your way, in any case, what we are invited to do with both of them is to bring them to God. We hold them in our hands, and we say, "You take these, and you make something out of them." And we trust... with tears of one kind or another (grief and hope sometimes each take that form, as you know) that will be enough.

O Lord, for whatever losses we have known, we offer to you both our sorrow at the pain of separation, and our hope that your grip will not let go of us. Mend all things, as you have promised, Lord--both the rips between us and the tears within us.

This Again?--May 4, 2020

This Again?--May 4, 2020

"Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.' So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong." [2 Corinthians 12:7b-10]

The risen Jesus, the Scriptures note, apparently has special powers and abilities beyond our own. He can appear behind locked doors, travel at superhuman speeds, and produce miraculous catches of fish, among other things. But one of the most underappreciated (but especially needed) talents of the risen Christ, it would seem, is extraordinary patience.  

The risen Jesus keeps bearing with us when we are dense, doubting, or don't get it.  And he doesn't give up on getting through to us, even when we keep banging our heads into the wall chasing after things that are not good for us.  Long after I would have sent Paul away with a frustrated, "This again?" Jesus keeps listening, keeps bearing with him, and keeps pointing Paul toward something better.  I would not have that sort of long-suffering compassion, I confess.

We don't know what this "thorn in the flesh" was that Paul wrestled with.  Some scholars think it was a physical sickness, or maybe an ailment that affected his eyesight because of some comments he makes elsewhere in his letters.  Others think he was afflicted by depression, or that he was taunted by demonic voices.  Still others just think that there was some other person in the church who really, really got under his skin.  In a sense, it doesn't matter what the specifics were.  What seems noteworthy to me on this day is that Paul keeps going back to thinking it would be great if the Lord would remove this thing.  And throughout three different seasons in his life asking about it, time after time after time the response from the Lord was, "No--this is not the right thing for you.  No, I know you think that pursuing this will be good, but it will not.  No, what you need is what you already have: me."

For a lot of my life, when I have read this passage, I have entered it from Paul's vantage point.  I know what it's like to keep asking and asking and asking, to keep seeking in prayer, and for only answers back to come as silent "nos".  I know what it's like to be sure--absolutely sure--I know what the next good and right thing is... only to have the door swing shut and the possibilities closed off.  And in those moments, sometimes we want to assume that if Jesus is really risen from the dead, he should be giving us the things we ask for.  

But today I've been thinking about how this whole recurring conversation must have seemed from Jesus' vantage point.  And when I think for a moment about what it must be like for the risen Jesus to bear our habit of again and again and again seeking after the things that are not good for us, it amazes me that Jesus doesn't zap us with lightning or at least smack us upside the head on a daily basis.  It's got to sound sometimes to him like we are that acquaintance everybody has who keeps getting swept up in one shady investment proposal or pyramid scheme after another, who keeps asking you to "get in on the ground floor" because "this time it's gonna be a gold mine for sure!"  Or that we're the relative who calls on the phone sporadically, every time from a different city and state, trying to convince you (and maybe themselves) that this new set-up they've got will work out "this time," but... also asking you for some money ("a loan!" they insist) to help them out "just this one last time."  Sometimes it's got to seem to Jesus like we are addicts who keep falling off the wagon asking for you not to tell anyone else that they're drinking again, because they're sure they can handle it all by themselves this time.  And each time in those episodes, the answer has to be "No" because of love... because the thing we are SO sure would just make everything great for us is really not the best thing for us.  And we just refuse to see it.

I am continually amazed that the risen Jesus refuses either to become our vending machine and just give in to every prayer request (even the terrible ones) just to get us to believe in his power, or to zap us with divine judgment when we seek repeatedly for the wrong thing.  Instead, Jesus shows a patience I have a hard time mustering for others in my life, and he remains firmly committed to give Paul what is really best in the big picture.  When Paul starts complaining, "But everybody else I know doesn't have to deal with this thorn in the flesh that I have!" Jesus' response is still, "I know, but I need you to trust me on this one--it is better for me not to give you thing you are asking for."  And when Paul starts over again, praying, "What's the harm that could come from me not getting this?" Jesus' response is again, the firm but loving, "This is not what you need.  It's not what you need, and it's not what is good in the big picture."  And then when Paul, even later in his life, tries to bring it up all over again (still surely thinking, "But THIS time it will be different!"), I am amazed that Jesus doesn't just throw angry fists down and shout, "This again?"

Instead, over and over again, there is graceful patience that puts Paul (and us) back on course again, and that bears with us when we seem hell-bent on running off in the wrong direction down some rabbit trail or chasing after mirages.

And that, if I am really honest, is really what I need.  It's what all of us need.  Look, I know me.  I know us.  We are wayward, thick-headed, stubborn, easily-fooled sheep, and we need someone who will both say "no" to us with love when we are chasing after a mirage or want to spend our last dollar on snake-oil, and who will also still answer the phone when we call at 3:00 in the morning, swearing that "this time" it will be different.

That's the power of the risen Jesus we most truly need.  I don't usually need someone to appear out of thin air a la Harry Potter like a parlor trick, and I don't need a miraculous catch of fish.  What I do need from the resurrected Christ is someone whose love even longer-lasting than my habit of running down dead-ends.

Thanks be to God for the wisdom to know when and where to say No to us... and who refuses to give up on us at the same time.

Lord Jesus, let your power be made perfect in our weakness, and let your patient wisdom be our guide, today and always.

Walking Out of the Cemetery--May 1, 2020

Walking Out of the Cemetery--May 1, 2020

"So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also with be revealed with him in glory.  Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). On account of these the wrath of God is coming. These are the ways you also once followed when you were living that life. But now you must get rid of all such things--anger, wrath, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourself with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according ot the image of its creator." [Colossians 3:1-10]

So, let me pose a question:  why should I not be a jerk to other people?

(Ok, an aside to my own question: if you really have to ask yourself why you should not be a jerk to other people, you are probably currently being a jerk.  But Lutheran realism requires us to admit that indeed, we are all probably, at some level currently being jerks in some way.)

I pose this question because there are a lot of bad answers to it, and sometimes the worst ones have the veneer of religiosity to them.  And none of the bad answers are rooted in the resurrection, which is where the writer of Colossians goes with this.

Let's weed out some of the wrong answers so we can clear some ground for a good and true one to sprout from the soil.  Ok, so one approach is basically a utilitarian one: I should not be a jerk insofar as being a jerk gets in the way of me getting what I want.  This line of thinking says, "If you are rude, disrespectful, angry, scheming, and deceptive to other people, you will lose friends and allies and have a harder time getting what you want.  So most of the time you should be polite." The trouble with this line of thinking is that it still leaves the door wide open to being a complete jerk to others when you think it will get you what you want... or when you think it doesn't matter one way or another.  In other words, all that matters is Me-Getting-What-I-Want, and whether or not it is actually "right" or "good" to treat someone else crudely doesn't even factor into the equation.  This is the kind of self-centered narcissism that is on display around us all the time, and honestly, because it is so commonplace anymore, it is sometimes hard to remember that it is not OK.  It is sociopathy.

So, a second possible answer to the question, "Why should I not be a jerk to people?" often gets raised by religious people--at least the ones who are courageous enough to reject the first approach discussed above.  (And, ok, another moment of painful honesty, there are a painfully large group of "religious" folks who seem perfectly willing to accept the utilitarian logic of "I should be polite if it will get me what I want, but if not, being a jerk is acceptable, too... or at least, I will look the other way when powerful people act like jerks to others if they will do a favor for me later."  But that is a conversation for another day.)  The most common "religious" answer to why we should not be jerks boils down to a points and demerits sort of assumption about how God works.  This train of thought says that we shouldn't be jerks because we will lose "God-points" on our permanent record, and if we lose enough points, well then, we could be in danger of losing our salvation, or of going to heaven, or however we conceive of the "rewards" we imagine the angels are waiting to dole out.  

Now, this approach might seem a little less sociopathic than the "I'll act in whatever way gets me what I want" tactic, but it still boils down to the logic of self-interest.  It's just willing to consider that God is the one to avoid upsetting, not just other people.  But if my reason for not being a scheming, lying, malicious, jerk to other people is just that I'm afraid of going to hell if I act that way, again, I'm really just trying to work the system to avoid pain and to seek something positive instead.  And worse still, it suggests that our relationship with God is really still just a matter of bean-counting good deeds and bad deeds, like we earn our way into heaven, or at least earn our way out of hell.  And if that's how it works, well, then Jesus is entirely unnecessary to the whole system.  We can skip the cross and the resurrection, in that case, because it turns out that God just doles out punishments and prizes based on your tally of points.  I hope that will make it clear that even the "religious" answer ("Don't be a jerk because it will lose you points with God") is simply unsatisfactory.

Well, where does that leave us?  Maybe by now we have cleared enough ground that the resurrection-rooted answer from Colossians can rise and bloom.  Because the writer of Colossians is indeed very clear that for us who are in Christ, it is not optional, but essential that we give up the old patterns of rottenness.  But as he fleshes out his thinking, you'll notice that there is no talk of points, no talk of earning, and no talk of losing something that you have already been given.  It's not, "Be good, or else God will kick you out of the club and you'll go to hell." But rather, it's all about the resurrection.  

The writer of Colossians says, "Your old self is dead, and your new life has already begun in Christ, who is risen from the grave.  So you don't have to go back to those old patterns of meanness and greed.  You don't have to exhume that deathly old "Me and My Interests First" thinking.  And you sure-as-heaven don't have any reason to be abusive, crude, malicious, or deceptive in what you say."  All of those things are from our old self, the dead self--and when we feel the impulse to revert to them, it's like we are out digging up our old corpse in the cemetery to wear our decrepit, moldy burial outfit.  And that's disgusting.

Notice how the logic has nothing to do with "What you will get in return for your behavior," either as reward or punishment.  Instead it has everything to do with "what we ARE in Christ"--which is resurrected with him, and dead to our old selves.  That means that the reason not to be a jerk to others isn't simply that it could get in the way of my getting what I want. And it's not just that God will give me demerits for not being polite enough.  It is, rather, that we aren't meant to be those people anymore.  

So, when we find ourselves reverting to lies or scheming or wrathful, angry talk, or mean-spirited threats aimed at those we don't like, we have to hear the New Testament writers calling us out on it.  It is NOT OK.  It is not acceptable.  It is not how we act--it's just not who we are.  But don't hear it like a threat--like if you're too rude for too long, your heaven membership will be revoked.  Rather, hear it like a call to remember whose you are: you have been raised with Christ.  The old, scheming, crude selves, they aren't "us" anymore.  Running back to those old ways is like wallowing in the graveyard, rather than living fully.

And that's just it: Jesus is always about the business of bringing us more fully to life.

So the next time you find that self-centered, greedy, wrathful, scheming impulse bubbling up in you, open your eyes and recognize: you are digging up your own grave and trying to put the old burial outfit on again.  So drop the shovel.  Get up off of your knees in the dirt, and walk out of the cemetery.  Leave the old graveclothes behind.  You are already raised with Christ.  You are free to live like it.

Lord Jesus, we still struggle with the old self in us that doesn't want to stay dead.  Pull us close to you today so that we will remember who we are... and who we no longer have to be.

The Curious Case of the Missing Cross--April 30, 2020

The Curious Case of the Missing Cross--April 30, 2020

[Peter said to the religious leaders:] "The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins." [Acts 5:30-31]

So, I was today years old when I learned something really surprising: there's no cross in the book of Acts.  It has gone missing.

"Now, wait!" I can sense you thinking, "Jesus died on the cross before the story of Acts takes place!  That's why there's no cross! This is just a trick of the preacher."  And you would be half-right: the story of Jesus' crucifixion is told in the first part of Luke's two-volume work, what we call the Gospel according to Luke.  So yes, there is not another crucifixion scene in the sequel that we call Acts.  But that's not really what I have in mind... and there's no trick in what follows.  Check me on it if it seems surprising to you, too.

While there is no second narration from Luke about the crucifixion of Jesus, there are indeed lots of points where the followers of Jesus retell the story of Good Friday and Easter Sunday as they share the Good News with people.  And that's where the curious absence of crosses got my attention.  See, while Luke records people like Peter talking about how Jesus "was crucified," he doesn't ever use the word "cross" in the book of Acts.  That's weird at one level, because he obviously knew the word and had no problem using it in the first volume, where Jesus both talks about "carrying your cross" and has to have Simon of Cyrene carry his literal "cross" to the place of his execution. 

But here's the surprising thing.  In the book of Acts, while there is no mention of a cross, there is, in its place, a "tree."

Now, you could say I'm splitting hairs, and you could point out that it's still a Roman death stake.  You could point out that the Romans didn't really care whether they strung you up from a dead wooden post or tied you up to a tree--the point wasn't the uniformity, but rather the cruelty. And those things would be true, of course: sometimes they crucified you on a beam of lumber, and sometimes they would use a tree--just like in the American South the smiling crowds of churchgoing folks had no problem lynching people from a live tree or a gallows.  Dead is dead, right?  Domination is domination.  All of that is true.

But I don't think that Luke is being sloppy here.  I don't think it's a slip of his pen that every instance leading up to Good Friday sees this instrument of torture as a "cross," and then that every mention on the other side of Easter talks about it as a "tree." I think there is a method to Luke's madness, and it is the difference between cut lumber and a living plant.

On the other side of Easter, Luke starts calling the cross a "tree" because even the instrument of death itself has become the means for life.  And this is the real genius of Luke's storytelling: he wants us to see that what the powers of the day used for death, God used for bringing life.  What the empire and the crooked, arrogant emperor on top of it saw as a means of domination, God used for liberation.  What Caesar, Pilate, and the religious leaders intended to use to condemn, God used to save and set free.  What the political and religious leaders saw only as a cross (dead and death-dealing), the followers of Jesus could now see as a tree (alive and life-giving).

This is the transformation that Jesus' resurrection accomplishes--even the means of death itself becomes the instrument of life.

And if we can recognize that subtle but powerful change in the way Luke words his story, maybe we will recognize God transforming the marks of death all around us into signs of life.  Maybe there's no place in creation that is off limits to God.  Maybe the very things we think are no good, not usable for good purposes, and utterly hopeless become the elements through which God brings all of creation to life again in Christ.

All of this conversation reminds me of a brilliant insight of Frederick Buechner's. He writes, "A six-pointed star, a crescent moon, a lotus--the symbols of other religions suggest beauty and light.  The symbol of Christianity is an instrument of death.  It suggests, at the very least, hope."  I think he's on to something.  Part of the beautiful scandal of Christianity (as opposed to the ugly scandals that happen when we pair our faith with the quest for political power, money, or televangelism) is that we have been dared by writers like Luke to use our faithful imaginations to see death-dealing crosses and life-giving trees.  And if that kind of transformation is possible, well, my goodness... God could use even the meager stuff of this day in the middle of a pandemic to bring about a little resurrection.

Here, O God, are all of our crosses.  Turn them into trees by your creative power.

Like It Matters--April 29, 2020

Like It Matters--April 29, 2020

"Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but eveyrthing they owned was held in common.  With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.  There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold.  They laid it at the apostles' feet, and itw as distributed to each as any had need." [Acts 4:32-35]

I'm going to say something here, and I am going to ask you to give me the benefit of the doubt to explain it before you start picking up rocks to throw at me.  Would you do me that favor?  Ok, here goes:

The early church did not grow merely because they told a story about a divine figure who rose from the dead.  The church thrived--and spread like wildfire--because they actually lived like the resurrection of Jesus that they preached about actually mattered.  

Now hear me out.  You could find plenty of religions in the ancient world that had stories about gods or heroes who went into the realm of the dead and came back.  Just about every culture had a sun god, and the celebration of its "return" after the cold of winter was usually told like a journey or a battle in the underworld.  There were heroes like Hercules and Orpheus, too, who went into those shadowy realms where deathly monsters waited, too. There's a running rumor, too (although it seems a little shaky, historically) that the cult of Mithras told a story about their god dying and rising, too.  And for good measure, the old Norse myths tell of Odin sacrificing himself on a tree in order to gain knowledge and wisdom, and then coming back to life.  But to be honest, in the first century you could tell any of those other stories about other gods and heroes that seem to die and rise and then just go on about your business with life as usual, as if nothing was any different.

In fact, for a lot of those ancient religions, the death and return of the gods was seen as a support for propping up the order of the day.  The Romans used their worship of the sun (whom they called "Sol Invictus"--the Unconquered Sun) as a way of reinforcing obedience to the state, the king/emperor, and the decrees of the empire.  Just as surely as the sun was always going to rise in the new day, Rome would be calling the shots, and you should do what the king said.  That sort of thing.  The myths of heroes who went into the underworld, too, didn't really offer any hope of changing or breaking the power of death--the heroes might survive their brushes with the grave, but they left the inner workings of death unchanged.  And therefore, for most of those other ancient myths and religions with, the world wasn't any different because of those dying-and-rising gods--if anything, the stories were used to teach adherents, "This is how things are.  This is how the world works.  It ain't changing for you.  Get used to it... and get back to work."

But the first followers of Jesus really were different in that respect.  They didn't see the resurrection of Jesus as a way of preserving the status quo--they saw it as the upending of the old order and the beginning of a whole new creation.  Jesus' resurrection wasn't seen as just an analogy for the repeated cycle of seasons or the setting and rising of the sun--it was seen as the breaking of the powers of death, the dethroning of all other powers and authorities, and a rearranging of old priorities.

After all, if Jesus really was risen from the dead and really promised resurrection for us as well, then, for starters it means that there's more to life than just making as much money in this life as possible for myself.  That undermined all the voices from the empire that taught people to look out only for their own interests.  And second, if Jesus really was risen from the dead, it meant that he was right about what he taught and commanded his followers to do--and that meant sharing your abundance, lifting up the lowly, giving to others, and trusting God to provide what was needed for the day.  And if those things were true, well it was going to mean a whole new way of living your life.

And I really do believe that's the connection here in Luke's mind as he tells us about the life of the early church in Jerusalem.  He connects their sharing of possessions with the apostles' preaching about the resurrection, because the one logically led to the other for the first Christians.  If Jesus really was alive, it made perfect sense not to waste your life in the present just piling up more money or stuff if you could instead use your resources to help out a neighbor--who is of infinitely greater value in God's eyes than your cash.  If Jesus really is alive, then surely we could trust God to give us our daily bread, and I don't have to live my life with clenched fists clutching my possessions. In other words, the early Christians actually let their belief that Jesus is risen affect their daily lives--all the way down to their wallets.  That was the evidence the watching world needed that said these people really believed what they said... and it also spoke hope for people who were just so weary by the rotten systems of the world as they knew it.

This, I have come to believe, is what really made the early church catch fire across all sorts of people, especially those who were on the margins in the first century.  Women were treated like they mattered--in fact, they were the very first preachers of the resurrection!  Slaves were treated like they belonged, and those in high estate were taught to treat all with dignity and humanity regardless of their income.  Foreigners were welcomed.  The poor were told that they were specially beloved and blessed by God.  The outcast, the sick, the grieving, and the brokenhearted--the "least of these"--were all treated like they really bore the face of the risen Christ.  And because the early Christians actually arranged their lives, their routines, and their finances around that, it drew people.  

And maybe even more than that, the early Christians taught and believed that Christ's resurrection meant that the old order, the old system, and the old powers-of-the-day were dead men walking, rather than using the resurrection news to reinforce the status quo.  The early Christians did not say, "Jesus is risen, and therefore Rome will last forever, so get used to being ruled by a foreign empire and an arrogant blowhard on the throne." But rather, they said just the opposite: "Jesus is risen, and therefore the days of every empire and emperor are numbered, because God's new reign of abundance and justice and mercy for all is breaking in around us."  The resurrection of Jesus was the reason the early church dared to share their bread.  They lived like Easter Sunday actually changed the way they lived, acted, and used their money on Monday through Saturday. And that turned the world upside down.

If there is a reason folks think the church is dying in places like 21st century America, I think it has almost nothing to do with Christians not getting special treatment or whether there is prayer in schools or there being a multiplicity of religions around us in the public square. That's exactly the incubator in which the Christian faith first grew and spread.  No, I think the reason it can feel like the church is dying is that we have stopped acting like the resurrection really matters to how we live and work and share.  We have decided that the resurrection is only about getting a spot in the afterlife, but that everything else in the world will just stay as it is forever, unchanged, because "the way things are must be the way God has willed them to be," and therefore the hungry and poor should just accept their lot in life, and the wealthy and privileged should thank providence they were elected to comfort in this life.  We have decided that Jesus' resurrection doesn't get to affect how I use (or hoard) my money, and we have all collectively agreed that Easter can't make me rearrange my life around the needs of my neighbor.

And to the watching world, all that says is simply, "The resurrection those Christians talk about doesn't mean anything, not really. It doesn't even change the way they spend their money."  And if all we have to share with the world is one more myth about a dying-rising god like Odin or Osiris or Mithras, but one we treat like it's "just a story," you might as well pick one of those other stories to tell, because they are even more fantastic in their spectacle and special effects budgets.

If we want to see the church thrive, maybe it is time to stop acting like the resurrection is just about reserving a spot in the afterlife while leaving the present world unchanged.  Maybe it is time to let the news of Jesus' resurrection overturn the old orders of our lives once again so that we share our resources without fear, so that we give up the damnable thinking of "Me and Mine First," and so that we look out for those most vulnerable and weak before we pad our own pockets.  

That would get the world's attention.  I know it would get mine.

Lord Jesus let your resurrection rearrange our priorities, revitalize our practices, and renew our passion.  Let us live like your resurrection matters... today.