Monthly Archives: November 2011

And I am not…

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While TLC has its fair share of garbage shows like the infamously horrid “Toddlers and Tiaras,” the notoriously controversial “Sister Wives,” and the laughable yet lovable “Cake Boss” tonight my wife and I watched a new show that is pretty interesting. The show called “All-American Muslim” follows the lives of several families in Dearborn, Michigan as they live out an Islamic faith in America. While the show is obviously meant to show how “normal” Muslims are, if normal was somehow quantifiable, it provides an interesting viewpoint into a religion that so many people write off without a second thought.

While there are obvious differences between Christianity and Islam, there was an idea presented in tonight’s episode that Christianity in America undoubtedly purports. One of the people being followed on this show is attempting to get pregnant. Due to her inability to conceive she begins to struggle with the idea of once again donning the hijab. Her reasoning is that she feels that God is telling her to wake up by not allowing her to conceive and so by wearing the hijab God will then allow her to do as she desires. But I can’t just laugh off this idea that by obeying God certain blessings will be bestowed as something only Muslims assert because Christianity in America is pushing the same idea.

“Courageous” is a movie recently in theaters that discusses the idea of fatherhood. While I don’t want to spoil the movie for those who haven’t seen it, for the purposes of proving my point I have to talk about some key scenes. This movie follows the lives of a few individuals attempting to understand what God wants from them as fathers. Through heartbreak and loss it becomes apparent to these men that being a good enough dad just isn’t enough. So in the wake of a tragedy one man sets out to understand that which God desires of him as a father. Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting to be a good dad, this world could use a few more, but there is a problem with the thinking that by being a good dad is going to make your kids turn out right. This is part of the idea that shows itself in the movie, the idea that God blesses those who are obedient.

Two examples might be helpful here. First there is a scene where two of the men who signed the covenant are placed into situations that test their moral fiber. The man who tells the truth is promoted and the man who lies goes to prison. While its a nice story to get your point across, the world does not work in such a fashion. People are imprisoned for speaking truth and are allowed to walk free because of lies every single day. Are there situations when honesty frees and lies condemn? Most assuredly, but this is not a hard and fast rule. Also, this is a reality from which Christians are not free. Think of Paul who was imprisoned, or the thousands overseas imprisoned every day for clinging to a hope declared illegal. Does their faith and adherence to a promise not please God enough to set them free? I doubt it. In fact I have a sneaking suspicion that God is happier with his people outside the great U.S. of A than those who are within it. But even making a statement like that is problematic because it too is undergirded by this idea that in order to make God happy one must be faithful and pious.

There is another scene in the movie that pushes this idea and it is the scene where the father is giving his speech at church. One of the things he utters is almost a throw away phrase but I think it encapsulates the entire point because in his speech about being a good father he flat out states that he wants the blessing of God as if this were something he could guarantee by being a good father. I know that “Courageous” does not speak for all of American Christianity but I am hard pressed to find a place where this idea does not exist. The only problem is that this thinking turns God into a vending machine. I put in my dollar of obedience and get my snickers bar and all is well. This is not to say we shouldn’t want to be good parents or that we shouldn’t try to be faithful and pious but I think we need to recognize that being this way isn’t about getting God’s favor, its about acting the way we should act.

I had a close friend who was battling cancer. Everyone she knew prayed that she would be healed, that she would live a long and healthy life. But she didn’t. In January it will have been three years since she passed. She was one of the most selfless pious people I have ever had the privilege of knowing. Her faith inspired others, but it did not guarantee her recovery. Because faith doesn’t guarantee anything this side of death. It does guarantee that life will be easy. It does not guarantee that everything will work out the way we plan. It does not guarantee that God is going bless us in any way more or less than He does for anyone else.

Tonight as I was watching garbage TV I was also helping my wife grade. Her kids were doing memory work on the meaning of the Apostles Creed as spelled out in Luther’s Small Catechism. Although her kids were working on the Second Article my eyes happened to glance over at the First Article. It reads as follows:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.

What does this mean? I believe that God has made me and all creatures; that He has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them. He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life. He defends me against all danger and guards and protects me from all evil. All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.

The third to last sentence is the one that caught my eye. “All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me.” Blessings of life and home and food on the table come not as a result of my ability to do anything, but because of His ability and willingness to grant them. So why don’t all people get blessings then? Why are some homeless and some rich? I don’t know. I can’t answer that question. I once heard of a professor at my old seminary coining the phrase, “God is God… And you are not.” This phrase always seemed to me like a cop out. But the more I think about it the more I see the brilliance in its simplicity. I don’t understand God. I don’t know how He works or why things happen or why they don’t, and strangely I’m ok with that, at least for the most part.

I want to understand why bad things happen or why things go wrong. I want to be able to guarantee that my friends will overcome their battles with cancer and depression. I want to be able to guarantee that food will be on my table tomorrow and a roof will be over my head but I can’t. I can’t explain things and I can’t guarantee them. Not any amount of obedience or being the person I am supposed to be is going to fortify God’s hand of blessing in my life because I do not control God. God is God and I am not.

But that does not mean I am powerless in that ambiguity. Just because I can’t guarantee an outcome doesn’t absolve me from living the life I was created to live. This too is expressed in the explanation to the creed, “For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him.” The life I live is one resultant of the work God has done in my life, both in the redemptive narrative of Christ which is made manifest at the resurrection to come and in the daily blessings I receive as I await that hope. But I do things not because I can guarantee more blessings will come. Such a task is futile at best. One look at the way life is attests to that fact. Yet when I recognize that I am cared for in every way no thanks to my own effort I am freed to care for others. I don’t have to worry. I don’t have to be afraid. God is God… And I am not.

the men, the myths, the legends… JoePa and Luther

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For the past several days now it seems the biggest news story has involved college football icon Joe Paterno. Last night both the president of the university and JoePa were removed from their respective positions. But I wonder why so many people are clamoring for more. The alleged details of the situation are somewhat sketchy because it was an assistant that walked in on the man who actually is charged with rape who then told Paterno and then JoePa told the Athletic Director. In the eyes of the law Paterno fulfilled his duties and cannot be held culpable but it seems like more and more people expected him to do more and are now thrilled with his dismissal. Only, the assistant that actually walked in on the act, he’s still on the coaching staff at Penn State right now.

This is what is so intriguing to me about how people are reacting to this story and why it is getting so much media attention right now. The assistant walked into the shower room and found a young boy with an older man and did nothing. He did not remove the boy, he did not call the police, he walked down the hall, told JoePa and now JoePa’s 61 year legacy at Penn State is tarnished. Could JoePa have done more? Yes. Could this assistant have done even more? Yes. In fact each and every person associated with this scenario could have done and should have done more. That’s the problem.

No doubt this is a tragic situation, not only were young boys sexually assaulted, which would be enough to declare this situation tragic, but people proved their inability to care for other members of humanity. What I can’t figure out is why this is so shocking. Turn on the news every day and you will hear stories of rape, murder, fraud, betrayal and more too horrific to describe. It happens here at home in the US and it happens overseas. Families are separated, people are kidnapped, young children forced into becoming soldiers or worse, forced into the sexual slave trade, lent out to the highest bidder. Yet it is the situation at Penn State that has the media up in arms because JoePa didn’t do enough. Well guess what? Nobody does enough.

Today also marks another day in history. On November 10th, 1483 little Martin Luther took his first breaths. This is a guy who is responsible in large part for the defining event of the 16th century in Europe and in the Church, the Protestant Reformation. His little sheet of paper containing the now famous 95 thesis was not meant to change the world, it was offered up with the idea that some scholarly debate could be had. But guess what? He pissed off the wrong people and the rest is history. Yet for all the great things he did and all the fantastic theology that came from his pen people find his image tarnished. A black mark he can’t seem to escape is his little treatise about the Jews and their lies. Another one is how he wouldn’t come to the defense of peasants during their war but rather sided with the government and told that government to crush them. In fact, I could go on and on with story after story that people use to stain the legacy of Luther but I don’t need to because the point is clear, nobody does enough.

Scandals rock the world day in and day out because those people in leadership or those people who should know better don’t act like it. But what if they did? What if people acted the way they should act in and every situation they were ever presented from here on out? Would that guarantee happiness and joy for each and every person on this planet? Not by a long shot. Because the problem with humanity is not its inability to live according to the best way possible. The problem is that the ability doesn’t exist. I could sit here and wonder what life could be like if we all just got along only we can’t, its not realistic. Humanity at its deepest level is broken.

When a baby is born this is perhaps most obvious because the kid cares only for its own well being. As cute and cuddly as it appears, those cries and squawks and coos are all that kids way of reminding you that his or hers needs outweigh yours, that they are more important. We spend the rest of our lives trying to come to the realization that what we thought as a baby, our most primal instincts, isn’t true. That other people matter just as much as we do. No baby comes out of the womb with a note saying, “Go to bed mom I can wait to be fed.” No child is born with a cry that means, “Take some time for yourself dad I can wait to be changed.” This is one of the few things that is true of all human beings, our selfish nature. We have to teach kids to share. We have to teach the value of human life because it is not understood from the get go.

Thinking about people who have really stepped out and messed things up like Hitler, Chairman Mao, or any of the government officials who advocated the slaughtering of the natives so our borders could stretch from sea to shining sea it’s not so hard to see the humanity in them. Because they were living out the most primal desire of human beings, self preservation. Don’t get me wrong, Im not applauding or holding them up as exemplary figures in human history but before one goes accusing them as being monstrous one should first realize that monster also has a face and behind that face is the desire everyone has as a child.

So if this world sucks so much and if people are so broken what chance in hell do we have of making this world a better place? We don’t. People like JoePa and Luther remind us that even the best and brightest of us will screw up, sometimes irrevocably. But that does not mean this world is devoid of hope. It does not mean that there is nothing to which we can turn because there is. Christ. As fundamentalist as it sounds, the answer lies in the cross and resurrection because that event has redefined human existence. The truth of Christianity is not found in a code of conduct for a better life. It cannot be grasped fully and applied in a way that guarantees a better life. The truth of Christianity, that which it holds most dear is Christ himself. The living Son of God who took on this world and all it had to offer and defeated it. In that moment on the cross Christ took on all of the rape, murder, kidnapping, fraud and betrayal this world had to offer and when he rose again the power of those things was made null and death itself was destroyed.

That is what means to believe in a resurrected God, to stand in recognition of a reality greater than the one presented to us on a daily basis. But what does it look like to live in recognition of that? Well, in a lot of ways thats easier to understand than the event itself. Because when I recognize that all the things that plague me, all the things that bring fear to my life have been stamped out I can start living for others. The power of the resurrection in the life of a Christian is not the power to cure everything, escape all suffering, or live a life abundant in wealth, it is the power to be free from fear of this life. Fear that my needs won’t be met. Fear that it could end at any minute. Fear that I won’t be able to live up to the standard. The resurrection removes fear, defeats its power, declares it dead and declares you and I secure for all time. Yet it is up to us to determine how we will live in that security…

the distant triumph song

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Tonight I had a well needed respite from a hectic week of research, paper writing, work, sickness, and internship stuff. But rather than spend tonight sitting on my duff, a group of close friends and I decided to resurrect a tradition we had back in undergrad. During finals week a we would find a time to tackle the most heinous of food establishments, a chinese buffet. The food was good, the place was packed, and the company was great.

It’s nice every now and again to revive traditions from the past. Somehow those rituals, no matter how mundane or involved they may be, have a way of turning the clock backward to a time when life seemed easier, at least for me it did. Back when that tradition of demolishing buffets began I was five years younger and much more naive. Although I knew my wife we were not anything near a couple.  I hadn’t encountered the thoughts, fears, and struggles that came with my time in St. Louis. I had hope that I could be the one to change everything, the hope that those things that needed changing actually could change. For a moment tonight I was that younger dumber kid, and it was fun.

There was another tradition today that also brought me back, only not as far as a few years ago. During the service this morning the church celebrated “All Saints Day.” It’s a day set apart to remember those who have died in the past year. Of course a name and a face ran through my head, but it wasn’t a famous one. It was Sarah. As a part of the service today one of the traditions used to remember those dead is going up and lighting a candle which then signifies their presence. As I lit my candle I thought of her. How she was the first person my own age that I knew had passed. How those moments upon hearing the news were surreal and uncertain. How her death has shaped my life in ways I don’t think our actual friendship ever did. Sure it was a somber moment, however, it was also one that didn’t leave me stranded in the past. But before I can talk about that future, it’s to the past I must go.

This past week I spent time sick and studying. Part of the focus of my study was the role of God and divine messengers in book of Revelation. For quite a long time this controversial book has captivated audiences and distressed them just the same. It has been fought over, struggled with, and mined for all its worth. While some laud it and others abhor it, this week it became apparent to me that this book is in some ways the most helpful book in the New Testament. Helpful not because it’s some sort of road map we can find one to one correlation to our current situation, but because of the picture it paints of the church. The picture of a church that suffers, that struggles, and that fights daily. But beyond that, beyond the picture of the broken church is the picture of the risen and victorious Lamb controlling the drama as it unfolds.

There is something to that imagery of a Lamb who was slain but is now victorious that I really appreciate. Perhaps it’s the notion that someone else is in control. Perhaps it’s the notion that a helpless and feeble lamb has overcome the fiercest of enemies, namely death.  In a way its both, but in a way its so much more than either. In the mind of John that Lamb is most assuredly Christ. That slaying took place at the cross yet in being slain that victory won. Won in the resurrection, where that helpless Lamb led to the slaughter busted through the other side of death and broke death’s claim over humanity. This Lamb attested to in the book of Revelation is why I think that book is so helpful, because it reminds us of that reality. The reality that death is not the end.

This is the future I was reminded of again this morning as I looked at all those burning candles. There is something that separates the Christian narrative from other religious narratives and it’s not that you get to go to heaven. I am not sure how this became the end goal of Christian thought though I do have my own cynical theories. However, I’m not sure approaching the hope we have in Christ is actually helpful. In my own experience it actually makes things a little more confusing. Christ becomes the stamp on our hand that gets us into the club rather than the Resurrected Lamb who was slain.

This is why I think that imagery is so important, because the Lamb’s end what not its death. Death could not hold that Lamb. And just as that Lamb broke through and turned death on its head, we too will live again. This is the hope, not that we get to heaven, but that death is not our end. That in Christ we have died already. That just as he was the first to rise from the dead we too will one day rise again. I don’t know what that is going to look like when it happens or what it all means to sort this out as we continue to breathe here on the earth. But what I do know is that I’m tired of pretending the hope we have in Christ is one that allows us to escape suffering.

What makes us think that believing in God is going to make everything better? Yea I know there are verses about living life abundantly but I wonder what that means. What if living an abundant life meant a life lived without fear. No fear of today. No fear of tomorrow. No fear of the next day or the day after that. Not because all your bills are paid or your fridge is full, but because that fear that unites humanity has been removed from your life. That fear of dying, of not being remembered after you breathe your last, that fear that you won’t be able to provide and continue to matter after your time has passed. But that is not something we have to fear, because death is not the end.

I know I sound like a broken record. Perhaps you could care less about anything I’ve written here, but that isn’t going to stop me from writing it because as much as I want you to have the mind blowing realization that I have, I’m writing this because its hard to believe, and I need to remind myself of it. Life and death routinely frighten me to my core. I don’t know if bills are always going to get paid, if food is always going to be on the table. In fact, there have been many times money hasn’t been there when it was needed. But even more than that I wonder what will happen to my wife if I should die tonight. I wonder if I’m living this life for nothing. If the work I’m putting in and pushing toward is going to matter. And no matter how much I try to figure it all out I can’t and it scares me.

But that is why I write. To remind myself and hopefully remind someone else too. Because these things, though they matter, are not my ultimate end. There will come a time when I no longer matter to this world, but thats ok, because that is not my end. My end is with that Lamb who was slain. My end is on the other side of death. My end is the beginning of a life resurrected. My end is, as the old hymn goes, in that distant triumph song. The song sung by the Lamb. The song sung in the scriptures. The song sung by the church. And sung by a life lived in that reality.