Follow That Salmon

The discipline of moving against the flow… This is a practice of discipleship that seeks to redress a very natural tendency that we have as individuals and as communities.

That tendency is to become settled, comfortable and even self-satisfied. The is problem is that over time we accumulate, we build things – buildings, traditions, even stories we like to tell ourselves of who we are and where we have been. It’s as though we get into the habit of going a particular way and given enough time, it becomes our way of seeing the world. I wonder if that is the meaning behind the words in Scripture that say, “They shall eat the fruit of their way…” (Prov 1:31).

It’s interesting… when I read the Gospels, Jesus is always moving about from place to place – encountering people where they are. His home is on the road – betwixt and between. The lifestyle Jesus chooses for himself means that he needs to travels light.

Apart from disciples and a reputation for being a trouble-maker, Jesus didn’t accumulate very much. 

If all Jesus left behind for us were his yolk, his disciples and his instruction to go and make more disciples, then the challenge for us as disciples is to work out what that means for us in the church today. That’s a work in progress – a intentional act of translation… discipleship always is !

The discipline of moving against the flow starts with us. It begins when we deny ourselves, when we turn our back on ourselves and leave ourselves behind. Karl Barth says that this is conscious the decision of each new day…..

Take Up Your Cross and Follow Me

Over the last 2000 years the Cross has become loaded up with symbolism. In the vast flow of human history and experience, the Cross hangs like some vast, dynamic constantly moving orb. Like oysters encrusted on a ferry pier – the Cross is dense with century upon century of accumulated meaning. Like the pull of some massive sun, simply standing at a safe distance and observing is not an option.

It reminds me of Simon of Cyrene – an observer in the crowd as Jesus comes by struggling to carry the weight of the Cross. When Jesus stumbles, Simon is chosen from the crowd by a Roman soldier and the Scripture says he is ‘compelled’, strongly encouraged – some would say even forced to carry the Cross of Christ. The picture painted is one of reluctant & unavoidable participation.

And Jesus declares to his followers this is the way of the Cross, “If any of you wishes to come after Me, you must deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Me”. (Mt 16:24)

What If the Community Became Our Sanctuary ?

Since I have been back in Australia, I find myself looking at this country, looking at the church through the eyes of a missionary. I can’t help it and I can’t help wondering what is applicable from those experiences back here in Australia. I have a restlessness in my spirit because I think we have reached an edge place. How we respond to this margin in the next few years will determine whether the Kingdom of God gains or continues loosing significant ground in this country.  I have witnessed God working in amazing ways in the two-thirds world. It is time for those missional practices to come home. It is time for them to find local expression in the first world… in countries like Australia.

What impressed me in both Africa & South East Asia is that when you are in a place where the church isn’t, it makes you ask key missional questions. Questions like, ‘How am I prepared to change so I can connect the gospel with these people ?’ and ‘What am I prepared to do so that the Kingdom of God finds a meaningful & powerful expression in this place ?’, even, ‘How can I help people follow Jesus in ways that are natural, vital & life transforming – in both a personal and a communal sense ?’

It has been my observation and my personal experience that answering these questions has always involved a journey. This has been a movement away from what is familiar – a shift towards relearning the world from the perspective of the people I am serving. In both places our success has never been based upon our commitment to and the frequency of our team meetings, it has always involved deeply listening, being present and practically involved in the community.

If people were hungry – we found creative ways to feed them and develop more effective farming methods, if people were suffering from aids, that meant developing programs of support for those afflicted families, if people were troubled by demons, it meant prayer ministry, if people were troubled by their dreams it meant dream interpretation. We were always experimenting.  Failing forwards meant persevering with each other – finding ways to celebrate our differences. It meant praying – praying about everything – particularly all the obstacles and the resistance & sickness that seemed to come our way.

Always there is an emphasis on sensitivity, persistence, on generosity openness & intuition. Our weakness was our strength and our vulnerability guaranteed our dependence upon the Spirit of God. 

A few weeks ago I was reading a publication from Global Interaction, the missional org. of the Baptist Churches in Australia. They have as their mission statement, ‘Empowering communities to develop their own distinctive ways of following Jesus’. There is something very local and global about that statement that allows for difference and diversity.

Do you also notice there isn’t any mention of building great churches or even finding news ways of attracting people to come to church ? 

When the people won’t come into the church, the church must go to the people.

I keep finding myself wondering mischievous thoughts like what would happen if my local church choose a statement like this ? What sort of church or even network of churches might it become if the community became our sanctuary instead of our building ? 

Feeling The Weight of the World

Recently I came across Peter Rollins*  telling a yarn he calls, ‘The Parable of the 2 Camels’. It goes like this…

‘Once there was a merchant who was leading his two camels along a road. One camel was walking slowly because it was weighed down with packs of salt. The other camel moved along much quicker because it was loaded up with bales of cotton’.

‘Now along the way, the merchant came to a place where the road was flooded by a swollen river. As the merchant moved further along the road both he & his camels began being immersed deeper & deeper into the water’.

‘After a few minutes the merchant was swimming & the camels were almost completely submerged. But the merchant persisted. His livelihood depended on it.  Finally the merchant and his camels were back on dry road’.

‘As the merchant made the final trek to the bazaar, he noticed something had changed in the way the camels were carrying their cargo. The camel with the salt on it’s back seemed to have gained new strength & vigor. The merchant puzzled over this for a bit and then realised the water must have mostly dissolved the salt in the packs. However, the camel carrying the cotton was now struggling and groaning under the weight of its load. This was because the cotton had absorbed so much water’.

I like the parable of the two camels. I like it because it makes really clear a holy paradox that exists for people who embrace the Gospel.

I keep finding that whenever I encounter a paradox in Scripture, I need to pay attention because I have arrived at a place of significant spiritual truth. The way forward is not to decide between one possibility or the other but to try to a find way to hold the two in tension. These are places of tremendous spiritual dynamism.

The paradox of embracing the Gospel begins, when like the camel weighed down with the salt, we experience the river of God’s Grace. The mercy of God surrounds us & overwhelms us. We leave the weight and guilt of all our past selfish actions at the foot of the Cross. Our sins are washed away & we emerge on the other side with an incredible lightness of being that floods our very souls. It’s like the old hymn says, ‘My chains fell off, my heart was freed, I rose went forth and I followed Thee’.

This is the grace of the kingdom. This is forgiveness that makes us whiter than snow. This is love expressed as mercy… like being given a 2^nd, a 3^rd and a 4^th chance all at once.

Now the journey of discipleship is one where we keep following in the way of Jesus. So with that incredible lightness of being we enter back into the river – we continue embracing the Gospel with arms wide open. It is at this point that we experience the paradox. We begin to indentify with the experience of the camel who enters into the river with the cotton.

The more that we enter into and embrace the heart of the Gospel, the more we become weighed down with feeling the burden of a hurting world. 

I was talking to someone recently, asking them what their response has been to me talking for nearly 12 months now about mission. This person whose opinion I value said, “I feel exhausted !”

At first I found these words rather confronting. I started feeling a little bit anxious. Then this week as I have been reflecting on ‘The Parable of the 2 Camels’, I have been thinking maybe what my friend has been feeling, is a renewed sense of the weight of the Gospel.

You see, when we feel the weight of the Gospel, at first it can be overwhelming, even exhausting. Yet that burden we feel for a hurting world, that feeling of agitation, in the sense that I must… do… something… that’s not something I can claim credit for. That’s the Holy Spirit working.

This burden that we have for a hurting world, it changes our perception of the world we live in. It makes us see things that before were invisible. It makes us sensitive and aware of the needs of others… It opens us up to life lived beyond ourselves.

It moves us from being passive & selfish into merciful and inclusive action on behalf of others.

So how do you know a person is experiencing the paradox of embracing the Gospel with their arms wide open ?

Jesus says, “You will know them by their fruit”. He says, “Are grapes gathered from thorns or figs from thistles ? In the same way good trees bear good fruit… they cannot bear bad fruit”.

*from Peter Rollins’ book… ‘How (Not) To Speak of God’

Not Cheap Grace

The Golden Rule underlines, it makes really clear that we are saved to serve. We aren’t saved to contemplate. We aren’t saved to perfect our sacred knowledge or even strum a harp. We aren’t even saved to bath serenely in the light of God’s glory…

The grace we are freely & generously given isn’t a cheap grace, it demands that we pay it on to others with equal mercy.

In Matthew 18, Jesus says life in his Kingdom is like a King who decides to chase up some outstanding debts with his workers. Now there is this one worker who comes before him who owes literally a king’s ransom in accumulated debts.

This worker is the main reason that the King has had to deal with the issue personally. And he is really annoyed. The worker no longer has any of the money, so the King quickly decides his fate. He says, “It is my judgement that you and your wife and your children, will be sold off, along with all your possessions into slavery. Let this be a warning of the consequences of making a fool of the King”.

And in that moment of judgement, the worker falls on his face and he pleads, “Have patience with me, my Lord and I will pay you everything”.

The King listens and the King softens. And out of pity for the worker, he releases the man and forgives him of the debt.

If that was unexpected, Jesus has an ironic twist to the story that’s explosive…

As the forgiven worker is leaving the King’s palace, he encounters another worker who owes him a day’s wages. Seizing the man by the throat, the forgiven worker demands, “Pay me what you owe me !”

The other worker falls on his face and he says, “Have patience with me and I will pay you everything”.

But the forgiven worker refuses and in his anger, throws the man into prison until he can pay the debt.  

Now as news spreads of what had happened, overwhelmed by the hypocrisy – some of the other workers go off and tell the King of all they have seen and heard.

The King is enraged. He summons the forgiven worker back into his presence. He says, “You wicked man. I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Why didn’t you show the same mercy to that one who owed you money ?” And the King handed the man over to be punished and imprisoned until he had paid off his entire debt.

I find this parable confronting in the same way that the Sermon on the Sermon on the Mount tends to throw me off balance. Jesus is very clear here. If the Golden Rule doesn’t find a rich and deep expression in your living, then you won’t find your place in the Kingdom of Heaven.

That’s ouch !!! That’s a hard teaching to hear !!

Perfection = Mercy

The Sermon on the Mount has many demanding teachings. Perhaps the most confronting for me is Jesus’ injunction at the end of his teaching on loving enemies. He says, “Be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect”. It’s interesting when you look at what Jesus says in his similar teaching in Luke’s gospel, instead of using the word perfect, Jesus says, “Be merciful just as your Father is merciful”.

Perfection in Matthew equals mercy in Luke’s gospel. Being perfect just like our Father in heaven means being merciful.

So this is love expressed as mercy, generosity, openness, sensitivity & forgiveness… As disciples of Jesus, this our way of being in the world that impacts everything that we do.

Majestic, Potent, Personal

The Golden Rule again. This is Jesus take on it. He says, “In everything, do for others what you would have them do for you; for this sums up the Law of Moses & the teaching of the Prophets.”

So the idea here is that the whole of the majesty and potency of Scripture, is condensed into just one teaching.

It makes you sit up and take notice doesn’t it ?

This is the result of all the long history of God’s dealings with his people. A holy and sacred revelation. And the condensed down version translates into a simple, concrete way of regarding others that infuses and flavours our whole way of living.  

Last week I mentioned feeling the stretch of Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount. My uneasiness was mostly from the realisation of the gap that exists between the way I live my life & the bold expression of living that Jesus’ teachings open up for us.

This week however, when I look at Jesus’ teachings through lens of the Golden Rule, I notice something very different. The greater stretch of Jesus teachings is the way they refocus our sensitivity, our priorities, our openness, indeed our energy & resources away from ourselves and over towards others in everything that we do.

The Whole Torah

The Golden Rule. You know Jesus wasn’t the only one to commend the Golden Rule in his teachings. Hillel the Elder – a leading Rabbi of his Age – who was an old man when Jesus was just a boy – was once approached by a non-Jew and asked, “What is the defining essence, the kernel of the Jewish faith ?” Now the learned & wise man could have responded eloquently and long on the deep mysteries of Jewish thought and law. Hillel could have insisted that it would be an utter insult to reduce so profound a system of faith into one brief statement.

Indeed Hillel’s contemporary, the Great Rabbi Shammai, was infamously known for furiously driving away a man who asked a similar question with a stick.

However seeing the man really wanted to know, Hillel responded to the man’s question thoughtfully, saying,

“What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbour: this is the whole Torah. The rest is commentary; now go and study !”

Why The Golden Rule is Golden

My grandfather sometimes used to get into fights with other boys on the way home from school. When I was young he used to tell me, the fights were always round the issue of him being Salvation Army and them being Catholic. The irony is that as an adult his sister Grace married a Catholic. My mother, whenever she speaks of her Aunty Grace always remembers her husband in those terms. I am sure she has mentioned his name but the stronger memory for me is Aunty Grace and her Catholic husband. 

I have a sense that you have only to scratch the surface of any one of us, & there is some kind of prejudice shaping our decisions. It’s natural ! It helps us to give order to the world. Prejudice gives us an efficient way of setting boundaries, of filtering experience – of keeping ourselves and our loved ones safe. Yet the effect of prejudice is that it always keeps the people we are stereotyping at arms’ length – typecasting them into caricatures and cardboard cutouts instead of living, breathing people like you and me – complex and conflicted.

I’ve been reading the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel this past week again, focusing particularly on the Golden Rule. The Golden Rule says, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Mt7:12). This verse has it’s foundation in the much older book of Leviticus that says, “But the stranger that lives among you shall be like one born among you, and you will love them as you love yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Lev19:34).  So the sense of Jesus teaching here is an openness to others, that breaks down prejudice, creating space to encounter all people as image bearers of God himself.  

Over the years I have met too many evangelicals who are willing to right off a major part of the Church because Catholics don’t profess to be saved or born again like they are.

During the week I was reading a piece in the paper by a young catholic professional, Rachel Patterson.  After all the media hype surrounding the Pope’s visit and World Youth Day, I found it a refreshing read. Let me share some of the highlights…

“At the core of catholic faith is the belief that Christ is God and God is love. As followers of Christ we are called to love God and one another. As such, for Christians, life is not a meaningless experience but a beautiful, sometimes difficult thing to which there is a purpose other than mere self-satisfaction”.

“At the heart of Catholic moral teaching is an understanding of freedom that contrasts sharply with popular notions of choice. For most people, freedom is simply the ability to do what they want. For the Catholic Church, freedom is the is the ability to do good. It is easy to do what we want. It isn’t always easy to do what is right. And when we choose to do right by another, especially when it isn’t our inclination or in our interests to do so, we exercise our capacity for love. In other words, love isn’t just some gooey emotion we feel for our parents, children or significant other… ”.

“Some people… question why the church persists in having so many rules –especially when it comes to sex… [Why] does it ask us to keep sex within marriage [?]… Not because the church is scared of human sexuality. Sex is understood as something created by God and, therefore, a… good and beautiful thing. It can, however be misused and when it is we can hurt people and ourselves. Far from being oppressive, church teaching on sex is meant to be liberating”.

“It can be lonely leading a life that is counter to the prevailing moral norms. For many of the young adult making the trip to Sydney for World Youth Day, it is one of the few times in their lives that they will be surrounded by other young Catholics in a decidedly Christian atmosphere. To them I say, enjoy. Your faith is a gift and you do not need to apologize for it or isolate it from the rest of your life”.

“But the stranger that lives among you shall be like one born among you, and you will love them as you love yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt”.

Allowing the stranger to draw near… This is why the Golden Rule is golden.

Arms Wide Open

The Sermon on the Mount. These words of Jesus are life… life lived abundantly, generously, with arms wide open. They create the space for us to live life BIG, to embrace today – even when the storms of life come. These words are demanding because every stroke and letter is absolutely brimming with the merciful, compassionate and grace-filled way that God deals with people. These teachings of Jesus are what it means to live life naked and exposed in the very presence of God himself.

That’s why everyone who hears these words of Jesus and who acts on them are like the wise man who built his house upon the rock. The rains came down and the floods came up. The winds blew and beat on the house but it did not fall because it was founded on a firm foundation. I like what Rob Bell says about storms. He says it’s not like the storms might come. Storms come. The difference between a wise and a foolish man is in their ability to weather the storm. 

The Rock From Which You Are Hewn

God’s story woven into lives of ordinary men…

There’s an interesting word of encouragement that the prophet Isaiah gives the Jews when they are in Exile, when they were poised between the choice of assimilation and despair. It says,

‘Listen to me you that pursue righteousness, you who seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you; for he was but one when I called him and I blessed him and made him many’. 

I like what Walter Brueggemann says about theses verses. He says that Isaiah is saying if you want to seek God, look to the oldest, most embarrassing beginning we ever had. He says firstly, remember Abraham. On the one hand, he is the strange, impressive father of the faith who leaves his home at God’s command & goes out on a long journey. On the other hand, Abraham is also a pitiful figure – often helplessness and filled with fear.  Two times he gives his wife Sarah away to other men to save his own skin. Despite God’s promise of a child with Sarah, he sleeps with Sarah’s servant Hagar, to get an heir.

Often Abraham appears so confused, so unsure, so barely faithful.

And when you are done reflecting on Abraham, remember Sarah your mother. Sarah is the beautiful woman who other men desire. She is also the mother of Isaac, the promise carrier. However, when you remember Sarah, remember her oldness, remember her barrenness, remember her mocking laughter in the face of God when He promises her a son.

Yet when you remember Sarah, remember that this old and pitiful woman now laughs a new laugh – an Easter laugh. God uses her very barrenness to create newness. Sarah is the example for all barren people, who have within them no gift of life, no capacity for faith – yet God does something new and unexpected in the face of all the evidence.

What impresses me about this foundational story of Scripture, is what it says about the way God’s story is unfolding among us. Abraham and Sarah are people we can identify with because they are fragile and tentative, often moving forward with fear & hesitation. These are people just like us.

You know, God’s story often isn’t in the grand epics of history, the stories told by the winners. When I read the large sweep of Scripture, it seems to me that God’s story is mostly unfolding quietly, below the radar, twisting and turning – always with the very real possibility of failure. Yet when we remember this story of faith, remember that it is told and retold through the same fragile stories of other biblical characters. Remember the scheming of a timid Jacob, the stuttering of a reluctant Moses, the paranoid actions of a bipolar Saul, the treachery of a wife stealing David, the depressed and suicidal Elijah…

The very wonder of God’s story is that he achieves his purposes in the world through broken ordinary people, just like us.

Bruggemann says we remember these stories because they model faith and they invite faith.

We remember these stories because when these fragile people centered their stories in God’s story, they lived life BIG – filled with purpose, newness and imagination.

Truth Stranger Than Fiction

Sometimes, when I read the local paper, I am overwhelmed by the violence, by the screams and by the left over cries of loved ones struggling with their grief…

I mean it can be a brutal read. Take one recent Friday. The lead story was about Luke Hankey, a popular 24 yr old surfer from Bateau Bay. Luke was in the carpark of the local bar, when a fight erupted involving up to 25 males. When it was over, Luke was laying in a pool of blood, dying right there on the asphalt.

On the same page there was another story about a man from Wyong – aged 35 who murdered his 25 yr old partner, during a domestic dispute.  In his rage he stabbed her several times.

A couple of pages on, there was the story of police being called to a house in Umina Beach. Following an argument with his wife, a 37 yr old man, dragged an LPG gas bottle & a jerry can full of petrol into the house. He was feeling so overwhelmed that he was threatening to blow himself up. His wife escaped with their two girls but it took the police another eight hours to talk the guy around.

A few minutes later, I went looking for news about a murdered toddler I had heard about – Dean Shillingsworth – whose body was found in suitcase in a pond in South Western Sydney. I googled ‘dead boy found in suitcase’ only to find a bigger, more grisly story about five dead newborns babies found in a plastic bag in a cellar in Northern France. A 35 yr old woman admitted giving birth to the babies between 1999 and 2006.

Don’t you get tired of the violence upon violence, the screams and the left over cries of pain ?

It reminds me of what God says to Cain after he murders his brother Abel. He says, “What have you done ? Listen, your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground”. It’s like he is saying the violent actions of men continue screaming out to God – long after they are done.

In God’s reality, actions truly speak louder than words.

Living Life BIG !

The Sermon on the Mount… I’ve been turning it over again and again and it has been tough reading. I’ve been trying to get a sense of why these words are so exacting.

Then I was reading a story in the newspaper last Saturday and things started to become a whole lot clearer.

In April 1979, under the cover of darkness, Samir Kuntar, along with three other men travelled by rubber dingy, from Lebanon – 5kms into Israeli territory. They came ashore onto the beach at the town of Narhariya. Keep in mind, Samir Kuntar was only 16 yrs old at the time.

It was close to midnight. At random the four – who were members of the Palestinian Liberation Front – chose an apartment block where a young Smadar Haran lived with her husband & two young children.

Amid gunfire & exploding grenades, Kuntar and his accomplices stormed the flat and seized Mrs Haran’s husband, Danny and their four year old daughter. Kuntar forced them down to the beach, where he shot Danny and threw his body into the ocean. The little girl – Einat was forced to watch her father’s die. Then with the butt of his rifle, Kuntar smashed little Einat’s head against a rock until she too was dead.

Back in their apartment, Smadar Haran was hiding in the attic, with a neighbour – cradling her 2 yr old daughter, Yael. Fearing her other daughter’s cries would alert the terrorists, she covered Yael’s mouth with her hand. She accidently suffocated her own child. By night’s end, Smadar Haran’s entire family was dead.

Overwhelmed by the immense tragedy, Smadar Haran faced two choices – to live or to die. Smadar chose life. She trained as a social worker, she remarried a psychologist and today has she two teenage girls.

For the past thirty years the terrorist Samir Kuntar has been a prisoner in an Israeli jail. This last week the Israeli cabinet decided to release Samir Kuntar in exchange for two Israeli soldiers who were taken prisoner two years ago in Lebanon & who are probably dead.

As much as Smadar Haran wanted to escape the ties that bound her to Samir Kuntar, she could not. Now there is an extraordinary twist to the story. The family of one of the abducted Israeli soldiers – Ehud Goldwasser – lives around the corner from her in Narhariya. The two families are close family friends and Smadar Haran even attended the abducted soldier’s wedding.

This last weekm the Israeli cabinet wanted to know how Smadar Haran would feel if Samir Kuntar was released from prison, in exchange for Ehud Goldwasser.

Smadar Haran took a while to answer…

Finally she said, “It’s so delicate and I can’t close my eyes to other people’s pain and I can’t close my heart… Sometimes the best interests might not be my interests, maybe.”

This last week she wrote to the Israeli cabinet freeing it’s members from any guilt they may feel, “Kuntar is not and never was my own private prisoner”.

 “Turn it over and turn it over again, for everything is contained in the Scriptures. Regard it, grow old in it and never abandon it, for there is no greater virtue.”

The teaching of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount seems so demanding because most of us live life within a fairly narrow bandwidth… comfortably, safely ! We are careful with our relationships, associating mostly with people like ourselves.

Yet when I look at the gut wrenching, shattering life experience of Smadar Haran, whose family is murdered and who in fear and terror, suffocates her only other child, a watered down, less demanding version of the Sermon on the Mount just doesn’t cut it.

Jesus says don’t let anger be your response to the world because anger distorts your judgement, anger gives way to bitterness and shuts us down emotionally, even to the ones we love. Jesus says don’t strike back in revenge but give and forgive those who wrong you because revenge hardens hearts and sets up cycles of violence that take on a life of their own. Jesus says love your enemies because love even allows a poor widow to powerfully protest and transcend institutional evil and the selfish, conflicted ways of men.  

The Sermon on the Mount. These words of Jesus are life, abundant, generous & open. They create the space for us to live life BIG, even when the storms of life come.

He Who Saves One Life, Saves the World Entire

Living life naked and exposed in the presence of God himself. I think this is what Jesus has in mind in his teaching of the Sermon on the Mount… why it is so demanding. We are not merely talking about Jesus giving new order to the parameters of Jewish religious life or even temple worship, but the Spirit of God being granted access and transforming all areas of life. Anything that has God in such close proximity is deeper, wider and higher than ordinary living.

You see when we dwell in close proximity to the Scriptures, when we turn them over again and again, when look back over their writing down through the ages – something becomes very clear. God has priorities. God desires some things more than he desires others…   

Like the time Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector. Jesus is sitting eating a meal openly with a number of tax collectors and other social outcasts. Some Pharisees are walking by and they ask Jesus’ disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with those kinds of people ?” And Jesus, hearing what they are saying, turns to them and replies, “Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice’”. 

Jesus says this because as a good Jew who had memorised the Torah, word for word – Jesus knows God’s priorities. God desires mercy more than he desires sacrifice. God desires compassion more than he desires contemplation. God desires our hearts more than he desires our intellectual ascent.

Why ? Because the goal of life isn’t purity and holiness – that’s a by-product. The goal of life is an intensity of living, a fullness of life, concretely focused into habits of action that help to repair the brokenness of a hurting world. It’s like the Jewish Talmud says, “He who saves one life, saves the world entire.”

Really Turning the Other Cheek

“You have heard it said, ‘You shall not murder’ and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment’. But I say to you that if you are angry with your brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment…”.

“You have heard it said, ‘An eye for an eye…’. But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also…”.

 “You have heard it said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…”.

 

I really feel the stretch of Jesus’ teaching in these passages from the Sermon on the Mount. When I reflect on how my own life measures up to the Sermon on the Mount, I have a sense of missing the mark, of failing daily. In my darker moments I would be sorely tempted to just… give up !

Now, I also balance this with the tension of experiencing God’s grace, of my sense of assurance that the blood of Jesus covers my sin, that before the throne of God I am already declared pure, holy, acceptable, with a righteousness that is not my own. The freedom of it allows me to enter boldly into the presence of God Himself.

While the grace of God releases me from the overwhelming sense of guilt that comes from working hard for salvation, I also wrestle with the tension of scriptures like Mt 5:20, that says, “unless our righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, we will never enter into the Kingdom of Heaven…”. What about John 14:12 where Jesus says, “The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and in fact will do greater works than these…”. 

Words like these create tension, they create discomfort and uneasiness within us about the teachings of Jesus. I wonder if the anxiety & dissonance is Jesus’ intention, indeed God’s intention for Scripture in general ?  You see I think God can work with us in those places. He wants access to all areas of our lives. I think these are the teachable moments, the places where Jesus teachings can be translated into meaningful action that flavours our total response to living. 

Rather like a wise man who builds his house upon the rock….

 

Turn It Over & Turn It Over Again

There’s an ancient Jewish proverb from the Talmud I have grown rather fond of. It goes like this, “Turn it over and turn it over again, for everything is contained in the Scriptures. Regard it, grow old in it and never abandon it, for there is no greater virtue.”

During the week I have been reading through the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel. I have been turning it over again and again, I feel have been regarding it to the point where it has grown rather old. Thankfully, I didn’t abandon it.

For me the Sermon on the Mount has been personally demanding reading. It has made me feel contrite & reflective about the quality of my discipleship; even the integrity of my walking with God.

You can’t read very far into the Sermon on the Mount without starting to feel the weight of God’s glory, the light of his holiness pouring into all the nooks and crannies of our mixed intentions… even filling the yawning gap that exists between our words and our actions.

Like John Calvin before me, I notice that these series of teachings read more like a dense compilation of many teaching sessions, rather than one singular occasion. There doesn’t seem to be that logical, sequential development of an argument that one would expect from a master teacher, delivering his message.

Instead each topic appears like its own particular teaching, concentrated & hard-hitting – complete in and of itself. 

Oh My God !

I remember my wife being away at a conference and being busy preparing dinner in the kitchen. I was focused and safely immersed in the mundane activities of domestic bliss, when all of a sudden I could hear a high-pitched cry from the garage.  I thought nothing of it because my two boys playing, regularly involves rather loud high-pitched yelps of both pleasure & pain. The problem was that 15 seconds later the noise of it was still there and it was becoming more earnest by the second. It made me come out running, muttering under my breath.

I opened the side door of the garage and the scene unfolded before me. Both boys were crying but my older one was lying on the ground thrashing about grabbing at his neck. At first I thought he was fitting or that he was choking on something but then I was reminded of his high pitched screaming. I rushed to his side and tried to move him and found the situation even more sinister.

Both of my sons had become entangled in a deadly web of almost invisible nylon kite string. Now keep in mind one is six and the other is only four. The older one had the string dangerously wrapped a number of times around his neck. The string was also wrapped tightly around the younger one’s arms and torso and every time he moved in panic, trying to help his brother, the string would pull tighter, cutting into his older brother’s neck.

In those desperate moments my vision narrowed and I felt myself rushing to the precipice of unspeakable horror. My heart was beating out of my chest and I felt sluggish in my thinking.  It took me what seemed forever to break those deadly cords.

When I had finally freed both my boys, I held them tightly, speaking to them quietly, reassuring them with tears streaming down all our faces…

I was very fortunate that day, life isn’t always so forgiving !

You know, it is in those moments, when we are immersed in overwhelmingly difficult circumstances, beyond our control – that Jesus’ cry from the Cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me ?” seem most accessible & resonate deeply within me. 

You know life wasn’t supposed to be this way. In a more just world, a life lived well is supposed to bring blessing & the favour of God. It is the ones who deliberately pursue their selfish & evil ways that are supposed to suffer and to perish.

Yet as the writer of Ecclesiastes observes the world is rather more topsy-turvy. There are, “righteous people who perish in their righteousness and there are wicked people who prolong their life in their evildoing.” 

These last words of Jesus resonate within me for all the times I have been pushed around and broken by a capricious and self-centered world. A world where God sometimes seems distant, even disinterested. 

Jesus Yolk

Jesus didn’t leave much behind. It occurred to me the other day, he didn’t bequeath any property or buildings, any wife or offspring, Jesus didn’t write anything down, he didn’t leave behind any revolutionary guerrilla army, he didn’t leave behind a new religion or liturgy.

Remember Jesus said, “Do not think I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill it. Truly I tell you, not one stroke or letter will pass from the law until it is all accomplished”.

What Jesus left behind was his yolk… his interpretation of the Scriptures and a rather disturbing life lived in the light of those interpretations.  It was a life lived in contrast and challenge, dissenting against the status quo and the prevailing power structures of the day.  It was a life lived swimming up stream against the status quo.

Instead of an Adventist Jesus walking along all serene and white and surrounded by smiling children and adults and wild and tame animals, think of a Jesus filled with righteous anger overturning the tables of the money changers in the Temple causing disruption and chaos in all directions.

Let’s face it, if you were a reputable lending institution, would you approve a home loan for such a person ? As disciples we are called to take up our Cross and follow this Jesus – not just to believe. If we are truly Jesus disciples then why have so many of us been granted home loans ?

The only tangible thing Jesus left behind were his band of disciples and his final instructions, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations… teaching them everything I commanded you”.

If all Jesus left behind his yolk, his disciples and his instruction to make more disciples, then why do we hold on so tightly to our property, to our buildings & particular ways of doing things; whether we sing particular songs in particular ways, how many times we come to church, the particular ways we dress ? Why do we hold so tightly onto these things when Jesus modelled living life in the face of a deep and passionate embrace of the Scriptures, a life in the intimate presence of the Father, in actual connection to a circle of disciples ? My question is why don’t we grab more tightly onto these things ?

Jesus reaches down from the Cross, he grabs hold of us and he says, ‘Come and die’ ! The challenge of that is which Jesus do I believe in ?

Is it gentle Jesus meek and mild, who I adore and contemplate or is it the grubby, human peasant Jesus -  with the roughened hands of a carpenter in the Gospels who calls me out to follow ?

I believe in the Jesus who, “though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but instead emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born on human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death – even death on a cross”.

I pray for the courage to travel where he leads and to do so just as lightly !