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"Christ The Redeemer" Lit Up With Flags Of CountriesWe called on the Prince of Peace for the welfare of the city – and He showed up. + Jim Mullins, The Symphony of Mission: Playing Your Part in God's Work in the WorldWhen we finished our series on Baptism (Who We Are) this summer, our final message was entitled, "Rooted in Being Baptized as Jesus' Servants (For the Life of the World)." To help close the message, I shared a recent story about how Jesus' Church in the city of Phoenix, including three Surge Network churches, embodied this baptismal identity tangibly among their Muslim neighbors. This story is also included in Quarter 3 of Surge School readings in The Symphony of Mission, which we are currently immersing in right now. The story provides an embodied fulfillment of these words:
"If (Christians) Really Believed Jesus, It Would Change the World" (When I lived in Turkey) Hamid said something I will never forget – a clue to the very question I had been pondering. He said, "Do you remember when we read Luke 6, where Jesus commands people to sacrificially love their enemies? That was my favorite part!" He continued, "How many Christians have read these words? Because if so many Christians view Muslims as their enemy, wouldn't they be obligated to do good things for them? If they really believed these words, they would be building schools in Afghanistan, welcoming Muslim refugees at the airport, and inviting every Muslim they know to join them for dinner." And then with seriousness in his voice (Hamid) looked at me and said, "Jim, you should go back to America and teach Christians about this. If they really believed Jesus, it would change the world!" That was the day a Muslim commissioned me to preach the gospel to Christians. Amid the irony, I sensed that there was something profound about what he was saying, a connection between the sacrificial love of Christians and the perceived credibility of the cross. However, I wouldn't make that connection until some five years later when I was staring at the business end of a semiautomatic rifle. The Cross and a Peacemaking Presence Prayed For in the Face of Violence (Now back in the United States) A group of armed bikers was organizing an event outside of a local mosque where they would bring weapons, burn copies of the Qur'an, draw lewd pictures of Muhammad, and scream obscenities at people as they entered to pray. The particular mosque they had chosen was in a neighborhood with the largest percentages of refugees in the state. These people had been displaced from their homes and families and were trying their best to navigate the challenges of living in a new culture. All of them had experienced some form of suffering and danger: torture, natural disasters, ethnic cleansing, war. When I looked at the Facebook event for this rally, I saw that hundreds of people had already signed up to tell these globally homeless people to go back home. I remembered the words of Hamid and how he had challenged me to call Christians to obey the words of Christ. So in an act of overstated slacktivism, I expressed my disgust on Facebook. It was a well-worded mini-rant that made me feel better about myself. Then I closed my computer to pray, not the bold prayers of faith but the deflated prayers of a disheartened disciple. I had a sense that Jesus's name was about to get dragged through the mud once again and that violence was imminent. I was especially concerned because I had friends who attended that mosque and I didn't want them hurt. I also imagined how horrible it would make Christians feel if someone surrounded our church with guns, ripped up the Bible, and slandered Jesus. The thought was awful. I felt helpless. After logging back onto Facebook a few hours later, I saw that several people had commented on my post, and I was struck by one comment in particular. Erin, a woman from my church (Redemption Tempe), thought we should do something about the rally, that it wasn't enough to make a Facebook post. Since this was happening in our city, we were implicated. We needed to respond. Honestly, I was reluctant and afraid, but I knew she was right. Her post prompted me to reach out to Adam Estle, the executive director of Evangelicals for Middle East Understanding, and our mutual friend, the president of the mosque. We met for dinner and dreamed up a little plan. With only about twenty-four hours notice, Adam and I invited followers of Christ from around the city to join us at the mosque to be a prayerful presence in a place of hostility. We didn't go there to protest or even counterprotest (as the media suggested). Our aim was to create a physical barrier of protection with our bodies and a spiritual wall of protection through our prayers. We committed to being a calming, quiet, friendly, peaceful, and prayerful presence. We wanted our response to be marked with the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23). Our strategy was to arrive early so that we could fill the sidewalk in front of the mosque, thus forcing the hostile protestors to the other side of the street. We also wanted to be the first people our Muslim neighbors would see when they exited the mosque, so they'd be greeted by followers of Christ holding out hands of friendship rather than by protesting holding handguns. But the main reason we were lined up on the sidewalk was to turn our bodies into a physical barrier of protection for our Muslim neighbors. We wanted to dramatize the cross. We stood between the masked men with guns (a lot of guns!) and our Muslim friends because Jesus stood for us. Because Jesus had absorbed our death to give us life, we were willing to absorb bullets to defend the lives of our neighbors. He put himself in harm's way for us, so as his disciples, we were compelled to put ourselves in harm's way for our Muslim neighbors. There wouldn't be a single bullet that would pierce the body of a Muslim unless it went through the body of a Christian first. We didn't organize the Love Your Neighbor Rally with heroic moxie but with trembling hands and nervous prayers for protection. The Prince of Peace Showed Up on the Hottest (& Most Dangerous) Day of the Year Two types of people participated: those who were afraid and those who didn't really understand the danger. I didn't expect many people to show up. With each hour that passed there were new waves of hostility posted on social media. Almost all local and national media outlets were covering the event and using sensational language that seemed to make things worse. The organizers of the protest were calling people to bring as many weapons as they could carry on their motorcycles – and to be ready to use them. ISIS was tweeting ominous threats about blood being spilled in the streets, local businesses were closing shop, and (to make matters worse) it was the hottest day of the year. It was not hard to find a reason to stay home that day. People from our group started arriving around 5:00 p.m. At first, there were just a few of us, and we didn't really know what to do. We were awkward, not accustomed to being at a protest. My fears of a low turnout seemed confirmed. But then, at about 5:20 p.m., we saw one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen in my life: hundreds of Christians began to stream down the street in groups of five or ten, putting themselves in danger in order to love their Muslim neighbors. There were soon as many Christians assembled to be a peaceful presence as there were protestors: more than two hundred Christians from about fifteen local churches. There were also a number of people from other backgrounds who had been invited by their Christian friends. We had decided to wear blue shirts (a calming color), and as I saw that flood of blue shirts coming down the street, I began to imagine them as God's tears: tears of sorrow as he wept over this broken city and tears of joy to see his people unified in sacrificial love. When everyone had arrived, we spread out on the sidewalk along the front of the mosque. We stayed calm, prayed, sang some worship songs, and had great conversations. Almost everyone held up signs that had been made by Josh Harp, a pastor at Via Church, which said "love your neighbor" on one side and explained our purpose on the other side. We asked people to avoid yelling, chanting, or bringing signs with antagonistic slogans. We asked them instead to pray, to tell stories of positive friendships with Muslims, to describe calmly what we were doing, and to explain how Jesus was our motivation. On the other side of the street were more than two hundred protestors. Many of them were masked, wore bulletproof vests, and carried pistols, knives, and semiautomatic weapons. They were from many backgrounds, including atheism and neo-Nazism. A few even claimed to be Christians. Their signs and chants said some of the most vulgar things you could imagine – I won't repeat them here. They burned Qur'rans and held up indecent pictures drawn ahead of time at a "Draw Muhammad" contest they'd held before coming to the protest. Though our first job there was to pray for and be a human shield for our Muslim friends, we also encouraged our people to pray for and try to reach out to the protesting bikers. After all, they were created in God's image too, and behind their masks and bulletproof vests were genuine fear and pain that needed the healing of the gospel. We reminded one another that we weren't there to be against anybody, because our enemy is not flesh and blood but the spiritual powers that produce such hatred: sin, idolatry, Satan, and demons. Throughout the protest we sent a handful of blue shirts over to the protestors' side of the street. Some in our group had brought ice cold water on that blistering hot day to share with the protestors. We looked for the loudest and angriest people there and tried to engage them in conversation. It was clear they wanted to be heard, so we thought maybe we could help de-escalate the situation by simply listening. As we listened, we realized that there was real fear under all that anger. It grew out of thousands of hours of being discipled by sensationalist YouTube videos and talk radio shows. They were genuinely afraid. However, almost none of them (except a handful of people who had served in the military) had met an actual Muslim. Many of the veterans were struggling with PTSD, and some had lost limbs in Iraq or best friends in Afghanistan. The most formative years of their adult lives had been spent learning to view Muslims as the enemy. Now they felt rage when they heard a few words of Arabic conversation at a grocery store. So we listened, and kept on listening. Several of our conversations with the protesters ended in tears, prayer, and a deep sense of longing for God to mend this hemorrhaging world. I remember so much from that night: our Muslim friends who handled everything with such poise, the hard work of police officers, a petite nineteen-year-old girl in a blue shirt who showed kindness to a furious three-hundred-pound protester who was wearing a bulletproof vest and was armed with an AR-15. I remember the many conversations about Christ we had with the nonbelievers who joined our group, with our Muslim friends, and with the protesters. But what I remember most vividly is our times of prayer. It seemed like each time the protesters got louder, we prayed more fervently and the Spirit extinguished the waves of hostility. Standing in the most hostile street in the city that night, we worshiped God and experienced a real sense of the presence of Christ. Throughout the nights we saw groups of protesters walk away in a contemplative manner. Some of them turned their "F--- Islam" shirts inside out. Some even seemed to have a change of heart and sought out the leaders of the mosque to apologize. By the end of the night, there hadn't been one shot fired, one punch thrown, or one person arrested. We called on the Prince of Peace for the welfare of the city – and he showed up. Suffering for the Sake of Others is the Best Apologetic for the Cross The next morning, I woke up and started to thank God for what had happened the night before. I was grateful to be no longer standing in front of masked men with guns, but I actually felt saddened that it was all over. I assumed that the beautiful night of the church's unification in missional peacemaking was just going to drift into our memories and ultimately be forgotten. But when I checked my email, I realized that something bigger was going on. Waiting for me were dozens of emails, Facebook messages, tweets, and voicemails from Muslims around the world expressing their gratitude for the many Christians who had shown love by forming a human shield in front of that mosque. The messages came from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Turkey, and Afghanistan as well as many different cities within the United States. I wondered how they had heard about the events of that night and then realized that a Muslim man had snapped a picture that beautifully captured an image of the sacrificial love that existed all across the city and had shared the picture on social media. The picture was of four people from Missio Dei Communities (a local church in the Phoenix area), and the caption said, "It is reported that more Christians showed up to stand in solidarity with the #PHxMosque this evening than protesters." This photo was shared 6,079 times on Facebook and probably just as many times on Twitter, mostly by Muslims. Many news reports had been written by local and international media, some of them even quoting us as we pointed to the cross as our motivation. For example, Vice News quoted me as saying, "One of the main reasons we set up here on this sidewalk right now is to create a physical barrier between the mosque and our Muslim friends and potential violence and hostility. ... If they suffer, we suffer with them. To stand in between the potential pain and danger they are in in the same way that Jesus stood in between it for us." In the months that followed, we had dozens of opportunities to speak to groups of Muslims and have coffee with Muslim friends. In almost all of those instances we were asked the question, Why did you do it? In those moments we were able to share how we had been reconciled to the God of peace and were therefore compelled to be peacemakers. We were able to proclaim the self-giving love of Christ that was displayed on the cross. We shared the gospel with thousands of Muslims. That season helped me realize that the sacrificial love of Christians – when we suffer for the sake of others – is the best apologetic for the cross. The service movement in the symphony of mission displays the sacrificial love of Christ through lives of selfless service. As we generously give our lives to serve others, we imitate and display the generous love of Christ and his work on the cross. When as followers of Christ we generously share our time, money, knowledge, possessions, homes, and lives, we dramatize the generous sacrificial love of Christ that was displayed on the cross. Love is costly. Real love is the mess of childbirth, the burnt arms of firefighters, the scars from dogs' teeth on the arms of a civil rights leader, and the sore knees of a factory worker who has punched the clock for forty years to put food on the table. Love is ultimately expressed through sacrifice. We are called to be entrepreneurs of blessing, inventors of neighborly kindness, and artists of shalom – employing our whole minds, including our imaginations, in loving God and our neighbors. + Special City Notes (CN) excerpt above from Chapter 5: Service: Displaying the Love of Christ by Washing the Feet of the World, pgs. 95-99, in The Symphony of Mission, also featuring stories about how moving truck employees, Uber and Lyft drivers, waitresses, barbers, cyclists, and more are being "entrepreneurs of blessing." Jim also recounts the story above in the article "RT: 1 Year Ago Today: Love Your Neighbor Rally". And to close, here is one more great story from The Symphony of Mission followed by two complementary posts: Soli Jesu gloria. Rev. Mike "Sully" Sullivan Email Pastor Mike | Website | Visit Us | Support Us | Facebook Us |
The mission of Emmaus City Church is to be united with Jesus as He shares and shows His Gospel in, with, and for Worcester, MA. "As they talked and discussed these things, Jesus Himself suddenly came and began walking with them.” + Luke 24:15
Monday, January 30, 2023
Surge Story | Generous Cross-Shaped Peacemaking Presence
Friday, January 27, 2023
CN | Sheltering Mercy w/ Ps. 15's Rooted Way during Epiphany
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| "A Hill of the Heart" by Nathan Swann from Sheltering Mercy |
To be so rooted in Your ways that I may not be shaken + from Psalm 15 | A Hill of the Heart in Sheltering Mercy
Emmaus City Church (ECC) continues in our series in the Psalms based on the Lectionary Year A Readings that parts of Jesus' Church around the world are using in 2023 during the seasons of Epiphany and Lent.
This weekend's Psalm is Psalm 15, focused on the one who will never be shaken. What a gift to encounter life and be secure enough to never be shaken off a sure footing, a place of serenity, an habror of peace.
In Sheltering Mercy: Prayers Inspired by the Psalms, Ryan W. Smith and Dan Wilt have written a targum (i.e. the ancient practice of rewriting sacred text in today's vocabulary; see Psalm 29 | Living Word, Psalm 40 | A Testimony of Salvation, and Psalm 27 | Light and Life for other examples). And while this prayer attempts to follow the structure of Psalm 15, this is not a paraphrase or translation; it is a prayerful response. The title they give 15's targum is "A Hill of the Heart."
For 2023, phrases that have helped shape my prayers for the year ahead are "Enter the Holy Wild. Pay attention to the Voice in the wilderness. Worship Jesus." My prayer for Emmaus City Church is that our worship would increase in such a way that those who interact with us, whether at a Sabbath gathering, with a City Group meal or mission, at work or at home, would experience God's holy presence in light of how our hearts lean towards worshiping Jesus. We want to rest and risk in light of His holiness (see also "In the Holy Wild with the Lion Who Offers Us the Stream").
Psalm 15 that inspired the targum, "Light and Life," helps us worship the One who is holy as we continue in the holy wild of this season of Epiphany.
Psalm 15 | A Hill of the Heart
There is a hill called "Holy,"
stark against a sky of fire;
a tabernacle of tree and stone,
where wind
and flame
and tremor
guard the gentle whisper of God. 1
But who can tread that sacred ground?
Meet You in that hurricane eye?
Who can bear the closeness of the flame
at the celestial pole,
strung between earth and heaven?
The one who keeps to Your path
when others withdraw.
Who stockpiles truth in the hollows of the heart.
Who dispenses grace to friends and foes alike –
resisting evil,
cherishing good,
whatever the cost may be.
This, Lord, is my desire:
to be so rooted in Your ways
that I may not be shaken,
and by Your grace to meet You 2
on Your holy hill.
Bonus Listen
Psalm 15 by Poor Bishop Hooper
Bonus Reflection
Here are links to other recent City Notes (CN) books:
Red Skies; Story of God in a Sanitation Truck; The Artistry of What's Next; Seeds of Hope in the Rain & the Dark; Wrestling with God in Doubt; I've Seen What Hope Can Do; Baptism as the Way of Life; The Cross and Peacemaking Presence; Being with God; Knowing and Naming True Friends; Listening Closely & Paying Attention; Living and Loving Curiously with Wonder; Praying with Mary and Jesus; Waiting is the Womb; In the Holy Wild with the Lion Who Offers Us the Stream
With wild grace and holy shalom,
Friday, January 20, 2023
CN | Sheltering Mercy w/ Ps. 27's Light & Life during Epiphany
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Sheltering Mercy: Prayers Inspired by the Psalms by Ryan W. Smith & Dan WiltThere is no darkness so deep, no evil so strong, that it can wrest me from Your presence. + from Psalm 27 | Light and Life in Sheltering MercyEmmaus City Church (ECC) continues in our series in the Psalms based on the Lectionary Year A Readings that parts of Jesus' Church around the world are using in 2023 during the seasons of Epiphany and Lent. This weekend's Psalm is Psalm 27, focused on the light of God that drives away our fears in the face of danger. In Sheltering Mercy: Prayers Inspired by the Psalms, Ryan W. Smith and Dan Wilt have written a targum (i.e. the ancient practice of rewriting sacred text in today's vocabulary; see Psalm 29 | Living Word and Psalm 40 | A Testimony of Salvation for other examples) prayer based on Psalm 27. And while this prayer attempts to follow the structure of Psalm 27, this is not a paraphrase or translation; it is a prayerful response. The title they give 27's targum is "Light and Life," light being a key theme for the current season of Epiphany during the Christian year. For 2023, phrases that have helped shape my prayers for the year ahead are "Enter the Holy Wild. Pay attention to the Voice in the wilderness. Worship Jesus." My prayer for Emmaus City Church is that our worship would increase in such a way that those who interact with us, whether at a Sabbath gathering, with a City Group meal or mission, at work or at home, would experience God's holy presence in light of how our hearts lean towards worshiping Jesus. We want to rest and risk in light of His holiness (see also "In the Holy Wild with the Lion Who Offers Us the Stream"). Psalm 27 that inspired the targum, "Light and Life," helps us worship the "Lord Jesus, Light and Life, Illuminator of inner and outer worlds, Beacon in starless night, Lamp on twisting path, Breath of life in every living soul" as we continue in the holy wild of this season of Epiphany. Psalm 27 | Light and Life Lord Jesus, You are Light and Life. 1 Illuminator of inner and outer worlds. Beacon in starless night. Lamp on twisting path. 2 Breath of life in every living soul. 3 You have delivered me from sin and death; raised me to new life with You. 4 There is no darkness so deep, no evil so strong, that it can wrest me from Your presence. 5 Still, forces gather on the horizon 6 – rank upon rank, ravenous in their hatred, waging war while I walk these shadowlands. Avert their eyes, Lord; confuse their plans; let no weapon formed against me prosper. 7 May safety surround me – Sabbath rest in the storm. In the end, there is only one thing of lasting worth; one desire that burns within me: that I would continually live in, through, from, the center of Your love, dwelling in the secret place; perceiving Your wonder; beholding Your beauty; meditating on Your goodness. In trouble, You usher me into a room prepared for me – fire in the hearth, feast on the table, a home of the heart. 8 In Your presence, my soul is refreshed; my hanging head lifted; my trembling heart quieted, as songs rise up in me again: grateful praise for saving grace. Help me to know that You are near, Lord; 9 that my cries don't fall on deaf ears; that these prayers aren't lost on the wind. Quiet my heart to hear Your voice. Give me clear direction; confident trust. Am I not led by Your Spirit? Am I not a child of God? 10 I cling to the promise that You see and know before I even ask. 11 I lift my eyes to the sky – stars shimmering in the blanket of night I am Orion, hunter in the dusk, seeking truth in a world of shadow. At every turn, I find You: Living Word. 12 Radiance of Glory. 13 Light of the World. 14 But I see in passing glance and dim reflection. How I long to behold You in Your glory – not through a glass darkly, 15 but as a friend sees a friend: face to face. 16 Do You hide Yourself? Do You reject me because I run from You? Perhaps it is I who am hiding, and You who are running after me. 17 You have worked Your will in me. When those closest to me had no power to help, You remained faithful; Your hand provided. I waver between faith and doubt, fearing of Your turning away – that I will be cast off; disinherited from Your promises. I return to the firm foundation of Your truth: that Your Spirit dwells within me, 18 the hope of glory; that You are with me, to the end of the age; 19 that Your presence is proved by steadfast love and endless mercies. 20 My fear, doubt, worry, cannot alter this reality. Shield me from darkening dangers; from lying voices – enemies known and unknown. Protect me from the curses of their mouths. Give me a response in my hour of need. 21 I hold to the promise of Your faithfulness – that I will see some good before the end: that is my portion; my cup overflowing. 22 You are not slow to fulfill Your promise, but are patient in Your mercy, 23 preparing a weight of glory beyond compare. 24 Quiet my heart; grant me patience in these afflictions. May faith arise in me as I draw near to You and wait to see You move. Amen. 3 John 1:4 10 Romans 8:14 11 Matthew 6:8 12 John 17:17 13 Hebrews 1:3 14 John 8:12 16 Exodus 33:11 17 Henri Nouwen, A Story of Homecoming, 106-107 22 Psalm 23:5 23 2 Peter 3:9 Bonus Listen The Everlasting God by William Murphy Bonus Reflection Here are links to other recent City Notes (CN) books: Red Skies; Story of God in a Sanitation Truck; The Artistry of What's Next; Seeds of Hope in the Rain & the Dark; Wrestling with God in Doubt; I've Seen What Hope Can Do; Baptism as the Way of Life; The Cross and Peacemaking Presence; Being with God; Knowing and Naming True Friends; Listening Closely & Paying Attention; Living and Loving Curiously with Wonder; Praying with Mary and Jesus; Waiting is the Womb; In the Holy Wild with the Lion Who Offers Us the Stream With wild wonder and hope, |
Tuesday, January 17, 2023
Yeshua | He Sees the World at Every Moment w/ Tenderness
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| "Jesus" by Bas Uterwijk | Post Photography |
Imagine a man ... He's the Creator in the midst of the thing made. + Francis Spufford, Unapologetic
He sees the world at every moment with the thwarted tenderness of its creator. So that he is that creator, not his spokesman or his representative or his ambassador, but the creator him- or her- or itself, no longer thwarted but also no longer immune.
+ "Yeshua", pg. 109
This is how Francis Spufford imaginatively begins Chapter 5: Yeshua, my favorite in his poetic and punchy, a bit brash with some dry British "force and crackle" coming through, yet also beautiful Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense. For an introduction to Unapologetic from Spufford himself, check out:
+ Francis Spufford introduces Unapologetic (9+ minutes)
What will follow in this post (the first of three from Unapologetic) is a collection of organized excerpts featuring what Spufford describes as an invitation to "imagine a story, making a story-like sense, and having a story's chance to move us" (pg. 109).
For those familiar with Yeshua (or Jesus in His Latinized name), as well as those who are skeptical if His story has much truth or is merely the stuff of overzealous religious myth-making, I think Spufford's words craft a wonder-filled bit of holy imagination for us to receive a bit of a (re)introduction to Yeshua in 2023.
Yeshua | He Is As Human as We Are, But Responsible for the Universe
He's a male Jew in first-century Palestine, so he's probably bearded ... and quite short. He is in his early thirties in an age of hard labour and rudimentary medicine, when the average life expectancy is forty-something, so he may well be rather worn out and middle-aged.
He looks like us, for a value of 'us' which includes the entire human race. We have faces and bodies; he has a face and a body. He is as human as we are, but if you meet him, you are also meeting the being responsible for the universe ... His name is Yeshua, later to be Latinised as 'Jesus'. And what he has come for? To say some things; to do some things.
Yeshua | The Place He Has Come To, the Province that Simmers
The place he has come to (the place he has been born into) is a province of the empire that controls pretty much the whole known world. The empire has owned it for two generations, but it has not been independent for much longer. Before this empire there was another one, and another one before that. The province is not specially important, or specially rich. It has no famous sights. The only city is a huddle of yellow stone on a desert hilltop. But it is unusual. It is the only place in the world, so far, which is populated by worshippers of the God of everything. You can find scatterings of them elsewhere but this is the single place in which they are the majority, the natives. This is where their history happened. This is where they have worked their way from thinking that their God is the most important god, to thinking that He is the only God for them, to thinking that He is the only God there is.
The empire and its filthy gods encroach. Tourists wander into holy places, chattering and laughing. The empire's money with its blasphemous pictures has to be used for buying innocent, ordinary bread. It's as if the people of the province are being kept forcibly dirty, all the time. Somehow, they think, the favour of God has been forfeited.
The kingdom (of God, of heaven, apart from the empire, yet breaking into the empire) has started to represent righteousness itself, the state (in both senses of the word) in which God's people live in accord with Him again. It has become the focus of their longing. But a longing that cannot be acted upon. The occupiers are much too strong. Even tucked away in their barracks, the people know they are there ... backed up by superb organisation, matchless military technology, the wealth of the world. So the province simmers.
Yeshua | He is Called Moshiakh, 'the Anointed One' ... He Certainly Isn't Careful
The high officials of the one God's one temple perform a difficult balancing act, trying to keep the people happy, trying to keep the occupiers sweet so they don't take away even more of the province's limited autonomy. Low-level terrorism flourishes, followed by example-setting public executions. An ever-changing selection of pious groups offer ever-changing prescriptions for getting back God's approval. Preachers and would-be prophets are everywhere, prominent for a season and then gone. Some people say the rules of purity should be even stricter. Some people say you should abandon everything and go into the clean desert. Some people say you need to be washed in the province's one river. A lot of people think that the world will end soon; fear it will end soon; hope it will end soon, because then a more than human justice may put things right.
All the time, there are whispered rumours of someone, somewhere, claiming the kingship and starting the holy war to get the kingdom back. It never seems to be true, but every fanatic up in the hills knows the role is waiting to be filled. The religion has made a space for this figure, the king-who-is-to-come, the man whom the God of everything will choose to lead the uprising. He is called moshiakh, 'the anointed one', after the holy oil that kings wear. In Greek, where oil for hair is chrism, his title translates as christos. But it's a no-show so far ...
In summer the tension gets specially bad; and also at festivals, which are supposed to celebrate things being right, and make it feel much worse that they aren't. The soldiers are jumpy and resentful too. They don't like it here. The fleshpots of the exotic East it isn't. The locals are loons. Any moment, some teenage boy may try to stab you with a kitchen knife, and you can't tell if the girls are babes because they're all covered up. It's a grim little armpit of a posting. Say the wrong thing, eat the wrong thing, touch the wrong thing – any little thing can kick off a riot.
Into this setting comes Yeshua, with the love song to all that is ringing continually in him, and he says: don't be careful. He certainly isn't careful himself.
Yeshua | Nothing Lasts; Nothing But God ... He Wants Your Reckless Generosity
When crowds gather, to check out this new source of entertainment or outrage, to see if he's conducting himself like a teacher or a prophet or just possibly like a guerrillero looking for recruits – when the crowds gather, he sits them down in the sheep pasture, and he says: behave as if you never had to be afraid of consequences. Behave as if nothing you gave away could ever make you poorer, because you can never run out of what you give. Behave as if this one day we're in now were the whole time, and you didn't have to hold anything back, or to plot and scheme about tomorrow. Don't try to grip your life with tight, anxious hands. Unclench those fingers. Let it go. If someone asks for your help, give them more than they've asked for. If someone hits out at you, let them. Don't retaliate. Be the place the violence ends. Because you've got it wrong about virtue. It isn't something built up from a thousand careful, carefully measured acts.
Virtue comes, when it comes, in a rush; it comes from behaving, so far as you can, like God Himself, who makes and makes and loves and loves and is never the less for it. God doesn't want your careful virtue, He wants your reckless generosity. Try to keep what you have, and you'll lose even that. Give it away, and you'll get back more than you bargain for; more than bargaining could ever get you.
By the way, you were wanting a king? Look at that flower over there by the wall. More beautiful than any royal robe, don't you think? Better than silks; and it comes bursting out of the ground all by itself, free and gratis. It won't last? Nothing lasts; nothing but God.
Yeshua | He Doesn't Seem to Be Disgusted by Anybody, Anybody at All
He isn't a relativist, though. Far from it. He doesn't think you should relax and do what you like, and it won't really matter what. He believes in good and evil all right, to a drastic degree. He has a vivid, horrified sense of the HPtFtU (i.e. sin, or as Spufford defines it, the "Human Propensity to F%#k things Up"), in all its elaborate self-deceiving semi-oblivious encrustedness, and he talks as if it overshadowed huge swathes of human activity, including the human activities that humans tend to be proud of.
Whenever anyone asks him about the law, he usually ups the ante; he amps the law up towards a perfectionist impossibility, in which anger is forbidden as well as murder, in which desire can be as much a betrayal as adultery – in which internal states of being that apparently don't hurt (or even affect) anyone else weigh as heavily with God as external acts.
He seems to think a change is required in us as complete as the change that comes when chaff is set blazing after the harvest, and the fields billow with flame. We must all be 'salted with fire', he says. He can be frightening, indeed he can. He says it would be worth chopping off bits of yourself ... if it would rid you of what separates you from God. Yet he is an optimistic pessimist.
Come on, says somebody. How could anybody ever stand right with God, if it were as hard as you say? With God, everything is possible, he says. He annoys people when he talks like this. Because the implication of his perfectionism is that everybody is guilty; and if everybody is guilty, nobody gets to congratulate themselves, and murderers and adulterers cannot be shunned.
He does not seem to be disgusted by anybody, anybody at all.
On the other hand, he has a lot to say about self-righteousness, which he compares, not very tactfully, to a grave that looks neat and well cared for up top but is heaving with 'corruption' down below. For him, being sure you're righteous, standing on your dignity as a virtuous person, comes precious close to being dead. If you won't hear the bad news about yourself, you can't know yourself. You condemn yourself to the maintenance of an exhausting illusion, a false front to your self which keeps out doubt and with it hope, change, nourishment, breath, life. If you won't hear the bad news, you can't begin to hear the good news about yourself either. And you'll do harm. You'll be pumped up with the false confidence of virtue, and you'll think it gives you a license, and a large share of all the cruelties in the world will follow, for evil done knowingly is rather rare compared to the evil done by people who're sure that they themselves are good, and that evil is hatefully concentrated in some other person; some other person who makes your flesh creep because they have become exactly as unbearable, as creepy, as disgusting, as you fear the mess would be beneath your own mask of virtue, if you ever dared to look at it ...
+ First excerpts (subheads added) from pgs. 109-119 in Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense; more to come in ...
Bonus Video Stories about People Connecting w/ Yeshua Today
+ The More I Realized Yeshua is Our Messiah (7+ Minutes)
+ New Age to New Life in Yeshua (8+ Minutes)
+ Jewish Teacher Becomes a Student of Yeshua (6+ Minutes)
+ Millionaire Spiritually Bankrupt until I Met Yeshua (5+ Minutes)
+ Yeshua Gave Me Ultimate Self Worth (4+ Minutes)
Recent posts on overviews of the Story of Yeshua found in the Bible:
Creation, Crisis, Covenant, Christ, Church, (New) Creation | The God Who Loves Kindness, Justice, and Righteousness | The Whole Gospel for Guilt-Innocent, Shame-Honor, and Fear-Power Cultures | The Story of God in Nature | Black Identity in the Story of God | God Is Fully Present with Us | Embracing the Body We're Given | At Work in a Sanitation Truck
With wild wonder and hope,
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