Advent Two: Listening in the Desert

John the Baptist Sees Jesus from Afar, J. J. Tissot, ca 1890, France

The second week of Advent focuses on John the Baptist and his message of preparation: “ Prepare the way of the Lord.” “Repent and be baptized.”

I’ve been hearing about Jesus’s cousin John since I was small, and have heard dozens of sermons focusing on his call to repentance. Yet I’m still stumbling over parts of his story that surprise me, that remind me how little I know of what it means to listen, prepare, repent.

Today’s Gospel reading is from Luke 3:1-6

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.

He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,

"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:

‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.

Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;

and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"

I’m struck, reading it this time, at the precision of Luke’s historical context. John was clearly no mythical character, but a definite man, in a very precise time and place.

More than that, though, he was a man of influence who walked away from his place of privilege. The son of the priest Zechariah (some traditions describe Zechariah as High Priest), he was raised to be a priest himself.

Yet he appeared in the desert, far from his priestly responsibilities and robes, dressed, according to Mark, in camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, subsisting on locusts and honey.

Reading those first verses again, I’m struck by an odd, amusing thought: in the reign of all those powerful rulers (Caesar, Tiberias, Herod, Pilate, Philip), in the time of those powerful high priests (Annas and Caiphas) the word of God came to John in the wilderness.

To an unexpected person, in an unexpected place.

That word wilderness. Sometimes it’s translated desert. It’s not a word we associate with Christmas preparation. We like evergreens, candles, ribbons, snow.

Wilderness reminds me of Syria. Yemen. Somalia. Places we’d rather not think of. People we’d prefer to ignore.

And desert.  The UN predicts over 50 million people will be forced to leave their homes by 2020 because their land has turned to desert. Some of those people are pleading their cause in Paris this week at the Global Climate Summit. Many are already on the move, looking for food, for water.

We are halfway through the UN Decade for Deserts(2010-2020), and still many of our US leaders attempt to ignore the loss of arable land, the fossil fuel impacts on fragile ecosystems, the unprecedented displacement of entire populations. 

John’s message was reversal: high places made low, low places made high, crooked ways made straight, rough ways made smooth.

Dry places brought to life again? Flooded lowlands brought back above sea level?

I wonder.

And his message was repentance: repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Repent for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Repent and believe the good news.

The prescribed Advent reading ends at verse six, but this week I read on to the end of the chapter:

“Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”

“What should we do then?” the crowd asked.

John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”

Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”

“Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.

Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”

He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

It’s puzzling that John leaps so quickly from “repent and be baptized” to “produce fruit in keeping with righteousness.”

Puzzling that the fruit he describes has an economic edge to it:

Share your extra shirts and food.

Don’t collect more taxes than required.

Don’t pad your own pockets at the expense of your neighbor.

Be content with your pay.

I don’t remember hearing that sermon.

Those who heard John and his message chose to go out to the desert.

Turned from their preferred content providers in search of the word of truth.

Listened long enough for their hearts to be moved, their consciences stung, their wills rearranged.

Do we really want to listen?

A word of grief rises from the deserts of our world.

© Hydropolitic Academy, 2014

A cry for peace.

For safety.

For water.

A longing for justice.

For land.

For food.

The voices are hard to hear, drowned out by the Christmas ads, the candidate bluster, the smug repetition of acceptable lies.

Lord, I repent.

Repent of my hardness of heart, my failure to listen.

My collusion in a culture that ignores the cries of the poor.

My complicity in an economic structure always reaching for more.

My small gestures of generosity that fall far short of the enormous divide between privilege and poverty, comfort and despair.

I repent, grieve, and ask, “What should we do?”

What would the fruit of righteousness look like, in this time and place?

What would it mean to share my extra shirts and food with people I will never see?

How will your reversal take place?

Merciful God,

how many John the Baptists,

how many prophets of your light,

have we ignored

because they were not what we were looking for?

How many times have we ignored voices

crying in the wilderness,

"Make straight the way of the Lord."

How many times have we breathed a sigh of relief,

and turned our backs on your messengers,

because they did not speak the message

we expected to hear?

Help us hear anew,

the cry of those who would lead us to Christ.

Tune our ears to your heralds,

that we might also testify to your light. Amen

  (from The Abingdon Worship Annual 2008)

This is the second in a four week Advent series.
Earlier Advent posts on this blog:

Advent One: Hope beyond Terror, Nov. 29,2015

Advent One: Hope is Our Work, Nov. 30, 2014

Advent Two: Peace is Our Promise, Prayer and Practice, Dec. 7, 2014

Advent Three: Love is the Air We Breathe, Dec. 14, 2014

Advent Four: Joy is the Song We're Given, Dec. 21, 2014

Advent One: Rethinking Portfolios, Dec. 1, 2013

Advent Two: Resisting Idols and Injustice, Dec. 8, 2013

Advent Three: Redefining Home, Dec. 15, 2013

Advent Four: Rejoicing in Mystery, Dec. 22, 2013

Advent One: How Do I Know? Dec. 2, 2012

Advent Two: Outsiders In Dec. 9, 2012

Advent Three: Question. Fruit. Dec. 16, 2012

Advent Four: Sing Alleluia, Dec. 23, 2012

Advent One: What I'm Waiting for, Nov. 26, 2011

Metanoia,  Dec 4, 2011

Voice in the Wilderness,  Dec. 11, 2011

Common Miracles,  Dec. 18, 2011
The Christmas Miracle, Dec. 24, 2011 

Advent Two: John the Baptist,  Dec. 12, 2010

Mary's Song,  Dec. 19, 2010

Christmas Hope,  Dec. 24, 2010 

Lent Five: Escaping Blindness

In the days leading up to his crucifixion, Jesus repeatedly healed the blind and spoke out emphatically about another form of blindness. Matthew 23 records the most extended discussion, a series of seven

Jesus Heals the Blind Man,
unknown Ethiopian artist

“woes” directed at spiritually blind leaders. He says repeatedly “Woe to you, blind guides,” “blind fools”,”blind men”:

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.  You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.(Matthew 23:23-28)

Those blind leaders were the ones who, days later, hurried Jesus toward the cross.

And ever since, blind leaders have insisted on obedience to peripheral issues, indulged their own desire for power, presented a righteous front while neglecting the more important matters: justice, mercy, love of God and neighbor.

Part of the goal of Lent is to shed the habits of heart that hold us in spiritual blindness. Yet often, we are helpless to see those habits that blind us, and too often our leaders do little to help us.

I think of the slave owners whose churches endorsed their self-righteous possession of fellow human beings.

And grieve at our own silence at the human rights issues of our day.

Pastor/author/counselor Paul Tripp, reflecting on spiritual blindness, wrote:

We can be physically blind and live quite well. But when we are spiritually blind, we cannot live as God intended… Physically blind people are always aware of their deficit and spend much of their lives learning to live with its limitations.

But the Bible says that we can be spiritually blind and yet think that we see quite well. We even get offended when people act as if they see us better than we see ourselves! The reality of spiritual blindness has important implications for the Christian community.The Hebrews passage [Heb. 3:13] clearly teaches that personal insight is the product of community. I need you in order to really see and know myself. Otherwise, I will listen to my own arguments, believe my own lies, and buy into my own delusions.

My self-perception is as accurate as a carnival mirror. If I am going to see myself clearly, I need you to hold the mirror of God’s Word in front of me.

I need to wake up in the morning and say, “God, I am a person in desperate need of help. Please send helpers my way and give me the humility to receive the help you have provided.” And I need to pray further, “Lord, make me willing to help someone see himself as you see him today. (Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands, 2002, 53-54)

I thought of Tripp’s comments when I saw the Franklin Graham’s Facebook post that has been reposted from page to page this week:

How is it possible for someone who considers himself a spiritual leader to be so stunningly, painfully, grievously blind?

Did he read the testimony about police dogs attacking unarmed citizens, including a 14 year old boy?? Did he read the part about the police holding a gun to the head of a 19 year old man, arresting him for sitting in his own car, cooling off after playing baseball?

Did he read the report at all?

If not, why would he offer such comments, knowing as a leader they'll be repeated and reposted, knowing they'll contribute fuel and pain to an already simmering stew of anger?

Or is he so blind he doesn't think it matters?

Certainly he’s not alone. As our news sources become more and more polarized, our conversations more and more divisive, it becomes harder and harder to escape our own blindness.

Which is why it’s more and more essential that we seek out others to help us see what we’d prefer to ignore.

I fear we live in a time of great blindness - not so much on the part of those who claim no faith perspective and belittle the Christian church, but on the part of those within, those who speak most confidently on behalf of God.

A friend recently posted a link to this article: Why White People Freak Out When They're Called Out about Race.

It recounts the firestorm that erupted when a white Princeton male student was asked to “check his privilege,” and describes the way the white majority community insists on managing the conversation about race. Robin DiAngelo, a professor of multicutural education, explains:

In my workshops, one of the things I like to ask white people is, “What are the rules for how people of color should give us feedback about our racism? What are the rules, where did you get them, and whom do they serve?” Usually those questions alone make the point.

It’s like if you’re standing on my head and I say, “Get off my head,” and you respond, “Well, you need to tell me nicely.” . . .

When I’m doing a workshop, I’ll often ask the people of color in the room, somewhat facetiously, “How often have you given white people feedback about our inevitable and often unconscious racist patterns and had that go well for you?” And they laugh.

Because it just doesn’t go well. And so one time I asked, “What would your daily life be like if you could just simply give us feedback, have us receive it graciously, reflect on it and work to change the behavior? What would your life be like?”

And this one man of color looked at me and said, “It would be revolutionary.”

Revolutionary.

This should be the entry level of Christian discourse, the common expression of love for neighbor: gracious listening, genuine reflection, honest attempt to change our own offensive behavior.

Yet it's so rare, so unheard of, it would be revolutionary.

In the way Jesus himself was revolutionary.

This goes beyond the issue of race.

What would happen if women could offer feedback on the pain they’ve experienced in being shut out, shut down, and have that received graciously?

What would happen if those held in poverty could offer feedback about the systems that demean and deny them, and have that feedback heard and prayerfully considered?

What if Christians could sit and listen about ways we’ve judged, misrepresented, dismissed those who don’t share our faith? What if we could receve criticism graciously, offer thanks for the honest feedback, then respond in love to change our offensive behavior?

In 2 Peter 1, Paul advised habits that could lead toward spiritual sight:

Make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins. (2 Peter 1:5-9)

Real conversation, the revolutionary kind described above, would require real self-control, mutual affection, perseverance, love.

Those attributes are in short supply among our leaders, our news sources, our faith communities, ourselves.

So here are some Lenten practices to consider:

1. Acknowledge the risk of spiritual blindness: “God, I am a person in desperate need of help. Please send helpers my way and give me the humility to receive the help you have provided.”

2, Turn off the news sources that make us most comfortable, that fuel and excuse our blindness, and search out the full story, as close to the source as possible.

An Open Letter to Franklin Graham, Lisa Sharon Harper

3. On the question of Ferguson, read the Department of Justice report on the Ferguson police, or a reasonably impartial summar. And then read and consider the open letter toFranklin Graham (and yes, be assured, concerned faith leaders have written him, met with him, asked him to consider the impact of his words. He's demonstrated a stunning lack of interest).

4. Invite conversation with someone of differing race, religion, political expression, gender, age demographic, and ask for insight about experiences of injustice, oppression, pain. Practice listening graciously, exercise self-control, explore and consider other points of view. Pray for revolutionary conversations.

From all blindness of heart; from pride, vainglory,
and hypocrisy; from envy, hatred, and malice; and from all want
of charity,
Good Lord, deliver us.

(The Great Litany, Book of Common Prayer)

This is the sixth in a Lenten series.

Other Lenten posts:

2015: 

    Ash Wednesday: Confession Booth

    Lent One: Embracing Hunger: February 24

    Lent Two: Eluding Privilege: March 1

    Lent Three: Exploring Power: March 8

    Lent Four: Expecting Suffering: March 15

From 2013:

    An  Alternative Narrative: February 10

    Seeking Blessing in a Fracture Land: February 17

    The Poor in Spirit and Those Who Mourn: February 24

    Hungering Far Past "Rightness": March 3

    Guns, God, Mercy: March 10

    Making Peace: What God's Children Do:  March 24

    Where is Newness Needed? March 31

From 2012:
     Looking toward Lent
     Lenten Sorrow : Lament and Nacham
     Lenten Silence: Charash, Be Still

Ash Wednesday: Confession Booth

Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent and a day of repentance and confession.

I’ve been posting this winter about social justice issues, ways we exclude and abuse each other, and wondering what restitution would look like: for families harmed by racial prejudice, communities shattered by unjust social policy, women diminished by unexamined assumptions.

There’s a chapter in Don Miller’s Blue Like Jazz that I’ve carried with me: "Confession". Miller describes Ren Fayre week on his Reed College campus, and the idea of building a confession booth – not for the partying students, but for the small band of campus Christians:

"Okay, you guys." Tony gathered everybody's attention. "Here's the catch." He leaned in a little. "We are not actually going to accept confessions." We all looked at him in confusion.

 He continued, "We are going to confess to them. We are going to confess that, as followers of Jesus, we have not been very loving; we have been bitter, and for that we are sorry. We will apologize for the Crusades, we will apologize for televangelists, we will apologize for neglecting the poor and the lonely, we will ask them to forgive us, and we will tell them that in our selfishness, we have misrepresented Jesus on this campus. We will tell people who come into the booth that Jesus loves them."

 All of us sat there in silence because it was obvious that something beautiful and true had hit the table with a thud. We all thought it was a great idea, and we could see it in each other's eyes. It would feel so good to apologize, to apologize for the Crusades, for Columbus and the genocide committed in the Bahamas in the name of God, apologize for the missionaries who landed in Mexico and came up through the West slaughtering Indians in the name of Christ. 

 I wanted so desperately to apologize for the many ways I had misrepresented the Lord. I could feel that I had betrayed the Lord by judging, by not being willing to love the people he had loved and only giving lip service to issues of human rights.

For so much of my life I had been defending Christianity because I thought to admit that we had done any wrong was to discredit the religious system as a whole. But it isn't a religious system; it is people following Christ. And the important thing to do, the right thing to do, was to apologize for getting in the way of Jesus. 

Change starts with confession. Acknowledgement of guilt, acceptance of blame, desire to walk in a new way.

If I could, I’d build a big confession booth in the middle of every reservation.

In the most battered neighborhoods in our inner cities.

On the street corners where prostitutes ply their trade.

And God’s people would sit there and confess.

But my carpenter skills are lacking, and I haven’t figured out how to be multiple places at once. So this will have to do for now.

My confession booth:

I did not drive you from your land, but I’ve enjoyed the benefit. My own yard was once yours. Communities where my family has lived were built on the ruins of yours.

And I didn’t hold you in slavery, but I’ve enjoyed the benefit while you inherited the pain. 

I am not the one erecting walls against you, or jailing you unjustly, but I’m also not crying out for walls to be torn down, or paying your legal fees to see justice done.

I have benefited from your labor, without insisting that you earn a living wage.

I’ve assumed open doors for myself, without ensuring there were open doors for you.

I am complicit in more ways than I can fathom:

When I sit in pews in churches where women’s voices are silenced.

When I participate in programs, policies, patterns designed to please and pamper the wealthy, and disadvantage the poor.

When I enjoy the benefits of well-cared for roads, excellent schools, world class health care, while not asking why others, equally deserving, have no roads at all, substandard schools, poorly staffed clinics with outdated equipment.

And I have misrepresented God, our savior Jesus Christ, the present, powerful Holy Spirit, the glorious coming Kingdom.

I have colluded in a system that creates false standards, pretends to piety, accepts some more than others, delights in theological abstraction while ignoring human need, dares to speak for God in ways we know he would not speak. 

I have helped parcel out love in small measure, crumbs of compassion, small samplings of kindness.

I have stood on the wrong side of them versus us, been silent when I should have spoken, taken the coward’s way out, settled for easy instead of true.

Misrepresented God in speech, action, attitude: presented a flat, flimsy version that my own mind could manage, my own stick figure drawing of a reality far grander than I’ve glimpsed or taken time to imagine.

And yes, daily, minute by minute, I have judged you – whoever you are – for driving slow in the fast lane, for wasting your money for things I find foolish, for laughing too loud, eating too much, failing to be exactly like me.

Please forgive me.

I have friends who find confession oppressive. Insulting. As if admission we are less than perfect is in some way demeaning.

I find confession freeing: I am less than perfect. Far less. I fall short every day, of justice, of love, of the glorious possibility breathed into every human on the this planet.

So I confess, and celebrate Ash Wednesday, and invite you to join me in prayer that will echo around the globe this Wednesday:

Most holy and merciful Father:
We confess to you and to one another,
and to the whole communion of saints
in heaven and on earth,
that we have sinned by our own fault
in thought, word, and deed;
by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and
strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We
have not forgiven others, as we have been forgiven.
Have mercy on us, Lord.

We have been deaf to your call to serve, as Christ served us. We have not been true to the mind of Christ. We have grieved your Holy Spirit.
Have mercy on us, Lord.

We confess to you, Lord, all our past unfaithfulness: the pride, hypocrisy, and impatience of our lives,
We confess to you, Lord.

Our self-indulgent appetites and ways, and our exploitation of other people,
We confess to you, Lord. 

Our anger at our own frustration, and our envy of those more fortunate than ourselves,
We confess to you, Lord.

Our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our dishonesty in daily life and work,
We confess to you, Lord.

Our negligence in prayer and worship, and our failure to commend the faith that is in us,
We confess to you, Lord.

Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done: for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty,
Accept our repentance, Lord.

For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us,
Accept our repentance, Lord.

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,
Accept our repentance, Lord.

Restore us, good Lord, and let your anger depart from us;
Favorably hear us, for your mercy is great.

Accomplish in us the work of your salvation,
That we may show forth your glory in the world.
        (Book of Common Prayer, Ash Wednesday) 

This is the last in an unexpected series: Justice Is Indivisible. Other posts: 

Epiphany and Filoxenia: Entertaining Angels, Jan. 4, 2015

Looking Back, Praying Forward, Jan. 11, 2015

Creative Extremists for Love, Jan. 18, 2015

Selma:Stories We Need to Hear, Jan. 25, 2015

#NoMore Less Than, Feb. 1, 2015

Learning to Listen, Feb. 8, 2015 

Please join the conversation! Much as I love response in other formats (email, Facebook comments, etc) comments left here become part of the ongoing discussion. Look for the "__ comments" link below to leave your comments.   

 

Which "Way" Am I Called to Follow?

In this hot political season, with voices raised about guns, jobs, freedom, the American Way, I find myself pausing to ask: which Way am I called to follow? Whose priorities should I pursue?

Christ Takes up His Cross,
Anna Kocher, 2006

Before Christians were called Christians, they were called Followers of the Way. The Way was Jesus: simultaneously the path itself, guide and example, companion on the journey. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me.”

But he also said “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). The way to relationship with God, to the full life Jesus promised, is through Jesus himself, but also through following the path he shows us, walking with him the road of sacrifice and self-denial.

Following the Way of Christ starts with a willingness to set our native loyalties aside. Jesus said again and again: leave your nets, your fields, your money, your life, and come, follow me. The early believers understood that the first step of the Christian journey was a step away from all prior allegiance, including allegiance to self, to comfort, safety, the right to be right, the mistaken idea that somehow we, on our own, are good people, better than those others.

The Apostle Paul understood this completely:

If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more:  circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless. But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. Philippians 3

Too many contemporary Christians assume that today the first step is somehow different, somehow less demanding, that we can keep our old loyalties and still fit Christ in. But to follow Jesus, even now, requires a willingness to step away from tradition, denominational assumptions, national pride, comfort, safety, confidence in our own intellect or education, the mistaken idea that somehow we, on our own, are good people, better than those others.

I start here: I am a fallen, broken person, jealously loyal to my own ideas, selfishly committed to my own ways of seeing, in need of a hand of grace to help me stand free of the misguided assumptions that hold me hostage, that whisper I’m somehow of more value than those others not like me.

I need help to start on the Way, and I need help to continue. If Jesus is the Way, then we’re called to live like him, visible agents of healing, compassion, reconciliation, forgiveness. Before creeds, before denominations, before tee-shirt slogans or bumper stickers, the early Christians were known by the visible difference in their daily lives. They embraced lepers, prostitutes, Roman soldiers. They fed widows and orphans. They refused to retaliate when faced with persecution. They offered healing to enemies, welcome to wanderers unlike themselves.

Those early Christians were so convinced of the lasting love of Christ they turned and offered that love to those who maligned them, scorned them, punished them. Unevenly, imperfectly, they walked day by day in the Way they had been shown.

Jesus Calling Disciples, John Mosiman, USA, ca. 1970

Athanasius of Alexandria  (ca. 296-298 – 373) described the visible influence of the Way of Christ  on the surrounding culture:

Christ is not only preached through His own disciples, but also wrought so persuasively on men’s understanding that, laying aside their savage habits and forsaking the worship of their ancestral gods, they learnt to know Him and through Him to worship the Father. While they were yet idolaters, the Greeks and Barbarians were always at war with each other, and were even cruel to their own kith and kin. Nobody could travel by land or sea at all unless he was armed with swords, because of their irreconcilable quarrels with each other. Indeed, the whole course of their life was carried on with weapons. But since they came over to the school of Christ, as men moved with real compunction they have laid aside their murderous cruelty and are war-minded no more. On the contrary, all is peace among them and nothing remains save desire for friendship.  (On the Incarnation)

I admit, as followers of the Way in the 21st century, we face a challenge not known to those new Christians of an earlier world. We carry the heritage not only of those whose lives mirrored the example of Christ, but also of those who in the name of Christ went on with their war-minded ways, killing and conquering, justifying slavery and sexism, suppressing scientific study, shouting down opponents, carrying signs saying “God hates.”

No one said the Way of Christ would be easy. The call of love is always costly.

So we start with that other first step of the Way: confession. Not only confession of our own sin, failure, falling short, but confession of the falling short of those who have gone before, those who even now misrepresent God’s goodness and make the word “Christian” a sign of judgment rather than of hope.

Vinoth Ramachandra, Sri Lankan theologian who has surely seen more than his share of colonial misconduct in the name of Christ, notes “it is with a flawed and faithless people that the Christ has stooped to pitch his tent and link his name. Any sharing of the gospel within a pluralistic world, after two millennia of ‘Christianity,’ has to begin with humble acknowledgement of betrayals of the gospel by the church itself.” (Faiths in Conflict? 1999 p. 168)

Turning from our tribal loyalties, confessing our misrepresentation of the gospel and complicity in a culture skewed to its own good rather than the good of all, we start on a Way that leads us ever deeper into humility, deeper into the longing for wisdom, the repentant awareness of our own lack of love, our own inadequacy in the face of complex, overwhelming need.

From the Gospel of Matthew
Otto Dix, 1960, Berlin

And along that Way, as we read the words of Jesus, as we pray to hear and know his voice, as we ask to see with his eyes, to love what he loves, we find our hearts changing, and find ourselves claiming, with Jesus, a purpose and passion like his own, priority enough in this conflicted season:

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom
    for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight
    for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
    to proclaim the year
    of the Lord’s favor.”  (Luke 4)

This is part of the August synchroblog, "Follow." Links to other posts will appear soon.

This is also part of an continuing series about faith and politics: What's Your Platform?

More than ever, I welcome your thoughts about which issues to consider, as well as your insight, comments, and questions.  Look for the "__ comments" link below to leave your comments.