Mark 10: 2-16
2 Some Pharisees came, and to test him they asked, ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?’ 3He answered them, ‘What did Moses command you?’ 4They said, ‘Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her.’ 5But Jesus said to them, ‘Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you. 6But from the beginning of creation, “God made them male and female.” 7“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, 8and the two shall become one flesh.” So they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.’
10 Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. 11He said to them, ‘Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; 12and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.’
13 People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. 14But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. 15Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.’ 16And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.
And the two shall become one…and then they shall spend the next 20 years deciding which one.
This week’s theme presents an ideal of the sacredness of marriage and family but, as always, where there is an ideal there is also brokenness and struggle. It’s the human condition. The mystery of God taking two separate people and making them one flesh is something that has mystified and challenged couples since Adam and Eve. If all couples that have made a vow before God to love, honor and cherish each other have indeed been made into one flesh, why is the flesh so obviously at war with itself day after day?
It is a mystery which we can mull over often, sometimes in frustration and resentment, sometimes in deep sadness and sometimes just in real confusion that, for the most part, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of consistent evidence of true oneness in relationships. Marriage is an incredibly difficult journey of give and take and one would think that if there really were just one flesh, everything would be wonderfully unified. Life decisions would be easy and there would always be a great sense of mutual support, respect and appreciation. Disagreements would be rare and arguments unheard of.
“If we have actually been made into one flesh then he would always agree with me.”
There’s the crunch, the crossroads and crisis point. I don’t think anyone, male or female, goes into a marriage having thought through the idea that if two people become one flesh, how do they actually live and move as one instead of two different people always duking it out as to whose flesh gets to be more in control in every situation that comes along? There doesn’t seem to be a single good or easy answer to that question.
Perhaps it’s the wrong question.
We tend to take a divine mystery and look at it from a human point of view, our own point of view. But there’s another point of view: God’s. What is it that God sees when he looks at two people who have committed themselves to the sacred vocation of marriage and raising a family?
We have friends who make their own wine. I have never made wine myself but I at least know that it starts with some fruit to which water, yeast and a few other ingredients are added and it goes through quite a process before it becomes wine worthy of consumption. It goes through fermentation, clarification, siphoning, aging and mellowing. The ingredients are given time to interact with each other and great care is taken that bacteria is not introduced because bacteria can infect the wine and turn it to vinegar. Our friends love to make wine. They may start out with a bunch of individual ingredients that would seem to a neophyte to have little potential but experienced winemakers envision a finished product that will give them great pleasure.
God is the master winemaker. He makes the Wine of One Body. Before two people even meet and marry, God sees the finished product. He knows there is a long and sometimes painful process these two people must go through before they become a delightfully full flavored One Body Wine, but that in no way diminishes his pleasure in what he is making.
So the challenges, struggles, discouragement and frustration, as well as the times of mutual joy, love and shared vision are all critical to what God is creating. We are holy ingredients going through difficult times of cleansing, fermentation, clarification and aging. Our part in all of this is to be full of hope and grateful that we are indeed being taken carefully and lovingly through a necessary process. We do have a responsibility to guard this process against the bacteria that can turn the wine into vinegar. This bacteria can take the form of built up resentments, territorialism, aggression, defensiveness, withdrawal…there are too many things to list but no one needs to be told the whole list of negative things that destroy relationship.
Accepting that there is a process going on won’t necessarily make it easy but it can relieve some anxiety and guilt. The whole spiritual life is a wine making process and no matter how committed we are to being the best we can be as Christians, we still need to go through the process. I have noticed in my life that whenever something happens that makes me exclaim, “God is so good! Thank you, Lord”, it always happens after a long period of struggle where day after day my thoughts, emotions, desires and directions are purified, decanted and distilled. I have noticed that waiting is almost a built in requisite to seeing God’s will come to pass and usually his will is completely different from what I initially thought it was. To me, his will looked like some grapes, some sugar and a bit of yeast. It never even occurred to me that his will could turn out to be the exquisite wine I end up delighting in.
A pregnant woman would probably relate better to a metaphor of the child growing and developing in the womb. The mother can lovingly envision the child who is being created within. She cannot see all the processes of development going on and she is aware that there is and will be great discomfort involved in carrying and delivering this child. She knows that no matter how impatient she feels and no matter how uncomfortable she is physically, the child will be born when it’s time for him or her to be born. She is filled with the delightful mystery that this child, created from two separate entities will be an entirely different being from her and her husband.
We live lives filled with the holy and sacred process of creation whether it is the creation of the one body or the creation of a child or the creation of a deeper and fuller spiritual oneness with the Lord. All of life is fermentation, clarification and aging.
As St. Paul wrote in Romans 8: 22-25:
For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this (creation), but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons and daughters, the redemption of our body. For we were saved with this hope in mind. Now a hope that can be observed is not really hope, for who hopes for what can be seen? But if we hope for what we do not yet observe, we eagerly wait for it with patience.
So, groan away…and be joyful. All creation groans with you.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Friday, September 25, 2009
The Unclenched Heart
Sept. 27th, 2009
Mk 9:38-43, 45, 47-48
38 John said to him, ‘Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.’ 39But Jesus said, ‘Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterwards to speak evil of me. 40Whoever is not against us is for us. 41For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.
42 ‘If any of you put a stumbling-block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. 43If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. 45And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. 47And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, 48where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.
Some of the worst memories I have from my childhood are of being deliberately excluded from a group, whether it was from a little club the neighborhood kids had formed or a cliquey group of girls at school. Some of the most heart wrenching times I had as a mom was when one of my kids experienced exclusion. Those of you who are moms now or will be in the future will no doubt experience the same inner agony at some point in your children’s growing years. Exclusion seems to be one of the most constant manifestations of original sin, practiced by children and adults alike.
The theme that is most often talked about in this week’s gospel is the avoidance of sin in our lives and we are struck by Jesus’ use of extreme hyperbole to get this point across. There is no doubt that as individuals we need to be aware of ways that we offend the Lord, but in this gospel, Jesus seems to be talking about one more thing in particular that wrenches the Father’s heart and that is excluding others from the body of Christ - elitism.
Before Jesus speaks about cutting off body parts that offend, he instructs the disciples not to be so quick to judge that someone is “not one of us”. The first reading follows exactly the same theme: Complaints are brought to Moses that there are people outside the camp who are prophesying. Moses responds by saying, “What’s the problem? I wish you all would prophesy.” In both readings we have the infant beginnings of two different religious communities and in both of them, before people even knew what was really going on, they were practicing exclusion. It’s so elemental to human nature and it is as hurtful to the heart of God as it is to our hearts when our children are rejected and excluded.
One of the most destructive forces in any community, whether it’s a parish, the workplace or a family, is the formation of territories. You can see it happening all the time. One group sets up its own territory, which in a parish could even be a ministry or a prayer group, and gradually this territory has to be defended and controlled. The enemy has to be identified and that enemy is often someone who suggests changes or else another group who doesn’t think along the same lines. The enemy may be more conservative or more liberal or too lax or too rigid or too much into social justice or not enough into social justice… It’s human nature. Watch a group of kids and see how long it takes before one or more of them say something like, “This is my room. This is my toy. This is my space. You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not the boss. Don’t cross this line.” It’s very rare that the workplace isn’t divided into distinct groups: management vs. regular employees, this division against that division, this faculty against that faculty.
God hates this. These attitudes of territorialism and defensiveness have absolutely nothing to do with the Spirit of God. Did you notice that neither Moses nor Jesus said, “Just a second. I’ll check these people out and then I’ll tell you if there’s anything to worry about.” Neither Moses nor Jesus were concerned about their territories. They had nothing they needed to defend. Their egos were not on the line. And I have to say that when we get into an attitude of defending what we think God wants us to defend, what we are most often defending are our fragile egos. Our group or our territory becomes our identity. Jesus had no need to defend himself against anyone who might act without asking his express permission because his ego was not all wrapped up in his mission.
Instead of individual people going around wondering if they should be cutting off their hands to avoid offending God, I propose that whole communities should be terribly worried about this. If there’s a group in the body of Christ who think they are God’s right hand group and they are spending time defending their territories by pointing fingers at others, then this is the hand that should be cut off before it causes offense. I have seen a few parishes destroyed by this attitude. I have seen people and groups wounded terribly which caused them to define their own territories so they wouldn’t be hurt any further and then they started to point their own fingers and the whole scenario is repeated. It literally takes years for a community to heal from rampant territorialism. In the work place, extreme manifestations of territorialism can cause businesses to go under. Families can die from it.
I’m being very heavy about this topic but it’s too important to gloss over. We do it all the time. We do it as groups and we do it as individuals. Every time we share something negative with someone about another person or another group with whom we philosophically disagree, we are practicing exclusion and building walls. We fear we will be infected by wrong ideas. We fear we will be made to feel uncomfortable. We fear we will be judged so we judge first. We fear change. We fear someone or something will upset the balance of a group or ministry we have worked hard to establish.
Lose the fear. Think of Jesus. Think of Moses. It’s not up to us to defend God in whatever way we think he needs defending. Lose the fear. Open up. Love. It’s not about who’s right and who’s wrong. It’s about love. It’s about respect. It’s about acceptance, bridges and hands reaching out to each other to invite in, not keep out – open hands, not clenched fists with pointing fingers.
My husband and I worked in the UVic Chaplaincy where there were 14 different faith groups sharing office space. These weren’t just Christian groups; Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish and Sikh were some of the other faiths represented. There was absolutely no way we could all agree on our Spiritual and religious beliefs. Even the Christian faith groups had large differences. But our differences were not what we focused on. We all strove to find what we had in common. It wasn’t hard to find these things. Love. Integrity. Desire to serve God. I think when we worked there the specific chaplains involved didn’t have huge ego problems or anything to prove. There was no sense that anyone felt they were better than anyone else. Everyone supported each other’s ministries. Everyone knew that each chaplain was completely committed to his or her own faith beliefs but defensive walls didn’t need to be built. Everyone recognized that the only way the chaplaincy could operate was if there was huge respect and love for each other.
Each of us is called to search inside ourselves and see if we are harboring prejudice against ‘the other’, whether the other is someone of a completely different belief system or a person or group within our own parish or a family member who has chosen a path different from what we think is right. Love cannot operate from behind a fortress wall. Love is not love if it requires ‘the other’ to change before they can be loved unconditionally. God does not treat us this way and we cannot – must not- treat others that way.
The heart must be open and the hand unclenched.
And you shall be called ‘Breach Mender, Restorer of Ruined Houses.’ (Isaiah 58:12)
Mend the breach – restore the home. We cannot survive any other way.
Mk 9:38-43, 45, 47-48
38 John said to him, ‘Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.’ 39But Jesus said, ‘Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterwards to speak evil of me. 40Whoever is not against us is for us. 41For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.
42 ‘If any of you put a stumbling-block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. 43If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. 45And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. 47And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, 48where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.
Some of the worst memories I have from my childhood are of being deliberately excluded from a group, whether it was from a little club the neighborhood kids had formed or a cliquey group of girls at school. Some of the most heart wrenching times I had as a mom was when one of my kids experienced exclusion. Those of you who are moms now or will be in the future will no doubt experience the same inner agony at some point in your children’s growing years. Exclusion seems to be one of the most constant manifestations of original sin, practiced by children and adults alike.
The theme that is most often talked about in this week’s gospel is the avoidance of sin in our lives and we are struck by Jesus’ use of extreme hyperbole to get this point across. There is no doubt that as individuals we need to be aware of ways that we offend the Lord, but in this gospel, Jesus seems to be talking about one more thing in particular that wrenches the Father’s heart and that is excluding others from the body of Christ - elitism.
Before Jesus speaks about cutting off body parts that offend, he instructs the disciples not to be so quick to judge that someone is “not one of us”. The first reading follows exactly the same theme: Complaints are brought to Moses that there are people outside the camp who are prophesying. Moses responds by saying, “What’s the problem? I wish you all would prophesy.” In both readings we have the infant beginnings of two different religious communities and in both of them, before people even knew what was really going on, they were practicing exclusion. It’s so elemental to human nature and it is as hurtful to the heart of God as it is to our hearts when our children are rejected and excluded.
One of the most destructive forces in any community, whether it’s a parish, the workplace or a family, is the formation of territories. You can see it happening all the time. One group sets up its own territory, which in a parish could even be a ministry or a prayer group, and gradually this territory has to be defended and controlled. The enemy has to be identified and that enemy is often someone who suggests changes or else another group who doesn’t think along the same lines. The enemy may be more conservative or more liberal or too lax or too rigid or too much into social justice or not enough into social justice… It’s human nature. Watch a group of kids and see how long it takes before one or more of them say something like, “This is my room. This is my toy. This is my space. You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not the boss. Don’t cross this line.” It’s very rare that the workplace isn’t divided into distinct groups: management vs. regular employees, this division against that division, this faculty against that faculty.
God hates this. These attitudes of territorialism and defensiveness have absolutely nothing to do with the Spirit of God. Did you notice that neither Moses nor Jesus said, “Just a second. I’ll check these people out and then I’ll tell you if there’s anything to worry about.” Neither Moses nor Jesus were concerned about their territories. They had nothing they needed to defend. Their egos were not on the line. And I have to say that when we get into an attitude of defending what we think God wants us to defend, what we are most often defending are our fragile egos. Our group or our territory becomes our identity. Jesus had no need to defend himself against anyone who might act without asking his express permission because his ego was not all wrapped up in his mission.
Instead of individual people going around wondering if they should be cutting off their hands to avoid offending God, I propose that whole communities should be terribly worried about this. If there’s a group in the body of Christ who think they are God’s right hand group and they are spending time defending their territories by pointing fingers at others, then this is the hand that should be cut off before it causes offense. I have seen a few parishes destroyed by this attitude. I have seen people and groups wounded terribly which caused them to define their own territories so they wouldn’t be hurt any further and then they started to point their own fingers and the whole scenario is repeated. It literally takes years for a community to heal from rampant territorialism. In the work place, extreme manifestations of territorialism can cause businesses to go under. Families can die from it.
I’m being very heavy about this topic but it’s too important to gloss over. We do it all the time. We do it as groups and we do it as individuals. Every time we share something negative with someone about another person or another group with whom we philosophically disagree, we are practicing exclusion and building walls. We fear we will be infected by wrong ideas. We fear we will be made to feel uncomfortable. We fear we will be judged so we judge first. We fear change. We fear someone or something will upset the balance of a group or ministry we have worked hard to establish.
Lose the fear. Think of Jesus. Think of Moses. It’s not up to us to defend God in whatever way we think he needs defending. Lose the fear. Open up. Love. It’s not about who’s right and who’s wrong. It’s about love. It’s about respect. It’s about acceptance, bridges and hands reaching out to each other to invite in, not keep out – open hands, not clenched fists with pointing fingers.
My husband and I worked in the UVic Chaplaincy where there were 14 different faith groups sharing office space. These weren’t just Christian groups; Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish and Sikh were some of the other faiths represented. There was absolutely no way we could all agree on our Spiritual and religious beliefs. Even the Christian faith groups had large differences. But our differences were not what we focused on. We all strove to find what we had in common. It wasn’t hard to find these things. Love. Integrity. Desire to serve God. I think when we worked there the specific chaplains involved didn’t have huge ego problems or anything to prove. There was no sense that anyone felt they were better than anyone else. Everyone supported each other’s ministries. Everyone knew that each chaplain was completely committed to his or her own faith beliefs but defensive walls didn’t need to be built. Everyone recognized that the only way the chaplaincy could operate was if there was huge respect and love for each other.
Each of us is called to search inside ourselves and see if we are harboring prejudice against ‘the other’, whether the other is someone of a completely different belief system or a person or group within our own parish or a family member who has chosen a path different from what we think is right. Love cannot operate from behind a fortress wall. Love is not love if it requires ‘the other’ to change before they can be loved unconditionally. God does not treat us this way and we cannot – must not- treat others that way.
The heart must be open and the hand unclenched.
And you shall be called ‘Breach Mender, Restorer of Ruined Houses.’ (Isaiah 58:12)
Mend the breach – restore the home. We cannot survive any other way.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The View From Down Here
Sept. 20th, 2009
Mark 9: 30-37
30 They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; 31for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, ‘The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.’ 32But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.
33 Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, ‘What were you arguing about on the way?’ 34But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another about who was the greatest. 35He sat down, called the twelve and said to them, ‘Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.’ 36Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, 37‘Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.’
I’ll bet it was quite a shock for the disciples when Jesus took a small child in his arms and told them that whoever welcomes such a child in his name, welcomes him. Most people glide over that reading and assume that Jesus was instructing the disciples not only to be servants but also to be like little children. In this particular gospel, Jesus is not telling his disciples to be like little children. He is telling them they need to be humble enough to welcome and minister to the smallest and the least worthy.
In Jesus’ time, children were barely above slaves on the social scale. Children had absolutely no rights whatsoever. Jesus was still instructing his disciples that following him was going to take them down a path that was polar opposite to what they were thinking was going to happen. They had been arguing which of them was the greatest. This was an important point they wanted to settle because whoever was the greatest would surely have a position of honor when Jesus conquered the Romans and would have a lot of power. What blows me away is that Jesus had just finished explaining to them that whoever followed him had to pick up his cross and deny himself. They just didn’t ‘get it’. Jesus is so patient. Notice he didn’t just swat them on the upsides of their heads. He knew he was teaching them something contrary to centuries of social conditioning. It’s not easy to suddenly understand and change your mind about something you learned from birth.
We can shake our heads at what dim bulbs those disciples were, but are we any quicker to recognize when Jesus is asking us to re-examine our own deeply rooted cultural and social expectations and beliefs? Of course he wouldn’t challenge what we believe – because we’re right and all those other people are wrong!
How much do we cling to because “We’ve always done it that way”? Is Jesus not capable of shocking and challenging us just as much as he shocked and challenged the disciples?” Are we even open to that?
The Lord has shocked me several times in my life, turning my puny ideas and expectations upside down and leading me through to new experiences of him, of his ways and of his people. Our God is a God of surprises and he does not shape himself according to what we think he should be. The disciples truly thought Jesus was a wonderful Messiah and they weren’t wrong there. Where they were wrong was in their visions of where they were all going, how they were going to get there and what it was all going to look like when they got themselves there. I deliberately used the word ‘they’. They really thought they were all going to change things in Israel. Sure, Jesus would be leader but they would all be up there with him. He couldn’t do it without them, right? He needed strong right hand men to pull this off, right? All they were doing on the way to Capernaum was having a serious discussion as to which of them would be his strongest right hand man. Jesus was the Messiah, but he was going to need a Vice-Messiah and a Ministry of Messiah Affairs. He would need advisors, councils and special committees. Jesus needed them.
Had Jesus allowed them to continue with those visions, expectations and wrangling about their positions, the twelve would very soon have organized themselves into an ‘in-group’. Their energies would have been expended in maintaining this group, maintaining its power and position and not allowing it to grow and change. Their focus would have been inward on the group, not outward towards the people. The whole attitude of the kingdom servant is always having a heart turned outwards to the needs of others and not seeking a place of security but seeking to be available. The servant has no territory, no expectations that must be maintained at all cost. Because the servant has no position of power, he or she is free of the need to maintain position and control and just serve where called to serve. Just because you have always served and ministered a certain way or in a certain ministry doesn’t mean that tomorrow the Lord won’t call you to do something entirely different which will push against and expand your self set expectations, borders and limitations.
In the last while my husband Charlie and I have been feeling led to leave behind for a while the regular existence of house, possessions and involvement in our local parish, purchase a used 5th wheel and just go. We’re not sure exactly where and we’re not sure for exactly how long.
Did we struggle with this idea, even though it has its definite attractions? Oh, yes. We certainly did. We struggled with the whole concept of leading a life where we wouldn’t be available to serve our parish because, no matter where we have lived, service and ministry have always been our first commitment after family. To suddenly take off and not be available to our church community somehow felt wrong.
I often think of a drawing exercise recommended in a book called “Drawing on the Right Hand Side of the Brain.” You take a picture you want to copy and turn it upside down and try to draw it from that perspective. What happens, when we look at something like a photo, is the brain thinks it knows exactly what should be there; so instead of drawing what is actually there, the brain is instructing us to draw what it thinks should be there. Turning the photo upside down presents a completely unfamiliar image and we are able to draw it more accurately without being distracted by preconceived ideas of what should be drawn.
Sometimes the Lord turns our pictures upside down in order to shift us out of all our set in stone ideas of what “should be.” Once we loosen our grip on what we think should be happening, amazing growth happens.
Kingdom servants becomes quite adept at standing on their heads.
Mark 9: 30-37
30 They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; 31for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, ‘The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.’ 32But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.
33 Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, ‘What were you arguing about on the way?’ 34But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another about who was the greatest. 35He sat down, called the twelve and said to them, ‘Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.’ 36Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, 37‘Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.’
I’ll bet it was quite a shock for the disciples when Jesus took a small child in his arms and told them that whoever welcomes such a child in his name, welcomes him. Most people glide over that reading and assume that Jesus was instructing the disciples not only to be servants but also to be like little children. In this particular gospel, Jesus is not telling his disciples to be like little children. He is telling them they need to be humble enough to welcome and minister to the smallest and the least worthy.
In Jesus’ time, children were barely above slaves on the social scale. Children had absolutely no rights whatsoever. Jesus was still instructing his disciples that following him was going to take them down a path that was polar opposite to what they were thinking was going to happen. They had been arguing which of them was the greatest. This was an important point they wanted to settle because whoever was the greatest would surely have a position of honor when Jesus conquered the Romans and would have a lot of power. What blows me away is that Jesus had just finished explaining to them that whoever followed him had to pick up his cross and deny himself. They just didn’t ‘get it’. Jesus is so patient. Notice he didn’t just swat them on the upsides of their heads. He knew he was teaching them something contrary to centuries of social conditioning. It’s not easy to suddenly understand and change your mind about something you learned from birth.
We can shake our heads at what dim bulbs those disciples were, but are we any quicker to recognize when Jesus is asking us to re-examine our own deeply rooted cultural and social expectations and beliefs? Of course he wouldn’t challenge what we believe – because we’re right and all those other people are wrong!
How much do we cling to because “We’ve always done it that way”? Is Jesus not capable of shocking and challenging us just as much as he shocked and challenged the disciples?” Are we even open to that?
The Lord has shocked me several times in my life, turning my puny ideas and expectations upside down and leading me through to new experiences of him, of his ways and of his people. Our God is a God of surprises and he does not shape himself according to what we think he should be. The disciples truly thought Jesus was a wonderful Messiah and they weren’t wrong there. Where they were wrong was in their visions of where they were all going, how they were going to get there and what it was all going to look like when they got themselves there. I deliberately used the word ‘they’. They really thought they were all going to change things in Israel. Sure, Jesus would be leader but they would all be up there with him. He couldn’t do it without them, right? He needed strong right hand men to pull this off, right? All they were doing on the way to Capernaum was having a serious discussion as to which of them would be his strongest right hand man. Jesus was the Messiah, but he was going to need a Vice-Messiah and a Ministry of Messiah Affairs. He would need advisors, councils and special committees. Jesus needed them.
Had Jesus allowed them to continue with those visions, expectations and wrangling about their positions, the twelve would very soon have organized themselves into an ‘in-group’. Their energies would have been expended in maintaining this group, maintaining its power and position and not allowing it to grow and change. Their focus would have been inward on the group, not outward towards the people. The whole attitude of the kingdom servant is always having a heart turned outwards to the needs of others and not seeking a place of security but seeking to be available. The servant has no territory, no expectations that must be maintained at all cost. Because the servant has no position of power, he or she is free of the need to maintain position and control and just serve where called to serve. Just because you have always served and ministered a certain way or in a certain ministry doesn’t mean that tomorrow the Lord won’t call you to do something entirely different which will push against and expand your self set expectations, borders and limitations.
In the last while my husband Charlie and I have been feeling led to leave behind for a while the regular existence of house, possessions and involvement in our local parish, purchase a used 5th wheel and just go. We’re not sure exactly where and we’re not sure for exactly how long.
Did we struggle with this idea, even though it has its definite attractions? Oh, yes. We certainly did. We struggled with the whole concept of leading a life where we wouldn’t be available to serve our parish because, no matter where we have lived, service and ministry have always been our first commitment after family. To suddenly take off and not be available to our church community somehow felt wrong.
I often think of a drawing exercise recommended in a book called “Drawing on the Right Hand Side of the Brain.” You take a picture you want to copy and turn it upside down and try to draw it from that perspective. What happens, when we look at something like a photo, is the brain thinks it knows exactly what should be there; so instead of drawing what is actually there, the brain is instructing us to draw what it thinks should be there. Turning the photo upside down presents a completely unfamiliar image and we are able to draw it more accurately without being distracted by preconceived ideas of what should be drawn.
Sometimes the Lord turns our pictures upside down in order to shift us out of all our set in stone ideas of what “should be.” Once we loosen our grip on what we think should be happening, amazing growth happens.
Kingdom servants becomes quite adept at standing on their heads.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Hit Me Again...
Sunday, Sept. 13th, 2009
Mark 8: 27-35
Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way, he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’ 28And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’ 29He asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Messiah.’ 30And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.
31 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’
34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.
How often in your life has the phrase, “Deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me,” haunted you in relation to a challenging situation you were dealing with? How often did it make you feel that if you didn’t choose the most difficult and hurtful path presented to you, you would be denying Jesus and trying to save your life instead of losing it?
In writing his gospel, Mark was endeavoring to show how, at first, the Jews were all enthusiastic and excited about this new Messiah who had appeared on the scene, but gradually they began to turn away and become disgruntled with Jesus’ message as it became clear to them that Jesus was not the political savior they thought he was going to be. In this week’s gospel passage, Jesus is challenging his twelve disciples and the other ones who were following him to understand for once and for all that his mission was not a mission that would uproot the Roman Empire and set the Jews free as a political nation.
The cross Jesus was challenging those particular followers to pick up was accepting that Jesus’ mission was radically different from what they were expecting. Even Jesus’ closest disciples weren’t too clear about what was on the horizon and when Jesus told them in no uncertain terms what was to happen, Peter rebuked him. Jesus, in turn, rebuked Peter and basically said to his followers, “If you’re looking for success, national freedom, material riches and worldly power then you’d better find someone else to follow. You won’t find those things with me. What you will find with me are people and priests who will hate me, reject me and put me on a cross. This is where we’re going folks.”
If Jesus thought that suffering in itself was a good thing and a way to please the Father, he would not have gone around healing people. He would have instead told them all that they should pick up their crosses and deny themselves. Before he was crucified, Jesus did not seek out extra pain and suffering to validate his life or please his Father. Yes, he lived simply but he had good parents who raised him in love, he ate well, he went to weddings and drank wine and he had good friends he loved to visit. If he was offered a place at a banquet table, he took it. If a woman wanted to massage his feet with oil, he let her. He did not practice stringent asceticism for the sake of adding more pain to his redemptive work, nor did he encourage any one else to seek out pain and suffering as a way to please God.
Jesus certainly suffered before he got to ‘The’ cross. He was human and so he suffered hunger pangs, aching feet and cold hands. He felt the sting when others rejected his teaching. He grieved when his father died and when a good friend died. He endured the loneliness of being misunderstood by his closest friends. He knew what it was like to not have enough money to buy much beyond the basics and sometimes not even the basics. Jesus suffered because he accepted his human condition and lived with it as it was. He didn’t make the mistake of actually seeking to make it any worse than it was.
If he was saying anything to the rest of Christianity down through the ages, it wasn’t that suffering is good; it was that suffering is normal.
Are you a follower of Jesus because you believe he will make you financially rich? Do you read this blog because you hope I might give you a key that will make you a powerful woman, one who can tell other people what to do all the time? Do you go to Mass so people can see you so they might connect with you to do business with you or identify you as a good person? Did you have children, or do you desire to do so because you seek status and position in the world? (Women who are stay at home moms are snorting through their noses right now.) Did you get married or do you want to get married because you just love diamond rings and pretty dresses? Do you feel that a successful Christian is one who has all the best in material goods and is someone others envy?
No? I didn’t think so. In fact, I have to say that all the women I talk to about their spiritual lives and spiritual desires have indeed picked up their crosses, denied themselves and have followed after Jesus without ever needing to think about whether they have or wonder if they are suffering enough. The ordinary life of the committed Christian woman is full of crosses and self-denial. Just look at the mother cleaning up vomit in the middle of the night or staying with her child in the hospital or the woman who suffers from chronic pain or the woman who does not have the latest and greatest of whatever is late and great because her child needs school supplies and new shoes or her salary is inadequate or because she put money in the collection plate or because she simply doesn’t crave the latest and greatest, preferring rather to direct her energies and money to raising children or serving the church community or helping the poor. I could go on and on about the suffering inherent in our lives as women – sufferings we never even think about; we just accept them, live with them and get on with life in spite of them.
It is very tricky when life tosses at us extraordinary circumstances of suffering and there is a choice as to whether we accept that suffering or not. Then the turmoil begins because we remember the words ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.’ We can be crushed by fear: fear of the suffering itself on one side and on the other side fear that God will be deeply offended if we refuse the suffering.
We need to understand, once and for all, that Jesus’ suffering alone was not what saved the world. Millions before and after Jesus suffered and died more horribly than he did. What saved the world was Christ’s love within that suffering and the love that Jesus possessed was awesome gift and grace. “Pick up your cross and deny yourself” cannot and must not be considered a catchall theology of how to please God. Like any other scripture in the bible, it can be taken out of context and applied in destructive ways. To assume that God mandates every instance of extraordinary suffering is a faulty understanding of God’s true nature. To assume that anything that could bring us simple pleasure and joy is to be held suspect because we’re not denying ourselves is also faulty theology. J.L. Mackenzie, author of the well-known book called “The Power and the Glory”, says, “For many people, pain is a greater spiritual danger than pleasure.” Why? Because we are prone to keeping a score board with God and we review all the pain and suffering we’ve gone through and all the pleasures we’ve denied ourselves to point out to him that we’re good and worthy and have ‘paid the price’ of being his follower. Suffering can actually be a gateway to spiritual pride.
So, if you find yourself in a place of extraordinary suffering and you sincerely are unsure of what you should do and you keep remembering in fear and dread that Jesus said, “…pick up your cross, deny yourself and follow me”, please remember that he also said:
“Come to me all you who labor and are heavily burdened and I will give you rest. For my yolk is easy and my burden is light.”
Mark 8: 27-35
Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way, he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’ 28And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’ 29He asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Messiah.’ 30And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him.
31 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’
34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.
How often in your life has the phrase, “Deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me,” haunted you in relation to a challenging situation you were dealing with? How often did it make you feel that if you didn’t choose the most difficult and hurtful path presented to you, you would be denying Jesus and trying to save your life instead of losing it?
In writing his gospel, Mark was endeavoring to show how, at first, the Jews were all enthusiastic and excited about this new Messiah who had appeared on the scene, but gradually they began to turn away and become disgruntled with Jesus’ message as it became clear to them that Jesus was not the political savior they thought he was going to be. In this week’s gospel passage, Jesus is challenging his twelve disciples and the other ones who were following him to understand for once and for all that his mission was not a mission that would uproot the Roman Empire and set the Jews free as a political nation.
The cross Jesus was challenging those particular followers to pick up was accepting that Jesus’ mission was radically different from what they were expecting. Even Jesus’ closest disciples weren’t too clear about what was on the horizon and when Jesus told them in no uncertain terms what was to happen, Peter rebuked him. Jesus, in turn, rebuked Peter and basically said to his followers, “If you’re looking for success, national freedom, material riches and worldly power then you’d better find someone else to follow. You won’t find those things with me. What you will find with me are people and priests who will hate me, reject me and put me on a cross. This is where we’re going folks.”
If Jesus thought that suffering in itself was a good thing and a way to please the Father, he would not have gone around healing people. He would have instead told them all that they should pick up their crosses and deny themselves. Before he was crucified, Jesus did not seek out extra pain and suffering to validate his life or please his Father. Yes, he lived simply but he had good parents who raised him in love, he ate well, he went to weddings and drank wine and he had good friends he loved to visit. If he was offered a place at a banquet table, he took it. If a woman wanted to massage his feet with oil, he let her. He did not practice stringent asceticism for the sake of adding more pain to his redemptive work, nor did he encourage any one else to seek out pain and suffering as a way to please God.
Jesus certainly suffered before he got to ‘The’ cross. He was human and so he suffered hunger pangs, aching feet and cold hands. He felt the sting when others rejected his teaching. He grieved when his father died and when a good friend died. He endured the loneliness of being misunderstood by his closest friends. He knew what it was like to not have enough money to buy much beyond the basics and sometimes not even the basics. Jesus suffered because he accepted his human condition and lived with it as it was. He didn’t make the mistake of actually seeking to make it any worse than it was.
If he was saying anything to the rest of Christianity down through the ages, it wasn’t that suffering is good; it was that suffering is normal.
Are you a follower of Jesus because you believe he will make you financially rich? Do you read this blog because you hope I might give you a key that will make you a powerful woman, one who can tell other people what to do all the time? Do you go to Mass so people can see you so they might connect with you to do business with you or identify you as a good person? Did you have children, or do you desire to do so because you seek status and position in the world? (Women who are stay at home moms are snorting through their noses right now.) Did you get married or do you want to get married because you just love diamond rings and pretty dresses? Do you feel that a successful Christian is one who has all the best in material goods and is someone others envy?
No? I didn’t think so. In fact, I have to say that all the women I talk to about their spiritual lives and spiritual desires have indeed picked up their crosses, denied themselves and have followed after Jesus without ever needing to think about whether they have or wonder if they are suffering enough. The ordinary life of the committed Christian woman is full of crosses and self-denial. Just look at the mother cleaning up vomit in the middle of the night or staying with her child in the hospital or the woman who suffers from chronic pain or the woman who does not have the latest and greatest of whatever is late and great because her child needs school supplies and new shoes or her salary is inadequate or because she put money in the collection plate or because she simply doesn’t crave the latest and greatest, preferring rather to direct her energies and money to raising children or serving the church community or helping the poor. I could go on and on about the suffering inherent in our lives as women – sufferings we never even think about; we just accept them, live with them and get on with life in spite of them.
It is very tricky when life tosses at us extraordinary circumstances of suffering and there is a choice as to whether we accept that suffering or not. Then the turmoil begins because we remember the words ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.’ We can be crushed by fear: fear of the suffering itself on one side and on the other side fear that God will be deeply offended if we refuse the suffering.
We need to understand, once and for all, that Jesus’ suffering alone was not what saved the world. Millions before and after Jesus suffered and died more horribly than he did. What saved the world was Christ’s love within that suffering and the love that Jesus possessed was awesome gift and grace. “Pick up your cross and deny yourself” cannot and must not be considered a catchall theology of how to please God. Like any other scripture in the bible, it can be taken out of context and applied in destructive ways. To assume that God mandates every instance of extraordinary suffering is a faulty understanding of God’s true nature. To assume that anything that could bring us simple pleasure and joy is to be held suspect because we’re not denying ourselves is also faulty theology. J.L. Mackenzie, author of the well-known book called “The Power and the Glory”, says, “For many people, pain is a greater spiritual danger than pleasure.” Why? Because we are prone to keeping a score board with God and we review all the pain and suffering we’ve gone through and all the pleasures we’ve denied ourselves to point out to him that we’re good and worthy and have ‘paid the price’ of being his follower. Suffering can actually be a gateway to spiritual pride.
So, if you find yourself in a place of extraordinary suffering and you sincerely are unsure of what you should do and you keep remembering in fear and dread that Jesus said, “…pick up your cross, deny yourself and follow me”, please remember that he also said:
“Come to me all you who labor and are heavily burdened and I will give you rest. For my yolk is easy and my burden is light.”
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Sighs Large
Sunday, September 6th, 2009
31 Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. 32They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. 33He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. 34Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ 35And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. 36Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. 37They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’
It’s the sigh that gets to me.
When my children were growing up there were many times when I could see that they were hurting inside. Like all children and teenagers they went through tough experiences such as being the victim of a bully or being pushed out of the ‘in’ group or having a relationship break up. The wounds were deep and real and I never felt inclined to say, “She’ll get over it. No big deal” Or “He’s O.K.; it’s just teen-age love. Nothing serious.” Especially in the case of my sons, there were times when I knew there were wounds but they didn’t have the ability to share how they were feeling and to accept a touch of love or words of empathy because guys don’t share emotions very easily. Even when I could offer physical touch and words of empathy and sympathy, which are very important in themselves, I couldn’t do what I longed to do: reach into the depths of them, touch the place that hurt so badly and make it all better. Life still occasionally deals blows to my children and my husband and I still sigh for the wounds. That’s the way it is for parents and children.
It makes us sigh, not from impatience or frustration but from love that finds itself achingly limited.
When Jesus came to earth, he accepted the condition of being humanly limited. You might argue that being able to heal the deaf and raise the dead isn’t exactly being limited, but from Jesus’ point of view, from how he knew the Father and how he knew his Father loved his people, he was very limited. Jesus was able to heal those he did only because there was acceptance, hope and faith there. He could not heal those who did not want healing. (“And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.” Mark 6: 1-6) When people didn’t accept him as the Son of God he was not able to work any miracles because God will never push himself on anyone who does not want him. Ever. Nor will he change anyone who doesn’t think they need to change.
Jesus gladly healed the deaf, the blind, the mute and the ill. Wherever there was even a tiny spark of faith and desire, he worked miracles. But so rarely was he able to work the miracle he desired to work the most: the miracle of reaching deep inside and touching the inner wounds of fear, rejection, self-condemnation and blindness to the true nature of his Father.
…then looking up to heaven, he sighed and thought, “Father, if only I could reach in and touch this man’s wounded spirit. If only I could open his ears to your wonderful life-giving voice telling him he is loved, loved, loved by us. If only I could touch his spiritual tongue so that words of love for you would begin to flow like honey, healing all who hear. If only I could open his eyes to who you really are so that he would no longer be afraid of you and would run into your arms and delight in himself as your unique creation.”
I have no doubt that the sigh he heaved blew through the portals of the kingdom and filled all of heaven and earth, while angels and archangels experienced an intense communion with his desire. The sigh of eternal desire.
So why couldn’t he just reach inside and heal the heart of the man? He was God wasn’t he? Think of how much more effective his ministry would have been if he had immediately healed the inner heart of every person he saw. It would have been so simple.
Simple? Yes. Loving? No.
God, too, has limited himself in love and he will not push himself where he is not asked or wanted. For Jesus to heal where he was not asked to heal or where recognition of need or desire was absent would have been an act of intrusion, power and control of the sort God does not engage in – and we humans often engage in. We might argue that the good that would result would be worth it. Not to God. He wants his people to come to him freely. To heal where healing is not asked for, to change hearts when change is not perceived as being needed is the act of a dictator. God is not a dictator, not even a benevolent one. No dictatorial role, benevolent or otherwise, flows out of true relationship and what God wants with his people more than anything is true relationship, a free, loving, open, joy-filled relationship. He wants the kind of relationship where you will seek him in freedom, faith and strong trust for all your inner changes and then stick around to enjoy those changes with him. He wants to be more than the giver of all goodness. He wants to be your Beloved, someone you long to be with, someone with whom you are excited to share life and are restless if you’re away from him. The tragedy is that most often we misunderstand him and regard him somewhat fearfully as the Dictator and do all we can to please him - except go to him as children and lovers.
Some people prefer to think of God as a dictator. It’s so much simpler. Then all they feel they have to do is know the rules and follow them. But that’s sort of like your child saying, “I know that you like me have a clean room, not leave my stuff all over the house and not challenge your rules so from now on I’m going to stay in my room. I’ll keep it super clean and because I’m not moving around the house, I won’t be leaving stuff around. And because we’re not having actual interaction you won’t have to put up with my questions and complaints.” Wow. Wouldn’t that be simple? Sure, there would be no growth in relationship with you or inner growth in her from interaction with you but so what? It would be immensely simple and your child would be fulfilling her obligations.
And your heart would ache because you miss your child so badly and your child is missing so much of true Life.
The Lord yearns and aches for us with desire of an intensity that no earthly father or mother will ever experience for his or her children. Instead of staying within the perceived safety of just fulfilling what we think God wants from us we need to respond to him with our own sighs of eternal longing. You know the clichéd movie scene of two lovers, reunited after a long painful absence, holding hands and running into the sunset while glorious music plays? Well, in the kingdom, it’s no cliché. Except, instead of it being a sunset, it is always dawn – the dawn of a new day.
“God is an unutterable sigh, planted in the depths of the soul.”
(Jean Paul Richter)
Turn now to the God who sighs for you.
31 Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. 32They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. 33He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. 34Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ 35And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. 36Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. 37They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’
It’s the sigh that gets to me.
When my children were growing up there were many times when I could see that they were hurting inside. Like all children and teenagers they went through tough experiences such as being the victim of a bully or being pushed out of the ‘in’ group or having a relationship break up. The wounds were deep and real and I never felt inclined to say, “She’ll get over it. No big deal” Or “He’s O.K.; it’s just teen-age love. Nothing serious.” Especially in the case of my sons, there were times when I knew there were wounds but they didn’t have the ability to share how they were feeling and to accept a touch of love or words of empathy because guys don’t share emotions very easily. Even when I could offer physical touch and words of empathy and sympathy, which are very important in themselves, I couldn’t do what I longed to do: reach into the depths of them, touch the place that hurt so badly and make it all better. Life still occasionally deals blows to my children and my husband and I still sigh for the wounds. That’s the way it is for parents and children.
It makes us sigh, not from impatience or frustration but from love that finds itself achingly limited.
When Jesus came to earth, he accepted the condition of being humanly limited. You might argue that being able to heal the deaf and raise the dead isn’t exactly being limited, but from Jesus’ point of view, from how he knew the Father and how he knew his Father loved his people, he was very limited. Jesus was able to heal those he did only because there was acceptance, hope and faith there. He could not heal those who did not want healing. (“And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.” Mark 6: 1-6) When people didn’t accept him as the Son of God he was not able to work any miracles because God will never push himself on anyone who does not want him. Ever. Nor will he change anyone who doesn’t think they need to change.
Jesus gladly healed the deaf, the blind, the mute and the ill. Wherever there was even a tiny spark of faith and desire, he worked miracles. But so rarely was he able to work the miracle he desired to work the most: the miracle of reaching deep inside and touching the inner wounds of fear, rejection, self-condemnation and blindness to the true nature of his Father.
…then looking up to heaven, he sighed and thought, “Father, if only I could reach in and touch this man’s wounded spirit. If only I could open his ears to your wonderful life-giving voice telling him he is loved, loved, loved by us. If only I could touch his spiritual tongue so that words of love for you would begin to flow like honey, healing all who hear. If only I could open his eyes to who you really are so that he would no longer be afraid of you and would run into your arms and delight in himself as your unique creation.”
I have no doubt that the sigh he heaved blew through the portals of the kingdom and filled all of heaven and earth, while angels and archangels experienced an intense communion with his desire. The sigh of eternal desire.
So why couldn’t he just reach inside and heal the heart of the man? He was God wasn’t he? Think of how much more effective his ministry would have been if he had immediately healed the inner heart of every person he saw. It would have been so simple.
Simple? Yes. Loving? No.
God, too, has limited himself in love and he will not push himself where he is not asked or wanted. For Jesus to heal where he was not asked to heal or where recognition of need or desire was absent would have been an act of intrusion, power and control of the sort God does not engage in – and we humans often engage in. We might argue that the good that would result would be worth it. Not to God. He wants his people to come to him freely. To heal where healing is not asked for, to change hearts when change is not perceived as being needed is the act of a dictator. God is not a dictator, not even a benevolent one. No dictatorial role, benevolent or otherwise, flows out of true relationship and what God wants with his people more than anything is true relationship, a free, loving, open, joy-filled relationship. He wants the kind of relationship where you will seek him in freedom, faith and strong trust for all your inner changes and then stick around to enjoy those changes with him. He wants to be more than the giver of all goodness. He wants to be your Beloved, someone you long to be with, someone with whom you are excited to share life and are restless if you’re away from him. The tragedy is that most often we misunderstand him and regard him somewhat fearfully as the Dictator and do all we can to please him - except go to him as children and lovers.
Some people prefer to think of God as a dictator. It’s so much simpler. Then all they feel they have to do is know the rules and follow them. But that’s sort of like your child saying, “I know that you like me have a clean room, not leave my stuff all over the house and not challenge your rules so from now on I’m going to stay in my room. I’ll keep it super clean and because I’m not moving around the house, I won’t be leaving stuff around. And because we’re not having actual interaction you won’t have to put up with my questions and complaints.” Wow. Wouldn’t that be simple? Sure, there would be no growth in relationship with you or inner growth in her from interaction with you but so what? It would be immensely simple and your child would be fulfilling her obligations.
And your heart would ache because you miss your child so badly and your child is missing so much of true Life.
The Lord yearns and aches for us with desire of an intensity that no earthly father or mother will ever experience for his or her children. Instead of staying within the perceived safety of just fulfilling what we think God wants from us we need to respond to him with our own sighs of eternal longing. You know the clichéd movie scene of two lovers, reunited after a long painful absence, holding hands and running into the sunset while glorious music plays? Well, in the kingdom, it’s no cliché. Except, instead of it being a sunset, it is always dawn – the dawn of a new day.
“God is an unutterable sigh, planted in the depths of the soul.”
(Jean Paul Richter)
Turn now to the God who sighs for you.
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