The prayers, incantations, curses, blessings and healing practices found in the vast diversity of various indigenous spiritualities
Catholic spirituality which includes practices like adoration of the Host (flowing from a belief in Transubstantiation), praying to departed saints, etc.
The various occultic practices that are stereotypically ‘dark’ and engage in a multitude of ways with the unseen realm
Answer 1: They all believe that interaction with spiritual realities is a normal, every-day component of life in our time-space-matter world.
Answer 2: They tend to strictly separate spiritual from physical, except for rare interventions, which one of them denies entirely.
Short Reflection:
Contrasting these two lists is a bit of a cheeky attempt at framing things to make a point. Another way to frame them would be on a spectrum, from totally denying any/all spirit activity at one end, to some possibly harmful ways of being hyper-focused on spiritual activity at the other end. (For example, I would not want to naively accept every belief or practice reflected in the rather ad-hoc and vastly diverse collection of the first four.)
But it is worth noticing the binary. It’s a warning to people like me. The more I think and speak and act like naturalistic atheists or deists, the less vital my spiritual life will be.
Whatever negatives we may want to assert about any of the first four, the basic worldview at work is perfectly reasonable and resonant with vast human experience. A worldview that has at least these few points:
reality is not just physical but also spiritual
engagement with spiritual reality is not just for special rare occasions, but to be a regular part of life
Spiritual reality is not simplistically ‘good’ and pure, but also consists of spiritual realities that are good-that-has-been-corrupted, or good that is no longer good, or good that is curved in on itself, or good that has fallen into a state of malevolence. Or put simply: there are angels and demons. Good and Evil.
Taking evil seriously is directly referenced in the prayer that Jesus gave his disciples: “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one…”
The evil one does not tempt us in stereotypically obvious ways. It’s possible to be meticulously avoidant of any situations that could possibly lead you to anything even remotely resembling ‘demon possession’, whilst being naively unaware of evil’s sway in your life through ordinary things like viewing advertisements, shopping, avoiding people you don’t like, hundreds of ordinary fears and resentments, escaping from work with sensational travel experiences, etc.
The evil One, the great enemy, the adversary, the devil, the deceiver, the prince and power of the air, the Satan, Lucifer, and all the evil spirits or demons that exist – are rightly understood to be temporary, limited, permitted, defeated, destined for destruction, and in no way equal to the power and authority of the Good Creator.
(For a sermon for Birkenhead Community Church, 20 April 2025)
Resurrection Letter from Tertius
Grace and peace to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is Risen!
My name is Tertius. I’m a scribe – a letter writer – from the first century. You might remember my name and my greeting from the very end of a letter you call “Romans”. I scribed that letter for a well-paying, well-connected customer… who eventually became a dear mentor and friend. Known as “Saul” around his Greek contacts, we came to know him as “Paul” – the Apostle – a towering figure in the early church, though he preferred to speak of himself as a slave of Christ.
My name, Tertius, simply means ‘third’. Roman families often named children by birth order. First, Second, Third, Fourth… or Primus, Secundus, Tertius, and Quartus. The name ‘Quartus’ also features not far from my greeting in Romans. My name has taken on so much more significance for me now. It signifies so much more than my birth-order. It now points to my Master and Redeemer who was raised the Third day.
Paul and I wrote “Romans” while staying with the wonderfully hospitable Gaius in Corinth. And Corinth is where I am currently writing this letter to you. He tells me you did a sermon series a couple of years ago on the first of Paul’s two famous letters to the Churches at Corinth. So, you’ll be familiar with the ways in which the Resurrection collided with the philosophies and practices of Corinth… a fashionable new colony, full of pomp, athleticism, philosophy… and questionable sexual ethics!
I’d worked as a scribe for a wide range of wealthy people at Corinth. One of these was Erastus, director of public works – like a treasurer for the city. It was significant for a believer to have such an important position… important enough for his name to be inscribed in various places at Corinth. Some of your archaeologists have found a couple of those inscriptions you can still see today. It was Erastus who recommended me as a scribe for Paul. Dale thought it would be helpful for me to tell you my experience of getting a grasp on – or should I say becoming grasped by – the Resurrection of Christ. I pray my words reach Dale in time for him to read to you on Resurrection Sunday.
Ancient scribes like me didn’t simply sit in a dark, candle-lit room with ink and papyrus. We travelled. We consulted. We socialised. This helped confirm details for the letters we scribed. Many of us were educated in rhetoric and had strong language ability.
When Paul employed me for his first major letter to Corinth, I was not yet a believer. Let’s just say, as someone with my level of Greek education, I raised my eyebrows just a tad as I transcribed his words about the ‘foolishness’ of Greek wisdom. I grew to know Paul as a man of deep love and compassion, but he was not afraid of robust dialogue! And I grew to understand that Paul had a surprisingly impressive knowledge of the same philosophers and poets I’d learned about. He could quote, as he did at Athens once, the hymn to Zeus in one minute, and then be preaching the risen Christ in the next. See Luke’s second manuscript, which you call ‘Acts’ for more details, and to get a sense how intelligent Paul really was.
I was fairly familiar with the Jewish religion, but to be the best scribe I could be for Paul, I would need to learn more about this new sect. Paul suggested that I spend a fair bit of time getting to know the various networks of believers at Corinth. He probably had mixed motives… He knew I’d be able to confirm the accuracy of all that was going on… but he also knew I’d be exposed to a community that just might change my life. And that’s exactly what happened.
The Christian communities at Corinth were mostly independent households who would regularly come together in various larger gatherings for special religious meals. Mixing with these communities for a few months, I experienced two very different groupings of people, with very different kinds of dinner gatherings… As I found out, you can tell a lot about people by the way they gather.
As a man trained in language and ideas, I initially gravitated to the more philosophically inclined group. They loved the Greek schools of thought, and eloquent speakers… That’s probably why they came to identify as the people “of Apollos” – one of the more prominent speakers in the early church. By contrast, they were thoroughly unimpressed by a comparatively rough, at times blunt, tentmaking Apostle like Paul. They thought his teaching about Resurrection was nonsense. What would it even mean to have a ‘body’ in heaven? As some of the great Greek thinkers had said, “a dry soul is best”. The soul “flies from the body as lightning flashes from a cloud.” You don’t really want, let alone need a body in the heavenly realms. So… Resurrection of the body felt strange. Unnecessary. Restrictive. Clunky. Even dirty…
A typical dinner for these folks was luxurious and intellectual. The loftiest ideas – for those who could understand. The finest food – for those who were invited. Meticulous decorations. You folks might say it was “Instagram-worthy.” As in Roman symposia, the most important people were given the best spots. Servants kept every wine glass topped up and every plate loaded… whatever the guests wished for. I was well-familiar with these kinds of lavish gatherings composed of such cosmopolitan characters. This was the clientele I would often write for. They paid well.
A city like Corinth had plenty of hungry unfortunate folk… Their natural place was on the street… but having no understanding of how dinner invitations work, they sometimes would find their way into those gatherings… These sad folks were tolerated… permitted to watch… provided that they would not disrupt our proceedings with their sounds… or their smells… Someone told me about a beggar who wandered in months ago… he literally died of hunger. No ‘body’ in the gathering had noticed… Out of sight… and out of mind… in an adjacent room, he’d quietly fallen asleep… permanently. Thankfully, some of the servants of the house were believers and they tended to his body… though they gave his burial more time and expense than most would have thought appropriate…
The attendees at these gatherings were typical in their Corinthian-style immodesty and what we might call ‘ethical flexibility’. Controversially for many, the heads… and bodies… of some of the women… could frequently be uncovered… Many attending these gatherings could also be spotted taking part in proceedings at the temple of Asklepios… some even participating freely in the infamous after-parties, where more than food was on offer… “The body is for meats!” was a rationale which applied just as much to sex as it did to food. Such people latched on to some of Paul’s language about being ‘free’ in Christ… conveniently forgetting the parts about self-control and considering others… Such logic had one member proudly justifying a sexual relationship with their father’s newest wife… In Greek ways of thinking, matter didn’t truly matter. And apparently neither did the body. It was merely a temporary tool for attaining pleasure and status. A costume.
By contrast, the dinner gatherings of Chloe and her household were strikingly different. Chloe was a very successful businesswoman, and one of the early Greek women to join the way of Christ. She stood in a rich and fruitful line of leading Christian women – stretching from that early Resurrection morning by the tomb to now. Mary, Phoebe, Lydia, Priscilla, Junia and Chloe. And more… Women who changed the world. Chloe owned a number of olive groves and her oil was prized and distributed all over the region. Since following Christ, although Chloe’s business continued to be profitable, she was less motivated to maximise business success, and more interested in people, ministry and the Good News.
The social dynamic of her gatherings was something I’d never seen. And I’m not talking about the generous amount of Chloe’s premium olive oil at her table. I’m talking about the awkward, uncomfortable disregard for rank and status. Quite simply, there were no special guests eating special food in special places. Indeed, the only ‘special’ person at this meal was the risen Lord Jesus, who they insisted was present with them – especially as they broke a ceremonial loaf of bread and shared a cup of wine. More on that later… This dinner, with Jesus at its centre, seemed to be open to the whole world. It was for every… body. Glamourous bodies and disabled bodies. Rich and poor bodies. Jew and Gentile bodies. Male and female bodies. The altered or differentiated bodies of eunuchs. Every ‘body’ shared the same table…
In his letter, Paul had mentioned a number of people who were still alive who claimed to have seen Christ alive after his crucifixion. I was shocked to learn that two of them were part of Chloe’s household. Could such a thing really be true? If so, what did that even mean? How did it fit with the philosophy I was so arrogantly proud of? What was the significance of a single person being raised from the dead? What philosophical relevance did it have for the rest of us? And yet, this strange Resurrection philosophy was clearly animating these people… They were convinced, philosophically and practically, that the purpose of the ‘body’ was not directed at sex or food… but at serving the Lord and one another. It was clear that their future hope in the resurrection of the body was the motivation behind their concern for every ‘body’ here and now.
So different from the Apollos group! Instead of debates dominated by speakers, these gatherings were ordered. They prayed in turn. Read scripture. Chanted Psalms. There were moments for everyone to respond together as one Body saying responsive phrases like “Jesus is Lord” or a simple “Amen.” You didn’t have to be a scholar to participate. Every ‘body’ had something to give… and something to receive.
I’ll never forget meeting Chloe’s adopted son, who she had named Anastasios, which means ‘Rising up’. His body was a little small for his age. His thin legs were unconventionally angled. Others helped him with his meal. He thanked them and took his turn leading the gathering in prayer… speaking slowly but with definitive clarity. His tone and eyes radiated joy. Chloe had taken him in off the street – literally. He did not know his parents. You see, a practice that was common in the Roman world, which I have now come to detest, was leaving disabled or deformed infants ‘exposed’… to die… in a ditch. To have a body that was not ‘healthy’ was unfashionable for cosmopolitan Roman families. The resurrection of Christ, and the resurrection to come, had transformed Chloe’s mind. She valued lives and bodies that were unwanted…
Chloe would always introduce Anastasios as one of the teachers in the household. “He teaches us how to serve and be served. To give and receive. How to hope, believe, pray, and persist through suffering.” She meant every word. And she was absolutely right. God truly uses what we think of as ‘weak’ to humble those we think of as ‘strong’…
I began to see the true foolishness of the intellectual debates of the Apollos crowd, and the true wisdom of the radically counter-cultural Resurrection ethics of Chloe and her household. Their communal life embodied the Gospel. It was a letter to me… a letter I was learning to read… and a letter that was ‘reading’ me…
I had always thought that the values, ideas, and lifestyle I had inherited from Greek culture was so strong, wise, and glamorous. But I was now clearly seeing that they contributed to a world-system that divided people into those that mattered and those who didn’t… the strong and the weak… the valued and the worthless… the honourable and the dishonourable… the high and the low… the rich and the poor… the successful and the forgotten…
The comfort and living of a select few was built on the suffering and death of many… The more time I spent with Chloe and her household, the more I cared about every ‘body’ my world-system was harming. I felt dead… trapped within the system. I wanted out. I needed to get free. I needed what Chloe and her household had. I needed everything their Christ offered and gave… I needed to be raised to new life.
One evening after the gathering, I spilled all this out in conversation with Chloe and a few others. She told me that in confessing this with my mouth, I had already begun to receive the new life I knew I needed. As they prayed for me, I felt waves of freedom, and purpose, and life flow into my mind, heart, and body. A new Spirit.
I was due to return to Paul with a report on my time, which now included news of my own conversion. Paul beamed with joy, and when I asked if he could answer my many questions he eagerly agreed. It turned out that writing that second letter with him provided us with a timely opportunity to continue our conversations to help me grow in my understanding.
The Resurrection really is the truth that holds all other truths. When Christ rose on the third day, the ultimate future of humanity and even the cosmos, walked out of the Tomb. The future had rushed into the present. His risen and indestructible body was the template for the transformation, redemption, healing, and glorification of the entire human person: bodies, brains, neurons, hearts, motives, wills, relationships – our entire selves will be made new.
All kinds of bodies will be glorious and free. Male and female bodies. Modified and mistreated bodies. Abled and differently abled. All bodies need freeing and healing. Resurrection does not mean the perfect male and female bodies look like Achilles and Aphrodite, or to use some of your examples Brad and Angelina. No. Resurrection will make you more you, not more like some generalised ideal from Greek or any other cultural imagination.
Just as Christ’s risen body still bore the wounds and scars of the Cross, so too our bodies will be redeemed to reflect – and heal – all the experiences, deformities, modifications, injuries and anything that hinders us. Our bodies will be liberated into glorious freedom.
The Resurrection also extends to every corner of the cosmos. New gardens, new cities, new oceans, new ecosystems, new solar systems. New stargazing. New moon-rises. New biology. New chemistry. New physics. New Creation. New Heaven. New Earth.
This ultimate future is to be anticipated now. Resurrection means we have work to do. Justice will reign in this this New Heaven and New Earth. Justice for every Body. We anticipate Resurrection when we work to feed, clothe, house and care for every Body.
And we practice our care for every Body when we practice communion.Communion is for every Body. It’s not a sumptuous meal with my best mates who are just like me. It’s not about ignoring others to have a private moment with me and God. It’s about practicing Common Union as one Body.
And so, my sisters and brothers of Birkenhead Community Church, when you gather around the table of the Lord, do not feast like the world. Remember the Lord’s death. Proclaim his Resurrection until he comes again. Celebrate as one Body. Honour every Body.
Christ is Risen. He is Risen Indeed. Alleluia. In the common hope of Resurrection from the Dead, Tertius.
Here were my observations from reading Psalm 16 this morning.
“O my soul, you have said to the Lord, “You are my Lord…” Here David is talking to himself, or specifically to his ‘soul’. Not only this, he is talking to his soul about what his soul has talked to the Lord about. David seems to be trying to reach down to his deepest commitment to rekindle it, to tend the flame of faith. I think we are deeply committed to many things and don’t realize it? To looking good, to being successful, to avoiding this or that situation that we are afraid of, to trying to make the world a better place (according to the standard of the cultures reflected on our television, tablet, computer and/or phone screens). David here reaches into the deepest part of himself, and rekindles his deepest commitment to the deepest and most Ultimate Reality imaginable. The Lord.
“My goodness is nothing apart from You” Long before King Jesus the Son of David taught about abiding in the vine and declared that “apart from me you can do nothing” King David relativizes his goodness in relationship to God. David is going to be turning soon to talk about goodies (“the saints”) and baddies (people “who hasten after another god”). But before those reflections, he recognizes God as the one whose goodness enables, undergirds, defines and sharpens all goodness.
“The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places…” David has just reflected on the self-destructive result of idol worship. All the drinking blood and chanting of names cannot improve my life. Actually it makes it worse. It only adds a sense of futility to suffering: “Their sorrows shall be multiplied.” How different is the blood of the new covenant and taking the name of Jesus on our lips! But that’s for another post. Here we note the contrast of David’s gratitude. Because the Lord is his ‘inheritance’, he can enjoy and delight in his ‘lot’ in life.
“My flesh also will rest in hope…” This is the line just before he goes on to give those famous lines quoted in the New Testament (Acts 2) about his soul not being left in Sheol (the Grave). Rightly, like Peter at Pentecost proclaimed, the Grave is not the end for those who ‘rest in hope’. Christ is risen, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. We will rise with him.
“At your right hand…”In verse 8, David has just talked about the Lord being “at my right hand”. Out of context, we might misunderstand this as David imagining God as a religious trinket, a little genie in his pocket, or a voice on his right shoulder. No. David knows that the Lord is the One whom the heavens cannot contain. But the transcendent God is also immanent: “at my right hand”. The one sustaining and fixing the very laws of nature, the ones we know and the ones we don’t, is the one who is close with us with the result that we “shall not be moved.”
I’m in the midst of running a project for work that involves around 50 or so people. It puts me in collaborative partnership with a filming studio, audio technicians, receptionists, just over 40 contributors, station content directors, and producers.
It’s going really well and I’m enjoying the process. No complaints of any real magnitude.
There have been the odd moment of something happening a way that I didn’t expect, didn’t want or didn’t plan for. Perhaps my enjoyment of the process is entirely due to my ability to process these little issues with acceptance.
I’ve been reflecting on acceptance. In my experience it’s easier to accept something when I know that I have absolutely no ability to control or manage it. If I feel even a bit like I can influence the outcome, I start to be a bit less accepting of the outcome being what I do not want. It’s worse when the ‘thing’ is connected to or reflects upon me.
Nobody would suggest that acceptance is the only principle to life one’s life by. If we accepted everything in the most literal sense, we would become entirely passive spectators in life. Never participating consciously, actively, assertively. We would be not living life, but watching life go by.
Too much acceptance can be a problem. But instead I’ve been reflecting on the problem of too little acceptance. It’s a problem when I try to control things that I should not try to control.
As the Ultimate Being who created, oversees and is redeeming all of Reality, God is by definition the most ‘in control’ entity imaginable. Christians, and all other monotheists, believe that not one quasar or quark pulsates without the power and permission of Creator God. And yet, God seems to have chosen to be (at the same time) the most ‘accepting’ entity. Christians believe that although God could force planets, persons and plant-life to do precisely as he wants, he nonetheless has chosen not to do so. God has given various kinds of real freedom to various kinds of created things.
I don’t believe that the shape of scope which the universe has taken is of any surprise to God, but at the same time, I believe that God has, without being in any way detached or distant from nature (I’m not a deist), not micromanaged every microscopic moment. Rather, like a Mother or Father, God loving watches over the thing which he has so lovingly and wisely created. Trees grow according to their genetic code, seeking sunlight and water. Each tree takes a unique shape. And yet each tree is playing by the same rules and restrictions. One doesn’t see a tree suddenly sprout forth a horse’s head.
Humans too, are free to choose, train themselves this or that way, to develop as they wish. And yet, we cannot fly. We can’t survive like fish underwater. We are not as strong as some animals. This freedom is from God.
So God is in control but not controlling.
God is the ultimate accepter.
At times, we try to control others in ways that God doesn’t. We must have convinced ourselves that God requires our help making the world the way he wants it.
And of course this too is not entirely wrong. God does delegate. God works, speaks, heals and rules through humans. But perhaps at times we need to remember to be a bit more godlike in allowing others to be and to do what they wish.
God does this constantly and on a breathtaking scale with humanity. Humans are always violating God’s will. We lie, cheat, and steal. And the God who is constantly speaking and wooing us away from such sins, nonetheless has chosen to be the kind of God who will not step in and force us to do the right thing. We are beautifully and tragically free.
God is the ultimate accepter.
And we too, must learn to mirror God in his longsuffering acceptance of others. Most of all when their choices interfere with my preferences and plans.
It doesn’t mean we never try to influence things. It doesn’t mean we can never have a leadership position. It does mean that, like God, we have to restrain ourselves from pushing others past a certain point.
In Matthew 6, Jesus gives masterful teaching about prayer. He understands with perfect clarity the way that our egos work as we relate to others in the world.
The usual form of the Lord’s Prayer that most of us know and use is a combination of the versions given here in Matthew 6 and in Luke 11. With this combined form in mind, Matthew’s version seems to end abruptly. And on top of this, the follow up teaching on forgiveness seems a bit late, coming after the final bit about temptation and evil. It can feel like the gospel writers (or Jesus) made a literary mistake and got the order of lines out of whack. Something like:
pray this way about forgiveness
and finally, pray also about temptation and evil
Oh yeah, rewind back to forgiveness, I got a tad more to say on that…
This apparent disorder vanishes when I recall that Jesus (and the gospel writers) were rather intelligent people, and when I recognise that unforgiveness is a very common, tempting, and evil tendency for humans.
Jesus, we must remember, is the one with the most important and accurate information on humanity. He knows precisely how our egos tend to judge others and justify ourselves. He knows this tendency is profoundly common, very tempting, and he rightly uses the language of ‘evil’ directly in the middle of it all. Positively, Jesus knows what how we must think, act, and pray to counter this. With the greatest urgency, we must learn, practice and keep practicing the art of being a forgiving person.
Jesus knows how natural it is for us to point the finger of judgment at ‘them’. Look at what ‘they’ did. He knows how quickly we assume that ‘we’ would not (indeed, could not) ever do what ‘they’ did. Jesus knows that if I insist that I could never do what ‘they’ did (to me or to others), then I don’t think I need the same kind of forgiveness that ‘they’ do. He knows how this self-righteous judgment blocks me from fully savoring – and sharing – the forgiveness that the Father so freely offers me.
So then, I can read these verses more like this…
“Forgive us our various kinds of sins, just as we keep on practicing forgiving others of their various kinds of sins. After all, do we not all stand in need of forgiveness, and could we not all see ourselves in one another? Keep us from being tempted away from forgiveness like this. Deliver us from the evil One who is the source of all blame, finger-pointing, gossip, and discord. Deliver us into the free and forgiving arms of You, our Father.” For this is how forgiveness works. It has to be shared to be experienced. Your Father is eagerly watching and waiting for us to get our hearts in a posture that can receive forgiveness and share it. It just doesn’t work any other way.
For those of us in contexts with a wealth of technology and media (and a poverty of contentment and patience), many of us are feeling weary, tired and over it. This is an exhaustion that goes deeper than number of hours worked or slept. It is an underlying dissatisfaction with things… something… or maybe everything.
Further Fracturing…
Humans have had their usual military, political and personal dramas for aeons. But something is different. There is growing division and distrust and distance from one another. We are losing hope. Relationships seem more fragile. We have more and more reasons to avoid one another. More and more things are harder and harder to talk about. Discourse is toxic. Extremes widen. We seem strangely eager to uncover wrongs, and understandably terrified of being seen to be affiliated with anything wrong. We are determined to be right, or at least less wrong than ‘them’.
And underneath this, we are slowly waking up to the reality that our greatest boast in the modern world, science, is not the simple saviour we had hoped it was. We are beginning to admit that even an impressively comprehensive collection of accurate factoids cannot itself provide the epistemic basis for meaning, value, justice, human rights, compassion.
Worse still, it seems that our heroic efforts at making a more just world sooner or later take on the broken and fragile characteristics of our individual and collective psychologies. Our demonizing, defensiveness, vengeance, resentment, superiority (so often mixed with inferiority), fear and hopelessness end up pouring fuel on the fires of injustice. Seeking justice, we create more injustice.
As the Psalms frequently invite us to do: “Selah” (reflect on this for a moment)
The God of Just Mercy
The Christmas story, amidst all the consumptive noise, unintentionally exclusive gatherings, Santa hats and holiday ‘meh’, is about the arrival of the God of just mercy.
Luke’s historically-savvy Gospel understood well the reality of Roman oppression of 1st century Israel. Luke captures the song known as Mary’s Magnificat (see Luke 1:45-55), rich with feisty social justice themes of powerful people being cast down and rich being sent away empty, while the humble are lifted up and the poor are filled with good things. Despite what you may hear on streets or screens, the biblical Gospel was never only about individuals going to heaven after they die. God longs for his fair and just rule to be realised here on earth. Now.
To riff off of Isaiah 58, God is the breath in the lungs of the oppressed when they ‘lift up their voice’ (v.1) against oppressors – even (especially!?) religious oppressors (‘my people’ / ‘the descendants of Jacob’ v.1).
The Bible clearly and consistently shows God to despise oppression and injustice, but we should not mistake the Gospel for the kind of popular rage that wants to burn it all down. God doesn’t burn for the sake of burning. Like a farmer burning off a field, the fire is for fresh grass to grow.
The Magnificat ends with mercy.
Yes, the immediate focus is on mercy to the ancestors of Abraham, but those who know Scripture will recall that Abraham (Genesis 12:1-3) and his people had a vocation not simply to burn with judgmental finger-pointing at the nations forever, but to be a channel of blessing to them. The prophet Jeremiah knew that even in exile among their oppressors, the victim mentality that so often justifies violence would do them no good. Before Christ ever said “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you”, he told the captives to “seek the peace of the city…” Even in Babylon, a city continually reminding Israel of their oppression, Jeremiah wants them to have a different stronger memory of his words that “in its peace you shall have peace.” (Jeremiah 29)
God is not revealed as a tyrant in the thunderclouds, who gets a real kick every time he gets a chance to topple, expose, shame or punish someone. Yes, God is angry at oppression to be sure. But God knew the familiar patterns of injustice long before we did. God knows that oppressors often justify their oppression with their own claimed (or maybe even real) experience of oppression. God knows the cycle. Nobody’s hands are really clean.
Justice – and Mercy – for Everyone?
God knows that justice has to be mixed with mercy and hope – for everyone. Obviously the oppressed… but even oppressors.
The Oppressed are offered hope that oppression will not go unpunished in the end, and practical real-world assistance as the God of justice empowers down-to-earth help from their neighbours, allies and prophets.
As for Oppressors, yes they are summoned to repair the damage they’ve done as best they can, but they too are offered the hope of renewal and new life. For Israel who “oppresses all [their] workers” and more, they are challenged to change, for sure.
But… they are also told of the life they can have if they do.
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, 10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. 11 The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.
And that is at least one ingredient that missing in our world. A justice that is merciful and vulnerable. A justice for all. Hope for all. A God whose compassionate justice – whose just mercy – is well described from the times of Exodus:
The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished…”
Punishment and Forgiveness. Justice and Mercy. Consequences and Restoration. Held together in redemptive, transformative tension.
This God does not leave oppressors to oppress. The consequences of injustice are firm and full punishment. But nonetheless, even the “wickedness, rebellion and sin” of oppressors can be forgiven and overcome.
The author of the persistently profound hymn extolling the wonder of a Grace that “saved a wretch like me” is none other than an oppressor – the former slave-owner John Newton.
This is a merciful justice that may disrupt our popular rage or political resentment. But it just may be the one solution to injustice that actually works. If we would have the courage, and yes the mercy, to give it a try.
We strike out at and critiqueothers with our verbal, philosophical, political, social or literal swords. We block and defendourselves from criticism with our good intentions, mimising excuses, self-justifying reasoning. Our shields.
It’s not that we should never defend ourselves, and I don’t know if we should be surprised that people and nations frequently want to have at least some kind of readiness to respond to violence. It’s just that the sword and shield become a way of being. They shape us into people whose tendency is to critique others and defend ourselves.
This even happens within ourselves, psychologically. We divide ourselves into parts: parent / child, good / bad, the rebel / the law, or what have you… One part of us critiques the other part, and the other part defends itself. We don’t have to suffer from multiple-personality disorder to relate to the experience of feeling simultaneously innocent and righteous on the one hand and victimised and full of self pity on the other hand. It’s the sword and shield again. Just directed inward.
Christianity offers a way of life where we trust God to be our sword and shield.
We don’t need to take up the sword against others and sort them out. (Or ourselves.) God is just. (And merciful.) The biblical wisdom is that God almost always does this in his usual way – by delegation. Natural law, imperfect human governments, communal or relational systems. Injustice has its day, but eventually gets toppled. When we try to rush the process with our swords, we end up becoming what we hate.
We also don’t need to overly defend or protect ourselves from critique. God is our fortress, tower, shield, and defender. The great irony is that when I live in the freedom of not worrying what might happen to me (gossip, violence, theft, you name it), those things don’t have any power over me. I trust that God will deal with them as he will, and when he will. Ultimately, the biblical narrative promises a final justice that will heal all wounds and restore all things. I can choose to take comfort in that.
Christ – at Christmas and at all times – comes to us asking for an exchange. He wants our swords and shields, and offers us a cross and a towel.
I am offered a cross. An instrument of death and violence to myself. I am not expected to do what Jesus alone could do – atone for the sins of the world. I am invited, expected or even commanded to follow his way. To ‘take up my cross and follow’ him. To live sacrificially is not the way of self-loathing – constantly criticizing, punishing and judging myself. As the cliche truth goes, it’s not “thinking less of myself, but thinking of myself less.”
And this leads to the towel. I am to become a servant. Not a show off servant. Not “Hey everyone, I’m just going to pick up this piece of rubbish… aren’t I a great person….” Not “Hey everyone, look how pissed off I am about social injustice… I probably hate oppressors more than anyone I know…” Not this. Real service. Service that can go unnoticed. Uncelebrated.
The world is full of divided politics, communities, families and selves. If we’re honest, we’ll be able to see how we participate in wleding the sword of criticism, and raising the shield of self-justification.
The world needs more cross bearers and towel servants.
That is precisely what Jesus taught and modeled. It is his plan to bring his kingdom where needs are provided for, sinners are forgiven, and humans live in grateful peace.
The sermon on the mount is the best teaching on human living. It lays down the patterns for full and complete humanness. After the Beatitudes and opening statements, the first two issues that Jesus deals with are a) anger leading to murder, and b) lust leading to adultery. It won’t do to simply label murder and adultery as unlawful, immoral or wrong. Jesus knows we have to get to the heart of these matters and deal with our anger and lust.
The early chapters of Genesis are also profound in their statements about humanness. Every human is like Cain, who gets ‘very angry’ and is tempted into taking actions that violate the humanity of his ‘brother’. In chapter 6, we see the moral devolution of humanity is so degraded that the beautiful daughters of men were being treated like sexual property. The Creator is grieved to the point of being willing to uncreate the whole creation.
Anger and Sex are connected. We need not illustrate all the ways that this interrelation plays out through rape and pornography.
Their interrelation also shows up in another text that is likewise profoundly awake to the realities of human nature: The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, written by Bill Wilson. The Step 4 inventory (see chapter 5, ‘How it Works’) of ones own life invites an addict to reflect on a) Resentments, b) Fears, c) Sex conduct and d) Harm to others.
Anger and Fear can be understood as a natural pair, just as Sexual dysfunction and Harm can be. For example, consider Resentment and Fear. When I resent another person, I am looking down on them in judgement (perhaps sometimes justified judgement); and when I fear someone, I am looking up at them. When I process my resentments (and fears) properly, I discover that I need not look down on (or up at) others. I can look them in the eye as equals. This humane equality is a profoundly disturbing idea for someone whose identity is dependent on feeling superior to others.
The same is true for the Sex and Harm pairing. Healthy sexual relations is a mutually helpful matter of freely giving and freely receiving. Literally ‘intercourse’. Harm, by nature, including sexual harm, is the opposite of giving and receiving. Instead of giving it forces itself on someone. “You will have this whether you want it or not.” Instead of receiving it is taking. “I’ll take this whether you’re giving it or not.” It is violent and violating.
So therefore, according to Jesus, Moses and Bill, it seems to be a human reality that when we feel resentment towards someone who we feel has wronged us we sooner or later are tempted to some kind of violence or dysfunction.
This connection between anger and temptation, finally, is seen within The Lord’s Prayer, which is – not surprisingly – the humane prayer in the structural centre of the humanising Sermon on the Mount, preached by the one Christians see as the True Human. I am instructed to link my own forgiveness from my Father in heaven, with the forgiveness I am continually working at with others who have ‘transgressed against’ me. Immediately following (and linked to) this, is that I must be on guard against being led ‘into temptation’.
Whether our resentment is justified or irrational, political or personal, sharply focused or a foggy haze; we are reminded of an important moral human truth. The longer we allow anger to fester and burn the more tempted we can be to find our way into a fix, escape, or treat. This could be in the form of a verbal insult, a preachy self-righteous Facebook comment, some form of sexually energising daydream or exploration, or any other drug of choice (working late hours, over-eating, gambling, numbing myself with drink).
And so, the journey to full humanness must include humane prayers where we lay our vulnerability to anger and temptation before the Lord.
Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the Evil One.
Or, we might paraphrase…
Lord, help me to so savour your mercy towards me that I too flow with mercy towards others, especially those I am likely to point the finger of superior judgement towards, whose wrongs I feel the most burned up about. The ones who threaten me and interfere with how I think the world should run. Those who make my blood boil. The ones who, like me, do not deserve mercy. And keep me far away from letting my anger drive me into some kind of tempting and ultimately self-serving power trip. Deliver me from the fleeting and temporary soothing ego trips of violence of any kind to myself or another.
In Luke 18:1-8 we get the “Parable of the Persistent Widow”. It focuses on her persistence to win justice against her adversary. All parables of Jesus have a point, but here we are told the point of this one from the start: to show disciples that we “should always pray and never give up.”
I’ve been saying for years that when we pray we shouldn’t think of God like a vending machine. The differences should be obvious. A vending machine doesn’t care about us. It doesn’t make decisions about what we need. It is created by something other than itself. It will eventually wear down and fail to work, operate, provide, give or respond.
But here I’m going to explore at least one characteristic of vending machines which bear at least some kind of likeness to God. That characteristic is that (provided they are not defective) they work. They operate. They provide. They give. They respond to our requests.
Vending machines move. You put the money in (coin, cash, card, or
Aristotle, observing that objects in the world are in motion, rightly reasoned that (pardon the redundancy) there must be a necessary being that is a) not itself in motion, but b) is itself responsible for all of the motion in the world.
Some would at this point want to jump in and point out that this leads to (or is) a ‘deistic’ view of God. A God who kicks off all the motion in the world and then sits back and does nothing else ever again. Just one big shove, and done.
Despite this being perhaps where our minds may go first, it doesn’t mean we have to imagine things like that. As in a pool or billiards table, instead of imagining God as the white cue that is hammered at the other balls and (we might imagine) immediately removed from the table after that first contact, we might also imagine God as the cue stick, or better yet as the player who is active both beyond and on the table throughout the whole game. The one calling all the shots.
Theologian C.H. Pinnock proposed that God is not just an ‘unmoved’ Mover, but rather the Most-Moved Mover. Unlike a deterministic deity with a fixed plan like clock-work, Pinnock had an ‘open’ picture of God’s sovereignty which we won’t go into here. Suffice to say that the Bible does not portray God’s sovereignty in such a way that conflicts with our experience of God ‘changing his mind’, feeling sorry that he made humans, or responding to prayers.
This brings us back to the teaching of Jesus, using the example of a pleading widow to teach us to “always pray” and “never give up.”
According to biblical theology, God has chosen to be the kind of God who wants to relate to us, and wants that relationship to be one of asking. Jesus, as a master teacher who knows human nature completely, clearly knows that we will get tired of asking and want to ‘give up’.
The short parable ends with Jesus concluding that God, who we should understand is very unlike the ruler who “doesn’t fear God or care what people think” is the kind of God who will, in his own time and own way, “bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night.”
I don’t naturally want to cry out to God day and night. Not for anything. I find the deistic view easier. God has determined it all. Down to the last detail. No need to give him instructions. Just trust and wait until the end, when it will all get sorted out.
But no. This parable shows God to be the kind of God who wants us to be – at least a bit – impatient and persistent with him. He wants us to “keep bothering” him, like the widow did to the unjust judge. God wants us to ask for at least a little of the ultimate future in the immediate present.
This will take practice, and getting over our pride which doesn’t want to look like a fool asking God for stuff all the time and it seeming (at least some of the time) to make precisely no difference.
If we go to the Psalms, the prayer book of the Bible, the prayer book that shaped Jesus’ prayers, we immediately see this kind of view as they call persistently on God for all things, all the time, in all kinds of ways.
In prayer, I have the shameless audacity to be trying to move the Most Moved Mover.
My slowness to rise after my short six hour slumber was gently challenged by the relentlessly positive chorus of glad chirping from the other side of our bedroom window.
(The contrast between this happy throng and the pair of brutally barking dogs a few weeks earlier could not be overstated.)
They helped me pray my regular daily ‘Our Father’ at my dedicated place and prayer kneeler.
Our Father, who art in Heaven,
Yes, you are beyond this world, and also in it. You’re in the throat of those glorious birds.
Hallowed by Thy Name…
Yes, may we honour your name as freely and ornately as these simple creatures are.
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.
Yes, the celebratory proclamations of these winged friends is an earthly echo of angelic praise in the heavenly realm beyond our sensory comprehension.
Give us this day our daily bread.
Yes, you “feed the ravens when they call to you.” Feed us too, and may we not fight over the crumbs as these little friends are sometimes known to.
Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Yes, these animals are not worried about anything. Childlike, they watch, explore, hop, flutter and gladly receive nourishment. They do not hold grudges, despair over the sad state of things. May I not miss such simple gratitude in the midst of all my serious political philosophy.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the Evil One.
Yes, it is only when I think of myself as more important, larger then others that my Ego is warped and wooed into wrongdoing, harming others, exaggerating how wrongly I’ve been treated. How dare they not recognise my greatness. The birds just do not care about such things. They are not so easily tempted.
For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.
Amen, help me live like a bird today. A happy citizen of your domain. A glad participant in your power. A humble reflection of your glory.
Recovering the Kingdom 