Second Terrace

the watershed miracle: good news for the poor

-- La résurrection du fils de la veuve de Naïm, James Tissot, Brooklyn Museum

 “Do not weep”

The raising of the widow’s son at Nain was a watershed.

The Evangelist St Luke emphasizes the fact that this is the very first raising of the dead performed by Jesus.

It took place at a large funeral. It was in the most tragic of circumstances – the newly-deceased was a young man, the “only son of his mother, and she was a widow” (Luke 7.12).

Jesus comforted the widow in the public procession behind the open coffin. “Do not weep,” He told her. 

He told her this not because He rejected weeping or because He prohibited it. “Blessed are those who mourn,” He said in the Beatitudes. “Weep with those who weep,” St Paul wrote later in Romans (12,15). 

After all, the shortest verse in the Bible might be the greatest: “Jesus wept” (John 11.35) as He gazed at the tomb of His friend Lazarus.

Even though He will “wipe away every tear,” Jesus understands and embraces weeping. He told the widow not to weep because He knew what He was going to do. Unexpected joy was about to happen: the greatest lack, the worst poverty, was about to be upended.

Jesus touched the coffin and said, “Young man, I say to you, arise” (Luke 7.14).

And he did.

The watershed

It’s really what the people said about this momentous event that links this miracle with what came before and afterward:

“A great prophet has arisen among us!” And, “God has visited His people!” (Luke 7.16).

This miracle of raising the dead was a Sign – a glorification by the Holy Spirit – of the presence, the immediacy of Son of God. All miracles are exactly that – this is their primary meaning. The Son of God has come to be the Once and Only Ever True King. He has come to bring about the only righteous government, the spiritual descent of the New Jerusalem. 

The real Signs of the Kingdom are thus apocalyptic: they reveal mystery, a depth of reality beyond our common perception.

These real Signs are also Trinitarian: they are expressions of the love of God the Father shown to His beloved world – all of us – through His revealing Persons, the Son and the Spirit.

That is why we should pay attention to tiny expressions like this in the Gospel: “He had compassion on her” (Luke 7.13). This is God Himself comforting those who mourn.

Obviously, the miracles that Jesus performed were not for the purpose of spectacle or crowd entertainment. 

The Gospel of Luke emphasized this point immediately after Jesus’ raising of the young man in Nain. The disciples of John the Baptist heard about this miracle, as the news of it spread far and wide in the region of Galilee (Luke 7.18-23). 

When they came, they saw firsthand Jesus curing “many diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many that were blind he restored sight” (7.21).

The main question

John the Baptist’s disciples asked Jesus the primary critical question – the question that every person was waiting upon, whether they knew it or not, since the world began:

“Are You the One Who is to come?”

This is the elemental expectation, unavoidable and psychologically deep-rooted, in every single human being. Human nature cannot help but to grieve and mourn the Fall of humanity from full communion with God.

Humanity, as a result, became desperately poor.

And human nature also knows – from the bottom of every heart – that Someone needed to come to repair that breach, to achieve reconciliation, to make Peace between God the Father and prodigal humanity that set its face in enmity against its Creator.

I know that many people might take offense at the notion that “all humanity lies in wait for the Saviour.” What about those who don’t believe that God exists? 

I understand and respect this. Nevertheless, the heart and height of humanity – unbelief notwithstanding – and of all Creation is the Logos of God Himself. Humanity was created in the image of the Son of God, as the Son is the only “image” of the Three Persons of the Trinity.

Thus, for humanity to turn against the God of Love – Who is the Trinity of Three Persons, Which is the very meaning and destiny of humanity – means that humanity will be desperately homesick in the most pathological meaning of that word.

So – “Are You the One?” is the question that we all ask, every single one of us, millions and billions of human hearts who have ever and will ever “live and move and have their being.”

When you need rescued, you’re always waiting for the Rescuer – no matter how hard and for how long you try to deny it.

And “Rescuer” is exactly what the word “Jesus” means.

Surmounting the Fall

So Jesus answered the question posed to Him by the disciples of John the Baptist:

“Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is he who takes no offense at Me” (Luke 7.22-23).

Yes, it is Jesus Who is the One Who was to come. He is the Only-Begotten Son of the Father, Who by the Spirit proceeding from the Father rests upon the Son and glorifying the Son to all humanity, to all Creation.

By the Spirit, Jesus the Son – as God but now also as human – overcomes the consequences of the Fall: by turns, He surmounts the debilitation of lameness, the corruption of leprosy, the closing-off of deafness, the immobility of death …

… and, saved for the climactic end of the phrase, the cessation of poverty by the announcement that “This is He, the Messiah,” the One we were always waiting for.

The reality of poverty

There is a consistent them that the Gospel of Luke makes very clear here – a theme that runs through the Gospels, the New Testament, and indeed the entire Bible. And that is this:

If the Garden of Eden means anything, it is that Creation was meant to provide every physical need. No one was ever to starve or to need protection from the elements. God’s Table was always richly laid in plenty – only if humans would reflect the fellowship and communion that was God Himself, the complete Self-sacrificing love shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit toward Each Other.

When humanity rejected communion with God in the Fall, it also rejected humanity. With the breaking away from God’s Table, then came the breaking of the Edenic common good. Famine arose from the Fall. So did abuse and exposure from the elements.

So did oppression, violence, strife, and famine. There cropped up, all over the world, “rich fools building unnecessary barns” (Luke 12.13-21). 

The “poor” are those who have been prevented from God’s Table, who have been obstructed from His providence in Creation. Even after the Fall, Creation is intended to provide every real need. 

I take the experience of Joseph in Egypt as instructive here:

Under the wise and righteous stewardship of Joseph (Genesis 41), Egypt – emphatically “post-lapsarian” (ie., after the Fall) and not at all like Eden –  was able to store up sufficient provender against seven years of famine. There was enough to supply the needs of more than just the Egpytians, but also many refugees … like certain refugees from Canaan: Jacob (Joseph’s father) and all his clan.

So it seems clear that God’s Providence through Creation continues to be sufficient for the real and physical needs of everyone in the world.

If people starve to death or suffer from desperation and exposure, it is not only because of the Fall, but because of very contemporary wickedness.

Scarcity seems to be, more often than not, a human construct. It arises from all the unnecessary barns of Rich Fools who live only to “eat, drink and be merry.”

So it should come as no surprise that when it comes to the signs of damage from the Fall, or symptoms of the rages of sin and death, God looks – from the Old Testament to the New – how the poor are treated. He looks at the welfare of weakest humans, the unborn, indeed, but He looks at the condition of all the weak, all the powerless, all the marginalized, all the left-behinds and leftovers from history. 

What God judges most

It is a deeply challenging thought that of all the sleights and insults to God’s holiness that man can commit, it is the withholding of hospitality and generosity from people – and all Creation – and the result of the millions, perhaps billions, who are poor that God most often condemns in Scripture.

“Do all the workers of wickedness know nothing at all? They eat up my people as they eat bread” (Psalm 13.4 LXX).

This is only one of many, many verses about God’s preference for the poor in the Bible, Old Testament and New. At the Last Judgment, when the sheep are divided from the goats, what is the main standard upon which humanity is judged?

However we treat the poor is exactly how we treat Jesus Christ: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the last of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me” (Matthew 25.40).

What does it mean to be poor? Simply this: desperation. It is not just living “hand to mouth.” For too many, the hand never makes it to the mouth.

For too many in this world, there is a constant panic over food, shelter, water and heat, clothing – not just for themselves, but for their children, the elderly and infirm.

Henry David Thoreau famously said “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” He is talking about the generalized depression and anxiety that modern man suffers. Existential philosophers and psychologists have said much the same.

Modern desperation

But there is no such thing as “quiet” desperation. For the poor, desperation is always very loud. And frankly, out of all the concerns that Jesus spoke about in the Gospels, the “quiet desperation” of modern man ranks pretty low, especially compared to the real desperation that is cured not by good intentions, but with healing, provision, and resurrection. 

The implication is clear: modern man is miserable mainly because he is not living according to his created nature, according to God’s design of providence in Creation. He has subjected himself to alien goals and destinies – a hunger for power and wealth rather than righteousness.  It is for this reason that Jesus said that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God (Mark 10.25).

If you set your sights on power and wealth – if your hunger takes you into violence and selfishness – then you will starve your heart, that is, the very modern “quiet desperation.”

There is, in the world of the Fall, never any good news for the poor. If there’s a war, they are always the ones who suffer first and suffer most. If there’s an economic recession or depression, they are the ones first to go homeless and starve. If there’s pollution, they’re the ones who have to drink poisoned water and breathe toxic air. If there’s global warming and rising sea levels, they are the ones who get flooded first.

At long last, the Good News

Into this bleak context, Jesus walks and speaks:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor” (Luke 4.18). 

The Good News (ie., euangelion – “evangel” – in Greek, and Gospel – from Old English “godspell”) for the poor is that the Kingdom of God, which is the immediate presence of the Risen Son ushered by the Spirit at Pentecost, overcomes the Fall.

“They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11.9).

“Knowledge” here means full communion in the Holy Spirit, fellowship with the Holy Trinity itself.

And in that very communion, in the Kingdom of God, there will be no lamentation or sorrow, there will be no violence or domination, there will be no infirmity or pain, there will be no hunger or thirst …

… no one will be left behind, no one will be pushed away from God’s Table of Providence.

The biggest miracle

Here is the main point:

The promise of “He has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor“ (Luke 4.18) is fulfilled three chapters later: “The poor have good news preached to them” (Luke 7.22).

The poor getting good news – the good news of the Kingdom starting to grow in the here and now – is the greatest of Jesus’ Gospel miracles, the Signs of the Kingdom. 

The Gospel of Luke emphasized this main point from the beginning. Who was it in all the earth that got the good news of the Saviour’s birth? The humble shepherds watching their flocks by night: it was the poor who visited Jesus first.

This preaching of the good news to the poor is exactly what John the Baptist was looking for: because only the Son of God Who has now and also become the Son of Man can actualize that Kingdom as a reality.

The Kingdom in the light of the Son is the overturning of the order of sin and death. It is “abundant life” (John 10.10). It is “drinking deeply from the torrents of God’s delights” (Psalm 35.8 LXX).  

The Kingdom is so contrary to the ways of the Fallen World that Jesus’ descriptions of the “blessed poor” hardly make any sense – especially to those who put their hope in commonsense riches and in power.

His Words and Signs are all unsettling. He defeats the temptations of the devil himself. He evicts demons with a simple command. He heals multitudes of every kind of ailment. He calls His disciples by telling them to put their nets down on the other side of the boat – as if that would make any difference – and it did. 

He forgives sins – which should always be amazing, as sin is the worst ailment of all. The Pharisees and religious experts were correct in being scandalized by His doing so (Luke 5.21): no one – until He arrived as the Expected One – could even dare to forgive sin. 

He heals and harvests grain on the Sabbath – because healing infirmity and feeding hunger are exactly what the true “Sabbath rest” calls for.

In Luke 6.20-49, He gives the “Sermon on the Plain,” and upends the cynical “it is what it is”  sensibilities of the Fall:

“Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you that hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you that weep now, for you shall laugh” (6.20-21).

Notice that Jesus is not giving a spiritual, allegorical meaning to the word “poor.” One can add “spiritual impoverishment” to the interpretation of “poor” (πτωχὁς), but one must never disregard the primary meaning of “physical destitution.”

Because in Him – and later on, in His continuing Body after the Ascension, which is the Church – the hungry are fed. He demonstrated this in the Feeding of the Five Thousand. Now, we feed the poor, beginning at the Eucharist on the Holy Table, and extending from there the generosity and hospitality of the all-sufficient Christ to the poor of the world.

Just as Jesus told us to pray: “Give us this day, our daily bread …”

Upending the Fall

The Church is only the beginning of the Kingdom. 

Just as our work to comfort the poor has only just begun, so also is our work of healing and leading everyone to the knowledge of their salvation from sin and death, and resurrection into eternal life in Christ.

This all starts in the here and now, and starts from the inside out, in us. The Kingdom of God, Jesus says, grows from smallness (like a mustard seed or a lost coin, even the widow’s mite), weakness, even apparent foolishness – but mightily it grows:

“The Kingdom of God is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his garden; and it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches” (Luke 13.19).

The Presence of Christ does not grow from the top down, in power and violence, riches and domination. It does not and cannot grow from the State. “My Kingdom is not of this world,” Jesus said to the tyrant Pilate. His miracle at Nain made this clear from the start. And how many times have we Christians forgotten this truth over the centuries.

It grows from the heart to the complete person's body and soul, to the family, to the neighborhood. “Love your neighbor as yourself. Love and bless your enemies. Feed My sheep. Forgive freely as you’ve been forgiven. Be salt and light.”

“Let it be that through Me – and you – the poor shall eat and be satisfied” (from Psalm 21 LXX).

“And turn the world upside down.”

Which the Kingdom of God, the Body of Christ, did just that. 

Every miracle performed and every word spoken by Jesus is just this command, to upend the fallen world in His Name.

Just think – the people recognized all of this in that great Sign: “A great prophet has risen among us” and “God has visited his people!”

All because Jesus did His first raising of the dead, of the widow’s young son at a place called Nain.

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the great man theory and the boasting of st paul

-- Le Lavement des Pieds, by James Tissot, Brooklyn Museum

How is Jesus to be represented?

This is the most critical question in history. Is He to be proclaimed and presented in greatness, as greatness has been generally understood?

But does that greatness -- with all the trappings of royalty, riches, naked power, even domination and violence -- square with the Jesus we read in the Gospels? Did the character of Jesus' presence change from His earthly ministry after He rose from the dead and ascended into heaven?

Apparently, to the latter question, some indeed think so.

I do not.

The bleak life

The world of the Apostle Paul and the early church was a lot wilder than what we usually think.

People were generally pessimistic. Most people in the Graeco-Roman world of the Roman Empire (that stretched all over the Mediterranean, touching on India in the East and Ireland in the northwest), really believed that nothing was going to change. If you were born poor or enslaved, then that was the way you were going to die. 

And the afterlife was just a faded existence of shadows, languishing forever underground (literally) in Hades or Tartarus.

And it was always and only meant to be. You were pre-determined by fate. 

[How intriguing it is that certain of these pagan pessimisms continue on, as undying artifacts even in Christianity: fate and determinism, underground and fundamental inferno, even the idea that nuptial relations are somehow impure and disqualifying from consecration.]

This, obviously, worked out just fine for the aristocrats and princes of the day: it was an effective means to keep the lower class profitably in its place.

Secret societies and conspiracies

Well, this is just wretched stuff. So it’s not surprising at all that into this Graeco-Roman world came all sorts of imported religions, mostly from the Orient.

“Mystery religions” and cults sprouted up like mad. They promised an escape from this prison of fate and doom.

There were all sorts of wild cults that cropped up all over the Roman Empire. Most, if not all, insisted on secrecy. There were coded signs and secret gestures. There were dark rituals held in caves and way out in the countryside. 

Some of these cults were called “Dionysian.” They engaged in wild drunken frenzies called “bacchanalias” (from the Greek god Dionysius, or “Bacchus” as he was known in Latin). They’d whip themselves up into excess and ecstasy, speak in tongues, and often engage in violence (occasionally, it is said, in homicide).

The Gnostic hope

On the tamer and much more civilized side was the “Gnostic movement.” This was more of a culture than a specific religion. It had its influences on the Jewish community and even in the new Christian community of the first century.

Gnostics generally believed that there was a mystical path to escape the cold hard fate of the dark world. Maybe, if one could grasp a “knowledge” (ie., “gnosis,” hence “Gnostic”) of the way things really are – not the “fake news” of what everyone else knew – then one could pass through a whole sequence of levels and gates and tollhouses from this present darkness up and up and up to “The One.”

I don’t wish to demean this Gnostic desire. It is a valid one. It is a rejection of that horrid despairing culture of fate and oppression.

But the problem of Gnosticism, aside from its rejection of the Incarnation, was that it left the rest of Creation behind. It was essentially individualistic. There was little regard for the neighbor and the neighborhood. There was little to no care at all about the land and the animals, the rest of the people and the world.

Gnosticism was very much a “religion of escape.” 

I’m sure you’re already thinking this: “Holy smokes, nothing much has changed. We’ve got mystery religions and gnostics all around us today.”

Indeed. There are all sorts of Christian communities that are “religions of escape.” Conspiracy theories are the “mystery religions” of today that dismiss common civility and rationality as “fake news.” We’ve got loads of secret societies – real ones, not just online – that promise to whisper, in your ear, the “way things really are.”

The new society

So when the Christian Gospel entered the scene, starting about 33 AD, it was viewed very much as another Gnostic Jewish sect. 

It’s true. Christians were considered by the Roman Empire as Jewish until about 70 AD. At that time, the Jews rejected Christians because they did not join them in the Bar Kochba revolt against the Romans. And thus the Romans, because of this rejection, considered the Christian movement an illegal religion and began to persecute them. Why? Because the Christian community refused to join in with the Graeco-Roman crowd of a thousand gods, where every religion was counted as valid, just as long as you considered the Roman Emperor a god, too, and burned incense in front of his statue.

Because the Christians refused to become part of this polytheistic civil religion of the Roman Empire, they were called “atheists.”

I’m not kidding.

Signs and wonders

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. In this first century especially, the proclamation of the Gospel was often accompanied by “signs and wonders.” There were many miracles of dramatic healings and exorcisms.

These signs were mainly shown to demonstrate that this Christian movement was an extension of the Gospel ministry of Jesus Christ Himself. He was indeed sitting at the right hand of God the Father, and through the Holy Spirit He was enacting the Kingdom of God through His Body, the Church.

There is nothing like “signs and wonders” to attract a crowd or create a movement. Great men have always used spectacle to gain power.

A man named Simon Magus (ie, “the Great One”) was performing spectacle in the land of Samaria (north of Judea) in Acts 8.9-24. He heard Philip (of the Seventy)  preach the Gospel and believed and was baptized.

Then, after he saw the “signs and great miracles performed” by Philip and the Apostles Peter and John, he actually had the chutzpah to go up to the apostles, offer them money, and say “Give me also this power” (Acts 8.19).

He found that you don’t say things like that to real apostles, the true representatives of the true King. “Your silver perish with you,” the Apostle Peter said, “because youth thought you could obtain the gift of God with money. You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God” (Acts 8.20-21).

Simon Magus thought Christianity was expanding through greatness, through spectacle, and he wanted to get in on the ground floor of this new powerful scheme.

But he was way off the mark.

The golden rule

In the Body of Christ, in the only true Kingdom with the only true King, one doesn’t succeed through performing spectacle and get powerful by manipulating crowds.

One becomes great by being the least. One becomes first by being last. 

Because the Master Himself, Jesus Christ, came to serve, not to be served. He denied Himself, and poured out His life as a ransom for many.

Christianity is about meekness, poverty in spirit. It is only about peacemaking and proclaiming God’s forigveness and mercy, and giving forgiveness. 

Christianity is opposite from and upside down to everything we are used to in the world. We don’t take an eye for an eye (ie., lex talionis). We don’t be nice to our friends and rotten to our enemies. We don’t harbor grudges, keep long accounts, and take revenge.

Jesus tells us to do good despite our getting done bad by. “But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return … Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.” (Luke 6.35-36).

The great man theory

There is a “Great Man” theory in the writing of history. Many historians believe that the history of civilization is ushered by “Great Men” who move mighty peoples and events. These men might be good and wonderful like Jesus, Buddha, and Confucius, or awful and bad like Hitler, Stalin, Orbán, and Mussolini – what matters in this theory is that Great Men forcefully make a big impact on the way things really work.

Christianity completely disagrees. We reject the “Great Man” theory in the Body of Christ. We don’t need heroes or illustrious men. We do not bow and scrape before kings or despots. We are not impressed by power and celebrity. We don’t pay particular heed, certainly not favoritism, to the rich and to the aristocracy:

“Not many of you were powerful, not many were of noble birth” (1 Corinthians 1.26).

“Has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you, is it not they who drag you into court?” (James 2.5-6).

The Great Man theme of history is a symptom of authoritarian ideology that is infecting the world, as all sorts of people are relapsing into fan clubs for Strong Men like Stalin in today’s Russia, Franco in today’s Spain, Mussolini in today’s Italy, even Hitler in nationalistic cults all over today’s world.

So much agony has been inflicted, so much blood has been spilled, in the self-promotion campaigns of the Great Man. How much abuse, how much propaganda and cultism has been erected by sycophantic structures for the sake of protecting and enabling the power of the authoritarian? The world reels.

True greatness

Authority and leadership in Christianity is totally the opposite of the Strong Man. Christian authority and headship go only in the way of servanthood, of self-emptying (ie, kenosis), of self-denial and bearing one’s own Cross …

… of following in the way of Jesus, Who thought His equality with God the Father as something not to be grasped (Philippians 2.6), but instead, “humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross” (2.8).

The symbol of Christian authority is not in a crown nor a sword, not kingly robes and thrones or majestic edifices.

The symbol of Christian authority – true greatness – is Jesus washing the feet of His friends, on the way to Golgotha.

Enter the Apostle Paul. He worked tirelessly and at great pain and self-sacrifice (2 Corinthians 11.23-29), just like the Risen Christ told him to on the Damascus Road (Acts 9). 

It is a little-known fact that Christianity, at the time, had a lot of poor representatives. There were many like Simon Magus who subscribed to the Great Man Theory, and tried to apply it to themselves.

They were the “super apostles” that St Paul mentions in 2 Corinthians 11.5. These Great Men were not the real Apostles of the Twelve or of the Seventy. They were instead poseurs – self-anointed celebrity preachers who loved fame and celebrity. Many of them – and I know this is hard to believe – actually call themselves “super apostles.”

Today’s “super apostles” (and we've got them by the hundreds) love huge venues and slickly produced variety shows and televised extravaganzas (eg, the hideously called “New Apostolic Reformation” movement), so they didn’t disappear after St Paul.

They did a lot of boasting, of self-promotion. They preached unceasingly about their special hyper-spiritual experiences. They spoke in tongues. They ginned up the crowd. They even performed miracles. 

They were mightily impressive. They were Great Men indeed. And they raked in the cash.

The Weak Man Theory

Only at this point, in this context, can we understand the odd, arresting words of the Apostle Paul: “I must boast; there is nothing to be gained by it, but I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord” (2 Corinthians 12.1).

The Apostle Paul, too, had visions, just like the Super Apostles. He had been “caught up” (ie, “raptured”) into the same heavenly worship as would the Apostle John later on in Revelations. He too heard things that he couldn’t really understand and certainly could not articulate.

But St Paul said that he could not really “boast” or self-promote or brag (because that’s what self-promotion is) about visions and ecstasies at all. 

Instead, what St Paul actually could boast about was not his strength or greatness, but his weakness.

“I don’t want anyone to think more of me than he sees in me or hears in me” (2 Corinthians 12.6). That is perfect congruence. That is the total opposite of hypocrisy.

That is also outright foolishness in real-world politics. That kind of thinking will get you nowhere in power and wealth. That is not the way to become a celebrity or influencer on TikTok or Instagram.

And then St Paul doubles down on this anti-Strong-Man anti-common-sense:

“And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too enthusiastic” (2 Corinthians 12.7).

This is hardly the stuff of charismatic religion, hardly ecstatic. This is not dionysian enthusiasm at all, not the stuff you hear in rallies or crusades.

Who knows what the thorn is? There have been many theories. For my part, I’m pretty sure that it was bouts of severe depression – and who could blame Paul for these, as he had to contend with memories of his own persecution of the Christian Church that he now loved, that he lived for, and that he was suffering and dying for?

Three times St Paul begged for relief from this torn. Three times -- despite the fact that the Apostle had gone up into the third heaven and had started many churches and had performed miracles and written the Epistles that would forever structure Christian doctrine.

God had other ideas: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 6.8).

In the Body of Christ, Christ can only be King once we resign from the throne of self. The Holy Spirit – which is the Comforting Kingdom of God – will fill a soul, a psyche, only when it is no longer stuffed by ideology and idolatry.

“I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses,” the Apostle said, against all the histories of the world, “so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Corinthians 6.9).

The Apostle Paul utterly rejected the Strong Man Myth.

He subscribed, instead, to the Weak Man Theory.

“But God forbid that I should glory,” he wrote to the Galatians, “save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Galatians 6.14).

There was never, nor ever will there be, any greater weakness than crucifixion, far worse than any weakness inflicted by a thorn.

Yet at that very point, the "still point of the turning world," is that singularity, precisely when and where, God revealed his greatest power, His greatest Sign and Wonder of all time, that He is indeed and only Love.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

✾

the christian nationalist's problem with amos

"During the long and peaceful reign of Jeroboam II (786-746 BC) Israel attained a height of territorial expansion and national prosperity never again reached. The military security and economic affluence which characterized this age were taken by many Israelites as signs of the Lord's special favor toward them which they felt they deserved because of their extravagant support of the official shrines."

-- Dr R Lansing Hicks (Yale University), in his introduction to the Book of Amos, in the New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha: Revised Standard Version (1971) -- my favorite Bible, purchased at Winebrenner Theological Seminary in 1978

For those who like thinking the nation has special providential status, even an eschatological role, they might do well to consider the prophetic peril of being "God's chosen nation" -- for this is surely what Christian Nationalism claims.

If one wants to be a Christian Nationalist, then one subjects herself or himself to the Prophets of the Covenant, Old and New.

Like Amos:

"Hear this, you cows of Bashan in the mountain of Samaria,
who oppress the poor, who crush the needy,
who demand of their husbands 'Bring so we may drink' ...
Behold the days are coming upon you
when they shall take you away with hooks ...
and you shall go out through the breaches ..."
(Amos 4.1-3)

"Seek good and not evil that you may live,
and so the Lord, the God Sabaoth, will be with you
as you have claimed.
Hate evil and love good,
and establish justice in the gates"
(Amos 5.14-15)

"I hate, I despise your feasts,
and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies ...
Take away from me the noise of your songs;
to the melody of your instruments I will not listen.
But let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream"
(Amos 5.21-24)

"Hear this, you who trample upon the needy,
and bring the poor of the land to an end ...
The Lord has sworn by the honor of Jacob:
'Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.
Shall not the land tremble on this account ..."
(Amos 8.4,7-8)

And that's just Amos. One should be careful about making claims of possessing extraordinary historical status. If there's anything clear about the history of Israel in the Old Testament, it's that God expects more from His people. Their status of being His chosen people never excused them from moral obligation: actually, it increased the obligation.

A supposedly "Christian" nation is one that will be marked not by territorial gain or military success. It will be one that is only anticipated by the critiques of Amos and all the prophets. A truly Christian nation, or people, will be "peculiar," contrary to the ways of the world, the "realpolitik."

A "Christian Nation" will embrace the poor instead of abusing them, and find in their company the kingdom of heaven.

Such a people will mourn the suffering of the weak, the marginalized, the oppressed.

They are meek instead of self-aggrandizing, instead of self-promoting, instead of grasping for greatness -- because the real arc of real history bends toward justice.

They long for righteousness, real (not legalistic) righteousness that heals and restores all the people and the land, and that longing is fulfilled in "Thy Will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

They are merciful, and they are forgiven as they forgive.

They are pure in heart and refuse to be confused by ideologies. They seek instead the theological vision of God's love for His creation instead of seeking power and calling what they do "Christian" simply because they do it.

They are peacemakers. They do not denounce. They do not revel in conflict. They do not fuel their power with grievance and scapegoating.

In short, such a "Christian Nation" is utterly impossible within the confines of world politics. Such a State would have to live by the Beatitudes and the entire Sermon on the Mount in a world that is governed, secularly, by the sword (Romans 13.1-4).

And what is usually overlooked here is this terrible fact: despite the fact that the State is an authority "instituted by God" to "execute His wrath on the wrongdoer," it is still true that "he who lives by the sword dies by the sword" (Matthew 26.52).

There is utterly no salvation, no grace in the way of the sword.

"My Kingdom is not of this world" (John 18.36) -- so said the only true King.

Instead of holding to the foolish political notion of so-called "Christian Nationalism," it is simply better to love one's nation, its land and people, as a gift from God.

It is better to actually be God's people and to follow the call of the Sermon on the Mount in whatever place one is.

Let the State be the State, and "be subject to the governing authorities" (Romans 13.1).

But pray, do not set your faith in getting power as a Christian. "Put not your trust in mortal princes" (Psalm 146.3).

Otherwise, a Christian Nationalist is going to have to contend with the likes of Amos, no less.

a nonpartisan voter’s guide for the perplexed

 

“When you need a plumber, you want a good plumber. You don’t hire one only because he’s a Christian.”

That was Rev. Pat Robertson, decades ago on his 700 Club broadcast. He was talking about government and elections. “You want someone competent in positions of responsibility,” he said to co-hosts Ben Kinchlow and Danuta Rylko. “By the same token, you don’t ask a Christian plumber to do neurosurgery just because he’s a Christian.”

He was spot on. Competency and responsibility are the primary qualifications for an office or position in civic institutions.

That should go without saying. There have been many candidates who were completely confident, even enthusiastically so, about their own hi-gloss quality.

They may even think that God spoke to them and urged them to run. They may be one hundred percent sure that they will win because God told them so. 

This is tragic thinking. It reminds me of many instances when, while a youth minister and seminary prof, moonstruck young men would tell me that they just knew that God had chosen for them a certain pretty girl to be their “helpmeet.”

And I would always ask, “But did God tell the girl this?”

How many candidates for office will find out on election day that the Lord must have forgotten to tell the voters the same thing He said to them?

I don’t think God calls anyone to political office, mainly because He wants everyone saved. 

I do not doubt that such passionate candidates are sincere. But they are sincerely wrong.

Sincerity cannot be the sole qualification for office. 

Then there are some who are not sincere. These are the ones who have agendas that are contrary to their community and to democracy. One good way to flush out such a ruffian is to ask whether he (or she) will accept the results of the election, or if he’ll be just another sore loser.

In putting together a nonpartisan voter’s guide for the perplexed, one might consider a few more qualifications to add to competency and responsibility. 

That’s assuming, of course, a shared commitment here to democracy and civilization. If there’s a desire for a dictator or some other malodorous un-American society, then number one, that would count as a hidden agenda (see above), and number two, dictators don’t need voter guides in the first place.

The last thing dictators want is a fair and wide-open election. The only election they like is the predictable sort – the kind where only their friends (dead or alive) vote.

So add this to the voter’s guide: American. That is, a person committed to the democratic republic. A person who respects the institutions and traditions of our political system. It is really not a good thing at all that being a maverick or going rogue has become such a fad.

And, dare I say it, could it be that populism is no good for the population?

Here’s an idea: for every candidate running for political office, from local to state to federal, he or she must first pass a hard test on American history and civics. It should be at least as hard as the one given to people who want to be naturalized as American citizens.

What grade do you think today’s politicians would get, circled in red at the top right-hand corner of the exam? And please, no essays on this test for obvious reasons: a maximum of 25 words would drive most lectern-pounders madder than a Wampus Cat in a rainstorm.

And that brings up another item on the guide: Civility. 

I don’t just mean “decency” here. Although it sure wouldn’t hurt a candidate to have a passing acquaintance with genteel speech instead of being an enemy of the English language. These days, we poor Americans are awash in a storm surge of uncouth knavery. 

“Goodness,” the peanut gallery raises an objection, “Andrew Jackson’s campaign was mad as a mule chewing on bumblebees. Jefferson and Adams went at it hammer and tongs.”

Objection overruled. Just because a problem is old doesn’t make it not a problem. An old problem is still a problem. I think we all agree that sin is bad and sin is old, but it’s still bad.

Civility means that a citizen (or candidate) addresses his fellow Americans (even the opposition) with respect. It means that a politician is willing to work with the other side of the aisle and compromise for the greater good. 

Civility also means that a politician is never going to only vote with his party. He’s going to say no to the Whip. A lot. And Republicans will play poker (literally) with Democrats over bowls of Senate Bean Soup (which is pretty good, by the way).

Civility is a nice Johnny Walker blend of rationality and courtesy. On one hand, a rational candidate would avoid conspiracy theories like a red light district. On the other, a courteous candidate would debate, with dignity, his opponent on the issues and actually answer questions posed by the moderator, instead of squirreling off to that miserable and craven tactic of “pivoting” to memorized lines from his stump speech.

I try to vote at every election. This is the American thing to do. I also pray that the Lord will protect our beautiful country and democracy, and establish peace, justice, and reason in our world. This, I’m quite sure, is the Christian thing to do.

I pray, too, for clarity in perplexity. And for leaders who are grown up. Who are not partisan.

we are the temple

La prédication de la ruine du Temple (1886-1894) by James Tissot, Brooklyn Museum

We are the Temple

“We are the temple of the living God,” says the Apostle Paul at the beginning of the Epistle Reading for today.

He says “living God,” because he is striking a contrast to the cult of idols that he just described:

Be not unequally yoked

“Do not be mismatched [or ‘unequally yoked’] with unbelievers. For what partnership does righteousness have with iniquity? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial [i.e., Satan]? Or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols?” (2 Corinthians 6.14-16a). 

The cult of idols is the negative meaning of the word “world”: “... the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers” (2 Corinthians 4.4). The Apostle Paul describes that cult as “iniquity,” “darkness,” “unbelief,” “temple of idols.”

The directive to “be not mismatched” does not refer here to marriage – that is, between a believing spouse with an unbeliever. It is often interpreted just that way, but there are few, if any, Church Fathers who make that interpretation.

This call to separation for the sake of holiness is deeper and wider than the issue of spouses with different faiths (actually, such a problem was dealt with in 1 Corinthians 7.13-14 and 1 Peter 3.1: obviously, such marriages were already a reality and not forbidden).

This was a call by St Paul “to come out from them and be separate from them” (2 Corinthians 6.17).

Recall (pardon the pun) that “call” is related to the New Testament word for “church”: ekklesia. This is from the Greek verb “ekkalein” – which means “to call out.”

So the word “Church” itself is a calling to move out from darkness, to rise into the “fellowship of the Light,” to assemble together as the “Temple of the Living God.”

Bad paths of separation

But what does this separation mean?

In the long history of Christianity there have been many different answers to this question.

Some have taken this very literally. The Amish are an obvious example. They move into their own communities, physically separate from general society. They reject modern technology and choose instead a simpler life.

Others have interpreted this same call “to come out and be separate” in a far more individualistic sense. Revivalists and preachers in the last 200 years, from Charles Finney to Billy Sunday to Jerry Falwell, focused on a number of individual sins: like smoking, drinking, playing cards,  going to the theater, gambling, and others. 

According to this view, avoiding these sins – rather than fighting the passions behind them – was the “separation” that St Paul called for.

And there are some in the Orthodox world who make these same interpretations. Some think that moving into an Orthodox culture (like Greece or Russia or a community near a monastery) would make it easier to be Orthodox, to be “separate.”

Some take the Orthodox call to asceticism – the fight against the passions – and turn it into the same legalistic set of individual behaviors. Instead of avoiding smoking and drinking, some have turned fasting into a rigorist, fundamentalistic regimen. Some have even changed their appearance, growing long scraggly bears, becoming partisans for Russia against Ukraine, abandoning friendships and family – all in the name of “separation.”

Needless to say, Orthodox asceticism was never meant to be turned into a fundamentalist, Pharisaical legalism.

All Orthodox asceticism – fasting, Psalmody, almsgiving, quietness, prayer – has one purpose, and that is to love the Lord God better, and to love one’s neighbor better.

If Orthodox asceticism does not produce love, it might be asceticism, but it is surely not Orthodox. And, even more importantly, if Orthodoxy itself does not produce love, it might be a partisan ideology or an ethnic club or a cultural museum, but it is not Christian.

And there’s a lot of self-styled Orthodox chatterers (e.g., “Orthobro’s” and “radtrads”) on social media who need to take this to heart.

Temple of the Living God

What the Amish, the revivalist preachers, and Orthobro’s seemed to have not done is to read closely our Epistle reading.

In the Apostle’s words, God Himself has made these promises. Promises, after all, are a good thing. And promises from God are bright and hopeful, optimistic and joyful.

“God has said ‘I will live in them and move among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people” (2 Corinthians 6.16, quoting Leviticus 26.12 and Ezekiel 37.27).

“Therefore come out from among them, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch nothing unclean” (2 Cor 6.13, quoting Isaiah 52.11).

“Then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters” (2 Cor 6.13b-14, quoting 2 Samuel 7.14).

These Old Testament passages are important. Why did St Paul quote them? Because these are all passages that prophesy about the presence of Jesus Christ as King in His people. 

This “presence,” this intimate closeness and fellowship of the Father with us His people who are “the Temple of the Living God” is accomplished by Jesus Christ becoming and remaining incarnate, Who died on the Cross, rose on the third day, and ascended to the right hand of God the Father.

And His presence is realized, actually enfolding us into Trinitarian community, by the Holy Spirit.

This is a glad, happy thing! This is cause for great rejoicing!

Isn’t it clear that when St Paul quotes God as saying “I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you,” that we should immediately have the Prodigal Son’s reception leap into mind? That God the Father has been always waiting at the doorway of our heart, waiting for us to open up and come home?

This call, all these verses of promise, speak to the realization of the restoration of Israel, the return of the captives from exile in Babylon. 

The exiles are not just the Jews.

The exiles are all of humanity, all of Creation.

Different from the inside out

So of course we, as the Temple of the Living God, are going to differentiate from the dark culture of idols.

And that differentiation is not superficial. It will be deeper than skindeep, or appearances. Anyone can pitch a fit about smoking and drinking. Anyone can grow a long beard and wear a cassock (ask Rasputin) and spout venom on the internet. Anyone, Jesus said, can become a “whitewashed mausoleum” (Matthew 23.27).

But not everyone is clean from the inside out:

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you cleanse the outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside they are full of extortion and rapacity. You blind Pharisee! first cleanse the inside of the cup and of the plate, that the outside also may be clean” (Matthew 23.25-26).

“Inside cleanliness” is the only possible answer to the call of “Come out from among them, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch nothing unclean.”

No, we don’t follow the exterior laws of Judaism anymore (most of which are summarized in Leviticus 11). 

We follow the deeper and more real invitation to the heavenly Temple that was always the one all physical temples point to, the one that the Jersusalem Temple always anticipated.

That preparation, that way of cleansing, is the way of “seeking first the Kingdom of God and its righteousness” (Matthew 6.33). It is the way of “Loving the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. And loving your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22.37-40).

Love in the ruins

Love in the Ruins is a masterpiece written by the great Southern Catholic novelist, Walker Percy. 

Written in 1971, the story is set in an America that has become so divided, with parties so extreme and anger at each other, that society seems bent on collapse.

Percy wasn’t so much a prophet as he, a practicing physician, was simply a good diagnostician. He could see, even fifty years ago, the way things were going.

And here we are.

There are not a few Christians who want to run away into their own fabricated fantasies of “better worlds.” Maybe if they could create a Holy Russia, a Byzantine Empire around them, or maybe just an America of the good ol’ days, then things would be all right.

But no. Jesus tells us to get real. We should separate ourselves from our fantasies of wishing for a different society, another government.

“Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Matthew 10.16).

“You are the salt of the earth … You are the light of the world … Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father Who is in heaven” (Matthew 5.13-15).

The Apostle Paul knew, all too well, what "love in the ruins" was all about. In just a few paragraphs before our Epistle Reading, he writes these poignant words:

"Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. We put no obstacle in any one’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, tumults, labors, watching, hunger; by purity, knowledge, forbearance, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything" (2 Corinthians 6.2b-10).

Purity (vs desire for power). Knowledge (vs conspiracy theory and grievance). Forbearance (vs retaliation). Kindness (vs rage vulgarity). The Holy Spirit (vs the spirit of antichrist). Genuine love (vs condescension and manipulation). Truthful Speech (vs throwing red meat at rallies and ginning up the crowd). The Power of God (vs self-aggrandizement).

Jesus sends us into the world, into our America, as it is right now.

He doesn’t ask us to change the nation and society.

He calls us to change our hearts, ourselves, our home, our neighborhood.

From the inside out.

✾

the music of october

The Music of October

April is officially “Poetry Month.” But for my part, I think it ought to be October.

I think April is Poetry Month mainly because poets – many of whom are old guys like me – really like to identify with cold arthritic tree limbs turning green again. T S Eliot, who I think was born old, poked not a little fun at this identification with his opening lines in “The Wasteland”:

    April is the cruellest month, breeding,
    Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
    Memory and desire, stirring
   Dull roots with spring rain.

But October is a time of remembrance and fullness. And poetry, after all, is all about remembrance and the fullness of meaning. The blueness of the sky is paler now than the azure summer: every cloud is a sign. Every leaf is a photograph in an album of memory. The boughs of oaks and maples, loblolly and longleaf pines, whisper echoes of far-off waterfalls and ocean shores.

The October time of life is taken up by the poetic business of setting memory to rights.

After that longish introduction, here is the poet laureate of October, the twenty-three-year-old John Keats in 1819:

    Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
    Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
    While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
    And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue …

These are a few lines from the third stanza of his “Ode to Autumn.” In the poem, Summer has accomplished her hard work of “conspiring with the sun” and “bending the cottage-trees” with fruit, of “filling fruit with ripeness to the core” and “swelling the gourd,” of “o’erbrimming” the hives with sweet honey.

Now it’s Autumn and time for storing up the golden things. Now it’s time for thanksgiving and festivals. Now it’s the “soft-dying day.”

The color of October, Keats suggests, touches “the stubble-plains with rosy hue.”

The harvest is done now. The work of Summer is stored up, like tomatoes canned, peanuts roasted, crabapples jellied (thank you Susan), and apples squeezed slowly in the cider press.

Summer bends toward the business of October. One cannot get away from it, this Autumnal gaze. “Old men ought to be explorers,” Eliot wrote in “The Four Quartets.” The gift of maturity is that everything in the present can be framed and deepened and interpreted by remembrance.

We’ve learned, by now, in the October season, not to be governed by hard ideals. A lot of life is missed by being doctrinaire, driven by ironclad preconceived notions.

We find out, in the Fall, that it’s so exhausting to be an idealogue. It’s better, a far far better thing, to walk in the trees humbly, open-minded, and to listen to the wind as God intended.

We see, in the Fall, the mysterious hand of Providence. We see the face of God in our sister and brother. We see that the Father of lights in Whom there is no shadow of turning only gives good things, that while He never sends bad things He redeems all things, that God’s will is only a good will … that this was, and is, a good earth, a good life.

It took us a long time to figure that out.

It took until October.

By 1819, Keats was becoming a great poet. He was moving from a philosophical outlook to something he called a “negative capability” —a quality of imaginative open-mindedness in which “a sense of beauty overcomes every other consideration, or rather obliterates all consideration.”

Out of this sense of beauty came Keats’ “Ode to Autumn.”

But in 1819, John Keats had already entered into his own October. He would die only three years later in Rome – in 1819, tuberculine bacteria had advanced far into his lungs.

Still, he would have agreed with his fellow laureate. T S Eliot continued his lines in “East Coker”:

    Old men ought to be explorers
    Here or there does not matter
    We must be still and still moving Into another intensity
    For a further union, a deeper communion.

Which puts a deeper, sweeter, more poignant frame around this glowing line:

    Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
    Think not of them, thou hast thy music too.