Best Friends Forever

The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband. (Jeremiah 31.31-32)

Friendship

It was one of those minor spats that flare up out of nowhere and sputter out quickly. Except this one didn’t. Evidently both Walt and I had been keeping close score of the other’s negligence, while ignoring our own. It began as typically silly tit-for-tat—“How hard can it be to rinse off a plate and put it in the dishwasher?” “About as hard as picking up your shoes and putting them back in the closet.” But it soon turned into scathing renditions of painful incidents left unaddressed. In no time, years of happiness shattered into a pile of resentment and reproach. We were finished. We took to opposite ends of the apartment, mulling over the realization that what we believed was true love had actually been a delusion. We hated ourselves for getting suckered by a decade of sweet talk and surface romance, when nothing of the sort was happening underneath.

An hour or so passed and Walt came out to the living room. “I don’t want to argue anymore,” he announced. “But I have to say this. If we break up, I’m going to need a best friend to help me get through it. And that’s gonna be a big problem for me, since you’re the best friend I’ve ever had.” That’s all it took. Crying and laughing, we fell into one another’s arms and promised we would remain best friends for life for the sake of our love, and we would remain lovers for life for the sake of our friendship. It was a new promise—one that we’d never have made early on, as we had no idea how important our friendship would be in holding us together. And it taught us a lesson we’ve never forgot: our relationship depends on trust in one another’s friendship. I need to be free to tell my best friend, “Walt’s out of line,” and Walt needs to be able to tell his best friend, “Tim’s not treating me right.”

More Than a Lover

Scripture initially frames God’s covenant with Abraham and his descendants as a family matter. The promise of nationhood is treated as a closely guarded secret, a hidden legacy that will come to fruition in due time. That changes once God ordains Moses to speak to Israel on God’s behalf. When Israel leaves Egypt as a people, the union between the nation and its Maker assumes the nature of a love affair. True, the desert experience is no honeymoon. Yet the interaction between God and Israel smacks of a young couple learning to live together. When times are good, they couldn’t be happier. But let something go wrong and the whining and recriminations and acting out start. There’s a whole lot of “Why won’t you do as I ask?” (God) and “What have You done for us lately?” (Israel) and “See what a mess you’ve made!” (both) in the desert.

Though God loves Israel supremely and Israel loves God more than anything, they’re not the best of friends. And that puts Moses in the awkward position of go-between. As Israel’s first national prophet, he’s the template for every prophet who follows. When God wants to confide in best-friend Israel about lover-Israel’s faults, God speaks through its prophets. The problem is Israel’s not very good at detecting when God is talking Friend-to-friend. It tends to dismiss God’s frustrations—as if God’s a cranky mate picking another fight. Then, when God does come down hard on Israel’s unfaithfulness, the people sink into helpless despair. They’re finished. God has abandoned them. It’s all turned into rubble.

This goes on for centuries, to the point that few offices in Israel are as thankless as the prophet’s. By the time Jeremiah takes the position around 626 BCE, the prophet’s role more closely resembles a couples’ counselor than divine oracle. In fact, we call Jeremiah “the weeping prophet” simply because most of his time is spent mourning Israel’s infidelity and the suffering it brings to God and God’s people. The relationship obviously isn’t working and Jeremiah doesn’t know how to persuade Israel that God is more than a Lover. God is its Best Friend for life.

Fortunately—and out of necessity—God comes to Jeremiah’s rescue in chapter 31 by offering to forge a new relationship with Israel. “The days are coming when I will make a new covenant,” God says, bitterly noting that Israel failed to honor the old one, “though I was their husband.” (v31-32) Under the new covenant, God will remove the hindrances that blocked Israel’s attentiveness to God’s wishes and desires. “I will put My law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people,” God promises. “No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest… for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.” Essentially, God vows to take it upon God’s Self to ensure that a mutual, enduring friendship evolves to stabilize and nourish what’s proven to be a tempestuous, often one-sided love affair.

A New and Right Spirit

While this is a radically new promise—coming from a law-obsessed God to a rebellious people, no less—it’s not a particularly novel idea. Indeed, the Old Testament runs rampant with repentant figures who plead with God to find a better way to make this relationship work. In Psalm 51, written in the wake of his disastrous decision to steal Bathsheba by having her husband killed, David confesses he’s a failure in God’s eyes. “For my transgressions, and my sin are ever before me. Against You, You alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in Your sight,” he cries. As his poem goes on, however, we sense a tonal shift that suggests David has turned from talking to God as a guilty lover and he now beseeches God Friend-to-friend. “Teach me wisdom in my secret heart,” he prays in verse 6, slowly building up to verse 10: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” In terms of David’s relationship with his Maker, it’s the ultimate cry for help. He seeks more than a lover’s forgiveness. He asks God to be his Friend. And God responds, not only to David, not only to Israel, but also to us, promising, “I will write My law on your heart. You won’t need anyone to tell you how to love and honor Me. You’ll want to do it because we will be lovers and friends.”

A new and right spirit is more than a longing for reconciliation that we rekindle when we fall short in our faithfulness. It is God’s promise to us, spoken from God’s own mouth and written in our hearts by God’s own hand. It’s the promise we reach for when rushes to judgment overtake us. It’s the pledge we rely on when unhealthy desires and tendencies catch us off-guard. It’s the covenant that cannot be broken when our brokenness threatens to break God and us apart. When we can’t find it in our hearts to forgive ourselves, we look to the promise of love and forgiveness God eternally etched in the wells of our beings. We stand on its assurance that this relationship will work and it will last. God and us: best friends forever and lovers for life.

God’s new covenant in Jeremiah salvages the broken relationship with our Maker by inscribing the terms of an enduring, mutual friendship in our hearts.

Podcast link: http://straightfriendly.podbean.com/2012/03/25/best-friends-forever/.

Repost: Comfort

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins. (Isaiah 40.1-2)

A Deep Breath

The 40-day period between the Resurrection and Ascension intrigues me. The Gospels and Acts report several interactions between Jesus and His disciples, but we don’t observe Him doing much beyond issuing last-minute instructions. While Paul asserts one of these encounters involves 500 people (1 Corinthians 15.6), neither the Gospels nor Acts chronicle it. He spends His final days on Earth behind the scenes, preparing His closest followers to continue His ministry after He leaves. And there’s no record anywhere of a major public appearance where He announces He’s risen to life to the masses. This strikes us as a bit surprising, since Christianity hinges on faith in Jesus’s resurrection. We might think He’d seize every chance to be seen by as many as possible—until it occurs to us if His resurrection were a verifiable fact, faith would be irrelevant. Jesus stays out of the public eye because His mission centers on ending our reliance on what we know by requiring us to trust what God says. “Whoever believes shall have eternal life,” He says in John 3.16.

Instead of an historically definitive event, the pivotal moment comes in John 20.21-22: “Again Jesus said, ‘Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.’ And with that he breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” He uses a fairly innocuous gesture to transfer power to the disciples. He inspires them exactly as God first inspired humanity. With one breath, He fills them with His presence, His gifts, nature, and authority. Jesus explains they’re receiving the Holy Spirit—the Comforter Who, as He promised, “will guide you into all truth.” (John 16.13) Yet note why He breathes the Holy Spirit into them: “I am sending you.” The Spirit’s comfort and counsel aren’t only for the disciples’ edification. Henceforth, they carry It with them wherever they go and express It in calm assurance conveyed in their demeanor and words. They’re now able to bring Christ’s presence to any situation and change the atmosphere around it with no more than a deep breath.

A Most Unusual Message

When God directs Isaiah to “comfort My people… Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,” He’s invoking the prophet’s capacity to bring solace and clarity to Israel’s turmoil. Repeatedly God has pressed God's people to obey and repeatedly they’ve failed. By the time Isaiah comes on the scene, their stubbornness has pummeled them with sorrow. Recovering from 70 years of exile and hardship, they’re punch-drunk, exhausted, and despondent as they see their hope, like Jerusalem itself, lay in ruins. In times past, prophets predicted doom and destruction if Israel didn’t mend its ways. But God calls Isaiah to restore the nation’s faith and ease its worries. God commands the prophet to proclaim their troubles are ending, their sins are forgiven, and God's repaying their repentance twice over with God's love and mercy. This is a most unusual message delivered by a most unusual prophet who views his responsibilities in a most unusual manner.

Isaiah describes his mission this way: “The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.” (61.1) His compassion is so remarkable Jesus quotes him verbatim to define His ministry in Luke 4.18. And He essentially condenses it when He breathes on the disciples. He endows them with the Holy Spirit and sends them into the world to preach, to heal, to liberate people in distress. “Comfort my people; speak tenderly to them,” God tells Isaiah. Jesus vests the disciples with the Comforter so they can do the same.

Tenderly

We too have drawn the breath of Christ into our beings. We’ve also received the Holy Spirit and been sent into the world. We too can provide solace and clarity to troubled lives. Because the Comforter dwells in us, we have the capacity to make Its presence felt in every situation we enter. The confidence expressed in our behavior and the words we speak—words carried on inspired breath—have the ability to change the atmosphere around us. Yet if we limit our perceptions of what the Spirit within us can do and how we manifest Its power to our problems alone, we negate Jesus’s purpose for giving It to us.

We’ve received a most unusual message that must be delivered in a most unusual way. Our faith in Christ’s resurrection convinces us of His power to restore life. We’ve experienced it in our own lives. Thus, there are no lost causes and no one is beyond redemption. It’s our privilege to comfort God’s people—to assure them God has their problems in hand, God's forgiven them and will repay the costs of their mistakes twice over. Though much of their anxiety results from stubborn disregard for God, others, and themselves, we honor our calling to comfort them by resisting urges to confront or condemn them. “Brutal honesty” is an oxymoron; since it justifies wounding someone’s spirit as a method of healing, it’s patently dishonest. It’s best we leave that sort of “comfort” to self-deluded haters and old-school prophets. We provide comfort in a manner that pleases our Maker and reflects the Comforter’s presence in us—in a word, tenderly.

God of tender, loving kindness, make the Comforter's presence in us vividly known to us. May words of compassion, mercy, and healing come as naturally to us as our breath. Impress on us Your will that we comfort Your people. Amen.

Originally posted 12/12/09.

We speak tender words that neither confront nor condemn. We comfort.

Postscript: "Comfort Ye My People"

Possibly my favorite piece from the Messiah. Other than that "Hallelujah" tune, of course, and "Lift Up Your Heads," and "Surely He Hath Borne Our Grief," and... Oh, never mind.

Seekers and Searchers

Whoever diligently seeks good seeks favor, but evil comes to the one who searches for it. (Proverbs 11.27)

For Good

Last Sunday our pastor, Joy Douglas Strome, challenged us to define the dynamic governing our lives. Do our lives grasp for grace? Or do they lead from grace? It was a new question—well, actually, a new way of framing a question as old as our faith and the obligations attached to it. Her explanation brought the dilemma into sharp focus.

A life that grasps for grace is never content… always striving… always mildly disgruntled… always seeing either the wrong of those around them, or blaming all the problems of the world on themselves. If only I could get it right… If only they could get it right… Concern for self at the center of every formula. A life that leads from grace may not always be content, either. But the discontent fuels a response… that sense that a gifted life must be working in partnership with God for good. And, as one resource put it, not concerned with are we saved—but what are we saved for?

With that, the differences between the for-grace life and the from-grace life were so vivid I’ve found myself reevaluating the tiniest things, wondering, “Am I doing this for my benefit? Or am I pursuing it for good?” It may very well be that our thoughts, actions, and beliefs will prove beneficial for us. Indeed, it’s foolish and self-destructive to adopt mindsets and behaviors that result in unnecessary loss or harm. But are we as far as it goes? This quandary strikes me as something more probative than thinking through avenues to share goodness we receive, whether unanticipated or obtained. In other words, it’s not simply a matter of generosity or “paying it forward.” (Though both typically come into play.) It’s daring to test our desires and aspirations for value they present to people we love and live and work among. If what we strive to accomplish produces unfavorable results for others, what’s good for us may not be for good.

I say “may not” because not everyone responds favorably when we grow and prosper. The values, beliefs, and expectations of many near and dear to us may create conflict. Their perceptions may be clouded by personal experiences or deeply held social standards. To be blunt, some may envy goodness we achieve and receive, or resent our confidence we will find goodness. Coming out is a prime example. Often we delay honoring our God-given identities for fear some will react with dismay, possibly even hostility. Yet a closeted existence breeds dishonesty and deception. It’s no good to anyone—not people who love us, not people we know and love, and certainly not us. So while we lament and forgive the limitations of those who reject us, we rely on God’s grace to lead us from fearful denial to seek goodness born of self-acceptance, trust, and gratitude for our making. Belief that enforcing our integrity will result in good that reaches beyond us steels our resolve.

Shorting Dreams

So our quest begins with assessing goodness we desire. Will it make us better people—more caring spouses, more attentive parents, truer friends, finer citizens, and so on? Will it enable us to be clearer examples of grace, more faithful disciples, and more compassionate witnesses of God’s love? Will what’s good for us surpass us to be favorably received in our homes, communities, workplaces, churches, and extended relationships?

Proverbs 11.27 expands on this notion of a life leading from grace and one grasping for grace when it says, “Whoever diligently seeks good seeks favor, but evil comes to the one who searches for it.” It divides us into two camps: seekers and searchers. The language characterizing each is bold and revealing. Seekers are diligent. They’re consistent in how they approach every situation in life, rather than applying situational approaches that make for an inconsistent life. They seek good by seeking favor, looking beyond immediate concerns and personal longings to ascertain their merits in a wider context. And seekers diligently use these criteria for everything they undertake. There are no big deals and little deals. Seeking good by seeking favor in all they do is how they live.

Searchers never see past the good stuff to consider how what they’re looking for may affect the lives they touch. More often than not, grasping ends up shorting dreams that inspire their reach. “First Spouse Syndrome” is classic case. A couple starts out dreaming of a financially secure, happy, and healthy family. They work hard and cut corners so one or both successfully land on a high rung of the business ladder. But things go awry during the ascent. Sacrifices cause fractures in the relationship. Fatigue and anxiety engender selfish behavior and resentment. Work and family become increasingly distant universes that fight to eclipse one another. By the time searchers arrive at their goal, those they dreamt of benefitting from their efforts are left behind. There’s a new spouse, new family, and new life. And it’s all because they lost sight of favor that goodness provides for people beyond the one who finds it.

No Guarantees

We catch a glimpse of Proverbs’ profound wisdom by noting how it equivocates about results. It offers no guarantees that seekers of goodness will always find it. Yet it explicitly warns searchers they’re asking for trouble by not looking past their own desires and ambitions to envision how they’ll impact others. Why doesn’t Proverbs promise goodness will come when it’s sought in the larger context of favoring those we love and serve? Because life’s not fair. Our purest, most selfless motives won’t always meet with everyone’s approval. Indeed, seeking what’s right and good—“working in partnership with God for good,” as Joy put it—will likely set us at odds with searchers among us. One of the first things that seekers discover is that’s just how it goes. Psalm 34.19 tells us to anticipate turbulent times, while also urging us to remember Who our partner is. “Many are the afflictions of the righteous,” it says, “but the LORD rescues them from them all.” Jesus backs this up, reminding us God makes the “sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5.45)

If seeking goodness that favors others isn’t a sure thing, we may wonder what’s the point. It goes back to evaluating how we live. If our search for goodness starts and ends with us, we’re bound for disappointment. When what we seek is driven by a desire to bless others, we’ll find more than enough goodness to offset occasional shortfalls. On that we have Christ’s word: “But strive first for the kingdom of God and God’s righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” (Matthew 6.33) It doesn’t get any surer than that.

Once again, O God, Your Word calls us to a reckoning with our motives and desires. Increase our depth of vision to look beyond ourselves to seek goodness that favors those around us. Draw us into partnership with You, working for good. Amen.

Seeking goodness by seeking favor for others requires us to look past our own desires and aspirations. It’s the difference between a life that grasps for grace and one that leads from grace.

Love Among the Ruins

Jesus wept. Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” (John 11.35-37)

People of Substance

A lot has changed in the three years or so since Jesus found Peter and Andrew on the seashore and began assembling a core group of followers. For one thing, the need to recruit disciples has long passed. Jesus is an established Rabbi known for His provocative preaching and miracles. There’s always a show when He comes to town. People drop everything and flock to Him. Although it sounds crass, the comparison seems accurate: Jesus is a celebrity activist akin to Bono or Oprah—Someone Who wields His fame to change lives. That broadens His appeal significantly. By the second year, many people of substance actively court Jesus. They invite Him to banquets, prevail on Him to heal their sick, and ask to join His entourage. Since wealth and status don’t impress Him, He rebuffs those whose self-interest is obvious. Yet we’re given more than a few instances when Jesus befriends people who don’t fit the downtrodden mold. Besides, assuming Jesus confines His interest to the outcast and impoverished contradicts His message of radical inclusion in John 6.37: “All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.”

It should be noted, however, the better advantaged of Jesus’s followers are exceptions to their class. Unlike Bono, Oprah, and their ilk, Jesus never obtains the kind of superstar glamour that swings wide the gates to upper crust society. That’s why when we see Him dining in finer homes, clusters of unhappy neighbors gather in protest. It’s why Nicodemus, the highly regarded Pharisee, sneaks off in the night to visit Jesus. It’s also why the disciples balk when He decides to return to Bethany—the Jerusalem suburb where his dear friends Martha, Mary, and Lazarus live—after He learns Lazarus is gravely ill. The last time they visited that part of the country, its residents tried to stone Him.

Completely Out of Character

Although John’s Gospel doesn’t explicitly say so, Jesus appears to share the disciples’ concern. Something’s amiss—that we know. News of Lazarus’s sickness reaches Him and He reacts completely out of character. He’s indecisive and hesitant. It takes two days to make up His mind to go see about His friend. In retrospect, we realize Lazarus couldn’t have got sick at a worse time. Jesus’s arrest and execution will occur in a matter of weeks. Returning to Bethany puts Him within two miles of enemies conspiring against Him. His sense of foreboding must be unbearable, as must knowing His friends need Him desperately. Lazarus, Mary, and Martha never hesitate to welcome Jesus to their home. The sisters lavish Him with care, feeding and housing Him in grand style. On one occasion, Mary empties an expensive box of perfume on Jesus to signify how dearly He’s loved. Yet Jesus waits. He waits so long by the time He tells the disciples they’re going to Bethany He’s confident Lazarus is already dead.

John, whose main purpose for writing his Gospel is deifying Jesus as “the Word made flesh” (1.14), gives the impression Jesus lingers on purpose to set the stage for a final, unprecedented miracle that foreshadows His own death and resurrection. He confides to the disciples, “For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe.” (11.14) But if we accept that, we also accept that Jesus delays coming to His friends’ aid for heartlessly selfish reasons. What could be crueler than ignoring their urgent request for help—to allow Lazarus to die, while his sisters cope with undue stress wondering why Jesus hasn’t shown up? Clearly, Mary and Martha are wounded when Jesus arrives. Mary stays at home and lets Martha go out to greet Him as He nears the town. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died,” she says. (v21) Jesus doesn’t acknowledge her grief, however. He promises Lazarus will be revived, saying, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die.” (v25) When he asks about Mary, Martha brings her to Him and she says exactly what Martha said: “If You had been here…” Again, Jesus overlooks her sorrow, asking, “Where have you laid him?” (v33) Mary leads Him to Lazarus’s grave, with a gaggle of neighbors trailing after them. At the tomb, the weight of the entire ordeal buries Jesus. His disconcerting detachment vanishes. In the presence of beloved friends and cynical onlookers, He weeps.

A Horrible Situation

What is Jesus feeling? The episode is so fraught with conflicted emotions and behaviors attributing His grief to any of them amounts to speculation. Mourning Lazarus doesn’t prompt His tears; in mere minutes, He will restore His friend’s life. We want to agree with neighbors who say, “See how He loved him!” (v36) Then again, the cynics have a point when they counter, “Could not He Who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?” (v37) John’s reason for Jesus’s delay is moot when we observe how it affects Mary and Martha. The purest of intentions don’t change the fact Jesus walks into a horrible situation of His own making. Is that what we’re meant to see? Should we even question why Jesus falters? Perhaps the most obvious answer is the best one.

When Jesus reaches the graveside, regret, confusion, disappointment, and every other feeling we associate with human frailty engulf Him. He weeps because His hesitance incited His friends to doubt Him. His tearstained face conveys love among the ruins. He summons all of His power not only to speak life into Lazarus’s hollow shell, but also to revive the faith and trust of those He loves. What we’re looking at is precisely what Hebrews 4.15 describes: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.”

We all have uncomfortable moments when hesitance, fear, and every other imaginable internal conflict threaten the ruin of relationships with people who dearly love us and we dearly love. We cause grief and confusion about where we are and why we don’t respond sooner. When we realize what we've done, we weep. But there is life in us, because there is love in us—life we can speak that brings lost friends out of their graves and heals the pain of disillusioned loved ones. Accounting for shambles we create is never pleasant. Walking into situations where we’ve let people down is nothing we want to do, even though we know we must. At Lazarus’s graveside Jesus demonstrates the power of love among the ruins.

The humanity we witness in Jesus’s tears expresses the regret, confusion, disappointment, and every other feeling we associate with frailty.

Friends and Family

If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5.46-48)

In Love with Law; At Odds with Purpose

Today’s Gospel picks up where last Sunday’s left off—midway through the Sermon on the Mount’s most daunting segment. Although it’s less likely Jesus delivered the text in one setting, and more probable Matthew spliced numerous lessons together to solidify a platform for all that follows in his Gospel, the sermon’s organization is a feat of oratorical genius. Jesus begins with The Beatitudes, a high-level incentive plan that defines His core message and targets downtrodden and marginalized people who will constitute the backbone of His movement. He makes no promises about improving their situations. To the contrary, He says following Him will compound their troubles. Yet, from the start, He turns human logic on its head by promising their struggles won’t go unnoticed or unrewarded. What life takes will be returned: impoverished spirits will inherit spiritual wealth, bereft souls will find comfort, the lowly will be lifted, and so on. Then He confirms their invaluable worth by portraying them as salt that preserves the Earth and light that brings safety to the world. Once He seals His bond with His audience, Jesus turns to the Law that overwhelms them—directly, by disenfranchising them, and indirectly, by legitimizing sources of their distress.

Since He’s about to rattle some really big cages, Jesus prefaces His comments by insisting, “I’ve not come to destroy the Law, but to fulfill it.” (Matthew 5.17) It’s hard to imagine His listeners understand what that means, as many of us, though aided by hindsight and the Epistles’ in-depth analysis, are no less challenged to figure it out. As Jesus steps through the Law, He intentionally focuses on extreme behaviors like murder, adultery, divorce, and pompous oaths—i.e., infractions beyond the pale of ordinary, Law-abiding people. What throws them, however, is His dissection of attitudes and presumptions that pave the way to unthinkable crimes: aggression and deceit that end in senseless death; lust that fuels infidelity; indifference that erodes unions; hubris that enables insincerity. Had Jesus merely recited laws, His followers could have checked them off without thought or reservation: I’m not a killer; I don’t sleep around; I’m wed for life; I honor my vows. As the list went on, their hearts would swell with greater pride and affection for the Law, because It verified how righteous and obedient they were. That’s precisely what Jesus opposes by stressing how easily we can be in love with the Law while still at odds with its purpose. “’Do not kill’ is meant to accomplish more than deter murder,” He says. “Its primary purpose is to thwart lesser evils that lead to murder. Failure to acknowledge and abide by the Law’s intentions is tantamount to breaking the Law.”

Much Closer to Home

Jesus uses the “big sins” to lay the groundwork for what comes next, because what comes next drives much closer to home. It’s here, in verses 38-48, that He proclaims four pillars of His gospel: tolerance, selflessness, equality, and unconditional love. He’s still discussing the Law, mind you, but He’s left the no-brainers to dig down into the hard stuff—edicts intended to shape our responses in virtually every situation we encounter. First, He breaks down “eye for eye, and tooth for tooth”—a three-time favorite from Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. Jesus explains the point behind the measure’s severity centers on defusing conflicts before resorting to useless extremes. The law’s apparent equity is transparently inequitable. Taking your eye after you’ve taken mine won’t restore my vision. Extracting your tooth after you yanked out mine won’t ease my pain. By intention, the rule is designed to show it’s fallacious to equate retribution with justice. By intention, it expects us to find a better alternative before retribution becomes a last resort. The answer, Jesus teaches, is tolerating adversaries by negating their abuse. “Don’t resist an evil person,” verse 39 says. “If anyone slaps your right cheek, turn the other one also.” He segues from tolerance to selflessness, instructing us to exceed undue demands. “If someone wants your shirt, give up your coat, too,” He says. “If you’re asked to walk a mile, go two. Give when asked, and don’t refuse any loan requests.” (v40-42) How does this satisfactorily resolve conflicts? It doesn’t. It preempts them.

Wow. If it feels like Jesus’s strategy for conflict resolution is over-the-top, what’s next boggles the mind. He cites a law found in Leviticus 19.18—“Love your neighbor”—that is widely misinterpreted to imply “hate your enemy.” He debunks this error by insisting distinctions between friends and enemies are non-existent. If we’re truly God’s children, He explains, then our attitudes must align with God’s, and God treats no one preferentially. He reminds us, “God’s sun rises on the evil and the good. God’s rain falls on the righteous and the unrighteous.” Everyone is equal. Thus, in God’s eyes, loving friends is loving enemies; loving enemies is loving friends. Establishing equality is this law’s purpose, Jesus explains, before expanding its implications by asking, “If loving people we already love is all we derive from it, what do we gain? Even tax collectors”—reviled as traitors and crooks—“do that. If we limit our compassion to like-minded family members, where’s the benefit? Even non-believers do that.” (v46-47) So what if we boast day and night about how godly we are? We’re in the same rut as the rest of the world. In other words, without unconditional love, nothing changes.

The Ultimate Statement

Jesus concludes His discussion about fulfilling the Law’s intentions by saying, “Be perfect, therefore, as God is perfect.” (v48) It’s the ultimate statement, one that we should hear clearly and carefully. Otherwise, we’ll dismiss what He asks of us as ludicrously unachievable. It teeters on the ambiguity of its seemingly least important word—as. While striving for perfection is a mainstay of our Christian walk, it’s essential for us realize why we’re told to embrace so lofty an aspiration. “Be perfect like God is perfect” sets the standard. The thoughts and behaviors we find in God are the thoughts and behaviors we should emulate. God tolerates our insolence and abuse. We should do the same with others. God answers our undue demands by exceeding our expectations. So should we when asked. God’s mercy preempts conflicts to avoid unjust retribution. We extend mercy to achieve justice as well. God shows no preference among people. Nor should we. God loves without condition and expects no less from us. We’ll find perfection we seek in the Law—not by loving It, levying It, observing It, or obeying It, but by fulfilling Its purpose.

But there’s a second layer to “Be perfect” that replaces “like God is perfect” with “since—or because—God is perfect.” We are God’s reflection on Earth, the living, breathing embodiment of God’s presence. Perfection transcends aspiration to become spiritual responsibility. Resolving conflicts equitably isn’t enough. Gravitating toward friends and family who look like us, think like us, and behave like us falls short. Holding our ground, taking positions, building fences, and dismissing anyone who differs from us makes us no different than anyone else. Nothing changes. We weren’t created to look, think, and act like one another. We were made to look, think, and act like our Maker. When we learn loving the Law is futile if we’re at odds with Its purpose, we’ll fulfill the Law. Once we realize our differences are illusory, we’ll stop worrying about how things look and start seeing what God sees. That changes everything.

We fulfill the Law when we start seeing everyone is the same as us, and stop expecting them to look, think, and act the same us.

Our Friend at the Table

Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for all partake of the one loaf. (1 Corinthians 10.16-17)

The People of God

My faith community celebrates the Lord’s Supper on the first Sunday of each month, as has every congregation I’ve joined down through the years. So First Sunday always holds special meaning for me. Entering the worship space on that day promises a sensory return to the Cross. Even when the liturgy focuses elsewhere—like today, when the service centered on Psalm 139 (“Search me, O God”)—the service’s progression toward that climactic moment steadily draws my thoughts to the awful sacrifice and awesome victory that Calvary represents. Ordinarily, my inner vision lifts its sight to the Man of Sorrows. Perhaps because each new month finds me a little older and better acquainted with grief, appreciation for His boundless love runs deeper with every pilgrimage to the table laid in commemoration of His death.

Today was a little different. The minister raised the loaf of bread and chalice and said (like always), “These are the gifts of God for the people of God.” The people of God—the words pierced my heart. My usual seat put me in the first wave of communicants. As we quietly filed toward the altar, all I could think was, “I am one of the people of God.” In our church, the loaf is broken in two with each half given to a lay-member who offers it to the rest of us. We pull a morsel from the loaf as we pass, followed by a tiny glass of non-alcoholic wine presented by another lay-member. Today, taking my portion from the bread refreshed my understanding: I come from this. The brutalized body of my Savior and the living, breathing Body that witnesses His triumph over death merged in my brain. The moment was as much about arising out of this Body as entering into It. Back at my seat, I looked at the extraordinarily diverse group waiting to reaffirm its faith and membership in Christ—young and old, straight and gay, partnered and single, brown, black, yellow, and white, prosperous and secure, struggling and anxious. The people of God. Mist filled my eyes, verging on tears when the pianist broke the silence with a reverent, subtly jazz and country-infused variation of the old hymn:

There is a fountain filled with blood

Drawn from Immanuel's veins

And sinners plunged beneath the flood

Lose all their guilty stains

Friends of a Friend

The table beckons us to remember Who joins us together. Physically gathering there destroys our differences by demonstrating one incontrovertible truth we share. We are all friends of a Friend. Our love and concern for one another began with His love and concern for us. The table guards our mindfulness He befriended us long before we confirmed our friendship with Him. As Romans 5.8 so beautifully puts it, “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” The taste of bread and wine replenishes our conviction no friend ever can or ever will offer friendship in a more radically trusting and inclusive fashion than Jesus—to the point He had no reluctance saying so: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15.13) He goes on to say, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.”

Our Friend at the table invites us to remember Him—to recollect His insuperable, a priori offering of friendship, an act of courage and faith greater than any other—to reestablish Him as our common bond. The magnitude of His selflessness withers our small-minded selfishness to imagine He would go to such extremes for us (and people like us), yet deny anyone we find disagreeably unlike us. What have we done to deserve such kindness? How could we possibly think who or what we are entitles us more than others to Christ’s friendship? Jesus scaled Calvary’s peak to create a mesa, a level place where all stand equally tall to see the world from the same height. For this reason, the flat table couldn’t be more appropriate as the place where we commune as friends of a Friend. Knowing one another’s business—scrutinizing one another’s affairs for approval—is wildly inappropriate there because His business, everything He has told us in confidence, is all we need to know.

Participation

“Sinners plunged beneath the flood lose all their guilty stains,” the hymn says. We are not spattered with droplets or lightly brushed with Christ’s love and friendship. We are plunged beneath the flood. We go in looking different and thinking differently. We come out looking and believing the same. In 1 Corinthians 10, Paul calls this “participation in the blood of Christ,” saying the cup our Friend offers at the table equalizes us. He says the same of the bread: “Is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for all partake of the one loaf.” What’s on the table and the table itself defines everything we believe and do. Its contents and construction purposefully encourage participation by all. Nothing on or about it suggests limited accessibility to a select few. The table, the cup, and the bread are the gifts of God for the people of God. This is so fundamental to our faith any other presumptions regarding it are to be discounted, no matter how deeply they’re inculcated in our respective traditions. Some of us may feel constrained to indulge them in order to retain our faith heritages. But we must never accept them. To say you or I cannot meet at the table—or we’re unworthy to serve there—is as ludicrous as saying we’re not fit to breathe. That’s how basic it is, and that’s why the table is what it is.

The cup and bread are the gifts of God for the people God offered at a level table accessible to all. We meet there as friends of a Friend.

Christ Figures

Even now my witness is in heaven; my advocate is on high. My intercessor is my friend, as my eyes pour out tears to God. (Job 16.20)

The Middleman

A number of years ago while re-watching The Sorrow and the Pity, Marcel Ophuls’ masterful documentary about Nazi-occupied France, I bumped into a character that’s become an obsession for me. Through details too convoluted to summarize here, Denis Rake—a 40-year-old openly gay cabaret performer—volunteered as a British agent in France, where he served as a go-between for the Resistance and the Allied forces. He was perfectly suited for the job, being fluent in French and an expert radio operator. But Rake’s intrepid nature was his greatest asset. Even though homosexuality was illegal in England until 1967, at a very early age he summoned the courage to live honestly by honing skills to elude arrest. The brief interview in Ophuls’ four-hour film reveals a soft-spoken man as docile as the purring cat he holds. Yet a follow-up interview with his commander remembers him as a tenacious lion. As an American, I was stunned the Secret Intelligence Service trusted Denis Rake in large part because he was gay—precisely the sort of “irregular” the agency sought out to navigate dicey situations with a cool head.

Delving into Rake’s past, I learned of two other qualities that recommended him. He was no stranger to playing the middleman. At 13, after Belgium fell in the First War, he got arrested for hand-delivering encrypted letters for anti-German agents in Brussels. Even at that age, he outfoxed his captors and joined his parents to relocate in London for the war’s duration. The second attribute, though, is more compelling. While he asserts in the film that he volunteered with the SIS to prove his masculinity—and certainly that was part of it—Rake’s compassion for his friends living under German oppression drove him to risk his life for them. He was fearless, going so far as to enter a potentially fatal affair with a Nazi officer to remain in Paris after his SIS-provided papers were confiscated. His commitment to a free France enabled him to play a critical role preparing Resistance fighters to lay the groundwork for the Normandy invasion. In the end, despite England’s dim view of gay people, it welcomed Denis Rake home as a decorated war hero.

Called to Intercede

While I blanch at labeling Rake a “Christ figure,” he comes very close to fitting the bill. He was an outsider and an outlaw who would not be thwarted by social norms and prejudices. He avidly identified with beleaguered people and willingly endangered himself for them. He knew oppression and spoke the language of the oppressed. He risked his life to free them and, in the end, opened the minds of many who accepted injustice and hatred without blinking. Everything about his life verified his purpose as a go-between. And when we look back on our lives and consider our talents, could it be we’re also Denis Rakes? Are we chosen for our “irregularities?” Are we called to intercede for those without means or courage to break free? Are we Christ figures? I’m convinced we are.

In Job we find a vivid picture of why our intercessory roles are so vital. Job’s conformist friends not only prove useless—they compound his misery by insisting his woes are self-inflicted. (Today we call this “blaming the victim.”) Chapter 16 starts with Job railing at them in frustration: “Will your long-winded speeches never end? What ails you that you keep on arguing? I also could speak like you, if you were in my place; I could make fine speeches against you and shake my head at you.” (v3-4) Unable to find one friend who understands his pain and rallies to his defense, Job looks above. “Even now my witness is in heaven; my advocate is on high. My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God.” (v19-20) In a fit of prophetic pique, Job envisions the Risen Christ described in 1 Timothy 2.5: “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” This compares nicely with verse 21, where Job says, “On behalf of a man he pleads with God as a man pleads for his friend.” While we’re bedazzled by Job’s prescient grasp of Jesus’s ultimate role in redemption’s plan, we can’t overlook his need to conjure a Christ figure because he can’t find one among his friends. Not one relates to his dilemma. Not one offers to intercede to the God he claims to know in Job’s stead.

An Intercessory Chain of Command

Jesus erases all doubt He ordains us as Christ figures in John 14.12-13: “Anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father.” He activates an intercessory chain of command. We assume Christ’s identity as an outsider and outlaw to identify with those bound by oppressive forces. We volunteer as their go-betweens, becoming the critical link between them and Christ, Who mediates their case with God the Father. In this sense, we are Denis Rakes—fluent conversationalists and radio operators who keep the lines open between the presently defeated and their triumphant Ally. We are their friends.

Those around us beset by pernicious forces must know we’re true and faithful friends. Their problems most likely will exceed our ability to correct. Still, we lift their hopes and anchor their spirits by bringing all we have to bear on their case. Our compassion testifies we understand oppression first-hand. Our language is real, spoken as natives who know, not smug observers who rationalize and accuse. We intercede for them to Christ just as He does to the Father, as seasoned outsiders with established credentials. We say, “I’m praying for you” with conviction, and they believe in our prayers. That’s how the intercessory chain of command works. People in trouble place faith in us. We have faith in Christ. Anything we ask of Him will be done to the Father’s glory. God wins the war. God liberates the oppressed. We serve as His agents. We are go-betweens, radio operators, and interventionists. Though we may be docile in nature, to the hopeless, voiceless, and powerless, we are lions of love—Christ figures.

As Christ figures, we are lions of love to people in trouble. We defy norms and prejudices on their behalf, following an intercessory chain of command that brings their cases to God.

When Worlds Collide

When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell on his knees in front of him. He shouted at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Swear to God that you won’t torture me!” (Mark 5.6-7)

The Guise of Goodness

Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods ends with the fairy-tale characters summing up what they learned during their forest forays. Red Riding Hood—the least likable personality in the show—figures caution is best when strangers (like the wolf) turn on the charm. After the wolf devours her grandmother and nearly makes a meal out of her, Red concludes, “Nice is different than good.” How true this is—and how difficult for believers to absorb. On its surface, it totally contradicts what Jesus teaches about kindness. Because the type of charity we practice is genuine, we assume it’s genuine all-around. Much of the time it is, but not always.

Many who mean us no good are exceedingly adept at assuming the guise of goodness. They entice us with kindness, win our trust, and then, once our guard is lowered, reveal their appetite for vicious, often violent cruelty and condemnation. Paul warns us to watch out for these types, saying, “For Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness.” (2 Corinthians 11.14-15) But do we want to second-guess every kind act shown to us? No. That raises our risk of rewarding true kindness with disrespect and ingratitude. That’s why 1 John 4.1 tells us to “test the spirits and see whether they are from God.” How do we do that? Looking back to 1 John 3.10, we read: “Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.” The instant we detect false motives, prejudice, or injustice, we know what we're dealing with—deceptive niceness, not genuine goodness.

Different Worlds

Recognizing counterfeit niceness as “kindness” that potentially kills is fairly straightforward. Yet even when it’s tendered in bad faith, we’re compelled by Christ’s laws of love to offer genuine kindness in return. This does not mean we’re bound to indulge it, however. Just as “nice is different than good,” tolerance is different than permission. And this is where things get murky for us, because we tend to do the “nice thing,” forgetting spiritually guided people and carnally driven ones inhabit different worlds. The goals, mindsets, and success measures aimed at achieving earthly status and favor don’t apply to us. As Paul explains in Colossians 2.20: “Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules?” Common customs, like “playing nice,” are foreign to us, because they lead to ruinous compromise and subject us to dangerous influences and environments. Most of all, they sidetrack our attention toward pleasing others and ourselves, which often results in displeasing God.

Paul writes in Romans 12.2, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” There they are again: test and good. A transformed mind discerns what is authentically good, pleasing, and compliant to God’s perfect will versus what is not. In 1 Corinthians 2.12, Paul asserts this isn’t a skill we acquire, but a gift we’re given: “We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us.” When we embrace new life in Christ through His Spirit, distinguishing between “nice” and “good” is governed by our desire to please God.

Close Proximity

Mark 5 provides a superb example of what happens when our world and other worlds collide. Christ and his disciples have just sailed across the Sea of Galilee, when their path crosses that of a seriously troubled man. He’s vexed by an evil spirit and lives in the tombs, where he’s least likely to harm others or himself. He sees Jesus and rushes to meet Him. Once He gets in close proximity to Christ, the spirit that controls him cries out, “What do you want with me, Jesus? Swear you won’t torture me!”

Let’s look at this. Jesus is in the first stages of His mission. He’s new to the area, and already its most problematic resident is making a scene. The evil in the man’s mind convinces him Jesus has come to attack him. The nice thing to do would be to calm his fears so he can return whence he came and Jesus can move on. But that’s not the good thing—the right thing. Despite the spirit’s protests, something in the man knows Jesus can help him. Leaving him in his current state is unacceptable. Jesus speaks to his problem: “Come out of this man, you evil spirit!” (Mark 5.6) The spirit resists at first. Jesus asks for the man’s name, but the spirit answers instead. “Legion,” it says, “for we are many.” The demon begs permission to infiltrate a nearby herd of swine. Jesus assents, and the pigs—about 2,000 of them, Mark says—immediately dive into the sea.

It’s unlikely we’ll ever clash with evil in this manner or on this scale. Yet dismissing this as a “miracle story” without personal relevance is unwise. The same Spirit Who embodies Jesus lives in us. And when our world collides with worlds where evil runs rampant, it’s expected those vexed by its power will seek us out. Yet when they reach close proximity to the Spirit in us, it’s also possible a scene will develop. In their world, this is enough for anyone unaffected by its influences to move on politely and quickly. But in our world, we see what’s really happening. They need help. In kindness, we speak to their turmoil. The goodness we portray shows them their consuming thoughts and actions are unworthy of them—and everyone around them. They may resist us. They may opt for life in the tombs over life in full. But when our worlds collide, we have an opportunity to present what life in our world can be. They now have a choice. That’s why nice is different than good, and good is better than nice.

Although we occupy the same planet, followers of Christ and those driven by harmful thoughts inhabit different worlds. When they collide, we speak to their problems and show them a better way.

Postscript: If I Can Help Somebody

A riveting arrangement of the gospel classic, “If I Can Help Somebody,” performed by the Morgan State College Choir, featuring a stunning turn by the finest male soprano I’ve ever heard, Earnest Saunders.

IF I CAN HELP SOMEBODY

If I can help somebody as I pass along

If I can cheer somebody with a word or song

If I can show somebody that he's traveling wrong

Then my living shall not be in vain

If I can do my duty as a Christian ought

If I can bring them beauty to a world up-wrought

I can spread the message that the Master taught

Then my living shall not be in vain

Then my living shall not be in vain

Then my living shall be in vain

If I can help somebody as I pass along

Then my living shall not be in vain

Comfort

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins. (Isaiah 40.1-2)

A Deep Breath
The 40-day period between the resurrection and ascension intrigues me. The Gospels and Acts report several interactions between Jesus and His disciples, but we don’t observe Him doing much beyond issuing last-minute instructions. While Paul asserts one of these encounters involves 500 people (1 Corinthians 15.6), neither the Gospels nor Acts chronicle it. He spends His final days on Earth behind the scenes, preparing His closest followers to continue His ministry after He leaves. And there’s no record anywhere of a major public appearance where He announces He’s risen to life to the masses. This strikes us as a bit surprising, since Christianity hinges on faith in Jesus’s resurrection. We might think He’d seize every chance to be seen by as many as possible—until it occurs to us if His resurrection were a verifiable fact, faith would be irrelevant. Jesus stays out of the public eye because His mission centers on ending our reliance on what we know by requiring us to trust what God says. “Whoever believes shall have eternal life,” He says in John 3.16.

Instead of an historically definitive event, the pivotal moment comes in John 20.21-22: “Again Jesus said, ‘Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.’ And with that he breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” He uses a fairly innocuous gesture to transfer power to the disciples. He inspires them exactly as God first inspired humanity. With one breath, He fills them with His presence, His gifts, nature, and authority. Jesus explains they’re receiving the Holy Spirit—the Comforter Who, as He promised, “will guide you into all truth.” (John 16.13) Yet note why He breathes the Holy Spirit into them: “I am sending you.” The Spirit’s comfort and counsel aren’t only for the disciples’ edification. Henceforth, they carry It with them wherever they go and express It in calm assurance conveyed in their demeanor and words. They’re now able to bring Christ’s presence to any situation and change the atmosphere around it with no more than a deep breath.

A Most Unusual Message
When God directs Isaiah to “comfort My people… Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,” He’s invoking the prophet’s capacity to bring solace and clarity to Israel’s turmoil. Repeatedly God has pressed His people to obey and repeatedly they’ve failed. By the time Isaiah comes on the scene, their stubbornness has pummeled them with sorrow. They’re punch-drunk, exhausted, and despondent as they see their hope, like Jerusalem itself, lay in ruins. In times past, prophets predicted doom and destruction if Israel didn’t mend its ways. But God calls Isaiah to restore the nation’s faith and ease its worries. He commands the prophet to proclaim their hardships are ending, their sins are forgiven, and He’s repaying their repentance twice over with His love and mercy. This is a most unusual message delivered by a most unusual prophet who views his responsibilities in a most unusual manner.

Isaiah describes his mission this way: “The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.” (61.1) His compassion is so remarkable Jesus quotes him verbatim to define His ministry in Luke 4.18. And He essentially condenses it when He breathes on the disciples. He endows them with the Holy Spirit and sends them into the world to preach, to heal, to liberate people in distress. “Comfort my people; speak tenderly to them,” God tells Isaiah. Jesus vests the disciples with the Comforter so they can do the same.

Tenderly
We too have drawn the breath of Christ into our beings. We’ve also received the Holy Spirit and been sent into the world. We too can provide solace and clarity to troubled lives. Because the Comforter dwells in us, we have the capacity to make Its presence felt in every situation we enter. The confidence expressed in our behavior and the words we speak—words carried on inspired breath—have the ability to change the atmosphere around us. Yet if we limit our perceptions of what the Spirit within us can do and how we manifest Its power to our problems alone, we negate Jesus’s purpose for giving It to us.

We’ve received a most unusual message that must be delivered in a most unusual way. Our faith in Christ’s resurrection convinces us of His power to restore life. We’ve experienced it in our own lives. Thus, there are no lost causes and no one is beyond redemption. It’s our privilege to comfort God’s people—to assure them He has their problems in hand, He’s forgiven them, and He will repay the costs of their mistakes twice over. Though much of their anxiety results from stubborn disregard for God, others, and themselves, we honor our calling to comfort them by resisting urges to confront or condemn them. “Brutal honesty” is an oxymoron; since it justifies wounding someone’s spirit as a method of healing, it’s patently dishonest. It’s best we leave that sort of “comfort” to self-deluded haters and old-school prophets. We provide comfort in a manner that pleases our Maker and reflects the Comforter’s presence in us—in a word, tenderly.

We neither confront nor condemn. We comfort.

(Next: Travel Advisory)

For the Least

I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these my brothers, you did for me. (Matthew 25.40)

Who Qualifies?

My partner’s been without work for six months. Thankfully, we’re able to get along on one income, which has given him time to explore new fields and apply previously untapped talents to volunteer projects. At the same time, managing his benefits is a full-time job. He spends hours every day navigating the unemployment morass. A missed deadline or unplaced call can mean lengthy conversations and paperwork to get back in the system. On top of that, an ongoing condition also entitles him to health subsidies that require extra vigilance. If one agency drops the ball, another agency drops Walt. Almost daily, he’s on the phone, explaining why he qualifies for this or that type of assistance. “I’ve never felt so insignificant,” he said recently. “You have no idea how demeaning it is to have to convince someone your needs matter.” I asked if people he deals with are brusque or inattentive. “No,” he replied. “They’re very kind. But someone’s bound to fall through the cracks. I have to make sure it’s not me.”

I imagine most of us already know Matthew 25's story about letting people fall through the cracks. Actually, it’s not a story at all. It’s a plainly worded warning dressed up as a parable. Jesus tells it in the future tense and sets it on Judgment Day. Like a shepherd separating sheep from goats, the King assigns people to one of two groups. He places those who’ve helped anyone in need on His right; those who’ve parceled out compassion and generosity on a case-by-case basis stand to His left. He welcomes those on His right; those to His left are dismissed. Jesus doesn’t use the story to provoke fear of damnation as a means of promoting love. As 1 John 4.18 explains, “Perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.” Jesus knows this. His story’s purpose focuses on one question: Who qualifies for our mercy and kindness? “Everyone” is His definitive reply.

Beneath Contempt

“Whatever you did for the least of these my brothers, you did for me,” the King insists, much to the amazement of the right-hand crowd. Equal regard for all was so deeply instilled in them, they stopped worrying about who did or didn’t merit compassion. Meanwhile, the left-hand crowd was appalled—outraged, actually. Selectively deciding who deserved their attention seemed like the logical thing to do. Why waste their efforts on people unworthy of them? “In rejecting the least, you reject Me,” the King insists. Had they read 1 John 4.20, they would have acted differently. “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.”

Because the people Jesus mentions are hungry, homeless, without clothing, sick, and imprisoned—i.e., safely qualified for modern benevolence—we tend to interpret “the least” to mean “overlooked.” But His listeners heard something radically different. Their culture viewed anyone stranded in such conditions beneath contempt. These people were viewed as spreaders of disease, disturbers of the peace, and leeches on the system. If Jesus told the story today, He’d revise His list to include racists and homophobes, abusive parents and spouses, liars and cheats, and others we consider too hateful to merit attention, love, and forgiveness. He’d also alter the King’s comment to read, “Whatever you did for the worst, you did for Me.”

For Him

None of us is spared the likelihood someone will behave toward us in unthinkably horrible ways. People will heed their cruelest impulses at our expense. They’ll hate us without reason and plot our destruction to satisfy dark urges. They’ll exhibit no concern about suffering they inflict or scars they leave on us. Regarding those who harm us as profoundly needy people takes some doing, in part because they create enormous deficits in our own lives. And even if we get that far, we’ve not yet reached the place Christ expects us to be—accepting them as they are and loving them with the same compassion and understanding we desire. How can we love the worst? How can we honestly pray for their welfare? How can we find it in ourselves to care about their needs?

Jesus’s story answers these questions, too. When loving the worst costs more than we can give, we rely on our determination to love God at all costs. We do it for Him. He’s supremely qualified for our love and attention. We take John’s words to heart. Allowing love for anyone, including the worst of the worst, to fall through the cracks takes love of God with it. Choosing whom we will or won’t—can or can’t—love chooses not to love God at all. In Matthew 5.44-45, Jesus tells us: “Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.” Connecting that with the Judgment Day scenario pulls everything together. The King doesn’t separate the crowd because of what they do. He divided them according to who they are. His true sons and daughters made the leap, clearing personal hurdles to love the worst in eagerness to love Him. The impostors looked before they leapt. Withholding their best from the worst landed them in the worst of all possible circumstances. Moral of the story: loving God to the best of our ability will often require us to make a leap, to look at the worst as our gateway to loving the Best.

We don't pick and choose who qualifies for our love. Loving those who harm us will require us to look past them and love them for God's sake.

(Next: Comfort)

Make the Most

Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. (Ephesians 5.15-16) 

Times Like These

An old gospel number says, “In times like these we need a Savior. In times like these we need an Anchor.” The song’s popularity peaked in the late 60’s, which most definitely were “times like these.” The world was a crazy quilt of war zones; rage and discontent erupted at dining room tables, on campuses, in city streets, and every other conceivable spot. We who lived through those days can’t shake the sense we’re in “times like these” once again. But this round feels oddly different. Hostilities similar to those reflected in 60’s media are now the stuff of media itself. Average citizens sit at a safe remove, watching rabble-rousers do the work instead personally engaging in the struggle to reconcile our current issues. This might be viewed as an improvement; riots, fires, and looting that plagued any good-sized city 40 years ago are no more. But it’s also a shame, because our perspectives on equal rights, healthcare, war, etc. now cost nothing. We’ve confused passive poses with impassioned involvement, and given how comfortable we’ve got with our laissez-faire attitude, it’s possible we've lost all concern about resolving our differences.

The tragedy of this stalemate plays out in lives wounded by crossfire. In all the talk about Wall Street and Main Street, nobody’s noticed the real drama unfolding on the side streets, where things actually slip and slide. The people there need an anchor. Since pundits avoid putting human faces on stats they bandy about, very few have figured out we can’t wait for “change to happen.” People everywhere need help now. Judging from history, the economy eventually will dig itself out. Opposition to social justice will wear itself down. Left unchecked, the healthcare crisis will escalate to the point it can’t be feasibly ignored. The war will end. Yet while “we” may rebound, thousands upon thousands will not without immediate help. Times like these call for people smart and caring enough to abandon cheap controversy for higher purpose.

Our World Needs Us

Our world needs us. At this stage, every one of us crosses paths with others currently struggling—people without jobs or shelter, homes with bare cupboards, disowned children coping with rejection, war-torn families facing a holiday with one less at the table, a senior sacrificing meals to afford medication. They and others like them live in constant fear and torment each of us can ease at very little, if any, personal expense or effort. Alertness to their circumstances opens new opportunities for our love and concern. Ephesians 5.15-16 admonishes: “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.” In the context of this discussion, “careful” means more than “cautious;” it implies earnest introspection about our response to situations we can improve. Knowing we possess the ability to lift up others and not doing so is foolish. Making the most of every opportunity is wise.

'Tis the Season

'Tis the season when churches and charities fire up their brigades so those lacking means will not be denied holiday joy. The nobility of these efforts cannot be exaggerated. But there’s also an underside to them we seldom acknowledge. They encourage us to think supporting their causes is “doing our part,” when in fact we’re only enabling them to the make the most of their opportunities. In a way, it’s no different than believing agreement with certain media figures’ opinions constitutes active engagement. Most assuredly, we should support charitable efforts. But writing checks, tossing canned goods in hampers, donating toys, and dropping loose change in a red bucket can't excuse us from actively addressing visible needs around us. “Making the most of every opportunity,” Ephesians says, “because the days are evil.”

Confining our compassion for the needy to contributions shortchanges them and us. It’s a surrogate arrangement—giving by proxy—and, at best, all we stand to gain from it is a fleeting reward quantified by faceless statistics: x families had Christmas dinner, y children opened anonymously donated presents. And let’s be honest: the good we accomplish in absentia evaporates from mind before the decorations and leftovers disappear. We make the most of every opportunity by approaching people whom we know are in need, welcoming outsiders to our tables, marshalling neighbors and family members’ assistance, and so on. In times like these, weary, embattled souls need to know help is on the way and it’s coming from we who genuinely know and care about them.

There’s an even greater benefit gained by all when we make the most of our opportunities. Active giving puts legs on our concern. It imbeds faces and names in our thoughts and prayers. We find ourselves regularly checking on them, asking to do more. By making Christmas a time of discovery, searching for opportunities to make the most of our giving, its spirit and meaning thrive year-‘round. 'Tis the season that never ends.

We possess the ability to bring love, joy, hope, and peace to struggling people we personally know. We should make the most of every opportunity to do so.

(Next: For the Least)

Personal Postscript: Impish Interference

This past week found me recalling an old lady I once attended church with. Whenever she hit one of those maddening stretches where minor problems pile up and become hopelessly entangled, she’d say, “The devil sure is busy.” Though I’m reluctant to give him any credence, it seems like he’s sure been busy around here. We experienced a couple power outages in our apartment building, the last of which sent a surge through the phone lines that fried my modem cables and reconfigured the entire system. Since last Wednesday, I’ve been lost in a sea of connectivity challenges that have interfered with my posting schedule. I’m very close to being fully up and running, and apologize for the delays. Barring any further impish interference, we should be back to normal.