On High Alert

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? (Isaiah 58.6)

It’s Ash Wednesday. Once more we find our way to an altar, where we bow in humility and rise from our knees bearing a visible sign of repentance. As always, there will be a lot of thought and conversation today about what we’re “giving up” for Lent. We will leave the Ash Wednesday rite with the best of intentions and spend the next few weeks struggling to honor them.

To be sure, there is merit in self-denial. It teaches us discipline and retrains us so that we can master unhealthy reflexes and habits. Yet what’s supposed to come out of fasting? In Isaiah, we discover that it’s less about what we elect not to do, and more about relearning what we must do. In Isaiah 58, God says our piety and ritual—our subscription to religious obligation—mean nothing if they don't alert us to sacred obligations to those around us.

Sacrificing meat or candy bars or TV is, at best, a start. We do these things to keep us mindful that fasting is, above all, an act of faithfulness to a God Who desires meaningful change in our attitudes and behaviors. Yet if Lent starts and stops with what we’re “giving up,” we’ve not gone far enough. “Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high,” God warns. “Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD?” (v4-5)

There’s a break in the text, making room for us ask, “If there’s more to this fasting thing than getting off our high horses and wallowing in our guilt, what can it be?” The answer is remarkably simple and direct: God expects our fast to focus on doing better in the here and now—not feeling sorry that we haven’t done so in the past or pledging improvement in the future. Listen very closely to God’s definition of an acceptable fast (quoted at length, because its emphasis cannot be overstated):

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not hide yourself from your own kin? Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindication shall go before you, the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry for help, and God will say, Here I am.

If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.

If we enter Lent’s desert intent only on adopting an ascetic mindset—grappling with self-denial and its attendant temptations, distancing ourselves from others to relish the benefits of solitude—we fall short of God’s demands. The Hebrew word for “fast” literally means, “to cover one’s mouth.” Thus, it stands to reason if we refuse to placate our hungers, we have more to give. What are we to do with our excess—this food we don’t eat, this extra time we have on our hands, these comforts we sacrifice? God tells us: we surrender them to others in need.

We enter Lent on high alert, extremely conscious that our wilderness adventure will open opportunities to share. Indeed, if we’re doing the real work of fasting, we seek out the less fortunate, the hungry, the afflicted, and the oppressed. We create the means of practicing Lent’s discipline. We look for distressed families we can feed. We extend ourselves to overworked parents and provide them respite by offering to sit with their children while they recharge their batteries. We seek out solitary coworkers or churchgoers and sit beside them. We find the senior who needs help cleaning up the house or running errands. We make time for the sick and grieving among us, assuring them they’re not alone. We embrace the ridiculed and misunderstood. We speak kindly to ears bruised by insults and cruelty. We touch the untouchable and love the unlovable.

We are surrounded by fasting opportunities.

We leave our comfort zones, because fasting should make us uncomfortable. It thrusts us into a desert of strangeness and uncertainty. It tests our wills and purifies our motives, leading us beyond the desire to be holy so that we become holy. Fasting has very little to do with what or how much we “give up.” It’s all about what or how much we give. And if we center our Lenten experience intent on caring for others, our wilderness will explode with new and abundant life.

Your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. (Isaiah 58.10-11)

Miraculously Diverse

There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. (1 Corinthians 12.4-6)

Everything Falls Into Place

When people ask what I do for a living, I blithely answer, “I put on shows in barns.” There’s always a chuckle, followed by, “No, really, what do you do?” And I explain that I actually do put on shows in barns. Corporate clients hire the teams I work with to stage large employee gatherings. We start with nothing but an idea and figure out how to fashion live experiences that convey the messages our clients want to deliver. I’m the creative director—the idea guy. But the finest ideas in the world will come to naught without the rest of the team doing its best to bring them to life. The event producer visits the selected location and evaluates the available space—usually a large hotel ballroom or convention hall—to see what’s possible. Then we add designers and technicians, all of whom take responsibility for their share of pulling the pieces together. When I arrive onsite, I walk into a hollow room rapidly being transformed into a meeting venue. The stage is under construction. Lighting and sound gear is being rigged. Video equipment is put in place. In roughly 24 hours, a barren room becomes a theatrical environment where all the creative elements come together to inform and motivate an audience of several hundred people. 

Obviously, I could never do this on my own. The task is too great. It requires more time and manpower than I could possibly provide. But, more than that, I don’t possess the talent and know-how to do it alone. And one of the first lessons in my business is learning to trust and respect your teammates. They know what they’re doing and if the job is going to get done right, you’ve got to let them do what they’re supposed to do, while you do what you’re supposed to get done. I’ve been at this for 25 years now; to this day, I don’t really understand how everything falls into place. But it does.

This is the principle Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 12, where he discusses diversity of gifts. Initially, his explanation of how the Body of Christ functions would seem logically straightforward. “The community of believers is equipped with an enormous variety of talents and abilities,” he says, “all of them provided by the same Lord.” If we use my profession as a metaphor, Paul is telling us that God is the Client. God selects and endows each of us with gifts so that, working together, we can create something out of nothing, something that will bring God’s vision and message to life. Whether or not we accomplish what God desires of us depends on three things: recognition of talents we’re given, willingness to participate, and ability to trust and respect those we work with. The task is too great for one of us to manage alone. And although we will never fully understand how everything falls into place, when we commit our talents to God’s use, somehow the work gets done.

The Common Good

Once we digest Paul’s explanation, however, things become less clear. We start asking questions. What are my gifts? What do I bring to this project? Where are my strengths and, conversely, where am I limited? All of this boils down to the hardest question of all: who does God want me to be—what does God want me to do—to help build God’s kingdom? Some soul-searching is required. We need to inventory our talents to discern how they can be used constructively in the community of faith. Alas, Paul’s practicality falls by the wayside when he lists gifts God has given the Body. He dives into the mystical end of the pool, describing decidedly supernatural abilities: spiritual wisdom, knowledge, and discernment, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, diverse tongues and interpretations of tongues.

If such phenomena were evident in our lives, most of us wouldn’t know how to recognize them—let alone deploy them properly. While we may have witnessed these gifts in others, we shouldn’t mistake Paul’s roster as definitive. Nor should we imagine that not possessing these specific talents precludes us from offering the gifts God has bestowed on us. “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good,” verse 7 says. The ultimate question becomes, “How do I manifest God’s Spirit in my life?” And that can happen in an infinite variety of ways. Some of us possess gifts of joy, others gifts of compassion, and still others gifts of service, activity, and artistry. Every list of gifts is unique to each believer, all of them provided for the common good. Whatever we contribute to the building of God’s kingdom is worthy and necessary. So what are your gifts?

Miracle Workers

There is a second part of Paul’s story we should also reckon with. Often we know what our gifts are, but we worship and serve in faith traditions where they’re unwelcome—not because they’re not valued, but because we’re not valued. The talents and abilities God places in us are as native to us as other components of our making: gender, ethnicity, and orientation. They are inseparable from everything else God created us to be. As a result, the compulsion to use our God-given gifts for God’s glory often drives us to reject—or hide—our God-given identities. The world is full of women endowed with leadership talent who accept lesser roles for the sake of remaining in patriarchal traditions. Tens of thousands of gay believers endure the agonies of belittling doctrines and preaching in order to offer their talents to homophobic faith communities. Worse still, divinely gifted believers of every kind have withdrawn from the Body of Christ entirely because of discrimination and disrespect. And we must ask, how does any of this serve “the common good”? Why do we cling to religious exclusion when it's so obvious that it causes great suffering within Christ's Body?

Choosing where we worship and serve is a complicated decision based on many factors: our upbringing, where we live, our comfort with certain theologies, liturgies, and approaches to community life. Yet we must come to grips with the dilemmas that grow out of our decisions. If we remain in communities where we must surrender our identities in order to use our gifts, we dishonor our making. On the other hand, if we find new homes where we’re trusted and respected, we may have to sacrifice the comfort of traditions we’ve grown to love. We pray for the day when all believers are trusted and respected across Christendom. And we mourn the great losses that many traditions suffer by undervaluing believers who don’t fit their norms. Paul’s vision of the Church’s vast diversity of gifts imagines a miraculously diverse community of faith. When we make peace with who we are and the gifts God gives us, that miracle will become a reality. May God grant us strength and faith to be true miracle workers, wherever we are.

The gifts God gives each of us are as intrinsic to our making as our gender, ethnicity, and orientation.

Walk With Them

Ruth said, “Do not press me to leave you or turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” (Ruth 1.16)

The Compassion Principle

Not long ago I heard an illuminating talk about compassion. The speaker began by breaking down the word’s Latin roots, pointing out that it literally means, “shared suffering.” Then she said the best definition of compassion she’d ever heard came from a Benedictine nun, who told her to be compassionate is to walk beside people in trouble—actively participating in their journey, meeting them where they are, and supporting their efforts to move ahead. Thus, compassion is an intentional work of grace that collapses the distance and differences between those in need and us. It is not sympathy, which attempts to provide solace from a polite remove. Nor is it empathy, which professes to know and understand another’s situation. Compassion surpasses feeling and transpires in the doing. Our sorrow for others means nothing if it stops short of investing our all to alleviate it. Without committing to walk with them in their distress—to make their suffering our own—we’re merely well-wishers, sympathetic viewers from the sidelines.

The more we study God’s Word, the more we mature in our faith, the more convinced we are that compassion is the core Christian value. This belief is inherited from our Jewish forebears, who filled Hebrew scripture with texts extolling compassion as one of God’s defining traits. Numerous times the writers link God’s compassion with divine faithfulness, as we see in Nehemiah 9.17: “You are a forgiving God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. Therefore You did not desert them.” Compassion becomes the central theme in Jesus’s message as well, not only in His depiction of God, but also in the expectations He sets for us. Most famously, Jesus marries compassion for others to love for God in the Great Commandment, which we hear in Sunday’s Gospel: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength,” followed by, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mark 12.30-31) Then, in Galatians 6.2, Paul underscores compassion’s centrality to our faith when he writes, “Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” Bearing the burdens of others, sharing in their suffering, walking beside them, meeting them in their need—we cannot misconstrue the compassion principle as a call for kindness that keeps its distance. It is the law of Christ that places very specific demands on our attitudes and behaviors toward one another. Compassion, first and foremost, is an act of obedience.

Relentless

There’s a relentless aspect of compassion that we all too often—and easily—overlook. Compassion is an act of faith we carry out by faith, ignoring conventional wisdom, social mores and taboos, and political expediencies that would advise against walking with others. We see the full extent of compassion in God’s unyielding covenant to love and accept us despite our failures and deficits. But we also observe its relentless nature in dozens of biblical characters who are moved to bear the burdens of people around them. None of these examples is more vivid than Ruth’s. Here is a woman dealing with extraordinary loss, whose future is anything but certain, and who stands to lose everything she treasures if she embraces another’s sufferings as her own. Yet that’s precisely what Ruth does. She’s relentless in her compassion for Naomi, the mother of her recently deceased husband, and commits herself—despite her mother-in-law’s protests—to walk with Naomi, to bear her burdens, and to face life’s uncertainties alongside her.

Ruth’s story is familiar to most of us. Yet we risk undervaluing its gravity by underestimating its complexity. Sunday’s Old Testament text (Ruth 1.1-18) introduces her saga with a detailed background that brings Ruth’s dilemma into sharp focus. Ruth and Orpah are two Moabite women who marry the sons of a Jewish couple who relocate to Moab after famine descends on their home in Bethlehem. Despite ethnic, religious, and cultural differences, both marriages prosper. Then the father-in-law dies, as do both sons, leaving three widows with no viable means of support. With no blood relatives to provide for her, Naomi has no choice but to return to her extended family in Bethlehem. Going home is no guarantee she’ll be accepted. Her sons’ marriages to pagan women casts shadows over her and her return no doubt will give rise to resentments about having to care for a woman who’s not contributed to the family coffers for many years. Ruth and Orpah do have a way out, however. They can return to their families and resume the lives they knew before marriage. It won’t be easy. They too will confront prejudices and disdain for marrying outsiders. But they’ll have a safe home and provisions to ensure they won’t starve.

Reluctantly, Orpah assents to Naomi’s wishes. Ruth refuses. It’s inconceivable to her that Naomi should return to Bethlehem alone. So profound is her compassion that she voluntarily severs family, cultural, and religious ties to walk beside Naomi into a strange world, to live among strangers who despise her, to adopt strange customs, to speak a strange language, to worship a strange God. Ruth has absolutely nothing to gain by bearing Naomi’s burdens. That’s why the compassion conveyed in her resolve takes our breath away. “Do not press me to leave you or turn back from following you!” she insists. “Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die—there I will be buried. May the LORD do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you.” (Ruth 1.16-17) There’s no pause to consider what’s “appropriate” or “feasible.” There’s no lengthy hug, followed by a tender fare-thee-well and reminders to “call if you need anything.” Ruth doesn’t promise, “I’ll be there for you.” Ruth is there and refuses to be anywhere but there. Ruth is relentless.

Admonishments and Promises

Stripped of relentlessness, compassion is reduced to sentiment—an affect that has little effect in a harsh world. As believers who seek to reflect God’s nature in all we do and followers of Christ compelled to honor Christ’s commands, we are wise to take Ruth’s example to heart. And that begins by removing the filter of self from our eyes. Especially for American Christians participating in our national elections, this passage comes at a critical time. We cannot of good conscience enter the voting booth alone. We must take those we walk beside with us—those presently struggling with poverty, hunger, homelessness, violence, broken families, and every other form of social neglect. Beyond what may be best for us, we must consider what’s best for them and, if necessary, place their needs above our wants. We must subvert conventional wisdom, social mores and taboos, and political expediencies—many of them endorsed by religious leaders—to demonstrate true compassion in all of its relentless glory.

In Psalm 112.1-5 we read, “Blessed are those who fear the LORD, who find great delight in God’s commands. Their children will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches are in their houses, and their righteousness endures forever. Even in darkness light dawns for the upright, for those who are gracious and compassionate and righteous. Good will come to those who are generous and lend freely, who conduct their affairs with justice.” (NIV) May we listen closely to these admonishments and promises, and like Ruth, trust God above all else in our commitment to walk beside those in need.

Compassion goes beyond promising to be there. It is there and refuses to be anywhere but there, walking beside those in need, bearing their burdens, and sharing in their suffering.

Honest Work

Thieves must give up stealing; rather let them labor and work honestly with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy. (Ephesians 4.28-29)

We hear a lot about the “social safety net.” I genuinely believe the vast majority of us agree we need it, as most are wise enough to understand that we as a nation would be in far worse shape without it. Deciding who’s entitled to support is where the conversation unravels. These programs cost a lot of money—funds taken from us in taxes and essentially redistributed without our consent. And because it’s our money, we want to feel confident those who receive financial support are legitimately in need and not playing the system. It’s a fair expectation.

What’s not fair—what should be patently unacceptable to every believer—is the presumption that a large portion of the net’s beneficiaries is comprised of lazy people who’d rather “steal” from the system than find work. The stereotypes we often hear—“welfare queens” and “leeches”—don’t come from nowhere. We know these species exist. Yet when we paste such labels on those who rely on government provision to survive, not only do we defeat the net’s purpose. We give poverty a foul name. And as people who worship a God Who chose poverty as a way of life, we are highly aware that relying on common kindness (as Jesus did) is no slur on one’s dignity and worth. Second Corinthians 8.9 reminds us, “Though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor.” It should distress us greatly when believers promote ideologies that slander the destitute and dependent as thieves. “Get a job!” is their panacea to poverty—a facile answer that disregards many impediments to gainful employment: availability of work, deficient experience and education, childcare and health issues, transportation, criminal record, and so on. (And McDonald’s isn’t the answer.)

Ephesians 4.28 is a favorite for many Christians in defense of their simplistic go-to-work stance. Yet if we look at it clearly, it’s evident they’ve got it backwards. First, it’s written to the Church; it’s not a social policy statement. And it’s about actual thievery, not sloth or abusing kindness. Most of all, why does the writer urge us to find honest work? So we may have “have something to share with the needy”! This passage validates the social safety net, without any mention of who “deserves” to benefit from the fruits of our labor. (And frequently—conveniently—the expectation that we share what we earn with the poor gets amputated from the quote.) The writer goes on to caution us about we say, telling us, “Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up.” (v29) If our thoughts and words about the poor aren’t constructive, we’re out of line.

When we vote for candidates who endorse policies that deprive the poor, we add our voices to cynics who would rather compound the sufferings of the needy than part with a buck. We have quit our calling to build up, and joined ranks with believers and non-believers intent on tearing down. Working only for our benefit—demanding that those who don’t enjoy advantages we’ve been given do likewise—is how honest work becomes dishonest.

Right Religious

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world. (James 1.27)

In the month preceding the US elections, Straight-Friendly will offer brief reflections on what God requires of us, in hopes that we can enter the polls fully confident that our candidates of choice will promote policies that align with our personal convictions. Nothing here should be misconstrued as an endorsement of one candidate over another. It is simply meant to remind us of our responsibilities as faithful believers and citizens.

Every time we vote we make a vow, a personal pledge to care for our nation and its people. Every election presents us with a sacred moment, when we’re deeded the opportunity to look beyond ourselves—our immediate needs and long-held dreams—so that we can consider the needs and desires of others. Voting is the ultimate expression of community, a concept that we, as people of faith, inherently understand. And we know how community works because Jesus taught us a new way of building one. Community building (a concept that, sadly, has been ridiculed by many religious) reverses human “me-first” logic: “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all,” Jesus says in Mark 9.35. So, as Christians, we enter the voting booth at the end of a very long line of people we must serve. Their needs come first, their dreams above our own.

In case we’re unsure who these first-comers and preferred dreamers are, James spells it out. They are “widows and orphans in their distress”—the bereaved and abandoned, the easily blamed, readily overlooked social and economic casualties among us who are struggling to survive. And we should be very clear: they are not the lay-abouts and system-abusers that so many paint them to be. (We’ll discuss the indolent and parasites in a future post.) The people James calls us to care for are genuinely in distress due to misfortune. They are the homeless, the hungry, the sick, the disowned, and the defeated—the ones who inevitably find themselves at the end of the line. It is our duty as Christ’s followers to interrupt the social order and put them first, giving them our place and taking theirs. The world doesn’t see it that way, of course. But we we seek a higher plane that lifts us above the world’s ways. Right religion begins with honoring Christ’s community-building principle. Anything less stains us with the ugly sinfulness of a faithless world.

Every vote is a vow—to God, our nation, and every citizen in distress—a promise to care for all in need. Every election is a sacred right to live out the teachings of our Savior and advance God’s kingdom in very real and tangible ways.