Words and Meditation

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer. (Psalm 19.14)

He Knows What’s Up

The past few days, Walt’s endured relentless replay of “Work on Me,” by Tonex (pronounced “Tow-Nay”) & The Peculiar People—so-named for 1 Peter 2.9: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (KJV) Before getting into the song, it’s useful to provide some background on Tonex (born Anthony Charles Williams II), as his life speaks to his music. After growing up as a Pentecostal pastor’s son and church musician, he burst on the scene with no qualms about pushing gospel’s boundaries, bypassing convention to reach new audiences, and defying stereotypes about how gospel singers look and behave. For the first time, the genre had an authentic “bad boy.” Some questioned his methods, but none disputed his calling or commitment. People everywhere testified that his music changed their lives. He sold millions of CD’s and was honored with every conceivable award. Then, in 2009, on a nationally televised Christian talk show, he came out. The crowds fled. The awards stopped. Preachers labeled him an unholy disgrace.

Tonex secluded himself, sparking rumors of what’s to become of him. We who’ve dealt with similar rejection know what’s next will be even more amazing. To date, he’s the only high-profile male gospel star to embrace his same-sex orientation—though (trust me) the field overflows with men who would follow suit if they had his courage. Still, faith that God has extraordinary plans for Tonex rises less from his bravery than his music. The chorus of “Work on Me” is a prime indicator of where his head’s at and his heart lies. As one listens to it, the music—an inspired restyling of classic call-and-response gospel set to a pop-friendly stride—merges with the spirit in its lyrics: “You know what’s up. So fix me up. Please Lord, just work on me. You know my faults, my secret thoughts. Please Lord, just work on me.” This is worthy of David at his finest, a profoundly personal prayer in psalm. The lyric’s conscious craving coupled with the composition’s driving desire reveal sincere longing to honor God without compromise. Since He knows what’s up, He can fix us up. And nothing less than His pleasure with us will satisfy. As the first verse says, “Lord work on my life, so I’ll be pleasing in Your sight. You know what’s up.” The same message and emotions pierce Psalm 19.14: “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.”

Two Distinct Channels

Words and meditation mirror lyrics and music in how they work. They’re two distinct channels that converge in unified expression. Like lyrics and music, words from our lips have no power unless they’re tightly anchored to meditation in our hearts. Fully grasping this requires a little homework to dig out the roots of “meditation,” because modern concepts of its meaning deviate significantly from its origins. Meditation is more than inwardly articulated thought or attentive silence. At best, these notions focus on meditation’s means without remotely defining its ends. Conscious inner thinking is cogitation—knowing thought—while silence in search of God is contemplation, which literally means “to make space for the divine.” Both are valuable, but neither focuses on meditation’s purpose. If meditation is something other than cogitation and contemplation, then what is it? The family resemblance to “medication” and “mediation” provides our best clue. “To meditate” in the truest original sense means “to avail oneself to a healer.”

We seek God’s help with our outbound words and inbound meditation because one can’t succeed absent the other. Without conscious effort to please Him in what we say, our hearts can’t instinctively welcome His healing. On the other side, until we give God free rein to work on us, His power can’t work through us. Awareness we’re being healed even as we speak changes our conversation. Peace, confidence, and love gained in meditation emerge in words of peace, confidence, and love. In this way, talking and knowing become very much like lyrics and music. What can’t be put in words is felt in our composition. This is what David strives for—to be like the rest of the Nature, which automatically yields to the Creator’s touch and rejoices for His pleasure. He announces this right away: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.” (v1-3) Healing that transpires in word and meditation transcends spoken language and articulate logic.

Peculiar People

Contemporary translations of 1 Peter 2.9 hang very closely to the King James Version except for one phrase—“peculiar people.” Obviously scurrying from an adjective with unflattering connotations, they opt for “a people belonging to God” (NIV), “a people for God’s own possession” (NASB), “His own special people” (NKJV), etc., which suggests we’re His particular people. While the scholars get A’s for accuracy, I still think they fail by implying we’re some kind of in-crowd of spiritual elites. If anything, we’re outsiders. Mindful effort and heartfelt craving to please God in word and meditation make us peculiar. Knowing they converge as the Great Physician works on us enables us to speak, love, and live freely. And freedom so great is very peculiar.

Concerns about what we can’t understand or why we’re not understood hold no value for us. They invite us to speak defensively or timidly, neither of which pleases God, and they crowd our hearts with emotions that impede our healing. As peculiar people, we sing David’s song: “Let my lips and heart please You, my Rock and my Redeemer.” We sing Tonex’s song: “You know what’s up. So fix me up.” When we do this, we make good on the charge Peter affixes to our peculiarity: “That you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” (NIV) Darkness to light—healing meditation. Declaring praise—healing words. It pleases God to work on us so He can work through us.

As we speak healing words, meditation opens our hearts to God’s healing. As meditation yields to God’s healing, we speak healing words. It pleases Him to work on us so He can work through us.

Postscript: Work on Me

Some of you may have caught this yesterday, when I posted it on Facebook. If you missed it—or if, like me, you can’t get enough of this song—here’s Tonex & The Peculiar People: “Work on Me.”

For those preferring a softer-edged approach to the same theme, here's "Make Me Over."

The Maternal Manifestation of God

Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother, Sarah, and he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death. (Genesis 24.67)

Extrapolations

Sooner or later it falls on every believer to assess the Bible’s accuracy and completeness. Some accept it fully, going so far as to insist impeaching its factuality or questioning its gaps is a faithless act. Others grant that inaccuracies and oversights pock Scripture, if for no other reason than likely error by human writers and transcribers. Either way, Christians typically regard the Bible as sacrosanct text that stands “as is”—whether perfect and absolute or flawed and inadequate. Judaism takes a more canny approach. It starts by conceding inaccuracies and omissions are unavoidably there. Then it seeks to restore what’s mangled or missing by drawing on details found in comparable passages. Jewish believers call these extrapolations midrashim, or “studies,” and look to them for legal clarification or spiritual edification that would otherwise be lost when reading the literal text.

As any thoughtful reader knows, the Bible is woefully skewed to favor the male perspective. With very few exceptions, women are cast in secondary roles as wives, mothers, and daughters. Furthermore, those who appear without ties to a man most often are portrayed as helpless victims or harlots. While gender imbalance in Scripture went ignored by Christian scholars until very recently, it’s been a perennial concern for their Jewish counterparts. Yesterday, I clicked onto Fran’s post on the above-cited passage and discovered an extraordinary midrash intended to rectify the diminution of women in the Bible—specifically, the importance of Abraham’s wife, Sarah, and Rebekah, the wife of Isaac. The author focuses on the significance of Sarah’s tent, which has stood empty since her death three years earlier. Yet it’s remaining untouched, coupled with Isaac’s decision to marry Rebekah inside it, plainly designates it as a sacred place.

The midrash connects Sarah’s tent with Israel’s Tent of Meeting. According to Exodus 33.9, “As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance, while the LORD spoke with Moses.” The cloud consistently reappears whenever God’s presence is evidenced in the Tent. The midrash retrofits this to place its origins at Sarah’s door: “All the days in which Sarah lived, there was a cloud attached to the entrance of her tent. Since she died, the cloud ceased; and when Rebecca (sic) came, the cloud returned.” With that, things get truly fascinating.

Shekinah

Connecting visibly divine presence with Sarah, Israel’s matriarch, is not at all far-fetched. The Jews named this holy cloud Shekinah, a feminine noun that translates as “dwelling” or “settling.” Thus, they defined Shekinah as the maternal manifestation of God—the Mother Who dwells with Her children, settling over them to protect and care for them just as a hen broods over her young. Contrary to common thought, Shekinah wasn’t an extraordinary occurrence. It was a fixture in Israel’s daily life. The Hebrews relied on it to guide them through the desert. Numbers 9.17 reports “Whenever the cloud lifted from above the Tent, the Israelites set out; where the cloud settled, the Israelites encamped.” They clung to their Mother, trusting Her to lead them to places where their needs would be met and their safety assured. She was the Source and Keeper of their lives.

The midrash links Shekinah and Sarah by witnessing Isaac’s chosen site for his marriage. The text includes no detail about the wedding itself. None is needed. Entering Sarah’s tent sets a precedent we respect to this day by opening the marital rite with “Dearly Beloved, we are gathered here in the sight of God…” Isaac’s return to Sarah’s tent has nothing to do with sentimental attachment to his earthly mother. As the sole carrier of seed that will bring forth a nation from his union with Rebekah, he’s instinctively drawn to Shekinah, the motherly Presence that will bless and sustain his offspring for generations to come. This is what the midrash means by suggesting the cloud reappears at the tent’s entrance when Rebekah becomes Isaac’s wife.

Now suppose we do a bit of midrash-ing of our own to update the Old Testament’s Shekinah to New Testament times. Not surprisingly, the story begins with a blatant allusion to Shekinah. When Mary questions how she can conceive the Christ Child without sexual congress, she’s told, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” (Luke 1.35) The maternal nature of God supernaturally manifests itself through Mary and in Jesus. When we see Christ gather children to Him, restore their prematurely stolen lives, and multiply their lunches to feed thousands, we’re looking at Shekinah. We hear Shekinah when He tells us to come to Him as children, when warning us not to harm young ones, and when He mourns Jerusalem’s rebellion: “How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” (Matthew 23.37)

Shekinah also literally appears at four pivotal events in Christ’s life. When the angel announces His birth to the shepherds, Luke 1.9 says, “the glory of the Lord shone around them.” At Jesus’s baptism “the heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him.” (Matthew 3.16). At His transfiguration, “a bright cloud” envelops Him, along with Peter, James, and John. After Jesus ascends, Acts 1.9 tells us “a cloud hid him from their sight.” We actually hear Shekinah in the second and third instances, both times declaring Jesus as “My Son.” And it’s worth noting in neither case is the voice attributed to His “Father,” even though masculine-skewed tradition prompts us to assume the Speaker is male. This assumption doesn’t jibe with Early Church perceptions of divine presence, though. Like their Jewish ancestors they also chose a feminine noun—the Greek term for “presence,” parousia—to describe the ever-present Spirit that oversees and directs the Church.

Under God’s Wing

This is very intriguing, but what does it signify to us? The main implication seems fairly obvious. When we limit our concept of God to a father figure (whether we picture Him as a gently paternal ideal or an emotionally distant authoritarian), we deprive ourselves of Shekinah’s maternal influence. While our Father provides, our Mother abides. She settles on us, sustaining us day by day. We cling to Shekinah just as the Israelites did, trusting Her to protect us and looking to Her for guidance. When we sense Her presence lift, it’s time to move on. When we hear Her voice, we listen attentively to Her counsel. When we feel Her tender restraint, we don’t take another step without Her approval. And whenever we embark on a life-changing venture, we return to Her tent to seek Her blessing.

But there’s a second aspect that heightened awareness of God’s maternal presence brings to light. The abiding nature of Shekinah invites us to see ourselves as Jesus desired, as we truly are—chicks gathered under God’s wing. The extent to which we experience nurture and growth relies on our willingness to be gathered. Straying from under-wing exposes us to predatory influences and random dangers. It draws us away from the Source and Keeper of our existence. It denies us the comforts and joy of family life. Shekinah beckons us to thrive and luxuriate in Divine Presence, to know God’s love in a distinctly maternal way. It’s an awesome opportunity we can’t possibly ignore.

(Offered with a grateful hat-tip to Fran for her extraordinary, inspiring post.)

An unconventional, yet altogether accurate image of God’s maternal manifestation as Shekinah.

Living, Enduring

Love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. (1 Peter 1.22-23)

Constitutional Divides

There is at present in the US Supreme Court a vast Constitutional divide. Justices Scalia and Thomas stand at the conservative extreme advocating an interpretive approach commonly referred to as originalism. At the consistently liberal extreme, Justices Ginsberg and Breyer assess constitutionality in terms of pragmatism, with the remaining five panelists oscillating (to a predictable degree) between the two schools of thought. Originalism regards the US Constitution as inflexible, drawing its doctrine directly from what it literally says or inferring meaning through the lenses of its originators. Pragmatism is the opposite. It sees the Constitution as a “living” document that shifts in parallel to the nation’s progress. One shudders to imagine the Founders meant the Court to become the politically polarized body it is. Based on what we find in the Constitution, it appears they didn't. Nothing in the document definitively indicates either methodology is correct.

A very similar constitutional divide fractures the Church, with conservatives embracing the equivalent of originalism and progressives touting their version of pragmatism. The interpretive tug-of-war between them eclipses the document they’re wrestling with—God’s Word. Disagreements about how it’s to be treated confound current understanding of its governance in our lives. Is the Bible like the Creator Who speaks through it—immutable, immune to human time and advancement, and impervious to challenges? Or is it a living thing designed to shift and mature in keeping with humanity’s progress? Did God intend it to become the polarizing entity that currently paralyzes the Church? Before shuddering to consider this, we’re wise to search its pages for answers, because unlike the Constitution, the Bible provides profound instruction about how it must be approached and interpreted.

C—All of the Above

Based on what God’s Word says about itself, arguing its virtue as a volume of timeless precedents or its value in terms of timely relevance is superfluous. The answer isn’t A or B. It’s C—all of the above. “Not so!” Scriptural originalists will say. “What God says in the Old Testament remains in effect for us. What He inspires the Apostles to write applies across-the-board to us.” They’ll turn to Christ’s statement in Matthew 5.18: “I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen will by any means disappear from the Law, until everything is accomplished.” They’ll quote Isaiah 40.7: “The word of our God stands forever.”

Yes, these texts are accurately cited. But they’re also incorrectly couched. Jesus prefaces His teaching with this: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” (v17) The Old Testament’s purpose culminates when Calvary opens free access for all to God’s grace. The world and heaven defined by the Law and Prophets cease to exist. And Peter quotes Isaiah to debunk what many of his readers presumed—and many continue to presume—it to say. In 1 Peter 1.23-25 he writes: “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For [quoting Isaiah], ‘All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever.’ And this is the word that was preached to you.” God’s Word is living and enduring—timely and timeless, flexible and firm, i.e., all of the above. It lives in the present to ensure its durability over time. Thus we approach it pragmatically, weighing its contents in context with what we know and preceding generations did not. At the same time, we must trust its Author’s original intentions were sound and the principles He set down long ago hold true for all time. So how do we solve these internal contradictions? We dig below “what” to uncover “why.”

From the Heart

The Apostles took a radical position on Scripture that shocked conservatives of their day. They emphasized it should be lived, not merely learned. “The word of God is living and active,” Hebrews 4.12 tells us. “Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” God’s Word reaches the heart, the innermost being where motives and desires abide. It separates fickle thoughts and emotions from enduring truth. That’s what the Apostles were getting at. Our thoughts and opinions will change over time. Today’s feelings won’t be the same tomorrow. If we get hung up on what we’ve learned without letting it come alive in us, we bury God’s Word in the past, ruining its relevance to our lives and times. A Word that isn’t alive in us will not endure.

Peter’s instruction on God’s Word is a sub-bullet to a bigger point. “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth, so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart,” he writes. (v22) We activate God’s Word in our lives to do what’s right. We don’t abuse it to prove we’re right. That’s dead thinking—mortal imposition on immortal truth. Peter says God’s Word plants in us “imperishable seed.” It circumvents intellectual pride and emotional fear to penetrate our hearts. Love blossoming in the depths of our beings overtakes compulsions to treat Scripture like a high school debate topic. We can learn it word-for-word. But until we live it, we’re playing mind games, entertaining idle fascinations. The living, enduring Word is evidenced by deep love planted in our hearts.

A truly living, enduring Word will pierce our hearts, bypassing our intellectual vanity and emotional fears. It will sow imperishable seeds of love in our beings.

Out of the Box

Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. “Quick, get up!” he said, and the chains fell off Peter’s wrists. (Acts 12.7)

Defining the Box

My job as a marketing creative director places me in client input meetings that go something like this. The client details the project’s scope and objectives. Our team probes a bit deeper into the audience’s demographics and attitudes, deftly attempting to get a sense of what will appeal to it, as well as the executives who will be involved in the program we’ve been asked to design. Many clients are very clear about their expectations. Equally often they’ll say, “We’re looking for your best out-of-the-box thinking.” “The box,” as anyone conversant in corporate-speak knows, is a euphemism for cultural norms. It holds everything that’s been sanctioned and done well up to now. Staying in the box is generally safest because it minimizes risk. Yet it’s also a career-limiting strategy, since it portrays a lack of self-confidence and vision. The higher one climbs the more intensely one searches for out-of-the-box ideas to drive success and growth.

The same dynamic applies to believers. Some stay safely within culturally defined boundaries of faith, while others push to achieve greater heights in Christian experience. Either way, defining the box is an illuminating exercise. We must carefully examine conventional thinking about faith and discipleship around us rather than arbitrarily settling into it. If it doesn’t challenge our trust in God and obedience to Christ—if it asks no more than we’d naturally achieve without belief—our box is too narrow and restrictive. It’s here that the corporate analogy breaks down, because restraints endanger faith. Following Jesus is by its very nature living out-of-the-box. Safety inside the box is an illusion.

Better, Bigger Things

Acts 12 reports a time of intense persecution for the Church. Its phenomenal growth and popularity have rocked the religious establishment. The Jews urge King Herod to do something. He executes James, one of the original disciples, and when that pleases the traditionalists, he arrests Peter during Passover. The king intends to bind him over for public trial after the holiday. The situation is eerily similar to the arrest, trial, and execution of Jesus—also a Passover event. Since Herod’s conspiracy with the Jewish authorities didn’t work out like they hoped in Christ’s case, he takes extra precaution. He shoves Peter into the deepest, narrowest box he has, a cell buried far inside the local prison. He puts Peter in the custody of 16 guards, places sentries at the cell entrance, and shackles him to two soldiers. Jesus may have mysteriously escaped the tomb, but this one’s not going anywhere.

Let’s look at this for a moment, because Herod’s a wily politician. The resurgence of anti-Christian protest places him in a precarious position. He has to placate the religious right, whose hatred and blood-thirst exposes its fear of Christ’s followers. Since Pentecost, this minor sect has evolved into a major movement. Churches are forming in nearly every major city in the Empire. Gentiles—some of them high-ranking Romans—are converting. All Christians revere Peter as their leader. It’s a cunning maneuver on Herod’s part to imprison him for public trial after Passover. Provincial Jews who might be counted on to bolster outcry against Peter will have left Jerusalem. This also gives the Apostles time to organize a sizable, vocal minority to attend the hearing. Arresting the preacher looks good to the Temple establishment while it also protects him from assassination attempts and religious actions like the recent stoning of Stephen.

Locking Peter in a tight box seems like the safest, sanest way to go. But our logic is anathema to God. It’s dangerous to keep Peter off the streets for his safety. He’s needed out of the box, where he can lead and minister to the Church. Balancing the crowd at his trial isn’t an issue either, since there will be no trial. There’s no point in Herod’s scheme to avoid the errors that turned Christ’s unjust execution into a cause célèbre sweeping the Empire. (The king’s political savvy will soon do him in. He falls dead while accepting acclaim as a god for brokering peace in a rebellious province.) All the reasons in favor of boxing Peter in are for naught. God has better, bigger things in mind. As always, He’s thinking out of the box. He dispatches an angel to Peter. “Quick, get up!” the angel says. When Peter stands, the chains cuffing him to his keepers come loose. The angel orders him to dress and together they walk out of his cell unopposed. The sentries remain oblivious while they pass. When they reach the prison’s iron gate, it swings open by itself.

First We Stand

The world is full of Christians—practicing and lapsed—boxed in by logical schemes and cultural fences purportedly devised for their safety. Untold thousands are chained to erroneous doctrines alleging to protect them from death and destruction. Would-be gay believers are shackled to ironclad ideologies that prevent them from honestly pursuing their faith. Would-be women priests and pastors are confined in places too narrow for them to serve God’s people with their enormous gifts. Would-be apostles and leaders languish in institutions that sequester them from ministries they’re called to perform. These hindrances are forged from manmade reasoning intent on safeguarding those they encumber as well as the Church’s stability. But they’re dangerous to our faith. Our safety and the Body of Christ’s wellbeing are found out of the box.

God has better, bigger things in mind for us. His message is “Quick, get up!” There’s no need to wait for a public trial; there will be none. It’s unnecessary to balance opinion and outcry in our favor; human approval is irrelevant. The schemes and savvy of kings are pointless; their days are numbered. When we respond by faith as He urges us to stand, our chains will fall. We will walk out of the box unopposed because, like Peter, our passage won’t be detected until we’re free. Massive gates erected to hold us back will open by themselves. Expecting these barriers to vanish before we rise in obedience to God gets it backwards. First we stand. Then they fall.

Doctrines and barriers allegedly constructed for our safety can become restraints to pursuing our faith. Rather than languish in chains, God calls us to stand. When we obey, shackles fall and doors open.

Forcing Love to Fail

Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth. (Mark 10.21-22)

Sad Endings

Remember Gone With the Wind? Scarlett O’Hara nurses a teenage crush on the blandly vanilla Ashley Wilkes through America’s bloodiest war, the fall of the South, and three marriages. Her heart’s so fixated on a dream conjured without any knowledge of life that life passes her by. She rejects the one man with enough experience and wisdom to love her and there she is, putting off any thought of what she’s lost until tomorrow. The ending isn’t really tragic. It’s sad. Why can’t she let go her naïve nonsense and open up to Rhett’s love? Tomorrow will be no different. She’ll still be unhappy and unfulfilled.

Although Mark condenses the story of the rich young man to five verses, it follows the same arc. The young man possesses every earthly comfort and sets his mind on the one thing that eludes him. When Jesus comes to town, he rushes to ask how he can gain eternal life. To the casual listener, it’s a noble question. But Jesus sees through it. The man’s obsessed with an ideal born of selfish desire. “Jesus looked at him and loved him,” Mark writes. (Emphasis added.) In his compassion, Christ recognizes the man needs more than a guarantee of eternal bliss. He has to learn how to live—to find joy in loving and giving, and, most of all, to bankrupt assets that define him so he can be loved as he truly is. “Get rid of everything,” Jesus says. “Follow Me.” Like Scarlett, the man can’t let go and open up to Christ’s love. His story ends on a similarly sorry note: “He went away sad, because he had great wealth.” (Mark 10.22)

How many people are destined for sad endings? How many cling to immature desires that block their ability to open their hearts to Christ’s magnificent love? How many of us rely on Christ’s companionship and care while nursing fantasies and fears that blind us to the fullness of His love? Surely we’re aware we push Him aside when these feelings crop up. Do we put off dealing with them until tomorrow? Both Scarlett and the rich young man teach us until we address our harmful obsessions, we'll still be unhappy and unfulfilled.

It’s Too Late

“Love never fails,” Paul famously writes in 1 Corinthians 13.8. His confidence in its power bursts forth in Romans 8.38-39: “I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Notice he covers every imaginable impediment to God’s love, save one: us. We’re all that stands between God’s extravagant love and us.

Knowing God loves us is like knowing the sky is blue. It’s a phenomenon we accept at face value. Letting Him love us is another thing. That asks a lot of us—namely, dismissing our concocted reasons why He can’t love us. And rather than dig into that, we often fall back on unworthiness. “I don’t deserve such love,” we say. But Romans 5.8 debunks our pretense by conceding the point: “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were sinners, Christ died for us.” It’s too late for us to think we don’t qualify for God’s love. The work’s been done. He opened His arms of love to us because we’re unworthy. So we might as well come clean and admit why we force love to fail. What’s jamming our hearts’ doors so we can’t allow the entirety of His love in?

Christ’s Look of Love

That opens a can of too many worms to list. Still, if we examine them closely, I believe we’ll find they come from the same source: resentments for past hurts and disappointments. They summon doubts about God’s love that inspire all sorts of “ifs” “ands” and “buts.” If God loves me, why would He…? And why should I accept His love, when…? But how can I trust Him after I’ve been treated so…? Letting God love us entails serious risk on our part. That’s why so many of us hang on to vain ideals and imaginations instead of letting them go. Like the rich young man, we walk away, choosing our notions over clearing our hearts of impediments that force love’s failure. And there are just as many of us who, like Scarlett, say “yes” to One Who pledges His undying love for us, only to reject or diminish it with dreams of how much happier we’d be had things gone differently.

Until we’re rid of resentments and doubts about God’s love, they will define us like the young man’s riches defined him. The saddest part of his story emerges in his being remembered for what he lacked, not what he had. Jesus looked at him and loved him. We can’t doubt the young man saw the compassion in Christ’s eyes. (It was so obvious Mark made a point of noting it.) Yet he lacked the willpower to let everything else go and make room for God’s love. Christ’s look of love is trained on each of us. We see it. It’s impossible to miss. It pierces our transparent excuses and emotions. And as He looks at us with love so powerful that nothing or no one can keep us from it, Christ entreats us: “Get rid of everything that’s blocking my love. Then come, follow me.”

Removing resentment and doubt about God’s love is the only way we can experience its extravagance. Hanging on to them forces love to fail.

For a Little While

Through faith [you] are shielded by God’s power… In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. (1 Peter 1.5-6)

Time Dilation

My comprehension of the theory of relativity wouldn’t fill a thimble. There is, however, one component I find especially intriguing. Commonly known as “time dilation,” the theory posits that time passes more slowly for moving objects than stationary ones. Because variants in earthbound speed are relatively minimal, the difference is imperceptible. Yet it checks out mathematically and can be applied to bodies traveling through the universe, where travel speeds vary widely. Time dilation’s most powerful implication for us, I think, comes by improving awareness of the differences between our time and God’s time. As we all know, they are not the same.

We remain in flux. God remains at rest. He covers all time and space. We move through them. Time for Him is eternal, meaning the past, present, and future is simultaneous and impossible to gauge in a linear fashion. Our time is finite, creating perceptions it’s a measurable thing we can fractionalize in years, months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds. Ticking our way through life encourages us to evaluate our progress by how far we move in how much time. We hail those who advance swiftly as prodigies and lament those who mature slowly as “challenged.” Yet for the quickest to the slowest of us, time crawls in comparison to God’s time. Psalm 90.4 astutely reflects the time dilation theory: “For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.” From where God sits, time flies. From where we are, it creeps. And time disparities between Him and us are most exasperating when we’re trudging through trials, waiting impatiently for His intervention.

Real Time

First-century Christians were obsessed with time. They discussed it constantly, and were we to overhear their conversations, we’d think them slightly mad. As witnesses to Christ’s ascension (or converts taught by its witnesses), they based their lives on His soon return. It’s odd to imagine they didn’t know they were founding a faith that would endure for centuries. But they didn’t. They believed Christianity would last no longer a generation or two. Expedience informed everything they did. Then, as believers died away, they no doubt wrestled with disillusionment. Why was it taking so long for Christ’s promised return?

As the Church’s first leader, Peter is endowed with a profound grasp of time. In his second epistle, he directly quotes Psalm 90.4, reminding his readers to hew their expectations to God’s timing, not their perceptions. “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness,” he writes. (2 Peter 3.9) He stresses perceived delays indicate God gives us proper time to be reconciled to Him: “He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” Peter tells us time dilation has a purpose. The longer it seems God waits, the longer we have to learn how to follow His ways. Delays become reasons to rejoice—once we realize the time discrepancy is on our end. Because we’re moving, it feels as though God falls behind on His promises when, in fact, He answers and works in real time.

Invincibility

Accepting time discrepancies between God and us won’t necessarily offset our frustrations, though. As sentient creatures, perceptions are reality. How do we deal with that? Peter tells us to shift our attention from the clock to what happens during the wait. “Through faith [you] are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time,” he writes. (1 Peter 1.5) While passing through life’s troubles, we sharpen our sense of God’s protection. He grants us traveling mercies to ensure we’ll survive our trials and tests. It’s not about the light at the end of the tunnel, but Who’s with us in the tunnel. “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me,” Psalm 23.4 exclaims. We know this verse by heart. But do we truly take it to heart? We should.

Being confident we’re shielded by God’s power lifts anxiety about how quickly He’ll fix our situation. Since He’s already going through it with us, we have nothing to fear. As a great pastor I knew taught, God’s presence in us makes us invincible. Paul explains this in 2 Corinthians 4.7-9: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.” Faith in our invincibility adjusts our sense of time. We may feel weary, confused, attacked, and down for the count, but however long our trials last, we will never be overpowered, distressed, forsaken, or defeated. “In this you greatly rejoice,” Peter writes, “though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise.” (v6-7) For a little while, Peter says. How long is that? By our clocks, “a little while” could last a lifetime. But when we trust God’s protection, we learn to live in His real time. How long “a little while” takes is secondary at best. Having Him with us—in us—all the while is what counts.

Moving through life’s trials causes us to perceive time as slower than it is. God’s time is accurate and real. Rather than grow impatient with Him, we rejoice that He protects and keeps us all the while.

Entertaining Strangers

Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13.2)

Trust and Obey

The injunction against Arizona’s heinously overreaching immigration law brings a sigh of relief to American believers of every stripe. If not, it should, because it draws us back to Biblical principles that demand hospitality for strangers—i.e., foreigners or people “not like us.” While other sociopolitical issues like marital equality, women’s rights, and GLBT military and ecclesiastical service have become religious flashpoints, immigration may very well be the crucible God uses to melt, refine, and unite American people of faith.

It is not ironic that the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the “In God We Trust” inscription on US currency one week prior to Judge Susan Bolton temporarily stripping Arizona’s legislation of its racist content. If America insists on wearing its faith on its sleeve, it must open its arms to strangers. If it stands on trust in God, it must kneel in obedience to His will. God’s Word—be it the Hebrew Tanakh, Christian Bible, or Muslim Qur’an—can’t be plainer in its expectations that we who believe will welcome strangers. James 2.17 tightens our constraint to heed God’s command: “Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.” A hymn writer put it like this: “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way.” Those who trust in God obey Him. It’s that simple.

We Forget

God commanded Israel and Jesus taught us to embrace strangers for a very obvious reason: we are aliens in a hostile, barren land. “I am a stranger on earth,” David writes in Psalm 119.19. We forget that. In Israel’s case, God’s people were literally illegal aliens. Abraham and generations after him were no less than squatters, camping on land they didn’t own, grazing herds in pastures they didn’t purchase. Moses led the Hebrews out of Egypt into a desert very much like the one in Arizona. A trail of corpses cluttered Sinai just like those in Pima County. They crossed Jordan the same as Hispanic people cross the Rio Grande. They had no papers or passports. They entered Canaan with only the goods they could carry and the promise of a better life. Those who fought Israel’s immigration met destruction. Those who assisted them—Rahab, the prostitute, for example—were protected and blessed. We forget that.

We forget Joseph was imprisoned in Egypt because he was a stranger. The infant Moses was discovered in the Nile because Pharaoh decided to “thin the herd” of foreign slaves. Ruth was an alien in Israel after her husband died. Ezra was a Jew born in exile who faced opposition at home because he was a stranger. Esther was a Hebrew orphan who rose to the Persian throne and rescued expatriated Jews when public opinion rose against them. Xenophobic Babylonians conspired to abuse, imprison, and kill Daniel and his friends. Jesus entered the world in a strange place and foreigners defied Herod to spare His life. The Apostles faced hostility wherever they went. They were repeatedly jailed—and most of them martyred—in foreign lands.

We forget these people were to some extent guilty of the same charges (allegedly) God-fearing Americans level at immigrants. As long as their numbers were “manageable,” they boosted the economy; when they flourished, they were reviled as a scourge. They disrupted the peace and posed a public threat. They altered cultures and defied customs. They spoke odd languages and embraced peculiar beliefs. And we forget these are the people we’re told to identify and emulate as people of God. In the Bible, it is strangers who change the world and bring blessings to nations where they live. This raises thorny questions for a people boasting of its trust in God. How can we believe in Him yet ignore what He tells us to do? How will we be blessed by turning away from His principle?

Angels Among Us

I don’t frequent neoconservative religious sites. But after the Arizona ruling, I cruised a few to gauge their response. While I’m sure there are deviations from what I saw, radically right blogs fell silent, while closer-to-center ones went out of their way to balance their views. They consistently cited Matthew 25’s parable of the sheep and goats, in which those who invite strangers into their homes are rewarded and those who don’t are cast out. The call for compassion and fairness for immigrants cannot be denied—which is why I believe it may serve as the crucible of American faith. That this firestorm erupted in a God-trusting nation proves how far we’ve strayed.

Believers who’ve shaped their opinions of this matter in obedience to God must realize His standard rests above compassion—caring about the fates and rights of strangers in theory, from afar. The invitation Christ speaks of in Matthew exceeds an open door or Welcome mat at the border. It implies a passionate commitment to the welfare and growth of those seeking refuge with us. Once they cross our portal, we’re required to honor the other standards Jesus lays out in His parable: if they’re hungry, we feed them; if they’re thirsty, we give them drink; if they’re naked, we clothe them; if they’re sick and in prison, we care for them. This isn’t manmade socialism. It’s Gospel.

If we honored the Word we claim to know, we’d understand God ordains this edict for our benefit. Hebrews 13.2 insists we entertain strangers—invite them in, care for them, and learn from them. “By so doing,” it says, “some people have entertained angels without knowing it.” God places angels among us—not all of them homegrown. Future leaders and pastors, teachers and physicians, role models and geniuses leave their homes and risk their lives to abide in this land. We can’t scan them for seeds of greatness, yet it’s ludicrous to believe many don’t carry them. Raising walls to keep them out raises barriers for us. Deporting them deprives us. Anti-immigrant legislation won’t make us a better, stronger, more obedient nation. Clipping angels’ wings in the name of self-protection reveals how poorly we trust God and how little we know of Him.

Is this the Sinai or Arizona?