Weddings, Part 1: Lewis and Logic

January 30, 2012

Maria sacraments, Sin , , , Leave a comment

One is either pregnant or not pregnant.  One is either in Christ or not.

Just as you can’t be a little pregnant, you can’t be a little Christian. Nonetheless, it should not surprise us that pregnant and non- pregnant women could exhibit similar symptoms, i.e. craving for pickles.  We would not necessarily conclude about a pickle-loving friend that he or she must be expecting a child.

So also it is possible that non-Christians can be kind and generous. Their commendable behavior, however, does not make them Christian. But my point is not about examining someone to see if they are Christian, but to assert that there is no sliding scale for determining whether one is in Christ. There are truly only 2 groups of people: Christians and non-Christians. The Law of Non-Contradiction explains God’s logic.  You can’t be X and non-X at the same time.

Why is this important?  Because God has proscribed how we are to treat both kinds of people.

CS Lewis broke into my consciousness when my mother, as a new Christian, lamented the fact that she could not make sense of Mere Christianity, that it was too deep for her.  My first personal introduction to Lewis was reading the Chronicles of Narnia to Graham the summer he was 8.  We took advantage of Wes’ naptime to lose ourselves in the magical world of Aslan and the adventures of the Pevensie children.

Then I, myself, journeyed through Mere Christianity with the help of a weekly group at my former school.  I moved on through Surprised by Joy, The Abolition of Man and The Great Divorce as well as devotionals based on Lewis excerpts.  But what has renewed by delight and lifted my thoughts heavenward is a collection of essays named for the first, Weight of Glory.

Here is Lewis’ stunning and arresting premise: there are no ordinary humans.

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations – these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit – immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously – no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption.”

Lewis continues by starkly laying on his reader the burden of considering first how we treat each person we encounter.  We are either helping them heavenward or assisting them toward the horror of Hell.  And if that thought were not enough, he goes over the top with this addendum, “Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object present to your senses.”

So….what are we to do?

I was thinking about how we Christians are like members of the bridal party, getting ready for the big event that actually is not about us, but Jesus and His Church.  We’ve all been invited and are considered valuable participants.  When we criticize a brother or sister in Christ for not being strong or gifted in a particular manner like us, we are acting ridiculously.  Instead of sniping at one another, we should marvel at the other’s differences and thank our creative Lord.

My normal reflex is to be the Pharisee who prides herself in being good at X, unlike my fellow Christian/ fellow bridal party member who obviously doesn’t have it together in MY area of strength.  My busy gloating, secret smugness and touch of disdain prevent me from seeing her God-assigned role and her God-endowed gifts.

And what about those unfortunate souls not including in the bridal party, how are we to treat them?  Actually it is possible that we are incorrect in our assessment. So since we are not privy to the Heavenly Wedding Plans of Christ and His Bride, we would do well to treat all neighbors as possible fellow participants.  Kindness is never wasted.

Next week – Weddings Part 2:   God and Love

I want more than a blessing

January 21, 2012

Maria 2 Corinthians, Anxiety, Genesis, James, Joy , , , Leave a comment

Genesis 24:1   Now Abraham was old, advanced in age; and God had blessed Abraham in every way.

So….what more could he want? Abraham had wealth, status, power and obviously favor with God.

If I were Abraham I would want a lot more:  CONTROL and ABSENCE OF PROBLEMS!

You see, Abraham, though amazingly blessed, still had a major challenge.  His son Isaac needed a wife, the right kind of woman who would be appropriate to play a major role in God’s promised plan.  So Abraham sent his oldest and most trusted servant (we never learn his name) on a long-shot mission, to persuade a suitable woman to come out in the middle of ‘nowhere’ to marry into a very strange family.

Here’s the point.  Even when we have ALL of God’s blessings, we still have to deal with problems.  Challenges/burdens are opportunities to trust God and wait with patience while praying steadfastly.  These unlikely ‘friends’ are also reminders to hold our desired ends lightly.  When faced with a problem, I usually know how I want it to work out.  My vision causes me to be anxious, because I realize that I lack the ability (control) to bring about what I want.  I chafe at this lack of assurance that my outcome will be realized.  So I regard problems as anathema and think sometimes that they should not even be, since I’m now a Child of God, a believer.

But God’s ways are not Maria’s. I think I’m getting a glimpse of how God has set up life for His children.

The only way we will continue to trust our Father is for us to be needy.  Problems are both God’s chosen means to insure on-going reliance on Him and a daily wake-up call that we are not in control.  He obviously thinks we are at risk of forgetting this fact.

Here’s what I’ve been pondering.  If God means problems to be woven into the fabric of human life, both for believers and pagans alike, then I should change how I look at them.  Yes, I know about Brother James’ ‘Pure Joy Club’ (….count it pure joy, my brothers when you meet trials of all kinds…James 1:2 ) but despite that verse and others from Paul, I still regard problems as ‘the enemy’!

Recently, however, I encountered a different way of looking at life.  And it’s tempting.  CS Lewis apparently divided the world into happy people and people who don’t LIKE to be happy.  Before reading this, I naively assumed that happy people were those with no more problems.  But maybe that species does not even exist.  If that is so, then maybe Paul was onto something when he affirmed (first paraphrasing 2 Cor 5:5 –since we have this down payment -i.e. Holy Spirit  of what is to come, ”Therefore,) we always feel cheerful, confident and courageous..…” 2 Cor 5:6a

So here’s my new prayer:  Father, enable me to remember hourly what You have done for me through my adoption and assigned inheritance and equipping me with the permanent Holy Spirit as a guarantee of what is mine.  Furthermore, so change my mind through your Holy Spirit Renovation project that just thinking of my adoption and inheritance cheers me to no end so that I take the daily problems in stride.  After all, stupid is the child of God who keeps problems to herself instead of casting them on her Father to handle.

Information Overload v. Applied Knowledge

January 12, 2012

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But we have this treasure, in jars of clay, to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not ourselves. (2 Cor 4:7)

I am overwhelmed by information.  Because of the űber-abundance of blog-posts… you-tube videos…. search engines…. people’s opinions ad infinitum (et ad nauseum) I find myself unable to keep up.  Of course I am the one who has defined what comes into my backyard.  I am the gatekeeper.  Yet even knowing that I myself have chosen certain podcasts, blogs, correspondances, magazines, and papers, their presence in my world have become a burden.  Who or what will rescue me from this increasing feeling of lack of time?

Merci au Seigneur – thank the Lord.  His word has clarified the distinction between information and knowledge.  And THAT has helped me re-think the situation.  There will always be more information than I can take in.  But information is of no use until it becomes meaningful to me in the form of knowledge.  I see knowledge as information that I have chewed and processed and lodged on my treed, my framework of thinking.   When that ‘knowledge-byte’ is accessible and useful, and grounded in Biblical truth, it can serve to guide me in life choices.

I am struck by how often the word knows/knowledge is used in Scripture.  Consider how it is used in the 2 Corinthians passage in Chapter 4 –

6 For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, has shone in our hearts so as to givethe light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  7 But we have this treasure injars of clay,to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.

I think that ‘treasure ‘is this knowledge of the ‘god-ness’ or glory of Jesus and the fact that we KNOW that He is in us via the Holy Spirit.

Yesterday I was reading a devotion written by J.I. Packer and found myself SO relieved by how he interpreted verse 5 in the Romans 5 passage where Paul assures us that “… hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.”

This verse has always felt like an indictment of my lack of Christian love because I don’t FEEL that love in my heart.  But Packer described it as the KNOWLEDGE of God’s love.  Now THAT I can relate to, for I’m reminded that,

“God demonstrates and clearly proves his love toward us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”?  (Rom 5:8)

I see that knowing, i.e. remembering truths about God is what I called wisdom when applied to one’s life.

We come full circle.  Part of that wisdom is the ability to set limits.  And God actually helps.  Part of my frustration with the abundance of information out there originates in the 24 hour day.  God has set up boundaries.  I bump up or crash into them, but they are there for my own good.  They force me to assess, to make choices.  I want to be able to say with the Psalmist, ‘the boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places.  I have a good & beautiful heritage.’ (Ps 16)

Unnatural Grace – a book recommendation

January 4, 2012

Maria 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Grace , , Leave a comment

It’s just not natural!  – a theology of grace

I’ve been captivated by a book.  Six years ago Episcopal priest Paul Zahl committed to paper what he has been teaching for the 30 years as a pastor.  Grace in Practice, A Theology of Everyday Life (2007) is changing me.

Very quickly he demonstrates how humans consistently fail to give each other grace. Yet each of us longs desperately to receive grace.  What is grace? –one-way love, the kind of love we crave because it’s freely given with no strings attached.  If there is an expectation on the part of the dispenser of grace, then it’s not grace, but manipulation.  And we are born with an innate ability to sniff out this kind of hypocrisy.

Christ is the ultimate example of grace. There is nothing we can do to earn salvation.  We can’t be good enough; we can’t manipulate our way into heaven,   “For when we were still sinners, Christ died for us” Romans 5:8

Lest you think that some people get by fine without grace due to their skill, hard work & maybe a bit of luck and that only down–and-out folk need grace, Zahl shatters that illusion right from the start.  How? –by explaining 3 givens that are true about every human that has ever lived:

a)   We are all guilty & inadequate to meet God’s standard due to original sin.  We live under an objective sentence of guilt and inside we FEEL this guilt.

b)   We are worse than we think; actually we are TOTALLY depraved which Zahl explains means that there is no part of the human condition that escapes depravity.

c)    No one has free will; free will is a myth we can’t shake. We’ve drunk the Kool-aid.

Read the book to follow his very convincing explanations and illustrations.

Because of the above givens, we crave grace.  But those we live with or work for don’t give us grace.  Instead they try to change us with exhortations (or worse, with commands or manipulative advice) to do better.  He calls that the Law.  No one ever gets better by the Law.

To be fair, Zahl makes an interesting distinction between what he calls necessary or natural law, the kind of law that protects us, but has no moral (read:  guilt-producing) baggage.

That kind of ‘first’ law maintains safety among groups of people.  It has nothing to do with self-improvement, relief from guilt or a thousand other problems we have.  When moral law (you should call your mother more often, you should do your homework consistently, you should stop drinking)  is applied, not only does it not help us, but often we dig our heels in further and do just the opposite of what the Law intends. Amazingly we do get better when grace is given.

In order to communicate what he means by grace, Zahl widens the theological term, ‘imputation’ and applies it to phenomena we have all witnessed.  This principle of passing on power through naming originated with God, “God gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were” – Romans 4:17b

Remember the time when your coach might have confidently said to you as an awkward 7th grader, ‘I think you’ll make a mighty fine basketball player’?  The power of that grace-filled imputation summoned your gifts and talents and motivated you to work hard to fulfill that expectation.  You were drawn to the drills and endless work that resulted in your becoming the good basketball player, all because your coach invited you and did not compel you.  Zahl promotes grace not only because it’s biblical, but because it works.

“The letter (the Law) kills but the spirit (Grace) gives life” – 2 Cor 3:6

Zahl doesn’t discount the Law. He describes how we need to allow the law to drive us crazy, so that we come to our senses.  I now see how it is necessary to be killed by the Law before Grace is even an option to consider.  We have to exhaust ourselves in trying to satisfy the Law and finally abandon our efforts and die to it before we turn to Grace.

I won’t go any further in describing Zahl’ work, but here are some quotes & paraphrases.  I hope they will whet your appetite enough to order the book.  Each night in December I could not wait to finish the dishes and find my cozy spot and read.  I felt hope rising:  hope and excitement in being able to offer those whom I love this kind of grace that brings out the best in people.

  • Grace is too good to be true.  It’s totally unfair
  • ‘theological anthropology’-takes in original sin, total depravity and our un-free will, our bondage
  • Marriage needs perpetual absolution.  Husbands have to forgive wives for being women. Women have to forgive their husbands for being men.
  • Everyone needs the same amount of love – 100 % unconditional one-way love
  • For grace to be grace there must not be any conditions, no partial role for me.
  • Grace is listening to another person without bringing the conversation back to you.
  • Grace never tries to fix, but trusts God to do this.  Grace listens
  • Grace in the marriage produces grace with the children