Christ the King Sunday - John 18:33-37

John 18:33-37

³³ Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked him, "Are you the king of the Jews?"

³⁴ "Is that your own idea," Jesus asked, "or did others talk to you about me?"

³⁵ "Am I a Jew?" Pilate replied. "Your own people and chief priests handed you over to me. What is it you have done?"

³⁶ Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place."

³⁷ "You are a king, then!" said Pilate.
Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me."

This morning is Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday after Pentecost and before Advent. It seems to me that this is a particularly perfect time of year for it. We have been living in the memory of Pentecost in the age of the church, the time when the Spirit has descended and the church goes out into the world. But we have not yet arrived at Advent. We are not yet awaiting the birth of the infant king born in a manger. It also seems like an exceptionally perfect Sunday because it challenges us to see Jesus as King before Advent, in a time when we may not normally see him that way. In my experience, we tend to think of Jesus as quite tame. We picture him as the silent baby of Away in a Manger and the gentle peasant wandering around and speaking to groups of people quietly gathered on the hillside eating lunch. We like to forget that Jesus is our King who can give us orders at any time, who can ask us to die for his glory, and who can call us up for service in his army at a moment’s notice. We like to place Jesus in a box on a shelf and pull him out on Sundays, at meal times, and when we need him. Christ the King Sunday refuses to let us brush Christ aside.

If Christ is our king, then it is wise for us to learn about his kingdom by looking at his life. In our passage from John, Jesus said that he came to testify to the truth. There are many messages claiming to be truth in our lives. Movies teach girls that relationships have fairy tale endings where “happily ever after” is the easy result of meeting Prince Charming. Our fascination with sports teaches our boys that athletic ability is more important than honesty, integrity, intelligence, and compassion. Our advertisements proclaim the image that women must be skinny, flawless, and young. Our music teaches that real men are strong, unemotional, and better than women. The world claims to be bringing us the truth every time we open our eyes, but none of its truths were proclaimed by Christ. Instead, he proclaimed a truth and a kingdom that are not of this world.

Jesus showed us his kingdom, and he brought us, the church, into it. In verse 36 Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.” His servants would fight. Servants. People under his authority. His servants were his followers, those who learned from him and obeyed him. Today we, the church, are those servants. As his servants, we learn from the master how to live in his kingdom.

Jesus’ life was constantly engaged with sin and evil in the world. He was reversing the consequences of the Fall by Adam and Eve. He taught that the poor would inherit the kingdom of God, and he traveled with no place to lay his head. He overturned the divisions between Israel and Samaria, Jew and Gentile. Jesus healed the sick, raised the dead, and conquered demons. Throughout his ministry, the battles were for more than earthly possessions and power. From the temptation in the wilderness to the cross, Jesus was engaged in a spiritual war. And as his servants, Jesus has brought us into the battle on his side. We have plenty of demons to fight today, and plenty of the continuing effects of the Fall. This morning, we will look at four contemporary demons and what it might mean to be fighting against them.

At this time of year, the demon of poverty is one we cannot forget. We are surrounded by opportunities for giving, but such a systematic injustice requires more than a few coins dropped in a bucket or a gift purchased for a poor child. This battle requires faithful stewardship of our resources, living modestly so others can survive. It requires us to go against the American dream of constantly accumulating money and possessions and to follow the disciples in sharing the material blessings we have been given. It means following Jesus’ call to give to our brothers and sisters sacrificially instead of out of our abundance. The church has joined our King in this battle in many different ways – the angel trees in our hallways and last week’s food drive for the soup kitchen - and all of them are necessary. But I want to provide a different example this morning. There is a group of people in Durham who live at the Rutba House in Walltown, a poor and neglected neighborhood. Every evening they sit down at a common table and their door is open to all. People from the neighborhood with little to eat arrive next to the homeless, who are given a bed in addition to the meal. The housemates grow a variety of foods in their backyard, so they can have more to offer their guests. This group of people offers hope, compassion, advice, and love to each person who walks through their door, in addition to basic necessities, and through their ministry they are fighting the against the demon of poverty.

The second demon that I want to look at this morning is racism. In Jesus’ day, there was a large barrier between Jews and Gentiles. They could not share meals because the Jews ate different foods and had to remain ritually pure. They could not touch each other because a Jew could become unclean if he only touched a person who had touched something that was unclean. Jesus tore down these barriers. He stopped to talk with the Samaritan at the well. He ate dinner with tax collectors and sinners. And he gave us the parable of the Good Samaritan, showing that caring for a fellow human is more important than remaining ritually pure. For Paul, the church was the one place in Roman society where these barriers were broken down. He tells us that there is no longer Jew or Greek for those who are in Christ Jesus. The racial distinctions were dissolved. Unfortunately we have not learned this lesson very well. Our churches tend to be the most racially segregated part of society. We have White churches and Black churches. Latino, Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Greek, and Swiss churches. Instead of breaking down social lines, we have made them worse. Instead of sharing a common table, we can still walk into restaurants where our Black brothers and sisters cannot get service. Instead of loving our neighbors and our brothers and sisters across national boundaries, we ostracize the Hispanics in this country, assuming that all are illegal residents, that none contribute to American society, and that they do not deserve compassion, understanding, and acceptance as fellow Christians. Race is still a big problem in this country, and one of the groups who is fighting this demon is called Ubuntu. They meet once a month and share a table, and they wrestle with racism. They hear each other’s stories, from all sides, and they learn to give compassion to those who are different than themselves. They learn about each others’ traditions, and they celebrate them together. They are engaging in the battle.

The third demon is violence. I don’t have to prove to you that this is a problem. You need only to pick up a newspaper or turn on the TV. The news is of bombings, murders, and attacks. There are wars being fought all over the world, and neighbors are killing each other. But the goal of the church is reconciliation not war. It is to bring people into loving relationship with the Living God and one another. After all, the two greatest commandments are to love God and one another. After all, the two greatest commandments are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and to love our neighbors as ourselves. But wrestling this demon is hard. Our justice system serves its purpose, but it obviously does not stop violence. Our military does its job, but even it cannot police the world. The church must find a different way. I think that way is love and forgiveness in truth. There is a pastor I know who lives in South-Central Los Angeles. This is an area with high crime and high poverty, but he is the pastor of a South-Central LA church, so he lives in South-Central LA. Two years ago, his high school aged son and the daughter of a fellow pastor were sitting on his front porch talking when a car pulled up and a young man got out. The new gang initiations require you to shoot someone at close range, so this young man pulled out a gun, walked into the porch and shot the young man and young woman. The lady died, and the young man spent quite a bit of time in the hospital. But these pastors are still in South-Central LA. They know that the violence will only increase if the church leaves the city. Instead they need to do God’s work of bringing the message of peace and forgiveness to these lost teenagers who have found belonging in no where but these gangs. These pastors are using the power of conversion to wrestle the demon of violence.

The last demon is death, and it is also fought with conversion, but also with hope. We read many names on our prayer list each week. Sickness and grief surrounds us, but we do have hope. When we were baptized, we died with Christ, and we were also raised with him. So we have entered into his new life which will never end. For us, death is not the end of the story but only another step in the journey of our relationship with God. It is our hope in the resurrection which defeats the demon of death.

I want to close this morning by reading today’s appointed lesson from Revelation because it is in Christ’s return that his kingship will be realized fully and the battles with these demons will be brought to an end. Christ will reign over all of creation when he comes again in all of his glory, and until that day, we will continue to fight in our king’s army. So hear now the hope of the coming kingdom from Revelation, chapter 1, verses 4-8.

“Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits ^[a] before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

“To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.

7 "Look, he is coming with the clouds," ^[b]
and "every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him";
and all peoples on earth "will mourn because of him." ^[c] So shall it be! Amen.

8 "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty."

Our King is coming soon. Amen.

Job 23 Finding God in Suffering

Church is described as the people of God, body of Christ and temple of the Job

1 Then Job replied:

2 "Even today my complaint is bitter;
his hand ^[a] is heavy in spite of ^[b] my groaning.

3 If only I knew where to find him;
if only I could go to his dwelling!

4 I would state my case before him
and fill my mouth with arguments.

5 I would find out what he would answer me,
and consider what he would say to me.

6 Would he vigorously oppose me?
No, he would not press charges against me.

7 There the upright can establish their innocence before him,
and there I would be delivered forever from my judge.

8 "But if I go to the east, he is not there;
if I go to the west, I do not find him.

9 When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.

10 But he knows the way that I take;
when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.

11 My feet have closely followed his steps;
I have kept to his way without turning aside.

12 I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.

13 "But he stands alone, and who can oppose him?
He does whatever he pleases.

14 He carries out his decree against me,
and many such plans he still has in store.

15 That is why I am terrified before him;
when I think of all this, I fear him.

16 God has made my heart faint;
the Almighty has terrified me.

17 Yet I am not silenced by the darkness,

by the thick darkness that covers my face.

Footnotes:

1. Job 23:2 Septuagint and Syriac; Hebrew / the hand on me
2. Job 23:2 Or heavy on me in

It seems that everywhere we look these days, there is another tragedy, another sorrow confronting us. Some are big. The war in Afghanistan. The genocide in Rwanda. The riots in Mexico. In some strange way, these big sorrows are easier to deal with. We pronounce judgment, but out lives are not shattered. | There is another kind of sorrow that is closer to home. A family member commits suicide. The police officer who normally sits next to you in the pew is killed in the like of duty. A car accident leaves a vibrant pastor paralyzed. This is where our scripture lesson this morning finds me, and it seems that it is also where Job confronts you. Your friends and family members are battling serious illnesses, and we are left to wonder why and even more, to find our way through the maze.

I must confess to you this morning that these hard times have left me confused many times over the past year, and there have been no easy answers. In August 2005, a good friend of mine named Alyssa was found unresponsive in her bed. She was 14, a student in my youth group, and both a friend, and a daughter of friends. I would like to share her story with you today. The day after her first seizure, I boarded a plane and flew to North Carolina for the first time. I spent the next several days on the phone and on my knees as Alyssa laid in a drug-induced coma in ICU while doctors ran tests and attempted to stabilize her condition, and eventually diagnosed her with an inoperable brain tumor. | And I wrestled with God while Alyssa became my personal Job.

In Job 1 we learn that Job is a blameless and upright man who serves God, even offering sacrifices for his children’s sins. Job’s life is going well; he is wealthy, a respected man in his community, and he has been blessed with 7 sons and 3 daughters. Suddenly we are transported into the heavenly realm. The adversary challenges God. ^1:8 “Then the Lord said to the adversary, ‘Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is possessing of integrity and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.’” ^1:9 “Does Job fear God for nothing?” the adversary replied. ^1:11 “But stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.” So the adversary gains permission, and Job’s flocks are carried off and his children are killed in a storm. Then Job himself is afflicted, and his body is racked with pain and illness. And Job tears his robe in lament and falls to the ground, and he sits in the ashes, publicly lamenting his loss and pain. And Job’s wife says, ^2:10 “Are you still remaining in your integrity? Curse God and die!”

From the very beginning, Job certainly teaches us that life can be difficult, painful, and full of temptation, even, or perhaps especially for God’s faithful servants. Life is not always sunshine and roses, in spite of popular books and preachers. Job has lived well his whole life long. He has worshipped the Lord Almighty, and he isn’t even an Israelite. The Bible tells us that he comes from the lands of the pagan Gentiles. And it is Job’s very faithfulness that brings the attacks and sufferings from the adversary. Job is in good company. Jeremiah was the only true prophet left in Israel, and he had to announce the coming defeat and exile of God’s people. He was despised and rejected, and in the end he was taken captive with the rest of unfaithful Israel. Jesus spent three years teaching his disciples and caring for the people. He was faithful in every way that Israel had not been. Yet when it mattered, he too was despised and rejected. His disciples slept while he prayed in anguish and then they fled and denied him, and he was stripped and beaten and hung on a cross for the world to see his failure. Stephen stood before his people to share the good news of Christ’s saving power, and they rose up against him and stoned him while he prayed for God’s forgiveness for those throwing stones.

Unfortunately, we cannot push this pain into the past because it confronts our own lives. Part of our struggle is that good people perish, and Alyssa was no exception. She was faithful, listening to God and serving him constantly. She was preparing to serve on the worship team to help people draw closer to her Lord. She was full of the life and joy of the Holy Spirit. That joy and life never left through her seizures, medical procedures, and chemotherapy and radiation to battle her brain tumor, but they also did not free her from suffering. Over the course of a year, Alyssa lost much of her sight, her short-term memory, her physical agility, and her normal life. But Alyssa paralleled Job in another way: She never let go of God. She prayed, and she worshipped. She came to church, and trusted Jesus, and loved deeply.

It is in part this continual clinging to God that sets Job apart, and that helps us wrestle with our response to suffering. Repeatedly, we are told that Job is a man possessing of integrity, and the temptation offered by his wife is to relinquish that integrity, to let go of God. Job reminds us of another man who refused go let go of God. Jacob wrestled with God all night, and in the end, he becomes the patriarch Israel, the father of a nation. Fortunately for us, Job also resists this temptation to turn away, and we see him wrestle with God for 36 agonizing chapters.

And so we end up in chapter 23, just one of Job’s responses to his friends’ accusations. Job’s complaint is bitter. His three friends surround him on every side, preaching the conventional wisdom that suffering is a punishment for sin. Like the man born blind in John 9 the pain becomes his fault. But Job does not have Jesus to announce that Job has not sinned, so he seeks his vindication from God.

^23:2 “Even today my complaint is bitter; his hand is heavy in spite of my groaning. ³ If only I knew where to find him; if only I could go to his dwelling! ⁴ I would state my case before him and fill my mouth with arguments. ⁵ I would find out what he would answer me, and consider what he would say to me.”

Job certainly does not fear speaking the truth. He knows that he does not deserve suffering; he knows that he has been faithful, and he is seeking God to tell him so. After all Job knows God’s promises.

^23:6 “Would he vigorously oppose me? No he would not press charges against me. ⁷ There the upright can establish their innocence before him, and there I would be delivered from my judge.”

God will not continue to oppress him when he is judged according to his activities. The Biblical story until now confirms Job’s view. Abraham was given a son, Lot was rescued from the midst of wicked people, Israel was brought out of suffering in Egypt, and they were brought into the land flowing with milk and honey. Perhaps Job has neglected Genesis and the entry of sin and death into the fallen world where the innocent suffer alongside the wicked.

Regardless, Job feels abandoned, but he never stops seeking God’s face.

⁸ But if I go to the east, he is not there; if I go to the west, I do not find him. ⁹ When he is at work in the north, I do not see him; when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him ¹⁰ But he knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold. ¹¹ My feet have closely followed his steps; I have kept to his way without turning aside. ¹² I have not departed from the commands of his lips; I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.”

Even in the midst of his suffering, Job can continue to affirm his passion for God and declare his own faithfulness, but he cannot find God. Job sounds like Jesus on the cross crying the words of Psalm 22. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” “My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest.”

It seems that the suffering is only to continue. Job must endure seven more chapters of his friends’ accusations. The Psalmist will continue his lament for another 28 verses, and Jesus will die hanging on that cross. Our suffering endures in this world as well. Those of us around Alyssa watched helpless as she continued to grow weaker this summer. Her parents had to explain to her, again and again, that she had a brain tumor and would not survive. Eventually she recognized almost no one. The passionate athlete and musician slowly became confined to her bed. And those of us around Alyssa suffered as well. We had questions for God, and we were beginning to grieve. It was Alyssa who reminded us that suffering and death is not the end of the story.

God came to Job in the whirlwind, finally answering Job’s pleas to confront God. The scene was not the one Job had expected; God was questioning him not the other way around. Job was confronted with the majesty of God’s creation, and he learned that the dangerous things which God has created are beautiful because they are created. The death and destruction they cause are not beautiful, but the rain, the hail, the lightening, the lion are all beautiful because God has created them that way. There is a beauty in the unpredictability of God’s creation because there is also an unpredictability in God. It includes his decision to become incarnate in the form of a baby, and it includes the innocent suffering of God on the cross.

Job is confronted with the beauty and goodness of God, but he never receives the answers to his questions about suffering; he is never told what we knew from the beginning: his suffering came because of his faithfulness not because he lacked it. Still, Job was redeemed. He received the answer of God’s presence, and his questions somehow melted away when he was face-to-face with God. Remember the adversary’s challenge to God? That Job would curse him to his face? Here too, Job resists the temptation.

^42:11 “Then Job replied to the Lord: ² I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted. ³ You asked ‘Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?’ Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. ⁴ You said, ‘Listen now and I will speak; I will question you and you shall answer me.’ ⁵ My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. ⁶ Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.”

Likewise, Jesus’ cry from the cross is incomplete without the story of the resurrection. God had not abandoned Job, and he had not abandoned Jesus either. The Father and the Spirit raised the Son on the third day, defeating once and for all death and the Ruler of this world. So we cling to God even in our pain, and we seek his face while we pray for Christ’s return and the New Jerusalem to come in its fullness.

^{Rev 21} “And I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with humans, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

Creation will be restored to perfect relationship with God, and we will worship before the throne.

And how does Alyssa’s story end? In joy and sorrow, grief and hope. On July 4, 2006, one month after her 15^th birthday, Alyssa’s body succumbed to her 11 month long battle with cancer. With her friends and family by her side, she was sung across the Jordan to meet her Lord face-to-face, just as she had sought him all along. And we who love her are left behind to grieve. There is an emptiness in our hearts that will only be filled when we join Alyssa in the presence of our Lord. We are spending all of our time with God crying out in desperation and we are doing the next thing, “simply because it is next.”

But I mentioned joy and hope. Through her whole life, Alyssa taught us to laugh, to live life with joyful freedom, and we continue to do so. Throughout her illness, Alyssa listened to a song called For the Moments I Feel Faint by Relient K. One of Alyssa’s closest friends wrote, “I was just thinking, that maybe this song is her and God’s gift to us…a reminder of God’s love and grace. It’s like her reminder to us to never underestimate her Jesus…our Jesus…the Jesus she is dancing with at this moment.” It goes like this:

Am I at the point of no improvement?
What of the death I still dwell in?
I try to excel, but I feel no movement.
Can I be free of this unreleasable sin?

I throw up my hands
"Oh, the impossibilities"
Frustrated and tired
Where do I go from here?
Now I'm searching for the confidence I've lost so willingly
Overcoming these obstacles is overcoming my fear

Never underestimate my Jesus.
You're telling me that there's no hope.
I'm telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus
When the world around you crumbles
He will be strong

I think I can't, I think I can't
But I think you can, I think you can
Gather my insufficiencies and
place them in your hands, place them in your hands, place them in your hands

Never underestimate my Jesus.
You're telling me that there's no hope.
I'm telling you you’re wrong.
Never underestimate my Jesus
When the world around you crumbles
He will be strong, He will be strong

Jesus is strong, even in our weakness and suffering. Our hope, even in that suffering, is in our Lord Jesus Christ and his coming kingdom. Maranatha! Lord Come Quickly! Amen.

Answered and Unanswered Prayers

For the past year, I have been doing my best to walk between two extremes in regard to answered and unanswered prayer. Shortly after Alyssa's diagnosis last fall, I called an old friend with nothing but questions. Why Alyssa? The Smelley family? The rest of the crew? These are all God-fearing people who faithfully served God day in and day out through good times and bad. I wanted God to heal Alyssa, physically, and not just live in the suffering with her. My friend asked me, "Do you want God to heal everyone?" My answer? "Yes. Yes I do." What I really want is for God to step in and miraculously heal disease and war and faminine, and somehow that answer is exactly right in that it is precisely the desire for God's kingdom to come in its fullness. The Christian faith is not complete without the return of Christ.

Still, we do not yet live in that kingdom. We live on earth, and we are faced with tragedy (Will Wiersma, Wes Nishimura, Nate Fawell), illness (Uncle Don, Wilma Wilson, Leslie-Ann Malan), and death (Alyssa Smelley, Gus Gustavson, Fred Bauersfeld, Larry Holloway). I think that often we are faced with opposing choices. 1) Trust that God has already healed... If you have enough faith... God answers our prayers... or 2) God doesn't care about... God doesn't stop unjust suffering... God is not just. Loss of faith.

I'm not satisfied with either option.

This morning, the two worlds of healing and no healing, answered and unanswered prayer collided. In two weeks I will be preaching my first sermon in five years... on Job. Forty-two agonizing chapters of unjust suffering and brokenness. In chapel this morning, I cried through the entire sermon as Bishop Carder preached on Job 23. The innocent sufferer who cries out to God... A God who didn't prevent the adversary from inflicting the suffering. The world of unanswered prayer. Then I moved into planning my youth group lesson this week. I'm doing a series on the ways God works in the world. The people pray, and the Berlin Wall falls, Apartheid ends, nine miners are rescued alive. The world of answered prayer.

I have always had a problem with people who tell me that God will heal if the person asking has enough faith. It is dangerous. But I wasn't sure why I thought it wasn't true. After all, Jesus has only words of acclamation for the faith of the people who ask for healing. Job provides my answer: It isn't about us; it's about God. If the basis for healing is OUR faith, it isn't God, just as in salvation where if the basis is us, it isn't God. If it is about our faith, then we become magicians who can bring about wonders, and it is no longer the Lord who works the miracles. Besides, what do you do with the faith of hundreds of people who pray for a miracle and do not get it? Last year, I had a friend tell me that they were praying for Alyssa's healing. She has moved towards Pentecostalism and belief in miraculous works, which certainly do happen. Do not misunderstand me. God does heal. God does tear down dividing walls and break cycles of injustice. My problem was not that God is performing miracles in California, Washington, and the rest of the world. My problem was that she told me that we have to thank God for already doing the healing, and he will. That still makes us the ones who control the healing, but it also leaves us with a bigger problem. What do we do when the healing doesn't happen?

Jesus told us that we can move mountains with a mustard seed of faith. This is not a trick or a slight of hand where a small seed represents a huge amount of faith. The mustard seed is small, like the tip of a pen or a watchscrew. Jesus is not saying that we have to conjure up faith to ask for GOD to do big things because it is up to GOD. He has that power, but he still sometimes chooses not to heal. Not to do big things.

The common answer is that God knows better for us when he chooses not to answer our prayers. That he has a better plan or a more wonderful solution. We have problems here too. Is it better that a college student feels so lost and hopeless that he commits suicide? Better that a 23-year-old is killed in a car accident? Better that a 15-year-old dies of cancer? Better that family members suffer and grieve? Dr. Geoffrey Wainwright told us, "We cannot believe that God gives illness." It is not a better solution. It is a product of our fallen condition and our fallen world. When the kingdom comes, these things will pass away. "And I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with humans, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

I don't know that I have a way out of this maze yet, although I think that Job may actually provide our solution. Dr. Ellen Davis taught us that Job is one of only two men in the Old Testament who are said to be "possessing of integrity." Even Job's wife tells him to let go of his integrity and curse God and die. Instead, Job holds on to his integrity by holding on to God and asking him questions and talking to him. To let go of his integrity would have been to let go of his faith. Job teaches us that it takes great faith to cling to God when the miracles do not come. He is the only one in the book to do so. Job also teaches us that the dangerous things which God has created are beautiful because they are created. The death and destruction they cause are not beautiful, but the rain, the hail, the lightning, the lion are all good because God has created them that way. There is a beauty in the unpredictability of God's creation because there is also an unpredictability in God, and it is beautiful in God as well. It includes his mercy in choosing Israel as his people to spread his light to the nations. It includes his decision to humble himself to become incarnate in the form of a baby. Finally, it includes the suffering of God on the cross, where he joined us as an innocent suffering, and who, like Job, was redeemed out of that suffering through the resurrection. It is precisely this dangerous unpredictability which provides the grace which covers all of our sins with the blood of Christ and reconciles our relationship with the one who created us.

It takes great trust to cling to a God who is unpredictable in a world that is fallen and broken when suffering strikes and the miracles do not come. Lord, I trust! Help my lack of trust!

Theological Issues in the Race Discussion

I attended a discussion on Bono’s speech at the National Prayer Breakfast this year, and I have been meaning to write my thoughts on it for awhile. One of the panel responses to this speech was J. Cameron Carter, a theology professor here. In light of my last post about race, I thought perhaps I should vocalize my reactions to his response.

Let me start off by saying that I am fully in agreement with the statement that minorities can be racist, and it is experiences like the following one which remind me so clearly why Caucasians often find minorities offensive. Sometimes I do too.

Dr. Carter’s response to Bono was to say that Africa is the salvation of America. It is by working in Africa that we are redeemed. We have a lot to learn from Africa in their poverty and brokenness. Africa is the icon to God. We should baptize our children out of their blackness or whiteness. I was not convinced. Even more, I was hurt and disturbed. It seemed like Dr. Carter was again ignoring any group that wasn’t African-American or White. It also meant that as a Latina/Navajo/British/Irish woman, I could not be an icon of God. While this was offensive, I had a much bigger problem with the theology present in these statements. While I’m not sure that the most effective way to convince someone of your position is to make them cry during your lecture, I’m more worried that this man is a theology professor who is spreading these ideas to other students.

First, Africa is not the icon of God. Jesus Christ is the icon of God, and all humans are made in the image of God; as a result, all humans are icons of God. We Westerners would do well to learn from our Orthodox brothers and sisters on this point. Second, our salvation is through Jesus Christ. Our redemption is in Jesus Christ. In no manner is our redemption tied to Africa. Does that mean that we have nothing to learn from Africa? No, certainly not. We do. Does it mean that we should not be working in Africa? No. I do worry that this emphasis on Africa neglects the responsibility to work in Asia, the Middle East, Latin and South America, and the poor in the United States. Our redemption is not dependent on our work in Africa, although it may be contingent on our work for and with the oppressed. I also worry that making Africa the icon of God neglects the possibility that a latino/a, American, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Pakistani, Israeli, Saudi, Egyptian, etc. man or woman can be, and actually is, an icon of God. Third, I was not convinced, perhaps because Dr. Carter was shouting these ideas at the audience, that he had actually moved beyond his “blackness” which he says the church baptizes us out of. Dr. Carter argues that race (in the Enlightenment sense of one race being better, or more “enlightened” than another based on the color of their skin) is a modern construction. I agree with this evaluation. Telford Work pointed out the irony with this teaching and his determination that we baptize people out of their race. If race is a modern construction, then it is a false construction and doesn’t actually exist. If it doesn’t exist, then baptizing people out of it means either that he is recognizing that it does exist, or he is doing something that is illogical because he is telling people to leave something that doesn’t exist anyway.

All this is to say that while I often understand the emotional reactions of others in discussions of race, there are deeper theological issues embedded in these conversations. And lest any of you be afraid to enter these conversations, please know that there are many of us who would be glad to talk to you, and would not judge you for trying to understand these issues.

Majority and Minority Perspectives

I had a conversation with a friend the other night that made me pause for thought. Like many other times this year, I am posting about race, but perhaps with a slightly different perspective this time.

She and I were talking about her experiences listening to minorities talk about racism, and she was the first one to express the majority perspective in a way that made me capable of seeing how very similar the two reactions are, even though they are very different in their expressions. To my friend, it seems as though minority speakers are attempting to marginalize her when they speak out against the ways that minorities have been and continue to be marginalized by the Caucasian majority in the United States. When they speak about how the Caucasian majority should care about the minorities living within the borders of the country, they are passionate, perhaps angry, and almost always frustrated by the situation between the ethnic majority and ethnic minorities in this country. My friend reacted with anger and frustration to the minorities that she feels are marginalizing her in their efforts to raise awareness and compassion.

Her response raised my awareness that one of the big problems in this whole debate is that both sides feel marginalized by the other, and neither side has much of an awareness of how the other side feels. I have been caught in the middle for some time now, but I think my sympathies have tended to live with the minorities because I have felt like the majority groups tend to be the oppressors. While I still think that is true, I realize now in a much more powerful way, how minorities marginalize the majority by making them feel like they are worthless in the same way that they have been oppressed.

In light of my friend’s reaction, and in a desire to attempt to bridge the gap so that conversation on race and oppression can take place in a more fruitful way, let me offer a couple of stories that may help those of you who either are Caucasian or for some other reason don’t understand the importance of the race discussion. As you read each of these stories, place yourself in it and imagine what your reaction would be.

1) You are a white African in South Africa. Your family has lived there for generations, and you are a judge in the court system. You receive word that you are being removed from your post because you are a white African. You are therefore not fit to judge black Africans, so you will be replaced with a black African judge.
2) You live in Zimbabwe as a farmer on a small plot of land. The government decides to restructure the farming land, and your farm is being taken away from you because you are a white African instead of a black African. If you want to continue to farm, you need to leave the country, and you can’t find a job doing anything else because those jobs are now reserved for the black Africans. As a result, you are forced to leave Zimbabwe which has been your family’s home for years.
3) You have recently moved to Spain from England, and you run into people on the streets, in the marketplace, and even in your church who tell you that you need to return to England because you do not speak Spanish, which is the official language of that country. If you want to continue to speak English instead of Spanish, and if you want to teach your children English and speak it in your home, if you want to remember the British victories and celebrations, they you don’t belong in Spain, and you need to go back to England.
4) You are an English-speaking Canadian who moves to French-speaking Quebec. You are told that you are no longer allowed to speak English in your stores, advertise in English, have your children attend English-speaking schools, etc because it is against the law in Quebec.

Each of these stories comes out of the stories of what has been happening around the world lately, and if you can understand and feel the anger of each of these situations, then you understand what it feels like to be a minority living in the United States. I have been told that latinos are a different breed of humans who can’t have the same religion, same values, or same friends as Caucasian Americans. I can’t count the number of times that I have been told that all latinos need to go back to Mexico. The first issue with that is that a lot of latinos don’t come from Mexico in the first place. The second issue is that a lot of the latinos I know are in the US legally or are US citizens, either naturalized or natural-born. I have been told that I don’t have the capability to do certain tasks because of my race. I have been told that my (guy) friends’ parents would never let me marry them because of my race. I have been told by my (girl) friends that I should make sure that their parents don’t know my race because they wouldn’t like me any more. I have been told that I should just get over my feelings about these experiences. When you read the above stories, and if you were in those positions, would you want to be told to just get over it?

Two stories in the recent days have brought to the forefront the issues of race again. After the SOTU, I watched the Daily Show with the same friends. While I wasn’t sure that some of it was in good taste, I wasn’t that disturbed until they showed the response by the LA mayor who was speaking in Spanish as the response to the latino population. As he was telling the people to join in and stand up to work for a better country because we are all one people and all one nation, they voiced over his speech making fun of the fact that he was latino. If they reacted the same way to other responses, I might not have been so angry, but the response they gave to the white responders was based on what they were saying instead of on their race.

The second instance that has disturbed me was an article in Duke’s newspaper about a musical group from sunny Bakersfield, CA (yes, CA, so think twice before you say that racism is no longer a problem in the West). They are targeting 11-12 year olds with the message of White Nationalism because they know that is one of the most influential ages. They have racially based songs, and they model for White Nationalist clothes lines. Do me a favor, and read the entire article and think about how you would feel if you were one of the many non-white people reading this article. Here are a couple of notable quotes for you:

”The name of the band is derived from the family's white Prussian ancestry along with the color of the girls' eyes. The girls have also said the name references a chemical that they say was not found at concentration camp sites. "We think it might make people question some of the inaccuracies of the 'Holocaust' myth," the girls told Viceland.com.”
"I don't think that we wouldn't have criminals, although I believe that black people are more likely to be criminals, but I would just want the races to be separate, and I'd like this to happen peacefully.”
“April said that the media is mistakenly interpreting white nationalist beliefs as racist. "We don't necessarily think that we are the best race," she said. "Asians, for example, are generally smarter than us. They score higher on tests. However, white people are more capable and live better lives. We believe the white population is shrinking, and that we're losing autonomy. We've already lost it here in the state of California. The Mexicans are the plurality here, and it's disappointing to see the majority of a population going to a race that is clearly inferior to almost all other races."
“I laugh whenever people get really mad about us, because I think it just makes the anti-racists look kind of ridiculous."

Someone explain to me how this is not racist?

The one good thing that came out of this article was that it gave me a new perspective on the South. When I told a friend here who grew up in the South about this, she asked me if there were really people in California that needed to hear this message. I said yes, it comes up multiple times a year in the Westmont newspaper, and the two responses are usually broken down into people who are minorities or have close friends who are minorities versus everyone else. The minorities and their friends argue that race is still an issue, and everyone else argues that we have moved past racism and the minorities should get over their feelings and overreactions. She said that it seems strange to her because you cannot grow up with that framework in the South. Race is something you have to deal with because you are confronted with it all the time, and for that, I’m glad.

I guess in conclusion I want to say that yes, minorities should welcome in Caucasians and learn to live in and love their culture. They should learn to communicate with them and be patient enough to sit through their cultural ceremonies, even when they don’t care, in order to understand. But this is a two way street. If that is what the Caucasian population expects from the minorities, then the minorities have every right to expect it of them as well. That means that they need to make an effort to live in and love minority cultures, to learn about the languages and customs of the people, and to make an effort to sit through and learn about the ceremonies and traditions of other cultures, even when they don’t care about that culture, in order to understand those around them.

Reflections on the SOTU

I know that the State of the Union is long over for most people by know, but there were two distinct things that came up for me in the course of watching it and the show afterwards. The first was that I don't care quite as much about politics as some other people do. I watched it with 3 friends, one of whom is extremely passionate in his hatred for George W. Bush. I understand that there are distinct reasons for his passion, and I have heard enough of his personal story to understand some of the causes. At the same time, I am not willing to completely write people off when I don't agree with them. There are plenty of things in Bush's speech that I don't like. I wish he wouldn't distort Scripture for one, or conflate Christianity and politics and allegiance to the country for another. I listened to the speech thinking that some of the things he was saying were out and out lies. At the same time, I was thrilled with a couple of things that he said. The emphasis on more responsible uses of energy makes me happy, in spite of the fact that I wish he would drop the Yucca Mountain/Nuclear energy thing unless he is willing to commit the country to the responsible yet expensive adapting of radioactive waste, so it is no longer harmful to the environment or to humans. As I was watching the speech, I was analyzing various points and agreed with some and disagreed with others. I think that the gentleman I was watching with disagreed with everything Bush said. I realized that I am not so wrapped into politics that I cannot agree with anything a person says. I am capable of analyzing the points and agreeing or disagreeing without simply responding emotionally to the person on stage.

This man is able to disagree with Bush; however, I was disturbed by his characterization of Bush as evil. I have been trained well by Westmont, and I can't say that anymore. First of all, do I think that Bush is intentionally acting poorly? No. I think he is genuinely, and if he acts the way he preaches, probably prayerfully working his way through his presidency. Do I think that means he's done everything right? Not by a long shot. Still, the characterization of Bush as evil seems to assume that he (and half of the country) are not seeking to do good (whether we agree that they are doing good or not!). It also reduces humans as created in the image of God.

Whether we agree with politicians, or anyone else, or not, they are icons to God. Icons function as windows to God. They reveal to us something about our creator. They ARE the image of God for us as they are made in his image. I am reminded of Stan Gaede's chapel talk where he answered the question, "Is it alright if I call you Stan?" In that talk, Stan tells us that we need to remember that all humans are made in the image of God and therefore that should govern how we approach all humans. He read the passage below from C.S. Lewis:

The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. 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 splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of the 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.

-C.S. Lewis The Weight of Glory

How right Lewis is. How right the view of the Orthodox Church that humans are icons becacuse they are made in the image and likeness of God. We have a lot to learn.

Theology IS Practical

I had a discussion tonight that made me think that there is another reason that I am at Duke was this: Another student in the Div School was telling me that the theology we learn in the classroom is theoretical, and there is a disconnect between that and what happens in the church. She also informed me that she doesn't like professors who preach about moral issues in class because she can't stand that. (Granted, this was in reference to a professor who is rumored to speak against homosexuality, and that is a hot button issue, but still....)

I am so tired of people who tell me that theology isn't practical and who think that it is acceptable to express their own morals but is not permissible for others to express theirs. Granted, it was Telford Work at Westmont who challenged me to accept the non-modern paradigm, but he accomplished it through discussions on the writings of others, and many times those people were Duke professors. For those people who took Telford's classes, these books (with chapters written by Duke profs) may sound familiar: Practicing Theology, The Art of Reading Scripture, Knowing the Triune God, and The Theological Interpretation of Scripture. I don't believe that theology can be unpractical. It can be good theology or bad, but theology is never unpractical.

Our lives are governed by our beliefs, whether we acknowledge that or not. Perhaps that is why I was frustrated by the conversation at church. This student disagrees with the professors morals, so she says that it is inappropriate for him to preach those morals. At the same time, she enrolls in classes in feminist theology and refuses to recognize that those professors are preaching their morals in the same way. They research the topics that are interesting to them, and their approach to those topics is governed by their beliefs. We witness the ways that beliefs determine actions in the church as well. For example, pastors who do not believe that the Eucharist is a vital practice of the church where we glimpse the eternal God will not worry when the Eucharist is left out of the church. Scholars who do not believe that Christian faith is necessary for the proper understanding of Scripture will give priority to secular scholars.

I chose Duke because of the scholars who teach here, but I was looking for non-modern scholars who refuse to divide faith and reason, theory and practice, and the academy and the church. Thus far, I have been completely satisfied with the level of scholarship that has been available here. I have been pushed by professors who are not afraid to tell us that it is important to learn the history of the church councils because you can hear heresies preached from many church pulpits in America every Sunday. They teach us how belief in the doctrine of the Trinity governs the way we pray. Likewise, disbelief in the Trinity also governs the way we pray, preach, baptize, deal with sickness and death; the list is infinite. Perhaps this is the real reason why I love Duke; it is certainly the reason I came here in the beginning.