Tag Archives: Jesus
A Saint Encounters Jesus
And for whatever it’s worth, I think he’s right. But as I thought about it this week, I realized that this author never said explicitly what he thinks makes a saint. If I were in charge of Messiah’s sainthood development program, how would I know one when I see one? What are the characteristics of a saint? And how do we know they are genuine and not pious frauds?
Black Eyes and Wounded Hips
And the truth about people who do not fear God or respect humans is that they may look and sound and even feel tough, but in fact they are not. All it takes is the right kind of pressure to make the judge in the parable give in. The justice of the widow’s case is not his concern. His concern is only that he should not suffer or sacrifice for any particular outcome.
Losing Yourself and Being Found
As a society, we seem to have over-learned Jesus’s lesson about leaving the ninety-nine to find one who is lost. Or maybe it sounds more familiar than it really is. The stories that attract the heaviest tears and the loudest applause in our society are not stories of steadfast virtue. They are stories of ruin and redemption, of being lost and found. Think about it: would anyone have watched VH1’s series ‘Behind the Music’ if it featured a musician who stayed true to his wife, drank iced tea, and read books while he was on the road? Probably not.
Losing and Finding
So something really strange started happening to me after the birth of our daughter. I would be out with her somewhere, usually with one or both of the boys, and I would become obsessed with the thought that I had left her in the parking lot before we went home. And it was crazy, because I had just buckled her in. But your mind plays tricks on you.
On the Sabbath
Of all the Ten Commandments, this is probably the one I’m worst at. I’m going to go home tonight and work on my book manuscript. And Jewish interpreters insist that studying the Scriptures does not count as working, so maybe I could get off on a technicality. But I know better. I’m working. Working to feel useful, working to make money, working so that I know I am making the best use of my time. Working because I think of time as my tool, not as God’s free gift to me.
Your Name is Written
But either way, Jesus tells his disciples, rejoice that your names are written in heaven. Rejoice that you were sealed in baptism. Rejoice that when your name was called, you answered; you came up, you used the weakness of the moment to seize God’s promises for you. That’s the miracle. That’s the defeat of Satan and his empty promises and his power.
Not in Heaven
In the story Jesus tells, the Samaritan doesn’t say any of that. He is moved with pity. He sees the wounded man and doesn’t see a moral puzzle to solve. He isn’t out looking for ways to do good or make himself into a better person. He simply sees a fellow human who is suffering, who will die if he goes without water for four days, who will bleed to death in minutes or hours if his wounds are not bound up, who will wither away from infection if he is not cleaned. Who sweats and breathes and passes gas and loved his mother and misses his children and is less than perfectly honest and could do better and be better but who most importantly is there. Before the Samaritan’s eyes.
Lambs and Wolves
But what if these three assumptions are not always true? What if people don’t feel the need to build their Sunday—much less their life—around God? What if people have reason to believe they will not be greeted warmly at a church, whether because of their sexual orientation or their ethnicity or anything else? What if people really have felt unwelcome and unwanted, even among good church goers?
Thus Does the God Stand Upon the Earth
It’s as if he were to say, “Go, seek God, have spiritual experiences, work for social justice, redeem the academic project, build a growing and spirit-filled worshiping community if that’s what you want to do, but please, please don’t follow me. It will only bring you sorrow and bitterness.”
Looking Before and After
If you’re operating a plough, you need to make a straight row. If you’re looking back at your house—there are your friends waiting for you; there’s dinner being cooked; there’s your bed, which you left too early and will get back to late—you’re going to make a crooked row. And each row that follows will be worse. But in the mouth of Jesus, this country wisdom takes on a new meaning: If you put your hand to the plough of discipleship and look back, you’ll never be fit for the kingdom of God.
Brutally Ordinary Things 