Category Archives: Love

A Larger Hope

05 Tuesday Jul 2022

Posted by in All, Church, Heaven and Hell, Journey, Love

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You have heard, perhaps, a horrible scream in the dead of night. You may have heard the last shriek of a drowning man before he went down into his watery grave. You may have been shocked in passing a madhouse, to hear the wild shout of a madman…But listen now—listen to the tremendous, the horrible uproar of millions and millions and millions of tormented creatures mad with the fury of hell. Oh, the screams of fear, the groanings of horror, the yells of rage, the cries of pain, the shouts of agony, the shrieks of despair of millions on millions…Little child, it is better to cry one tear of repentance now than to cry millions of tears in hell. But what is that dreadful sickening smell?
—Rev. John Furniss1

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about eternal damnation: the fires of Hell.  Why?  Two reasons, really.  First, for 2,000 years the Christian Orthodox Church (“Eastern Orthodoxy”) has not believed in “once saved always saved.”  While we believe in the grace and mercy of God, we do not presume to know our eternal destination or that of any other; rather, we are encouraged to focus on working out our own salvation with God’s help.  Second, and relatedly, we are encouraged to think of the “consequences” given in the Bible as only applying to ourselves…to me.  After all, I am the chief of sinners.  We witness to the world and pray for all; however, the eternal destiny of me and all others is ultimately up to God.

So, from that context, I’ve been thinking about the various images of Hell.  The one above is obviously terrifying.  Others express the terror in other ways, such as “people will be tied back-to-back, never seeing the face of another.”  But that, it seems to me, is just a slow descent into eternal madness.

Here is a thought I recently had: Certainly anyone who actually believes in eternal torment—eon upon eon of unending agony and screaming that is beyond anything we can conceive—also doesn’t believe they might actually be there one day.  How could one live in such fear of what may come?

To manage my own fear, I have tried a couple of things that may sound familiar: I have assured myself that having said the “sinner’s prayer” I am no longer under threat of eternal agony; I have also worked to tip the moral scale in my favor just in case God judges like America’s Lady Justice; and, I have compared myself with that “other guy” to find assurance that I’m not so bad…a “nice” guy.  Still…

But, really, though, if I seriously believe that God may indeed pour out His eternal wrath on me, then I should be doing more, working frenetically(!), in fact, to ensure I don’t end up in screaming torment while the clock never moves.

And more, if I really love you, my neighbor, as Jesus says, then I should be willing to do anything for you…or to you…to ensure you don’t end up there.  In the name of my true love for you, then, I should be willing to do anything , including horribly torturing you now, if necessary, until you accept Jesus, rather than allow you to experience eternal torture.

Imagine with me that we have “made it” and are in Heaven.  What about those we love who didn’t make it?  Jesus knew His friends upon His resurrection.  Besides, it is the people we have known who make us who we are.  So, it seems unlikely that God will perform a “blessed lobotomy” on us so that we forget those we love.  Won’t that spoil our bliss?

Continuing, then, imagine we are in Heaven, and somehow looking over the railing at those suffering in Hell.  Perhaps we can satisfy ourselves that “they” had their chance and that “they” are getting what they deserve (I pray I don’t get what I so rightly deserve!).  One way that this has been defended over the centuries is exampled by this quote from Puritan preacher Johnathon Edwards:

The view of the misery of the damned will double the ardor of the love and gratitude in heaven.
—Jonathan Edwards2

Edwards, and others before and since, have believed that seeing the agony of those who “chose poorly” or were “predestined for God’s wrath” would actually increase the joy of those in Paradise with God.

Approaching it differently, however, George MacDonald wrote this:

Who, in the midst of the golden harps and the white wings, knowing that one of his kind, one miserable brother in the old-world-time when men were taught to love their neighbor as themselves , was howling unheeded far below in the vaults of creation, who, I say, would not feel the need that he must arise, that he had no choice, that, as awful as it was, he must gird his loins, and go down into the smoke and darkness and the fire, traveling the weary and fearful road into the far country to find his brother?—who, I mean, that had the mind of Christ, that had the love of the Father?3

Perhaps you can see why this has been on my mind.  In light of God Who “so loved the world” as to send His Son, Jesus, to be born, live, and die for the sake of the world so that death and sin might be defeated, it is hard for me to reconcile this with the belief that most of humanity (Matt 7:13-14) will spend eternity screaming in tortured agony.  MacDonald’s version, not Edwards’ seems Christ-like.

I am in no way suggesting that someone, say a Hitler, be given a “free pass to Paradise” after death.  Life comes with consequences.  However, to imagine that the consequence for turning from God in this “short” life is an eternal existence of agony seems counter to the love of God.  Perhaps there may well be some age of unknown length for the resurrected unrepentant to have a change of heart.  After all, God is infinite, not evil.  God, we read in the Scriptures, will destroy sin, not relegate it to a corner of creation.

Of course I can see from my own life and my life’s experience that the threat of “consequences” is necessary to correct me and restore me to the right path.  However, the threat of eternal punishment sounds like retributive punishment, since there is no possibility of restoration for the one punished.  In fact, the idea of eternal, retributive punishment may do more harm than good.  This, from a priest who has heard a lifetime of confessions:

The dogma of hell, except in the rarest of cases, did no moral good.  It never affected the right persons.  It tortured innocent young women and virtuous boys.  It appealed to the lowest motives and the lowest characters.  It never, except in the rarest instances, deterred from the commission of sin.  It caused unceasing mental and moral difficulties…It always influenced the wrong people, and in the wrong way.  It caused infidelity to some, temptation to others, and misery without virtue to most.
—Rev Rudolph Suffield (1873)4

I may well be wrong in my thinking.  One day I may find that God’s love for all mankind does include some kind of eternal existence in the darkness with teeth gnashing–Satan and the unrepentant continuing to exist in some corner of creation.  I pray not because I am the chief of all sinners and my repentance is so poor.  Please don’t wish eternal punishment on anyone, even your worst enemy.  Don’t say, “I hope there’s a special place in Hell for that person” as I once used to say. Rather, pray for everyone, forgive everyone for everything.  Repent for everything and everyone.  To hope another goes to “Hell” is to risk your own salvation; after all, we only love God as much as we love others. (1John 2:8-11)

The possibility of an alternate view of life after death–a larger hope–has been around a very, very long time.  Summarizing the Orthodox Church’s general doctrine, Archbishop Hilarion Alfeyev writes:

The [Orthodox Church’s] teaching on [Christ’s] descent into Hades, as set forth in 1 Peter 3:18-21, however, brings an entirely new perspective into our understanding of the mystery of salvation.  The death sentence passed by God does not mean that human beings are deprived of hopeful salvation because, failing to turn to God during their lifetimes, people could turn to Him in the afterlife, having heard Christ’s preaching in hell.5

Whether or not all followed Christ out of Hades is not held doctrinally by the Orthodox Church.6

If you are interested in reading more on a hopeful view of life after death, you can start with this list—click here.  In light of the fact that there is good reason—argued for by many saints and scholars over the centuries—to have hope for the eventual salvation of all after death, why would anybody fight for the view of eternal punishment even for a single human?

We should have but one thought: that all should be saved.
—St. Silouan the Athonite

I’ll close with this story I recently read (paraphrased, as I cannot remember the source):

Imagine all of the “saved”—either by God’s election or man’s freewill choice, whichever you prefer—gathered expectantly before the gates of Heaven, all eagerly awaiting admittance.  Amid the joy, the singing, the fist-bumping, the congratulations, and the tears, a rumor begins to spread, slowly at first, but quickly gathering speed.  “Hey, I just heard that everyone who ever lived will be admitted!”  Song turns to shouting: “No way would God allow that!”…“Not fair!”…”I worked hard for this!”…”Who do they think they are!”…”Where are their years of sacrifice like I had to endure!”…”Keep ‘em out, this is our place; we love God!”  The joyous gathering becomes an angry mob at the injustice of it.  And, in an instant, the mob finds itself in hellfire.  And that was the Last Judgment of God.

———————————————————————————————————————————

1  Furniss, John.  The Sight of Hell.  Ch XI-X.  A book written for young children.  Published 1874.

2 Quoted in Allin, Thomas.  Christ Triumphant.  45.  From Edwards’ 1739 sermon entitled, “The Eternity of Hell Torments.”

3 MacDonald, George.  Unspoken Sermons, Series I: “Love Thy Neighbor.”  Quoted in Hart, David Bentley, That All Shall Be Saved.  156.

4 Allin, Thomas.  Christ Triumphant.  7.

5 Alfeyev, Hilerion.  Christ the Conquerer of Hell.  212.

6 Christ the Conquerer of Hell. Epilogue.

Why Us?

19 Wednesday Dec 2012

Posted by in All, Love

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Jesus turned and saw Andrew and another following, and said to them, “What do you seek?” They said to Him, “Rabbi (which translated means Teacher), where are You staying?” He said to them, “Come, and you will see.” So they came and saw where He was staying; and they stayed with Him that day…later, Andrew went and found his brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Christ.”
–The Gospel of John, Chapter 1, verses 38-41, paraphrased

Have you ever wondered why God created us? After all, we seem to be a lot of trouble for Him, so much so that He once destroyed “every living thing” that He had made, except Noah and his family and at least representative pairs of all animals and birds.

But, why would God create us? Some point to Isaiah’s words that say God created us for His glory. Surely this is true. The Westminster Shorter Catechism tells us that “the chief end of man” is “to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” Again, surely this is true. Still, somehow all of this seems a little sterile to me. Using a human relationship, I can glorify a human king by being an upright, obedient subject and by showing proper respect to the king. But beyond that I might never have any relationship with the king.

God moved me beyond my early notion of bringing Him glory when I began to understand Jesus when He said that eternal life is to “know the only true God [the Father] and Jesus Christ whom He sent.” Here, the Greek work for “know” means the most intimate relationship we can imagine. So, to combine the Scriptures, somehow my intimate relationship with God glorifies Him.

But, again, why? What is it about God that wants a relationship with me and yearns for me to have a relationship with Him…a relationship He wants so badly that He, in the person of Jesus, died to have it?

I think have found the answer; and of course I’m not the first to come to this. Here is how I am currently thinking about this question of the creation of mankind. Have you ever had an experience that you found so joy-filled that you couldn’t wait to share it? An experience you just couldn’t wait to invite another into hoping they, too, would share your joy? As a kid I was always inviting other kids to play football or baseball in the park; it was so much fun for me and I wanted us all to have fun. As an adult I encourage friends to go to a particular restaurant or to go see a movie…all things that have brought me joy. Even better are the events in which I share the joy with them, such as shared meals or movies. I really enjoy golf. I find great joy in being outside and walking the course. The (very) occasional good shot I hit is also joyful. My pleasure from golf was actually enhanced when my wife began to play and we could share the joy of the game. It seems natural to us to invite others into that which we have found joyful and in that act find our own joy enhanced; so natural is it that I believe it is part of who we are, part of being made “in the image and likeness” of God.

So, now I imagine the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit; I imagine the perfect love that exists in the relationship, so perfect that the three are distinct and yet one, unified in love. I imagine the joyous love that must always be present within the Trinity, so present that the Apostle John says that God is love. I find it easy to imagine that God, immersed in perfect love and the resulting joy would want to share that experience; not just by showering others with love but by inviting others in to that experience of love. With whom did God choose to share His experience? Us…He created us to share the experience of love with Him, to enter into the same relationship with God that Jesus has with His Father.

With whom did God choose to share His experience? Us…He created us to share the experience of love with Him, to enter into the same relationship with God that Jesus has with His Father.

Can there be any truth more profound? I think not. When Jesus walked the earth He continually invited others along. “Follow Me” was His urging. Some followed; most didn’t. This inviting is, I believe, at the heart of what Jesus means when as His last words to His followers before being crucified He prays for us to be relationally “one” with He and our Father (John 17:22-26).

I have had a few deeply mystical encounters with God in which I have experienced the briefest taste of His love for me. Its power is incapacitating in the moment. The result of each encounter has always been the deepening of my love for Him. And I have the great fortune of experiencing perhaps the best possible human expression of God’s love in my marriage and also with a small, deeply loving community of committed Jesus followers. These experiences have been important events that have moved me along the path of being transformed into the likeness of Jesus. Here is something I’ve discovered along the way: the more I become like Christ, the more I experience the kind of love that exists within the Trinity, and the more I respond to His invitation to join in His love, the more I long for others to experience it…I long to share with you the experience God is sharing with me.

So, I say to you, whoever you are reading this, I have found the Christ…come, and you too will see.

Eros–Self Love

13 Tuesday Nov 2012

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[Jesus,] who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
—Hebrews 12:2

Self-love. Eros love, to use the Greek. I love myself and I want happiness for me. Is that wrong? Some would say so; they would say that it is wrong for me to want anything for myself. Real love, they might continue, is selfless and total unconcerned for self. This line of thinking has already caused me no little consternation in my own life as I think of my motives in a loving relationship. It is a common way to think within Christianity, but is this true?

Apparently, Jesus believe I should love myself. After all, He explicitly endorses self-love:

You shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. Apparently, if I do not love myself then what hope has my neighbor of receiving my love? What hope do I have of obeying Jesus if I don’t love myself?

Bernard of Clairvaux, the 12th century monk, offers a progression of four “degrees” of love that help me think through this (see his work, On Loving God). From lowest to highest, they are:

1) Love self for the sake of self. This is selfish, self-centered love. He refers to this as “carnal” love. This “first degree of love” is where we all start.

2) Love God for the sake of self. This is where I begin being “in love” when another is involved. I remember saying, “I can’t live without you.” It is loving another because of the happiness it brought me. I began my Christianity this way; I loved God for what He could do for me. Whether it was keeping me out of hell or keeping me healthy…I loved God for what I got out of the relationship.

3) Love God for solely because He is God. As I persisted in my relationship with God and begin to know Him, I found myself coming to love Him for whom He is. He is God and I love Him for that alone. And, as a consequence, I found that as He drew me closer to Him I began to see myself in the intense light of His perfect holiness. There was nowhere to hide; in every act I saw my sin. I loathed myself for the stink of my own sinfulness.

4) Love self only for the sake of God. God never loathes me. Jesus died for me; there is no greater expression of one’s love for another than this. A reporter once commented to Mother Teresa how much she loved the poor. She replied, “I don’t love the poor; Jesus loves the poor and I loves Jesus.” She loved the poor for the sake of Jesus. So it is with me: Jesus loves me; therefore, I love myself for the sake of Jesus. This is Bernard’s “fourth degree of love.” Given what I know about myself, what goes on within me, I have no other basis for proper self-love than this. Any other basis of self-love would be delusional and be the selfish love of Bernard’s first degree: self-love for my own sake.

If I love myself for God’s sake, then I say to myself, it is very good that I exist. In fact, philosopher Josef Pieper (Faith, Hope, Love) asserts that self-love is the love “on which all other [types of love] are founded and makes all others possible.” If I cannot apply the test, “it is very good that one exists” to myself, then to whom else can I really apply it? If the deepest form of love is union with another, then whom else am I more one with than with myself? As Pieper says, “unity is closer to the source than union.” With Jesus and with my wife I am becoming united; only with myself am I in unity.

Self-love is a consequence of my creation, of believing in my deepest self that it is good that I exist, then it must be good to seek my own happiness. I am, it seems, created to be a hedonist…a hedonist according to Bernard of Clairvaux. What does it mean to be a Christian hedonist?

If eros is self-love, then look at the other extreme, agapē love, the love God has for us. It is often described as selfless love, sacrificial love, a love free of self-interest, self-protection, or self-gratification. We say that Jesus died for us out of His agapē love for us…but then what do we make out of the joy He felt as He went to the cross? He was joyful because He loved His Father and out of love for Him and for us was crucified. Doing something for the One He loved and for us, who He also loved, gave Him joy. How, then, can we say that Jesus’ love was selfless and free of self-interest? Was it purely agapē love as we like to define it? Is there such a thing as love that is absolutely selfless?

Let’s try the philosophical technique of reductio ad absurdum, taking this idea of selfless love to its logical conclusion. If selfless love is best, then what about painful love? If it is good that I get nothing out of love, then wouldn’t it be better if it hurt? No.

This selfless characterization of agapē love sounds to me like a very antiseptic love, and I think it is a wrong characterization. I love my wife and my love gives me great pleasure. Should I not want that for myself? I love myself, shouldn’t I want happiness for me? Frankly, I cannot conceive of loving my wife without the accompanying joy and happiness it brings me. I cannot conceive of loving God joylessly. The feeling seems mutual; the old prophet Zechariah tells us that God sings over us (Zephaniah 3:17).

Eros, self-love, and agapē, selfless love. If self-love is that upon which every other love exists, then where does self-less love fit? Does eros end where agapē begins? I don’t think so. Consider the paradox of hedonism: it is the concept that one cannot find happiness by seeking it; rather, one finds happiness by living a virtuous life. However, one does not deny the received happiness as the reward of virtue. Bernard says the same thing about love:

Love is an affection of the soul, not a contract: it cannot rise from a mere agreement, nor is it so to be gained. It is spontaneous in its origin and impulse; and true love is its own satisfaction. It has its reward; but that reward is the object beloved. For whatever you seem to love, if it is on account of something else, what you do really love is that something else, not the apparent object of desire.

Tricky stuff. It seems that if I love serving God or love making Him happy, then those are the objects of my love and not God Himself. My joy, then, would be based on service to Him (likely as I define it) or His happiness (also likely as I define it) rather than God alone. My love for Jesus must be based on my affirmation that it is very good that He exists and my desire (out of self-love) to be united with Him. I am choosing to reorder my life to be in loving relationship with Him. It that because of self-less love or self-love?

I love God and I love my wife. I hope I would find it true were it ever put to the test that I would do anything for them, even giving my life. It is self-less in the sense that I desire nothing more than them. It is selfish in that out of their joy of being loved I receive the very pleasant reward of joy, the desire for which is born out of my self love, my eros.

So, unconditional love between lovers would be each wanting only the other, and out of the joy of the other experiencing joy. In this light, to even talk of “sacrificial love” seems foreign; for the lover there is no sacrifice, there are only acts of love for one’s beloved. For the joy set before Jesus, he endured the humiliation of the cross…my, what love.

The Glory of Jesus Given to Us?

05 Monday Nov 2012

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The glory which You [God the Father] have given Me [Jesus] I have given to them [Jesus followers], that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me. –Jesus; The Biblical Gospel of John, 17:22-23

“It’s very good that you exist.”  Believing this of another is the ultimate in positive affirmation that the other exists, and it is, I have been claiming, the biblical basis of love.  It is what God said about us in the beginning (Genesis 1:31).  It is what we must hear God say to us and more importantly, it is what we must experience from God to be able to love in His way.  It is what we must offer to others if we claim to follow Christ (1John 4:7-21).  However, it is easily misunderstood.

It seems to me that our American culture (all of Western culture?) has taken this “very good that you exist” thing wrongly because of the way our culture has redefined tolerance as affirming anything that makes the other person “happy.”  Consequently, a critical element of love, implied in the statement, has been overlooked.  It is indeed very good that I exist.  I need that affirmation from God and from others in my life.  What it doesn’t mean, however, is that everything I do is good or even that every aspect of who I am is good.  The God of the Bible does not tolerate all behavior and being in the way our society has come to expect.  In other words, who I am and what I do is not indiscriminately excused by God if it is indeed not “good” according to His nature (see my recent blog on forgiveness).  Therefore, as a Jesus follower I cannot indiscriminately affirm aspects of being or behavior that are not “good” according to God’s morality and commands. This applies to me and others–and I’m assuming with great humility that I can know to some extent “good” as defined by God.

I believe that God yearns for our “goodness,” that He wants the best for us; this is clearly seen in the Bible in God’s promises, culminating in Jesus’ death for us and His subsequent resurrection.  Returning to God’s own statement of the very goodness of creation (Genesis 1:31), what is meant there by “good” is “the purpose for which it was created.”  It is very good that all of creation, including you and me, exists for the purpose God intended.  Therefore, it is good that I exist within the context of my becoming fully whom I was created to be.  You, too.  For me, this “becoming” means to journey towards a life ultimately free of the lies in which I have come to believe and the inner wounds I have suffered, a life free of the fears with which I live and the hurt I inflict on others.  I believe Jesus makes this explicitly clear that it is also God’s desire for us in what He says He gives us (see the passage at the top of the page).  He explicitly gives glory to those who follow Him, the very same glory given to Him by God, His Father.

So, what exactly is this glory Jesus gives us?  Theologian M. Robert Mulholland Jr. (Dictionary of Spiritual Theology, Zondervan) notes that an aspect of the Greek word doxa (glory) refers to the “essence of a person, that which makes a person who he or she is” (216).  In John 17:1, Jesus tells us that the Father (God) and the Son (Jesus, God-Man) “glorify” each other.  In other words, both Father and Son find their essence, their true identities only in relationship with each other.  Try this: a human father has no identity apart from his son (or daughter).  It seems obvious that for one to have identity as “father” requires the existence of one’s child.  Similarly, for one to have identity as “son” or “daughter” requires that one has a father.  And so it is with God.  God the Father finds His true identity as Father only in relationship with His Son, Jesus.  Similarly, the Son, Jesus, finds His true identity as Son only in relationship with His Father.  Mutual glorification, therefore, means that only in relationship with each other do Father and Son fully become who they each are (see John 17:1, 5).  And not just any relationship will do, such as acquaintance or friend, it must be a relationship of loving union…they, Father and Son, are one (see John 10:30).

This is the same glory Jesus is offering to us when we choose to follow Him: the glory He has with His Father, God.  Jesus is saying to me that it is only through the same relationship of loving union with God that He has can I find my true identity and become fully who I am meant to be.  (Some writers call this my true self as contrasted with my false self.)  This loving union is the relationship Jesus intends for us in John 17:3 when He defines eternal life as “knowing God and Jesus,” where “knowing” means the most deeply intimate knowing of another person one can imagine.  It is a “knowing” that is most often used when referring to the intimacy between husband and wife that takes a lifetime to achieve (and it is never actually “achieved” since the journey of becoming intimate is eventually interrupted by the death of one spouse–with God, my “knowing” Him, an infinite being, in this deeply intimate way will take an eternity).  Therefore, the glory offered to me by Jesus is to become my true self–the image of God I was created to be– through a relationship of loving union with Him (this relationship is sometimes referred to as the “transformative union” with God).

So, with this understanding of love as affirming the goodness of one’s existence and wanting the best for one, which can only in relationship of loving union with God, then what does it mean for me to love my neighbor as I love myself (Matthew 22:39)?

Self-love is me affirming that it is very good that I exist, where the goodness referred to is that I become freely me–my true self–the me I was created to be, the me whom is free of the baggage of the lies I’ve believed and still believe, the hurts I’ve experienced and caused, the fears that torment me, and the failures that haunt me; it is the me free from all the baggage that hold me captive and feeds my false self.  This is the goodness I intrinsically want for myself, it seems built in to humanity that we each want this for ourselves. I long for this in the depths of my soul…and I can only find it in  a relationship of loving union Christ.

Then, if this is the healthy way I love myself, what about my neighbors?  I surely must want this for them, too.  I must affirm that it is very good that they exist and I must want the best for them, as well, which is for them to become fully the person who God created them to be.  Therefore, I must want them to be in a relationship of loving union with God.  This means I must not want for them anything else, nothing, no matter how pleasant it may seem in the moment, that would interfere with this transformative union with God from starting or from continuing in a healthy way.  And, again, I must exhibit great humility in expressing what I want for and not want for my neighbor.

As for my enemies (Matthew 5:44)…well, the same thing must apply if I am to love them as commanded by God.  I must affirm the goodness of their existence and I must want for them the things that move them toward a relationship of loving union with God.  Only in this way, it seems to me, can I fully and rightly (righteously) hate the things they do to interfere with their relationship with God thereby preventing them from becoming fully themselves as they are created to be by God.

This, I believe, is what it means to hate the sin but love the sinner, whether that sinner is me, my neighbor, or my enemy.

Sadly, not everyone will appreciate this point of view; most, in fact, will not (see Matthew 7:13-14).  Our society spends a lot of money trying to convince us, and we try to convince ourselves and each other, that many, many things and behaviors are good for us when, in fact, they keep us from this type of relationship with God, and, therefore, from becoming who we are in Christ.  Generally, most of us don’t want to become fully who God created us each to be, at least from God’s perspective; rather, we continue to think we know better than God what is best for ourselves.

A relationship of loving union with Jesus, a transformative union: it is what Jesus means when He says He is the only way to God, the Father (John 14:6).  No other relationship will do.  None.

Becoming my true self in relationship with Christ, this is what it truly means to be “saved.”

Love Gives

30 Tuesday Oct 2012

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A Play in One Act…and my apologies to Broadway.

Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.
–Jesus; John 15:13

Of course I know who he is. What? I cost the guy his life! Whadayamean by that? The DA is calling it what? Criminally negligent homicide! Hold on there, sport. Wait just one minute. You got nothing on me. You can’t hold me. I know my rights. Besides, I barely knew the guy.

You’ve got the wrong guy, I tell you. I’m a pretty good fellow, really. Ask anybody. I pay my taxes, I generally obey the law, I’m a pretty good husband and neighbor. I’ve got a good job; been there for years. Oh yeah, I go to church every Sunday, haven’t missed one in, well, a few weeks. I’m respectful of my elders, too, and I like kids. I take good care of my dogs. Our house is in good repair. I mow the lawn and tend the flower beds. I ride my bike on bike-to-work day, and we recycle! Ask anybody, I tell you, anybody. Well, almost anybody. I’m certainly not like one of those other kinds of people…you know the type.

Well sure, I’ve done some “bad” stuff, I suppose, everybody has. For the small stuff I did I thought this Jesus guy just winked and smiled at me like a doting grandfather. For the more serious stuff I did (and I assure you there has been very little of that!), I think he punished me a bit; I admit that probably deserved that. Some minor punishment was okay with me. Nothing I did could possibly have caused his death. We barely knew each other, I tell you. Tell me again why you are charging me with homicide?

Alright, you could say that some of what I did was wrong, I guess, if you really must use that old word. And I admit to sometimes even knowing that it was wrong before I did it. But most of it seemed harmless at the time. Yes, of course there were those few times when I admit to knowing beforehand that there would be consequences to others, and I didn’t care. There, I said it. Sometimes I didn’t care. But later I did say I was sorry, didn’t I? Sometimes I was even reeeally sorry. That didn’t fix it?

Okay, so there’s a little bit of criminal in all of us, so what? We all do wrong sometimes. It makes life a little exciting, “living on the edge” like they say on those reality TV shows. But that doesn’t make me a bad person. I’m just living my life my way, I’m a Nike-kind-of-guy! Just “do it,” you know. Acting with negligence? No way. Maybe I occasionally acted recklessly toward others, but what risk did I expose him to? Nothing big, I assure you. This guy Jesus, whose death you say I caused say was never at risk for my actions. I can’t do anything to him, he’s God; I told you, I go to church, I know these things. So, negligence on my part is for sure out of the question. Out! of! the! question!

What do you mean, God is love? I know that; church-goer, remember. What has that got to do with anything? Besides, if God is love then he could have turned the other cheek, right? Overlooked the stuff I did. He didn’t have to die because of me. And I certainly didn’t cause him to do it, he volunteered. Can’t blame that on me, no sir. He didn’t have to do it, you know. Yep, just a little punishment for me and things would have again been just fine between us. Slap on the wrist, swat on the behind…that’s all it would have taken. None of this dying stuff. Remember, I’m not one of those people. Not me.

He had to do it? What do you mean, “He had to do it?” And I should have known it! How can you say that?! How could I have known that little fact? Yeah, I know all about forgiveness. I told you that I said I was sorry to those people I wronged. Isn’t that enough? A gift? What gift? I didn’t get a present. Two presents! Wait, I got two presents?! Oh, I’ve been offered two presents, one from those I wronged and one from him. I don’t get it. I wronged him and some others and they offer to give me a present…how can that be? Well, since I don’t have it, what present did they offer me? Not holding my guilt against me? Hold on just one minute. Who said I was guilty of anything? Not me! Okay, I guess if I did those few things wrong I’m technically guilty, I guess.

But, why would anybody offer to give me that kind of present when they could hold my guilt over my head, make me owe them? Dog-eat-dog world, ya know. Love? Are we back to that? Are you telling me that because he, and those others I wronged, love me so much they freely offer me this present? Whadayaknow? Maybe there are two kinds of people in this world, them that take and them that get taken…they seem stupid to me. What’s in it for them? Yeah, I know…love.

But why die? What’s this present got to do with him dying. Why did he have to die if I’m guilty–not that I’m admitting to anything, of course? Compelled by love, you say. Wasn’t there another way? Well, sure I did; when I wronged those others I tried to fix what I broke; you’d have to be a real jerk to just walk away. I own up to it when I screw up; always have, always will. I make it right. You’re saying that’s why he died, to fix what broke? Look, I keep telling you that I go to church and the preacher says that God is perfect; so, how could he break anything. What I broke?! He died to fix what I broke?!

So, let me get this straight: you are telling me that he gave me the present of not holding my guilt over my head and he died to fix what broke because of me? So, he wrapped the present and opened it? What’s left for me to do, he’s done everything? Accept the present; sure, I can do that! Gimme the thing. I’m holding my hands out, God…where is this present?

Wait, it can’t be that easy. What’s the catch? No catch, you say, just admit my guilt. Is that all? I knew it! I’ve seen enough of those cop shows to know you all lie. You offer a deal, then get you to confess and, wham!, in the slammer you go for life. Bait and switch. You just want me to admit to this homicide. Clear the books. Another case closed. Well, no way. No way. No way. No way.

What! You are not so smart, you know; pretty dumb, really. Here’s a tip: this doesn’t help at all to get me to confess. You’re telling me now that if I confess my guilt to get this present, my guilt is not held against me, he fixes what I broke, but I STILL get the death penalty?! See, I knew it! Do you think I’m a complete imbecile? You were trying to trick me. You left out that little fact of THE DEATH PENALTY! Reborn? What do you mean, reborn? I get the death penalty and them I’m reborn. Sure. Right. No such thing as reincarnation, buddy boy.

Really? I’m reborn? You are going to stick with that? Yeah, the preacher does say he came back from the dead. He can really do that for me, too? Yeah, I guess he can, after all, he created this whole mess of a universe. Reborn. Hmmmmm, let me get this straight. I’m reborn, that means new fingerprints, a new face, new DNA…a whole new identity? Hey, then nobody could pin these charges on me, right? I’d be a free man. It’s better than double jeopardy. Oh?, not reborn like that…but I would still be free of the charges? And he will have forgotten them? Hey, maybe this deal isn’t so bad after all, accept for that dying part.

More? He’ll adopt me? The same guy who you say died because of my criminal negligence will give me a new identity by adopting me into his family. Really. This is like no fairy tale I’ve ever heard. Disney should be rolling over in his grave. No, I don’t want to hear that he is no longer in his grave. My head hurts enough already over this.

Stop! There can’t be more. Stop, I say. He’ll what?! Relocate me? Wait…if I have a new identity, then why do I need witness protection? Is this a conspiracy case? Is there somebody else involved in his death? Who else is in on this? YOU! You have a record, too! Not any more? What do you mean, “Not any more”? Ah…you accepted his gift?! You died and were reborn? Ha! For a guy whose been reborn, you don’t look so good. And I can see why: in your dealings with me it’s plain that you aren’t too good at this negotiating stuff. I’ll get a better deal in exchange for my guilty plea, I can promise you that. Maybe I’ll negotiate a full head of hair. Yeah, ha!, you didn’t do so good. What, you didn’t have a lawyer?

What do you mean “now and not yet.” Even though you have a new body it is still yet coming; you have been relocated but not fully; you are adopted and still becoming a son…geez. I’ll certainly get my deal now; I’m not waiting around for “not yet.” A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, ya know.

All this. I get all this and all I have to do is confess? Let me ask you, did it hurt to die? Great, I told you how bad you were at this. If it is good and hard how did you do it? How do you keep it up? He what?! He helps! After what you did, and what I allegedly did, to him…he still helps? Foolishness. You gotta know that this story gets more and more foolish to a wise guy like me. Do you ever clear any cases? Your job must be like trying to coax a camel through the eye of a needle. Where is my lawyer?

God’s Double Bind

22 Monday Oct 2012

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If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
–The Apostle John; 1John 1:9

How can a loving, holy, and just God say to both the murderer and to me, “It very good that you exist”? Doesn’t it seem that God has put Himself in a bind when He created free-willed humans who turned against Him? On the one hand, God loves us so much that He wishes none of us would be out of relationship with Him (2Peter 3:9). On the other hand, God is just and He cannot affirm our wrong behavior, it cannot go unpunished (Romans 1:18-19). This is not just a bind, but a double bind (see Miroslav Volf’s book, Free of Charge).

God loves us and doesn’t want that we should get what we deserve; God cannot let our offenses go unpunished. How does God get Himself out of this double bind? He forgives.

Perhaps by understanding God’s forgiveness of me I can better understand how to love myself and those around me (Matthew 22:39).

Anytime I act contrary to God’s ways, I commit an offense against Him. Lying, cheating, greed, anger, wishing I were someone else, lust…whether in thought or deed in these, and more, I offend God. For His part, God first names the offense, calling it what it is. Sin. Then, He offers us the gift of not holding my sin against me (Isaiah 43:25). He must do both, for failing to name the sin merely excuses it and failing to not hold it against me leaves me forever guilty.

Then there is my part. To receive God’s forgiveness, I have to accept both the accusation and the gift. To refuse to admit my wrongdoing is to say I did nothing wrong and do not need forgiveness. As evidence that I am genuinely sorry, I perform “deeds appropriate to repentance” (Apostle Paul’s words, Acts 26:19-20); that is, I try not to do it again (to see how serious my effort should be, see Hebrews 12:4).

Some 500 years ago, Martin Luther said this:

There are two kinds of sin: one is confessed, and this no one should leave unforgiven; the other kind is defended, and this no one can forgive, for it refuses either to be counted as sin or to accept forgiveness.

Only when both parties fulfill their part can forgiveness in its fulness occur leading to the point of it all: restoration of relationship.

And yet forgiveness may not cancel the consequences of my actions. Forgiveness does not undo the offending deed; often there has been “damage done” to persons or property for which the offender must be accountable.

Forgiveness between humans is much the same. If offended, I must name the offense and not excuse it by sweeping it under the rug. And, I must offer the gift of bearing the burden of not demanding revenge; rather, I offer the gift of release from guilt. If I am the offender, I must admit to the wrongdoing and accept the gift of release from guilt (of course, only God can release me from my ultimate gift; that is why true forgiveness must involve three people: the offender and the two offended, God and the human). I must also attempt to perform the deeds appropriate to repentance, which may be working to rebuild trust, paying for broken things, jail time…

In the case of the murderer of Jessica Ridgeway, we must name the offense for what it is, a horrifically evil deed. We must not hurry past that in a rush to forgive. And we must also carry the burden of not seeking revenge, instead offering the murderer the gift of release from guilt, thought the punishment may be life imprisonment or even the death penalty.

I must forgive others because God has done it for me, and this is what it really means to love the sinner and hate the sin. It is something I am quite well practiced at when it comes to myself and my own behavior. God first says to me, “It is very good that you exist” and offers me forgiveness. I say to myself, “It is very good that I exist” in spite of my behavior, accepting God’s love of me. And because God first loves me and I love myself, I must also love my neighbor in the same way (Matthew 22:39), saying, “It is very good that you exist.”

An Enemy of God…Who, Me?

18 Thursday Oct 2012

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“You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘You shall not commit murder’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
–Jesus; the Gospel of Matthew, 5:21-22

It is very good that you exist. This, according to philosophers and, I believe, the Bible, is the basis of love. I left off wondering whether I could really say that to an enemy, someone like, say, the killer of this 10-year old Colorado girl, or the Taliban who shot the 14-year old Pakistani girl who stood up in her country for the right for women to be educated. Is it really very good that these kinds of people exist?

In His famous speech, called the Sermon on the Mount because it was made on a hillside, Jesus equates anger with murder. Broadly speaking, it seems there are two kinds of anger. First, there is “other-centered” anger born out of wanting the best for another: “You knew the material but you failed the test!” Jesus’ anger was this kind of “other-centered” anger. The other kind of anger is “self-centered” anger. This anger arises in me when you act to thwart my will by not letting me have my way or what I think I deserve: “That idiot cut me off in traffic.” The vast majority of anger is this type, I think.

At first, Jesus’ equating anger with murder seems astonishing, particularly when I realize He is talking about any self-centered anger, even angry thoughts. After all, don’t we say, “sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me.” Every school child learns this rhyme. We learn to excuse words spoken in anger at an early age. Yet Jesus doesn’t seem to distinguish between types of anger, all is equated with murder. The angry and the murderer are each destined for a “fiery hell.”

Why does Jesus do this, set this impossibly high standard by equating anger and murder? Isn’t it because anger is one of the roots of evil acts in the world? Jesus’ brother James says it this way (James 4:1-4):

“Where do you think all these appalling wars and quarrels come from? Do you think they just happen? Think again. They come about because you want your own way, and fight for it deep inside yourselves.

You lust for what you don’t have and are willing to kill to get it. You want what isn’t yours and will risk violence to get your hands on it. … You’re spoiled children, each wanting your own way. …

If all you want is your own way, flirting with the world every chance you get, you end up enemies of God and his way.”

Self-righteous anger denies that it is very good that the other exists. It says instead, “Get out of my way, your very existence is impeding me!” Murder may be the ultimate expression of this anger–the actual causing another to cease to exist–however, whether murder, other violent acts, abusive words, angry outbursts, or hurtful thoughts, all come from self-centered anger; the root is the same for all. So, according to James, even an angry thought born out of my self-centeredness makes me an enemy of God as much as the murderer!

It is very good that you exist. The murder kills; I act out of only run-of-the-mill anger; we are both guilty in the eyes of a Holy God. So, if I can’t say that it is very good that the killer exists, then how can I say it about myself? And yet, God says it about both of us, the angry and the murderer. How can that be? More thinking to come…

We Are Blessed

17 Wednesday Oct 2012

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God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them…
–The Biblical Creation Account; Genesis 1:27-28

In his book, Faith, Hope, Love, Josef Pieper examines the language we use to describe the various types of love, (e.g., self-love, friendship love, erotic love, selfless love) and finds a common theme regarding the nature of love: acceptance, in the sense of the Latin meaning, “good.” God’s first act toward created man and woman was to “bless” them, to praise their existence and to accept the first humans as “very good” (Genesis 1:31) “It is very good that you exist,” He says to all of mankind. This acceptance is based on nothing other than our very existence as humans, not our looks, our performance, or any other quality beyond our existence as humans.

Setting aside for a moment the fact we each have behaviors that should not be excused, stop and feel this statement: It is very good that you exist as a human being.

It is very good that you exist; for me, this offers the most profound comfort, a near tear-producing sense of acceptance in the core of my being. I feel a freedom I have never known, freedom from trying to earn acceptance and freedom from the fear of losing it. In God’s eyes, it is very good that I exist. God said it a little differently to His Son Jesus: “This is my Beloved in whom I wam well pleased.” This is the love God has for us, too.

Philosophers going back to Plato have tied one’s love to the acceptance of the other’s existence. Further, they have noticed that there are healthy degrees of acceptance. For example, I feel toward a stranger, and toward a friend, and toward my wife that it is very good that they each exist. Yet it is clear to me, and these philosophers agree, that I feel a different degree of passion toward a stranger than I feel toward my wife.

In the case of the stranger my affirmation of his goodness of existence simply acknowledges he is a creation of God. I have a general, caring passion–love–for him in the sense that he is a fellow human being. At the other end of the scale, however, my love toward my earthly beloved (my wife), entails an additional desire or passion to be united with her: a desire that we two become one flesh (Genesis 2:22-25). We remain remain distinct persons, but are united by a common passion to deeply know the other.

My longing for oneness with my wife is not surprising to me. It is a result of my Trinitarian theology. God is three separate persons, distinct in that the Son is the begotten of the Father and the Spirit precedes from Father and Son. And yet they are one in essence, each sharing the attributes of God. They are also one in relationship: theologians call it “mutual interpenetration,” Father, Son, and Spirit each in the other and each with the other in them. There is unity in their diversity.

I’m made in the image of God, Who is love. While God cannot share His essence with me, those things that make Him God, such as His infinite nature (I am forever finite), He has elected to allow me to share in His relationship; I am one with Him in relationship (see Jesus’ words in John 17:25-26). So, it is no surprise to me that in an earthly relationship I should long to be one in relationship with my beloved, my wife.

Great stuff, at least to me.

So, my love for another, in its most basic form, is the affirmation that it is very good that the other exists. But…doesn’t this understanding of love make it that much harder to obey Jesus and love my enemies, and in this particular case, Jessica’s killer? Can I really say to this killer, “It is very good that you exist?”

It Was Very Good

15 Monday Oct 2012

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God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
–The Biblical Creation Account; Genesis 1:31

God talks to me a lot. That may sound funny to many; however, it is true. No, it is not an audible voice; rather, He speaks to me through others, usually authors, and most frequently through authors who are no longer living. Is has ceased to surprise me that as I am puzzling over a question authors will appear with whom I can enter into the question at hand. This quetins of loving one’s enemy is no exception. Enter Josef Pieper, a German Christian (Catholic) philosopher who specializes in the writings of Thomas Aquinas. My thinking is my interacting with his (Faith, Hope, Love, Ignatius Books) writing on love and that of others.

Love is one of the three theological virtues; faith and hope are the other two. The greatest of these is love (1Corinthians 13:13); faith and hope cannot be understood apart from love. But, what does it mean to love? Poets have tried for millennia to describe it. “How do I love thee…” Elizabeth Barrett Browning famously asks, then tries to answer. St. Paul, the poet, tries to describe love in his letter to Corinth (Love is patient, love is kind,…1Corinthians 13:4-8). Poetry, in fact, seems to be the only language we have to express love, and even often it seems inadequate even in the hands of a master poet.

St. John, often called the Apostle of Love, dispenses with poetry and states a brute fact: God is love (1John 4:8). This is what Christians believe and it is at the heart of the Christian conception of love: we must love our neighbors because God first loved us (1John 4:19); failure on our part calls into question our love for God (1John 4:20); mutual abiding, God in us, us in God, perfects love within us (1John 4:16-17).

The Christian account of creation begins with, “In the beginning, God created…” All that is other than the Trinitarian God Himself–Father, Son, Holy Spirit–has been created by God, this is the Christian view. At the end of the creation period (six days or day-ages), God “saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). It was very good. In God’s eyes, it is good that the creation exists. Why is the creation “good”?

To answer that question, it seems to me, is to answer the question, “Why did God create?” I can’t pretend to know the motives of God; however, perhaps we can infer at least some of the answer. The trajectory of the Christian scriptures, the Bible, tell us that God wants a relationship with us, and more than a God-servant relationship, He wants to share the very relationship with us that exists between God the Father and God the Son (Jesus). We are invited to be one with Jesus as Jesus is one with God the Father (John 17:25-26). Perhaps, then, the love that exists between the three persons of the Trinity is so profound that this loving God determined to share it with created beings made in His image (human beings, see Genesis 1:26).

Loving Enemies

15 Monday Oct 2012

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“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?”
–Jesus; The Gospel of Matthew, 5:43-47

In Colorado, a 10-year old girl, Jessica Ridgeway, is kidnapped and, days later, found dead in a field. The community is deeply shaken and scared. The killer is still at large.

We are told by Jesus to love this killer.

How can this be? By societal norms all would agree that the act itself was monstrous; many would call the killer a monster. Yet, Christians are called to respond by loving this person, the killer of a child. It seems to make no sense; surely Jesus is mistaken, He was really talking about your average run-of-the-mill enemy, right? the kind of person that just insults us or perhaps the neighbor who has a dog that barks all night. He didn’t really mean to love this sort of person, did He? Certainly they are beyond our love; only God could possibly love such a being.

Love the sinner, hate the sin, isn’t that our standard Christian response? Hating the sin is easy; loving the sinner is fine in theory, but it seems hard in this particular case to be able to love the person who would perpetrate such a horrific crime and inflict such pain on the young girl’s parents and the community at large. How does one love while simultaneously hoping the killer is caught and punished? And we are commanded to do more than love, we must also pray for this killer. Certainly there can be no harder command of Jesus than His command that we love and pray for this kind of neighbor.

These kinds of questions have led me to wonder about the true nature of love as God intended it, and not as our culture has corrupted it (e.g., reducing love to sex or tolerance). Maybe by understanding how to love and pray for this killer as God would have me I can better understand what He means when He says to love Him with all that I am and to love my neighbor, including the terrorists, my literal neighbors, and my family members as I love myself.

If you are following along, I’m going to try to keep the individual posts of my journey through this shorter; however, they may be more frequent because I want to work through some of what I’ve been reading, and this is my means to do so.