Category: Grace

Addressing the Root Problem

“Where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind.” (James 3:16)

Humanity’s root problem is not irrationality or immorality. Its root problem is spiritual. It has to do with the state of our hearts, the springboard of our values, attitudes, motivations, decisions and actions. When our hearts are off everything is off. When our hearts are filled with selfish ambition there is all manner of disorder. There is breakdown of relationships. There is conflict within ourselves, with other persons, with other creatures, and with society and the world as a whole.

Our rationality and morality make things worse without hearts that are getting right, without our at least beginning to become centered and open to the Spirit of God in our lives. Without a change of heart, we rationalize and moralize the irrational and immoral.

Humanity’s core problem is selfish ambition, egotism. Rather than a self turned outward to our Creator and engaged with others and all creation with the love of God poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, we instead live turned inward upon ourselves and seek to make others and our world conform to our inturned desires. When egotism holds sway, we go to war. We battle religiously and self-righteously. In other words, we rationalize our behavior.

Egotism operates with efficiency to provide justifications for our behavior. Power is exercised to get our way, self-righteousness clouds our conscience, and morality is whatever we make it. We fling moralisms at our opponents.

Then, when we hear from one whose morality comes from a very different place than that of our egocentric view of the world, it sounds foreign, unattainable, unreal. It makes little sense in the world as it is. In such a world, Jesus’ words about where blessing is found must be dismissed because he ignores the dynamics of the “real world” where battles are engaged for leverage and power over others. He tells us blessing is found with the “poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” and with those who mourn “for they will be comforted,” and with those who hunger for righteousness “for they will be filled,” and with “the merciful, for they will receive mercy,” and with “the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God,” and with “those who are persecuted for the sake of justice, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

The alternative to selfish ambition, which gives rise to all manner of disorder, is to acknowledge our deep need and profound hunger for God and for right relationships with others and with creation, a right relationship which comes through a journey of relinquishing our lives to God. Jesus’ central message was “Repent (turn back to God), for the reign of God is near.” Let God reign in your heart and be changed. Come, be on a journey of relinquishing. As Jesus said, “Lose you life and you will find it.” Let go, and keep letting go.

By the help of the Spirit, step away from the fight for power over others and come to a place of freedom to serve and to speak truth to egocentric power. Be witnesses from a center other than the egocentric self. Witness from the place of surrender to God and openness to what God is doing as God calls forth our true self made in the image of God. The false egocentric self remains as a source of temptation, but being released into newness of life by the grace of God provides growth in overcoming this downward pull of self-absorption.

The change that is needed in our families and neighborhoods and nation is ultimately a change of heart, a change in the centering of our lives. Such a change among leaders would bring courage to address the common good rather than serve ambition and personal power. With that change, there is freedom to speak the truth with clarity in response to arrogance, injustice and ruthlessness. Our God-given humanity calls us to an ever deepening journey of trust in God in order to be witnesses to true humanity and true community as gifts of our Creator.

Filed under: Faith, Grace, Humanity, SpiritualityTagged with: , , , ,

Can ICE Agents Be Saved?

”Can they be saved?” is a question that could have been asked of tax collectors in Jesus’ time and place. These traitors who collected taxes in Judea for the occupying power of Rome were at the top of the list of sinners. Religious leaders certainly saw them outside of God’s mercy. They asked Jesus’ followers, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

Can tax collectors be saved? Can ICE agents be saved? Can those occupying cities in this nation, pulling people out of their homes and cars, beating them, shooting them, confining them in inhumane detention centers, deporting them to nations they are not from, separating parents from their children, racially profiling and abusing them be saved? Can White supremacists be saved? (A White pastor who had been detained by ICE was let go with the words, “Well, you’re White. You wouldn’t be fun anyway.” Clearly, White supremacists have been recruited for this activity.)

Can ICE agents be saved?

Can tax-collecting traitors who got rich off the oppression of others be saved?

Jesus was passing by a man named Zacchaeus who was a chief tax collector and was rich. Jesus said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today.” People grumbled at Jesus’ going “to be the guest of one who is a sinner.” But Zacchaeus demonstrated repentance, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” Jesus said, “Today salvation has come to this house…for the Son of Man came to seek out and to save the lost.”

Another tax collector, Matthew, became one of Jesus’ twelve core disciples. Jesus “called Matthew sitting at the tax-collection station, and he said to him, `Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him.” And Jesus made it clear to Matthew, and to all, that following him meant that they “deny themselves and take up their cross and follow.”

Jesus’ central message was “repent and have faith for the reign of God is near.” Let go and let God reign in your lives.

Salvation is open to all. Relationship with God is open to all. The way is repentance. Turn around. Do not continue down the path you are on. Relinquish your life to God. Let God direct your steps.

The message to ICE agents is: “Do not continue to bully and terrorize others. But turn to the God who is Love and have your life turned around, so that you exist for the uplift of others and for seeing other’s needs and serving them.”

Salvation comes to the house of an ICE agent when they repent. Salvation comes to those who oversee ICE, when they repent and bear fruits of repentance. Fruits of repentance are seen when leaders in government no longer center their decisions on holding on to power, but instead take responsibility for leading our nation with compassion and care for all.

By God’s grace repentance, change of direction, and new life is available to all.

Filed under: Grace, Justice, Mercy, Repentance, Salvation, SocietyTagged with: ,

Resurrection To New Life

Therefore we were buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:4)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in one of his last letters from prison, before he was executed by the Nazis, wrote, “The key to it all is the ‘in Christ’.”

In Christ there is no condemnation. “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)

In Christ we are reconciled to God. We are “now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:24) “In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them.” (Corinthians 5:19)

In Christ we become children of God. “In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” (Galatians 3:26-27)

In Christ we are built up and established in faith. “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith.” (Colossians 2:6-7)

In Christ there is true community. “We, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another.” (Romans 12:5)

In Christ there is unity. “There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28)

In Christ we are able to walk in the way God sets before for us. “For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we may walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:10)

In Christ we are set free from what has had us bound. “For freedom Christ has set us free.” (Galatians 5:1)

In Christ we are raised to new life.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, SpiritualityTagged with: , ,

The Ten Commandments, Separation of Church and State, and Cultural Change

Louisiana passed a law that mandates the Ten Commandments to be hung in every public classroom in the state. On the face of it, if you exclude the first four of the ten commandments, the other six express what most people would regard as ethically desirable: Honor your parents, do not murder people, be faithful to your spouse, do not steal, do not bear false witness against your neighbor, and do not covet what belongs to your neighbor.

The first four are of a more religious nature. The first two call us from idolatry (the worship of images, extensions of our imaginations, and therefore of ourselves). The third has to do with not taking God’s name in vain and the fourth with keeping the seventh day holy by making it a day of rest.

The first four commandments clearly make this a religious document, that and the fact that these commandments are expressions of the Judeo-Christian tradition. It is disingenuous to treat them otherwise in a nation that calls for the separation of church and state. It does not work to define the Ten Commandments as an historical and foundational document in the formation of the nation. They remain an expression of ecclesial traditions.

Furthermore, it is clear from the comments made by the mandate’s supporters that the intentions behind this law are directed to infusing a particular Christian worldview into the culture of the state. Clearly, there is a problem with the state espousing a particular religious view. It is a problem for the state and for the religion. We have had a nationalist Christianity from our nation’s inception which was capable of supporting slavery and the dispossession of the land from people indigenous to it. This was a Christianity without Christ—a civil religion, supportive of nationalist goals, and wrapped in Christian rhetoric.

Also, the idea of mandating or forcing a particular Christian view onto a nation and culture has nothing to do with the ways of Christ. This mandating of laws as a way to reform culture was not the way Christ operated. He proclaimed the nearness of God, of God’s reign or governance, and called people to turn to God. He called them to trust their lives to God. He focused on the first commandment that calls us to turn from idols to serve a living and true God. (Along with common idols such as power, money and pleasure, we can make an idol of the Bible, our particular beliefs, our forcing our beliefs on others, our self-made-righteousness, etc.)

The other commandments, within Jewish and Christian scripture, mean very little without the first. Jesus said the central call of God, as the Hebrew Scriptures express it, was to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind and our neighbor as ourselves. From a place of trust in and love of God everything else about being truly human, made in the image of God, follows.

The reality of Christ and of God’s presence come not from politicians crafting legal mandates but from those who are light in the world. To his followers who were coming to know the reality of God’s presence, Jesus said, “Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven” (from whom all good works flow).

Jesus reserved his harshest judgment for religious leaders who hammered people with their laws. He said, “Woe to you experts in the law! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not lift a finger to ease them.”

Jesus represents an entirely different approach to people and to personal and cultural change. He said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Jesus operated by invitation, not mandates.

The change we need is a deep change in the human heart that laws do not reach, but which love does. This change cannot be forced. Mandates crafted by politicians, arrogant in their ability to force through legislation, do nothing to heal and liberate. Love and mercy bring true healing and transformation.

Filed under: Discipleship, Grace, Society, WitnessTagged with: , , ,

A Christian View of Christian Nationalism

By “Christian,” I mean a follower of Jesus who has come to view the world from the experience of “being in Christ.”

By follower of Jesus, I mean one who is being led to:

  1. Bear suffering in order to serve others. 1
  2. Serve rather than seek dominion over others.2
  3. Love rather than judge or condemn others.3
  4. Love enemies and pray for them.4
  5. Love our neighbor as ourselves, no matter who our neighbor is.5
  6. Do justice, love mercy and live faithfully.6

By the experience of “being in Christ” I mean that we:

  1. Participate in the reality of the crucified and risen Christ so that we die to the old in-turned self and rise to “walk in newness of life.”7
  2. Participate in Christ’s love.8
  3. Be led by the Spirit, rather than by religious rules, principles and beliefs which the “flesh” (the ego-centric self) loves.9
  4. Operate by God’s grace through faith, rather than legalistic moralism.10
  5. Trust ourselves, others, and all creation to God, rather than act like we are the ones who have the answer.

When Christian nationalism is viewed from the vantage point of following Jesus and participating in the reality of Christ, it is seen merely as nationalism with a Christian facade. It is an idolatry of the nation undergirded by Christian rhetoric, particularly in the form of “Christian” laws and principles.

Those who seek to bring back the “Christian foundations” of our nation hearken back to an earlier Christian nationalism, one, at least in part, inherited from Europe. They hearken to a kind of Christian morals and mores that existed as a dimension of our nation alongside its constitution, a Christian morality that for many included the institution of slavery and the dispossession of the peoples indigenous to the land. In other words, a Christianity far removed from the message and life of Christ—a Christianity quite capable of horrendous evil.

The present Christian nationalism carries forward the elements of this earlier nationalism, above all in its White (and male) supremacy. It downplays our history of racism, oppression, and injustice and discounts the primary roots of the American revolution and constitution in Enlightenment values.

Of course, there has been another much smaller stream of Christianity (which included European American Christians) that engaged in movements for the abolition of slavery, pressed for peace among nations, and sought social justice.

Above all, it has been African American Christians who, from their lived experience, brought radical clarity to the unchristian reality of our nation. Frederick Douglass called the Christianity of the slave-holding South and those Northern churches that continued to support their Southern counterparts as “sham religion.“

Black Christians continue to offer a critique and an alternative to White Christian nationalism. White Christians must listen to their voices—which means we must repent of our arrogance. By listening with open hearts, we will receive from those who experience the oppressive nature of White Christian nationalism.

The call to follow Jesus and participate in the Christ reality is a call to repent from all Christian nationalism, from all idolatry of nation and of whiteness and of ourselves, and all attempts to have dominion over others. Freed from idolatry, we are freed from feeling like we must secure “our Christianity.” We are freed from safeguarding what we have built (our false Christianity) and therefore freed to serve others.

Jesus calls his followers, not to dominate and bully others, but to be salt and light in the world, to be witnesses to God’s love and mercy in word and in action. At the heart of our witness is a welcoming love toward others that does justice, loves mercy and walks humbly with God.

  1. “If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” Luke 9:23 ↩︎
  2. “But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you, but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave, just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:25-28 ↩︎
  3. “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.” Matthew 7:1 ↩︎
  4. “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Matthew 5:44 ↩︎
  5. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Matthew 19:19 ↩︎
  6. “The weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith.” Matthew 23:23 ↩︎
  7. “We were buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.” Romans 6:4 ↩︎
  8. “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” Romans 5:5 ↩︎
  9. “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.” Romans 8:14 ↩︎
  10. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.” Ephesians 2:8 ↩︎
Filed under: Discipleship, Grace, Justice, Racism, Society, WitnessTagged with: , ,

Who Are Our Enemies?

There is this tendency to identify the bad guys with the assumption that we are the good guys: If we (the good guys) only got rid of all the problem people, all the vermin, things would be so much better. If we simply excluded or neutralized certain kinds of people, maybe whole categories of people, the ones we view as threats, who are the enemies of our communities and our nation, then things would be made right.

Running for president a second time is a man who makes a pledge: “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections.”

He tells us that there are people who are “poisoning the blood of our country, it’s so bad and people are coming in with disease, people are coming in with every possible thing that you can have.” “Nobody has any idea where these people are coming from, and we know they come from prisons, we know they come from mental institutions, insane asylums, we know they’re terrorists.”

It has been noted that this kind of rhetoric has similarities to the language that Hitler used to enthrall the crowds that came out to hear him.

Donald Trump is often accused of creating divisions in our nation, when he is mostly stoking the divisions that are already there. The fear of others, the experience of threat from this or that group of people, the identification of our major problems as being outside of ourselves (those others) rather than within, sets us up for manipulation. Trump simply hooks into our tendency to ignore our own sin and make the place of evil external. The truth, as Paul tells us, is that “we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We are all a problem. We are all in need of spiritual transformation.

We have this tendency to see the problem as being mainly out there in “those people.” Exclude them or get rid of them and things will be okay. This tendency runs deep; it can be tapped into and is tapped into by wannabe authoritarians who need us to have an enemy they can promise to vanquish.

Jesus speaks to this tendency to see the problem mostly outside ourselves: “Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye but do not notice the log in your own eye?” He makes it clear that until we take the log out of our own eye we are in no condition to help our neighbor, to see the speck in order to take it out of their eye.

When we operate with this kind of blindness and “have religion,” we are particularly dangerous. We are the good ones. We have God on our side. We are the ones who know where the problem comes from and what must be done.

It was religious leaders that handed Jesus over to Pilate to be crucified. When given the opportunity to choose the release of either Barabbas, an insurrectionist, or Jesus, they chose the insurrectionist.

When we remain unaware of the depth of our broken condition and project our disorder on others, blaming others for the very things we are guilty of, blaming them for the state of our nation, then we may seek judgment upon them. We gravitate to a leader who will put them in their place. And then, whatever afflictions they experience, we deem those afflictions as something they deserve.

The divisions we maintain with these attitudes run deep. They are ideological, cultural, ethnic, religious, and political. The attitudes that support these divisions are moralistic, judgmental, hardhearted, resentful, merciless, oppressive, and unloving.

The truth is we are all related, children of God, made in God’s image. We are all siblings of the same humanity whatever the differences of culture, ethnicity, religion, and vocation. And we are all broken. And the decisions we make affect others, all children of the same Creator. Therefore, St. Paul writes, “Let each of you look not to your own concerns but to the concerns of others.”

We must stop listening to someone in a position of power or desiring power badmouth our siblings. We must listen to our siblings, far and near, living under different circumstances from ours, facing difficulties, some of which, as with us, are of their own making and some of the making of others. Some experience societal forces pushing them to the margins. Others experience forces that ease them toward the center.

Whoever and wherever they are, we must seek to understand what others are going through, what forces affect their lives and their relationships. Get to know their needs. Get to know them. Have them on our minds, in our prayers. When a so-called leader tells us who threatens us, who we must be afraid of, who must be eradicated, we must refuse to listen. He or she is talking about our siblings. Even if there is someone who makes themselves our enemy, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and pray for them.

When we make decisions that will affect others (when we vote, for example), “let each of us look not to our own concerns but to the concerns of others.” Therefore, get to know the experiences and concerns of others. Hold them in our hearts so that, rather than trample over them, we respond to their concerns.

“Here I am, Lord. Is it I, Lord?
I have heard you calling in the night
I will go, Lord, if you lead me
I will hold your people in my heart.”

Filed under: Compassion, Fear, Grace, Humanity, Mercy, SocietyTagged with: , , ,

Politics Won’t Save Us

When traveling recently, I saw a very large sign that read, “Save America. Vote Republican.” I can imagine a similar sign from a Democrat.

I believe that politics matters and therefore who we vote for matters. When I consider who to vote for, I look for those who demonstrate some sense of social justice, mercy, and faithfulness. I have in mind the prophet Micah’s words about what God requires of human beings: “Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God.”

I expect that those who are committed to justice will have some understanding of what is unjust in our society, what government policies and actions are unjust, and what steps a government can take to address injustices. I also want people in government who demonstrate mercy and compassion, who are not entirely self-absorbed and out for personal power. As far as walking humbly with God, I will settle for a demonstration of some humility. I tend to avoid politicians who do a lot of God-talk.

Politics are important and I take voting and participation in the political process seriously. But I expect very little from politics when it comes to salvation. The unethical ways that political campaigns are run and the ways that many voters are manipulated by appeals to the worst in us do not indicate much in the way of a rescue from what is tearing us apart.

We have ways we talk about our torn selves and society. We use psychological terms (repression, suppression, denial, avoidance, wishful thinking, rationalization, anxiety, obsession, addiction, etc.) and sociological terms (systemic racism, ethnocentricity, discrimination, sexism, power structures, class conflict, etc.). But there is another term that, outside religious circles, gets little mention. And that is the word, “sin.” It points to the underlying spiritual condition of our fragmentation.

In the New Testament letters of Paul, “sin” is often used to refer to the underlying power that affects our lives. Indicative of this are various phrases he uses: “power of sin,” “enslaved to sin,” “freed from sin,” “captive to the law of sin,” “sin that dwells within,” living “under sin,” and not letting “sin reign.” With this language, Paul indicates that sin is at the root of all human brokenness. He, therefore, rejects the idea of listing various sins that we must then work on eliminating in order to better ourselves. Our problem goes much deeper than something we can simply work on.

The problem of sin is the problem of our alienation from the source and center of our being and identity. Ultimately, the change that is necessary is spiritual. All other solutions to this fundamental problem are simply ways of managing our emotional, mental, and physical brokenness so that we can, on some level, maintain relationships, employment, daily business, some semblance of “success,” and the ability to “carry on.”

That is why scriptures, in one form or another, call us to the recentering of our lives. Our deepest need is to be reconciled to God. And, given the depth of our problem, only God can do this. So, Paul writes, “In Christ God was reconciling the world to God’s self.” (2 Corinthians 5:19)

The Gospel of John points to an enlightening that must happen for us to begin to acknowledge the depth of our problem. We are told that the Spirit of truth comes to prove us wrong about sin (It is worse than we think). The Spirit brings us to a point where we acknowledge that our problem is something we are unable to manage. It is more than all our psychological and sociological descriptions and solutions.

Furthermore, the Spirit must prove us wrong about sin, “because we do not believe in [Christ].” (John 16:8-11) We do not believe in the need for God as our Rescuer. We think we can solve our problem. We do not need outside help. We do not need the work of reconciliation that God has accomplished for us in Christ Jesus. So, the Spirit comes to enlighten us.

When we find ourselves giving up on ourselves to fix our problem; when we come to recognize our radical need for help and begin to turn to God, our Liberator, it is the Spirit proving us wrong about the nature of our condition and drawing us toward the help we truly need. Spiritual change is on the way.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, Spirit, TruthTagged with: , ,

Where Is The Resurrected Life Found?

A reflection on Acts 10

Peter, a Jew, found it in a Roman soldier, who, as a soldier, represented the oppression of the Roman empire.

It took a vision and the leading of the Spirit to bring Peter to the point where he invited three Gentiles sent by a Roman centurion named Cornelius into his house and “gave them lodging.” And then went with them and entered into the home of Cornelius.

Peter shared with Cornelius the change he underwent: “You yourselves know that it is unlawful for a Jew to associate with or to visit a Gentile; but God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean.”

The distance Peter traveled could hardly have been greater: He was in the house of a Gentile, a soldier (in Christ, Peter had become a man of peace) and a Roman who represented the occupying power of Rome. Because the distance was religious as well as political in nature, it was a longer way to travel than that of a progressive ideologue sitting down with a conservative ideologue.

What made it possible was a spirituality that recognized the humanity in all. Peter had his eyes openned by the power of the Spirit. He had died to the old way of seeing others and made alive to what God was doing in places where he had not expected to see the resurrected life. The new life that he had found was not far from anyone, if they would turn to receive it.

Peter shared with Cornelius and his household what he had come to see: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.”

Peter speaks of “what is right” as a sign of God’s work in a person’s life. He also refers to the fear of God. But here it is not a slavish fear of punishment, but rather fear understood as taking God seriously, having reverence. The “fear of God” in Cornelius was seen in his life of prayer and care for the poor. This was a man who was open to what Peter had to share concerning Jesus of Nazareth who “God anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.”

Where is the resurrected life found?

It is found where love is practiced, where there is goodness and healing. Peter says nothing about what Cornelius believed but about what he did. The resurrected life is not, first of all, about beliefs or a particular Christian theology. It is about the lived life. Above all, it is about openness. One who thinks of themself as an atheist but is implicitly open to Incomprehensible Mystery and to our true humanity is closer to God than a Christian who has a well-worn Christian ideology, but whose heart is closed to others, particularly to others very different from themselves.

We have seen Christian ideologues operate by falsehood and manipulation, who live for power and are far from “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power” for “doing good and healing all who were oppressed.”

Resurrection to new life is open to all who will receive, wherever and whoever they are. It is not far away. As with the reign of God, new life is near.

Filed under: Grace, Humanity, SpiritualityTagged with: , ,

Christmas Reflections 2021

Jesus came into the same world we live in, with the same pressures and fears and brokenness. He was born in an occupied land, a province of the Roman empire. Like us, the nation in which he was born was occupied by oppression, injustice, and violence. He was born as an outcast. There was no room for him in the inn.

We who have come to know Jesus, who have become his followers and have a taste of God’s reign, are not surprised by how the Messiah and Savior came into the world, how he came to us vulnerable as an infant born in a stable. Everything about his birth points to his life as a whole. He came to outcasts, to the poor, the broken, the sick, the leper, the deaf, and the blind. He came to those that the self-righteous put on their list of sinners. He did not come to condemn people, but to seek and to save the lost.

If we have experienced God’s grace through Messiah Jesus, if we who were lost are now found, we know this is the way God is. We are not surprised that the Savior’s birth is announced to shepherds in the field, rather than to those in positions of wealth and power or to religious leaders who make much of their righteousness and talk down to others.

Shepherds were among those at the bottom rung of society and as far as the religious leaders were concerned, they were ritually unclean. The announcement of the Savior’s birth is made to them. Is not this the way it is with God our Rescuer? God proclaims good news to those who have been marginalized. Our Liberator comes to us in our brokenness and need.

Shepherds in the field “keeping watch over their flock by night” are told that “this will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” The sign that this child is the liberator the world needs is that he is wrapped in rags and lies in an animal trough. And this is good news for us!

God our Savior, who comes to us in Jesus, comes where we are, in our low places, when things have gone wrong, when there is no room for us, when everything has broken down. In fact, when we are at our most vulnerable, most broken, we know, right then and there, that rescue and liberation is present for us.

Of course, when we are full of ourselves and thinking we have it together pursuing life on our own terms, our salvation is still near, but we hardly know it or experience it—until we are knocked off our high horse and perhaps blinded like Paul on the road to Damascus. He went from being full of himself and his self-appointed mission to being vulnerable, broken, and open. At that point he started to let God his Liberator direct his steps, and his mission completely changed.

Jesus described this spiritual reality. He said, “The humble are exalted and the exalted are humbled”—which is good news for both the humble and the exalted. The Savior meets us where we are. God will bring us down from our high horse in order to get us to a place where we will receive what God gives. And when we have hit rock bottom, God will raise us up. Either way it is grace. God’s grace is sufficient in every situation and time of need.

Because God has come to be with us in Christ Jesus, we are finding that we can rejoice in all circumstances. God our saviour is near, whatever we face. With the shepherds on that first Christmas eve, we join “a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!'”

Filed under: Grace, Mercy, Society

Reflections On Lent

We have difficulty admitting weakness. We tend to cover up our fears and feelings of vulnerability, not only before others but within ourselves. We all put up fronts before others and ourselves, in one form or another. Some put forward a front of confidence and strength. Others put up a front of neediness in order to get something from those who appear strong and self-sufficient. In either case, we attempt to control and manipulate situations and others, as if we were the source of our lives. In this denial of weakness, we run from our fundamental need which is our need for God.

The truth is that we are profoundly powerless, helpless, and weak. That we are these does not mean that there is no power, help, and strength for us. But denying this reality of helplessness (or acting like all we need is the strength someone else appears to have) cuts us off from our true power, help, and strength—the “grace that is sufficient” and “the power that is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

One of the aspects of Lent for Christians is the experience of silence and self-examination that puts us in touch with our weakness. We take a step toward our true selves when we acknowledge our cover-ups and our brokenness. We take another step when we willingly share our weaknesses and fears with others. It is at that point that we truly meet one another. We find that we are all in need of God’s grace.

In the season of Lent, we draw near to the cross of Christ which is both the symbol of our brokenness and of our deliverance. At the foot of the cross, we find true fellowship with one another. Gathered around the one who, in dying, took our sin upon himself, our cover is blown; our weakness is exposed. And we find that we all share the same condition. We are a fellowship of broken, needy people, needy for God and God’s liberation through Christ.

Lent is a season for getting in touch again with our weakness, that in our weakness we may discover strength and help and the empowering that is ours in God. We discover that “God is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble.” (Psalm 46:1) The wording of this psalm does not have God giving us strength, but rather that God is our strength. It is in union with God that we experience power. Acknowledgment of weakness and loss opens the door to the power of God available through Christ. Baptized into Christ, we are united to Christ’s weakness, loss, and death. In Christ, we die to our attempts to be strong in ourselves apart from God, and we are released into the power of God, raised with Christ, and made alive to God and God’s will. Thanks be to God.

Filed under: Faith, Grace, Spirituality