Necessary Possibilities

For a variety of reasons that would be difficult to explain (since I’m not entirely sure how to explain it even to myself), I have had two concepts/phrases competing for my attention this week.  They are, “what counts as necessary,” and, “as much as possible.”  Weirdly, these thoughts were at war within me until I sat down to write, at which point I realized they might be synonymous.  Perhaps what is necessary is for us to engage in doing things in such a way that they are done as well (or as much) as possible.

Often, I think the word necessary contains connotations that lead toward doing the bare minimum to get by, but if you think long and hard about how we use this word in real life, it is usually attached to radical, uncomfortable situations.  We use it apologetically.  “I’m so sorry, but this is necessary.”  I can over think for weeks at a time about what counts as necessary, to the extent that it would have been better to just risk it in the first place, because it would be less consuming.  But most of the time, the “necessary” is painful in some way.  It is used to describe things we would not otherwise choose.  We are doing this… saying this… being this… because for some reason or another, we have to. 

I have recently been reading James K.A. Smith’s book, “Imagining the Kingdom,” which does not undermine the concept of free will but also presents a realistic understanding of what it is to be inclined toward one choice or another, to be persuaded by the very world we conceptualize as the real world, to act habitually and without deep thought in the vast majority of circumstances.  He articulates things I have agreed with, without knowing it (probably thus proving his point) for a very long time… maybe even my entire life.  Attention is given to the importance of living into regular ritual and routine which forms and transforms us into the people we desire to be, given our understanding of what is good in the world.  I appreciate this considerably (see: liturgist), but I also believe we will still encounter extraordinary circumstances that cause us to take pause, sometimes veering from our culturally ingrained habits as we meticulously consider whether or not we must resist the norm in order to take necessary action.

But again, what is necessary if not “as much as possible”?  And perhaps the question that follows on the heels of this one is: What is possible?  I’m not sure it means merely what can be done.  In fact, I’m pretty sure our desires play into this in more ways than we would often like to admit (sometimes for good, and sometimes… well… not).  For, just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should, and just because you should do something doesn’t mean you will.

I’ve come to realize that the most difficult decisions require us to rank our loves.  They are the decisions that will benefit someone… or something… or some circumstance while taking away from another.  They are the decisions that must be made and that have no win-win outcome.  I should be clear that I don’t think most decisions fall into this category.  I think most of the time we can do things that (at the very least) cause no harm and much of the time we can even find creative solutions in which all parties are (again, at least minimally) satisfied.  But sometimes… rarely… we just can’t.  And when that’s the case, the words “as much as possible” don’t bring any comfort at all to hurting people.  Sometimes, “as much as possible” isn’t enough.  And that sucks.

Smith would argue that what we love defines us.  I think he’s right.  And most of the time, I think that works out pretty well.  But sometimes it hurts.  Still… may we love things (people… places… experiences…) that matter and may we love things that love us back.  I’m not sure that’s solid theology, but I don’t mean that we should only do what’s right or good to those who love us…  of course I don’t mean that!  But may we have enough requited love in our lives that we can make the hard choices and be (at our core) the very most good we are capable of being.

L.

Creeds: It’s Almost Advent

We are so bad at waiting.  And by we, I mean me… but I also mean you.

So, it’s almost Advent.  Every time the liturgical season changes, I find myself saying, “This season is my favorite time of year!”

I say it about Lent and Christmas and Easter and even Ordinary Time.  Advent is no exception, and I’m laughing at myself just a little bit, because even though I claim to be a realist in theory and sometimes measure up closer to a pessimist in practice; as it turns out, I really do love the whole year!  I’m thankful for the changing of liturgical seasons to remind me of this. 

Today, I’ve been working on a sermon for November 26^th, the Sunday before Advent begins.  My local church has opted to extend the Advent season a bit in order to utilize a very beautiful art series, which requires a couple of extra weeks.  It seems we’re not waiting for the waiting!  Ironic.  With this in mind, it made sense for me to move on to the next phrases in the creeds, fully submersed in my own thoughts about how the conception of Christ came to be. 

The Apostles Creed:

“Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
Born of the Virgin Mary,”

The Nicene Creed:

“For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.”

Conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, God incarnate, born to a virgin.   

Stop for a minute and think about that.  I mean, really think about it.  Don’t just skim over it, because that’s the temptation for a story so familiar.  This is unbelievable stuff!

Mary is totally perplexed and presumably terrified (the angel says, “Don’t be afraid”), and can we really blame her?  Yet I’m always amazed that she doesn’t say, “No.”

I want to be exceedingly clear that I think she could have.  Who are we to know if others did?  We have Mary’s narrative, because instead of running from what must have, undoubtedly, been the craziest thing she had ever experienced in her short life; she asked a question that seems to seal the deal.  “How can this be?”

Some translations go on to tell of the lack of impossibility with God, and I like those words.  They’re good words.  But there’s something particularly endearing about the NIV when the words are interpreted, instead, “No word from God will ever fail” (Luke 1:37, NIV).

Sometimes I’m not sure we can wrap our minds around impossible things, but I feel fairly confident that we can embrace the tension between failure and success, knowing full well that neither tends to look like anything we ever could have expected.

The word… or perhaps, the Word (Jesus) will not fail.

And with that, Mary offers consent.  “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38, NRSV), and the rest is history… and theology… and salvation… as God and humanity work together to birth redemption into the world.  (But not yet…  pause in the time of waiting that is quickly approaching to remember what it is to anticipate…)

 
L.

God Who Touches

I’m getting a lot of mileage out of Genesis 32:24-32 this week:

“So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for it is daybreak.’

But Jacob replied, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’

The man asked him, ‘What is your name?’

‘Jacob,’ he answered.

Then the man said, ‘Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.’

 Jacob said, ‘Please tell me your name.”’

But he replied, ‘Why do you ask my name?’ Then he blessed him there.

So Jacob called the place Peniel (which means face of God) saying, ‘It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.’

The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip” (NIV).

Jacob wrestles with God—Undoubtedly, one of the weirdest passages of Scripture… ever…  And yet it is packed with all kinds of important discussion material: Calling, Blessing, Free Agency, Naming, Struggle, Injury, and Scars.

There may not be a better passage that deals with identity, and that’s saying something, because so much of Scripture is about living into who we are as the people of God.  If you know anything at all about Jacob’s story, you also know that he had a hard time with this from the very moment he was born, clinging to his twin brother’s foot! 

For his entire life, Jacob has wanted to be someone he is not, and I think it’s interesting that God connects this struggle to a new identity.  We’ll get to that, but let’s also think for a moment about how very physical this struggle is.  It’s tempting to ‘over spiritualize’ in such a way that we compartmentalize and fail to interact with God holistically.  That’s part of why I’ve taken so much time to work through this series on God and our senses.  It would be so much easier to back God into a corner where nothing ‘real’ ever happens… where we only have to think good spiritual thoughts a couple of times per week in order to be disciples… where God stays in God’s place, and that certainly isn’t in our actual space. 

But we have a God who touches…

In Jacob’s narrative, it’s not so gently, either!  Sure, in the end Jacob wins.  God doesn’t force us to do anything (see: free will), and Jacob seems to have chosen this wrestling match, even refusing to let go!  Yet he doesn’t walk away unscathed.  In fact, he walks away limping.  There is pain involved.   

I recently got into something of a debate (although that wasn’t my intent) about whether or not our feelings matter.  I would say yes.  I would say our feelings are often an extension of our experience, and it is difficult to argue that something is untrue if there is a firsthand account.  I wasn’t trying to imply that feelings are more important than facts, but I was trying to make it clear that truth can be found in both and that feelings hold more weight than data, like it or not.  I am not a fan of the phrase, “perception is reality,” because perception can certainly be skewed, and I guess I have had enough encounters with people who spin lies to be wary of allowing just any perceived story to stand, but there is no doubt that perception is influential and that misperception must be gently and lovingly corrected in order to avoid disaster. 

To claim that our feelings (physical, emotional, mental, social) have no place in relationship to theology and spirituality is to deny our humanity.  If humanity wasn’t on God’s radar, I’m not sure why Jesus was fully human. 

In this passage about Jacob, God touches him.  God wrenches him.  God breaks him.  It hurts!  That seems awful.

There’s a part of me that wants to say, “Well, at least God let him win,” but there’s another part of me that finds it astounding that, after this battle that lasts all night long, God asks Jacob to let go; and when he doesn’t, God calls Jacob an overcomer and blesses him with a new name that he might actually be able to live into. 

Hebrew parents were serious about naming their kids.  Jacob literally means, “he grasps the heel,” and that’s a Hebrew idiom for, “he deceives.”  This is exactly who Jacob has been for his entire life up to this point, but God renames Jacob after this very long and exhausting night that leaves him broken and limping (and I have to imagine feeling physically and emotionally spent).  God renames him Israel, which means, “He struggles with God,” and then God chooses Israel to be God’s very own people.

How crazy is that?

Well, maybe not that crazy.  Don’t we tend to be closest to the people who touch us deeply?  Another phrase for which I have no affinity is, “We hurt the ones we love the most” (double meaning… can’t even figure out how to make a comma help it read one way or the other), but I can’t say there isn’t some truth to it.  Significant relationships can cause pain, even accidentally, because we are always touching.

God has used struggling people from the beginning.  Don’t let go.  Be blessed.

L.