Goodness doesn't know

Yes, goodness knows
The Wicked's lives are lonely
Goodness knows
The Wicked cry alone
Nothing grows for the wicked
They reap only
What they've sown…

Last week I went with my family to see the musical Wicked.

It has some fab tunes (by Stephen Schwartz of Godspell and Prince of Egypt fame) – and, more than that, a thought-provoking story. The musical is based on the novel by Gregory Maguire, which is in turn a subversion of L. Frank Baum’s book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and the iconic MGM movie that has taken audiences over the rainbow and along the yellow brick road since 1939.

Avoiding major spoilers, let’s put it like this. The story takes that gloriously 2D baddie, the Wicked Witch of the West, and tells her story in a way that turns it on its head. Villainess becomes heroine. The witch, Elphaba, is a sparky, inventive and idealistic young woman with a gift for casting spells. But she is rejected for being different (in this case ‘like a froggy, ferny cabbage…unnaturally green!’) Sealing her fate, Elphaba falls foul of Oz’s corrupt political masters who play on general ignorance and fear to spin her as an enemy of the people – hence the version of the story we see on our TV screens every Christmas Eve. The way the plot manages to twist and turn all those familiar motifs – from scarecrow to broomstick to ruby slippers – is truly, well, wonderful.

The show opens with a spectacular musical ensemble as the citizens of Oz celebrate the witch’s recent death. (You can listen to it here, with lyrics here.)

Forget ‘Ding dong the witch is dead’ – this number, with its blending of major and minor strains, is musically ingenious, and here’s why. Remember Lewis Carroll’s poem, Jabberwocky? The genius of this poem is that the first verse, complete with all its made-up words, is identical to the last verse – but means exactly the opposite. The first verse is sinister and menacing, the last verse – though using exactly the same words – is joyous and celebratory. Well, Wicked’s opening works similarly (though in reverse). The opening number is a joyous celebration of the witch’s death. The closing number is the same song – but now the minor tones come to the fore and it takes on a sinister, even tragic feel, and the words become deeply ironic.

The reason? In the interim we've ‘got to know’ the witch. We've been told her story. We understand her. We love her.

So now we cannot celebrate her death, but only mourn her as a terribly maligned scapegoat.

It strikes me that Wicked has a thing or two to teach us about prejudice and scapegoats. Those who seek power – political or religious or social – need scapegoats. They need someone to blame, someone to direct the fear and hatred of the populace toward. Hitler and the Jews is a very obvious example – but there are examples closer to home.

Fear the immigrant. Fear the gay. Fear the scrounger. Fear the Muslim. Fear the ‘other’. Et cetera. Fill in the blank according to your brand of prejudice.

It leads to soundbites and spin at best, violence and persecution at worst. ‘Goodness knows’ (that is, of course, we know) ‘the wicked deserve everything that’s coming to them’.

Until you get to know them. And then you discover that – who’d have thought it? – they’re human too. And sometimes, they might just have a thing or two to teach us.

So, my reflection for today: don’t judge others. Get to know them. Hear their story. Grow to love them and they'll no longer be ‘them’, the other, but part of the big ‘us’ that is the human race.

Don’t judge others. And certainly not by the colour of their skin – even if it’s green.

Vote Jesus

I want us to be a Green Party church, not a UKIP church.

(I’ve broken the law of polite conversation: never mention politics or religion. And I mentioned both. D’oh.)

What do I mean, anyway? ‘Green Party church’?

I went to the Green party conference this week. Just one day (the last), for two sessions – Q&A with the leaders and a plenary. It was in preparation for an event in just over a week’s time – Natalie Bennett, the Greens’ leader is speaking at the Northampton Jesus Centre.

I’ve never been to a political party conference, so it was a fascinating experience on that basis alone. And I suspect the Green Party may be more interesting than most. Still small enough to have the feel of a sparky group of activists yet with a real enough political platform to feel like a credible party, it was an interesting blend of people. Fair few eccentrics. Quite a few beards. High proportion of LGBTQ people (the kind you don’t need sophisticated gaydar to spot). A number of disabled people. Mix of social classes. A guy from ‘Occupy’ who looked like Jesus.

Old and young. But especially young. Lots of young people. Young people engaging with passion; young people speaking with conviction; young people putting forward motions, debating with the facts at their fingertips, pursuing their urgent points with eloquence.

21st century Jesus?

Furthermore, I noted lots of what some would call – not me and certainly not them, but some – ‘political correctness’. I’ve mentioned the range of people. Then there was the moment when questions were temporarily only allowed from ‘those who gender-identify as female’. There was the respect shown – along with the sense that there was nothing unusual about it – when a young man with a severe speech impediment brought a motion.

It all had a fresh feel, of a future of possibility, of a world worth fighting for. It was forward-looking, aspirational. There was also a strong sense that everyone had a voice; everyone would be listened to; anything could be brought to the table.

Now for a frank admission: it made me envious. I want the Jesus movement I’m part of to attract sparky young activists like these. Lots of them. I’m desperate for us to be a magnet for those with imagination, passion, drive. And, yep, we could do with a few big brains, too.

We have our eccentrics. We have our beards. I love them. They make us us. I love the young people who have grown up in church circles and owned its vision as theirs.

But oh God, send us an army of youngsters from all over the place, too. And let us honour their new voices, be open to their fresh ideas, not have ‘off the table’ taboos. Let us work out our passions and priorities through dialogue and debate, listening and loving the other.

The Green Party, like any other party, has to define its policy. That was what the plenary sessions were all about – agreeing on and finalising policy. Policy, by definition, doesn’t mean ‘anything goes’. But that policy would be reached through listening and openness working together with leadership and vision.

I like that.

I long for that.

At the GP conference, a speaker said, in passing, ‘UKIP’s main support base is older, less educated people; the Green Party’s main support base is younger, more educated people; so the future is ours!’ It got a laugh, a small cheer, a ripple of applause.

The implication was that UKIP represents the defensive views of a dying breed, hanging on to prejudices largely out of fear of change, whereas the Greens represent the aspirations of the rising generation based on hope and imagination.

I leave the political judgement to you, dear Reader. But as I consider our church and movement – we could go either way. We could cling onto safe old views and fear change. We could dismiss justice as ‘political correctness’, park power firmly with the status quo.

Or we could open our ears and our hearts to a fresh word for a fresh time from a fresh generation.

I’m getting older. I have to face it. I’m older than Jesus now (he’s 33 forever). Young people like him tend to tip tables over, tend to hang out with the wrong people, tend to say what sounds like our worst nightmare and keep saying it.

Bring it on, I say.

Vote for change. Vote Jesus.

Jesus at the centre

Love this video about the work of the Jesus Centres. I'm particularly involved with the Coventry Jesus Centre, but have been to then all, and think they're all great.

Got goats, high horses, and sacred cows

Two posts today got my goat. (If you think you can work out which posts, don’t bother, you’re probably wrong - and what would it profit you to be right?)

The first was a quote on a ‘moral issue’ that a friend posted up on a social media site, which I took serious issue with. In my view the moral point it was trying to make was, in fact, immoral. The second was a longer post from another friend, lionizing a Christian from long ago, and defending (or at least excusing) this particular luminary’s – in my view – execrable views.

Christians, I find, when they get on their high horse, so often choose the wrong horse.

In my opinion.

Which is the dilemma, isn’t it? It’s so easy, in disagreeing with what I see as self-righteousness or preachiness, to get - well - self-righteous and preachy about it in return.

Later today, I was reading and writing about some of what Paul wrote in his letter to the Romans. ‘Love is the fulfilling of the law’ he wrote.

Relevant to my got goat? I think so.

Paul is addressing a particular problem – differences of outlook in the Roman church on vexed questions of Jewish food laws and festivals.

Not situations we generally face in our non-Jewish church context. But the principle Paul lays down is still relevant: 'If your brother is grieved (by your actions or attitude) you are no longer walking in love'.

So sometimes we may have differences of opinion or outlook. (Indeed, in my experiences, it’s what Christians are good at.)

The crucial thing is that we can learn to ‘disagree well’.

That is, to make love our highest priority, even as we work through our differences (and let’s not pretend that that is always easy!)

In it all, we must avoid hurting 'one for whom Christ died'. Love will 'pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding'. Or as he put it in another letter: ‘Love does not insist on its own way’.

Love actively seeks to encourage, to join people in brotherhood, and to build a church of compassion and generosity.

There are several issues I can think of straight away that my friends and brethren and I need to find a way ‘disagree well’ on. Give me five minutes and I’ll think of several more.

Oh God: help us slay our sacred cows. Help us get off our high horses. Help us unget our got goats.

Help us make love our highest aim.

Belieber

Contrary to the sniggering assertions of some of my friends I’m not a Belieber. In truth, I hardly know any of the songs Justin Bieber’s sung. I couldn’t even hum along.

Nevertheless, I did find the story of the ordinary lad who achieved YouTube fame, well – endearing. I was prepared to say ‘Good luck to the lad’ and wish him well. I even played a video of one of his songs during a Sunday sermon once (this one – Pray). It was this that made some label me a belieber – and if that’s all it takes for the cap to fit, I don’t mind wearing it.

But recently the media has turned against young Justin. ‘Justice Bieber’ yelled the headline of the Metro as I passed through the station on my way to work the other morning. The young singer, catapulted too far into realms of fame and fortune he couldn’t handle, has been caught speeding, apparently high and drunk. More scurrilous stories have come out. Strippers. Substance-abuse. You get the picture.

And it made me really sad, not because I’m Justin’s number one fan, but because it seems to me there’s something toxic about a culture that lifts people – in this case a child – to the heights only to smash them down and gloat when they land on the rocks.

We (rightly) excoriate child abuse, but it seems to me that there’s a kind of collective, cultural abuse about this kind of thing. Yes Bieber’s 19 now, but he was only a minor when he started his meteoric rise. I don’t think any young person – indeed any human being, let alone a child – can handle such a flight. (Remember Icarus?)

I think the boy who wrote ‘Pray’ meant well. I think a culture that should know better – that says it knows better – should examine itself before baying for Bieber blood. 

I pray for Justin Bieber. But I also want to take my part in forming an alternative culture; one in which innocence, youth, childhood, idealism, the gifts of a rising generation – such things are nurtured and protected, not squandered and spoiled.

Top Tory vs meagre Messiah

Work and  Pensions Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, refused to meet Foodbank charity chiefs over Britain’s growing hunger crisis this week.

Apparently, Mr Duncan Smith accused the charity of being too “political” and “scaremongering” to oppose his welfare reforms. The senior government politician walked out of a Commons debate on the issue of UK poverty in the run up to Christmas.

More than 500,000 people – one third of them children – have received emergency supplies from the Christian-based charity.

Chairman of the Trussell Trust, the charity that runs Foodbanks, Chris Mould said: “We reject the suggestion that we have a political agenda. Our interest is the needs of poor people who we see in their thousands every week.”

The Trussell Trust describes itself as “a Christian organisation motivated by Jesus’ teaching on poverty and injustice”. They “serve people of all faith groups and beliefs or none”.

So was Jesus concerned about the poor? Yes, He was! In His first ever public teaching, Jesus announced that He had come to bring “good news to the poor,” throwing in for good measure that He would “set at liberty those who are oppressed” (Luke 4:18).

Jesus may not have been party political – but He was certainly on the side of the poor and the have-nots over the self-satisfied rich.

It’s not surprising. Jesus Himself was born on the streets, after all. Forget cosy Christmas-card images of a lovely warm stable: the Bible just says that Jesus was “laid in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7).

A manger is a road-side feeding trough. Jesus was born in the 1st century equivalent of a petrol station.

It’s all the more amazing when you think that Christians believe that Jesus was not just any old person – He was God’s own son, who chose to come into our world to rescue us. It says something about this God that He chose to be born not in a palace – but on the street.

And that He chose to die a painful death on a cross even though He was innocent.

God identifies with the poor, the hopeless, the accused, the rejected, the scum of the earth.

Do I?

Fishing for complement

The fish was off. It almost all went wrong.

It’s not every day we have an apostolic leader (Jesus Army speak for big leader) over for dinner. And the trout was off. Cue waiting at the table while my ever-resourceful wife cooked up some chicken fillets instead. But said leader amused my kids (and their dad) with optical illusion videos on his phone and all was well.

Later we had a great evening talking about lots of things from UK housing through to Pope Francis. Not surprisingly, given the rollercoaster ride my wife and I have had this year, we talked about vision and disappointment and community.

One issue we touched on that I thought would make a worthwhile wee post was the difference between generations when it comes to their money ethic. It ties into the wider discussion about intentional community – because if you’re going to share your money, as we do in a common pursue, the way members see money matters.

The older generation (his lot), we realised, prize frugality. This is the generation whose parents negotiated rationing and making frayed ends meet. For them ‘simplicity’ is about spending less. A community lounge with faded curtains, ill-matching plastic chairs and patched-together cushions is AS IT SHOULD BE.

The rising generation (our lot) prize liberality. This generation hasn’t, by and large, grown up with scarcity.  For this generation ‘simplicity’ is about spending more on others. About not worrying about money, being generous and spontaneous. A community lounge with simple, contemporary decor and plenty of (young) people feeling at home is AS IT SHOULD BE.

Of course, the younger generation’s liberality can tip over into profligacy – ‘want it nice, want it easy, want it now’. Likewise, the older generation’s frugality can slide into parsimony – ‘if it’s not horrible, it’s not holy’. And both sides can be inclined to characterise the other unfairly: ‘Wasters!’ ‘Misers!’

A better approach – as so so so often with these paradoxes – is to take both views at once. As John Wesley said ‘Earn all you can, give all you can, save all you can.’ 

Don’t waste God’s money; don’t be indulgent. Don’t penny-pinch; don’t be miserable.

Or to put those things positively: Spend money joyfully and remember that ‘God gives us richly all things to enjoy’ (1 Timothy 6:17); identify with the world’s poor and remember that ‘if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content’ (1 Timothy 6:8).

Jesus (funnily enough) got it right. ‘You can’t serve God and money’, he warned. But he also said ‘Use wicked wealth to make friends’.

Simplicity is best. But if the fish is off don’t eat it.

Pope hope

Do we live in the age of a second Saint Francis?

Early days, I know, and routine as it's become to lionise the current Pope, the Luther in me wants to dissent on principle... but it really does appear that Jorge Mario Bergoglio - Pope Francis - is a true spiritual leader for our times.

I read a quoatation from his First Apostolic Exhortation “Evangelii Gaudium” yesterday, which struck me (quite a few extracts struck me: get a flavour here):

“Sometimes we are tempted to be that kind of Christian who keeps the Lord’s wounds at arm’s length. Yet Jesus wants us to touch human misery, to touch the suffering flesh of others. He hopes that we will stop looking for those personal or communal niches which shelter us from the maelstrom of human misfortune and instead enter into the reality of other people’s lives and know the power of tenderness. Whenever we do so, our lives become wonderfully complicated and we experience intensely what it is to be a people, to be part of a people.”

Pope Francis hugs a man in his visit to a rehab

Touching suffering... wonderfully complicated... intense empathy. Having gone through a degree of ministry burn-out of late, I might have found such words repellent. But no: they refreshed. Is a mark of a saint that he or she speaks words - the same words - that from another would have a different effect?

I posted the Pope's words on Facebook and my brother, a social worker, commented, “I can draw some parallels with my profession here”. My brother works with adults with learning difficulties, work which I can imagine can be tough, long and thankless.

This may be another mark of a saint: he can speak to any and all, man or woman, western or eastern, of any religion or none, with words that will resonate.

I applaud all who “touch the suffering of others”, who embrace human solidarity and refuse the blandishments of self-centredness. I don't always want to want to walk that path myself, but as another saint (Teresa of Avila) almost said, I want to want to.

Speak on, Pope Francis. I, for one, am listening.


(A little theological postscript for those who may question my approach to 'sainthood' in this post. I, along with reformed Christians generally, believe that 'the saints' are all who are being made holy - sainted - by Christ: all His followers, not just a select few. But I maintain it's good to recognise those who have made special progress, who become able to speak to and for humanity, to reresent human potential and beckon us all higher. Call them prophets if you like; call them stars. Like the word martyr - originally a word to describe all Christians as witnesses, which came to be especially used of those who died for their testimony - the word saint can, I think, bear these two levels.)

Saint George the internationalist

Happy Saint George's Day – that day when English patriotism swells in English breasts and St George's cross (the English flag) can be seen flying from windows and fences around the nation. This the day when our Prime Minister is prompted by that Saint Georgish feeling to declare how very 'proud' he is 'to be English and British'.

Saint George, as it happens, was not English. He was Greek. He served in the Roman army. He travelled the Near East before he was martyred under Emperor Diocletian. He was nothing if not cosmopolitan.

I love this beautiful island nation, too. Yet, with cosmo George the martyr in mind, I pray that Britain's greatness will not be walled in and hoarded by the Saxo-Normans who happen to form the racial and cultural majority in our era. I pray that we can be a nation with an open welcome and a generous outlook to those of other nationalities and races – and in particular those who have suffered hardship or persecution or threat of death elsewhere.

It's what George would have wanted.

Hell of a time

Someone I respect and love a great deal wrote this in the wake of Margaret Thatcher’s death yesterday.

“Without wanting to jump on the Thatcher bandwagon... in the 80s her and Tebbit oversaw educational policy which saw me and many others sit quietly in fear while my teachers made my classmates laugh with lies (as I know) about 'queers'. I'm not negating the specific teachers’ responsibility, but Thatcher’s policies practically encouraged it. So personally, if there is a hell, I hope she's there, with other champions of hate.”

Here is another glimpse of the little-known anguish suffered by LGBT people in the recent past. The comment may offend againt the principle of 'De mortuis nil nisi bonum', but it also betokens pain and anger. Sobering thought: while I was breezing through school, enjoying every minute of it (though I did have the pretension to consider myself ‘persecuted’ when someone scrawled an anti-God comment on my desk) – at the same school here was someone experiencing the blunt end of prejudice. And it wasn’t playground taunts; it was in the classroom, from the teachers.

I can’t hope anyone’s in hell (apart from anything else, for me hell isn’t an ‘if’) – but I do thank God (again, for me not an ‘if’) that our society is moving away from such woeful ignorance and prejudice.

I hope the LGBT community can avoid the rhetoric of hate. It’s a big ask because there’s a lot of pain, and pain issues in anger, which can harden into hate. (It’s also a big ask from a Christian because the community of Christ has done so badly at avoiding such rhetoric – and that’s without having anything much to be angry about.) As my favourite gay wizard said: "Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement."

Only a determined effort from all to get beyond slogans, ignorance and stereotypes, to listen, to learn – only such determination can take us away from a hell of hatred that still threatens to engulf us.

On one occasion, at the aforementioned school, the Jesus Army came in for some unfair criticism at the hands of a sociology teacher. I wasn’t there, but I heard what happened. The same young gay man, who’d previously sat in fear whilst he and other gay people were mocked, took his courage in both hands and spoke out in defence of the Jesus Army. He did it because he knew me – and he knew what was being said was unfair and prejudicial.

I wish I'd known about what he was going through then so that I could have defended him. And I pray God will give me courage to speak out in his defence – and in defence of his community – now and in the future.

A hell of a chapter

Faced with nineteen verses of fire and damnation, I wasn’t sure what to write.

I write a weekly bible study for the Jesus Army. (The bible chapters for each week roll round on a rota, covering the whole bible every seven years or so – the New Testament, being shorter, is completed more like every three years).

What would you write when faced with Nahum chapter 3, as I was this morning? No offence to Nahum, I ought to say, as I may well meet him one day on some golden street up yonder. He had a job to do. And yet…

I’m not at ease with fire and judgement, and I’m skittish about Christians who are. It is clear that judgement, yes even eternal judgement (it’s a hell of subject) are very biblical. A God who isn’t Judge is not the God of the bible. But unlike that feisty early church theologian, Tertullian, I can’t rub my hands at the thought of sinners roasting.

To be clear, Nahum chapter 3 is not about hell. But it is about the destruction of a vast metropolis and everyone who lives in it. Nineveh’s evil, violence and oppression have overspilled the measure, and God says ‘Enough’. Time’s up. Cue fire and brimstone.

‘Will not the judge of all the earth do what is right?’ asked Abraham when faced with a similar city-becomes-bonfire scenario. And I can get where nervous old Abe’s coming from on this. Slightly worried, seeking reassurance that all the destruction is – well – right.

It was then that I noticed that the book of Nahum ends with a question. Which is unusual in the bible. In fact, a quick check confirmed there’s only one other book in the bible that ends with a question: Nahum’s prequel, Jonah.

Which got me thinking about those two questions: one  – Nahum's – about the human cry for justice (and God’s answer), the other – Jonah's – about human incomprehension of mercy (and God’s answer). And this is what I wrote. Hope it helps you, like it helped me, to understand just a little more about God – His great passion for justice, and His massive heart of mercy.

'Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and plunder… Behold, I am against you, declares the Lord' (v.1, 5). This last chapter of Nahum paints a dramatic picture of the destruction of Nineveh, capital of Assyria (an empire whose violence oppressed the entire ancient world). After eighteen verses detailing destruction, the book ends with a question: 'All who hear the news about you clap their hands over you. For upon whom has not come your unceasing evil?' (v.19) The implied answer is ‘nobody’; nobody has escaped Nineveh’s evil, and therefore everyone rejoices at her destruction.
  There is only one other book in the bible that ends with a question – the ‘prequel’ to this one: Jonah. Like Nahum, Jonah was told by God to proclaim Nineveh’s destruction (Jon.1:1). But in Jonah’s day the Ninevites repented and were spared (Jon.3:4-5). Jonah’s response to God’s mercy was to sulk, and the question that ends the book of Jonah is from God: 'Should not I pity Nineveh?' (Jon. 4:11). The implied answer is, of course, ‘Yes’.
  Nahum’s question reveals human thirst for justice, for an end to oppression. God is not unmoved by this heartcry: He will bring judgement and restore justice. Yet we must hear Nahum’s message with Jonah’s in mind, too: God’s mercy is bigger and wider than our small human hearts expect. The judge of all the earth will do what is right (Gen.18:25); and in the end mercy will triumph over even judgement (Jas.2:13).

The  questions such a passage make me ask myself are: what injustices do I long to see ended? Am I working towards that myself in my words, actions, prayers? And where might I need to have a bigger heart, and show more mercy?

Oh Jesus, help

‘Christians! They do my head in sometimes!’ I was letting off some steam, chatting to my brother recently. ‘Gays! They do my head in sometimes, too!’ he replied (he’s gay). Just goes to show any group we belong to – even, or perhaps especially, those we derive something of our identity from – can be uncomfortable things to belong to.

I write a weekly Bible study for the members of the Jesus Army around the UK. This week I wrote about the final chapter of Paul’s letter to the Galatians. The issues threatening to tear apart Paul’s churches now seem rather remote to us – questions of Jewish law-keeping don’t generally cause too much hand-wringing in British churches today.

But that doesn’t stop Paul’s teaching, especially in this last section of Galatians, from being deeply relevant to us today when we consider some of the issues that do threaten to tear our churches up. So: read Galatians 6, and then, if you like, you’re invited to read what I wrote for the Jesus Army to ponder:

The crisis in Galatia (see Gal.1:6-7) had left the churches there deeply divided. Groups looked down on other groups as less ‘right’, even less Christian, and sneeringly condemned them. Paul has dealt with this at a theological level in the first five chapters of Galatians; now, to close, he deals with practical and heart issues surrounding conflict.

Christians’ dealings with each other should be characterised not by obsession with status or smug self-righteousness, but by a spirit of gentleness (v.1). Their heart should be to bear one another’s burdens (v.2), not to condemn one another. Ironically, self-important people make themselves the least important (v.3). Each person should take responsibility for their own life before seeking to take responsibility for others (v. 4-5, see Mt.7:3-5).

Paul urges a generous approach which focuses not on criticising and pulling down, but on giving and doing good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith (v.6-10).

In his handwritten postscript (v.11-18), Paul brings his letter to its powerful conclusion. The true marks of a Christian are not about outward status (v.12-13); they are the marks of suffering love. Paul embodied this lifestyle – so different to the world’s power-hunger – in his own suffering (v.17), as did Jesus at the cross (v.14). Suffering love brings new life (v. 15). True followers of Christ – God’s true people, the Israel of God (v.16) – will take up their cross and live lives of grace (v.18).

Such a passage leaves me asking questions like: What is the difference between having a ‘spirit of gentleness’ and just being timid? How can I show generosity of spirit to those I meet, those I know? Who am I inclined to look down on, and how can I change this? And what does it really mean to have grace flowing from my spirit?

The New Testament isn’t just a book I read; the New Testament reads me. And it invites me to be more like its main character.

Oh Jesus, help.

Chicken and egg

Warning: the following factoid (and the moral derived from it) is doubtless simplistic, trite and naive. Nevertheless, it got me thinking and I thought I'd share.

There are apparently 18.45 billion chickens on planet Earth. That's slightly more than two per human being.

If every human being actually owned two or three chickens no-one would go hungry.

As it is approximately two thirds of the world are hungry. And last night, during the Superbowl, Americans ate 1.23 billion chicken wings. (Who counted? Well, I read it on Twitter so it must be true.)

Just what can we do to right the gross injustice of the world's food resources? We can't ignore this stuff as Christians.

I believe it was Mary the mother of Jesus who looked into what her Son would stand for and sang: "He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty."

When the kingdom comes, will I be sent away?

To rest is holy

Last Sunday I spoke about the fourth of the Ten Commandments:  ‘Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.’ Here’s a summary.

What do we make of the command to rest, to take time out – in this case one day in seven – to stop working?

Some find obedience to this command easier than others. Garfield for instance.

The fact that God has to command rest indicates we can become work-addicted. More on this later. First to explore a couple of ‘whys’ behind the command.

‘Why’ number one. The Exodus version of the commandment says the reason for Sabbath is: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

So why did God rest? Was he tired out? (Theologically problematic given omnipotence.) Had he got ahead of schedule? (Ditto omniscience.) Pop back to heaven? (Ditto omnipresence.) In fact, the reason God ‘rested’ is hinted at in these word: And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.

God rested to celebrate, to enjoy creation because it was very good. It was not only of value for what it could do or produce (utility), nor was it meaningless (futility). It was fruitful and abundant, but its meaning was not limited to this. Ultimately it was a work of beauty that both glorified its maker and brought joy to its maker.

Sabbath reminded Israel: creation was made for more than utility (what it can do) and futility (having no meaning).

‘Why’ number 2. The Deuteronomy version of the commandment says: You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty outstretched hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.

Sabbath reminded Israel they were no longer slaves. Not only was creation not made for utility or futility, but nor were they. They had been delivered from Pharaoh’s back-breaking brick-making and soul-destroying quotas.

And we should note a further revolutionary fact: the commandment was not only for adult Israelites but for ‘your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you’. Sabbath was egalitarian: for all creation – even animals.

Sabbath points back to creation’s original purpose – joy, celebration and glory – and forward to the day when creation would cast of its slavery to utility and futility.

For, as Paul puts it, creation has been ‘subjected to futility’. As Genesis has it:
Cursed is the ground because of you;
in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
and you shall eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.

Sin has made work hard, unyielding, relentless. Utility. It has made the human destiny ‘dust’. Futility.

Work, work, work, work, work. Die.

It is a Christian commonplace (though no less glorious for that) that Jesus’ death and resurrection have undone the effects of sin and overcome the fall. He brought old creation to its end – he literally bore the thorns of Genesis on his head as he died, the ‘last Adam’ – and took it to the grave. On the Sabbath he rested.

And ‘on the first day of the week’ (as it carefully points out in all four gospels) creation began again. That is Jesus was raised imperishable. If old creation began with the heaven and the earth and finished with a ruling man, new creation began with a ruling man and will finish with a new heaven and earth.

And in the meantime? After all, looking around the world today there’s plenty of evidence of utility and futility – but what of new creation?

In the meantime, there’s work to be done. ‘God and make disciples’ says Jesus, echoing the ‘Be fruitful and multiply’ of Genesis. And he doesn’t just mean converts. He means spread new life. Baptise people into new creation. Make new people (including yourself). And live like he commanded.

Which includes Sabbath.

The New Testament is ambivalent about actually having a one-day-a-week Sabbath. Paul ranges from tolerance to trenchant prohibition.

The latter almost certainly had its roots in Jesus’ own strong condemnation of a Jewish Sabbath-keeping which had become so divorced from its raison d’être that it enslaved people rather than freeing them. (To love God is to love people. Put another way: obedience to God will always emerge as love for people – otherwise we haven’t understood what God is commanding us.)

Sabbath for new creation people is not a day off a week (though if it works for you, feel free).

Sabbath is a way of life. As the letter to the Hebrews says: There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God... Let us therefore strive to enter that rest.

Sabbath is an end to futile labour. Our work in the Lord is not in vain. It’s an end to seeing people as worth only what they produce. All are valued. It’s an end to stressy striving. It’s an end to manic measuring.

It means hard work, but it also means valuing play. It means tears, but joy follows after. It means human beings, not human doings. It means saying no to drivenness, but yes to servanthood. It means sprinkling some Calvinism in our Arminianism. It means work is good, but rest is ‘holy’.

It means, for some, and in order to obey the Lord of the Sabbath – being a little more like Garfield.

Have yourself a very little Christmas

A few years ago I wrote a little rant about consumerism at Christmas. To my great amusement the first comment on the post was spam advertising Christmas hampers. The irony. Added grist to my mill, needless to say.

Right, so let's get this straight: I love friendship, being together, family, fun and games, warmth and generosity. If that's how you celebrate the season, I'm with you (and I venture to say that God - not the killjoy we sometimes present him as - would agree).

But this poem - written some years ago, but updated today - is to say again that as a follower of Jesus, I can't, I simply can't, commerorate his birth by abandoning everything he stood for, everything he said.

So the poem, a plea to abandon consumerism precisely because it's Christmas, is called 'Have yourself a very little Christmas' It's an anti-advert. Works best read out loud - but you may just have to imagine that.

Have yourself a very little Christmas: an anti-advert

You’ll all have seen that jolly chap
dressed all in red and furry white
with pressies stuffed into his sack
and reindeer trained for turbo flight
– but did you know that Santa’s suit
was first designed by Coca Cola
in 1931 to loot
the world? A big fat dollar
for corporate fat cats to get fatter?
Last year eleven billion pounds
were borrowed to fund the Xmas platter
of the rich – and if that sounds
not filthy enough then you may need
to consider that eleven billion notes
is enough, by far, for a year, to feed
fifty million of the poorest poor…
Please: kick sick consumerism out the door.

See, Jesus is not some stained glass sissy
looking woefully down from Cathedral windows:
he’s angry; he’s fuming against hypocrisy,
yelling “Woe to the rich” to the pious offenders
who tithe full of pride and let justice go hang
– and “Blessed are the poor”, “Forsake all and follow”:
get out of the rat race, so shallow and hollow:

Come out of the inn: no room for me there
far from chestnut roasting firelight,
my squalling fogs bleak midwinter air,
and gold quickly sold funds a refugee flight.
From wood of the trough to wood of the cross
from roadside birth to borrowed tomb
from curse of king to mother’s sore loss
I never asked the world for room.

Slam the door; make sure you lock it;
follow the leader means do what I say – like
not running in circles to line every pocket;
like: give it all up; like: give it away.

Like what you're hearing? Like what you've heard?
Wanna be in my gang now you know about my birth?
Like what you're hearing? Like what you've heard?
Would you own all creation
and inherit the earth?

Everyone valued

I love being in a people-loving church of zero-prejudice.

Two Facebook statuses by different friends, both in the Jesus Army, stuck out to me this morning. Here's the first, referring to our big bash in Sheffield last Saturday:

I am proud of my church, the Jesus Army. We have slogans "All accepted, none rejected" and "Where everyone is valued." Saturday in Sheffield demonstrated, once again, that it doesn't matter how people classify you: by race, colour, gender, age, sexual orientation, previous religion, history, class or any other "box", you can be accepted as a full member of the church.

And the second from another friend:

The last few days have been a stark reminder that life is all about the people... Those who are gone, those who are here, those who are far away and those who are near. They all shape you, make you and change you. Its the people that make life what it is and its those people that remember what you made of life when you're gone. Thanking God for the people in my life, those that have been, and those people making life what it is!

I believe that in our time the church must earn its right to speak into our culture. It earns that right not by seizing or protecting power, not by intoning or preaching from some lofty height, but by - truly, demonstrably, authentically - loving all people everywhere.

I'm glad to be part of a church that is at least trying to do just that.

The bible says

I love the bible. But I wrote this poem in response to those who think 'the bible says' is the end of the argument. It seems to me that what the bible says invites us into an argument that the bible invites us to have... with the bible!

                The bible says

                The bible says
                Slaves
                Obey your masters
                The bible says
                Women must be seen and not heard
                In church
                The bible says
                Go into the land and kill them all
                Spare not the women and children
                The bible says
                Stone
                The man who lies with a man
                The bible says
                Do not eat shellfish
                On pain of death
                This and many other things that are wrong
                The bible says
                The bible also tells a story
                A story in which slaves are set free
                By an almighty outstretched arm
                A story in which Mary is not sent back into the kitchen
                To be with the women
                A story in which
                Love
                Fulfils the law
                A story in which we cannot call unclean
                That which God has made clean
                On pain of death
                The bible tells a story
                That invites us to argue
                To wrestle
                To do battle
                Even with what
                The bible says
                The bible tells
                The story of a journey
                In which love knows the way

Love's the point

I wrote this paraphrase of Paul's famous passage on love in 1 Corinthians.

If I ‘do so make covenant’ * before men and angels, but have not love, I am missing the point of the promises I am making. And if I live in community, and understand all the mysteries of the common purse, and if I attend every meeting, arriving punctually and staying till the end, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away every chance of romance I have, and if I deliver up my life to celibacy, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love enjoys people as they are, and can wait for perfection to come after resurrection; love can say ‘I am no less than anyone else’ but also ‘I am no better than anyone else’; love has no need to interrupt, shout others down, or push its way forward. Others can contradict love without having to face explosions or implosions. Love is not afraid to confront others if they’re wrong, but much happier to praise them if they’re right. Love puts up, bigs up, looks up, keeps up – always.

Our inspirations have a limited shelf life; our words will pass their ‘use by’ date; our certainties will be swallowed up. For our certainties are uncertain, our inspirations are uninspiring, compared to what we’re heading for. When perfection comes, my inspirations, words, and certainties will seem to me like that collection of stickers I prized when I was five: I’ll smile at them and let them go. At present these things are the binoculars through which I glimpse God, but when God arrives I’ll drop them without a thought (and realise I was looking through them the wrong way anyway). Then I’ll realise it was never about how much I knew God, but how much God knew me.

For now we need faith; then we’ll see. For now we need hope; then we’ll receive. For now we need love; and so we will forever, when only love remains.

* For those not familiar with the Jesus Army, my reference in the first paragraph of this paraphrase to 'covenant', 'community' and 'celibacy' are three of our church's key distinctives. Covenant refers to the promise of lifelong discipleship that our committed members make to God and each other; community refers to our intentional Christian community houses (with their common purse arrangements); celibacy refers to the promise that some have made to remain single in order to serve God more freely. These things are important ways in which we've sought to put the New Testament into practice over the years.

These things matter to us. But as with the issues that mattered to the Corinthians - tongues, prophecy, faith, knowledge and so on - if we forget that they're actually all about love, we've forgotten what they're for.

Drop in the ocean

A Jesus Army team takes a double-decker bus to the West End of London each month to give out food and drinks, and talk and pray with people. Last week I was on the team.

Aleksandar is 19 and from Bulgaria. He has been living on the streets of London for just over a week. I meet him outside the Jesus Army bus and we drink coffee from polystyrene cups and chat.

Aleksandar came to the UK after nursing his mother “pretty much single-handed” before she died four months ago. A so-called friend of his family offered him work in the UK. But when Aleksandar arrived he found the “friend” wanted him to work without pay. “Slave labour, basically” says Aleksandar. “He said to me ‘You’ve got no papers, no permit – so no choice.’ I said ‘No thanks.’ So I left.”

Now Aleksandar hopes to get help from some of London’s homeless charities, including the Jesus Army’s “Jesus Centre” near Oxford Circus.

Zeb is only 15. He and his mates hopped on the bus for some food and a Snickers bar (or two). They’re pretty respectful – though Zeb’s zonked on booze and who knows what else.

He’s been a heavy drinker since he was 11 and in and out of care.

At the momen, Zeb is homeless: sometimes “sofa surfing”, sometimes sleeping on the streets. His mate “Tripz” has made some rap videos and posted them on YouTube via producer “Pacman TV”. Zeb is in one or two of them, wearing his baseball cap and posturing in the background. The videos are a moving mix of youthful hope and old-before-their-time despair.

Delia is anywhere between 35 and 65. Her mental health problems and homelessness make it difficult to tell. She’s worried because the doctor’s said she shouldn’t eat meat. But she’s very appreciative of the vegetable curry we give her from the Jesus Army bus. She chats away, reminding me, curiously, of both Eastenders character, Dot Cotton, and a female Frank Spencer.

We make other friends that night. Iranian Ali, joker George, gay Phil, arthritic Sue.

It’s a sea of humanity, each person with a story, often heartrending.

Round the corner is Leicester Square. Another sea surges through it, this time mainly dressed in designer jeans and sequined miniskirts. Stopping to talk with those who want to, I find they can be as hungry as the homeless.

“I want to make my lift mean something” says Ahmed. “I’m a youth coach” says Musa “and I tell them to make their life count”.

“I’ll have a cross” says Sam in the queue in McDonald’s. I give her a trademark Jesus Army fluro-red cross. “I believe, but it’s hard, innit?”

It is hard. Hard not to be overwhelmed by all the people, all the need. But I want to play my part to help the Jesus Army to play their part. To add some love. If we’re going to be a drop in the ocean, I’d rather we were a drop of love than anything else.

Some names in this post have been changed.

Drugs shame cop jailed

This morning the front page of our local paper made me sad.

‘Drugs shame cop jailed’ shouted the headline. The story was about a young police sergeant who’d been caught trying to give illegal drugs to ‘as he tried to seduce a young man’ in a gay bar.

I only caught a glimpse of it as I ran out of the front door, late for work (again). I don’t know the backstory (can we ever, really?) But it made me reflect on the unhappiness of this young police officer’s situation. Yes, he’s done wrong, broken the law, and that’s particularly serious for a policeman. But I sense a sad struggle in the background.

I know a bit about Rainbows, the bar he was in because a number of my friends – gay and straight – have mentioned what a friendly, open, accepting place it is. It’s widely known as one of the most chilled out, peaceful venues in the city.

And then I imagine this young officer there. Is he desperate for some acceptance? Looking for some relief? Has he struggled with his sexual identity? Wrestled with what others may think of him? Felt the conflict between his public position and his private world? What drove him to the crazy risk of using drugs to try to buy love?

And I see in my mind’s eye that police sergeant’s face, as pictured on the front of the paper. A photo taken as his guilty verdict was announced. Grief. Broken. Hopeless. Finished.

My heart went out to him.

And it stirred in me again the strong desire for our community, our church, to be a place where all can come, no matter what ‘guilty’ verdicts hang over them, no matter what struggles they have and try to hide. I want to be part of a community like Rainbows, but even better. A community where all are accepted, welcomed, loved – as they are. And we can walk on together, all broken, all heading for a better future because God accepts us all – as we are.