+Z’ev

Today’s assigned readings:
AM: Job 42:1-6, 1 Peter 1:3-9
PM: Isaiah 43: 8-13, John 14:1-7

Bring forth the people who are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears! Let all the nations gather together, and let the peoples assemble. Who among them declared this, and foretold to us the former things? Let them bring their witnesses to justify them, and let them hear and say, “It is true.” You are my witnesses, says the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me.
Isaiah 43:8-10

Today’s feast celebrates Thomas, rather famously called “Doubting Thomas” because of the words credited to him, demanding to see Jesus personally and to touch him, before Thomas would believe in the Resurrection.

It seems that doubt would be a fine place to start.

Jesus has not only room for doubters in his movement, he specifically commissions them for work. Look in the 28th Chapter of Matthew, where “they worship him but some doubted”. Jesus gives them all - even the doubters - the Great Commission. He does so without doctrinal tests or theological purity exams. He simply sends them all out to be evangelists. So also, God has a place for doubters. Look in today’s readings, where “the people who are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears” are made - without demand for change or remodelling - to be God’s witnesses, and, collectively, God’s servant.

I do like to resolve doubt. I live doubt to be cleaned up in all areas. I like certainty. When offered divinely revealed answers, some part of me tends to roll over and play dead.

Increasingly (at the age of 43) I’m beginning to see that Certainty, far from “faith”, is in fact a form of “Control Issues”. A child can be certain that Santa will bring toys and that “Jesus loves the little Children”; that plus a few other rules (Don’t talk to strangers, be seen and not heard) make life rather easily manageable. But those rules promptly fall by the wayside. There is neither a tooth fairy nor a Santa Clause and God, at least, wants you talking to strangers a lot. The more mature you get the more of those certainties you have to let go of.

What I’ve noticed in myself is an odd cycle of doubt, leading into fear, followed by a demand for certainty - usually centred on “rules”. I did this a few years ago, when I converted to Orthodoxy.

I was visiting with the vocations committee at my Episcopal Parish. My whole life’s purpose was (in my own head) being called into question, called into doubt by the meetings with this committee. Mostly I’m still not sure what they were looking for. But ok. In the midst of all that doubt - which was focused on my own self - I was also participating in online discussions with other Episcopalians on their way into or just out of seminary. Everyone was expressing doubts, uncertainties, fears. Increasingly I became certain that there was a right way, damn it all to do this thing called Christianity. So… rather than face the chaos I was invoking upon myself (I, after all, asked for help discerning my vocation) I ran away. Orthodoxy - and a hyper-conservative form of it, at that - became my model.

I wrote essays lashing out at my “former” friends. One Sunday, flying home to SF from a visit with the folks and in the midst of a relationship breaking up - with a man that lived with me, in my own apartment, causing chaos all over my world - I wrote an angry, fearful essay that became quite famous, actually. I even got paid to have it published.

Fitting into the theological and moral box I’d made for myself I was inflicting my own idea of order on those around me.

The next stage in the cycle is claustrophobia and release. And I found myself boxed in, spiritually abused and falling in love - which ended the entire rules thing (for a time, anyway).

I like rules and certainties in relationships, in jobs, and in my home life.

But one thing I’ve learned in my own life - especially in my friendships and romances - is that if I fix the chaos, demand sameness, insist on “certain rules” to be followed, then I’m not relating to the other person/people as they are in themselves. I am, in fact, relating to me - and attempting to clone myself into the other person(s).

I’ve also learned that the cast majority of people are like me. They like order, structure, rules, allegiance. There are a few collections of people who, pardon me, think different. They are usually called things like “Cultural Creatives” or some such catch phrase. They are usually far away from “traditional societies” as we categorise such things. If you will, they are Postmodernism-as-culture. But that’s too much of a label, right there. I usually find myself falling in love with these people, either romantically or platonically. But still, a large majority of people in the world are more traditional, more boxed in by rules and craving more (not less) “order and decency.”

These are not the people that God wants. God loves them all, yes. I have no doubt about that. But when he wants something done he calls on the people that “are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears” to be his witnesses. He has named this people “Israel” - wrestles with God.

In her better moments and manifestations the Church is also called Israel and she lives up to the title. But the church, too, succumbs to the all-to-human desire for uniformity: confusing adherence to creeds and dogmas with the Kingdom of God, becoming in her turn people who “are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears”. Increasingly it seems that “faith” is not the opposite of “doubt” but really a vital component of it. I’m going to mix some metaphors here, sorry: in the midst of chaos, one must step off the brink without knowing where the safety net is. That step is faith: it happens *because* of doubt and through doubt. Not to fix doubt or stop it or even over come it. But only in the real presence of doubt can any faithful thing be done.

But the People of God have cultural creatives too and they know that wrestling is far better than rolling over and playing dead.

Shabbat Shalom!

Huw

Today’s assigned readings:

AM: Isaiah 8:11-20, Romans 10:1-15
PM: Job 28:12-28, Matthew 13:44-52

S’pranikum! as the Russians say. A Joyous Feast!

Jesus said - “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad.”
Matthew 13:44-48

Today’s readings are three very different parables. I’ve left off the coda to the third one - I think verse 48 says it quite clearly. Walk with me through these…

1) The kingdom is like something you find - and in that finding you discover it is so valuable you give up everything for it.

The writer of Matthew would understand that greatly. Tradition says he was the Tax Collector, Levi, whom Jesus called to follow him. You know all about tax collectors. Jesus and his group are about the only folks in all of the Jewish people who will speak to these vile scum - workers for the government, collecting taxes for the pagans, siphoning off a good bit for themselves… Being as these guys were, themselves, Jewish they were considered traitors. Further, as a member of the Levite Tribe, Matthew should have been serving in the temple.

Matthew is the original Altar Boy Gone Bad.

But when he meets Jesus, he gives it all up. Erm, well… sorta. Don’t forget: the first thing he does is throw a party for all his friends to meet Jesus. And there’s no sign that Matthew was suffering from convertitis.

2) The kingdom is something that finds you…

I don’t know about you but every sermon I’ve heard on this parable talks about the pearl. Every sermon: Methodist, Orthodox, Roman, Episcopalian… There’s a reason for it, of course. The real meaning is too scary.

Look at the wiki page on this parable. The first line is: “The implied analogy was that the Kingdom of Heaven was of such worth that his disciples should gladly be willing to give up their wealth and comfort to obtain it.”

Bah!

The text says QUITE clearly - that the kingdom is like the merchant - not the pearl itself. Get that?!?! The kingdom is like a merchant… read it with me out of your Bibles: “…kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls…”

Even the Gospel of Thomas backs us up on this: “The Father’s kingdom is like a merchant who had a supply of merchandise and found a pearl. That merchant was prudent; he sold the merchandise and bought the single pearl for himself.” The kingdom is like the Merchant. Got it?

You, my dear reader, are the Pearl.

God gives up everything he has for you. Any of the Apostles would have understood this as well. They saw God give up everything - even his only Son - to come and find us.

Put those two parables together and we have an important synergy:

We give up everything for God. God gives up everything for us. It’s like falling head over heels in love with both parties simply gaga for each other.

Now move on to the third parable:

3) The kingdom is like a net that catches everyone…

There were some in the Early Church - and right on until today - seem to have been what I call semi-universalist: They were quite clear that God was roping in the entire world with this plan of his.

We give up everything for God. God gives up everything for us.
And EVERYONE gets caught in the net. Not just Jews, not just believers: everyone.

But what about free will?

The early Christians were equally clear that we could refuse to come to the party. I think Jesus’ parables include this mindset. The idea is that even some who get caught in the net just won’t fit.

Matthew’s Gospel is here encapsulated in three simple stories. The seeker must give up everything just like God does. But just hanging around with followers of Jesus is not enough. That first blush of romance is not enough to carry a relationship through - there is work to be done (be doers not just hearers, as James says).

Much love,

Huw