Scripture: Daniel 6
Several years ago, Lisa and I visited South Africa and toured some of its largest game reserves. Twice a day our group would venture out into the field in giant Land Rovers that had no doors, windows, or roofs. Following the twisty dirt roads through the forest, we encountered lions, leopards, elephants, rhinos, water buffalo, and cobras – with nothing between us and them but our camera lenses.
On the first day, our guide explained how this worked. These animals were wild and unrestrained; they were free to roam and, therefore, also free to eat us if the mood struck them. But they wouldn’t do so, he promised, because they had grown up around the vehicles in which we were riding. They had grown accustomed to their profile. Further, no one ever fed or threatened an animal from one of these Land Rovers, so they didn’t view them as a source of food or danger. The animals therefore largely ignored these things, apparently considering them some sort of moving, clicking, diesel-smelling curiosity. During our trip this generally held true, a notable exception occurring one evening when an ornery rhino decided to ram one of the vehiclesjust for fun or spite ... we didn't stop to ask.
Having offered us some reassurance, the guide also provided a warning. We would endanger everyone in the vehicle if we changed its profile – for example, by standing up to take a picture. And, of course, if we stepped out of the truck it seemed extraordinarily unlikely that we’d ever step back in. The moral of the story was simple enough: stay in your seat and stay safe; get out of your seat and get eaten. And these instructions echoed in our ears when we literally found ourselves in the lion’s den – in the middle of a dense forest, surrounded by a collection of lion cubs under the watchful eyes of their very large parents. In my entire life, I’ve never seen people sit with such conviction.
In a sense, the story of Daniel in the lion’s den appears to have a moral of similar clarity and simplicity. We might summarize it this way: Daniel was a good and faithful man, and God therefore spared him from the punishment the king had imposed upon him. Certainly, the text supports this interpretation of the story. Indeed, the text seems to make this point over and over again: the king calls out to Daniel to ask if he was spared by the God he has “faithfully served”; Daniel responds that God saved him “because I was found blameless”; and the narrator of the story notes that “no kind of harm was found on [Daniel], because he had trusted in his God.” Some commentators have compared the story to a folktale or Aesopian fable with the kind of uncomplicated and unmistakable message they usually offer.
Well, if that’s what you want to take away from the story then I won’t quarrel with you. And I agree that the story does indeed tell us that God spared Daniel because he was a good and faithful man. But I want to suggest that serious theological and practical problems follow if we conclude that this is the only thing the story has to tell us. I want to propose that there is something else – indeed, something more important – going on here. And I want – if you’ll indulge me in a terrible pun – to discover the other message implicit in this story by “reading between the lions.”
Now, if you think about it, the simple message we usually take away from this story – that God spared Daniel because he was a good and faithful man – raises a number of profound difficulties.
Some of those difficulties are practical. After all, this message does not comport with our real-life experience. We all know good and faithful people who endure unspeakable losses, tragedies, and sufferings. To borrow a phrase from Harold Kushner, it is a fact of life that bad things happen to good people. So if we take this story as a sort of promise – an assurance that God will protect us from bad things if we will live well and faithfully – then we’re likely to conclude it has little application to the world as we find it.
And there’s another practical problem as well. God did not just find Daniel to be good and faithful; he found him to be blameless. Now, perhaps you’re working toward blamelessness or perhaps you’ve already achieved it. If so, then please accept my hearty congratulations.
Unfortunately, the rest of us poor slobs don’t hold out much hope on this front. We have a deep sense of our blameworthiness and, I suppose, a correspondingly deep gratitude for the grace of Jesus Christ that saves us anyway. But if the point of this story is to encourage the blameless to stay the course then I fear it is directed toward a very small audience, and one that certainly does not include me.
The simple message – that God spared Daniel because he was a good and faithful man – leads us into some deep theological problems as well. After all, our faith rests upon the life and words of another blameless prophet – Jesus of Nazareth – who endured a horrifying punishment unto death. The idea that a life without blame will be a life without suffering is belied by nothing less than the Cross itself. And the proposition that bad things won’t happen to good people is belied by the sacrifices and blood of the countless martyrs of our faith.
In fact, I think the simple message – that bad things don’t happen to good people – isn’t even consistent with the story itself. That message might follow from the story if the king didn’t sentence Daniel to the lion’s den – no doubt a traumatic experience – and if Daniel hadn’t been thrown into it – no doubt an even more traumatic experience. But in the story these very bad things do indeed happen to Daniel – or, to put it differently, God did not spare Daniel from these bad things – even though he was a faithful and blameless man.
Well, if the simple message isn’t the point of the story (or, at least, isn’t the primary point of the story), then what is? I actually think the answer to that question isn’t mysterious at all. In fact, I think the text of the book of Daniel provides the answer loudly and clearly – but does so by how it is structured. In my view, if we want to understand the importance of the story of the lion’s den, then we have to look at what comes next. And what comes next are these words: “In the first year of King Belshazaar of Babylon, Daniel had a dream and visions as he lay in bed.”
The story of the lion’s den comes at the very end of chapter 6. Chapter 7 begins with Daniel’s first great vision and prophecy. More great visions and prophecies follow in the remaining chapters. Indeed, in these chapters God send the angel Gabriel to Daniel to help him comprehend what he is seeing and hearing. And, of course, God does this not just to increase Daniel’s wisdom and understanding; God does this so that Daniel can share that wisdom and understanding with others.
Daniel’s experience reminds me of the lyrics of Steven Curtis Chapman’s wonderful song, “I Will Not Go Quietly”:
I was born with an angel whispering in my ear
Telling me sacred secrets that God wanted me to hear
And I have lived to tell the mysteries I’ve been told
And even when they tell me it’s my time to go
I will not, no I will not, I will not go quietly
Such is the nature of prophets. They hear the whispers of angels. They tell the secrets God wants them to hear. And they do not, no they do not, they do not go quietly.
And that, I believe, is the principal reason God spared Daniel. Certainly, God spared Daniel because of who he was – a faithful and blameless man. But, more importantly, God spared Daniel because of what he was – a faithful and blameless man through whom God had things to say. And it follows that the central message of the story of Daniel in the lion’s den is not that Daniel could not be killed. It is that God will not be silenced.
God will not be silenced. We may turn away, we may ignore God’s cries to us, we may surround ourselves with noise, but God will not be silenced. We may choose hate over love, war over peace, exclusion over inclusion, and spitefulness over forgiveness, but God will not be silenced. We may worship stuff and honor celebrity, we may love objects and use people, but God will not be silenced.
There is a challenge in this, but also comfort. For in those lonely hours, when it seems as if the cacophonies of life have drowned out all that is best, we can close our eyes and remember that God will not be silenced.
God will not be silenced. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. In the beginning, God spoke to Adam and Eve. God spoke to and through the prophets. God spoke to and through Jesus Christ. God speaks to and through us still, because God loves us still. And, make no mistake about it, God will not be silenced.
There is a wonderful scene in the old film “The Greatest Story Ever Told.” It is Easter morning, and the tomb has been found empty. Messengers rush the news to the temple officials who persecuted Jesus. They are concerned, but then one shrugs his shoulders and says: “In any case, the whole thing will be forgotten in a week.” Another says: “I wonder.”
In the thousands of weeks and years that have followed, the world has conspired to forget what God – through Jesus Christ – did among us, said to us, and sacrificed for us. It was God’s boldest and strongest and loudest exclamation of love and grace. And it echoes still, now and forever, because it is not only the word in the beginning, but will be the word at the end. We are called to hear it. We are called to speak it. We are called to tell the story. We are called to share the sacred secrets and the mysteries we’ve been told. And we are called to not go quietly.
Because we are the children of the living God.
And God will not be silenced.
Amen.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Monday, March 17, 2008
Carrying Christ
It is not unusual, in the midst of a Palm Sunday church service, to discover we are having fun. The children wave their palms around; the music seems to play particularly loudly; we find ourselves grinning from ear to ear. Of course, we don’t do these things just for the sheer joy of them – although it’s my understanding that some churches have come down in favor of allowing joy during worship. Rather, we do these things in remembrance of the celebration that accompanied the triumphant entry of Jesus Christ into the holy city of Jerusalem.
All of that has its place, but I want to suggest that the apparently simple and celebratory story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem is actually deeply complex and darkly suggestive. Perhaps more importantly, I’d like to propose that embedded in this story is a message that can inspire us and influence how we approach every single day of our lives. And, I believe, it is in this inspiration that we find an even greater cause for celebration.
To find these things, we have to look past the crying of “Hosanna” and the waving of palms. We need to take ourselves out of the crowd for a moment. And we need to ride into Jerusalem right beside Christ.
Imagine it. Jesus knows that his entry into Jerusalem will put into motion a series of events that will culminate in his crucifixion on Calvary. Jesus knows that in the coming days he will be betrayed and denied – by those who say they love him. Jesus knows that he will find himself alone before death, alone unto death, alone in death. And he knows all these things at the precise moment when the same crowds who will later flee Him cry praises and wave palms all around Him. William Stringfellow, in Free in Obedience, puts it this way: “The real witness of Palm Sunday is not the parade or what the disciples or the secular authorities saw; it is the encounter between Christ and the power of death.”
But Jesus must ride into Jerusalem. It is not that he must do so because it was foretold by Zechariah; it’s the other way around: Zechariah foretold it because Jesus would fulfill it. And Jesus will fulfill the prophecy and ride into Jerusalem precisely because it sets into motion all of the terrible events that make his sacrifice and his resurrection and our salvation possible.
Still, the ride into Jerusalem is not just the fulfillment of a prophecy or a critical incident in the unfolding tragedy and ultimate glory. The ride into Jerusalem is a theological statement. It is the testimony of Christ through action.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that his love has no limitation. For he willingly endures – indeed, rides into – unspeakable things for us, all of us, each of us.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that following God’s will can take us into some lonely and desolate places. But he shows us what we must do.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he reminds us that the first will be last and the last will be first; he reminds us that the meek shall inherit the earth. For Jesus does not enter the city surrounded by armed guards brandishing spears in a dazzling display of power. He enters the city surrounded by celebrating crowds throwing down palms in a dazzling display of love.
And when Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that even the lowliest among us can carry him out into the world. For Jesus does not arrive on a tall and handsome stallion. He arrives on a beast of burden, a grunt, a donkey.
G. K. Chesterton wrote a wonderful poem – called “The Donkey” – that remembers this event and suggests what we might make of it:
The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still.
Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears
And palms before my feet.
We often pray for Christ to carry us. We pray for Christ to carry us through troubles and tribulations. We pray for Christ to carry us through sickness and sadness. We pray for Christ to carry us through this life. We pray for Christ to carry us into the next. And there are times when we know, we simply know, that Christ has taken us into his big carpenter’s arms and has lifted us up and is holding us close and is carrying us where we need to go.
But, as Palm Sunday reminds us, there are also times when we carry Christ. We carry Christ by what we believe and by how we live. We carry Christ by what we say and what we do. We carry Christ by who we are and by who we try to be.
And so all of us, even those of us who feel we are among the least in the world – perhaps particularly those of us who feel we are among the least in the world – carry Christ with us wherever we go. We carry Christ into our houses and into our workplaces. We carry Christ into hospital rooms and homeless shelters. We carry Christ into our back yards and onto the back roads. We carry Christ into all the places our lives lead us.
Palm Sunday reminds us – all of us “tattered outlaws of the earth” – that we too have our hour. We too have our time to carry Christ. In a sense, every hour is that hour; every day is that time.
So I invite you tomorrow – and all the tomorrows after it – to ask yourself one simple question when you wake up in the morning:
Where will I carry Christ?
Where will I carry Christ today?
Amen.
All of that has its place, but I want to suggest that the apparently simple and celebratory story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem is actually deeply complex and darkly suggestive. Perhaps more importantly, I’d like to propose that embedded in this story is a message that can inspire us and influence how we approach every single day of our lives. And, I believe, it is in this inspiration that we find an even greater cause for celebration.
To find these things, we have to look past the crying of “Hosanna” and the waving of palms. We need to take ourselves out of the crowd for a moment. And we need to ride into Jerusalem right beside Christ.
Imagine it. Jesus knows that his entry into Jerusalem will put into motion a series of events that will culminate in his crucifixion on Calvary. Jesus knows that in the coming days he will be betrayed and denied – by those who say they love him. Jesus knows that he will find himself alone before death, alone unto death, alone in death. And he knows all these things at the precise moment when the same crowds who will later flee Him cry praises and wave palms all around Him. William Stringfellow, in Free in Obedience, puts it this way: “The real witness of Palm Sunday is not the parade or what the disciples or the secular authorities saw; it is the encounter between Christ and the power of death.”
But Jesus must ride into Jerusalem. It is not that he must do so because it was foretold by Zechariah; it’s the other way around: Zechariah foretold it because Jesus would fulfill it. And Jesus will fulfill the prophecy and ride into Jerusalem precisely because it sets into motion all of the terrible events that make his sacrifice and his resurrection and our salvation possible.
Still, the ride into Jerusalem is not just the fulfillment of a prophecy or a critical incident in the unfolding tragedy and ultimate glory. The ride into Jerusalem is a theological statement. It is the testimony of Christ through action.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that his love has no limitation. For he willingly endures – indeed, rides into – unspeakable things for us, all of us, each of us.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that following God’s will can take us into some lonely and desolate places. But he shows us what we must do.
When Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he reminds us that the first will be last and the last will be first; he reminds us that the meek shall inherit the earth. For Jesus does not enter the city surrounded by armed guards brandishing spears in a dazzling display of power. He enters the city surrounded by celebrating crowds throwing down palms in a dazzling display of love.
And when Jesus rides into Jerusalem, he tells us that even the lowliest among us can carry him out into the world. For Jesus does not arrive on a tall and handsome stallion. He arrives on a beast of burden, a grunt, a donkey.
G. K. Chesterton wrote a wonderful poem – called “The Donkey” – that remembers this event and suggests what we might make of it:
The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still.
Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears
And palms before my feet.
We often pray for Christ to carry us. We pray for Christ to carry us through troubles and tribulations. We pray for Christ to carry us through sickness and sadness. We pray for Christ to carry us through this life. We pray for Christ to carry us into the next. And there are times when we know, we simply know, that Christ has taken us into his big carpenter’s arms and has lifted us up and is holding us close and is carrying us where we need to go.
But, as Palm Sunday reminds us, there are also times when we carry Christ. We carry Christ by what we believe and by how we live. We carry Christ by what we say and what we do. We carry Christ by who we are and by who we try to be.
And so all of us, even those of us who feel we are among the least in the world – perhaps particularly those of us who feel we are among the least in the world – carry Christ with us wherever we go. We carry Christ into our houses and into our workplaces. We carry Christ into hospital rooms and homeless shelters. We carry Christ into our back yards and onto the back roads. We carry Christ into all the places our lives lead us.
Palm Sunday reminds us – all of us “tattered outlaws of the earth” – that we too have our hour. We too have our time to carry Christ. In a sense, every hour is that hour; every day is that time.
So I invite you tomorrow – and all the tomorrows after it – to ask yourself one simple question when you wake up in the morning:
Where will I carry Christ?
Where will I carry Christ today?
Amen.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Healing in Three Voices
The last words someone speaks before they go to meet their maker can carry a great deal of significance. Sometimes those final words reflect the faith of the person who uttered them. The last words of John Paul II have a childlike simplicity: “Let me go to the father’s house.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s last words before his execution by the Nazis have a courageous, almost defiant quality: “This is the end, for me the beginning of life.” Henry Ward Beecher, the prominent clergyman who struggled with doubt throughout his life, expressed uncertainty even in his last breath: “Now,” he said, “comes the mystery.”
Of course, not all last words have such gravity to them. In his final moment, Groucho Marx is supposed to have said: “Die my dear? Why that’s the last thing I’ll do.” The wit and writer Oscar Wilde, passing away in a dingy Paris hotel room that offended his aesthetic sensibilities, left this world saying: “Either that wallpaper goes or I do.” And the story is told that Lady Astor, recovering briefly from unconsciousness and seeing her family gathered around her, asked “Am I dying or is this my birthday?”
Whether full of gravity or levity, we think of last words as having special meaning. Perhaps that is why the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa made this deathbed request of those gathered around him: “Tell them I said something.” In light of the fact that his last recorded words are “Tell them I said something” it appears they may have taken him a bit too literally.
So it’s not surprising that we attach particular importance to the last words of Jesus Christ – words spoken from the Cross itself. Matthew and Mark record those words as the cry “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthanai,” or “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Luke recounts them as “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” And John captures them in the simple three-word phrase “It is finished.” This raises an interpretive problem because, in a strictly logical sense, only one of these things can be true. Only one of these statements can be the actual final words of Jesus Christ. He can’t have said all these things in his last breath. Or can He?
Years ago I read a book by a renowned biblical archeologist that helped me understand a fundamental truth about how people in the ancient Near East thought about matters – and particularly religious matters. This scholar pointed out that our thought processes are heavily, although unconsciously, influenced by Greek philosophy. So, for example, without even knowing it we follow Aristotle’s principles of logic whenever we think about something—even when that something is God.
When we talk and think about who God is and what God does we try to follow the same logic we follow elsewhere in life. As a result, when we reach a conclusion about God we necessarily exclude other, logically inconsistent, conclusions we might otherwise entertain. To put it bluntly, we allow logic to limit our holy imagination.
But the people of the ancient Near East didn’t think in these terms. They could imagine things about God that would appear to us internally inconsistent. They were not bound by the laws of Aristotelian logic.
Years ago, I witnessed a delightful contemporary example of non-Aristotelian thinking. An itinerant preacher came to the University of Michigan campus, perched himself on an outdoor concrete bench, and began sermonizing to the passing students. I disagreed with much of what he had to say, but he did have a wonderful moment. A skeptical undergraduate, no doubt thinking himself extraordinarily clever, called out this question: “Can God make a rock so heavy he cannot lift it?” Without missing a beat, the preacher responded: “God can make a rock so heavy He cannot lift it. And He can lift it if He wants to.”
As I say, the people of the ancient Near East – like this preacher – were not constrained by the limitations of formal logic. And I suspect God isn’t constrained by them, either. I assume that the God who created order also controls order. It therefore seems completely plausible to me that Jesus Christ, the perfect expression of God in this world, said more than one thing to us in his final words. I find nothing astonishing in this. I take it as just another example of how the theological takes off when the logical comes to the end of the runway.
Of course, a simpler – but no less compelling – explanation presents itself. It has nothing to do with logical possibility or theological plausibility, but everything to do with psychological reality. The psychological reality to which I refer is simple enough: we tend to hear whatever is most important to us. Perhaps, therefore, the people gathered at the foot of the Cross heard different things because they needed to hear different things. Perhaps the gospels record different final words because individual listeners experienced these various statements as if they were Christ’s final words.
The text provides some support for this explanation. After all, these words speak in three very different voices. We can understand how listeners with varying needs and perspectives could attach more significance to one of them than to the others.
These different voices do share a common context: all of them come at the ultimate moment of the Passion. All of them therefore relate to the magnificent reconciliation that occurred by God’s grace and through the death of Jesus Christ. As Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams puts it, Jesus’s death is “the gift that once and for all makes peace.” Or, to phrase matters a little differently, the death of Jesus is the gift that, once and for all, makes healing possible.
“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit” speaks in the voice of holy surrender. These words call us to give everything over to God – right down to our spirit, right down to our ineffable essence. When we surrender everything, when we place in God’s hands all that we have and all that we are, then healing can begin.
“It is finished” speaks in the voice of gracious duty. These words call us to find purpose in our lives, to pursue that mission with all our heart and mind and soul, and to complete the work God gives us to do. When we commit our efforts to what matters, when we live lives of love and forgiveness and praise and devotion, then healing can begin.
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” speaks in the voice of sacred suffering. These words remind us that even in our times of brokenness and questioning – especially in our times of brokenness and questioning – we must continue to reach toward God. When we turn to God at all times and in all things, even amid our confusion and desperation, then healing can begin.
More than two thousand years ago, on an obscure hill in an empire’s outpost, words fell from a Cross. Those words spoke in different voices – so they might offer hope and healing to each and all. Those voices echoed through time and resound to this very day, in this very place, in our very lives. As it is written: “Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.”
Amen.
Of course, not all last words have such gravity to them. In his final moment, Groucho Marx is supposed to have said: “Die my dear? Why that’s the last thing I’ll do.” The wit and writer Oscar Wilde, passing away in a dingy Paris hotel room that offended his aesthetic sensibilities, left this world saying: “Either that wallpaper goes or I do.” And the story is told that Lady Astor, recovering briefly from unconsciousness and seeing her family gathered around her, asked “Am I dying or is this my birthday?”
Whether full of gravity or levity, we think of last words as having special meaning. Perhaps that is why the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa made this deathbed request of those gathered around him: “Tell them I said something.” In light of the fact that his last recorded words are “Tell them I said something” it appears they may have taken him a bit too literally.
So it’s not surprising that we attach particular importance to the last words of Jesus Christ – words spoken from the Cross itself. Matthew and Mark record those words as the cry “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthanai,” or “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Luke recounts them as “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” And John captures them in the simple three-word phrase “It is finished.” This raises an interpretive problem because, in a strictly logical sense, only one of these things can be true. Only one of these statements can be the actual final words of Jesus Christ. He can’t have said all these things in his last breath. Or can He?
Years ago I read a book by a renowned biblical archeologist that helped me understand a fundamental truth about how people in the ancient Near East thought about matters – and particularly religious matters. This scholar pointed out that our thought processes are heavily, although unconsciously, influenced by Greek philosophy. So, for example, without even knowing it we follow Aristotle’s principles of logic whenever we think about something—even when that something is God.
When we talk and think about who God is and what God does we try to follow the same logic we follow elsewhere in life. As a result, when we reach a conclusion about God we necessarily exclude other, logically inconsistent, conclusions we might otherwise entertain. To put it bluntly, we allow logic to limit our holy imagination.
But the people of the ancient Near East didn’t think in these terms. They could imagine things about God that would appear to us internally inconsistent. They were not bound by the laws of Aristotelian logic.
Years ago, I witnessed a delightful contemporary example of non-Aristotelian thinking. An itinerant preacher came to the University of Michigan campus, perched himself on an outdoor concrete bench, and began sermonizing to the passing students. I disagreed with much of what he had to say, but he did have a wonderful moment. A skeptical undergraduate, no doubt thinking himself extraordinarily clever, called out this question: “Can God make a rock so heavy he cannot lift it?” Without missing a beat, the preacher responded: “God can make a rock so heavy He cannot lift it. And He can lift it if He wants to.”
As I say, the people of the ancient Near East – like this preacher – were not constrained by the limitations of formal logic. And I suspect God isn’t constrained by them, either. I assume that the God who created order also controls order. It therefore seems completely plausible to me that Jesus Christ, the perfect expression of God in this world, said more than one thing to us in his final words. I find nothing astonishing in this. I take it as just another example of how the theological takes off when the logical comes to the end of the runway.
Of course, a simpler – but no less compelling – explanation presents itself. It has nothing to do with logical possibility or theological plausibility, but everything to do with psychological reality. The psychological reality to which I refer is simple enough: we tend to hear whatever is most important to us. Perhaps, therefore, the people gathered at the foot of the Cross heard different things because they needed to hear different things. Perhaps the gospels record different final words because individual listeners experienced these various statements as if they were Christ’s final words.
The text provides some support for this explanation. After all, these words speak in three very different voices. We can understand how listeners with varying needs and perspectives could attach more significance to one of them than to the others.
These different voices do share a common context: all of them come at the ultimate moment of the Passion. All of them therefore relate to the magnificent reconciliation that occurred by God’s grace and through the death of Jesus Christ. As Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams puts it, Jesus’s death is “the gift that once and for all makes peace.” Or, to phrase matters a little differently, the death of Jesus is the gift that, once and for all, makes healing possible.
“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit” speaks in the voice of holy surrender. These words call us to give everything over to God – right down to our spirit, right down to our ineffable essence. When we surrender everything, when we place in God’s hands all that we have and all that we are, then healing can begin.
“It is finished” speaks in the voice of gracious duty. These words call us to find purpose in our lives, to pursue that mission with all our heart and mind and soul, and to complete the work God gives us to do. When we commit our efforts to what matters, when we live lives of love and forgiveness and praise and devotion, then healing can begin.
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” speaks in the voice of sacred suffering. These words remind us that even in our times of brokenness and questioning – especially in our times of brokenness and questioning – we must continue to reach toward God. When we turn to God at all times and in all things, even amid our confusion and desperation, then healing can begin.
More than two thousand years ago, on an obscure hill in an empire’s outpost, words fell from a Cross. Those words spoke in different voices – so they might offer hope and healing to each and all. Those voices echoed through time and resound to this very day, in this very place, in our very lives. As it is written: “Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.”
Amen.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Unfinished Business
Scripture: John 19:28-30
I do not know whether the Christian faith raises any little questions. But I know it raises some very big ones. One of those questions, of course, is whether God exists. Many years ago, I had the privilege of studying with the great theologian Hans Kung. At the end of the class I asked him to sign my copy of his vast eight-hundred-and-forty-page book entitled Does God Exist? He turned to the opening page, signed his name, and then under the title wrote a single word. The word was: “Yes!” This saved me a lot of reading.
The season of Lent draws our attention to another of those very big questions: Why did Jesus die? What is the meaning, the significance, of the Passion? How did it change things? One day, when I was taking seminary courses in Detroit, I was informed that a committee from the board of ordained ministry wanted to meet for fifteen minutes with each of the Methodist students enrolled at the school. I dutifully appeared, crossing paths with the student who had just finished talking with them. “Don’t worry,” she said, “no tough questions.” I went in, sat down, and smiled at the chair of the committee, who leaned back slowly and said “So tell us; why did Jesus die?” I’m afraid I responded by blurting out “You have got to be kidding.”
It’s not that we don’t have an answer to the question. In fact, we have lots of answers, and many of us subscribe to more than one of them. Indeed, those answers have consumed substantial amounts of ink and energy in several branches of theology, including the branch called soteriology. Soteriology takes its name from the Greek word soter (meaning “savior” or “deliverer”) and explores the saving work – the “salvific” work – of Jesus Christ. Over the last two thousand years, the answers to this question offered by soteriology have focused on a variety of themes.
In the early church, the significance of the death of Jesus was understood largely by reference to sacrifice. Some versions of this understanding portrayed the death of Jesus as a sacrifice by God – as an act of boundless love and grace, in which God gave over His only son to take on the sins of the world and, through his blood, to cleanse us of them. We see this theme in the ninth chapter of Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews, it runs very deep in our thinking, and it probably sounds familiar to you. Other versions of this theme, however, portrayed the Passion of Jesus as a sacrifice to God – as an act of appeasement necessary to assuage an angry God and preserve us from wrath and annihilation. As biblical scholar Jeffrey Hopper observes, “In this unfortunate shift, God is acted upon and changed rather than humans.”
In recent years, some theologians – influenced by the work of anthropologist and cultural historian Rene Girard – have moved away from an interpretation of the Passion that focuses on the theme of sacrifice. Girard readily acknowledges that “the Passion is presented to us in the Gospels as an act that brings salvation to humanity. But,” he continues, “it is in no way presented as a sacrifice.” To the contrary, Girard argues, thinking of the Passion as a sacrifice is not consistent with the image of God presented in the Gospels – a God “who is alien to all violence.” Jesus died, Girard therefore concludes, not as a sacrifice but in order to end sacrifice; he says “[t]his is the essential theme, repeated time and time again of Jesus’ preaching: reconciliation with God can take place unreservedly and with no sacrificial intermediary through the rules of the kingdom.” “Go and learn what this means,” Jesus declares in the ninth chapter of Matthew: “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.”
In the course of Christian history themes other than that of sacrifice have also emerged. In his recent book Tokens of Trust, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams elegantly summarizes some of those other images in these words: "Jesus’ death is a ransom, paid to our kidnappers (the powers of destruction); it is a punishment that we deserve, voluntarily borne by another, who is innocent; it is even a triumphant nailing up of a cancelled invoice." These images, of a ransom given over to Satan or a debt made good with God, help explain why our passage for today has occasionally been translated using the words: “It is paid.” Or, as an old hymn puts it, “Jesus paid it all.”
The Greek verb at issue here – rendered variously as “paid,” “done,” or “finished” – is teleo and it appears only twice in the Gospel of John. Of course, it appears in verse 30 of chapter 19, where Jesus declares “It is finished.” But, interestingly, it also appears immediately before this passage, in verse 28 of chapter 19, where the scripture refers to the fact that Jesus has “accomplished” everything that was needed. In the same vein, John sometimes uses a different but closely related Greek word in describing how Jesus “completed” God’s work. In sum, when Jesus says “It is finished” he is not simply crying out that his life has ended. Rather, he is declaring that something has come to completion: something important; something defining in the relationship between humankind and God; something planned and prescribed in the divine order of events.
But what is that something? And how does all this help us with our big question: Why did Jesus die? In the end, the question of why Jesus died is more question than I can fully answer. But I take some consolation in the fact that it may be more question than can be fully answered. Recognizing this, Rowan Williams offers the following guidance: “It’s important to be aware of all these images and to try and see why they are used; [it is] equally important, though, not to treat them as if they were theories that explain why Jesus died.” He continues: “Our theories about all this are likely to be convoluted and unsatisfactory; but all we need to know is that whatever it took – and takes – for us to be set free from our destructive and deceitful traps has been done [through the death of Jesus].” It is paid; it is done; it is completed; it is finished.
And it is not just finished in some abstract and theoretical sense. It is finished in a real, true, and experiential sense. It is finished for each of us, singly, individually, and personally. The refrain of a contemporary song puts it this way: “You did it all for me; you gave your only son; you’d do it all again if I were the only one.”
It is finished, indeed – and yet, and yet it is not over. In our thinking about the Passion, and about Jesus’s words “It is finished,” we must not confuse completeness with closure. It is, after all, possible for something to be magnificent, inspiring, and complete in itself – and the Passion has all these qualities – but for it also to leave some matters open. Many famous examples of this exist in art: the sketches of Michelangelo are complete and perfect in themselves – but they invite the observer to imagine how they might look with the additions of color and dimension; some symphonies of Mahler and Schubert are complete and perfect in themselves – even though they have only two movements, rather than the traditional greater number, and invite the listener to dream of the music that might fill those left unwritten; literary anthologies often contain fragments of works that authors never developed into full epic poems or novels – fragments that are complete and perfect in themselves but that also invite the reader to muse over the endless possibilities of where the story might go next.
But we don’t need to use analogies to describe the difference between completeness and closure. All we need to do is to look at the text itself. For the text reminds us that after Jesus declares “It is finished” we see the unfolding of still more of God’s important and amazing work. The Gospel of John makes this perfectly plain. Think of it – after Jesus utters these words, the following things happen: Jesus rises from the dead. (John 20:9). Two angels appear to Mary Magdalene to console her. (John 20:12) Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene to send a message to his disciples. (John 20:17) Jesus comes to the disciples and breathes the Holy Spirit on them. (John 20:19) Jesus returns to the disciples to answer the doubts of Thomas. (John 20:26-27) Jesus shows himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias. (John 21:1) Jesus commands Peter to feed and tend his sheep. (John 21:15-17) And the Gospel of John concludes with these words about God’s ongoing work through Christ: “And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” (John 21:25) As long as there is suffering and sin on earth – in other words, as long as there is an earth and we inhabit it – God will have work to do – work that takes its meaning from the suffering of Jesus Christ. In one of his essays, Pascal captured this starkly but beautifully when he said “Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world.”
More than twenty years ago, a great theologian did me a true service. Through a simple gesture, he helped me understand that the big questions of our faith have eight-hundred-and-forty page answers – and also one word answers. Does God Exist? Yes. Well, I am no theologian, great or otherwise. But even I can understand how that lesson applies to the big questions of our faith implicit in Jesus’ words “It is finished.”
Did Jesus die so we might be saved? Yes. Did Jesus’s death make complete some essential part of God’s design? Yes. Does God continue to work in this world? Yes. Is Jesus still present with us, loving us, striving with us, suffering for us? Yes. And what about our role in all of this? Do we have work to do? Do we have unfinished business? Oh yes, yes, yes.
Amen.
I do not know whether the Christian faith raises any little questions. But I know it raises some very big ones. One of those questions, of course, is whether God exists. Many years ago, I had the privilege of studying with the great theologian Hans Kung. At the end of the class I asked him to sign my copy of his vast eight-hundred-and-forty-page book entitled Does God Exist? He turned to the opening page, signed his name, and then under the title wrote a single word. The word was: “Yes!” This saved me a lot of reading.
The season of Lent draws our attention to another of those very big questions: Why did Jesus die? What is the meaning, the significance, of the Passion? How did it change things? One day, when I was taking seminary courses in Detroit, I was informed that a committee from the board of ordained ministry wanted to meet for fifteen minutes with each of the Methodist students enrolled at the school. I dutifully appeared, crossing paths with the student who had just finished talking with them. “Don’t worry,” she said, “no tough questions.” I went in, sat down, and smiled at the chair of the committee, who leaned back slowly and said “So tell us; why did Jesus die?” I’m afraid I responded by blurting out “You have got to be kidding.”
It’s not that we don’t have an answer to the question. In fact, we have lots of answers, and many of us subscribe to more than one of them. Indeed, those answers have consumed substantial amounts of ink and energy in several branches of theology, including the branch called soteriology. Soteriology takes its name from the Greek word soter (meaning “savior” or “deliverer”) and explores the saving work – the “salvific” work – of Jesus Christ. Over the last two thousand years, the answers to this question offered by soteriology have focused on a variety of themes.
In the early church, the significance of the death of Jesus was understood largely by reference to sacrifice. Some versions of this understanding portrayed the death of Jesus as a sacrifice by God – as an act of boundless love and grace, in which God gave over His only son to take on the sins of the world and, through his blood, to cleanse us of them. We see this theme in the ninth chapter of Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews, it runs very deep in our thinking, and it probably sounds familiar to you. Other versions of this theme, however, portrayed the Passion of Jesus as a sacrifice to God – as an act of appeasement necessary to assuage an angry God and preserve us from wrath and annihilation. As biblical scholar Jeffrey Hopper observes, “In this unfortunate shift, God is acted upon and changed rather than humans.”
In recent years, some theologians – influenced by the work of anthropologist and cultural historian Rene Girard – have moved away from an interpretation of the Passion that focuses on the theme of sacrifice. Girard readily acknowledges that “the Passion is presented to us in the Gospels as an act that brings salvation to humanity. But,” he continues, “it is in no way presented as a sacrifice.” To the contrary, Girard argues, thinking of the Passion as a sacrifice is not consistent with the image of God presented in the Gospels – a God “who is alien to all violence.” Jesus died, Girard therefore concludes, not as a sacrifice but in order to end sacrifice; he says “[t]his is the essential theme, repeated time and time again of Jesus’ preaching: reconciliation with God can take place unreservedly and with no sacrificial intermediary through the rules of the kingdom.” “Go and learn what this means,” Jesus declares in the ninth chapter of Matthew: “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.”
In the course of Christian history themes other than that of sacrifice have also emerged. In his recent book Tokens of Trust, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams elegantly summarizes some of those other images in these words: "Jesus’ death is a ransom, paid to our kidnappers (the powers of destruction); it is a punishment that we deserve, voluntarily borne by another, who is innocent; it is even a triumphant nailing up of a cancelled invoice." These images, of a ransom given over to Satan or a debt made good with God, help explain why our passage for today has occasionally been translated using the words: “It is paid.” Or, as an old hymn puts it, “Jesus paid it all.”
The Greek verb at issue here – rendered variously as “paid,” “done,” or “finished” – is teleo and it appears only twice in the Gospel of John. Of course, it appears in verse 30 of chapter 19, where Jesus declares “It is finished.” But, interestingly, it also appears immediately before this passage, in verse 28 of chapter 19, where the scripture refers to the fact that Jesus has “accomplished” everything that was needed. In the same vein, John sometimes uses a different but closely related Greek word in describing how Jesus “completed” God’s work. In sum, when Jesus says “It is finished” he is not simply crying out that his life has ended. Rather, he is declaring that something has come to completion: something important; something defining in the relationship between humankind and God; something planned and prescribed in the divine order of events.
But what is that something? And how does all this help us with our big question: Why did Jesus die? In the end, the question of why Jesus died is more question than I can fully answer. But I take some consolation in the fact that it may be more question than can be fully answered. Recognizing this, Rowan Williams offers the following guidance: “It’s important to be aware of all these images and to try and see why they are used; [it is] equally important, though, not to treat them as if they were theories that explain why Jesus died.” He continues: “Our theories about all this are likely to be convoluted and unsatisfactory; but all we need to know is that whatever it took – and takes – for us to be set free from our destructive and deceitful traps has been done [through the death of Jesus].” It is paid; it is done; it is completed; it is finished.
And it is not just finished in some abstract and theoretical sense. It is finished in a real, true, and experiential sense. It is finished for each of us, singly, individually, and personally. The refrain of a contemporary song puts it this way: “You did it all for me; you gave your only son; you’d do it all again if I were the only one.”
It is finished, indeed – and yet, and yet it is not over. In our thinking about the Passion, and about Jesus’s words “It is finished,” we must not confuse completeness with closure. It is, after all, possible for something to be magnificent, inspiring, and complete in itself – and the Passion has all these qualities – but for it also to leave some matters open. Many famous examples of this exist in art: the sketches of Michelangelo are complete and perfect in themselves – but they invite the observer to imagine how they might look with the additions of color and dimension; some symphonies of Mahler and Schubert are complete and perfect in themselves – even though they have only two movements, rather than the traditional greater number, and invite the listener to dream of the music that might fill those left unwritten; literary anthologies often contain fragments of works that authors never developed into full epic poems or novels – fragments that are complete and perfect in themselves but that also invite the reader to muse over the endless possibilities of where the story might go next.
But we don’t need to use analogies to describe the difference between completeness and closure. All we need to do is to look at the text itself. For the text reminds us that after Jesus declares “It is finished” we see the unfolding of still more of God’s important and amazing work. The Gospel of John makes this perfectly plain. Think of it – after Jesus utters these words, the following things happen: Jesus rises from the dead. (John 20:9). Two angels appear to Mary Magdalene to console her. (John 20:12) Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene to send a message to his disciples. (John 20:17) Jesus comes to the disciples and breathes the Holy Spirit on them. (John 20:19) Jesus returns to the disciples to answer the doubts of Thomas. (John 20:26-27) Jesus shows himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias. (John 21:1) Jesus commands Peter to feed and tend his sheep. (John 21:15-17) And the Gospel of John concludes with these words about God’s ongoing work through Christ: “And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” (John 21:25) As long as there is suffering and sin on earth – in other words, as long as there is an earth and we inhabit it – God will have work to do – work that takes its meaning from the suffering of Jesus Christ. In one of his essays, Pascal captured this starkly but beautifully when he said “Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world.”
More than twenty years ago, a great theologian did me a true service. Through a simple gesture, he helped me understand that the big questions of our faith have eight-hundred-and-forty page answers – and also one word answers. Does God Exist? Yes. Well, I am no theologian, great or otherwise. But even I can understand how that lesson applies to the big questions of our faith implicit in Jesus’ words “It is finished.”
Did Jesus die so we might be saved? Yes. Did Jesus’s death make complete some essential part of God’s design? Yes. Does God continue to work in this world? Yes. Is Jesus still present with us, loving us, striving with us, suffering for us? Yes. And what about our role in all of this? Do we have work to do? Do we have unfinished business? Oh yes, yes, yes.
Amen.
Monday, March 3, 2008
One Hundred Pyramids
Scripture: Hebrews 12:1: “Let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.”
Dr. George Sheehan was a cardiologist from New Jersey, a devoted husband, and the father of twelve. Like many people, in his mid-forties he became restless and began to reexamine his life and its meaning. But, unlike many people, he didn’t look for answers in self-indulgence; he didn’t try to shake his ennui by getting a flashy new suit or a flashy new car or a flashy new spouse. In fact, he did just the opposite. He embarked on a lifelong program of testing and challenging himself – a program of self-denial and self-discovery. And he did this by returning to an activity he’d pursued in college: running. Five years later, he set the then-world-record for the mile for a fifty-year-old.
Along the way, Dr. Sheehan wrote a book that I view as one of the masterpieces of contemporary spiritual literature: a book called Running and Being. It is a book about running in the same sense that Moby Dick is a book about fishing. Running and Being is actually an eighteen-part fugue on the human condition; this is reflected in the titles of his chapters: living, discovering, understanding, beginning, becoming, playing, learning, healing, winning, losing, suffering, meditating, growing, seeing.
The book has much to say about many things, some of which I’ll return to later. But one of the book’s central themes is that through activities like running we build and reveal our character. Sheehan quotes an observation John Berryman once made to his fellow poet James Dickey: “The trouble with this country is that a man can live his entire life without knowing whether or not he is a coward.” Sheehan embraces running because he sees it as a way to know, a way to find out who we are, a way to demonstrate our capacity to have courage and to persevere. Peter Maher, the Irish-Canadian marathon runner, put it more bluntly and less poetically when he said: “Running is a big question mark that’s there each and every day. It asks you, ‘Are you going to be a wimp or are you going to be strong?’”
Our text from Hebrews similarly associates the image of running with the idea of perseverance: “Let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.” And, indeed, the scriptures repeatedly urge us to be strong, to have courage, and to go the distance. The book of Matthew tells us that “He who endures to the end shall be saved.” (Matt. 10:22) In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul urges us to “be people of courage” and to “be strong.” (I Cor. 16:13) This message dominates Paul’s second letter to Timothy, which includes a passage particularly appropriate for today: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Tim. 4:7)
I think, however, there is something else going on in the passage from Hebrews – something extraordinarily subtle and easy to miss. And I think that this something else is reflected in the phrase “the race that is set before us.” But let me make my point a little differently: you’ll notice that that the text does not say “Let us run with perseverance the race that we have chosen.” In my view, the phrasing of the text from Hebrews embodies a profound insight into the nature of life: we often find ourselves running in a race for which we do not remember filling out an entry form. Sometimes we run the race we planned. But more commonly we run the race “that is set before us.”
In the end, many of our plans count for nothing. A proverb says “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.” Indeed, we do not plan for many of the bad things that happen to us. We do not plan to lose a job, to go through a divorce, to suffer a stroke, or to endure the death of a child. Nor do we plan for many of the glorious things that happen to us. We do not plan to laugh – it must come spontaneously; we do not plan for the new friends we encounter or for the children who come into our lives in all the various ways that happens; we do not plan to hear God’s whispers to us; we do not plan to fall in love. These things, too, are part of the race that is set before us.
It turns out that in an exercise of infinite wisdom God made life unpredictable and thereby made life complicated and thereby made life beautiful. A scene from Somerset Maugham’s novel Of Human Bondage conveys this perfectly. Toward the beginning of the book, the protagonist, Philip, is given a piece of oriental cloth by an older man, who explains that the meaning of life lies within it. Philip does not understand what this means but for many years carries the cloth with him out of fondness for his mentor. Philip’s story goes on to include many struggles and false starts: he tries to become an artist but lacks the necessary talent; he enters medical school but has no sense of purpose; he becomes infatuated with a lovely woman but she has no feelings for him. Toward the end of the novel, however, Philip comes to appreciate what the older man was trying to say and what the oriental cloth signifies; he realizes that the cloth is beautiful precisely because its design includes countless unanticipated twists and turns; and he recognizes that it is this same unpredictability and complexity that gives life its richness and beauty.
The poet Miroslav Holub conveys the same idea in these lines:
A hundred miles from wall to wall.
An eternity and a half of vigils blanker than snow.
Tons of words old as the tracks of a platypus in the sand.
A hundred books we didn’t write.
A hundred pyramids we didn’t build.
Sweepings.
Dust.
Bitter as the beginning of the world.
Believe me when I say
it was beautiful.
We try to plan our lives; our plans do not materialize. We dream of the one hundred pyramids we’ll build along the way; we never lay so much as a cornerstone. We set out running one race; we find ourselves in an altogether different one. And this lack of control and abundance of unpredictability may leave us with a deep sense of loss, of futility, even of failure.
But, as the book of Hebrews tells us, this misses the point completely. Life is not about planning the race we want to run and then running our race diligently. Life is about running the race that is set before us with perseverance. And it is about persevering in our effort to run that race with the sort of faith and love and strength and commitment that fills the Lord’s heart with delight. Any race run, any life lived, in this way is a triumph. Any race run, any life lived, in this way is beautiful. The knowledge of this fills us with hope and reassurance. And the knowledge of this saves us from despair ... just as it saved the author of Ecclesiastes.
George Sheehan recognizes this when he writes as follows: "Everything is vanity and chasing the wind, said Ecclesiastes. Driving race cars, running governments, amassing wealth, building cities: all this is vanity and chasing the wind. But, said Ecclesiastes in an about-face, whatever you put your hand to, do it with all your might. He answers to life: It is not the inconsequential things that you do but how you do them that magnifies the Lord."
Or, to use the words of another great runner, the Olympian Billy Mills: “My life is a gift to me from my Creator. What I do with my life is my gift back to the Creator.” Hebrews tells us that this gift has much less to do with what we have done than how we have done it.
Toward the end of his book, George Sheehan says this: “When you race, you are under oath. When you race, you are testifying as to who you are.” This may well be true of running. But surely it is more broadly true of life itself. We live our lives under oath. Through our lives, we testify to who we are. In our every action, we testify to whose we are.
Several years ago, I ran – or, more accurately, struggled through – the Honolulu marathon. This marathon is somewhat unusual in that the officials do not turn off the clock and close the course until the last participant has crossed the finish line. This makes the marathon a favorite among slow runners and those who will need to walk some or all of the race.
The Honolulu course follows a large loop and on the return leg you run right past the road where you started out. As I approached that part of the loop I could see in the distance the shape of someone who was still in the process of beginning. When I got closer I could make out the figure of a young man wearing a race number, his movements severely restricted by acute cerebral palsy, his legs barely pushing him along the twenty-six-point-two mile course that lay in front of him. And when I got closer still I saw something even more amazing: he was smiling gleefully.
He was running with perseverance the race that was set before him. He was testifying to who he was. He was showing that the meaning of life lies not in where you finish but in how you run. He was magnifying the Lord. And I can tell you that it was more inspiring, more moving, and more beautiful than the glory and the grandeur of one hundred pyramids.
May we go forth and run likewise.
Amen.
Dr. George Sheehan was a cardiologist from New Jersey, a devoted husband, and the father of twelve. Like many people, in his mid-forties he became restless and began to reexamine his life and its meaning. But, unlike many people, he didn’t look for answers in self-indulgence; he didn’t try to shake his ennui by getting a flashy new suit or a flashy new car or a flashy new spouse. In fact, he did just the opposite. He embarked on a lifelong program of testing and challenging himself – a program of self-denial and self-discovery. And he did this by returning to an activity he’d pursued in college: running. Five years later, he set the then-world-record for the mile for a fifty-year-old.
Along the way, Dr. Sheehan wrote a book that I view as one of the masterpieces of contemporary spiritual literature: a book called Running and Being. It is a book about running in the same sense that Moby Dick is a book about fishing. Running and Being is actually an eighteen-part fugue on the human condition; this is reflected in the titles of his chapters: living, discovering, understanding, beginning, becoming, playing, learning, healing, winning, losing, suffering, meditating, growing, seeing.
The book has much to say about many things, some of which I’ll return to later. But one of the book’s central themes is that through activities like running we build and reveal our character. Sheehan quotes an observation John Berryman once made to his fellow poet James Dickey: “The trouble with this country is that a man can live his entire life without knowing whether or not he is a coward.” Sheehan embraces running because he sees it as a way to know, a way to find out who we are, a way to demonstrate our capacity to have courage and to persevere. Peter Maher, the Irish-Canadian marathon runner, put it more bluntly and less poetically when he said: “Running is a big question mark that’s there each and every day. It asks you, ‘Are you going to be a wimp or are you going to be strong?’”
Our text from Hebrews similarly associates the image of running with the idea of perseverance: “Let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.” And, indeed, the scriptures repeatedly urge us to be strong, to have courage, and to go the distance. The book of Matthew tells us that “He who endures to the end shall be saved.” (Matt. 10:22) In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul urges us to “be people of courage” and to “be strong.” (I Cor. 16:13) This message dominates Paul’s second letter to Timothy, which includes a passage particularly appropriate for today: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Tim. 4:7)
I think, however, there is something else going on in the passage from Hebrews – something extraordinarily subtle and easy to miss. And I think that this something else is reflected in the phrase “the race that is set before us.” But let me make my point a little differently: you’ll notice that that the text does not say “Let us run with perseverance the race that we have chosen.” In my view, the phrasing of the text from Hebrews embodies a profound insight into the nature of life: we often find ourselves running in a race for which we do not remember filling out an entry form. Sometimes we run the race we planned. But more commonly we run the race “that is set before us.”
In the end, many of our plans count for nothing. A proverb says “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.” Indeed, we do not plan for many of the bad things that happen to us. We do not plan to lose a job, to go through a divorce, to suffer a stroke, or to endure the death of a child. Nor do we plan for many of the glorious things that happen to us. We do not plan to laugh – it must come spontaneously; we do not plan for the new friends we encounter or for the children who come into our lives in all the various ways that happens; we do not plan to hear God’s whispers to us; we do not plan to fall in love. These things, too, are part of the race that is set before us.
It turns out that in an exercise of infinite wisdom God made life unpredictable and thereby made life complicated and thereby made life beautiful. A scene from Somerset Maugham’s novel Of Human Bondage conveys this perfectly. Toward the beginning of the book, the protagonist, Philip, is given a piece of oriental cloth by an older man, who explains that the meaning of life lies within it. Philip does not understand what this means but for many years carries the cloth with him out of fondness for his mentor. Philip’s story goes on to include many struggles and false starts: he tries to become an artist but lacks the necessary talent; he enters medical school but has no sense of purpose; he becomes infatuated with a lovely woman but she has no feelings for him. Toward the end of the novel, however, Philip comes to appreciate what the older man was trying to say and what the oriental cloth signifies; he realizes that the cloth is beautiful precisely because its design includes countless unanticipated twists and turns; and he recognizes that it is this same unpredictability and complexity that gives life its richness and beauty.
The poet Miroslav Holub conveys the same idea in these lines:
A hundred miles from wall to wall.
An eternity and a half of vigils blanker than snow.
Tons of words old as the tracks of a platypus in the sand.
A hundred books we didn’t write.
A hundred pyramids we didn’t build.
Sweepings.
Dust.
Bitter as the beginning of the world.
Believe me when I say
it was beautiful.
We try to plan our lives; our plans do not materialize. We dream of the one hundred pyramids we’ll build along the way; we never lay so much as a cornerstone. We set out running one race; we find ourselves in an altogether different one. And this lack of control and abundance of unpredictability may leave us with a deep sense of loss, of futility, even of failure.
But, as the book of Hebrews tells us, this misses the point completely. Life is not about planning the race we want to run and then running our race diligently. Life is about running the race that is set before us with perseverance. And it is about persevering in our effort to run that race with the sort of faith and love and strength and commitment that fills the Lord’s heart with delight. Any race run, any life lived, in this way is a triumph. Any race run, any life lived, in this way is beautiful. The knowledge of this fills us with hope and reassurance. And the knowledge of this saves us from despair ... just as it saved the author of Ecclesiastes.
George Sheehan recognizes this when he writes as follows: "Everything is vanity and chasing the wind, said Ecclesiastes. Driving race cars, running governments, amassing wealth, building cities: all this is vanity and chasing the wind. But, said Ecclesiastes in an about-face, whatever you put your hand to, do it with all your might. He answers to life: It is not the inconsequential things that you do but how you do them that magnifies the Lord."
Or, to use the words of another great runner, the Olympian Billy Mills: “My life is a gift to me from my Creator. What I do with my life is my gift back to the Creator.” Hebrews tells us that this gift has much less to do with what we have done than how we have done it.
Toward the end of his book, George Sheehan says this: “When you race, you are under oath. When you race, you are testifying as to who you are.” This may well be true of running. But surely it is more broadly true of life itself. We live our lives under oath. Through our lives, we testify to who we are. In our every action, we testify to whose we are.
Several years ago, I ran – or, more accurately, struggled through – the Honolulu marathon. This marathon is somewhat unusual in that the officials do not turn off the clock and close the course until the last participant has crossed the finish line. This makes the marathon a favorite among slow runners and those who will need to walk some or all of the race.
The Honolulu course follows a large loop and on the return leg you run right past the road where you started out. As I approached that part of the loop I could see in the distance the shape of someone who was still in the process of beginning. When I got closer I could make out the figure of a young man wearing a race number, his movements severely restricted by acute cerebral palsy, his legs barely pushing him along the twenty-six-point-two mile course that lay in front of him. And when I got closer still I saw something even more amazing: he was smiling gleefully.
He was running with perseverance the race that was set before him. He was testifying to who he was. He was showing that the meaning of life lies not in where you finish but in how you run. He was magnifying the Lord. And I can tell you that it was more inspiring, more moving, and more beautiful than the glory and the grandeur of one hundred pyramids.
May we go forth and run likewise.
Amen.
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