Stephen
Terry, Director
The
Central Issue: Love or Selfishness?
Commentary
for the April 13, 2024, Sabbath School Lesson
"Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves? Is it only for bowing one's head
like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?"
"Is
not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every
yoke?"
"Is
it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with
shelter--when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your
own flesh and blood?"
"Then
your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly
appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord
will be your rear guard."
"Then
you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will
say: Here am I."
Isaiah
58:5-9
Christianity is in crisis, but
it is a crisis afflicting every other religion as well. Muslim, Jew, Hindu,
Buddhist, and Christian have chosen to reject love and compassion in the
interest of ever-increasing power. We see it in the never-ending fighting
between Sunni and Shia Muslims. We see it in the murderous atrocities committed
by both Muslims and Jews. We see it in the bloody Russian Orthodoxy's Patriarch
proclaiming that a war that is murdering thousands of Ukrainian women and
children is a holy war fought for God. We see it in India persecuting Muslims and
Muslims returning the favor.
In the West and particularly in
the United States, we look at these conflicts with an arrogant
self-righteousness as though we are the chosen ones who have a true
relationship with God, all the while sending millions of tons of armaments all
across the globe that have done little for the world beyond sweeping a
countless host of innocents into their graves should they be fortunate enough
to be buried. We really meant to destroy the bad guys, but these were all
acceptable "collateral damage." We blame the enemy for hiding behind civilians,
but what did we expect? They were defending their homes. Were they supposed to
gather in an open field to be bombed into oblivion by two-thousand-pound bombs?
I do not think that those with the bombs would do that in fighting to protect their
homes. Why do they think the enemy should?
We dehumanize our enemies so
much that the blood we shed is little more than animal blood soaking the earth around
their destroyed homes. But our vision is imperfect, for if we could truly see,
we would realize that the blood is Christ's.[i] He
continues to die as collateral damage in our war against those who have so little.
We have raped the world of its resources to create an artificially wealthy
lifestyle, leaving those to whom those resources belonged to live in poverty.
Then we wonder why they follow those resources to our borders, wanting a measure
of that better life that those resources enabled in Europe and North America.
Some have called the migrations an invasion. What they really mean is "We want
to continue to haul away your resources, but we do not want you to come along
with them. We want to enjoy them only for ourselves." This is not just a
problem for the West. As prosperity grows in China, Russia, and India, they
will discover that similar migrations will occur. The poor of this world truly
have little to lose and everything to gain in the struggle for justice. The
wealth of those who ignore the injustice behind their wealth may find the cost
of that wealth to be dearer than they expected.
I do not have enough knowledge
of the sacred texts of other religions to instruct them in the path to
compassion, empathy, and justice that will set things right in their culture. But
I do know that until Christianity accepts the example of the apostolic church
learned at the feet of Jesus, we will continue to be in crisis. If we continue
to see the masses at our borders as just animals trying to break through a fence,
we will find God is not only a God of compassion, but also of justice. That justice
could come as elevating those hordes to overcome the ones treating them so unjustly.
Or it could come as a lowering of the status of their oppressors to that of
those they are oppressing to help them learn the human value of those they
treat so poorly.
Even if we do not know or
understand the ministry of Jesus, history has taught repeatedly the fate of
empires that see the rest of the world as theirs to conquer and plunder. The
wealth they accumulate simply starts to rot society at its core. Not happy with
all they have, those who can backstab and betray one another to add power to
their wealth. As the saying goes, "The fish rots from the head," this
infighting starts for the top positions and spreads downward until even those
with little fight and claw one another for the slightest advantage. Churches
are not exempt. Pastors fight just as much for the best parishes as the wealthy
over the world's resources. When a powerful leader speaks, one falls in line if
one wishes more power and control in the organization, even if it means trashing
what was once dear, even if it means betraying a friend. No kiss required.[ii]
The apostles understood the
values Jesus taught and sought to emulate them. They cared for the poor and
shared according to need.[iii]
This is quite different from the Christianity that endorses taking everything
you can from the poor and begrudge them having even the minimum needed for
survival. We cast them out as though they were offal instead of welcoming them
to share the bounty. Why do we do this? Is it because we fear they will steal
from us as we have stolen from them, that they will have no more compassion
than we have? If instead of using religion as a way to placate the poor into
accepting their fate complacently, we had used it to change our own hearts toward
compassion and justice for all, that lesson would have become ingrained in
their hearts as it should have been in ours and no such fear would be
justified. Instead, are we reaping the poisonous fruit of vines we have sown?
Instead of grafting the world to the compassion and love of Christ, have we, by
our own example, grafted them to a strange and poisonous weed that will destroy
them as surely as it is working to destroy us in our greed and indifference to
the suffering in the world.
We like to blame God for all the
suffering, even denying his existence for that reason. But he is not to blame.
We are. He has consistently tried to call us to a higher path, but enamored by
the wealth of this world, we have chosen to destroy whatever and whomever we
think stands between us and having it all. We were meant to love one another,[iv]
not backstab, betray, and manipulate one another into submission to our perverted
will. Jesus knelt and washed his disciples' feet. If they had the secular power
to do so, they might chop off those same feet if they felt those who owned the
feet challenged their power and authority. This may seem a ghastly image, but
is it more gruesome than the broken and bloodied bodies of children that those
in power see as acceptable "collateral damage" suffered by those who dared to respond
to injustice as their oppressors taught them to respond to an enemy, lessons
they learned well?
There is a path forward, but to
find it we need to return to the time of Jesus to rediscover what his disciples
did. The single digit percentage growth rate of Christianity in our day is
lamentable. We have sold our birthright for pottage by betraying the ministry
of Jesus in exchange for power and authority granted to us by the wealthy and
the governments they control. Christians once ran wild and free, filled with
the Holy Spirit, and this enabled great works of compassion, including
miracles. Those who saw this power working in the saints came to seek that
Christlike character for themselves, being grafted
onto that same vine that they might receive the Holy Spirit. But through the
centuries, we discovered the dainties of the rich, and the softness of their
fabrics, and became lapdogs of the wealthy, no longer caring about let alone emulating,
the character of Jesus. Everything became about the comforts of this life, with
little thought of what was to come tomorrow. We became so comfortable with
material wealth and afraid that we might lose it that death became something to
dread instead of a portal we all must pass through to Eden restored. That fear
may be a primal angst of a judgment that justice demands. Selling out the love
and compassion of Jesus for all that we can get in this life has left the
scales of justice severely imbalanced. Like Scrooge in Dickens' "A Christmas
Carol," while we are yet alive, we can and must work to right those scales by
no longer allowing power to perpetuate injustice, whether in our lives, in the
church, or in this world. If Christians could learn to have empathy and
compassion instead of a lust to control everyone and everything, then we could
understand that God is willing and has provided the manpower to deal with
suffering in our day. We only need to let loose of the golden fruit that we
have chosen to grasp instead.