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Positive Faith and Sin Part II
Read yesterday’s post before reading this. It’ll help.
People tend to be afraid that talking about faith positively means you’re unwilling to face the “hard” parts of faith. To be honest- that makes me either eye roll or laugh depending on how generous I’m feeling (and I’m not usually feeling generous).
So let’s just go there.
What is sin?
Well, in the Bible anyway, it’s a few different things. 1. It’s a force that is active in the world that opposes God’s plan to bring creation totally in line with his values (compassion, patience, mercy, love). 2. This is kind of a continuation of 1, but, the force that opposes God’s plan that is somehow within each of us. 3. A specific action that does not line up with God’s plan. Let’s unpack each of these three a little further (but I’m not going to go into great detail).
There’s an impersonal component to sin because it’s something outside of ourselves that we all battle and this force can pull us away from our certain way of seeing and being in the world. In other words, sometimes we live “in sin” because we’ve been influenced by sin.
There’s a personal component of it as well. Pay careful attention to how I preface this next sentence. Without some guidance, help, support, affirmation, or love, we do not instinctively put God’s love on display in our lives. I believe this is, practically speaking (not so much theologically speaking), what it means to live in sin. It’s when we are unable to prioritize reflecting God’s love to the world around us. We are more than capable of doing it- but we need the love and support of others in order to get there (in addition to the love of God, naturally).
The third component of sin is something I’m not particularly interested in unpacking. The individual actions that we do flow out of something that happens in 1 or 2 and, as a general rule, people are not particularly confused about the specific for instances of when they do not reflect God’s love.
I tend to believe that focusing on creating a community that fosters love, support, affirmation, admiration, and more, will create the environment we need to better reflect God’s love. That needs to be our focus in order to take sin seriously.
I’ll say more tomorrow.
Positive Faith in Scripture: Jonah
“Then they grilled him: “Confess. Why this disaster? What is your work? Where do you come from? What country? What family?”
He told them, “I’m a Hebrew. I worship God, the God of heaven who made sea and land.”
At that, the men were frightened, really frightened, and said, “What on earth have you done!” As Jonah talked, the sailors realized that he was running away from God.
They said to him, “What are we going to do with you—to get rid of this storm?” By this time the sea was wild, totally out of control.
Jonah said, “Throw me overboard, into the sea. Then the storm will stop. It’s all my fault. I’m the cause of the storm. Get rid of me and you’ll get rid of the storm.”
But no. The men tried rowing back to shore. They made no headway. The storm only got worse and worse, wild and raging.
Then they prayed to God, “O God! Don’t let us drown because of this man’s life, and don’t blame us for his death. You are God. Do what you think is best.”
They took Jonah and threw him overboard. Immediately the sea was quieted down.
The sailors were impressed, no longer terrified by the sea, but in awe of God. They worshiped God, offered a sacrifice, and made vows.”
Jonah 1:8-16, Message
First off, let me apologize for having you read such a lengthy passage. I skipped the first 7 verses though- you’re welcome. Long story short, God asks Jonah to go preach to Nineveh so that they might turn towards God (because they were misbehaving), and Jonah runs away, leading to this fiasco with the boat. God sent a storm after Jonah in order to coax him to fulfill his mission.
Unlike yesterday, here is a story where God did establish some cause and effect. Jonah ran, so God sent a storm. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves- no one was harmed. In fact, again, God does not even express frustration Jonah. He sends the fish to swallow Jonah up- where Jonah prays and asks God for help (was this is an actual literal fish? or part of the imaginative way of telling stories that was so common in the Old Testament? I don’t know!).
When Jonah prays for help, God does not admonish him or rub Jonah’s face in his own pee (as I’ve seen people do to potty-training puppies). No- God’s response to Jonah’s prayer is something like: “Get going to Nineveh because I can’t ignore them any longer.” It’s almost as if God is taking responsibility for the lack of resolution in Nineveh.
God does not speak incredibly harshly about Nineveh or Jonah. In fact, God seems to have high hopes for both in spite of themselves and, in both cases, he is correct. Jonah fulfills his mission (though he’s not happy about it) and Nineveh turns towards God.
I don’t want to belabor the point, but what we see is not, actually, an angry God who can’t possibly be pacified but, instead, a gentle God, slow to anger and quick to forgive. A God who glosses over the shortcomings of his followers in order to encourage them to move forward.
What would change, for you, if you knew your shortcomings were things God just glosses over in order to help you move forward?
Vocation, Calling and Tough Talk
"Vocation is not evoked by your bundle of need and desire."
Dr. William Willimon, p. 54, Accidental Pastor
We spend a lot of time thinking about who we want to be when we grow up. We encourage our kids to plan for their future. Maybe we point out early signs of talent or giftedness and stretch our bony pointy finger to the future with no small amount of anxiety and say, "Child, maybe go thataway..." We take personality tests, aptitude tests and find our strengths. We shore up our weaknesses or at least try to defend or camouflage them. We try to find careers, callings and hobbies that help us find our bliss. My niece Kaitlin dreamed about being a veterinarian and now she is one! My nephew Robby told me once he was going to ride a rocket to Mars - who knows, maybe he will!
The super fortunate among us smash up all these ideas and opportunities and sometimes end up with a legitimate sense of calling. But after obsessing over the writings of Will Willimon, I no longer think calling and vocation should feel like a roll of the dice.
Listen to this quote:
"Vocation is what God wants from you whereby your life is transformed into a consequence of God's redemption the world. Look no further than Jesus's disciples - remarkably mediocre, untalented, lackluster yokels - to see that innate talent or inner yearning has less to do with vocation than God's thing for redeeming lives by assigning us something to do for God."
Dr. William Willimon, Accidental Preacher, p. 54
Think about this. The door is wide open. The needle does not have to be threaded. God wants something from us and our life is the consequence. We're assigned a job. Be a faithful partner - so don't kiss strangers you find attractive and want to assert power over. Be a faithful grandparent - still figuring what that looks like, but I am practicing the role by giving my grandchildren sugar and always saying "Yes". Be a faithful pastor - figure out how to keep serving others even when all you can imagine doing is crying for unending stretches of time. On and on the roles go that we are assigned. Our vocation and calling is not diminished by our lack of enthusiasm or talent for the job assigned. Think harder. See if this clarifies things for you and opens you up a bit to a renewed commitment to practice.