A Prayer for Tuesday

Today we pray…

Father, today we pray for those we hate.  We confess that our hatred is wrong and we confess our inability to do the very thing we want to do - bear your image.  Heal our wounds Lord, surgically remove the scar tissue that obscures the tenderness that is within us - the best of who we are.  Help us!

Amen

Unwritten rules

“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.  Matthew 5:43-47 The Message

Tomorrow, we pray.  But for today notice another thing about this passage.  Jesus says we are familiar with the old written law and an unwritten one as well.  He challenges the unwritten law. This is also our work. We must be about challenging the unwritten laws that drive us.  

One of the unwritten laws that is prevalent in our world today is this tendency to lump people into judgmental categories.  Democrats call Republicans names and assume things about them because of their voting record AND Republicans call Democrats names and assume things about them because of their voting record.  We talk about folks of different ethnicities, different religious beliefs, even different accents as if we KNOW their motivations, beliefs, and limitations. Our prejudices are written on our heart in invisible ink and we remain unconscious of how these unwritten laws inspire us to violate the actual law we believe in ourselves - love one another.

A great spiritual discipline is to remain curious about others without judgment and clear about ourselves - our limitations, the way we hate, the things we do not know….in this way we  fulfill the law of God as interpreted through Jesus.

Flourishing

Do you have a tendency to question God about the bad stuff in your life?  It’s a common response to suffering. Folks have written entire books trying to make sense of what is often referred to as “bad things happening to good people.”  I appreciate conversations about this, because I happen to think this is a very clear place where we can discipline ourselves and develop a more robust spiritual backbone. One verse in particular teaches us that God gives good things to both the naughty and the nice.  Stop already with this tendency to blame God every time life does what life does - life is messy and difficult and includes death and life, sorrow and celebration, grief and joy. This is life on life’s terms. The scriptures say it like this:

“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.  Matthew 5:43-47 The Message

We say we believe?  Then we need to practice believing - even in the midst of the bad stuff!  I’d encourage you to take some time and notice what these verses tell us to focus on.  But i particularly love this, and focus on it in times of tragedy and inexplicable suffering:  This is what God does.  He gives his best - the sun to warm and the rain to nourish - to everyone, regardless:  the good and bad, the nice and nasty.

Maybe practice believing as a spiritual discipline.  When your mind wants to chase rabbits down the hole of wanting to know and understand, explain and justify, thank it for its rabbity ways to tell it you are busy remembering what you believe!  Let’s see how that perspective changes our level of stress, set our course of action, impact our feelings and our capacity to love one another!!

Well-Designed Suffering

After the massacre in Broward County, Florida at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, our community spent a Saturday evening sitting in our suffering.  We were all heartbroken. We have teachers in our midst and they felt afraid; parents of children in schools felt afraid too. Others felt despair; some felt angry.  A few people have wandered into my office and asked me why such a bad thing happened to such good kids. One person has chosen to leave church altogether, having come to believe that God LET this happen.  

One of the many thoughts I have as I sit with my friends and we talk about this tragedy is regret.  I regret that in addition to all the other problems we have in our world today, we continue to fail at teaching and learning how to suffer. I think there are ways to suffer that are productive, and ways to suffer that are counter-productive.  Please do not confuse this with managing feelings or telling someone what they should think during crisis.

But I am calling us out and asking that we begin to slow our roll.  Pause to prepare. Think carefully about our response to tragedy and loss.  It is too easy to try to channel our big emotions into blame or fear-mongering.  This is unproductive. The world has ALWAYS been a scary place. But we are not making progress by protecting ourselves from our profound distress by getting mad and lashing out at others.  This is unproductive. It short-circuits the moment. This is a time to reflect on our part and what we can actually DO to improve the world in which we live.

In my own suffering in recent years, I found plenty to opportunity to blame others.  I ruminated and tried to make sense of the events that revealed the chasms in my family of origin’s relationships.  I was sorry I hadn’t seen the real state of things earlier, detached sooner, been more honest about the fragility of our relationships.  But I also learned some things about suffering.

I learned that trying to make sense of others’ actions is sometimes a waste of time.  Ruminating is a sure-fire way to end up depressed and even physically ill. The best thing that has come out of my crushing disappointment in my family situation is that I have indeed learned a few things about productive suffering.  Thing one: Beware of being so focused on the people that do not want relationship with you that you forget to focus on all the people who care deeply about you. My friend Suzanne Stabile has a story about herself that she tells when she describes herself as “chasing the one.”  In other words, in a room full of people, she notices the one person who seems displeased and disinterested in her. She has at times had a tendency to chase after the one rather than notice the crowd of folks who deeply appreciate not only her work, but her presence. I’m done chasing.  I’m looking around and seeing plenty to say grace over. I’ve got 2 grandchildren, 3 bio kids, 2 kids via marriage, family and friends who teach me that they care about our relationships. This is a good life; no need to chase anyone; nothing is lacking. How about you? Who can you pay more attention to?

God's Boundaries

One question we all wrestle over is the legitimate confusion we have about suffering.  I know this guy who is a really bad dude; he hurts others and one would think that the justice system would stop his reign of terror.  It hasn’t happened yet! He keeps getting released from jail with a long list of instructions to follow, all of which he ignores. Even his grandmother (and you know how we Memes are about our grandbabies!!!) is scared of him.  I got a ticket for an illegal U-turn one time and was sure they were going to lock me up for life. What’s up with this guy?

I know this other sweet, loving family who seem targeted for suffering.  They’ve lost three family members in six months, their young child was diagnosed with cancer, their house burned down and the primary breadwinner in the family lost her job due to downsizing.  

When these crazy dynamics collide our community often asks what’s up with God.  Where is he? Why doesn’t he intervene? Why does he send suffering on the righteous?  Why don’t the bad guys get what they deserve? These are great questions and I get itchy with anticipation for the great discussions we have because of our community’s willingness to wrestle what they honestly wonder about God and his ways.

In the next few days we are going to unpack a few things.  But first, here’s a scripture for consideration:

What happened was this:  People knew God perfectly well, but when they didn’t treat him like God, refusing to worship him, they trivialized themselves into silliness and confusion so that there was neither sense nor direction left in their lives.  They pretended to know it all, but were illiterate regarding life. They traded the glory of God who holds the whole world in his hands for cheap figurines you can buy at any roadside stand.

So God said, in effect, “If that’s what you want, that’s what you get.”  It wasn’t long before they were living in a pigpen, smeared with filth, filthy inside and out.  And all this because they traded the true God for a fake god, and worshiped the god they made instead of the God who made them - the God we bless, the God who blesses US.  

~ Romans 1, The Message

Point one:  God has boundaries.  He hasn’t a codependent bone in his body.  He doesn’t interrupt the consequences of our choices like a helicopter parent.  But what he does quite consistently is this: he blesses us. However we parse out our thoughts on what God is or is not up to, I put a stake in the ground and raise a flag to remind me of this one true thing:  God made us and he blesses us. No matter what my eyes can see, I must interpret it through this filter: God made us and he blesses us. We can have all sorts of feelings about how life is shaking out for us and those we love, but this one thing we must factor into the narrative:  God made us and he blesses us. How have you either remembered or forgotten this when you are trying to make sense of suffering?

To be continued….