Not Niceness

The scriptures referred to are 1 Corinthians 13 and Luke 4:21-30.

In Douglas Adams' sci-fi comedy The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the narrator says it takes place “nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change.” In the TV version of Neil Gaiman's and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens, a demon and an angel are at the crucifixion. The demon asks, “What has he said that made everyone so upset?” The angel replies, “Be kind to each other.” The demon says, “Oh yeah. That'll do it.” In Monty Python's Life of Brian, there is actually a scene of Jesus saying the Beatitudes. And then the camera pulls way back and we spend most of our time with people on the fringes of the crowd who can't quite hear what Jesus is saying. The film isn't about Jesus, though it had its start in a comment Eric Idle said to the press when asked what the next Python film would be. “Jesus Christ: Lust for Glory,” the comedian quipped. And the other members of the group thought about it. But upon studying Jesus they decided he wouldn't make a good subject for satire. Satire attacks what's bad. So they decided to focus instead on fanatical followers, both religious and political, in their story about a guy born in the next manger over from Jesus who gets mistaken for the Messiah.

But that's typical of how Jesus is treated in our culture. He is sidelined, dismissed as not interesting or terribly relevant to the main action of the story. This is glaringly obvious when you consider how many films are made about the Biblical apocalypse which conveniently leave out the return of Jesus, the Prince of Peace, to concentrate on the deaths and disasters. In the comedy Rapture-Palooza Jesus gets shot out of the sky as he comes to earth. This gets him out of the way so that there can be a karate battle between God and the Antichrist.

Try to recall an action movie where the hero tells the villain he loves him and forgives him. You probably can't. There may be one out there but I'll bet it did badly at the box office. We don't want to love or forgive our enemies. We want action and conflict and writers realize Jesus would put a damper on all that.

Which is why they also water down what Jesus said and make it into Hallmark card sentiments, like “Be nice.” Jesus never said, “Be nice.” Jesus himself wasn't always nice. Jesus said, “Love your neighbor. Love your enemy. Forgive every wrong against you. Turn the other cheek. Go the extra mile. Disown yourself, take up your cross and follow me.” That's what people objected to. That's what got him killed.

It was not niceness but love that Jesus preached. And it wasn't just love of your family and friends and your own group. Jesus said we are to be like God our Father. And God loves the whole world, as it famously says in John 3:16. It is that radical love that goes beyond the people you already love, that extends even to those who hate you, that Jesus commands of us and which people refuse to do.

Though we don't want to love our enemies, we want to have them. Here in the US, when the cold war ended, and our enemy wasn't out there anymore, we felt we still needed an enemy. And so we turned to people in our country that dared to use their freedom of thought and speech and behavior to think and speak and behave differently. And the same thing was happening in Jesus' day. Jews would identify as Pharisees or Sadducees or Zealots or Essenes, all with quite different ideas of what their nation should be like and how to achieve that. And when they revolted against Rome, and the Zealots took Jerusalem, they found it was actually easy to defend against siege by Roman troops. They could have held out. But eventually the different Jewish parties within the city turned on each other and decimated their ranks. Which made it easier for Rome to defeat them. Forget loving their enemy; they couldn't even love their neighbor. Because they turned their neighbor into the enemy. The Pythons did their research on all the factionalism in first century Judea, with, of course, an eye to the contemporary world. Someone once said that if you want to destroy a group, give them power and they will do it themselves.

In today's gospel, which really should have not been cut off from last week's passage, we get the aftermath to Jesus reading from Isaiah in his hometown synagogue. If you remember the scripture he read said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.” And afterwards, Jesus says, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” This week we learn of his townspeople's reactions. “All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth.” But what Jesus says next is not so nice.

Luke only hints at what Jesus is reacting to. He says the people asked, “Is this not Joseph's son?” Mark in his account goes into more detail. He tells us, “Many who heard him were astonished, saying, 'Where did he get these ideas? And what is this wisdom that has been given to him? What are these miracles that are done through his hands? Isn't this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James, Joses, Judas, and Simon? And aren't his sisters here with us?' and so they took offense at him.” (Mark 6:2-3) The Greek word translated “took offense” is skandalizo, the word from which we get scandalize. Literally it means “to put a snare or stumbling block in someone's way,” and thus “to hinder right thought or conduct.” And what was it that hindered their believing in him? The fact that they knew him and his family. In other words, they were thinking, “You're nothing special. We know where you came from. We know your mother got pregnant before your father married her. We knew you when you were a snot-nosed kid. How can you be the Messiah?” Oddly enough they echo Nathaniel who said, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:46) Mark also tells us of Jesus, “He was not able to do a miracle there, except to lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. And he was amazed because of their unbelief.” (Mark 6:5-6) Because they wouldn't trust him, he couldn't work with them. That true of any relationship and especially a relationship with God.

That's why Luke records Jesus saying, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, 'Doctor, cure yourself!' And you will say, 'Do here also in your hometown the things we have heard you did in Capernaum. Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet's hometown.” And then he goes on to talk about how the prophets Elijah and Elisha had more success helping and healing 2 Gentiles. Probably they had no expectations of the prophets and were more open to trusting them. (Though Naaman had to be convinced by his servants to do as Elisha said.) But Jesus bringing up the idea that God might show love and mercy to people outside their group enraged them. And a mob grabbed him and tried to throw him off of the hill on which the village was built. Throwing someone from a height was often the first step in stoning them.

But Jesus just turned and walked through the crowd. I imagine it was his sheer presence and sense of authority that allowed him to do that. He turned and looked at them and they moved out of his way. And then he moved his base of operations to Capernaum.

It is odd that some people take less offense at a God of judgment than a God of love and forgiveness. And it is easier to get folks upset over and energized against other people than to stir up compassion for them. It is easy to rally folks against, say, refugees trying to get to the US than to show empathy for people who are, after all, fleeing warring drug cartels. In a recent episode of Trafficked with Mariana Van Zeller, the journalist did something different. Rather than following criminals smuggling things like drugs into the US, she followed criminals smuggling firearms out of the US to Mexico, at the rate of 2000 weapons a day. That enables the cartels to fight over territory, which in turn causes the people caught in the crossfire to leave and seek the safety of our country. Van Zeller points out that the criminals aren't the ones coming here; they are staying put and staking their claims to various parts of our neighbor Mexico. And they are being supplied weapons by a network of American criminals in exchange for drugs. Blaming the refugees is blaming the victims.

In the same episode, Van Zeller does something else she rarely does. Rather than just following and talking to police and criminals, she follows some victims, a group of Mexican mothers who every weekend go into the wilderness and look for disturbed ground. Then they dig, hoping to find the remains of their children whom the cartels have “disappeared.” The leader of these mothers is a woman whose son was a decorated police officer, who had been kidnapped from his home one night by cartel thugs. He has not been seen since. She and these other women are trying to at least recover the bodies of their children. It moves Van Zeller, herself a mother, to hug the woman as she cries.

A mother's love for her own flesh and blood is natural. Jesus said that if we only love those who love us, there is nothing special about that. We are to go beyond that. We are to love as God loves, with no exemptions. (Matthew 5:43-48) Jesus raises the bar on love.

In the act for which he is known worldwide, even by non-Christians, Jesus goes further. He not only preaches love; he not only heals all who ask him, including Gentiles; he dies on the cross for the whole world. And he doesn't just die for the “good” people. Paul reminds us that “God demonstrates his own love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) It is rare for someone to die for a good person, he points out. But God Incarnate died for the ungodly. Why in the world would he do that? Because he loves us.

While Paul's chapter on love is traditionally read at weddings, the Greek word he uses is not eros, which means romantic love, but agape, divine love. So Paul is describing the love God has for us, which we in turn should have for each other. You could translate this passage, “Divine love is patient; divine love is kind; divine love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.” And just to emphasize what we are talking about, let's replace the pronouns. “Divine love does not insist on its own way; divine love is not irritable or resentful; divine love does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. Divine love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Divine love never ends.” Or as J.B. Phillips paraphrased it: “[Divine] Love knows no limit to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. It is, in fact, the one thing that still stands when all else has fallen.” That's true of God's love. That's true of real Christian love as well.

On the night he was betrayed, Jesus told his disciples, “I give you a new commandment—to love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34) We are not simply to love each other in an ordinary way, but to love each other as Jesus loves us. And the very next day, he died for us. Jesus calls us to self-sacrificial love. Parents love their children that way. Couples should love that way. Paul said, “Each of you should be concerned not only about your own interests but about the interests of others as well. You should have the same attitude toward one another that Christ Jesus had, who though he existed in the form of God did not regard equality with God as something to be clung to, but emptied himself by taking on the form of a slave, by looking like other men, and by sharing human nature. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even death on the cross!” (Philippians 2:4-8) Jesus gave up more than we can imagine for us. That is the kind of love to which he calls us.

But isn't that naive? Especially loving one's enemies. What will you accomplish by that? Using non-violent protests Martin Luther King got the Civil Rights Acts of 1964, 1965 and 1968 passed. Gandhi got independence from Britain for India the same way. And of course, with no retaliation on his part, Jesus Christ saved us from our sins. There aren't a lot of examples of this because we don't do things that way very often. Instead we fight, for ourselves or for our group. And to hell with everyone else. And then we wonder why our world is the way it is, full of conflict and exploitation and pain and trauma.

G.K. Chesterton said, “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and left untried.” He understates our situation. It is in fact impossible for human beings to live out that ideal. But with God all things are possible.

And the Christian ideal is not merely to be nice. Evil people can be nice to lull their victims into a false sense of security. The Christian ideal isn't even to simply treat others as we would like to be treated. Every religion has some form of the Golden Rule. The Christian ideal is to love others as Jesus Christ loves us, with no exceptions.

Will we fail? Of course! All efforts to do something supremely difficult, let alone impossible, fail at first. You must persist, getting incrementally better, day by day.

And if we only had this lifetime to master divine love we would fail. And if we only had our natural capacity to love we would fail. But we have all eternity and we have the Spirit of the God who is love within us, transforming us into new creations in Christ. And we are told that, one day, “we will be like him.” (1 John 3:2) The image of the God who is love so clearly seen in Jesus will at last be seen in all its beauty and goodness in us. Isn't that worth it? Then why wait? Let's get started. Let us love one another as Jesus loves us.

Reading the Book

The scriptures referred to are Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10.

I don't know what age I was but I was having trouble with long division. And my mom taught me how to estimate the answer first. Using common sense I could figure out at least the range of numbers in which I could expect to find the answer and use that to narrow the possibilities and zero in on the right number. And of course, estimating is a useful first step in many tasks in life. I am grateful she taught me that.

Most people, when they are having trouble with something, are grateful for helpful tips or answers. And you can distinguish between a truly helpful and an inane suggestion, sometimes by immediately recognizing that it is right when you are shown it, but more often by putting it into practice and seeing how well it works.

A lot of non-religious people think faith is not useful in real life and actually makes it worse. If so, why does it survive? Why do 85% of the world's population hold some sort of religious belief? Why do 72% of the “nones,” the people who claim no religion, still believe in God? They must find it helpful. And a large body of scientific studies have found that religious people tend to live longer, have lower blood pressure, have stronger immune systems, are less prone to depression, are less likely to abuse drugs and alcohol and even go to the dentist more often! Religious faith correlates with greater optimism and hope, self-esteem, sense of meaning and purpose in life, self-control, and social support. Faith in God is not a mistake; it works. Especially faith in a God who loves us.

So why are the people hearing Ezra read the law of Moses crying?

After the exodus from Egypt, the event that has most shaped Judaism is the exile to Babylon. The deportation of all but the poorest Jews to Babylon began in 597 BC. In 586 BC Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed. When Babylon was in turn conquered by the Persians, the Jews were allowed to return to their homeland after 70 years in exile. They started rebuilding the temple but didn't get very far. Around 458 BC Ezra the priest returns from Babylon and works on restoring the religion of the people, while Nehemiah returns around 444 BC to rebuild the city's walls. Our passage from Nehemiah tells us of how Ezra, in renewing the covenant with God, starts by reading the Torah. We are not sure if he reads all 5 books of Moses or maybe just Exodus, Leviticus and/or Deuteronomy. But it takes 5 or 6 hours. And as the people stood to listen to Ezra read, to this day Jews stand for the reading of the Torah, just as we stand at the reading of the Gospel. After the exile, Jews become people of the Book. As are Christians. We both derive out beliefs and behavior from the Bible.

The Levites “who taught the people” are said to have read “with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.” (vv. 8-9) One comment on my blog years ago was a criticism, not of how I interpreted the Bible, but that I interpreted it at all. It came with a link to the critic's blog, where I found not merely quotes from the Bible but his comments on them. I pointed out that his comments were also interpretations of the Bible. I never heard from him again.

Anyway, here we have Biblical validation of interpreting scripture. The real issue is how to interpret it properly. One sign of a cult is that they elevate obscure parts of scripture, or attach bizarre interpretations to them, and ignore the parts that contradict their interpretations. For instance, Fred Phelps and his family's Westboro Baptist Church took the 7 passages on homosexual acts and prioritized them as the worst and, he said, unforgivable sins. That's despite the literally hundreds more verses about idolatry or murder, as well as the more than 50 condemning slander and spreading rumors. That's despite the fact that all the commands to love one another in the New Testament alone outnumber all the references to homosexuality in the entire Bible. (John 13:34, 35 and 15:12, 17; Romans 13:8; 1 Thessalonians 3:12; 1 Peter 3:8 and 4:8; 1 John 3:11, 23 and 4:7, 11, 12; 2 John 5, etc) Phelps' website said God actually hates gays and had a counter keeping track of how many people were going to hell every second. (How he calculated this is a theological puzzle.) I wondered how he reconciled all this with Jesus' total lack of mentioning homosexuality and his commands to love everyone, including our enemies. (Matthew 5:43-48) Or the fact that God is love (1 John 4:8) and does not desire the death of anyone. (Ezekiel 18:23, 32) And then I read Banished, Lauren Drain's memoir of growing up in that church and then being expelled for asking those very questions. It turns out Phelps simply ignored any parts of the Bible that would cause him to rethink or revise his interpretation. He made himself, not God, the final authority.

Shakespeare said, “The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.” It's easy. Translate it badly. Take it out of context. Disregard the history or culture behind it. Treat a verse either literally or metaphorically, whichever suits your purpose. Pretend you have no biases that you might be reading into it. And, of course, ignore the rest of scripture. So to properly interpret the Bible, you do the opposite.

First, it helps if you look at different translations of the passage you are examining. There are several good translations of the Bible and no perfect ones. Not even the King James, whose translation of 1 Timothy 6:10 says that the love of money is “the root of all evil” rather than the more correct “a root of all kinds of evils.” And modern translations have access to the literally thousands of ancient manuscripts discovered in the last 2 centuries, like the Dead Sea scrolls and Codex Sinaiticus, which give us a text that is closest to the original documents.

But as anyone who speaks more than one language knows, you can't always capture precisely all the nuances of an expression and translate them into another language. So I use multiple translations of the Bible which I access on my phone and check them against the Hebrew or Greek to make sure I know what the Bible is actually saying. I love the translators' notes in the NET Bible, which set out the various ways difficult passages can be translated and why they chose the one they did. Though even they don't get 1 Timothy 6:10 completely right. Again, no translation is perfect.

Next it really helps to know the context of the passage, which includes the history and culture of the time. When Jesus says, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a sewing needle than for a wealthy person to enter the kingdom of God,” he is not just dumping on the rich. In fact the reaction of the disciples is an astonished “Then who is able to be saved?” (Mark 10:25-26) Why? Because in that culture it was thought that riches were a sign of God's favor. So if the rich can't make it, what will happen to the poor? Jesus replies, “With humans it is impossible but not with God. For all things are possible with God.” (Mark 10:27) Jesus is teaching that no one has any special advantage with God; nobody can save themselves, no matter how powerful they are; we are all, rich or poor, dependent on God's grace. The proper response is to be humble and trust God's love and forgiveness.

It also helps to notice if a verse or passage is intended to be literal or not. Even people who say they take the Bible literally do not do so when it comes to part of the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus says that we should pluck out our eye or cut off our hand if it causes us to stumble. (Matthew 5:29-30) What he's doing is using hyperbole to emphasize that we must get rid of sinful habits and attitudes even if they seem to be a part of who we are. Nor do literalists think that a sign of the end of the world is when an actual beast with 7 heads, 10 horns and 10 crowns comes out of the sea. (Revelation 13:1) They get that the passage is using symbolism.

Yet people want to make metaphorical, or at least less real, verses obviously meant literally. Jesus literally meant to not resist the evildoer and to turn the other cheek and let them have your clothes and go with the soldier who forces you. (Matthew 5:39-41) Because he literally does these things. He goes willingly with those sent to arrest him. (John 18:7-8) He tells Peter to put down his sword when he tries to defend Jesus (Matthew 26:52) and heals the man whose ear is cut off. (Luke 22:50-51) The soldiers hit him and he does not retaliate. (John 18:22-23) He carries the cross given to him and goes with the soldiers to Golgotha. (John 19:16-17) They take his clothes and gamble for them. (Mark 15:24) Jesus literally does these things for us. So why do we think we are free instead to fight back when someone offends us or takes our parking space or plays their music too loud?

And in Christ's parable about the Last Judgment, are we not to take the moral literally--that how we treat the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the sick, the imprisoned and the resident alien is how we treat Jesus? (Matthew 25:40, 45) If not, then what was his point? As his brother James says, “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacks daily food and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, keep warm and eat well,' but you do not give them what the body needs, what good is it?” (James 2:15-16) That's about as helpful as sending “thoughts and prayers” to people suffering from a disaster. As John writes, “But whoever has the world's possessions and sees his brother or sister in need and closes up his heart against him, how can the love of God be in such a person? Little children, let us not love with word or tongue but in action and in truth.” (1 John 3:17-18) We are to provide real, physical help to those in need.

We also must beware of our own biases. Some people say that God will punish this nation for things like, say, allowing abortion, something never mentioned in the Bible, and ignore that in Jeremiah God gives his criteria for such judgment: “'...their houses are filled with the gains of their fraud and deceit. That is how they have gotten so rich and powerful. That is how they have grown fat and sleek. There is no limit to the evil things they do. They do not plead the cause of the fatherless in such a way as to win it. They do not defend the rights of the poor. I will certainly punish them for doing such things!' says the Lord. “I will certainly bring retribution on such a nation as this!'” (Jeremiah 5:27-29) He is predicting the fall of the kingdom of Judah and the exile to Babylon.

God's Word comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable. And maybe that's why the people were crying as Ezra read them the Torah. They could see how they had fallen short of what God expected of his people. And indeed in the next chapter of Nehemiah the people confess their sins and those of their ancestors. They pray, “Our kings, our leaders, our priests and our fathers did not follow your law; they did not pay attention to your commands or the warnings you gave them.” (Nehemiah 9:34) They realize that they did not act with justice or mercy. They did not love God with all their heart and soul and strength (Deuteronomy 6:5) or love their neighbors as themselves. (Leviticus 19:18) They turned away from God. The Jews came to see the exile as God hiding his face from them and letting them suffer the consequences of not being a just and compassionate people.

But I wonder if some of them were crying because they were hearing for the first time proof of what a loving and merciful God they had. They were hearing how God was not only concerned for the poor, the widow, the fatherless and the resident alien but had put provisions into the law of the land to protect and help them. (Exodus 22:21-24) They heard how every seven years debts were forgiven and debt slaves were to be set free. (Deuteronomy 15:1-18) Women heard that they weren't to be subjected to incest. (Leviticus 18:6-18) The people heard a vision of how the kingdom of God should work on earth. I wonder if some of the tears were tears of joy.

If not, maybe that's why Ezra sent them home to eat, drink and share with those who had none. Yes, they had sinned. But if they turned to God, they would find him there welcoming them back. Our God is a God who forgives us, who restores us, who transforms us. Every second we have on this earth is a second chance for us to turn to God. Because not only do we believe in God, God believes that we can do this—if we are united to Christ in his death and resurrection, if we are united to his Spirit, if we are united to each other as the embodiment of Christ's love. So even when we fail, we confess our sins, we ask his forgiveness, we learn from our mistakes, and, filled with his Spirit, we deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow him again.

No matter how bad things look in the present, remember the whole story of the Bible. We know where it's heading. We've read the last chapter. In the end good will triumph; love will win. God's kingdom will come on earth. Crying and mourning will be no more. And he will wipe away every tear with those nail-pierced hands. (Revelation 21:1-4) So as Ezra says, “Do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

Hallelujah!

One in Many

The scriptures referred to are 1 Corinthians 12:1-11.

The first Captain Marvel was not owned by Marvel comics, nor by DC comics, but by Fawcett comics. You may remember that the original Captain Marvel is really a boy who, when he says the word “Shazam,” becomes a man with the powers of 6 ancient heroes and gods. The magic word is an acronym for Solomon's wisdom, Hercules' strength, Atlas' stamina, Zeus' power, Achilles' courage and Mercury's speed. In other words, he can do just about anything. At one point he was more popular than Superman, possibly because in addition to his physical powers he had greater wisdom. The owners of Superman, another hero with every power you could wish for, sued Fawcett for copyright infringement and eventually got the rights to him. But while he is now owned by DC comics, Marvel comics, by cleverly exploiting an oversight by DC, was able to copyright the name “Captain Marvel” and use it for their own superpowered character. So today the original character is simply called Shazam.

These heroes are the ultimate in childhood fantasy characters. They are virtually all powerful. So the problem for the writers is how do you generate any suspense when your hero is superstrong, invulnerable, shoots beams of energy and can fly? I think I know why the creators of the Superman radio show invented Kryptonite as his weakness and why the comics and films picked up on it. Otherwise, practically any Superman story would be over in 5 minutes. He's too powerful for most villains to pose any real threat. And most stories need some kind of conflict or difficult obstacle to your protagonist achieving his goals. Which is why my favorite heroes were generally ones with few or no superpowers.

In the real world, nobody can do everything. Nobody knows everything or has every conceivable skill or talent. But some people think they do. They will claim an expertise in anything you bring up. What surprises me is that they can always find people who believe them. Keith Raniere who created Nexivm, L. Ron Hubbard who created Scientology, and other cult leaders have claimed to possess genius level skills in multiple fields of knowledge. Most cult leaders are self-proclaimed polymaths. Just don't dig too deep into their resumes and educational records.

In reality, we all have both strengths and weaknesses. Einstein understood physics to a degree beyond many of his scientific peers. They are still testing his predictions and finding them correct. Einstein also got lost in Princeton so often that the local police were used to having neighbors call them to pick him up and drive him home. (That would be a great weakness for a superhero. He can solve any problem...if he can just remember how to get there. Or is that Doctor Who?)

We so love the individual hero who can do everything that we have convinced ourselves they exist in real life. So we have conveniently forgotten people like the legion of scientists and engineers employed by Edison to come up with inventions credited to him. Or Rosalind Franklin, whose X-ray crystallography enabled James Watson and Francis Crick to discover the structure of DNA, for which they and not she won the Nobel Prize. Or Tenzing Norgay, the Nepalese Sherpa who was one of the first persons to climb Mount Everest but did not get the same recognition that Sir Edmund Hilary did, though one wonders if Hilary could have done it without Norgay. They say that behind every successful man is a woman. But often it is a lot of women and men who did the lion's share of the ground work for which one person received all the credit.

In the church at Corinth everyone wanted every possible spiritual gift. In today's passage Paul points out that the Spirit of God gives different gifts to different people. He says, “All of these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.” Paul doesn't say why God does this but there is a clue in verse 7: “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” In other words, the distribution of the gifts to various people is for everyone's good. If one person had all the gifts, there would be great temptation for him to use them for his own benefit. If you were Superman, wouldn't you become the world's benevolent dictator? And since no one could stop you, how long could you stay benevolent?

Often churches think they can find a person who is a Superman and can do all these things. They call that person a priest or pastor. And inevitably they are disappointed when he or she can't do it all.

Not even Paul could do it all. (2 Corinthians 10:10) He mentions people like Apollos who were better preachers. (1 Corinthians 3:6; Acts 18:24) His letters often end with lists of people who help him in the churches he planted. (Romans 16) Plus he suffered some kind of affliction. He writes, “Therefore, so that I would not become arrogant, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to trouble me—so that I would not become arrogant. I asked the Lord three times about this, that it would depart from me. But he said to me, 'My grace is enough for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.'” (2 Corinthians 12:7-9) Paul doesn't say exactly what it was but I think it was a vision problem because of remarks he makes about how the Galatian Christians would have gladly given him their eyes (Galatians 4:13-15) and the fact that he had a secretary actually write down his letters (Romans 16:22) and he signed them using big letters (Galatians 6:11). And if Paul had trouble seeing, he would not be able to be as independent as he'd like but would have to rely on others. Paul was not a Superman.

The “Great Men” way of looking at history has bled over into the way we see figures in the Bible. But they were not self-sufficient individuals doing it all on their own. Moses had the support of men like Joshua and Caleb and his father-in-law. David had his corps of mighty men. Jeremiah had Baruch, his secretary. Jesus had the Twelve to help spread his message. Paul had people like Silas, Timothy, Luke, Titus, John Mark, Aquila and Priscilla. Overall he names at least 40 people involved in sponsoring his missionary work. God doesn't endow nor does he want Lone Ranger Christians.

As in Corinth, people today are really drawn to this list of spiritual gifts, to the point that they ignore Paul's other list of gifts. In Romans he says, “And we have different gifts according to the grace given to us. If the gift is prophecy, that individual must use it in proportion to his faith. If it is service, he must serve; if it is teaching, he must teach; if it is encouraging, he must encourage; if it is giving, he must do so with generosity; if it is leading, he must do so with diligence; if it is showing mercy, he must do it with cheerfulness.” (Romans 12:6-8) These are not as flashy as the spiritual gifts but they are all functions necessary for the common good.

God is love and a key part of love is sharing with and helping one another. Ideally in the church people use their gifts to help the whole community. Every church needs people who can preach and people who can teach. They are NOT the same gift. For that matter the ability to teach adults, the ability to teach teens and the ability to teach kids are not the same gift. We need people who can sing and people who can play instruments and people who can lead the music. We need people who can organize and people who can empathize. We need people who can keep the books and people who can make wise money decisions and people who make sure the money is also used to in compassionate ways to further the mission of Jesus. We need people to maintain the church and people to reach out to the wider community. We especially need people who can bring the good news to others and who can bring people into the church.

These are all different activities which require different skills and thus different people. But they must all be done in the same Spirit, the Spirit who empowered Jesus in his ministry. Paul was probably emphasizing the fact that one Spirit distributes and activates all these gifts because in a polytheistic culture, people might think different spirits like the various gods presided over separate matters. That's not exactly a problem in today's culture but even within the church people can act in accordance with other “spirits.”

There is the spirit of competition. Some people think different churches are rivals or even enemies, rather than our brothers and sisters in Christ. The main differences between most churches are not in the basics of what they believe but in interpretations, in emphases and in polity. For instance, most churches recite the Apostles Creed, a baptismal creed that summarizes the basic beliefs of Christianity. So they agree that, say, Jesus died for us but their explanations of how exactly this worked might be different.

Churches also differ in which doctrines they emphasize more than others. Lutherans emphasize grace. Episcopalians tend to emphasize the Incarnation. But they agree on the importance of both. Again Lutherans mention baptism in just about every worship service. Episcopalians emphasize the Eucharist. But neither church neglects either sacrament; both are valued as vital to church life. It's kind of like how individual workers may differ in which tool is their favorite. But no one would use a hammer when a screwdriver is called for or throw away their wrenches.

Finally, there are differences in how churches are organized and what you call the local clergy and the officials who oversee larger districts. I'm not saying all the differences are trivial but that doesn't make us enemies. Remember what Paul says about varieties of services and activities and manifestations of the Spirit. We serve God in different ways and the Spirit reaches people through various means.

Another spirit that we Christians should not serve is Mammon or money. Of course, the church needs money to function and do ministry and pay staff and bills, but making money is not its primary purpose. When the bottom line becomes your top priority you have inverted your mission. And we have seen lots of scandals involving churches and preachers and misuse of money. Paul famously says, “For love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” (1 Timothy 6:10) Notice it is the love of money that is condemned, not money itself, though it affords a powerful temptation. And notice that this translation accurately reflects Paul's original Greek: love of money is a (not the) root of all kinds of evils, not of all evil. There are other roots of other evils. But, sadly, an obsession with wealth, just like the 1849 gold rush, has caused a lot of people a lot of grief and has lured people from the true and lasting riches of faith in Jesus.

There are other spirits out there—patriotism, capitalism, liberalism, conservatism, any ism—that some churches, maybe not consciously, try to unify around instead of or in addition to the Holy Spirit of the God who is love. Our allegiance is to Jesus Christ alone and it should not be conditional on whether we think he would support our intellectual, economic or political ideas. First we commit to following the one who demonstrated the love and justice, mercy and transformative power of God in his teachings, life, death and resurrection. And then guided by his Spirit we use our various gifts to express his grace in all we think, say and do, working together for the common good.

We must stop trying to either be Superman or find one among mere humans. We have someone who is all powerful: God. And he has chosen to work through each of us using the gifts his Spirit has distributed. We are all part of the body of Christ, with distinct functions and abilities, working in unison to bring his good news in both word and deed to a world obsessed with the fantasy that someone can do it all by himself or herself. We can't. We keep trying and we keep failing. But working together in the Spirit of God's love we will find we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.

Two Kings

The scriptures referred to are Matthew 2:1-12.

The whole thing was Melchior's idea. He, Caspar and Balthazar were all involved in the calculations of the emergence and then the observance of the new celestial phenomenon. It was Melchior who approached the king of Persia about the star (the simplest way to explain it to a layman) to get the king to fund the trip. It was also Melchior's idea to have Caspar select the gifts they would bring. Balthazar questioned putting Melchior's protege in charge of choosing what they would present to the new king. And, sure enough, Caspar chose gold, a solid if uninspired gift, and frankincense, a royal perfume, and...myrrh!? That's an ointment for preparing a body for burial. In what universe would that be an appropriate gift for a newborn?

It was also Melchior's idea that Balthazar accompany them. The magi tried to beg off. He was too old, too achy and too cranky for a long trip. It would take them at least a couple of months to make it from Persia to Jerusalem. And maybe longer, seeing that they would need a considerable escort of soldiers to protect them and their valuable gifts. And Balthazar didn't travel well. The number of foods he could eat these days was limited. He could no longer sleep on the ground in a tent as he did when he was younger. And riding camels was bad for his back. In fact, with all the rocking and lurching, he often got camel-sick. He would not be good company to travel with. He didn't even like his own company. He came up with a million reasons why he should be left behind. But then Melchior pointed out that Balthazar was their language expert. He could speak and understand the tongues and dialects they would encounter as they traveled through Arabia. And it was especially important that, upon reaching Judea, they have someone fluent in Aramaic and Hebrew. After all, it was Balthazar who connected the celestial phenomenon with the prophesies of the Hebrew scriptures. He had to accompany them. Balthazar knew he was right. He would come, he said. But he wouldn't enjoy it.

As it was, by the time the whole expedition was prepared it was nearly 2 years since they had seen the sign in the night sky. Even Balthazar had to admire Melchior's persistence in working with the Persian bureaucracy to make this a reality. He hoped that young Caspar would by now be too bored by the delay to go. But the idea of a road trip excited the young man and he was only too willing to take off for an exotic foreign land to see a king. And so, at last, they set out.

Balthazar almost immediately regretted it. Though assured by the stable master that the camel he was given would provide a smooth ride, the animal was wayward and headstrong. It was reluctant to kneel so he could get on it. And it could spit with great accuracy, something he discovered when he was trying to get the beast to stand still so he could get his possessions off its back. Caspar thought this was hilarious. Melchior offered Balthazar a handkerchief to clean the sputum from his face and beard.

He had to admit Melchior had done a great job planning each leg of the trip. He even tried to include some interesting sights for them to visit along the way. The reason for this was, at least partly, to keep Caspar entertained, or so Balthazar suspected. The youngest magi was easily bored. He constantly asked how long would this take and were they there yet? With Melchior doing the navigating and consulting the maps and the sun, it fell to Balthazar to keep Caspar's mind occupied. He told him stories. He invented games like “I spy” though this rarely worked since they were often traveling through featureless deserts. He tried to tell jokes, which even Balthazar knew he was not good at. He tried to get Caspar to sing songs to make the time go by. But Balthazar soon regretted teaching Caspar to sing “A hundred goatskins of wine on the wall.” When he got to zero, Caspar simply started over. It turned into the song that never ends.

In addition, Balthazar was sleeping badly. It wasn't just the hard ground and the cold nights. He was troubled by what he had gathered about King Herod from travelers they met at each oasis. Everyone knew Herod was ruthless. Well, that was pretty much common with kings. They didn't tolerate rivals. But Herod had killed his own wife, her brother and at least 2 of his sons. And things weren't looking too good for Herod's heir to make it to the throne. In fact, it was reported that the Roman Emperor Augustus himself had quipped, “It's better to be Herod's sow than his son.” Would the magi be doing the new king a favor by drawing the tyrant's attention to him? Balthazar began having dreams about babies being killed. They were horrible.

At last they saw a shining gold and white temple perched on a hill and knew they had reached Jerusalem. They had, of course, sent messengers ahead to alert the king of their arrival. It wouldn't do to enter a paranoid ruler's territory unannounced. They were welcomed and put up in sumptuous apartments. When they were ushered into the throne room, they bowed low. Struggling to rise, Balthazar greeted Herod with appropriately hyperbolic praises. They presented him with gifts fit for royalty. In view of the monarch's age, Balthazar made sure that myrrh was not one of them. Herod in turned graciously accepted their accolades and their gifts and invited them to feast with him that night. They did so and were treated like royalty. Caspar was open-mouthed at the splendor of the palace and the extensive menu they were served. But they noted that while Herod introduced them to his remaining sons by his—was it 10 wives?—none was the right age to be the one foretold by the star.

The next day they met with Herod again in his throne room and Balthazar said, in his most elegant Hebrew, “We thank your majesty for your gracious hospitality. And your sons are most handsome and intelligent men. But do you have a younger one whom we have not yet met? For we were wondering: Where is the one born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

Immediately Balthazar was sorry he had said this. Herod stared at them and not in a pleasant or even neutral way. He obviously was hearing this for the first time and it disturbed him. The king's council, sensitive to Herod's mood swings, also saw this and looked frightened. Then Herod, with great effort, put on a not very convincing smile and said that he too would love to know about this new king. He would consult the chief priests and teachers of the law and get back to them. After some very stiff and awkward formal praises and thanks, the magi withdrew.

They didn't dare speak as they were escorted back to their apartments. But when they were served their midday meal, they conversed in a regional dialect of their native Parthian tongue, sure than none of Herod's servants/spies would understand them.

“He was not happy to hear what you said,” observed Casper, stating the obvious.

“We shouldn't have alerted him to the existence of a potential rival,” said Balthazar.

“But what were we to do?” asked Melchior. “We assumed it was Herod's son. If not, then how can we find the child without the help of Herod's advisors and scholars?”

“I should have spent more time studying their scriptures. Maybe I could have worked it out,” Balthazar said regretfully.

“An unknown king? How could you have known? And how could we have planned for this? We had to go through official channels,” Melchior said.

“If it is God's will that this child become king, he will take care of it,” said Caspar simply. Though said with youthful optimism and faith, the two older magi accepted Caspar's pronouncement with resignation.

After an anxious couple of days, the magi were summoned to see Herod again. But not in the throne room. He met them in a side chamber away from his advisors and nobles. In fact, only one aged man was with the king. Balthazar thought he must be a rabbi, since he was not dressed as a priest. Herod said to the man, “Tell our visitors what you discovered.”

The old man said, “In the prophet Micah, it is written, 'But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.'”

That sounded vaguely familiar to Balthazar. Wasn't Bethlehem the town the Jews' great king David came from? He would have to look it up to see if he remembered it correctly. But even so, he would have disregarded it because they assumed the king would be born to Herod, who did not live in a backwater town like Bethlehem, nor was he descended from David. He wasn't even considered a true Jew by his people because his father was an Indumaean, descended from Edomite converts to Judaism. Though raised as a Jew, Herod was ethically an Arab. Small wonder he was not loved by his subjects.

Herod then moved closer to the magi and said in a low voice, “Just when did the star that marked his birth appear?”

Balthazar seriously considered lying to the king. But surely he had his own astrologers who could confirm the magis' observations. So he told him how 2 years ago they had observed the phenomenon in the East. As he told Herod, Balthazar wondered why the king's own astrologers had missed it. The interpretation was subtle but if Persians could figure out it portended the birth of a Judean king, surely Jewish stargazers would have. And then he noticed what the old man standing next to Herod did. Or rather what he didn't do. His face did not register surprise or curiosity or indeed interest in this sign from the heavens. He was deliberately impassive. Except his eyes which could not help but steal a glance at the magi. Balthazar's and the man's eyes locked for a second.

He knew! Of course, he knew, realized Balthazar. But he dare not tell this homicidal monarch that a rival king was born. The king's astrologers and scholars kept it from him.

Herod was speaking. “Go and search carefully for the child,” the king said. “As soon as you find him report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” Herod was all smiles.

As was Balthazar. “Of course, O great king,” he said, trying to sound as sincere as he could. And after more empty pleasantries, the magi were dismissed.

It turned out that Bethlehem was only about 3 hours ride south from Jerusalem. Well, 3 hours if they took the caravan. They seriously considered heading out the next morning but Balthazar did not want to give Herod time to beat them there. They must go today. As it was, by the time they were ready to travel the sun was getting low in the sky. And there was another problem.

“How do we identify which child in Bethlehem is the one?” asked Melchior.

How indeed? It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.

The sun set as they rode to Bethlehem. And it turned out to be a stargazers' worst nightmare: the sky was solid with cloud cover. They couldn't even see the moon, let alone the stars. Their task was now like searching for a needle in a haystack in the dark!

“Well, at least we need not worry about Herod,” said Caspar. “If we have trouble seeing, so will he and his men. He will probably wait till daylight to come for the child.” True, thought Balthazar. His respect for his younger colleague was increasing.

They saw some faint lights that seemed to be in the right place for the little village. Melchior told the escort to wait for them outside the town. No reason to make their presence too obvious.

The 3 magi entered the village. There is nothing like wandering through a strange town in the dark looking for some house you don't know. Balthazar was almost in despair of finding the child. Then in the dark street shined a light. There was a break in the clouds. A shaft of moonlight fell on a small house on the outskirts of the village. They took it as a sign and hurried to the place.

Melchior gestured to Balthazar to knock. He knew the language best. He knocked and after a moment heard someone coming. A man opened the door, looking suspiciously at the three fancy foreigners on his doorstep.

Balthazar realized that simplicity and directness were the best approach in this circumstance. “Greetings, my good man. We come from the great king of Persia in the East. We observed a special star arise and came to greet and give gifts to the new king its presence revealed. Is he here?”

The man looked at the three but instead of showing any sign that he thought them to be mad, he blinked a few times and then turned to someone inside and said, “Mary, we got kings this time.”

“Not kings,” said Balthazar, “but, uh, wise men who watch the skies for signs. I take it that others have preceded us.”

“Shepherds originally,” said the man, moving in an odd manner. He turned and the magi saw a donkey pushing against the man's hip. He shooed it away and invited them in. They walked up the short flight of stairs from the animals' quarters to the family room where they saw a young woman setting a dish with a meager amount of food on a low table. The man said, “I am Joseph. This is my wife Mary.”

“We just sat down to eat but, please, accept our humble fare,” she said. She looked down at a boy of about two, clinging to her dress, staring at the strangers intently. “Jesus, get some dishes for our guests.” The boy ran to get some dishes from another low table.

“No need, madam. Rather let us share our provisions with you,” said Balthazar. “Caspar...,” he said, but already the young man was bowing as he exited the house to get food from the caravan.

They ate and shared stories and Caspar made faces and did simple magic tricks which delighted the boy. After the biggest and best meal the family had ever eaten, the magi bowed to the ground before the boy, offering their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. As his colleagues arose, Balthazar again had trouble getting up off the floor. “I help,” said the boy, grabbing the old man's gnarled hands with his two chubby ones and pulling. Balthazar laughed but it did help him get to his feet. He smiled at the boy and tousled his hair, quite forgetting that you shouldn't do that to a royal child without permission. But with this little family in this little house in this little village it was hard to see anything regal in the traditional sense. But then Herod was regal in the traditional sense. The world had quite enough of that.

Before they left, Balthazar shared with Joseph the fact that Herod said he would like to see their child. Joseph's face showed that he fully understood what that meant. Warning received.

They returned to their camp and lay down and went to sleep. But within hours Balthazar was awake. He ran to Melchior's tent. He was up. “You, too?” Melchior asked.

“A dream.” Balthazar said. “Warning us to leave immediately. And take a different route.”

“Caspar and I had the same dream,” Melchior said.

“Where is Caspar?”

“Warning the family.”

Just then the young man returned panting. “They're gone. The house is empty.” The other men looked alarmed. “But not ransacked. And the donkey is gone, too.” They let out sighs of relief.

“Thank God,” said Balthazar.

“We must go as well,” said Melchior as he went to wake the escort.

They were on the road by first light. Melchior was revising their itinerary on the fly and griping about not having had enough time to do it properly. Caspar was quiet for once. Balthazar was lost in thought.

Of the two kings he had met on this trip, he knew which one he had liked best. But they all start as a child. To become a king is a bloody business. He hoped that whatever happened to the boy, he did not become like Herod, using his power to intimidate and terrify and spill the blood of others. If only he could retain his innocence and desire to help.

And that's when Balthazar realized his joints and back didn't hurt anymore and his stomach had settled down. Even though he didn't get much sleep that night, he felt refreshed. He tried to pinpoint when exactly he began to feel better.

He decided that from now on he would talk to travelers more often and collect any news he could from Judea. He was very interested in what kind of king Jesus would grow into.