To What Purpose?

The scriptures referred to are 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5.

When the first Lord of the Rings movie hit the theatres, I saw it with my son and his friends. We all enjoyed it except one person who was really incensed that Tom Bombadil wasn't in it. Bombadil is a delightful character but as director Peter Jackson revealed on the audio commentary to the DVD, he doesn't advance the plot. The movie was already almost 3 hours long and so Tom did not make it into the film. Jackson pointed out that you could still enjoy him in the original book but that was not enough for this fan. They had forgotten that the purpose of the movie was not to be a compendium of every single detail in the original story but to entertain.

I'm a big Sherlock Holmes fan. One of the things I enjoy about meeting with other Sherlockians is that they don't usually get bent out of shape by such trivial things. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote 56 short stories and 4 novels about the great detective over 40 years. Of course he forgot about things like where Watson's war wound was and how many wives he had. Reconciling these things by using deductive and sometimes specious logic is called the Great Game by fans. Just last weekend I was on a Zoom call with a group from my hometown, discussing The Adventure of the Engineer's Thumb, not one of the best stories. Nevertheless we went through it with good humor and wit and one implausibility gave me an excuse to repeat Holmes' dictum that “When you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

Not all fandoms approach the object of their attention so cheerfully. Some forums are so toxic with rabid fans tearing apart everything they don't like or nitpicking about some seeming discrepancy that I belong to a Facebook page called “Doctor Who fans who actually like the show.” The moderators make sure that all posts and comments are done in the spirit of sharing enjoyment of the show and not going on and on about this or that thing that someone feels has irrevocably ruined TV's longest running sci-fi show. People joining the page frequently express gratitude for its existence and wish there was one like it for Star Trek or Star Wars fans who don't hate-watch every new show and movie.

I am convinced that such toxicity in certain fans is a symptom of a personality type. My son has seen it in some folks who engage in role-playing games, people who bring the game to a halt by citing and arguing over obscure details in the manuals. They are called “rules lawyers”. They also have forgotten that the point of the game is to have fun.

So it's not surprising that such people also exist in religious circles. An old friend of mine invited me to his mosque to observe a Quran study session. And sure enough there was a guy there who kept diverting the discussion of the passage they were supposed to be looking at to talk about certain irrelevant points he was obsessed with. And I thought, “Oh my God, I've had someone like that in Bible studies I've led!”

And these people existed all the way back at the beginnings of the church. In last week's passage from 2 Timothy we read, “...and warm them before God that they are to avoid wrangling over words, which does no good but only ruins those who are listening.” (2 Timothy 2:14) This is a theme which pops up in both letters to Timothy. In the beginning of the first letter Paul says that he urged Timothy to stay in Ephesus “so that you may instruct certain people not to teach any different doctrine, and not to occupy themselves with myths and endless genealogies that provoke speculations rather than divine training that is known by faith.” (1 Timothy 1:3-4)

There was a great deal of lore that had arisen in Jewish circles, like elaborate ideas about all the ranks of angels. And there were at least the beginnings of what came to be known as Gnosticism. Coming from the Greek word for knowledge (gnosis), Gnosticism was a pagan school of thought that held that the physical world was evil; only the spirit was good. Eventually some teachers tried to introduce these ideas into Christianity. Of course this caused problems. The God of the Bible created the world. So Gnostics said this was an evil god or a deeply ignorant lesser being only distantly related to the real God. But what about the central doctrine of Christianity—that God the Son became a human being and died for our sins? No, said the Gnostics, that was an illusion. He only appeared to be human. He either never died or worked it out that someone else (Simon of Cyrene or Judas) got crucified in his place! That is the opposite of the gospel. (1 John 4:3) And they thought true salvation only comes from the secret spiritual knowledge that the Gnostics taught, which could only be disclosed to and understood by their initiates. So it was a very elitist and intellectual set of doctrines that appealed to people who felt they were special and smarter than other people.

Paul says in today's passage, “For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths.” Sound familiar? Because even today people turn from the clear truths of the gospel of the incarnate, crucified and risen Christ and go after novel and alluring teachings that promise secret knowledge. A lot of cult leaders use this pitch to attract followers. And there are even churches which have woven into their preaching and teaching ideas that appeal to human desires for health, wealth and power. You will never hear them talk about how Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23) Or that he said, “Whoever does not carry his own cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:27) Rather than tickling people's ears, they want to cover them so they don't hear that.

The idea that mere knowledge brings salvation is a lot more attractive. Again that idea goes way back. In Genesis 3 we read that the first lie was telling the first humans that simply by acquiring knowledge “...you will be like God...” (Genesis 3:5) The ironic part is that humans have already been created in God's image. But that isn't enough. Knowledge is power and we want to be as powerful as God. We don't seem to have a burning desire to be as just and as loving and as merciful and as forgiving as God.

But to acquire that knowledge we feel that we need to let go of our trust in God. It couldn't be that there are some things that we are not ready or able to handle once we know them. And yet when we tell little kids not to go off with strangers, we don't tell them that the reason is that they might be raped or murdered. We want them to be cautious around strangers, not traumatized by the very idea of them. And in the beginning, God knew we were not ready to understand all the ways in which his good gifts could be turned to harmful purposes. When we are told that the first couple was naked and not ashamed, it means they were vulnerable. It hadn't occurred to them to misuse their minds and bodies to harm one another. But by the 6^th chapter of Genesis we learn that the thoughts of the hearts of humans were evil and that “The earth was ruined in the sight of God; the earth was filled with violence.” (Genesis 6:11; cf 6:5)

But why was there a tree of the knowledge of good and evil in paradise to begin with? Well, why do you have a stove in your home when little children can accidently burn themselves on it? Because eventually they will be old enough and wise enough to use it. But when they are small, we just tell them “Don't touch!” They are not ready yet. At some point, I think God would let the spiritually mature humans learn about how good things can be abused and used for evil purposes. Sometimes God isn't saying “No” but “Not yet.” We need to trust his wisdom and timing.

Back in 1 Timothy, Paul says, “But the aim of our instruction is love that comes from a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere faith.” (1 Timothy 1:5) The purpose of studying the good news of Jesus Christ is not to inflame our desire for power or for seemingly forbidden knowledge, but to kindle in us love; in Greek agape, the kind of love God has for us. God wants what's best for us. That's why we have the Bible.

“All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.” In other words, God gave us the Bible for practical reasons. Its purpose is not merely to entertain us with exciting stories nor was it God-breathed (the literal meaning of the word translated “inspired”) in order to titillate us with fascinating intellectual mysteries. Its purpose is to teach us about who God is, especially through the revelation of Jesus Christ, God made flesh, and how we should respond to him, that is, with love.

The Bible is meant to be used for reproof. The Greek word here means “tested evidence.” You wouldn't want to be convicted without evidence. We shouldn't just speculate about God without thoroughly examining the evidence of scripture.

The Bible is to be used for correction. The Greek word literally means “to straighten up again.” In other words, we are not to use God's word to beat people over the head but to get them back on track so they don't wander away to myths.

The Bible is to be used for training in righteousness. The Greek word is usually used for educating a child. But the purpose is not simply to stuff our heads with knowledge but to give us the discipline of being a righteous and just person, a person of good character.

And why is that? “...so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.” The Greek word translated “proficient” has the sense of being fit and completely ready. God wants us to be fully equipped to carry out the good works he has prepared for us.

Just as fans love to delve into all the details of their favorite stories and characters, it is okay to be a Bible geek and revel in the more obscure stuff of the 31,000 verses of scripture. But we are not to let them cause us to stray from the essentials of the faith and get caught up in empty discussions. (1 Timothy 1:6) Paul warns about “an unhealthy interest in controversies and verbal disputes. This gives rise to envy, dissension, slanders, evil suspicions, and constant bickering by people corrupted in their minds and deprived of the truth, who suppose godliness is a way of making a profit.” (1 Timothy 6:4-5) Yes, even back then, Paul saw that these false teachings could be monetized by unscrupulous people. Cult leaders exploit their followers, sometimes even in the name of Christ. It is in this context that Paul writes, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. Some people in reaching for it have strayed from the faith and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” (1 Timothy 6:10)

Remember that the aim of Christian instruction is love. It is love of God and love of all those created in his image. As it says in 1 John, “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. How does God's love abide in anyone who has the world's goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses to help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.” (1 John 3:16-18)

Jesus said, “There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' “I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted?” (Matthew 21:28-31) Even Jesus' critics admitted it was the first son. And God's word does us no good if it stays in our heads and doesn't move us to act on it. We are not saved by our works but we are saved in order to do good works. (Ephesians 2:8-10) Studying the scriptures equips us to do God's will.

The purpose of the written word of God is to bring us closer to him. And since the center of the Bible is Jesus Christ, the living word of God, the purpose of the gospel is to make us more Christlike. We cannot do it on our own which is why God gives to those who truly trust him the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. (Romans 8:9-10) The Spirit does this by pouring the love of God in our hearts. (Romans 5:5) Again, knowing this does no good if it stays theoretical. As Paul said, “...if I have prophesy, and know all mysteries and knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:2) For, as 1 John tells us, “The person who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (1 John 4:8) Real love changes your life: what you think, say and do. That's ultimately what you need to know about God.

The Deadliest Sin

The scriptures referred to are 2 Kings 5:1-15.

The Torah, the first 5 books of the Bible, are the core of the Jewish faith. They contain 613 commandments. That's a lot. And obviously some are more important than others. You wouldn't put wearing clothes of mixed fibers on the same level as murder, nor gossip on the same level as idolatry. (Leviticus 19:16,19) So when a scholar asked Jesus which was the most important commandment, it was a genuine matter of debate. Jesus answered with the words of Deuteronomy 6:4-5: “Listen, Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord is one! You must love the Lord your God with your whole mind, your whole being and all your strength!” That's the Shema, the central creed of Judaism. It is prayed by observant Jews in the morning and evening. It is supposed to be said by a Jew when dying. Herman Wouk, the author of The Caine Mutiny, was an Orthodox Jew and yet he was surprised when, as a huge wave almost washed him off the deck of the ship on which he served in World War II, he found himself automatically saying that prayer.

Everyone in his audience probably agreed with Jesus that the commandment to love God with all we are and all we have was the greatest. But Jesus, never one to do the expected, added a second commandment no one asked for: “love your neighbor as yourself.” This comes from Leviticus 19:18. Jesus then says that all that is contained in the Torah and the Prophets depend on these two commandments and that no other commandment is greater than these two. (Matthew 22:40; Mark 12:31) And indeed if you look at the Ten Commandments, the first 4 concern our conduct towards God and the last 6 concern our behavior towards other people.

A similar debate arose in early Christianity about which are the worst sins. Some came up with lists of 8 or 9 but it was Pope Gregory 1 who boiled it down into 7. They are traditionally given as pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth. I would update the seldom used word “wrath” to “rage” and the word “sloth” to “laziness” or “apathy.” The word “pride,” which has both good and bad connotations, I would update to “arrogance.” And that, the worst of the seven deadly sins, is what I would like to talk about today.

Arrogance is what we see in Naaman, the Syrian general, who comes to be healed by Elisha in today's Old Testament reading. When the prophet won't even come to the door but has his servant tell the general how to get cured, Naaman is outraged. He expected something different and insults Israel and its rivers.

We are told that Naaman was a great man. No doubt Naaman took all the credit for his military victory, though we are told that the Lord had given the victory to his nation. I'm not saying that Naaman had nothing to do with his success, but he couldn't have done it without having certain talents, like the ability to organize and command men, to strategize, and to quickly change that strategy if the situation shifts. Military experts like to say “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.” It is a shortened version of an observation made by 19^th century German military strategist Helmuth von Moltke the Elder. His point is that you can't anticipate everything your enemy might do, or for that matter, what your allies will do. Add in weather and other factors over which you have no control and a good commander has to be able to think on his feet and improvise when necessary. You can't teach that. It is a gift. And all our talents and gifts come from God. Presumably Naaman had that talent.

But Naaman had a problem which he could not overcome: leprosy. And it bothered him. When I was a private duty nurse I was often assigned to wealthy men, because they could afford a private duty nurse. And I was surprised at how these men, who had built up large and successful companies, were brought low psychologically by their physical conditions. I came to realize that in chronic illness they were up against a problem that they could not defeat using the tools that had worked for them in business and finance. No amount of confidence or street smarts or negotiating skills or intimidation works against a disease. They felt that their bodies had betrayed them and they were dispirited.

But that didn't mean that these men were compliant with everything their doctor prescribed or that I, their nurse, was supposed to get them to do. An arrogant person feels he doesn't need anyone. He knows better than anyone else. He may listen to advice but he won't necessarily follow it if he simply feels differently about the matter. Many an otherwise smart person will get themselves into trouble by ignoring what experts tell them. Steve Jobs delayed surgery for 9 months trying to cure himself by going on a vegan diet, trying acupuncture, herbal remedies and other unproven treatments for cancer. He later regretted this when his health continued to deteriorate. Today we have people with no medical training throwing out everything science has learned about how to treat and fight diseases because internet influencers are telling them to try their own patented cures (which they will gladly sell you.) And these people are now controlling the NIH and CDC. Meanwhile childhood diseases we used to have under control are coming back with a vengeance. Already we are seeing deaths that were preventable.

As a nurse I have observed that people do not make major changes in their life until it becomes too painful to continue going on as they have been. In the verses inexplicably skipped in our lectionary reading we learn that Naaman went to his king who wrote a letter to the king of Israel explaining that Naaman was seeking a cure. So Naaman is not totally arrogant. When he got desperate enough, he sought help.

But when he doesn't get the personal service he expects from Elisha, he reverts to his arrogance. He says, “I thought that for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy!” He goes off in a rage. In this, Naaman does something that arrogant people often do. It is not merely that they want something done, they expect it to be done in a certain way. They presume to tell the experts how to do their own jobs.

When I was the production director and copywriter at a radio station here in the Keys, I once was told that the manager of a very fancy and expensive restaurant wanted us to create an ad to get the locals to eat there during the off-season. They wanted to announce, as a “local's special,” a dinner costing twice as much as the average meal at an ordinary restaurant. I tried to explain to the manager that this might be less than their normal price but it was still expensive. I suggested we instead frame it as a special price for special occasions and encourage locals who had never eaten there to take advantage of the offer to celebrate birthdays, anniversaries and such. “No,” the manager said. “We must call it a 'local's special'.” So we did the ad that way. A week later, when they realized it wasn't working, they called back and we did the ad the way I suggested. They knew how to run a restaurant; I knew how to advertise it.

Naaman, however, is not totally arrogant, as we said. His servants manage to calm him down and talk sense into him. They say that if the prophet had told him to do something difficult in order to be cured, he would have done it. What Elisha had told him to do was not hard at all. Give it a chance, they say. And it works. In the end Naaman is humble enough to stand before Elisha and acknowledge what God did for him.

Why is arrogance considered the worst of the seven deadly sins? Because it is, as C.S. Lewis said, the complete anti-God state of mind. The arrogant person feels he knows better than anyone else, and that includes God. So why do they need God? They might admit that they are not always be right but they are never wrong. And if somebody thinks that they know it all, they stop learning. They either already know everything, or what they don't know they deem unimportant. And once you stop learning, you stop thinking. Oh, they may encounter new information from time to time but their cognitive bias only allows them to take in what backs up their deeply held opinions. Anything that contradicts their beliefs is fake. They would rather believe that all the experts are lying to them than that they might be wrong.

You see arrogance everywhere, including on both sides of the religious divide. There are religious people who are always right on everything even though they cannot discern between which parts of their faith and practices come from the Bible, which come from tradition and which come from their culture. Like the commandments there is a hierarchy of values. Some beliefs and behaviors are essential, some are important but not strictly essential and some are neither. For these folks however all their beliefs and practices are like links in a chain; they are of all equal importance. But a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. A lot of people raised as fundamentalists lose their faith when they discover that something they were taught was wrong and then their whole faith begins to come apart. Some of the most outspoken atheists were once such Christians.

But you see arrogance among atheists as well. They decry the “God of the gaps,” the argument that if science can't yet explain something, the only possible answer is God. They have a point. Yet they do the same thing. They confidently say that science will one day explain all those gaps. Atheists have faith, all right; they just place it in science.

That is, they place their faith in humans. Science is a human endeavor, which means it is not perfect. Scientists sometimes make mistakes and sometimes they even make things up to get grant money or further their careers. We are in the middle of a replication crisis in science. Scientists are having problems recreating a significant number of important studies from the past because they are not getting the same results. For instance, it looks like we have been pursuing the wrong treatments for Alzheimer's disease for decades because of a flawed study. We have to start over. Scientists are human and can have their own dogmas, which they will defend as fiercely as religious fundamentalists.

Plus there is the problem of what we will do when we get to the point that the human brain can no longer comprehend what we discover. If, as they hold, our brains evolved primarily to help us survive, it is remarkable that we understand so much that has no discernable survival value. Will our brains continue to understand the infinite number of things in our ever expanding universe? Should we shift our faith to computers, though they are the flawed products of flawed human minds? It all comes back to trusting human intelligence above everything else.

Finally, there is the logical problem of asserting there is no God. You can't prove a negative. You would have to know and examine all the data in the universe to rule out God's existence. Even Richard Dawkins was forced to admit that, strictly speaking, he can only be an agnostic, someone who says they don't know whether God exists or not. The person who says definitively that there is no God does in fact believe in a superior intelligent being: himself. As someone said, I don't have enough faith to be an atheist.

Arrogant people cause problems because they do not work well with others. Dealing with flawed individuals but seeing no flaws in themselves, arrogant people inevitably push people away, especially those who are experts and even friends who are trying to stop them from doing things that are stupid or wrong. Only the most craven yes-men will stick with the arrogant person. And because they will not contradict him, the arrogant person will inevitably make mistakes. And because they have ceased to learn anything or listen to others, they will double down on their mistakes and make bigger ones. Which is why dictatorships never last.

Humility is the opposite of arrogance. Contrary to popular opinion, humility is not thinking you are worthless; it is having a realistic perception of not only your strengths but also your weaknesses. It is being willing to admit your mistakes and apologize. It is being willing to ask for help. It's being able to appreciate the knowledge, skills and talents of others. It is being willing to learn.

A truly intelligent person is humble. He or she knows what has been securely established and what we still don't know. They are willing to listen to others and to learn. The word “disciple” means “student.” I have even learned from respected Bible scholars who are not believers. I have learned how to be a better Christian from believers with a lot less education than I. But I know for sure that Jesus Christ is God, the Father is God, the Holy Spirit is God and that God is one and God is love. And what's more, I know that I am not God.

God and Injustice

The scriptures referred to are Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4.

Another week, another spate of shootings. Reacting to one in her community, a friend of mine on Facebook complained that the world no longer made sense. I commented that the problem is that the world almost makes sense but not quite. That is, the world is not so irrational that we can't understand or haven't figured out how to act in the majority of situations. Generally speaking, if you treat people well they will do the same to you. If you ask for help with something, most people will try to help. But it's the exceptions to these rules that throw us off. When someone that you've acted properly towards responds with anger or when someone you've never mistreated, or whom you don't even know, inflicts violence on you, you don't know how to make sense of it. It seems to come out of nowhere.

My theory is that these acts of mass violence arise when someone thinks that their feelings are more important than the lives of others. They are expressing the bad feelings they have by making others feel as bad as they do. They feel their cause is so righteous that those who oppose it, or who simply aren't as outraged as they are about it, must suffer. Or their feelings of despair are so painful they want to die but they want others to die as well so that the world knows how they feel. And often this is the way that people who also feel overlooked can get the world to pay attention to them, if only in a negative way and after they are gone. Other people express these feelings of depression, pain, anger and indignation at what is wrong with the world in their art, in poetry, in song, in writing or in activism. But some can't think of any better way to express this than by simply hurting or killing other people. As the saying goes, hurt people often hurt people.

For most of us, just seeing such violence and injustice is painful. And those of us who believe in a just God often ask him, “Why?” That's what Habakkuk is asking in our Old Testament reading. J.M. Smith captured the strong emotions the author expressed in the translation that he made for his teaching videos on his You Tube channel Disciple Dojo. He renders the first 4 verses of the book this way: “The 'burden' (oracle) that Habakkuk the prophet beheld: How long, YHWH, must I scream for help...and you not listen? I cry out to you, 'Violence!'...but you don't save! Why do you show me iniquity, and toil you [just] watch? And destruction and violence [are] before me and there is lawsuit, and [the] strife it carries. Because of this Torah has grown cold/limp and justice never goes forth! Indeed wickedness is surrounding the righteous! Because of this justice goes forth crooked!”

Habakkuk's book is different from the books of other prophets because he doesn't begin with what God revealed to him but with his questions directed at God. To understand what he is so upset about, it helps to know what was going on during his time.

Israel and Judah were always surrounded by large empires: Egypt to the southwest, Assyria to the north and now Babylon gaining strength to their east. Assyria had already conquered Israel and taken the elite of the ten northern tribes into exile. Babylon was such a threat that Egypt and Assyria joined forces to fight them. Habakkuk lived either during the last fraught days of King Josiah who died fighting the Egyptians or during the reign of his successors, who were puppets of the empires. But Habakkuk is initially concerned about what he is seeing within the kingdom of God's people. He is observing conflict, violence, justice being weakened and ultimately coming out all twisted.

Israel's mission was to be a “kingdom of priests and a holy nation,” and as descendants of Abraham, all the peoples of the earth were to be blessed through them. (Exodus 19:6; Genesis 12:3) In Isaiah God says, “I will also make you a light to the Gentiles, that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth.” (Isaiah 49:6) But Israel and Judah hardly acted like they worshipped and followed a just and compassionate God. So why is God allowing this?

God tells the prophet that he will punish his people by letting the Babylonians conquer them. But Habakkuk doesn't understand this. The Babylonians are even worse than the people of Judah. How is that just? God tells Habakkuk that the Babylonians in turn will receive what they are due. Their own evil deeds will bring about their downfall.

Much of the 2^nd chapter of Habakkuk is devoted to describing the king of Babylon and his fatal flaws. “...he is arrogant and never at rest...he is as greedy as the grave and like death is never satisfied...” (Habakkuk 2:5) He is pictured as ridiculed and scorned by the nations who will taunt him by saying, “Woe to him who piles up stolen goods and makes himself wealthy by extortion! How much longer must this go on? Will not your debtors suddenly arise? Will they not wake up and make you tremble? Then you will become their victim. Because you have plundered many nations, the peoples who are left will plunder you. For you have shed man's blood; you have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them. Woe to him who builds his realm by unjust gain to set his nest on high to escape the clutches of ruin.” (Habakkuk 2:6-9) If you don't treat others as you would like to be treated, people will treat you exactly as you have treated them. (Luke 6:31)

And, sure enough, the Babylonian empire was eventually conquered by the Persians and the Jews were allowed to return home. During the 70 years of their exile, they transitioned from a religion centered around the temple, which the Babylonians destroyed in 586 BC, to a religion centered around studying and obeying God's word. The writings that became the Hebrew Bible were collected and compiled during this time. This ensured the survival of Judaism after the Romans destroyed the second temple in 70 AD. Jews everywhere could continue to worship and follow the Torah wherever they went. And, of course, this meant that Christianity could spread likewise. Paul and other apostles would go to a synagogue in whichever city they came to and show from the scriptures that Jesus was the Messiah. And as the writings by Paul and others were copied and shared by churches, the New Testament came into being.

Empires continued to rise and fall. The western Roman empire fell in 476 AD. Its successor, the Byzantine empire, fell in 1453. The British empire was dismantled in the 20th century. The Soviet Union existed for 69 years. And we see that, just as with Babylon, their sins and arrogance usually bring about their downfall.

Emperors and dictators rarely fare better. Of the 84 Roman emperors over its 490 years, 20 were assassinated, and 8 were assassinated by their own bodyguards, the Praetorian Guard. Another 6 were possibly assassinated. 8 were executed and 6 committed suicide. Including the 8 who died in battle, it turns out that 68%, or more than 2/3s of them, died violently. Only 25 died of natural causes or illnesses. Most reigned for less than 8 years.

Mussolini reigned 21 years and was executed by his people and his body hung upside down at a gas station. Fearing the same treatment, Hitler shot himself as the Russians took Berlin and closed in on his bunker. His Thousand Year Reich lasted only 12 years. Nicolae Ceausescu ruled Romania with an iron fist for 24 years and was executed in a revolution in 1989. As Jesus said, those who take up the sword will die by the sword. (Matthew 26:52)

Those who build criminal empires, unleashing violence in the streets, perish in much the same way. Jesse James was shot by a member of his gang. During Prohibition, Dutch Schultz, “Legs” Diamond, Hymie Weiss, “Mad Dog” Coll and many others were killed by other gangsters, while John Dillinger, “Pretty Boy” Floyd, “Baby Face” Nelson, “Ma” Barker and Bonnie and Clyde all died in shootouts with the law. Al Capone did survive being stabbed in prison but after being released due to his decline from syphilis of the brain he died of a heart attack and stroke at the age of 48. More recently drug lord Pablo Escobar was killed by the Colombian National Police one day after his 44^th birthday. When someone decides it's OK to kill others, people think it's OK to kill him.

But Habakkuk did not see people reaping the consequences for the violence and injustice of his day. He was left with God's assurance that he did have a plan. Habakkuk and the Jews who stayed faithful would just have to trust God. As God says in our reading, “the righteous will live by their faith.”

If there is no God and no afterlife, then there is no justice in this world. We can despair or we can trust in God and in his justice and his mercy. But that doesn't mean that we simply sit back and let injustice reign. Another way that verse 4 could be translated is “the righteous will live by their faithfulness.” We are the body of Christ, carrying out his ongoing mission. Jesus made us citizens and ambassadors of the kingdom of God and we are expected to show how his kingdom works. We are expected to, as God tells Isaiah, “Learn to do what is right! Promote justice! Take up the cause of the orphan! Defend the rights of the widow!” (Isaiah 1:17) Jesus told us that what we do or do not do to the poor, the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the imprisoned and the alien, we do or do not do to him. (Matthew 25:31-46) We are to love both our neighbors and our enemies. (Mark 12:31; Luke 6:27) No earthly kingdom acts like that.

And the early Christians got the message and put it into practice. In Acts we read that “They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of the bread and to prayer...All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.” (Acts 2:42, 44-45) Consequently “There were no needy persons among them...” (Acts 4:34) This early form of communal sharing did not last, but later when plagues hit cities and the rich and powerful fled to the countryside, Christians became known for staying and caring for the sick even when it cost them their lives. When Christianity was legalized, churches built hospitals, housed the elderly and orphans, took care of abandoned infants, created schools, and helped the poor with food and money. These are things that we see as normal, and governments and civic organizations have taken over many of these functions. But this was a real departure from the Greco-Roman world that existed before Christianity. Not all human beings were valued. Slaves and barbarians did not enjoy the same right to life and protection as citizens of the empire. Sickly and deformed children could be drowned and unwanted children could be left on the side of the road for anyone to take, be they enslavers or hungry scavengers. But Christians saw everyone as a person who was created in God's image and for whom Christ died. Eventually these ideals spread. Today most non-Christians would subscribe to the idea that all human beings have inherent worth.

Today there are those who denigrate Christians who they accuse of being social justice warriors. But Christians were always at the forefront of human rights. Bartolome de las Casas came to the New World in 1513 as a chaplain during the conquest of Cuba. Within 2 years he returned to Spain to convince the king to end the cruel system being installed in the Americas. He became the first bishop of Chiapas in Hispaniola and was officially appointed “Protector of the Indians.” He denounced the atrocities of the conquistadores and actively fought slavery for 50 years. Christians started the abolitionist movement in the UK and the US and participated in the Underground Railroad, secretly bringing slaves to freedom. Christian beliefs about the equality of all human beings inspired the women's suffrage movement and civil rights movement, as well as reform movements to abolish child labor and alleviate poverty.

God is a social justice warrior. In Hebrew the word for righteousness also means justice. Some people have lost or ignored the connection between loving God and loving all the human beings he created. The prophets, like Habakkuk, remind us. Jesus reminds us. When asked for the greatest commandment, he gave two. And he expanded the second one, about loving your neighbor, to include people unlike you and even your enemy. He told us to look for him in those whom society either despises, devalues or forgets about. He said the mark of the person who follows him is loving others as he loves us. (John 13:35)

When we see people being harmed, we often question God's justice. But we should ask ourselves why do we let people harm others, either through direct violence or by using power, money, and deception to exploit those they find useful and erase those they don't? Why do we put bullies, conmen and people who exhibit no empathy, fear or regret into positions of power? When we look at the world, we, like Habakkuk, sometimes scream out “Why, God, why?” But the real question is “Why, humans, why?”

A Hell of a Story (2)

(If you want to see how I revise my older sermons, here's an example. I first preached and posted this on September 26, 2010 when I had just begun the blog. I forgot and did a small revision and update to preach at the jail this morning. I didn't realize I had posted it 15 years ago until just now. So you can just read this version and if you're curious, go back and compare.)

The scriptures referred to are 1 Timothy 6:6-19 and Luke 16:19-31.

When I first discovered podcasts one of my f,avorites was The Tobolowsky Files. It is a series of stories told by Stephen Tobolowsky, one of those actors whose face everyone recognizes even though they don't know his name. He's been in many movies, including Mississippi Burning, Thelma and Louise and Memento. He's also a staple on TV. He's probably best known for playing Ned Ryerson, the insurance salesman who annoys Bill Murray everyday in Groundhog's Day. Tobo, as his friends call him, is a born raconteur with a wealth of stories about both his professional life and his personal life. He has been thrown from a horse and broken his neck, suffered amnesia, had his apartment broken into as he lay medicated and helpless in his bedroom, formed the “Dangerous Animals club” with his boyhood pals, written the film True Stories with David Byrne of the Talking Heads, and chatted with an irrepressible Holocaust survivor at his synagogue. This last person's experiences are the basis for the podcast episode entitled “A Good Day at Auschwitz.” Tobo's stories are funny, sad, nostalgic, mystical, bizarre, dramatic, romantic, heartbreaking and heartwarming. If you just want to hear a good story, google The Tobolowsky Files, go to the website and click on any episode. You will be spellbound.

Besides a compelling plot, one of the keys to making a story memorable is good details. Details can flesh out a story, make it more vivid and more arresting. Jesus was a good storyteller and one of his most memorable tales is today's parable of the rich man and Lazarus. In just two sentences Jesus sets the stage. The rich man wears fine linen and purple, a very expensive dye later reserved only for kings, and he feasts every day. In contrast, the poor man lies at the rich man's gate. He would be satisfied with the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table. Instead of being covered with fine linen, he is covered with sores. Which the dogs lick. That detail, besides making us go “Ick,” makes us sympathize with Lazarus.

Note that the poor man has a name and the rich man doesn't. Tobo says the worst parts for an actor are those without a name but just a title like “second detective” or “loudmouth executive.” Those characters are never fleshed out. And indeed, Jesus' “rich man” has no distinguishing features or personal characteristics. He is just a generic rich guy, because that is not the point of the story.

The stage is set. It's time to call “Action!” Which in this case is that both men die. Lazarus is carried by the angels to Abraham's side; in other words, heaven. The rich man finds himself in Hades. He sees Lazarus and Abraham far off and asks the father of the faithful to send the poor man with just a drop of water to cool his tongue. But every story needs an obstacle. Abraham says there is an uncrossable chasm between the two places. So the rich man pleads with Abraham to send Lazarus to warn his brothers. Abraham replies that they have the writings of Moses and the prophets to tell them how to live. The rich man says that the scriptures won't do them any good, but a man coming back from the dead will impress them. Abraham begs to differ. If the moral arguments of scripture won't move them to turn to God, neither will the miracle of a man returning to life.

There are a couple of things to note here. First, the layout of heaven and hell in the story cannot be taken too literally. Hell is separation from God. But here they are within hailing distance. But if the rich man and Abraham couldn't interact, the story wouldn't work. So the chasm that prevents people from crossing over but allows for conversation should be seen as a plot contrivance. It makes it possible for us to see what the story is really about.

And what it's about is not that the rich automatically go to hell and the poor always go to heaven. The Bible does not condemn gaining wealth if it is done through honest work and if it is used to aid those in need. (Proverbs 19:17, 22:9; Luke 3:11; 1 John 3:17-18; Ephesians 4:28) The man's sin was not being rich but not helping Lazarus. The poor man was lying at the rich man's gates. He couldn't enter or leave his house without stepping over Lazarus. But he couldn't even be bothered to give the man his table scraps or leftovers, much less treat him like a fellow human being. We are commanded to love our neighbors as we do ourselves. (Leviticus 19:18; Mark 12:31) The rich man's actions or rather, lack of action are anything but loving. He reserved all the pleasures he could afford for himself. The rich man suffers in the afterlife what he avoided in this life. Lazarus, deprived of all physical and social comfort in this life, is comforted in paradise. So it's not about how much you have but what you do with it. The man isn't condemned for being rich but for being selfish and not even thinking of helping his neighbor.

And the rich man still hasn't learned his lesson because he asks Lazarus to do for him what he didn't do for Lazarus—give him a morsel of mercy, that is, a drop of water. Only when he is told that it is impossible, does the man in Hades think of others. And his concern doesn't go beyond his own family. He asks that Lazarus be sent to warn his brothers. This time Abraham doesn't say that this request is impossible, he merely says that all the warning they need can be found in what Moses and the prophets revealed. And you cannot read the Bible with an open mind without noticing that God expects us to take good care of others, especially those too poor to afford food, water and shelter. The prophets routinely connect bad religion with a lack of concern for the poor and powerless. (Deuteronomy 15:1-11; Isaiah 1:15-17, 58:6-10; Jeremiah 5:26-28, etc) So Abraham is right. If the brothers would only heed the commandments of their own religion, they would avoid the rich man's fate.

Ah, but the man knows his brothers only too well. They won't listen to God's word. They need something more arresting, like a resurrected Lazarus. (And what does it say about the brothers that they also saw Lazarus at the gate often enough to recognize him should he return from the dead?)

But wait! Wouldn't a resurrected Lazarus convince them? Well, if someone you knew came back from the dead and told you to change your ways so you won't go to hell, wouldn't you listen to him? Or would you run to a psychiatrist, terrified that you were going crazy? After all, even the disciples had doubts at first. (Matthew 28:17) When he first appeared to them, they thought the risen Jesus might be a ghost. (Luke 24:36-43) Contrary to popular belief, it was hard for them to get used to something that went against what they previously thought about reality, as well as the beliefs they had grown up with. They thought the Messiah was meant to sit on a throne, not hang on a cross. So it took 40 days of encountering the risen Jesus for the new reality to take hold. (Acts 1:3)

There's another reason why sending Lazarus might not work. True, he might put the fear of hell into the brothers but that's a pretty negative motive to do good. It's like putting a gun to someone's head and saying, “I want you to be a good person.” You may change their outward behavior but not their inner attitude. They would still in fact be acting out of selfishness, in this case, self-preservation.

God is love. (1 John 4:8) He made us in his image. (Genesis 1:27)He wants us to emulate him by loving him and each other. So as Abraham says, if people are not touched by God's word on justice and mercy, they won't be changed by an external event, no matter how spectacular.

But weren't the disciples changed by the resurrection of Jesus? Yes, but only because they had already been touched by his words. When many turned away from Jesus because of his difficult preaching on his body and blood, he asked the twelve if they were going to leave as well. “Lord, to whom shall we go?” they reply. “You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68) What the resurrection of Christ did was confirm what they already had begun to believe—that Jesus was the Messiah. And rather than putting fear into them, it took their fears away. If Jesus conquered death, what else was there for them to fear?

The point of Jesus' story of a man who goes to hell is that the existence of hell isn't sufficient to change people. If they don't respond to God's word, to the values it promotes, to the perspective on life it gives, to the just and loving God it reveals, to the good news that Jesus proclaims, then they won't respond any better to miracles or even fear of hell. That's the twist to Jesus' story.

The best stories change the way we look at things. Tobo's episode “A Good Day at Auschwitz” lets the listener see the Holocaust through the eyes of a resourceful man who could find moments of joy even in that hell on earth. In today's parable, we see that heaven and hell are not so much external places but internal states of the spirit. Those who live for themselves alone are cut off from God, the source of love, even in this life, as we see in the rich man's five brothers. They are deaf to the gospel. Wrapped up in themselves, their exile from God is self-imposed. As C.S. Lewis said, the gates of hell are locked from the inside.

Those who love God and others, not just with their lips but with their lives, are already part of the community of God, and both in this life and the next, they can look forward to greater intimacy with God.

Character is destiny, especially if you live forever. The good news is that we can change. If you let the Spirit of God grow you into his image in Christ, then, as you reach out and connect to others, the body of Christ grows and the kingdom of God expands. The kingdom, Jesus said, is among you and within you. (Luke 17:21) Heaven is not where you are going; it is what you are becoming.

Think about it. There is no place you could put someone like Hitler that would not be hell for either him or for others. He carried his hatred and rage and love of destruction with him. By the same token, anywhere Jesus is can be paradise. So the ideal place for him is in your heart, in your mind, in your life.

But don't think that you can keep him to yourself. Nothing can contain Jesus. Hell couldn't. And if you keep your eyes open, you'll see Jesus in the damnedest places, like in the poor, the needy, the sick, the imprisoned and the stranger. (Matthew 25:34-40) If he is in you, then you can't help but reach out to him in others. You just can't stop him from acting like that. He is irrepressible. And thank God for that.

The Heart of a Traveler

My wife and I just binged the Netflix series Travelers. It's a different kind of time travel show. Using historical records, a mysterious director in the future sends the consciousness of volunteers into the bodies of people who are about to die. By using the extra life they have given these bodies, the travelers from the future try to change their past, which is our present. It turns out that in the 21^st century everything went so wrong that the future is hellish, with people living in underground bunkers to protect them from nuclear winter and without any of the foods we have today. Each team of travelers consists of an historian, a medic, an engineer, a tactician and a leader. They follow a list of protocols that are calculated not to cause too many changes other than the big ones that will enable humanity to survive. Of course, this is difficult for them to do and remain unnoticed by the families and friends of the people whose bodies they have taken over. Towards the end of the series, a man who has fallen in love with a traveler asks the team why they don't simply tell the world what is wrong with it and how to fix it. They explain that most of the people in the world know both what is wrong with it and what they should do to fix it. The implication is that people just don't want to make the necessary sacrifices to change the way things are.

There are religions and philosophies which hold that all the problems in the world stem from our ignorance of certain truths. If people just knew the truth, they would change the way they lived. But it doesn't take much reflection to realize that folks don't always react to knowledge that way. When I was in a skid row ministry in college, I thought the key to helping the people we were encountering was to first get them to acknowledge that they were alcoholics. So I was shocked to discover that they readily admitted that they were. But what they took from that knowledge was that their situation was hopeless and so they just leaned into their addiction.

Today most of us now know that our world is heating up because we are burning fossil fuels. We know that nuclear war is a stupid and self-destructive option for anyone to attempt. We know that life expectancy is better than ever because of things like vaccines and modern medicine. We know that huge inequalities in income undermine stable societies. We know that mindlessly following all-powerful rulers leads to authoritarian governments that oppress people. We, like the travelers, are living with the consequences of our past. But we don't want to make the changes necessary to avoid repeating history.

Knowledge is not enough. For instance, putting the Ten Commandments into classrooms will not stop school shootings. The problem isn't that somehow violent people have never learned that the Bible says “Thou shalt not kill.” It's that they don't care. It's that in their hearts they think their feelings of insignificance or anger or despair or self-righteousness are more important than the lives of others. And it doesn't help that “follow your heart” is the message most often expressed in our culture, from self-help books to Disney movies.

In fact you could create an alternate version of the Ten Commandments that express our true values, the ones we don't always say aloud.

It would go something like this: “You are the master of your own life. You shall have no priorities higher than your own desires and comfort.

“You shall make idols out of anything you wish. You shall be free to make gods in your own image. You shall worship and follow your idols no matter how damaging this is for you or other people.

“You shall freely use God's name to justify whatever you want, even if it directly contradicts what God or Jesus explicitly said.

“You shall work continuously without rest and make those under you do likewise. You shall not set aside time to think about and reorient yourself to anything or anyone greater than yourself.

“You shall blame all of your problems on your genetics and upbringing, excusing yourself from making any changes in the way you act and ignoring those who managed to become better people in spite of what they were working with.

“You shall demonize and dehumanize and diminish and even take the lives of those you don't like.

“You shall do whatever you desire sexually, without regard to whether it harms others.

“You shall take whatever you want by whatever means you can get away with.

“You shall not let truth get in the way of what you want to say, even if it harms others.

“You shall not let the fact that what you want belongs to someone else stop you from pursuing it.” (Compare this with Exodus 20:1-17)

The problem in following your heart is that the heart doesn't always want what's good for it or for you, much less what's good for others. As it says in Jeremiah, “The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurably sick—who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9) As Jesus said, “For from within, out of the human heart, come evil ideas, sexual immorality, thefts, murders, adulteries, greed, evil actions, deceit, debauchery, envy, slander, arrogance and foolishness.” (Mark 7:21-22)

This is something the travelers in the TV series come up against. It turns out that other people in the future have lost faith in the director's great plan and have come back to our time to sabotage it and take control for themselves. And when the existence of the travelers comes to the attention of the governments of the present day world, they are distrusted. Some wish to get their hands on the future technology for the benefit of their own governments instead of sharing it with the world. The biggest problem the travelers encounter is not ignorance but human nature, including their own.

Knowledge is good but knowledge alone is not sufficient to solve our problems. Knowledge must be coupled with wisdom, which is about understanding the human heart and understanding what is truly valuable in life. For example, the Nazis had some of the best scientists and some of the best generals of that time. The problem was in the ways they used their knowledge of chemistry and rocketry and warfare. In fact the British called off their plans to assassinate Hitler when they realized that he was overruling his generals and redirecting the scientists' work according to his own desires. He thought he knew better than the experts. The British realized that by letting Hitler continue to direct his country's war effort, he would lose the war. Hitler's evil heart would bring about his own defeat.

But knowledge and wisdom are still not enough. For people to use their knowledge of God and his commandments wisely, they need a change of heart. In Ezekiel, God says of his people, “I will give them one heart and will put a new spirit within them; I will remove the hearts of stone from their bodies and I will give them tender hearts, so that they may follow my statutes and observe my regulations and carry them out. Then they will be my people, and I will be their God.” Ezekiel 11:19-20) Likewise in Jeremiah God speaks of a new covenant in which “I will put my law within them and write it on their hearts and minds. I will be their God and they will be my people.” (Jeremiah 31:33) Jesus came to inaugurate that new covenant and to give us a new heart and a new Spirit. (Luke 22:20; John 14:15-17)

In this day and age, there is very little in the way of essential knowledge for living that we do not already have. What we lack is the motivation to put that knowledge to use wisely. As a nurse, I have taken care of patients with conditions that they fully understood and I watched them ignore their doctors' orders because it would go against their desires. I have seen patients with emphysema continue to smoke. One even managed to get about 25 feet of tubing for her nasal cannula so she could stand outside her door and smoke while hooked up to the oxygen tank back inside her room. She didn't want to die instantly by blowing herself up while smoking next to the oxygen tank, but apparently she had no objection to killing herself slowly with tobacco. Another patient, a brittle diabetic, was secretly eating sweets his wife brought him, sending his blood sugar soaring. And he was a retired nurse! They knew what would save them but their hearts were not in it.

When a person's physical heart is incurably failing, we call it congestive heart failure. Their heart can no longer do its job properly and so they are slowly dying. It is possible these days to replace it with a donor's heart. Of course the donor must die so that the heart's recipient can live. One way you can think of what Jesus did is that he died so that we might have a change of heart: his heart. He gave his life that we might have life. As Paul put it, “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So the life I now live in the body, I live because of the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

For a patient to receive a new heart they have to trust a surgeon to cut them open, break their sternum, take out the bad heart and then transplant into them the healthy heart. It is difficult and the patient can expect to have some pain afterwards. They must do physical therapy to regain strength and mobility. They will have to take their medicine so they don't get an infection or reject the heart. And they will also have to change their diet to stay healthy.

To get a change of heart spiritually, we have to trust God to open up our life, get inside us, and change out our corrupt heart for the heart of Jesus. Afterwards we may feel the pain of leaving behind the stuff we desired but which was bad for us. We have to work with his Spirit as he helps us gain spiritual strength and the ability to walk with God. We need to avoid those things that will infect our hearts with unhealthy desires and habits and cause us to reject Jesus' way. So we need to change what we consume mentally and spiritually.

One of the things I hate in TV shows and movies is when the hero wakes up in a hospital bed, rips out his IV, tears off the leads to the heart monitor, gets up and leaves the hospital to get the bad guys. It is very dramatic but it is also unrealistic because anyone in that bad a shape is in no condition to do anything by themselves. (Not to mention the fact that pulling out an IV and not applying a pressure bandage will cause him to bleed profusely. Instead of walking out, he'd most likely pass out and possibly bleed out.)

We cannot radically change our life without help. That's why Jesus gives us his Spirit to comfort, strengthen, guide and encourage us. (John 14:26) The Holy Spirit gives us the ability to trust God, to turn our life around (ie, repent), to pray, to love God and to love other people, including our enemies. The Spirit of God gives us gifts and abilities for us to demonstrate that love. (1 Corinthians 12:4-6; Romans 12:6-8) The Spirit produces in us love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23) We need the Spirit of Christ in us because otherwise we cannot change in the ways we must in order to become new creations in Christ. (Romans 8:9; 2 Corinthians 5:17)

In the TV show Travelers we see a countdown of the seconds before each person faces death. Then they start to show pain as the new person's consciousness takes over. In real life making a change can be similar. As a nurse I have seen that often people will not make major changes in their lives until it becomes too painful to continue living in the same unhealthy ways. It took a near-fatal heart attack and quintuple bypass surgery for my father-in-law to change his lifestyle, like to stop eating fatty Polish foods and start exercising. It wasn't that he didn't know that he should do those things. But it took the pain of his desperately sick heart to make him realize that he must change or die.

It is wiser, of course, not to wait until the last second to change. After all, every second of this life is a second chance to change what we are doing. At any moment, we can decide to turn from the desires and fears that actually rule our lives and turn to God. We can let him take over and bring us back to the path we should be traveling—back to the One who is the source of healing and forgiveness and growth and love.

A Plus Sign

The scriptures referred to are 1 Corinthians 1:18-24.

I don't know if you've ever seen the gurney on which condemned prisoners undergo lethal injection. It looks like a typical hospital gurney except for two extensions that stick out on either side. Those extensions are there so that the person's arms can be strapped down away from the body and so that those performing the execution have access to the veins on the arms where the IVs are inserted that will deliver the lethal doses of drugs. Now imagine that you saw people walking around with miniature versions of those gurneys hanging around their necks. Some might be realistic but some might be rendered artistically; some might even be made of gold and some might be encrusted in diamonds. You would still think that wearing an instrument of death was really weird.

But essentially that's what the cross is. And it was more brutal than the gurney. Contrary to what you see in movies and art, the condemned man would not carry the entire cross. He would just carry the crossbar, or in Latin, patibulum. The upright would already be in place. It could even be a tree with the branches cut off. The patibulum, weighing about 70 pounds, would be laid across the shoulders of the condemned man (or woman) and tied to their outstretched arms. They would be marched through the streets of the city, with a placard that announced their crime. At the place of execution the condemned were stripped naked. They may also have had their wrists untied and then nailed to the patibulum. They would be lifted onto the upright. It would be just high enough off the ground that the condemned could not stand but would hang by his arms. The feet were then nailed by their heels to the upright. The placard with the charge was hung above the condemned person's head. And then he was left to die, from shock, dehydration and asphyxiation, because it was hard to fully expand your lungs in that position. This could take days. In Jesus' case, he was whipped beforehand by a cat-o-nine-tails with either bones or metal hooks on the ends of the leather strips, shredding his back. So in his case, blood loss would hasten his death. It was meant to be a painful and humiliating way to die to reinforce the idea that Rome was in charge and that this is what you got if you opposed the empire. After the slave revolt led by Spartacus, after the siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD, after the local rebellion of the Galilean town of Sepphoris when Herod the Great died, the Romans crucified thousands of men. Since Sepphoris was only 4 miles from Nazareth and was being rebuilt by Herod's son during Jesus' boyhood, if Joseph and Jesus looked for work there, they would have passed those crosses every day.

How did such a grisly instrument of torture and death become the symbol of Christianity? Well, it wasn't at first. Christians secretly identified themselves by the symbol of the fish. The Greek word for fish, ichthus, was used as an acronym for Iesus Christos Theos 'Uios Sator or Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior. But by the 2^nd century, Christian were making the sign of the cross on their foreheads. And in fact, Christians were mocked as “adorers of the gibbet.” There is a graffito from the year 200 AD of a young man worshipping a crucified donkey-headed man, with the words “Alexamenos worships his god.” This blasphemous picture, scratched into a plaster wall in Rome, is the earliest depiction of Christ on the cross, his arms stretched out on the patibulum and the placard above his head. By the 4^th century, after the first Christian emperor Constantine outlawed crucifixion, we start to see visual depictions of the empty cross.

But why did the cross come to represent Christianity? Because of its centrality to the faith. As Paul writes in our passage today from 1 Corinthians, “....we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” In his teachings, Jesus turns the values of this world upside down, declaring that the “first shall be last and the last first.” (Mark 10:31) And who is considered the last in society if not someone who was publicly executed in the most shameful and gory way possible?

For many Jews, especially the religious authorities of the time, the idea that a crucified handyman was the Messiah was something they could not accept. The Messiah they wanted was a holy warrior-king, a David 2.0, who would free them from the Romans. What good was a dead Messiah? And indeed had Jesus not risen from the dead, he would not be a useful Messiah. As his critics said mockingly at his crucifixion, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Christ of God, his chosen one!” (Luke 23:35) Jesus healed other people and he raised 3 people from the dead that we know of. (Luke 7:11-15; 8:49-56; John 11) If he stayed dead, what would we make of that? But in our earliest book in the New Testament, Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians, in the very first chapter he mentions Jesus' resurrection. (1 Thessalonians 1:10) So why didn't the empty tomb become the symbol of Christianity?

Because first Jesus had to die. And his death was not just a fluke or merely the result of running afoul of the authorities. He died for us. (1 Thessalonians 5:10) Specifically, he died for our sins. (1 Corinthians 15:3) As it says in 1 Peter 2:24, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we may cease from sinning and live for righteousness. By his wounds you are healed.” And he did it out of love for us. As Paul says in Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates his own love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Essentially Jesus went on a suicide mission to save us. He gave his life so that we may live for him and with him forever.

How does that show the power of God, though? You measure a hero by what he overcomes. In fact, one of the reasons they introduced kryptonite into the Superman stories is that he is so powerful, his victories are no more impressive than one of us crushing ants. In the words of one of the comic book's editors, Dorothy Woolfolk, Superman's invulnerability is “boring.” Green kryptonite weakens and can kill Superman. It is his overcoming that in order to save others that makes him a hero.

Death is the final enemy, as Paul puts it. (1 Corinthians 15:26) Most of us would agree. Right now there are billionaires like the founders of Amazon, Google, Paypal and others are trying to figure out ways not to age and ultimately not to die. Bryan Johnson of Braintree is paying experts millions of dollars to help him live forever by creating specialized diets, taking 100 supplements a day, optimizing his sleep, using light and oxygen therapies and basically turning himself into a guinea pig for various controversial medical experiments, such as blood transfusions from his teenage son. There's a documentary about him on Netflix.

Jesus willingly went to his death and defeated death by rising again. His resurrection after being killed for the sins of the world validates his power to forgive sins, just as his healing the paralyzed man lowered through the roof did. (Mark 2:3-12) Jesus can overcome death which is the result of our sins. That's how he is the power of God. That makes him the ultimate hero.

And that's why it's become popular these days for superheroes to die and come back again. They are imitating Jesus. Too bad they aren't imitating the way he lived his life, like turning the other cheek and loving his enemies. But people love displays of physical, political and earthly power, not of the moral power of forgiveness, healing and transformation of lives we see in Jesus.

But how is the crucified Christ the wisdom of God? Earthly wisdom tends to be about how to get what you want and protect yourself from things you don't want to happen to you. In other words, it is about control. We've gotten so good at controlling so many things these days that we don't feel that we need God. We've got it all handled. Until we don't. At any time a disaster can take away our belongings, our home, our loved ones or even our health. In fact, as someone said, being a disabled person is not only something anyone can become at any time, it is something all of us will become if we live long enough. Statistically, most people will suffer a disability for the last 8 years of their life. Knowing that you are not in control of everything can be scary. But it is that fear and the knowledge that God is in control that is the beginning of wisdom.

In Star Trek: Strange New Worlds a character says, “Not believing you're going to die is what gets you killed.” She could almost be thinking of Jesus' parable of the man who has a surplus of goods and figures that from now on he can relax, eat, drink and be merry. “But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life will be demanded back from you, but who will get what you have prepared for yourself?'” (Luke 12:20) Living only for yourself and your pleasure is not wise but foolish. It is short-term thinking. Jesus teaches us to think really long-term: not just for this life but for the next. If you will cease to exist in a few decades, the kind of person you are becoming is not that important. But if you are going to live forever, whether you are becoming a more heavenly person or a more hellish creature, tormented by regrets you can't get past and grievances you won't forgive, is absolutely vital. The kingdom of heaven is within and in the midst of us. (Luke 17:21) The person you will be for eternity has its roots and beginning in the present. Now is the time to change the trajectory of our life.

Living for the God who loves us enough to die for us and serving him through serving the others for whom he died is wise in the long run. When you die, will you find any comfort in the awards you won, all the video games you played, all the time you spent drunk or drugged, all the trivial pursuits you indulged in? Will you regret all the time you spent thinking about yourself? Or will you instead find meaning in all the time you spent loving and helping others, leaving their lives better for you being there for them? And what do you think you will find more of in the next life—mindless activities and distractions and things that will make you feel worse, or will you find love and meaning and purpose and joy?

The reason Jesus is still changing lives 2000 years after he went to the cross is that people find deep wisdom in what he taught and how he lived. And people find great power in following him, even though it means renouncing themselves, taking up their crosses and following in his way of self-sacrificial love.

Usually when you read about the life of a great person, the last part, the part about their decline and death, is a bummer. Queen Elizabeth 1 was depressed and sat motionless for hours on end, refusing to lie down in bed, where she knew she would die. Having conquered the known world, Alexander the Great suddenly got sick, lost the power of speech and died at age 32. Suffering from dementia, Robin Williams, who made so many people laugh, killed himself. But as awful as Jesus' death was, it does not have that same effect on us. Instead in his last days we see nobility; we see great sacrifice; we see deep love. Jesus' death is what all the gospels, or good news, are inevitably leading up to.

Some people, not believing that Jesus was the Son of God, see his death as the end of the story. And many probably think Christians are ghoulish for wearing the instrument of his death. But as it says in 1 John, “In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” And it goes on to say, “Dear friends, if God so loved us, then we also ought to love one another.” (1 John 4:10-11) The cross is a symbol of God's love for us. As Jesus said, “No one has greater love than this—that one lays down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) Paul writes, “And he died for all so that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised.” (2 Corinthians 5:15) Ironically Jesus transformed the cross from as symbol of death to a symbol of a life lived without fear of death.

Think of what you could do if you did not fear death. In the movie Groundhog's Day Bill Murray's character, realizing he can't die but will wake up every morning, eventually comes to see this as a great gift and changes from a selfish person to one who helps and saves others. In this life fear of pain and persecution keeps people from sticking their necks out and doing what's right. We let others suffer rather than taking action to help them because we are afraid of suffering. Jesus didn't let the fear of suffering and death stop him from breaking rules to heal others or from speaking the truth to power. If we truly trust in him, we will give up all rights to ourselves, take up our crosses and follow him, knowing he will raise us up on the last day. (John 6:39-40) 

Free At Last

The scriptures referred to are the book of Philemon.

I remember when computers were first introduced into the workplace, in my case, the hospital where I worked in the early 1980s. They had a black screen with green letters and you could order a limited number of supplies or tests by using a lightpen to click boxes. My children remember us getting a computer for the home in the 1990s as a present from my mother. My grandkids have never known a world without computers. They take them for granted. They are considered digital natives.

If you were living throughout most of history you would never know a time when slavery did not exist. It was universal since roughly the invention of agriculture during the Neolithic Revolution 11,000 years ago. A person could become a slave to pay off a debt, as punishment for a crime, as a prisoner of war, as a child abandoned by poor parents, or by being born to slaves. It is estimated that in the first century AD approximately 1/3 of the population of the Roman Empire were slaves. As the Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible says, “Slavery in the Roman Empire was not ethnically based; the Romans were happy to enslave anyone.” And if you lived back then, you would have taken the institution of slavery for granted. (Sadly, it still exists in parts of the world.)

Some forms of slavery were death sentences, like working in the mines or being a gladiator. Some forms of slavery meant a life of hard labor, such as working on a farm. Some forms of slavery were a bit better, such as being a household slave, provided your master did not sexually abuse you. They could do even worse. Your master could have you tortured to extract information from you, have you beaten for disobedience, and even have you killed, especially if you tried to run away or if you stole from him. In fact, he could have you crucified. That form of execution was primarily used as a punishment for those who rebelled against the empire and for slaves.

That's what makes Paul's letter to Philemon such a remarkable document. Philemon was a friend who had been converted to Christianity by Paul. Philemon had a church meet in his house. (There wouldn't be any church buildings until after Christianity was legalized in the early 300s by Constantine.) Paul is writing to Philemon because he had a problem. He had also converted a man named Onesimus, who helped him in his ministry. Then he found out that Onesimus was a runaway slave. In fact he was Philemon's slave and apparently he had stolen money from him. Paul's dilemma is this: According to the Torah, if you found a runaway slave you were not supposed to give him back. Deuteronomy 23:15-16 says, “You must not return an escaped slave to his master when he has run away to you. Indeed, he may live among you in any place he chooses, in whichever of your villages he prefers; you must not oppress him.” But Roman law said a runaway slave must be returned. What was Paul to do?

Paul is a prisoner at the time he writes the letter. He may have been in Rome, waiting to plead his case before Nero. So he can't plead Onesimus' case in person. Instead he sends this message in the form of a letter of recommendation. Usually this was sent to someone of equal or lower status, pleading the case of a person of lower rank. The person being recommended was to be treated as a representative of the writer of the letter. But you wouldn't write such a letter about a slave! And Paul is not Philemon's equal or superior, either socially or economically. So Paul reminds him that he is the man who brought Philemon to Christ. Paul is like a spiritual father to him.

As such Paul rather diplomatically asks Philemon to do him a favor. Paul says that he could be “bold enough in Christ to command you to do your duty, yet I would rather appeal to you on the basis of love—and I, Paul, do this as an old man, and now also as a prisoner of Christ Jesus.” Paul is not above playing the sympathy card. Because Paul has no legal basis for asking Philemon to do what he wants him to do.

Paul continues, “I am appealing to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I have become during my imprisonment.” Paul is calling the slave his son because he has become Onesimus' spiritual father as well. The implications of his saying that will come out a bit later.

Paul writes “Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful both to you and to me.” Paul is making a play on words here. The name Onesimus means “useful.”

“I am sending him, that is, my own heart, back to you.” Remember, legally Paul has to do this. And notice again the emotional language Paul is using, calling Onesimus “my own heart.”

“I wanted to keep him with me, so that he might be of service to me in your place during my imprisonment for the gospel...” This is what Paul wants but cannot legally demand. He said earlier he could have commanded Philemon in Christ to do this “but I preferred to do nothing without your consent, in order that your good deed might be voluntary and not something forced.” Love asks consent. It may try to persuade but it doesn't force people to do things. That's why Jesus gives us a choice of whether we want to change our minds and lives and follow him.

Paul then wonders if the reason that Onesimus ran away was “so that you may have him back forever, no longer a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother—especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.” How is Philemon getting Onesimus back forever? As a brother. Here's where Paul being a spiritual father to both Philemon and Onesimus becomes relevant. As Christians, they are now brothers. Paul even includes himself as a brother to both men. Though Paul wants Philemon to send Onesimus back to help in his ministry, they will be brothers forever in Christ.

“So if you consider me your partner...” Paul is using a business term here. Paul is planting churches; Philemon is hosting a church in his house; they are both serving Jesus Christ. Paul continues “...welcome him as you would welcome me.” Philemon is to welcome his own slave as if he were Paul. Paul expects him to treat Onesimus as he would the man who brought him to Christ. This will take humility on Philemon's part.

Paul continues, “If he has wronged you in any way, or owes you anything, charge that to my account.” This is why many commentators think that Onesimus stole money from his master. And even if he didn't, slaves cost a lot. They were worth anywhere from hundreds to thousands of what the average person would make in a day. The average cost of a slave was 2000 denarii, or 2000 days' wages. Losing a slave was losing money.

And Paul is not just saying he owes Philemon this debt metaphorically. He goes on and says, “I, Paul, am writing this with my own hand: I will repay it.” By putting it in writing, Paul is making the debt legally his. Philemon could take Paul to court and demand the money.

As an aside, let's note that Paul didn't actually write his letters himself. He dictated them. In some cases we know who actually wrote his words down. (Romans 16:22) In others he includes a sentence written by his own hand to authenticate that it is a letter from him or to send a personal greeting. (1 Corinthians 16:21; Galatians 6:11; Colossians 4:18; 2 Thessalonians 3:17) I think he had ongoing vision problems. (Galatians 4:13-15) But Paul cares enough about Onesimus that he personally writes that he is taking on the slave's debt to his master.

But Paul adds, “I say nothing about you owing me even your own self.” If it hadn't been for Paul, Philemon would not have heard the gospel. Paul may owe Philemon money but Philemon owes Paul his new life in Christ.

Paul then says, “Yes, brother, let me have this benefit from you in the Lord!” Paul is again hinting that he wants Philemon to return Onesimus to him.

“Refresh my heart in Christ.” Paul is again engaging in word play. He called Onesimus “my own heart.” How can Philemon refresh Onesimus?

Paul says, “Confident of your obedience, I am writing to you, knowing that you will do even more than I say.” What is more than Paul is saying? The most obvious thing is for Philemon to not just refrain from punishing his slave and send him back to Paul but to free Onesimus. Legally Paul cannot demand this but he is basically arguing that Philemon should emancipate his new brother in Christ, so that he is a freeman, who can serve Jesus through continuing his work with Paul.

Paul has been criticized for not calling for the abolition of all slavery. But no one at that time was. The early Stoics did but then toned down their rhetoric on the topic as they became mainstream. The Essenes were for freeing slaves but not because of opposition to the institution. They wanted their monk-like disciples to give up all personal possessions when they came to live in their commune in the desert. They also encouraged their followers to give up their wives. But no one called for slave revolts, which were more common than you'd think and which the Romans viciously put down.

So Paul approached slavery in a different way. For instance, it is interesting how Paul subverted the household codes that were common back then. These were written to elite men on how to run their household. Paul uses these codes of conduct, however, to address not just men but their wives, children and slaves. Yes, he tells wives to submit to their husbands as part of the mutual submission all Christians should do to each other. He also tells husbands that they should love their wives, something no pagan would tell a man was his duty. Moreover they should love their wives like Christ loved the church—enough to die for her! He told children to obey their parents but also told fathers not to exasperate their children, again something unheard of in a culture where a father could legally kill disobedient children. He told slaves to obey their masters but told those masters to treat their slaves well. Specifically he says, “Masters, treat your slaves the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.” (Ephesians 5:21- 6:9) Perhaps Paul was thinking of the passage where Job says, “If I denied justice to my male and female slaves when they had a grievance against me, what will I do when God confronts me? What will I answer when called to account? Did not he who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same one form us both within our mothers?” (Job 31:13-15) Paul famously wrote “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28) And though he told Christians to retain the place in life in which God put them, he did say to slaves that if they could gain their freedom, they should do so. (1 Corinthians 7:21)

In fact, so much of the Bible does not justify slavery that an edited version of the scriptures was created in 1807 for use with slaves. This so-called Slave Bible removed 90% of the Old Testament and more than 50% of the New Testament. It was used by missionaries to convert and educate enslaved peoples and so it omitted all references to freedom and escape from slavery while emphasizing loyalty and submission to masters. You wouldn't be able to find most of the verses in this sermon in it, including the entire letter to Philemon.

What did Philemon do? I don't think you need to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that he must have freed Onesimus and sent him to Paul. If not, he would have destroyed the letter, and not shared it with his church and let them make copies to share with other churches around the empire, which is the reason we have it today. As evidence, in Paul's letter to the Colossians he says, about a fellow Christian named Tychicus, “I sent him with Onesimus, the faithful and dear brother, who is one of you.” (Colossians 4:9) Philemon was a member of the church at Colosse.

Perhaps because of the letter to Philemon, Christians became known for freeing their slaves and even making some of them bishops. And Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch who was martyred in Rome, mentioned that in the late first century there was a bishop of Ephesus, the fourth largest city in the Roman Empire, whose name was Onesimus. He said he was the same Onesimus for whom Paul pleaded and to whom Philemon gave freedom and whom he welcomed as a new brother in Christ.