There’s an interesting meme going around Facebook these days.
I actually took quite a break from Facebook the past week and a half, not checking it much other than to post a here and there update of travel or information.
But there’s this interesting meme that I’ve seen being posted, especially on the walls of many of my pastor colleagues.
It’s a church sign with an interesting phrase on it.
Now, before I go on, I need to tell you that I really hate philosophizing church signs. I think a church sign should have information on it, not try to give you fortune cookie-like advice. Especially because almost none of that advice is original, and probably needs a little more explanation or nuance than four lines will allow.
But this little church sign, supposedly on Wantagh Memorial Congregational Church, is getting all sorts of Facebook posts, and I think it’s interesting. On it is written:
“Live so fully that Westboro Baptist Church will picket your funeral.”
Now, I have to admit, I’m not quite sure what the sign means by that. Westboro Baptist Church seems to want to picket anything that will get them some media attention.
But the sentiment of the meme, of the sign, is pretty simple: do something.
Do something.
Today’s reading comes off the heels of a few important readings. The magi find Jesus by a star, at his baptism Jesus is proclaimed God’s anointing, at the wedding in Cana Jesus performs his first miracle of turning water into wine, mimicking the ancient Roman gods who would do such things for their own pleasure…but Jesus does it for the community to feast together.
All of these readings are meant to build up to this point; they show who Jesus is: the revealed, anointed, powerful one.
And today we get to hear what this revealed, anointed, powerful one is to do!
In reading from Isaiah’s 61st chapter, Jesus sets out his agenda: release those from oppression, help the blinded to see, give good news to the poor, proclaim to humanity that God’s favor is upon them.
Notice that there is no mention of saving people from sin in that proclamation.
Notice that there is no mention of getting people into heaven in that list of duties.
Notice that there is no, “I’m going to die as a perfect sacrifice because God desires a perfect sacrifice to make everything ok…” in that agenda.
Now, I’m not saying that God does not bring people to heavenly paradise through the person of Jesus Christ. And I’m not saying that sin isn’t a real force in our lives; we love to turn inward.
What I am saying is that, these three themes that Christianity has trumpeted for years as the central message of the church wasn’t even on his agenda when Jesus started his ministry.
Jesus, it seems, is more interested in fulfilling people here and now, freeing people here and now, comforting people here and now. God’s plan of salvation for humanity is immediate: in hearing the good news that God loves you for Christ’s sake your life will be different here and now, not just for eternity.
Jesus’ agenda at its origins was about now.
But…
But it’s easier to pretend it’s about the future, because then nothing has to change in the present.
Do you know what happens in this scene right after Jesus proclaims in the middle of the temple that he has come to do these things? It’s not in today’s reading, but I wonder if you know what happens.
The crowd takes Jesus, they drag him out of town, and they try to throw him off of a cliff.
They don’t like this message; it might mean they have to live differently.
Over a week ago I wrote a blog piece in response to the great number of shootings happening in our current neighborhood, Uptown. Now, I consider Uptown to actually be a pretty safe neighborhood, but we had a rash of shootings before 10pm for a few nights in a row, and for some reason many of them happened just up the block from us.
As you might imagine, this is worrisome to me, not only because we walk around at night in our neighborhood, but also because of the little one we’re expecting…and expecting to walk around with.
And the blog piece started to be shared and viewed all over the world, and got many responses both positive and negative. One person was quite upset with me, and told me that I had obviously picked a bad neighborhood to live in and that if I don’t like it, I should just move instead of advocate for stricter gun laws.
The man who I don’t know lives in rural Wisconsin…which means we’re probably both Packer fans, so at least we can agree on that.
But you see, my concern over this issue isn’t just for me.
What about those kids, those families, even those adults who can’t move from the neighborhood, who have no other option?
What about those who are too poor to go anywhere else, don’t they have good news too?
What about those who are so blinded by their privilege and their use of recreational guns, that they can’t see that sometimes these guns are killing our babies every night? I mean, you remember that our apartment was broken into a few months ago. What if we had had a gun under our mattress, a mattress that was flipped over by the way? Where would that gun be? We’re safe, law-abiding citizens; you don’t need to worry about me shooting up your car.
But you might have had to worry about your car being shot-up by my gun.
What about those who are held captive by fear so that they don’t go out at night? I remember that feeling. When I lived in Humboldt Park I heard machine gun fire almost nightly.
I remember my first time. Young recent college grad teaching school on the west side.
Papapapapapap.
Waking up with a jolt, my housemate waking up with me. It was close. The alley? The next street over. Screech of tires.
No sirens.
And that year one of my student’s friends was killed by gunfire, and he was shot in the leg and would always limp from there on out.
After 7pm we were captive to our apartment. “You should get a gun,” a friend of mine said. But that would just ensure that I would shoot myself or someone else…
Now, you may not agree with me on this issue, but I think we can all agree that there are too many deaths and something must be done, even if we can’t agree on what that something is.
You and I may not agree on this issue, but I think we can agree that if Jesus’ first agenda was about the here and now, then we too, must be about the here and now…and now something must be done.
Even if you think it’s not about the guns, but about the perpetrators or family systems or the violence or how our systems let the psychologically disturbed slip through the cracks…and I think you’d be right about that…by God let’s stop arguing over the reasons and actually do something.
Let’s do something.
We’ve been organizing a Faith and Justice team here at LMC, and we’ve set up a memorial outside. We’ve taken it down to revamp it for 2013, but there are ways that we can bring awareness to this issue in real time, for real results.
And yes, this message may not be falling on welcome ears, I realize that. Some may want to throw us off a cliff. But you see, we’re not an activist church, we’re the body of Christ!
And the body of Christ has always been about the agenda or Isaiah 61!
You know, in that blog post I quote from Isaiah as well. I quote from the second chapter where the prophet speaks about beating swords into plowshares and learning war no more.
I had someone, someone I didn’t know, message me on Facebook. They had liked the article, but they were getting some flak from some people who claimed that Isaiah was only talking about the perfection of heaven, after the Messiah had come. They thought that perhaps the prophet was talking about the time when God would make everything right and well, and so we didn’t have to work for that justice now because God would do it eventually.
She wanted to know what to say to them.
My response was pretty simple.
“If we believe that Jesus is God’s embodied good news for a hurting world, then we don’t need to wait for God to make things right, God’s already shown up on the scene in Jesus.
It already happened.
What are we waiting for?”
Good people, the message of Jesus is for the here and now, it’s about salvation today that moves toward eternity, not a message for an eternity that isn’t present today.
And we have an oppressed and oppressive world. We have a world blind to its addiction to violence. We have a world where we often give the poor no option but to live in graveyards.
Let’s do something. Let’s live as the body of Christ with thisagenda laid out in Isaiah 61, even if we get picketed, even if they try to throw us off a cliff.
Because Jesus already came, and now we are the body of Christ. It already happened.
— Reposted From Endless Falling
