Richard Dahlstrom

Bend it Like Beck - Glenn gets the conversation started

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:36:29 -0700

Glenn Beck, the celebrated conservative commentator had some things to say over the past week or so about "social justice" and "economic justice". It's easier to find commentaries on what he said, than it is to find what he actually said, but here's part of the exact words he spoke:

"I beg you, look for the words "social justice" or "economic justice" on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I'm going to Jeremiah's Wright's church? Yes! Leave your church. Social justice and economic justice. They are code words. If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish"

Later we learn from Beck that these are code words for totalitarianism and communism, and that Christ only called people to change their own individual lives and responses, not to empower the government to intrude into the life of the free markets. "Jesus spoke only for individual compassion, not for governmental justice" according to Beck.

He's not alone in his critiques. Another commentator has critiqued that bastion of liberalism, "Wheaton College"(sarcasm intended) for promoting "anti-American" and "pro-Marxist" theories under the guise of social justice". The response of the Wheaton provost cuts to the heart of this problem. He said,

We equip our students to think carefully and biblically about issues of justice, and encourage them to commit to act justly throughout their lives as defined by a biblical worldview … There is an enormous difference between recognizing the tragic state of so many rural school systems and inner-city school systems that serve disproportionately minority constituencies as a justice issue of concern to God, on the one hand, and a radical, naturalistically-driven call for Marxist redistribution of wealth on the other

But this, it seems, is a distinction Beck and millions of his followers who know Jesus seem unable to make. Beck's vision is that the free markets will take care of everything, and that anyone who doesn't believe that favors totalitarianism, Naziism, and dictatorships. It is difficult to know how to respond, but I will try.

I'll begin by offending my friends on the left. I'm not convinced that the Bible has a much to say about the Christian call to motivate governments to act in certain ways to further justice. You don't find Jesus talking about mobilizing people, getting out the vote, pushing to make cross executions illegal, or petitioning for fairer taxation.

On the other hand, Jesus and Paul didn't live in a democratic society whose vision was government of the people, by the people, and for the people. In other words, the option of affecting government policy wasn't real in Paul and Jesus' day. We're not in such times anymore, having been granted the incredible privilege of helping shape our policies by electing people.

In fact, Beck and many of his followers would be quick to remind us that our country is founded on the theistic values of individual freedom and dignity. One challenge, of course, comes from the realization that nobody is advocating for ultimate freedom. Conservatives want unrestricted markets in business but want to regulate morality, from life in the womb to how a family is defined. Liberals want to define the limits of corporate powers, but be left alone in the bedroom.

The debate about the size of government and it's level of involvement in our lives good and important. This segues into the subject of "social justice". If we claim to be a country founded on God's principles, perhaps we'd better recognize that God's reign was far, far, from the libertarianism espoused these days. Provisions were made for the poor, the widow, and the immigrant, when God was king back in the day. Taxation paid for caring for the poor, and God was more than a little involved in making sure that wealth was redistributed about every 50 years (you've heard of the year of Jubilee?) so that the rich had limited powers to oppress the poor.

If you tell me that our nation is founded on principles handed down by God, I'll tell you that God had a lot to say about public health, sanitation, care for the poor, and economics. He also had a lot to say about protecting the least of these, including the little ones not yet born. He apparently didn't stop caring about these things when Israel asked for a king, because in the prophets, the calls for justice are everywhere, including here and here.

This post isn't about whether Democrats or Republicans are getting it right. Instead, I'm offering the observation that how people apply their faith to their politics is nuanced, and a challenging issue, determined by a blend of Jesus passive relationship with Rome and the ethics of God's theocracy. Can we please be patient with each other and drop the communist, and Nazi labels, recognizing that this territory isn't as clearly defined as our friends on either the left or the right would have us believe.

The Paralysis of Polarized Politics

Richard Dahlstrom — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 10:30:09 -0800

After spending a glorious Sunday afternoon watching the best Ice Hockey game ever (and I've seen many), I posted a tongue and cheek comment on my facebook page, indicating that Canada had both the gold medal and health care. The comments that ensued were a reminder that Christians are as deeply divided and entrenched on this issue as everyone else. We're red Christians and blue Christians - big government Christians, and small government Christians, and we're good at pushing each other's buttons. I'm pretty certain though, when the comments were done being posted, nobody had changed their minds, or changed anyone else's mind either. Perhaps the only thing that happened was a little bit of grace and charity was lost.

All this leaves me wondering if there's value in the dialogues between blue and red Christians. I think there can be, but only to the extent we hold these truths to be self-evident:

1. No party or system has all the answers. I'm well beyond suspicious that our systems won't save us: I know our systems won't save us, because Salvation, in the fullest sense of the word, is found only in Christ. He alone will restore justice, and the environment, and heal bodies, and bring peace, at least if the words of Isaiah are true, as Jesus himself indicated they were. Because of this, our conversations about political matters need to be kept in perspective, and when Jim Wallace or Glenn Beck tell me that their party is God's party, it makes me want to stop listening to them.

2. We have a 2nd, and truer, passport: I don't lose sleep over who's in power, or whether my political convictions are being adequately represented, because when the day is done, my calling isn't to change American government; it's to embody the reign of Christ in my life, my home, and my faith community, offering an alternative to the ways of this world. And I'm called to do this no matter who's in power.

Throughout history, that posture has taken countless different forms; Jews sheltered in WWII by Christians, those dying of the plague taken in by Christians in the 2nd century both come to mind. Today, Jesus is on the front lines in Haiti through World Vision, and He's healing the uninsured through clinics in many major cities in America. I have my convictions on health care, and health, and food, and energy, but my calling is ultimately to live those convictions out in how I use my time and money.

3. We should vote our convictions. William Wilberforce wanted to expand the influence of government by ending slavery in England. MLK Jr wanted to expand the influence of government by granting equal rights to African Americans. Evangelicals have long wanted to expand the influence of government by defining marriage and protecting life in the womb. And, at various times, we've wanted to shrink the role of government too, either to balance the budget or for other reasons. So we vote. Yet our 2nd passport is the one that counts, and we're ultimately called to live out our convictions regardless of who's in power and where things are headed. I hope this as liberating for you as it is for me. If not, perhaps Psalm 62:5-8 will be helpful here. I read it this morning and could feel the peace of Christ wash over me.

4. We need to give each other grace. There are things that seem pretty obvious to me as a result of my faith in Christ: life in the womb is sacred; both families and governments shouldn't spend more than they have; and war should, at the very least, be seen as a last resort, along the lines of 'just war theory'. Beyond this though, there are big questions about the role of government in regulating business, and the definition of 'basics' that constitute government responsibility. This is where we who share the same faith will divide, and why I am independent.

As one who has travelled the world and been in places lacking a public health department to regulate rural areas, I've seen people eating undercooked food on plates washed out back in cold and dirty tap water. I've had friends eat off such plates and get violently ill. This makes me think that it's a good thing for the government to get involved in regulating the quality of food service in a country. I've also seen Europeans, in a highly regulated and taxed culture, follow their hearts and become aerobics instructors, farmers, baristas without worrying about what will happen to their family if one of them gets sick, and this makes me think their system has some merit. These people love Jesus just like we do, pray and serve in the communities, and favor a larger government. I also have friends, both in my church and across the country who strongly disagree with that vision, feeling that it puts too much power in the hands of the government and, at the very least, runs the risk of eroding one's sense of personal responsibility. They also pray, love Jesus, and read their Bibles.

Who is more spiritual? I don't think we should even ask the question, let alone hazard an answer.

I hope we who disagree on such matters can give each other grace because, when the day is done, we love the same Jesus, hold the same passport, and place our hope in the same King.

What Would Jesus Eat? Eschatology and Food Choices

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 09:54:06 -0800

There are many followers of Christ in this world who don't think much, if at all, about the connection between their food choices and their theology. For many of these, there's a good chance they'll be eating a big slab of meat tonight, cooked over a fire, complemented by a pesticide laced salad, enhanced by an Italian Red, and washed down with coffee that was utterly affordable thanks to the rainforest that was cleared to increase the crop size. None of these foods are seen as making a statement about their faith, but I'd argue that they do. If I thought it was all going to burn up, especially in the near term (as I've been told it will, any day now, for the past 35 years), I'd join them in buying the most food for the least money.

Instead, I'll be having a slab of meat, a salad, red wine, and coffee, just like them, except utterly different. My meat will be grass fed, my salad organic and local, my wine from a local winery, and my coffee shade grown. That is, at least, what I'll be eating when my food choices match my theology. Believing that God's people are called to make God's good reign visible here and now in some small measure means that I need to make choices that exalt health, justice, and ecology (among other things) in all areas of my life, including "what's for dinner?"

Concerned about the state of environment and the horrible carbon footprint of the beef industry, I'd always believed that vegetarians were on to something, but could never manage to get there myself because when I tried, I'd be continually hungry and sick (not to mention that truth that I enjoy only about 1/2 the vegetables available). A recent read called "The Vegetarian Myth" (see intro here), written by a left wing activist former vegetarian, opened my eyes to the realities that the real culprit isn't meat or not meat; it's industrial agriculture. Monocrops require heavy pesticides (oil), deplete the topsoil, which then requires heavy fertilization (oil), so that the crops can be maximized and then harvested by machine (oil), to then be shipped to warehousing locations (oil), where they'll either become something else (twinkies, made from oil), and/or shipped yet again to stores (more oil). The problem is that this is our world, whether we're vegetarians are meat eaters, if we just run down to the supermarket and buy the cheapest beef and spinach on the market.

The food that comes out of this system is destructive to the human body, the earth, and industrial pork and cattle that inhabit it. Why are we doing this? Maximum profit of course, and cheap products. Do we really think, even if Jesus were returning tomorrow, that He doesn't care about us trashing his planet, compromising our bodies, and torturing his animals like this?

On the other hand, if I buy, organic vegetables, and grass fed animal products, and as local as possible, several things happen:

1. I participate in a sustainable model that actually builds topsoil, rather than destroying it.

2. I dramatically lower my carbon footprint, by consuming things that required relatively small amounts of energy to produce.

3. I ennoble small farming and local economies, both of which are far healthier and more resilient than ADM, supermarket to the world.

4. I declare by my choices that monocrops and the forced migration of small farmers to the urban centers, a destructive global trend, is wrong.

5. I gain a healthy ratio of Omega 3- Omega 6 fats in my diet, and enjoy lower blood pressure, good heart health, and the taste of real, rather than industrial food. I'm sick less, sleep better, and just generally feel more alive.

I'm as guilty as anyone regarding my food choices, even more so because I now know better and still choose cost and convenience way too often. This conversation, if we take it seriously, is a portal to many other topics. Since we who can afford to eat this way don't, how can we ever expect those with neither the means nor understanding to freely choose these healthy alternatives? Is it enough to live 'alternatively', or is activism appropriate? And if activism is appropriate (as I sometimes sense is the case), why do I feel like I'm wasting my time? Wouldn't it be better to just grab a Big Mac and get on with handing out Bibles?

I welcome your thoughts!

The Need for Lament...

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 06:59:03 -0800

Survey the landscape of American Christianity on any given Sunday and you'll find plenty of evidence that God is on the throne, we're walking in victory, and Satan's utterly crushed. There are lots of praise choruses about our victory and God's goodness, along with clapping and shouting "praise the Lord". It's the winning team for certain, at least if noise and bravado are indicators.

Unfortunately, they're not. Have you seen the movies from the Youth Rallies during the reign of the Reich? If not, there's some to be found here, in a video I recently produced. The singing and enthusiasm would make most Pentecostals appear as stoic Lutherans in comparison. Singing slogans about victory doesn't make them true, and the sad fact of the matter is that for many of the people singing, the words of victory ring hollow to them. They sing about triumph over sin, but are mired in addiction. They sing about God's power in the world, while their spouse is in the last stages of cancer. They sing about peace, while their neighbor's kid lost his leg in Iraq. For millions the words, if the singers stop to ponder them, seem hollow at best, perhaps even a lie.

I'll go on record as being for praise music. I like it, and play it on my ipod sometimes in the car when I'm driving alone. But if the Psalms offers the full range of emotions, I'm wondering if it doesn't also offer a decent example of the proper proportion between praise and lament. If it does, then we're way too heavy on the praise side of things. By minimizing lament, we're teaching people to process the real world in a different way than the saints who've gone before us, teaching them to plaster over their grief with a dose of loud singing, or snappy 'feel good' songs. The distance between these pleasant tunes and the emotions of a heart that's broken, or fearful, is large enough to stretch someone's faith to the breaking point.

In contrast, a look at church history shows us that those who take their complaints, fears, failures, and doubts to God, will find real answers, real transformation. Abraham: "What will you give me, since I'm childless?", Moses: "...please kill me at once", David, "How long O Lord?", Paul, "we despaired even of life." I could go on with Jeremiah, Job, John the Baptist, and many more, but you get the point. For every dance on the far side of the Red Sea, there's a question, a weariness, a complaint. There are, to hearken back to this past Sunday's teaching, honest to God questions and struggles, wrestlings that in the end might well leave us wrung out, but intimate.

The problem is that few were told about the 'wrung out' part when they came to faith. This is because too often we've sold people on some sort of hybrid Jesus. There's the real Jesus part having to do with his death on the cross and then there's Jesus CEO, enabling us to climb the success leader, or Jesus Therapist, assuring us of successful marriages, or Jesus CFO, assuring us of wealth, Dr. Jesus, assuring us of great health, or Jesus military commander, protecting us from IED's. These 'add ons' speak more to our desires for health, wealth, and happiness than our calling as disciples, because the reality is that stuff happens - to Christians.

When it does, I hope the struggling saints don't walk into a worship service three weeks in a row without hearing, somewhere in the gathering, that those who mourn are blessed, or a song of longing, or a prayer of waiting and crying out. Lacking that, they'll eventually presume that this well dressed, clear eyed, upwardly mobile Jesus doesn't have much to say to them. They'd be right, but they'd only be rejecting the success Jesus of American dreams. The real one was called the man of sorrows. I just hope there's still room for him in church.

I welcome your thoughts.

The Dilemma of Pluralism

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 08:51:16 -0800

This morning's BBC report discloses that the French government has refused to grant citizenship to man because he is forcing his wife to wear the 'full veil'. Because she is not free to 'come and go with her face uncovered', this man's values place him a category of person to whom the French government denies citizenship. It is recommended by the French government that anyone showing signs of "radical religious practice" be refused citizenship.I'm interested in your thoughts on this subject so I'll just toss some questions out:

1. The phrase 'radical religious practice' seems ambiguous. Isn't 'eating the flesh and drinking the blood' (see John 6, or your weekly communion table) also radical? Or living in community? What are the risks that this ruling becomes precedent setting for all manner of religious persecution? On the other hand, isn't the state obligated to protect the powerless (Romans 13), and isn't this woman being rendered powerless? But what if she wants the full covering?

2. This man's patriarchy no doubt offends the sensibilities of most of us reading this. But would France also refuse to grant citizenship to a person who believed that a woman shouldn't work outside the home while raising children? The bigger question than the particular ruling is, in this case, how wide this ruling opens the door.

3. We live in a pluralist world, where different belief systems bump up against each other. France is trying to understand how to be pluralist without sacrificing it's own cultural distinctives, and this is where the rub comes. How can we be embracing of other cultures, while maintaining our own cultural identity? This issue is a raging river in Europe, even more so than the United States, but it's an issue everywhere, and an important one.

Pluralism and tolerance are terribly politically correct, but we all have our limits. You can't be a pedophile, you can't steal other people's stuff; on these we all agree. Keep talking about ethics though, and you soon come to multiple forks in the road. If we aren't careful, we're going to end up using these forks to stab each other.

What are your thoughts?

Finally: Corporations are People too!

Richard Dahlstrom — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 10:43:21 -0800

There were many in the evangelical world of my youth (read: James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, et. al.) who decried the 'liberal courts' for overstepping their bounds by using the court as means of legislating, rather than limiting their responsibilities to 'upholding the constitution according intent of its framers'. They viewed Roe v Wade as an example of, not merely ruling on a case, but of using a case to create and impose a new ethos that was far beyond the scope of the case at hand. How dare those liberals do that! If only conservatives ruled the court, such nonsense would cease, right?

Apparently not. The court used the case of "Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission" as a means for overturning a century of campaign finance laws, ushering in an era whereby corporations (both American, and foreign ones with US subsidiaries) are granted the same freedom of speech rights as individual Americans. The McCain/Feingold law that sought to limit the degree to which companies could influence elections (and thereby, influence elected officials) was overturned with this ruling.

So, as Stephen Colbert mockingly said last night: "Now my bank, "Morgan Stanley" has the same rights to contribute their voice to policy making in Washington as my barber, "Stanley Morgan". Each one can donate hundreds of millions to campaigns and then, by virtue of their generosity, have access to, and influence over, the policy makers. It's a fair battle. And may the best man win."

All sarcasm excluded, isn't it obvious to everyone that granting free speech rights to multi-national corporations is 1) far beyond the intent of the framers, 2) dangerous in it's opening that will now grant foreign companies influence over American campaigns, 3) marginalizing to common citizens, who will never be able to match the scope and wealth of large corporate spending and influence, and 4) the very kind of 'legislative over-reach' that conservatives have been angry about for years.

This is precisely why there's so much anger and cynicism towards American politics. Apparently the religious right, and political conservatives weren't really angry about the Supreme Court's over-reach in the 70's, but angry that over-reach didn't favor their ideology. Now that the recent court and ruling is in line with their goals, the right has fallen strangely silent about "the intent of the framers".

When the rhetoric dies down over this ruling, the thing that will have changed is this: corporations can buy as much time to exercise 'free speech' and thus influence the vote, as you and I can. This isn't good news for salmon or eagles, people who use banks and have loans, water tables or topsoil.

But it's good news for multi-national corporations because now, when we appeal to our constitutional rights by declaring, 'we the people', they can spend 150 million dollars crying back: "I'm a person too!"

Our prayers: thermometer of our world view

Richard Dahlstrom — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 09:42:07 -0800

I recently read a survey that indicated 90% of American men self identify as being "above average fitness" compared to their peers. When you do the math (and even I can do this math) it becomes these men don't have self image problems; but they are delusional. Their problem comes, I suspect, from one of the oldest tricks in the book: confusing intention with action. They want to exercise, want to eat right, want get enough sleep, want to cut back on coffee and alcohol. They watch bow-flex commercials, drink low carb beer, and declare themselves 'fitter than average'. Intent gets confused with action. What's actually needed are objective measures of health; things like body mass index, resting heart rate, and the good/bad cholesterol ratio. The harsh numbers tell the truth.

There's a similar objective assessment, in my opinion at least, in matters of spiritual health. Many of us say that we live in a world where God is able to intervene in history, and does intervene in history. He changes hearts, heals bodies, brings the triumph of the cross to bear in lives that are wracked with self-loathing and guilt, sets people free. We say God does these things, and many of us even go a step further and say that, while God is able to do whatever he wants, he sometimes partners with us mere humans, "waiting" as it were, for us to get involved in God's activities by our doing one simple thing: asking.

We who believe this can offer a boatload of evidence that this is true: God steps into history to deliver Israel from slavery because he 'hears their cry'. Hannah prayed for a son and God gave her one. Elijah prayed for an offering to be consumed and it was. Jesus told us that we have not because we ask not. Later he said that 'this kind' (speaking of a certain demonic possession) can only come out by prayer and fasting. It's all through the Bible - God steps into history in response to prayers. We believe it - or at least we say we do.

But saying we do is like watching bowflex commercials while eating popcorn and drinking low-carb beer. The real thermometer of our belief that God steps into history actively is our prayer life. I was reminded fo this recently when some people at our church asked pastoral staff to come over to their house and pray through it because they were sensing 'dark spirits.' We don't get these requests often (all right, never until now) but a team went and prayed. The family said that the effects were both immediate and dramatic.

Dramatic encounters with the forces of darkness are, in my opinion, easier that dealing with the day to day subtleties of life, because there's so much noise telling us that we live in a purely material world, and because we've so many medical, and financial, and therapeutic tools at our disposal that we come to believe, practically speaking, that we can "do it on our own" in spite of what we say we believe. I mean, with a good marketing guy, a killer web site, and good sound and lights you can build a church.. right? Sadly... right.

Our prayer life, asking specific things of God, is a good indicator of the degree to which we believe God is at work in the world. We're saturated in a materialistic culture that says, both overtly and covertly, that God isn't active, that things just happen. We push back, maybe even pointing to the very verses I've quoted above.

Big deal. The real issue is this: Am I asking God to step into my world, or the world of another, to bring healing, faith, hope, provision, direction? Do I believe it when Jesus says, "apart from me you can do nothing?" Does the amount of my praying correlate to the amount of my talking about how great God is, how involved he is in history?

The house demons are gone, and I'm reminded through the event that, behind the veil of our material world, there's a God able to intervene, and forces of darkness intent on destroying hope and life. We've a calling here folks, to be people of prayer. I've taken to writing my daily prayers in a journal, just like I do with exercise, so that I can look back and see if I'm being consistent. When there's a gap of 13 days in the journal, I realize that I talk a good game, but have a long way to go in living what I say I believe. How about you?

Quake: shaking our assumptions?

Richard Dahlstrom — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 07:27:47 -0800

David Brooks excellent article about this week's quake in Haiti is a must read. Whether you agree with his diagnosis or not, he shines a light on a problem that absolutely must be addressed: There is no formulaic relationship between $$ aid and economic development/autonomy. Haiti is the ongoing recipient of immense investments. By some estimates, they have the highest per capita ration of NGO's (nongovernmental organizations, like World Vision) in the world. In spite of this, Haiti has remained locked in poverty, and it is this poverty that prevents the kind of infrastructure (building codes, sewage systems, access to water, hospitals, schools) from developing. What do I mean?

The government is not able to provide the resources to educate the nation's next generation.

The unemployment rate is over 80%.

More than half of Haitians live on less than a dollar a day.

There are few paved roads, an inadequate supply of potable water, minimal utilities, and depleted forests.

About 60% of the population lives in abject poverty.

Less than 20% of Haitians age 15 and over can read and write.

Fewer than 75% of children attend school.

40% of the Haitian population does not have access to primary health care.

The United Nations estimates 6% of Haitians are infected with HIV/AIDS. The highest rate in the Western Hemisphere. An estimated 30,000 people die of AIDS every year.

One in twenty Haitians is infected with HIV/AIDS and there are over 150,000 AIDS orphans.

When things begin to shake, the underlying social and economic pathologies are revealed, and the devastation is exponentially greater than would be the case, were there adequate infrastructure present.

So why is it that infrastructure doesn't develop? And how can we, who are opening our wallets, invest our dollars in the best way to assure that we not only triage the damage, bury the bodies, and provide acute care to those who need it now, but also begin addressing the systemic issues that have kept Haiti stuck for so long?

Brooks declares that beginning with the assumptions that all cultures and beliefs are morally equal is the height of folly. Ideas have consequences, and the tragedy of Haiti isn't just that there's poverty, it's that the poverty is interwoven with deeply held beliefs and practices. Until these beliefs change, the poverty will remain. Brooks says it this way:

In this country, we first tried to tackle poverty by throwing money at it, just as we did abroad. Then we tried microcommunity efforts, just as we did abroad. But the programs that really work involve intrusive paternalism....It’s time to find self-confident local leaders who will create No Excuses countercultures in places like Haiti, surrounding people — maybe just in a neighborhood or a school — with middle-class assumptions, an achievement ethos and tough, measurable demands.

When WWII ended, the German government sent hundreds of young people who'd been raised in the ethos of the Hitler Youth movement, to Capernwray in England for moral re-education. International Needs is taking a similar strategy in Romania. This, it seems, is the path in Haiti offering the greatest light. But such a strategy swims against the popular current that eschews any challenge to another culture's world view.

We'll take an offering at our church on January 24th for Haiti as part of the important effort to contribute to the acute crisis of the moment. But it's vital that all of us with means think long and hard, not about whether to invest, but about how to invest, so that our investment leads to changed lives and changed cultures, not just handouts.

A Case for Marriage

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 09:46:55 -0800

I’d like to spend a few words building the case for marriage, because this institution, like all institutions (it seems) is increasingly regarded with both suspicion and cynicism by younger generations. For this reason an increasing number (of both Christ followers and the general populace) are forsaking marriage, choosing instead to simply live together.

I understand the cynicism, but disagree with conclusion. The cynicism makes sense because people are looking for something more substantive than some sort of ‘legally binding’ arrangement. If that’s all a couple has, and they stay together for propriety, or reputation, perhaps even ‘for the children’, then they enflame the notion that marriage is meaningless. After all, when a couple stands before God and their friends to make a vow, they don’t promise to live together; they promise to love each other through all the seasons life – and let me tell you, the latter is much harder than the former.

My wife and I have been married thirty years, and I don’t think I’m speaking presumptuously in declaring that we love each other deeply. We’ve built a storehouse of adventures, laughter, child-raising, and braving challenges together. Each of these marvelous moments seems to add a brick to the solidarity of our marriage, and each brick makes the notion of walking away from our commitment to love, all the more difficult.

God knows, though, there are moments when we’ve both wanted to walk away. Between us, we know all the tricks – stony silence, careless disregard, hurtful words, manipulation, a fear of truth or confrontation that leads to perhaps the worst thing of all: the pleasantness of relational death. We’ve never strayed very long into any of these arenas, falling in unwittingly, and then crawling out – but we’ve been there, and when one or the other of us is there, the grass suddenly looks greener elsewhere. After all, we’re both competent and capable individuals, right?

I’ve a feeling we’re not alone in this. But, in spite of the fact that our eyes have looked longingly at freedom once in a blue moon (ok, maybe twice), staying in the arena of working on the promises we made has always been the obvious choice. And because of this, the bricks have continued to accumulate, until we’ve now, not a wall with a marriage contract tacked on to it; but a home of love and gratitude.

There are many reasons we chose to stick with the vows, but one of them is pretty simple: We made a vow – and we made it before God, our friends, and our family. It carried a weight for us (as I both believe and teach that it should for anyone who makes it), and this weight has always been lurking in the background. But recall, as we have, that our vow wasn’t a commitment to stay together – it was a commitment to love each other. Choosing to simply stay together, without comitting to the hard work of learning to love does two things: 1) It displays our obsession with appearances and our desire to please people, both of which lead to the charges of hypocrisy in the Christian community. 2) It helps create the disillusionment that leads young adults to avoid marriage completely, opting instead for ‘authenticity’. That marriage and authenticity are thus juxtaposed reveals how wrong headed we’ve become.

The value is found in declaring a commitment to love one another. Sometimes love might call for consequences, such as temporary separation or intervention. But always, love is working for the good of the other, and the union, rather than retreating into a cage of selfishness in order to preserve one’s own fragile and wounded ego. But beneath it all, there’s a commitment to love that was public, personal, and had the effect of creating a sense of accountability

Ironically it’s that sense of accountability that is largely missing in the generation that’s must hungry for authentic intimacy. Intimacy without accountability is a mirage, and boatloads of heartache and woundedness are waiting for those who try to create it. Better to keep the accountability ingredient in the mix; and how is that done?

Simple: marriage.

I welcome your thoughts.

A Plea for Beauty

Richard Dahlstrom — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 21:09:23 -0800

Our church staff was looking at this article yesterday, which articulates some data from the Barna research people about how Christians are perceived by those who are not. I wonder if the real Jesus, not the one conservatives and liberals have fabricated, would be perceived as boring (remember when he walked on water, remember the accusation that he went to the wrong parties, the ones with unreligious people), or judgmental (remember the women caught in adultery who, in accordance with Levitical law should have been stoned, and he found a way to forgive her?), or insensitive to others? The people who hated him the most were the religious experts – seminary trained, with big Bibles that they used to prove to themselves that Jesus was a heretic worthy of death (John 5:39, Acts 13:27). They’re the only people Jesus angered, at least until those people nearly incited a riot in their efforts to get him killed. Then Rome stepped and helped put him to death.

The normal run of the mill people though? They seemed drawn to the man, which is baffling because they’re not generally drawn to his body on earth today, the church. Why is this?

Of course, this could be a huge conversation, because there are many reasons. But let’s tackle just one: We’ve become, frankly, rather utilitarian in our approach to relating to God, each other, and the world. What do I mean? I mean that we may well have the right ‘WORDS’ about the sin nature of humankind, and our need for reconciliation with God, which has been miraculously provided through the incarnation and death of Jesus (I John 2:1,2). All of this is good and true, but it’s sort of like a house without any beauty (see the attached movie).

The ‘gospel’ is good news, not only because it gets us justified… it’s good news because God is reconciling people to Himself and each other, breaking down dividing walls. If we start breaking down walls too, by reaching across doctrinal divides, not to shoot our brothers but to share and learn from each other, we’ll add the beauty to the message. The gospel is good news because the entire earth is going to be transformed (Romans 8, Ephesians 1:10,11), and so we can embody a little glimpse of this earth renewal by caring for our environment because God cares for His creation and we’re in His family. The gospel is good news because, according to Luke 4, people are healed, debts are forgiven, captives are set free. Unless you want to spiritualize all of that, and turn those things into a tract about getting to heaven, then maybe we ought to be working to set people free who are caught in human trafficking, and feeding the hungry, digging wells and opening clinics. This stuff is beautiful.

Instead, we’re boycotting Old Navy, not because of unjust labor practices, but because they don’t say “Merry Christmas” in their ads. This is more than embarassing, it’s angering. It’s just another exercise in missing the point, and our house continues, to look to the world, like a prison camp filled with boring haters, rather than a welcoming home, the place where the beauty is so inviting we can’t help ourselves… we’re drawn. This is what the church is supposed to be, and can be. But only if we start behaving like Jesus. Until then, we’ll continue to be like the people Jesus struggled with the most: religious prigs.