The Fear-Power Matrix

The first of three messages I’m calling Essentials of Community on Sunday May 5 considered peace to be the first essential. That’s peace as the opposite of fear. While, thankfully, we do not have the big obvious reasons to have a culture of fear, not, say as we would if we were living in Syria, fear seems to be the seething undercurrent of much of our life. It’s beneath the anger that seems to spew forth at the slightest provocation. Fear creates distrust; it is behind self destructive behaviours. it ruins relationships, diminishes community.

Fear has a cousin, or maybe more like a sibling: power. Fear and power feed off one another. I call it the fear-power matrix. You do not have to be a paranoid conspiracy theorist to recognize that there are those whose power depends on, feeds on, and promotes a culture of fear. The human’s first sin, we read in Genesis 3, was for a power grab, and fear immediately was born. Hiding from God ensued. God asked, “Where are you?” (Genesis 3:9).

The last part of John 14 pictures a God who wants to reside with and in us, displacing these trespassers in our lives, fear and power. They do not belong. We accept them as given parts of reality, but it is not what God intends for us, at least that’s what I get from this. Jesus said if we follow his word, he and the Father will dwell with us. If we pattern our lives after Jesus’ self-giving service and obedience to his will, we will experience a new resident in our lives. In answer to the question of John 14:22, Jesus says that instead of some earth-shaking public spectacle, he will continue to work through a community of people to share this new possibility in and to the larger community. And at the heart of it all will be a peace, such as the world cannot give, a peace that accompanies the gift of the Spirit, the “counselor” or “helper” or “advocate” (as paraclete is variously translated) whom we will find alongside us. We find God, then, within and beside us. The world cannot give this peace. The world can only express peace as a wish on a Christmas card, or by imposing order aimed at controlling external factors associated with fear, without touching – and perhaps increasing – the fear we find within anyway, because of our basic insecurity, which Christ offers to shatter.

What is the Bible?

The congregation I am serving on an interim basis decided, to their credit, to have a once-a-month worship service as a “Family Service”, in which the children would stay present instead of having their own time after the children’s time in the service.

We had, as the topic of this service this morning, “What is the Bible?”

We recognized that the Bible represents some contradictions, or at least seemingly so:

1. As a collection, or library, of books, yet telling one story, of God’s renewing creation.

2. As a variety of kinds of writing (poetry, history, letters, etc.), yet setting our God’s Word (human words, divine Word).

3. The Bible is old, yet the subject of renewal in understanding and application today.

4. The Bible is not simply a set of rules, yet does set out high expectations for us, as those who are part, already, of a new creation.

In sum, the Bible is the story of each of us, as we are being created anew through God’s Word, through our own chaos and darkness, toward new creation and life.

Boston Bomb Victims’ Hidden Injury – Hearing Loss – NYTimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/25/us/boston-bomb-victims-hidden-injury-hearing-loss.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0

And to think this hidden injury is multiplied the world over, where bombs go off on a daily basis. I, for one, would not have thought of this without something happening closer to home, to people more like “us,” whatever that means.

Revealing (apocalypse of) Good

Thoughts drawn from yesterday’s message at St. Andrew’s Ajax:

The message was the second of two recognizing the reality of evil in the world,how Christ has dealt with this, and how he has offered to share with us what he has done. Yesterday the main point was that not only is evil real, but its effects are intensifying. At the same time, however, God is working good that is “gooder” than the bad is “badder.”

The message was drawn from a book that is criticized, understandably, as portraying God as one who deals with the violence of the world only with violence, in the extreme, of his own–The Revelation to John. With that very charge in mind, I pointed out the parallel, or rather contrast, between the rider on the white horse of chapter 6 with the rider on the white horse of chapter 19. The first is the rpresentation of conquest, leading to war, famine (or disparity), and death. The other, in chapter 19, clearly is meant to be Christ, “the Word of God” (19:13). On the charge of resolving things violently, it is to be noted that his sword is not wielded in the hand, but proceeds from his mouth.

So what if we see the violently powerful depiction of the defeat of what is against God as indicating the power and decisiveness with which God acts (and ultimately will act to defeat all evil), but not the form it takes? Seeing it that way, instead of the rider-on-the-red-horse of war of chapter 6, we have the rider-Word of chapter 19 producing community; instead of disparity/famine (black horse in chapter 6), the the sword-Word further brings a spirit of abundance, and life instead of death.

Community and a spirit of gracious abundance are both products of the Word lived, and are much needed parts of a lived out witness to God’s devastatingly powerful love, shared in a fearful, stingy, violent world.

Recognizing the Reality

Thoughts out of my message yesterday (April 14) at St. Andrew’s, Ajax. Audio of the message will be available at www.standrewsajax.ca.

Since there is a power that seems to try to destroy our happiness when we most have it, I decided to address the reality of evil in the wake of Easter celebration. As evidence and example of the reality of evil, I referenced the sickeningly disturbing recurrence of girls being gang-raped, subjected to further humiliation through cyber-bullying, resulting in their suicide. As I make these notes, there has been news of bombs at the finish of the Boston Marathon. We do not just have social “ills” and global “issues.” We face evil.

Arguably, the book of the Bible that most obviously (or at least most grapnically) deals with evil is the Revelation, or Apocalypse, to John. The context of the book is the brutal persecution of early Christians at the hands of the Roman Empire. As with what they faced, symbolized (chapter 13) by the beast from the sea and the beast crom the land, with the authority of the “dragon” behind them, there are forces coming together todsy, as in every age, to try to deceive us and rob us of union and peace with God. The deception today plays especially on our insecurity, and tries to convince us that we are not smart enough, pretty enough, good eough, or even worth while persons, without what the powers of influence have to offer, having instilled the “need.” It is curious today that as “brand” (think of cattle) names have come to be considered critical (who instilled this?) to our credibility, attractiveness, and success, so a “mark” was required in the vision of John for people to engage in commerce and get on in the world.

But as chapter 20 conveys, when we are joined to Christ, Satan is bound and unable to deceive us (the completeness of the 1, 000 year symbol), even while Satan is still loose in the world and wreaks havoc until all is fulfilled (the significsnce of the “little while” time period symbol). Whatever the language in chapter 20 may convey about future events, it always has this basic meaning for us, whatever the times.

Evil is real. That was underscored again today in Boston, as it is underscored every day somewhere. It has power to destroy and cause misery in this world, and we must spare no effort to limit its power and effects. But we will never destroy evil itself. We must place our trust for that in one who has already demonstrated his power over it. “Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God” (1 John 5:5 nrsv).

Seeing Green

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Right now the way along this “greenbelt” isn’t terribly green. They say there is beauty in everything, but it’s a little hard to see it here – I guess unless you get right down and marvel at the movement of awaking bugs andvthe like. But I can, at least, see in it what is to be. In the next few weeks things will get greener and greener. Some people look at their path right now and find it looks drab and dismal; in fact they might not see a path at all, at least not to anywhere good. We need to pray for them to experience Easter, and that we might find the way to share it.

He Disallows Indifference

This Sunday, March 17, at St. Andrew’s in Ajax, we’ll be looking at John 12:1-8. It tells of the outrageous pouring of perfume on Jesus. Outrageous? It was Judas, yes that Judas, who objected to this, and he may have had a point, on the surface of things. He just made his point out of the wrong motive, and did not, perhaps could not, perceive what was really happening. The whole episode shows that the very presence of Jesus brings strong reaction. His very presence disallows indifference, especially concerning who he is, as well as the things he cares about. So part of what we will explore is how is Jesus present today, and where is that kind of reaction to him?

Social Medium

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I took this shot this afternoon near where I live in Ajax. Before very long, the snow will be gone, and the ground will be dry enough for human activity to return to this setting. Teams of various ages will be on the field, developing skills, learning teamwork, and building memories. Then there are those who will park themselves on these benches, some of whom may be reconvening from the hockey arena. In other words, what you see here is not just a baseball field, but a social medium. Maybe the social media we tend to think of–online–are best thought of as extensions and supplements to the physical spaces where we (continue to, I hope) meet and interact.

Trance

“If only.” It’s a seductive mindset. It’s also a form of unconsciousness. Its appeal is clarity but its reality is obtuseness. It reduces complexities to single issues and singular ways of dealing with those issues. It creates villains, the elimination of whom/which will solve our current problem(s). And we all say it, do it, think it: If only …

It’s the most common mindset behind interniational and inter-ethnic strife and hatred. It’s at the heart of work and family conflict. It poisons our souls. It’s a way of ethically and relationally sleep-walking through life, and it’s time for us all to wake up.

That’s what I’m addressing in this Sunday’s message. Reading: Luke 13:1-9.