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| Lake Bordelon, Camp Hardtner by Bette J. Kauffman |
Fr. Richard Rohr says, Religion has tended to
produce people who think they have God in their pockets, people with quick,
easy answers about who God is, what God requires, and how to live a Godly life.
But the Apostle Paul understood that nothing is more dangerous, or more likely to get between us and God, than righteousness. God can most easily be lost, precisely by being thought found.
But the Apostle Paul understood that nothing is more dangerous, or more likely to get between us and God, than righteousness. God can most easily be lost, precisely by being thought found.
These words from First Corinthians are hard for us to hear.
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? (1:20-25, NRSV)
Let us not be distracted by old-world titles and language. St. Paul might just as well have asked, “Where are the teachers? Where are the pious ones who study the Bible daily? The ones who can call up a Bible verse at a moment’s notice, especially when needed to make someone else behave!”
Some translations of the Bible use the word “preacher” in place of “debater” in that third question. Where indeed are the preachers of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
It’s enough to make one regret having accepted an invitation like the one to speak to you today!
And let us not be distracted by Paul’s reference to the Jews and the Greeks! WE are seekers of wisdom. WE are impatient demanders of signs! We are sometimes so impatient for signs that we see them everywhere.
I had a conversation with a very smart, devout young man in my office just a few days ago. It was a conversation triggered by the fact that he is in danger of failing a course I teach. And every reason he gave for not having done his coursework was a good one: I’m a youth minister at my church, I play music every Sunday morning, I lead a Bible study… and on and on it went.
And I finally had to say to him, “You know, I don’t think God is calling you to flunk out of college to do church.”
I did not say this to him—he’s such a sincere young man—so I did not say to him that what can get mixed up in our most pious motives at times… is our dedication to a merit system.
And we U.S. Americans come by our dedication to a merit system pretty honestly. It is part of our national story. We pulled ourselves up as a country by our bootstraps…
Or so we believe. I’ve always wondered how we’d have done without the leg up provided by indentured servitude, child labor and slavery.
But that’s another meditation. My point today is that this society teaches the merit system in every way possible, by incentives and sanctions, with As and Fs, through defining ourselves as the land of opportunity and making heroes of those who achieve against the odds.
It’s the wisdom of our age! And we have the best of intentions and at times some success in using our merit system well.
But our merit system has a dark side. Making winners almost always makes losers, too. Our merit system contaminates our faith and causes us to lose sight of Christ crucified.
Well, we’re happy to claim Christ crucified—for us. We’re just.. not so sure about the whole world.
Our merit system leaks into our religion and turns it into a moral code… a moral code that we use to divide poor people into “deserving”—the ones we should help—and not so deserving—those who make bad decisions, aren’t trying hard enough, live immoral lives by our standards—the ones who haven’t earned our help.
In his book, “The Prodigal God,” Timothy Heller compares the good church people of today with the elder brother of the one we call “the prodigal son.” He points out that we are too often that older brother, standing outside the tent displaying our piety, insisting that we have been faithful and true and devoted to the father all these years, yet hurt and angry that the father is squandering… the feast and the ring and the robe… on the unfaithful, undeserving younger brother.
I think I spent my childhood and youth hoping for someone to interpret that story for me in a way that made the elder son the hero!
We really have trouble accepting the absolute grace of Christ crucified. We desperately want to earn just a little bit of something from God!
But that’s ultimately an ego thing. And as Heller states, when we go down that path, Jesus might be our best friend. He might be our model of good behavior. But he is not our savior. We’re trying to save ourselves.
Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
One last story: A seeker went to a wise person to ask, “What keeps the earth from falling down?”
The wise person answered, “The earth is resting on a lion.”
“On what, then, is the lion resting?” asked the seeker.
“The lion is resting on an elephant,” said the wise person.
“On what is the elephant resting?”
“The elephant is resting on a turtle.”
“And on what is the….”
“You can stop right there,” said the wise person. “After that, it’s turtles, all the way down.”
Friends, our world rests on Christ crucified. And after that, it’s Grace…, just Grace, all the way down.
“The elephant is resting on a turtle.”
“And on what is the….”
“You can stop right there,” said the wise person. “After that, it’s turtles, all the way down.”
Friends, our world rests on Christ crucified. And after that, it’s Grace…, just Grace, all the way down.
AMEN
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