The Redemption Project - Idols

There’s a wonderful passage in the forty-fifth chapter of Isaiah. The prophet mocks those who worship idols. Their gods, he says, are cut from the same wood that built the fire, which baked your bread. And you now bow down to it even as you eat the food you cooked upon it.

 

It’s fun and funny, and I encourage you to read it. Because, we seem to be having an issue with idols these days. And it’s killing people.

 

The obvious idols are the statues and moments to the dead leaders and soldiers of the Confederate States of America. We’ve seen a few of these come down in the past few years and, now, as a society we’re realizing that it’s time for these graven images to a racist way of life to come down.

 

But it’s not just about the statues.

 

Idolatry is forbidden again and again within Scripture. The Children of Israel are warned about it, and the early Christians warned one another (and us). It’s dangerous not because it simply diverts our worship from God, but because it’s about control. And control means someone is greater than someone else.

 

Graven images are something we create. They are static, unchanging, and as they have no life of their own, we are allowed to impose our own image upon them.

 

Every statue to Lee or Davis or Forrest is an image carved in our likeness. Yes, they look like the historical persons whose name adorns their plaques, but they don’t represent them. They represent those who made them, who defend them, and who worship them. They represent the continuation of an old American idolatry: that some are not truly human.

 

Those men behind those statues worshipped a false God, one they created and, after a manner, controlled. And as creators, they were themselves gods who made more idols, imposing images on others. On the image of those with darker skin they carved animals, creatures, things less than themselves. And those who worship at the feet of these statues and lift high their banner see the images they carved. They do this to ignore the image of the One upon them, the same that is upon us all.

 

Of idol worshippers, Isaiah concludes by saying that they have no understanding. They are blind, their eyes are shrouded and they are ignorant. They do not see nor comprehend the truth; because, they do not follow the One whose Spirit inspired another prophet to declare that there is no Jew nor Greek, no male nor female, no black nor white.

 

We stand in difficult days. Those who worship these idols are few but hold the highest offices in our land. They are seeing their idols destroyed. Their gods are nothing but wood. And they, out of fear, are willing to kill to preserve the images they worship and those they have imposed.

 

But the prophet promises, they will be shamed, dishonored, forgotten.

 

And those who follow the One will be delivered.

The Redemption Project - Our Prince

There's several drafts of abandoned attempts to say what is in my heart this week. Most of them wanted to try and discern some meaning, give some prophetic word that might speak to the heart of our country. There was anger in most of it. But, as the week has closed and I find myself wrung out, I'm not interested in that. I just want to tell you about my boy, about kindness, compassion, and love.

 

This Tuesday 16 June, we said goodbye to our sweet kitty, Prince Corin. I wrote about him earlier this year, our miracle boy who came back from the brink to spend five more years chattering at birds, leaping two hops across the bed to the top of the cat tree, and filling our days with his long tail and sneaky moves.

 

He'd lost weight just before his brother died. That's happened before. His cancer and/or IBD flared up, but each time he beat it back. I think with the passing of his brother Shasta, it got the better of him. The chances of him recovering, coming back to full health and energy were so slim, letting him go was the loving and merciful thing.

 

In the course of a month, we've said goodbye to our two boys who have filled our home and lives with love and joy and mystery for sixteen years. It is impossible to convey the emptiness we feel in our hearts, the void that exists in every room. The wounds that were cut a month ago have been ripped open, and we've started the journey of grief over again.

 

Corin was the most selfless soul I have ever met. I could spend pages telling you of time after time when he came to us; because, in that moment, we needed something. There was the time he lay down beside me when I wasn't feeling well. The time, after a traumatic six-hour car ride, he came out from beneath the blankets to give Leanne the smallest purr to let her know he was okay before she made the drive back. Or how, in these past weeks, he came and hopped onto my lap as I wrote early in the morning; because, he knew how lonely it is back here now.

 

And through his illness, he's allowed us to see the overwhelming compassion that surrounds us in our small world. We had two wonderful vets who sacrificed time to talk with us, to work him into their schedule, and be honest enough to say that it was time. And we've had our friends and co-workers who have been so kind.

 

This world is poorer without our Prince. I do not fully understand why a critter of such love and selflessness is gone when so many who seem to revel in hate and pain live on and on. I know only that I wake each morning thinking of him, and wondering if I can be as attentive and giving as he was to those around me.

 

And by doing so quicken the coming of the day when I can hold my boys again.

The Redemption Project - Laughter

Oh yes, you did laugh.

 

Sarah, in her tent in the middle of the day, long past hope, laughs. The stranger that Abraham is entertaining repeats the old, old promise that she would have a son. The words carry across the shimmering midday air to ears that are still sharp enough to hear this promise repeated. And, she laughs.

 

Like you, I've heard Sarah's laughter in this moment criticized as bitter, even sinful. She dares to laugh at the promises of God. She shows her lack of faith. She doubts God.

 

But this is wrong. Sarah isn't punished for her laughter. She isn't chastised for doubt or unbelief. No, the stranger calls it out. He makes it clear that she did laugh. And there was nothing to fear. Laughter, after all, is the sound that hope makes.

 

While the cable news networks have largely stopped covering them, protests continue in this country. Peaceful marches, prayers, gatherings continue to happen in city after city. There is a sense that things are different this time. That this moment is a true moment of change.

 

As a white male, I am looking at this with a cautious hope. I want this to be a transformational moment for this country. I pray we will finally begin to reckon with our history, the way we've built our society to lift some above others. But, I worry this is just one more moment that will see surface changes that leave the root issues untouched.

 

If this is how I, someone who has benefitted from the current state, feel, how do those who have lived on the other side of this system, those who have had to work harder and put up with more obstacles feel? Are they, perhaps, afraid that this will all fade like the summer dusk and everything will go back to the way it was?

 

Sarah, we're told, was afraid. The assumption is that she feared the reaction of the stranger who came bearing this old promise. But I think she was afraid of what anyone who has waited so long fears, that she would be disappointed. No, she tells the stranger, I did not laugh; because, I dare not let anyone know that I still have hope.

 

Laughter is the sound of hope bubbling up. It is not a scoffing at what surely cannot be but a exclamation of joy amidst despair. It is the small flame within us that is gasping but not yet snuffed. And when we hear it, from our own lips, we fear; because, it means we still hope and hope means we can again be disappointed. It means we still believe things can change.

 

This moment in which we find ourselves is one that speaks to the hope within us: that the world can change, that the way of things is not the way they will always be. It is a moment where we just may find that something new, something long-expected may be born.

 

And, then, oh yes, we will laugh.

The Redemption Project - Icons and Idols

We find ourselves, after a week of protests that led the President who, in a grab for power, chased away protestors to pose with a Bible, at Trinity Sunday. Here, early in this new season, we think again about the mystery, the icon of our God, the One in three.

 

I am not denying the reality of the Trinity when I call it an icon. What I mean is that, as a concept the Trinity is an icon for us. It does not so much define the ineffable reality of God as give us a means to try to understand that reality. That's what icons are, a way to understand someone.

 

Icons refuse the imposition of our opinions, prejudices, and agendas. They are windows, ever pointing beyond themselves to the Divine, calling us beyond our understanding. Idols do much the opposite. Idols are merely repositories for our fears, our egos. They are less a window than a mirror.

 

The problem we as Christians have is that we make idols out of our icons. Icons are relational, calling us to allow the icon to be as it was created to be so it can teach us about itself and, in turn, about ourselves. Idols are formed when we abandon the relationship.

 

Jesus, told a story about icons. At the end of all things, people ask him when they saw him naked, hungry, and thirsty. Jesus tells them that when we saw others, truly saw them so as to arouse our love and compassion, we'd seen him. Every person we encounter, seen and accepted for who they are, reveals to us the One. We are icons, pointing to Christ.

 

But when our fears, our brokenness comes between us and another, we turn each other to idols, made in the image we give them. If people fail to be that idol, to refuse our petitions that they act as we desire, we lash out. We reach out to destroy them so we can make new idols.

 

In Lafayette park in D.C. on Monday, we saw an attempt to smash idols. There were people that no longer reflected the image the President wanted to see. So, he committed an act of violence to stand on holy ground and create his own idol.

 

But unlike symbols made of wood and metal, humans do not go silent when you attempt to destroy them. They cry out. They ask to be seen for who they are, to be seen as the reflection of the One who conquered death with love. And they continue crying until we turn, look, and see.

 

In the icon of the Trinity, we see a relationship. In our limited, human minds we are given a means to see three persons who are equal and distinct. Like the visitors to Abraham's tent, they each take a place at the table, none taking the head nor the foot but sitting together. And each is accepted and valued for themselves.

 

Before his death, Jesus prayed that we would all be one as the Trinity is one. It was a prayer that we see one another as holy icons, which point to Christ. It was a petition that we would form relationships with one another where we come and sit together at the table as friends and equals.

 

And where no one is treated as another's idol.