'Ruthless Trust' and Manning on the American Church and you and me
Hello dear squirrels of far-far-away,
This post is inordinately long because of the addition of the final chapter of a book by Brennan Manning entitled "The Wisdom of Tenderness". Please read it thoughtfully at your leisure. It is profound and challenging and you don't have to have read the rest of the book (though I highly reccomend it) to engage with it. I included it because Elizabeth mentioned topics of faith, church and humanity and Manning spoke and speaks truth into my life about these things.

Shortly after my last post, I painfully realized that I was making myself presentable to you all, in the hope of earning your admiration, approval and love. It is not that I spoke falsely, rather, my impetus and purpose were self-centered and desperate. God never tires of reminding me that the awareness and acceptance of His unquestionable love for me is not only enough, it is the only thing that will ultimately satisfy my loneliness, restlessness, and desire for intimacy. In the shelter of his tender embrace I become free to give and exchange love and attention to my friends and all the people I meet or write to in a day without dependence upon the rewards of an appreciative smile, the heartfelt reply, the glistening admiration, or the beaming praise. I no longer notice the lack of these things in dismay and clutching desperation, but go about actions and thoughts for their - God's - own sake. Trusting in God's unquestionable and eternally merciful love (dependent not on my strengths and virtues but on my weaknesses of all things!!!) I can trust that you all do in fact like me, and would even if you knew all the horrible things I've done and am capable of. This is freaking hard. FREAKING hard. It is freaking hard to accept God's voracious love. My logic collapses and I can only shake my head in wonder.

I've been putzing around Academy tutoring writers with some promising development: speaking impassionately about really creating the world she is describing by showing (not explaining) it to the reader with one very motivated 10th grader, and clinging onto my patience in response to a stubbornly shy and unreadable 8th grade boy. Putzing around Academy luckily includes perusing the more than adequate library and dabbling in tangential topics like Meyer's Brigg's psychology of personality Types, and the science of kinesics (or Body Language). In the last two days I've been spending hours discerning what traits I, my friends, teachers and students use to interact with people and ideas. Tee hee hee ;) My friend Andrea is interning with a neuroscientist this summer and they need 18-30 year-olds for a study about intelligence, personality and creativity. I had an MRI on tuesday and the rest of the written tests this afternoon. It was all very fun; though the MRI machine screached its beeping and blooping, shaking and whirring all around my head and body, I somehow managed to fall asleep. Of the tests today my favorites were making red and white 2D patterns with cubes, drawing random non-representative squigglies, defining words, drawing more non-representative squigglies with only four lines, and discerning patterns among shapes, colors and lines. It was fun and my brain got a good workout.

That's the update from the Southwest. The following is Brennan Manning's "A Word After . . ." from The Wisdom of Tenderness. I love you all and am learning to remember you all love me. Peace and All Good,
maria


"Loyal, tender-hearted shepherds respond to the gentle Presence that sustains their brothers and sisters in the human family. However, when the dignity of others is trampled by the machinations of political or religious leaders, they're not afraid to stand up for the truth and sustain the disapproval of the powerbrokers. They're incapable of remaining silent in the face of flagrant injustice. They heed the words inscribed on the tabernacle of a village church, "The greatest thing on earth is respect, because it is the heart of love." If speaking and acting on behalf of the marginalized is the only alternative, tender-hearted Christians become confrontational, angry, and unrelenting; should circumstances demand, they're wild and woolly adversaries.
These observations serve as a short preface to this last word.

If Christian imagination, long mummified within the legalisms and barbarisms of a soulless church, suddenly quickened, like the snap of a switchblade, it might create an image of the unimaginable: a unified Christian community in America!
Imagination focused on Jesus and anchored in his Word liberates us from the tyranny of the existing arrangement; unglues us from the stuckness of the status quo; unlocks closed doors so that we can look anew at Torah, Christ, church, and cosmos; implies that i can be more than I am at any given moment; and promises that the epitaph on my tombstone will read more than, "He muttered his prayers, mowed his lawn, and lost a thousand golf balls."
An exercise: Let's imagine that the apostle Paul, who lived the words he wrote in Second Corinthians, "The Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom" (3:17), has been given a crash course in the English language and transported via a time machine into the present. It's a Sunday afternoon in New Orleans, and Paul is hungry. He buys a shrimp po'boy from a Chartres Street vendor and, heeding his advice to Timothy, purchases a California wine-cooler. He crosses to the Moonwalk on Decatur Street, reaches the top step, and gets his first view of the Mississippi River. Then he seats himself on a wooden bench next to a white-haired gentleman.
"Good day, sir," Paul says, pulling the po'boy from his bag. "Perhaps you could share with me your perspective on the spiritual state of the Christian community in America today?"
The man turns and coolly appraises the stranger. He sees a man of small stature with a large nose, sparse red hair, well-formed chin, gray eyes under thick joined eyebrows, and a heavy beard. 'Who is this guy?' the man wonders. 'A media mole digging for dirt, a dilettante dabbling in spiritual things, the enemy disguised as an angel of light?'
"Why do you ask?" he says skeptically.
Paul takes a swig from his wine-cooler, thinking through his response. Then he says, "A disciple of your era wrote, 'Many Christians have gathered like ravens around the carcass of cheap grace and there have drunk the poison which has killed the following of Christ.' If seekers are to encounter Jesus today, they must find him in his body, the Christian community. I ask, sir, because I want to meet Jesus on your turf."
The older man, clad in jeans, turtleneck, and Reeboks, listens intently. His eyes never leave Paul's face. 'This inconspicuous little fellow emanates an unquestionable spiritual force,' he thinks. 'Yet his appearance, gestures, and voice don't fit the picture of conventional piety. He seems neither worldly nor mystical. He doesn't have the riveting, unflinching stare of the 'born-again' crowd -- a stare that often suggests a neurotic condition masquerading as sincerity. And he hasn't come after me with one sledgehammer blow of the Bible after another. Obviously, he's read Bonhoeffer, though; he quoted him.
And the honesty in his eyes is unmistakable. I've listened to a number of preachers,' the Reebok man mused, 'who have mesmerized me with spellbinding oratory interlaced with a self-depracating humor designed to create the impression that they're humble, but something in their eyes gives them away. A barely perceptible movement of the iris tells me that many preachers inhabit a vacant part of their mind. They've so polished and repolished their style over the years that they've forgotten the substance of their message and speak simply for the sake of speaking. Contrived passion, artificial fire. The eyes betray the rhetoric. I remember meeting a farmer who got so animated about his potato crop that he was more credible than the typical preacher. It's all in the eyes! The same is true of this stranger sitting next to me. I'm forced to take him seriously because of his gaze.'
The Reebok man stands decisively and holds out his hand. "My name is Daniel," He says. "Let's take a walk."
Paul shakes hands warmly and offers his first name in return. He puts his empty bottle into his bag, along with his sandwich wrapping, and tosses everything into a nearby trash can. Then the men set off.
"My brother," Daniel begins, "I can't remember a time when the name of Jesus Christ has been invoked more often than now, or the content of his teaching been so thoroughly ignored. His words have been twisted, spindled, and mutilated to mean anything, everything, and nothing. The seduction of cheap grace has created mass-market, cost-free discipleship. By and large, Americans are spoonfed on the pabulum of popular religion.
"Academically, many professors of religion have turned Christianity into the religion of the professors. They speak to one another in pedantic tones of the soteriological value of Jesus' suffering and death, write learned papers in dreary prose, finesse the exegesis of biblical passages, split hairs over hermeneutical principles, authoritatively announce, 'Jesus said this but didn't say that,' and seldom relate the Word of God to the needs of the Christian community. The esoteric language of many religion scholars makes their work inaccessible to the average layperson. Yet Bible studies proliferate, often at the expense of authentic Christian conduct.
"What Martin Luther and other reformers learned from the apostle Paul, who advised us 'to know nothing except Jesus Christ and him crucified,' has been usurped by the gifts of the Holy Spirit, including praying in tongues and private relations of doubtful authenticity. The staple of the typical Sunday sermon is heavy-handed moralizing tinged with raw emotional appeal that lays guilt on the people and breeds fear, shame, and distorted images of God. For many devout people who hear such sermons, the Good News isn't news and it isn't good.
"Paul, another issue bewitching God's people these days is the tendency to gratuitously give a monopoly on evil to a single person (such as Osama bin Laden), a single nation (such as Afghanistan), or a single institution (be it Islam, Judaism, the Mormon Church, or the Catholic Church).
"When one person, nation, or institution is declared to be Satan, logic rules: eliminate this source of all evil, and everything will be all right; when Satan is localized in a finite reality, the end of evildoing is just around the corner.
"And yet, as you know, brother, one lesson we've learned from the history of civilized humanity is that when we kill our particular 'Satan,' evil doesn't disappear from the face of the earth. In fact, it may reappear in the place we least expect: ourselves. Remember the movie 'Ben-Hur'? When Judah finally kills Massala -- his 'Satan' -- Judah's lover turns to him and says, 'It is as if you have become Massala.'
"Labeling someone Satan gets the labeler off the hook. The source of evil has a specific face and shape (and it's surely not I!).
"Here's the problem, Paul. Many Christians today have discerned the speck in the eye of another, and they think they need look no further. Everyone has a pet peeve, a favorite target, a personalized 'what's wrog with the world' speech. The villain may be televangelists, racism, the welfare system, the immigration system, the worldliness of the church -- whatever. No one of us is immune from spreading evil, including those who pontificate about what the 'real' problem is.
"Brother Paul, American Christians revel in this kind of declamation. The tragedy is that the scorching words of Jesus in Matthew 23, 'Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites,' are now directed at other churches, authority figures such as the pope, the presiding bishop, politicians of the opposing party, the ACLU, and so forth. You and I know that we miss Jesus' message entirely when we use his fierce words against anyone other than ourselves. Those words must be understood as directed to the self; otherwise, they're perverted.
"And that, Paul, is the form, shape, and stuff of Christian pharisaism today. Hypocrisy isn't the prerogative of people in the high places. It's the natural expression of what's meanest in us all."
Daniel looks over at Paul and notices how intently he's listening. It's not the riveted concentration of knitted eyebrows but the quietness of pure attention. "This is getting heavy, brother," he says. "Shall I continue, or would you like to take a break?"
"Please go on," Paul says encouragingly, "but let's sit down on the embankment."
They seat themselves comfortably on the grass, and twenty minutes of silence follow. Daniel has more to say, but he isn't sure how to proceed, and Paul is immersed in thought.
Finally Paul says, "Faith comes through hearing. Are people not hearing the Word of God today?"
"Well, yes and no," Daniel replies. "As you recall, I said earlier that professors of religion have turned Christianity into the religion of the professors. The supreme irony is that ministers of the gospel have twisted the Word into the gospel of the ministers. Nof ALL ministers, of course, or all professors. There are many who preach what Jesus preached and teach what Jesus taught. Their sermons brim with purity and power. Alas, though, the majority of them ignore the Great Commandment and unleash their anger on those who challenge their doctrine or fail to interpret the Scriptures as they do.
"A classic case in point: The teaching of Jesus on the indissolubility of marriage is unbending and uncompromising. Yet the apostle Paul, who arguably understood the mind of Christ better than anyone before or since his time, didn't hesitate to intervene in the unhappy marriage of a believer yoked to an unbeliever. Invoking his own apostolic authority, Paul modified the teaching of Jesus and dissolved the marriage, because--as he wrote in his Letter to the Romans--'God has called us to a life of peace.' And elsewhere he said, 'We have the mind of Christ.'
"Paul, the only effective foundation for nationwide Christian renewal lies in attaining Christ-consciousness, in moving beyond the bare letter of the Bible into the God-consciousness of Jesus. The major cause of division and darkness in the American church is our failure to achieve the mind of Christ. Rigidity rules, and the freedom of Christ has been obscured. Tenderness has vanished. A scrupulous moral code substitutes for an engaged, participatory encounter with the Master. The result is a religion about Jesus and not the religion of Jesus.
"The violence with which some Christians expound their beliefs makes me think that they're trying to convince themselves. The specter of their well-concealed unbelief frightens them, so they become more militant and strident. When this same fear grips the churches, they disintegrate into lifeless propagators of formal rituals or intolerant agents of repression. Without an intimate, heartfelt knowledge of Jesus, the preachers who staff these churches resemble travel agents handing out brochures to places they've never visited.
"The consequences of such ignorance have proved disastrous, Paul. Rampant legalism has a strangehold on a significant section of the evangelical arm of the American church. Fear has gained such a foothold that it's assumed to be a normal part of Christian life."
Daniel heaves a heartfelt sigh. "Have you ever heard of a group called the National Guild of Christian Therapists?" he asks.
"No," says paul, shaking his head. "My attention has been elsewhere. Are they trustworthy?"
"More than that, they're credible and committed. In their latest report, they narrate the widespread phenomenon of clients tormented by intense feelings of guilt, shame, remorse, and self-punishment. They've concluded that these things are the dominant symptoms of a psycho/spiritual sickness afflicting American Christians today: the bitter fruits of legalism, perfectionism, and guilt-tripping don't fall far from the tree. Many of the clergy and laity thrash about trying to fix themselves, improve their prayer life, make themselves presentable to God and lovable to others. Sooner rather than later, they're appalled by their inconsistency, dejected by their mediocrity, and depressed because they haven't met their own lofty expectations. In the self-help spiritual swamp, there are no survivors.
"One last observation, if you can bear with me, Paul. The greatest single need in the church today is to know Jesus Christ through engaged, participatory encounter. When religion replaces the actual experience of the living Jesus, when we lose the authority of personal knowing and rely on the authority of books, institutions, and leaders, when we let religion interpose between us and the primary experience of Jesus as the Christ, we lose the very reality that religion itself describes as ultimate. Therein lies the origin of all holy wars, bigotry, intolerance, and division within the body of Christ.
"Brother Paul, I've spoken at great length. Pray for me that i have the courage to stand fast and love the brethren in their brokenness."
Paul rises quickly to his feet. "Daniel, the range and depth of your insight into the contemporary church is remarkable," he says. "How is it that you're so knowledgeable?"
"I'm a bishop," says Daniel, also rising. "Two years ago, I was appointed by the elders of the National Assembly of American Churches to freelance the country as a pastor/theologian-at-large. This week I'm to report my findings and to make recommendations for reform and renewal. Frankly, I'm at a loss. The task is overwhelming."
Paul grabs the older man's arm. "Would it be possible for you to convene an emergency meeting of the elders tomorrow night?" he asks. "I wish to speak to them."
Daniel eyes him skeptically. "You what?"
"I wish to address a prophetic word to the National Assembly."
"Who ARE you?"
"As I told you earlier, my name is Paul. These are my credentials." Paul strips off his shirt. "The brand marks on my body are those of Jesus. I'm an apostle who doesn't owe his authority or his appointment to any man. I was appointed by the Father, who raised Jesus from the dead. My only boast is the cross of Christ, which has set me free from the tyranny of pleasing others and conforming to the petty patterns they dictate. As you can see, I bear on my body the signature of Jesus. Will you arrange the meeting?"
Daniel nods his head in affirmation. "Tomorrow night in the grand ballroom of the Corinthian Hotel," he says.
The two separate in silence.
The following night fifteen hundred elders gather from every region of the country--pastors, evangelists, superintendents, bishops, cardinals, primates, prelates, provincials, archimandrites, generals, and untitled shepherds. Some come robed and bearded, others are in three-piece suits, many are in clerical collars, and a minority sport T-shirts and jeans. Murmured greetings are exchanged, and then utter stillness sweeps the room.
Daniel mounts the platform, turns to the audience, and begins to speak in measured tones:
"My brothers and sisters, a most extraordinary thing happened to me yesterday on the levee. For three hours I met with a man whose name is Paul--the very same Paul whose inspired letters are in our Bible. I saw for myself the brand marks of Jesus engraved on his body. There's no doubt in my mind that he is who he claims to be. In his sovereign wisdom and for his own loving puposes, God has chosen to visit this nation and speak to us tonight through his servant, Paul of Tarsus. My friends in Christ, I present to you the Apostle of the Nations."
No applause. Nary a whisper. The group is far beyond disbelief into rampant incredulity. As the apostle reaches the podium, his eyes fix on a forty-five-year-old pastor sitting in a wheelchair in the first row. A spinal injury suffered in an auto accident over a decade earlier left him paralyzed from the waist down. For the past twelve years, he hasn't taken a step.
Paul descends the stairwell, strides directly to the paralyzed man, and places a hand on his face. "In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene," Paul commands, "stand up and walk!"
The flummoxed pastor pushes the heels of both hands against the sides of his chair and, with a mighty effort, hoists himself erect. Almost casually, he ventures a first step and then a second--and then another and another and another. He starts to skip, suddenly runs down the center aisle, circles the entire ballroom, returns front and center, grabs the hand of his ecstatic wife, and pleads, "May I have this dance?"
Amid gasps and soft cries of "Oh, my God!" Paul returns to the podium. "I am Paul," he announces, "a slave of Jesus Christ sent on special mission to share the Word of the living God with you.
"Yesterday, Daniel shared with me an incisive appraisal of the spiritual condition among American Christians. This morning I stopped at McDonald's for an Egg McMuffin and this afternoon at Burger King for a Whopper. The fast-food culture of this country is an apt metaphor for the state of the church. You're overfed and undernourished, both physically and spiritually.
"However, there's no time to waste on jeremiads and prophecies of doom. Nor is it appropriate to pillory pastors who, like each of you, are earthen vessels with feet of clay. You must forget past failures and press on toward what lies ahead in Christ Jesus. You're living in the 'isness of the shall be,' and in this interim period of salvation-history, there's much to be done.
"First, the passionate, pursuing love of God must be proclaimed in season and out of season. Forceful emphasis must be placed on the tenderness and mercy of God, who first loved us. Instead of a light volley of divine love followed by the heavy artillery of rule-keeping, Jesus' love for the unlovely must pierce the heart of every Christian. The intellectual cognition and the experiential awareness of God are inseperable. Henceforth, the primary pastoral task is the quality of faith within the community. Every disciple can and will come to know Jesus through the baptism of fire. No other priority takes precedence; nothing else matters. The greatest part of the time, energy, talent, and financial resources of each local church is to be invested in this enterprise. Other ministries and projects will flourish as a result.
"Next, fraternal love will be the sign par excellence that Christians have actually experienced the love of God. Resting safe and secure in the tender compassion of the Lord, Christians will feel no need to pander to the approval and acceptance of others. Cordial love filled with respect for the sacredness of human life must be your badge of discipleship. Wrangling, bickering, and back-biting signal the loss of conscious contact with Jesus. All of you must quickly repent, ask forgiveness, and waste no time on self-recrimination.
"Authentic religion demands moderation in all things except love. The gospel tolerates a moderate love between Christians no more than it tolerates a moderate love between God and you. As I wrote to the Romans, the one who loves his or her neighbor has fulfilled the entire law of Christ and the prophets as well.
"Third and last, I want the American church to go underground for the next decade. Specifically, I urge you to return to an ancient practice of the apostolic church--the discipline of the secret. Maintain a tactful silence in the presence of unbelievers. Cultural conditioning has rendered much of your Christian language meaningless. When the latest perfume bears the name Grace--well . . . you get my point, brothers and sisters.
"As the local church lowers its profile, let it raise the bar for membership. Every disciple, no matter how mature, must have a mentor. A Christian is always in the process of becoming one. Weekly small-group meetings aren't an option soley for the devout; they're a universal necessity. Those walking the Way can't survive without support. The loner is a liar. Doubting Thomas didn't meet the risen Jesus alone in the woods but when he returned to the community of faith.
"At the dawn of the twenty-first century, it's become too easy to be a Christian. Numerically, your churches will shrink if you follow my recommendations, because as seekers old and new weigh the cost of discipleship, many will find it excessive. Don't be alarmed: Growth will develop slowly from inside out, as seekers' hearts are touched by hidden acts of unpretentious mercy. Your faithfulness will be measured by your willingness to go where there's brokenness, loneliness, and human need. What are you to draw from the life of the Master? The knowledge that love and mercy are the most powerful forces on earth.
"The discipline of the secret will disentangle the church from all the cultural accretions, devotional deviations, and religious baggage of the past. Fierce loyalty to Jesus Christ and the witness of fierce mercy to sinners will restore credibility to the Christian claim. Only he who believes is obedient, and only she who is obedient believes. Success in ministry, along with knowledge of Scripture and master of biblical principles, must never be confused with true discipleship. These superficial signs of faith may be the corruption of discipleship, if your life isn't hidden with Christ in God.
"Dear brothers and sisters, revive the drooping spirits of your people. Banish all anxiety and fear. Remind the saints that the crucified One, reigning in glory, has prevailed over every principality, power, and dominion. He has disarmed them, made a spectacle of them, discarded them like garments, and led them captive in his victory procession.
"With the signature of Jesus branded on my body, I, Paul, servant of the Messiah, kneel before the Father, and I pray that out of his infinite glory, he may give you the power to help your hidden self grow strong, that Christ may live in your heart through faith. And I ask him that, with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all Christians the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb its depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives--full in the fullness of God!""

'Dear REader,
Perhaps you will dismiss this exercise in Christian imagination as the dangerous rambling of a self-styled prophet, or perhaps you will conclude that it has sketched accurate images of yourself and the church of your experience. If the former, let it go; if the latter, let it be!'
- posted by maria @ 10:21 PM