Thanks-GIVING: Gratitude Through Generosity

How often do we take the gifts God gives us for granted? I don't just mean that we take them for granted in that we forget where they came from or that others don't have them, but we can know where our gifts come from, realize others don't have them and still take them for granted. How? By forgetting what they're for.

God makes resources available to us not so that we can simply enjoy them and thank God for them, even thanking God that we're not like those who have less access to resources, but God gives us this access to resources, these blessings, for the blessing of others. This is the pattern of God's covenant: "...I will bless you...all peoples on earth will be blessed through you" (Genesis 12:1-3). It was never God's intention that the people of Israel would be blessed for the sake of their own blessing but so that they might see the ultimate blessing in the blessing of the world. The greatest reward is not our being able to use our resources without restriction, however nice that may be, but it is our ability be a part of God's work of blessing that we might see other blessed by the generosity of God through us. We take blessings for granted when we do not share them and thus find the life that is truly life through our shared life with others. That's the best and only way for us to truly enjoy our gifts and to understand true gratitude: by giving them away.

How often do we interrupt God's invitation to generosity with our thanksgiving rather than allowing our thanksgiving to flow from our generosity? How often does God give us enough bread that we might share it with others and we say "Thank you Lord for your blessings" and continue to eat and get fat? We can't truly celebrate gratitude for our blessings if we do not remember what they're for, where we came from. God continuously reminds Israel that they were slaves in Egypt so that through memory and gratitude they might be drawn to mirror God's generosity and so that gratitude might flow from generosity.

"In the future, when your son asks you, 'What is the meaning of the stipulations, decrees and laws the LORD our God has commanded you?'tell him: 'We were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand'" (Deut. 6:20-21).

This year during Thanksgiving let us celebrate thanks-GIVING that from gratitude, from our memory that we were slaves in Egypt, will flow radical generosity that we might match God's generosity. Let us remember, as we eat and drink and give thanks, those on the under side of society, those in need, and let us remember why God has blessed us.

Try this: as you eat your thanksgiving meal, enjoy family and friends, and celebrate the blessings from God's hand, try praying "give US this day OUR daily bread" and keep the hungry in mind. Allow your meal to be a Eucharistic meal, a meal of hope for the hopeless, a meal in which gratitude leads to generosity and generosity leads to gratitude, calling our past liberation into the present and calling our future liberation into the present, that it may be for you a new reminder of God's radical invitation into his work of redemption. Open you table, if only in your heart, to Jesus and find true gratitude through generosity.

"Jesus and Nonviolence" by Walter Wink

I just finished reading Jesus and Nonviolence: A Third Way by Walter Wink. Wink is a professor of Biblical Interpretation and Auburn Theological Seminary in New York. Another book he's written which is definitely on my list is called The Powers That Be: Theology for a New Millennium. Wink is a genius and a must read for anyone interested in liberation theology (not that he's a liberation theologian), Jesus & Empire discussions (not that he'd necessarily use the Empire language), or, in this case, nonviolence.

Wink submits an third option, one which he sees as not his own but of Jesus, apart from the "fight or flight" options we have been trained into so very long. He argues that nonviolence is the only form of resistance which does not "mirror" the oppressor being resisted and which "creates... social instruments for change that already embody the better life they seek ahead" (page 102). On page 72 Wink writes,

"Violence simply is not radical enough, since it generally changes only the rulers but not the rules. What use is a revolution that fails to address the fundamental problem: the existence of dominion in all its forms, and the myth of redemptive violence that perpetuates it?"

Therefore in all our work for social change, in all our revolutionary ambitions, and in siding with the oppressed we must embody God's Kingdom for the not only do the ends not justify the means but they desperately depend on them. Wink, though he seeks an alternative to violence does not promote the second option which we usually think of as the only other option: "flight." He seeks a radical new way, Jesus third way, which aggressively seeks change and empowers the oppressed to assert their humanity but also embodies a dominion of love, i.e. God's dominion. We must resist evil, he explains, but we must love our enemies and offer to them the gift of opportunity to be redeemed unto the oppressed. The third way is no less courageous than the way of violence (it may indeed be more so) in the pursuit of justice.

Wink doesn't only deal in pragmatic examples (although he has plenty of examples) of the "effectiveness" of nonviolence but offers this option in a way that transcends effectiveness and "means and ends": "Means and ends coalesce as people create for themselves social instruments for change that already embody the better life they seek ahead" (page 102). "With Jesus a way emerges by which evil can be opposed without being mirrored" (page 27).

This book was very helpful and I would highly recommend it to anyone who cares to embody the Kingdom of God here and now.

Russell Athletic Violates Human Rights... but not anymore

About 7 months ago I wrote a post about the violations of Russell Athletic against human rights in Honduras. But today I heard the good news that student protests in the United States have helped end the struggle.

"The often raucous student movement announced on Tuesday that it had achieved its biggest victory by far. Its pressure tactics persuaded one of the nation’s leading sportswear companies, Russell Athletic, to agree to rehire 1,200 workers in Honduras who lost their jobs when Russell closed their factory soon after the workers had unionized."

Read the New York Times article.

The Kingdom Has Come Near

The Kingdom of God has come near. It's here, among us now as with the Holy Spirit we model for the world the new way under Christ's reign. All things are now subject to Christ--his politics, his ethics, his compassionate economy--but not all things are yet obedient. Let us invite the world into obedience and into the beautiful dance of God's dominion. As Abram was called into a land unknown to bring blessings yet unseen, let us venture into unknown land and be the visible body of unseen blessings. As Christ was born into the world let New Creation be born in us.

Victim to Victimizer or a New Way?

The pattern often goes like this: one group is victimized by another, the oppressed do something to assert their humanity, the oppressed gain some level of equality or are at least invited by the oppressor to assimilate, the oppressed then take power for themselves, and finally the victim becomes the victimizer. This was the pattern for Israel who, having been freed from Egypt, took slaves for themselves. This is still the pattern for Israel who, having suffered in the Holocaust of the 1940's, displaces and victimizes the Palestinians. This was the pattern for the U.S. settlers who, having escaped the tyranny of the "old world," escaped into the "new world" only to massacre the Natives living there. And this may yet to be the pattern of those oppressed by segregation who, through the Civil Rights Movement, asserted their humanity and are still fighting for equality in this country. The reason I bring this up is because we have to see the possible future before we can choose a better future.

The election of Barack Obama can be seen as a sort of culminating point in the history of the Civil Rights movement--a milestone event if not a culminating end to the struggle of black people in America to gain equality. A black U.S. president is a symbol of hope in so many ways but is it equality or is it assimilation? Is the victim becoming the victimizer?

I think now is the time to call the United States to a new way, a way in which the victim does not become the victimzer. Barack Obama has inherited a policy of systemic oppression through economic oppression as well as through the violence of war. What can Barack Obama do to break the pattern and to never become the victimizer? What can we do? Can we go a different direction? Can the oppressed find the answer to the "crucial moral and political questions of our time"? Can we realize the "need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression"? (Martin Luther King Jr.) We are called to trust not in Presidents and politicians. We are called to something bigger than countries and world leaders.It's not about Barack Obama, it's not about the Civil Rights Movement, it's about the Kingdom of God.

"Jesus moved from the culture of sacrificing others for one's own gain to a new culture of sacrificing self for the sake of others. This new culture would become known as Christianity. It is important to see the sacrifice of the cross not as the one sacrifice of Jesus but as the final movement in the sacrificial process of an entire lifetime, a life that refused to victimize anyone. Jesus sacrificed himself in many ways to redeem and rehabilitate the victims of the world. He was the victim who did not become a victimizer. He always offered something new and surprising. He went from being a victim to being a liberator, a generator of new life. Like Jesus, out of our own suffering today we are called to usher in something new so that all of us together, in new partnership, may have a better life. Out of the wounds and pains of cultural poverty, new cultures will emerge, and that will be a gift not only to the poor but to all of humanity."
_Virgilio Elizondo
(Daniel G. Groody, The Option for the Poor in Christian Theology, pp. 167-168)

I received this e-mail from Jim Wallis yesterday:

It has been eight years since the United States military began operations in Afghanistan in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. I know you join me in lamenting the suffering, violence, and death on both sides of the conflict. Our scriptures and history teach us that war is not the answer to building the peace and security we are striving for in this world.

I’ve joined with other faith leaders in sending an open letter to President Obama, urging him to build a new strategy in Afghanistan that leads with bold humanitarian aid and development instead of more military escalation. Will you join me?

Tell President Obama: We need a whole new approach in Afghanistan.

Unfortunately, the options being debated are far too narrow and are unlikely to bring the peace and stability we so desperately need to end this war.

The two strategies contending for prime time - counterinsurgency, requiring a substantial escalation of troops, and counterterrorism, relying on precision targeting technology to apply military pressure on the most dangerous operatives, often at the expense of civilian lives - don't address the deep moral and practical issues we face in Afghanistan.

There are many moral concerns at stake in President Obama’s decision: legitimately protecting Americans from further terrorism, protecting the lives of our men and women in uniform, protecting the Afghan people from the collateral damage of war, defending women from the Taliban, and genuinely supporting democracy - to name a few.

Focused and effective humanitarian assistance and development can no longer be an afterthought. They must be central to any strategy the U.S. government puts forward. The president must choose nonmilitary strategies to lead the way, rather than the other way around, which often just makes aid and development work another weapon of war.

Tell President Obama: More war will not bring peace.

We know what can rebuild a broken nation, inspire confidence, trust, and hope among its people, and most effectively undermine terrorism: massive humanitarian assistance and sustainable economic development.

And it costs less - far less - than continued war. The Congressional Research Service has said it currently costs about $1 million per U.S. soldier, per year in Afghanistan.

We all share in responsibility for a war that has been waged in our names and with our tax dollars. Join me and many faith leaders across our country in praying for the president as he considers a new strategy in Afghanistan.

After you pray, sign our letter to President Obama urging his serious consideration of a humanitarian and diplomatic surge, instead of more military options. We'll make sure it gets to the White House.

Blessings and peace,

Jim Wallis

What Would You Do?

In light of my recent discussion on Facebook with some friends on the subject of nonviolence, I have decided to pickup a book which has been sitting on my shelf. I had planned on reading the Politics of Jesus by Yoder before I got to this one but this one is just so pertinent to recent conversations. It's called What Would You Do? and actually the long title is If a Violent Person Threatened to Harm a Loved One... What Would You Do? It's John Howard Yoder's attempt to take the quandary ethics "what if" question seriously and to approach it responsibly in the realm of ethics. Hopefully it will help me better offer my perspective in light of the "what if" questions. Perhaps, if it calls for one, I will write a review when I'm done.

The Gift of Nonviolence

Creative nonviolence is not a dehumanizing tactic to humiliate and ridicule our enemies (although this might be the result of our efforts) rather, creative nonviolence is our gift of love to our enemies--we offer to them ourselves as a gift of reconciliation that they might repent and find redemption for themselves. Nonviolence is the gift of opportunity, we offer the oppressor a way out of complicity with oppression. Therefore the fault is ours if we allow oppressors to remain oppressive, we apparently are not loving our enemies if we do not offer redemption to them through repentance.

Walter Wink says, "never adopt a strategy that you would not want your opponents to use against you" (Jesus and Nonviolence, page 46). If those whom I oppress simply kill me, that's it, no more reconciliation for me. They've stooped to my level and have committed the crime of pushing the problem out of sight and out of mind rather than aggressively perusing peace... the oppressed become the oppressor. But if those whom I oppress offer to me the gift of nonviolence I pray that I will have the humility to repent and to turn from my oppressive ways. We must learn creative nonviolence if only to truly "do unto others as we'd have done unto us."

Matthew 24, First Thought Commentary: Part 6

Read part 1,2,3,4,and 5 of this series.

45"Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? 46It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. 47I tell you the truth, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. 48But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, 'My master is staying away a long time,' 49and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. 50The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. 51He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." _Matthew 24:45-51

Jesus gets away from apocalyptic language here as he talks about the "wise servant" in sort of a pseudo-story. Jesus told other stories in Matthew with servants in them. Sometimes the servants represented Israel as in Matthew 18:21-35 and sometimes the servants are, more specifically, the Prophets of Israel as in Matthew 21:33-45 but just about every time a story is told by Jesus, as with most Rabbis of his time, it is a story of Yahweh and Israel. Interestingly enough, when Jesus told stories about Yahweh and Israel he was often simultaneously talking about his own mission as though Jesus understood his own vocation as so caught up with Yahweh's work of redemption and judgment that Jesus saw his own role as to do and be for Israel what Yahweh (and sometimes the Temple) did and was for Israel.

In this passage Jesus has previously been talking of readiness for the coming of the Son of Man--the ever enigmatic Parousia. What we have seen in the preceding passages is that there will be judgment for those who are not "ready" for the Parousia just as there was judgment for those oblivious to the flood in the days of Noah. They don't even see it coming and yet while they least expect it, since no one knows when it's coming, they will be swept away (which must be a bad thing). This language is not to be taken literally in the ways we post-enlightenment thinkers have been trained to think literally. It is symbolic language that pertains not only to a climactic eschatological event, although it most certainly does, but to any situation of judgment in the context of powers and systems. The question is yet to be answered, who is ready? How does one find themselves ready in the days ahead? What does that look like?

We know that readiness is to be constant since no one knows the day or the hour but readiness does not mean having calculated the day or the hour or even the century. The one who tries to figure out which world events match up with which Bible "prophesies" or who thinks they know which generation will see the day of the Parousia is not necessarily any more ready than the man who simply doesn't care when it's coming. What matters is not the when or even the what, it's the how. How do we be faithful in the midst of uncertainty? Who is the wise servant?

Jesus answers the question in the negative using a story. He tells us who is not ready using a sort of illustration of Israel. Israel is the servant placed in charge during the master's absence, very similar to the Tenants in Matthew 18 (which also represent the Jewish religious authorities). The servant's job is to feed the other servants until the Master returns. There's no question of readiness if the servant diligently sticks to his/her vocation, of course they'll be ready because they'll be found doing what they were asked to do. If the master's call and the servants need stays in the forefront of his or her priorities, then readiness will not even be a question. But if the servant loses sight of this vocation and dishonors the master's request, begins beating and oppressing their fellow servants for whom they are to care, the servant will find themselves unready, to say the least, when the master comes at an inopportune moment. They will find themselves in the judgement to which Jesus previously referred (the more detailed nature of which I will leave for some other time or for someone else to write about).

Israel had been placed in charge of it's fellows but Israel, as Jesus hints in some of his other stories not least in Matthew 21, has lost sight of its vocation. The Jewish leaders, even the Temple system itself, have found themselves beating the fellow servants. Israel is unready and "not one stone will be left upon another." In Matthew's context (remembering that Matthew was written after the events of 66-70AD) the Roman Empire has found itself beating the servants, eating and drinking not only the food of the oppressed but eating and drinking with the drunkards (and not with the Body of Christ... this is a thought for another post). Both of these systems, the system of the Temple and the system of Pax Romana, have devolved into systems of oppression, catering to the wealthy and the militant (read the first few passages of Matthew 5 to see that the Kingdom of God caters to a much different crowd).

To Jesus the ready person, the wise servant, is the one who feeds fellow servants (including if not especially the poor and the oppressed) and finds themselves feasting upon and drinking the body and blood of Christ (of course "body of Christ"/Eucharistic language is not explicitly in the passage but it makes sense to say this). The ready servant is not complicit with systems which live as though they are oblivious to the flood coming to liberate the oppressed.

The answer to the question of what it looks like to be ready--what is the task of the wise servant--is not answered in full until Matthew 25. In the final passages of Matthew 25, Jesus takes us back to what's truly important. It's not important when Jesus is coming back. It is supremely important, however, that the people of God find themselves feeding, clothing, visiting, healing and inviting the "least of these" who are indeed not merely other servants but they are those with whom Christ shares his identity. Anyone who studies Matthew 24 without finding the final passages of Matthew 25 at the center of Jesus' answer to eschatological questions has missed the point of Jesus' call to readiness.

Matthew 24 is a chapter of hope. Even though death rears its ugly head in the form of systems and oppressors, in wars and rumors of wars, resurrection is right around the corner. The best is yet to come. If we want to find ourselves "ready" for the day of Jesus' coming, we must find Jesus in the faces of the poor, the imprisoned, the sick, and in all who are oppressed. We must share our identity with the least of these. We must order our whole lives by the hope of resurrection, with the hope that another world beyond wars and rumors of wars is possible, living in the Kingdom of God in the reign of the God who defeated death, then we will be found ready, never to be mistaken for being complicit with the powers and systems which Christ is returning to judge.

Matthew 24:1-8

Matthew 24:9-14

Matthew 24: 15-28

Matthew 24:29-35

Matthew 24:36-44

Matthew 24:45-51

Creativity Over Violence and Quandary Ethics

There is a lively discussion happening on my Facebook, of all places. I posted a quote by Logan Laituri, an Army veteran with combatant service in Iraq during OIF II, which went like this, "...as Christians, we know violence is not part of God’s intent and that in every form it counteracts Christ’s redemptive suffering on the Cross." And the discussion get started from there (I wasn't really looking for a discussion, I just liked the quote). I've had the discussion about non-violence before and it almost always arouses passion in people. It's a very personal subject for people because we've all got so much invested in it. Violence, we're taught, is justified and necessary against the wicked foes of this country and/or our families and we want to know that God wouldn't just let somebody die or get raped or something without killing the foe. We lead our lives by, to use a term which is new to me but I think I will be using in the future, quandary ethics (thanks Danny for introducing me to this term coined by Stanley Hauerwas). The "What if...?" is always among the first things to pop into our minds and thus we broad-stroakingly justify violence by way of creating a scenario in which we'd be left with "no other choice" long before we ever find ourselves in a position to actually respond to violence. This leaves us with little to no wiggle-room for creativity. Because we've already trained to think in terms of "no other choice" we'll always be quick to interpret our situation as such whenever the opportunity arises.

Remember 9-11? After 9-11 the American people, having convinced themselves ahead of time that there's "no other choice" found themselves in what they interpreted to be such a quandary in which they had "no other choice" and so the thought of creative non-violent reaction was laughed away and dismissed (some folks even got fired from the Bush administration for suggesting such nonsensical ideas). Now that the dust of the twin towers has settled many many more people are starting to wonder if there wasn't a more creative option.

People often, trying to hit close to home, refer to my fiance Amanda (who I love beyond language). They ask, "what if..." (so I already know it's quandary ethics) "what if Amanda was being attacked? Wouldn't you defend her?" It is indeed a tough question because I do indeed have a preferential love for Amanda. But if ever my preferential love for Amanda causes me to abandon my not so preferential love for my enemies, then I have missed the point on love. I'm not in the business of forceful defense. But I can creatively turn the other cheek (read chapter 2 of Jesus and Nonviolence by Walter Wink to understand what this means). I believe that there is a more responsible and, dare I say it, a more advanced way of dealing with violence. We all believe it when it comes to our children (well, not all... I did see a lady at Disneyland say to her kids who were fighting, "if you do that, she's gonna hit you. Then what?" as her kids proceeded to fight and the daughter proceeded to hit). Amanda, as the one who I would be "defending" in the "what if..." question above, paints this out beautifully.

Amanda Bidwell

I hope that I am never defended by the sword (or gun or knife or anything else that kills). Yes, Wes is my protector, but he protects me in a different kind of way than the way of the world.

I teach preschool and something you hear constantly is "use your words". We teach our children not to hit back, but to tell them they don't like it. And when those children do hit, we sit them down and we find out why they hit. There's always a reason why. (example: Not enough toys for everyone to play with)

I was just saying the other day that I miss working with groups of children (right now I work one on one with one child and their family) because I miss being able to problem solve with them. I actually enjoyed sitting a child down after a frustrating moment to help give him the tools to make better choices next time. (example: ask to use the toy when someone is done or find something else to play with).

Maybe it seems far fetched to some to compare preschoolers to intruders, but maybe not enough toys is some how similar to not enough food or not enough money. Though the actions don't fit the situation (hitting because there aren't toys, or breaking into a house because there isn't enough money) there is a frustrating need and someone doesn't know how to deal with it. Maybe I can give them the tools to stop the situation before it happens. Maybe there is a glimmer of hope that we can change a life by our sacrificing hearts that reflect the beautiful face of God. That we can find a creative way to react to those terrible things that happen to us. Maybe we can see that the boy is going to hit, and maybe we can give him our extra shovel to play with us in the sandbox too.

Perhaps we should take up the mantra, "use your words" or "we don't hit" in more of our political discussions.

Jesus was more creative than we are. He defeated death by letting it do its' worst and still coming out of the tomb. Ours is the task not of avoiding the cross but of stepping out of the tomb. Jesus befriended his enemies (Judas in particular) long before they intruded.

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