A mountain climber was traversing a perilous cliff when he heard a panicked
shout. It seems another climber had become trapped in a cleft down below, and
needed someone to rescue him. "Just a minute," said his rescuer,
"I'll throw you a rope." "Thank the Lord you came along," came the reply. "Oh, you're a Christian?" the
rescuer said, throwing him the rope. "That's great, so am I! Catholic or Protestant?" "Protestant!" he
answered, tying the rope round his waist. "That's great, so am I!"
said the rescuer, as he began to pull the man up the slope. "Methodist
or Baptist?" "Baptist," the fellow answered. "That's
great, so am I! General Baptist or Particular Baptist?"
"Particular Baptist," he answered. "That's great, so am I! Particular Baptist Eastern Confession or Particular Baptist Western
Confession?" "Western Confession," the fellow answered as
he got near the top. "That's great, so am I! Particular Baptist Western
Confession Reform of '87 or Particular Baptist Western Confession Reform of
'95? "Reform of '95," he answered. "Die, you heretic scum!"
said the rescuer, and he let go of the rope.
Long ago Mark Twain observed, "There are only two kinds of people in
the world: those who divide the world into two kinds of people and those who
don't." Seems to me we have a lot more of the first kind these days
than we used to. Everywhere you turn people are divided into "us"
against "them." Watch the news … read the papers … listen
to the radio … especially during this time when Health Care Reform is
being debated. But I would suggest that
“debate” is not what’s actually happening. The dominant theme is it's us against them.
And the rules are clear. We are right and they are wrong. We are good and they
are bad. We are smart and they are stupid. We are loving
and they are hateful. We are beloved of God and they are going to hell, and
we're glad about that, too.
"The heresy of fundamentalism," said one scholar,
"is in its `tyranny of limited alternatives.'" That is, it narrows
everything down into only two choices in a "my way or the highway"
theology. Since its birth on the American scene as a reaction to Modernism,
Fundamentalism has always thrived on having a clear enemy to attack. If it
lacks an enemy, it loses steam. But it always finds an enemy. For instance Mel
White, who was a ghost writer for several fundamentalist television evangelists
in the seventies and eighties, insists that when the Berlin Wall fell and
communism was no longer a threat, abortion and homosexuality were intentionally
chosen as the next "enemies" to attack, thereby drawing upon the
anxieties and appealing to the pocketbooks of their constituency. These two
complex issues were simplified into absolute evils, demonized, and attacked.
And it worked, along with painting our own government as the enemy. And the beat goes on.
The Fundamentalists have a right to their own point of view. What troubles me
is how much our whole society has bought into this kind of simplistic "us
against them," … "only two choices" thinking. Do you
realize how many people decide since they aren't a Fundamentalist,
they can't be a Christian, as if there were no other alternative? There seems
to be no genuine dialogue taking place in our society these days. We are
increasingly polarized into ethnic, political, and religious camps, standing
behind our stone walls hurling insults at those who are not like us. Perhaps
this competitive division is not new, but it seems to me the rhetoric has
become more heated and violence more glorified as a way of resolving conflict.
It is a dangerous situation precisely because we have divided the whole world …
and now even our own society … into “us against them.”
Jesus had a different approach. The disciples came to him one day and
complained, "We saw somebody casting out demons in your name, and we
tried to stop him because he wasn't one of us." He wasn't of the right
denomination. She wasn't of the right gender. He wasn't of the right color. She
wasn't of the right orientation. He wasn't of the right nationality. She wasn't
of the right class. He wasn't ordained. She wasn't licensed by the state. They
were different, and wouldn't take orders from us. They didn't understand we have
the copyright, the patent, the legal title to your name.
Jesus must have felt the irony of the situation. It was exactly the same charge
the religious powers had leveled at him. He wasn't educated … just a
carpenter's son who lacked official approval - all of which was to say, he
wasn't one of them, and they couldn't control him. Jesus told the disciples to
leave the man be. He said, "Whoever is not against us is for us."
"Whoever is not against us for
us" - just the opposite of what we usually hear. Usually leaders of
movements say "whoever is not for us is against us" … as a way of holding tight control by
creating an "us against them environment." But Jesus said
"Whoever is not against us is for
us," which is amazing when you consider his situation at the time. First
of all, he recognizes that we do have enemies. We do have people who are
against us. If we think we can stand for what is right in the world and seek to
proclaim a gospel that God loves everybody equally … over and against the
political and economic and social and religious hierarchies of the world
… and not be opposed by those who stand to profit from injustice,
oppression, and evil, we are mistaken. We are naive. Jesus never told his
disciples they would have no enemies. "They will put you out of the
congregation," he told them. "Indeed, an hour is coming when
those who kill you will think by doing so they are offering a
worship to God" (John 16:2). But take heart … when people
you don't even know categorize you and label you and demonize you and slander
you and seek to ostracize you from the rest of the community or denomination or
nation, you might just be on to something right. You have certainly touched a
nerve. But it's nothing new in the history of faith. "Blessed are you
when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against
you falsely on my account" Jesus said. "Rejoice
and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they
persecuted the prophets who were before you" (Matthew 5:11-12).
The Bible never says we won't have enemies. But it does promise God's presence
with us. "In this world you will face persecution," Jesus told
his disciples. "But take courage; I have conquered the world!"
(John 16:33).
On the other hand, the Bible doesn't tell us to make enemies of
everybody we can. We have to be careful in situations of conflict not to become
reactive and even adolescent, by being perverse simply to shock
others and to assert our freedom. We can assert our freedom with integrity
… act out of our center … in ways consistent with our values. You
see, the Bible also holds us responsible for how we respond to those who come
against us.
That's the other thing that amazes me about Jesus saying "Whoever is not against
us is for us." He transcends the
conflict to see the universal connection we share as beloved of God. Jesus
lived in a highly polarized day, too. The Pharisees hated the Sadducees, the
Zealots hated the Herodians, the
Jews hated the Romans. Jesus came along accepting them all and confronting them
all, and they all tried to attack him. Yet, somehow, if the gospel traditions
are correct, Jesus ended up having personal friends and followers who were
Pharisees and Sadducees and Zealots and Herodians and
Jews and Romans. He didn't categorize people and judge them as a class, and
even in a hostile and dangerous situation, he did not become paranoid and
controlling, rebellious and perverse, insisting that only his closest followers
could be his friends. Hated by his enemies, he refused to hate them. Crucified
by his opponents in the ultimate demonstration of their power, he responded
with the ultimate demonstration of his power … he forgave them. Do you
realize how remarkable and unusual that is in all of human history?
Will
I have seen and known the resentment of the racist, his hostility, his
frustration, his need for someone upon whom to lay blame and punish. I know he
is mistaken, misguided, and willfully disobedient, but somehow I am no always
able to distinguish between him and myself. My sins may not be his, but they
are no less real and heinous. Perhaps I have been too close to this man.
Perhaps if I had not heard his anguished cry when the rains didn't come in time
to save his cotton, if I had not felt the severity of his economic deprivation,
if I had not looked upon his agony on Christmas Eve while I, his six year old
child feigning sleep, waited for a Santa who would never come; if I had not
been one of him through these gales of tragedy, I would be able to condemn him
without hesitation. If I had not shared his plight; if I had not lived with him
in an atmosphere of suspicion, distrust, ignorance, misinformation, and
nefarious political leadership, surely my heart would break less when I see him
fomenting mob violence in front of his schoolhouse and his church house.
Perhaps I would not pity him as much if I were not from his loins. But pity him
I do.
Wrestling with this vision of his own face in the face of his enemy,
If an enemy turns upon us with hatred and spite, bitter, insecure, frightened
little souls needing to control by way of demagoguery and exclusion, and we, in
our resistance, also become hateful, spiteful, bitter little souls needing to
exclude them, has the enemy not won in a fundamental way? If, in the heat of
debate and self-defense, we wither spiritually to the point where we celebrate
our enemy's personal woes, we are no better than they. But then, indeed, that
is the whole point of the gospel. We are no better than they … we are
just as sinful, limited, and shaped in ways we do not even see by the culture
around us. And the grace of God is for them as well as for us.
Jesus had the Divine ability not to be shaped by those who opposed him. He did
not react to provocation but responded out of the center of his being. Perhaps
he recognized also the terrible waste of energy in letting ourselves be
consumed by hatred. A medieval Jewish story tells of an angel who appeared to a
man and told him he would return in thirty days and grant the man one wish. He
could have whatever he wanted if he would accept the condition that whatever he
wished, his neighbor would receive the same doubled. But the man hated his
neighbor, and he could not bear the thought that his neighbor would receive
twice as much as he. He could hardly sleep for thinking of it, and spent his
thirty days thinking more of his hatred for his enemy than his blessing by God.
Consequently, when the angel returned and asked what he wished, the man
answered, "I want you to put out one of my eyes."
The Old Testament prescription for justice, "an eye for an eye and a tooth
for a tooth," was invoked to limit the cycle of violent retaliation so
that total war would not result from minor offenses. Otherwise we would all be
blind and toothless. The New Testament replaced it with the law of love.
"Love your enemies, Jesus commanded, "and pray for those who
persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; who makes
the sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and
on the unrighteous" (Matthew 5:44-45).
The difference between "us" and "them" ought always to be
that we include them in the grace of God even though they might exclude us. If
we ever lose that difference, we will betray what we claim to believe. Remember
the classic word of the cartoon character Pogo? "We have met the enemy
and he is us." God grant us the humility to see that every human
struggle is “us against us”, and that God's grace in Christ is for
all of us, everywhere, including even the people we don't like because, well,
they don't like us. And God give us the wisdom also to beware those people
carrying ropes who come to save us. Amen.
May we pray?
God of us all,
Grant us courage to stand for what is right, to work for justice, and to
proclaim the gospel in the world, even if it means opposition. But grant us
also the strength of Spirit to respond to opposition with grace and in all
circumstances be Christian, for Jesus' sake. Amen.
Rev. Mary Anne Biggs, Pastor
Nekoosa United
Nekoosa