Sentimental Machiavellians

I was listening to a story on the BBC World Service this morning about the recycling of used pacemakers for use in the developing world.  There are laws and regulations in most developing countries that prevent the re-use of these devices.  There is a charitable organization in the U.K. which is working to facilitate this recylcing.  It involves working with families of people who have died and asking them to donate this small device.  It is a great idea making this life-extending technology available in places where the cost would make it prohibitive.  The human interest in this story was a older man in Mumbai, India who would likely have died some years ago had it not been for this effort.  At the end of the story it is noted that this man is now playing with his 8-month old granddaughter.  It is wonderful.

But then the reporter makes a statement that sounds lovely and heartwarming but disturbed me deeply.  Something like this: From the perspecitve of this man who had the joy and privilege of enjoying his granddaughter, the reporter said, "the complex logistics of ethics are unimportant."  Loved the story until this point.  Then I was disturbed.

First it is disturbing because I'm not sure it is true.  I am not convinced that her research into his history and convictions was enough to allow her to draw the conclusion that he felt the "complex logistics of ethics" unimportant.  What was clear, however, was that the reporter certainly held this view.  It would have been more truthful and journalistically transparent for her to say that, upon seeing this lovely family scene, to HER the "complex logistics of ethics are unimortant."  So first, own your own convictions and don't project them onto someone else.

Second, it is distrubing because, for many, I am sure it IS true. It is the cry "Don't confuse me with notions of right and wrong when something makes me feel warm and comforted inside."  As a grandfather myself I am delighted that this man had the joy of knowing his granddaughter.    However good and desirable a thing might be, it does not give us license to avoid the hard work of considering the moral and ethical implications of how we get to that good.  We have become, I am afraid, Machiavellians. But with a twist.  No one would accuse the author of "The Prince" of being sentimental.  The end justifies the means he said, however brutal or costly those means are.

We are Sentimental Machiavellians. The end (feeling a cheering and warm sentiment about something) justifies the means.  The "complex logistics" of right and wrong don't matter.  But they do. 

The pacemaker story is perhaps a bad example.  There is nothing in the practice of respectfully asking families if they are willing to donate a device that their loved one needs no longer to help prolong lives in developing countries.  And that's why the "complex logistics" comment is even more disturbing.  Slipped into a very good an reasonable story of people finding ways to help others in need is a bald and dangerous philosophical statement that encourages us to turn our attention from the consideration of what is right and wrong to the experience of having our heart warmed.

It is immaterial what altar we sacrifice the very real need for ethical consideration, be it political expediency or sentimental heart-warming or something else.  Ethics - right and wrong - matter and should not be so lightly dismissed.  Machiavellians, whether hard-hearted or sentimental, have it wrong.

Lost in wonder

Why is it that dancing while singing in church seems so natural here in Africa and so awkward at home? (Apologies to my daughter who is not awkward about it at all.)  We sang this morning some African songs in praise to God.  Nigerian bishops moved to the front  of the auditorium and danced, exuberantly, as they sang.  Here's the great thing.  They were joined by equally exuberant bishops from the West.  Let me say that the Right Reverend Martin Minns plays a mean tambourine.

Part of this, of course, is cultural.  When in Rome...  But it is also instructional.

The worship we do when we are gathered (as opposed to the worship we give in our lives at home, at work and in the community) is meant to be a foretaste of the great wedding feast of the Lamb.  Yet sometimes it feels like we are at a shotgun wedding and no one is very happy.  But why?

First, it is the Spirit Himself  who brings our hearts to worship when we gather.  It is the Lord who leads us to true repentance and the joy which brings praise and thanksgiving to Him. I don't want to whip up emotional response or advocate that people force exuberant worship.  Both of those flow from us and not from God.  But we need to be open to Him and to worship in Spirit and in truth. (John 4:23)

It is an image of being set free, from our sins and all else that binds us, like the spirit of the age, or even of Western secularism.  Two great hymns allude to this:

As he died to make men holy

Let us die to make men free. ( Battle Hymn of the Republic)*

Long my imprisoned spirit lay

Fast bound in sin and nature's night

Thine eye diffused a quick'ning ray

I woke the dungeon flamed with light

My chains fell off, my heart was free

I rose, went forth and followed thee (And can it be?)

I long to be free from all that binds me, my sin, my unforgiveness and resentments.  From all that stills the praise of God on my lips.

And here is another reason.  The Spirit will not descend to us for worship unless He has first descended to us convicting us of our sin and inviting us to repentance.  If you are anything like me you want to skip to the happy, joyful bit without stopping at the humbling experience of repentance.  Perhaps our gathered worship of God is comparatively lifeless because we our comparatively unrepentant.  The natural fruit of true, Holy Spirit inspired repentance is thankfulness, joy and praise.

Dancing in the aisles in praise is not the only expression of the joy of liberation in Christ Jesus.  I do not expect that when I get home I will find my congregation dancing in the aisles - although I would not be distressed by it.  But there are other expressions of that praise that are equally valid.  But it does rather need to be expressed.  I pray that we would be open to and waiting on the Holy Spirit to lead us first to  repentance and then to the expression ofpraise.

Charles Wesley paints the picture well:

Till we cast our crowns before thee

Lost in wonder, love and praise

*Which republic? Dreadful name for a hymn about the judgement and grace of God which brings us to praise His glory.  Makes it sound like a nationalist anthem. 

Little white lies

This is All Saints Cathedral in Nairobi, where the GAFCON meeting is being hosted and therefore where we hang out from 8 until 8 daily.  

Last night we heard about the East African Revival, a movement which began in the 1930s and has continued to shape the Church and the broader societies since.  One great example which was given to the whole conference was the story told by Bishop Samson Mwaluda with whom we worked just last week on our mission.  The family in which he grew up was transformed by his father's conversion to faith in Jesus thorough the revival.  It was a good story and great to see a familiar face speaking to the whole conference.

The theme which speaker after speaker repeated last night was the need for repentance in our lives for revival to come.  One thing that struck me was a short sentence, "There is no sin too small to confess".  I often think that repentance is hard with the "big" ones, but easier with the small ones.  That is not the case, and I had an experience of it this week while on mission.

You see, one night at the table I told a little white lie.  It was a small fabrication that was unnecessary but made me feel included in the conversation.  I was saying my prayers before bed when the memory of that small fib came back to me.  At the table of gracious hosts, in the company of my friends and brothers and sisters in the faith, I cheapened the truth and sincerity of that table just to feel more included in a conversation.  A little white lie, but I saw suddenly what I had done for what it was, a violence to that fellowship.  But why not just forget it?  It's really not that big a deal.

I slept poorly and was quiet at breakfast.  We went off to our last day of the mission and I remained uncomfortable.  Part way through the teaching on the work of the Holy Spirit it became clear to me that He, the same Holy Spirit, was impressing on me the need to confess and repent.  But it was not enough to confess and repent in my heart.  I needed to confess to another whom I had sinned against. I was humiliated.  For to confess this to another was to show him or her my weakness and insecurity.  What would be thought of me?

By this time it was simply a matter of obedience to the Holy Spirit.  I could not continue the work without coming clean.  It was incredibly difficult and hard on my pride, but I sought out one of my colleagues and told the truth.  I was graciously received, and, I am happy to say, not just excused with a "don't worry about it" but was forgiven.

There is no sin too small to confess and the little ones are frankly easy to gloss over.  Had I not said something, no one would ever have known, and I would have preserved my pride and the esteem of my friend.  As it turns out, I only had to sacrifice the former, not the latter.

Walking with God means walking in real integrity, even in the smallest things.  This was one of the marks of the East African Revival, and it has begun to make a mark on me.

You in your small corner

This Little Light of Mine was a Sunday School favorite when I was a boy.  It has continued to be as an adult because we sing it frequently at Isaiah 40 Foundation conferences.  Everybody knows it and seems to love it.  The verses end with this: You in your small corner and I in mine.  The excellent point made is that we should be salt and light wherever we are.

But this morning it has made me think of something else - the ubiquity of small-corner ecclesiology.  In the US and Canada, congregations, even if they are a part of a larger denomination, think in terms of my church, my congregation - my small corner.  There tends to be very little sense of the wider church.

Yesterday we had the opening worship for the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) in Nairobi, Kenya.  I have never attended a gathering of the Church which has been more than national.  This conference has gathered Anglicans from 41 nations around the globe.  It is not a small corner.

I was moved to tears, one of several times last evening, when the gathered host sang the hymn, Revive Us Again.  It was heartfelt and vibrant in expression and the prayer of the assembled.  To think, the Anglican Church globally was praying in song:

Alleluia, thine the glory, alleluia, amen!

Alleluia, thine the glory

Revive us again.

The other remarkable bit is that the prayer is revive us again.  The powerful preaching of our African Anglican hosts reminded us that revival is not for the Church or for nations but for individuals.  In impacting individuals, it transforms the church and whole communities and nations.  And most critically it begins with us, with me.  

Alleluia, thine the glory

Revive us again.

Light to them who sit in darkness

"Karibu" is perhaps the word I have heard most in the past week.  It is Swahili for "welcome" and that is what we have been in Kenya.  We have been preaching, teaching and ministering in the Anglican Diocese of Taita Taveta whose principal town is Voi.  This town is in southern Kenya, about a third of the way between Mombassa and Nairobi.  It is also at the crossroad of the road to Tanzania.  With the added feature of being tucked up between Tsavo Game Park East and West, it is growing fast.

As I think of mission, two things come to mind, preaching the gospel to the "heathen" and community development.  The Anglicans of Taita Taveta are doing just that.  They are on mission in their own community. Voi is not a big place.  It has perhaps 100,000 people now.  But from the top of the hill behind the town center you can see the roofs of four Anglican churches, not to mention the many others.  You can't swing a cat without hitting one - not that I tried.

The humble churches are filled on Sunday and many parishes have had to add more services on a Sunday.  People are coming to know Jesus, and the Lord is adding to their number almost daily.  

They are also committed to the growth and development of the whole community, not just their churches.  The mission statement of the church that meets in a temporary shelter at the site of the cathedral which is being built, speaks specifically of this.  The Church invests itself - both money and effort - into the infrastructure of the town.  They have built two office buildings that house local shops and businesses.  The building of them provides employment and the space they give allows businesses to operate and further develop the town.  The other plus is that it is a revenue stream for the mission.  Being salt and light by building and owning office space has never even occurred to me.

I have never seen a body of Christians who hold together so well those two aspects of mission, preaching the Gospel and community development.

And all of this makes me think about how we in North America could learn from this.  Our tendency, I think is to hold to one of these two in our exercise of mission.  If we are outwardly focussed at all, either we focus on evangelism and bringing people to know Jesus, or we engage in community development in assisting the poor and working for justice.  The Gospel proclaimers are often suspicious about the "social gospel" people.  They, in turn, tend to be uncomfortable with the overt proclaimation of the Gospel.  There isn't a polarization here.

Not that there are no problems here.  People are very poor, and therefore very desperate.  This makes crime an issue.  Despite, or perhaps because of, the growth in Voi there is a lot of unemployment.  As people who in generations past have been subsistence farmers become better educated, they move to the towns looking for work, of which there is not enough.  Young men, in particular, become depressed and as a result alcoholism is a growing issue.  As we prayed for people this week, one of the most common requests was for sons and husbands who have become alcoholic.

And we did pray a lot for people and they were eager to receive.  The Lord did much healing.  It has almost been cliché - improving eyesight and making the lame walk.  It was exciting to see.  And He also blessed His people with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, filling them and gifting them for the work of ministry and the building up of the Church.

I come back to what I think of as mission.  It is summed up in the words of Zechariah at the birth of John the Baptist.  To be a missionary is to be a prophet of the Most High who will "give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death." (Luke 2:79)

We go on mission to give that light.  But I have rather been receiving it.

Grace and peace to you,

Alex+

We're on a mission from God

I have the remarkable privilege in the next few weeks to spend some time in Kenya, first on a short-term mission to the Anglican Diocese of Taita Taveta and then to a global Anglican conference in Nairobi.  And it makes me think, naturally, of mission.

The only things I remember from the film, The Blues Brothers, are its title, its stars (John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd) and their iconic phrase, "We're on a mission from God."  I did not even remember what the mission was until I looked it up on IMDB this morning - they were trying to save a Catholic orphanage.  Their mission, although not what we classically think of as such - no unreached masses except perhaps Jake and Elwood themselves - but it was connected to the ministry of the Church.  It remind me that mission is a word whose roots are fundamentally Christian. Etymologically is is rooted in the Latin word that means "to send."  From the beginning Christians have sent people out to tell others about God's love and saving work in Jesus Christ.

The word, being a good one, has been taken for use in business and other sectors.  Everybody these days has a mission statement.  It is a distillation, as concise as possible, of what a business or organization is about - what they are trying to accomplish.

So as I go on mission, what am I trying to accomplish?  What is my mission statement?  Frankly, I don't know.  (This approach, by the way, is a recipe for business failure).  But there is a reason I am in the dark on this.  Like Jake and Elwood it is not the classical sort of mission - at least from my perspective.

We (the team of my bishop, two fellow priests and me) are ostensibly in Taita Teveta to preach and teach on God's healing power through Jesus and in the Holy Spirit.  And in that sense it is typical. We are going with something to proclaim.  We are going to give something we have and know.

But here's where it is not.  Paul expresses in his letter to the Colossians exactly what I feel about the East African Church:

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints.
(Colossians 1:3-4, ESV)

I have heard of the faith of the African Church and particularly of the Anglican Church in Kenya, of which I was for a time a North American missionary priest.  And I am in awe of their faith and courage.      And of the rate at which the Church is growing there.  It puts us in the West to shame.  Would that I had that kind of faith in Jesus Christ.*

So I go on mission feeling that those to whom I am supposed to proclaim something have rather more to proclaim to me.  So I don't really know what I am trying to accomplish.

But here is where we hit something else significant about mission.  MY mission statement is of secondary importance.  Because the mission is God's.  So I go on mission seeking to understand what God is trying to accomplish.  And I have confidence that it is to bring us all into a new or deeper knowledge of Jesus.

Grace and peace,
Alex



* I am reminded, however, that Jesus tells us that we need faith only the size of a mustard seed (Luke 17:5-6)

Rocky Soil

A couple of years ago our church had a booth at the activities fair for students at the University of Vermont.  This is a day where groups as diverse as Domino's Pizza and the campus hiking clubs have information and sometimes swag for students.  Domino's swag is always popular if not always delicious.  We had little packets of post-it notes with "St. Timothy Anglican Mission" on the back.  We gave quite a few away.

Yet one young man wandered by our table and picked up a packet.  When he had read the name of our organization he put it down hurriedly with what can only be described as disgust.  Hang on to this story.  I'll come back to it.

I live and minister in New England. There is a story, perhaps apocryphal, that some mission agencies who send people to Muslim countries send them to New England first.  To quote the apostle Frank, "if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere" (and I realize that New York is not a part of New England).  It is, as we all say, rocky soil.  Like that's never happened before.  I think we should stop saying it.  It is not novel.

Faith in Jesus spreads in contexts like this.  Or at least it used to.  The conditions of New England and, I would argue, most of North America are startlingly like that of the first century.  Here are some examples:

1.  New England is highly urbanized.  Vermont, northern New Hampshire and northern Maine are exceptions to the rule.  The rest of it is all city pretty much.  (My apologies to those who live in the beautiful rural towns of the other states for insensitively failing to understand your context.)    The New Testament church was mostly an urban movement.  Rome, Corinth, Thessalonica, Ephesus, Colossae, Jerusalem. None of these were remote villages.  The advantage to gospel ministry in urban centers is that there are lots of people there.  People whom Jesus loves and whom he wants to know.

2.  There is a diversity of belief in New England.  The Mediterranean culture of the first century was NOT religiously or philosophically monolithic.  As if.  Read about Paul in Athens (Acts 17).  He noted the great variety of altars and shrines to every god imaginable.  To be fair he was distressed by it, but he didn't berate the Athenians when he spoke but noted, quite rightly, that they were "very religious".  Every worldview is essentially a faith in something - science, money, a green earth, Jesus, Buddha or Dagon.  The people of New England are very diversely religious.  They are, I can assure you, passionate about what they trust in.  What I don't see in the New Testament is the complaint that "it's not like it used to be when we were a Christian culture" because it never had been.  But I was working on similarities here wasn't I?

3.  Much of New England is antagonistic to Christianity.  In the first century there was plenty of antagonism toward faith in Jesus Christ.  Paul's pre-apostolic career is just one example.  Paul's post-conversion experiences are another - just read Acts, or 2 Corinthians 11.  We might be tempted to think that modernly we have it harder (which we SO do not) because now people have baggage around Christianity - witness my opening story and the revulsion of the young man at the mention of "church".  In the first century Christianity was new, ergo, no baggage.  Well perhaps no baggage due to history but certainly some due to our practice.  In the first century people were disgusted by Christians because at their services they were cannibals, eating flesh and drinking blood.  Wait, that doesn't count.  They misunderstood what the Christians meant.  I am arguing that the current antagonism we experience and the disgust that the aforementioned young man felt are precisely for the same reason.  People do not understand what we mean - what the faith is all about.  And we've had time to explain - Peter and James and John were starting from scratch.

So what's different?  The automobile, mobile phones and soft-serve ice cream aside, I'd like to consider two things.

First.  There were missionaries to take the Gospel to those pluralistic and antagonistic urban centers.  Please don't take umbrage in thinking that I am condemning us for not being evangelists and failing to ask our co-workers if they have been saved by the blood of the Lamb.  There is much effort in many congregations in New England to grow the church.  And that's the problem.  We're trying to grow the church - not make disciples.  And here is the mea culpa moment.  As a pastor, like many pastors, I love the trappings of success - lots of people on a Sunday, programs for every imaginable group by age, interest and applicable dysfunction.  Much, not all, of our effort is is to get more people in the door.  It makes us feel worthwhile and significant. Forgetting that we are worthwhile and significant because God has loved us in Christ Jesus.  It is, of course, good for the Church to grow.  But that is a by-product of making disciples by taking the Gospel to those who do not know it.

This is blessedly absent in the work of St. Paul.  You will note that he never says in his letters, "I give thanks to God that your Sunday numbers are over 300".  He gives thanks for their faith, for their love.  If you read the book of Acts you will notice that Paul often doesn't stay around long enough to work on "church growth".  He is not growing the church.  He is preaching Christ crucified - a scandal to the successful and foolishness to the prosperous.

Second. Paul proclaims the truth of the Gospel in love.  Wait, why is that different?  Don't we do that too?  Yes.  Sometimes.  But not always.  It is easy to be sentimental, glossing over the inconvenient truth (apologies to Al Gore) so we can continue to feel warm - what we call love - towards someone or something.  That's love without truth.

But I am (and we are) also easily tempted to rant about how bad "society" is - as if we weren't a part of it.  Or we loudly condemn in word and deed things we find appalling or distressing.  I heard a story last week of a Christian responding to a blog post by a transgendered person.  The response was, "Disgusting!"  The response was disgusting.  I remind you of Paul in Athens. Paul was "greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols".  (Acts 17:16)  But the Athenians were blithely unaware.  of said distress.  Our distress is entirely beside the point "for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God." (James 1:20 ESV)

Make no mistake Paul proclaims the Gospel clearly:


Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.
(Acts 17:29-31 ESV)


Here is a clear call to repentance combined with real love.  And for whom?  The idolaters.  He was just following the lead of the One who loved tax collectors and sinners.

Jesus make us missionaries not just church growers.  For the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.  Help us, O Lord to speak the truth in love, because you love sinners and invite them to your table.

So here we are in New England.  Or Milwaukee or Toronto.  In very similar circumstances as the first century.  So that means we only have about 300 years before the future counterpart of Constantine makes it easier for us again.  Hope you weren't in a rush.

Ecclesiastical Narcissists

The church which I attend (and pastor) is a modestly-sized newish Anglican congregation.  We have been meeting weekly for five years now.  We are ecclesiastical bedouins. Having originally met in homes we moved to rent space from a Greek Orthodox Church and are now renting from a community center on Sunday mornings.  The homes were warm and hospitable, the Greek Church beautiful, and the community center clean and bright.  In different ways each has met our changing needs.  I am thankful - but troubled.

When I was a kid I remember that the church was always referred to as "God's house".  To be more accurate, even in the small village in which I grew up, one would have to say "God's houses" as there were several.  God appears to be well-heeled - the cattle on a thousand hills and any number of pied-a-terres scattered across the globe.  The original temple built by Solomon but envisaged by his father, David, was clearly understood to be the dwelling place of God.  David's distress was that he had a beautiful home in which to live but the ark of God - the mercy seat where his presence was understood to dwell - was housed in a tent. (2 Samuel 7:1-2)  It seemed to David, well, unseemly that God should be so poorly housed.

I was reading Ezra this morning on the rebuilding of the temple and was struck by this passage:
Then rose up the heads of the fathers' houses of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and the Levites, everyone whose spirit God had stirred to go up to rebuild the house of the LORD that is in Jerusalem. (Ezra 1:5, ESV)

The people and priests, and Cyrus king of Persia to boot, were interested in constructing a house for the Lord.  For his Name, for his honor.  Stirred up. And here is where I began to be troubled.  I stated above that all the places in which we have worshipped as a community have, in their turn, met our needs.  But as I read Ezra, I realize that our needs are really not the first thing.  Our congregation has not had the luxury (or burden) of building a church structure.  But I have seen the result of many such projects.  I compare the great cathedrals of Europe or even the small community churches of years gone by to the common modern expressions.  And I am troubled.

Help me understand: Why does the Lord needs a gas fireplace, comfy chairs and a coffee bar in the foyer?  All such things exist in some, admittedly beautiful, new churches.  We are concerned that there be ample and easy parking.  God forbid that we might have to hoof it a block or two to come to worship the Living God.  Our focus is on whether the buildings meet our needs and preferences - not that they are a fitting place for his dwelling.  I said we were ecclesiastical bedouins.  I fear that we are ecclesiastical narcissists.

The soaring vaults of the great cathedrals, while both beautiful and awe-inspiring for us, were not designed for us and our appreciation, but for the glory of God and the honor of his Name.  The builders of Solomon's temple and the second temple were concerned that the place be fit for the dwelling of the LORD.  We want to make sure it is comfortable for us.

I do not begrudge beauty and elegance in church architecture.  But I am troubled by its pandering to our tastes (because we are no longer talking about needs) and cultural expectations.  A church is God's house, a place for his dwelling.  This is perhaps a simplistic Sunday-school understanding.  But at least it reminds us that the temple is for God not for us.

Just

One of my daughters, when overcome with admittedly trivial, first-world crises, will often say, "I want to die in a hole" as an expression of protest.  It has been three months since I last posted so I want to say that I have not died in a hole.  Just a summer hiatus.

My children are now grown or nearly grown but I remember clearly one of the great cries of childhood, "It's not fair!"  This cry of protest can be easily evoked in any group of children - even two will do - by giving one of the crowd a larger piece of cake.  The magic of this is that the piece of cake need not actually be larger as long as at least one of the crowd perceives that it is.  Or has more interesting frosting.  Or is more desirable in a way that you have not even imagined. The cry goes up - "It's not fair"- railing against gross injustice.

Continuing with the idea of trivial, first-world crises, the cake scenario is a perfect example.  However it does serve to illustrate an almost innate desire for justice we have even at a young age.  Even recognizing that "it's not fair!" is, when translated, only "I don't like it", nonetheless the appeal is for justice or fairness.  At an early age we have a sense that things should be "fair."

And for most that continues into adulthood.  Many fight for societal justice in the face of many great injustices.  There are heroes of this fight - famous, like Rosa Parks, and unsung like folks I know who intentionally move to the poorest part of town to get involved in those communities.  The fight for justice is often quiet and gracious like this.  But it is also often strident and loud.  The Arab Spring is an example of the latter.

But I always come back to the cry, "It's not fair!"  The protest is to address the problem we see in the world or in our social structure.  The problem outside of ourselves.  I was arrested when I read this in the psalms last week:

For the Lord is righteous; he delights in righteous deeds, and the just shall see his face. 
(Psalm 11:8 1979 American BCP translation)

It is not those who fight for or care about justice who shall see his face, but those who are just themselves.  This is not a critique of the brave and loving souls who strive for justice in the world.  It is  a part of our Christian lives.  In my Anglican tradition one of our baptismal promises is to strive for justice and respect the dignity of every human being.   But while I am striving for justice, am I just myself?  It is always easier to see the problem that "they" have.

Before we give vent to our anger at injustice around us, perhaps we should begin with the injustice within us.  Jesus tells us to take the log out of our own eye before we take the speck of dust out of our brother's.

What Psalm 11 did for me this past week is to make me ask not, "Is it fair?" but rather, "Am I fair?"  A good question to ask.

Curiosity

It is all beginning to fade with the passage of time, but I think that I recall that one of the things we corporately and officially valued at GE was curiosity.  To be perfectly accurate under the heading "Imagine" were the values "passionate" and "curious."  One must be careful with words however.  Curious is used to mean interested and inquisitive, seeking to understand or it can be a euphemism for "weird" - as in Alice's observations in Wonderland, "curiouser and curiouser."  In the former instance these two qualities together are metaphorical dynamite, in the latter, perhaps literal dynamite.

All told, curiosity is seen as something of great value.  Something that drives us to learn and explore.  But it strikes me that this was not always the understanding or use of the word.

Curiosity has not always been a virtue.  All of the older texts I read suggest that curiosity is a vice.  Curiosity killed the cat, we are told.  

John Calvin has a few things to say about curiosity, specifically the disciples' curiosity whether this was the moment Jesus would restore the kingdom to Israel.  The context here is the first chapter of Acts at the end of the 40 days between Jesus' resurrection and his ascension.  Now that Jesus has risen from the dead the disciples are anxious to know when the actual ruling a kingdom part starts.  God's plan for redemption in Jesus is much bigger than the political control of a piece of Middle Eastern soil (a much-coveted piece, to be sure, even to this day.)  The disciples don't quite get that yet.  But let us not be too hard on them.  I often have a pretty small and parochial vision of God's purposes so I have no stones to cast.

Jesus' response to the disciples in Acts 1 is this:
“It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:7)

In his comment on their question and Jesus' response Calvin describes the disciples as rude, deceived, and bad scholars "under so good a Master."*  It is always fun to read the reformers like Calvin and Luther.  There is a candor and bluntness that we see little of in the attempt to maintain civil discourse.  It might not always sound charitable, but you don't have to guess what they actually think.

But back to curiosity.  On Jesus' "It is not for you to know" response Calvin says this:

"This is a general reprehension (rebuke) of the whole question. For it was too curious for them to desire to know that whereof their Master would have them ignorant; but this is the true means to become wise, namely, to go as far forward in learning as our Master Christ goeth in teaching, and willingly to be ignorant of those things which he doth conceal from us. But forasmuch as there is naturally engendered in us a certain foolish and vain curiosity, and also a certain rash kind of boldness, we must diligently observe this admonition of Christ, whereby he correcteth both these vices."** (Emphases mine.)

Curiosity does not come off well with Calvin.  And there are two reasons, I think.  First, Calvin understands that some things are not any of our concern.  In the information age, we are quite used to knowing everything - or at least having the right to know everything.  Those who have gone before us didn't think that way.  We attach great value to being "in the know."  They didn't.  And subsequently, curiosity was not always seen as positive.

Second, Calvin's conviction that these things were not their, or our concern, is rooted in an understanding of Jesus as our Master, or our Lord.  By virtue of his position and authority over us, he doesn't owe us the complete plan in advance.  The hierarchical order in this tends to rub our egalitarian sensibilities the wrong way.  Not so Calvin, or his forebears.  Contained in his worldview was the notion that he is under the authority of others, primarily God.  Calvin and the rest of the reformers were no yes men.  They challenged the ecclesiastical authorities - which is why there was a Reformation.  But they retained the conviction that Lordship and authority remain good things, despite what had been done with them.

The Lord, because he is Lord, is free to reveal to us what he wants. It is foolish curiosity and rash boldness to demand more.  Doing so is questioning that Lordship - at least on some level.

As I reflect on these thoughts and others in past blogs, I feel rather like a 16th century reactionary looking back to the good old days - very old days.  I am reasonably fond of the 21st century.  But I am thankful for the perspectives that I read in older writers.  They are not always right.  My worldview is challenged by older ones - and it should be.

*Calvin's Commentaries - Acts 1:6 and following.
** Ditto, or Ibid if you want to be particular