Redemptions-R-Us

  This is the back side of the previous post in which I complained about the inappropriateness of the pat answers we give when our friends encounter tragedy.  It doesn't feel like "God is good all the time" when we have lost a loved one.  And when we are hurt at the hands of another human being, it's hard to believe that "God is in control".  We know who was in control, and it wasn't God.

  But here's the other side of this thing that I did not address in the previous post: God really does very often seem to redeem tragedy and bring good out of it.  I'm not saying it happens every time, and I'm not saying it's what God had in mind in the first place, but I have personally experienced many times in my life when apparent good has come on the heels of a terrible calamity, rather like the story of Job in the Old Testament, but for me, never on such a grand scale, thankfully.  Job lost his wealth, his family, and his home all in one day, but later it was all restored to him, and several times over.

  One of my favorite names for Jesus is "Redeemer".  I think it's his middle name, perhaps, because this characteristic has been so evident to me so many times in life.  I don't understand how God can relinquish control of his human creation by granting him free will, then when things get totally messed up, employ his redeeming power to save the day.  It's one of the mysteries of existence that seem to be impossible, yet real.

  One small example that is very much on my mind, as it was the catalyst for this blog, was the experience of my own exile from the institutional church.  When my local congregation blew up, forcing 150 exiles into the religious wilderness, it was evidently the result of the selfish actions of a few power mongers in the church leadership who had to have things their way.  They told us that God was in control, but it was obviously not the case; they were firmly in control and expecting the submission of all their underlings (see my earlier posts on Harmful Hierarchy and others).

  I was absolutely sure that God had not had his way, that men's free will had trumped the will of God, and that scores of displaced believers were victimized in the process.  You know this if you have read my earliest posts, 'cause you can see my disgust with the behavior of these people.

  But now, several years after the fact, I am in a place of unimagined freedom.  I have a completely new understanding of the role of the church in the world and the standing of the individual believer with the Lord.

  All my life I sang songs about the glorious freedom of the believer, and while experiencing that freedom in my personal life, I wondered why it didn't seem to exist within the walls of the church.  I would exult in my relationship with the Lord when I was alone, only to have my salvation taken away on Sunday by men who preached a works-based redemption that somehow depended on my ability to pull myself up by my own bootstraps - with God's help, of course.

  Staying outside the walls of the local church has been the best thing that could have possibly happened for my spiritual well-being.  There really is no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus and who aren't inside the church building (Romans 8:1 - sort of).  Go figure.  When my friends and I were ejected, we were confused and bewildered at first.  But no more.  We are loving it.

  And here's the thing:  Many of us are wondering if God had this in mind in the first place.  Would he purposely blow up a congregation in order to get us out into the community like he intended?  Did he intentionally harden the hearts of the church leaders like he did with Pharaoh at the original Exodus so that he could accomplish a mini-reenactment at a little country church in rural Michigan?  (Actually this is happening everywhere.)

  Or was this a redemption of a sorry situation where out-of-control church leaders blew up a church and then God brought good out of it anyway?

  We are still not sure, but many of us are saying he meant for this to happen.  One thing is for sure: We are in a wonderful place, and we will never go back to the old life.

  Okay, nobody died in the scenario that I just described, so maybe it wasn't a serious enough example of tragedy being redeemed by God.  But it was a life-changing experience for my friends and me, and it serves to raise the question about how much of the bad that happens to us is the will of God in the first place or whether it is instead, the redeeming work of God bringing good out of evil.

  Anyway, I'm not changing my position on my earlier post; I still think we should be careful to mourn with those who mourn and not devalue their heartache with our pious platitudes.  I just thought I should acknowledge that these pat answers come from somewhere, and maybe they are rooted in the truth.  God really does have the power to bring good from bad, and he often exercises that power.

  Have you seen this happen in your life?  Is this God's built-in antidote for the destruction that's caused by human free will and our existence in a fallen world?

God is Good All the Time - or NOT

   (--or this could be subtitled, "Destructive Pious Platitudes".) 

  We met them at the huge flea market where they had the booth next to ours and were selling a zany assortment of trash and treasure from Model A tires to gooseneck lamps.

  We had been eager to press on with our downsizing and pursue the gypsy life, so in an effort to lighten our load of inventory left over from the Christmas store at our former Christmas tree farm, we had set up shop at the annual Thumb Octagon Barn Fall Festival where we thought our mix of antiques and photo art would be likely to sell to the thousands of visitors. 

  Rick and Mary were in the next booth, and they were as friendly a couple as you might find anywhere, very soft-spoken and unassuming, and we were three days into our four-day weekend of camaraderie, trading watermelons and fried cakes across the tables, before the subject of spiritual journey came up.

  It came about in the most off-handed way, but it seemed as if Rick had been waiting to share all along, and he started into a tragic story, telling of a disastrous head-on crash years ago that had taken the lives of his first wife and 18-month-old daughter.  It seems that some drunken teenagers had been on a wild spree that started as a joy ride that turned into a high speed chase propelled by the police sirens and flashing lights in their rearview mirror, and a few miles down the road, destiny met destiny in a pile of twisted metal and glass where blood and antifreeze ran together to the curb.

  Somehow Rick and his son survived the crash, and shortly the local parish priest arrived at his bedside in the hospital to minister to the broken man in his hour of grief, and that's where Rick's spiritual journey took a drastic turn.

  "This is part of God's plan for you," said the priest in comforting tones, but Rick didn't see any comfort in it, and his heart was repulsed by God's apparent cruelty to him and his family.  After a while he recovered physically, but he never regained the same spiritual fortitude and quietly slipped away from the Catholic Church never to return.

  His theological platform is a simple one now, and it's a long way from the Catholic catechism. "Believe what you want to and believe it well, and you'll be fine," is what he asserts now, and it seems to be working for him, though his second wife, Mary, says she hasn't abandoned her faith but seldom attends church.

Mary & Rick, former Catholics

  Before we parted company, I told Rick that his story was an unusually tragic one, but that in one way it wasn't uncommon in that many folks have been put off by pious platitudes coming out of the mouths of well-meaning friends and family during times of grief.  People don't know what to say, so they revert to the familiar pat answers.

  Kaye and I have both been through cancer a couple of times, and have been surprised at the insensitive things that people say in their eagerness to help.  I told Rick that the Bible says we should "mourn with those who mourn." (Rom. 12:15)  The Bible does not say we should try to cheer each other up when we are going through tragedy.

  Here are some pious platitudes I've heard that have not been all that helpful to me:

• "God is in control."  This really has an entire theological school of thought behind it, but I would simply counter that when God gave man free will, he gave up control.  And so there can be Hitlers and Gaddafi's and drunken teenagers in the world who take the lives of innocent people.  So it may not have been God's will that Rick's wife and child were wiped out in a grinding crash on a lonely blacktop; it was a result of the choices (the free will) of some carousing teenagers high on weed and alcohol.  In the Lord's prayer, when it says, "your will be done on earth as it is in heaven"(Matt.6:10), it alludes to a future time and dispensation when God's will may be done on earth.  Until then, the will of God is very often not done in the world, and many people suffer because of it.
• "God is good all the time, all the time God is good."  This is an American Christianism that comes out of an affluent society without regard for the rest of the hurting world.  Tell the two million Christians who were systematically murdered by the tyrannical government of the Sudan that "God is good all the time" and see the puzzled looks in their eyes.  Tell the descendants of the six million Jews wiped out by Hitler that "God is good all the time", and see if they agree with you.  Tell your friend or family member who has just been told they have terminal cancer that "God is good all the time", and see if you get an affirming nod in return.
• "I don't know how I would get through this without the Lord."  It's been my experience with folks who do not know the Lord, that for the most part they get through things just as well as the faithful.  They just call it luck or fate, not the Lord, and they adjust.  On the other hand, not everybody who has the Lord recovers very nicely either.
• You fill this one in with a Comment below.

  If I'm making a point here it is not whether these statements are true or false; I'm saying that they may not be the best things to bring up when someone is grieving.  People may simply need someone to cry with them.  That's all.  You know, in Bible times when someone lost a loved one, mourners would show up at the house and weep and cry and wail and help the person grieve.  Their job was not to encourage, at least not at first.  Maybe we should revive that old tradition; it might be more appropriate than telling people, "I know how you feel, and believe me, you'll get over it with time."

  Okay then.  Kaye and I have been enjoying the folks we've been meeting on the city streets and country roads this summer, and Rick and Mary were a delight to associate with while at the Octagon Barn Festival.  Oh, and we all made a few dollars too!  We went with two pickup loads and came back with one.  Praise the Lord!  -- or praise the people who needed all that junk we were selling!