Tricky Dick, Grace, and Forgiveness

It has been a very long time since I published anything to this blog. There was a period of time where my life was in such a turmoil I didn't feel like writing anything. Some or the turmoil still remains and maybe I'll share more of that later, but right now I just felt there were still some things I would like to share.

One of those things, and one that actually pushed me to start writing again, happened a this summer and I noted it down and continue to think about it. You may remember a lot of news reports 'celebrating' the 40th anniversary of the resignation of President Richard Nixon.

I don't want to spend a lot of time talking about Nixon, but I also realize that there are a lot of people young enough to only know about this from history class (and how much do most of remember from our history classes). So, some background:

President Nixon was one of the most hated men alive for my generation. Kennedy got us into Vietnam, Johnson expanded that war--correction, 'police action'--but Nixon really expanded it and was the focus of many student anti-war protests. I remember the turmoil the nation was in--maybe in some ways similar to today, but in some ways worse. Certainly, not everyone hated Nixon--he did get elected twice--but he was a very polarizing president and those who were against him were very strongly against him.

Then came Watergate, and that's were everything really fell apart. Nixon tried to deny any involvement but gradually the whole thing fell in upon him. As more evidence came in, we all began to see just how extensive the lies had been, and even then Nixon continued to vehemently deny all that he had done. He destroyed the trust of a generation and maybe some of that effect is still being seen today in the lack of trust in any politicians or in government as a whole. But, that's another topic for another day. For Nixon, it continued to unravel his presidency. Impeachment proceedings were begun and only when his most fervent backers met with him to tell him that there was no possibility that the impeachment would fail to pass, did Nixon resign.

Just before he announced that to the press and the world, he spoke to the White House staff (the servants) and then to his administrative staff and the speech was not prepared or written out. It was impromptu, and even a little rambling. But, what struck me was the line that was quoted by all the various news reports on the 40th anniversary, because it was one of those things that was worth sharing.

Nixon knew that he would be vilified in history. He also knew that, as much as he would like to blame (and had blamed) others, it was his fault. He was finally ready to admit it, though not publicly yet. He praised his staff and didn't even hint that they were to blame for anything that happened. Then he said,

Always give your best, never get discouraged, never be petty; always remember, others may hate you, but those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.

I am not interested in rehabilitating Nixon, but there is a lot of wisdom in that statement, but also a lot of grace. Those who hate you only win if you hate them back. Nixon showed himself to be a paranoid leader, but he learned something pretty valuable through it. We tend to hate people who hate us, but hatred only produces more bitterness and unhappiness in our own selves. If we hate those who hate us, we destroy ourselves.

Reminds me of Joseph, who was incredulous when his brothers late in life still feared that he would get even with them when their father died. They simply could not imagine any other outcome, because that is what they had done to Joseph decades earlier when they plotted to kill him and only reneged on that when the opportunity arose to sell him into slavery and make some money off it (Wonder what they did with that money). They sold him to traders on their way to Egypt where in all likelihood he'd be put to work in some grand building project and die in hard labor. Now, Joseph had the opportunity to get even and their father's death made that easier.

But, Joseph's answer was (paraphrased), "How could I do that? Am I in the position of God? I have no authority to punish you (though legally, he did with his high position in Egypt)." He didn't exonerate them (telling them bluntly that what they did had been evil), but he did forgive them. And, his forgiveness was not just tolerance (which is what much of what we call forgiveness actually is) but real forgiveness. It was over for him. That's grace. And, he not only didn't punish them, he had rewarded them and taken care of them and their families for years.

Nixon's statement showed great wisdom, but it was also practical. It doesn't help to hate. It only satisfies the hatred of your enemies and makes them feel even more right to have hated you. And, the bitterness destroys you.

But, Joseph doesn't go the practical route in his reply. How did he forgive them to such a deep and fundamental level. I think it is because he also recognized the hand of God in what the brothers had done. God didn't force them to do it, they plotted the evil solely of their own volition, and Joseph stated that very clearly as well. However, God, in a sense, twisted their plan into something good that resulted in the Joseph's rise to such a lofty position, but also saved the lives of many people from a 7 year famine. That's what Joseph said.

Ironically, the primary beneficiaries of that salvation were the very evil brothers who sold Joseph as a slave. And, that didn't bother Joseph one bit. For some people, even that would have created bitterness, but Joseph had a completely different world view than most people. God is sovereign, but that doesn't make God responsible for evil. Men make their own decisions and do what they want.

But, Joseph saw God as one whose sovereignty is so complete that it works in a way that is incomprehensible to us. We get things done by controlling others to the extent that we can and manipulating them as much as we can beyond that. We control by systems and rules. But, God can have sovereign control without controlling men's decisions and actions. And, if that is true, it should relieve us of a great burden. We may fear disasters and epidemics, but in everyday life what we really fear is that other people will harm us--whether it's a thug with a gun, a coworker who is manipulating the boss behind our backs, or a friend who could (and sometimes does) betray us.

But, if God can turn evil plans into good, then we don't have to worry that someone might do something to harm us, and when they do, we don't have to worry that this will be the end and have lasting results.

Nixon doesn't mention forgiveness, but for us that's the further result. We can forgive, and not just because to not forgive would only satisfy the one who harmed us. We can forgive because what they did, if it was wrong, was ultimately against God and not against us. And, God can turn evil into good for those who are willing to trust him, and that is the key component. What happened to Joseph in the end only happened because he was able to trust God. I don't think the story would have turned out that way if he had turned on his brothers when he had the chance.

No one can truly harm the believer, at least not in the ultimate long-term (eternal) sense. Others may harm you, but they only win if you turn on them and take the matter into your own hand. And then, you destroy yourself. Those who are willing to forgive and let God judge them are the ones who win. They are the ones who are blessed.

Who's The Man?

Jeff Hawkins replied to my previous post:

"Personality Cult leadership is a HUGE factor in the church today. Churches are built around a "man" and not THE Man, Christ Jesus. New Testament pattern of "plurality" in leadership is crucial...."

Jeff went on from there, but I wanted to focus on this topic first.

I certainly have to agree. A few weeks ago I turned on CNN as I was eating a snack and listened to Piers Morgan interviewing Joel Osteen and his wife. Besides all the problems with his theology and view of God, what struck me was how he was clearly the center of a church and a financial empire. While he talked about God, everything was really about him.

That is an extreme example, but, though maybe more subtle, not really all that uncommon. We don’t have to look far to see many examples of this and in fact, there are times in almost every church when you can at least see shades of this. In many churches, no one questions the pastor, and if they do, it becomes a huge and divisive issue. There is a Chinese saying that you might hear in a Taiwan church which roughly translates as “To be submissive is to be blessed (祝福就是夢福)”. In other words, we'll all be better off if we just do what the pastor says. Leaders lead, the rest follow.

But, is this really the way it is supposed to be? I remember a quote by Peter Jensen to the effect that God is sovereign and he does not delegate and I think that is true. It’s not that God doesn’t give us the privilege of serving and even the privilege of some kind of authority. The issue is what that means.

Do we really believe that we are sinners; that we really are depraved? Do we really believe that this sin nature has affected every facet of our selves? Or, do we think that this is somehow changed when a person becomes a pastor? I can't see anything in the Bible that would imply this and all we have to do is look at so many examples of “fallen” pastors to know that this isn’t the case. Pastors fall just like everyone else at times and it’s a bit disingenuous to think that this is because they are somehow not real or something like that. If we truly believe in a sin nature that is common to all, then no matter how good our intentions are, no matter how strong our faith is, we must keep that in mind. We are still sinners and if so, we cannot completely trust any decision or action that we (or others) make.

I don’t in any way mean that we should become suspicious people, no more than we should be suspicious or our own selves. But, maybe that’s a key to understanding the concept of servant leadership. We know that we ourselves are not always perfect (unless we are a bit psychotic). We know that our motivations are not always the best. We know that we make mistakes and some are big (and embarrassing). We know that we are not always completely honest. That doesn’t mean that we don’t trust ourselves (otherwise we wouldn’t argue our points so forcefully and defend our views or ourselves), but it does mean that our trust is tempered with reality. It means that we study “experts.” It means that we ask others’ opinions about things. We even define “smartness” sometimes by saying things like “smart people are people who know what they don’t know.” We know that we need other people to get by and make progress.

So, why would we build a church around a single man? In a sense, to the extent that a church does that, it is to that extent setting itself up for failure. But, even if we leave out the possibility of catastrophic failure, anyone time we give one person too much power or influence in an organization, we then limit that organization so that it can never grow beyond that person’s limitations. It will develop along the lines of his strengths and those are the things that may be most obvious in the beginning, but it will also build in his weaknesses. The longer this goes on, the more “warped” the organization or church will become.

I think that’s why we need to go toward a type of team leadership. That doesn’t mean that we lead by consensus or that there can’t be one person in charge. Those mistakes are recipes for failure or at least mediocrity. But, leadership is not absolute and untempered. It's not enough to say that the leader must depend on the Lord to guide him. Certainly that is true, but the reality is that no one ever fully depends on the Lord, and we need the help of others. A man who cannot follow has forfeited the potential to lead.

There are Bible passages dealing with this that I think we sometimes overlook or explain away. Paul includes in his exhortations on submission to authority the statement that we are to be submissive to one another. Even leaders have to submit. Jesus mentions the Gentile rulers who rule by authority and power and then tells his disciples that they can't do that. He destroys the argument "but I'm doing this for their own good" by a little aside that these Gentile rulers consider themselves to be acting out of benevolence. It's not enough to have good motivations. You can't be like that. He uses the example of a servant (who might have some authority over another servant, but still are quite limited) and then to make sure that we don't explain that away, he mentions the example of a small child.

We need to think seriously about leadership and what it means in the church. I'm afraid we've taken our own understanding of leadership and read that into the Bible. The problem is not just pastors who make themselves the center or who don't listen to others. The problem is maybe even more that this is what we expect and what we promote.

Children, especially in the society that Jesus lived in when he spoke to his disciples, were not allowed the room to express any of the traits that we would normally associate with a leader. But, Jesus told his disciples that they needed to be more like a small child and even that the more they took on the position of a child, the greater they were.


It may not make sense to us, but we can't dismiss it just because it doesn't make sense. These are the words of Jesus, not just the words of a disciple. He said it. Do we understand? The more we try to explain it away, or the more it doesn't make sense, the more it means that we are off the mark. Maybe we are clueless, but we need to look at this further.


Your thoughts?

On Behalf of the President of the United States of America

My father was in the Navy steaming towards the Pacific battle zone for his first term of duty when the Atomic Bombs were dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki which precipitated the end of World War II. He never saw combat, but he had signed up voluntarily as a 17 year old to go and serve his country. He was willing to lay his life on the line for it.

Last week at his burial a representative handed us a flag neatly folded into a triangle. As he presented it to us he said that he did so "on behalf of the President of the United States of America." It struck me at the time how that sounded. It was touching and full of meaning, but at the same time, I'm quite sure that President Obama had no idea that my father had died and that someone was speaking and giving out a flag on his behalf except to the extent that he knew that it happened regularly at funerals for veterans. He's the President of the United States, still the most powerful nation in the World and with lots of business on his plate every day. There is no way he could possibly handle all the affairs of the Executive branch of government alone and he relies on a lot of people with delegated authority to act in his name. That is just the way it has to be. I would not expect him to know about my father who served a short stint in the Navy long before the President was born and who never saw any combat.

Which makes it all the more amazing that God knew William Jasper Franklin completely and intimately, even better than my dad knew himself and, according to the Bible, is presenting him with a Crown of Glory. It's mind boggling to think that the God of the universe knows him as well as everyone else on this globe, not just as a name, but personally, intimately. Of course, anything less and he would not be omniscient, he wouldn't be God. Still it's something so wonderful that I can't imagine what it means.

For God so loved the world.... That's easy to say when the world is just an abstract collective noun. But, when you know every single individual and can still say that you love so much that you give your son to die for each one of those people, that puts things in a new light. He knows me. He knows all that I think and do. He knows about things that I hope no one else knows about. He knew about them even before there was me. Yet, he still loves me and he put his life where his mouth is. And he knows every other person on this globe in the same way--everyone I have ever met, will meet, or never will meet. He knows them intimately.

What does that have to do with the church and with missions? You tell me. I think I know, but I'd like to hear more. I know that it speaks to where my heart should be. And, when I speak of the Gospel, the good news of God's love, I am offering a gift on behalf of the God of the Universe--not a flag but the possibility of crown of glory. Everyone that I meet, including those who I would rather not have met, has the potential of becoming a creature glorious in God's sight.

Why is Good Friday good?

We don't usually think about it very much, but I suspect that, to a person who knows nothing about Christianity, it would seem more than a little strange that we call the day Jesus was killed "good." Jesus is our God, the founder of our religion (trying to describe it from their point of view, not mine), the good man that we follow. Why would we celebrate his death, and more than that, why would we call it good?

One perspective would be that it is "good" for us, because his death paid the price for our salvation, and that is true from a believer's perspective, but that is far too self-centered to be the whole picture. I don't think that salvation is nearly as human-centric as we sometimes think. Certainly it is true that God loved/loves us and that means that we have worth as an individual. But, I don't think that salvation is fundamentally just saving us from damnation. It's not a "get out of hell" pass. It's not a ticket to heaven. Those things are included, but not the center.

Salvation is a restoration of a relationship that should never have been broken in the first place. Adam sinned as he rebelled against God. He didn't believe God, didn't trust God, and even to the extent that he did believe, he still decided to go his own way. We are born alienated from God. Our true "damnation" is not just to hell, but to an alienation from God--and by extension, alienation from each other. In fact, C.S. Lewis described hell that way--as the place where man finally gets his wish to be independent and to get his own way. It is for people who, instead of saying as Christ did, "nevertheless, thy will be done," say, "my will be done." Hell is taking our current state of alienation, and making it eternal and more stark. God, in his extreme mercy, gives us a chance to return to the relationship that we were created to have, primarily with God, but also with others by extension.

And, that is the gospel that turns everything that seems real to us upside down. We like the concrete, but God offers us hope. We like it now, but God offers us only a little bit now, with the promise of glory to come. We like things that we can understand, can picture, and can see examples of in nature around us. But Christ offered a gospel that turned it all upside down and backwards. Those who are called "blessed" in the Beatitudes don't sound very blessed in normal human thinking. Christ said to turn the other cheek, to offer a man your cloak, to love your enemies, and much more. He said that, if we want to lead, we have to serve and take the lowest place of a slave or a child. He said that if we want to really, really live, we have to die.

That doesn't make much sense to us most of the time. I know that we can describe it in ways that do make sense and even to say that it doesn't make much sense will probably provoke a strong reaction among a lot of Christians. But, it's easy to tell people what this means and rejoice in this grace in church. It's a lot harder to live it outside (or even in church, for that matter). So, we don't turn the other cheek and don't teach our kids to do so either. We value strength, independence, freedom, honor, glory, position, power. We preach the walk, but seldom really walk the walk. We don't really believe that what Christ tells us to do can really be good. It doesn't make sense.

And, maybe that's what makes Good Friday "good." It's a reminder to us that God doesn't do it the way we would expect. It reminds us that things don't often go the way we want them to go, or in the way that makes sense to us. It reminds us that disaster can be victory, that death really does bring life, that turning the other cheek is not just an ideal or a platitude. It's the way God did it. It tells us that God is the ruler of the universe and that nothing escapes his control. It tells us that, even when he seems to lose control (Can God be killed? Crucified by man?), that is the moment when he exhibits the most power. It's not the kind of power that makes a showy display. It's the kind that gets the job done without anyone noticing that it's working.

Remember when Joseph's father Jacob dies and Joseph's brothers begin to again fear for their lives. How could Joseph not punish them? He had been holding back because he didn't want to hurt his aging father, but now with the father gone, he could do with them as he wished. With that fear in their hearts, they come to him to manipulate him based on the memory of the father and to beg him to forgive them. He responds almost with incredulity, telling them that he couldn't possibly usurp the place of God, but then adds to that a statement that is so simple, but so fraught with meaning. He doesn't at all belittle their sin or overlook their guilt, but he paints a picture of a God who is in completely control, even as they followed their own free will. He says (my paraphrase), "What you did was evil, as you schemed against God, but God had his own plans and He made your plans result in accomplishing His." God is so sovereign that his "rule" is almost incomprehensible to us. He can accomplish his will without pulling strings to make us do anything. The brothers followed their own wicked plans, but in doing so, the put Joseph in the place so that his dreams were fulfilled. They bowed down to him of their own free will.

Tolkien said, "All that is gold does not glitter, not all those that wander are lost." Things are not as they seem. There is a player in the background, and he always gets his way. we don't have to understand; we don't have to see how this is going to work. Good Friday is "good" because it tells us that God's will will be done, on earth as in heaven. There is nothing at all--even what seems to be abject weakness, passivity, and failure--that can stop him from accomplishing his will. That is what is "good" about it.

And so, we can celebrate Good Friday just as much as we can celebrate Easter and resurrection. We can be thankful (which is what the ancient word for the Lord's Supper, the Eucharist, means) for his death. Our thankfulness is not selfish or self-centered because it is not based on what we got out of it. It is because we get to see a glimpse of the power and glory of God even when He does not look at all powerful. And, that is the gospel, that is our faith. It is foolishness to the world because it is completely backwards from our thinking. But, it is that which gives us the power to live as Christ commanded, because we can know that there is nothing at all that Satan or anyone else can possibly do to impede the will of God. No one can harm us as we trust in Him. Nothing can separate us from the love of God and nothing is outside his realm of authority.

And, that is truly good.