Peace Amidst Devastation: Peeling Onions (III of III)

In my last reflection I shared what I had recently learned about Aramaic references to a healthy or a diseased eye: how such terms can actually be statements about one's generosity. Or stinginess. Thanks to some helpful commentaries, a few scales fell from my eyes as I saw Jesus' words in a new light.

Here in this final reflection on "Peeling Onions" I turn back a few pages to Psalm 46, a Psalm best known for this little gem. (The onion's first layer.)

Psalm 46:10a - Be still, and know that I am God

This verse is a familiar one for Christians. It adorns the walls of Christian bookstores and (in needlepoint) the halls of many Christian homes.

It's not hard to see why. Though the word "Peace" is not to be found in it, it reeks of peace all the same. In so many words, it encourages us to relax and trust God, knowing that he's in control.

For those whose lives seem to be spinning out of control, this is an intoxicating promise. And a good one. One we do well to dwell upon.

But that's just the first layer of the onion. The astute reader will notice (!) that it is not even the whole part of a verse, and that the verse itself is, of course, part of a larger Psalm.

What does the rest of Psalm 46 look like?

Psalm 46
1 God is our refuge and strength,
   an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
   and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam
   and the mountains quake with their surging.

4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
   the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall;
   God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
   he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

7 The Lord Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.
8 Come and see what the Lord has done,
   the desolations he has brought on the earth.

9 He makes wars cease
   to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
   he burns the shields with fire.
10 ‘Be still, and know that I am God;
   I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth.’

11 The Lord Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.

To my great shame, I have a confession to make here. I've been memorizing this Psalm, and yet somehow I was nearly done memorizing it before I began to actually confront all of what it said. Sad. Be that as it may, I suddenly heard the word.

Come and see what the Lord has done,
   the desolations he has brought on the earth.

Desolations? Ouch. The next layer of our onion has peeled.

What happened to that warm-fuzzy poster quote material?? God... bringing desolations on the earth. What sort of desolations?

Well, Psalm 46 indicates that our God brings desolations through natural disasters as well as through war. Ouch.

If you were looking for a God who wears pink slippers and sits on a throne dispensing benevolent glances... maybe this God is not for you. The God of Psalm 46 is quite active. And more than a little scary.

That thought rankled within me for several weeks. We Christians quote the peaceful verse quite a bit. In fact, my wife and I use a calming song (for a Sunday School class we teach) whose main and only lyric is this:

Be still, and know that I am God.

We sing that through three times. And since the kids like it, sometimes we go for another round. But imagine the kids singing this:

Come, come and see... desolation of sea.
Mountains fall down... whenever he speaks!

Psalm 46 is not, end-to-end, a song of tranquility. It depicts God in the midst of a world wracked by at least as much upheaval as our own lives evidence. Probably a great deal more.

Christians often take Muslims to task for quoting little sound-bites from the Qur'an that seem peaceful enough–until you read the rest of the Qur'an and discover the wider context. We Christians are playing a bit of the same game when we quote Psalm 46:10 out of context.

But, as I say, I've memorized this Psalm and will continue to recite it until April. (At which point I turn 47 years of age, and I'll start in on Psalm 47!)

To my shame (again) it wasn't until I had recited Psalm 46 for several more weeks that the third layer of the onion began to peel away for me.

Yes, Psalm 46 paints a pretty turbulent and violent scene. But after one internalizes the craziness of all that is happening around the writer, peace returns to the scene. Not peace of the sort we use to calm children before bedtime. No. Peace of the sort that is useful to people whose lives have been turned upside down. The kind of peace a refugee from Syria could use.

Peace in the midst of a raging storm.

One thing in particular struck me one day as I reviewed Psalm 46 again. God is active in war, true. But what is he doing? Shattering the tools of war. Call me stupid, but I didn't really internalize that rather obvious fact until quite late in the game. God is bringing desolations, yes. But it appears he may be taking a turbulent world down a path that leads to a war-free world.

He makes wars cease
   to the ends of the earth.

Syrian refugees already know that the earth is not peaceful. That's not news to them, and they don't have the luxury of needlepoint assurances to the contrary adorning the halls of homes they had to abandon two years ago.

What Syrian refugees need to know is that, in the midst of this upheaval, God is still present. God is bringing good. God will, one day, make wars cease. What they need to know is this:

The Lord Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.

People don't build fortresses for giggles and grins. They build them because the world is a dangerous place. But fortresses are hard to build. And when you're done, is the one you built up to the task?

Contrast that with the thought of God himself being your fortress. God is not the sort of fortress that comes up short on strength, resiliance and durability. If God himself is our fortress, we can, even in a turbulent world, return to some rather peaceful and comforting words:

'Be still, and know that I am God.
   I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth.’

These words are not a needlepoint-stitched ticket to a blissful, idyllic existence. But they do promise us a future. One we can long for and anticipate. One where wars have ceased and where God is exalted. Let us seek that peace, and (even while it is not yet with us) remember that God will yet one day bring it about.

P.S. It was not my goal at the outset, but I find that all three of the threads in this reflection series invites a segue into politics. I accept the invitation. It is a fact that the Republican party is known for its belicosity. Democratic candidates find themselves trying to keep up, so as to not appear wimpy, but it is Republican candidates who lead the charge. What I find ironic is that the God of the Bible "makes wars to cease." Republican candidates will of course give lip service to this notion, but their chosen route to that destination is a dead (and bloody) end: more guns and a larger national defense budget. I suspect that it will be people with a Republican mindset who find themselves to be the very obstacles that God tramples on when he finally causes wars to cease. That's food for thought. (And probably an encouraging one for the Syrian refugees that Republicans love to hate.)

Giving Sight To The Blind: Peeling Onions (II of III)

Matthew 6:19-24

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

It took a a beautiful Wheaton College chapel message to get my lazy fingers into gear on these "Peeling Onions" reflections, but it was this passage from Matthew that inspired the title.

I recently began a slow walk through the New Testament. (Someone yells out, "How slow?") So slow that... well, put it this way. I just finished a slow run through the Old Testament, and that job took five years! But we digress.

So here we are on Matthew 6, and I read the above verses...

And I'm just about to move on... And I'm struck by a thought.

That's odd!

That... what?

Well, Jesus is talking about the dangers of money. And then he started talking about eyes... And then he started talking about money again!

I cannot claim to have read Leviticus more than twice in my life, but I've read the Sermon on the Mount dozens of times.

And yet. I had never noticed that oddity before. Why is a discussion about eyes sandwiched between two warnings about money?

I looked more closely at the verses again.

And I discovered a footnote I had never really noticed before.

"The Greek for healthy here implies generous."

Huh. OK... and what about the unhealthy eyes? Another footnote!

"The Greek for unhealthy here implies stingy."

OOOOOOooooh. So let's read that passage again.

The eye is the lamp of the body. If you see the world through generous eyes, your whole body will be full of light. But if you view the world with stingy eyes, your whole body will be full of darkness!

Wow. I've been reading that passage for decades. Never had a clue. But now I see that it's really a single passage about money. Always was. It just took me forty years to notice.

Thus the title of this blog: Peeling Onions. The Bible, God's gift to us, is the most beautiful document in the world. But! We have to read it slowly if we want to gain all that it has to give. We must move slowly if God is to peel away our misunderstandings and give us new layers of insight.

And now it's time (as with a TV commercial pitch) for the... "But wait!"

Yes. There's more. The Bible is even better than a multi-purpose Ginsu 2.

My encounter with Matthew 6? That happened in November of last year.

Yessir. I'm moving along at a good clip. Today I'm on Matthew 20!

One clarification is in order before we skip forward 15 chapters. The actual Greek behind that passage in Matthew 6 is singular. As in, Jesus spoke about a healthy EYE and an unhealthy EYE.

I mention that because we're going to find that EYE again.

(Keep your eyes open!)

Matthew 20:1-15
For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

“About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went.

“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’

“‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.

“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’

“When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’

“The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’

“But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’

Didn't see it? I didn't either. But it's there.

I wouldn't have known were it not for the commentary that pointed this out. But there it is. The EYE. The onion yields another layer. In Matthew 6, Jesus warns against seeing the world through a stingy eye. In Matthew 20, he bring his point home with a story.

Maybe we should be taking this one seriously?

My prior blog touched on politics, and it seems a return trip is in order. Before we hit the road, however, I'll note that I absolutely despise even the notion of being affiliated with any one party. I ask each and every candidate the same two questions:

1) Are you competent for the job?
2) How do your priorities align with those of Christ Jesus?

With that as backdrop, let's proceed. Well, it goes without saying that the Republican Party claims to represent Christians. And does so stridently.

So let's ask the question. Of the Republican candidates now vying to win the primaries... How many are viewing the world through a healthy eye?

Well, I guess we'd need to know how God sees the world to answer that.

In Matthew 20, we see that God wants to employee the underdogs. The under-employed... and pay these particular souls more than they deserve.

That, friends, is what Jesus says viewing the world generously looks like.

I'm not aware of any Republican candidates espousing this point of view.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Now it must be said that I've given Republicans most of my attention over these past two blogs. True enough, and there is a reason why. Jesus said it for me over 2,000 years ago.

John 9:41
Jesus said, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.’

The Republican party courts and expects the "Evangelical" vote. I put quotes around the word because it no longer means what it used to mean. Republicans still get that vote, but that simply goes to show that both Republicans and Evangelicals share a common problem: a diseased eye whose condition has worsened to the point of spiritual blindness.

...If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

Those are strong words for the Republican party. And for "Evangelicals", whatever that word means anymore.

But it's also a strong reminder for me. Do I have a healthy eye? I'm not a Democrat, much less a fan of the welfare state, and yet Jesus' story rivets me. At least in spiritual terms, God's grace is extravagant–so much so as to appear exactly that way. So I, too, am in the spotlight. And feeling uncomfortable. How much of my life is marked by grace like this?

To be continued...

What Trump Did Not Know: Peeling Onions (I of III)

Some works of art simply beg to be stolen and then shared with a wider public. Great masterpieces should not languish in a basement, as it were.

The same goes for good stories like the one I am sharing here.

Stealing, in this case, is a rather simple affair. A bit of cutting, pasting, and transcribing audio to words? Easy. Done. All taken from this YouTube clip.

Disseminating this gem of a story to a wider audience is the harder task. I have no "bully pulpit" with this blog. The nations do not gather at my URL.

And yet I feel compelled to give it vent. Share it all the same. A beautiful song, sung into the void is still beautiful. In this case, I'm repeating someone else's song. It hasn't been heard much, and the clip may go away. And many people don't have 30 minutes to spare. So I sing, into the void, a shorter version of it.

The song begins with this prologue. The set up of the story.

Anna O'Connor, the speaker's daughter, died four years ago. She died young. Of cancer. But the combination of her stunning beauty and her rare form of cancer seem to have brought her to the attention of "the beautiful people", as they call them.

One in particular, billionaire Teddy Forstmann, seems to have been the catalyst. As I review the Wikipedia article on this billionaire, I can see why. He, too, was stricken with cancer. He died a few months before Anna did.

But before he died, Teddy took Anna to many exotic places (I'm guessing they were all cancer charity events), and Anna found herself in the company of a host of famous individuals. I won't recite them all here, but only note the few that are key to this abridged telling of O'Connor's story.

First, a picture of Anna, taken by Gilles Bensimon, former International Creative Director of Elle Magazine. He took one look at Anna and decided a shoot was in order. It's not hard to see why.

For sheer, simple beauty, Anna is Marilyn Monroe's match.

Moving on, we pick up the story where Dr. O'Connor notes with glee, "Here's Anna with the next president of the United States..."

O'Connor stammers on, "... Is that allowed? Can I say that? Oh, I'm sorry, that must be the wrong slide. Here's Anna with the next president..."

O'Connor then adds a bit of astute political commentary: "I'm sorry this is so depressing! Am I right? Oh my gosh... what happened there?"

(The immortalized words of Buck Dharma in the I Could Have Used A Little More Cowbell SNL skit come to my mind: "He speaks for all of us!")

But here's the portion of O'Connor's story that I'm getting us to.

When Trump met Anna, he blurted out, "Wow, this one's beautiful."

But as O'Connor notes about Trump, "There was something he just... didn't know. So I suppose that will surprise some of you..."

[Crescendoing laughter, as the audience picks up on this dig...]

O'Connor continues, "Although on the surface, she appeared beautiful. I'm her father, I think I can say that. But not far below, she was a real mess. Her beauty, we might say, was only skin deep. So we'll call these scans...

This is where the onion peeling begins in seriousness. Anna O'Connor. Marilyn Monroe. To Trump? The situation is a draw. Both are beautiful women, and for his sexual purposes, both equally delightful.

What Trump cannot understand is that both women were, beneath the skin, rotting. But this is no tie race. No.

Here is where Anna pulls away from iconic Marilyn in this race of beauty.

No slam on Marilyn, here. I obviously didn't know her. But her life was a mess.

Anna, on the other hand, had only rotting flesh beneath her beautiful skin.

How ironic. It turns out that Trump was, in the final analysis, right.

Very, very right.

The onion, friends, has another layer to peel. On the surface? Beautiful. Below the skin, not so much. But peel one more layer and we find that Trump's analysis is (accidentally) spot on.

"Wow, this one's beautiful."

Why? As O'Connor shares, and the 30 minutes are well spent listening, Anna wanted to let God have his way in her life, and it didn't have to be according to her own terms.

That is not the picture of a girl's dream life. That's a young woman dying.

Why the smile? Well, she knew what Jesus knew. And what was that?

Confused yet? Watch the YouTube clip. But in this shorter MTV version? Jesus knew he would soon die. And it wouldn't be fair.

Jesus was able to do something beautiful because he trusted the Father with "the bad news" and embraced what God could do with such materials.

It was Jesus' faithful walk to the cross that changed the world.

But the offer is extended not only to Jesus. We too can do beautiful things with our suffering. Even now, four years later, I'm moved by Anna, a woman who also embraced her via dolorosa with an inner grace that far exceeded her natural beauty.

What an appropriate picture to lead me into the season of Lent.

Thank you, Dr. O'Connor. Thank you, Jesus.

I cannot end this reflection any better than with O'Connor's own words regarding his daughter Anna: "So we might say that just below the skin, it was a real mess, but deeper still there was a real beauty."

To be continued...