As the anger on the streets of our cities heats up over the policing of America’s black citizens, it’s become clear that way too many people are too apathetic to really care about the black struggle.. Instead, they are waiting for Jesus to somehow step in and solve the problem. My Facebook news-feed is filled with homages to Jesus, and his love for “everybody” (posted mostly by my white friends). “We must pray for those in harm’s way…” (again, posted by my white friends). “If only our country would come back to God, he would fix these problems” (an Evangelical meme that I wish would never be spoken again). And then, of course, there’s the President of the United States posing awkwardly with a Bible in his hand as if to convince us he’s “right.”
I’ve stayed silent for a while because I simply don’t know what to say. There’s nothing I can say to those who want to stoke interracial hostilities, their minds are already made up—and they will only see me as a ‘liberal Antifa Deep-state operative’ bent on destroying ‘America’ and bringing back a time when they were forced to care for people outside their tribe. And when it comes to those who agree with me, there are thousands of tweets, memes, articles, and postings making points in a way far more eloquent way than I ever could.
I can’t say to my black friends, “I understand what you’re going through…” because I don’t. It’s true I grew up a gay man in Wyoming and Montana, so I do know what it’s like to live in fear of being “found out.” However, if I practiced hard enough I could convince ‘most’ people I was straight. I did still have beer bottles thrown at my head, I had to be whisked away from parties to prevent a brewing fight, and I had “friends” threaten serious bodily harm when they found out who I was. But that was “when they found out.” It wasn’t necessarily obvious while I was driving down the street or standing in line to get dinner. (Although I did go through a weird glam-rock stage where I could see people literally cross the street as I walked by.)
But again, I could hide most of that. Skin color is hard to hide. Yet, silence isn’t an option either. One of Hitler’s most ardent opponents, the theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer has been cited as making this quote:
Silence in the face of evil is itself evil. God will not hold us guiltless. Not to act is to speak. Not to act is to act. He paid with his life for his stance against racism and genocide. While it’s true there is some argument as to whether or not he said it, it does sound like something he would say.
So, what do I do?
I appeal to those who at least claim to care about what Jesus said, and what he thought about “the others” who lived around him. And I start by saying, almost everything I’ve read about Jesus (and the quotes above) is wrong. The answer to our problem isn’t God, It isn’t Jesus, but it’s us. I don’t see anywhere in the Gospels where Jesus thought otherwise. I remember singing a song:
Jesus is the answer for the world today
Above him there’s no other
Jesus is the way
Yet I don’t find anything in Jesus’ biography, a.k.a. the gospels, where he taught this. Which means that the constant placement of our hopes for salvation are misguided, even according to Jesus. The Jesus portrayed in the gospels was a great ‘exception…’ a man so focused on ‘God’ that he made it his life’s mission to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to earth, where all of us could partake. He tapped into something that astounded those around him—so much so they were willing to leave everything to follow him.
His view of Yahweh at the times was, in many ways, unique. While God had been called a father before in Jewish literature, Jesus took that a step further; he used an Aramaic term: “daddy.” Fathers in those times were heads of households, they made the decisions for their wives and their children; and they were not to be questioned. Any disrespect from children could result in stoning. Once children were old enough, they recognized that, and used a much more somber name for their fathers. But not Jesus. To Jesus, even as an adult, God was personal. God was ‘Abba.’ Jesus saw this vast force in the Universe as being intimate. Even though the term could have connotations disrespect—within a relationship Jesus had with his God—was so intimate that the idea of disrespect never entered into his term.
The Jesus written about in the gospels was enlightened. The challenge though, is that those who wrote about him were not, and they set Jesus up in a position that would forever dis-empower humanity. We ceded our own power to a concept that Jesus didn’t preach.
And so here we are, staring down the barrel of one of the most difficult years society can remember, and we’re looking for something outside of ourselves to save us. Yet this was never Jesus’ message. Based on his biography, he didn’t appear to be under any illusions that God was going to do the work for him regardless of how much his daddy loved him. We know this because Jesus’ own behavior. He fasted, prayed, observed Jewish laws, went to desert, climbed the lonely mountain—all to know the will of God.
The word “prayer” in Aramaic meant, among other things means, “to set a trap for God.” In other words, Jesus set up his life so that his very personage drew God to him, and then retained that presence once it had shown up. He set himself up so that wherever and whenever God was near, Jesus “caught” him. Jesus tried to teach us how to ‘harness’ the power of God to do good in the world, not to force God to do the work for us.
Humanity has always tried to harness the power of the gods. We built temples, did rituals, danced, said certain words in a certain order… in all fairness, we think we’re witches and wizards, and if we do the right actions, we harness the power of God and force him to work for us. Yet Jesus didn’t do this. He was under no illusion that he could control the will of God. In fact, Matthew records his prayer at Gethsemane where he states just the opposite.
My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.
First of all, he KNEW what God’s will was for him—because he did the work. Then, he surrendered to that will—again because he did the work. And THEN… he did the work.
This challenge is up to US to fix, and to “give it to Jesus” is both to miss the point and relinquish our own power. Now they’re victims of life and Jesus didn’t seem to think that necessary. He believed WE had a lot of influence in the Kingdom of Heaven, but only if we worked together. Jesus never asked God for anything. His prayers consisted of thanking God that God had already answered his prayers, and then he went on to receive what it was he had been asking from the God in the first place.
Jesus isn’t the answer, he’s an example. We need to stop waiting for him to rescue us, and instead take on his approach to God. This isn’t about Jesus or God, this is about us—doing the work—surrendering ourselves to God—Not for the “answers,” but to remind us WE are the ones who make the change in the Kingdom of Heaven. Our ‘salvation’ is fully dependent up on us. And Jesus was convinced we could pull that off.
That being said, I pray every day to “God/the Universe/Whatever is out there” for help. But I have no illusions that anything is going to change without my help. I must speak. I must get involved. As Jesus would.