I watched 60 Minutes on Sunday night and was overwhelmed by the pain of the veterans of the Iraq war who returned to Iraq to deal with their problems. One of them was a soldier who was wounded, and whose lieutenant came to his aid and was killed in the process of retrieving him from danger. His guilt for his lieutenant's death was palpable. He spoke of terrible dreams and lack of sleep from the moment of his wounding on.
The program that took these men back to Iraq was an excellent one that produced some fine results. Some of the men said that they had been helped by the process and had had a lessening of their symptoms. It was incredible to me to see the sacrifice that these men had offered to their country, and I was reminded again about how the rest of us more or less sat out the war while they fought. I also wondered what the members of the last administration would think of these stories of the soldiers' sacrifice in the war that we became involved in without any requirement on our part for sacrifice at all. We got off Scot free in this war, no matter how we felt about it.
What I saw in the eyes of those men who had fought in Iraq was the meaning of hell. We think of hell as the place where bad people go when they die. That has been a part of our theological thinking for centuries. But the truth is that we create hell here on earth all of the time. We do it in the way that we blame others for our problems; for the unthinking way that we treat the unfortunate, and deny care to people who desperately need it. We do it manifestly in our war making, in the way that we enlist our young to carry on the business of war for the rest of us, then sit back and comment on the progress of it, or don't comment at all and just let it go on.
Matthew's Gospel has a series of stories in the 25th chapter that demonstrate the meaning of Hell. We hear about the foolish bridesmaids who are shut out of the wedding banquet because they are off buying oil for their lamps. That is followed by the story of the frightened servant who buries his talent in the ground because he was afraid of his harsh master. He has his talent taken from him and given to the man with ten talents and he himself is thrown into outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. The final story in this Gospel is the story of the sheep and the goats, where the sheep who took care of those in need were accepted into paradise, but the goats, who ignored the poor among them had to depart into eternal fire because of their neglect.
It is no wonder that hell has become such an overwhelming part of our theology. If what Jesus is saying in these stories is literally true, then we are all in trouble; because there is not one of us who has not been foolish like the bridesmaids, frightened like the servant with the one talent, or neglectful of the poor like the goats.
So then, what do we all have in store for us when we meet our Lord? Are we all destined for the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth? There was a preacher who was preaching about this and was asked by a member of the congregation, What about the people who have no teeth? The preacher responded without missing a beat: Teeth will be provided!
If our damnation is not the issue here, then what is? What is Jesus trying to tell his followers in these stories? It seems to me that the point of all of these parables is the same: Keep Awake! Keep watch because we don't know the day or the hour of our Lord's return. We don't know the moment when the final judgment will occur and we will stand before our God with our lives behind us and eternity before us. Keeping watch is the essence of what Jesus was teaching his followers and all of us in these stories.
We are coming to the end of the Pentecost season where we have been reading constantly about the life and the teaching of Jesus. Matthew follows these stories with the coming of the Passion of Jesus, his betrayal and crucifixion, leading finally to the resurrection on Easter. But that isn't our story at the moment. This is a summing up of all that he taught us, a kind of a review.
Keeping watch is the lesson that he brought to us in these stories. When we watch what Jesus did with his life, we see the heart of his compassion for everyone who was in need and his unwavering willingness to give himself for the care of others.
The most magnificent moment in our liturgy for me is the time when the priest stands before me with the wafer in his hand and says: The body of Christ, the bread of heaven. The body of Christ, who gave himself on the cross for me, that my life will be redeemed and have ultimate meaning, even as I also know that I haven't been all that I could have been. That is when I know that I am safe in God's hands for eternity with my Lord standing beside me with all of his forgiving grace. It is the moment that I know that no matter how I have failed to live up to my Lord's teaching, that I am still received by God in the way that I receive the wafer from the priest.
That is also what I know about those soldiers in Iraq, or Afghanistan or wherever it is that they are fighting for us. That their lives, and the lives of their enemies will also be redeemed by our loving God who sees us not as we are, but as how He created us, and who sent his son to show us the way so that we will never be lost.
The program that took these men back to Iraq was an excellent one that produced some fine results. Some of the men said that they had been helped by the process and had had a lessening of their symptoms. It was incredible to me to see the sacrifice that these men had offered to their country, and I was reminded again about how the rest of us more or less sat out the war while they fought. I also wondered what the members of the last administration would think of these stories of the soldiers' sacrifice in the war that we became involved in without any requirement on our part for sacrifice at all. We got off Scot free in this war, no matter how we felt about it.
What I saw in the eyes of those men who had fought in Iraq was the meaning of hell. We think of hell as the place where bad people go when they die. That has been a part of our theological thinking for centuries. But the truth is that we create hell here on earth all of the time. We do it in the way that we blame others for our problems; for the unthinking way that we treat the unfortunate, and deny care to people who desperately need it. We do it manifestly in our war making, in the way that we enlist our young to carry on the business of war for the rest of us, then sit back and comment on the progress of it, or don't comment at all and just let it go on.
Matthew's Gospel has a series of stories in the 25th chapter that demonstrate the meaning of Hell. We hear about the foolish bridesmaids who are shut out of the wedding banquet because they are off buying oil for their lamps. That is followed by the story of the frightened servant who buries his talent in the ground because he was afraid of his harsh master. He has his talent taken from him and given to the man with ten talents and he himself is thrown into outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. The final story in this Gospel is the story of the sheep and the goats, where the sheep who took care of those in need were accepted into paradise, but the goats, who ignored the poor among them had to depart into eternal fire because of their neglect.
It is no wonder that hell has become such an overwhelming part of our theology. If what Jesus is saying in these stories is literally true, then we are all in trouble; because there is not one of us who has not been foolish like the bridesmaids, frightened like the servant with the one talent, or neglectful of the poor like the goats.
So then, what do we all have in store for us when we meet our Lord? Are we all destined for the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth? There was a preacher who was preaching about this and was asked by a member of the congregation, What about the people who have no teeth? The preacher responded without missing a beat: Teeth will be provided!
If our damnation is not the issue here, then what is? What is Jesus trying to tell his followers in these stories? It seems to me that the point of all of these parables is the same: Keep Awake! Keep watch because we don't know the day or the hour of our Lord's return. We don't know the moment when the final judgment will occur and we will stand before our God with our lives behind us and eternity before us. Keeping watch is the essence of what Jesus was teaching his followers and all of us in these stories.
We are coming to the end of the Pentecost season where we have been reading constantly about the life and the teaching of Jesus. Matthew follows these stories with the coming of the Passion of Jesus, his betrayal and crucifixion, leading finally to the resurrection on Easter. But that isn't our story at the moment. This is a summing up of all that he taught us, a kind of a review.
Keeping watch is the lesson that he brought to us in these stories. When we watch what Jesus did with his life, we see the heart of his compassion for everyone who was in need and his unwavering willingness to give himself for the care of others.
The most magnificent moment in our liturgy for me is the time when the priest stands before me with the wafer in his hand and says: The body of Christ, the bread of heaven. The body of Christ, who gave himself on the cross for me, that my life will be redeemed and have ultimate meaning, even as I also know that I haven't been all that I could have been. That is when I know that I am safe in God's hands for eternity with my Lord standing beside me with all of his forgiving grace. It is the moment that I know that no matter how I have failed to live up to my Lord's teaching, that I am still received by God in the way that I receive the wafer from the priest.
That is also what I know about those soldiers in Iraq, or Afghanistan or wherever it is that they are fighting for us. That their lives, and the lives of their enemies will also be redeemed by our loving God who sees us not as we are, but as how He created us, and who sent his son to show us the way so that we will never be lost.
A powerful blog post, Dad--one that I hope is widely read! Love, Jennie
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