At the beginning of the 3rd
chapter of the First Book of Samuel is the phrase: Now the boy Samuel was
ministering to the LORD under Eli. The
word of the LORD was rare in those days, visions were not widespread. That sounds a lot like the world that I
understand. There are those, of course,
who shout the Word of the Lord very loudly from their own peculiar places, but
these are usually people with a certain ax to grind, conservative Christians
who want to denounce abortion, gay rights, gun control, contraception,
evolution or the warming of the environment.
They pound their bibles and preach what they believe is God’s eternal
word against all of these things. They
are also generally politically conservative; don’t like people of races other
than Caucasian and are very forceful in making their voices heard. People who have more progressive views are
heard from less often as the conservative Christians mostly inhabit the radio
and television channels where religion is the topic.
I am
encouraged by the editorial staff of Charlie
Hebdo who has offered a beautiful response that we all need to see and to
hear. May God bless all of us as we face
these difficult times and find ways to love and encourage each other. This is what our Lord taught us when he was on
this earth. May God help us to love one another
as we have been loved.
The result of all of this is that many, many people are
turned off by religion and believe it to be at the root of a lot of the trouble
in the world. Church attendance has
dropped in many places, except at megachurches that attract thousands on any
given Sunday. This tends to reinforce
the conservative belief system that undergirds these places of ministry. I don’t ever think that I will forget the
offensive prayer that The Rev. Franklin Graham offered at the memorial service
after the horrible events of September 11, 2001. He denounced the Muslims and blamed all of
them for the demolishing of the World Trade Center. He made their religion the cause of the
disaster, and drove a wedge between Muslims and Christians. We have been trying to recover from those
kind of opinions ever since.
Christians are not alone in this. Militant Muslims have wreaked havoc in many places:
in the Middle East, and in this country trying to exert maximum pressure on all
of us to listen to them and to understand that they are a military force to be reckoned
with.
After the massacre of the staff at Charlie Hebdo in Paris the magazine printed a new issue. On the cover was a cartoon of the Prophet
Muhammad with a tear in his eye. The
words that were on the card that he held were:
Je Suis Charlie, meaning “I am
Charlie”; the same statement that was on the cards held by the crowds in Paris
lamenting the assassination of the staff of the magazine. What a wonderful way to respond to terror and
hate. Here was the staff of the affected
magazine offering hope, love and forgiveness in the wake of the terrible crime
that they had experienced.
If we are going to find places where “the Word of the
LORD” is heard in our time, it is in places like this, when Hope, Love and
Forgiveness can follow tragedy. That is
when we can really hear the what our God is trying to tell us.
In John’s Gospel, the author writes: For God did not send his Son into
the World to condemn the world, but in order that the world would be saved by
him. Notice that the passage
says “World,” not Christians. It
was the world that Jesus the Christ came to save. That is the essence of what we are facing in
the turmoil that has been brought upon us by the political nightmare of facing
off Muslims and Christians in some kind of contest. The truth is that God speaks through both
groups, as well as many others in this world.
That is a revelation that ought to get our attention. God’s Word is not ever silent. Difficult love and forgiveness are what we
need in moments like this. Embracing one
another in the name of God is a beautiful act that can been seen by others as
reflecting the power of God to enter into our humanity and change us. We can’t do it by ourselves.
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