The Golden Ass

As Christians, we are taught that Jesus is love. We are also, of course, taught to follow Jesus. However, I have spent most of my life having a very impoverished imagination for what that even means. I am still learning. My training in love through Gravity Leadership has opened my eyes to some ways that Jesus practices love to which, previously, I was mostly blind.

We all live in a shared socio-communal context. Rival and antagonistic groups of people frame said context in terms of different problems and solutions that are linguistically or discursively irreconcilable to one other. Said context has a particular history that positions or situates different people and groups of people within it in very different ways, ways that lend themselves to the very linguistic antagonisms of competing problems and solutions in the first place.

Even our history of the shared context we inhabit is itself is a subject or object of antagonistic framing with our speech that we direct towards one another. And, since our history is at stake in the language and narrative framing we choose, so is our future. This antagonism is so deep that if I even begin to name the history and trajectory of our history and future, I am understood to be engaging these antagonisms. What happens in your body if I say the word “racism”? How about “freedom”?

These discursive linguistic antagonisms that serve as rival stories of the truth of our shared social context in question (and its history and future) tend toward totalizing theories / schemas by which people find themselves and their place in said context. In other words, I am tempted to want my story to be THE story, to be everyone’s story. Hence the above noted irreconcilability.

So, if we are Christian, we are called and invited to grope towards practices of truth telling and caring in this social context where our language is predominantly tempted to irreconcilable temptation to essentially win a war. How do we train ourselves to practice love in such an impossible situation!? Well, one of the lessons in Gravity Leadership’s Workbook that we train through is called, “Seeing Jesus Practice Grace and Truth.” The idea here is that, when we try to embody and enact the love of Jesus, we are immediately confronted with a tension between, on the one hand, being truthful and honest and, on the other, being “nice.” We have a very difficult time imagining a love that embodies both truth and grace bound up together in the person and work of Jesus, who shares his life with us as we participate with him in the coming of his kingdom OF said love.

The Authority of Love

The lectionary reading last Saturday was Mark 11: 27-33, when the chief priests come and ask Jesus "by what authority do you do these things?" (Temple cleansing, etc). Jesus is like, "By what authority did John baptize, the power of men or of heaven?"

Similar as for us, there's here a shared context (political exile under the thumb of Rome) with rival sets of linguistically framed problems and solutions. And, there is an entire shared tradition of discourse (rabbis / teachers) by which people vie for authoritative telling of the history and future of the people who are subject to this context. People find themselves and their place in this context by clothing themselves in these authoritative stories.

All along, Jesus has been not only hinting that the story is ABOUT HIM, but also practicing truth telling and care IN THE GATHERING A PEOPLE TOGETHER AROUND HIIMSELF. By showing them what it means to live the story with himself as the central actor in and of it. The religious leaders, predictably - in either their context or ours - are like, "Hey YOU'RE not the center! The institution we run is! Don't you know - that's where God is present and at work? What's your deal?" “By what authority do you do these things?”

Notice that this episode in Mark 11: 27-33, in the wake of the Temple Cleansing, didn't start with Jesus "calling them out." The religious leaders were the ones calling Jesus out. They were coming to him with a harsh truth at the cost of relational connection and belonging. They were seeking to dominate and over-power him. They were in a war they wanted to win. He had just been busy showing his disciples what it means for the story of our shared context to be about himself (including in the Temple cleansing). Then others come along and are like, "umm...wowah dude."

Note how one of our possible temptations in response to people calling us out is always to justify ourselves, to, in my friend Gino’s words, “spit facts” and win the argument or the war established in the antagonism. As Gino noted in a recent sermon, they even ASK him for SPECIFIC "facts." They ASK him for an "argument." He doesn't engage in that antagonism. He doesn't engage that temptation to prove himself and his place (in the story / world).

He also doesn't call them out in return. He doesn't shame them, over-power them by telling them why and how wrong they are. In the predominance of our antagonisms, we tend to imagine that Jesus’ asking them, “by what authority does Jon baptize” WAS his “calling out” the religious leaders. But, he doesn’t. He also doesn't shame them in another way. He doesn't disempower them by taking and stealing their responsibility and agency away from them.

He instead puts them in a position - EMPOWERS THEM - to name and own their real desire. They find themselves unable to do this. If there is any condemnation or death dealing, he lets them step foot into it themselves (just as in, for example, Matt 12: 22-32 and Mark 3: 20-35, "the binding of the strong man" / "the unpardonable sin", which is about my being bound to foreign powers of nation (and family)). Where they come to overpower Jesus, he does not return the favor.

Parables of Love

Then, in both Matthew's and Mark's versions of this episode in Mark 11: 27-33, Jesus follows this up with parables - of the two sons, of the wicked tenants - that do a number of things that are relevant to what we're talking about:

1. They give responsibility and agency to those in his audience. They empower them. We tend to miss this, because, in functioning in our discursive or linguistic antagonisms, we again focus on or imagine that these are stories of Jesus "calling out" the religious leaders. We imagine that the he’s giving the harsh truth that’s much needed.

2. They are foolishly extravagant INVITATIONS into an ongoing practice in time of faithfully reciprocal RELATIONSHIP. I.e. - the CARE into which we are invited to train as disciples of Jesus. This is why it's a parable about SONS. It's why the tenants are given such an important responsibility in relation to and in representation of the Master. Such tasks imply a binding relationship of mutual caring. Again, we tend to miss this, because, in our habitus of functioning in a space of linguistic or discursive antagonistic theories, inside of totalizing stories over our context(s), in our modus operandi of fighting to win a war, we skip in our minds to the failures of the tenants and the religious leaders. But, the INVITATION is not only primary but remains implicit as a choice in the telling of the parables to their audience!

“And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. 6 He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 7 But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’” – Mark 12: 4-7.

In other words, these words from Mark 12 aren’t just about obtaining pie in the sky. They aren’t just about God declaring us “righteous” because of Christ’s dying “in our place” on the cross. They depict an extravagantly abundant, to the point of utter foolishness, desire of God for relational unity with us. This is “the joy set before him” (Hebrews 12: 2).

Again, we tend to imagine that Jesus was “calling out” the “tenants” and the “disobedient son.” Obviously, the parables are also the practicing of truth telling. But, per the above, we tend to miss the invitation to relationship of care - itself in the context of Jesus' gathering a people around himself in the first place (some now call this "organizing?") - that is the real and first thrust of the stories. In fact, "truth" in those parables is inconceivable as a category without the graceful imitating of the person who is the Truth. Truth is also inconceivable as a category here without the previously established empowerment, agency, authority, or responsibility GIVEN to and SHARED WITH those in his audience BY the telling of the parables!

Speaking of parables, the CBN story depicted above has this caption:

“The [Jericho] march was centered around Joshua 6 where God gives specific instructions on how the corrupt city of Jericho is to be conquered.

"But the Lord said to Joshua, 'See, I have handed Jericho over to you, with its king and the valiant warriors. And you shall march around the city, all the men of war circling the city once.'"

As another friend said in conversation about this, “it’s not as if Jesus shied away from pointing out people's guilt and/or shame when that was needed.” This is correct. “Peter do you love me?” “Is there anyone left to condemn you?” “May he who is without sin cast the first stone.” “The baptism of John - was it of man or of God?” “Zacchaeus, I'm staying at your house tonight.”

Coming to a place where truth and grace meet in the presence and work of the King means facing and naming our shame and guilt in the space of safety in the presence of the King who we come to trust not only desires us but cares for us. Jesus often purposefully facilitated his disciples facing and naming their shame and guilt BY connecting with them relationally. He does this with the intention of dignifying and edifying us RATHER THAN by exerting power over us (or Rome) in such a way as to cut off relationship with us and, well, "shaming" us (or Rome). In the love of Jesus, as my friend Matt Tebbe taught me: “The first truth we tell is about ourselves.” This is the Christian practice of confession.

Going Away Astounded

After the two parables of two sons and of the wicked tenants - in Matthew - the religious leaders continue to come and "call out" Jesus. They continue - in Matt. 22 - to come and “test” him. They continue to act on their desire to over-power him and put him in his place. He continues to point in the direction of their agency or empowerment and to an implicit invitation into relationship in the larger scheme of the history of Israel. They keep "going away astounded" (lol?). This continues until Jesus finally goes on the offensive with a recapitulation of the original thrust of the community he’s forming and shaping: that the story of our shared context centers on and is oriented around him. I’m speaking here of Matt 22: 41-46, on the "question of David's son.”

THEN, in Matt. 23, he goes into something that very easily LOOKS LIKE antagonistic "calling out" of the religious leaders. But, it says he's talking "to the crowds and to his disciples." He's not even talking to the religious leaders at this point. How could he be “giving them the business” if he’s not even talking to them? So, if he’s not “calling out” the religious leaders with a long series of “woes to” them, then what IS he doing?

What he is doing is actively engaging in teaching of the crowds and disciples - those who had gathered around himself in invitation and care - what it means and looks like to follow him. Doesn't look like seeking out the places of honor, doesn't look like converting seekers into death dealing ways, doesn't look like making arbitrary and random oaths that render your word meaningless, are self-indulgent in the value they place on the things that are about you and what you have power in or over, and don't honor God with wondrous awe, etc. Speaking of agency and empowerment, woe if you take that path!

All of this implies that (even) the central actor of the story is placing himself INSIDE it. My friend Glenn Runnalls often says, in reference to 1 Cor. 13: 8-13, “A 1 Corinthians kind of loving requires a first Corinthians kind of knowing.” This speaks to the question of totalizing schemes - of my wanting my story to be THE story, everyone’s story. Even Jesus wasn’t seeking to win the war of the antagonisms of his day by making his story THE story. I mean this in the sense that Jesus wasn’t standing above and over his context. Instead, he Incarnationally situates himself inside it and, in sharing our context of warring antagonisms with us, also shares with us his Way of life and love.

Hearing this in the space of the text, I “go away astounded.” My “astounding” is accompanied by a desire to put this training into practice, to engage in a fuller love where grace and truth are bound to one another in the embodied person of Jesus, who shares himself abundantly with us. This is repentance.

Please don’t imagine that this “fullness” of love is limited to the territory of politics. A female Catholic friend just shared with me this weekend how there is antagonism in her relationship with her apparently agnostic or Deist boyfriend around questions of religion. This summer, another friend shared with me that she had found herself speaking harsh truth to someone who she thought was "in a cult." After reflecting on that experience and hearing the scriptures invite into a different kind of love, she was wondering how to relate to someone in such a situation without being harsh or offensive. In what other territory of your life, where antogonisms and pretentiousness otherwise reign, might Jesus be whispering into or reaching out and touching your soul with this sharing of the love embodied in the whole of power and grace of his person?