The Beauty of Ugliness

If you've been in an evangelical church on a Sunday morning in the last 10 years you may have noticed the backgrounds behind the lyrics on the screen. These are ultra-beautified scenes designed to stimulate people's sense of beauty and pleasure... A dew-laden glen, sun streaming through trees, a child on a swing. They are photoshopped to the max. Today I saw one that amazed me. It depicted a sillouhetted Christ hauling a cross against the background of swirling white clouds and an impossibly blue sky. I laughed to myself. Leave it to Christians to turn a scene as morbid and dark as the crucifixion into something pretty and palatable!

In fact I think Christians have been in the business of cleaning up God's mess for a long time.

Same thing with communion. We got rid of the wine in favor of Welch's. But I rather like the bitter beauty of wine. I mean, it's an acquired taste right? You need a certain level of exposure and romantic indoctrination to fall in love with a well-crafted wine or beer (though most of us would agree there is something innate to be discovered in the drink... we're not just manipulating ourselves). But, as my father-in-law reminds me, it's bitter stuff. And he's right. It is bitter. And it's gorgeous. Life can be like that. And I think that the place where God intersects our lives can be like that. Beautifully bitter. Gorgeously mundane. I mean, why would God command the Jews to eat bitter herbs on passover? Why would he want people to codify and commemorate within the very heart of their spiritual rhythms the bitterness of slavery?

Christians have gotten good at giving lip service to ugliness recently. "It's hard but good." "It's been really challenging but I know God has a plan in all this." But like the artistically framed picture of the passion, it only hints at a reality that's tough to look at, tough to hear about. When I went to see the Passion of the Christ in college, the lady sitting in front of me said during the credits, "I paid 8 bucks for that?!" I think that's how a lot of Christians feel when they find out that Christianity is not an opiate for the masses after all. Jesus told his guys: "In this world you'll have troubles. But take heart, I've overcome the world" (Interesting he didn't say, "I've overcome your troubles.")

Maybe that's why I swear. One, because swearing helps me talk to normal people and communicate that being Christian is different from being Ned Flanders. But more importantly, I feel that well-chosen profanities CAN give the linguistic gravity to talk about the ugliness all around us. And I WANT to have the language for ugliness because when we talk about ugliness with unapologetic honesty, it's cathartic. AND we're identifying with a God who talks about ugliness throughout the bible and makes himself beautiful in the ugly and the everyday.

God is like Pablo Neruda. The Chilean poet had a knack for finding beauty in the little things. Things like a cat or a lemon. And the poetry is breathtaking. I mean...

Cutting the lemon
the knife
leaves a little cathedral:
alcoves unguessed by the eye
that open acidulous glass
to the light; topazes
riding the droplets,
altars,
aromatic facades.


If I were a poet I'd try to write about sunsets and mountaintops, but Neruda seems to see God himself in the lemon. I guess what I'm saying is that God himself sees himself in the lemon... in bitter herbs and bitter wine, in life's disheartening ironies, in our unthinking exhausted moments when we can't even bring ourselves to care. In the ugly and the plain and the bitter, there's God like a kid with finger paints... making art; a strange kind of upside-down image we need a new framework, a maturity of thought in order to decode, to reveal the altars, the aromatic facades, the beauty.

Out on a limb, down through a roof

A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. ² They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. ³ Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. ⁴ Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. ⁵ When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

⁶ Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, ⁷ “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

⁸ Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things? ⁹ Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? ¹⁰ But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the man, ¹¹ “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” ¹² He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

When was the last time you felt like you had gone WAY out on a limb? When did you last feel like you were in completely unfamiliar territory, frightened by the unknown, afraid of being attacked from some unseen direction, but resolute no less? I’ve been hanging out there for a couple days now. A gut-churning series of events in my life has led me to consider a course of action I’ve never considered before. I’ve been working on an idea that feels like lunacy to me, but I can’t think of a good reason NOT to do it. I know that’s vague but I’m not ready to publically commit to the idea.

I imagine that’s where the paralytic and his 4 friends were. I imagine them getting to the crowded house and feeling crestfallen. There’s no way they were going to get to Jesus. They looked at each other wondering what to do, then at their paralyzed friend, who looked up with desperate eyes. Please…. Please… Get me to Jesus. More looks and someone has an idea. We’ll dig our way to Jesus. Of course, that would involve vandalism, hard work, and lots of presumption. But considering their dedication to their friend and what they’d heard Jesus could do, they couldn’t think of a really good reason NOT to do it. So through the roof they went!

Jesus could have denounced them for this, but he recognized their hope-galvanized vulnerability and admires them for it. I wonder though, given his experience with the leper a few days earlier if he wasn’t hesitant to heal the paralytic. The reason people are crowding to see him was that they had heard he was a miracle-worker and now he was hesitant to pander to their expectations. So he was only “preaching the word to them.”

But seeing risk and vulnerability in the 5 men, he seems to narrow his eyes and look around the room at those present, gauging their responses. Looking at the Pharisees, he makes a decision. “Son, your sins are forgiven.” I’m sure the crowds were confused. The religious folks were enraged. But then, to demonstrate his authority and identity, Jesus heals the man and sends him home. The people were amazed. The religious folks were still enraged, though culled for now.

Here’s a couple quick take-away bullet points for me:

1.    Jesus likes to challenge people’s assumptions.

2.   Jesus likes to demonstrate his authority and identity, especially to those who question it.

3.   Jesus is really into vulnerable people.

The Unfairness of Kindness and the Indignant Jesus

Mark 1:40-45…

⁴⁰ A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.”

⁴¹ Jesus was indignant. He reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” ⁴² Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.

⁴³ Jesus sent him away at once with a strong warning: ⁴⁴ “See that you don’t tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” ⁴⁵ Instead he went out and began to talk freely, spreading the news. As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.

Believe it or not, my bible says Jesus was “filled with compassion”, not indignant. So yesterday, I was all ready to write a blog on the surprising compassion of Jesus when I stumbled across this newer translation. Apparently, the words look similar in the Greek and the translation committee had manuscripts using both words. They felt “indignant” was more appropriate to the context of Mark’s gospel and probably a scribe, not understanding why Jesus should be upset about healing a leper, tweaked the words to read “filled with compassion.” I might’ve done the same thing and I have to admit I felt “indignant” that I should have to adjust my reading of scripture here to account for an annoyed Jesus healing a leper.  Seems kind of cold doesn’t it?

Well, I’ve done some reading and to my chagrin, I’ve concluded that indignant is probably a  good translation, but the question I have to ask is “why”? Isn’t Jesus known for his compassion with the downtrodden? Why would he be mad that a poor beleagured soul is throwing himself in an act of faith and reliance at the feet of the Savior? Here’s a couple possible reasons I reject:

1. Jesus just rolled out of the wrong side of the bed that morning. I assume that everything in this gospel is written for a reason and I can think of a million other ways to say, “Jesus had grumpy days.” No, I think this story is more complex than that.

2. Being Jewish, Jesus was mad that a leper would approach him, making him ceremonially unclean. Then why would Mark go out of the way to record that Jesus “reached out” and touched the man? Seems like touching would be counterproductive and Jesus constantly harps on people who just clean “the outside of the cup.”

So here are 3 reasons for Jesus’ indignance that I find probable and consistent with the Jesus in Mark. All 3 rely on Jesus knowing how this would all play out if he healed the man.

       1.     If I heal this man Satan will use his testimony to cloud peoples’ minds about my true identity and mission. People already think I’m a magician and this will be one more reason for people to love me for what I do and not for who I am. The only way around this is if he agrees to keep his healing a secret from the crowds.

       2.     If I heal this man, the priests will be upset that I made myself ceremonially unclean rather than understanding the significance of the fact that the work of my Father is being done. The only way to challenge their paradigm is to send this man to them to fulfill his religious obligation in being healed.

       3.     I know what’s in this man’s heart. He believes me for healing. But he doesn’t trust me enough to obey my instructions. He’s going to tell everyone about this, driving everybody away from a right understanding of who I am and what I came to do.

All these seem consistent with Jesus saying, “how long must I put up with this generation,” or in modern English, “you guys just don’t get it do you?” But what I see in Jesus, deeper than anger or indignance, is a deeply principled person who, compelled by the Father’s love and the Father’s business, rejects a number of practical considerations and does something because it's right, regardless of “what this will mean.”

Debra and I are watching MI-5 on Netflix. It’s a British TV series in which officers of the intelligence service are constantly forced in ethical quandaries in which functionalistic considerations are weighed against moral standards. Usually the bad guys say things like, “nobody plays by the rules anymore. If we insist on towing the line of ethical conduct, the nation we’re charged to protect will be destroyed or marginalized. Scrupulous people are naïve. We can’t afford morality. You’ve gotta break a few eggs…” Of course the good guys are always insisting that if we lose sight of our standards, we’ve lost something much deeper than our physical security.

That’s kind of what I see here in Jesus’ actions. He’s upset by the rottenness of the human heart. He’s frustrated that his choice to heal a single leper will (at least in the short run) lead to scandal and misunderstanding rather than the redemption of people. But he looks angrily into the face of practical considerations and flips them the bird. He must do His Father’s work. It’s who He is. He can do nothing else.

Have you ever felt like doing the “right thing” is a trap? I have. Everytime I give a dollar to a homeless person, I feel like it’s a trap set just for me. I feel a deep anger, an “indignance” that my compassion might lead to dependency or empowering unhealthy choices. I hate living in a world in which kindness can have seriously negative consequences. It so unfair. And inevitably, the pressure of “what this will do” to the person drives me at the end of the day to close my garage door and turn on my TV and try not to think about it. But Jesus thinks about it. And if I’m following Him, I’ll have to think about it.

I’m not saying we should reject common sense or all practical considerations. But I am saying we have to stay engaged. We have to wrestle. And at the end of the day, if we’re following Jesus, we have to choose to be about the Father’s business, even if doing so opens a can of worms. Of course it’ll make us angry. It SHOULD make us angry! But if we forget what the Father is about, then we’ve forgotten a critical part of what it means to be Christian. So here’s a refresher from the words of Jesus:

 “The Spirit of the LORD is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come.”

“For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.”

As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work.

“Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor. Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.”

The truth about truth.

So… Guy walks into the bank and says to the teller, “I want 200 bucks!”

“I’m sorry sir,” replies the teller. “You only have 100 dollars in your account.”

“Now,” said the Evangelical man across the table from me. “Nobody in their right minds would say, ‘look man, that might be your truth, but my truth is different.’” He looked around the table as if to say, “that takes care of the question of absolute truth.”

Well, I was feeling courageous (or snarky perhaps) so I chimed in. “I don’t think that’s representative of most post-moderns. We’re not debating how much money is in the account or that the teller knows best. We’re just saying you’re not the teller! You’re just a random person in line trying to tell me how much money is in my account!”

So let’s get something straight here. My generation is struggling to live in a world where competing worldviews are constantly threatening to rip each other to shreds. So in the mind of your average agnostic college kid, God exists. And God has a monopoly on Truth: Big T Truth. But you don’t. So they say, “don’t tell me about your absolute truths because who are we kidding? You’re just as flawed as me.” You’re not God. You’re not the teller. You’re just another blind man describing one part of the elephant.

But let’s say you tell me, “I know I’m not the teller, but he’s a close friend of mine. He invites me to his side of the counter every day and shows me his accounts. I could be wrong but I could swear I saw you only had $100.” Then you might believe me.

The problem is your average agnostic college kid lives in a worldview in which tellers do NOT form close friendships with bank customers and certainly do not share account information with just anybody. It seems disingenuous, even scandalous that you might purport to know God personally and intimately.

Someone recently asked me, “Do you really mean to tell me that God talks to you or are you speaking figuratively?” It took me a moment to remember that this question shouldn’t surprise me. It was a bit scandalous for me too when the Holy Spirit started speaking regularly. Now it feels normal. God is no longer a mighty untouchable King James God. His voice is familiar, affirming, challenging, and instructive. And yeah, it’s quite literal. Like “Go to the store at 10AM and look for the guy with the purple socks” literal. Crazy thing is, sometimes the guy with the purple socks is there!

So based on the trust relationship I’ve built with him and the stuff he says, I believe my beliefs. I believe them so much that I’m willing to promote them. But I also recognize my own fickle humanity and fallibility enough to be humble and intentional about the things I say most loudly. It’s not like I’m saying my word is Absolute Truth.  But I’m saying that I have a personal, if imperfect relationship with Absolute Truth. I get it wrong. I’m deeply flawed and deeply subjective in my pursuit of the Absolute. But one of the things I’m quite confident about is the existence of a personal God who is deeply involved in the process of revelation. He WANTS to be known. That’s why he keeps stepping in, intervening, pursuing His creation. So I keep looking for truth because I know that true things are not only discernable, but WANT to be discerned.

Truth is relational. (“I am the truth,” says Jesus.) But relationships are messy and subjective things. Can Christians be comfortable with the tension of confidence within subjectivity? I think we must be.