Okay, I'm feeling like Peter in our story yesterday. Hmmm. Didn't we have this question yesterday? Like Peter, have my answers been based loosely on Phileo love rather than Agape love? Have I missed the question? Do I love God with a love that would forsake family, home, comfort, security, identity, etc?
I love the way the thought from Anne Lamott frames this question. In many instances of my life I could not answer this question because I could not feel, find, accept, our live out of the grace. Yes, grace is an elusive word and concept. When I was doing my CPE unit (clinical pastoral experience), the first essay we had to write was based on the question, "what is grace?" You would think a theology degree or two would help to answer this, but they didn't. They made it worse. I love what Lamott says, "Grace is the light, juice, breeze that makes you free from that isolated place and puts you with others who are as embarrassed and as startled and eventually as grateful as you are to be there."
So many of us think of our imperfect faith as an obstacle when it fact it is the bridge to agape love and true humility. As we lauded the election of a new Pope on yesterday, most folks seem to find hope in the fact that Francis I has been, is, and hopefully will be a humble man. At a basic level, we admire those who are in touch with their imperfect faith, their grace-bound humility. I am reminded of the people who were admired by Jesus in the scriptures: they were people of extravagant mercy, humility, and generosity (ex: the centurion who showed strong faith, the widow who gave all she had, and Mary who anointed Jesus with very costly perfume).
Just as Jesus gave an encore appearance to Thomas, to move him from doubt to faith, it seems Jesus gave an encore to Peter to move him from faith to action (love). Where in my life do I find Jesus appearing to move me from my head to my heart?
I think, ultimately, we make this faith thing a lot more complicated than it needs to be sometimes. I like what Barbara Brown Taylor says about this:
“To make
bread to dig in the earth, to feed an animal or cook for a stranger—these
activities require no extensive commentary, no lucid theology. All they require
is someone willing to bend, reach, chop, stir. Most of these tasks are so full
of pleasure that there is no need to complicate things by calling them holy.
And yet these are the same activities that change lives, sometimes all at once
and sometimes more slowly, the way dripping water changes stone. In a world
where faith is often construed as a way of thinking, bodily practices remind
the willing that faith is a way of life.”
Am I willing to move from Phileo love to Agape love? Is this not the greatest commandment of scripture: love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul, strength, mind and your neighbor as your self?" In this process, this journey, I am heartened to know that God meets me in my inadequate faith, meets me where I am, and loves me enough not to leave me there: static and lifeless. So much of our faith is often misconstrued as a destination, as a codified set of beliefs that can be acquired and stored. I find in Jesus the invitation to journey: death, new life, grace, forgiveness, transformation and wholeness. Maybe, as the Beatles so aptly put it, this is all I need:
During yesterday's and today's readings and commentary, one verse kept coming to mind: "Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, 'I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!'” [Mark 9:24] And in my head I know that God's grace is sufficient to make up for my lack of faith, lack of agape, even lack of phileo. But in my heart, I still strive to a destination and forget that what is important is THAT I walk and the WAY I walk. So, today, I will pray that I take a step in faith of abundant grace, and trust in His extravagant love.
ReplyDeleteBingo. Who can seriously declare divine love for another human being? I submit that any person who would passionately and willingly declare such a love is either a fool or a very dangerous person. This is unhealthy. I think Peter did the honest thing and in the end he and Jesus settled on it and remained friends. There is a peculiar danger in taking love and the passions involved in this deep love and expressing them in this material realm. It is foolhardy to ignite this flame and try and 'share' it with people. I think it could very well be a sin. It certainly is not loving. The irony is deep here. Such a love as agape, or my understanding of agape love, would require that someone accept such a love on terms they have no way to reciprocate. By saying, I'm going to kill myself because I love you and then making you feel guilty by jimming up your passion for me, while yet at the same time having the foreknowledge that you will deny me is cruel. Extremely cruel. It is a type of emotional blackmail.
ReplyDeleteI could understand laying down one's life as a matter of circumstance; that is humane. (i.e. The soldier who falls on a grenade to save his fellow soldier.) But I don't believe I can genuinely understand how one can premeditate and come up with a strategy to 'lay down one's life for their friends.'
Very peculiar. Either you have real friends who you are on the level with, or you are a needy person who is lonely and playing games with decent folk and messing with their minds. Which is it?
On the other hand, when it comes to grace. My experience with it is one of respect for others, especially the unlearned, the foolish, the foolhardy, and the weak. Those who, for whatever reason, have a hard time dealing with the world around them. Turning the other cheek, forgiveness, refusal to seek justice against those who have caused deep harm are all ways to practice grace. Grace as a personal matter, helps one reach for the humanity within others in their time of weakness. It is my hope when I practice grace, even when by all rights I should seek justice with extreme prejudice, that a moment in the future; seeds which I, and hopefully others, have laid will; when the person knows they've screwed me; see that I have them in a vulnerable position, yet also see that I decide to lift them up rather than put them down. From this sporting gesture it is also my hope that the spirit would cause a turning in them and teach them an important lesson of the heart. Is this not repentance?
It is my view that grace can only truly be practiced by those persons who have the power to destroy. The more absolute the power, the more potential to destroy, the greater potential to practice grace.