From Useless to Useful

[B]ut I preferred to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own free will.  -- Philemon 1:14

There is not much virtue in our doing what we are obligated or compelled to do.  Jesus spoke of the Roman law that said a soldier could compel a civilian to carry his pack a mile.  At the mile marker, the bearer had a choice to put down the load or to carry it on to the next marker.  If he chooses to continue, the bearer has another choice, for he can go the extra mile out of defiance and pride, or out of a Christ-like love for the man whose pack he carries. 

It won’t look much different on the outside.  The soldier may not respond positively.  He may not care one way or the other.  He may be suspicious of the bearer’s motives.  The burden-bearer has no control over the other person’s reactions in the near term or over time.   

However, the person who is willing to be meek and whose genuine desire is to love others will find that he is moving away from self and toward truth.  Following Jesus means dying to self.  A defiant, arrogant person – such as I am naturally – has all kinds of trouble with meekness and humility, and even love.  A situation in which I am humbled to some degree is an opportunity to embrace the character of Christ by faith and hamstring the old nature. 

The story of Paul’s letter to Philemon began when a slave named Onesimus – the name means “useful” – ran away from his master, Philemon, thereby becoming “useless”.  Paul himself makes the wordplay on the name in verse eleven.  Somehow, Onesimus came into contact with Paul and became a Christian.  Paul is sending the letter to Philemon by the hand of this runaway.  I could wish we had recorded for our edification the contents of the conversation between Paul and Onesimus in which the latter was convinced to return to his master. 

Both men must face the challenge of putting down the old nature and responding in Christ to one another.  Philemon has been wronged.  We have Paul’s testimony of his Christian character.  He is unlikely to have been harsh or unreasonable with his servant.  Onesimus was likely discontented and rebellious.  Perhaps he fled because he had stolen from his master.  It reminds me a little of how Jean Valjean’s theft of silverware from the virtuous Bishop Myriel transformed his life in Les Miserables. 

The one who has done the wrong and the one who was wronged, now being brothers in Christ, must be reconciled to one another, putting the old relationship and the old way of interacting into the past.  They will go back to being master and slave in one sense.  However, Onesimus will now be acting and serving out of the love of Christ for his master, and Philemon will receive the service and respond in turn more as a father to his once-wayward son. 

I am not capable of understanding all the theological concepts involved.  Concretely and pragmatically, I know that Jesus has set the example and provided me with the power to live and act in accordance with God’s will and purpose.  If free will is not a reality then all of Christianity is a cosmic joke.  Virtue, obedience, and goodness do not really exist for us. 

But we know they do exist, and that acting out of love is the path to heaven, rough at times, always strait and narrow, sometimes with precipices on either side, but always true, and, however winding, always carrying us nearer to the heart of God.

Reprieve

For this is the message you have heard from the beginning: we should love one another, unlike Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil, and his brother’s were righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers. The one who does not love remains in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him. – 1 John 3:11-15

(I seem to have been given at least a temporary reprieve from limblogo. I am still somewhat limited as to how often I can visit and how long I can stay. I’ll be reading most stuff offline and not able to comment as often as I’d like. Still, it’s better than not getting to see you all at all. For some reason it reminds me of the story about the family that took their baby to church for christening. On the way home, the baby’s older brother was weeping copiously. When his parents asked what was wrong, he replied, “The pastor said he wanted us to be raised in a good Christian home. But I want to stay with you guys!”)

You don’t have to watch children very long to realize that jealousy and envy are pervasive. I’ve been reading fairy tales lately. One of the most common themes is the damage done as a result of – I wanted to say “these emotions” but that isn’t right. Greed, envy, and jealousy are more than emotions. They are like built-in mind parasites – standard on every model since the Fall. In the story of Cain and Abel, Abel brought a blood sacrifice to the Lord while Cain’s offering was bloodless and thus unacceptable in atoning for sin. Cain’s jealous response was to cut his brother’s throat, in effect spilling Abel’s blood in a twisted imitation of the righteous act. I believe in original sin truly enough, but I don’t believe sin is ever original. It is always something good that has been warped and perverted.

Love is the good. Love twisted becomes possessive, covetous, acquisitive – focused on material illusion rather than spirit and truth. I find this in myself certainly, that most of my sins arise from a perception that I am lacking something, that I am not accepted or as good as someone else. I might never admit this in a conscious way, but, like Cain, Esau, Saul, perhaps even Judas, I resent the brother who seems to get the breaks while nothing I do seems to be good enough. All these characters failed, but the failure was not nearly as damaging as the attitude that arose from it.

I suppose one could argue that Cain brought an unacceptable sacrifice because there was something wrong with him from the beginning. There’s something wrong with all of us in that sense. God indicates that it is Cain’s reaction that endangers him. Then the LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door: it desires to have you, but you must master it” (Genesis 4:6-7). Cain needed to master his emotional response to his failure, to employ his will in controlling his anger and bitterness.

It’s not easy, at least not for me. I find it hard to use my will to receive and believe truth. I tend to want some external confirmation of my worth and acceptance, and we all know that path can be destructive. Internal confirmation in the form of feelings can be misleading as well. Only the truth can set us free, and to know the truth we must choose it, will to believe and trust in truth.

I must also will to love. It can’t just be “feelings”. Could I will to love even Barry Manilow? That’s what it comes down to – do right. Fight the feeling. Forget “if lovin’ you is wrong, I don’t want to be right”. Too often it’s more like “if loving you is right, I’d rather be wrong”. Amazingly I would rather cling to my bitterness, my anger, my sense of being wronged, of being treated unjustly. I refuse to forgive. I’d rather be miserable in hatred than free in love.

To love others I will need to know what love is. I can find an explicit definition in 1 Corinthians 13, of course, but I can find it everywhere in the Bible – especially in the Gospels as I watch Christ operate in this world. To love others we must receive love. Like Jesus, we need to hear the Father telling us we are beloved. It is the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, the love we are given by the Father that goes out to those around us. We can love because He first loved us.