Where Is Heaven? Guilt and Shame.
In Psalm 39, we read And now, what is my hope? O Lord, my hope is in you.
Deliver me from all my transgressions and do not make me the taunt of the fool.
I fell silent and did not open my mouth, for surely it was you that did it.
Take your affliction from me; I am worn down by the blows of your hand. With
rebukes for sin you punish us; like a moth you eat away all that is dear to us;
truly, everyone is but a puff of wind. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to
my cry; hold not your peace at my tears.
In a blog earlier this week, I lifted up the story of our
people that holds that God, as ruler of all, has conquered the power of chaos.
Yet, we also read that on occasion the power of chaos rears its ugly head. At
those times, our people look evil in the eye and challenge God to intervene.
Our ancestors in the faith give room for another
understanding of God and the power of chaos. This understanding holds that God
has conquered the power of chaos, and at times of dire necessity, God uses the
power of chaos for divine purposes. Chiefly, God uses the power of chaos as
consequences for the sins committed by God's people. This belief is expressed
powerfully and painfully in the excerpt from Psalm 39 used above. And, God uses
the power of chaos to test people. This belief is expressed in stories such as
that of Job. Walter Brueggeman raises this concept in his work and draws the
conclusion that "Israel can live with this view of God and is neither in
wonder or embarassment about it.
I urge readers to visit some of the following passages from
Scripture: Deuteronomy 32:39; Isaiah 45:7; Job 40: 15-24 and 41: 1-34. Also,
please see Leviticus 26: 16, 23-25, 28.
In our time, this concept of God is terribly difficult to
accept by many, and I fear, many times pushes people away from God. To help
unpack this belief of God using the power of chaos, I want to draw a
distinction between guilt and shame. Guilt, in scripture, is a legal term and
connotes that a person has broken the law and stands convicted of that crime.
Shame, however, is a feeling that is ever present in human life. Shame can
accompany a guilty act ( I am both guilty of breaking the law and ashamed of
myself for doing so.) but, shame can also speak about the overwhelming feeling
we have that takes responsibility for actions and consequences that are not our
fault. (I witness a man slip on ice on a sidewalk at distance from where I am
standing and ask myself repeatedly througout the day why I did not do more.)
The poet, Wendell Berry captures the essence of shame.
The times are disgusting enough,
surely, for those who long for peace
and truth. But self-disgust
also is an injury; the coming
of bodily uncertainity with age
and wear, forgetfulness of things
that ought to be remembered,
remembrance of things best forgot.
Forgive this fragmentary life.
If we accept the story of our people, we have a deeper
expression of faith that gives us the strength to face making difficult
decisions that include risk to self and pain to others. We have a deeper
expression of faith that helps us live the reality of one person losing a house
in a hurricane while ours is still standing.
The most difficult challenge this belief poses is a
challange to human capcity. It challenges the trust we have in our systems and
our capacity to cope through ingenuity, resolve, and mustered inspriation. This
belief poses the possibility of a power, a force, a divine presence that is
outside the system, that breaks into the system, and has the strength to
restore the system. In doing so, we are reminded of our weaknesses, our
failures, and our temptation to put trust in powers that cannot conquer death.
We, as Christians, call the divine presence God. The metaphysics that come with
this belief is called heaven.
No comments:
Post a Comment