This Little Light of Mine

…historically the Christian life began with the public acknowledgement of two uncomfortable realities: evil and death. And in baptism the Christian makes the audacious claim that neither one gets the final word. 

When I get to [certain] stories in the New Testament I’m inclined to take the sophisticated approach and assume the people who had demons cast out of them were healed of mental illness or epilepsy or something like that which, when you think about it, simply requires exchanging one highly implausible story for another. But lately I’ve been wondering if this leaves something important out, something true about the shape and nature of evil, which, as Alexander Schmemann puts it, is not merely an absence of good, but the presence of a dark and irrational power.

~ Searching for Sunday, Rachel Held Evans

 

 

Only in silence the word,
Only in dark the light,
Only in dying life:
Bright the hawk’s flight
On the empty sky.* 

As I said to my daughter, who asked me about suffering a few days ago – the darker the room, the brighter a flame burns. This is not an easy answer. Neither is it an acceptable answer, but it’s the only answer I have and the only answer I can have, in this life. Held Evans continues:

…God is in the business of bringing dead things back to life, so if you want in on God’s business, you better prepare to follow God to all the rock bottom, scorched earth, dead-on-arrival corners of this world, including those in your own heart, because that’s where God works…

Evil and suffering are realities in this world, however much we want them to be no part of it. But God has a plan in all this – and it may not be one that we understand. When we call Him Messiah, Jesus gives each one of us the God Light – the Holy Spirit – that burns and forever burns, even in the dark.

The Light shines on in the darkness, and the darkness did not understand it or overpower it or appropriate it or absorb it [and is unreceptive to it].

John 1:5 (Amplified)

*from A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin

When to Judge

…what business is it of mine to judge outsiders (non-believers)?… God alone sits in judgement on those who are outside [the faith]. REMOVE THE WICKED ONE FROM AMONG YOU [expel him from your church].

1 Corinthians 5:12-13 (AMP)

How often have those within the Church sought to impose their beliefs on those outside the Church? How often have those within the Church sought to cover up acts of pure wickedness in an attempt to keep up appearances, to save face or to maintain the impression of an impeccable leadership? I wish it were possible to say ‘never’.

Reblog: Manipulated by Christian Grey (by Me, a Fifty Shades Avoider)

AMEN. Shout it from the rooftops! That is just how my first relationship (which led to my first marriage) started out, when he began pursuing me. He overwhelmed me in such a short space of time and because ‘he was vulnerable’ I didn’t know how to say no… plus I’d not properly recovered from the sexual abuse of my childhood nor had a boyfriend before. He must have thought he was the spider that trapped the fly when he met me. In my EMDR session today I was recalling all those seemingly small, seemingly non-abusive moments right at the beginning of the ‘relationship’. Coercion, manipulation: subtle forms of evil but nevertheless evil.

But hallelujah for therapy and hallelujah for a wonderful, kind, patient husband. ‘The Lord is my shepherd; I have everything I need.’

Laura Droege's blog

Ruth Perry over at The Beautiful Kingdom Warriors posted a huge list of links about the response to Fifty—oh, never mind, you know what book it is. I read a few. One that I found especially intriguing was from a woman who had survived an abusive relationship: “Fifty Abusive Moments in Fifty Shades of Grey.” I’ll be writing about numbers 48 and 50.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have not read the book, have no plans to read the book, and absolutely no intention of wasting time and money on a movie based on the aforesaid book. Normally, I think people should read a book/watch a movie if they’re going to critique it; I’ve made an exception here.

Second full disclosure: I’ve never been in a physically abusive relationship, though my first relationship falls into the “emotionally abusive” category. I wasn’t certain that this was true until…

View original post 1,092 more words

More Thoughts on the Middle East: The Danger of Emptiness

“When the evil spirit goes out… it wanders through waterless places looking for rest and never finding it. Then it says, ‘I will go back to my house from which I came.’ When it arrives it finds it unoccupied… it goes and collects seven other spirits more evil than itself to keep it company, and they all go in and make themselves at home. The last state… is worse than the first…”

Matthew 12:43-45 (Phillips)

We should not be surprised by the looming war in the Middle East. When the last war ended, countries were left in tatters. Into the void comes a zealous, unequivocal ideology that promises solidity in place of quicksand – or so it must seem.

Our strongest weapon against this evil is not found in bombs or bullets. Our strongest weapon is Christ. Christ refused to bow under pressure, refused to return evil for evil. Jesus’ radical love prayed for those who made themselves His enemies. His radical love even took pity on them.

I cannot honestly say that I advocate pacifism, but I can honestly say that I believe Christ does – and how do we make sense of that?! I can also honestly say that Jesus tells me to pray for my enemies – and to love those who persecute others. So I will pray for the hearts and minds of the terrified victims, and I will also pray for the hearts and minds of the persecutors. We must never underestimate the power of prayer.