God, be merciful to me, a sinner

The early Methodists regularly met with other likeminded believers who were committed to rigorous self-examination. They gathered to confess their sin before God and each other, seeking support and encouragement in an atmosphere of loving accountability so they might grow in holiness and grace through the power of the Holy Spirit.  There were 22 questions that were commonly used for this searching self-inventory, and the first one is a real zinger. 

Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?  

This searing question invites us to see ourselves in Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector in the gospel of Luke.  You know the story. The good, honest, law-abiding religious guy looks over at the louse who has cheated people out of their money and collaborated with the enemy, and he loudly thanks God that he is nothing like that! Meanwhile, in humble acknowledgement of his guilt, the tax collector barely lifts his eyes up to heaven as he softly prays, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”  

Lately I have been asking myself that question in light of the murder of George Floyd and the public outcry following. A massive outpouring of grief and anger and a passionate demand for justice has become a global reality with marches and protests in cities and towns literally around the world. 

Everyone, it seems, has something to say. Some of us, myself included, have fallen all over ourselves posting supportive messages and memes and/or peacefully protesting and preaching — and of course it’s a very good thing that eyes are being opened and that so many want to help change systems and institutions that have persistently favored whites over blacks and other people of color.  

But in some cases, it seems that we who are genuinely well-meaning are also trying to distance ourselves from “those people " while ignoring our own prejudices and shortcomings. It’s  “Oh, I’m not like that; look at what I’m reading/doing/saying and who I’m hanging out with” or “Look how woke I am about this stuff. Let me tell the rest of you what you should be reading and doing.” Reflection on that question has made me stop and look honestly into my own heart and ask again —

Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?

Ouch. I don’t want to see myself as a sinner, as a racist, as a hypocrite, as a person who benefits consciously or unconsciously from advantages I have neither earned nor achieved. It may feel good to write blog posts like this and indignantly stick up for people of color, and it may look great to like and share stories on Facebook and fill my bookshelves with the writings of James Baldwin and Alice Walker and Cornel West and Toni Morrison, and it’s better to do those things rather than propping up the status quo, but it means little if I am not willing to be changed and to become an agent of change. It means nothing if I do not seek to walk humbly with God, if I do not love wholeheartedly like Jesus, if I do not blaze with the passion of the Holy Spirit. 

Ordination stole, 1999

As I continue to ask myself that question, I confess before God and you that I have a long way to go before I can truly say that I love my neighbor as myself. I have much to learn and do, and there are many stories I need to hear. And so, as I slightly lift my eyes towards heaven, I pray for strength and boldness and forgiveness, as I open my heart to the transformative, fiery grace of the Spirit, as I continue to pray, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

"It is how we deal with that ugly fact that is important"

Unless you know me, you might be surprised by what I tend to read for fun. I am a fan of a well-written murder mystery, especially if it’s set in England or Scotland. It has to be a mystery, not a thriller or tale of espionage, and it needs to be a well-written blend of drama with only light touches of humor, plus it needs to make me look at something differently or at least think about something in a new way. Fortunately for me, there are a number of excellent authors who write just that kind of book.

One of my favorites is Ian Rankin, a Scottish writer whose Detective John Rebus has been around since the late 1980’s, aging not particularly gracefully but mellowing a touch in his retirement. Rankin is not always heavy-handed with social commentary, but there’s plenty one can discern from the interactions of the characters, their conversations, and the sometimes unexpected changes in Rebus that result from his interactions with people different from himself.  He sometimes comes face to face with his own prejudices and begins to confront them.

Rankin's book entitled Fleshmarket Close takes a hard look at a detention center where people who illegally entered the country are warehoused. They are caught in limbo, fearing deportation back to the violence of their home countries and denied entrance into the country to which they have fled for asylum. If it sounds familiar, it ought to because some of these very same issues are hot in the United States, as well.

Stef Yurgii is the Kurdish journalist who is murdered. He had been one of the lucky ones who was allowed to stay, even though his family was still crowded into a small space with too many other families at Whitmire Detention Center.   As the story unfolds, you see a wide range of attitudes from various characters, and when Rebus intervenes to protect a human rights lawyer named Mohammed “Mo” Dirwan, he is bemused by Dirwan’s relentless cheerfulness and casual assumption that there’s more to Rebus than meets the eye.

In one memorable scene, another officer betrays thinly veiled racism towards both Dirwan and the deceased victim, and Rebus swiftly steps in to steer the two men apart.  As the other officer departs, Rebus asks Dirwan  if he can tell within a few seconds what kind of person he’s dealing with, and Mo responds in the affirmative but says that he finds Rebus a bit harder to pin down. The next part of their conversation has stuck with me ever since I first read the book in 2004. Rebus asks:

"But all cops are racist?"
"We are all racist, Inspector — even me. It is how we deal with that ugly fact that is important."

 Did you get that? " We are all racist ...It is how we deal with that ugly fact that is important."

It's a profound and yes, ugly fact that the world into which we are born is structured in such a way that the worth of a person is often judged by skin color rather than the content of her or his character.  The history of the United States is not alone in that, as evinced here in Rankin's book, but the current world spotlight is on the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow that continues to produce strange fruit and brutal consequences to this day.

In the eighteenth century, the concept of race was not yet as developed and systematized as now, but notions of the inferiority of dark-skinned people were pervasive. In his Thoughts on Slavery, John Wesley attacked the slave trade and refused to excuse the people who claimed that their purchases of goods that came from slave labor were innocent. He points out that they are culpable because they are not ignorant of the plight and suffering of those who are enslaved, and he exclaims that the blood of their brother (and by extension, sister) is poured out on the ground like water and cries out to God just as Abel's blood did when his brother Cain killed him.

And here we are nearly 300 years after Wesley's sermon, and those same attitudes have solidified and injustices still persist, and our nation is convulsing in the throes of the pain.  How will we deal with this ugly fact?

We are now in the season of Pentecost, when we recall the mighty acts of the Holy Spirit in emboldening and sending the apostles firth on their mission as the Church.

This is a hinge moment of history, and it is the Church's job to be led by the Spirit and to live out the gospel of Jesus Christ who came to set the prisoner free, to proclaim release to the captives, to give sight to the blind, and bring healing to the sick.  I pray that we will humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord and let the healing waters flow, lifting us to new understanding and repentance and hope for a better way forward as God's justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

Our Earth We Now Lament To See

It is perhaps hard for us to imagine, but the eighteenth century was just as turbulent and scary as ours. Disease and poverty, alcohol abuse and family discord, violence on the streets and war were all familiar threats, and the seeds of some of our modern-day ordeals were being sown with the highly lucrative business of buying and selling human beings, something John Wesley forcefully condemned.  I invite you to pray this hymn written by Charles Wesley as a cry of lament and yet as a word of hope, not in ourselves, but in the God we know as Love Divine.

Our earth we now lament to see

With floods of wickedness overflowed,

With violence, wrong, and cruelty,

One wide-extended field of blood,

Where men like fiends each other tear,

In all the hellish rage of war.

As listed on Abaddon’s side,

They mangle their own flesh, and slay:

Tophet is moved, and opens wide

Its mouth for its enormous prey;

And myriads sink beneath the grave,

And plunge into the flaming wave.

O might the universal Friend

This havoc of His creatures see!

Bid our unnatural discord end;

Declare us reconciled in Thee!

Write kindness on our inward parts,

And chase the murderer from our hearts!

Who now against each other rise,

The nations of the earth constrain

To follow after peace, and prize

The blessings of Thy righteous reign,

The joys of unity to prove,

The paradise of perfect love! ~ Charles Wesley

(Abaddon is understood as a destroyer, the king of locusts in Revelation and also as the realm of the dead in various OT passages, while Tophet was a place of human, particularly child, sacrifice.)