Jerusalem – Mind Journeys

How can you tell which ones are the Christians?

We are the ones who are marked with a cross. We are the ones who are drawn to suffering. We are the ones who provide meals for the disadvantaged through soup kitchens. We operate Op. Shops to help them be dressed with dignity. We are the ones who nurse the dying in hospice care. We are the ones who accompany the grieving at funeral services. We visit prisoners. We care about the suffering of the Rohingya people forced into exile. We protest the treatment of refugees and send money to care for those in camps. We take our part in attempting to preserve wildlife.

Of course, Christians are not the only ones who do these things. Christians don’t have a monopoly on the works of mercy. But we Christians do these things because we are marked with a cross. This cross is not just a piece of jewellery or our logo. This cross, traced on our forehead when we were baptised, is a symbol of our willingness to follow Jesus in his suffering. We identify with his pain.

It’s not rational, this putting ourselves on the side of suffering. The rational thing is to avoid suffering. We identify with the suffering of Jesus and begin to learn solidarity with all people and all creation. We follow the suffering right through to its end and learn how character grows with suffering.

Jesus asks us to walk with him to Jerusalem. If we follow, we must be prepared to die with him. His promise is that, if we die with him, if we identify as much as possible with his death, we will be raised with him. Jesus is inviting us into this cycle of death to life, suffering to freedom, pain to release.

There is a tradition of beautiful painted crosses with two sides: on the grey side are depictions of Jesus being crucified and grim symbols of death. On the richly coloured side are depictions of the empty tomb and saints and angels applauding Jesus as he bursts to new life.

We are people of the cross, people of both sides of the cross. We identify with the suffering of Jesus and the suffering of all creation. As we enter more deeply into this suffering, we discover, to our joy, signs of healing, love and new life.

At church yesterday, it could easily have degenerated into a heated argument about the end times. ‘What did I think of Trump deciding that Jerusalem was the capital of Israel?’ was the question that initiated our discussion.

We quickly agreed that:

Tel Aviv was of no importance in God’s plans.
If God could work through Cyrus, I said (Isaiah 45:1-13), he can surely work through Trump. ‘And Darius,’ added my interlocutor quickly (Ezra 5-6).
My interlocutor argued that making Jerusalem the capital put paid to the two-state solution. I replied that it is not beyond human ingenuity to have two states and a Jerusalem capital. One possibility was that Jerusalem could be capital of both Israel and Palestine. Surprisingly, he conceded this point.
I learned from my friend that Mr Trump had spent time with African-American churches in the South. We agreed that it is easier to see the worldly influences on the President than the Christian ones.

I tried to argue that our modern idea of the nation-state was not the same as the Bible’s. I don’t think I won that point, even though it’s obvious to me that the ‘goyim’ (nations) in the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) are more tribes than geographical locations delimited by boundaries.

As we talked, my companion revealed a belief that God’s plan included a battle, presumably on the plains near Jerusalem which some scholars identify as Armageddon. I agreed that this agenda could well have been pressed on Mr Trump by his evangelical supporters. It may even have been the reason that Trump’s ‘recognition’ of Jerusalem as the capital was precisely to hasten this outcome.

This is where I part company with my friend. Obviously, there is likely always to be violence in the background as God’s plans are played out – that’s human nature, sadly. It is unlikely, however, that God would intend violent collateral damage (such as the destruction of the Palestinians), or that God would choose violence to further God’s plans.

What made up my mind some years ago were the pleas of Palestinian Christians: wouldn’t you imagine that God had a better plan than their destruction? As I thought about that, I realised that God would not plan the destruction of any Palestinians, Christian, Muslim or Jewish. On the contrary, God wants all Palestinians to flourish.

I cannot countenance violence because in the Bible Jesus accomplishes his victories only by non-violent methods. Love your enemy, Jesus insists.

‘You have heard that it was said, love your neighbours and hate your enemies, but I say to you, love your enemies.’ (Matthew 5:43-44).

This non-violent love is for me the end of my searching the Scriptures; the point where I come to when I have exhausted all other possibilities for God’s plans.

My interlocutor of yesterday, however, at the end of his searching the scriptures, finds four points, including God’s use of violence, that indicate when the end of all things is at hand. I didn’t argue this point with him; I doubt I could change his mind.

I don’t spend energy searching for indicators of the end-time. I take seriously Jesus’ injunction that we ‘do not know the day our Lord is coming’ (Matthew 24:42). Why spend time on a search that will end up being fruitless?

The thing about God is not his timing at all. For God, all time is one. We are not to worry about when God is coming, we are to be concerned about whether we are ready today. We show our readiness by loving our enemies as well as those who love us (Matthew 5:46-47).

Tag: Jerusalem

Marked as Christians

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