God of the Gaps: A Brave New World

Consider the following:

A man was looking for a good church to attend and he happened to enter one in which the congregation and the preacher were reading from their prayer book. They were saying, “We have left undone things which we ought to have done, and we have done those things which we ought not to have done.”

The man dropped into a seat and sigh with relief as he said to himself, “Thank goodness, I’ve found my crowd at last.” (The Spirituality of Imperfection, p 234)

What truths are taught in this story?

Luke 12:22-34

Commentary

Jesus’ reasoning has five parts:

v22-23 more than food ... more than clothes. Here “more” is a comparative adjective, which means it defines the nouns--food and body. There is more to life, there is more to us, than the food, clothes, etc. we are looking at.” We have a tendency to define ourselves down, to reduce our lives and our problems to things of relative unimportance.

v24-26 much more valuable than birds! In this section, Jesus addresses worrying about food. Here and in the next section, “more” is an adverb, meaning it modifies the action. That is, God will do a better job feeding us than he does feeding the birds.

v27-28 much more will he clothe you! In this section, Jesus addresses worrying about clothes: “God will do a better job clothing you than he does clothing the lilies.” The implication is that God’s actions on our behalf are more certain, more thorough, and more effective.

v29-31 your Father knows that you need them (v30). In these last two sections, Jesus steps back to look at the big picture. First, there is God the Father—v30 is the first place in this passage where God is mentioned in this personal way. The pagan—the one estranged from God—runs after the petty things in life because he does not know the generosity of the Father. We who know the Father should not be driven by worry and despair!

v32-34 do not be afraid (v32). The big picture expands to not just include the Father, but others inside and outside of the kingdom of God. We worry about petty things due to anxiety—fear of what the future holds. Jesus’ counsel is not just “Don’t worry,” but to live in the kingdom with the expectation of sufficiency. Once our focus expands beyond ourselves, we are free to enter into a brave new world of kingdom living.

What is the context for these verses? v13-21 are the parable of the rich fool, who tore down his barns to build bigger barns only to die that night; v35-40 are a charge to be ready—to be caught doing what is right. v32-34 are not just good advice, but the way we are called to live each day.

Application

What more is there to life than the petty things we worry about? Jesus gives us two answers: God, and neighbor. The petty things we worry about all pertain to our own needs—or at best our immediate family’s needs. We have been designed to live in community—with God, certainly, but with each other as well. Our obsession with our own needs shrinks our world down to a universe of self—a world that can never satisfy, because we were created for a brave new world: a community where we mirror the love of our Father in heaven as we love each other, a community where we return the Father’s generosity by sharing his material gifts with each other.

This brave new world is based on our knowledge of our relationship to our spiritual Father. We are no longer alone. Not only are we not alone, it turns out that the ruler of this brave new world is working for us. Despite today’s troubles, despite our petty concerns about food, clothes, and the like, our Father will make sure we get exactly what we need. As any parent with a young child knows, what the child wants and what the child needs is rarely the same thing. We may not get the food we want, we may not get the clothes we want, we may not get the health, or happiness, or prosperity we want.

What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? ... Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ... For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:31-32, 35, 38-39)

That love is what we have been missing; that love is what we see when we back up to look at the whole picture.

When we really get that we are loved—that God is for us—we can begin to live with an expectation of sufficiency. [1] That expectation of sufficiency changes us from hoarders (the thieves and moths cannot take what we are using, but rather only what we are hoarding) into givers. Only once we are free to give without reservation are we free to love and care for our neighbor.

The Discipline of Koinonia:
Community through Intimate Participation

Koinonia means a partnership. Partners, in a business, in a marriage, in a club, or a church have a shared common interest. They are bonded together by that interest.

However, koinonia goes further, as partners enter into the life of one another, sharing treasures & trials, pleasures & pains, life & death together.

Koinonia creates an openness where we no longer have to try to be somebody we are not; we no longer have to live solely for ourselves; we no longer have to feel different and alone.

In one of our Wednesday night contemplative services, we learned about the relationship between one of the Hebrew words for “love” and the word for “obligation”. If you truly want to love another person, take on an obligation to care for that person. We have come to view obligations as burdens and hardships, but the Bible teaches that there is no love that does not bring with it an obligation to another. An ancient spiritual truth states: There is no koinonia without kenosis (i.e. there is no community without the emptying out of self). From this change in our orientation comes the humility that nurtures the gratitude that allows the generosity that transforms how we live.

As we fulfill our obligations to another, we discover that the other person is more like ourselves than we thought. Koinonia, in the words of theologian Mary Daly is, “The deepest possible community ... that is discovered rather than ‘formed,’ when we meet others who are on the same voyage.

Points to Ponder

Would you say that you are predisposed to hoarde what you have, or give it away freely?

Food and clothing—the two items Jesus focuses on in this passage—might not be your foibles. What material things do you tend to worry about?

What immaterial things do you tend to worry about?

Where have you not trusted God your Father to give you what you need? Would you like to trust in him today?

End Notes
1 - Not an expectation of prosperity—I think that sets us up to believe in a false gospel where we begin to pray for all sorts of ridiculous worldly things!