It is only retrospectively, in light of who we are becoming,
that we understand who we have been.
This is so obviously true that we rarely think about it. It requires change of a certain order of
magnitude for it to become conscious.
How many of us have had the experience while raising our children of
eventually realizing, “My God, I’ve become my parents?” Suddenly, the narrative of our childhood is
understood in a new way. The capacity to make new choices about how to relate
to the past and to the future becomes available to us.
Sometimes the understanding gained through retrospective
insight can be painful to assimilate. It
is only after getting sober,
or after the divorce, or after returning from combat duty
that we are given the wherewithal to ask ourselves: “Did that really happen? Was I really like
that? How was it that I made those
choices? If only I knew then what I know
now.” Yet there is a certain joy in
coming to accept the past, however painful, when seen in the light of the
transformation it has occasioned.
As we follow the way of Jesus, our experience of the Risen
Christ creates change of an even greater order of magnitude. It brings us into a new way of life and a new
sense of community that radically alters our perception of reality. Jesus describes this change of perception in
a familiar parabolic saying,
Do not judge, so that you may not be
judged. For with the judgment you make
you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s
eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?
Or how can you say to your neighbor, “Let me take the speck out of your
eye,” while the log is in your own eye.
You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will
see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.[i]
“That is to say,” notes James
Alison, “all our knowledge of each other is projective and relational: our knowledge of someone else is inseparable
from our [relationship] to that other person, and what we know of them depends
on a real similarity between the other and ourselves such that we can properly
project from our own experience and begin to understand the other.”[ii]
Jesus raises the question: What is
the mode of projection whereby we encounter others? Is it based on denial of our similarity, such
that we see problems in others in an accusatory mode, or is it based on a sense
of similarity, such that we see problems in others in a forgiving mode, as
analogous, if not identical, to our own problems? The first leads to a process of mutual
antagonism and spiraling conflict. The second leads to compassion and the
potential for cooperation. The result is
insight and an expansion of community.[iii]
This is what we find in the Gospel
accounts of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus is
gathering a radically inclusive community of men and women from across social
classes, sectarian affiliations, and political perspectives. They are all learning together, eating
together, and experiencing healing together, despite their manifest differences
and failings.
Jesus simply invites people,
irrespective of their circumstances, to join him in the process of co-creating
the world energized by God’s life-giving Spirit. Jesus assumes that others, like him, actually
desire to realize their creative potential in the image of God. He draws people into a movement whereby they
become conscious agents of God’s power to reconcile and heal.
Notice that there is no confession
of wretchedness, no beating of the breast, or putting on sackcloth and ashes
required to join this movement. There is
just the offering of a healing touch, the sharing of bread, and the invitation
to do likewise. It is only as one
becomes drawn more deeply into this transforming way of life that one begins to
discover that one has been forgiven; that the past is truly past; and that the
harms we’ve caused or endured do not have the power to exclude us from this
movement.
Too engaged in the joyful project
of renewal to be scandalized by other people’s behavior, the log gently becomes
dislodged from our eye so that we can see ourselves and others as Jesus does:
as people basically like him, absolutely beloved of God and given the power to
share in God’s project of making the world new. It is as we come to forgive our
brokenness, rather than condemn it, that we realize the power to heal.
For those still caught up on the
accusatory mode, where identify is forged over and against those we condemn,
such indiscriminate love is crazy. No
wonder Jesus’ family thinks he has lost his mind! No wonder the authorities try to demonize
him![iv] Accepting such love is threatening, because
as it dissolves the log in our eye we are forced to confront the awful,
liberating truth that we are no better, and no worse, than anyone else.
It is at this point that may
choose to seek to escape, deny, or control the continuing process of creation. We
freeze our experience of reality, remaining bound to perceptions that reinforce
our sense of victimization and entitlement to justify our condemnation of
others. On the other hand, we may
consent to the process of being made new and allow ourselves to be carried into
the forgiving mode, whereby our true identity emerges as we realize our
intrinsic relatedness with others. We
can joyfully accept our brokenness as but the prelude to a wholeness that is
far greater and vastly more encompassing than we could have ever perceived
while the log was still in our eye.
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