How do we 'get better?' How do we stop f-ing up? These are questions, I bet, that we ask ourselves more often than "how do I get to heaven" or "become perfect" and I think they offer a very good start. We know of which we speak: the snippy remark that turns a nice Saturday afternoon with the spouse into quiet hostility; the arrogant or boastful conversation with an acquaintance that makes us wince afterword; the dismissive look we give to a bunch of low-rider juveniles on the sidewalk, which lumps them into a stereotype that makes us realize our own exclusive group - think. All cringe-worthy, all short of what we know is the better way.
We don't want to cringe, to realize our shortcomings, and so we often avoid what has been in front of most of us all our lives: the image of our most revered people. For Christians, of course, that image is of Jesus, and we often dispel the discomfort we get from the Gospels by saying, "sure, easy to say in a perfect world. If I did that (turn the other cheek, give an extra cloak when one is asked for, live for the day) I would be bloodied and poor and living by the dumpster." But some careful examinations of perfection don't let us off the hook so easily. Some, like Dallas Willard's The God Conspiracy, force us to understand that being Christ-like is do-able, and that, in the end, leads to a better life, for others as well as the self.
Willard starts from the notion that Jesus was brilliant, not just "good," and spoke in the manner of genius, where all things were related in a seamless whole. Discussing the Beatitudes - the Sermon on the Mount - he finds for us the common theme: do not live for other's approval, but for the approval of God; to do this, forsake anger, contempt and arrogance. And we find that he is right - that anger produces a never-ending chain of misery, and that social approval produces contempt and arrogance, those on the bottom vs. those on the top. In such a system, the Law becomes the bulwark that sustains the system, even if this law came from Moses himself, for the law is practiced only for external reasons - for social approval. Thus Jesus rips the Pharisees, those guardians of external law, and shows them how to LIVE the law - to extend oneself outside of one's hierarchy; to eat and communicate with those we believe to be beneath us.
All tied into one theme: treat others as you would have yourself be treated, and you do away with exclusive hierarchy, which breeds contempt, which breeds anger, which breeds hatred - which breeds misery. Do away with social approval, which causes need for certain things and behaviors, which produces anxiety and fear and greed, to guard and maintain those things and behaviors. In the end, live for the day alone, live for God and His law, and trust - for His kingdom is greater than all that human social nonsense.
This summary of (the first half of) Willard's long and insightful book is inadequate, but perhaps the reader has formed the same question in his or her mind from this that I did: sure, great, Willis, but how the hell do you do that? What kind of mind-police would I need to never get angry, to never become snobby or self-righteous? The first is build into our animal DNA, while the second is built into our social system. I assumed, as is often the case, that we would have to rely on that old catch-all, grace - which cannot be achieved, but must be bestowed. But it dawned on me last night that this not necessarily the case.
Willard shows very clearly how our ordinary behavior creates misery for both the world and ourselves, and how clearly Jesus understood this. What Jesus was trying to do was to convince us through concrete parables that our ordinary way of thinking made our lives more insecure, more miserable, quite apart from an abstract notion of God. This is why Willard reminds us that Jesus was not only good, but a genius.
That is: If we understood what Jesus was saying, we would follow his advice out of our own interest. Like the middle child in the argumentative family, we would be the peacemakers, because peace makes for a better overall life. Like the oddball in high school - and we all are at some point - we would help ourselves by seeing others as ourselves. We can, then, begin to achieve this more perfect way by deciding to - by seeing the logic in it, and how it would, without question, make our lives better. Lose your job and have to move to a smaller house or apartment? Flunk a test? Get a homely girlfriend or dorky boyfriend that you like? No big deal. As for anger - yes, it is unavoidable, but one can let it go. Teased by the kids in Junior High? Punched in the nose by the local bully? Snubbed by the cool kids at the lunch table? What to do - get into fights or let it gnaw and turn into bitterness - or let it go? The answers are obvious. For a better life, at least when one is not threatened with immediate great harm, turn the other cheek - and don't mind the kids at the other table. They are only kids, and if they behave like that when older, are still only kids.
In the end, though, it is best to know that God is with us through it all - that there is a moral basis as well as a practical basis for behavior. But to become better - to stop f-ing up - is also a mind thing, something we can think our way into. Amazing. And we thought the great holy men were only well - meaning cherubs. FK
We don't want to cringe, to realize our shortcomings, and so we often avoid what has been in front of most of us all our lives: the image of our most revered people. For Christians, of course, that image is of Jesus, and we often dispel the discomfort we get from the Gospels by saying, "sure, easy to say in a perfect world. If I did that (turn the other cheek, give an extra cloak when one is asked for, live for the day) I would be bloodied and poor and living by the dumpster." But some careful examinations of perfection don't let us off the hook so easily. Some, like Dallas Willard's The God Conspiracy, force us to understand that being Christ-like is do-able, and that, in the end, leads to a better life, for others as well as the self.
Willard starts from the notion that Jesus was brilliant, not just "good," and spoke in the manner of genius, where all things were related in a seamless whole. Discussing the Beatitudes - the Sermon on the Mount - he finds for us the common theme: do not live for other's approval, but for the approval of God; to do this, forsake anger, contempt and arrogance. And we find that he is right - that anger produces a never-ending chain of misery, and that social approval produces contempt and arrogance, those on the bottom vs. those on the top. In such a system, the Law becomes the bulwark that sustains the system, even if this law came from Moses himself, for the law is practiced only for external reasons - for social approval. Thus Jesus rips the Pharisees, those guardians of external law, and shows them how to LIVE the law - to extend oneself outside of one's hierarchy; to eat and communicate with those we believe to be beneath us.
All tied into one theme: treat others as you would have yourself be treated, and you do away with exclusive hierarchy, which breeds contempt, which breeds anger, which breeds hatred - which breeds misery. Do away with social approval, which causes need for certain things and behaviors, which produces anxiety and fear and greed, to guard and maintain those things and behaviors. In the end, live for the day alone, live for God and His law, and trust - for His kingdom is greater than all that human social nonsense.
This summary of (the first half of) Willard's long and insightful book is inadequate, but perhaps the reader has formed the same question in his or her mind from this that I did: sure, great, Willis, but how the hell do you do that? What kind of mind-police would I need to never get angry, to never become snobby or self-righteous? The first is build into our animal DNA, while the second is built into our social system. I assumed, as is often the case, that we would have to rely on that old catch-all, grace - which cannot be achieved, but must be bestowed. But it dawned on me last night that this not necessarily the case.
Willard shows very clearly how our ordinary behavior creates misery for both the world and ourselves, and how clearly Jesus understood this. What Jesus was trying to do was to convince us through concrete parables that our ordinary way of thinking made our lives more insecure, more miserable, quite apart from an abstract notion of God. This is why Willard reminds us that Jesus was not only good, but a genius.
That is: If we understood what Jesus was saying, we would follow his advice out of our own interest. Like the middle child in the argumentative family, we would be the peacemakers, because peace makes for a better overall life. Like the oddball in high school - and we all are at some point - we would help ourselves by seeing others as ourselves. We can, then, begin to achieve this more perfect way by deciding to - by seeing the logic in it, and how it would, without question, make our lives better. Lose your job and have to move to a smaller house or apartment? Flunk a test? Get a homely girlfriend or dorky boyfriend that you like? No big deal. As for anger - yes, it is unavoidable, but one can let it go. Teased by the kids in Junior High? Punched in the nose by the local bully? Snubbed by the cool kids at the lunch table? What to do - get into fights or let it gnaw and turn into bitterness - or let it go? The answers are obvious. For a better life, at least when one is not threatened with immediate great harm, turn the other cheek - and don't mind the kids at the other table. They are only kids, and if they behave like that when older, are still only kids.
In the end, though, it is best to know that God is with us through it all - that there is a moral basis as well as a practical basis for behavior. But to become better - to stop f-ing up - is also a mind thing, something we can think our way into. Amazing. And we thought the great holy men were only well - meaning cherubs. FK
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