March 2

Personal Gods

Exodus 32:1-6

The people said to Aaron, “Come make for us gods who will go before us. As for this man Moses…. we don’t know what has happened to him.” Exodus 32:1

As I listened to one of the most popular christian songs of the last ten years I had an epiphany.  An epiphany is one of those moments when in the cartoons a light bulb goes on over one of the character’s heads. “Shazam” would be another descriptive term for the moment. I had just run out to the store to get a few items that I am sure I couldn’t live without until tomorrow. On the way back from the store I was supposed to stop at my sister in law’s house and pick up our nephew who is staying the night with us. No I didn’t start listening to music and forget to stop and get my nephew. Some of you know me too well. After securing the necessary items at the store I went immediately to get my nephew. As I was buckling him into his seat he asked me what he always asks me whenever I drive him anywhere, “Hey Doug, can we turn the music up really loud?” You see we have this routine of turning on whatever cd that is currently in the disc player and turning it up really loud and then playing the drums on the steering wheel or dashboard or seatback or whatever suffices for drumming at the moment. Sometimes I will let him play air guitar. Please don’t tell my sister in law. The only thing different about this time was that I chose to drive my wife’s van because it was parked in the garage and was warm, unlike my truck which was parked outside and also was nearly out of gas. All this to say that I didn’t really know what cd was in the player that I was about to turn on and up to maximum volume. It was only a short drive so I didn’t really care if it wasn’t one of my favorites. So on and up it went. Oh how I wish I had known what song was going to play. I have never really liked the song that came on but never understood why. Honestly there a lot of things about contemporary westernized christianity of which I have grown weary and I think what happened in that moment was I suddenly realized I didn’t like song because its lyrics represent most of what troubles me about what we call, “christianity.” It is a song about heaven. That seems cool enough. But it is a song that invites the listener to think about their personal experience in heaven. That even seems cool enough on the surface but that is the first thing that troubles me. We don’t think deeply enough about our spiritual reality. I think too often we just want to think about something that makes us feel good or safe or loved or personally rewarded. However, if we are honestly thinking about heaven and how desperately we want to go there and spend eternity with the savior we love, then we must think also about the alternative to heaven because it is just as real and Jesus talked about it just as vividly and passionately.  Just as desperately as we want to go to heaven and be with Jesus we must desperately be involved in the accomplishment of the kingdom of heaven on this earth, which is to bring relief to the suffering and the good news to the poor. If we really believe in heaven and want to go there then we must learn how to spend ourselves on helping others go there as well. I am tired of cocooning in the pleasantries of “christian” pop culture which includes music that helps us feel secure about our destiny while millions suffer presently and may suffer eternally unless we heaven bound hopefuls do something. The irony of heaven is that it is not about our personal experience; our comfort; our joy; our salvation. Heavenly thoughts are those that are centered and focused on the well being of everyone but “me.” The self oriented person, should they make it in by God’s grace, will be utterly bored with heaven because it won’t be about them. At all. Nothing.  Our “self” will be consumed in the presence of the God who revealed himself by fire and who is called “all consuming” in the letter to the Hebrews. For this I am grateful because, I don’t know about you but, “I” is my biggest problem.  I just had another epiphany so please excuse me as I interject it here. If we take Christ out of Christianity what is left is I-anity. (I like that thought so much I just added the word to my dictionary.)That is the other thing that bothers me. The fact that too often Christianity is reduced to a domesticated view of the God, who I just mentioned, is called all consuming, the God of fire. This view causes us to see God as someone who is responsible for serving us and taking care of us and meeting all of my/our needs. He is responsible for giving me/us the life I/we want. It becomes a movement about me and us, rather than about Jesus the Christ and his kingdom. My heart breaks over this mindset because too often we don’t even consider what God may want or require of us. Consequently we go shopping for the “characteristics” of God that make us feel better, comfortable, safe, holy, or at least the one that promises to give us the best life now. The truth about Christianity is that the word “Christian” was coined in the first century to refer to those people who, did not just believe in Jesus, but those who were living like Him. It was used of those who were following Jesus to the point of abandoning their lives to the cause, needs, goals and ideals of the way of Jesus; i.e., the kingdom of Heaven or the kingdom of God on earth.  This “shopping for God” leads to what is known as syncretism. Better look it up. It is the tendency to mix together all the aspects of religious characteristics until we arrive at a god concoction that suites our perceived needs; to concoct, really, what amounts to a personal god. That is what was happening in Exodus. God, through the savior Moses, had just delivered his people Israel from the power and rule of Egypt, a culture that had a “god” for everything. He had revealed himself to them in 10 different miraculous ways as their deliverer from Egypt. Now as He is leading them on the journey He reveals himself as the one true God who is a consuming fire. And although He has taken them out from under the power and influence of Egypt, He has not yet taken the power and influence of Egypt out of them. He has called Moses up to the burning mountain to receive the words that will cleanse them and form them into the people who represent his name in the earth. Before Moses can receive the words and return to the people however, they lose patience and faith and hope. Consequently, in their faithless, impatient state they determine they need to fashion their own gods to go before them; something a little more predictable and manageable that they can follow. They cry out to Aaron, Moses’ brother who is the next best thing. “Aaron, make us gods to go before us. As for Moses, we don’t know what happened to him.” Make us/me a god who fits my needs. Make us something we are familiar with, something safe. So Aaron does something very interesting. He tells them all to take off the earrings of gold they were wearing and give them to him so he could fashion the “god” from that material. He took the earrings, threw them into a fire and according to Aaron, “the golden calf just popped out.” They had received those earrings in Egypt and wore them as a sign of their slavery. In essence what happened is that out of the thing that represented their slavery to the past they fashioned a god they could follow into the future; a personal god.  What is sad and syncretic (remember that word?) about it all is that they put God’s name on it, the one true God, the God who is a consuming fire God. They fashioned this thing out of their slavery and need and fear and faithlessness and impatience and called it “God.” They fashioned something that represented a “God” on their terms. A personal god.

My solution is not a song but it could be. Since I believe in and enjoy epiphanies let me tell you about another one. I was at a leadership meeting about a year ago listening to a man who had been involved in serving the poor for over 25 years. He was not really talking about what I am talking about but while he was talking, the genesis of these thoughts began taking shape in my heart. As he spoke I began to think about the reasons people study the bible, go to church, pray, belong to small groups, serve, etc. Often, I surmised, it is because they want to have a good life and they perceive that these activities will contribute to or create the life they want. I suddenly realized the consumeristic, syncretic potential in that approach to God. It would be so easy to gravitate towards the things that meet our needs and satisfy the criteria for the God we want to serve or the God we want to serve us; you know, a personal God.  At that moment I decided on a different approach. I would from that moment on “abandon myself” to bible study and to prayer and to small group and to serving etc, etc. In other words I would throw myself into the fire of God’s grace (figuratively of course) and see what came out. Hopefully what comes out is a person for God not just a personal god.

 

Just a thought, albeit a long, serious one.

Gotta go…out of milk.

Dance with God