i am leaving for israel & palestine this morning, back next saturday. i am excited! it’s a learning trip with my mom and one of our life-long dreams. last night at our house of refuge my new friend who helped us connect to this particular trip shared about her experience in palestine. as she was sharing, i was reminded how desperate we are for God’s help and hope to heal and restore so much brokenness in this world.
it’s going to come through the spirit of God moving through people to act as ambassadors of love and change and healing.
the beatitudes in matthew 5 are one of my favorite passages of scripture:
blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” – matthew 5:3-10
we read it at the end of our house of refuge last night. oh, they always stir my heart. read them after intense conversation about the israeli-palestinian conflict and the realities and complexities of life there and they really do you in.
they reflect a better way but a harder way. they call us to humility. they call us to relationship.they call us to reconciliation and justice. they call us to love and mercy. they call us to a vulnerable life. they call us to action.
they call us to take the hit for following the ways of Jesus. as individuals, as communities.
a few years ago i did a series on the beatitudes that was really fun for me as a practice. i thought i’d post those links here today. some of you have already read them before, but for me, they are always a good reminder. i also included a couple of other beatitudes posts over the years.
“blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” matthew 5:9
i know i’ve been all over the place the last few weeks & i like to do that here, not feeling pressure to color in the lines but just go with what’s right in front of me. at the same time, i really do want to finish this beatitudes series! there are only 2 more to go.
in this beatitude, the word for peacemaker, is eirēnopoios. what’s interesting is this is the only time it’s used in the bible. the word peace, in the greek, is shalom, which means: completeness, wholeness, safety, soundness, health, friendship in human relationships and with God.
the other beautiful part of shalom is that it is not only about the absence of evil, strive, bad things. it is also the presence of good and positive things. “maker” is an active word. i read it as: “blessed are those who make/participate in/create wholeness, healing, friendship, reconciliation”.
for many of us, the idea of being a “peace-maker” has some big misconceptions. we may have been taught that keeping the peace means not rocking the boat, not messing with the status quo, going with the flow, doing whatever we can do not to be in conflict, stuffing our own feelings for the sake of others, and a whole host of other not-so-healthy relationship skills. so, it’s easy when we read this beatitude at face value to think that at yet another turn it’s our responsibility as Christians to just be quiet and tow the line (this is especially strong for Christian women although i know all kinds of men who struggle with being afraid of conflict, too).
i don’t think that kind of “keeping the peace” is what Jesus is getting at here. he was the ultimate status-quo rocker, oppressive-system-toppler. at the same time, he was referred to as the “prince of peace” and in this beatitude it says that when we are makers of shalom, we will be called “children of God.” to me, this is a lovely reflection, that God’s children will be like him, and he is a peace-maker.
real peace-making does not look like buttoning up our lips and just going along with the powers that be. one look at the gospels & it’s quite clear that is what he was calling us all toward something much deeper than that. i believe he was and continues to call us to restoration. to not just the absence of evil but to the presence of good. that despite the obstacles against it (of which there are many), the ways of the kingdom of heaven are available on earth, now, too.
the earth is not crying out for more brokenness. it’s crying out for healing, restoration, connection, wholeness, and healing.
the question is whether or not we’re willing to participate in its creation. making peace won’t just be about eradicating strife, evil, and conflict but requires us to participate in creating good, bringing love, joy, justice, and mercy to create healing and wholeness in our relationship not only with others but with ourselves & God, too.
to me, peace-making means not only standing against what’s wrong but also actively embodying what’s right. when it comes to issues of equality and injustice, words are only a start. actions are what change things. i think of gandhi & the amazing work that he did on behalf of the poor in India. one of gandhi’s primary inspirations as a young man was Jesus’ sermon on the mount! (thisis interesting). through nonviolent action, things changed. if he just talked about it–or used force–change would have never come. he says, “violent means will bring violent freedom.”
when it comes to living out kingdom ways now, to me it means i will need to respect the fine line between passivity and violence. i think it’s finer than we sometimes think. and because i’m human, sometimes i’ll tip toward one side or the other & it will feel really cruddy. i’ll be too quiet, i’ll be too pissed off. but the part i keep holding on to is that the only way to participate in creating the kingdom now is to actually participate–stumbling, bumbling, trying, with a heart dedicated to practice and actions instead of words.
i think peace-making is brave. it’s staying in instead of running away. it’s being vulnerable instead of protected. it’s letting the image of God that’s in us be reflected instead of hidden. it’s practicing love instead of talking about love. it’s risking our pride, egos, money, time to actually create good instead of only talk about creating good. it’s refusing to participate in systems that oppress others. it’s creating systems that don’t.
the world may not seem to notice. the systems may not topple tomorrow. people may get mad at our actions & our courage. like Jesus, we are sure to be misunderstood, mocked, and called trouble-makers, heretics, liberals, and a whole-host-of-otherthings-that-are-a-lot-worse-than-that.
but in the end, that’s okay. we’re blessed–and acting like God’s children–when we’re making real peace. with ourselves, with others, with God, with the world. when we’re active, living agents of shalom.
God, may we be brave makers of peace, actively participating in creating wholeness and restoration in any way we can.
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the other posts in this series that are scattered out the past few months:
“blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God” – matthew 5:8
i am back, longing for the beach as always but glad to be home, too. we had an amazing time on our vacation, just the 7 of us. my back held up pretty well considering, but do i ever miss the days when i never even had to think about it. my body just worked. sometimes, now, it feels like a full time job.
on my trip i read 4 books, 2 novels & 2 memoirs. it was lovely. my favorite read was litby mary karr. it was the wild & beautiful story of a poet and writer’s journey to sobriety. it was full of wit, pain, and everything in between. i laughed out loud so many times & cried a few times, too. it reminded me, yet again, of the healing power of the central theme of the beatitudes and 12 steps–humility. in all kinds of ways i could identify with mary’s journey & the deep desire to “find a short-cut” instead of having to do the day in and day out heavy lifting of an authentic, humble, connected life.
over and over she resisted community, resisted prayer, resisted needing anyone, resisted change, resisted healing. these things were so much harder than the comfort & escape of a drink. well, lots of drinks; she was most definitely a binger. always, though, we can plug in almost any addiction–work, church, drugs, porn, sex, relationships, approval, food, you name it, and the same thing can be said. all of these ways of escaping are a lot easier in the short run. in the long run, though, they destroy, divide, and hinder freedom. they are not a pathway to peace, but rather a sure road to shame, self-hatred, and in-grown eyeballs.
we have three more beatitudes to wrap up this series. this 6th one fits so well with lit & mary karr’s journey toward change. in this beatitude, Jesus says, “blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”
pure in heart. in most of my christian experience prior to working the 12 steps, i was taught that purity meant perfection. when our hearts were “right with God” then somehow we wouldn’t be sinning, struggling, stressing. now i see it completely differently. i see purity of heart as humility. an openness to God. an honesty with ourselves, with God. an authenticity that doesn’t feel the need to hide or pretend or do all kinds of things to cover up what’s really going on inside.
when we are pure in heart, honest & open, we see God. a barrier gets lifted, a veil gets removed & somehow, some way, we intersect with God in a way that we can’t when our pride & games are getting in the way. maybe it’s somehow connected to the scripture in 2 corinthians 3:16-18 that says “but whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. for the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. so all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. and the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.”
in my own journey, i know how to hide from God, others, and even myself. it wasn’t that hard to do. in lots of ways, my church experience helped with it. to hide, all i needed to do was surround myself with a bunch of other people who were going through the motions of faith by going to church, studying the Bible, growing kids “God’s way” and stay as busy as possible. the busier the better because then i didn’t have to reckon with the deep loneliness inside, or the feeling of tension that any moment someone was going to find out about the two-faced-ness of my life–trying hard to look good on the outside while my inner life was wracked with shame & guilt & anger toward myself, God, and a whole lot of other people.
i remember when 17 years ago i was asked to become more “pure in heart” and be more honest about what was going on inside in my relationship with God, myself, others in the confines of a safe women’s group at a church in san diego. i was terrified. literally. in fact, i found all kinds of ways initially to get out of having to share. i whined about the group not using the Bible enough. i complained that there didn’t seem to be a point or an end or a finish line to strive after (the stuff that i am best at). i found ways to give just “enough” information to look like i was contributing while holding back the real stuff. but i kept going & over time, something broke in me and i started to become more honest. the truth be told, though, it was about 3 years into this group–right when jose got out of the military and we moved to colorado–that things really started to kick in on what it might mean to be more honest, more pure in heart. i had barely scratched the surface when i had to move.
however, what had happened there lingered. i saw that the more honest & humble i was toward God, my flaws, my weaknesses, my struggles, the more i did in fact, “see God.” freedom started to flow & i felt some of the fear i originally felt dissipate. i began to feel more connected to others, to God, to myself in the midst of the mess.
now i associate the word “mess” with “pure in heart.” before, i thought pure in heart meant clean, shiny, new, perfect, squared-away, put-together, unbroken. now, i think of pure in heart as messy, honest, real, unhindered, raw, vulnerable, authentic, human.
human beings feel. human beings are messy.
part of my journey toward more purity of heart has been continually embracing my humanity & God’s divinity. i spent a lot of years trying hard to strive to be divine when that was never the idea . i always fell short, i always lacked, i always felt separated from God. all the energy i spent cleaning the outside of my cup didn’t do me a lick of good; it actually just equaled more church volunteer work & more ways to pretend.
when i finally started working on honestly addressing the inside of my cup, the heavens parted & i was able to see more clearly my humanness & God’s divinity. and my desperate need to remember “there’s a God and i’m not him.”
regardless of this awareness, the tug toward wanting a more clean, less messy life always beckons me. i try to figure out ways to “get purer faster” and sometimes juke and jive myself out of confronting the realities of my humanity & all the ways i continue to struggle with freedom & deep, lasting peace. but i know, maybe more than ever, that this beatitude calls me to stay on the path of honesty & is the one i want to keep walking on. it’s the place i’ll see God, myself, others in new ways that need seeing.
so, that’s what this beatitude means to me in this moment. what about you?
“blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy…” – matthew 5:7
i sometimes tell people “grace is my love language.” and it’s really true. that’s not on the 5 love languages list, but there’s no question it’s my #1. the more grace and mercy i receive from people around me, the more loved i feel & the more i am drawn toward them. the less mercy i feel, the harder it is on my soul & the more likely i am to move the other direction.
yeah, mercy is compelling.
in the beatitudes, Jesus is reminding us of core practices, attitudes, and leanings-toward-people-and-the-world that are guiding principles of kingdom living. through each of these attitudes and actions, a fruit or outcome results. when we are spiritually poor, we see the kingdom of God. when we mourn, we receive comfort, etc.
Jesus says that the merciful will receive mercy back. later in the scriptures Jesus also quotes hosea 6:6, that God desires “mercy not sacrifice.” i am more convinced than ever that as human beings we are far better at sacrifice than mercy. we know how to follow rules, tow the line, and somehow stay in the lines of “right behavior.” what we aren’t so great at is mercy.
religion has stripped a lot of mercy out of how we follow God & replaced it with sacrifice. it makes me think of the story of the good samaritan and how the religious leader was too focused on “religious” things and kept walking while the samaritan man, the one on the margins who held all the wrong beliefs, was the one who stopped and offered mercy & compassion to the wounded man on the side of the road.
one current example of this in action that’s so obvious is the typical response to homosexuality & the church. instead of stopping and caring and erring on the side of mercy, the side of sacrifice is elevated above all, leaving carnage all over the place. and look who’s stopping to pick up the wounded on the side of the road: the outcasts, the fringers, the ones-who-will-risk-their-reputations-and-even-their-lives to care about the hurting.
Jesus was known for offering mercy to those who weren’t used to receiving it. in fact, over and over, he was ridiculed by the law-abiders for the grace and mercy he offered. it was an abomination to them, the people he touched, the ways he healed, the mercy he passed on to the unclean. it’s also my favorite part about Jesus.
to me, mercy is the essence of being a Christ-follower. i do not think Jesus’ intention and hope for us was that we’d be known as the people in town who spent all our energy concerned with laws, rules, and who-was-doing-what-right and who-interpreted-the-scriptures-this-way-or-that-way. when i read the gospels i see wild stories of Jesus continually passing on mercy to the desperate, the messy, the broken, the needy, the humble, the spiritually poor, the willing.
i need mercy each and every day; mercy is a beautiful gift that God passes on to us. i cling to lamentations 3 & the hope that even though i continually screw up a long list of things, God’s mercies are new every morning. years ago, when i was first starting to reckon with pain from my past, i remember how harsh and cruel i constantly was to myself. unforgiveness was rooted deep in my heart; i couldn’t offer mercy to myself and certainly couldn’t fully receive God’s mercy either. the result–i was mean to other people, too. we pass on to others how we feel about ourselves; subtly or directly, it always leaks out.
this beatitude, in my opinion, is core to living out our faith. mercy is a healing balm to wounds. it fills in the cracks, helps people stand on more solid ground, brings wind underneath people’s wings, dissipates shame, and sets people free. mercy transmits a message of love & compassion.
the world does not need any more cruelty, meanness, or uncompassion. oh, we all know there’s enough of that to go around already. but i do believe our world, our cities, our neighborhoods, our churches, our communities, our families, our own hearts, are in desperate need of mercy, kindness, and compassion. people who listen. people who stop and shore up wounds. people who restore hope. people who forgive. people who look others in the eye and say “yeah, i struggle, too.” people who let go and trust God-at-work instead of feeling like the world will fall apart unless they speak “the truth”. people who have tasted mercy in their own lives.
i know what it feels like when i intersect with some of the opposites of mercy. it hurts. it devalues. it belittles. it disempowers. it shames. it makes me think of what maya angelou says: “people will forget what you did, people will forget what you said, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
i don’t think Jesus espouses a feel-good religion. the beatitudes are far from that, each one in and of itself is extremely difficult and challenging in actual practice. but i do believe that mercy is compelling and brings with it a spirit of love & hope that is desperately missing in the unforgiving, harsh, and cruel systems we often live in.
God, may we be people and communities who generously pass on mercy, and freely receive it, too. help us be conduits of your kindness and compassion, the most likely to care and the least likely to judge.
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ps: i am leaving today for a family vacation for my son’s college spring break–a caribbean cruise with just jose & i & all the kids–no computer, no cell phone, no work for a whole week, yeah! i can’t wait. we planned this 3 years ago when jose graduated from law school & never went because of our nutty schedules. it’s my first time traveling in 6 months & i’m hoping my back will hold up okay. i just need to make it through my flight & then i’m home free…
also, here are a few other things to check out:
ps: darkwood brew did a recent series on the beatitudes. i haven’t had a chance to watch them but they look great also, check out the beatitudes society. they are doing some beautiful work on behalf of peace & justice & mercy.
ppss: i wanted to let you know about a fun project i was a small part of called banned questions of the bible by christian piatt, published by chalice press and releasing this month. here’s the video trailer & an excerpt from one of the questions here:
a few days ago i walked a labyrinth with a friend. no matter how long or short, whenever i carve out quiet time & get some silence & space to connect with God, i am always refreshed somehow. nothing super exciting happened in the moment but i did have this strong and beautiful sense of God’s sureness underneath my feet as i walked.
it was the world’s ugliest labryinth (really) and it was a little windy & cold outside but as i walked i started noticing these little rocks that were sparkly & shiny here and there. they were scattered within the stark brownness of the rest of the path. i felt this sense of God whispering, “notice the beauty…don’t miss the beauty…see, it’s here…sometimes it’s hard to notice but it’s there.” in the middle of the mess of living in the trenches with people, sometimes i just get tired. the needs always are bigger than our resources. pain doesn’t magically disappear. poverty is complicated. abuse has long-lasting and brutal effects. and a Jesus-centered life of descent as opposed to the life of ascent (even though that one’s taught in Jesus’ name, too) is definitely a bumpier road.
but that’s the road that Jesus is calling us to in the beatitudes. it is a beautiful road. and an ugly road (my friend deb made up a new word–beautifugly). and most definitely the road i want to continue to walk because there’s so much to be learned here.
in this fourth beatitude, Jesus says, “blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (NIV). in the NLT it says, “blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied.” the word in the king james for righteousness in the broader sense is centered on the way toward a state approved of by God, integrity, purity, virtue of life. in the narrower sense, it is justice.
there are three parts of this beatitude to consider.
the first is the “hunger and thirst” part. this implies that we aren’t where we want to be. we aren’t satisfied with the status quo. we want more. people who are hungry and thirsty will go to pretty big lengths to try and find food & water. embedded in these words are longing, desire, and some kind of movement.
in this past week i have had several conversations centered around women & the church. biblical equality is such a foreign concept in so many evangelical circles & every time i think about the inequality & the perpetuating of oppression toward women that is basically the norm i get all riled up. and it reminds me just how powerful the status-quo-and-what-we’ve-always-been-fed is. if it doesn’t affect us, often we don’t really care. if everyone else is doing it or buys into it or throws “God says” into the sentence, shouldn’t we, too? hungering and thirsting after integrity looks to me like a holy-stirring inside that says “things are not right and i want to play a part in making them right.”
the second part of the beatitude–righteousness–might easily mispoint us toward personal piousness & making sure we somehow have our own ducks in a row. but what if we read it more corporately and considered communally what hungering and thirsting for integrity & justice really looked like in action? so much of what i had been taught in a lot of my contemporary christian experience was focused on “personal righteousness”–basically making sure that i was “right with God” somehow. it centered on thinking the right thoughts & believing the right things. when i read this now, i see something far deeper. i see a corporate thirst for integrity & wholeness that comes not from ascending up toward God, getting one step away from our humanity and one step closer to godliness, but rather a descent toward embracing our humanness & need for God & the wholeness that comes from that.
the last part of the beatitude says that the blessing of hungering and thirsting for righteousness is that we will be fed, filled, satisfied. i don’t think this is a contentment that brings stagnation or inaction. but i think it is a contentment that is God-fuel, holy spirit reminders like the one i got yesterday at the labyrinth–“i’m here, strong and firm, i’m underneath you, and i’m making beauty in the ugliness.” as i was walking the labyrinth the lovely words of julian of norwich, the 14th century mystic, came to me. i knew it must somehow be God because it is very rarely something that i reference or think of. she says, “all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.” somehow that’s what satisfied, full, filled somehow means to me.
in the midst of Jesus’ seemingly-crazy-upside-down-living we can have deep peace. in the midst of longing for change in our own lives, in the lives of the world & the neighborhoods & churches & families, we can have deep peace. in the midst of embracing our humanity & letting God work in our lives, we can have deep peace. in the midst of actively pursuing justice & advocating for change, we can have deep peace.
God, help us be people who long for change, in our own lives & in the communities we live in. and then, guide us as we act on those longings and pursue justice, integrity, wholeness and healing. may we experience your deep peace in the midst.
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ps: i posted this on facebook but i thought i’d share it here, too, as i know some of you aren’t on there. it’s really great stuff from my friend craig spinks & recycle your faith called unprogrammed relationships. watch this one & also the one called a loving contempt.
