Introduction
Whether it’s a bewildering election defeat or victory sinking in, or it’s deep hurt that another earthquake should shake Nepal, or disgust that someone be murdered for writing critical things about religion, there may be strong feelings this week: a fundamental questioning of the things we feel we can thoroughly rely on. As Jesus prays for his disciples, preparing them for his death and resurrection, an event to make the cosmos quake, he audaciously speaks of joy.
Context
We may try to protect ourselves from truth claims by politicians with cynicism. It can make us feel sophisticated when really we’re resentful about being powerless.
We can also use cynicism to protect us from religion’s claims about a god who might unsettle us. It can make us feel righteous while actually we feel vaguely unworthy.
If even the earth can quake, though, surely we should be cautious about absolute truth claims, be they religious or a-religious, political or disengaged.
It is unsettling that Jesus prays for joy, rather than for any sense of righteous victory. For joy is a vulnerable feeling, open, absurd, not claiming control. From the outset, the New Testament judges deeply our tendency to belittle others with the truth we have discovered in Jesus. It is deeply ironic that we do, so we need constantly to allow ourselves to be wisely open to the way the witness to truth of others may judge ours, and to measure the Church’s character against the joyful uncompetitive unity for which Jesus prays, rather than some dream of safety or success. If we have well developed emotional defences, it is a prayer we may prefer be not answered.
Reflection
Avijit Roy, an atheist blogger, has shown us what it means to be martyred for your faith. Martyr does not only mean someone who is killed for what they believe. As Acts reminds us (Acts 1.15-26), it means ‘witness’. Because so many of those testifying authoritatively to the resurrection of Christ died violently, the word has become charged with that additional sinister meaning. The very death, though, emphasises the authority of their witness and the killers’ fear of the truth they spoke. Avijit Roy lived in America where he was surely relatively safe. Others like him have already died brutally when attending book fairs in the Indian sub-continent, but he had gone to take part in such an event in Dhakar, Bangladesh. His beliefs, and his desire to expose the foolishness of religion, were so strong that he went knowingly into danger to witness to the truth as he saw it.
Whether or not his blogs were entirely true or pleasant is beside the point. The mob who hacked him to death clearly do not believe in God, whatever religion they claim to trust. No-one of any faith who truly trusts that God is God, can imagine God needs such protection. Their faces were covered as if to emphasise that they knew they were wrong. Their deluded violence hacks with jealous rage at their own unbelief. Perhaps they hack into their own self-loathing and fear of loss of control of their women and money if people no longer subscribe to the secure structures that a patriarchal religion shores up. From the blogger’s point of view, the truth to which he witnesses – that religion is more trouble than it’s worth – is thoroughly vindicated.
As the apostles choose Matthias as a witness (Acts 1.12-16), our sense of the power of resurrection truth to that ragged group of powerless men and women, under threat from a patriarchal empire, is movingly charged by Avijit’s death. Soon Peter will walk into danger, preaching in the square and letters will be sent to and fro across the known world. They would have blogged if they could. At the same time, we are judged deeply by an atheist martyrdom, and compelled to search for dangerous foolishness in ours and any faith. The story of Judas is carefully recorded (squeamish details of his death missed out by the ‘U certificate’ lectionary) partly because of the witnesses’ bitterness about his betrayal, but also emphasising that he was at the heart of the fellowship, so there is never room for complacency about our motives as individuals and as a group. The mob displays a kind of unity but not a scrap of Godly joy (contrast John 17.11,13). Perhaps, when Jesus prays for protection for them, and we know most will be killed for witnessing, he is asking God to protect them from such distortions, such delusion, such sectarianism, such superiority and entitlement, such religious jealousy and bitter disappointment that must be motivating that deluded group of murderers.
He prays that they be made holy (v.19), that is: worthy of veneration, separated to God, showing mysterious purity that points beyond this world while living in it. We know that, for Jesus, holiness is found and nurtured in joyful community (again, 17.11,13).
Prayer
Picking up the theme of protection, prayers in a pattern such as this could make room for a lot of different opinions and reflections after a general election and in the face of world events while, equally, allowing for strained relationships at work or home.
God of life, your Son prayed for joy.
When we are entrusted with power, protect us from arrogance.
When we are defeated, protect us from bitterness.
When we succeed, protect us from pride.
When others succeed, protect us from jealousy.
When others make mistakes, protect us from gloating.
When disappointments gather, protect us from cynicism.
When others suffer, protect us from apathy.
When the earth quakes, protect us from despair.
Questions
- How far is Jesus’ prayer for joyful unity being answered in our church community?
- What can we helpfully learn from atheist critics of our faith?
Action
In a quiet, private time at home, sit in the most familiar, comfortable place or, if you are physically able, lie on the floor, better still the ground. Allow gravity to work on you as completely as you can, feeling the support beneath you. Aware of catastrophic earthquake, aware of political claims of certainty, aware of the life and death claims of religious faith, all working on our hearts and minds, allow God to reveal the unshakeable quality of his love.
Young People
Search on the internet for ‘Where the hell is Matt?’. Watch the 2008 video. Matt Harding began travelling with a friend who filmed him doing his silly dance in amazing places. Animals, then people couldn’t help joining in. It became more and more ambitious. Eventually, in gatherings arranged through social media, many, many people have joined in. (If you have time, you won’t be able to resist the 2012 film. If you really have time, watch all three, 2006 first.) Talk about how you feel by the end of the film. Talk about joy, why people join in and what we learn from what we see in these films. How far does our Christian faith express such human unity and joy?
John’s gospel begins with John 1. Obvious, but easily forgotten when we read verses that can sound excluding of others. (‘…that they may be one…’ 17.11). ‘All things came into being though him,’ (1.3) so perhaps any such unity and joy could be a glimpse of the Word made flesh. ‘The world did not know him.’ Perhaps we do not know God when we kill in his name; perhaps people do ‘know’ God when they answer Jesus’ prayer and manifest God’s character unknowingly.
David Warbrick is Parish Priest for All Saints Kings Heath in the Anglican Diocese of Birmingham, where he has served in diverse contexts for twenty-two years.
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