Tuesday 10 June 2014

THE JESUS MANIFESTO



I was quite startled when a high profile individual on social media declared that God was distributing special weekend blessings to his children and if you declared your address somehow this blessing would maneuver itself from behind the celestial wings of Cherubim and land at your doorstep (Heavenly DHL or something). Thousands of ‘Likes’ followed, as well as comments ranging from affirming the oncoming ‘special blessings’,  to some quiet voices warning others of the potential harm that could befall you for so freely declaring your physical address to faceless strangers. The thread grew in length, and before long, people began to rank and file, factions being formed. Some felt this was preposterous, a portrayal of Heaven as some priceless shopping mall with seasonal specials, while others, with some desperation in their voices clutched tightly every word that was spoken of approaching hope, of  pending breakthrough in their lives.  These voices mingled in-harmoniously as when bulls fight, uncoordinated, horns clashing, and as the dust rose I wondered how the main spectator of all this might have felt and thought. The main and most important spectator being of course Jesus Christ himself.  

What is a blessing anyway? Can it be held? If it can, I suppose then it is fair to suggest that it can also be packaged, box and ribbon, and also branded.  Is it a message? That too may be branded. Weekend Blessing Specials, Season of Breakthrough, Year of Favour. These are the themes commonly emblazoned upon many posters that belong primarily to the charismatic wing but extremely popular not just here in Malawi but worldwide. We are told to claim our blessings, seize that which was won on the cross for us. To possess plenty, for this is your birthright as a child of God. And when one listens closely beneath the Hallelujahs and praise songs, one begins to wonder whether they are nothing more than a distorted echo from the crackling sound of simmering material ambition. The desire to live luxuriously. And the author of the faith, a dirt poor Carpenter elevated on a cross looks down as His congregation kneels, closes its eyes, and dreams of LV bags. Or the new CL65 Mercedes.  But what is the seemingly forgotten message that He had initially said?

“And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come…” Haggai 2:7

The desire of all nations…the urge in the hearts of all people across the face of the Earth. What was this desire? What was it about this magnetic young man that attracted hordes from all rungs of society and orders of life to his presence. What did Jesus see in the constitution of Mankind that made him point to people and show them before their eyes what they had collectively felt and dreamt all along but had vaguely known? He had not uttered it in the inaccessible marble palaces of princes, or obscured it in the hieroglyphs of glorified pharaohs buried beneath mysteriously massive and unmovable stones upon the sands of Egypt. Thousands of eyes upon him, he announced it without discrimination. To fishermen, thieves, scholars, murderers, single mothers, brothers, merchants; upon open fields and along the sandy beaches of the sea and he spoke with sublime world shattering simplicity:

“The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.”

It is this simple truth that echoes through the ages. Jesus Christ showed us all that all that was great, all that was valuable and worthwhile, all that was worth striving for and grasping, all that elevates, the culmination of all our hopes, the beginning and the end of us rests within. There is nothing outside of you that can ultimately validate you, and every feeling of inadequacy that you might struggle with is a result of a cruel and imperfect world weighing heavily and oppressively upon you. A world that could have been better, but a world tarnished and ruined by people who had forgotten where their treasures truly lay. This is why He walked around comfortably in rags, for there was no fundamental difference between straw and silk. This is why he slept wherever his head lay for a dry cave in the Mediterranean Basin was as sufficient as a lofty villa of one of the Caesars.  He nullified traditions that seek to muffle your voice and rank you in the world, traditions that write out your destiny and seek to determine the path of your feet before you had searched for yourself and determined the direction your steps would take. He taught us that the pillars of strength required to support one against all the crippling sorrow and ills one sees in the world are found when you close your eyes and take hold of the treasure within.

And the truth of the message applies even to those who had not necessarily heard it directly that way. Mohandas Gandhi stunned all protocol when he appeared before Queen Mary of England in his customary loin cloth prompting an astounded Winston Churchill to call him a ‘half- naked fakir’. The Mahatma understood that the pomp of an Earthly Empire upon which the sun never set was miniscule compared to the latent strength in one human heart. I am not saying that Gandhi was a Christian, but he understood the message. It was these notions that caused abolitionists to question themselves and their choices, with regard to slavery. They spent their quiet nights haunted by a still voice that reminded them that if Jesus died for all men equally, if we speak of these self evident truths and liberty, how can we then permit this atrocity? And from the crucible of this self conversation hosted within, men like Lincoln were made. It was the message expressed by the quiet and extraordinary strength that Nelson Mandela and the other Apartheid activists showed over decades of horror, decades that should have made beasts of them, but they stood steadfast as men draped with unshakable dignity. It was expressed by Vera Chirwa, the first female Malawian lawyer, unflinchingly looking at a dictatorship square in the eye, forgiving her captors for the injustice they were doing her. Jesus Christ suggested that everyone, born in the past, and yet to be born possesses this hidden treasure. And this is the timeless golden message that passes unnoticed through the centuries like a thin thread barely visible in the light. Visible only to those who are looking. Who are straining their eyes so that they might see. And from this revelation Jesus Christ became the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, for no single king offered his subjects the freedom to search within and to simply be. And to be complete in that simple being. He created a Kingdom with no borders, with no walls. But with a citizenry stretched through time. Children of the Light. Black, white, Indian, Malawian in AD 2014, Assyrian in 1300 BC – no difference. All might look within and transcend themselves across all time. This is salvation. All nations bow. And they do so willingly after understanding. I have come across people who ridicule religion without even having a decent thought about it, or considering what others are saying. God does not punish blasphemers on the spot for it would be like striking a blind man unaware that above him is a mighty and powerful sun illuminating and nourishing him.

We will always debate and argue on the dogma and particulars. When shall we pray? What is permissible to eat and drink? How shall we dress? The denominations will continue to exist and everyone must decide individually, even if you are irreligious that is your choice but the echo of such a beautiful message resonates around us all. An echo we cannot ignore.

Everyone has needs and has the right to ask God for what they need or even what they want, but let’s be careful we do not sully something that was pure. To be blessed is to know that you have a respectable place and purpose in the world; that your life is not a sequence of meaningless events; to soak the warmth of the sun in good health. To sleep peacefully at night. To live without hate or envy. That is a blessed life.

Let’s focus on that.

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