Give thanks because he’s given Jesus Christ, his Son.
It’s November and Thanksgiving is almost upon us. On Facebook, 30 Days of Thankfulness is in full swing. Each day, participants in the 30 Day Challenge use their status to record something in their life for which they are grateful. From the enormity of faith, family and friendships to the simplicity of a free latte at your coffee joint or a friendly smile from a sales clerk, folks publicly share their litany of thanks for the joys and blessings of their lives.
Of course, being thankful for something is not limited to a 30-day time span that only rolls around each autumn. Nor is it required to use social media to proclaim the things that make your day brighter. After all, considering the ways in which the love and goodness of God fills our lives is nothing trendy or avant-garde but is a deliberate spiritual exercise reaches back into the Psalms of the Old Testament. There, again and again, in numerous songs, often composed in the face hardship, trial, and even persecution, the tenor of the Psalmist is to turn to God and offer praise, prayer and thanksgiving (Psalm 2, 5, 7, 10, 13, 18, 20, 22, 23, 37, 61, 62, 64, just to name a few!).
Certainly the Psalmist is not grateful for the trauma and setbacks he experiences. Rather, there is a conscious decision to find a way to be grateful for God’s presence in his life amidst the hardship. To sing of God’s praises helps disappointment from becoming despair, concern from becoming anxiety and fear, or dislike becoming bitterness and hatred. It’s a gratefulness that does not depend upon external circumstances, but on an inner faith and confidence that helps form a person’s identity.
This kind of deep, soul-searching thankfulness and gratitude is not relegated to faceless biblical heroes of bygone days, but occurs in the here and now. I am sure each of us have known or know someone—a relative, a friend, a neighbor or a co-worker—who has faced extreme pain, anguish or loss; a cancer diagnosis, the catastrophic loss of home and property, or discovering terminal illness which now means hospice care. Despite their dire circumstances, they still manage to find the good happening and focus on that instead of their misfortune. We marvel at their resilience, their positive attitude, and the gratitude that pervades their perspective and we hope that we might respond with half the grace, dignity, humor, and gratitude as they do for the blessings they count in their lives.
Gratitude is not simply an emotional response to circumstances. Yes, we are thankful when we are the beneficiaries of some good or perceived blessing. We seek out the benefactor, the one who has bestowed us with good and express our thanks. But having gratitude that transcends circumstances, having the ability to find the good that persists in life is a virtue. It is an interior quality that helps define a person’s character. More than a personality trait, virtue is something to be cultivated, practiced until it become a habit that so shapes our identity it becomes something by which we are known to others.
Gratitude as a virtue is a deliberate choice made in our ordinary, everyday lives as we see goodness with humility and graciousness, regardless of circumstances. Gratitude is a decision; it is, as Paul wrote—from the confines of prison—to think on whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent and worthy of praise (Philippians 4:8). Gratitude is, for the Christian, to realize we are dependent upon God for our lives, our redemption and our salvation. Gratitude and thankfulness in all things does not mean to be grateful for all circumstances, but to be thankful for the presence of the crucified and risen Christ in and throughout all circumstances, just as the lyricist wrote,
And now let the weak say, “I am strong”
Let the poor say, “I am rich
Because of what the Lord has done for us.”
Facebook’s 30 Days of Thankfulness is not a requirement for people who want to become more grateful. But it is one way to cultivate and practice thankfulness if you are committed to making gratitude a habitual part of your life. Other ways include keeping a blessing journal, living out Philippians 4:8, looking for the good in daily life, and offering praise and thanksgiving in your prayers. Regardless of how you choose to practice gratitude, choosing to spend some time with it makes it far easier to sing,
Come, ye thankful people, come;
Raise the song of harvest home.
All is safely gathered in
Ere the winter storms begin.
God, our Maker, doth provide
For our wants to be supplied.
Come to God’s own temple, come;
Raise the song of harvest home.
Featured image courtesy Gabrielle Henderson via Unsplash.
If you consider the three names mentioned above and come up with several possible responses, you’d be well within reason. There simply is no one definitive answer because, depending upon context, any one figure could be sorted separately from the others, e.g., Jane Eyre is a fictional figure (the creation of Charlotte Brontë), John Wesley’s life preceded the publications of the two Janes, or even that Jane Austen was a lifelong singleton compared to the two others. You may have indeed come up with different responses as the possibilities are numerous.
A fresh June morning in the English countryside. Photo: Tammie Grimm
But how are these figures all like each other? You might be wondering, except for the fact that all are British figures, is it even possible to compare the life of an eighteenth-century reformer and evangelist with that of a Regency novelist alongside a heroine from a Gothic novel? After spending the spring re-reading Jane Eyre with a student and then re-reading beloved Jane Austen novels over the summer, I think there is affinity among the three beyond the fact that each has occupied a fair amount of my reading and reflection over the past year. Indeed, I believe it is possible to argue that the three are all on the same page together when it comes to integrity of personal identity and character. Wesley may have been an evangelist and religious reformer, but the Christian worldview and faith of Brontë and Austen is evident in the characters they develop in the pages of their novels.
There is little doubt to many regular readers of this site that John Wesley’s Christian belief and faith pervades his written works, whether it be sermons, letters, tracts, or hymns. Most of us who are contributing authors discuss the many various ways that Wesley’s life and ministry reflected his passion and zeal to help persons live new lives in Christ, to become more of who they were created to be, becoming more like Christ. As much as Wesley desired converts to the faith, his desire was to help persons be sanctified, to grow ever in perfect love through the power of the Holy Spirit—to be and to do like Christ—or as Wesley frequently put it in biblical terms to have the mind that was in Christ (Philippians 2:5) as to walk as Christ also walked’ (I John 2:6).[1]
To be sure, neither Jane Austen or Jane Eyre explicitly discuss the Wesleyan way of salvation, the need for regeneration, prevenient grace, justification or entire sanctification. Yet, their stories depict characters who live out their Christian faith with wit and vivacity as well as varying degrees of pathos and faithfulness.
Re-reading Jane Eyre after several decades, and with the benefit of a seminary education, I was struck by Jane’s abiding faith that guides her throughout the novel. It’s easy enough for a twenty-first century high school English student to recognize many of the religious references and themes present even if their significance is lost on
Haddon Hall, location for Thornfield Hall in the 2011 Jane Eyre. Photo: Tammie Grimm
them and their contemporary English teachers who dismiss Christian belief as quaint and anachronistic. Still, the religious experiences and convictions of Jane are plainly discussed by Brontë and integral to Jane’s development throughout the novel. It is evident to the biblically literate Christian that Jane is the living embodiment of Proverbs 2:6, “Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray.” The Christian faith and teaching instilled in her as an orphaned child raised at Lowood School (which, in concept, is not radically different from Wesley’s own Kingwood School that came into being at the start of the Industrial Age) serves her when she is faced with temptation to become Mr. Rochester’s mistress. Wesleyans might even imagine Jane holding fast to the first two General Rules (e.g. to avoid evil and do good) as she struggles with her desires. It is her conscience that guards her from regret and guides her in character during a pitched moment of crisis:
Indomitable was the reply—“I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there are not temptation; they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane; with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by; there I plant my foot.”[2]
Haddon Hall bridge, site for Thornfield in the 2011 adaptation of Jane Eyre. Photo: Tammie Grimm
Yet, Jane’s resolve is not simply her own. In the remaining paragraphs of this pivotal chapter, Brontë writes of the presence of supernatural, likely a divine, power to prompt Jane to flee temptation completely and run away from Thornfield Hall. Towards the conclusion of the novel, in an answer to a fervent prayer, the presence of the supernatural appears again, bringing resolution to Jane and her Byronic hero Edmund Rochester. And, finally, instead of coming to a satisfying romantic denouement, the non-sequitur of the novel’s last line, “Amen; even so come, Lord Jesus!” can be as abrupt and confusing to the Christian reader as it is to the most astute Brontë scholars.
Brontë is not out to write a religious narrative in Jane Eyre, but as a daughter of a Curate in the Church of England, she has no issue with integrating her faith and everyday living in her eponymous character. Neither is Jane Austen’s intent to discuss Christian faith in her romantic novels. The daughter and sister to clergymen, Austen was granted a cathedral burial because of her support of and contributions to clerics in her neighborhood.
Mr. Collins, as played by David Bramber in the BBC Pride & Prejudice miniseries.
Austen’s most visibly representative figures of religious establishment, clerics Mr. Collins (Pride and Prejudice) and Mr. Elton (Emma), are the target of humorous satire within her works while others like Captain Wentworth’s older brother (Persuasion) is a sympathetic figure looking out for the best interests of his younger sibling. Both authors are not above pointing out the hypocrisy in the life of the clerics they portray. Whereas Austen seeks to create caricatures of her clerics, Brontë creates stern, unyielding taskmasters of Mr. Brocklehurst, the head of Lowood Institute, or of St. John Rivers, Jane’s clergy cousin who dreams of being a foreign missionary. Rather, like Brontë with Jane Eyre, it is in the lives of Austen’s heroines (and even their intended suitors) that the cultivation of virtue is the evidence of the faith that dwells within.
Without a doubt, Austen does not come close to discussing religious experience in the explicit ways Brontë describes. Still, Austen’s heroines are faithful members of the established Church of England who regularly attend worship and prayer services—which proves to be as good a meeting place for plot development between suitors as any local dance or formal ball. Piety may not be the predominant virtue running throughout Austen’s novels, but each of her heroines—whether it be the Dashwood
Pemberley gardens, located at Chatsworth. Photo: Tammie Grimm
sisters or Emma Woodhouse, Anne Eliot, young Catherine Morland or even Elizabeth Bennet—are all essentially virtuous people seeking to become better persons through self-reflection and examination in light of the events that unfold. Self-examination may not happen explicitly through the lens of faith, but this penchant for self-reflection is not an exercise exclusive to her characters.
Austen wrote three prayers that have survived her death, each designed to accompany the Book of Common Prayer. Self-examination (somewhat akin to the spirit of Ignatius of Loyola and John Wesley) is evidenced in the following prayer Austen wrote, and which hangs in St. Nicholas Church, Steventon, a church where her father and brother pastored:
Give us grace, Almighty Father, so to pray, as to deserve to be heard, to address thee with our hearts, as with our lips. Thou art everywhere present, from thee no secret can be hid. May the knowledge of this teach us to fix our thoughts on thee, with reverence and devotion that we pray not in vain.
Look with mercy on the sins we have this day committed and in mercy make us feel them deeply, that our repentance may be sincere and our resolution steadfast of endeavoring against the commission of such in future. Teach us to understand the sinfulness of our own hearts, and bring to our knowledge every fault of temper and every evil habit in which we have indulged to the discomfort of our fellow-creatures, and the danger of our own souls.
May we now, and on each return of night, consider how the past day has been spent by us, what have been our prevailing thoughts, words, and actions during it, and how far we can acquit ourselves of evil. Have we thought irreverently of thee, have we disobeyed thy commandments, have we neglected any known duty, or willingly given pain to any human being? Incline us to ask our hearts these questions oh! God, and save us from deceiving ourselves by pride or vanity.
Give us a thankful sense of the blessings in which we live, of the many comforts of our lot; that we may not deserve to lose them by discontent or indifference….[3]
The Pemberley drive from the 2005 Pride & Prejudice film adaptation located at Chatsworth. Photo: Tammie Grimm
Neither Brontë nor Austen write with the religious zeal and desire to see their creations sanctified in the way Wesley
wanted for the people called Methodist. And as much as I want to see Jane Eyre as an example of discipleship in a Gothic novel, she is a solitary figure with no supportive community to support her in her daily Christian living.
Still, the novels offers insight, for those reading with a lens of Wesleyan discipleship, to the ways in which our favorite heroines (and their suitors) live into their Christian faith and teaching. Brontë and Austen do not offer escapism from the everyday, but provide a portal to consider how Christian faith helps shape the characters we love and cherish through the ages.
[1] John Wesley, ‘The Character of a Methodist,’ The Bicentennial Edition of the Works of John Wesley (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1976- ). 9:41. See also, ‘Sermon the Mount XII,’ Works, 1:680; ‘The Case of Reason Impartially Considered,’ Works, 2:593; ‘The More Excellent Way,’ Works, 3:265; ‘The Principles of a Methodist,’ Works, 9:55; ‘The Principles of a Methodist Farther Explained,’ Works, 9:225.
[2] Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre, (New York: Penguin Group, 2006), 365.
[3] Glassy, Terry and Jane Austen. The Prayers of Jane Austen (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers), 9-19.
Our weekend sermon comes from Dr. Tammie Grimm. Enjoy the text below or listen to the attached audio file.
Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still. For they must needs be present, that love and live in that which is omnipresent. In this divine glass, they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure. This is the comfort of friends, that though they may be said to die, yet their friendship and society are, in the best sense, ever present, because immortal. ~ William Penn, More Fruits of Solitude
This quote, from seventeenth-century Quaker William Penn, serves as an epigraph on the opening pages of the seventh installment to J.K. Rowling’s wildly popular magical wizarding series, Harry Potter. Like it or not, a major reverberating theme throughout Harry Potter books is death. For those of you unfamiliar with the details of the story, or who may be only vaguely aware that earlier this summer there was a midnight book release party to celebrate this fictional character’s birthday as well as the premier of a Harry Potter play in London, death plays an important role throughout the story.
From the opening pages of the first book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (or Philosopher’s Stone for the original UK audience) to the final chapter of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and even the latest installment, Harry’s journey is punctuated by death. He arrives to us on the pages of the first chapter as an infant, who has miraculously survived a killing curse that leaves him an orphan left to be raised in the home of his awful Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon and with their equally horrible son, Harry’s cousin Dudley. Living in a muggle family (non-magical people) who disdain him and his magical kind, Harry never really fits into the Dursley’s family life and believes his parents died in a car crash. It is not until the fateful day when a letter arrives inviting him to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that the truth is gradually revealed. Both his parents were killed at the hands of the evil, self-proclaimed Lord Voldemort, who is his archnemesis. The whole series of seven books—even this latest theatrical installment, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, in which Jo Rowling collaborates with playwrights—centers on Harry and his loyal friends, Ron and Hermione, continually thwarting the escalating attempts of Voldemort to completely vanquish Harry in Voldemort’s quest to “conquer death.”
For those of you wondering if the imaginary, magical world of Harry Potter is even appropriate to discuss in a Christian sanctuary, be not afraid! Though I have been known to dress up as Hogwarts’ transfiguration teacher Professor Minerva McGonagall—complete with witch’s hat, robe and wand for the last two book releases—I have not forsaken my Christianity to become a witch in any supernatural sense of the term. You see, the plain truth is that my Christian formation and worldview, my understanding of the Bible and theological education, both in the local congregation and in formal graduate studies helped me fall in love with Harry Potter in the first place. It actually was not until my final year of seminary, when the fourth book came out, that I became aware of who Harry Potter was and what a cultural sensation author Jo Rowling’s story had created. The copies I originally read were owned by a friend, my former Director of Student Life at Asbury Theological Seminary, who graciously allowed me to borrow them to enjoy as a reward for myself at the end of a busy semester. Over the years, it has been with other Christians who know the biblical story with whom I have enjoyed the most analytical and animated discussions about our hero, his friends and the significance of particular lines and descriptions Rowling crafts in the telling of her story.
From a literary point of view, Harry Potter is not allegory like Hinds’ Feet on High Places or Pilgrim’s Progress in which the story has hidden meaning. Nor is it like The Chronicles of Narnia which C.S. Lewis referred to as being a “supposal” as he was not out to write allegory. His intent was to “sneak past watchful dragons” by writing a story in which he “supposed” if there was a world like Narnia that needed redemption much like ours, what might it look like with talking animals and creatures of fairy tales and folklore? Those of you who read that series in a summer book club with me five or so years ago, know religious overtones were abundant and many of you were quickly able to recognize that the lordly lion Aslan was a Christ figure in the ways he overcame death, created Narnia and offered forgiveness.
But Harry Potter, despite being “the boy who lived,” is not really a Christ figure, or at least he is not in my opinion. He has neither power over death nor does he ever vanquish death himself. It is when he is invited to take his place at Hogwarts that he discovers his parents died trying to save him. And eventually, we readers learn along with Harry that it his mother’s choice to try to prevent Voldemort from killing her baby, by sacrificing herself, that cast a protective charm onto her child because her actions amount to the ultimate sacrifice of love that any person can offer another—to give their life for another. His mother’s action is a Christlike sacrifice to be sure, but its magical power in Harry’s life falls woefully short of the miraculous power that Christ affords to all humanity—for those who choose to accept his life-giving gift. Throughout his years as a Hogwarts’ student, Harry is time and again confronted with the forcefulness of death. He learns of its suddenness and savageness and discovers what it is to be horror-struck by its violence and viciousness. The loss of life is never easy for Harry, just as it is seldom easy for us mere mortals.
Yet, Rowling’s story points to life beyond death. In as early as her first book, Rowling comfortingly hints at and then progressively works (throughout the series and in this summer’s play) to assure Harry and all her readers, young and old alike, that death, in its simplest form, is merely the other side of the coin to life. At significant junctures along the way, she indicates that there is an appropriateness that all earthly life must come to an end. And, furthermore, she demonstrates that there is a tranquility associated with death that awaits those souls as they let go of their hold on this life. In counterpoint, to deny the reality of death we all face, Rowling indicates this is not necessarily so for the witches and wizards who choose to haunt the halls of Hogwarts. In a poignant scene at the end of the fifth book, after losing a cherished link to his parents, Harry questions a ghost named Nearly Headless Nick about death and the afterlife. In response, Nick says,
“I was afraid of death. I chose to remain behind. I sometimes wonder whether I oughtn’t have…Well, that is neither here nor there…In fact, I am neither here nor there…” He gave a small sad chuckle, “I know nothing of the secrets of death, Harry, for I chose my feeble imitation of life instead.”
It is Hogwarts’ beloved headmaster Albus Dumbledore who typically helps Harry grapple with our limited understanding about the afterlife. “It is the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more,” or when he tells Harry that, “to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.” Yet this lesson of accepting the inevitability of death and the mystery of an afterlife is as hard for Harry to comprehend as it can be for any of us. Harry’s childhood was largely bereft of love. As Harry grapples with a profound sense of loss and bewilderment at all he has missed, Dumbledore tenderly prods him, “You think the dead we loved ever truly leave us? You think that we don’t recall them more clearly than ever in times of great need?” This idea echoes the sentiments of William Penn’s passage that the living and the dead share a communion that persists even though persons exist on either side of the veil drawn between death and life.
As Harry matures into a young man, he is finally able to visit the grave of his parents. There, carved into their headstone, he reads the inscription, “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” This verse is not some made up line of the author’s invention, but a direct quote of I Corinthians 15:26. As Harry struggles in the enormity of this moment to comprehend what it could mean, his friend Hermione gently helps him. “It means…you know…living beyond death. Living after death.” For the Christian reading, as Hermione speaks those words aloud, a verse further down in the same chapter of Corinthians comes to our hearts and minds. “Where, O death, is your victory, Where, O death, is your sting?” For those of us who struggle with death and loss it is the Gospel story—our story— that teaches us the truth of love, death and life. Life triumphs over death and death does not have the final say. Death for us is just a mere portal through which we will pass in order to fully celebrate eternal life with God.
Eternal life. It is the requirement to inherit eternal life that prompts the lawyer in the Gospel of Luke to inquire of Jesus. And the response is the repeated refrain of what we refer to as the Greatest Commandment, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind” and “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
For those of us who are already fans of this series, the presence and power of love is something of which we are readily aware. We run out of fingers and toes to count up the references to love in the Harry Potter series. Lily Potter’s sacrifice for her son is borne of love, and her love magically protects Harry until he is seventeen and leaves his aunt and uncle’s home for the last time. Love is regularly commented upon by Dumbledore. Love, he admits to Harry, is what blinded him and caused him to be predictable and act “exactly as Voldemort expects…fools who love to act.” And love is an ever present thread in the friendship of Harry, Ron and Hermione, and it is the driving motivation in this summer’s play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.
Our scripture lessons this morning help demonstrate that it is by knowing the biblical story that we can see more into Rowling’s story. The Greatest Commandment is not just about love—it is about loving holistically, loving things whole—integrating the very aspects of our being, heart, mind, soul and strength and becoming whole in who we are and who we love. To love God with our whole heart, whole mind, whole strength and whole soul and to love our neighbor as ourselves is to inherit eternal life.
What can stand in starker contrast of loving wholly than Voldemort’s hatred for humanity and his attempt to attain eternal life by splitting his soul into seven pieces? Voldemort is not just the nemesis—the evil villain of the story. For Christians reading the story, he is the very antithesis of how we are called to live. Our lives are to be made whole and patterned after the example of Christ, one whose life and the manner in which he lives is emblematic of the death he died on the cross of Calvary; whole, complete and filled with the love of God and love for neighbor.
For those of us who know the biblical story and read Harry Potter, countless situations and conversations become more significant and carry deeper meaning. One line of dialogue between Harry and Dumbledore illustrates this when Dumbledore tells Harry that the sad tragedy of Voldemort is that he “never paused to consider the incomparable power of a soul that is untarnished and whole.” (Another favorite Dumbledore quote is when he says, “It is our choices, Harry, that show us what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” Indeed, I think a sermon on Wesleyan theology and the decision to accept God’s grace and the power of the Holy Spirit working through us is hidden in that little nugget.)
Please do not misunderstand me, Rowling’s intent was not to write a Christian story, like that of Pilgrim’s Progress or The Chronicles of Narnia. Harry’s purpose for existence is not to introduce the reader to Christianity nor is his story written as a moral tale really intended to make people better Christians. Rowling makes it clear Hogwarts exists in the context of many faiths and is not a religious school. Yet, her Christian understanding is present. It is her intent to weave Christian parallels into her writing even as she incorporates ideas from world mythologies and folklore. Therefore, when we read Harry Potter with a Christian worldview and understanding of the biblical narrative we see so much more of the story than what Rowling has very ably written.
The story of Harry Potter from the first installment written 21 years ago to the play that debuted in London last summer is captivating literature. They are wonderful stories of a magical world that is fun to enter and to enjoy, whether you dress up for special events or wear a t-shirt proclaiming the name of the house into which you’d be best sorted or even if all Harry Potter remains for you is just a story that can be pulled off the bookshelf and returned to from time to time in order to escape the real world.
The wizarding world is not real. Storybooks are the stuff of fiction that enlivens our imagination and brings us pleasure. But it is the biblical story, or as a friend of mine so eloquently puts it, “The Story of God, the Story of Us” that enlivens our very lives! Our story is not simply the Gospel texts, but extends back into the Old Testament, beginning with Genesis and read with the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament to which faithful Christians testify. It is our story in which we read the truth of this world, indeed of all creation. And it is this truth that enlivens the Christian disciple’s imagination, heart, mind, soul and strength to allow us to see further into other storybooks that we love and cherish and read and re-read.
It is our story, the Gospel story, that is a story for all ages, young and old alike, yesterday, today and tomorrow, in this age and the next. This is the story that we are called to live day in and day out, 24-7, 52 weeks a year, all our life long. The real life of Christian disciples is a choice to live fully and completely, integrating all our love for God, heart, mind, soul and strength, sharing that love with our neighbor. It is the Christian’s choice to live into God’s calling to be wholly and entirely like Christ, made possible by the power of the Holy Spirit. Nothing in part, segregated, walled off or closed up and returned to a shelf when real life enters in. The Bible lives and breathes through us, loving us and others through life and in death. Strictly speaking, the biblical canon contains 66 books, but our Christian story is one that continues for eternity—long after we turn the final pages of a storybook and read the words, “The End.”
“The part you must jettison is not only the best-written part; it is also, oddly, that part which was to have been the very point. It is the original key passage, the passage on which the rest was to hang, and from which you drew the courage to begin.” Annie Dillard, The Writing Life
As I complete edits on my doctoral thesis, I was stupefied to trip over this nugget several weeks ago. A month or so earlier, I heeded the wise advice of my supervisor and ripped out an entire section of a chapter that I had written and formed the whole motivation for my research and writing. It was agonising, and even though that work was at once the genesis and culmination of what I was writing towards, it was the right move. Though a valuable piece of research and writing, it does not “fit” into the thesis as it stands. It has another place in which it can stand on its own merits – but not in the thesis on which I’ve worked so hard for many years.
Lent is upon us, and I’m drawn back to Annie Dillard’s thought over and over again the last week or so. In recent years, the age-old practice of self-denial and fasting from a particular enjoyment has, in many communities, been approached differently. Rather than view Lent as a time of sacrifice in this season of preparation, a suggestion is to add something healthy or positive to our daily life. The idea is that by adding something good to our lives, whether it be spiritual reading, taking a daily thematic photo or committing to a particular health routine, we must give something up, something extraneous and unnecessary, to make room for the new addition.
There have been years in which my approach to Lent, to give something up, has been to consider Lent as something of a chore. Something to be endured, a prolonged period during which I faithfully swore off chocolate, diet soda or some other item I enjoyed, only to look forward to Easter when I could add it back into my life again guilt-free. And, when I’ve taken the positive approach, adding something new and beneficial has, too often, just been adding one more thing in an overcrowded life.
However, this year, in light of Dillard’s quote, I have considered what it is I need to sacrifice in order to find life — as I did when I jettisoned part of my chapter, parts of my thesis which were (and still are) my favourite bits. How does self-denial allow for the addition of something good? How does fasting bring about wholeness? What parts of me must be cleansed in order for God to do a new work in me? Maybe in approaching Lent differently, there will be a different outcome – something more lasting and true.
“Create in me a clean heart, O God. And renew a right spirit within me” Psalm 51:10
“I want to look confident but not come off as aggressive or too assertive – that just won’t do!” How many of us have thought that when preparing for a public presentation, whether it be a workshop we lead for our peers, a meeting with other leaders or even a job interview? We want to look professional, neat and tidy, but with a little snap, a little flair that gives us some edge. We want to avoid dowdy and boring, but we also avoid appearing gaudy or overdressed. It’s the age-old quest of Goldilocks – looking for that bowl of porridge that is not too hot, not too cold, but just right.
Zeal is like that, too. It’s a good thing to have zeal and be zealous – to share our excitement and love for the Lord with others – but to be overzealous or to be called a zealot carries a whole different connotation to it. Zealot does not come with complimentary overtones. It implies your passion and fervor have crossed the line; you go from being an enthusiastic advocate to being a fanatic, unreasonable and so singularly focused that you become offensive and actually repellant to others. But, without zeal, not only do we not share our faith effectively with others, our faith languishes and grows cold, like the second of two bowls of porridge Goldilocks passes over in the quest for the one that is just right.
Most Christians can agree that there is a line distinguishing the difference between being eager to share your love for God with others and being so assertive that people seek to avoid you. But is it really possible to have too much zeal for the Lord? Or is it that in being overzealous or becoming a zealot our zeal is actually misdirected – distorted by falsehoods that are incompatible with zeal, becoming objectionable and obnoxious – even dangerous.
Contemporary issues with zeal are similar to problems Wesley noticed about this quality that is integral to sharing Christian faith. In his sermon, On Zeal, Wesley writes, “without zeal it is impossible either to make any considerable progress in religion ourselves, or to do any considerable service to our neighbor, whether in temporal or spiritual things. And yet nothing has done more disservice to religion, or more mischief to mankind, than a sort of zeal which has for several ages prevailed.”
Sadly, zeal might be misdirected towards inconsequential matters, either material objects such as our clothing, our accessories or even our worship spaces, that results in arrogance or conceit. Or zeal might be confused with pride which leads to being offensive to others. Tragically, zeal can be tainted by anger, even hatred, for those that don’t share or claim the same love for God, inciting violence, death and destruction. While Wesley cited the Crusades and the martyrs that suffered under Queen Mary as examples of this wrongly motivated zeal, ISIS is a contemporary manifestation of the same perverted sense of zeal. Zeal of this sort is neither too hot nor too cold. It’s just wrong: wrongly motivated and wrongly deployed.
Genuine zeal, however, is something that is true and lasting and good. It is ardor and energy that stem from love for God. It is directed to share God’s love with others. “True Christian zeal,” Wesley wrote, “is no other than the flame of love. This is the nature, the inmost essence of it.” Zeal actually is hot – as hot as fire.
Zeal of this sort operates in an attitude of confidence, but with humility, allowing the possessor of Christian zeal to know understand their place within the world, as a child of God and steward of God’s creation. Zeal is patient, not forcing its way on any person or group of persons, but allowing divine grace to operate in any and all circumstances. And, while it is a good thing to be zealous for the Church, Wesley commends it is a better thing to be zealous for actively doing the will of God through prayer and demonstrating love for neighbor, and an even better thing to be zealous for seeking the fruits of the Spirit and sharing in the love of God in order to share it with others. This is the zeal that we need: zeal inspired by God’s love to be zealous to share God’s love. This zeal burns with a holy fire that is controlled but cannot be quenched. This kind of zeal is not the middle ground of “just right” between two extremes, but it is zeal that is hot, truly hot enough that excites the Christian to share the love of God with others.
If there is anything we need today to be faithful disciples of Jesus Christ who seek the lost to share the love of God that others might know the transforming grace through the power of the Holy Spirit, it is zeal. Zeal that is hot, passionate and unafraid. We need zealous disciples, with hearts ignited for God in a flame that burns so hot and bright it does more than generate heat that warms the individual and lights a single disciple’s path.
Our zeal for Jesus Christ must overflow out of our hearts, attracting others to the light that is perfect and good and holy, shared in the power of the Holy Spirit so that God’s goodness and love is known and so that God’s kingdom is ushered in in real and tangible ways. This is the zeal that isn’t too cold, isn’t just wrong, but is hot and just right.
A proposed pipeline in my community has caused me to consider the nature of Christian faith and our lives as disciples. I’m not talking about the political, economic or environmental ramifications of pipelines, but the pros and cons of using the analogy of the Christian way of life, our discipleship, as a pipeline.
On one hand, the idea of having a pipeline to God, to supply our lives with the divine grace, sounds like an ideal concept. And, in some respects, Christians have access to any number of pipelines by which God’s grace is poured out. Spiritual disciplines and other practices of faith, such as prayer, reading the Bible, attending church, participating in acts of mission and service are known to Wesleyans as being “means of grace.” These activities serve as channels designed to deliver and pour out God’s grace into a Christian disciple so it may flow out into the world.
On the other hand, the image of a divine power located in a far off distant source that can only be accessed when a believer taps into the pipeline reduces God to far less than the omnipotent, omniscient deity the Triune God of the universe already is. The corresponding picture of a believer who can control God with the turn of the spigot makes God a little too much at our command rather than us as servant leaders doing his will.
One of the more predominant pipeline proposal signs that has popped up in my community refers to the fact that a pipeline delivers its resources or its refuse 24/7/365. As some neighbours have noted, the promise of the benefits of constantly available energy resources can have problematic consequences. Without a doubt, this also draws a strong analogy to the Christian life as well.
It is incredible to think of, to realize God’s grace is always available for renewal. In one sense, it is how the whole Kingdom of God was advertised and announced by John the Baptist. “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight”(Matthew 3:3). Jesus’ life and ministry demonstrated that the Kingdom of God has arrived, breaking in with powerful inroads through healing and miraculous works as the lame walked, the blind saw and the hungry ate.
Tapping into the means of grace as a channel to have divine power and grace made available 24/7/365 is a comforting and empowering promise upon which Christianity rests. But it doesn’t quite tell the whole story or describe the importance of rhythm, the need for ebb and flow in our lives. Humanity is, after all, created for work for six days and rest on the seventh (Genesis 2:3).
The proliferation of internet news outlets and cable channels that produces a 24-hour news cycle helps paint the picture of the upside and downside of constant availability. On one hand, it is great to be able to catch up with the world, but watching for any great length of time can create anxiety and restlessness in a viewer, never mind reveal that from hour to hour, newscasters are repeating themselves and looking for a new angle. The spiritual life cannot be sustained at full tilt. Seasoned disciples know that growth and strength come from periods in the desert. The words of Ecclesiastes rings true, “for everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven”(Ecclesiastes 3:1).
One argument for pipelines is that they help transport remote resources to a nearby location. This is both problematic and helpful as it confronts the Christian life: problematic because it allows us to think of God as a distant entity in a fixed location who cannot traverse the distance that divides heaven and earth, and helpful because it provides a way of thinking about who disciples are and how they act – as ministers and agents of God’s grace. In some ways, disciples are pipelines of God’s grace, not merely using the spiritual disciplines so they can tap into the reservoirs of divine power and grace to use for themselves, but allowing their lives and examples to be used as a conduit of God’s grace that fills them up and pours out of them to others.
The real deal is that divine grace isn’t a commodity that needs transportation from one point to another, but a divine resource available in abundance. Disciples need to be the channels and conduits of God’s grace. Our very lives should be the faultiest of pipelines, too. The divine grace we receive is not ours to dispose of as we see fit, but should pour out of us and splash into the lives of others. We need to be as soaked and as saturated in God’s grace so that it flows through our lives and into our environment -pervading all of our lives so that we are not just energized, but fulfilled to the point of overflowing, allowing the goodness of God’s love to be available to all.
For as long as I can remember, my family has celebrated St. Patricks’ Day like many other Irish-American families: corn beef and cabbage, homemade Irish soda bread, green dye in everyone’s beverages all served on Mom’s best Irish linen tablecloth. Typically, the sound of The Chieftains or Tommy Makem and The Clancy Brothers can be heard on my parent’s stereo. Over the years, I’ve tried including The Pogues, The Waterboys and of course, U2. But tradition in my family runs strong – St. Patrick’s Day isn’t the complete without a rousing rendition of “My Wild Irish Rose”and “O Danny Boy,” designed to bring a tear to your eye.
Early in my career as a school teacher, I was introduced to another saint commemorated in March: St. David. Like St. Patrick’s Day, there are associated traditions for St. David, and as a young school teacher with a new teaching assignment, I found myself carrying on another cultural tradition of sorts when I was conscripted by a friend and co-worker to make St. David Day cookies for our faculty colleagues. In preparation for St. David’s Day, we’d spend the last weekend of February making dozens and dozens and dozens of a little Welch biscuit so faculty members could literally fill their pockets with these addictive little morsels. It was in discovering more about St. David and this new tradition I participated in that I also discovered more about St. Patrick and the rich tradition of Celtic Christianity.
Who St. Patrick is to the Irish, St. David is the Welsh. Both men were early Christian bishops who helped spread Christianity and converted Druids and other pagans throughout Ireland and Wales. Both are two of only a handful of Celtic saints, who are also recognized and canonized by Rome for their influence on the Christian faith. Celtic saints were the men and women of Ireland, Scotland and Wales who, whether they were of noble or peasant birth, lived a life dedicated to God, and sought with heart, body, mind and soul to share and express God’s love to others. Many Celtic saints are known only in their localized area – their holiness revered and cherished among the people who witnessed that the successive generations continue to benefit from the life of the saint who once lived there. Whereas the status of Catholic saints of the Roman church is conferred by a far-away pope after a lengthy documentation process that verified the saintly credentials of a person, Celtic sainthood is conferred by popular veneration.
Often times, particular Celtic saints may have legendary stories attributed to them. The famous Lorica of St. Patrick is attributed to an incident following Holy Saturday in 433 when Patrick kindled the paschal (Easter) fire on a hill across from Tara, the center of the country and seat of the Druid High King. Patrick’s fire undermined the high king’s authority and power, who, by virtue of their office, ritually lit bonfires, thereby symbolically claiming they were the givers of light and warmth. When summoned by the Druid king to what would likely be his execution, Patrick and his companions robed themselves in white and found miraculous protection in chanting the Irish hymn invoking God and heavenly protection from the “powers of corrupt and distorted powers of the world.” The tale does not describe the king’s reaction, but the resultant successful spread of Christianity throughout Ireland suggests he did not have much of a fight left in him after being thwarted by God’s miraculous protection.
A similar story is told of St. David, but instead, the subdued chieftain is credited to say, “the kindler of that fire shall excel in all powers and renown in every part that the smoke of his sacrifice has covered, even to the end of the world.”
But for all the miraculous stories and the supposed powers that rivals today’s superheroes, Celtic saints became saints because the community in which they lived recognized their life of holiness and relationship to God. Perhaps one reason there are so many Celtic saints is because they saw no separation between what was secular and religious – all of life was sacred, and therefore consecrated to God. It was intertwines, much like the famous knot work still popular today.
In the centuries before furnace units and central heating, Celtic women who kindled the day’s fire in their hearth didn’t just clear the night’s ashes, they prayed and asked God’s blessing upon the fire that would give their families heat and light throughout the day. The prayer underscores the understanding they shared with St. Patrick and St. David, that light and life was a gift from God.
This morning, as I kindle the fire upon my hearth, I pray the flame of God’s love may burn in my heart, and the heart of all I meet today. I pray that no envy or malice, no hatred or fear, may smother the flame. I pray that indifference and apathy, contempt and pride, may not pour like cold water on the fire. Instead, may the spark of God’s love light the love of my heart, that it may burn brightly throughout the day. And may I warm those who are lonely, whose hearts are cold and lifeless, so that all may know the comfort of God’s love.
In our contemporary lives, when the light and heat of our homes can be programmed and controlled by remote from miles away by computer prompts, it takes a little imagination – or a power outage – for us to understand how present day humanity is still dependent upon the provisions of the earth – God’s creation – for our sustenance.
But understanding that God’s presence is infused into all of daily life like the Celtic saints of old did does not require we heat our homes with peat dug from a bog. Spiritual sight to acknowledge God’s sovereignty in all things comes with practice as we avail ourselves of divine grace. Like the Psalmist who was content “to be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord” (Ps. 84:10), may we also embody holy lives and open the doors of heaven, pointing the way to God for others.
On any given day of the week, a scan of my Facebook newsfeed reveals secrets about my friends I might never have guessed on my own. It turns out that several friends closely identify with a variety of Disney Princesses, from the bookworm-ish Belle of “Beauty and the Beast,” to the kind and gentle maternal Snow White, to the adventurous Mulan who is the heroine of her own story. I’ve discovered some of these friends are most likely to enjoy time in Paris, France or Stockholm, Sweden while others are destined to live in New Mexico or New Hampshire. By answering a series of multiple choice questions, usually with nine choices depicted on a grid, each of us can discover our inner superhero, the color of our soul, or even the kind house in which we are meant to live. You can find almost anything out about yourself, including but not limited to:
What classic fictional character are you?
What burger topping describes you best?
Which US city should you live in?
Not only are online quizzes a fun diversionary escapism, they also illustrate something called the “Barnum Effect.” The “Barnum Effect” occurs in most popular internet quizzes designed to reveal results that appear tailored made, but in actuality, are really so vague and general that they apply to a wide spectrum of people responding. (For the record, I self-identify with courageous Merida from “Brave” who longs for a voice in shaping her destiny, I should enjoy time in Aberdeen, Scotland and I’m best suited to live in the New England states. If you know me, it sounds about right, but really, those answers should apply to any East Coast red head who enjoys the cooler seasons and climates and likes to travel to the UK.) Very little, if any, inner truth is revealed. These quizzes actually say nothing about who I am as a child of God, what God has done or is doing in my life, nor what God wants me to do with the gifts and graces I am provided with in order to be a faithful disciple growing in grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.
As it turns out, understanding the inner character God created within me and revealing the imago Dei (“image of God”) embossed upon my heart does involve responding to a series of interrelated questions. In his sermon, “The Witness of the Spirit,” John Wesley asked just four questions, but of a different variety than the ones on a pop culture website. His questions included:
What is this “witness of our Spirit”?
What is the “testimony of God’s Spirit”?
And how does he “bear witness with our Spirit that we are the child of God”?
How is this joint testimony of God’s Spirit and our own clearly and solidly distinguished from the prescription of a natural mind and from the deliverance of the devil?
With hard hitting, open-ended questions like these, discerning an answer to discover the path to your inner self involves more than choosing from a bank of multiple choice responses designed by computer-programmed algorithms on popular internet websites.
Lack of multiple choice responses might seem daunting, but it only makes the process of finding the path to our true inner self more rewarding. After all, Christian disciples know what it is they are looking for! With the imago Dei stamped upon the heart of each believer, Christlikeness is the true and valid goal for each and every Christian. The questions help us navigate the journey and our resulting growth in and towards Christlikeness. Each journey towards God’s holiness is as unique and as personal as our age, gender, race, ethnicity, occupation, or status.
To aid in the soul-searching that occurs during this journey, Wesley advocated the use of a small group, what he called bands and classes, made up of other disciples, who covenanted with one another to “watch over each other in love.” True soul searching is done in the company of others; there is no isolating one’s self behind a laptop or in a crowd transfixed to our handheld screens and devices.
Small groups in the Wesleyan tradition seek to help individuals discern an inspired life particular to their individual context. Every disciple committed to share in accountability and spiritual discernment with one another seek to craft an uniquely tailored life that still shares in God’s goodness and demonstrates towards others. Questions such as
Do we love God and our neighbor?
Do we keep his commandments?
How does it appear to you that you are alive? (a classic Wesleyan question familiar to any one who attends annual conferences in the United Methodist Church)
helped early Methodist disciples probe the depths and breadth of their public and private lives to see if they had “holiness of heart and holiness in outward conversation,” double-check that they were producing the fruit of the Spirit, as well as demonstrating love towards God and one another.
The crux of finding the path to our inner true selves and becoming more Christlike is a matter of responding to questions – not just random questions – but ones carefully posed by friends in spiritual conversation and in holy love. I suggest a far more fascinating and revealing quiz would be, “Which Saint Does Your Life Emulate?” Answers are not meant to be computed according to a standardized algorithm, but discerned and deliberated in the company of others. The value of other Christians dedicated to “watching over one another in love” in the process of spiritual discernment is that no one is left to the whims of fleeting emotions or how one feels before their morning coffee. It is then, in the company of other disciples, who are also witnesses to the truth of the Holy Spirit, that we can truly find and navigate the path to our inner self that is found in Christ.
Advent. For some, it’s a countdown to Christmas. For others, it marks the beginning of the Christian calendar year. For most Christians, it is a season of preparation: not just to celebrate the birth of Jesus but to renew our hearts that we might see Christ in the here and now as well as in hope and expectation of his second coming.
When we are children or new to Christian faith, Advent mostly seems to be about counting down to Christmas. Advent calendars, either the candle wreathes lit in weekly worship (or even in the home) or the calendars with perforated windows (bonus for the ones with chocolate morsel surprises!), are used to help teach the importance of waiting; patiently, but expectantly. Regardless of age, we are reminded each week that the light breaks into the world and with each new glowing candle, the symbolic darkness of the world’s troubles recedes as the hope, peace, joy and love of Christ take center stage, culminating in a flood of light on Christmas Eve.
However, if we always let Advent be a countdown to Christmas, we more likely become consumed with the crazed frenzy of the holiday season, stressing out as we sit in gridlocked traffic instead of getting items crossed off our to-do lists. You see, Advent has so much more to offer! In the midst of the hustle and bustle of the season, Advent bids us to a posture of getting ready for Christ. We prepare our homes and our hearts not only for the celebration of the nativity inaugurating the twelve days of Christmas, but also for the constant way Christ breaks into our lives each and every day, and for the eventual, expected and awaited second coming of Christ in history. Congregations that allow for Advent (thereby waiting on Christmas) sing brooding hymns that voice our hope and longing for God to finally break into this world. The focus of Advent is on God’s coming, God’s arrival, God’s entrance into the world. We sing “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” or “Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus” requesting Christ’s full presence among us. In “Hail to the Lord’s Anointed” we are reminded that “he comes to break oppression, to set the captives free, to take away transgression, and rule in equity.”
Advent also begins the year for Christians. Just as Jewish friends celebrate their new year at Rosh Hannah and the Chinese inaugurate the year with the Lunar New Year, the Christian church marks the start of the new liturgical year with Advent. As I’ve experienced Advent in its various manifestations over the years – as a countdown to Christmas, or a time of preparation and expectation to receive and see Jesus – it is this aspect of Advent that beckons me this year. I don’t just mean opening the lectionary to Year B, either. If Advent is the Christian New Year, what things am I called to do, or do I need to do differently, starting now, for Christ and for the world, that should not wait for a New Year resolution on January 1?
I have a deep appreciation for the liturgical tradition that marks time differently than our culture does. In the past, I have been an Advent Nazi, holding off on Christmas carols and songs till at least mid-December. I also have strong opinions regarding purple (not blue) as the proper color of waiting and expectation. And as firmly as I’d like to hold onto those aspects of Advent, I am reminded that my staunch mindset can hinder me from seeing how Christ is breaking into the world while I remain firmly entrenched in tradition for tradition’s sake. As the culture continues to co-opt Christmas into a commercial holiday that begins increasingly earlier and earlier, I’m ready, this year, to begin my contemplations for making New Year resolutions now, in Advent.
And the wonderful part is that I dare to believe John Wesley invites us to do just that! Many contemporary Wesleyans are familiar with Wesley’s Covenant Renewal Service, a service instituted among the people called Methodists. Wesley’s Covenant Prayer is often used today, as it was in Wesley’s day, in January, at the start of the new calendar year. Since Wesley lived in 18th century England, a time in which Christendom was unquestioned, when persons in the early Methodist movement were expected to be members of the Anglican Church, the whole calendar, ecclesial and cultural, moved with intentional ritual, filled with reflection and meaning. Today’s postmodern, post-Christian society lacks the rhythmic cadence, the purposeful quietness that allows us to be introspective, to take pause and take stock of our selves and get our bearings. So, what’s to prevent the contemporary Christian, specifically the modern day Methodist, from using Advent (the Christian New Year) as the time to contemplate how to prepare our hearts for the continual and eventual return of Christ by using Wesley’s Covenant Renewal Service?
In Wesley’s service, participants are asked to consider five aspects of their discipleship: their everyday Christian life lived before God and the world. A modern paraphrase by George Lyons reads as follows:
– First, consider what your sins are and examine whether you can resolve to forego them all. Consider what His laws are — how holy, strict, and spiritual, and whether you can, upon deliberation, choose them all as the rule of your whole life.
– Second, compose your spirits into the most serious frame possible, suitable to a transaction of so high importance.
– Third, lay hold on the covenant of God and rely upon His promise of giving grace and strength, for only through these will you be enabled to perform your promise. Do not trust your own strength, but take hold on His strength.
– Fourth, resolve to be faithful. Having engaged your hearts, opened your mouths, and subscribed with your hands to the Lord, resolve in His strength never to go back.
– Fifth and last, being thus prepared, in the most solemn manner possible, as if the Lord were visibly present before your eyes, bow and open your hearts to the Lord.
Each prompt is not only consistent with a life of intentional Wesleyan discipleship, which is lived day in and day out throughout the year, but also imbued with themes of Advent. Waiting in expectant hope. Joyfully preparing for the coming peace. Asking God’s grace to break in and envelop the world in a conspiracy of love. How meaningful might our Christmas celebrations and the New Year resolutions we take on might be, if we take full advantage of Advent and live into each of its various aspects in this Christian New Year? May this Advent season be especially blessed as you celebrate it in all aspects as God leads and guides you.
Dystopian young adult fiction is not my preferred genre for leisure reading. For one thing, novels set in a stark world, often portrayed as a police state, in which humanity is regularly repressed and coerced is a sure prescription (in my book!) for disturbed sleep and not sweet dreams. However, having recently committed to helping a middle schooler with a literature project, I’ve fallen headlong into Victoria Roth’s Divergent trilogy. As a discerning adult of a certain age whose tastes for fiction run more along the lines of spy thrillers and good old-fashioned murder mysteries, I am alternately fascinated and distressed by the predominance of this burgeoning genre. Yet, at the same time, I’ve grown a little more understanding of why this genre has captivated the imaginations of today’s youth and young adults. Rather than diagnose the sociological factors contributing to the proliferation of this genre, I offer these observations from the perspective of one whose more serious reading includes the writings of John Wesley and works on how Christians are formed theologically.
Value and Benefits of Community
The world into which “Divergent”’s main protagonist, Beatrice/Tris, is born, is run by five different factions. The worst thing that can occur to a citizen is to be declared “factionless.” Though Beatrice/Tris often acts as a “Lone Ranger” figure, she continually longs for and is most at ease when surrounded by a community in which she is a member and knows acceptance, nurture and even challenge.
Desire to belong is not just teen angst seeking to be part of the “in crowd,” this is a fundamental human instinct. Wesley understood that and organized the lives of early Methodists into societies, classes and bands in which Christians could support one another in their pursuit of following Christ. It was in these groups that members could not only find refuge from the world but uphold one another as they sought God’s intentions in their own lives and context.
Problematic Compartmentalization
The five factions are separate entities and except for the higher echelons of leadership only associate with their own. “Faction before Family” is the mantra drummed into the heads of citizens from the time they are children. Though born into a biological family and raised within a particular faction, if an adolescent were to choose a faction different from the one in which they were raised, they have little to no contact with their families from that point forward – they are labeled for life.
It is human nature to want to assign labels and assign categories to which we can locate persons as a way of understanding. Throughout Christian history, different sects of believers have earned names for the particular and distinctive ways they practice Christian faith. These categories can become harmful and problematic when they lose sight of the holistic nature of Christian faith; to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength and love our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12:30-31). Wesley often referred to Christian discipleship as having the “mind that was in Christ” and “walking in the way Christ walked.” To engage in outward actions of mercy and compassion without attending to nurturing one’s relationship with God and other believers depletes interior resources even in the most earnest of persons. Likewise, to be in love with God without demonstrating that love to our neighbor truncates our faith.
Defying Societal Expectations
Each 16-year-old will discover the faction for which they have the aptitude during a serum-induced exam on the eve of their Choosing Ceremony. As a result of this test, Beatrice/Tris defies the expected norm of testing for one faction and displays the aptitude for at least three of the five factions. She is labeled “Divergent” and urged to conceal this fact from others – even those she loves – because it is dangerous. Throughout the course of the trilogy, she discovers others who have the capacity to think and act beyond the parameters set upon them by society.
At some point, most Christians seeking to follow Jesus realize that their discipleship asks them to defy stereotypes that confine and segment their selves into neatly ordered boxes. Wesley was labeled an “antinomian” by some of his detractors for disregarding the law, defying Anglican norms and declaring the world to be his parish. Alternatively, he was labeled a legalist and called a “Papist” by those who considered the rules that governed the methodical living of his followers to be constraining. Despite this contradiction, Wesley is credited for holding a dialectic in tension, balancing each as he he sought a third alternative. For good reason, contemporary authors refer to Wesley as a “rational enthusiast” or a “radical conservative” for his ability defy expectations and hold together what society would otherwise compartmentalize. Our discipleship is at its fullest when we love God with all our heart, all our mind, all of our souls and with all the strength of our will.
Valuing and Cultivating Virtue
Beatrice/Tris chooses to transfer factions even though there is much about her parent’s faction she cherishes. When she transfers, she meets Tobias/Four, another transfer who is also Divergent. Tobias/Four seeks to emulate and champion the qualities once championed by his adopted faction; bravery, courage and guardianship. Furthermore, he finds value and admires the virtues inherent in each of the factions, seeking to do what he can to cultivate himself as a well-rounded person.
In a similar vein, Christian disciples understand themselves to be recipients of the Holy Spirit and endowed with God-given gifts and talents they use for Kingdom purposes. Yet all Christians, regardless of gifting, are called to cultivate the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). Wesley understood earnest Christians to be growing in these qualities. Regardless of social status, gender, educational level or ethnicity, Wesley and the people called Methodists radically included every person who expressed a desire “to flee the wrath to come” and encourage them in a faithful walk with Christ that they might bear fruit for more harvesting.
Purposeful Living
Beatrice/Tris and Tobias/Four work with others to not just free themselves from the present regime of factions but to unseat them in an effort to build a new society. They recoil when they discover their allies simply plan on substituting one totalitarian regime for another. Eventually, in league with other Divergents, they work to establish an integrated society in which all members are valued, fully included and experience human free will rather than government or scientific manipulation and coercion.
Disciples following Christ seek to live new lives free of bondage to sin and death. Christians just don’t seek any new identity, but one that is firmly established and grounded in the Lordship of Christ, the one human who is perfect, pleasing and good in the eyes of God. The ultimate goal of the Christian disciple is to live as God intended in ever increasing love for God and for neighbor. Wesley was adamant that humanity should continually strive to emulate Christ in all they did, which consequently had an effect on British society. As a result of seeking Christ, many persons were liberated from addictions. As Christians sought to share the love of Christ with others, schools were established and many families were gradually lifted out of poverty. Transformation of society occurred because disciples sought to be transformed and renewed in the image of God.
Final Thoughts and Takeaway
Though I found the Divergent trilogy (and its prequel “Four”) to be quite the page-turner, my nightstand reading is not about to be overtaken by dystopian young adult literature. I did find relevant themes for Christian living which helped redeem the genre as a whole. Regardless of your purpose for reading, whether to develop a sermon illustration, study the art of narrative, find a way to relate to a younger family member or neighbor, or just reading for plain enjoyment, Christians should not avoid similar novels on general principle. Though a central Christ-figure is nearly always missing, a recurrent theme runs throughout this genre: that humanity is subjected to its own perversions but seeks the goodness it was originally created to express. And when considered in the light of Christianity, this theme hits close to home and is profoundly relevant for Christian disciples who seek to be in this world but not of this world.
From the opening pages of the first book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (or Philosopher’s Stone for the original UK audience) to the final chapter of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and even the latest installment, Harry’s journey is punctuated by death. He arrives to us on the pages of the first chapter as an infant, who has miraculously survived a killing curse that leaves him an orphan left to be raised in the home of his awful Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon and with their equally horrible son, Harry’s cousin Dudley. Living in a muggle family (non-magical people) who disdain him and his magical kind, Harry never really fits into the Dursley’s family life and believes his parents died in a car crash. It is not until the fateful day when a letter arrives inviting him to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that the truth is gradually revealed. Both his parents were killed at the hands of the evil, self-proclaimed Lord Voldemort, who is his archnemesis. The whole series of seven books—even this latest theatrical installment, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, in which Jo Rowling collaborates with playwrights—centers on Harry and his loyal friends, Ron and Hermione, continually thwarting the escalating attempts of Voldemort to completely vanquish Harry in Voldemort’s quest to “conquer death.”
He has neither power over death nor does he ever vanquish death himself. It is when he is invited to take his place at Hogwarts that he discovers his parents died trying to save him. And eventually, we readers learn along with Harry that it his mother’s choice to try to prevent Voldemort from killing her baby, by sacrificing herself, that cast a protective charm onto her child because her actions amount to the ultimate sacrifice of love that any person can offer another—to give their life for another. His mother’s action is a Christlike sacrifice to be sure, but its magical power in Harry’s life falls woefully short of the miraculous power that Christ affords to all humanity—for those who choose to accept his life-giving gift. Throughout his years as a Hogwarts’ student, Harry is time and again confronted with the forcefulness of death. He learns of its suddenness and savageness and discovers what it is to be horror-struck by its violence and viciousness. The loss of life is never easy for Harry, just as it is seldom easy for us mere mortals.
