Month: September 2020

Mini-sermon: A Different Kind of Power

I had the chance this last weekend to share a 7-8 minute mini-sermon for my church’s online worship service, so I thought I’d share it with y’all as well.

If you prefer to watch a video, the service is on YouTube here. My part starts around 36:34, but check out the other two mini-sermons before and after too, if you have time…and/or the awesome sung version of the Lord’s Prayer at 25:35…and/or just the whole service.

We’re going through the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) line by line, and the line for this week was “your kingdom come, your will be done.” My hope is that these reflections feel relevant to this week, including the grand jury’s failure to satisfy justice in regard to the officers who killed Breonna Taylor, as well as Senate Republicans’ plan to try to replace RBG on the Supreme Court before the election.

Here’s the mini-sermon! I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments section.

―

One of the things I think is really cool about this line of the Lord’s prayer, “your kingdom come, your will be done,” is that the Greek verb translated “come” is a verb of movement. Real, physical, location-in-space kind of movement.

It’s a really common verb, one that’s used all the time for various comings and goings. The same word that’s used for things like “Jesus went to Capernaum,” or “Liz came home from Fred Meyer.” (That one’s not in the Bible, but it’s the verb that would have been used.)

It’s not just “the coming kingdom” in terms of time, as in, “wait for it…it’s coming…someday…maybe? keep waiting…” It’s not just “yeah, God’s kingdom will come…in the end times”―Left Behind-style, for anyone willing to admit to having been into that. It’s not these things. 

It’s “we want God’s kingdom to move―to really move―more fully into our realm of existence, in a tangible way, here, and now.” 

This verb can also have to do with making an appearance, like coming before the public. I like this image―maybe when we pray together “your kingdom come,” we are saying that we want to see God’s kingdom make an appearance. Sometimes it’s so hard to see. We’re saying we want to see it. We want to see God’s kind of reign make a public appearance.

It’s also a really strong verb tense here, almost like we’re commanding the kingdom into showing itself. Almost like we’re speaking it into moving, into making itself known―and speaking ourselves into awareness of this kingdom. We’re saying, we want to see this kingdom where we didn’t see it before. Your kingdom come.

―

I want to acknowledge that the word “kingdom” can be kind of a weird word, or a loaded one. Maybe it sounds kind of patriarchal, or imperialistic, or colonialist, or anti-democratic, or just odd and antiquated. 

I looked up some other ways the Greek word for kingdom might be translated, and one of them, that I kind of liked, was “royal power.” The kingdom is a matter of royal power. 

So, when we say “your kingdom come,” we’re saying that we want to see power operating differently from a lot of the ways we see it operating when we look around us. We’re saying, the ways in which power is exercised and taken and stolen and hoarded and used and abused in this world are not working. They’re not good. We want something different. Let a different kind of power come. Let power operate differently among us.

―

In the Sermon on the Mount, which is where the Lord’s Prayer is situated in the book of Matthew, we see Jesus dreaming out loud about all sorts of ways power could operate differently from how it often does in our world. 

We see Jesus speaking of a kind of royal power that belongs to the poor in spirit (that’s Matthew 5:3; in a passage that mirrors this one, in Luke, it just says “to the poor”).

We see Jesus speaking of a kind of royal power that belongs to those who have been pursued and persecuted on account of justice (that’s Matthew 5:10). Theirs, too, is power. 

And when we pray “your kingdom come,” we’re saying that these are the kinds of directions we want to see power move in: toward people who are poor, toward people who pursue justice to the point of being penalized for it by the systems and structures of injustice.

As Jesus goes on in the Sermon on the Mount, we see him continue to flesh out his vision of what power could look like. 

We see that he envisions people―all sorts of ordinary people―empowered to refuse to treat others with contempt. Empowered to be reconciled with others. Empowered to cut out things that bring evil into our lives. Empowered to be loyal to our commitments in relationships. Empowered to speak simply and honestly. Empowered to give generously of what we have been given. Empowered to love even our enemies and the people who persecute us, and to pray for them―which doesn’t mean we excuse what they do or stay in abusive relationships, but that we say, the cycle of hatred ends with us. (This is all following pretty closely with the Sermon on the Mount up to the Lord’s Prayer.)

When we pray “your kingdom come,” we’re saying we want to see this kind of power―on the move, rising up, making a public appearance, in our world, now. We want to see Jesus’ kind of light-shining, evil-exposing power; Jesus’ kind of healing, restoring, transforming power.

We’re saying we want this, urgently. We’re saying we want this, desperately.

When mind-bogglingly large areas of the US West Coast are on fire, and people are displaced and losing homes and dying, and we’re all covered in unhealthy smoke from it, we pray: God, let your kingdom come. The ways our nation engages with this beautiful, resilient, and fragile earth that gives us life are not good. We need a different kind of kingdom; we are desperate to see power move in different ways. 

When our reality is full of state-sanctioned violence against black and brown and immigrant lives and bodies, we pray: God, let your kingdom come. God, the ways our nation terrorizes people and communities who are beautiful and beloved and made in your image are not good. It dehumanizes all of us. We need a different kind of kingdom; we are desperate to see power move in different ways.

When powerful people’s words are full of hate, and when media sources misinform and lie, and when social media algorithms manipulate us behind the scenes, and when powerful people attempt to sabotage elections to stay in power, we pray: God, let your kingdom come. We need a different kind of kingdom; we are desperate to see power move in different ways.

When a global pandemic, and powerful people’s mishandling of it, takes so many lives, and so many more lives than necessary, we pray: God, let your kingdom come. We need a different kind of kingdom; we are desperate to see power move in different ways.

―

So, then, when we get to the “your will be done” part of the prayer, I don’t think we’re talking about a demure, shrinking, submissive: “well, I don’t really know what’s right or good, so…whatever you want, God.”

I think we’re talking about storming the gates of heaven―about being much more demanding with God than many of us might feel comfortable being or were taught to be. 

We’re talking about saying: God, we know you want justice. We know you want love. We know you want people to flourish and not to perish. We know you want us to take better care of this one earth you’ve entrusted to us.

We’re saying, we are desperate for all these things to happen. Please come and do them. Please help us be people who do them. Please help us be a community that does your will. 

We want to desire the things you desire, to want the things you want. We want to see your different kind of power on the move. We want to be aligned with the ways your kind of power operates, so differently from what we see. 

Let your kingdom come, your will be done.

Answer To

I’m thinking of all the evangelical leaders who say ridiculous and harmful things, and wondering if all the ordinary Christians who listen to them know that they don’t have to – that just because someone is a pastor or has a big following (or a lot of media attention) and claims the Christian name doesn’t mean that what they are saying is true or good or helpful.

Drawing on my last post, about God empowering ordinary people, I think God wants us to be empowered to use our brains and hearts and human compassion and empathy – and our own reading of Scripture with all these things in mind – to determine what kinds of leaders we choose to follow.

Answer To

I’d like to know 
what kind of god you answer to

behind that smile 
you grab to coat your face
before you leave the house,

your real thoughts locked away 
on shelves 
beyond my reach―

and all of this, you say,
is leadership.

I’d like to know, because
if he is not a god 

who shares himself in humbleness,
who gives himself in tenderness
and sees the ones 
who cry to him for justice, 

then I want nothing 
to do with him.

If he, like you, knows only 
how to smile and not to weep, 

and if he laughs at things that 
make me want to turn the tables 
on their heads in holy anger―

if he does not bleed a screaming 
river from his side 
as you wield scripture like a knife,

I’d like to know―

because, if so, 
this god you answer to
is not a god I want to know.

And, surely, with the sureness 
in my soul,

I do not answer to you.

Empowerment and authoritarianism and the armor of God, with shout-out to the Black Panthers

Here is one way I might translate Ephesians 6:10-17 (emphasis added):

(10) Henceforth, (y’all) be empowered in (the) Lord and in the strength of his ability. (11) (Y’all) put on the whole armor of God for the purpose of y’all being powerful to stand up to the schemes of the devil; (12) because the wrestling, for us, is not toward blood and flesh, but toward the rulers, toward the authorities, toward the world-rulers of this darkness, toward the spiritual things of evil in the heavenly places. (13) On account of this, (y’all) take up the whole armor of God, in order that y’all might be powerful to resist in the evil day, and, after accomplishing everything, to stand. (14) Therefore, (y’all) stand, after girding y’all’s loins in truth, and after putting on for yourselves the breastplate of justice, (15) and after shoeing the feet in readiness of the good news of peace, (16) in all things taking up the shield of faith, in which y’all will be powerful to extinguish all the flaming arrows of evil; (17) and (y’all) receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is a word of God.

As you may have gathered from the italics I added, I got interested in what these verses have to say about power. In particular, I thought it was interesting that the Greek word δύναμαι tends to be translated a bit more weakly than it needs to be.

δύναμαι is used three times in the eight verses above, so it seems pretty important. On top of that, a closely related word, ἐνδυναμόω, is used in v. 10 (also italicized above).

In most translations, δύναμαι is rendered here as “can” or “is able.” In the NIV, for example, the relevant phrases read:

  • “so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes” (v. 11)
  • “so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground” (v. 13)
  • “take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one” (v. 16).

I’m not saying I think this is a bad translation, but I am interested in the fact that δύναμαι could alternatively be translated not just as “can,” or “is able,” but as “is strong,” or “is powerful.” It’s the word from which we get our English words dynamite and dynamic.

I wouldn’t go quite so far as to translate δύναμαι as “is dynamite,” as fun as that might be―boom!―but I do think it’s interesting to try to incorporate this idea of power into the translation. Thus, we might have:

  • “for the purpose of y’all being powerful to stand up to the schemes of the devil” (v. 11)
  • “in order that y’all might be powerful to resist in the evil day” (v. 13)
  • “taking up the shield of faith, in which y’all will be powerful to extinguish all the flaming arrows of evil” (v. 16).

I’ll add another one, just for fun, from the closely related verb in v. 10 (ἐνδυναμόω): “be empowered in the Lord and in the strength of his ability.”

I think sometimes Christians have the idea, even if we might not quite put it this way, that all power is reserved for God―and this means that we as humans aren’t meant to have any. We are meant to be small, and powerless, and weak, and frail, and all-around worm-like in every way.

But the God I believe in―and the God Paul believed in, back in the day―is not an insecure political leader who hoards power for himself and tries to keep others as small and powerless as possible. 

The God I believe in does not hoard power, but shares it. God’s ego is not threatened by the thought that ordinary humans might learn to stand and walk in their power. God wants to empower people. 

God wants people to be powerful―powerful to pursue truth (the belt), and justice (the breastplate), and peacemaking (the shoes). Powerful to stand up to evil and to resist unjust schemes. Powerful to hold onto faith like a shield and extinguish all the flaming arrows of evil. 

I think Paul wants people to know that this is what God is like. Paul wants the average, everyday churchgoers in the city of Ephesus to be empowered (v. 10). He wants them to put on God’s full armor so that they can be powerful (v. 11). 

Paul hopes that, in the “evil day”―in the times when the presence of evil is particularly obvious and oppressive―these ordinary people might be powerful to be part of the resistance (v. 13). And Paul has every confidence that these humble unassuming ordinary people will in fact be powerful (v. 16). 

I find this idea of empowerment via the armor of God particularly striking in the context of Paul’s immediately preceding words. Right before this passage, Paul speaks directly to both wives and husbands (Eph 5:22-33), both children and parents (Eph 6:1-3), and both slaves and householders (Eph 6:5-9). 

Whatever else we might say about these passages (and feel free to click the links above for some of my thoughts), at the very least, it is clear that Paul writes to a church full of all kinds of people, with all sorts of different amounts of power in the structures and systems of our world: husbands, who had a great deal of power in their marriages, and wives, who had very little; parents, who had a great deal of power in their relationships with their children, and children, who had very little; householders, who had a great deal of power in their homes, and slaves, who had very little. 

And now, when he writes about the armor of God, Paul makes no distinctions among any of these groups. He writes to the whole church, to everyone in it: I want you to be empowered by God. Whether you have all the power in the world or none of it, put on God’s armor, and be empowered. Stand up to evil. Resist oppression and hatred and deception and greed, wherever you see it. Truth, justice, peace, and faith belong to you. 

I am reminded of a slogan of the Black Panther Party: “All the power to all the people.” 

(I just learned this recently, from a documentary called The First Rainbow Coalition, which follows the story of alliances formed among the Black Panther Party and other working-class community movements in Chicago in the late 1960s or so, including a Latino group and a group of southern whites.)

I think sometimes (white) Christians are afraid of things like this. Not only because we tend to be racist―which we absolutely do―but also because we get nervous about the idea of people having power in general. Sometimes this is for good reason, as we have seen powerful people abuse their power and do a great deal of harm. Sometimes we want to limit power to the tiny group of people whom we think have really earned it.

But perhaps God knows that power can be so dangerous and awful precisely because it tends to accumulate in the hands of just a few―because, when we get a bit of it, we tend to hoard it for ourselves. 

Perhaps if power were actually distributed more evenly among more people―among all people―we would see less in the way of authoritarian abuse of power, and more in the way of ordinary people rising up to work together for the health and wellbeing of the community. 

I don’t think God wants us to think we are worms, weak and gross, always groveling for mercy and thinking we’re the absolute worst. I think God wants to empower us to figure out how to live in a way that honors God, other people, ourselves, and the natural world. I think God wants us to be powerful to be fully ourselves. Powerful to be about truth and justice and peace and faith and healing. 

This is not an easy thing. Often it’s easier to be small. 

It’s hard to stand―that’s why we need the “full armor of God” for it. But it is good. 

So, be empowered in the Lord. God shares God’s power―God’s awesome, good, truth-exposing, justice-seeking, peace-making power―with us. All the power to all the people.