Slices of God

Two years ago I posted this piece, calling for compassionate theology. It is even more relevant today: we desperately need compassion to fill this land. So, here you have it . . .

The Koran calls God the merciful and the compassionate.[1] The Bible says, “The Lord is compassionate, abounding in love.”[2] Fractally, we are called to be followers and imitators of Compassion: we are called to be compassionate.[3] Jesus said the two greatest commandments are to love God and love our neighbors (albeit an expanded definition of neighbor!)[4] It is a call to live compassionately, to empathize with sufferers, to be caretakers of those unable to care for themselves, to go the extra mile. It comes from a transformed heart: one full of compassion. If you want to know how to change the world, scripture makes it perfectly clear: “Love never fails.”[5]

To seek the truth is to be filled with compassion. The Dalai Lama understands this. In his book The Art of Happiness, he says, “I would regard a compassionate, warm, kindhearted person as healthy. If you maintain a feeling of compassionate loving kindness, then something automatically opens your inner door.” Such behavior creates openness and facilitates communication, enabling us to relate to each other more easily.[6] This is how we are to live. When we have and express compassion toward all beings, then, and only then, is God fully expressed in us. There is no greater truth than compassion.

It is also through compassion that we extend truth in grace to others. Karl Barth said, ”By this we shall be judged, about this the Judge will one day put the question, ‘Did you live by grace, or did you set up gods for yourself and perhaps want to become one yourself?’”[7] Living by grace means more than accepting it. Compassion opens the valve for grace to flow to others.

What does compassion look like? Perhaps we need to start by looking at Jesus’ description of what it does not look like. In a paraphrase by Richard Stearns, in his book The Hole in Our Gospel, Jesus said, “For I was hungry, while you had all you needed. I was thirsty, but you drank bottled water. I was a stranger, and you wanted me deported. I needed clothes, but you needed more clothes. I was sick, and you pointed out the behaviors that lead to my sickness. I was in prison, and you said I was getting what I deserved.”[8]

In very revealing words, as reported by Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine, a Native American at a New York conference on social justice, attended by theologians, pastors, priests, nuns, and lay leaders, said, “Regardless of what the New Testament says, most Christians are materialists with no experience of the Spirit. Regardless of what the New Testament says, most Christians are individualists with no real experience of community. Let’s pretend that you were all Christians. If you were Christians, you would no longer accumulate. You would share everything you had. You would actually love one another. And you would treat each other as if you were family. Why don’t you do that? Why don’t you love that way?”[9]

Our focus has turned on itself. We have lost sight of the two greatest commandments: love God and others. Without compassionate living we are chaos to God. Fractally, when we ignore the needs that surround us, we ignore God. When we ignore God, we ignore our own souls.

God is love.[10] In a very real sense, theology is the study of love. If our theology is built on compassionate truth, it is true theology. If we love all humankind in word and deed, we are a part of God and his domain.

All the theological debates may be waged, all the academics may argue and publish, all the strange, dimensional, and fractal books may be sold, but if none of it is filled with compassion, it is nothing. Theology that is of God is not complex; it is simple: love God and love all humankind. That is it. If you want to be sure your theology never fails you: be compassionate. The details will take care of themselves.

– Sam Augsburger

[1]Sura II:158.

[2]Psalm 103:8.

[3]Ephesians 5:1.

[4]Mark 12:29-31.

[5]1 Corinthians 13:8.

[6]Lama, The Art of Happiness:  A Handbook for Living, 40.

[7]Barth, Dogmatics in Outline, 152.

[8]Richard Stearns, The Hole in Our Gospel(Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2010), 59.

[9]Wallis in Augsburger, Dissident Discipleship: A Spirituality of Self-Surrender, Love of God, and Love of Neighbor, 200.

[10]1 John 4:8.

Einstein theorized that time is a dimension quite like our spatial dimensions. The entire dimension of time, including its past, present, and future, simply is. We are the ones stuck at a particular location in space-time. While some find this concept disconcerting, I find it quite comforting. 

Jesus said, “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:34, NIV) Taking the liberty to paraphrase, I believe it means, “Don’t worry about tomorrow; tomorrow is already history.” If you are not content (or comfortable) with Einstein’s theory, follow me along a theological path that is “less travelled” . . . 

Many, if not most, theologies believe in an infinite God that is not confined to time. If this includes you, read on! If God is not confined to time, does this mean he “knows” the future or that he is inthe future (just as much as we are in the present at this moment)? I am convinced that God is fully in the past, present, and future. These designations are simply different locations in space-time and God permeates them all. 

Here’s the kicker: if God’s future is more than knowledge, then it is a very real future. In essence, it is a future that includes you and me. Not the idea of you and me, but the actual you and me. If God’s future is as real as his past and present, we are already there! We just don’t remember it yet. 

When this concept first entered my psyche, I experienced a profound release of anxiety. Worry is only compatible with the present. However, once we realize that time is but an illusion, worry has no stronghold. 

Friend, let go of your confinement to the present. The future is as real as any moment in time. Soak it in. As faint as the memories of the future are, try to remember . . . and let go of the worries. 

– Sam Augsburger

Recently I gave a talk to a group of retired academics. Given the freedom to choose a topic from my book, Slices of God, I chose to talk about the Trinity. The long and the short of it is Trinitarian doctrine is relatively new (300’s CE), not clearly outlined in either the Old or New Testaments, and questioned by many theologians, including some of the Radical Reformers (1500’s CE). For more information on this controversy, see chapter 3.12 in the book.^[1] For now, however, I want to focus on a question addressed to me during the Q and A period that followed the talk. 

A psychologist in the back row asked, “Whom do you pray to?” Acknowledging I had just highlighted issues with the Trinity, I said, “After all the processing and questioning I have done, I still find myself talking with Father. It is comforting for me.” Having said that, I quickly admitted the Father image is not a positive image for everyone. Some individuals I have met find it revolting instead of comforting. Others are indifferent about it. Either way, to whom can father-fearing, but God-believing individuals relate? 

In the Old Testament, we find one scriptural text that says God is a “father to the fatherless.”^[2] Such a statement begs us to question the issue further. What is God to the motherless? What is God to the childless? What is God to the spouseless? What is God to the friendless? What is God to the lifeless? Have we limited the ways in which God can and does present himself to us, given our human brokenness? (And yes, I caught the fact that I just said, “himself.” It is natural for me.)

In The Shack, William P. Young portrays God as a wise, strong, comforting, and compassionate woman.^[3] I find the character portrayal incredibly warm and welcoming. I understand that Jesus taught his disciples to pray to “our Father in heaven,”^[4] but it was also in a culture that was strongly patriarchal. Jesus was notorious for meeting individuals on their terms and often in ways that were taboo for that culture.^[5] 

So how should we address God? God, being infinite, has no insecurities to motivate a slap on the face for misaddressing “him.” God, in God’s infinite grace, just wants time with us; conversation with us. If no other designation works, then perhaps you can pray, “Our Friend in heaven, you are whole, and I long to connect with you.” 

God cares more about the connection than the conduit.  

– Sam Augsburger

www.slicesofgod.com

^[1]See the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy at https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/trinity/trinity-history.html

^[2]Psalm 68:5

^[3]William P. Young, The Shack(Newbury Park: Windblown Media, 2007)

^[4]Matthew 6:9-13

^[5]John 4

-Sam Augsburger

One of my Facebook friends recently posted the question, “Why is religion such a hard subject to talk about?” Perhaps it is because religion is so messy. But, why is religion messy?  

The fact that religion is difficult and messy is evidence supporting the argument that religion is of human origins. Yes, religion is human-made. God does not make chaotic and messy things. Humans do. God does not need anything from us: especially religion. God is infinite and infinity has no needs. Religion defies God’s infinitude. (For more on God’s infinitude see Slices of God, chapters 2.02 – 2.04.) It is we who are in need, not God. But, instead of turning to God alone in faith, we turn to human constructs that we believe will lead us out of our brokenness and back to God. Religion is born when humans inform God how we are to escape our chaos and return to his favor. The reverse is faith. 

However, there is good news for those of us entrenched in messy religion. God, in God’s infinite mercy and grace, meets us where we are. God meets us in religion. That is infinitude at its best. Jesus did just that. He was infinitude in the flesh: an extension of God in our domain. Jesus rejected human-made religion and offered hope, freedom, healing, and forgiveness to people with broken hearts held captive by religion.

Contrary to religion, God loves brokenness that knows it cannot restore itself. It is there that the God-become-flesh meets us in love. In the Apostle John’s words, “To all those who envelop the God-become-flesh, he gives the gift of becoming God’s children — children not made by religion, but by God’s love.” (John 1:12-13, SFA paraphrase.)

-Sam Augsburger

-Sam Augsburger

-Sam Augsburger