The alternative to domination

The God imaged by Jesus exerts no dominating supremacy. In Christ, we see an image of a God who is not armed with lightning bolts but with basin and towel, who spewed not threats but good news for all, who rode not a warhorse but a donkey, weeping in compassion for people who do not know the way of peace. In Christ, God is supreme, but not in the old discredited paradigm of supremacy: God is the supreme healer, the supreme friend, the supreme lover, the supreme life-giver who self-empties in gracious love for all. The king of kings and lord of lords is the servant of all and the friend of sinners. The so-called weakness and foolishness of God are greater than the so-called power and wisdom of human regimes.

                     Richard Rohr, Daily Meditations, 10/22/2021

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Let it die!

Our old image of God as the “mean old man of heaven.”

Let it die!

Our belief that God is about domination, and privilege, and wealth.

Let it die!

Our addiction to power over others.  Our need to control and punish.

Let it die!

Our lust for wealth.  Our willingness to do anything to get ahead.

 

Let it die!

Our belief that God is a God of power who uses power to get more power.

Our belief that we, as imitators of God should use power to get more power.

 

“unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains barren”

“If you try to save your life you will lose it, but if you lose your life for my sake and for the sake of the Gospel, you will save it”  (John 12, Mark 8)

 

As long as who hold on the idea that God thinks of power the way we do,

and believe that God is a God of power to get more power,

we will keep getting what we are getting.

 

Injustice.

Inequity.

Violence.

War.

A toxic individualism that kills.

 

People scrambling to win.

“Tribes” fighting against tribes.  People devouring one another.

 

We have to grab hold of this truth!

“God is a God of love who gives itself away for the sake of more love.”

(Stephanie Spellers, The Church Cracked Open)

 

The most important word in the New Testament may be kenosis.

Emptying.

 

Unless we let the wind of the Spirit blow,

and the fire of the Spirit burn.

 

Unless we let our inner house be cleaned of hate, and fear,

greed, and the lust for power.

 

Unless we are willing to let go of those false images of Sacred we have created, our twisted and rusty old idols,

we will suffer,

the planet will suffer,

the animals will suffer,

those around us will suffer.

 

Kenosis is the only path to the rule of God,

in our lives and in our world.

 

So let it die!

Let us die!

Slain by love, that we might rise again!