About two weeks ago, Pat Oakes sent me a report entitled, The Real Cost of the Iraq War to American Taxpayers.
According to the US Department of Defense, as of June 2005, the war in Iraq cost the United States taxpayer $195 million a day. According to a number of other sources, including the U.S. Department of Education, the Department of Labor, the United Nations, and Doctors Without Borders, the money we spend on the Iraq war could fund a host of other programs and projects around the world.
For example:
- one day in Iraq could cover the full cost of attendance at a public college for one year for more than 17,100 students.
- one day in Iraq could enroll 27,000 children in Head Start.
- one day in Iraq could employ 4, 269 elementary school teachers for one year.
- one day in Iraq could provide health insurance to 380,900 uninsured children in America for one year.
- one day in Iraq could feed all the starving children in the world for four days.
- one day in Iraq could vaccinate three-quarters of the children in Africa for measles.
- one day in Iraq could build 5, 571 AIDS clinics in Africa.
- one day in Iraq could provide antiretroviral treatment to 650,000 women living in Africa with AIDS for one year.
I'm not citing these figures this morning to criticize the Bush Administration's Iraq war policy. I'm citing them to illustrate a bigger and more fundamental point: the price humanity pays for its inability to live with itself in peace, the price humanity pays for its inability to get along with itself, the price humanity pays for its inability to share God's creation in a just and righteous manner, the price humanity pays for its inability to work out differences and disagreements in less violent ways.
As the numbers Pat sent me illustrate, war and preparation for war, human aggression and defense against aggression, human oppression, exploitation, and tyranny, the inability or unwillingness of some humans to communicate and compromise with other humans, the distrust, egotism, self-centeredness, pursuit of self-interest, and unbridled competition that too often leads to open conflict--all of this exacts a tremendous toll on the human race, a toll that reaches far beyond the people actually caught up in these conflicts, a toll that the most vulnerable people in God's creation end up paying in disproportionate amounts.
Think of the time, the energy, the resources that we could devote to caring for, enhancing, uplifting, and further developing human life on earth--especially for those who are currently suffering from a lack of health care, educational opportunity, and economic development--think of all the time, the energy, and the resources humanity is diverting away from caring, enhancing, uplifting, and developing itself and that instead we are wasting on conflict, on war and preparation for war. It is abundantly clear that human conflict, that humanity's inability to get along with itself--is sorely diminishing human life throughout God's creation.
As I have preached numerous times from this pulpit, the message I get from the Bible, and from the Christian tradition that I find most compelling, is that God is calling humanity and trying to help humanity undergo a radical transformation so that human beings can share God's creation in a just, righteous, and loving manner, so we can share God's creation without fighting each other and killing each other over who is going to be in control of God's creation. The very heart of the message that I so often I preach is that there is something about the human heart, the human mind, the human will, the human soul, the human spirit that must undergo a radical transformation in order for us to live in peace, the peace that Jesus called the Kingdom of God.
As I preached last Sunday, that radical transformation, that passing through the eye of the needle, that embracing the cross so we can die to an old self and rise to a new self, is what I believe Christian spirituality to be all about.
The question I ask myself today is: do I think this is possible?
Do I think it is possible for this radical transformation of human beings to occur?
Do I think it is possible that all human beings will one day share God's creation in a just, righteous, and loving manner?
Do I think it is possible that all human beings will live together in peace within God's creation?
Do I believe that it is possible that humanity will one day inhabit what Jesus called the Kingdom of God?
My answer is no, I do not. I do not believe it is possible.
This may come as a shock to some of you since this radical transformation, since the Kingdom of God, since peace and justice are so often the topics on which I preach. But do I actually believe they are possible for humanity?
No, I do not. I do not believe they are possible.
And that is why Easter is so powerful for me.
That is why the resurrection of Jesus Christ is so powerful for me.
I do not believe in the resurrection of dead people, and yet I am confronted by this story about the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the central story of our faith. What this does to me on some deep level within me, deeper than my rational thought, is tell me that God is capable of doing things that I do not believe are possible. It tells me that there are possibilities that exist outside the realm of my personal beliefs--possibilities for which I can hope, even though I don't believe.
I could not continue in my ministry were it not for this hope. I could not continue in my ministry were it not for the story of the resurrection. I think I would just fall into complete despair, just as the first disciples did after the crucifixion. When I consider the state of the world, especially climate change, the incessant warfare, and global poverty, I don't feel at all optimistic about the possibility for a joyful future for humanity on this planet earth. But Easter and the resurrection move me, and empower me, and compel me to hope for and strive for what I don't believe possible--the transformation of humanity, and a planetary home in which humanity lives together in peace.
Before a man with a gun assassinated Robert F. Kennedy, he often ended his 1968 presidential campaign speeches paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw: "Some people see things as they are and say, 'Why?' I dream of things as they never have been and ask, 'Why not?'
To dream of things as they never have been--my God, what a radical way of dreaming. That doesn't mean dreaming that things as they currently exist will improve. It is not a dream of human progress--that from here to there things will develop and gradually get better over time.
To dream of things that never have been--it is to dream of a radical new reality, a brand new reality that is not derived from the present reality, it is to dream of things that never have existed, things that never have happened. Ever!
And then to ask, "why not?" That is radical. It is to dream the impossible dream.
I have come to believe that the most radical thing you can do is to dream of things you don't believe are possible, but to hope for them, nevertheless. And to strive for them. To hold out the hope that for God they are possible, and that with God's help, they just may be possible for us, despite all the evidence to the contrary. Despite your disbelief.
Biblical scholar Walter Bruggemann, whom some of us are now reading, calls this radical act the "prophetic imagination" or nurturing an "alternative consciousness."
One of Bruggemann's primary concerns is that many contemporary Christians have become incapable of dreaming things that never have been and asking, "why not?" We are quite capable of seeing the world as it is and asking, "why?" We are quite capable of judging other people and critiquing the various systems that order our world. But our ability to imagine a radical alternative to what currently exists--an alternative completely at odds with what exists, an alternative that does not seem possible according to the logic that orders our current reality--our ability to imagine this radical alternative, to nurture this alternative consciousness, and to hope for it, pray for it, long for it, and strive for it has atrophied.
Bruggemann writes the following words to the American church, and he includes both liberals and conservatives in his judgment:
The contemporary American church is so largely enculturated to the American ethos of consumerism that it has little power to believe or to act. This is true not only of the church as an institution but also of us as persons. Our consciousness has been claimed by false fields of perception and idolatrous systems of language and rhetoric....The task of prophetic ministry is to nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture around us...The alternative consciousness to be nurtured, on the one hand, serves to criticize in dismantling the dominant consciousness...On the other hand, the alternative consciousness to be nurtured serves to energize people by its promise of another time.
Brueggemann draws our attention to the Exodus story and God's call to the liberated slaves to create a new type of human community that had never before existed in God' creation--a nation built solidly on a foundation of freedom, compassion, and justice. God called on the ancient Israelites to make a clean break from Egypt, and to create something totally new, something that would serve as a sign to the rest of God's creation, something that would serve as an invitation to the rest of creation. Unfortunately, it was not possible for the ancient Israelites to fulfill this call.
Brueggemann draws our attention to Jesus Christ and to Christ's call to his contemporaries to see and enter into a brand new reality that had never before existed in God's creation--the Kingdom of God. Christ called people to make a radical break from the world that currently existed, and to enter into a reality that was not derived from what preceded it, a new reality based on unconditional love, and service, and mercy, and nonattachment to things. Unfortunately, most of his followers, including me, have not found it possible to fulfill this call.
Again, the question for today is, do I believe it is even possible to fulfill this call?
Do I believe the Kingdom of God on earth is possible?
Do I believe it is possible for me to enter the Kingdom of God?
Do I believe what has never been can be?
No, I do not believe it is possible.
But the resurrection story confronts me and compels me to hope for and strive for that which I do not believe is possible.
For me, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, whether I believe in it literally, metaphorically, symbolically, narratively--whatever--the resurrection is God's radical breaking into this world to open my eyes beyond the narrow and constricted view of what seems plausible, reasonable, possible, doable, believable, or technically feasible, and giving me hope that God's transcendent power lies way above and far beyond what my little mind can accept or believe.
I do not believe that what never has been can be, but the resurrection compels me to ask nevertheless in my heart and soul, "why not?" And it gives me hope to continue plugging away at my efforts for transformation, and plugging away for peace and justice within God's creation. The resurrection compels me to not give up or give in. To dream the impossible dream. To hope for and work for foolish idealistic things.
The Biblical image that I shared last week when talking about death and resurrection was the eye of the needle. An image I'd like to close with this week is the wine and the wine skin. Jesus said, "you don't put new wine into an old wine skin because the new wine will burst the old skin; you need a new skin for new wine.
What this means to me is you cannot fit a brand new reality into an old reality. What this means to me is the God's Kingdom will not fit into this world as this world currently exists. God's Kingdom will not conform itself to this world as this world currently exists. And God's Kingdom will not fit into or conform itself or limit itself to what I currently believe is possible.
So the resurrection of Jesus Christ pushes me way beyond and far outside of my belief in what is possible, and it compels me to place my every last drop of hope in something I don't believe is possible because God has already shown that what is possible far exceeds my own beliefs.
The resurrection is the new wine that bursts the old wineskin of my rational mind.
The resurrection pushes me outside of my comfort zone of belief, and it thrusts me into the far more radical, discomforting, and liberating zone of hope beyond belief, of risk beyond belief, and of new life beyond belief.
So, in your heart of hearts, do not limit what God can do, what God can help you do, and what God can help us do to what you believe is possible, plausible, reasonable, doable, believable, or technically feasible.
May the resurrection of Jesus Christ push you over the edge of your belief and way beyond the comfort zone of your belief. May the resurrection of Jesus Christ compel you to hope for something you don't even believe is possible. May the resurrection empower you to strive for something you don't believe is possible. May the resurrection move you to dream of what never has been and to ask, "why not?"
Let the people say, Christ is risen.
Christ is risen, indeed!
