Carols & Context: Silent Night

 

 203 years ago on Christmas Eve, the carol ‘Stille Nacht’ made its debut in St Nicolas parish church in Oberndorf, Austria.  The lyric had been written 2 years earlier by Catholic priest Joseph Mohr, but on Christmas Eve of 1818m he brought his poem to schoolmaster and organist Franz Xaver Gruber and asked him to compose a tune for it.  It was to be played on guitar at that night’s mass (the church’s organ was feared damaged by flooding).  Gruber obliged, and the rest is history.

  In fact, history is a big part of ‘Stille Nacht’ – which would be known in English as ‘Silent Night’.  It speaks of a tranquil scene, of “heavenly peace”.  Mohr wrote the words in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars (the year after their end).  His native Austria had been a major combatant in that conflict – the Austrian Empire opposed Napoleon’s forces.  It is estimated that over half a million Austrians were killed in action over these years of fighting – more than any of the other powers involved.  Joseph Mohr’s adulthood had been lived in the shadow of these wars, until they finished (he was around 23 at that time).  So it seems to me like Mohr might have cherished peace.  And he may also have been acutely aware of its fleetingness, its fragility in this word.  Austria spent much of the nineteenth century in some war or other.

  Just shy of a century after its debut, ‘Stille Nacht/Silent Night’ was performed in another famous context: the 1914 Christmas truce in the First World War.  The story goes that German and Allied troops emerged from their respective trenches and sang the carol in their own languages (they also played football together).  Again, how poignant it must have been, to sing of a silent night, instead of hearing gunfire every night; and how they might have longed for heavenly peace, instead of earthly war.

  The world they were living in may have seemed a far cry from the one the angels described on the first Christmas:

 

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours [or, peace, goodwill among people]” (Luke 2:14)

 

  That day, that silent night in Palestine, 2000 or so years ago, was a snapshot, a glimpse, a note, of heavenly peace.  It was delicate, and it didn’t last, but every now and then, we can still catch glimpses like that, we can still hear echoes of ‘Silent Night’: ringing out in juxtaposition with the shots on battlefields and in our streets; sounding a noble countermelody to the noisy, polarized and polarizing rhetoric in Houses and homes; and as the peaceful resolution of the discord of imperialism and insidious ideologies.  One of the great problems of our age is our inability to disagree well, to hold difference.  Peace is possible – but it’s gentle and easily disturbed.  Maybe that’s why the dove is a common symbol of peace.

 The Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament) has this beautiful vision of a future peace – a vision so important that either God said it twice, or two different prophets used the same quote:

 

                “[The LORD] shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples;

they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks;

nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Isaiah 2:4; cf. Micah 4:3)

 

  I wonder if Jesus, the “holy infant, so tender and mild”, slept in heavenly peace because he dreamed of that day?  And in his living and his dying, he showed us the way.

Carols & Context: Away in a Manger

 

One of the most well-known Christmas carols, ‘Away in a Manger’ is a staple of Nativity plays.  The song has been attributed to reformer Martin Luther in many carol books, but there seems little evidence that he actually wrote it.  For one thing, it was only published (in English, as ‘Away in a Manger’) in the nineteenth century, some 300 years after the German’s death.  There is no surviving German version, other than translations from English.

  It is sometimes reckoned that ‘Away in a Manger’ was a song that Luther wrote for his young son, but a more likely candidate for that is ‘Von Himmel hoch…’ – almost certainly penned by Luther, in German, and dealing with a similar theme (the opening line translates as “From heaven above [to earth I come]”).

  It has been suggested that ‘Away in a Manger’ is actually entirely American, perhaps the work of William J. Kirkpatrick.  But the song’s authorship is not the only assumption worth challenging here. ‘Away in a Manger’ is frequently sung at Nativity plays, with Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus, shepherds, angels, wise men (or some combination of these) in a stable scene.  It makes sense, because that’s where you’d find a manger, right?  And the Bible says that Mary laid the baby Jesus in a manger (Luke 2:7).  And why?  Because “there was no place for them in the inn”.  But let’s hold it there for a moment.  A more accurate rendering of that line, however, might be ‘there was no guest room for them.’  Luke uses another Greek word later in his gospel to talk about an inn (in the ‘Good Samaritan’ story, Luke 10:34) – why not use the same word here if he means an inn?

  Kenneth Bailey, an expert on the Near East, now and in New Testament times, has suggested that the manger may have been in a house.  Many houses in first-century Palestine had two parts inside – one part at ground level or slightly raised, which served as the living area for the human inhabitants; the other, lower part where the animals would be kept when indoors.  And in between would be the manger – easily accessible for the animals, and easily replenished with fodder by the people.

  Bear in mind that Joseph had to travel with Mary to his ancestral home in Bethlehem.  It’s possible – perhaps likely – that he still had relatives there.  And in the Near East, it is bad form not to open your home to travelling relations.  But if you had no guest room in your house, everyone would share the same living space, and a baby may well be put in the manger – it’s warm and soft, and it’s in easy reach.  So, if that was the case, then the Nativity is actually set against a backdrop of hospitality – someone opening their home to their family (maybe not close family) in need.

  Hospitality is a big deal in the Bible.  It’s culturally very important in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, but it also becomes a key tenet of the fledgling faith of the early Christians of the New Testament.  Jesus talked about hospitality quite a bit (Matthew 25:35f and Luke 14:12-14 are just 2 examples), as did Paul, who wrote or inspired many New Testament letters to churches (cf. Romans 12:13 especially).  The early church, according to Luke’s other book, Acts, was characterised by hospitality (cf Acts 2:45; 4:34ff).  I think hospitality is so important to them all because they could see opportunities to ‘pay it forward’ for hospitality they had experienced.  And maybe they erred on the side of hospitality because you never really know who your guest might be.  As the writer to the Hebrews counselled:

 

“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it” (Hebrews 13:2).

 

  Sadly, we seem to live in an age (and a country?) that is more hostile than hospitable to strangers – such as refugees and asylum seekers.  We need only look at fairly recent events in the Channel, and in Parliament (see the Nationality and Borders Bill, currently in the House of Lords).  I want to be part of a country that takes the risk on welcoming the stranger, so we might entertain angels.  Jesus was into hospitality, maybe because he’d experienced it, starting when he was ‘Away in a Manger’.

Carols & Context: O Holy Night

 

One of the finest Christmas carols has to be ‘O Holy Night.’ It’s also one we don’t sing or play often enough, as it’s musically quite challenging – maybe because the tune was written by a French composer of operas.  The English version of the song is hugely popular, written by John Sullivan Dwight in 1855.  But this was based on his translation of the French ‘Minuit, Chretiens’, penned 12 years previous by Placide Cappeau.

  Cappeau was a French wine merchant, injured in a freak shooting accident as a child (the compensation for which funded his literary education).  His passion and skill was for literature, and so he was asked by the local priest to write a poem to mark the renovation of the church organ.  He agreed, and the result was the lyric of ‘Minuit, Chretiens’, also known as ‘Cantique de Noel’.

  It wasn’t without controversy, however.  Some in the Church at large discredited the composition, and its writers: Cappeau was not particularly religious, and (perhaps worse?) was a well-known socialist.  Adolphe Adam, the composer, was not a writer of music for ecclesiastical, but theatrical, use.  And yet, Cappeau got it.  He may not have been classically religious, but he understood Jesus, Christmas and the significance of it all – perhaps better than many who were.

  One thing I was struck by a few years ago, having sung this song in choirs and in religious settings, was that we only sing or hear 2 verses of ‘O Holy Night’ most of the time.  But there are 3 verses.  And the third verse is incredibly poignant:

 

                “Truly he taught us to love one another,

His law is love and his gospel is peace.

Chains shall he break, for the slave is our brother,

And in his name all oppression shall cease…”

 

This was a popular sentiment for Dwight (who published the English version) and many of his colleagues in the north of 1850s America – as Abolitionists.  Dwight was a Unitarian minister, committed to peace and justice.  A century later, he might have been persecuted as a ‘communist’, politically, and a liberal theologically.

  I sometimes wonder if there’s a reason that this verse is so often cut.  Perhaps it’s too ‘political’ for Christmas.  Maybe it’s uncomfortable, reminding us of a painful past, and persistent problems around race – and other forms of oppression, like the misogyny so rife today.

  But I think we need this song as a whole, with it “thrill of hope,” because “in his name all oppression shall cease.”  Christmas, for me, is about love and peace, joy and hope.  It’s about people coming together as family – a shared humanity, under the same starry sky.  In his birth, Jesus demonstrated solidarity with all people, and invites us to do the same.

From now on

 

Towards the end of The Greatest Showman, P T Barnum is brought back down to earth with a bump.  He is embroiled in a scandal, as he is pictured being kissed by Jenny Lind, the Swedish opera singer whose American tour Barnum has managed.  And when he returns home, his circus building burns down.  It seems like he has gone from the top of the world, to losing almost everything.  As he says in the song, ‘From now on’,

 

                “I drank champagne with kings and queens,

Politicians praised my name,

But those were someone else’s dreams,

The pitfalls of the man I became…”

 

Barnum realises that he had lost focus, he had gone off course.  And so he resolves:

 

                “From now on, these eyes will not be blinded by the light.

From now on, what’s waited till tomorrow starts tonight…”

 

This all reminds me of a pivotal moment in Matthew’s Gospel, in the New Testament.  Jesus was out with his disciples once, and they had seen and heard so much from him – stories, lessons, miracles.  So Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do people say I am?”  And they answer that some think he’s a new Elijah (he was a great prophet in the Hebrew Bible, who performed miracles and challenged the powerful), or the more recent ‘incarnation’ of Elijah, John the Baptist – Jesus’ relative and contemporary, recently killed by Herod the Tetrarch.  Others were suggesting Jesus was a Jeremiah or another great prophet.  And then Jesus asked them, “But who do you say that I am?”  Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah [or, Christ], the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:15-16).  Jesus blesses Peter for this epiphany.  It must have been a real mountain-top experience – Peter’s realisation, and the group also maybe realising that Jesus is the one they’d been waiting and hoping for.

  But the reason I’m reminded of this story by that song, ‘From now on’, is what comes next.  Straight after that moment of clarity and perhaps euphoria, Jesus changes the tone entirely:

 

“From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised…” (Matthew 16:21)

 

Peter’s bubble was burst, and he then went into denial, an argument with Jesus (never a good idea): “No, this won’t happen to you!”

  Jesus responds in the strongest possible terms, “Get behind me, Satan!” (Matthew 16:23).  In a moment, Peter goes from being blessed by Jesus, to being cursed.  But it’s not the first time Jesus shooed Satan away.  Quite early in Matthew’s story, Jesus said, “Away with you, Satan!” (Matthew 4:10), in response to a series of temptations he experienced while fasting in the wilderness.  These included the lure of power, fame and fortune.  And that was not the way.  Just as here (Matthew 16:24ff), Jesus told his disciples that his way is the way of the cross.  A way of discipline, of self-denial and sacrifice.

  If the disciples had thought that Jesus was going to be king; lead an uprising to overthrow the occupying Romans; make himself (and them) rich and famous; be a success by the ‘normal’ standards; then they had sorely misunderstood.  And here, Jesus was fixing their focus – and his – on the cross, a symbol of humility.  Jesus was setting an example, teaching a lesson, that real life is not about what we get, but what we give.  Jesus lived and died not for himself, but for the other – and the Other.  On the eve of his crucifixion, Jesus, in anguish, prayed, “… yet not what I want, but what you want…” (Matthew 26:39).

  As Barnum sings, “But when I stop and see you here, I remember who all this was for…”

  The word ‘Christian’ means one who is like Christ.  Being a Christian must never be primarily about one’s one good.  It’s not about success, or power, or wealth, or health even.  Sadly, many interpretations of the Christian faith have misunderstood this.  But one of the earliest Christian texts we have is found in Paul’s letter to the Philippians, where he seems to quote a hymn of the day to make a point:

 

                “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

[hymn starts here] who, though he was in the form of God,

did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,

but emptied himself,

taking the form of a slave,

being born in human likeness.

And being found in human form,

he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death – even death on a cross…” (Philippians 2:5-8)

 

That is the kind of culture we should see in Christianity – the attitude of Christians and the atmosphere of churches.  Not one that say, “me first”; “my way or the highway”; “our rights and views should be respected and protected (above others’)”; I could go on, but I’m sure you get the idea.  If those who take the name of Christ do not allow this mindset, of humility, of self-denial, to permeate them, then they are not worthy of that name.

  Let Christians and Christianity focus on Christ, whose cross is the template for life - from now on.

Tightrope

 

 “Some people long for a life that is simple and planned

Tied with a ribbon

Some people won’t sail the sea ‘cause they’re safer on land

To follow what’s written

But I’d follow you to the great unknown

Off to a world we call our own”

 

These are the opening lyrics of Charity Barnum’s solo, ‘Tightrope’, in The Greatest Showman.  She has signed up for a life of adventure with her entrepreneur husband, P T Barnum.  Charity doesn’t know where this life will take her, but she is open to the mystery, the journey, to see what might happen and who she might become.  And perhaps the flipside of that is, she doesn’t want to miss out  on this voyage of discovery.

  It’s not unlike the invitation of Jesus to his disciples.  He said, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people…” (Matthew 4:19).  A couple of years later, one of those men – Peter – said to Jesus, “Look, we have left everything and followed you…” (Matthew 19:27).  It’s true, discipleship – following Jesus – had cost Peter and the others virtually everything.  But as Dallas Willard put it, the cost of “non-discipleship” is far greater:

 

“Non-discipleship costs abiding peace, a life penetrated throughout by love, faith that sees everything in the light of God’s overriding governance for good, hopefulness that stands firm in the most discouraging of circumstances, power to do what is right and withstand the forces of evil.  In short, it costs exactly that abundance of life Jesus said he came to bring” (Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines)

 

  There are other moments from the Jesus story involving the disciples, and especially Peter, that speak to this.  The first is a really powerful story, where the disciples had got into the boat to cross Lake Galilee one evening, while Jesus dismissed crowds who had come out to meet him and to hear him.  After sending everyone away, Jesus went to pray on a hill, while the wind got up against the disciples’ boat.  Jesus then started to walk – on the water – toward the boat, in the middle of the lake.  The disciples assumed Jesus was a ghost, but he reassured them that it was actually him.  As if to test this, Peter says, “Lord, if it’s you, command me to come to you on the water” (Matthew 14:28).  Jesus invites him, “Come”.  So Peter climbs out of the boat and starts walking on the water toward Jesus.  But then Peter notices or remembers the wind and waves around him, and he starts to sink.  He shouts, “Lord, save me!”  Immediately Jesus reaches out his hand and catches Peter.

  As Charity sings in her chorus, “Hand in my hand and you promised to never let go, We’re walking a tightrope…”  In another song, the Hebrew Psalm 37, the writer says, “though we stumble, we shall not fall headlong, for the LORD holds us by the hand” (v.24).  So the people, on whose behalf the writer was speaking, expected to stumble.  They knew there’d be bumps in the road, but they also trusted that God was not going to let failure or disaster define them and have the final say, because God was there to catch them.

  A similar image was employed in Isaiah 42:6, in a message to the Hebrews in exile in Babylon – the result of their history of slips.  They were being told about God’s servant (which was them, in the first instance) who had a calling to bring justice and healing and liberation to those around.  So we read there: “I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you…”

  Called – like Peter was called by Jesus.  Taken by the hand and kept…

  Peter’s life was characterized by the call of Jesus.  To follow, on the shore of Galilee.  And now, to walk on water like his master.

  The story on the lake didn’t end there.  Jesus has a word with Peter when he catches him.  He (famously) says, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31).

  This seems like a harsh rebuke, but more literally Jesus might have said, “Mini-faith, why did you doubt?”  It’s not necessarily a put-down.  It could be a pet name.  Because Jesus called Peter and the rest to be his disciples, meaning he expected them to become like him.  But they weren’t there yet – even if Peter had just taken a big step.

  Another time Jesus used this term (a Greek term he seems to have invented) was when he came down a mountain after being ‘transfigured’ (shining with the glory of God) in front of three of his disciples (including Peter, of course).  They joined the rest of the disciples among a commotion, as a father had brought his epileptic son to be healed.  The others had tired and failed, so Jesus stepped in and healed the boy instantly.  Puzzled, the disciples asked Jesus, “Why could we not cast it [the epilepsy] out?”  And Jesus answered, “Because of your little faith…” (Matthew 17:20).  Again, I don’t think Jesus is criticizing them.  I think he’s saying, ‘you’re on the right track, but you’re not there yet.  You couldn’t do this today, but one day you will’.  After all, he then tells them that if they have faith “as the mustard seed” (I don’t think he’s necessarily talking about size here, but character of faith – referencing his parable in Matthew 13:31-32), they “will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for [them]” (Matthew 17:20).  A bit of grammar here: when Jesus says, “you will say to this mountain…”, the Greek verb is in the indicative.  It’s not the imperative (like an order).  It’s more like a statement.  This is going to happen.  They will do the things Jesus does.  Maybe not yet, but one day.

  That is what being a disciple of Jesus means.  Becoming like Jesus.  Living like him.  It’s actually the same as being a Christian.  That name really means little Christ, or one who is like Christ – where Christ became an alternative name for Jesus.  A Christian is a mini-faith.  A little Jesus, growing into someone like him.  Imagine passing that up.  It’s costly to follow Jesus and to commit to that life of growth, and all that comes with it.  “But it’s all an adventure that comes with a breathtaking view, Walking a tightrope…”

Rewrite the Stars

One of the motifs that runs through The Greatest Showman is social status, and a caste-like system that seemed to hold sway.  People are born into a certain position, and that’s pretty much where they stay.  And different groups within this system don’t mix.  Whether the division and positioning is gender-based, wealth- or class-based, ability-based or race-based, people were put in their place and expected to stay put.

  We’ve seen a bit of that in ‘This is me’.  The track ‘Rewrite the Stars’ is a variation on the theme.  This is a duet by Philip Carlyle (Zac Efron) and Anne Wheeler (Zendaya).  These “star-cross’d lovers” come from quite different social locations, from contrasting worlds.  Carlyle is from an upper-crust, wealthy family, an actor in serious productions (at least, he had been).  Wheeler was one half of an acrobatic act with her brother, a star turn in P T Barnum’s show – an oddity, because she was black.  Her place was fixed – no matter how talented or clever or anything else – society had assigned her a lowly place, as though it was written in the stars.  Carlyle had much to lose in doing so, but he at least could choose to cross the many social boundaries between them.

  The song ‘Rewrite the Stars’ comes from a desire to smash the social structures, to break the barriers to belonging, envisaging an environment that can include everyone equally.

  Bafflingly (to me anyway) this was absolutely scandalous at that time (and this time?).  And yet, I think Jesus courted such controversy with a central value in his presentation of the kingdom of heaven – God’s will, on earth as is it in heaven.  If we read the New Testament treatment of Jesus’ life in the Gospels, we find someone who consistently crossed cultural and ‘class’ chasms as though they weren’t there – perhaps because, where he came from, they weren’t…

  I’m only going to pick out a few examples here, as virtually every page of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John shows Jesus in this mood and mode.  We’ve already looked at some of his attitudes and behaviours with women – including foreign women, who ‘counted double’ in that culture.  Another serious taboo was leprosy.  ‘Lepers’ were fairly common in Jesus’ day, it seems, although ‘leprosy’ was something of a catch-all term for a variety of skin conditions.  In the old Levitical law, provision was made for the management of outbreaks.  In confirmed cases, the priest could send the leper outside of ‘the camp’ (into isolation) for a set time, to be reviewed and eventually re-integrated into society, ideally.  However, by the first century, it seems that a lot of lepers were sent away and left there.  For example, in Luke 17, on his way into a village, Jesus meets ten lepers at once.  This sounds like a ‘leper colony’ – similar to what we see in the film Ben Hur, set in the same time period.  The incident I want to look at here, though, is perhaps the most striking and controversial encounter between Jesus and a leper because it’s the first one.

  Jesus is ‘on tour’, doing his stuff, healing and teaching, when a leper comes and kneels in front of him, begging, “Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean” (Matthew 8:2; Luke 5:12).  Jesus reaches out to the man, touches him, and says, “I do choose.  Be made clean.”  And immediately the leprosy is gone (Matthew 8:3; Luke 5:13).  So the man could be re-integrated into his community; perhaps get some work; worship and learn at the synagogue; enjoy family life.  But what I love about this story is that Jesus touched him.  I get the sense that Jesus didn’t need to touch the leper to heal him, as we can see in other healings that he only needs to say the word.  But he breaks a barrier by touching the man.  He includes him as a human being, while most people had excluded him.  Jesus rewrote the stars.

  In Matthew’s gospel, the very next thing we read about is a Roman centurion coming to Jesus to appeal for the healing of his young servant, lying at home paralysed.  Apparently without a moment’s hesitation, Jesus says, “I will come and cure him” (Matthew 8:7).  But the centurion stops him, saying, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof…” Why would a Roman centurion say this to a Jewish man – whose land mighty Rome occupies?  Perhaps firstly because the centurion is a Gentile (non-Jew), and Jesus the Jew was ‘not allowed’ to enter such a person’s house.  That’s probably the real reason.  Another potentially controversial characteristic here may be that this centurion might have been gay.  The Greek word used for “servant” in this story is “pais”.  This word can mean servant, although as a slave, he might have been more correctly termed ‘doulos’.  A ‘pais’ can also mean a young boy, and sometimes described a young male lover.  I suspect Jesus would have been aware of all this about the centurion.

  The centurion explains his compromise, that Jesus need “only speak the word” and the servant will be healed, because as a centurion (a commander of a hundred soldiers), he knows about authority, and about his words making things happen.

  Jesus is so impressed by this man’s grasp of God’s kingdom – that it’s a reality where what God (Jesus, in this case) says, happens (on earth as it is in heaven) – that he publicly commends his faith, telling his followers:

 

“Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith.  I tell you, many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth…” (Matthew 8:10-12)

 

That sounds like a rewriting of stars to me.  The “heirs” lose their inheritance because they fail to ‘grasp’ it, when others do.  So those who ‘don’t fit’, who don’t belong, get it, while those ‘born into it’ are cast out.

  Jesus made a very similar point in an exchange with chief priests and elders at the temple, saying:

 

“Truly I tell you, the tax-collectors and sinners are going into the kingdom of heaven ahead of you…” (Matthew 21:31)

 

  He had pretty much enacted this fairly early in his ministry, when he called a tax-collector named Matthew to follow him.  Matthew did, straight away.  It seems that Matthew may have invited Jesus, along with some of his (now ex-) colleagues, to dinner because after that, Jesus and his disciples are at a dinner where a number of tax-collectors and “sinners” attend.  The Pharisees “saw this” and said to the disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax-collectors and sinners” (Matthew 9:11).  Jesus answered for himself: “Those are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick…”

  The Pharisees couldn’t understand why Jesus would hang out with those sorts of people.  Tax-collectors were known cheats, extorting people out of more than they owed in tax, as well as being collaborators with the occupying force (Pharisees had a nationalist streak, among everything else).  And sinners – these people, the Pharisees thought, were preventing God’s kingdom from materialising, because they just wouldn’t fall into line with the(ir) rules (that’s what they thought “Thy will be done, thy kingdom come” was about).  But Jesus rewrote the rules.  And rewrote the stars.  These people got Jesus and what he was about.  These were his people.

  The final example I want to mention came from a discussion among Jesus’ disciples as to who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.  In answer to their question, Jesus “called a child, whom he put among them, and said, ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven…’” (Matthew 18:2-4).

  The visuals of this scene are helpful.  Imagine the normal set-up of disciples with their teacher.  They’re probably sitting or kneeling on the ground, at Jesus’ feet – who might also be seated.  Then comes the child, who seems to be standing, and as such is towering over them all.  Who is greatest in this picture?  The child, head and shoulders above the rest.

  Contrast this with the normal perception of such a child in that world – a “little child” (the Greek word is a diminutive form, suggesting possibly under seven years old).  At this age, they were not contributing to society, and there was every chance they might not live to adulthood.  They were almost seen as expendable, and probably not as a full person in their own right.  But here, Jesus turns all that on its head.  He rewrites the stars.

  While these examples may have been plucked out, they are not isolated incidents.  On the contrary, they are consistent with the general tenor of the Gospels – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John – and Luke’s follow-up volume, Acts.  And the main contributor to the New Testament, Paul, agrees with much of the sentiment.  He was wildly inclusive, particularly of Gentiles/foreigners.  He also – controversially – addressed children in his letters, before addressing their parents (Ephesians 6:1-4; Colossians 3:20-21).  He addressed wives before their husbands (Ephesians 5:22ff; Colossians 3:18-19).  He addressed slaves before their masters (Ephesians 6:5-9; Colossians 3:22-4:1).  In even addressing these groups, Paul was being revolutionary – he was dignifying them with choice and agency, to behave in the way he suggests.  But by speaking to them first, before their supposed superiors, he was challenging the structures.  He was, in a sense, rewriting the stars.

  That is a central pillar of the Gospel.  It is good news because it releases people from the structures that hold us – slaves and masters, women and men, children and parents, those like us and those not.  The good news is: Jesus rewrites the stars.

This is me

 

Many musicals – most, even – have an anthem, one song that really takes hold of audiences, often becoming synonymous with the show or movie.  I’d say ‘This is me’ is that song for The Greatest Showman.

The story goes that, before the film had had received the greenlight for production, this song was performed in a workshop in front of studio executives.  Keala Settle – who carries the song – had never performed it, and was rather reserved at first.  Telling the story of the song, she grew into the performance, and the rest is history.

‘This is me’ is a song about refusing to be ashamed, about standing up and standing out in spite of rejection and marginalization.  It’s sung in the film by Settle’s character, bearded lady Lettie Lutz, and the other ‘Oddities’, at a time when their difference and rejection from the well-to-do in society is at its sharpest.  This is a song of defiance, and of owning and taking pride in one’s own identity.

For me, one of the reasons why the New Testament’s Gospels are called that is because they are good news stories – that’s what Gospel means, it’s an old English word for good news.  There are so many tales of people in the shadows, on the underside of history and in the margins of society, stepping out in boldness to meet Jesus or because they’ve met him.  I want to mention a few.

The first is a woman in a crowd who had the audacity to interrupt someone else’s miracle to get one of their own.  Jesus had been summoned by Jairus, an official at the local synagogue, whose daughter lay dying at home.  On the way, Jesus was swamped by crowds, as usual, but he stopped when he felt someone touch him and apparently draw some power out of him!  It was a woman who had been stricken with bleeding for twelve years – basically, she had a constant period for twelve years.  Not only would this have been unpleasant and (I daresay) exhausting for her, it also meant she was basically an outcast, as menstruation was an uncleanness in Jewish society.  But this woman thought to herself, ‘If I could just touch him, or even just the edge of his cloak, I’ll be healed.’  That’s what she did, and that’s what happened.  So she came clean, owned up.  And Jesus said,

 

“Daughter, your faith has made you well” (Mark 5:34)

 

Fun fact: this is the only person in the gospels that Jesus calls ‘daughter’.

Also, notice that Jesus credits her faith, and not his power, as the prime mover here.  To borrow from a book title (which in turn borrows from a quote), “She believed she could, so she did.”

Another story features a woman in the region of Tyre and Sidon (modern Lebanon), whose daughter was very sick.  This woman is called a Canaanite by Matthew, and a Syrophoenician by Mark.  Both are making the same point – she was a Gentile (non-Jew) and a ‘foreigner’.  Jesus and his disciples were passing through that region, and the woman came out to call on Jesus, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David” (that’s a pretty Jewish term for a non-Jew to be using) “my daughter is tormented by a demon” (Matthew 15:22).  Jesus didn’t answer, but the disciples complained to Jesus, that he should get rid of her because, in their words, “she keeps shouting after us”.  The arrogance of these young men!  First of all, treating this woman as just an annoyance, secondly, she wasn’t shouting after ‘us’ (ie, them) – she wasn’t interested in them, only in Jesus.  But their attitude was probably normal for young Jewish men toward a Gentile woman.  There’s a Jewish daily prayer (read by men, the women say a different one for reasons that will be obvious) that says,

 

“Blessed are you, O LORD our God, King of the Universe, for not having made me a Gentile… a slave … [or] a woman”

 

So it’s no wonder these men treated this woman with such disdain – she was 2 out of the 3 items on that list.

There’s clearly, then, a bit of racism and sexism on their part.  But controversially, Jesus said some things too – things that could seem racist as well.  When he finally breaks his silence, firstly he speaks about an exclusivist, exceptionalistic vision – that he “was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel”.  Even if Jesus didn’t believe this, it could reinforce negative ideas.

Then, when this woman kneels before Jesus, saying, “Lord, help me,” Jesus answers:

 

“It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs”

 

Talk about kicking someone when they’re down.  He implies that she is a dog.  My theory on this is that Jesus is testing his disciples, challenging and subverting their perceptions by using popular terms and ideas but exposing their error, a sort of reductio ad absurdum.  That’s exactly what happened here, as the woman takes it in defiance:

 

                “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table”.

 

Jesus praised her, “Woman, great is your faith!  Let it be done for you as you wish.”  And her daughter was healed right away.

On another occasion, Jesus was a guest at the home of a Pharisee called Simon.  (Pharisees were a group among Jews who prided themselves on their zealous observance of the written and oral Jewish law – there was perhaps an elitism about the, and they certainly seemed to look down on those who were less strict in their adherence to the commandments.)  While they were at the table together, a notorious woman of the town burst in.  Although it’s not stated explicitly, it’s clear that this woman was a prostitute.  She stood by Jesus’ feet and wept on them.  She washed his feet with her tears, and dried them with her hair.  Then she started kissing his feet, and she opened a jar of ointment she had with her (a tool of the trade) and anointed Jesus’ feet with it.

Simon was scandalized, saying to himself, ‘If Jesus were a prophet, he’d know what kind of woman this is touching him – that she is a sinner.’  In response, Jesus pointed out that the woman, and not Simon, had treated him like a guest of honour.  She showed great love because she had experienced great compassion from Jesus – she heard and saw the love of God in him.  Simon, on the other hand, demonstrated his own sense of entitlement by failing to extend even common courtesy to Jesus, such as having a servant wash his feet.  Once again, Jesus praised the woman, saying, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace” (Luke 7:50).

I’m struck in that story by just how little attention the woman paid to Simon the Pharisee.  He tried to shame her, but it seemed to just wash over her.  She knew who she was, and she accepted God’s love as seen in Jesus.

Finally, in a perfect picture of the patriarchy at play, early one morning, writes John, Jesus went to the temple in Jerusalem, and a bunch of people came and listened to him as he taught them.  This was interrupted by the scribes and Pharisees bringing “a woman who had been caught in adultery, and making her stand before all of them…” (John 8:3).  In depictions of this famous scene, the woman is often cast down to the ground, clinging to Jesus’ feet.  But the words here tell us that she was made to stand, in front of everyone.  Like she was on trial, and to shame her.  These men brought the charge to Jesus:

 

“Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of adultery…”

 

Funny, I always thought it takes two to tango.  Surely they must have also caught a man in the act of adultery – where is he?  Apparently he got away with it, and the woman got the blame and is thrown under the bus.  ‘Twas ever thus – remember the Garden of Eden?

So the lynch mob wanted to test Jesus.  Their interpretation of the Law said she should be stoned (to death).  But what, they asked, would Jesus do?

“Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground” (John 8:6).  Let’s pause for a moment.  Review the scene.  It’s not the woman who is on the ground, but Jesus.  The woman stands tall with Jesus kneeling.  I find that a powerful image.  Is that, in fact, why Jesus knelt down – to reframe the situation, and elevate the woman?

Much has been made of what Jesus wrote on the ground.  Some ancient versions of the text add later the detail that it was “the sins of each of them”.  Who knows?  At any rate, they kept on at him, so he got back up on his feet and issued a challenge:

 

“Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her” (John 8:7)

 

He got back to his writing on the ground, and the words started to sink in.  One by one, oldest first, those men went away, until “Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him”.  He straightened up and asked her, “Where are they?  Has no one condemned you?”

She replied, “No one, sir.”  And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.  Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.”  It seems to me like Jesus put it back to her.  He gave her the authority over her life.  No one condemns you – that’s up to you now.  She could walk tall, free, unashamed.

You may have noticed that all these stories centre on women.  That’s not a coincidence.  Women needed good news in those days, as they’d had a bad press for… ever, actually.  Their story had been written by men.  Jesus gave them, and all of us for that matter, the chance to set the record straight.  To tell our side of the story.  To stand up tall, and to show the world, “This is me.”

Never Enough

 

  One of the story arcs in The Greatest Showman centres on the song ‘Never Enough’ by Swedish opera sensation Jenny Lind (played by Rebecca Ferguson with a vocal from Loren Allred).  P T Barnum persuades Lind – who has already dominated Europe’s venues – to tour America with him as her manager.  The whole thing turns out to be a costly distraction for Barnum (and Lind, to an extent), and that is essentially what the anthem is about.  As one of its composers, Justin Paul, has said:

“ ‘Never, never, never enough’.  It felt like you could imagine someone in a castle trying to count all of their riches and it still doesn’t add up to enough,  It’s kind of that moment where somebody isn’t really satisfied…”

 

  It’s something we see (and perhaps experience) all the time.  People want more, the next thing.  Somehow, it’s never enough.

  There’s a story of Jesus addressing this kind of thing.  A wealthy young man came to Jesus once and asked him what good deed he needed to do to have eternal life.  The term “eternal life” in the Gospels literally means ‘life of the age,’ or ‘age-life’.  ‘The age’ is another term for God’s kingdom.  So it’s not so much focused on living forever in heaven when we die, but living a different kind of life, both now and forever.  In short, this young man was asking how to get on board with God’s kingdom, with what God is doing.  So Jesus reminds him about keeping the Jewish commandments, namely:

“You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; Honour your father and mother; also, You shall love your neighbour as yourself” (Matthew 19:18-19)

 

  The young man says he’s kept these since he was a kid, and asks if there’s anything else.  Side note – interesting that he is still looking for more.  It’s like he knows he’s not there yet.

  Jesus tells him that if he wants to go ‘all in’ for this life, he should sell his possessions and give the proceeds to the poor.  Then, says Jesus, the man would have “treasure in heaven” (Matthew 19:21) and could come and follow him.  (It’s not the only time Jesus spoke of treasure in heaven.  He also mentioned it in the Sermon on the Mount, telling people to store up treasure in heaven, rather than perishable treasure on earth [Matthew 6:19-20].  The point was, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” [Matthew 6:21].  In other words, re-assess your values.  Don’t fixate on ‘stuff’, but focus on God’s ways.)

  That rich young man walked away, because he had a lot of possessions.  He was sad, but he apparently wasn’t ready to shift his values.  In a way, perhaps he may not have needed to actually get rid of everything.  Maybe he only needed to be able to do it.

  Notice, the commandments they talked about were from the Ten Commandments (plus the neighbourly one).  They come from the last six Commandments – which govern human relations with each other (the first four are concerned with human relations with God).  But Jesus missed the last one: “You shall not covet your neighbour’s house… [or other property]” (Exodus 20:17).  Jesus knew this man’s weak spot was ‘covetousness’: a pursuit of possessions.  And it was a distraction for him, it was holding him back.  It seemed like he valued things more than people, or God.

  So Jesus tells his disciples that it’s hard for a rich person to get into the kingdom of heaven.  He gives the famous image, that it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.  There’s been a lot of debate about that phrase (incidentally, it appears in both Jewish and Muslim texts as well).  Some people say that Jesus was talking about a real place called the Needle Gate, a tiny door in the wall of Jerusalem.  A camel could only squeeze through it, they say, if its saddle bags were removed.  It’s a strong image, but apparently there’s no evidence of such a place.

  Another theory is that the Greek of the New Testament has been written down wrongly, and that it’s a cable, and not a camel (the words have only one letter difference in Greek).  That would mean the image is of a thick rope passing through the eye of a needle – which would obviously be impossible because of its size.

  Perhaps the most popular interpretation is that Jesus is simply using hyperbole – a figure of speech.  A camel, of course, can’t fit through the eye of a needle.  And nor can someone so distracted focus fully on God’s kingdom.

  Focus versus distraction is a bit of a theme in the New Testament.  Paul – who may have written up to half of it in the form of his letters to young churches – spoke of trading his old value system for the sake of “knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (another way of speaking about God’s kingdom?), for whom he sacrificed literally everything (Philippians 3:7-8).

  The mysterious writer to the Hebrews made a related point:

“… let us lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely [or, that easily distracts], and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross…” (Hebrews 12:1-2)

 

  That’s focus, and not being distracted by other stuff – good, bad or indifferent.  And on the last point there, the cross, Jesus also told his followers once:

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.  For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life?  Of what can they give in return for their life?” (Matthew 16:24-26)

 

  Even the whole world is ‘Never Enough’ to fill the void of longing for life as it can be, for this age-life.  To find that life, we need to focus and not be distracted, aligning our values with those of Jesus and the kingdom of heaven.  What we value we put our heart and soul into.  If we value what God values, somehow that will be enough.

The Other Side

 

  The song, ‘The Other Side’, in the movie The Greatest Showman shows P T Barnum trying to persuade actor and wealthy socialite Philip Carlyle to join him.  Carlyle’s involvement would not only be an endorsement of Barnum’s entertainment enterprise, but also a way to make it financially viable too, by offering Carlyle a stake in it.

  It’s a hard sell, but eventually Carlyle is won over – perhaps by the prospect of a different kind of life (on “the other side”) – less secure, less respectable, but much more alive and free.

  It’s about buy-in.  It’s about getting someone to believe in what Barnum is doing.  That’s an important aspect of faith – perhaps obviously, as faith is about belief in something at some level or other.  But the Christian faith (and no doubt others) requires buy-in.  It demands a commitment.  Often that is confused or conflated with paid-up membership of a particular congregation or denominational structure, and the doctrines and values they espouse.  Sometimes buy-in and belief in these contexts is reduced to saying a certain prayer or certain prayers, agreeing with a few precepts, or adhering to certain micro-ethical standards.

  But there’s something much more fundamental about belief and buy-in with Jesus.  It’s an active belief, that is lived out.  It manifests in a life that looks a bit like Jesus, because the believer has committed to following Jesus.  By that I mean they take seriously the kinds of things Jesus said and did, and seek to embed all of this in their own life.  So it’s not about ‘brand loyalty’ to a particular faith tradition or a specific sect within it; it’s about living in response to the reality of the rule of God, as Jesus announced and enacted.

  This is why Jesus called disciples.  A disciple was a bit like an apprentice, or a ‘mentee’ to a mentor.  The whole idea is that the disciple learns from the master, to think like they do and act like they do, to take on their teaching, and live the way they do.

  In both Matthew’s and Mark’s accounts of the Gospel – the story of the good news of Jesus – we read about Jesus summoning four young fishermen on the shore of Lake Galilee: “Follow me,” he said (Matthew 4:19; Mark 1:17).  Follow: that is what a disciple does, they follow in their master’s footsteps – literally walking very closely behind him on the road to hear everything he said and watch his every mannerism and movement.

  The third gospel, Luke, doesn’t tell that story.  Instead, we read there of one of those Galilean fishermen, Simon Peter, being won over by Jesus in this way: Jesus was teaching crowds by that same lake, and he got into Simon’s boat so he could address them all.  It created a stage facing the banked shore, like a theatre.  When the show was over, when Jesus had finished talking to the crowds, he told Simon Peter to put the boat into the deep water and let the nets down for a catch.  Simon says, “Master, we’ve worked all night long but have caught nothing,” before adding, “Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets” (Luke 5:5).  The nets are put down, and are filled with so many fish that Simon has to call his colleagues in the other boat to help haul it in.

  This is pretty similar to a story in John’s gospel, which is told right at the end of the Jesus story.  And on that occasion, Jesus isn’t in the boat, but on the shore – although the disciples in the boat don’t recognise him at first.  He calls out to ask them if they’ve caught any fish, to which they answer ‘no’.  So Jesus instructs them to cast the nets to the right side (that is, ‘the other side’) of the boat and they’ll find some.  Which they do…

  Back in Luke’s earlier episode, Simon is overcome.  He kneels at Jesus’ feet, saying “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” (Luke 5:8).  Jesus reassures Simon: “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.”  In some versions of the Matthew and Mark equivalent, we read the phrase, “I will make you fishers of men,” when Jesus calls those first, fishermen followers.

  I think that image makes a lot more sense if we look at it from the fish’s point of view.  If you’re a fish, you live in the water.  That’s your world, your experience, your reality.  You may not have any concept of something other, something different, something beyond.  But above the water is all this other stuff, another world alongside yours.  And when you’re pulled from the water, drawn up, you glimpse ‘the other side’: a bigger reality, a different kind of world.  Ok, it’s not great for the fish at this point, but the idea is there: disciples of Jesus are alive to this other reality, partly beyond our understanding and experience, yet somehow present and almost tangible – “the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17).  And in living it, and in thought, word and deed, inviting others to embrace and experience it, they (we?) are catching people – drawing them into this new understanding and way of life.  So it’s not a preoccupation with the hereafter, but a new perspective on the here and now.  That is what Jesus invites his disciples to: the other side.

Come Alive

 

   Like many good movies (and some not so good ones, no doubt), The Greatest Showman has a ‘how the band got together’ montage.  The song ‘Come alive’ provides the soundtrack to P T Barnum gathering his group of ‘curiosities’ and unusual performers.  Barnum recruits various people from the margins and shadows of his society, offering them the chance to see themselves and the world differently, and challenge the perceptions of others.  It was, simply, an invitation to come alive.

  In the Gospel of John, Jesus coins a famous phrase, that he came to bring ‘life in all its fullness’ (John 10:10).  In actual fact, the verse in its entirety contrasts Jesus – the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep – with the religious leaders of the day – “the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy”.  So how can we tell if a religious leader or community reflects Jesus?  Maybe by their fruit – do they bring life, or do they steal and kill and destroy?

  And what might ‘life in all its fullness’ look like anyway?

  When Jesus had been on the scene for a bit, he’d started to turn heads and set tongues going, so much so that people started to wonder if he was the Messiah figure they’d been expecting.  Among these was John the Baptist, a relative of Jesus, and what we might call an affiliate – they preached a similar message about God’s kingdom.  So John sent some of his own disciples to ask Jesus if he was the one they’d been expecting, or if they should wait for someone else.  The writer of Luke’s Gospel then summarises what Jesus has been doing:

“Jesus had just then cured many people of diseases, plagues and evil spirits, and had given sight to many who were blind” (Luke 7:21)

 

  That’s exactly what’s been going on in the preceding chapters of Luke.  To make it even more explicit, Jesus answers them:

 

“Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them…” (Luke 7:22)

 

These were understood (or could be, at least) as signs of God’s kingdom, of a restoration, a righting of wrongs.  Hebrew texts like Isaiah 35 and 61 spoke of exactly these things happening.

  In demonstrating and enacting God’s kingdom, Jesus brought people to life – in some cases, literally.  He removed barriers to inclusion and participation – sometimes by healing ailments, sometimes by simply challenging social boundaries.  Jesus went to the margins and partied.  He sat at the table with people many would have shunned.  Jesus did and still does invite and invest in the ‘unlikely’.

  If you are in a place where people are not coming fully alive, then maybe it’s time to find a space where people can and do come fully alive – somewhere that Jesus is, because it doesn’t sound like he’s where you are now.

  Jesus “came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10) -  where we can find ourselves “dreaming with our eyes wide open… Come alive.”

A Million Dreams

 I think my favourite song from The Greatest Showman is probably ‘A Million Dreams’.  It’s sung by the young PT Barnum, and then the adult one.  I find it such a poignant and powerful song, full of meaning.  People who know me well may recognise why this song in particular speaks to me: I’m a dreamer.  I readily identify with the sentiment of the chorus:

“Every night I lie in bed, the brightest colours fill my head,

A million dreams are keeping me awake.

I think of what the world could be, a vision of the one I see,

A million dreams is all it’s gonna take –

A million dreams for the world we’re gonna make…”

 

I’m especially struck by that second part, about what the world could be.  That’s my story, this is my song.  It’s like the famous saying by George Bernard Shaw, “You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’  But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?’”

  In the song ‘A Million Dreams’, young Barnum is open to the possibility that people will call him crazy, and say he’s lost his mind.  The echoes of Jesus and his story are loud and clear.  People said Jesus had “gone out of his mind” (Mark 3:21) – his own family, no less – in view of his attracting large crowds who wanted their lives and their world to be better, so they came to Jesus for healing, and to hear his incredible teaching.  Stories of a better world.  Pictures of how life can be.  In fact, in Mark’s story of Jesus, immediately after that incident of Jesus being insulted by his relatives, he launches into a set of stories about God’s kingdom (Mark 4:1-34 – it’s paralleled in Matthew’s account, mostly in chapter 13).  These parables, as they are called, paint a radically inclusive, gently influential way of life, an alternative reality.  This is the reality that comes about when the life presented by Jesus in his ‘Sermon on the Mount’ (and modelled by Jesus) is taken seriously and actually lived (or at least aimed at).

  To many (probably most) people, it all sounds crazy.  Loving enemies.  Not getting angry at people.  Turning the other cheek.  Not worrying about… well, anything, really – but trusting in God’s providence of the necessities of life.  Not judging others.  Treating people the way you’d hope to be treated.  Generally making choices that promote life and not death.  Maybe it is crazy.  A pipe dream.  But it’s Jesus’ dream, of what the world could be.

  “A million dreams is all it’s gonna take.  A million dreams for the world we’re gonna make.”