Max Lucado, if you don't know, is a pastor from Texas, but one of the more prolific evangelical authors of recent times. He's published 40 some books and the jacket of this one boasts 130 million total books in print. His writing is basically a Christian version of self-help, with lots of bible verses and basic affirmations. It's not terrible. I don't always (or often) agree with his theology, but I have found his writing helpful from time to time (especially when I was younger and less confident in my own beliefs).
I don't want to trash it, but it's not my thing.
As I read through the book, some chapters seem really good - like they'd be incredible helpful to people who need a dose of hope. Others (far fewer) seem problematic, like they're going to provide a short term fix, but make things worse in the long run. These tend to be over-spiritualized chapters. It's not surprising; one of the hallmarks of evangelical theology is a tendency to downplay or ignore humanity. Modern evangelicalism was birthed out of a theological divide that, in shorthand, led to liberals being associated with social justice and real-world problems, while conservatives became associated with eternal destiny and spiritual health. These are just stereotypes, but they're important.
In one chapter, Lucado talks about how the Devil is the embodiment of evil and selfishness and those people who deny the real, personal existence of a devil are just playing into his schemes for damning our souls. This is very typical evangelical fodder (although a bit dated) perfectly appropriate for someone Lucado's age and for his core audience. I'd argue this kind of talk ends up letting us, as people, off the hook. We blame the devil for our sin and it creates a layer of separation from responsibility. Evangelicals have been trained to take the shame and guilt of sin on ourselves (sometimes too much), but we struggle accepting responsibility, which, in my view, is a real key to overcoming and redeeming our faults and failures.
The most recent chapter I read started and ended with the powerful story of a college softball player who injured her knee rounding first base on a game-winning home run. The rules prevented her teammates from helping her to reach home plate, so the opposing team decided to do it, even though it meant them losing the game. It's a profound story of compassion and selflessness - the kind of thing that can bring a tear to the eye and stir the soul.
Lucado uses it in an interesting way, though. The softball story is bookended around an extended explanation of Jesus' humanity. (Lucado's real talent is somehow extending what should be a paragraph of information into a chapter; that's how you write forty books while working full-time as a pastor.) He talks about how Jesus experienced life as we do, understands our suffering, and offers a solution.
All of that is great. He ends the chapter, though, after revealing the conclusion of the story, by saying what that opposing team did for the injured player in what Jesus wants to do for us. We're stuck in the failure and inadequacy of life, incapable of doing what we need to do and God makes up the difference. That's all true, but it missed the actual, practical point: that we're called to do for others what those players did for their opponent. We're called to be the difference for each other.
Now, I grew up hearing that kind of argument refuted as humanistic. God does for us; we don't do for ourselves. Ultimately that comes back to the Calvinist idea of total depravity - that sin completely removed the image of God from humanity and we're incapable of doing good without God.
That's not the foundational argument for over-spiritualizing, but it is a contributing factor. Many evangelicals want to be careful not to attribute anything good to humanity.
I don't think that's a real worry, because I don't believe in total depravity. I certainly affirm that people are incapable of being good on their own, but I wholeheartedly believe God has always intended to make us partners in the redemption of the universe. God works with us and in us - sometimes before we're even aware of it - to bring good to the world. It doesn't diminish the power of God to say that we can be agents of grace and salvation to one another - so long as we recognize the work of God underneath and within it all.
The real issue evangelicals struggle with - at least in this instance - is the notion that this life doesn't matter. We get so focused on being "in the right place" when we die that our lives become a means to an end. I don't know whether Lucado himself would say it (I don't like putting words in someone's mouth), but many evangelicals would say that grand gesture in the softball game doesn't mean squat if the people involved haven't prayed the right prayer and committed their lives to Jesus Christ.
That's far too dichotomous for me. It's a simplistic separation between the physical and spiritual - something the New Testament and the earliest Christians fought tooth and nail against. Jesus profoundly merged the physical and spiritual; the Jewish tradition (of which Jesus was deeply a part) says we are not us without both elements. The Lord's Supper, the center of our faith, makes it very clear how these two things are completely intertwined.
Yes, Jesus wants to do for us spiritually what those players did so graciously and self-sacrificially for their opponent. We can be lifted up, made whole, healed, and redeemed by the love of Jesus Christ. But that love was manifested in a physical act: suffering and dying out of love for the world. That love continues to be manifested in physical acts, like the one in question and a billion others around the world every day.
In fact, Jesus tells his disciples they will do even greater things than him. Maybe, just maybe, some of those things are fallible, sinful, dysfunctional human beings responding to the love of God by being agents of salvation to each other in the midst of the world. I don't believe eternity is some far off place. I don't believe "afterlife" is the best way to talk about heaven. Eternity begins here and now. God's redemption is happening as we speak. Our call is to be part of it as God calls an enables.
I believe strongly the condition of your soul has far more to do with the condition of your hands and heart than most evangelicals have been led to believe. I suppose there's some danger out there that we could focus so much on humanity that we forget God. I don't think it's likely, though. After all, no one has put more faith in humanity than has God. We'd do well to follow that example.
4 comments:
Ryan. Thank you. You nailed this - and in a very helpful way. I really appreciate how you were so gracious, while clearly delineating the problems.
Thank you, Ryan, for this analysis. Very thought provoking.
And, yes, a generous donor (who knows Max personally) DID pay for all of those books and mailing costs!
Thanks - so well said - part of our journey - staying both in reality and Reality. We do so need each other.
Jesse - Thanks for clarifying. There was some confusion out here in the hinterlands, both about the costs associated with such a mailing, and about the contents of the book. The latter has been addressed by Ryan, and in a more gracious manner than I would have.
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