Subtitle: THERE IS NOTHING SIMPLE ABOUT GRACE

The impulse to send humanitarian aid to “innocents” in Gaza is born of good impulses.  Helping those in need is an act of grace.   Unfortunately, grace is hard.  We know such aid is unlikely to reach those for whom it is intended – that in fact it is likely to end up in the hands of the bad guys, empowering them, not those in need.  Further, by empowering the bad guys, even unintentionally and even from excellent motive, we increase the evil that is Hamas.  Therefore, one must ask if such aid is actually and really graceful?  Compounding the issue even further is the consideration that to send such aid in the face of the realities just described is an inherently selfish act, based not in producing actual good and grace, but instead based in our need to perceive ourselves as doing good.  Grace is, above all, sacrificial and there is no good in acting out of our need instead of towards producing genuine good.

Grace is complicated and hard.

Whenever I am confronted with this issue, I reflect on the story of Jesus encountering the woman of Samaria as told in John’s gospel, chapter 4.  Jesus manages to simultaneously make this woman feel loved while confronting her with the extremely dissatisfactory nature of her lifestyle.  Jesus does something that these days we consider an impossible task, as we equate love and grace overwhelmingly with acceptance.  These days we would think the graceful thing to do would be to take this woman to our breast, encouraging her, and praying her lifestyle issues work out later.  Certainly, we would not dare confront her with the unsatisfactory nature of how she lived.  Too often when I bring this up with fellow Christians the retort is that He was Jesus and therefore “magical” somehow.  As if He could be both/and graceful and confrontational yet we could not.

As Christians we are called to imitate Christ.  And yet just a couple of days ago I considered a story where Jesus was capable of great violence and destruction.  If our call is indeed to imitate Christ, then it certainly must be possible for us to be “both/and” – to express grace in confrontation – to be both peaceful and violent – to know when each is called for.

Being imitators of Christ is complicated and hard.

Two reflections on the dilemma I just described.

Reflection one – our media and our political communications (sometimes even our Christian communications) are designed to be anything but complicated and hard.  They are designed to be, as the host has frequently said, “often wrong but never in doubt.”  We communicate in short soundbites said with great authority, the exact opposite of complex and hard.  We as a society, promote the direct and simple.  Each advance we have made in communication has compounded this issue, I would say the internet has brought the problem to a pinnacle, but my parents said that about television and here we are, so I dare not.

Reflection two – Jesus was, in some sense “magical.”  But the purpose of His ministry, and most importantly His death and resurrection, was to give us access to that same “magic.”  If we find it somehow impossible to be both graceful and confrontational then the problem is with us, and we need to go to work to try and gain the access we have been granted.

It is hard to look at the suffering in Gaza – terribly, horribly, painfully hard.  Grace demands its end.  But that does not always mean the end is direct and straightforward.  Grace is also smart and thorough – and complicated and hard.

ADDENDUM (an hour or so later): It is also worthy of note that the first time Jesus sends out His disciples He instructs them, “whoever does not receive you nor listen to your words, as you leave that house or city, shake the dust off your feet.”  There are people in this world that would rather live in a state of dis-grace than accept the grace that we have to offer.  Thus, the question of grace is even further complicated – what to do with those that do not want it?  Grace demands we help them, yet they do not want our help.  Grace just gets more complicated and harder.