Readings: Jeremiah 7.9-15; 1 Corinthians 12.1-11
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord
Jeremiah was a failure. Or so he may well have believed. By the time of his death, in all likelihood as an exile in Egypt, Jerusalem had been sacked twice, thousands of his compatriots had been forcibly relocated by the invading Babylonians and the southern kingdom of Judah had collapsed into anarchy with rival warlords taking advantage of the chaos. He had spent his entire adult life trying to prevent this catastrophe but all his warnings, the harangueings, and heart-felt desperation had been fruitless. Political, moral and spiritual deterioration had become endemic.
From a political perspective, the kingdom of Judah was ripe for conquest. From a spiritual perspective, here was a nation that had abandoned its God; ceasing to live within its centuries old traditions, the people had simply lost their way and, as a result, they were vulnerable to any predatory force. What they got was Nebuchanezzar and the full force of the Babylonian Empire rolling over them.
Jerusalem fell for the second time in 587BC. Not everyone was dragged off into enforced exile. The Babylonians installed a Jew to govern Judah on their terms, a man called Gedaliah. Jeremiah knew him and stayed on in Jerusalem to support him. This was the Jews’ last chance to hold things together. But then, five years later, Gedaliah was assassinated by a rogue member of the Royal house, angry that he had been passed over for the governorship. The Babylonians were not having that. They soon quashed this latest rebellion and that marked the end of any coherent Jewish society. Those who could, fled to Egypt to escape the chaos. This was probably what Jeremiah did. The cruel irony would not have been lost on him: the exodus under Moses, when God redeemed his people, was now turned inside out, as if it had never happened. Egypt was now a place of refuge.
This slice of Jewish history feels incredibly familiar, doesn’t it? Across the world, there are many countries, so riven by warfare or civil turmoil, that their people have no option but to flee. The numbers of refugees seeking security anywhere other than their homeland appears to be growing year on year.
Perhaps we have to accept that human beings lack the collective talent to hold onto stable government. We can now see that, when Francis Fukuyama predicted in ‘The End of History (published in 1992) that the nations of the world were moving inexorably towards Liberal Democracy and that the bitter rivalries which had beset the 20th century were over, he was utterly mistaken. The first quarter of the 21st century has opened an era of new tensions. Old certainties now count for little.
Once again, we can see the rise of the idol, manifest as an autocrat. Strong men surface in times of upheaval and then seek to consolidate their power. Checks and balances are rendered impotent. In countries where democracy has been long established, a ‘Populist’ approach, revolving around the cult of an individual, has emerged, celebrating the dogmatic and spurning the nuanced. Intolerance becomes fashionable. Reasoned argument is replaced by bellowed assertion. Anyone holding contrary views is cancelled. These Populist movements seem to gather momentum around individuals on whom all hope is projected. It is so easy for these leaders to morph into heroes, and the hero to become an idol who is immune to criticism.
Jeremiah knew what he was talking about when he stated over and over again that the problems besetting Judah were because the people were failing to pay heed to God. God was no longer the corner-stone of their political, social and moral structures. They had created their own, alternative idols. Jeremiah understood that disaster would inevitably follow. He couched his warnings as threats, emanating from a jealous God but we have the benefit of living in The Last Days, that period of human existence following the final revelation of God: his incarnation as Jesus.
We can see that devotion to anything or anyone other than Jesus carries enormous risk because, if we do not graft ourselves on Jesus, drawing on his strength, we leave ourselves terribly vulnerable to whatever manifestation of human frailty is prevalent. Not only that, we are left so unreceptive to God’s active agency that the gifts he wishes to bestow upon humankind are rendered impotent.
Humankind has enormous potential – unsurprisingly, as we were created in God’s image. But humankind also has the capacity to fall into extraordinary error if our unbridled impulses are not properly constrained. Two sides of the same coin, we might say.
I have a sense that the idolization of stars (which perhaps began in the middle of the 20th century with the rise of mass media), the rise of the influencer on social media and extreme political movements and ideologies, which are built around iconic figures, occur because the need to worship is built into our DNA. Because we are created beings, we long to know our creator. If that knowledge eludes us, we are in danger of satisfying this primaeval urge to worship by focussing on a human figure instead of God. No man or woman can survive the weight of cult status. Can you name any such leader who has not become monstrous? Distorted by their own ego, tortured by a neurotic, precarious belief that their invincibility is under constant threat, they retreat into their own fastness, companioned by their own reflection, emerging only to order another act of repression.
The sacking of Jerusalem and the dispersal of the Jewish people were actual events, rooted in history. But they are also metaphors for all time as are other passages where he records the Lord saying that Jerusalem will be rebuilt and that there will be a new covenant, “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest…for I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more (Jer 30.33-34).”
This passage and others like it are a different sort of prophecy: not a warning of disaster, unless there is a radical change of heart and behaviour, but a glimpse of a new era where the relationship between God and his creatures is of a wholly different nature, when falling under the spell of an idol will be impossible because God would have ‘written on our hearts’; we will – quite simply – know God.
Paul, speaking to the congregation in Corinth, echoes Jeremiah by reminding them that the days of idolatry must pass. With the Corinthians, we have entered a chapter of the human story where the special status conferred on the Children of Israel has been stretched to include all peoples. What matters now is not whether one is a member of the Chosen Race but whether one has the new law written upon one’s heart. What matters now is not adhering to the old, prescriptive law, the list of ‘Thou Shalt Nots’ and the rituals of Jewish living but responding to the simple stark commandment to Love: to love God first and then to love our fellow human beings. We have to love God first because he is the source of l0ve and without drawing on that source, our capacity to love is likely to shrivel and become barren.
Paul makes it clear that when God’s spirit is made manifest through gifts, this is for the common good. When we look at the gifts Paul lists, we can see how some are obviously manifestations of the love for others. Wisdom, knowledge, discernment and healing count for little when they are not distributed. Faith too, if recognized as a deep-rooted optimism, is a social benefit.
The other gifts are more difficult for 21st century people to relate to. We understand far more of how the world works than Paul’s contemporaries. Our understanding of physics and physiology means that we have more answers to the seemingly inexplicable than were available to the first Christians. What we do share with them, however, is the same need to see God’s agency at work in our lives.
What Paul’s other gifts – miracles, prophecy and glossolalia – have in common is that they defy neat explanations. They remind us that there is a dimension beyond our ready comprehension which nevertheless touches our lives.
I have a feeling that, if Paul were writing to the Christian community in 21st century Mirepoix, he would list other spiritual gifts: one more pertinent to the time and place we inhabit. The key thing is that they would a;; emanate from the same spiritual source and would all be there for the common good. I think it is worth asking ourselves what spiritual gifts are most needed in the 21st century.
Top of my list would be empathy: that heightened expression of consideration that enable us to put ourselves in another’s situation. Empathy acts as a brake on selfishness. It stops us behaving in a way that impinges inappropriately on someone else. It broadens our appreciation of the difficulties and pressures that others experience. Loving our neighbour as ourselves becomes more accessible if we can identify wholly with that neighbour.
I would also elevate the ability to generate Art to a spiritual gift. For so many people in our secular age, the closest they come to a spiritual experience is a profound aesthetic one. To be moved by a powerful piece of music or literature, to be taken out of oneself in that way, can be a significant step towards grasping a sense of the divine. I would not argue that a worthy artist needs to be a Christian. Exploring the human condition – including our unique capacity to appreciate beauty – is, in itself, of spiritual value. Indeed, art which allows itself to be constrained by dogma, is often inferior. What we realise, in fact, is that God can speak to us through the medium of sound, or pigment or words, just as surely as he can through glossolalia, the talking in tongues.
To my mind, the work of scientists and their revelation of the chemistry of the universe, if not in itself a miracle, brings home what is amazingly ‘miraculous’. The mind-blowing, inter-connected complexity of the world is an ongoing miracle. To be able to elucidate this is surely a spiritual gift.
And the human capacity to innovate, to think ‘outside the box’ and invent new, improved ways to support the way we live and the way we interact with the natural world, is surely a spiritual gift as well.
When the motivation is rooted in the common good, these human skills become spiritual gifts. And the capacity to marvel and experience awe is also a gift that draws each of us closer to God.
Those of us who are not great artists, cutting-edge scientists or major innovators should recognise the attributes we do have, including facts of our personality and character, as nevertheless emanating from God: ours to use for the common good. It ought to be be our daily prayer that all we do and all we say should be in alignment with God’s purpose.
This is hard. It involves a hefty dose of humility: not a fashionable quality.
The thing is, we cannot always tell the direction of travel Gods wants us to take. Sometimes, when we pursue, with relentless, unswerving zeal what we consider to be a righteous path – doing God a favour – we have to be nudged (and sometimes knocked) back to where he actually wants us to be. So it is for us to pray every day the gethsemane prayer, “Nevertheless not my will but thine be done”.
In this way, I believe, we can steer clear of the current trend towards idolatry, finding substitute gods, and remain open to the only God there is, allowing him to translate our skills and talents and personal characteristics into spiritual gifts, for which he is the source and the common good is the focus.
It may also help to remember the words ascribed to St Theresa of Avila:
Christ has no body but yours.
No hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on this world,
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on this world.
Christ has no body now on earth but ours.
For we are living in that period in the human story when we blessed with knowledge of Christ and commissioned, quite simply, to live with God’s new law written on our hearts.