Come and Die (Together)

"With all wisdom and insight he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth..."

― Epistle to the Ephesians

“When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.”

― Deitrich Bonhoeffer, "The Cost of Discipleship"

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Dear Kate,

I am going to do for you what a good friend does, to ask you to think.

It was said that we love those who give us the illusion that we are thinking, and hate those who actually make us think.  Because to think is to consider how thoughtless we have been, how we have been taking on our own mis-takes and let them be.  But that's what a good friend does, risking to be hated, for your liberty.

I am going to "let you be" today, by bringing you to a bigger playground, a better flourishing garden, trusting that's where Christ is going to come out and play.

Recently I've been trying to engage my church friends to read Ephesians, a playground much bigger, a garden much more flourishing, than what we are used to.  Our pastor asked how we could introduce the book (a letter) to the congregation.  Last time I counted there are about 2,387 ways to approach the letter, but I am not going to suggest any of them.  If one is interested at all, one would have gotten what one needs to "approach" the letter: I Googled the word "Ephesians" and it gave me "about 21,700,000 results in 0.47 seconds."

I am going to suggest to let the letter read us.

You are a doer, not a philosophizer.  Most of us are doers.  Which is to say, to do is our philosophy.  We love actions, thirst for facts, running on empty.

Now here's a piece of writing talking about "every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places," a "chosen" people "before the foundation of the world,"  will and destiny, redemption and glory, an "inheritance," the biggest jackpot ever, that we didn't do anything to win but was already "accomplished" for and "pledged" to us. So, what are you, the doer, going to do about such absurdity?  What are you to use such flowery garden language for?

To philosophize is to think, to wrestle with paradoxes.  Søren Kierkegaard proposed, "The paradox is the source of the thinker's passion, and the thinker without a paradox is like a lover without feeling: a paltry mediocrity."  And he went on to say, "The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think."  Amen.

I am asking you now to consider a question that thought alone cannot think.  Trust me, this is not high art, not even supposed to be difficult, and has utmost relevance to all your daily doings.

In Ephesians we hear the alien language of Paul, alien because it's not how we speak, certainly not in the year 2020, not in North America, where we have the best universities safekeeping the best thoughts ever thought about by humankind.  You go to work you don't talk this way.  You go home you don't talk this way.  You talk to yourself, all day, even in your dreams, and heck no, you don't talk this way to yourself either.  Paul sounded more than happy and crazier than hopeful, and we wonder what his rumpus is.

"Alien," let me seize on this word and ask my question: Having been a human being for so many years, what do you think, about humankind?  Are we fundamentally alienated or are we meant to be (if not yet) together?

You say this is a question for the philosophers; I say it is for you, the doer.  Yes, throughout history brilliant philosophers, especially political thinkers, have been wrestling with this question, but it was the everyday everyman who acted out the implications of the philosophers' answers, setting life goals, shouting slogans, and, yes, killing each other based on the assumptions of some philosophy.

"We are in this together," we say.  Why?  How?  Who says?  How can it ever be?  "The condition of man...is a condition of war of everyone against everyone," so said the brilliant philosopher Thomas Hobbes, "...and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."  No, we are not in this together, no one ever is.  Look at ourselves, we are always fighting.  When we have no money, we fight.  When we have a lot of money, we fight a lot.  Just accept it and do the best you can with this piece of hard cold truth.

So if we, human beings, are fundamentally alienated from each other (let's for now not question why or how we become this way), what should you, a sane, smart, savvy mother do when it comes to relating to your teenager?  Why not ease up on your insistence that everyone should sit down to have a warm, homecooked meal together every night?  The sentiment is based on an erroneous assumption that is going to bring nothing but disappointment.  Your child will never love you the way you want to be loved, and vice versa.  The chance of her ever understanding you is slim to none.  She uses you and you use her too, for your own respective ends.  Domestic peace means to divide a pie of scarce resources (time and money and mental space) to the best of each's negotiating power, and settle for some sort of "good enough" that would avert all-out wars.  Say what you will, that we are "in this together," but do what a politician does: do what you can to keep your place for another day.

Is that how you lived your life?  You are a great philosopher with strong beliefs, you know?  Someone else might have worked out the doctrines for you, but you are a true believer.

Read today's quote again, Paul's alien language.  "A plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in (Jesus), things in heaven and things on earth."  Oh, so Paul actually believes we are in this together, that we are not meant to be alienated?  But how can it be true?  It is not life as we are experiencing it.  Black lives matter, all lives matters, but my life matters the most.  I can't stand to lose what is mine and you can't yours.  Listen to how the biggest leaders in the greatest nation speak: they yell to be heard.  They don't need to offer anything good or new or half-reasoned, they just do the yelling to get their way.  If I am to truly subscribe to--believe in--what Paul is claiming here, I will need to challenge just about every assumption I have about life.  If I have to do such philosophy, I might as well die.

So here I leave you with the question, a most relevant one, once again: Are we fundamentally alienated from each other, or are we meant to be together?  Please note that there is no in-between ground, because if we are not together, then we are apart, just a matter of degree.  And I am sure you are smart enough to know, whichever way you answer, you will be asking yourself another thousand questions.

Have fun, say Hi to Jesus for me.

Yours, Alex