National Geographic
Today I watched "The Gospel of Judas". It's still playing now even as I type, but one account in the entire documentary moved me deeply. It told of the politics surrounding the persecution of Christians, and in particular detailed the story of a slave woman and her son, who were brought into the gladiator arenas before crowds hungry for entertainment. Part of a roman governor's duty was to keep his people entertained, and it was cheaper for the government to torture and kill Christians in the most cruel way possible before a crowd, than to hire gladiators. One of the cruelest methods was known as the Iron Chair. They'd prepare an iron chair under which burning coals were heaped. The victim was then made to sit on the chair and roast slowly to death. This woman who had nothing to her name, and who had lived out her life never even holding legal rights to herself, never once denied Christ before the governor and the crowd, to the point of death on the chair. I watched as they bound her hands and stretched her arms out T-shaped, then used a bar attached to a stick to force her waist into the chair, holding her down until her screams died and she finally collapsed, stiff and limp.
I almost cried. For some time amid all this busyness and the numbing-out of my deep spiritual hunger, I have forgotten who I am in Christ. My heart no longer leaps at the thought of revival, I am only glad. I no longer thirst to see God in the 12th, I have grown so discouraged by the testimony of its supposed leaders that I hold close to no hope if things don't change, and have no idea how to help another sister find purpose and meaning within the ministry. I avoid the boys because I don't want to disillusion them. I listen to the intended-rousing speeches of men, I listen to jabs in the air about spirituality and I already see it all crashing into dust because it is so humanly contrived. I am drier and more burned out than when I thought I'd hit the limits of burnout. Father where are You, and what is Your purpose for me here? The first chance I get (I've tried multiple times, You know that Lord) to sit down with Fwee over discipleship, I'll tell Fwee I don't know how to disciple her, that You Lord, have not given me anything to teach her, or share with her in particular.
Where are You Jesus? I want to meet You, but it is only with so much faith and grief that I hold on to thoughts of who you are. Because Lord, the world seems to believe that the Jesus I meet is too good to be true. Jarett smiles kindly and pats my head and says I have a very vivid imagination when I share with him how in prayer I meet You and You minister to me. Why is it Lord, that my brothers and sisters in the world hold to a Jesus that is alive anywhere but in their own lives? Why have those that once reflected You so much become so insanely, dislikably human again? Why wouldn't that brother even explain the change to me? He said he'd held your hand and seen Your smile, like me. Will I be like that too Jesus? What hope then have I for growth? (Cos he seems to put across that he does everything ten times better than me, and he's right sometimes.) Jesus in times like that I need You to be here and tell me I've got it right, because my imagination is starting to fail me and I can no longer see. When rationality kicks in and I forget the precious facts, then doubt is given room to grow. Today the distinction between blind faith and reasonable faith has once again for me been blurred out, and it seems as though Your Word, the 4 gospels, Your lamp for my feet grows ever dimmer and my heart fails to trust it more and more. Is it for real, was it all politics and public favour that got Matthew, Mark, Luke and John voted into the canon? I know You died for me and lived, but Lord I don't just want to know that. I want to know You--Your character, Your very person that is alive to me. Tell me Jesus, again, that these are documents I can trust. Nowayear, and increasingly so, I just feel like the very person I knew has been condemned to being a figment of my imagination, a construct vaguely supported by institution. I am both at once full of desire to grow in faith, and yet at the same time highly critical. My gifts of discernment are lately vaguely in operation--oh Holy Spirit, please don't give up on me. Please show me, because I don't know anymore.
Returning to the Iron Chair, Jesus, once again I am found asking myself if I would die for You. If that moment comes, please give me the strength. Please help me to see You, not too far away, so that my heart might hold on to You. Cos Jesus, for all the faith You are asking of me, I am really no brave, strong, "fool of the world" for You--just Your very afraid little girl, who hopes that in her she will find the humble obedience to bear out whatever You wish for her to do. Teach me to love You again, deeply. Lord, change me still, even now, and never stop changing me please--the lack of Your presence is unbearable. From where should I start my search all over again? From where will You speak Lord?
For my friends, I don't have a fascination with a gory death. The notion of persecution is powerful to me perhaps because abstract ideas are at their most thought provoking and heart changing, when they have been made literal. What more can I deny for God, besides my life, I keep asking myself. I just haven't been able to come up with anything better yet. And I don't mean this in a penalistic way either--I am fully aware of the joy and peace that comes from growing into the heart and mind of Christ when I give up my right to myself. I can feel God's delight in me. I delight in the goodness that abounds from following Him like this--lives around me are changed, people are ministered to, I am ministered to, and I feel a good deal more whole when moving in His spirit.
With this documentary then, comes a reminder of the significance of this perspective. If I am preparing both to live and die for Jesus, then the micro decisions I make in how my life is to be lived, once again matters. I have lately been so entrenched in work that I have grown comfortable being the distant analytical critic, who finds handling abstract constructs easier than handling my own human contradictions at the feet of Christ. Why? because I am partly too tired at the end of each day to have to come back to myself and discover the possibility of unresolved issues in my life. because I am finding it difficult to trust in human testimony since last July/August and because of that, doubt the point of my bearing testimony for Him. because I am hungry for mentorship, ministry and accountability, and I don't believe God has not placed anyone to respond to this hunger--they just wouldn't respond. Despite the reminder, I just can't find the strength to go on pouring myself out. I feel selfish, as though I have reclaimed me for myself by keeping to myself. But I deeply need a refocus in the extreme. I need to know again why I believe what I do, for now I question the authenticity of everything, including the people I have known, my experiences, and the Word. I need to know the God I believe in is indeed the God I have known--both meek, gentle, the understander of grief, the healer of broken worlds, and the One who is faithful, true and reliable to the very end. Oh Jesus, I was made to know You--what else could life be all about?
An aside concerning the documentary:
As a whole the documentary doesn't reveal much of the content in the gnostic gospel, except the perception of Judas as a hero in it instead of the usual villian. In it he is the one whom Jesus explicitly told to conduct betrayal, and he also claims to be the only one who knows the "truth" behind the "mystery" of Christ's betrayal. In the gospel Jesus predicts to Judas that he will be cursed by all Jesus's disciples, and that it would cause Judas much grief.
| e.s.t.h.e.r in the arms of Jesus @
4/09/2006 11:12:00 pm |
|
|