Aug 27 | Resistance Lectionary Part 9: God’s Justice

Citation: 1 Corinthians 1:18-25

As we learn more about science and the architecture of the universe, it becomes clearer that any divine being must be so utterly vast and unknowable as to be impossible to describe or fully fathom. This sense of distance from deity has permeated a lot of my own conversations with those who don’t claim a religious belief for themselves.

It’s a strange thing to hold in balance with the belief that Jesus lived among us in our flesh.

How can something be both utterly unknowable and yet closer than the blood in our veins? More easily than you think. After all, another person in all of their complexities can never be fully be known by us, no matter how close we are. I have known my mother for my entire life. There is much I can interpret of her feelings without her telling me. And yet, I know there is so much more that I could never know unless she chooses to tell me.

In this passage from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, Paul calls the community to put an end to its divisions. Anyone with any parish experience will know what this looks like! Conflict arises when strong leaders clash. Paul, rather than using his cache among them to claim ultimate authority, humbles himself, saying that it was not his own skill that brought people to Christ, but that God wished to prove great power by infusing Paul’s poor words with it.

This is the paradox that Paul constantly returns to. For men in the Roman Empire, bravado and confidence were prized and weakness was to be avoided at all costs. (Sound familiar?) Paul utterly rejects this, often referring to himself as a “slave for Christ,” a title of humiliation. By doing so, he sets up a demarcation between Roman society and God’s way. By elevating weakness and foolishness, he proves that God’s wisdom and justice is wiser and more just than societal wisdom and justice.

But how can we know what it looks like? If we are Christian, we can look to Jesus’ life, and to the cross, but we must not think that is the whole of the message. Indeed, the Hebrew Scriptures as well are woven well-through with stories of a God who is concerned with treatment of the poor, who rarely metes out punishment without forgiveness, who makes use of society’s rejects for the great work of wooing the world back to Eden.

This is what a true heart of justice looks like: soft, fiery, concerned most of all with balance.