Instruments

Scripture: Mark 1:14-20

Article: "Where are the Liberals?" http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/10/opinion/brooks-where-are-the-liberals.html?scp=5&sq=david%20brooks&st=cse

Last week, the New York Times published an OP-ED by columnist David Brooks entitled “Where Are the Liberals?” Brooks claims that “given the circumstances, this should be a golden age of liberalism,” arguing that the reason it’s not lies in the fact that Americans ultimately don’t trust the government. He calls this the “Instrument Problem,” explaining that while “Americans may agree with liberal diagnoses, they don’t trust the instrument Democrats use to solve problems.” Fair enough.

However, this prognosis begs other questions: Doesn’t commitment to a larger cause or ideology demand a certain amount of patience? And is the Democratic leadership entirely to blame for this ailment? (Brooks says yes, claiming that liberals have more or less shot themselves in the foot by criticizing government as much as conservatives do.) However, it seems to me that folks espousing the liberal diagnosis but refusing to “carry the card” carry just as much blame for the trouble Liberalism is in as does the Democratic leadership; Often, these leaders are simply stating facts: Yes, the government has problems. Yes, there are corrupting forces in the government. Yes, we need to continually analyze what is working and what is not and negotiate how to be more effective. What’s sad is how folks take these statements and use them as evidence that “the government” really is Lucifer. Are we that naïve? Is it so hard for us to take a step back and seriously contemplate how many millions of schoolchildren would be starving or elderly people living on the streets (especially in the current economic climate) if the government didn’t provide school lunches and social security? Yes, the government certainly has its fair share of problems, but I’m not so comfortable with the alternative.

In Sunday’s gospel reading, Jesus is just beginning his ministry in Galilee. The Gospel according to Mark, chapter 1, verses 14-15 reads: “Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’”

The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God has come near.

In an age where eschatology has almost unequivocally come to be understood as something (terrifying, perhaps) that happens in the future or at the ‘end of time’ in the popular psyche (thanks in large part to literature like The Left Behind Series), the gospel writer records Jesus saying that “The Time” is both now (it is fulfilled) and it is near: It is both present and future, but not distant. God has done something that both fulfills the here-and-now and sets in motion an unstoppable coming and indwelling of the divine Kingdom. This “something” is God’s movement from utter transcendence and invisibility to physical, earthy, ordinary presence. Jesus’ very existence marks the presence of God with us, and his invitation to turn away (repent!) from brokenness to harmony with God and one another marks the nearness of God’s reign on earth. Jesus is, in effect, an instrument. He brings what feels so distant and wholly untouchable and unattainable into our realm, blessing our world in all its messiness and imperfection.

In many ways, it’s a lot easier to focus on the “big picture” than on the various colors and utensils used to create that picture, whether the big picture is ideology or the Kingdom of God. (And I’m not suggesting they are the same! Relax.) Both allow us to lay back a little, confident that our vision of perfection (or almost-perfection) is the right one, while not getting too tied-up in the details or having to defend the processes or behaviors we’ve adopted to realize those visions.  We do this because we know that our instruments suck. They have to be tuned and practiced until we scream, dusted and tuned again. Some even require us to dump the spit out during rehearsal. This may explain why many Americans ultimately trust the liberal diagnosis and vision of a more equitable society but find themselves ashamed or unwilling to defend the instrument that’s been doing the heaviest lifting in this department for over 70 years.

But the Gospel tells us that God blesses our instruments. This was revealed when God came to us as an instrument in Jesus Christ and beckoned us to use our instruments—our bodies, our tools, our minds, and our hearts—to not only name the hurt in our world but to work towards its demise, building and healing, feeding and transforming. God knows our instruments are imperfect. In the Presbyterian, Reformed tradition we even assert that Jesus himself was conditioned (and limited) by the socio-cultural presumptions of his time—Limited by his humanness! But God chose to be fully present in and through him anyway, revealing that wherever individuals and entire societies seriously seek to provide for the most vulnerable people and accept their lives as intricately woven in others, God is in the midst of them. Even in our dusty, out-of-tune instruments.