I left the Christian Church a long time ago. Before I did, however, I embraced my faith fully. I was a Bible school graduate. Preacher. Missionary. But somewhere along the way things fell apart. The what and the why are complicated – too long for this newsletter. At some point I tried a new embrace and thought I never looked back. But as I get older I am realizing that I did look back — I guess in some ways becoming that Old Testament pillar of salt.
A few years ago I was hospitalized for my mental illness. It was a very difficult time for my family and for myself. I had lost my mind and it was a long journey to find it again. I look back now at that time and I realize it was the grace of others that sustained me. Grace, this undeserved love, given freely. The grace of Jesus, an idea I fully held in my heart that in turn was then fully rejected. And now I’m old enough that, atheist or not, I believe that grace can save.
Another belief I have retained, it seems from days with the church, is the idea that God is a verb. Learning in college that the existence of God is enveloped in doing was incredible. That God was not only active in our lives but was the action in the world was exhilarating. It gave me hope that relief from all the misery and pain of this world was just an action away. But this idea, like with grace, was lost in my attempt to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
But then I interviewed the hip hop artist Common. Being an interviewer on TTBOOK tends to change how you think about a lot of things. Common was no exception. A spate of recent highly-publicized killings of Black men by white police had him angry. His dismissive attitude as we started made me nervous. The fact that I loved his music didn’t make it any better.
But then we started talking about hope.
"Optimism is not just only looking at what's in front of you. Hope has to do with also seeing things that may not be right there tangible, right there in your face at the moment. (Hope) is having faith in the unseen." – Common
It was familiar and that scared me. But it rang true. We talked about mens' roles in the lives of women. About the appalling violence in his home turf of the Southside of Chicago. Then I pushed him. How can there be hope in just bleak times? I asked him a question I have asked myself a million times. How do we make hope? Common, without a beat, went to God.
"God is in action, meaning we can only express God if we do. You can go to church. You can go to temple. You can go to wherever (to) worship. But if you don't act? If you don't do? Then God is not really being expressed." –Common
Jesus said that where two or more are gathered in his name, there he is. Take Jesus out of the equation for a second. Gather two or more in the name of justice. In the name of equality. In the name of love, and you have created something bigger than yourselves.
Maybe that’s the trick – rolling up your sleeves with your neighbor, your lover, your friend, and even your enemy — and doing the work.
–Charles