Relationships

Reflections on The Cup Song in Gaeilge

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The Cup Song! In Gaeilge in Northern Ireland. This is a celebration of the recovery of language. Once forbidden in the North, the language is enjoying a revival. Its a language I have never spoken. Though having driven the coast of Ireland twenty years ago I heard it and entered villages that had little English. And I just about fell out of my chair when my cousins came in from a night of cards and music and said, “It was good craic!”

The revival of language is not without its politics and complications. In Canada we surely shall grieve the loss of First Nations languages. And around the world, languages are dying. When a language dies, knowledge dies too. Embodied in the language are ways of knowing the world, stories and culture. As a follower of Jesus I am able to rejoice in the revival of language and the knowledge and even the identity contained within it. Common grace.

I had a lunch with a friend last week. He shared of his spiritual journey. He said something like this: “When I started with Jesus God spoke to me only in English. But now he speaks to me in Japanese.”  I’m really happy about this. The heart. God speaks the languages of the heart. John’s vision given by God is of a great celebration of Jesus by people from all nations, peoples and languages.

Having said that, it must be noted that in the politics of language, culture, and identity do require wisdom, truth and grace. There is so much pain there. Although we can study it, we need the grace of God to move into reconciled relationships and even to assist in the recovery of languages and the rebuilding of peoples. I don’t know how to do this so I am thankful for those who are studying and labouring at it. Who else will sing the cup song?

More than that I find myself wondering, “Who else will be singing the  Salvation Song before the Lamb?

9After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” 11And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

13Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?” 14I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
15“Therefore they are before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple;
and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
16 They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore;
the sun shall not strike them,
nor any scorching heat.
17For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
Revelations 7:9-17

Sin is always relational.

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Sin is always relational.

14Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. 15I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. 16The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? 17Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. 18Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar? 19What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? 20No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. 21You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. 22Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

I remember when I said this out loud, “Sin is always relational.” The Follower of Jesus sitting across from me was surprised and called it into question. Ever since I have come to recognize that we can develop a cerebral idea of sin that reserves consequences to just the “me.”

The deception in this approach can lead us to rationalize sin as an act that might not be on the “approval” list of others but is OK because we are not hurting someone else.

Idolatry exists because of our independence from God. That is sin.

When Paul writes to the Corinthian church about idolatry he wants them to reconnect their framework of decisions and life-value-judgements to relationships. He appeals to the very physical nature of the Lord’s Supper (the Bread and the Cup) to convey our union with Christ and therefore a union or interconnectedness with the whole people of Jesus as His body. He demonstrates that idolatry, in this case the participation in the ceremony and cultic rites of the many religions of Corinth, was a kind of spiritual union–a dark demonic spiritual union.

As well we must acknowledge, idolatry is always relational. It involves our relationships with self, people, the stuff of earth AND God. So Paul uses the word jealousy. “Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy?” He is jealous for you. You can only be jealous for that which “is” yours. Jealousy in this case has its judgement, for we now by His grace through Christ we belong with Him. We have a place at His table. Why should we abandon His table for another? We are now incompatible at the other table. We don’t belong there.

The Source of All that We Admire in Christ Jesus

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When Jesus entered into our relationships, taking on flesh, He continued to live int he communion of the Father and the Holy Spirit. Living in the midst of our brokenness Jesus was subjected to the same temptations we are. Yet He did not sin. Why not? He lived loved. He lived fully in the reality of His Father’s love for Him. Check out what happened at Jesus’ baptism:

21Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, 22and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” Luke 3:21-22

Jesus spoke of His communion with the Father and the Spirit. In John 5 Jesus connects even the authority of what He did to the reality of being loved by the Father.

19So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. 20For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel.
John 5:19-20

Live loved.

Reconciliation

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Key Verse ~ Reconciliation

Reconciliation is the death of hostility.

Between God and people Jesus did the work of making reconciliation a gift available to deal with the hostility of people toward God. Our enmity towards God has been dealt with from God’s perspective; Jesus is our peace.

Ephesians 2:12-16
12remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Between people reconciliation is the death of hostility. Getting there requires truth, an honest assessment of the reality of the relationship and the conditions that brought it to such disrepair, anger, and grief. Reconciliation cannot be hurried. It takes time. But it it also seems to me to require an alternate source for strength, courage, honesty, and forgiveness.

Key Verse ~ Work

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The Gospel redeems you and your work.

23Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, 24knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.   Colossians 3:23-24

Our relationship to work is to flow from our relationship with Jesus. Therefore what we do is an offering to Him.

What’s your work? Who’s your work for? “Working only for the man” or the dollar, can rob work of meaning, generate bitterness in relationships, and truly make us slaves of rotten bosses and systems.

What’s your work? Do it heartily for Him. Let Him redeem your time, energy, passion, skills, and heart.

Study heartily for the Lord.

Solve problems heartily for the Lord.

Serve heartily for the Lord.

Lead heartily for the Lord.

Teach heartily for the Lord.