Brett Tilford

There’s something deflating about being reduced to an “ism”.

Question: “Doesn’t it make sense that our acts of obedience play a key role in our salvation? I mean I still believe in the grace of God – it’s just that I wonder sometimes if I have a bigger part to play.”

Answer: “Oh, that’s nothing more than 5th century Pelagianism.” a friend replies.

Question: “Sometimes I look around at the world and it seems so devoid of God. It’s just things, physical things that I can touch and feel. Doesn’t it make sense that this is all there is – maybe there’s nothing beyond the material world?”

Answer: “Oh that’s just secular atheism. It’s intellectually dressed up rebellion against God.”

Question: “I’ve had these moments throughout my life when I feel like I’ve experienced something other than myself. I get this feeling when I walk into an old church, maybe it’s just nostalgia from my youth but I swear I feel like there’s something real and beautiful about it all.”

Answer: “Oh that’s just basic theism. It’s for people who need a crutch in life – need some big ‘other’ to look out for them.”

Question: “Don’t you think the Bible really could be this perfect revelation from God? Every time I open it’s pages I get something out of it. I think it may be the best book ever written.”

Answer: “That sounds like a key tenet of biblical fundamentalism and it’s naive at best. The Bible is riddled with historical errors, contradictions, and enough barbaric passages to make your head spin. If God were real, he would do better.”

Question: “Sometimes I read two bible passages and they seem to contradict each other. For Easter I read the 4 resurrection accounts and I realized that they were incredibly different. The other day I read a passage where God mandated the genocide of an entire people group. Sometimes I wonder if the people who wrote the Bible had their own agendas.  What if it really isn’t this perfect word delivered straight from the hand of God? How do I know what the truth is?”

Answer: “Those sound like the questions of classical theological liberalism. It’s for people who aren’t willing to bow the knee to Christ and submit to his revealed Word. Also, all liberal churches are dying, so it’s kind of for losers.”

Question: “I believe in the idea of truth but I’m not sure it’s as easily grasped as the radio preachers tell me it is. Like, what if all we have are our interpretations and temporal understandings of truth? So even if capital “T” Truth exists – we’ll never be able to fully grasp it in this life? What if what I think of as “the truth” is really just “my truth”? In other words, what if there is no absolute truth?”

Answer: “That’s relativism and it’s what’s wrong with America. Since you think you’re so smart let me ask you a question. Do you think you’re statement “there is no absolute truth” is true? Well if you do you’re an idiot because it’s a self defeating argument.”

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This is what we do with people’s questions. We reduce them to “ism’s”. This allows us to not take them seriously, to write them off as brainless so-and-so’s – who wouldn’t know reality if it hit them in the face. It makes us feel superior and safe.

This is what’s wrong with our churches. We have no place for questions and honest dialogue.

This is what’s wrong with our politics. We spend all our time shouting and little to no time listening.

You know what it tells me? We don’t really love God, truth,  justice, or this great Country as much as we tell ourselves.

What we care about is being right.

Politics and Christianity has so often ended in disaster.

Turn back the clock 1,700 years and there was a time when Christians were the persecuted ones, the minority – estranged from popular culture and blamed for the bad luck of the Roman Empire. That changed when Constantine came to power and suddenly Christianity was the official religion of the empire. This had some upside. Confiscated church property was returned and Christians were no longer murdered for their beliefs. Of course the downside was that the emperor now weighed in on theological questions and the church was pressured to sign off on wars and atrocities of the state. Strange bedfellows indeed.

In the U.S. in the past 30 years we’ve witnessed the rise of the Religious Right. It’s been fueled by the following: 1. A misguided theology that saw a connection between ancient Israel and modern America. 2. Clever revisionist history that views the U.S. as a “Christian Nation” (instead of a nation where people have a freedom of religion). 3. Shrewd political maneuvering by the Republican party to brand a few issues as central to the moral slippage in our nation, e.g. Abortion and Gay Marriage, at the expense of other biblical issues like care for the environment or the plight of poor and working class people – with the result that Christianity has been largely co-opted by the Republican party. It’s one thing to say, “I’m a Christian who happens to be a Republican.” – it’s another thing entirely to think “Anyone who calls themselves a Christian should be a Republican” or “The Republican Party is God’s hope for America” or “Republicans are the only politicians with any sense of morality.” Of course the same would be true of similar statements about Democrats or any other political party. My point isn’t to pick on Republicans per se, but simply to show how tricky mixing faith and politics can be.

With examples like these in mind, it makes sense why many Christians have retreated from the political arena altogether. Most pastors I know basically refuses to address political issues from the pulpit. They know that there are people in their congregation on both sides of every issue and they don’t want to take sides. They stick to issues like parenting, leadership, finding success both personally and professionally, and a gospel focused on the individual (not society) – while at the same time steering a wide path around hot button political issues.

I think the challenge to this line of thinking is that love inevitably has political dimensions because a love that stays silent in the face of injustice is no love at all. Love demands that we stand up for the downtrodden, demands that we speak up for those whose tongues have been ripped out; requires that we not simply shake our heads at oppression, but join hands to do something about it. It demands that we work for change on a societal level.

Think of Martin Luther King Jr. Armed with a steadfast commitment to racial equality, rhetoric steeped in the tradition of the Old Testament prophets, and an understanding of Christian faith that embraced non violent resistance – he took a stand, not a personal or private stand in the quietness of his own heart, but a public and political stand.

A less well known example is Dietrich Boenhoffer. He was one of the few church leaders who publicly refused to support the Nazi takeover of Germany. Even going so far that he participated in a failed plot to assassinate Hitler – which led to his imprisonment and death. In his book “Letters and Papers From Prison” you see hints that he was struggling with the Protestant Liberalism of his countryman, not because they held different views of the Bible than he did, but because they had capitulated in the face of evil.

My hope is that the Church can continue to find ways to be political (because that’s what love requires) while at the same time refusing to be co-opted by any party. That we can seek to empower the poor and working class people of our nation, instead of befriending the well-to-do in attempts to bolster our own position. That we would encourage vigorous theological and political conversations among our members, instead of spouting the ideological party line or remaining silent. The church is at it’s best not as a political insider – wielding power, wining and dining, kissing ass, etc. – but as the outsider, the critique, the question mark, the prophetic voice of dissent.

I’ve come to love melancholy music. For Emma, Forever by Bon Iver, Hospice by The Antlers and anything by Sigur Ros. My friend said that if he listens to Sigur Ros for more than two hours he wants to kill himself. Not me though. I like the wail of the falsetto and the screams of the guitar. The resonance of the base drum – like a buddhist monk chanting in a temple where even footsteps echo; the sounds these albums have stolen from every day life – a train rumbling over dusty tracks or the simple clapping of hands. It’s all very earthy, mournful and beautiful.

You probably know someone who cuts. You’ve seen the scars – like a thousand paper cuts scattered on forearms and legs. When I first encountered this as a youth pastor working with teens, I thought it stemmed from self hatred – they hate their bodies so they hurt it. After a bit of research though I learned this wasn’t the case. It turns out people cut for therapy. The process of opening up their bodies and watching the wounds heal is like good medicine. Sure it hurts, but at least they can feel again. Oh God, anything to feel again.

Turns out the worst thing isn’t that we feel pain – it’s that we don’t feel at all. I think the same is true of our music, the worst thing isn’t that it makes us feel sad, it’s that it doesn’t make us feel at all.

We don’t want people to be happy (by the term happy I’m thinking of their overall well being and quality of life).  Advertisers don’t want consumers to be happy. Employers don’t want employees to be happy. Churches don’t want members to be happy. Governments don’t want citizens to be happy. Parent’s don’t want kids to be happy.  Why, you ask?  It’s because we’re willing to exploit the desire human beings have to be happy for the opportunity to increase our own happiness.

Advertisers don’t make as much money from happy people. They make money from people who are unsatisfied and hope that the next purchase will do the trick.

Employers want unsatisfied “go getter” types who will trade their lives for the promise of a promotion. Happy people have lives outside of work.

Churches don’t want people to be happy because our major customer is the guilt ridden and depressed. Church services and events become dispensaries for getting “high on the spirit”.  If people are happy then we fear they won’t need God.

Governments don’t want people to be happy because the only way they measure success is by the GDP. This depends on a vibrant “American Dream” chasing workforce who also happen to be the consumers that fuel the demand for more shizz to be made. Get too many people saying, “I’m satisfied” and we might slip behind China! God forbid.

Parents don’t want happy kids because they’re harder to show off. Unhappy kids get honor roll bumper stickers for their parents SUV’s, are captain of every sports team, and get accepted to the top private schools… all before the 6th grade. Happy kids do what they’re good at and pretty much quit the other stuff.

Of course, I’m tempted to externalize this evil. To say the problem is those damn advertisers, employers, churches, governments, and parents. Not me. The problem is never me. Unfortunately, the truth is I am these things. I’m a marketer, business owner, church leader, voter, and parent and I’m willing to extort and manipulate the fact that people want to be happy.  I want them to be unsatisfied. That’s a motivating factor for them to buy from me, give my company a competitive advantage, financially support my church, add to my country’s GDP, or motivate my daughter to become the envy of the neighborhood at everything she does. I want them like a hamster on the wheel chasing that elusive dream… but never actually catching it.

Too bad. I think the world would be a better place if quality of life of those around me were my first priority.

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P.S. I recognize that not all advertisers, employers, churches, governments, and parents are like this all the time. My point is that we operate like this more than we’d like to admit.  Below is a breakdown of my estimations for how often each of the previously mentioned groups of people operate in ways that propagate unhappiness in human beings.

• Advertisers: 80%
• Employers: 75%
• Churches: 30%
• Governments: 50%
• Parents: 20%
• Brett: 1% (yes I’m lying)

This video really got me to thinking about beauty in the modern era. What a strange world we live in when people’s imperfections can disappear with the click of a mouse. Unbelievable.

I remember seeing a news piece a few years ago about a makeup artist who was so concerned with what was being communicated to young girls via the magazines they were reading, that she started going around the country raising awareness, her message was something to the effect of “These people are works of art, they aren’t real. No matter how much you diet or apply makeup you’ll never look like them. When they wake up in the morning they look just like you!”

I really do think that the whole “Barbie or bust” (no pun intended) idea of beauty is extremely destructive. What are we communicating to our children when every person’s skin they see, on T.V. or the drive by billboards, looks like a freakin mannequin. I can’t imagine the types of conversations I’ll have to have with my kids in a few years. My little girl will say, “Daddy, look at that lady on t.v.! She is so beautiful!” I’ll reply, “Well honey, she isn’t actually real. See there is this thing called photoshop that allows you to make people look perfect. It’s weird I know, but it helps people sell things.” God help me.

I think all this hits a little to close to home because I’m in the design business. Just a few months ago myself and Charles (the lead designer in our business) were working on a project together. The client had requested that we touch up a picture of one of his family members. It wasn’t anything big. However, once we got started it was so hard to stop! After fixing the teeth, we noticed that the eyebrows were a little bushy, and the eyes could probably be a little bigger. Also, that chin could afford to be a little smaller.  If we raised those cheekbones she looks older.  All of the sudden one of us (I honestly don’t remember who- I think it was Charles) yelled out, “Stop! We have to stop this!” He was right.But there was such power in that mouse. Razorburn? No problem, “click”-it’s gone. Dirty fingernails? Click-gone. Bags under the eyes? Click. Hair out of place? Click. Nose to big? Click. Eyes too small? Click. Cheek bones too low? Click. Skin to blotchy? Click. My God this is out of control. Now some nerd sitting in his apartment loft is deciding what beauty is? Scary.

When I think of Jesus I think of someone who seemed to be saying “God believes you are beautiful.  Hey you leper! God loves you and thinks you are beautiful.  Hey you drunk, God thinks you are beautiful.  All you outcasts and beggars, God thinks you are beautiful. It would be easy to pin all the blame on the advertising agencies of the world.  But you know what this comes back to all of us, because who is buying the way they are selling? Me and you. So maybe the point of the video isn’t to think, “How could those people?!”  But instead to turn that pointing finger back at myself and think, “Why don’t I live more like Jesus lived?”  Believing that everyone is beautiful.