John Crist, Jesus Christ, and me, too

Tuesday morning I got an email I’d been waiting for: the pre-sale code to buy tickets for John Crist’s upcoming comedy tour in which he was finally spending a few days in the Pacific Northwest. Between my family and my in-laws, seven of us had plans to see him live. Within a few clicks I’d secured our tickets.

The next evening I got a completely unexpected email: “In an effort to focus on his health, John Crist has made the decision to postpone his 2020 tour dates.”

A quick Google search painted the rest of the picture for me.

I am heartbroken.

Heartbroken to hear of yet more women who were treated like playthings instead of people. Heartbroken to hear of yet another well-known Christian desecrating the name of Christ. Heartbroken to know that the world has more ammunition to hurl at the “hypocrites” that claim to follow Jesus, and heartbroken to know that so many Christians are simply feeding that ammunition into their hands by openly shaming a sinner while preaching grace.

If there’s one thing I know about the Church (and perhaps this could be broadened to Western culture on the whole) right now, it’s that there are acceptable sins and unacceptable sins. There are the sinners we shun and there are the sinners we seek. There are testimonies we don’t want to hear and salvation stories we’d rather silence because their content teeters toward what we consider “not okay.” Leave your sinful addictions out of it, please, until you’re completely cured - we don’t want to hear about how God is transforming you right now, it’s the finished product we care about!

But any of us who are being self-aware on this walk with Jesus know that there are no finished products this side of the Kingdom of Heaven. There are only ugly, clumsy, moment-by-moment transformations that happen with three steps forward and two steps back.

I am grieved over John Crist’s sin. But I am hopeful for the opportunity the Church has, right now, to paint a portrait of Jesus with her response. We have a choice at this crossroads: We can respond in bitter unforgiveness and total abandonment of this man and drive deep-seated shame even deeper into the watching men and women whose sins also fall under the category of “not okay,” or we can respond with the same love and grace we ourselves have received from Jesus through no merit of our own, and watch opportunities for true healing arise.

I know that we fear being seen as licentious, permissive, or dismissive of the evils that have been committed. I feel very deeply the responsibility to honor God’s holiness by taking sin seriously. But taking sin seriously does not have to mean shaming someone for what they’ve done. It is not shame that transforms people - it is forgiveness. Shame may, for a short time, inspire them to try harder to fight their sin, but Jesus didn’t come and die so that we could try harder; He came to utterly annihilate the power of sin and death on our behalf with the power of grace. There is now, therefore, NO CONDEMNATION for those who are in Christ Jesus.

One day, Jesus was dining in the home of a Pharisee named Simon - an upright and God-fearing man - when a disreputable woman came in off the streets of the city. She wasn’t invited - she wasn’t the kind of person this Pharisee would ever have wanted in his home, lest she defile his pure standing before God and render him ineligible to participate in Temple worship. But she had heard Jesus was there, and she wanted the opportunity to bless Him with a gift.

Simon could only look on in horror while this disgusting sinner defiled Jesus with her touch, her tears, her hair. The heavy scent of the perfume she used to anoint His feet couldn’t mask the odor of her sinfulness. This Man could hardly be a prophet, the Pharisee mused, or He would know this woman was a sinner.

Jesus answered Simon’s smug thought with a question: “A moneylender had two debtors: one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them both. So which of them will love him more?”

Simon answered, “I suppose the one whom he forgave more.”

[Jesus] said to him, “You have judged correctly.” Turning toward the woman, He said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave Me no water for My feet, but she has wet My feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss; but she, since the time I came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet. You did not anoint My head with oil, but she anointed My feet with perfume. For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, the same loves little.” Then he said to her, “Your sins have been forgiven.” Those who were reclining at the table with Him began to say to themselves, “Who is this man who even forgives sins?” And He said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

Luke 7:43b-50

The woman in this story was unacceptable. Her many sins were on the list of “not okay” - they were the kind that made people not even want to associate with her, lest she taint them in the eyes of others or the standing of God. And yet it was not being shamed and avoided by the religious that transformed her; it was being loved and forgiven by Jesus. He responded to the holy aloofness of Simon the Pharisee with the rebuttal: “NO CONDEMNATION.”

No one took sin as seriously as Jesus: it cost Him everything. And yet no one consistently refused to shame sinners the way Jesus did, either.

When a shamed and sinful woman is offered the redemptive power of a gracious love, she transforms into a beautiful vessel of that gracious love toward others. And we have the opportunity to see this same transformation in the lives around us if only we will respond to brokenness like Jesus does.

If any of you are heartbroken by the news about John Crist, as I am, I beg you to consider a few things as you respond:

• Shame drives sin deeper into secret. When we publicly shame John Crist’s conduct, we do not solve the evil or prevent anyone else from struggling with the same sins - we simply communicate that if they ever dare to be honest, we will condemn and disown them. Their sins, instead of coming into the healing light of community and forgiveness, sink deeper into the dark where they can fester and grow. Do we want to see our brothers and sisters and selves transformed and made whole, or are we more comfortable sitting here in whitewashed tombs full of rot and death, as long as the outside looks nice?

• How you respond to this distant celebrity figure is training wheels for your response when the sinner is someone close to you. And one day, no matter how well-cushioned your Christian bubble, it WILL BE someone close to you. It’s very easy to drop a fallen celebrity like a hot potato and think nothing of it, but what about when it’s your child? Your sibling? Your spouse? Every person in your life is a sinner with ugly stuff in their past and present. Grace is something to start practicing NOW.

• Every testimony is a testimony-in-progress. Yours. Mine. John Crist’s. When we leap over one hurdle, another is only a few strides away. This race is life-long, and if we’re waiting for the finish line to celebrate God’s work, we’ll miss out on it completely! God is working NOW, in me, in you, and in John Crist. Testimonies don’t have to be wrapped up in bows with a “happily ever after” to be testimonies - and in fact, God’s magnificence usually shines brightest when we are at our smallest. If we are faithless, He remains faithful. That is a testimony.

• Remember what kind of characters make up the pages of your Bible. You need not think hard to find examples of many believers and instruments of God who had heinous sins on their record. We may be quick to throw John Crist under the bus and yet somehow manage to see men like Abraham (who sold his wife twice to save his own skin and raped his maid) and David (who abused his power in order to commit adultery with Bathsheba and then had her husband murdered to make himself look better) as heroes of the faith. The point is that no one is righteous. Were these crimes despicable? Yes. Were these men loved by God? Also yes. The same paradox is true for all of us, and this is the heart and soul of the Good News! We come with no goodness to recommend us and yet He loves us anyway, even to death.

None of this is to minimize or dismiss the pain that John Crist’s actions have inflicted. The human beings his sin has harmed matter deeply, and they too need to be received with love and care. Unfortunately, the harm done to these specific women is but one piece of what has been revealed to be a deep and far-reaching cultural wound. It touches all of us in some way, and so we cry out for God’s comfort and abundant grace.

Are you a woman who has been objectified, belittled, or used? Me, too.

Are you a person who has been disillusioned with religion because of the rampant hypocrisy you see? Me, too.

Are you a sinner who fears that not a soul would be left by your side if they “really knew”? Me, too.

Are you a Christian who has been let down by a person of faith you looked up to? Me, too.

Are you a broken human taking three steps forward and two steps back every day on a testimony-in-progress that sometimes seems like purposeless wilderness wanderings? Me, too.

Are you left with no one to hope in but Jesus, the One who already bought your victory and has declared NO CONDEMNATION over you? Me, too.

you are a God who sees

There's a saying: "Hurt people hurt people."

It's been on my mind lately. There is so much pain in this world and it seems to increase at an exponential rate, which makes sense - because every one of our wounds can be traced back to the hand of another wounded soul. Sometimes things hurt so much that the only accessible relief seems to be to turn and hurt somebody else, even if it's entirely unintentional. Even if we hate ourselves for doing it a moment later.

Hurt people hurt people.

Hurting fathers hurt their children. Hurting wives hurt their husbands. Hurting children hurt their families. Everywhere, pain breeds more pain, and one person's wounds can sink claws of destruction deep into the soul of a child many generations down the line, perpetuating a brokenness that has cracked us all down the middle since the fall of Adam.

It seems hopeless: I am broken, just like endless ancestors before me. And if I ever try to numb my pain, I'm doomed to break someone else in the process.

There's a very broken woman in the pages of the Bible. Her name, at least when we meet her, is Sarai. We don't know much about how she grew up or what wounds she carried with her from childhood, but we do know that she was deeply scarred in her marriage and in her relationship with God. Her husband quite simply did not cherish her as much as he loved himself (Genesis 12:13). She was denied, too, the opportunity to love and be loved by a child (Genesis 11:30). She witnessed God's promise of a biological heir for her husband, but toward Sarai herself, God was silent (Genesis 15:4).

A deep, jagged wound left Sarai empty and aching in her area of most profound need. And she did what all hurting people do: she turned around, sucked in a shaking breath, and plunged her pain into someone else like a poisoned blade. She found half a moment of blessed relief, and in an instant another generation - no, another whole nation - was infected with destruction.

---

After Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Abram’s wife Sarai took Hagar the Egyptian, her maid, and gave her to her husband Abram as his wife. He went in to Hagar, and she conceived; and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her sight. And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done me be upon you. I gave my maid into your arms, but when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her sight. May the Lord judge between you and me.” But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your maid is in your power; do to her what is good in your sight.” So Sarai treated her harshly, and she fled from her presence.

Genesis 16:3-6

---

Enter Hagar - another very broken woman, an Egyptian slave in Abram and Sarai's household. Hagar likely had nothing of her own in life, least of all a voice or any kind of power. She was entirely at the mercy of others, and when Sarai's pain became unbearable, Hagar received the abuse.

She was treated little better than a cow for breeding - violated to dull someone else's pain.

And she did what all hurting people do: she turned around, sucked in a shaking breath, and plunged her pain right back into her mistress like a poisoned blade.

This, to me, is one of the bleakest pictures in the Bible. Two broken people in heart-to-heart combat, each trying to destroy the other in hopes of forgetting her own desperate state for just an instant.

And I can look around at any relationship of any kind on this earth and see the very same image.

Is there any hope for healing? Any chance this sick cycle can ever be broken? Or should we just resign ourselves to hearing of another school shooting or another ugly divorce or another split church every passing day?

Well, the story doesn't end there.

---

Now the angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from and where are you going?” And she said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.” Then the angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself to her authority.” Moreover, the angel of the Lord said to her, “I will greatly multiply your descendants so that they will be too many to count.” The angel of the Lord said to her further,

“Behold, you are with child,
And you will bear a son;
And you shall call his name Ishmael,
Because the Lord has given heed to your affliction.
“He will be a wild donkey of a man,
His hand will be against everyone,
And everyone’s hand will be against him;
And he will live to the east of all his brothers.”

Then she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God who sees”; for she said, “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?” Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.

Genesis 16:7-14

---

There it is: Hope.

In the middle of this black picture, the angel of the Lord appears.

Hagar has been driven out, all the way to Shur - the middle of nowhere, wilderness of wilderness. She is desperately alone. But God says,

"Hagar." I know your name.

"Sarai's maid." I know who you are.

"Where have you come from and where are you going?"

What an incredible pair of questions for the God of the Universe to ask at that moment. He knows the answers - but does she? "Where have you come from?" It's about more than her journey from Abram and Sarai's dwelling in the land of Canaan to the back of beyond. God probes into the origin of the problem, the origin of the wound. Healing only comes when we all answer the question: Where have we come from? We have to dig out the roots of our actions, all the way down to the bedrock of brokenness they spring from. No healing can happen until we cease trying to medicate away our symptoms and reach instead for the rotting insides of the wound.

"And where are you going?" When we get down to the messy guts of our pain, God's plan is never to leave us wallowing in it. Healing only comes when we answer the question: Where are we going? Now that we've uncovered the real traumas, we have to cut out the rotting core and wash the wound clean. No healing can happen until all the lies we have believed because of our wounds are completely eradicated and cleansed with the truth.

Hagar only answers the first question: "I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai." It's God who answers the second. "Return to your mistress, and submit yourself to her authority." Go, but don't take the pain with you. Go, but don't keep stabbing others with your wounds. Go, but go in the healing of the truth.

And what is the truth?

For Hagar, who has lived the life of a piece of property, the healing truth is that she is significant. She has a place in the world and a voice in history. God hears the cry of her heart and sees the pain she has endured.

She names her son, the father of one of the greatest nations on earth, Ishmael - "God hears." She names that spring of water where He appeared to her Beer-lahai-roi - "The well of the Living One who sees me."

That is the truth that breaks sin's sick cycle in our world. God hears. God sees. Our pain is not unnoticed by Him, and He doesn't want to leave us in it.

He's calling us by name and asking two questions: "Where have you come from and where are you going?" Because if we're going to stop being hurt people who hurt people, we need to know the answers.

---

this is God's will

God has been working in me.

It's always interesting to watch Him, because so often, His shaping touch is so gentle that I don't even feel it until I notice its tangible effects on my life months or years later. He works slowly, deliberately, never hurried or pushy, and why not? He has all the time in the world. I am learning, the longer I watch Him, that the aggressive, domineering, hurry-up-or-you'll-regret-it messages I sometimes hear in my heart and mind are never from Him - they are just my Enemy's strategy to distract me from the loving and teaching voice of my Father.

Today I noticed that my prayers have changed in the last year, maybe two. It was such a gradual shift that it didn't occur to me that anything was happening at the time, but now I can see it: Where I once asked for miracles, I've begun to ask for the revelation of God's character. Where I once asked for changed circumstances, I've begun to ask for changed hearts. Where I once asked God to step in and do blatant divine work in my life (and others'), I've begun to ask Him to lead His children to be His hands and feet toward one another.

I've asked God to miraculously heal the pain and suffering of a family member (well, let's face it... more than one family member), and I don't think that's wrong - but the beauty I have found in "Thy will be done" is that He often wills to do far deeper and greater work than simple healing of a physical problem. He shows us who He is - and there is no greater miracle than that.

The gloriously inefficient plan

But He doesn't necessarily show us who He is the way that I have often expected or desired, either. Looking back, I see that I wanted Him to sweep in in a grand vision, in an incredible event that no one could possibly doubt was an act of God - that would force us to turn our hearts toward Him more. But He has very rarely done so. Instead, He seems to prefer to work small... gentle... slow. He seems to prefer inefficiency. He seems to prefer to involve us, not to force us.

And I am coming to see that His favorite inefficiency is to reveal Himself chiefly in the small, Spirit-led voices and actions of His children. He shows us who He is in the unconditional love, the bottomless forgiveness, the open-hearted welcome of people who are just like us, people who are broken, but have been saved by the blood of Christ and transformed by the Holy Spirit.

So instead of asking Him to put on a huge show of power to remind me of His worthiness, His faithfulness, or His love, I have begun to ask Him to send someone - one of His small, saved people - who can gently, slowly, inefficiently live out His character before me in the humblest of ways. I am learning that He wants to do His deepest work through us, the Church. He wants me to hear His voice from the mouths of His children and see His love through their sacrificial actions and invite His grace into my life in the form of these genuine and difficult relationships.

And He wants me to do the same for them.

We, the Church of Christ, are intended to be His will. His voice. His hands. His arms. His feet. His heart.

The call to imitate Christ has never been more vital.

Now is not the time to wait for miracles to rain down from heaven. If God chooses to do that, then hallelujah, but here is the truth: we are the miracle. The God of all Creation has spared no expense to purchase a relationship with us, and to offer Himself fully to every living soul. That is a miracle. Every day that we walk with Christ as the active manifestation of His love, His grace, His power, His mercy, His unity, and His forgiveness for others is a miracle - and it's the miracle that will save the world, that will bring life to those who are dying in darkness.

God isn't showy or controlling or in a rush. He's not even all that efficient at times. But He is working - and He wants to work in me, and in you, and through us all. Broken and hurting people in our sanctuaries and our world are praying for a vision of what God's heart really looks like. What if we - the Church, the body of Christ - are the answer to that prayer? Am I ready to step in and live it? Are you?

The hard, healing work

This is hard work. The hardest work. It means that instead of burying our brokenness, we re-open the old wounds to the community of Christ - to be healed and, equally importantly, to provide an opportunity for His Church to practice its lofty call. It means that instead of pretending we're all okay, we build relationships based on the assumption that we are all not okay - and that no matter what your pet sin or your coping mechanism or your personal trauma, I've got my own pet sin or coping mechanism or personal trauma that really isn't much different, except maybe by name.

It means I am not just climbing to get myself to the top, but I'm choosing to throw my weight into these burdens in perfect sync with those who are climbing beside me, so that together we can lift up those who are too wounded to make the trek on their own.

And it's risky, because without exception, all of our deepest wounds came from other people to begin with - often the people closest to us. It seems counter-intuitive that we'd need to look for healing in the same position of vulnerability that hurt us, or that we'd ever trust someone other than ourselves to pull us up the treacherous mountainside to victory. But this is the plan.

The gloriously inefficient and hazardously optimistic plan.

Disorders. Addictions. Emptiness. Trauma. Sin. Pain. Abandonment. Disease. Not a single one of us is not suffering somehow from the wounds of a broken world. But until we stop pretending otherwise, until we stop hiding from each other - which can only mean we are hiding from the healing hand of God - the destructive cycle will go on.

God has been working in me. Slowly, gently, He has been clearing my vision to see what my true vocation as a servant of Christ is. It's not to preach the Gospel to a certain number of people or to write a particular book or to revolutionize the way we learn Scripture. Even if any of these things did happen, my real, bottom-line vocation would still be exactly the same as yours: To imitate Christ, who lived unapologetically real, fearlessly vulnerable, and inexhaustibly loving.

He laid His life down for His friends - not just literally, but also daily, entering into other people's muck and empathizing with their pain and loving them all the way to healing. And all this He did fearlessly, freely, even at the risk of unimaginable betrayal.

Now He has passed the baton to me. To you. To His Church.

This is God's will. We are God's plan.

Will we obey?