Understanding now why LOVE MATTERS MORE by Jared Byas

"No matter how much we expand our own experience of the world, we will never know everything." (JB)

"It sounds simple, but it’s so important for us to understand that we are limited. In other words, we are not able to grasp absolute truth or reality as it really is. Yet in certain parts of Christianity we have made absolute truth an idol, and God has been replaced. We are deeply afraid of what it means for us if humans do not have access to absolute truth. And that fear comes out in hurtful ways." (JB)

First of all... let me say that if I were to die right now and the last book I read was a book with the title "Love Matters More".  Then I will be okay if that is the legacy I leave behind.  I am okay, if no other message is conveyed at my memorial, than "Love Matters More".  This is the cherry on the ice cream sundae of my library of books.  The title says it all.  Even if anyone forgets what Jared Byas wrote in the whole book... if they can walk away with these three words and implement them in their day to day life... I think he will have done what he set out to do.  

"This is my first memory of a Christian trying to love me who clearly spent way more time learning what to believe than how to believe. I have heard my entire life that Christianity is about love, but what I saw—through our programs, services, and interactions—is that Christianity is about belief. I’ve come to realize that fear about being wrong in our beliefs has crowded out the clear message of Jesus’ life and death—the unmistakable emphasis in the Bible and in thousands of years of church tradition—love matters more." (JB)

Okay... I was kind of kidding... reading the book is still a good thing to do and as I will point out in the blog... there is a lot of wisdom within the pages.   And I'm sure Jared did a lot of hard work on those words past the cover, but I wanted to emphasize those three words and how transformative they can be.

I mentioned in my last post on Rob Bell's book "Love Wins" that love in action has to matter more than beliefs.  Jared Byas is confirming the same thing.  So maybe this is something to think about a little more.  Why has there been such a focus on beliefs, when it seems obvious that Jesus was more about love in action, than he was about beliefs? 

The premise of this book is addressing a phrase, that seems vastly overused in the Christian culture. "Speaking the truth in love"  

"Honest conversations about how we experience people or how we feel about others can be an important part of love, even crucial. But something is out of whack when I hear story after story of people being hurt by people who are 'just telling the truth in love.'” (JB)

Love isn't something we need to tell people we are doing... we just need to do it.  In the church culture, so often people have felt it necessary to admonish others on their behaviour and found some out of context backup in the bible so that they could feel good about themselves when they "told the truth in love".  All the while, clueless to the damage they did to the person they were telling it to.  Jared wrote a book that is long overdue by decades.  

"One thing that helped me in this journey was to recognize that certainty is a feeling." (JB)

Okay... I thought I knew this.  But when my eyes glanced at this line it finally registered in my brain.  Certainty is a feeling... not a foundational cornerstone.  Wow!  So when someone tells me they "are certain" about something... I can understand that as they "feel certain".  Their thoughts may be coming out of their mouth as a belief about their unshakeable identity, but that's not what is actually happening... it is the expression of a fluid feeling.  

Jared Byas is a co-host with Peter Enns of one of my favourite podcasts: The Bible for Normal People.  Jared talks with Pete about this book in Episode 138 on the podcast.  So if at the end of this blog post, I haven't convinced you to get this book, go and listen to the podcast, and let Jared invite you into this conversation)  

"The real problem with “speaking the truth in love” is that at the end of the day, we want grace for ourselves and judgment for other people." (JB)

OUCH!  How often have I been the one who "wanted grace for me" and in the outcome... passed along my judgement to others.  I think I need a new definition of truth.  

"The New Testament also uses as its primary definition of truth the idea of faithfulness." (JB)

I know I am jumping around, so you will have to read the book to get the whole picture... but there were so many things that stuck out in this book for me.  Truth = faithfulness.  So truth isn't a set of ideas or opinions but a state of being faithful.  How might we honour someone if we chose to be faithful to who they are instead of who we think they need to be based on our world view? 

"Love has a way of changing our minds about what is true. It doesn’t change the facts, of course. It changes what the facts mean and leads us to wisdom. It changes how we see the world. And if we get enough people to change how they see the world, it changes the world. It is true in science, and it is true in the church." (JB)

I think something I need to take out of this book is the difference between two very different words. 

TRUTH   OPINION

My opinion is just that... it is my opinion.  It might be true, but it might not be true... but in the end... I don't even have to fit my opinion anywhere on the spectrum of truth.  It can just be my opinion and that is good enough.  These are my thoughts, my opinions, my understandings... and truth doesn't even need to enter into the same picture.  Truth is a portrait all it's own.  And the beauty of that portrait can stand on its own... without my opinion discolouring it or covering it up. 

"We love well when we understand who someone is and behave according to who they are. We do not love well when we behave according to who we want them to be or who we assume they are because of who we are." JB

Jared, thank you for such an amazing read.  Like I said... "the cherry on the top". I still feel like I have missed so much of what this book has to offer... so I guess to finish off this post... the only thing I can say is... 

PEOPLE, PLEASE GET THIS BOOK AND READ IT.  AND THEN WALK AWAY WITH THREE WORDS THAT CAN TRANSFORM YOUR LIFE. 

LOVE MATTERS MORE

A must read and a must see... "Love Wins" and "The Heretic" by Rob Bell

Some communities don’t permit open, honest inquiry about the things that matter most. Lots of people have voiced a concern, expressed a doubt, or raised a question, only to be told by their family, church, friends, or tribe: “We don’t discuss those things here.”

My hope is that this frees you. There is no question that Jesus cannot handle, no discussion too volatile, no issue too dangerous. At the same time, some issues aren’t as big as people have made them. Much blood has been spilled in church splits, heresy trials, and raging debates over issues that are, in the end, not that essential. Sometimes what we are witnessing is simply a massive exercise in missing the point. Jesus frees us to call things what they are. (RB)

I started this blog post as a personal rant... and then as I started copying and pasting some of Rob Bell's quotes in... I realized that he did all the ranting for me... in the book "Love Wins" and even in the documentary "The Heretic".  

To say it again, eternal life is less about a kind of time that starts when we die, and more about a quality and vitality of life lived now in connection to God.

Eternal life doesn’t start when we die;

it starts now.

It’s not about a life that begins at death;

it’s about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death. (RB) 

Maybe Eternity isn't as long as it seems to be.  I think the concept of existing forever to be... undesirable... but maybe that isn't what Eternity is about.  Maybe it is more about the moment now, than about a destination after death.  This makes now... the NOW that I find myself in... to matter.  Now has to matter for me.  Because Now is that I'm sure that all I have. 

If you believe that you’re going to leave and evacuate to somewhere else, then why do anything about this world? A proper view of heaven leads not to escape from the world, but to full engagement with it, all with the anticipation of a coming day when things are on earth as they currently are in heaven.

When Jesus tells the man he will have treasure in heaven, he’s promising the man that taking steps to be free of his greed—in this case, selling his possessions—will open him up to more and more participation in God’s new world, the one that was breaking into human history with Jesus himself. (RB)

I don't know if the chapter "Here is the New There"  encourages me or discourages me.  I wanted to find something that would encourage me that I don't have to exist forever, because in my limited mind... existing forever doesn't line up with how Love has expressed itself in my life.  Love lives in my limits.  How would Love look in a redeemed place, when Love has blossomed in the manure of my life?    I am still not drawn into the forever aspect of eternity, but the Now aspect of eternity that he talks about... now that I can get inspired about.  That "heaven" is more about Here and Now... than it is about the There and Then.   This is still a very grey area for me.  I have no conclusions.

First, heaven.

Now, hell. (RB) 

But, simply put, the Hebrew commentary on what happens after a person dies isn’t very articulated or defined. Sheol, death, and the grave in the consciousness of the Hebrew writers are all a bit vague and “underworldly.” For whatever reasons, the precise details of who goes where, when, how, with what, and for how long simply aren’t things the Hebrew writers were terribly concerned with.

Next, then, the New Testament. The actual word “hell” is used roughly twelve times in the New Testament, almost exclusively by Jesus himself. The Greek word that gets translated as “hell” in English is the word “Gehenna.” Ge means “valley,” and henna means “Hinnom.” Gehenna, the Valley of Hinnom, was an actual valley on the south and west side of the city of Jerusalem.

Gehenna, in Jesus’s day, was the city dump. (RB)

So Hell in the Old Testament refers to the place of the dead, which wasn't a big topic of conversation.  Hell in the New Testament is the city garbage dump.  So my question... if this is obvious to biblical scholars... why have millions of people been told that Hell is a place of eternal conscious torment for people who don't sign up to be part of Christianity's club?  When I look for an answer to this question... I can only come up with words like power, control and fear.  There is no Love painted in this  of portrait of Hell.  

 Many people in our world have only ever heard hell talked about as the place reserved for those who are “out,” who don’t believe, who haven’t “joined the church.” Christians talking about people who aren’t Christians going to hell when they die because they aren’t . . . Christians. People who don’t believe the right things.

But in reading all of the passages in which Jesus uses the word “hell,” what is so striking is that people believing the right or wrong things isn’t his point. He’s often not talking about “beliefs” as we think of them—he’s talking about anger and lust and indifference. He’s talking about the state of his listeners’ hearts, about how they conduct themselves, how they interact with their neighbors, about the kind of effect they have on the world.

Jesus did not use hell to try and compel “heathens” and “pagans” to believe in God, so they wouldn’t burn when they die. He talked about hell to very religious people to warn them about the consequences of straying from their God-given calling and identity to show the world God’s love. (RB) 

I am more and more drawn to the idea that "beliefs" don't make one iota of a difference to the Creator... Love in action is the real deal.  That is definitely evident in the storyline of Jesus.  This is GOOD NEWS!  I will struggle with what I "believe" until my last breath... but until I breathe my last... I can love.  There is no struggle for me in that directive! 

And then, last of all, please understand that nothing in this book hasn’t been taught, suggested, or celebrated by many before me. I haven’t come up with a radical new teaching that’s any kind of departure from what’s been said an untold number of times. That’s the beauty of the historic, orthodox Christian faith. It’s a deep, wide, diverse stream that’s been flowing for thousands of years, carrying a staggering variety of voices, perspectives, and experiences.

If this book, then, does nothing more than introduce you to the ancient, ongoing discussion surrounding the resurrected Jesus in all its vibrant, diverse, messy, multivoiced complexity—well, I’d be thrilled.  (RB)