Profane (Easter - Day 36)

(Based on 1 Timothy 3:14-4:5)

As a recovering alcoholic, I cannot receive alcohol with thanksgiving. As a person who has a mind that will fantasize about all things sex, I cannot receive pornography with thanksgiving. As a person who smokes like a chimney, I cannot receive cigarettes with thanksgiving. What do these all have to do with what's written in today's passage in first Timothy? 

Evidently, when Paul was writing this letter to Timothy, there were some preachers in the church who were condemning two things: certain types of food and marriage. Paul, referring all the way back to Genesis, reminds us that "everything created by God is good, and is to be received with thanks. Nothing is secular, everything is holy and shouldn't be smeared at or thrown out. God's word and our prayers make every item in creation holy." 

This sure makes an interesting case for black and white thinking, doesn't it? I can begin to list all the things that I've at one point or another labeled as good or bad, holy or unholy. But, if everything is holy, then how can I even begin to put a box around anything? Without getting into the rabbit trail debate on what's considered "created by God" and what's not, I would like to focus more on what we give thanks for and what we don't.

The problem, I think, is not with defining one's own boundaries when it comes to food, sex, drink, and pleasure. The problem is defining everyone's boundaries. I know what my boundaries are, and when I move past them, what is holy becomes profane, what is good becomes bad. Does this mean that whatever I'm referring to in that moment is inherently bad? Paul would say no. It is bad for me, but it doesn't mean that I can cast it's badness for me as a generalization for everyone else. 

When I generalize something that I struggle with as bad for everyone, I am turning something holy into something unclean. Paul says everything should be received with thanks, because every item in creation is holy. The problem is, I don't have the ability to receive everything with thanks, making some things unholy for me. But, at the same time, the thing that I may not be able to receive with thanks others may receive with gratitude. 

I have proven to myself that I cannot receive certain things with gratitude. I abuse them and they flare up a construct of shame within me that prevents me from having any sort of gratitude for whatever it is. It's not that the thing is bad or unholy, but I am not mature enough or thankful enough or sincere enough to receive that item with thanksgiving. 

In this passage, Paul says there are "professional liars" out there who are condemning certain types of food. They're also telling the congregants not to get married. He says they have lied for so long and so often that they don't even know how to speak the truth anymore. Basically, they have convinced themselves for so long that something is unholy, they can't possibly see it as God's creation and inherently good. 

Does this sound familiar? Have you ever heard someone make a sweeping generalization about an issue, like homosexuality or gay marriage, and completely smear it and cast it out as unholy? What about alcohol, or sex, or food? 

Jesus came to fulfill the laws of the old testament, not because they needed to be stronger, but because they needed to be fixed. Mankind turned the law into wholesale condemnation of certain types of food, certain types of marriage, and certain types of rituals. Instead of using the law to expose the holiness of everything, the law was used to create an illusion of secularization and sacredness. Jesus represented the sacred entering into the world of the profane. He spent his life fusing the two together, exposing the holiness in every man, woman, and child. He exposed the holiness in what was considered unclean. He exposed the holiness in what was considered unlawful. In this way, he turned the law upside down without taking away from it. He fulfilled it. 

One of the byproducts of believing in Jesus is understanding that nothing in creation is unholy or secular. Music, arts, alcohol, sex, marriage, homosexuality, and government are inherently good and holy. It all comes down to the individual as we ask the question, "Am I thankful for this?" If we're not thankful for certain things, then we can humbly back down, surrender, and go our own ways. However, take the things we aren't thankful for and make broad, sweeping declarations in our mission statements and doctrinal values is to take what was created for good and to consider it unclean and unusable. 

The question should always come down to, "Am I thankful for this?" 

If we're thankful, then we should enjoy it and celebrate it. In my case, I am not thankful for alcohol because it sets off a chain reaction inside of me that leads to wanting more and more and more. What was intended for good, I create into something bad. But, for me to condemn alcohol and anybody who drinks it is to consider something that is holy as something profane. 

The bottom line is, for everything that I am not able to give thanks for, there is someone else on this planet who is giving thanks for it. In fact, there are probably millions more people giving thanks for the things that I cannot receive with thanks. That's okay. Everything is holy and nothing is profane and tossed out as trash. For every marriage that someone condemns, there is a marriage that someone is thanking God for. For every divorce that someone condemns, there is a divorce being given thanks for. For every beer being secularized, there is a celebration in some pub where people are giving thanks. For every gay relationship that is being condemned, there is a gay relationship being given thanks for. For every Muslim being stereotyped, there is a Muslim being given thanks for. For every government decision that is being condemned, there is someone giving thanks for it. For every act of premarital sex that is being condemned, there is an unmarried couple giving thanks for it. 

To make generalizations or wholesale condemnations of anything is to assume everyone thinks and thanks God the same way we do. I am guilty as anyone because in the five years I've been doing this blog, three of those were spent making these exact condemnations that Paul's talking about. Anyone I considered "unholy" I would make a wholesale condemnation against them and what they believed in. I try not to do that today, although I still screw up every once in awhile. 

For every issue or point of contention that we hear about today, we have to remember there is always another narrative. Just because individually we may view something as unholy, it doesn't mean it is unholy. Everything in creation is good and touched by the hands of God. To deem something as right or wrong for ourselves is responsible and needed, but to deem something as unholy for everyone in and of itself is to take the Creator out of the creation. 

Today's Action: Make a list of all the things we consider holy or unholy. Ask ourselves, "Am I thankful for this?" When we come across something as unholy, think about one person in our lives who views it oppositely. When we come across something as holy, think about one person in our lives who views it oppositely. Thank God for all the items on the list.