The gift of mercy

We recently had a talk at church about spiritual gifts. We were encouraged to celebrate our diversity, to work together with our unique gifts given to us by God to build up the body of Christ. What was so freeing and affirming was hearing that all spiritual gifts are valuable, that we should not all be teachers and preachers or worship leaders, but those who are servants and administrators and gifted in hospitality are amazing and worth celebrating too. That we all need each other, and that we should all develop more fully into the gifts that God has given us as different individuals. We were encouraged to think about what gifts God has given us and work on practicing and developing them for the Kingdom.

I have been reflecting on all of this and realised that on a deeper level, I don't know what my gifts are. I know what my heart is and what my passions are, the kind of person I want to be and the mission I want to be about. But spiritual gifts? No idea.

Dave has been so good to me with his willingness to talk this all through. We had a little taster discussion yesterday, and he told me that he thinks I have the gift of mercy.

Now, I baulked at this. Mercy? I am one of the most unforgiving people I know! When I fall out with someone, it takes years for me to reconcile, if at all. I don't make peace. If someone hurts or wrongs me, I keep it inside me and hold it close, totally uninterested in being forgiving and merciful. I lash out and want to have a go. It is one of the things I want to change most about myself. One of my gifts can't be mercy.

Dave is adamant though that the gift of mercy in this sense isn't to do with forgiveness and peacemaking. Dave tells me that the gift of mercy is to do with being angry and hurt by the injustice and pain in the world, deeply feeling what God feels for the poor, suffering and oppressed. And if Dave's definition is the one intended in Paul's letters, then I think I do have the gift of mercy- though I didn't think of it as a gift, really.

I am still waiting for Dave to explain this more to me, but in the meantime, I have been thinking about God's heart for the poor. Dave said to me that the gift of mercy is in many ways a painful and difficult gift to have. While most people can hear of injustice and suffering and think it is wrong, they can move on and get on with their days fairly quickly and easily. But for people with the gift of mercy, this burns deeper. They feel the hurt of God's people, and carrying on as though nothing is wrong is harder. Impossible at times.

I agree with this. Sometimes I find it difficult not to be overwhelmed by the sadness in the world and the atrocities of which human beings are capable. A few months ago, one of the children at a project of ours was taken, beaten and brutally killed by gangs. I heard this at staff prayers and couldn't shake it. This boy, who had struggled so hard and become an amazing role model, resisting the threats of gangs and serving children in his position, so young and yet so brave. I tried to go on with my day. I said to a colleague, "It's hard to go on with our work when things like that can happen." She nodded and was quiet for a bit. She went back to her computer.

That boy stays with me. I have shed lots of tears for him and had so many fall outs with God over him and so many others like him. My questions were killing me. My pastor told me I had to lay them down. God feels the same pain that you feel. Fot every death and injustice you have mourned, He has been there first, weeping with you. My pastor is right.

This morning when I was on the train to London, reading about world developments on social media, something struck me hard. I do want to change the world. I believe that it is possible. I believe that there is something worth fighting for, a world where everyone is equally valued and celebrated, a world where no one has to worry about how they are going to survive. This is why I do the things I do, why I retweet and share articles and posts which inspire and sadden and anger me. Though more often than not, I feel overwhelmed and cynical, angry at humanity and critical of everything, unsure about God - I do want to change the world. This sense of injustice, God's heart for the suffering burning deep within me, can be my fuel for action. There is fire in me yet.

If this is the gift of mercy, I am ready for it to grow. I am ready for the pain to drive me to action. I am ready to fight.

Black Mirror

Dave and I have recently been watching a series called Black Mirror, written by brilliant satirist Charlie Brooker. I love it. In it, Charlie Brooker explores everyday elements of the 21st century Britain taken to the extreme. I love the genre of dystopia but it's been a while since I've seen such an amazingly crafted, complex, intelligent and original take. With the possible exception of one episode, all of the stand-alone stories in Black Mirror are chillingly plausible and darkly insightful of the technologically advanced moral vacuum we inhabit.

One thing that is fascinating about Black Mirror is how much it really makes me think. I have been bowled over by how compellingly tragic and clever the series is and how it deals with deeply worrying and disturbing developments in culture. Without going too deeply into the details of the specific episodes, I just wanted to share some thoughts here.

Commercialisation

Black Mirror exposes the ruthless commercialisation of everything- beauty, innocence, grief and bereavement, dreams, politics, justice, just to name a few. Nothing is off limits. Nothing is considered sacrosanct. Everything is commercialised and stripped of originality for profit. Everything is up for grabs to be sold out and cheapened. 

Charlie Brooker explores the extremes of commercialisation through reality talent shows, including the even starker and more raw crossover with pornography. Many of the episodes include an unforgiving expose of the sexualisation of women to a disgusting degree for commercial gain. With dystopic flair, he creates a world in which even the concept of justice is commercialised, with the obsessed public paying to attend a 'justice park' where they watch and take part in the protracted psychological torture of an accomplice to a child’s murder, in the name of punishment for her crimes.

Moral vacuum

Along with this ruthless commercialisation is the underlying moral vacuum that pervades society and popular attitudes in our generation. There isn't any sense of right and wrong. There is no sense of ideology or morality that go deeper than self-centred individualism and consumerism. All that is left is the pursuit of self-gratification and elevation of entertainment in all its basest forms.

Black Mirror shows this subtly and repeatedly using useless but flashy developments in technology. Gadgets which ultimately serve no real purpose. An artist does illustrations on an electronic tablet with an electronic paintbrush, then shuts the blank screen away, leaving nothing there. A man who operates an animated blue bear to ridicule politicians with puerile innuendo struggles with the emptiness of life. He is left devastatingly speechless when confronted by a politican who screams, "Who are you? What do you even stand for? At least I stand for something!”

The way that Charlie Brooker shows this moral vacuum in Black Mirror is so powerful. This pervasive amorality is shown to be a consequence of the relentless commercialism and individualism of our ‘advanced’ and affluent culture. In our relentless satisfaction of the self, we have lost any sense of moral compass or values. All that remains is emptiness - with dire repercussions for society and the individuals in it.  The man behind the bear disintegrates in this emptiness, destroyed by his despair and depression. It is painful to watch.

But Black Mirror goes further than this, which I think is amazing. This moral vacuum gives way to unbelievable cruelty. The public mood of mudslinging and obsession with assigning blame reaches fever pitch in this dystopic society. People lob shoes at politicians with contempt, angry with their hypocrisy yet holding no deeper ideals of their own. The child murderer is demonised, made to suffer every day for the explicit entertainment of the public, harrangued, unethically drugged and psychologically abused.  Zealous and extremist self-righteousness becomes a way of self-gratification, readily drawn on for commercial profit. 

Groupthink

Alongside the extremes of commercialism and amorality, Black Mirror is also haunting in its foreshadowing of a sort of groupthink, a mindless vapid conformity which turns ugly very quickly. No one in Black Mirror is able to stand up to this soullless mass mentality. This is the death of the individual conscience, replaced by a groupthink bent only on the things I have mentioned already. Brainwashed, individuals are incapable of acting and making decisions independently, puppets of the commercialist forces on which they feed.

The prime minister is forced by public opinion on social media to commit an unspeakable act to free the princess from a terrorist. With the power of a cult, the crowd on a reality talent show vote to have a contestant forced into the pornography industry. No one questions or feels guilt or shame about their behaviour. The power of the masses is the only rule. Frightening when the masses are little more than unreflecting and selfish consumerists.

What really haunts me about Black Mirror is that no one wins. No one comes out really alive, retaining something good and pure and real. Everyone succumbs. The episodes hurt to watch, even more so because they are so plausible. We are human and desperate and this is the world that we live in. That could be us one day, left to our devices and to the corrupt powers of this culture. 

This insanely powerful speech is the climax of "Fifteen Million Merits".  It is absolutely soul-destroying when this man succumbs. How do you really and truly kill a revolutionary ideology? You commercialise it. 

I highly recommend Black Mirror, especially the episodes “White Bear” and “Fifteen Million Merits”. (A disclaimer though: swearing and some sexual content, so if that’s not for you, stay away.)  British writing at its best, and it does what it says on the tin - it's a black mirror, showing us the deepest and darkest parts of our society.

Well done Charlie Brooker. 

Different paths, great big God

Yesterday I reconciled with a friend I have not been in touch with for over 3 years. It was one of the most freeing experiences I think I have ever had. I have never found relationships easy and reconciliation does not come naturally to me. I think I see more now why forgiveness is given such a central place in our relationship with God. It is a beautiful thing, simple but yet so complicated.

We met and caught up. How to summarise three years? It humbled me to hear about the things my friend had overcome in the time I had kept my distance.

Before seeing this friend, we had had a brief meeting with one of our closest friends, who had some great news and was preparing for an exciting new phase in life.

Reflecting on my day afterwards, I remembered all the years we have known these friends of ours, all the changes we have all been through, all the places we have journeyed through. It got me thinking about how much things and people change.

We are constantly evolving. We grow and learn and live. We are all on different journeys, with different struggles and burdens to bear, different fears and hopes and dreams. Sometimes our lives cross over and we have the privilege of being part of each others' journeys.

We all met at uni and I am a little amazed at how different our paths since then have been. We are not the people we used to be, and we live such different lives now. From careers to callings to life stages, things have really changed. We are all seeking to serve God with our lives, in the ways that we know how.

Sometimes I am blinded by my calling, my passions and my gifts. I see the ways other people are journeying and I think they are doing it wrong, that they aren't doing justice to God and his kingdom. I can be closeminded.

Reflecting on yesterday got me thinking about how big God is. The whole world, with its nearing 8 billion people and all their different journeys and paths to finding him. It got me thinking, God can't be narrow minded and closed to possibilities, insensitive to differences and struggles. He must see all of us, on our different pathways to his peace, and love and cherish us all the same.

We must have an amazing God.

Our stories are important

On Thursday at our home group I shared my story. I have never shared the story of my life in such detail, honestly and openly talking about the events and developments which have shaped me, the good and the bad. I have given many testimonies in my life but these have often been an exercise in what to skim over, what to draw out and emphasise, what to omit. And with my story, that was really quite a lot.

Not to say that I hadn't told the truth in past testimonies, but on Thursday it was different. I spoke openly about things I hadn't shared systematically and honestly before. I wrote it all down and read all 6 sides of it to our small group.

I found it really hard. My story is not one you can share over light hearted drinks.  Seeing it all written and reading it out, it was strange to think that this was my story, that all that illness and darkness had happened to me. I couldn't distance myself from it like I do so much in everyday life, living life as though I wasn't influenced by these things. I don't think of everything that ever happened to me- or at least I try not to. But when I was reading my story out at house group, I had to own it. This was my story. This is my life.

Thinking about it now, I understand more the power of stories. To Write Love on Her Arms, a mental health charity I love, has as one of its slogan - "Your story is important." And I get it more now. Whatever your story is, whether it's fairly straightforward or it's full of tragedy and abuse, your story is important. It is yours and it has value. Your life, no matter what your story, has worth.

We should own our stories. They make us what we are. Our stories are important.

The errors of presumption

This morning we attended our church’s 9am service. Branded as being the quieter and more traditional of our three Sunday services, it’s one that I rarely go to, and this morning I had my eyes opened.

Very near the beginning of the service, the band leaders decided to open in prayer against gay marriage. They cited their joining with the Coalition for Marriage campaign, asking us to pray for the upcoming reading of the Bill in Parliament, for boldness for the MPs in speaking out against gay marriage, and the upholding of historic and Biblical marriage as defined by God.

It was a long prayer, with lots of ‘amens’ and exalted righteous language. It took me a great deal of willpower and grace not to walk out of the church at that moment.

I am a Christian who disagrees with the Coalition for Marriage campaign and am actively pro gay marriage. To what extent my sense of horror about this morning’s prayer is rooted in my disagreement with the argument against gay marriage, I’m not sure, but what made me really angry was the presumption with which the prayer was prayed.

I suppose this is complicated for Christian leaders and churches, who have to take a stand against certain issues and developments, whether or not all its members agree. I am fully aware that it may just be because I feel very strongly about the issue of gay marriage and the way that the church is engaging with it, that this is a source of frustration for me. Maybe this prayer really was the right way of dealing with things if their position is right.

But what I really want to come out and say to these people who speak out so openly in this way for the Coalition for Marriage is this. I am a Christian who loves and tries to follow Jesus, and I am for gay marriage.

I am sure there are other Christians like me. How many there are I’m not sure - more often than not I feel the isolation of being a minority in this area. But sometimes I just want to stand up and ask: Can you not be a Christian and support gay marriage? Because I think you can. I am, and I do.

The trouble with prayers like the one we had to sit through this morning, and churches jumping on board with the Coalition for Marriage, is that they are not representative of all Christians’ views. There are people like me who are made to feel, and are represented, as holding a wholesale opinion that they do not have, purely by virtue of being part of a church. On a wider scale, people in society then see all Christians as a group who all reject gay marriage, when this is not true.

It is churches’ presumption that all Christians have this viewpoint that angers me and that I think is wrong. This is the problem with the Coalition for Marriage mobilising churches to campaign against gay marriage. Churches are made up of individuals, and not everyone agrees. People who don’t agree are then made to carry the weight of the anti-gay marriage expectation in church and outside church. I’m not sure in which context this is more unpleasant.

When we were in Buckingham, our vicar put a petition for the Coalition for Marriage at the front of our church. This angered me because of the presumption: “Well, if you go to this church, and you’re a Christian, then you must uphold this view of marriage and you must be against gay marriage. Sign this petition - of course you will!” I wanted to tell the vicar that if he was going to put this petition at the front of the church, for equality and integrity purposes, he should put a petition supporting gay marriage right next to it. I would sign that.

I am a Christian and I support gay marriage. I have reasons for believing what I believe, just as people have reasons against gay marriage, which I disagree with. Just like many of them, I love Jesus and am doing my best to follow him with my life. It is only right that my view should be respected and not made to be what it is not. It is insulting, untrue and lacks integrity.

I don’t want to go into the language of the prayer that upset me, as my husband graciously and wisely told me to try not to get too angry and to remember the positives. All I will say is that it is not helpful to simplify issues like this with the presumption that everyone agrees, your opinion is the righteous, Biblical and God-ordained one, and that as Christians who follow God we should all pray for the other side to fail. Why can we not pray for guidance and truth to win, pray for God’s hand to be over the developments and not assume that we are certainly right? If not, why can people not just preface their views with the fact that it is only their view and that if you are a Christian who is not part of the Coalition for Marriage, you aren’t the infidel who is substandard in some way?

I couldn’t stop thinking about what someone outside of the ‘Christian fold’ would think sitting there for the first time, hearing that prayer. Or even more awfully, a gay person.

For now, I won’t go into my thoughts and arguments why I think gay marriage should be supported. I just want people to know and respect that Christians can be for gay marriage. And that is ok.