Have you met those people who seem to talk and talk and really have no idea what they’re talking about? Then there are those people who talk and really seem to know what they’re talking about until later when you find out that they really have no idea. In fact, I think, at times, we could all fit into one category or the other. I know there have been times when I have been so sure about what I’m saying and then find out later that I was completely off the mark. The fact is that our knowledge grows and changes with our experiences, and that what we know with conviction today might change tomorrow.
Near the end of the book of Job, we finally hear from God, from within a whirlwind, we are told. I love the first words we hear from God: “Who is this who darkens counsel in words without knowledge?” Words without knowledge. Job and his friends have no idea what they’re talking about. 34 chapters of words without knowledge. They seem to know the way the world works, they seem to be able to judge each other and God based on this knowledge, when really, they have no idea. And God expands on that, saying “Where were you when I founded the earth? Have you ever commanded the morning, appointed the dawn to its place. Have you come into the springs of the sea, in the bottommost deep walked about? Have the gates of death been laid bare to you, and the gates of death’s shadow have you seen? Tell, if you know all.” How arrogant are Job and his friends to question God, to believe they know the mind of God? How arrogant are we when we presume to know how the world works?
How many times have we caused harm because of what we know to be true. Just in the past hundred years, we knew Japanese Canadians were a danger, so we interred them and took their property. We knew communism was evil and persecuted those we believed were communists. We knew the lighter the skin colour the higher the intelligence and moral judgement. We knew indigenous people needed to be assimilated for the betterment of Canada. We knew that any sexual deviation from male and female within a marriage was wrong and made illegal any acts outside that norm. Much of this has been supported by the church, justified in ways that now seem incomprehensible. What were we thinking?
In Paul’s letter to the community in Philippi, in the Christian scriptures, he talks about his past, before he became a follower of Jesus and before he travelled to far off places to share his experience of the risen Christ. He talks about growing up Jewish, being born of the tribe of Benjamin, and how he was a Pharisee, one who upheld Jewish law and who was a persecutor of the church. He says he was righteous under the law and blameless. Yet, he continues, all of this is nothing and that he has lost all of this because of Christ. He says, “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Jesus Christ.”
Some of the early Jewish followers of Christ were persecuted by other Jewish people. Paul was one of those persecutors and he believed that he was being righteous under the law. He believed that these people were perverting his faith and leading people astray from the one true God. He believed he was doing right, until one day, when he was knocked off his feet and blinded by a vision that turned his life upside down. He became one of these Christ followers that he had been persecuting and in fact, with a new found zeal in this new faith, became one of those leading people astray to follow Christ.
Paul described himself as blameless under the law, which is the exact word used for Job. Job is described as blameless and upright, but it doesn’t mean he was perfect and it doesn’t mean he didn’t have a lot to learn, just like Paul, just like us. Job, like Paul, was knocked off his feet by the presence of God, and told how he was wrong.
We all have a lot to learn. We all need to be knocked off our feet. No matter how righteous we may see ourselves, we will have experiences that will show us the error of our ways. Currently, Canada has apologized for its error in judgement in taking indigenous children away from their home and putting them in residential schools. The United Church is in the midst of offering apologies to the many hurt because their gender identity didn’t fit within the prescribed norm. I have recently heard stories of women demanding an apology for the way they were treated in homes for women who were pregnant outside of marriage. Many nations around the world are still suffering the effects of missionaries whose mission was to bring Christianity to those without and to bring help in ways that were often unhelpful because no one asked what was needed. It was just assumed. All of these things were done with the best of intentions. All with the zeal of faith and love of God, feeling as if they were doing the right thing, feeling righteous and blameless.
How often do we stand firm in our judgments, stuck in our ways, firm in our beliefs, and unwilling to budge, feeling we are right, feeling that our way is the only way, in politics, in faith, at work, at church, at home? How do we keep our righteousness from becoming self-righteousness?
Some of us have to knocked off our feet, blinded, hit by such a strong experience, that we are forced to open our eyes and see differently. Do we need to wait for that to happen or can we find other ways? Keeping an open mind is sometimes easier said than done, so how can do we do this?
I’ve heard this a number of times, most recently on Sunday during our Blanket Exercise. We have two ears and one mouth for a reason. There are times, no, I think at all times, we need to be doing more listening than speaking, especially to those who are in pain and are suffering. Rachel Held Evans, in her book “Inspired,” wrote that the book of Job “favours the wisdom of those who have actually suffered over those who merely speculate about it.” Job’s friends did more talking than listening to their friend who was in pain and Job, although he may have had a lot to learn, was the one speaking from his experience, was the one who needed to be heard, and not judged for his suffering.
I also think it’s helpful to create experiences, rather than wait for them to happen. Last week, I was part of a circle of 20 people in the Blanket Exercise as we listened to the story of colonialism through the eyes of the indigenous people. This week, I have been part of a group learning what it means to be Affirming. Reading books that have a different point of view, listening to a different radio station or watching a movie that you normally would have avoided, hanging out with people with whom you feel uncomfortable. These are all ways that we learn, but they’re not easy ways. They take time. They take effort. They, at times, make us uneasy, tense, embarrassed, and mostly, vulnerable.
Opening ourselves up to new ideas, learning to listen before we speak, being vulnerable to being told we are wrong, that we have done wrong, that we are doing wrong, takes courage, takes risk, and takes humility. We are fortunate because we can do all of this within a community of faith, a community that loves and supports us as we learn and grow. We also count on a higher power to help guide us, give us strength, and accompany us always so that we are never alone. Through those times when we are knocked off our feet, we can rely on the holy one to keep us grounded and we can be thankful that we will land on our feet, even if we remain a little wobbly. May it be so and thanks be to God. Amen.
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