Two
treasured terms within the history of Christianity are “friendship” and “followers.” Friendship with God is well-illustrated in the
Sayings of the Fathers of the Egyptian desert.
Fourth-Century Gregory of Nyssa (following his brother, Basil) and the 5th
Century Theodoret of Cyrrhus described friendship with God as the goal of growth
in the Christian life.[1]
And
Jesus begins his public ministry by calling his would-be disciples to “Follow
me.” Become my followers.
Now
this gives me pause when I realize how active I am on social media. Facebook’s primary category is “friends.” Twitter invites you to become “followers.”
On
Facebook, friends are people who are willing to observe your preaching, excuse
me, your one to two sentence observations or descriptions of your ongoing life,
humor, or mood. Friends are allowed to
comment, offer suggestions, or to thank you for sharing scenes from your recent
vacation. When my wife and my
mother-in-law took a recent spring trip to Belgium and Holland, I got to see
all the great times they were having without me, while I was sitting on my couch
. . . in Sawyer. No . . . really . . .
that’s ok. (tearing up) I’ll be
fine.
I
have 668 friends on Facebook. Pretty
sweet, huh? My son, Abraham, has way
more friends than I do without even trying.
I know of people who brag about having over 1000 friends. But 668 is pretty good, right? To have that many friends? Except . . . those people I have listed . . .
they’re not really “friend” friends. I
am neither that popular nor that loving.
I’m not sure I even know or have met some of the people who are my
Facebook friends.
And
Twitter, Twitter is even worse! It is
great to have friends, even better to have a following! I spend too many days hoping a Facebook friend
will like my post. I went over the moon
when one of my favorite authors liked my post!
And then shared it! And Anna Lappé, one of my favorite writers and leaders, now
follows me on Twitter. Life is complete!
Facebook
and Twitter have totally re-defined what it means to have a friend and a
following. It is the nature of cultural
systems we give our allegiance to, cooperate with, or participate in, that those
systems sometimes end up defining, using, and caging us
more than we define, use, and contain the time we spend with them. So much so, that Tik-Tok even has videos they
throw in to say to you, “Yeah, you really should go to bed. Stop watching so many videos.” I’m caught.
I’m addicted. I’m no longer
free.
Several
years ago I gave up social media for Lent because I knew I was caught,
addicted, and needed to extricate myself from the unhealthy ways social media
was defining me. Ugh, it was rough. And it reminded me how much social media is a
metaphor for wider commitments and loyalties.
On
a national global scale, the book of Revelation is about a “freedom from” the
Roman imperial project to have “freedom for” the things of God. In effect saying, you cannot call yourself a
friend of Rom and consider yourself a friend of Rome.
The
book of Revelation is a reminder that the New Testament is based on the pose,
poetry, and images of Hebrew Scripture.
Revelation is a book that is thoroughly Jewish in content. In Revelation, the strong use of numerology,
visions, and values all have Jewish sensibilities—particularly the critique of
empire.
Remember
that the birth story of the Jewish people, the Exodus, is a critique of the
Egyptian Empire. Even when Israel rises
as the most power imperial power in the ancient near East, prophets are afoot
to ask David if Israel is really any different than Egypt was, or any different
than any other empire.
One
by one ten, the Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Syrian, and Roman Empires
marched through what the Children of Israel believed to be the promised land
and claimed it as their own. Each of
these empires also required some form of tribute, an allegiance that often
demanded some form of religious, political, and economic fidelity to their
gods, with the king, emperor, or pharaoh often making divine claims—Daniel in
the lion’s den, or with Bel and the Dragon, Shadrach, Meschack, and Abednego in
the fiery furnace, Esther presenting herself to the king at the threat of death,
Mordecai refusing to take a knee to the local lord, the Maccabees refusing to ordain
the sacrifice of a pig in the Temple.
All these Biblical heroes and heroines had to determine how to balance
loyalty to the empire versus loyalty to their God, their faith, and their
people. Just in sharing these stories,
we know there were so many others who were faithful that did not escape,
persecution, torture, and death.
As
a result, in Jewish storytelling, allegiance to, cooperation with, and
participation in the religion, economics, or politices of empire became the
definition of evil. Jewish heroes like
Joseph or Daniel or Esther may have ascended to high rank and position within
the empire, but eventually their faith practice or the plight of their people
would run counter to imperial edict. The
listed Scriptural stories were about how a faithful Jew, outed by their
loyalties, their friendships, their followings, their spiritual practice,
navigated faithfulness. Even the apostle
Paul would use his Roman citizenship to make his way in the world but often
found himself in conflict, turmoil, and prison for his faithfulness.
In
this Jewish storytelling, Babylon became the iconic empire, the seat of all evil. In critiquing empire, Jewish writers used
Babylon to remember that empire regularly conquered with violence, war, and death. Blood covered the earth. Empire also led to regular practices of
economic injustice. Real, physical
hunger was ignored. The poor were
cheated of their subsistence so that the rich could regularly fill themselves
with lavish fare. Finally, one of the
signposts of imperial sin was ecological devastation. The earth hemorrhaged. Mother Earth, as a living, spiritual being, began to
wheel out of control in chaos. Famines,
disease, and catastrophic shortages became more commonplace.[2]
To convey
just how terrifying and ghastly these imperial practices were, Jewish
storytellers created monstrous beasts with multiple heads, long teeth, and insatiable
appetites.[3] These monsters salted the land, burned the
cities, killed or enslaved the men, raped the women, and turned paradise into
desert.
The book
of Revelation is very specific in naming kings, military generals, and
merchants as the enforcers of this living death. Only a certain “marked” people can
participate in the wealth such a system generates. If a people is unwilling to play by the rules
of the system, that people will be slaughtered at worst, excluded from the
imperial wealth at best. This Domination
System ensured the participation of the masses through deception, brute force,
and charity. The rule is, however, that
all must participate and comply. Or
die. (Revelation 13:14, 16-17)
The
classic Jewish drama plays out in Revelation.
When allegiance or complicity is demanded which conflicts with allegiance
to the Living God, how has a faithful Jew responded through the ages? To whom do they give friendship? To whom do they give following or loyalty?
Remember
that the Biblical definition for purity is to “will one thing.” That is a prophetic statement which suggests
that God unseats all other idols, priorities, or values. The exiled author of Revelation, John of
Patmos, advocates a fasting from the machinations of the Roman Empire. The angel in Revelation 18 tells the
faithful, “Come out of her, my people, so that you do not take part in her
sins, and so that you do not share in her plagues.”
As Jewish
storytellers and prophets had declared for centuries, the correct response to
impire was an unwillingness to provide allegiance for, cooperation with, or a
participation in the imperial religious, political, or economic systems.
Exiled by
Rome on the isle of Patmos, John made it clear that to choose for the
Domination System, to choose for empire, meant lack of freedom or enslavement.
Chapter 18 reads, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. She has become a haunt for demons. She is a cage for every unclean spirit, a
cage for every unclean bird, a cage for every unclean and disgusting beast.”
John
urged the people to show their freedom through their unwillingness to show
allegiance to, cooperate with, or participate in the Domination System. For it is tempting to use the system to gain
what little profit one can, when it appears to be your only source of life on
the horizon. Fast from the system of
death, John encourages.
This
fasting, or freedom from empire, allowed the faithful Jew to be free for the
things of God. Though it should be
remembered that John’s vision is graphic about what your fasting from empire
might cost you. The cost of discipleship
might mean your life.
But,
sisters and brothers, sibling and cousins, God’s purposes are being worked
out. And the future . . . ah, the future
is so bright we have to wear shades.
John’s vision, part of it in Revelation 21, is borrowed from the Babylonian
Exile prophet Exile prophet Ezekiel who believes the first order of joining
hands with God is a friendship in solidarity that will lead to the creation of
a new heaven and a new earth. And the
heaven and earth will be filled with the presence of God. Caesar will be unseated and God will take the
throne—with a whole set of other values.
War and sorrow are no more. The land and creation are restored. Rural and urban settings live in harmony. The water will not be poisoned with lead
or despoiled with blood. Rather, the river running from the throne will be crystal clear.
Would
that some evangelical, fundamentalist, or even mainline preacher study
Revelation enough to notice that critique.
Can you imagine someone at one of these highly-advertised Revelation
seminars preaching that the end of the world is coming because we have not
headed off empires appetite for conquering through war, economic justice, and
ecological devastation?
The “freedom
for” to “freedom for” found in Revelation must seem miles away from the simple
fasting I did from social media one Lent.
But that fasting had me wondering how available I am for my faith and
family when I spend too much time fretting over whether I should join the Wordle
craze. Do I use Facebook and Twitter for
enjoyment or do they use me, manipulate me, define my world, tell me who are my
friends? Do I use my cell phone, my
podcasts, or my Roku TV to entertain me, or does my cell phone (oh, I’d better
check that email), my podcasts (do I have an Illini podcast cued up for my free
time), or do the many Roku TV apps (will I have to join Hulu to watch that
show?), do they all dictate my life? Is
my identity defined by the kings, military officers, and merchants of the world? Or am I free enough to claim my faithful
identity as a Child of God? How do I claim
the good I want to do? Who am I friend
to? Who am I follower of?
Even more
gut-wrentching . . .
As a community, as a nation, how do we resist or fast
from those practices of empire which are all about systems or cultures of
conquering, and war, and economic injustice, and ecological catastrophe? Do these systems and cultures define us and
the wants, desires, and practices we have in the world? Or are we able to, as John describes in
Revelation, step out from them to define their role in our lives? How do we claim our faithful identity as the Children
of God? As the Body of Christ? How do we claim the good we want to do?
God’s
purposes are being worked out. Though it
might not be apparent, God is acting as a source of life, an underground spring
that we may not believe war, economic injustice, and ecological catastrophe are
the only ways we might live in the world.
May we choose the freedom for a place where war and sorrow are no more,
where rural and urban settings live in harmony, heaven and earth are filled
with the presence of God, and the river flows crystal clear from God’s throne. May we have the courage to walk faithfully
toward that vision. Amen.
[1]
Roberta Bondi, “Prayer in Friendship with God,” Christian Century, January
29, 1997.
[2] See
David J. Hawkin, “Globalization, Empire, and the Four Horsemen of the
Apocalypse,” Churchman 118 (2004), pp. 317-324.
[3] Heather
Macumber, “A Monster without a Name:
Creating the Beast Known as Antiochus IV in Daniel 7,” Journal of
Hebrew Scriptures Vol. 15, Article 9, DOI:1055.08/jhs.2015.v.15.a9.
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