Take That Road

Field Notes From a Religion-Less Christian

March 14, 2022

On Confidence in the Face of Annihilation

“Arise, O God, maintain your cause.” (Psalm 74)

It deserves an exclamation point. There is none. I want to place an exclamation point. There is none. So is it written in exasperation of realizing nothing will come of it? Or is it rather written in the firm and steady confidence that the advent has already begun and all will be rectified and all will be well?

Will something this week with Putin’s invasion of Ukraine plunge us into a global conflagration? Chemical or nuclear weapons unleashed?! The specter of such changes all war. But what is the cost of “allowing” Russia to swallow Ukraine? This is insane that we have nation-states invading others. But why would be think we have evolved to something more civilized?

When I realize that Jesus’ death and resurrection is the merciful love at all costs (death) declared to be the eschaton on and over all human endeavor (resurrection), I end up with the conclusion of “the firm and steady confidence that the advent has already begun and all will be rectified and all will be well.” “Arise, O God and maintain your cause,” means that. 

But how could I say such a preposterous thing? On what basis? What evidence? Why is it not some pipe-dream of the innocent and the poor?

[Excursus on Dietrich Bonhoeffer and confidence in God: Bonhoeffer, in “After Ten Years,” writing in 1942 of the previous 10 years of resistance to Nazism and companionship therein with family and colleague and friends, 1 year before his imprisonment for such and 3 years before his murderous hanging for the same, asks “Who Stands Firm?” and answers not one who has confidence in godliness but rather one who has confidence in God (this is my language, the way I can say it). He writes, “Who stands firm? Only the one whose ultimate standard is not his reason, his principles, conscience, freedom or virtue; only the one who is prepared to sacrifice all of these when, in faith and in relationship to God alone, he is called to obedient and responsible action” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, English Edition, Vol. 8, p 40). This is a difficult distinction for us to make – this godliness vs. God, because we cannot not think of ourselves as the actors on every stage, the subject of every sentence. Outcomes always and only depend on our ability to act, whether in behavior or belief. We cannot, we will not allow ourselves to be taken out of the game so that our outcomes, our destiny, lies solely in someone else’s hands. Faith in God, confidence in God, is not an add-on to virtues (e.g. reason principles, conscience or virtue) but rather the annihilation and lose of virtue, just so there is nothing left of Self, only God remains. Faith is being bereft of Self and filled by God. Luther writes in his Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians (1531, LW 26): “And this is why our theology is certain; it snatches us away from ourselves and places us outside ourselves so that we do not depend on our own strength, conscience, experience or works, but depend on that which is outside ourselves, that is, on the promise and truth of God, which cannot deceive.”

If we cannot allow ourselves to give up our place on the playing court so as to win the game by letting somebody else play, how do we get to that victory?  How do we come to such faith, this faith that is the absolute opposite of weakness, the opposite of an atrophy in the face of evil, but rather a confidence in God so that all godliness can falter and fall and in fact be killed, but always “stand firm”? We come to it only kicking and screaming all the way as God drags us out of the game, benches us. How do we come to such faith, such confidence in God? How do we stand firm? We are placed there, put there, killed (of any agency) (I think of Colossians 1 here: taken from darkness and transferred to the Kingdom). We come to such confidence in God by God. 

The great irony then occurs. The one bereft of all virtue and ability to affect any change becomes the most powerful resistance to evil, the only thing that defeats evil, a confidence in God alone and not a confidence in positive outcomes. Who stands firm? The one who cares not anymore of stability and strength but only God, who is unmerited and unconditional mercy. The one who loves at all costs simply because faith in God alone means only that that action and option, faith active in love, is left on the table. You cannot trust in God alone and not only love (bring mercy) at all costs and to the end.]

The one born in Nazareth (and the story says Bethlehem so to ensure we know his salvific lineage) is hung up on a tree, ignominiously, and savagely executed by the State. That is the evidence. After that, you see, there is nothing left of our aspirations to wealth and well-being. There is nothing left standing. It is a nuclear and chemical war let loose on creation and it is an annihilation. Not maybe. Not could be. But actual and done. It is finished. That is the way Jesus put it, of course, and it makes sense that we should take him at his word. Nothing left, then, but what? But what? Anything left when nothing left? What can come of nothing? Only that whom created nothing in the first place and then created something out of nothing. 

God. 

Arise, O God, and maintain your cause!