Author: Wick

“The power of God is not pagan violence, brute power, or vulgar magic; it is the power of powerlessness, the power of the call, the power of protest that rises up from innocent suffering and calls out against it, the power that says NO to unjust suffering, and finally, the power to suffer-with (sym-pathos) innocent suffering, which is perhaps the central Christian symbol.” Caputo – The Weakness of God

Caputo brings up an interesting topic, one that I’ve not given much thought (though I remember it being thought of briefly in college, under the topic of “trying to get a good grade in theology, and not doing well”). The question is this:

“Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation.”

I memorized this verse back in high school. But never really gave it much thought. “Grow up in my salvation?” I was saved, wasn’t I? I said the prayer that talked about asking Jesus into my heart. Bible says that covers me, right? Done deal.

Then life/college/post-college hit. Turns out, this salvation and all that God desires/is/is doing is something quite a bit larger than simply “coming into my heart”. Overwhelmingly so. But not overwhelming in the tidal wave of death that’s about to swallow an entire village. Overwhelming in the sense of a tidal wave of new life (that may included death) that’s about to swallow all of creation.

Pretty cool stuff.

There’s also the aspect of craving something like a newborn baby. We’ve all seen them. Even as a student in school I could understand this concept. But to actually be the parent of several newborn babies, who all naturally CRAVE milk. To see as they’ve been unsuccessfully attempted to satisfy by bottles, or pacifiers, etc.

I also pray that I do crave PURE spiritual milk. Not watered down. Not easier to swallow because it’s been processed and rid of certain nutrients. It’s a good craving to practice, and there is plenty of time and spiritual milk out there to be satisfied, and yet continue to crave….

“Suppose our thought of God is not domesticated by Sunday sermons by His Reverence or co-opted by ecstatic visions of a great military show of arms in a massive square, visions of the super eminent power of the supreme creator of heaven and earth, of the hyper-eminence of the arche?…

..Suppose that we reverse these gears and thrust theology in the direction of weakness and the disavowal of power?” John Caputo – The Weakness of God

We don’t have to talk for very long to see the influences he’s calling out here. Or the benefit of emphasizing God’s connection (not out of pity, or even sense of religious duty) with the marginalized and powerless of the world. Perhaps we’ve clung to, and over sold God’s nature of…well…what we would say “being God”. For many of us, that means things like “all-powerful”, and “over all things” (able to control, exert His Lordship, etc. etc…) Of course, with all of that in mind, it’s easy for us to swear our undying allegiance to Him. As the bumper sticker reminds us…”we win”.

But what about swearing our allegiance to the God of the weak? Not that God lacks in anything, but that God is so beyond needing to trump any “power” or “prove” Godself in any way that we could think of. That the real power behind God is not in winning some sort of triumphal “end times battle” where God and Darkness duke it out in a ring (located somewhere near Armageddon, right?) But the triumph comes in revelation of Truth. Darkness was/is powerless from the beginning.