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Standing at the edge
The practical verses the ideal and how to bring Jesus’ Kingdom of God into the world.
Jeff Neuman-Lee
June 17, 2007
There were two men: a practical man and an idealistic man. They were leaders in their community. They stood on a hilltop facing away from all their people. They were to lead the people forward to a better place.
The practical man looked down the hill. He saw where the land sloped more gently, where the people and their wagons might move smoothly, without tipping over. He watched the curve of the river below, searching for places where it might be forded, or, if not that, where it might be most easily bridged. His mind raced to think of all the people and skills necessary for this endeavor. He also thought about how difficult this move might be to sell to his people. The slope was steeper and the river wider than they were used to. The grassy area where the people had taken up a place to rest was fertile, although not enough to sustain the people for long. The people might want to just stick around longer than what would be good for them.
The idealistic man stood shoulder to shoulder with the practical man. He did not look directly down. He did not see the slope or the tumbling water where it stopped. He did not notice the next hill or even the next one after that. He was looking out beyond the horizon, noticing the direction in which the people should all go.
One of the things about being on the edge of culture that can haunt you is the pull to be just one of the guys (or girls.) To be regular. To not stand out. It is the most powerful force for conformity. Jesus understands this in a most pointed way. In his parable of the sower, some of the seed lands where the cares of the world gather like weeds around the other-wise fine seed, and chokes it out. Jesus also warns his followers that there is a real cost to following him, that we should weigh that cost with what we can tolerate. Is doing God’s will worth it to us? Or not. Jesus also warns about persecution, which can take many forms, from the spontaneous disgusted look on the street, to socially expected intolerance and ostracism, to organized governmental scapegoating and hatred. Or, in his own example, to death.
For being different, on the edge of culture.
Yet, this is what followers of Jesus, Christians, are supposed to be. We are the priesthood of God, mediating between God and the world. God’s purposes for humanity, what Jesus calls the Kingdom of God, is really different than what humans normally expect. Without the people who follow Jesus, God’s kingdom might not be seen. It is something different from what is normal.
And that difference is a gift to the world. Those who can be different show the world something which it has not seen; they offer, within themselves, a better world to others. They hope to allow God’s Spirit to work within them in such a way as to be true representatives of Jesus’ Kingdom of God. Even if they lose their friends. Even if they lose their lives.
Sounds heroic, or frightening. And, given that the results of one’s standing in a different place may certainly not be seen until after one’s death, to stand at the edge of culture in the cause of Jesus’ Kingdom of God demands substantial faith. By “substantial” I mean faith which has real substance. The power to change oneself in relation to others and to God.
From here, we have some questions about how to do this. How do we be priests to the remainder of humanity? So, the tug between practical faith action and idealistic faith action.
An example of practical faith action: a team of Jesus’ followers “dumbs down” the message to include its individualistic parts but exclude the large community minded part of the message and puts on great Sunday morning worship/shows to attract many, many people whose culture expects an individualistic message and great shows. The team doesn’t move these folks very far from their culture, at least not at first, but they might just move some very close to following Jesus and the whole to some degree closer.
And example of idealistic faith: a team of Jesus’ followers refuses to compromise their understanding of the message and, like prophets of old, are imprisoned and ridiculed by society. Many people are disgusted by them and many people misunderstand them because they are simply so far away from people’s understanding of what it means to be human. This team, too, doesn’t move folks very far from their culture, except perhaps a few, who catch a deep vision of what the world can be if they, too, follow Jesus.
There are dangers to both sets of teams of Jesus’ followers. In the first case, the team of Jesus’ followers are tempted to simply jump into the world and its values and lose their place as priests for Jesus’ Kingdom of God. In the second case, the team of Jesus’ followers are tempted by their own supposed purity to keep themselves from really interacting with others and refuse their place as priests for Jesus’ Kingdom of God.
Yet, there are also different benefits which follow from each strategy. In the first case, the more “practical” case, more people may potentially be moved more quickly. In the second case, the more “idealistic” case, the culture may gain a new understanding of the depths of the life of Christ and, in the long term, be moved altogether.
In both instances the work of Christ is being done. In neither case is it done, nor can it be done, in some complete and exhaustive way. Rather the practical and ideal paths complement each other.
It doesn’t stop those who go either practical or ideal from hating each other. Determined that their way is right, they push against each other and challenge each other and even attack each other. All in the name of the Prince of Peace.
Still, God is working even in this.
I hope that if you pause and think about it, you will see how being a priest for Jesus’ Kingdom of God, or in other words, how simply following Jesus is in and of itself a political act. Every follower of Jesus, whether practical or idealistic, in one way or the other stands on the edge of culture and in doing so takes political stands.
I know, I know how many people hate the idea of being political. It feels like putting your hands out at the end of sewage pipe. But it is inescapable for followers of Jesus. To say that there is not politics with following Jesus is self deception.
I invite you to consider the variety of practical ways of following Jesus and idealistic ways of following Jesus. Think about those who, in the love of Christ, consider the young desperate mother in whose poverty cannot see another way but to abort her pregnancy and attempt to defend her rights. Then, those also, in the name of Jesus, consider that new life in her womb and its inherit value and have only disgust for an individual who might contemplate ending that life. Both purposes are in Christ. The first tends towards the practical, the second towards the idealistic. I’m sure you might have an opinion, even a heated opinion about which side is correct.
But to stand back from your own point of view, see that point of view of your opponent having merit from the point of view of the Kingdom. Both are fragmentary parts of God’s whole. Others, who care not for the mother and neither for the unborn, may not be pursing Jesus’ kingdom at all, they have not seen it. Will they see it in the anger the practical followers have against the idealistic followers and vise versa?
I am one who espouses ending war. It is a plague upon humanity. It is against what Jesus’ kingdom promises to be. Pretty idealistic, huh? I have excellent friends who do not glorify war, but see that sometimes it is a practical necessity and a way to move forward towards teaching the world about Jesus’ kingdom.
The dangers of idealism and practicality befuddle us both. One seems to block the other in the pursuit of doing the work of Jesus in this time. Yet as I have learned to love all those who follow Jesus, I have learned that his Spirit is greater than my little patch.
So all I can do is to do what I hear God calling me to do. And then step back and watch how God is working through the whole of those who follow Jesus to see the great work of peace which is coming into this world.
And I have come to appreciate how I need both the practical and idealistic parts of myself and parts of the church. Without the idealistic, the practical person becomes aimless, building bridges to nowhere. Without the practical, the idealistic person cannot get off her mountain and get going.
It is hard work to be good at either being the practical man (or woman) or the idealistic man (or woman.) Many try and do not succeed.
When they do succeed it is definitely a thing of beauty. The practical woman or man engineers pathways and road, easing the movement of the people forward. Even when the people are reluctant to change, still they can stand on the shore and marvel at the gleaming promise of the bridge which might just someday carry them to the other side. It certainly is a clear reality.
On the other hand, the direction of the idealist may only be understood by a few, or totally neglected — not out of want of sympathy, but out of the raw ability to see something close to what she sees. Although less seen, the idealist points the way. And if it is done in concert with God, he or she may just take off from their spot on the hilltop and fly.
Jeff Neuman-Lee
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