Part of the attraction of religion is it makes sense of the experiential content of what Carl Jung called 'synchronicity', its that sense that you are destined or fated to do something, the sense that, through it all, 'God has a plan'. The success of the purpose-driven movement is a testament to how powerful a part of the religious experience this is. But as a person who believes that God is an 'Open' God, who does not know all that will happen in the future, and is responsive to human choices and actions, can I have any place for this in my system? Is my religion of Cosmic Surprise and Adventure capable of making sense of the experience of destiny? I think so.
Parents have plans for their children. They plan for their children to do well, to be all they can be, to succeed in life, to be happy, to find fulfillment. They make plans and undertake actions to make this more likely. They save for college, they try to be the best parents they can be, they focus on their children, they act to help make their plan a reality. But a parent cannot force their own image of 'the good' upon the child. They cannot decide before hand what the child will do for a living, what kind of person they will marry, how many children they will have. To force one's own conception of the good life upon a child is not to really love the child as something independent of oneself, but rather only to use the child as a route to ego justification, it is to love the child incompletely. And to love a child in such a way is a risk, it entails the possibility that the child can indeed hurt themselves, the parent, or other people. Such is the risk of freedom-providing love. But it remains true that the parent CAN have plans for their children, just not the kind of plans that remove the child's freedom, rather they must be plans that increase a child's freedom.
There is a character of life that we all want expressed within those we lead. There is something it means to be a 'decent person' a person of integrity, a mensch, etc. But there are oh so many ways to express that character. There are so many KINDS of decent people, such a plethora of possible expressions of good character. I've met so many different ways goodness expresses itself. To somehow box in the character of life within one particular expression of it, is to in fact remove that character one seeks. Because creative self-expression is an essential part of the good life. It makes sense to plan and hope that the people one influences will adopt that certain character of the good, but it makes little sense to kill that very character by forcing a certain vision of how it MUST be upon it.
God is becoming incarnate in the universe, or rather more or less incarnate, every day. God calls the universe to express His Character, but HOW that character is expressed isn't predetermined. And indeed as the Universe expresses that character in new ways. God Himself changes, by sharing in those experiences, God's form is transformed by the adventure of the universe, but the Universe is conditioned by God's changeless, powerful character. God indeed has a plan for the Universe in the overall, just as He has a plan for me in the overall, that plan being the expression of the Divine Character, to experience 'The Good' to be fulfilled, to find happiness, to discover my true self, to share in the adventure of life in love and faith, etc, etc. But HOW that character is expressed, how the adventure will proceed, is in no way demanded or predetermined. And there is something else. In every moment, God has a vision (or rather visionS) of how the universe could proceed in such a way that it could indeed express His Character. God presents me with ideal possibilitiies, ways the world could be more divine, given the facts on the ground as they are now. These ideal possibilities are callings, God calling me to a better way. To fulfill these possibilities, is in a very real way to fulfill my destiny, my fate. When God sees a path that is important to the fulfillment of myself and 'The World' He 'lights that path up' and leads me to it, He sees for me, in that one moment, a possible destiny, that would be a genuine fulfillment of His plan for my life. But those possibilities, those paths, change given the events here 'on the ground'. A friend needs a kidney, God calls me to donate my own, I feel and experience the call. But my fear and doubt and self-centeredness keep me from acting, the friend dies, I can now no longer be called to that act. That act is closed to me forever, by the facts on the ground, God can no longer call me to it. But God will now, given the changes on the facts on the ground, call me to something else. My fate, my destiny...changes.
So one can fully retain all the valuable insights of the image of the Absolutely Sovereign God and incorporate them into a theology of God as Suffering Servant, as Crucified and Rising Christ, as Companion and Friend.
No comments:
Post a Comment