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<\/a><\/p>\nJesus asking himself what I\u2019m going to give up this year.<\/em><\/p>\nHere we are again, then, back to my favorite time of year\u2014Lent. It\u2019s my favorite because I prefer its spare solemnity to Easter\u2019s de trop color and elation. It must be just my personal taste that makes me inclined to repent of my sins rather than eating a lot of chocolate or something. It\u2019s not that I\u2019m more holy than you, it\u2019s just that I have better aesthetic sensibilities.<\/p>\n
All kidding aside, as I was sitting in church this morning waiting to have ash smeared on my head and be told that I am going to die, I found myself wondering about two words that I\u2019m hearing more and more. They are becoming entrenched in our common vocabulary, along with the assumptions about life and faith that underly them. The two words are \u2018center\u2019 and \u2018adjacent.\u2019<\/p>\n
As far as I can tell, the way the word \u2018center\u2019 is used is grammatically shifting. It is possible now \u2018to center\u2019 someone or something, rather than to merely \u2018be in the center,\u2019 as one taking on an active quality rather than abiding in a passive one. The taxonomy of \u2018location\u2019 adopts a more forceful tone, as it were. The word \u2018adjacent,\u2019 then, is to be near someone who is in the center, while not getting to fully participate in the glory of whoever is \u2018centered\u2019 but to be a sort of hanger-on, to understand and sympathize as an insider, but not to be granted the full status of the person in the center. The status of the \u2018center,\u2019 moreover, is defined by lack, by having been treated badly by others. The words as they are being used today hint at some perplexing Christian truth.\u00a0Sitting there, hearing the readings go past me, I was suddenly curious about how St Paul might culturally appropriate these words for his own use. There is a jolly good hint in his description of himself and the \u201cfavorable time\u201d of salvation. He says,<\/p>\n
We put no obstacle in anyone\u2019s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love; by truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right and for the left; through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing, as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In this way of being, there is only one person who lives in the center and that is God. He doesn\u2019t have to be \u2018centered\u2019 because he is<\/em> the center. If you go over to Colossians you will see that his \u2018centeredness\u2019 goes all the way out to the margins of the impossible to reach edges of eternity and beyond. There is no end to him being the center, to being all in all. Strangely, though, he invites me to be \u2018adjacent\u2019 to him. I can go nearby and see who he is and then, in a strange turn of events, he \u2018centers\u2019 himself, even in me.<\/p>\nThat \u2018centering\u2019 produces the curious results listed above\u2014the being at the same time poor and rich, dying and yet living, sorrowful yet rejoicing, unknown and known, honored and dishonored, slandered and praised.<\/p>\n
If you wanted to be \u2018Jesus-adjacent\u2019 you would find that you wouldn\u2019t go on merely basking in the glow of the person in the center, but that Jesus would in a single, swift \u2018favorable time\u2019 \u2018decenter\u2019 you by \u2018centering\u2019 himself in<\/em> you. And I think I can see why so few people would be up for such a switch. Because then come the beatings, imprisonment, riots, starvation, and worst of all, humiliation in the eyes of the people you wanted so much to love you. It is in a single moment the least powerful place to be in the cosmos\u2014for it is power that \u2018centering\u2019 and \u2018adjacent\u2019 really refer to\u2014and the most powerful. Or rather, I like that other word, \u2018favorable,\u2019 so much better. This is a favorable time to find Jesus powerfully reordering the hearts of those who so desperately need him.<\/p>\nAnyway, I was thinking this year, as usual, of only being \u2018Lent-Adjacent.\u2019 I, of course, want to decenter myself and center Jesus, but I don\u2019t much have the inclination. And besides, I know he will do it anyway, whether I like it or not. In the meantime, I think I will give up something I don\u2019t like, like oatmeal and the aforementioned humiliation. No wait, that\u2019s my mother. She\u2019s<\/em> giving up oatmeal. Gosh, as usual, being already so \u2018holy,\u2019 I can\u2019t think of anything.<\/p>\nAll kidding aside, in this favorable time, if you have a moment to pray for a dear and beloved person in Kenya who is back in the hospital and not doing well, I would be so grateful. He is a young man with a wife and two children, and no one can figure out what is wrong, and that is partly because the hospital isn\u2019t functioning as well as one might hope. Truly, only God can do a miracle and I would beg you to pray for one today. We worship a God of power and love who comes into our great poverty and affliction. And today, that is what this person, as indeed we all do, needs most.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jesus asking himself what I\u2019m going to give up this year. Here we are again, then, back to my favorite time of year\u2014Lent. It\u2019s my favorite because I prefer its spare solemnity to Easter\u2019s de trop color and elation. It must be just my personal taste that makes me inclined to repent of my sins […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2373,"featured_media":5203,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,80,75],"tags":[23,34,61,64],"class_list":["post-13933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture-watch-2","category-demotivations-with-anne","category-the-bad-word-association","tag-anglicanism","tag-culture-watch","tag-the-church-year","tag-vanity"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n