Top 40 Theology

(Originally written March 2010)

So this is something I've been musing about for months; nay, years, and a journal entry may not do it justice, but here goes anyway.

If you listen to top 40 at all, you've probably hear Miley Cirus' song "The Climb." My wife can't stand it. Wierdly, I think it's kind of catchy, in a you're-16-and-you-already-sound-like-you-have-Cindy-Lauper-type-vocal-dysfunction sort of way, but catchy nonetheless. And if you listen to Country radio at all, you've heard Miss Underwood sing "Temporary Home." They offer polar opposite life philosophies which border on - and at times unapologetically dive into - Theology. But here's the rub: they both, like their more esteemed counterparts from academia, fall catastrophically short.

"Well what did you expect from a former American Idol (is that not the most unapologetically pagan yet accurate description of a TV show ever?) and a former...Hannah Montana...whatever she did.?" I actually thought both songs were gutsy choices for these performers, but I am getting off track.

The message in "The Climb" can be summed up in these words from the chorus : "Ain't about how fast I get there, ain't about what's waiting on the other side- it's the climb." Fair enough. Although if you've ever been climbing the final destination has more than a little to do with the blood, blisters, sweat and tears along the way, but the song makes a valid point about the (potentially) transformative process of the journey as well as the risk of missing out on all the things along the way if we only ever look for the end result.

"Temporary Home" offers what many would call a Christian perspective on life, namely enduring hardships here on earth by viewing them through the lens of eternity, an eternity spent in Heaven. The song talks about a single Mom trying to provide for her daughter, a young boy who's bounced from foster home to foster home, and an elderly man on his death bed being comforted (and comforting his family) by his impending entrance into glory. Well, what's wrong with that?

If you've ever been in a situation where a family member was saying goodbye in their hospital room before they die, and the family and ill family member are Christians, you will never again doubt the power of Scripture to comfort and sustain the frail bodies and broken hearts were find ourselves wrapped in here on earth. But what about the foster kid being ok with his situation? What about the struggling mom and her dependant daughter? Evangelicals have for far too long been apathetic on these issues, and a watching world has called us on it. Certainly the eternal security of any soul should be paramount in our interactions with them, but that doesn't put food in their stomachs. That doesn't stop their dad from beating their mom. That doesn't stop molestation, abandonment, poverty, or provide education, counseling, or opportunities.

When I was a freshman I was in a discussion oriented class where part of the required reading was a book titled "Heaven is not my Home." I wish I had read the darn thing. As near as I could gather from the title and subsequent in-class conversations it had a bone to pick with Christians on these very issues, and in particular the hymn with which many of us are familiar. Later on I had a sociology prof who leveled the claim that religion was a tool with which to oppress the masses and keep them in poverty by distracting their starving eyes with promises of paradise. Dude had an ax to grind.

So which is it, as the famous candy asks? Now or Later?

Why can't it be both?

Or maybe, why can't people see that it HAS to be both, if either is to have any significance?

Here and now, and all the accompanying pain, sickness, sorrow, and longing for eternal happiness, love and fulfillment, only makes sense if there is a God who created us to long for these things, who did not incorporate sin into the original plan. Yet our actions here in our 'temporary home' clearly have eternal implications, if we are to believe what Scripture says about our actions, how we treat the poor, and what we do with the tellingly physical and temporary life and ministry of the person of Jesus Christ. Yet here we are some two millennia later and still we have these two entrenched camps. The problem is, as it often is, both sides have parts of the truth, which if focused on to the exclusion of the other parts leads to a bunch of divided righteously indignant folks who understandably say, "But what about THIS?!" Sound familiar? So where is the balance? Where is the love, the love, the love....

The example that keeps popping into my head was one I heard a few years ago, from a man I consider myself blessed to have known and even more blessed to have worked under. He delivering a sermon and was citing a book as an example. The book had been written by an officer (army? my mind is regrettably hazy on certain details) who had served and been a POW in the Vietnam war. A devout Christian, he wrote a book recalling his experiences as a prisoner and how his faith in the eternal had sustained him in the immensely difficult temporal. He recounted being able to tell which new prisoners would make it and which wouldn't (he was incarcerated for nearly a decade). He said the ones that came in visibly optimistic would talk about being home for Christmas, then Easter, then a family member's birthday...as the reality of the situation set in their superficial optimism turned into irreparable despair. He said that he and several others learned to look at the most brutal and ugly realities of their situation, while always having an ultimate hope....that was what sustained them through years of unspeakable hardships.

To not acknowledge and do something about the ugliness and injustices in this world due to misguided religious zeal is immature and inexcusable. That type of Christianity is disingenuous and frankly, useless. But to mock someone's ultimate hope as a fairy tale for the weak that can't handle the complex realities of today's world is equally irresponsible and self-indulgent. You learn much along the climb, because Christ has surrounded us with fragments of his glory and clues as to his character and our subsequent responsibilities in light of this new understanding. You are able to endure the climb because you know that someday there will be a mountaintop like none any eye has seen, where valleys that seemed eternal are hardly visible and everything is put into perfect perspective. We are not there yet, but thank God we are on our way! Our temporary home has significance because God created it, called it good, and instructed us to take care of it. But "God", "good" and "care" are words which only truly find their definitions in eternity, or in the One who is waiting there for us. This is the paradox of Christian living, the eternal in the temporal. The significant-yet-temporary climb. If either the journey or the destination get left out, the other becomes meaningless.