[I’m on vacation for the month of July. But I’m still blogging. This isn’t a sermon or a reflection I’ve written with anyone in mind. Just thoughts that happen alongside the lectionary.]
Last week, extreme weather drove trees and power lines to the ground, covering the community in constant darkness. The sense of powerlessness, communicated our profound lack clearly.
The storm was several hours, but its savagery was short, a mere twenty minutes. Lightening painted the sky, but rain became occasional. The temperature dropped, and with the windows open, it made for strangely comfortable sleeping.
The ensuing week was hot and there was no relief at night. The luxury of air conditioning and electronic entertainment were missed, constantly.
It is hard to avoid the connection to climate change. Both the extreme weather and our unpreparedness for its effects.
Expectations
Even as we expect climate change to effect our communities, we don’t really expect anything to change. It’s an intellectual exercise, really. A potentiality more than something we live through.
This was so clear, though. The effect so obvious. The heat. Loss of power (literal and figurative). Our inability to communicate. Both our present and our future. A foretaste of what’s to come.
Against this, an expectation of “normal” seems indulgent. Not something imbued with hope, but with malice and entitlement. Much like the entitlement sold to the Silent Generation as they went off to work in the 1950s. Work hard now and you’ll get your reward later. Later, of course, has come. And this is the reward?
There’s something disorienting and shallow about this kind of entitlement. It isn’t predicated on wisdom or relationship. It relies on an elemental certainty, a bedrock faith in balance. Like good always wins—all by itself. Like natural laws of probability will manifest this, regardless of what we (or anyone else) do.
This is a myth, but not faith. At least not a reflection of spiritual faith, anyway.
Expecting the gift
We’ve taken to calling welfare expenditures “entitlement spending”. It casts a negative shadow on protecting the population. And it belies the kinds of expectations that generate hope.
Expecting our neighbors will do the right thing most of the time is a foundational element of our society. Helping our neighbors not go hungry must be one too. Because these both free us to hope.
When Jesus condemns “this generation”, it is when he looks at the people and sees that their expectations are out of whack.
“We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.”
Not the expectations of generosity and hope. Not a look of love and gratitude. An expectation of subservience. Dance, monkey!
It is much like expecting the gift and getting mad when it isn’t good enough.
Expectation: It’s all relational
Our expectations of others are all about our relationship. To them, from them, with them.
It is why our expectations about the climate never stay as our own. It’s our climate, our world, air, community, relationships, churches, schools. We share in these things and with them. Wildfires in Canada bring bad air quality here.
It is distortion to pretend we’re separate.
This is what Jesus shares about expectations. Not just that they have crazy expectations about him. That we have manipulative desires for controlling each other. But that we are a we.
And we don’t get to throw stones from the cheap seats. We aren’t supposed to live life like theater critics.
We’re supposed to love. That’s the work. And the work is going on on the stage.
Note: the characters of Statler and Waldorf are part of the show. For the Muppets, the whole theater embodies “the stage”. In this way, the critics are part of the show. But notice how many critics there are. Kermit isn’t a critic. Or Fozzy. There’s a giant cast and only two critics. Their critique isn’t actually of the show, but exists as part of the show.
Today, much of our critical culture attempts to exist outside of the show, while making each of us an independent critic. No wonder people don’t feel creative or a part of anything.