One day, when Jesus was talking to his followers about the folly of humans making vows, he said,
“But let your statement be, ‘Yes, yes ‘ or ‘No, no’ anything beyond these is of evil.”
The thought seems so direct and filled with obvious inference, that you wonder why Jesus would take the time to mention it. But in reality, who on earth really lives in this manner? Without promise or vow, how can we assess the honest or pure intentions of the people that we are dealing with? It’s like Jesus is propagating some version of a “handshake” theology.
I think the confusion lies in the nature of a vow or a promise against the simple affirmation that Jesus advocated for his followers. A vow is eternal. Beyond circumstance. If a person vows… then they are binding themselves into infinite spiritual territories that are unknown. If one party dies, the vow remains, unless some sort of reductionist clause is added which calls for the vow to be terminated when one party dies. Is a vow with this sort of an alteration, still a vow? With a handshake, the universe knows, if the hand dies, the shake dies with it. A vow or a promise, on the other hand, is beyond the person. Possibly, the vows spoken of by Jesus dealt with the reality that the finite cannot bind the infinite into some sort of agreement. The infinite can work alone with full capacity to fulfill a vow, the finite cannot.
Maybe Jesus was trying to get his followers to contemplate the true nature of their identity as created beings. Perhaps to be created negates the power to vow… except in the misnomered simple human to human vows rife with clauses and behavioral poetry…. like, “no ice cream past 8 o’clock.” Perhaps no vow is possible from finite to infinite save the immature promise of= if you…then me. Right now, I’m thinking about the vow Peter made to Jesus in all of his humanness… “I am ready to die with you.” Peter would die for Jesus, but he wasn’t ready to make vows to God.
So, all of this just makes me think about the chaos of existence and how we seem to clunk around asserting our identities and shouting our opinions and arguing our knowledge.
And I wonder, if foundationally, evil knows that, for the world, Jesus is the only Yes. The only true affirmation of life. And because of that, evil has multiplied and subdivided the No’s into a seemingly infinite array of possibilities…. to the point where at this moment, all of Yes is No.
Do humans go beyond Yes or No (Jesus values or World values) into evil thinking they are following truth? If a person says Yes to No does that satisfy the fundamental path Jesus referred to? When we say Yes to No is the void still present in our heart? Saying Yes to No infers saying No to Yes.
In a world united under the contentious banner of technology and programming, perhaps the only Yes to Jesus is service to humanity apart from worldly recognition. (If I were honestly true to this thought, would I type a blog where others might read and ponder my random thoughts and then divide over them?)
Deny yourself?
Pick up your cross?
To be right or to be loving?
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
Yes?
or
No?
Fictive Whispers 