city, are their only world, their only place of identity. For this reason, the world and its destructive currents pose a much more serious threat to them. If local believers lower their guard by fraternizing too closely with “bad” people, the “worldly” forces that surround them will snatch away their new life in Christ. To intentionally remove social barriers with the world is considered unwise, even foolish. Moreover, their motives would be questioned if they were seen hanging out too much with immoral people.
Absolutizing
Line drawing between “decent” people and “unworthy” people creates a false either/or, an artificial choice between good and bad. With a wide angle lens, such line drawing falls within the broader human propensity for absolutizing that which God relativizes.3 To absolutize something is to make it an unchangeable standard, an ultimate reality—something to be adopted, not adapted. When we absolutize a cause, a strategy, or a doctrinal interpretation, we become dogmatic and closed. In our thinking and attitudes we become air tight, unwilling to engage in dialogue with a perceived enemy who could threaten our stance. We cannot love and respect those who hold different views. Though unspoken, the thinking is this: “When I know that I’m right, and that God is on my side, why would I play host to the devil and his schemes?” This attitude precludes any dialogue.
In the political jargon of Washington, DC, this becomes, “We don’t negotiate with terrorists.” In first-century Palestine, it was, “We know the Christ doesn’t come from Galilee” (John 7:41) and, “If he were a real man of God he wouldn’t defile himself with sinners” (Luke 15). In some churches you hear, “Everything must be done with decency and in order.” In others, “Heaven is our destiny and soul winning is why we’re here.” In Venezuelan politics, the slogan of the current government is “Fatherland, Socialism, or Death.”
What do these statements have in common? They absolutize that which we hold dearest. Even though some of these causes might be worthy of our concern, they become anti-gospel and destructive when we give them an authority that belongs to God alone.
Here lies the beauty of our friendship with Caligallo. God used this young man to teach us that a street criminal is much more than a street criminal. Caligallo was a human being (alas, much like myself!). In the parable of the prodigal, the older brother absolutizes his position and status as the worthy son. He deems his brother unworthy, leaving no room for negotiating the matter. To accept his younger sibling as no different than himself—equally guilty and shameful in his actions, and equally welcomed by their father’s embrace—was an unacceptable impossibility.
Our Non-Absolutizing Savior
In Luke 20, when Jesus entered Jerusalem, the teachers of the law sent spies to trap Jesus in his words. The plan they hatched assumed he operated within their framework. Jesus confounded them because he revealed a fundamentally different way of seeing things. The question they posed to him was: Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not? The question assumed a closed system, a world of absolutized options. Caesar was all-wrong. Israel, with its God-given covenants and law, was all-right. Classic, air-tight thinking. Jesus, they thought, would be forced to reveal his true allegiance. He was either with them or against them. To their surprise, Jesus didn’t fall into the trap. Jesus’ spirituality was different from theirs. He didn’t absolutize the Israelite establishment and its nationalistic cause. Let’s look at what he did.
Jesus took a position above the polemic that pit Caesar against Moses. Does this mean Jesus betrayed Moses and the Jewish nation? It means Jesus didn’t equate Israel and its interpretations of things with God’s. Concretely, it means Jesus wasn’t in step with an Israel whose self-perception didn’t permit them to accept their pagan neighbors as objects of Yahweh’s love and affection.
Am I suggesting Jesus advocated a laissez-faire faith in which ultimate beliefs don’t matter? The counterpoint to not absolutizing isn’t the lack of strongly held beliefs. Jesus held beliefs just as fervently as the scribes and Pharisees. Where, then, does the difference lie? Jesus’ only absolute was his heavenly Father. He didn’t believe in Israel the way he believed in his heavenly Father. Nor did he believe in Moses the way he believed in Yahweh, the God of Moses.
The teachers of the law, chief priests, and Pharisees saw these matters differently. Note that in this diagram their nation is at the extreme left of the horizontal line, with God on their side. To the Jews of Israel, their nation and their understanding of themselves were absolute. To acknowledge that God could be present among a pagan nation like Rome was tantamount to heresy and worthy of condemnation. God was on Israel’s side and against their pagan neighbors. Jesus, on the other hand, removed himself from the false dichotomy. He refused to inhabit the either/or continuum where Israel and Rome dwelled at either extreme. By granting primacy to God alone, Jesus relativized his attitude and allegiance toward both. Neither Caesar nor Moses represented ultimate reality. Nor were they to wield unquestioned authority. Both were flawed instruments with limited powers.
To relativize Rome and Israel didn’t make them equals. Jesus didn’t treat them as if they were one and the same. Rome was Rome, Israel was Israel, and God’s purpose for each was unique. In the prodigal parable, the father’s heart beats for both sons, even as his love expresses itself differently to each.
Jesus is Savior of the whole world. Though this bald declaration may appear cliché, there’s an edge to it that is often lost. God’s primacy over all nations translates into Jesus’ defiling himself and the Twelve by spending two nights in a Samaritan village (John 4). By seeing God’s supremacy as rendering all other causes relative to God’s ultimate Lordship, Jesus affirmed a Roman centurion’s faith as greater than that of “anyone in Israel” (Matt 8:10).
In declaring himself and his mission as the truth (John 14:6), Jesus spoke as one with absolute authority. We, his followers, get tripped up by lending absolute authority to our interpretation of Jesus. As “older brothers” in God’s family, we believe we see truly, when in fact we see through a glass dimly. With family dynamics like this, we need a very special father.
1. Bailey, Cross and the Prodigal.
2. Ibid., 44–47.
3. Eller, Christian Anarchy, 1–47.
3 / The Running and Pleading Father
Imagine the father’s sorrow as he looks down the road day after day, waiting for his “son that was dead” to return. Grief over his son’s foolish heart keeps him awake and vigilant. Though overcome with joy enough to throw a party when the son comes home, his grief continues. He laments his older son’s refusal to join the celebration.
Before Caligallo was killed, I knew his days were numbered. My grieving had already begun. After he was gone, my compassion for Caligallo translated into sorrow for my neighbors. Their exuberance at the news of his elimination stabbed me in the heart.
I can imagine the father’s sorrow also peaking, like Ryan’s and mine, at the likely comments from the incredulous townspeople. “What on earth’s going on?” “I can’t believe what I’m seeing!” “How could a father do such a thing?” “What a disgrace!” “What that boy needs is a good spanking!”
The dad in the parable is wealthy, a
