Dr. Mark Eckel, Director, Mahseh Center

“I Can Do Bad All By Myself.”  Tyler Perry’s latest film title speaks for itself.  William Golding’s The Lord of the Flies declares what humans can become, comes from what humans are—inescapably, terribly, dangerous.  As Ralphie, the bespeckeled target of power gone mad, says, “I’m afraid of us.”  As the cold war strategist George F. Kennan would put it: “The fact of the matter is that there is a little bit of the totalitarian buried somewhere, way down deep, in each and every one of us.”[1] Often I tell my students, pointing out around me, “The problem is not out there,” then pointing to my chest, “The problem is in here!”

“No man’s really any good until he knows how bad he is, or might be.”  Father Brown knew what it was to be “inside a man.”[2] Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s “Ascent,” one of the autobiographical sections of Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago, justly asserts that “the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between political parties—but right through every human heart.”[3] The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Lewis Stevenson demonstrates the titanic battle raging within humans: depravity triumphing over dignity.[4] How The Grinch Stole Christmas is Dr. Seuss’ classic tale about a hard-hearted creature whose life is obsessed with blotting out Christmas.  Charles Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol” reminds the softened soul that indeed Scrooge lives in us all.  Truth be told, we all have “bad hearts.”

But it’s Christmas!  We do not want to dwell on such things!  We would rather, with our culture, declare ourselves good simply because we believe in something.  Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest, exposes the siren call of consumerism for what it does and how we follow.  Describing what he considers to be the most awful marketing promotions

The winner of this year’s worst catch phrase is a tie: between Macy’s and Eddie Bauer.  Macy’s shopping bags say, “A million reasons to believe!”  In what?  What does Macy’s want us to believe in? That Jesus is the Son of God?  (Imagine that on a bag.)  Nearly as maddening was the cover of this year’s Eddie Bauer catalog, which proclaims “We believe.”  As with Macy’s, I was eager to find out just what Eddie Bauer believed in.  The Council of Chalcedon’s fifth-century declaration that Jesus was fully human and fully divine?  Not exactly.  Page three professed the retailer’s creed: “We believe in the world’s best down.”[5]

What is meant to be tongue-in-cheek condemnation of marketers is really a poke at us all.  Who “believes”?  We do!  Why do we “believe”?  Because down deep we think we’re doing good by giving.  However, the mandate of gifts on a holiday does not a heart change!

But it’s Christmas!  Can’t we rest in our goodness for one day out of the year?!  Back-story to our celebration on December 25^th is an oft forgotten character: Ahaz.[6] In his day, the world’s superpower was Assyria, modern day Iraq.  Ahaz was king of Judah.  Judah was a small nation state.  When a couple of northern neighbors rattled their swords, Ahaz went looking for allies.  Ahaz bet the farm on human partnership with Assyria’s dictator Tiglath-Pilesir III.  Neither Isaiah’s words of hope nor The Lord’s direct communication swayed Ahaz from his human-centered course.  Ahaz’ small heart—the Grinch had one too for a while—brought a frightening, foreboding, yet fulfilling prophecy to earth in Isaiah 7.

“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”

These words changed history.  But because Ahaz’ heart was proud, calloused, afraid, and shaken[7] he refused to give The True Sovereign his trust.  The Christmas Story begins with king Ahaz who has forsaken the true King.

But it’s Christmas!  Can’t we tell a positive story?  Why must we be reminded of our corrupt hearts?  Because it is our corrupt hearts that makes Christmas possible.  Without our need for a Savior, Christmas would simply retain its original intention—the pagan celebration of winter solstice.  The Grinch and Scrooge repeat what our hearts need.

Every year CBS runs the 1965 television classic “Charlie Brown’s Christmas.”  And every year people who watch, hear Linus reading the Christmas story from Luke 2; the result of Isaiah 7.  Tyler Perry’s movie is punctuated with preaching and ends with restoration.  The Grinch is changed by good-hearted Whovillians who wholeheartedly believe in Christmas.  Scrooge, confronting his past sins, falls on his knees in repentance.  So I offer a simple poem to remind us of The Scrooge in us all—the possibility of change, because “It’s Christmas!”

Scripture informs,

Hearts are deformed,

Until Christ, the heart storms,

Salvation performed.

The faithful are warmed,

By hearts conformed,

When The Spirit reforms,

My life is transformed.

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[1] John Lewis Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History. (Penquin, 2006): 46.

[2] G. K. Chesterton, “The Secret of Father Brown,” The Collected Works of G. K. Chesterton (Ignatius, 2002): 219.

[3] Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956. (Harper Classics, 2002): 312.

[4] Many other voices would concur with the general concern that humans are corruptible: “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allen Poe, “The Lifted Veil” by George Eliot, “Rappaccini’s Daughter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne and “The Man That Corrupted Hanleyburg” by Mark Twain.

[5] James Martin, “Merry Marketing,” Wall Street Journal Online 17 December 2009. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703757404574592752896254832.html?mod=djemEditorialPage

[6] Read chapters 7 and 8 in Isaiah.

[7] Isaiah “proud,” 9:9; “calloused,” 6:10; “lose heart,” 7:4; “shaken,” 7:2 (NIV).

Dr. Mark Eckel, Director, Mahseh Center

Still-beating hearts and walled-off living victims were the subjects of Edgar Allen Poe’s macabre tales.[1] Poe was my favorite writer in junior high.   I mentioned this once while speaking at a conference.  A well-meaning soul sought to explain The Gospel to me on a comment card, not believing that someone could be a Christian and love Poe at the same time.  There is a reason why humans are drawn to the classic suspense genre.  But it was not until I was an adult that I understood the reason for Poe’s strong attraction.  What draws us toward the unknown?  What is it that stirs our hearts to mystery?  And why ponder Poe at Christmas?

“Can you keep a secret?” is the question of mystery.  The English word has given us the process of initiation.  A secretive ceremony honors the first-time participant.  In our culture the word “mystery” has come to ask the question, “How will this crime be solved?”  TV dramas inevitably answer the query in an hour’s timeslot.  But once the case is cracked there is no more mystery.  While detective stories may baffle us, eluding our understanding for a time, the narrative has a conclusion.  The older word “mysterium” better explains the original intent of the term.  Mysterium marks the location, physical or otherwise, where something obscure takes place.[2] The opening line of the old radio show says it best: “You are now entering the inner sanctum.”

Friday the 13^th seems to present a mysterium problem for emergency room doctors.  Atul Gawande recounts his thoughts about the event in his award winning book Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science.[3] Gawande states that there is no immediate explanation for the excess number of ER visits on a day marked by superstition.  While a committed natural science researcher, neither he nor other doctors could explain the abnormal increase in hospital needs on that fateful calendar day.  The evidence, however, did not seem to suggest a supernatural answer: it was nothing more than a fluke.  But, unable to catch a break or keep the patients straight on one such Friday, Gawande began to wonder why that day presented more problems than others.  A nurse explains, “It’s a full moon Friday the 13^th.”  Gawande narrates, “I was about to say that, actually, the studies show no connection.  But my pager went off before I could get the words out of my mouth.  I had a new trauma case coming in.”[4]

P. D. James, the famed British detective novelist, was asked why her specific craft so engages our minds and imagination.  Because her books are often tied first to a homicide, James responds

Murder is the unique crime, the only one for which we can make no reparation, and has always been greeted with a mixture of repugnance, horror, fear, and fascination.  We are particularly intrigued by the motives which cause a man or woman to step across the invisible line which separates a murderer from the rest of humanity.”[5]

“I had murdered them all myself.”[6] Father Brown perhaps comes closest to true, biblical mystery.  While a crime may have been solved, the good padre still wondered after the human penchant toward sin.  Sherlock Holmes fans are used to deductive reasoning: a scientific analysis, assessing problems from the outside, in.  Father Brown became the murderer because he was a murderer.  Chesterton’s sleuth, a Catholic priest, saw people as they were, from the inside, out.  The mystery of our own nature continues: “The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out.”[7]

Flannery O’Connor believed that Southern authors were both “grotesque” and “Christ-haunted.”

We find that the writer has made alive some experience which we are not accustomed to observe every day . . . If the writer believes that our life is and will remain essentially mysterious, if he looks upon us as beings existing in a created order to whose laws we freely respond, then what he sees on the surface will be of interest to him only as he can go through it into an experience of mystery itself. . . . Such a writer will be interested in what we don’t understand rather than in what we do.[8]

O’Connor exactly represents the New Testament word for “mystery.”  The secret thoughts and plans of God, formerly hidden, are now revealed.  In no way is the mystery diminished.  We still wonder at God-perpetrated events.  So called “mystery religions” kept mysterious, teachings they did not wish to fall into unworthy hands.  The group controlled the available knowledge requiring all to become initiates.  Christian “mystery,” on the contrary, is freely proclaimed to the world.[9] The “Christ hymn” of 1 Timothy 3:16 clearly announced belief in Jesus’ life as being both historical and revelational.  Jesus came in flesh, was vindicated by the resurrection, and ascended into heaven.  His work was broadcast, believed, and became doxology.  “This Christian life is a great mystery, far exceeding our understanding, but some things are clear enough.”[10]

Christ’s person and work is why I have a fascination with Poe.  What is so attractive about mystery?  How am I at once repelled by and attracted to what I find baffling?  My answer?  The unknown makes knowing the known possible.  I crave “mystery.”  I am fascinated by what I do not understand which makes what I do know, that much more wonderful.  Herein is the wonder of Christmas—the mystery of God becoming man.

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[1] “The Tell-tale Heart” and “The Cask of Amontillado” are two of Poe’s short stories mentioned here.

[2] John Ayto. 1990. Dictionary of Word Origins. (Arcade): 359.

[3] Atul Gawande. 2002.  Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science (Picador).

[4] Ibid., 114.

[5] http://www.amazon.com/Talking-About-Detective-Fiction-James

[6] G. K. Chesterton, “The Secret of Father Brown,” The Collected Works of G. K. Chesterton (Ignatius, 1986): 217.

[7] Jeremiah 17:9, The Message.

[8] Flannery O’Connor. 1997. Mystery and Manners. (Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux): 40-42, emphasis mine.

[9] See Glenn W. Barker, “Mystery,” International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 3 (Revised, Eerdmans, 1986): 451-55; W. L. Liefeld, “Mystery,” Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. 4 (Zondervan, 1976): 332.

[10] 1 Timothy 3:16, The Message, emphasis mine.

Dr. Mark Eckel, Director, Mahseh Center

Myths, falsehoods, and exaggerations crowd the covers of greeting cards every December.  Here are a few.  “Xmas” is not eliminating Christ from Christmas: “X” is the first letter of Christ in Greek.  “Santa Claus” is actually based on a person in Church history whose name was Saint Nicholas.  Jesus was most assuredly not born on December 25^th.  Mary did not ride on a donkey.  The “inn” was not Motel 6 but rather reference to someone’s home.  A “stable” or “barn” is a modern explanation of a cave.  “Manger” was a feeding trough for cattle probably hewn out of the cave’s rock floor.  “Three Magi” seems to be based solely on the number of gifts given celebrating Jesus’ birth.  These and other fictions about Christmas arise from extra-biblical sources such as Christmas carols.  This is for sure: “All was calm, all was bright” it was not.

Jesus’ birth story[1] reads more like a reality detective show.  He was born, as we would say, “out of wedlock.”  “Unplanned pregnancy” is putting it mildly.  In addition to the stigma of supposed premarital sex, Mary gave birth while she was literally “on the road.”  The first witnesses of “Christmas” were from the lowest rung of society—shepherds.  Scholars who should have been following the events did not seem to care.  Yet, astrological signs made pagan sorcerers caravan hundreds of miles to follow a star.  Angels could not help themselves but exclaim.  And then the bad guys show up and things get really interesting.

From the beginning, Jesus encountered threats against His life.  The Palace enlisted the aid of foreign intellectuals to locate the baby.  When outsiders outwitted the king, he dispatched shock troops to find and kill The Child.  Warnings came through dreams.  The family narrowly escapes to a foreign country.  Ancient prophecies are fulfilled.  Joseph—the silent-type, male-hero who literally does not utter a word—is the action figure responsible for Jesus’ safety.  From a human perspective, God’s entrance into the world could not have been more mismanaged, or more exciting.  But with The Infant came infanticide.

In a world of 24-7 news coverage, we are used to genocide.  We sit, reclining comfortably, watching the horrors on our television screens.  And then we change the channel.  Were we to live under the authority of megalomaniac despots, we would better understand Jesus’ birth.  William Barclay gives us a thumbnail sketch of the tyrant-at-the-time:

Herod was a master in the art of assassination.  He had no sooner come to the throne than he began by annihilating the Sanhedrin, the supreme court of the Jews.  Later he had slaughtered three hundred court officers out of hand.  Later he had murdered his wife Mariamne, and her mother Alexandra, this eldest son Antipater, and two other sons, Alexander and Aristobulus.  And in the hour of his death he had arranged for the slaughter of the notable men of Jerusalem.[2]

“Better to be Herod’s pig than his son” has become an apt proverb.[3] To target crown-claimers is one thing; to kill babies is another altogether.  Genocide was perpetrated against defenseless innocents in Herod’s attempt to kill The One of whom ancient prophecies foretold.  Death and destruction were part of Jesus’ birth.

Attacks on Jesus did not begin in Matthew.  As “the ruler of this world”[4] Satan has shed blood repeatedly over the millennia to wipe out the Messianic Line.  Since Cain gave Steinbeck the storyline for East of Eden, “the ancient serpent” has attacked relentlessly.[5] The unnamed Egyptian pharaoh’s death sentence was stopped dead by two named Egyptian midwives.[6] Starvation and death forces a Hebrew woman to include foreigners into her family, only to open Messiah’s genealogy to Gentiles.[7] Inept planning by Haman is undermined through palace intrigue by Esther, a “closet” Jewess.   Follow the pattern through the ages and we discover murderous plots and purges against God’s chosen people who would bear and bless Messiah.[8] Evil intentions never catch Heaven unaware.[9] Unfortunately, extermination practices against The Child means that children will always suffer.[10]

Jolted to remember that the entrance of God-in-flesh is the central chapter in the supernatural battle, we must begin in Genesis 3.  The whole of The First Testament anticipates His coming.  Matthew and Luke take up the narrated story; something akin to Law and Order or The Closer. Blameless people die.  Evil seems to triumph.  But then, the tables are turned.  An authority figure appears.  The bad guys lose.  1 John 3:8 is a verse that summarizes it all: “The reason The Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.”  The Slaughter of The Innocents will never adorn the front of a Christmas card: but it should.

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[1] Read Matthew 1-2 and Luke 1-2.

[2] William Barclay.  1958. The Gospel of Matthew, Vol 1. (Reprint, Westminster): 28.

[3] There is no indication that the statement was actually made; but all indications of Herod’s dispatching those who threatened his throne makes the comment bristle with truth.  See Craig S. Keener’s historical connections in A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Eerdmans, 1999): 110-12.

[4] John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11; 1 John 5:19.

[5] Genesis 4 marks both the first anticipation of The Child (“I have brought forth a man!” says Eve) and the first attempt to snuff out The Messianic lineage when Abel is killed.  Seth is literally “the substitute” bearing the beacon of hope through “the new Adam” Enoch.  [See Kenneth A. Mathews, Genesis 1-11:26 (Eerdmans, 1996): 290-91.]  As for “the ancient serpent” read Revelation 12.

[6] Shifra and Pu’a are given more credence, more authority in biblical history than the dictator of a superpower.  By refusing to name Egypt’s king, the writer strips him of his authority.  The power shifts from the throne room to the nursery.  As to whether or not the two women were Egyptian or Hebrew see Everett Fox The Five Books of Moses (Reprint, Shocken, 1995): 259.

[7] Read the book of Ruth.

[8] “Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war against the rest of her offspring—those who obey God’s commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus” (Rev 12:17).

[9] God will use the evil of men to praise Himself (Psalm 76:10).  Read Genesis 45:4-11 and 50:20.

[10] Frederick Dale Bruner. 2004. Matthew: A Commentary, Vol. 1. (Revised, Eerdmans): 68.

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