The Rhythm of Resistance

Lead Collective hosted a fundraising event recently, which was big fun (minus a few AV hiccups…) Shrug emoji... We took guests through a series of movements throughout the evening - movements that I believe mark the ultimate story we all find ourselves in. We acknowledged the painful fractures that exist in our world because of sin (both personal and systemic), the redemptive work available to us in the Spirit, and the celebration we are invited to enjoy in Christ.

I shared a few comments about these movements, but alas, the AV troubles made it quite difficult to hear… (once again, shrug emoji.) I thought I would share some of those thoughts here for those who weren’t able to hear or for those who were unable to attend.

My comments centered around the seeming contradiction between these movements. Suffering, labor, celebration… These seem like mutually exclusive experiences, and yet somehow they are bound together by the same story. The story Christians cling to is one that acknowledges original goodness and beauty along with fractures and corruption. It acknowledges meaningful work which often feels like an uphill battle, and it whispers of a day when redemptive labor is complete and all things are made new.

NT Wright notes “we are not oiling the wheels of a machine that is going over a cliff.” The work we put our hearts and minds to (in the Spirit), will last. The story ends in flourishing, and if we know the ending, we can fight for flourishing in our world, today, knowing that every dollar given, every hour volunteered, every tear shed, every sacrifice, every act of love, is never wasted.

Every child who is surprised by the feeling of being seen and understood for the first time, serves as a reminder that some day we will be transformed by the discovery that we have been fully known and fully loved by God, all along.

Every experience a student is given which expands their imagination and opens up the aperture of opportunity in their life is a signpost pointing to the day when hope bursts through the ceiling of our imagination and ushers in the fullness of our creative capacities.

Every second chance (and third and fourth) given to a justice-involved student is a glimpse into the gift of grace we are all slowly learning to unwrap and receive.

Every unjust system that is made visible, and confronted is a new crack weakening the damn holding back the rivers of justice that will some day run through a world made new.

Do you see the cohesion between these seemingly contradictory ideas? Suffering. Labor. Hope. All tied together by a single story. A story that acknowledges hard truth, and invites us into meaningful solutions, and promises that some day despair will be wiped from our eyes, until flourishing is all we see.

That story is the fuel of Lead Collective. The hope of that story is our super power. It gives us the freedom to acknowledge all that is broken and unjust in our world and it gives us this punk rock energy that refuses to make peace with it.

Jurgen Moltmann said, “Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it.”

Hope in future flourishing causes us to contradict the reality of present suffering.

If we believe the hope of God’s promised renewal is not wishful thinking or wide-eyed naivety, then we will lay hold of these future promises and begin to drag them into the present, confronting and contradicting the hell of today, with the heaven of tomorrow.

That’s what we’re doing at Lead - We’re refusing to believe the world has to be this way.

When we hear that one in five kids is born into poverty in our city, we actually believe it doesn’t have to be this way. When we hear about the challenges of upward mobility… it doesn’t have to be this way. Gun violence among our youth - it doesn’t have to be this way… Lack of opportunity… it doesn’t have to be this way.

There is meaningful work to be done. And because of Jesus, our work is not in vain.

But what’s with the celebrating…? the feasting, and the dancing? Isn’t it a bit early for celebration if there is still work to be done? Like celebrating a victory before the enemy has conceded, how can we celebrate with good food and wine while people continue to go without? How can we dance, while many of our neighbors are still crippled by grief?

We can feast and dance and celebrate in the midst of suffering, and redemptive labor because our feasting and our celebrating does not mark the end of our work…no, our feasting is not the exclamation point at the end of the final sentence of our story, it is a recurring theme of resistance in the ongoing story of renewal that we are participating in.

When we feast, we celebrate the hope that animates our hearts and fuels our mission. And as the Kingdom expands in the world around us, so the table at the feast expands with it.

The solution to our world’s suffering is not found in the denial of flourishing. The solution to sadness isn’t found in the denial of joy. It’s found in the expansion of joy. If we are weeping over all that is sad in our world, and if we are laboring in the places where God has called us to labor, then when we dance, and when we celebrate, we should expect to see the feast expanding and new neighbors joining us around the table. We shouldn’t despise the flourishing in our own lives, we should contend that it would extend to the margins of our world. We labor so that the sweetness of our wine would be on the lips of those who have never tasted it, that the richness of our food would satisfy the bellies of the hungry, and the joy on our faces as we dance would reach those who feel overlooked, and overwhelmed.

We contradict the realities of this world, as we set our hearts and minds on the hope of a promised future. A future of flourishing, for all. This is a rhythmic form of a resistance built into the Christian story. Who knew that it could be found in feasting?

So as we accept the invitation to celebrate in hope, I want to ask you something: How can you help expand the table? How can you pull up an extra chair? How might you take what God has blessed you with, and instead of despising it, how might you extend it? …that we may become a complex people full of deep lament, meaningful work, and ever-extending celebration.