The Lord is Wonderful: A Review of Marilynne Robinson’s Home

“The Lord is Wonderful”, is the closing line of Home. Robinson’s third novel continues to unwrap the depth and complexity of human life in Gilead, Iowa. Home is a followup to Gilead, but not a sequel, prequel, but the same stories told from a different house. Their relationship is not unlike that of the four Gospels in the Bible. Giving unity in setting and characters, diversity in form and content and both creating an overwhelming artistic complexity and beauty.

Gilead and Home have much in common, namely, the Boughton’s and the Ames’s and the shining star of radicalism: Gilead, Iowa. In Gilead readers were invited to read the memoirs and letters of 76 year old Rev. John Ames as he dies of angina pectoris, a failing heart, writing to his 6 year old son Robby (whose name we learn in Home). The reader becomes fully acquainted with the Boughtons in Gilead, particularly John Ames’s fabled namesake, John Ames “Jack” Boughton and his sister Glory. Home puts Jack and Glory to the foreground and leaves John Ames a shadowy figure. Robinson’s characters evoke a kind of gestural stroke like the paintings of Rembrandt, the interaction of the characters is greater than the sum of its parts. When it comes to the psychology of human interaction something very different from Gilead is given in Home, Robinson weds form and content in electing a unique third person POV. However, the POV in Home is not omniscient, but rather is cinematic. By not giving the us the privilege of knowing the intentions and thoughts of her characters, Robinson leaves us to grapple with the complexity of humanity found in the relationships of Jack and Glory. Following Jack or Glory around could have been interesting, but in Home Robinson gives reflections on the mystery of the family, and God’s providence in it. Where Gilead gave pastoral and theological reflection, Home explores familial and relational bonds.

Thematically there is perhaps one dominant motif, the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Jack certainly is the Prodigal who returns and Glory the elder brother, yet Robinson shows something much more profound and real than how that story is typically treated. There is much Scripture in Home, though not to the same degree as Gilead, however, what Robinson does in the final pages of Home is nothing less than a reflection on how wonderful the Lord is. Throughout the entire novel we follow Jack and Glory as they eke out their time in Gilead waiting and watching for some glimpse of grace. Reflection is too narrow, what Robinson gives us is a dramatization of wonderfulness of the Lord. If this sounds too pious and mawkish for a Pulitzer prize winner, one must read it for themself to test her maxim “if you can pull it off, you can do it”. This kind of description admittedly makes the book sound trite and pious. Perhaps, that it is why Robinson did not just tell us the Lord is wonderful, but showed us.

In the publisher’s write up of Home, they call it Robinson’s “best work”. I agree. I think that Robinson has demonstrated her prowess as an author in Home that her other work (Housekeeping and Gilead) affirms but in Home her writing is rich with complexity, artistry, and most of all grace.

Prioritism

At closer inspection the prioritist call for the church to trump humanitarian aid for the sake of evangelism is not as pious as it may sound. A theology is only worth the community which can embody it. I am willing to wager that the same zeal extreme prioritists apply to mission work – cutting humanitarian services for exclusively evangelistic ones – is kept at bay from creating major disruptions in their own lives. Where do they invest their time? Their money? Their career or credentials? How much is discarded into the stuff of life (housing, repairs, mortgages, food, family, leisure, entertainment, rest) and how much is salvaged for the true eternal work of evangelism? Are they as faithful to route out all “superflous waste” in their own lives as they seek to impress upon all missions endeavours?

I would suspect that there are in truth two theologies at work here. One emphatically endorses the goodness of God’s creation and gifts, his present Lordship, and worship which extends to all areas of life. Another, with dogged fidelity to a sacred/ secular dichotomy, in which creation and its cares are the irrelevant trimmings of souls and the afterlife. I pity the recipients of the latter.

Response to Chris Little's "What Makes Missions Christian?"

This is my abbreviated response to Chris Little over his article "What Makes Mission Christian?" in the most recent issue of International Journal of Frontier Missions (ijfm.org):

First, it does sound like you were “set up” in this issue and that is not right. At the same time I was taken aback by much of your language aimed at the opposition. You warned of the “horizontalization in mission” (67) and urged “recovering the doxological theme in mission” (69), reminding us that “mission is not undertaken for the welfare and glory of man” (70). Are you really willing to assert that “there is nothing particularly Christian about humanitarian work” (68)? That Oprah Winfrey and Bill Gates are indistinguishable from Compassion and World Vision? Furthermore you drew several hard, fast lines between holism and a host of evangelical boogey-men: liberalism, Liberation Theology, annihilationism, inclusivism, and rice Christianity. I’m sure you could point to holistic ministries in each camp but to resort to over-generalized name calling is unfair, unhelpful, and will certainly break down lines of communication.

Second, and more to the point of the actual argument, I am uncomfortable about your portraits of Jesus and Paul. What do you really make of the nature of Jesus’ work? We cannot get around the fact that his miracles are almost entirely centered on restoring bodies. To try and distance him from that central, prophecy-fulfilling work is in danger of making his miracles into arbitrary magic tricks exclusively meant to draw crowds to hear his words – as if pulling a rabbit from his kippah would have worked just as well. As a side note, that brought out two interesting comments in your article. The first is that Jesus never did a miracle which did not lead to words. In reality, wherever you find a couple of paragraphs of black print together in the Gospels it’s usually Jesus doing without saying. The second statement was that ‘poor’ is not “simply a socio-economic term” (69). Granted poor, deaf, blind, dumb can all have spiritual meanings, they also have very literal, very powerful meanings as well including the Isaiah prophecy you referenced (Lk 4:18-19) which was literally being fulfilled by Jesus (Lk 7:21-23). We can safely assume literal poverty was what their money bag was for. I am not trying to play Jesus’ works off his words but simply saying the picture is far more complex than either side has a tendency of painting it.

Briefly on Paul, it is not true that he “seems purposefully to have avoided…personal charity” (67). He made much of his humanitarian aid to Jerusalem (Ac 24:17; Rom 15:25ff; 1 Cor 16:1-3; 2 Cor 8:1-4; 9:1-2, 12). Very interestingly, when he goes to compare his gospel with the apostles the thing James, Peter, and John challenge him on is not Romans Road but to “remember the poor”, which he is quick to assert is the “very thing I was eager to do” (Gal 2:10). Of course, Paul’s calling and gifting distinguished him from the Stephen, Cornelius, Lydia, James, and Lukes of the NT but we cannot make the case that he did not capture God’s concern for the poor nor consider it fundamental to his mission – he did.

Third, (and I hate to use an over-played word you are probably exhausted of hearing) I am afraid that this might lead to a reductionistic view of mission (at least I didn’t say Platonic, Gnostic, or post-Enlightenment). True mission has always been more but certainly never less than answering the question of how one gets saved. At its best, mission must entail the full council of Christ, the message of resurrection and reconciliation, and planting communities who live as a powerful, subversive force here and now in light of the resurrection. It should come as a shock to our over-programmed senses that the only two formal offices in an institution bent on reaching the world are elders and deacons. How can we make mission any less than that?

Honestly I think prioritism is a bad question that has generated a hopeless debate. I would liken it to asking, Which is more important, evangelism or holiness? Or evangelism or theological education for that matter? You might be able to make a great case for one or the other but you are not going to be happy with the results. True, giving someone a loaf of bread is not the same as sharing the gospel (as George Verwer reportedly said), but sharing the gospel is not the same as giving a loaf of bread. Both neglectful Christians are disobedient.

At the end of the day I don’t have a problem with a clarion call to include the gospel at the forefront of all endeavors. It’s our lifeblood. But the way there cannot be through denigrating something so dear and so oft-repeated throughout the Scriptures.

Review of Surprised by Hope

Wright’s newest title and growing theme in his writing and teaching of late is an attempt to connect the elusive dots between Christ’s resurrection and ascension, the end of the age, and their implications for the individual, the church, and the cosmos in the present. He outlines his framework primarily as a critique against mainstream, post-Enlightenment, Western Christianity which views salvation as “‘my relationship with God’ in the present and about ‘going home to God and finding peace’ in the future’” (196). This gross misunderstanding, according to Wright, is committed generally to life after death without working out the specifics (6), begets an escapist piety without quarrels with the injustice in our day (27, 66), skews proper exegesis (199), smacks of Gnosticism in which “the created world is at best irrelevant, at worst a dark, evil, gloomy place” (90), and places personal eternal security at the center of everything and “the hope of creation as mere embroidery around the edges” (80).

Emphatically distancing himself from evolutionary optimism (things will get better and better as we build heaven on earth) or transitional souls (things will get worse and worse until we finally abandon this wicked earth), Wright seeks to answer “the major, central, framing question” of both Testaments: “God’s purpose of rescue and re-creation for the whole world, the entire cosmos” (184). The bodily, in our space-time continuum, resurrection of Jesus “is the decisive event demonstrating that God’s kingdom really has been launched on earth as it is in heaven” (234). By rising bodily (not spiritually) from the dead, death has been defeated (not redefined), and we have witnessed the inception of the inevitable trajectory of God’s good earth (our present space) meeting God’s perfect heaven (God’s present space) as depicted in Revelation. Believers are signposts here and now of the goodness of creation and its eventual renewal by championing the Lord’s present dominion over all the earth – spiritually, socially, politically, economically – and anticipating when we are resurrected bodily and creation is “set free from its bondage to decay” (Rom 8:21). “We do not ‘build the kingdom’ all by ourselves but we do build for the kingdom…what is done in the present in the body, by the power of the Spirit, will be reaffirmed in the eventual future, in ways at which we can presently only guess” (143, 156).

As always there are so many things Wright does exceptionally well. His opening chapters prove that he remains a premier apologist and one of few theologians with refreshing, exciting things to say about the resurrection and new creation. In a lot of ways, his critiques are penetrating and demand attention. Biblically, we cannot deny social action, political involvement, environmental concern, the integrity of secular work, or the stuff of life but neither can we support their weight under the present ambiguity about a temporary earth and eternal heaven. He has caught the evangelical hand in the cookie jar trying to retrieve treats of present relevance while balancing precariously on a rickety step-stool of escapism.

At the end of the day, despite talk of the middle way, we are still left out of focus when we approach the New Testament with Wright’s prescription. At the heart of the problem is his rendition of the gospel: “the gospel, in the New Testament, is the good news that God (the world’s creator) is at last becoming king and that Jesus, whom this God raised from the dead, is the world’s true lord” (227). Though this is absolutely true and cannot be said enough in our wishy washy private spiritualism, this narrow definition demands he shy away from (not deny) talk of the role of sin in individuals and Christ’s solution (which really fuels talk of his lordship), a deafening theme in the Scriptures. By emphasizing the former aspect of the gospel at the exclusion of the redemption of humanity is really the false dichotomy that looms large behind the social action versus evangelism debate. Both are about as helpful as giving priority to Jesus as Savior or to Jesus as Lord.

Not surprisingly, when you tease out the implications of a Jesus more Lord than Savior you end up with incredibly helpful insights and incredibly bizarre exegesis. To cite a few of the latter: 1 Corinthians 5:17’s warning that without Christ’s resurrection “you are still in your sins” becomes “not simply a private experience; it is a fact about the cosmos” (247). Similarly, he draws a curious analogy: “He wanted to rescue Israel in order that Israel might be a light to the Gentiles, and he wanted thereby to rescue humans in order that humans might be his rescuing stewards over creation. That is the inner dynamic of the kingdom of God” (202). That is Wright’s paradigm speaking, not the Scriptures and certainly not 1 Peter 2:9-12 which labels believers with all the titles of Israel and gives them the same marching orders, “that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness…[that Gentiles] may see your good deeds and glorify God”. A final example is his esteem for the church’s mission for beauty. Because Christ is Lord over a good creation beauty joins the ranks of social justice and evangelism as the duties of every believer. Though we cannot deny its relevance, it is infused by Wright a priority the New Testament simply does not give it.

Review of Art of Biblical Narrative

I started my review of The Art of Biblical Narrative I posted it below. Essentially, Im okay with saying Ruth and Boaz weren't real people... Ask me about it.

Robert Alter's The Art of Biblical Narrative is a must read for anyone interested in hermeneutics and Biblical interpretation. Although this book was written before the French Revolution of Derrida, Lyotard, and Foucault, his approach is free from many of the snares and objectivist language that plagues so many hermeneutics books. "Well then, what is approach? What's his worldview? I see that he teaches at Berkley, he must be liberal" You might say. For 'hardlined evangelicals' drinking the cool-aid of Warfield, they will have a problem with his understanding of historicity of the events recorded in the Old Testament. For 'hardlined liberals' drinking the cool-aid of higher criticism, they will have a problem with his understanding of historicity of the events recorded in the Old Testament. No that wasn't a typo. Alter argues that the ancient Hebrew way of realizing history was through fiction.

0Not a balance-between-a-documentary-and-spiritualized-fables, but something different. Inspiration is pretty easy to understand when we think of the propositional stuff of 1 Timothy. What about fiction? The other 3/4 of the bible. Every character's inflection, which P.O.V., which details to include, which ones not to. Anyone who has been involved in any creative process knows that there are no rules as to what must be included, as Marilynne Robinson tells her students if they can pull it off they can do it, with that said how does a Sovereign God inspire and put His stamp of approval on a set of texts that seem to open to interpretation? I have not read every inerrantist's dealing with questions but I know what I have read is that they are assumed at best, ignored at worst.

The book is arranged with each chapter dealing with a different literary device of the OT. Alter's greatest insights are on the subject of repetition. When we are confronted with events that seem to overlap, some respond by saying "see how similar these stories are, who can make heads or tales, who knows what is real and what is made up"? Alter argues that the key to these stories is wrapped up not their similarities but in the subtle differences, in that we begin to perceive the message and shaping power of the narrative.

The Art of Biblical Narrative is not an apologetic for the scriptures, rather Alter demonstrates the beauty, intricacy, and craftmanship of the OT. Which becomes a kind of apologetic, but certainly only for those who have eyes to see.

Mo Money, Mo Problems

“How much is too much?”, is the traditional wording of paltry middle class piety. The fact that Jesus failed to mention the secret income cap (with a conversion chart next to weights and measures in the index) has rendered most everything he and his disciples said about money impotent. Without a clear, codified dollar amount looming over our climb up the economic ladder, we are free to revel in our wealth under the guise that none of us are rich.

The problem with our parade is that it sorely misunderstands what the market and the Scriptures teach about money – namely, that it can be amassed in a vacuum. Perhaps the reason for Jesus’ great omission is that he could not conceive (literally) of a world in which us and our things were not intertwined with God and humanity and the earth. To ask how much is too much is to pit money against itself, abstracted from the world we live in. But to ask how we might worship with what we have is to invite the concrete reality of God and the poor into our dialogue.

That is the conversation the Bible takes up. John’s radically impractical legalistic words about two tunics and extra food envisions a world in which some people have neither (Lk 3:11). Jesus’ Messianic signposts of good news, sight, and liberty were not for arbitrary audiences as if he could have divided his time between Wall Street and Water Street. Nor were his miracles arbitrary magic tricks as if pulling rabbits from his kippah would have done just as well. No, they were integral to his God-given mission (Lk 4:18-20; 7:20-23). Comparing the rich young man’s sorrow to Zacchaeus’ joy reveals the rightful place of possessions between us and the Lord (Lk 18:23; 19:6). Surprisingly Jesus does not say, “where your heart is, there your treasure will be also”, but the reverse. Once we have our treasure in the right place our hearts will follow (Lk 12:34).

Community thinking, vertically and horizontally, on wealth is desperately needed if we are to gain any clarity at all. Things are not passive objects that fill our homes, but threatening thorns (Lk 8:14), treasure traps (12:21), an alternative to the kingdom (12:31), an alternative to the Master (16:13), a respite from worship (12:34) – in short, they pit us against God. Generosity is not another personal spiritual discipline that needs work but the names and faces of those around my table (14:13-14). It is not the aimless simplifying of my home so faddish today but the sacrificial supplying of the destitute (12:33). It is not asking with the lawyer “Who is my neighbor?”, but with Jesus “Who proved to be a neighbor?” (10:29, 36).

There is nothing wrong with money in and of itself but there is no such thing as money in and of itself.

The Pursuit of Ugliness and the Loss of Beauty

I recently watched two films in the same weekend. The Pursuit of Happyness (2006) and American Beauty (1999). I couldn't help but reflect on how these two films shared so much in common and yet came to vastly different results.

To briefly summarize each of these plots. The Pursuit of Happyness, set in San Francisco 1981 introduces us to Chris Gardener a low income working man who is struggling to make ends meet. Everything changes when opportunities for him to escape his poverty come through hard work and a payless internship at a stock broker firm. Gardener completes the internship as a homeless man and is granted a full time job at the company.

American Beauty is story of American suburbanite Lester Burnham's spiral into a depression fueled by his lustful obsession with his daughter's friend. When given the chance to actualize his fantasies, he is shocked back into his fatherly role, but this revelation comes all too late.

There is one particular question that both of these films explore and offer an answer to: What is beautiful? What is worth pursuing?
Despite these movies' great differences, one great similarity they share is that they are both about the DNA of what it means to be an America, and interestingly they are both made by non-Americans (British screenwriter Sam Mendes directed AB, Italian director Gabriele Muccino TPoH). Chris Gardener seems to be working towards everything that Lester Burnham already has, a well paying job, his own house, a family. Yet, Burnham is less that satisfied with it all. They seem to be two slices of the same person, one looking forward with wishful eyes while the other looks back grimacing.

If one were to develop a soteriology from The Pursuit of Happyness, it would be, as William Edgar says, solus bootstrapus. This move shows us a man who is essentially a "good guy", someone who has been dealt a bad hand, given the chance to do the right thing he will. Sure enough as we see, he works hard pushes through, shows himself to the be the good guy that he is. Thus happiness has been attained, or has it?

One fundamentalist website reviewed American Beauty saying this"This is the story of an American tragedy, not beauty. It's about despair. Isolation. Hopelessness." (Pluggedin review of American Beauty). Well, that is correct. The problem is, that the reviewer missed the whole point of what is ugly, what creates despair, isolation, and hopelessness. The story shows us that chasing after the American dream, reveling in greed, lust, and apathy is ugly. What we assume to be beautiful as Americans is truly ugly. Our lake houses, suvs, sterile picture perfect homes are an affront to beauty of a man who came in a borrowed inn, rode a borrowed donkey, and was buried in a borrowed grave. American Beauty's antidote for the ugliness of the American dream is to show us that the moments that truly matter are the small things in life. The voyeuristic next door neighbor shows us with Edward Hopperian style, that this world is so full of grace and beauty that sometimes his heart feels like it will explode. He remarks that in the face of a dead homeless woman, he saw the face of God staring back at him. This kind of grace, as the title of a sermon I recently heard reminds me, sings in a minor key. What would Lester Burnham say to Chris Gardener? Perhaps "eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we may die".

Interestingly that fundamentalist website said this about The Pursuit of Happyness.
Should

Inspirational isn't a word I would normally choose to describe a great movie, as it conjures up connotations of something sappy or overly sentimental. Nevertheless, I think that's the word that best captures Will Smith's powerful portrayal of real-life father and pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps worker Chris Gardner. (PluggedIn review of Pursuit of Happyness)

I am grateful for the poignant message of movies like American Beauty, and appalled at the ugliness of The Pursuit of Happyness. With one you weep for redemption entering in like a bull on parade, and while with the other one find yourself looking for a coffee table from Ikea to turn over. What these movies show us that, while the reviewer of American Beauty cited it as a tragedy, perhaps that title is more fitting for The Pursuit of Happyness.