The Controversy
Stephen Terry
Commentary for
the October 14, 2017 Sabbath School Lesson
If
someone asks, ‘What are these wounds on your body?’ they will answer, ‘The
wounds I was given at the house of my friends.’” Zechariah 13:6, NIV
Our
lesson this week focuses on the controversy between law and grace. However, it
is only one iteration of the more fundamental controversy between the desire to
experience progression in the understanding of one’s faith and the reactionary
elements that resist any form of change, believing that in preserving the way
things have always been understood and done is somehow holier than advancing in
spirituality. This can be painful when one is faced with those who would use
religious dogma not to set believers free as Christ was wont to do, but to
control and bring them to submission either through demagoguery or brute force.
This danger has confronted the church in every age and is deeply threatened by
the idea that the believer can have a direct one-on-one relationship with a
loving and compassionate God that does not need to be parsed by the
institutional church, nor by any man or woman. No one will be able to stand on
the great judgment day and be able to excuse their actions by saying, “I only
did and believed what the church told me.” Rather, we are more likely to be
asked by God in that event, “But what did YOU understand about Me from our
relationship?”
Years
ago, I wrote this little parable to illustrate the dangers of simply going
along when God begins to open our minds to new possibilities. I hope you find
it thought provoking.
The
Parable of the Coyotes
As
a coyote, I have learned many things that are expected of coyotes. Some are
more important than others. Perhaps one of our greater truths is that the great
order of things requires that we howl at the moon. Night by night, this ritual
must be completed. While no one is quite sure how our howling relates to the
moon, most are sure that the moon appreciates it.
At
times, when we are not out hunting or caring for our whelps, we talk about it.
Some are sure that our howling keeps the moon on its course, waxing and waning
as it goes. Others are positive that the moon might fall from the sky if the
howling did not keep it there. Still others think the moon responds to the
howling by blessing the hunt. But I am not so sure.
My
doubts began when I started to ask the pack members how they knew these things
to be true. Some told me that I can be sure they are true as every coyote
believes them and questioning them would only lead me astray. Others told me
that the howling had been handed down to us by great coyotes of the past.
Certainly I would not question my great coyote forebears. Still others said,
“What does it matter why, as long as everyone benefits from the unity that the
howling brings to the pack?” Yet, I would continue to ask, “Why do we howl at
the moon?”
I
noticed over time that whether few or many were howling, the moon did not slow
or hasten its passage. The success of the hunt also did not seem to coincide
with the amount of howling. I only noticed that the howling grew more desperate
when the hunting was poor, often without any improvement in the results. As I
noticed these things, I began to share my findings with the other adult
coyotes. When I suggested that perhaps there were other reasons the hunt was
not successful, they could not listen. They assured me that howling harder
always works, and I should trust the wisdom of coyotes far more experienced
than I.
I
tried to be a more faithful coyote, but I found that I could not ignore my
findings. I felt compelled to discuss them with whoever would listen.
While some listened at first and even parroted my questions to the pack, they
were pressured to avoid conversation with me and be loyal to the pack.
Eventually, although I was tolerated because I was a fellow coyote, the rest of
the pack ceased to listen. Some pack members even engaged in what I would call
“aggressive howling” as they would howl whenever I was around, even if the moon
was not, to remind me to toe the line.
Eventually,
I was ostracized from the hunt, as my lack of faith was determined to be
displeasing to the moon and therefore a threat to the hunt’s success. While the
others would hunt and howl with abandon, I was expected to care for the pups to
earn my keep. I was depressed that the others would not listen to me. I was
sure that if we studied these things, our understanding of the moon and
everything else in our world would improve, and that improved understanding
would bring greater blessings.
While
the howls were sounding in the distance, and I was pondering all these things,
I was surprised when a pup came bounding up to me with the question, “Why do
coyotes howl at the moon?” At first, I was so taken aback that I did not know
what to say. At first, I said, “I don’t know.” But she responded with the same
question children bedevil their parents with everywhere. She asked “Why?” Then,
I realized that somehow the same question that had troubled me for so long was
also awakening in this young pup’s mind. So I shared with her what I had
discovered. Even though I had more questions than answers, her precociousness
drew all I knew from me. Little did I know the price I would pay for answering
that “why.”
When
the pack returned, the pup asked her mother about howling and my findings. Her
mother, feeling that I was leading her pup astray, went to the pack leader with
her concerns. The pack leader, incensed that I had continued to
question the howling and was now “infecting” the younger members of the pack
with my findings, decided he needed to deal with things once and for all.
Calling the pack together, he confronted me.
“You
have continually questioned the howling of the pack, even though we have made
it clear that your “findings” are unwelcome. You have been ostracized and
relegated to the lowliest job we could think of, and still you have not
learned. We cannot tolerate your questioning of the wisdom of the pack or that
of our great ancestors. You leave us no choice but to expel you from the pack.”
Trembling
I replied, “But the pack is the only life I have known.”
“For
the good of the pack and your own safety you must leave! You need to go now!
You are no longer a coyote as far as we are concerned!” Then with eyes like
burning embers and a sharp, toothy grin, he asked, “Do you remember what we
call those who are not coyotes?”
Too
frightened to speak, I meekly shook my head “No.”
“We
call them prey!”
May we be open to the possibilities that Paul’s Epistle
to the Romans opens up to us. Grace will not turn us into licentious
law-breakers. Instead, we will find freedom from the law through the indwelling
presence of Christ, filling our hearts with a divine love that is prohibited by
no law.[i] For those who would use
the law to control others, this can be very threatening to their feeling of
power over others. For those who are set free by God’s grace, it is the
breaking of those same chains of control and oppression. In the words of Martin
Luther King spoken on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. in
1963, we can be “Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty I am free at
last.”[ii]
