This is coming a few days late and is not fully polished because I am trying to finish writing my thesis this week. But I preached in church this Thursday about spiritual abuse and the language of sacrifice. Audio and (approximate) transcript below.
Transcript:
When I was young, there was something strange about the presentation of passages like this, where this intense language about giving up everything for Christ was somewhat blunted by the fact that this dangerous counter-cultural gospel we were promised always boiled down to messages like “what if instead of getting laid, we focused on getting prayed?”
But then I got older, and I watched as people used the same passages to justify manipulation and spiritual abuse. “The way I’m leading is hurting you? Well, you know, following Christ can be painful.” Or worse, someone would say “look, the way the church is behaving is unjust” and the leader would point back and say “see, people are opposing us because we’re doing Christ’s will and the world hates that”
Today I want to look at two ways this gets twisted, starting with Jephthah’s actions in the first reading. We only got the second half of the story, so I’ll summarize. Israel is being attacked by a group called the Ammonites and this guy Jephthah is selected to lead a counterattack. He makes a vow to God that if God helps him defeat the Ammonites, then he will sacrifice to God the first thing that comes through his doors when he get home, presumably expecting it to be like a cow or an ox. But when God gives him a victory, his daughter comes through his door to welcome him home and so to fulfill his vow to God he has her burnt to death.
This is horrific. It’s murder. And this isn’t just me imposing my twenty-first century standards on the text -- the early Jewish interpreters also are extremely clear that what Jephthah did here is evil. But he doesn’t see himself that way. Jepthah feels real love for his daughter. He is devastated when she walks through the door to greet him. The problem is that he mistakes his sincerity for what’s actually needed, which is taking responsibility. He does not have to follow this vow, there’s midrash where his daughter carefully explains how doing so would be contrary to God’s law, but he doesn’t even entertain this. And so not only does he refuse to make the right choice, he refuses to acknowledge that he made a choice at all. So he gets to preserve his self-image as a compassionate, loving father, and his daughter suffers the consequences.
What a portrait of so much of the abuse we see today! People who voice grief at the high suicide rates of gay and trans kids but don’t reckon with the role of the theology they teach. Pastors who respond to trauma they participated in with “I’ll pray for your sadness” and not “I repent.” Heroes who do “so much for Christ” that their victims are told it would be best to keep quiet for the sake of the gospel. Each of these people is sincere. Each sees themselves as loving. But friends, you are not crazy if something seems wrong to you. Don’t let a smile and a warm invitation convince you there is love where your eyes say there isn’t. If God forbid you are stuck in a situation like this, I want you to know that you are more important to God than any institution.
This may not resonate right now. I hope it doesn’t. I would not be here if I’d ever seen Stacy behave this way. But one day you and I will leave this place and statistically at least some of us will cross paths with abusive leaders and abusive institutions -- yes, even in progressive churches. And I hope you will recognize it when you see it and I hope that you will do something. I can’t promise it will be easy, or rewarding, or even successful. But surely the time has come to stop giving children over to Jephthah’s vow.
The second is more self-inflicted, although it’s certainly encouraged by certain aspects of Christian culture. There are ways we talk about suffering -- idolizing people who have “given up everything”, or making suffering the true measure of a person’s faithfulness -- that make it easy to convince yourself that parts of you that are unhealthy, that are over-scrupulous and self-hating and self-destructive are really pious.
This is bad because -- and I want to say this as clearly as possible -- you are worthy of God’s love and you deserve to know that. It’s also bad because it shapes our idea of love into something that primarily consists of flashy, enormously sacrificial gestures instead of the boring but important work of actually being there for people.
Consider this. Right now there is a lot of suffering in the world and a lot of people quite rightly feel a call to do something about it. Here are two options. First, you could try to fight human trafficking by posing as an businessman trying to buy children, find people willing to sell to you, and call the police to intervene and have them arrested. This is a big gesture with genuinely frightening moments and you will feel that you are putting everything on the line for Christ. Or, you can live frugally, give ten or twenty percent of your income to a group like GiveDirectly or the Against Malaria Foundation and permanently help dozens of families. The first option (you may recognize the Sound of Freedom movie1) is now generally understood to further victimize the people they “rescue”. These groups traumatize countless vulnerable children so they can play superhero. The second doesn’t feel particularly heroic but is likely one of the most impactful things you will ever do.
This is a function of how you approach problems. When your goal at the outset is to suffer for Christ or to do something hard, you are focused on yourself. You will create situations where you feel like a savior, and we have a hundred years of colonial legacy showing that this focus usually makes things worse for the people you’re “saving.” On the other hand, what people genuinely need is often boring. I got an email from GiveDirectly yesterday about a family who spent money from donors on a latrine that wouldn’t need to be rebuilt every time it rains. Most people aren’t looking for dangerous heroism, they want loving communities and enough to eat and bathrooms that work. But too often we would rather die in a blaze of glory than live with an uncomfortable couch so someone else could have clean water.
But still, after all this, we’re left facing Jesus’s words. Despite all the misuse, something in them resonates with us. Not because we’re called to seek out misery, but because eventually some of you will find yourself in a situation where loving your neighbor and being loved by your community come into conflict. A situation where you can make things right for someone else at great personal cost.
And I think we benefit from Jesus’s words here. If the sacrifice is worth it, be smart. Count the costs and make a plan that’s worth what you will lose. Find some people who can support you through the fallout. And then do it. Love your neighbor. As yourself. As if they were Christ. You probably won’t feel cool or heroic or badass. You’ll likely be sad and stressed and completely worn down. But it will make the world a better place. And it will be an act of love. And God-willing, that will be enough.
Operation Underground Railroad (the “Sound of Freedom” group) is known in NGO circles for harmful practices and unethical advertising, but it’s hard to find a single source that captures all the (severe) misconduct. See Laura Robinson’s series of posts (e.g. this one) for a summary of OUR’s history of dishonesty and harmful conduct, and articles like this one or this report for more severe sexual misconduct, including an OUR operative groping the naked chest of a 16-year-old girl he was “saving”.