God and History

But the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord had spoken to Moses. Exodus 9:12 (NRSV)

I just finished reading the book Lincoln’s Battle with God by Stephen Mansfield. He is the author of such books as The Faith of Barack Obama and The Search for God and Guinness. It was an interesting summary of the life of Abraham Lincoln and his lifelong struggle with faith and God. I can’t do justice to his argument and sources in this Musing but I came away convinced that the Atheist President as not an atheist, he was a man struggling with a concept of God and faith that did not fit with his life experience and the circumstances he found himself in. The Christian Church and theology of his time did not provide him with the tools he needed to make sense of life. It also did not help that many practitioners were inauthentic and their faith did not stand up to the tests of reason or compassion.

One conclusion Mansfield comes to is that Lincoln become convinced that the Civil War was in some way God’s judgment upon the United States of America for our sanctioning human abuse in the slave trade. I am not advocating that this view is theologically correct. What I am willing to say is that given the times, the circumstances and the theological perspectives he had to choose from Lincoln made a choice that was necessary for his peace of mind and decision making as President. I would like to think that if Lincoln were alive today he would more than likely come out at a different place theologically. I think he would see the Civil War as the consequence of human action and our willful disregard for God’s desire for humanity and creation. It wasn’t divine judgment; it was natural consequences for humanity ignoring the fundamental foundation of creation – distributive justice, equity for all creation.

I think the argument can be made that where the Bible portrays historical power struggles, wars, etc as God’s intervention or lack thereof you could just as easily portray them as the natural consequences of humanity’s willfully ignoring God’s desire for human society and human and creation interaction. The Ancient and Modern state of Israel sits in a geographical place that makes it unavoidable for imperial or strategic control to be desired and their place to be a battleground for these interests. Add to this the modern reality that three of the world’s religions (about 4 billion people) all claim it as their own holy site and you have a perfect mix for human conflict and the consequences of choices made by the people who are in power in this world and in this troubled piece of real estate.

Dietrich Bonheoffer made the argument during his imprisonment, before his execution for his part in the assignation attempt on Hitler, that God was dead. Not that God, the divine beyond our ability to fully comprehend, was dead but that the human construct of God as the source of all that happens, the cause of dramatic world conflicts and the source of natural disasters was dead. The shear destructive force of the allied bombings of Germany and their wholesale destruction of all things and all life convinced Bonheoffer that we humans could not blame things on God. That natural forces and human created consequences were to blame and that ultimately God was grieved by what we humans do when we get out of step with God’s desire for creation.

I think Lincoln’s struggle with God is a mirror for the struggle many are having with the traditional portrayal of God today. I think his battle with the accepted ways of understanding God and human activity speaks to the battle many are having with the institutional church (synagogue, mosque, temple, etc). People find what is being offered as inauthentic and they cannot stand up to the tests of reason and compassion. People believe in God. People desire to live faithful lives. They just don’t feel that most of the contemporary expressions of faith echo what they know of God and they sure don’t reflect their desire for a world of justice, compassion and peace. We have to stop blaming God and start accepting the consequences of our choices and choose to go about things differently as individuals and as nations.

Dear God, help me to see that what I say and do has consequences and that what nations and corporations do have consequences. Wherever possible, help me to make the choices that reflect your desire for creation. May justice reign on earth and may there be equity for all. Amen.