You Have to Come in by “The Door”

Sometimes people accuse liberals of simply wanting to read the scriptures their own way – that somehow liberals want the religious message to be easy. While some may surely take that position, it does not square with most of my experience. The liberal position requires us to have the courage not to close off inquiry once a generally accepted meaning of a particular scriptural passage or religious belief has been determined. For me, one of the foundations of liberal theology is the humble awareness that our understanding will always be somewhat limited, so we have to maintain our efforts to expand it. It is also true that once we look deeply at the meaning, our deeper understanding may require us to act courageously. Liberal theology is not for cowards.

I was brought up on a Christian song that went something like this: “So high you can’t get over it, so low you can’t get under it, so wide you can’t get around it, you have to come in by ‘the door.’” The leaders of my childhood church took these words to mean that if you didn’t believe in “Jesus Christ as your lord and savior” then you couldn’t get into heaven. While I couldn’t see it then, I now realize that they seem to have left out a good deal of the Gospel in order to end up with that understanding. For example, how about Jesus’ admonition to “take up your [own] cross, and follow [him].” In this context, I have come to understand the words of the song to mean (metaphorically speaking) that the only way to experience resurrection (new life) is by way of crucifixion (the death of the old). There is no way around it.

But, before you get too nervous, let me clarify that I am not talking about literal death by crucifixion, although that was certainly a real possibility in the time of Jesus and the time following. While physical death is always possible for those who promote justice, there are many other transformational changes that can be equally painful. These days such “crucifixions” are called paradigm changes.

All healthy religions call for paradigm changes. They call people to modify how they see the values of life. They call people to set aside their superficial distractions so that they can experience a more profoundly meaningful life. Seen in their best light, the necessary changes usually turn out to be really good for us, but that awareness usually doesn’t happen until we go through the pain of the loss of our old worldview.

We face many paradigm changes today. One of the challenges facing the church is how to modify the structure of the church so it can promote the Gospel in a rapidly changing society. As it turns there is nothing of absolute value in anything we do. If we insist that our institutional forms shouldn’t change, then we will make ourselves obsolete. So, we have to think about our format for worship and our preferred schedule for events. If these are considered to be more important than “the message,” then the church is doomed.

Another paradigm change requires us to see our universal connection with one another: that we do not stand before judgment as individuals, but as communities, even as the whole of creation.

While changes may be most obvious in form, the deeper meaning of them is that we take very seriously the message of broadly distributed justice and the ongoing presence of divine love. Paradigm changes are not designed to make religion more palatable. Rather, the changes must reflect our deepest integrity and our willingness to go through “the unavoidable door.” While metaphorical crucifixion and loss may be difficult, we are supplied with a large measure of hope. Jesus tells us in many ways that we will not be abandoned. I think his words are consistent with a Sufi (mystical Islamic) saying: “When my heart cries for what it has lost, my soul rejoices for what it has found.”

Let’s have the courage to go through “the door” together.

Wayne Gustafson
“Don’t place a period where God has places a comma.” Gracie Allen
The United Church__of Christ