Fr. Craig writes a weekly “meditorial”. It is a little bit spiritual reflection, a little bit quirky observation on what is going on in culture and the world, often amusing, occasionally irreverent and surprisingly meaningful. It is usually accompanied by a photo taken by Fr. Craig from his passion for landscape and especially night photography.

I leased a new car this week as I began to accept the inevitable, that having had 176,000 happy miles with my Honda, that its mortality, though long accepted intellectually, meant that now was the time to take advantage of the electric vehicle incentives before they went away. There was considerable dismay that the dealership had such a low opinion of the value of my trustee ride after we had been through so much together. Indeed, I was faced with facing that I needed a “push, pull or drag” sale. The inducement is that if you can get your broken down horrible old car onto the lot, they will give you a cash discount on the purchase of a car.

The “push, pull and drag” metaphor is strangely appropriate for how God goes about trying to turn us into saints.

Richard Longenecker was an Anglican theologian who taught at Wycliffe College in Toronto.

The University of Toronto has two Anglican theology schools. Trinity is more liberal and more catholic, Wycliffe is more conservative and evangelical. They sit across the street from each other, in mute architectural testimony to either Christian diversity within the Anglican tradition, or to their intolerance of the other. At times it has been a bit of both.

Longenecker wrote New Testament Social Ethics for Today. It was a short book where he examined the famous verse from Galatians 3:28: “In Christ Jesus there is neither Jew, nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female”. There were still debates then (1984) and today as well in Catholic and evangelical circles of whether women should be allowed to be ordained. It is indeed shocking how recently those debates occurred within the Episcopal Church.

Longenecker showed that there are verses from Paul’s writings that talk about “how things are” and Christians should not try to upset the apple cart too much. (He used the example of whether women should have head coverings in church: we are trying to convert Greeks and Romans and they think that heads should be covered in temples, so best not to rile people up over something so trivial.)

But there are also ringing amazing verses like “neither … male nor female.”

Longenecker argues that the western tradition of human rights starts right in that verse, and that there was nothing like it in the ancient world. He describes this as “eschatological” or “teleological”. (From “telos”: purpose, what is the end goal of something) He asks, what is the direction in which God is moving? What is the purpose of being human, created in the image of God, and redeemed by Jesus, the incarnation of the Son of God. He states that in Jesus’ Kingdom men and women experience profound equality in Christ. That’s the direction where things are going.

So, yes, sometimes we need to accept “how things are” and not needlessly upset the apple cart over small things. It shows up in the phrase “… but we live in a fallen world, after all”. But, in the Big Things, Jesus is “pushing, pulling and dragging” us into the future, into the Kingdom of God, where the Fall is no more.

I sometimes summarize this as “Yes, I am a utopian: I believe in the Kingdom of God!” It is a handy “out” when I have opined that I want every American to have free healthcare, to get rid of the 2nd amendment, or at least assault rifles, or that we can solve homelessness, and poverty, the scourge of addictions, where every child is wanted and cherished and poverty has been eliminated and where love and justice for everyone prevails and everything else that

defaces the image of God has been cleansed. So, yes, a utopian I guess. And yet, so are we all who follow Jesus, as we pray “thy kingdom come”.

The question then is where is God pushing, pulling and dragging you? He wants to make you a saint, someone who walks with God. Where is God pushing, pulling and dragging us at St. John’s? At St. Luke’s? Wherever and to whatever end it is, is better than we can hope or

imagine, for that is the sort of God we worship.

Peace be with you

Fr. Craig+