Last night at Emerge, our twenty-something / college-and-career coffee shop, we discussed the nature of expression and whether or not it is free. One of our country's basic freedoms guarantees its people that they have the right to free expression and that right is inalienable to them as being human. Where might this notion have come from? This is what we discussed...First of all, God created us to be expressive. This is evident by viewing nature. Take all things that have been created and compare their ability to express themselves. A hundred chimps on a hundred lap tops clacking away for a hundred years on the keyboards can never compose a sonnet. Sure they may accidentally hit a word or two by chance but they lack the expressive ability to hammer out a thought provoking piece of prose on their love for bananas. Even the howling wolves have never scrawled with their paws in the snow a song they bay at the moon. This is not to say that God didn't design animals to be able to have limited communication. Fireflies light up the night with yellow-hued love calls to attract a mate; squirrels chatter to one another endlessly, but what animal has ever invented the internet or what bird has ever directed a major motion picture? Simply none. Humanity is of a different sort... even when impaired by deafness or muteness we are able to express concepts and ideas through sign language or through brail.
God designed humans to be fully expressive. Where do we think He got that idea? In Genesis God has a conversation with Himself and says, - plurally, I might add - "Let us make man in our image." The first act we see God revealing Himself to humankind is in expressive explosions of creation of worlds with His words. Mankind took notice and followed suit by equally being creative staying true to his nature. Ants have been building for millenniums yet they've never constructed mini-malls nor have they grown past their dirt-holed homes. God's very nature is expressive and we are created in His image.
If then God created us to be fully expressive, then what about the notions of totalitarian governments who won't allow its people to be freely expressive? In essence, these government entities can be classified as evil empires with anti-Christ attitudes that deny people this freedom that has been created in them in an expressive nature and endowed to them by God. These governments are Satanic in nature since his desire is to cease people from bringing God glory in their lives, which is the purpose of humanity. They are quelling God's image in humanity in this restriction.
Is then all expression good and acceptable to God's standard of holiness since we can express whatever we choose?
Take for instance what Paul says twice in his first letter to the church at Corinth. In chapter six (vs. 12) and in chapter ten (vs. 23), Paul says that though all things are lawful, all things are NOT beneficial. This principal can be applied to expression. Though we have been given the freedom to express ourselves and the capabilities to express ourselves, not every expression is valuable to us. Adam and Eve were placed in the garden and given basically one rule, don't eat of that tree. Yet, God didn't place a force field around the tree preventing them to reach it. It was completely lawful - or possible - for them to reach the tree, however their reaching the tree wasn't beneficial to themselves nor to the world! Thus the curse. Not all things are profitable to us and expressing contempt for God by rejecting Him has a dire alternative... eternal separation from Him in Hell, and this is of our own choosing and the consequence of our expression.
Isaiah in chapter six of his writings describes the vision of God seated on His throne and the train of His robe filling the Temple. This wasn't a pretty Renaissance painting, but a terrible vision of God in His holiness. Immediately Isaiah expressed his utter sinfulness - though possibly the saintliest man in Israel at the time - with this metaphor, "Woe is me for I am a man of unclean lips and dwell in the middle of a people of unclean lips." Why did Isaiah use 'lips' instead 'hands' or 'eyes'? It would seem clear that hands do evil by murdering, fornication, stealing, etc., but Isaiah used 'lips'. Think of this, both Matthew (12:34) and Luke (6:45) record in their accounts of Christ's life that from the abundance of our hearts our mouth speaks. Isaiah was in the presence of our holy God and in that Light there was no hiding what is in man's heart... sinfulness, not compared to each other but compared to God, and who can ever measure up to that save Christ alone? Man's heart is utterly wicked and that's what comes to light in the holiness of Christ. Our 'lips' express what is in our hearts. It's the tongue - not the eyes - that is the window to the soul.
This is possibly why we can't be fully expressive to the church community at large. If we admitted to our "brothers and sisters" what is on our heart, or what we struggle with in our lives then the facade that we put up on Sunday mornings would be shattered and our credibility lost as stained glass Christians. It's too costly to be vulnerable. There's too much as stake we think. This drives our community to be not much like a community at all. To whom can we go to be expressive? To whom can we be completely vulnerable? How many friends can you tell your darkest fears and struggles to without fear that you will be the topic of every email and cell phone conversation from now until Sunday?
There's one place where all pretense is lost and all fears are consumed... the metaphorical foot of the cross... literally to Jesus. We come to Him with no pretense because there can be none. He knows the deepest struggles we've yet to face and it doesn't change His love toward us one bit.
My pastor, Roger Daniel, said once that the fact that we can't trust the community to express ourselves in our struggles and weaknesses proves that the community is not much like Christ.
This is a problem. Because when we can't express ourselves and where that freedom doesn't exist God's nature ceases to exist - or ceases to be expressed - there too. God created us unlike any other organism in this world. He created us to create. He created us to paint and sing and to write and to love just as He has painted the worlds into existence with His words; and sings the love song of a savior sent to a people needing rescued from a curse of self-choosing; and to love in fathomless expressions of nearness to a people that hold Him at bay with clinched fists of self-centered-ness. All the while knowing that He gave us the freedom to express love for Him... or contempt, but hoping for love.
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