Justice vs Love

I used to think that God's foremost quality was Love. I still want to believe that, but it's come to my attention that the Christian God, at least, is equal parts of Love and Justice, and has a passion for each that it beyond the ken of humanity.

Love, of course, consists of relationships. It manifests in selflessness and sacrifice. This is the aspect of God that we tend to focus on today, the one that we like to hear about. Not the God of fire and brimstone, but Abba, Father. The God who sent Jesus to save us so he could spend eternity with us. And this is, indubitably, a part of God's nature. God does, in fact, love us more than we could ever imagine.

But the other part is Justice, and Justice is just as integral to God as Love is. It's a part of who he is. Now, Justice deals with the law (a law that has its soul in Love). It also deals with punishment and reward according to what we deserve according to that law. God's Justice says that the wages of sin is death--or, more on point, the punishment of sin is everlasting torment with Satan. He also says that the reward for righteousness (a righteousness that can only be attained through accepting Jesus' sacrifice, not by works) is eternal life with Him. Punishment and Reward, very simply. One is eternal bliss, the other eternal torment. There is no grey area.

This marriage of Love with Justice explains much of the tougher aspects of Christianity, particularly the institution of Hell. Why does sin merit such a harsh punishment? Because God's wrath at a violation of the law of Love is virtually unending. He loves the righteous with a burning, everlasting love -- and he despises the unrighteous with an equal degree of loathing. He cannot do otherwise, because he IS Justice, just as he IS Love. It is just as much out of character to release sinners from torment as it would be to reject one of his beloved sons or daughters.

According to this system, Christians have indeed been saved from death by Jesus' sacrifice, and it was a great act of Love -- the greatest, even, for it replaces infinite wrath with infinite love. Humans have all broken the Law of Love, and according to God's Justice, we all deserve the eternal wrath of an infinite being. Because Jesus took that punishment on himself, God now sees those that follow Christ as perfect beings worthy of heaven. So there are only two options for humanity: repent or perish. And according to Love and Justice, this all makes sense, and it is both loving and just.

My issue, though, is that it seems to me that Justice and Love are two logically incommensurate values--that God cannot claim both of these to the utmost degree. In other words, to be completely Just, God must sacrifice being Loving. And to be completely Loving, God must sacrifice Justice. This is because while an action like sending people to hell to be tormented for eternity may indeed be Just, it certainly has no Love in it. It doesn't lead to a relationship, and it isn't selfless or sacrificial. It's just the law, and a terrible, painful, and hard law. Likewise, if God made exception to people who refused to bow the knee to him -- if he refused to punish them eternally because of his magnanimous Love -- then he would be denying his own Justice.

So it seems to me that the two aspects of God that are the strongest and most lauded character traits are logically unable to exist in the same God at the same time. And I think that many people realize this, and that's why we get books trying to explain how hell isn't what we think it is. In this age, people want a God whose Love is more powerful than his Justice, who would never dream of shutting himself away from his creation for any reason; who would never create a place where everlasting torment has its way with frail humanity. The other end of that spectrum is preaching Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God -- a concept rebuffed by some, but equally as valid according to Scripture. It's a God whose Justice is to be feared and accepted, a God whose Love only extends to the cross and no further.

Logically, there seems to be no middle ground. Either God's Justice or his Love must triumph, and hell indicates the triumph of Justice over Love.

the wine of god's wrath

And the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I stretch out my hand against Egypt...

--Exodus 7:5 

I've been reading this book, Erasing Hell by Francis Chan and Preston Sprinkle. It's written as a response to the more post-modern "Christian Universalist" position that is becoming increasingly popular, and it's written as an honest inquest into the Biblical reality of hell.

And it makes me extremely uncomfortable.


You see, at the same time as I'm reading this book, I'm watching the ninth and tenth seasons of Stargate SG-1, where the enemy is this huge religion from another galaxy and its gods, called the Ori. The priests of the Ori perform miracles, healing sick, raising people from the dead, etc-- unless someone claims to not believe in their divinity. At that point, the Ori will kill entire planets. They demand worship, and if a people refuse to bow the knee, they are killed. Follow the Ori or die.


When SG-1 resists the Ori, they are always asked, "You question the power of the Ori?" And they always respond, "No. We know your power, and it's awe-inspiring. What we question is your right to claim authority over beings of lesser power. We question your morality. We question your godhood."


And the picture Francis Chan paints of God (and even Jesus) is one of a God who has a huge emphasis in "severely punish[ing] those who do not bow the knee to King Jesus. (pg. 103)" He pulls passage after passage from the Old Testament, from Jesus, and from Paul and Peter which paint quite vividly a portrait of a wrathful, vengeful, condemning God who will cast all who do not follow Jesus and obey his gospel into a place where they will be "tormented day and night forever and ever." 


Like Stargate's "Ori," God offers the "good news:" bow the knee and be saved from torment. This is God's love.  This is the gospel. Instead of being cast into eternal torment, we can worship a being of incomprehensible power. No other option, no other choice. Subjection or torment. Convert or die. This is not love. This is not morality. This is "might makes right" on a divine scale.


What makes a God? Is it power, or is it morality? For my part, I could not worship an immoral God, no matter how powerful he is. And that's why this doctrine makes me uncomfortable. In my understanding of morality, love keeps no record of wrongs. Love forgives its enemies and prays for its persecutors. Love does not sentence someone to eternal torment-- no matter what he's done, and especially not for simply refusing to bow his knee. So why does God do this?

"God's ways are higher than our ways," Chan reminds us. His methods are not for us to understand, but simply for us to obey. Nevertheless, humanity understands morality, don't we? We know, at least generally, what's right and what's wrong, what's loving and what's evil. We know that if someone extends the choice "follow my commands or be cast into eternal torment," that's wrong. What makes it right for God? Do we assign him moral immunity simply for the vastness of his power?

And people will say, "No, God is saving us from our own sin. It's not God who sends us to hell, but we choose it when we sin." To which I would respond, "Who decided that the wages of sin is death? Is that a law even God must follow? A truth more universal than our Creator?"

The bottom line is, hell makes me nauseous. I don't understand how an ethically perfect being could torment his own creation for refusing to acknowledge him as their god. Chan makes it very clear that hell is not remedial--it doesn't fix people--it's just punishment. It's just vengeance born of anger. It seems incredibly contrary to me for Jesus to tell us to love our enemies one minute and preach the horrors of hell the next. Is God above his own moral law? Is that moral?

Sometimes I feel wistful

It was him, wiping away tears of joy at just seeing her.
Her, beaming and giddy and skipping and laughing.
Him, not reciting a formula but literally shouting his love.
Her, holding his face to hers for just a second longer.
Both of them, holding hands, skipping and dancing out of the chapel.

I've never been a fan of weddings. They're boring, they're all pretty similar, they all end the same. That, though, wasn't a wedding so much as a celebration. It was like a pronouncement that these two kids are perfectly in love, and plan to be for pretty much ever. It was the best day of their life, and everyone could tell. There was no reservation. It wasn't a ritual for them; it was a gift to each other, from each other.

I feel like I suddenly understand the dying institution-- you don't get married to "become one flesh." You get married because you can't comprehend being with anyone else for the rest of your life. You don't want anything else. A lot of guys label it a prison, but to him it was more like finding freedom. Like, in his wife, in that union, he found himself more himself, if that makes any sense. It was really neat. You could see this love between them that they were dying to find a way to express. Marriage was the most natural step in the world.

I wonder if I'll ever feel that strongly for anyone. I wonder if it's even possible.

In any case, congrats, guys. That was fun to watch.

ruminations on perfection

Der Weg ist das Ziel.

This life is not about its culmination; it never has been. People continually strive for perfection, but perfection--if we ever reached it--would be terminally boring. Life is and always has been about pushing forward--about the journey, and never about the destination.

Imagine a perfect world: no one need strive for anything, because they already have it. There is no rivalry, no improvement, no challenge, no purpose. For this reason, there are some aspects about heaven that I don't quite understand. We all idealize perfection, but in reality, I don't think anyone would choose a perfect world over one where we have the chance to continually improve ourselves--and one where we can make mistakes. Without mistakes, life would be kind of purposeless. Imagine a video game where you're assured to win every time--no one would play it. We play video games because we want the chance to prove ourselves--we want the challenge. We want the chance to make mistakes, and if that chance is taken from us, we immediately lose interest.

If anything and everything we do brings about the same solution--perfection--then no one will have any motivation to continue. This is, in essence, why communism is a failed economic system.

So then, what is heaven like? Is heaven a place of perfection, where every desire is immediately granted and every whim satisfied, and we long for nothing?

For my part, I hope it's not.

I want the ability to fail. I want the chance to make mistakes and keep trying. Without the possibility of disappointment, success means nothing. Perfection is not the best feeling in the world--instead, it's attaining Perfection against all odds. Once we reach it, we immediately look for the next challenge.Without some possibility failure, success means nothing. Without some possibility of hell, heaven means nothing.

And if we are given, in heaven, the ability to make mistakes, how is it different from our present life?

So my tentative, concluding thought: I hope heaven isn't perfection. I hope it is, like this one, a place where we are offered the chance to strive for perfection and given the possibility of failure. Perfection isn't as sublime as we've heard.

On the Physics of the Illusory

Ideas--true creative inspirations--are subtle, like that illusory dream that quietly fades seconds after awakening. Ideas can't be forced. Instead, they form at the edges of consciousness, lingering there until noticed; and then, you try to focus on them, and they seem dimmer, less focused. Like stars--brighter when you look away, because of the increased ratio of rods to cones in the peripheral retina. I wonder if some physiological aspect of the brain is comparable.

I feel like searching for an idea requires stealth. Pretend to focus on something else, keep the hunt for an idea in the subconscious--and then, in the middle of reading a book or taking a shower, it appears, and you seize it with a triumphant Eureka! And your captured idea becomes the basis for your poem, or your short story, or your screenplay.

Forced ideas, I feel, make average literature.

call my name

Stagnation is Death

The last month has killed me. After finishing two scripts and sending them to everyone I could possibly send them to, I've done nothing but wait--Wait for the competition to announce the next batch of winners. Waiting for friends to give me their opinions on my scripts (FAIL, friends). Waiting for the Hollywood insiders to give me a Pass or a Recommend. Patience, I've found, is not my strong suit.

Write more! you'll say. I know, I should. I've tried, but for the life of me, I canNOT find a new story that captures my interest. I need something fresh, dark, gritty, and realistic with high stakes, but every story I think up sounds so cliche to me right now. I don't know why. My muse has left me for now.

Not that it would make a lot of difference. At this point, everything is riding on those two scripts. If they fail, I'm not sure I could stay here; or, at least, not without significant changes. If they work, then I'll have everything I've been looking for regardless of my current project.  Maybe that's why I can't bring myself to care enough about the next battle. I'm just not sure it matters enough right now. The stakes aren't high enough.

So that leaves me pacing my studio apartment like a lion in a cage, hoping for something to happen. Hoping to escape the concrete bonds of this sun-choked city and do something real. My hometown is ridden with unthinkable trauma, and I can't even so much as lift a finger to help. I'm so, so tired of all this. I need out, just for a bit. Just for a month.

A week, even.

A day.

I need something to bring me out of this.

if the silence takes you,

You wake, and immediately know that something's different. Quieter. You rise, stroll over to the window, and open the shade to find that your world changed, altered by a silent but consummate snowfall.

Everything is white. The morning sky is gone, replaced by a solid array of winter clouds. The concrete, the mud, the cars, the trees--none of them exist anymore; in their place, intriguing amorphous white shapes stare at you. The streetlamp is still on, unable to recognize that the sun has risen. It's so different, so foreign. But also... so clean. So startlingly beautiful.

Ten minutes later, you step outside into the alien world. The cold hits you, but you ignore it as you gently step into the layer of fresh powder at your feet. The first footsteps on an uncharted moon. The thought makes you smile. You're a heroic adventurer, boldly scouting a virgin landscape. Alone, but inexplicably content.

You run your hands through the snow, tracing patterns with your fingers. Grab a handful, put it softly to your lips, take a bite. Again, you smile. A couple more paces into the field of snow, and you collapse onto your back, the snow cushioning your fall and creating a perfectly shaped pillow for your body. More comfortable than any king-size plush-foam retail mattress. So natural, so... perfect.

Your eyes close as you descend into rapturous silence. Belated falling snowdrops caress your cheeks, but the strange thing--the wondrous thing--is the silence. The stillness. No cars. No birds. No shouts. No constant electric hum. The snowflakes and the clouds envelop every sound, leaving only a breathless serenity in the whitewashed world. Everything fades away as you lie in the snow, in a foreign world that you, suddenly realize with a pang of honest jealousy, is yours. You finally belong. This is it. This is yours.

You've found your peace.
You've found stillness.
You're here.

Love Wins

Eternal life doesn't start when we die; it starts now. It's not about a life that begins at death; it's about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death.

--Rob Bell

Today, I began Rob Bell's "Love Wins." Fourish hours later, I finished it. Partly, it's because I heard about the controversy surrounding the book, and I love a bit of controversy; I think it's more than healthy to question your beliefs every now and then. Partly, it's because the Christianity I believe in has its soul and basis in Love, and Bell's title kinda drew me in from the get-go.

So, my thoughts: Love Wins is an honest book, and modern Christianity needs a bit of honesty in its stagnate climate. The book has a couple less-than-orthodox claims (as I'd hoped), and, ultimately, contains a huge amount of truth. Is Bell's theology perfect?  I doubt it, though it's certainly within the realm of possibility. The thing I love about it most, though, is that Bell doesn't argue doctrine within Christianity. He argues a Jesus that transcends Christianity; and through that, the Jesus that I've come to regard with comfortable familiarity once again took on a breathless divinity.

So regardless of any truth or fiction in the book's theology, I consider it a success.

Truth #1 - Jesus is bigger than Christianity. 

He didn't come to start a new religion, and he continually disrupted whatever conventions or systems or establishments that existed in his day. He will always transcend whatever cages and labels are created to contain and name him, especially the one called "Christianity."

This is one of those things that Christians all know, of course, but something we rarely take the time to contemplate. One of Bell's strengths is representing a God that doesn't fit inside a religion. Christ, he reminds us, is the Word incarnate: there before the beginning, the mystery that we strive to understand, present forever with us and through us. Bigger than the universe. Really, Christianity's attempt to wrap a neat little bow around our presentation of Jesus is a little presumptuous. Jesus is surprising, mysterious, mystical, intelligent-- but most of all, he's Love. And love always perseveres, and love never fails, and love doesn't consign itself to a single religion. Whaaaaaat? you say. No, it's true. Go look at a Muslim family. Trust me, they love each other every bit as much as you love yours. Jesus, as love, works in them and through them, too.

Truth #2 - Christianity isn't about getting into heaven. 

Life has never been about just "getting in." It's about thriving in God's good world. It's stillness, peace, and that feeling of your soul being at rest, while at the same time it's about asking things, learning things, creating things, and sharing it all with others who are finding the same kind of joy in the same good world.

Bell talks about how Jesus' kingdom of heaven was first and foremost something that should be worked for here on earth. Heaven on Earth. Partnering with God to create something beautiful, something lasting, something peaceful. Following Jesus isn't about obtaining a membership card to the afterlife heaven club. It's about loving right here and right now, striving to create a world more focused on showing people love than on believing the right things.


I love to think; new opinions excite me. When I read a little of Rob Bell's less conventional theology, then, my heart beat a little faster.

My favorite question of the book asks if God's pursuit of humanity stops after we die. Is that it? We get our lifetime, then rest with our decisions? But God, Bell points out, isn't about purposeless punishment. He's about redemption, time and again. He's about making all things new. Sacrifice, then rebirth. Is he relegated to condemning us to hell without the possibility of forgiveness, simply because our earthly time has expired? If we choose hell (which we often do), then so be it. But what if the hellions repent? What then?

Love always perseveres. Love never fails.

In any case, I'm not going into details on his more technical points. I recommend the book, if only to open your mind to a couple new perspectives. Whether you agree with them or not, Bell represents a God unbound by human conventions and a love more radical--and more understandable--than we're used to seeing. And that's something I respect.

Dear Selfless,

Good and Evil have always been created by lovers and creators. The fire of love glows in the names of all the virtues, and the fire of wrath. 

Zarathustra saw many lands and many peoples. No greater power did Zarathustra find on earth than the works of the lovers: "good" and "evil" are their names.

Of course, Nietzsche went on to censure everyone who is duped by the creators of good and evil, who succumbs to the system that those lovers set up; but, like most passages in Nietzsche, the kernel of truth in his storm against morality is golden.

Both good and evil are the works of lovers. People murder in the name of love; they also sacrifice their own lives in the same cause. And there is no act on earth with more impact, more influence, than one done for the cause of love.

I find it frustrating, then, that so many people find good and evil in trite, meaningless actions. Good and Evil are powerful. They affect lives in profound ways: one strips people down to nothing, stealing freedom and laughter and warmth; the other builds people up, giving them confidence, community, and strength. One instills love; one drains it.

Good and Evil have far less to do with specific actions than with specific people. In fact, they cannot be separated from the effects they have on the people around us.

This past week, I learned about a couple Evil happenings in the world, things that break people, destroying their ability to feel or even comprehend love. I also saw firsthand a number of Good things: things that bring a measure of hope and community into lives devoid of both. It reminded me that there are more important things in life than commercial success. Life isn't about success; it's about love.

I think it's easy, sometimes, to forget about radical concepts like Good and Evil while living in middle-class America. We don't see either very often. But when we do, we see the power they have. It's disconcerting and a little uncomfortable, but it's also a reality. And it's not a natural phenomenon; it's a weapon wielded by regular people. We can instill love, or we can drain it. Either way, it has a potent effect on someone's life.

"Love God," Jesus says, "And love others. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." I think this is a passage often overlooked in the Christian community. Everything that matters in this life has to do with love.

There is no greater power on this earth than the works of lovers.

On the Tree on the Mountainside

The free man is a warrior.

How is freedom measured in individuals and peoples? According to the resistance which must be overcome, according to the exertion required, to remain on top.

The highest type of free men should be sought where the highest resistance is constantly overcome: five steps from tyranny, close to the threshold of the danger of servitude.

--Friedrich Nietzsche

I wonder, sometimes, at my decision. I've moved across the country to a city where I know virtually no one, where thousands of starving artists have tried and failed, where the greenery and silence of nature is exchanged for a smoggy concrete labyrinth full of screeching cars and wailing sirens. It's discouraging, it's frustrating, it's difficult, and it's lonely.

But it's also a cyclopean challenge, a chance to overcome, an opportunity to flex my independence. There are days when I just want to give up and go live a life with friends and family--but there are also days in which I can face the challenge with exuberance and confidence, knowing that, should I succeed, every other challenge in life will pale in comparison.

I love challenges. I love pitting myself against a hopeless situation and winning. As an undying optimist and an admittedly naive idealist, I know that, eventually, I'll succeed, and that the troubles and pitfalls along the way will be worth the end result.

But the end result isn't enough motivation to keep going. It's the challenge that drives me. It's having a Gordian Knot placed in front of me and knowing that everyone is watching to see if I can unravel it. I think, more than anything, it's the realization that I can't let a puzzle go unsolved, even if it costs me the warmth and contentedness of being with friends and family. It's the battle, the chess game with capitalist America. It's the fight.* And if I give up, if I admit defeat, I'll lose a part of myself that I don't think I could live without.

I forget this sometimes, looking out over my industrial city, alone on a particularly caliginous evening. Then I realize that giving up will cost me far more than the price I pay to live here.

"But by my love and hope I beseech you: do not throw away the hero in your soul! Hold holy your highest hope!"

*Also, it's the morning coffee, the solitude, and the creative process. But mostly it's the challenge.

Greens and Purples and Silvers

True, we love life; not because we are used to living, but because we are used to loving. There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.

I would only believe in a god who could dance. And when I saw my devil I found him serious, thorough, profound, and solemn: it was the spirit of gravity--through him all things fall.

Not by wrath does one kill but by laughter. Come, let us kill the spirit of gravity!

I have learned to walk: ever since, I have let myself run. I have learned to fly: ever since, I do not want to be pushed before moving along.

Now I am light, now I fly, now I see myself beneath myself, now a god dances through me.

Thus spoke Zarathustra. 

People don't understand why I love Nietzsche so much. They think something along the lines of, "Wait, isn't he that atheist philosopher? Aren't you a Christian? That doesn't make sense." And I grin.

Because life, I've discovered, is far less about the black and white, and far more about greens and purples and silvers. Less about Yes and No and more about Why and How. Less about systems and rules and more about discovery and illumination.

Most people don't ask questions about anything beyond the physical. Anything existential or metaphysical seems pointless and possibly depressing, so they avoid it.

I thrive on it.

I love learning about what makes people act the way they do. Maybe I should have been an anthropologist, but seeing different cultures and learning how they came about is, to me, just about the most interesting thing there is. When it gets more personal, learning people's life stories and adventures, so much the better. I want to be part of it. I want to know it all and experience it all. Every story, every belief, every flavor, every experience, every location. I just want to know, and I think it's this curiosity that keeps me going. If you tell me your favorite city is Florence, I want to go so I can see why you like it. If you're a dedicated Buddhist, I want to learn everything about it so I can understand your commitment. If your favorite ice cream flavor is Ashes & EyeJuice, you'd damn well better give me a taste of it so that I can know what you know.

"Behind your thoughts and feelings," says Nietzsche, "there stands a mighty ruler, an unknown sage." I like to find the "unknown sage" in everyone. Because people aren't worth less because they believe something differently. On the contrary, their unique perspective is very often worth more. It gives them a richness, a texture, that makes them unique.

And anything unique is always beautiful.