On (Western
calendar) Palm Sunday last week, we went to church with the girls that Rosey
counsels. It was a new church for me, and
the pastor’s body language was positive.
He was sincere in his prayers; cared about the congregation in front of
him. That sincerity spread to the
congregation, many of whom cried when the girls shared their own stories. You could see women across the church using
their dupatas to hide their faces and cover their tears.
One of the women who runs the house gave a message about the Palm Sunday cry: “Hosanna!” I had long forgotten that “Hosanna” is a cry for help in Hebrew. “Save us!” we cry to the King of Glory as he enters the city, humble on the colt of a donkey. “Save us!” we cry out to the Prince of Peace. She vulnerably shared her own story of being sexually assaulted as a teen, an incredible risk in an Indian context. “Save me!” she cried from her own experience of pain and separation from others and from God. She spoke of how God’s rescue of her inspired her own willingness to serve others, and expanded the Hosanna cry from a one-step personal plea to a two-step direction for life. “We are being saved to save.”
We are being saved to save.
Where do we believe our salvation will be found, and what do we think it will consist in? As I sat in a (Western calendar) Easter service this morning, the limited aspirations of our presidential candidates ran through my mind. The ones who claim to reject money are the very ones who think the right application of money will solve all our problems. The ones who belittle government power are the very ones who seem willing to do anything to acquire it. The ones who act the most distressed about violence are the ones who brag about what violence will accomplish in their hands.
We will not be saved by the proper application of violence. We will not be saved by the proper application of power. We will not be saved by the proper application of money. And thus we will not be saved by a vote for those who only know how to use money, power, or violence to change the world.
Jesus [“He saves”] came to those calling hosanna [“Save us!”], having rejected the wealth of the world, the power of the world, and the violence of the world. Yet on Good Friday and Easter, without employing any of these things, he brought salvation. In the brief years preceding that terminal week, He told stories of how a willingness to trust God for provision could replace a need to trust in accumulating our own money, that a willingness to submit to God’s authority could replace a need to trust in acquiring our own power, and a willingness to place faith in God’s security could replace a need to trust in employing our own violence. And in His last week He culminated the rejection of those false needs in taking up His cross and surrendering all to the One who could be trusted in, even unto death.
God saved Jesus so that Jesus could save.
And we are being saved so that we may extend that salvation to others.
We are being saved to save.
The safe house where many of those girls feel that they are being saved is in a tenuous position. It will only exist so long as being-saved people maintain open hands so their money may flow out to anyone in need. It will only be staffed so long as being-saved people have humility to give up positions of authority in order to work for far more humble positions with the girls. And it will only make a lasting difference so long as being-saved people break into the cycle of violence which brought the young girls here – the powerful men using violence to abuse the lowly men who abuse the women who abuse the children – with a love greater than violence.
In that Palm Sunday service last week, the pastor stepped up to the podium after the girls had spoken, opened his notes, took a look, then closed them again. “I had a message prepared for Palm Sunday today,” he told the congregation. “But I just want to let the testimony of our friend and these girls stand.” He then asked someone to pray for all of us, and closed the meeting.
One of the women who runs the house gave a message about the Palm Sunday cry: “Hosanna!” I had long forgotten that “Hosanna” is a cry for help in Hebrew. “Save us!” we cry to the King of Glory as he enters the city, humble on the colt of a donkey. “Save us!” we cry out to the Prince of Peace. She vulnerably shared her own story of being sexually assaulted as a teen, an incredible risk in an Indian context. “Save me!” she cried from her own experience of pain and separation from others and from God. She spoke of how God’s rescue of her inspired her own willingness to serve others, and expanded the Hosanna cry from a one-step personal plea to a two-step direction for life. “We are being saved to save.”
We are being saved to save.
Where do we believe our salvation will be found, and what do we think it will consist in? As I sat in a (Western calendar) Easter service this morning, the limited aspirations of our presidential candidates ran through my mind. The ones who claim to reject money are the very ones who think the right application of money will solve all our problems. The ones who belittle government power are the very ones who seem willing to do anything to acquire it. The ones who act the most distressed about violence are the ones who brag about what violence will accomplish in their hands.
We will not be saved by the proper application of violence. We will not be saved by the proper application of power. We will not be saved by the proper application of money. And thus we will not be saved by a vote for those who only know how to use money, power, or violence to change the world.
Jesus [“He saves”] came to those calling hosanna [“Save us!”], having rejected the wealth of the world, the power of the world, and the violence of the world. Yet on Good Friday and Easter, without employing any of these things, he brought salvation. In the brief years preceding that terminal week, He told stories of how a willingness to trust God for provision could replace a need to trust in accumulating our own money, that a willingness to submit to God’s authority could replace a need to trust in acquiring our own power, and a willingness to place faith in God’s security could replace a need to trust in employing our own violence. And in His last week He culminated the rejection of those false needs in taking up His cross and surrendering all to the One who could be trusted in, even unto death.
God saved Jesus so that Jesus could save.
And we are being saved so that we may extend that salvation to others.
We are being saved to save.
The safe house where many of those girls feel that they are being saved is in a tenuous position. It will only exist so long as being-saved people maintain open hands so their money may flow out to anyone in need. It will only be staffed so long as being-saved people have humility to give up positions of authority in order to work for far more humble positions with the girls. And it will only make a lasting difference so long as being-saved people break into the cycle of violence which brought the young girls here – the powerful men using violence to abuse the lowly men who abuse the women who abuse the children – with a love greater than violence.
In that Palm Sunday service last week, the pastor stepped up to the podium after the girls had spoken, opened his notes, took a look, then closed them again. “I had a message prepared for Palm Sunday today,” he told the congregation. “But I just want to let the testimony of our friend and these girls stand.” He then asked someone to pray for all of us, and closed the meeting.
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