Be Holy, for I, the Lord your God, am Holy!
Fifteen “Thou Shalt nots” to only 3 “Thou Shalts!” That’s there in today’s daily Lectionary reading from
Leviticus. But look: “shalts” frame the
“nots”. “You shall be holy, for I the
Lord your God am Holy” appears at the beginning and “You shall love your
neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord”
concludes it.
YES to holiness. No no no
no no…to theft, lies, murder, grudges, and judging, just to name a few. YES to love.
The passage tells me what I know in my bones to be true. Holiness and Love are intimately related. It has been easy to get confused about
this. With Bishop Michael Curry and
countless others I am part of the Jesus Movement. This is not my childhood Christianity—not
primarily centered on trying to be a good girl—or nice. It isn’t “Be holy…be pious” or “Be holy…be
perfect.” “Be holy: Love (like me!)”
says God.
bell hooks calls it out: our culture is mostly embarrassed and down
right bad at loving. She counters our “isms”
that keep people down based on race, gender and class with a love ethic. all about love: new visions lifts up
love as a life-giving way. She debunks
the assumption that being ethical takes the fun out of life. Love is what we “DO,” not so much what we
feel. It transforms our lives. She says
“I know no one who has embraced a love ethic whose life has not become joyous
and more fulfilling.”
That’s what I
want: love, joy, freedom. Lent is a
season to “go for these,” but not without cost.
Jesus, God enfleshed, loves with no limit. He loves even on the cross. He teaches what
his Jewish roots did and do. Become
love-able.
We are able to learn to
choose love, to become Holy. God would
not ask us to do what it is impossible to do.
Becoming more love-able means looking at where I fail at it. Ouch.
The point isn’t the focus on failure.
I am heartened by a story told from time to time. When asked what about life
in the monastery, a monk answered, “We fall down and we get up, we fall down and we get up.” The point is not that we fall down on
loving, but to keep getting up. Let’s
dust ourselves and each other off and claim our love-ability this Lent. Dare to be holy!
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