Sunday, January 29, 2012

Democracy Swallows Poison.

Jim Crow laws once flourished in the South. Their purpose was to suppress political power among African-Americans by keeping them from voting. A consensus exists that Jim Crow laws were evil; but that belief is not universal.

But even people who would not return to Jim Crow tolerate Jim Crow under a new guise.

1. Solving a problem that doesn’t exist.

Voter fraud isn’t a significant problem in America. People just don’t impersonate others to cast votes. Among modern democracies, American voters are apathetic; but the idea is advanced that the opposite is true – that far from being a low-interest democracy, we’re teeming with people energized to cheat at the ballot box. The fact is, with near-universal suffrage among adults, incentives to impersonate other voters really don’t exist.

But states dominated by Republicans tend to pass voter-ID laws. Since voter fraud is not a problem, there is only one reason for these laws. That is to suppress voting by Democratic-leaning constituencies – minorities and young adults and poor people, who are less likely to have a government-issued ID.

2. A subtle form of Jim Crow.

If it’s illegitimate to keep someone from voting because their skin is dark, it's illigitimate to create an unnecessary hurdle to voting to exclude dark-skinned people.

If it’s illegitimate to keep someone from voting because they’re poor, it's illigitimate to create an unnecessary hurdle to voting to exclude poor people.

If it’s illegitimate to keep someone from voting because they’re young adults, it's illigitimate to create an unnecessary hurdle to voting to exclude young adults.

3. The passivity of the courts.

In times past, a southern state passed a law that African-Americans had to wear bright clothing after dark. The given reason for this law was that drivers couldn’t see dark-skinned persons at night, so they had to wear bright colors for safety. The Courts saw through this paper-thin pretext and struck down this racist law.

So far, voter ID laws have survived constitutional challenges. I don’t know why.

4. De-valuing the golden rule.

But I know that there is a trend. That trend is toward the death of decency and the death of democracy.

It is indecent and un-democratic to exclude people from the democratic process because you want to hoard power among people like yourself. Certainly, it defies the golden rule. But the golden rule is in eclipse. In fact, Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul recently was booed at a Republican presidential debate for invoking the golden rule in foreign policy.

The golden rule is a bedrock Judeo-Christian value, and its eclipse is a knell not only for the death of decency, it’s a knell for the death of true Christianity.

6. Sliding along a continuum.

There’s a continuum between survival of the fittest, that is, social Darwinism, and Christianity, love your neighbor as yourself. Naziism was a high water mark of social Darwinism. The early church described in the book of Acts might have been a high water mark of Christianity.

I’m not comparing America to Nazi Germany. But Nazi Germany is an end point for the death of decency and the exaltation of power. We are not Nazi Germany, but I mention Nazi Germany because, unless it changes its course, a nation ends up in the direction in which it is heading.

We still have vigorous democratic institutions. But it’s humbling to think that Hitler rose to power in a democracy. So did Hugo Chavez. Then Hugo Chavez (from the left) exerted power to undermine the possibility that a strong challenger could arise to unseat him. He did so by undermining any economic independence of any person or group in Valenzuela apart from the government. Governor Walker in Wisconsin follows the Chavez playbook (from the right) by virtually outlawing government-employee unions in that state. I’m not saying that Walker is Chavez; he’s Chavez-light.

Voter-ID laws are a Chavez-like exploitation of power to cement power, to make the Republican Party less vulnerable to democratic processes.

7. Naming a trend.

We need to name this trend in America truthfully. We need to call it anti-democratic, un-Christian, and indecent. If America chooses that path, it does what it has the right to do. But if we name what we do, at least we choose that path with our eyes open. A direction that is as grave as that might be chosen, but it should be chosen, if at all, deliberately. God forbid that we blunder our way away from democracy, decency, and self-determination.

I would prefer this: Democratic or Republican, we must be firm. We must say that politics must never be used to disenfranchise voters. Winning by excluding swaths of voters – making the franchise itself subject to "just politics" – is a bad direction for America.

Saturday, January 28, 2012

"F*ck the Poor"

I’ve listened to high Republicans fling poop at the poor. Newt Gingrich comes to mind. He claims that the poor don’t work. If he were right, I’d have to erase "working poor" from my vocabulary.

But I’ll cling to that phrase. The Labor Department defines the working poor as persons who have been in the labor force for at least 27 weeks during the year, but who still live below the poverty line. In 2008, in the United States, there were almost nine million of those folks. (I couldn’t find figures for later years.)

1. Time for a new national motto?

Republicans like Gingrich rise in the world. So much so that I’m tempted to pull out a dollar bill to confirm that the old motto is still printed on the eagle’s banner: "E pluribus unum" (Out of many, one). But with the rise of the values touted by Gingrich and his kind, I half expect to find a new motto: "Nolite tangere quae mihi" (Don’t touch my things). (If anyone knows Latin, feel free to kibitz; I had to use Google’s translating function.)

This new de-facto motto fractures us. The old one cemented us in a common destiny.

2. Hey, Bible: got anything?

If the eagle’s banner doesn’t show our present direction, if it’s not partisan enough, if it persists in proclaiming, against strong contrary evidence, that we’re a unified country, then I look to the Bible for a smack of truth. Biblegateway.com lets you search many translations of the Bible for words and phrases.

So I plugged into that website’s search-engine the phrase "Fuck the poor". I got nothing. Maybe I should have searched the New International Version instead of the King James.

Really, that phrase, or its sentiment, was dear to the religious elite in Jesus’s time; but it’s far from the Bible’s spirit. I’ll say a thousand times: look to the story of Lazarus and the rich man if you doubt who’s side God is on. (Luke 16:19-31.) Or look at the Sermon on the Plain. (Luke 6:20-49.) Or, there’s that saying about the rich and the camel and the eye of a needle. (Matthew 19:24; Mark 10:25; Luke 18:25.)

Believers might know these passages; non-believers also might know them. These and other parts of the Bible show God’s love for the poor. The Bible plainly shows this. We rich (and, by Biblical standards, a whole  lot of us qualify as that) might do well to read the Bible with nervous attention. The Bible warns against persons of plenty whose psychological epicenter is the word "Mine".

3. Fuck the poor?

So "fuck the poor" ain’t biblical. The more Biblical phrase is "Fuck the rich". (Yeah, I know, "With God all things are possible." That’s why I said it was the more Biblical phrase.)

I’m not a communist. I’m not a socialist. I’ve lived under communism and the experience didn’t give me a warm glow.

But I’ve read Luke. I’ve read Leviticus 19:9-10. I’ve read Psalm 72. These scriptures are clear. Similar passages that show God’s love for the poor sprout throughout the Bible.

To me, the theme of God’s special love for the poor is so clear in the Bible that it’s like God’s love for the poor reaches from the pages of the Bible and twists the reader’s nose with that message. It’s so clear that I doubt the attentiveness of a believer that doesn’t see it.

4. Does anybody care?

But the Bible’s composers knew that the Bible was likely to be ignored. The rich man tormented in hell in Luke 16 worries about his five brothers. He pleads for "father Abraham" to send dead Lazarus to his living brothers; certainly, he pleads, if someone warns them from the other side of the grave, they would repent and avoid an afterlife of torment. But Abraham replies, "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."

Our habits and our attitudes and our ways of life often change little over time. Verses and chapters from the Bible often no more change our direction than a piece paper blowing in the wind moves a train off its rails. Sociologists say that a radical psychological transformation is the by-product of a "paradigm shift". A Christian needs to shake off his old way of seeing the world and take on a new one. The Bible can help; prayer and other spiritual disciplines can help. It takes discipline and effort and grace. Sometimes our own brokenness teaches us.

5. Objections?

Some might quarrel with this clear message of God’s love for the poor. So, some might protest: "But Jesus didn’t know how horrible and shiftless today’s poor would be!" Please.

Or: "Sure, love your neighbor, but who’s my neighbor?" Already answered: Luke 10:25-37.

6. It matters.

I admit: maybe I’m a pious scold. But, in my feeble way, I’m a pious scold for God.

Feeble truth-teller that I am, this I know: God is not indifferent to how we treat each other, how we treat the poor. Nor is our treatment of each other without divine consequences to us. So, "Love your neighbor" is a law of Leviticus, and it appears throughout the New Testament. And in Deuteromony God warns Israel to obey the law, that they might prosper in the land that God gave them.

I don’t assume God’s continued blessing on America. Some in Jesus’s time assumed their specialness as descendants of Abraham, but Jesus said that he could raise children of Abraham from stones. As children of Abraham, so citizens of America. America will prosper as long as we please God. To please him, we’ve got to strive to be like him.

But we’re not like him when we despise the poor. My plea to change that attitude is my bailing bucket in a sinking ship. If enough people bail, our ship gets saved. But most people won’t leave the buffet line as the ship takes on water.

And you know what? We can’t do it alone. Our ship won’t be saved unless we bail and God bails with us. But if we’re forking roast beef while the Atlantic swirls around our ankles, he’ll probably go to help people who want to be saved.

Those are people who might share their meager fare with strangers.

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Uncertainty is Your Friend.

False certainty is a problem for out times.

1. A new lawyer learns not to predict outcomes.

When I was a new lawyer, Judges were gods to me. I feared them and I looked up to them. My first court appearance as a new lawyer was a simple trial-setting conference. Today, I would hardly think about it before I went, except to print a calendar from the computer and to look at it to see when I could do the trial. But on that day, over-and-over I rehearsed my little speech to the judge: "Your Honor, such-a-date and such-a-date would be acceptable."

I still remember the first time I heard a judge make a really, really bad ruling. I couldn’t believe that the judge had ruled as he had. I stood behind counsel table and literally stared at the judge with gaping mouth. When the judge saw my look of shock and horror, he snapped at me.

Eventually, bad rulings lost their power to shock me. Years ago, a former colleague of mine from the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office became a court commissioner. I was then a criminal-defense attorney. We chatted, and she asked me what I found to be the greatest difference between being a prosecutor and being a criminal-defense attorney. I told her that I could no longer go to court and make a stupid argument and expect to win.

A recent court-appearance comes to mind. I made a motion for the return of my client’s property – his medical marijuana. The marijuana-trafficking charges against him had been dropped because the amount of marijuana was small, and because he could prove that he could lawfully possess the marijuana for his medical condition. The judge I was in front of was smart. I had written a good legal memorandum that explained why my client should get his marijuana back.

The prosecutor opposing me wrote a legal memorandum, too. I looked at it and almost sneered. Maybe when I read it the word "stupid" ricocheted in my brain. But however ill-reasoned I thought it was, still I knew that anything might happen. So I prepared arguments to counter the prosecutor’s arguments.

Which turned out to be a good thing. The judge was much taken with the prosecutor’s legal memorandum. It took all of my persistent arguments to persuade the judge to rule right.

2. Uncertainty in present times.

The point is that my professional experience disposes me to embrace the reality of uncertainty. This embrace of uncertainty distinguishes me from many people that I know.

For example, I know Democrats and Republicans who are already celebrating their side’s victory in November. I strongly support Barack Obama, and I’m hopeful for his reelection, but I really don’t know what’s going to happen. Nobody can know what will happen in the next eleven months, and what happens might make all the difference..

3. Unpredictability in history.

History, even recent history, shows how uncertain the future is. On the night of September 10, 2001, what American went to sleep knowing that, the next morning, an obscure hater living in Afghanistan would murder three thousand Americans, and that his acts would lead to wars that would bring pain to many thousands of families?

And on September 10, 2001, the prevailing wisdom was that George W. Bush would be ejected from office at the end of his first term. The prevailing wisdom was that people were realizing that he was a friend of the rich, not of the middle class. Then the twin towers fell, and Americans rallied around our war-president.

And who knew that George W. Bush would use his new popularity to drive Democrats who rallied to him out of office? Or that, seven years later, Americans would reject Bush’s would-be Republican successor in no small part because of the perception that Bush had bungled the wars?

Going back further in history, to 1920, who knew that an obscure soldier from World War I would resurrect defeated Germany, drive the world again to war, and cause the murder of millions of innocents?

4. Ours is a predictability-culture.

Yet ours is a culture that touts predictability. People pay too much attention to gurus who purport to predict the ups and downs of stocks, for example. Over the long run, even the best of them do little better than a guess. Some of them, who have almost a worshipful following, make catastrophic predictions that are proven wrong almost immediately.

I personally am a sucker for people who foretell the political future, despite my claims to skepticism. Two weeks ago, Mitt Romney was considered the inevitable Republican nominee for president. But yesterday, in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich pulled off an incredible come-from-behind upset of Romney, based on Gingrich’s resourceful debate performances in the week leading up to the primary.

5. Managing the future.

We don’t only try to predict the future; we try to manage it. Some try to manage it with money. But money is un-reliable. First, you can’t count on it coming. Then, if you have it, you can’t count on keeping it. And even if you get it and keep it, it can’t guarantee a happy, predictable life; in fact, it can’t guarantee life. Some illnesses don’t yield to money. And a drunk driver can wipe out the benefits of a fortune’s worth of solid financial planning.

As a young man, I figured that my smarts and my work ethic would propel me to success. But I couldn’t manage my career even with these assets. My professional road has been much bumpier than I expected it to be.

Some people look for certainty in love. Only when I was young did I predict, unrealistically it turns out, fabulous relationships. When a relationship that I had put my hope in turned sour, my disappointment was great. Now, I don’t make predictions.

Power isn’t reliable, either. Ask Anthony Weiner, the New York Congressman with poor judgment about cameras and underwear. More tragically, think of John F. Kennedy. Or think of Winston Churchill, who was turned out of office at virtually the moment of his great triumph.

6. Religion and uncertainty.

Some who know me might predict that I will now give pious advice that only religion gives certainty. But certainty in religion is a manifestation of our too-certain times. I wish religious people were a little humbler about their knowledge of God than they are. I also was certain about religion; but then I had humility thrust upon me.

7. Embracing your inner I-don’t-know.

No, where I’m headed is this: we need to embrace uncertainty. There’s wisdom in that, the wisdom of reality.

This is easier for some than for others. My students in China, typically, had a low threshold for uncertainty. One morning, after outrageous classroom behavior, I ordered certain trouble-makers to my office that afternoon. I was intentional about delaying the meeting for several hours. That was because I knew that the delay, the not knowing what would happen, would drive these trouble-makers crazy. One of them was explicit. After class, he pleaded to know what penalty I would impose, because, he said, he couldn’t bear waiting to find out. At the appointed hour, I went easy on them. The punishment had been not knowing what the punishment would be.

Others embrace uncertainty more easily. I think that these are humble people. They don’t, against experience, arrogantly think that they know what the future will be.

If more people embraced uncertainty, maybe we would waste less time with false prophets – false prophets of religion, false prophets of finance, false prophets of politics, false prophets of love. Maybe we’d be a little smarter if we didn’t leap to conclusions about the future. Maybe a habit of mental restraint would lead to an admirable restraint in forming judgments. Maybe we’d begin to comprehend how much we don’t know, and we’d continue to gather facts and suspend judgment when, before, we would make an early, ill-formed judgment.

Knowing what we don’t know: there’s wisdom in that.

Sunday, January 15, 2012

The Little Dog Abby

Dad’s second-to-last dog was a little mutt named Muffy. My friends the Medrano sisters found her abandoned on a busy street in Colton. They thought that she needed to be rescued and that Dad needed a dog for company.

Muffy was a happy dog. She didn’t jump up on people when they came to the house; instead, she would rat-tat-tat her feet on the floor like a staccato drum-set.

We tried, but we couldn’t train Muffy to stay out of the street. One day, that killed her.

My twin, Peter, hated to see our tender-hearted old father heartbroken. So he found Dad a new puppy. She was little and white, and Peter chose her because she was the shyest among her brothers and sisters. Peter figured that a meek, quiet dog would suit our meek, quiet Dad.

Peter surprised Dad with her one night. Dad was as happy as a ten-year-old boy with his first puppy. He named her Abby.

Dad loved Abby, and Abby loved Dad. When he napped, she napped. When he watched television, she sat on his lap. They ate dinner at the same time.

Dad's home-health-care aide would take Abby in the backyard and throw a ball to exercise her. But unless Dad was there watching, Abby and the aide just watched the ball bounce into the distance. But if Dad was there, Abby happily and vigorously chased the ball.

Abby loved to run. That’s what she did when she was happy and excited. She would run back-and-forth from room to room, or up and down the hallway.

She would run in the front yard. But the front yard had tricky terrain. Sometimes Abby would miscalculate her trajectory over one of the low rows of decorative bricks. Then, she would trip her feet on a brick and tumble all catawampus.

In his last years, I was Dad’s evening-and-night care-giver when his regular care-giver went home. I would cook his dinner; I would make sure he did not fall; I would help him choose a channel when he lost the ability to understand and operate the television remote-control. I put him to bed.

One day, dad broke his hip. He had hip-replacement surgery, and he went to a convalescent center to recover. I knew he missed Abby, so I asked the personnel there if I could bring Abby for visits. They said that I could, so I did. It was good for both Dad and Abby.

After I started bringing Abby, other people also started bringing their bed-ridden loved-ones’ dogs. Apparently, until then nobody had thought to ask if it was alright to bring pets.

One day, a woman came into Dad’s room. She asked for a favor. She said that her mother was in one of the other rooms, and that her mother’s dog had died while she was in the convalescent center. She wanted to know if Abby could visit her mother? The visit took place, and the visit with Abby made the frail woman happy.

Dad died in the convalescent center shortly after that – a complication from his surgery. We grieved Dad, but we also worried that Abby would not get over Dad’s death.

But in the time that I cared for Dad, Abby had bonded closely with me. She became my dog.

Peter and I lived in our Dad’s home while starting our law practice. We stayed in it after Dad died.

But it was a problem that we couldn’t take Abby to work (she desecrated the carpets there). And staying home alone traumatized her. When I visited her during the noon-hour, she would be upset and be hiding under hanging clothes in my closet, and she wouldn’t come out to greet me.

The cure was a new dog – a puppy, Bella – to keep Abby company. They became good friends, and Abby stopped being upset when she stayed home.

In time, Peter forfeited his life-long bachelorhood and married Tanya, his bride from Belarus. Peter and Tanya decided that they needed privacy for their marriage to thrive, so I moved out. I left little Abby behind. It was for the best – she had more company with Bella and Tanya than she would have had if she had stayed alone during the day in my house.

I visit Abby. Abby has grown old. The once little running dog now scarcely moves around. Sometimes I stop at the old house in a rush on the way to another appointment. Abby wants to come to the door to visit with me, but her old body doesn’t take her around well. When I come by the old house in a rush, she wants to see me, but she has to be disappointed.

When I do see her, I see how old she is. One of her eyes is milky; the other is a little milky. When she sits, I watch her slowly put her fanny on the floor, and the effort and languid pace of that operation reminds me of the space shuttle docking with the space station. She no longer runs. She wears a diaper, and Tanya cuts a hole in the diaper for her tail. Her tail is what tells me that she’s happy to see me.

Tanya’s mother visits from Belarus. Abby loves Tanya’s mother. She follows Tanya’s mother around the house as best she can, and, at night, she follows Tanya’s mother into her bedroom and sleeps next to her. I don’t know where this affection sprung from so suddenly. Maybe – maybe – Tanya’s mother somehow reminds Abby of Dad.

I don’t know. But I’m always glad when Tanya’s mother visits, because it’ s a happy time for Abby. Abby is old and I should visit her more often.

Through the years, Abby has been a living link to Dad. When she's gone, that link will be severed.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Dating: a Little Navel-Gazing.

There’s nothing sweeter than a good Christian woman.

So I know it must pain them to drop me like yesterday’s bran muffin. But they do it anyway.

Not that I blame them. Were times less tolerant, the gap between my personal religious beliefs and modern orthodoxy would have catapulted me to a place of honor at a bonfire for heretics. "Did you see Jon today?" "See him? I think I have a little of him in my eye!"

But I can’t solely blame my eccentric religious beliefs for being serially spit up like a hairball. There’s more to it. I think I’ll not list my shortcomings. Just take my word. Picture an ancient horizontal refrigerator being pulled back from a restaurant wall, and hitherto hidden cockroaches fanning up toward the ceiling in a widening stream.

When I re-read that last paragraph, I fear that I might be painting my soul in more horrible hues than the facts warrant. Or, maybe, people who know me best will read this and say, "He almost gets it."

On the bright side, I haven’t committed most crimes in the Penal Code. That’s due, in part, to the rich imaginations of its drafters. Honestly, for the challenge of a lifetime, make the Penal Code your bucket list.

Yet the modern Christian single woman is way too sophisticated to be much impressed with that old pick-up line, "Hello. I’m a stranger to most of the Penal Code." For one thing, that’s exactly what you’d expect a professional public enemy to say.

But even if I muddle through to semi-familiarity involving dinners and long talks, then the day eventually comes when I sit for The Break-up and The Explanation.

The Break-up must come if it must come. I do not yet know the utility of The Explanation. I have never thought of suing a woman because she dumped me for less than good cause. Maybe they intend The Explanation for my betterment. Or maybe women have a taxonomic nature, and to list my shortcomings excites them like an entomologist might be fascinated by a particularly interesting cockroach spotted streaming up a restaurant wall.

Lovely women, for sharing your interest and concern, thank you.

I’ve dated non-Christians. I’ve enjoyed that. A non-Christian isn’t put off by my eccentric beliefs. She already thinks I’m eccentric for being a believer. The idea of an odd Christian might to her seem a little like the idea of an uncomfortable mammogram: that’s just the way it is.

A good relationship requires similarities and differences. I have a many interests, and any of them could ignite a good relationship: literature (especially Shakespeare); politics (especially progressive politics); law (especially criminal law); travel (especially Latin America); sports (especially swimming); and motorcycles (though a Harley girl might look past me and my metric bike).

Am I optimistic? Uh, not really. Today is the best predictor of tomorrow, and today I’m unattached. And I have been virtually all of my life. And that might mean that I lack some quality that helps a man forge a bond with a mate.

I once worked for a man who was married four times. It’s not the kind of a thing that people boast about, but it shows an aptitude for romantic bonding. I lost track of him, and for all I know his last marriage has turned out to be a long-distance run compared to the first three. Or maybe he paused in the middle of his long-distance run to bond with a hot aerobics instructor.

The point is, I seem to lack his romantic-bonding aptitude.

On the other hand, maybe sports supply a good metaphor. There was a time when I was injuring my shoulder while swimming, and my doctor strongly suggested that I find a coach to examine my stroke. Maybe I need a dating coach. Lacking a gift for dating, maybe I should embark on a course of study to become good at it.

Or maybe there’s a different explanation. I have sometime said that I’m not married because, when I was young, I was too picky; then I grew older, and the women became too picky.

But that’s not completely correct. Sometimes it’s been true that women I’ve dated have summarily ejected me, for fine reasons clearly stated; but it’s also been true that I’ve failed to kindle what might have been perfectly good relationships.

Or maybe my control over my romantic life is illusory. Another metaphor: professionally, I work hard. I labor at my briefs. But as I grow older, I wear a certain fatalism. Because as hard as I work (and I grow better at my job as I grow older), I am subject to time and chance. Every lawyer has won cases he should have lost, and has lost cases he should have won. Certainly, that’s true of me.

Maybe dating is like that. In dating, maybe I’m waiting for the one I should have lost but won.

So this discussion of dating has morphed into the debate over "Nature or Nurture?" with added question marks after "Choice" and "Fate".

I’ve started a debate, but I can’t finish it. There’s an opportunity here for some clever sociological research. Maybe life or further thought will give me an answer. Or maybe the government will fund a study called "What’s Up With These Single People?"

Monday, January 2, 2012

Heaven: Easy or Hard?

 First, I don’t know your eternal fate. It might be heaven, or it might be hell. I’m not privy to that information.

But the Bible suggests who is saved and who is not. The quote about this that gets all modern attention is Romans 10:13: "For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."

And based on that, most American Christians accept that salvation is easy. But it really isn’t. The modern, literal interpretation of this passage suggests that everybody who knows this passage, pious or not, could call on the name of the Lord and enter heaven. So, taken too literally, without knowledge of other scripture, salvation is a knowledge test. But it doesn’t seem that the same thing that gets you into Cal State LA should get you into heaven.

And the Bible says otherwise. Clearly, not everybody will be permitted to call on the name of the Lord. Some people will cry out "Lord, lord . . .", and Jesus will reply, "Get away from me, you evil-doers . . .." (Matthew 7:22-23.) The name of the Lord won’t rise from them; perhaps they won’t be permitted in that time even to know it. Perhaps they’ll be like I was in dreams years ago: I felt under demonic attack, and I tried to cry out to Jesus but could not. (I had a friend who had like dreams.)

The point is, salvation is not as easy as it sounds. There’s more to it.

Another part of the Bible that bears upon salvation is largely overlooked. This is a part in which Jesus preached two tracks: he preached blessings for some, and he preached grief for others. This is Luke 6:20-26, often called "The Sermon on the Plain". Jesus speaks four blessings and four griefs.

There’s a clear pattern in who gets blessings and who doesn’t. This pattern shows how backward is the theology of many American churches.

1. The blessings

Blessed [are] ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed [are] ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed [are] ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.
Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you [from their company], and reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake.
Rejoice in that day, and leap [for joy]: for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for in the same manner did their fathers unto the prophets.
2. The curses.

But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.
Woe unto you, ye that are full now! for ye shall hunger. Woe [unto you], ye that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep.
Woe [unto you], when all men shall speak well of you! for in the same manner did their fathers to the false prophets
3. Which are you?

Jesus said, "The last shall be first and the first shall be last". (Matthew 20:16.) The Sermon on the Plain accords with that. You’ll likely recognize yourself in one or the other of these blessings and griefs; you’re either one of the first or one of the last. By that, you should be comforted or discomforted.

The odd thing is, I see preachers get it backward. They preach against the lowly, but they flatter the comfortable. A lay preacher might stand outside of the San Bernardino courthouse and harangue the people lining up to go inside about their sinfulness. The people are waiting to go into the courthouse to be brusquely treated (perhaps) by their public defender, after which the judge will hand them their asses. These people need hope, not heaviness.

And in a congregation of well-fed Christians who park their nice SUVs in the capacious parking lot, the pastor assures them of their happy place in heaven.

Who’s right, do you think: these pastors or Jesus?

4. The assurance of salvation.

One reason that modern pastors get this wrong is that they believe the modern assurance of salvation. They believe the born-again theology that holds that you are "born again" the moment you "accept" Jesus, and that after that you have an irrevocable ticket to heaven. The well-fed can wallow in their comfort; their life is a first-class ticket to a happy afterlife.

But the Luke passage, and other parts of the Bible, suggest otherwise.

I once took a course at Fuller Theological Seminary called "Ministry to the Dying and Bereaved." The teacher one day veered into the doctrine of assurance of salvation. He was old, and he looked toward the end of his life. He denied that he had assurance of salvation; he said that he had only a "hope of heaven."

Students challenged him. Certainly, they said, he had assurance? But the teacher replied that no, assurance of salvation was not a Biblical principle, and that it had taken root only recently. He cited an event from early in the 20th Century when a member of a Presbyterian congregation had self-confidently expressed his happy knowledge of where he would be in the afterlife. The other members of the congregation were so shocked by his hubris that, though he was rich, they ejected him from the congregation.

Years ago, I read Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s "The Cost of Discipleship". Bohnhoeffer was a brave pastor who resisted the Nazis in Germany and paid for his resistance on the gallows.

His audience for "The Cost of Discipleship" was Germans before World War II, and the nub of the book was a denunciation of the doctrine of "cheap grace", easy grace. He called for his audience to know costly grace, hard grace.

Bonhoeffer, of course, contradicted the then-and-now current interpretation of Martin Luther’s theology of by-grace-you-are-saved-and-grace-alone.

I’m not prepared to say that one is right and one is wrong. I am prepared to say that which theology should be expressed to a congregation depends upon the times and the congregation. In Martin Luther’s time, there was a theology of works to get into heaven; and often these works were designed to enrich a bloated church. Luther’s grace teachings were an antidote to this orientation of salvation by works.

But in the time of Bonhoeffer, theology in Germany had degraded to the point where six million Jews could be murdered and his country did not shriek in collective outrage. If grace is cheap, conduct doesn’t matter, and people commit outrages against man and God. That dishonors God. In such times, people need to remember that grace isn’t easy or cheap; it’s costly and hard.

5. Our time.

What of our time? It’s mixed. Some people are really, really comfortable. (Woe to you.) Some people struggle and struggle and dread. (Blessings on you.)

Should you have assurance of salvation? It depends: are you the rich man, or are you the beggar Lazarus?

Remember that story? (Luke 16:19-31.) There was a beggar named Lazarus. He was miserable. The dogs in the street licked his sores. There was also a rich man who did nothing to help Lazarus in his misery. They died. Lazarus reposed in heavenly comfort. The rich man suffered the pains of hell. He pleaded for a few drops of water for his parched tongue, but there was a un-crossible chasm between Lazarus in heaven and the rich man in hell.

The rich find no assurance of salvation in this story. The poor do.

Or look at Revelation 3:17-18. Jesus spoke to the church of Laodicea. He said:
Because you say, "I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing," and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.
If I found a church called "Poor, Blind & Naked", I might join it. And I would hope that these poor, blind, and naked people would be on their way to being spiritually rich, keen-eyed, and clothed in righteousness.