The single story

In the TED talk The Danger of a Single Story, Chimamanda Adichie discusses the idea that when we have a single frame of reference about a culture or country we define them by it.  An example that she uses is the single story of Africa and how it shapes our preconceived ideas about those who live there, no matter what country they come from.  When I first heard this idea, I was captivated by it.  I began thinking of all the places where I have held a single story and how that has shaped my interactions.  Then I realized that it also applies to individuals as well.  You see we often define the people we know by a single story.  In doing so we often have a hard time seeing them as anymore than that story. This is the main reason why first impressions are considered so important.  Once that impression is made, your story is now set for that person and even your best efforts and intentions may prove futile in the face of it.  I know the truth of this from both having it done to me and having done it to others.  There is a deep tragedy in this, however.  By limiting people in our eyes, we miss out on the beauty they have to offer the world.  They become definable objects that fit nicely into a box rather than being the images of God that they were created to be.

Certainly one of the greatest dangers in this is that we can define people by a single bad experience with them or by a single character flaw.  There is a scene in Lord of the Rings where Faramir, Frodo, and Sam are talking.  Faramir is detaining the two from their mission and Sam is forcefully arguing that those who claim to oppose the enemy should not halt them in their progress.  Faramir looks at one of the men, now dead, who was on their way to attack Gondor and asks if he was truly evil at heart.  It's a poignant moment in the film.  Faramir realizes that there is more to each person than a single story.  Unfortunately, I've done this many times with others.  If I have a sharp disagreement with someone, I am often tempted to define them by this.   Or if they don't agree with my particular political viewpoints or they've made moral choices that I don't agree with, they become that issue. This leads to hatred, anger, racism, and oppression.  Yet I fear this is not the greatest danger that comes from this problem.

I think the more subtle danger to this is far more destructive.  When others begin to see you as a single story, you do the same to yourself.  You project only that which you want others to see you as.  By doing so, you begin to live into a single story.  In my own life, I like when people see me as being adventurous.  And so that is the story of my life that I let people see.  Now certainly I have spent a lot of time doing adventurous activities and extreme sports, but that leaves out a great deal of who I am and what makes me, me.  When we allow ourselves to be defined in this way we become something less than what God created us to be, we become diminished.  It affects everything about us.  We become constrained by this new identity and are unable to become anything more than that.  We begin to give up on the dreams that God himself inscribed on our hearts.

When thinking of the single story, I think about the story of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery.  The pharisees and crowds have identified her by her adultery.  They strip her of any other identity and She embodies adultery to them and nothing more.  The woman herself seems almost resigned to her fate.  She has accepted the single story of herself.  She knows the punishment and waits for the sentence to be carried out.  Then Jesus does something miraculous.  He turns the situation on its head.  Jesus withholds condemnation from her and tells her to sin no more.  He restores her dignity and gives her a chance to rise above the story that she has lived into.  By giving her back her identity as a child of God, she is able to live a more beautiful and grand story. We must learn to do the same.  May we see beyond our own single story that has been defined by others and instead recapture the image of God we were meant to reflect to others.  May we begin to notice the beauty that lies in each person that we meet and resist the urge to define them by a lone character trait or by a single interaction with them.  I want to leave you with this C.S. Lewis quote from The Weight of Glory.  I think it sums up well the incredible nature that humans possess and the nonchalance that we seem to pay it.

"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which,if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship it, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. ... There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.  Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - These are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors”

We are invited to so much more.  May we live out grand complicated stories and encourage others to do the same.

Built Together

Over the last couple weeks I've been listening to orchestral and soundtrack music.  A couple of my friends recommended it to me and I have to tell you, I love it.  There is a certain epic-ness to the songs.  One of my favorite songs begins with these low ominous notes on the strings.  As the song continues, a soft violin enters in.  It builds and then begins to fade as other instruments joyfully join the music as if they have just been awakened.  It's almost as if the violin is going in search of others to join the orchestral sound.  The song builds throughout until finally about two thirds of the way through the song the violin again takes center stage now accompanied by the full orchestra each doing their own part.  The song crescendos in a beautiful harmony that stirs the soul.  You can't help but feel the moods the composer is trying to convey.  You feel the despair present in the opening, yet the hope found in the violin and finally the joy found in the conclusion of the song and the unity of the entire ensemble.  As I listened to this I was struck by the beauty of it and the similarity that it has with the church, or rather with the church as it should be.

In one sense the church itself is the violin, yet at the same time the church is also the entire ensemble.  You see as the church we are called to be the hope of the world going throughout spreading the good news and be a witness to the very real presence of the Kingdom of God.  The Holy Spirit moves in our midst and desires greatly for us to communicate hope to the tired and broken world around us.  We communicate this not simply by going to church, but by being the church.  In order to be the church we must begin to see ourselves as the entire ensemble.  Whenever I think of community, I often get a picture of uniformity.  Everyone acting a certain way, dressed a certain way, even speaking a certain way.  This is a deeply distorted vision of community, but I think it's held by many people especially in our western society that trumpets the cause of the individual over living in community.  In the orchestra, each person has their own instrument and own music to play.  The sheet music is certainly not the same for everyone, yet they all complement each other to form a greater sound.  The distorted view of community would have everyone playing the same instrument and the same notes.  You would no doubt be bored within a few minutes of listening.  On the other hand, pure individualism would either be a bunch of solo acts or (more likely) simply a cacophony of noise with everyone looking out for their own interests without bothering to listen to the rest of the orchestra for their cues or timing.

In Ephesians, Paul uses a similar analogy to talk about community.  He says that we are being "built together." (Ephesians 2:22).  He's not negating our personalities and our abilities, but rather he is saying that those will be added to the strengths and gifts of others in order that God's kingdom may be known in all its splendor.  It means that the church communicates God's glory in everything they do.  They lift each other up when they have fallen.  They utilize their own passions and strengths to communicate hope to a world filled with despair.  They step out of their comfort zone and take a stand for the downtrodden and helpless.

I have some pretty incredible friends who communicate this message daily in their lives.  Sure you'll see them at church on Sunday praising God, but it doesn't stop there for them.  They go throughout the world enacting change.  I have one friend who worked alongside people from volatile countries working to enact much needed social reform that is seen as subversive there.  I have a friend who started a women's center in Iraq and trains Latinos to go throughout the Muslim world with the gospel.  The list goes on.  They see the life of Jesus and realize that to be the church means to "let His kingdom come, and let his will be done on Earth as it is in heaven."  It means realizing that the task of change is too great for any one person, but that the body of Christ when functioning properly can truly show the reality of God's kingdom here on Earth.

I was walking through the woods the other day with my camera.  A downed tree caught my eye because despite it having split near the base it continued to hang there.  As I looked, I saw a couple Mountain Laurels supporting the weight of this much larger tree.  They had even begun to grow around it.  What a beautiful picture of being the church!  We are to lift up the fallen, support those in need, fight against injustice, give mercy to the suffering.  We are to be built together.