No Lasting City

Dave Brisbin 11.8.20 A contentious election is past and yet still continues. In a year like 2020, it seems nothing is straightforward. One thing is clear: we’re a 50/50 nation, divided on a razor’s edge over ideology and cultural issues. We lament the division and animosity on both sides, but politics by definition is managing divisions within a group, not erasing them. Erasing divisions requires totalitarian enforcement; short of that, people will always see things differently. It’s our human condition. Politics done well, focuses on the group’s common purpose—life, liberty, pursuit of happiness—to hold the center while compromising to make decisions for the good of all. But when politics loses its way, fear and corruption pulls the center apart until there is no more overlap, no apparent common purpose. There is talk now of healing and reconciliation. How? Waiting for our leaders may be waiting for a train that never arrives. If we want healing, we need to start with ourselves. We always need to start with ourselves. An insight comes from an unexpected place: Moses pitches the tent of meeting a half mile outside the camp of the Israelites. If you wanted to meet God, you had to go outside the camp, outside tribal politics and adversity. Jesus was crucified outside the city gates, and the author of Hebrews says, let’s go to Jesus outside the camp, for here we have no lasting city—we are seeking the city to come. Where do we ultimately place our hope? Administrations come and go, politics is an ever swinging pendulum. There is no lasting city for us in the mere tools we use to manage our divisions. But practicing presence, we can go outside our self-imposed camps and find the grace of the city to come even as we live and breathe right here and now.