Exiles in our own country?

Reverend Sue
Oct 8
5 min read

Jeremiah told the remnant who were exiled in Babylon to pray for the welfare of the city which held them captive. To pray for the welfare of the place they found themselves in far from their spiritual and cultural and historical home. God told them to put down their roots and to bloom where they were, to belong. But they were not told to forget who they were or whose they were. (Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7.)

You may wish to read what I wrote three years ago focusing on the gospel reading.

Many of us may feel like exiles in our own country, in our own church, at this time in history (and many times before) so maybe there is something for us in this ancient message through the prophet Jeremiah. For the exiles they were encouraged to feel a sense of belonging in the foreign place and circumstances they found themselves in. We may identify with feeling like exiles in a culture we sometimes feel very uncomfortable in, or indeed too comfortable in! Maybe feeling like an exile, or feeling solidarity with those who are treated like exiles, is a holy and right place to be?

What do I mean? Some of us live in countries (like Australia and much of Britain) where we could have said, did say, that we lived in a Christian country. We now live in a post-Christian world, a world in which Christianity is not the only or even the most significant spirituality and value system. We can bemoan this and look back to the good old days and ask why can’t they come again. But they won’t.

Others may live in countries in which religion and the state are worryingly becoming the same thing and the form of Christianity given power makes many of us feel like exiles in our own land, in our own faith.

So, if this is where we are, where is the power, the holiness? After all the chosen people of God were allowed to be taken in to exile and yet not forgotten. Jesus lived, taught and healed at the edges of society. The margins, the unlikely places and people, this is where God loves to move and heal and inspire!

What are some of the qualities of exiles that might awaken us, challenge us, renew us? Or - how might understanding ourselves as exiles help us to reframe our current experience of church and community and equip us for faithfulness and mission? Michael Frost explores this at length in his book “Exiles: living Missionally in a Post Christian World.” He takes up Walter Brugerman, the Old Testament scholar’s notion that exiles are driven to practice a dangerous faith.

Firstly, exiles are reminded of the dangerous stories of their faith – the story of the exodus, the journey from slavery to freedom. For us the stories of Jesus are dangerous – he was a dangerous man. His peers knew this. He was recognised as a danger to religion, to social order, to life as it was known. As exiles we are to remember how dangerous he was and is. How radical, subversive, life changing the gospel really is. If we really listen to the gospel then we cannot be too comfortable in our world.

Secondly, exiles need to believe dangerous promises. The exiles of Babylon had to believe the promises of the prophets that they would one day return to Jerusalem, that restoration would happen. We need to believe the promises of God rather than the soft sell of our culture – be interesting, be fit, be rich etc. One such list of Jesus’ dangerous promises are the Beatitudes – blessed are the peacemakers (not the war mongers), blessed are the poor (not those who create wealth at the expense of others), blessed are those who hunger and thirst for what is right (not the spin doctors). Dangerous promises. Promises which if we believe will keep us a little on the edge.

Thirdly, the exile engages in dangerous criticism of the host culture. The exiles in Babylon were to belong but not to forget who they really were. And it is that edginess, that dissonance between what is put forward as the wisdom of the day and what really matters that keeps us alert if not alarmed! All earthly powers want to be acknowledged and affirmed. When we are critical of the powers that be we do so as exiles, those who know this is not our true home. This world is not yet lived according to God’s way. And arguably we need to keep this critical edge whilst looking to our own corporate life as church.

And fourthly, exiles sing dangerous songs. Music gets through to us in ways that the intellect finds it hard to edit. You know, the tune that goes around in your head even when you tell it not to. Or when you are in love and suddenly every cloying, heart breaking song is about your situation. So, it matters what we sing – if we sing “Jesus is my boyfriend and I really love him” type songs too often then that will limit our capacity to know Jesus as Lord and divine other. If we sing “Onward Christian Soldiers” too often then we reinforce a sense that God is on our side against others of his creatures. It is important that our songs, our liturgy, our methods of fundraising – that everything we do brings us back to the radical love of God expressed in the life of Christ.

And so we are called to pray for the welfare of the community in which we are exiles – to build houses, plant gardens and give ourselves to life where we are - fully. And we are called to know that we are exiles, that we are called to a dangerous faith. As so often we find ourselves, we find the holy, in the paradoxical, in the place where two competing truths claim us.

Is this not after all where Jesus lived and where he invited his disciples to follow him? Fully human he belonged in his culture, his time and his place. Fully divine he was always an exile with a dangerous commitment to the fulfilling of the kingdom. And those moments when these truths came together were often moments of healing. And not everyone recognised what was happening. Indeed, very few did. Of the ten healed only one came back and gave thanks.

So let us live as citizens of two worlds, praying for the welfare of this community to which we belong – enjoying everything good about it, and working for its overthrow – for the coming of the kingdom of God – which will be better still. For us and for others.

Even so, come Lord Jesus, come and help us be at home in you, in this place, in this time. And then at home eternally in you.