Power no one wants

There is no denying that everyone seeks power in some degree somewhere. Whether it is the capacity to determine if you stay up until 7:30 pm or the reins to the nations, children of all ages want the right to exert their power. If you say you don’t want it then you’re living in deception, sugar. Power means freedom. Power means prestige. Power means affluence. Power means you never need to take crap from anyone anymore. Right?

Much of the religious community has adopted some form of the philosophy of dominionism, relying on a particular reading of the Genesis narrative where God give dominion to Adam over all the animals and plants of the world, coupled with messianic fulfillment of Jesus’ launch of the kingdom of God upon the earth. These people believe that they are commissioned to go and take authority of their territory, which includes their town, their schools, workplace, marketplace and any place that their blessed little feet touch. As long as it’s God and them, they hold the majority. Real power.

Everyone knows that money is true power. In a capitalistic economy like ours, money speaks. Everything has a price and if you want something, a price has to be paid. This is what an economy of exchange expects. You scratch my back, I scratch yours. This is how power is secured. The trouble with this thinking today is that it is outdated. Our currency, our money is fiat money. Slips of paper that our government has declared to be legal tender for one thing: debt. Don’t believe me? Go look at any bill you have and read what it says. If money is true power, debt is true power in our economy – he who holds the debt has the power.

Warning: I’m about to intentionally step on all toes.

What if the miracle, wonder-working power that every believer thinks they’re operating under in their grab for dominion wasn’t what we thought it was? What if the power of the kingdom of God wasn’t ruling over territories and its people? What if the miracle power we’re seeking already resides in us but we’re unwilling to use it because the personal cost is too much?

Consider the following: In the book of Acts, Jesus, before ascending, tells the disciples to go to Jerusalem and wait until they receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon them. In the fourth gospel, the writer tells us that Jesus appears to the disciples who are hiding after the crucifixion. Jesus breaths on them and says, “receive the Holy Spirit.” Did they receive it or not? The book of Acts would kinda make you think they didn’t…unless they aren’t the same disciples, which is for another time. What I want you to look at is what Jesus says to the disciples after he breaths on them.

Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said unto them, Receive you the Holy Ghost: Whose so ever sins you remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose so ever sins you retain, they are retained. (Joh 20:21-23)

So, they receive the Holy Ghost and then Jesus tells them that THEY now have the right to remit or retain sins. Now this term remit is foreign to a lot of people, so let me put it in a context that everyone will identify with. Remember how the disciples asked Jesus to show them how to pray? One of the lines he said was, “…Forgive us our debts and we forgive our debtors.” The word “forgive” here is the same word as “remit” in the other passage. Jesus tells them whatever sins you forgive are forgiven. I submit to you that this is the power, the miracle working, dynamic power we are endued with by the Holy Ghost. Furthermore, I submit that this power to forgive, is a power no one wants. Stew on that for a moment.

Look around your life for just a moment. Why would anyone want to forgive anyone? This isn’t a matter of declaring someone right or wrong, it’s about forgiving them for any, or all the pain, physical, emotional, and mental suffering you’ve endured, yes, endured for weeks, months, and years. Why should anyone be released of this debt they have exacted from you? Where is your restitution, your pound of flesh, your rights, your privileges, your honor, your self-worth?

No one knows the shame you’ve suffered, the guilt you’ve buried deep down, so far down it only comes out in eating binges or weekend drunks that last five days. Don’t tell me I need to forgive that S.O.B. who stole my innocence; who shattered my hopes, my desires, my dreams; who made me hate myself and those who remind me of who I use to be before…

I have no authority to tell you to forgive someone who is egotistical, homophobic, racist; misogynist, opinionated, arrogant, divisive, belligerent, maniacal, the sort of scum that shouldn’t have any influence in this world.

But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.
(Mar 11:26)

Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. (Luk 23:34)

There is a power we are all seeking. None want this power I’m talking about simply because we can’t see giving up the debt we’ve amassed thinking it was wealth. We have become so encumbered by the things we think are owed to us we don’t see what true wealth looks like. We fear losing something more than what could be gained. Everything we’re holding onto is simply a mental accounting trick we’ve employed to balance the books of our pain. Its power is defined by how much it taxes us and how much it depreciates our self-worth over time. We have become bankrupt without declaring it. It is a zero-sum game we play by ourselves.

If you want to have power, see things change in your life, make a difference that is truly real, then do the one thing you’ve never intended to do, the one thing that you’ve already received. You have everything to gain.