Dogs and Lent

Easter is pretty much the central defining idea of Christianity – experientially, theologically, and actually. We would have a really hard time talking about Christianity if we didn’t have the cross. The cross and the tomb stand as the two most powerful images – obedience and sacrifice and then victory and hope. I am intrigued by the idea of sacrifice. It is after all this aspect of the Easter story that is most profound. The common understanding is that Jesus took upon him the sin of the world and died paying the penalty we all deserved. THAT, we say is sacrifice. Or is it?
To me the greatest sacrifice in the whole story about Jesus is what happened at his birth. That God would choose to lower himself into a actual human body is a form of sacrifice I am sure that I have not mastered or understood.
I think about it like this:
I love my dog (or so my wife tells me). Let’s say I knew that my dog’s habits and behaviour were leading her to a deadly confrontation with a wolf. Of course, as her owner I would do all in my power to train her to change her ways but failing that there would be only one choice left. Become a schnauzer myself. If the technology were available to me to do what Tim Allen did in that movie and I were to seriously consider doing that in order to save my dogs life, I know that several people would protest. (Others of course would no doubt cheer me on – thinking I am a dog after all.) And if in spite of the protests I went through with the procedure what would my friends say about me.
They could laugh at me behind my families back – scoffing at the insanity of lowering myself to the level of a dog
They could mourn what they ultimately see as a waste.
They could call into question my love for my family and friends.
But they would have to admit that I loved my dog.
And then after I became a dog I would no doubt proceed to warn my dog of the perils of her behaviour. If she rejected my instruction I would no doubt be obligated to face the wolf myself and try to defeat the beast. And then what if I died trying to defend my dog – what would my friends say then?
I’m not sure they could/would say anything appreciably different, because in actuality I was already lost to them as a human.
Good thing that technology exists eh?
I know that an illustration like this is a poor way to describe the theology that is woven through these thoughts but…
1. For me Jesus is a picture of sacrificial love long before he gets to the cross
2. For me Jesus life, even without the cross, stands as blistering assault on everything that my natural tendencies want to do. For me Jesus life shows me how to be truly humble – selfless. This is important to me because I see selfishness as being the default problem for human beings. 3. For me Jesus life, teaches me about redemption. When I believe that God made himself into human flesh it just seems like a matter of course to me that he would use all his powers to provide a vehicle for his love to reach the people he cared about.
The cross means something different for me then. For me the cross becomes the inevitable result of an unshakeable love that began with the choice to become human like us.
I have tended to be satisfied with acts of sacrifice. Events that demonstrate my ability to sacrifice like Jesus did on the cross. But I have this sneaking suspicion that when Jesus taught about ‘taking up our crosses’ he meant more than just a string of meaningfully placed (even tightly spaced) events of sacrifice. What he was demonstrating and teaching was how being incarnational (that is willing to fully identify with another) is not only truly sacrificial but also deeply and redemptively powerful.
These days it is common for me to hear people (even evangelicals) asking each other (much to the chagrin of the Catholic haters) what they are giving up for Lent. The question intrigues me. I know that for many this Lenten practice is important and a valuable spiritually maturing discipline. However, I wonder if this Lent phenomenon is really little more than cleverly disguised pietism. So what if I prove at the end of 40 days that I can go without chocolate, junk food, buying new clothes, eating out, even food itself. In the end has it helped me to become more incarnational – more willing to live in someone else’s economy?
So this year for Lent by goal is to live more intentionally incarnational.

Philippians 2: 5-11 Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself.
He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to
cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time
came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave,
became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly
humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. INSTEAD, HE LIVED A
SELFLESS, OBEDIENT LIFE and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst
kind of death at that—a crucifixion.
BECAUSE OF THAT OBEDIENCE, God lifted
him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all
created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will
bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the
Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.