Rock star Bono of U2 contrasts “grace” with “karma” and makes a forthright confession of his faith in the gospel of Christ:
Bono: You see, at the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics—in physical laws—every action is met by an equal or an opposite one. It’s clear to me that Karma is at the very heart of the universe. I’m absolutely sure of it. And yet, along comes this idea called Grace to upend all that “as you reap, so you will sow” stuff. Grace defies reason and logic. Love interrupts, if you like, the consequences of your actions, which in my case is very good news indeed, because I’ve done a lot of stupid stuff.
Assayas: I’d be interested to hear that.
Bono: That’s between me and God. But I’d be in big trouble if Karma was going to finally be my judge. I’d be in deep s—. It doesn’t excuse my mistakes, but I’m holding out for Grace. I’m holding out that Jesus took my sins onto the Cross, because I know who I am, and I hope I don’t have to depend on my own religiosity.
Assayas: The Son of God who takes away the sins of the world. I wish I could believe in that.
Bono: But I love the idea of the Sacrificial Lamb. I love the idea that God says: Look, you cretins, there are certain results to the way we are, to selfishness, and there’s a mortality as part of your very sinful nature, and, let’s face it, you’re not living a very good life, are you? There are consequences to actions. The point of the death of Christ is that Christ took on the sins of the world, so that what we put out did not come back to us, and that our sinful nature does not reap the obvious death. That’s the point. It should keep us humbled … It’s not our own good works that get us through the gates of heaven.
I blogged about this some ago when the book of Michael Assayas’ interviews with Bono, from which this is taken, first came out. You can buy it by clicking this:
Here is what strikes me: Bono is making a case for the Gospel by contrasting it with the popular pop-spirituality concept of karma. What are some other contemporary mindsets, preoccupations, or problems that can be points of contact for Christian evangelism?
HT: Strange Herring
{ 38 comments… read them below or add one }
The Supreme Court seems to think he has something to confess:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB12409190313586334...
My point of contact is emotional eating. I wrote the Bible study Freedom from Emotional Eating to help bring women to an intimate, life changing relationship with God through the backdoor of working on their problem with weight. I get to speak at a hospital about emotional eating next week, so this might be a way to break into the secular world as well. If we find out what people really want, we can use that as a path to get them to what they really need – Jesus Christ.
Whether they want to call it karma or not, pretty much everyone on earth believes in it. I think Bono makes a really good comparison. I've been meditating on ways to share the Gospel that don't include me reciting memorized scripts. I want to share it in a way that is real, that tells my story, which is a part of the bigger story of who Jesus is. This is a neat jumping off point… thanks.
In Gerhard Forde's "On Being A Theologian Of The Cross" i really like his analogy of addiction which he uses to great effect.
In one spot Forde writes, "To use again the analogy of addiction, when the optimistic encouragement to quit fails, it only increases despair and fosters hypocrisy. For the alcoholic the humility to confess, 'I am an alcoholic,' is not a mark of despair but of hope. It is false optimism that brings ultimate despair."
It strikes me that Bono uses his God-given vocation of music very well. He excells at his music and uses interview opportunities to naturally bring his God-given faith into the discussion. He also puts his faith into action by helping others. A great example of vocation for us all.
It strikes me that Bono uses his God-given vocation of music very well. He excells at his music and uses interview opportunities to naturally bring his God-given faith into the discussion. He also puts his faith into action by helping others. A great example of vocation for us all. And his use of the f word, well that's a bad habit. It makes him a real person, not a phony Christian I suppose. His use reminds me of that clip of Bobby Knight explaining, well, um …you know what he was explaining!
Bono has been saying this kind of thing since the '80s at least. He made it big, so people tend to assume that he is the usual worldly musician, and he DOES have a lot of the faults that musicians seem to be prone to. But he knows where his salvation comes from.
With the pervasive "green" mentality of our culture, we have the chance to tell the story of how this creation has gone awry, and God's action to restore and renew it through Jesus: that the Creator made the cosmos "very good" and, through the One who "reconciles to himself all things," is making it that way again.
Although we can't perfectly follow the moral law, we should be spending enough time in God's Word and in fellowhip with Him that we follow it more consistently each year. I should be more compassionate this year than I was last year, less critical this year than I was last year, and more disciplined this year than last year. If I were inclined to use the f word (which I'm not – after all, I'm a homeschool mom – that's not one of my faults!), then I would hope to be less inclined to use it next year. The fact that a Christian is looking more like Christ every year is a testimony in and of itself to those who aren't Christians. What hurts the church more than anything is that Christians often aren't looking more like Christ every year.
RE: "The fact that a Christian is looking more like Christ every year is a testimony in and of itself to those who aren't Christians."
Please know that I'm not trying to nitpick here, but if a Christian somehow appears more like Christ each year (I feel uncomfortable even typing that, honestly), it would be solely credited to Christ and not to the Christian or her efforts to be a better Christian. I don't see how a resemblance to Christ would draw anyone to faith; only God draws people to faith. Doesn't mean we shouldn't give up our attempts to be faithful to the Lord, but none of us will achieve Christ- likeness on this earth. Even with his f bomb, Bono is no less a Christian or a witness for Christ than others. He certainly offends some , while simultaneously drawing others. I'm thinking that the people who suddenly hear God's Word proclaimed through Bono might not have been reachable by traditional methods. I'm thinking perhaps a cousin I know whose been a tough nut to crack….
Sorry, can't quote any famous smart people!
It is true that only God draws people to faith, but God uses means, not magic. The obvious example would be a preacher proclaiming the Gospel. God is the one at work, but the preacher has been given the gracious opportunity of participating in God's work. Because words are not the only way of communicating, resembling Christ could be another example of an opportunity to participate in God's work of drawing a person to faith.
Of course, it should also be noted that that particular opportunity should never be expected to stand alone because there are always flaws in the way any of us resemble Christ.
True Christian faith involves an understanding of the moral law that, however hard we try, cannot consistently be obeyed, coupled with the incredible gift of God's grace and forgiveness for those who truly repent.
The opposite of the above is the romantic notion that we are capable of determining our own "lifestyles" and need to express our true inner selves by doing our own thing. Much of the sort of rock music that Bono has heretofore stood for encourages this sort of romantic view of liberty as opposed to the freedom we have to do both right and wrong.
Toward the end of his life Karl Barth intended to tour America and lecture on the meaning of freedom as opposed to liberty. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to do so.
something about boasting all the more in my weakness seems more the way of the cross to me than praying for stigmata.
Barb, I agree with you. Following Reinhold Niebuhr, I believe that we are equally sinners but unequally guilty in the degree of our sin. We should indeed try to live holy lives and improve our lives over the years, though, as Niebuhr remarked, remembering that perhaps the greatest of sins is spiritual pride.
So , that interview was aprox. sometime 2004-05 ?
Matt,
100% agreed! God the Holy Spirit does not work apart from His means of grace – God's Word, the waters of baptism and the Lord's Supper.
so barb. do you follow god´s moral law better every year? do you look more like christ every year?
ok peter. do you follow the moral law more and more every year? do you look more like christ every year?
Bono's interview made me think of the U2 song "Grace," which was on the 2000 album All That You Can't Leave Behind (2000).
The Word of God is there. A means.
"Sorry, can't quote any famous smart people!
"
Download Dr Rosenbladt's audio message in the ad from NRP on the right side of this page (I think it is only $3.50).
It really should be titled "How to Share The Gospel (with) Those Broken by the Church". It is more for believers than the title implies.
And this baffles me. I did radio for three semesters in college, and every time we had a live call-in show, we had to put our station on a 6-second delay loop, which would allow us to "dump" bad language with the push of a button, as long as we did it within 6 seconds.
Are they trying to say that in an auditorium full of entertainers, there was no way to cut that out of the airing of that program? Granted, Bono showed a slight lack of class, but in the end, the network is the one who should bear the blame because they could have stopped it but didn't.
ok barb. how are you doing with that? are you spending enough time in the word? are you more compassionate than last year? less critical? more disciplined? do you look more like christ now than last week?
cf st pauL: "christ died for sinners of who I am (not was) chief. " do you feel Paul meant that as hyperbole or that he felt that that was exactly how he saw is christian walk as looking like? ah but you say, he felt that, but he was a great saint so obviously his life looked in fact very sanctified? where would you point me to in scripture to see this as being so?
Frank, you're setting up a false tie there equating "follow the moral law more and more every year" and "look more like Christ every year". (something Barb wasn't doing, BTW)
Becoming more and more like Christ would wind up with a better following of the moral law, obviously, but the better following of the moral law isn't evidence of being more like Christ. We are indeed transformed continually into the image of Christ by the work of the Holy Spirit, but that transformation isn't always displayed through a reduction in the acting out of a particular sin.
Equating the two is a nonsensical thing in this regard. If that nonsense what you're pointing out, then cool.
One thing about Bono's swearing that might be familiar to Lutherans is what Luther said about going out and purposefully sinning to remove a hold of guilt which could hold us back from fellowship with God.
Bono knows he's a sinner and has plenty of proof of it every day (like we all do), and his not worrying about trying to scrub his life of every tiny "bad thing" might be something along the lines of what Luther was intending.
Just an off-the-cuff thought.
Webmonk, I was merely asking barb if she felt that her life was actually reflecting what she said that a christian life should look like in her post.
I do believe that romans ch 7 is the way a christian´s life looks. what we see. We cling to the promise of sanctification by faith and not by sight. as st james says faith is to the body as works are to breath. someone only notices his breathing when there is something wrong with it.
The good works we do happen in a way that could never be compelled, freely, out of love and not fear. and christians delight in the law, because they realize that the old adam in us needs to constantly be checked with fear of punishment by that law. we know that without the law we could easily capable of the darkest evil.
The life of a christian is one of growing increasingly aware of one´s utter depravity, and a consequent ever more desparate clinging to christ and what he promises to us in our baptism in the face of our struggling faith, repentance and reformation of our life.
"unequally guilty in the degree of our sin". Peter can you please explain what you mean by that phrase? thanks!
Webmonk, If you read the context of Luther´s comments, you will see that what he was saying was that we could act in fear or in faith. that which is not faith is sin. the opposite of sin is not goodness, it is faith. In anything we contemplate doing we also know we will bring to the task our sinful selves. but our neighbor needs our labors. so we will do our best, which will be full of sin, but we can be bold in acting knowing that the HS will be with us and christ will use what we do and cover our sins.
Webmonk: My life feels like that of a salesman, who, every time he meets his quota, his company raises the quota. Satan comes and says "give up! it´s really quite hopeless. Sisyphus had it better!" Luther calls this dispair a great shame and vice. We are to live in the routine, and stay out of the results. Results are for God to work out.
In this effort I welcome the law, rules, regulations to train and discpline us and keep our old adam in check. Often (not always) when I see my ego checkmated by the law, I feel pleasure. I don´t identify with my ego anymore, so whatever threatens my ego I receive with thanksgiving and I no longer feel threatened. I am safely hidden in Christ. My ego gets to die. Good riddance. I brought me nothing but pain.
Ego, that self aware self centered "I am" . that painful selfconsciousness that teens often feel trying to fit in. That thing, also called the old adam, that gets in the way of simply being content with a creaturely existence: that let´s God be God and we his creature. Like the better peter who could walk on water because he found himself , gazing on Christ, the true "I am" and not like that other peter who self-consciously said "oh sh*t! what am I doing, and started sinking fast.
very nice.
A) WebMonk. our exchange made me realize. the question that keeps coming up is this one : "what. should. life. as. christian. look. like."
Depending on one´s religious perspective, one parses this perenial question differently and comes to a different answer. Usually we divide attempting to distinguish (eg faith VS works) or conflagrate attempting to resolve seeming contradiction (faith AND works).
B) Sister Barb said that, to be a christian, one´s life "should" (=must)be evidenced in a certain way. Further, she said that to not manifest one´s faith in this way "hurts the church MORE THAN ANYTHING".
I think I should take what Barb says seriously and literally, and let her tell me if she overstated a point, or in fact means what she said exactly as she said it, and that her life is evidence in support of the truth of her two rather strong and absolute assertions. Fair?
c)And I can use this as an opportunity to posit a contrary picture as to what the life of a christian SHOULD look like:
A christian´s life, I say. should (=must) look like a moral life: useful to one´s neighbor, and harmful to no one, in EXACTLY the same active sense as the life of ANYONE should look.
"anyone" here, I assert fully includes pagans, atheist, deists, idolators (Mormons, JWs, etc etc).
Even the stated (=visible) motives, and expected rewards and punishments can and in fact, I say, must, look identical. These are fear of punishment, just pay for honest labor, do unto others, fairness, justice, etc. etc. etc, along with the logic that is used to prove the verity of morality and a moral life.
So the "argument" then boils down to this:
d)
So the "argument" then boils down to this:
1) must there be a VISIBLE difference between the life, and vocation, of a christian, as opposed to that of non-christian.
2)If the answer to that question is a "yes", there is a second, maybe more immediate question: Is it mandatory (usually asserted with that word "should") for there to be VISIBLE "progress" in moral terms.
3) Thirdly, if the answer to the second question is also "yes", then the question finally becomes this one: "How does one know "progress" when one sees it? What is the yardstick and what does that ideal/yardstick look like?
4) Fourthly, ….
e) fourthly: and here is where I say religion finally matters, what if 1-2 are true. Do I personally DO what is mandatory? do i measure up? Whatever should and must mean, they do not mean "try one´s best". So we pass from the "what" in 1) through the "why" in 2) and 3) , to the question now "so what?!". So barb and Peter and webmonk and FWS: "DOES your life look as it "must"? and if it does not then what?" Ask the wrong question and the answer will most certainly not be useful or true.
So. If MY assertion is correct. 1) is not. 2) and 3) become misdirective, even if one can answer with a yes even from a pagan perspective. We let the law do it´s work and see it´s absolute necessity and we fall short exactly as a pagan should also see things to the extent that the law in his heart is seen reason-alby.
f)
The difference is that a christian knows that our Lord, is even now resolving all this sweetly, by grace. We trust this. That which is not of faith is sin. The opposite of evil is not goodness or even a visible moral life. That opposite is faith. And faith is the evidence of things unseen.
Things like salt and yeast. Things told in parable that are sheer nonsense to a utilitarian world. A world that in fact must be utilitarian. I am part of that world.
Come Lord Jesus!
B) Sister Barb said that, to be a christian, one´s life "should" (=must)be evidenced in a certain way. Further, she said that to not manifest one´s faith in this way "hurts the church MORE THAN ANYTHING".
I think I should take what Barb says seriously and literally, and let her tell me if she overstated a point, or in fact means what she said exactly as she said it, and that her life is evidence in support of the truth of her two rather strong and absolute assertions. Fair?