God Does Not Want to be Everything (Pt 2)
notes on an apophatic anthropology and the theology of ordination
The Mystery of Lowliness: The Life of Moses as an Icon of Christ
Introduction
As I said in the last post, the best readings of Numbers 11, the ones that stay truest to what the text itself wants to say, help us think much more clearly both about what it means to be human and what it means to be ordained to the church’s ministry. I argued that the story of Moses’ spirit-sharing, rightly read, teaches us about the interrelatedness of humility and strength of purpose, self-awareness and moral clarity—all brought about through the overshadowing, overflowing Spirit that is always welling up from our deepest, centermost being. I also argued that it is that kind of spirit-sharing is definitive for ordained ministry. In this post, I want to sort out how it is that Moses, acting as he does in this moment, tells us what God is like and why God acts as God does. God does not want to be everything; that’s why there is anything at all. But God does want every thing to be fully, deliriously itself. And so God gives of himself, and keeps giving, until our hearts are ignited by the realization that it is truly more blessed to give than to receive.
God is Jealous for You (and for Your Spirit)
One of the earliest readings of Numbers 11 comes in James 4:4-6, which quotes from an unnamed “scripture,”1 a lost writing traditionally attributed to Eldad and Medad:
Adulterers! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you suppose that it is for nothing that the scripture says, ‘God yearns jealously for the spirit that he has made to dwell in us’? But he gives all the more grace; therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
James seems to be rebuking certain figures in his community much as Moses rebuked Joshua, because they, like Joshua, have been infected with worldly ambitions. Perhaps in their jealousy for control they’ve sought to silence those who’ve unsettled them and the order they hold dear. Regardless, James clearly believes that these folks have set themselves at odds with the God whose name is Jealous. This is the sin, and the judgment, the remedy for the sin, he wants them to face.
But what, really, does it mean to speak in such terms? How, if at all, can it be good and true to say that God “yearns jealously” for the spirit God has made to dwell in us? To talk about God being jealous (or angry or pleased or remembering/forgetting or coming/going) is to talk about something that is happening to us at the deepest center of our being. Hence, to say that God is jealous for your spirit is to say that God has made your spirit to work for your good. God is jealous for your spirit just in the sense that God is continually, zealously upholding its integrity so that you can be yourself, true to the marvel of your original, final design.
The Spirit Does Not Possess
St Paul speaks of the spirit both in its relation to the person and in relation to God. At the beginning of the letter, he asks, rhetorically, “what human knows what is truly human except the human spirit that is within?” (1 Cor. 2.11). And at the end, he insists “the spirits of prophets are subject to the prophets” (1 Cor. 14.32).
Taken together, these remarks suggest a reciprocity between our relation to ourselves and our relation to God. Prophets, Paul insists in 1 Cor. 14, are free to reign in their charismatic impulses, to defer—gladly!—to one another, awaiting—happily!—their own turn, because they are no more slaves to their own spirits than they are slaves to the free and freeing Spirit of God. “You can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all be encouraged. And the spirits of prophets are subject to the prophets, for God is a God not of disorder but of peace” (1 Cor 14.31-33).
Sometimes, of course, God’s peace necessarily disrupts the false order we’re trying vainly to maintain. But, as Moses shows us, those who are truly composed, yielding, self-possessed are quick to stand aside to make room for others as they are drawn into the new order God is creating. And, again, they can do this, and know they should do it, because they know that God the Spirit is neither possessive nor possessed, neither grasping nor graspable. God, to be sure, holds and guides us. But God does not, and indeed cannot, stifle or manipulate us. Again, it is as impossible for God to control us as it is for the Spirit to lie to the Son or for the Son to deceive the Father.
Moses Enacts the Humility of God
In the immediate aftermath of the story we’ve been studying, Numbers identifies Moses as the humblest man alive (Num. 12.3). And the measure of his humility is not so much his readiness to be displaced/replaced as his eagerness to make room for others in his standing with God. Unlike Joshua, Moses does not fear diminishment or the loss of his spirit through the empowerment of others. He longs for everyone in Israel, not only a few, to be prophets. And he wants them to be filled not with his spirit but the Lord’s (Num. 11.29). Joshua seems to be concerned for Moses’ image (as opposed to Moses himself). But Moses is too self-aware, and too God-aware, to be concerned with managing his reputation. He is, truly, a person, and so is not concerned with his “persona.” This self-aware, unassuming confidence in God is what sets Moses apart. And what reveals him to us as an icon of Jesus. Precisely because he is not obsessed with his own image, precisely because he does not fret about losing face, but instead trusts himself and his people to the slow work of God, Moses reflects the light of the knowledge of God that shines in the face of Jesus Christ.
Far too often, let’s be honest, we Christians have spoken about humility in terms that approach self-hatred and self-harm. Anastasios of Sinai, for example, says in his Questions and Answers that “true humility… is not, as some people think, to commit sins and consider oneself a sinner and worthy of hell” (Q. 91). Even the demons, he quips, know their sins and feel their unworthiness! No, “true humility is to do what is good, but [in that doing] to [continually] think of oneself as impure and unworthy of God, having as sole hope of salvation His kindness.”
Such arguments, it seems to me, more or less always come down to the logic of mastery/slavery: God, as your maker and owner, has the right to do whatever he pleases with you and to you. But if Moses is truly the prophet of prophets, and if Jesus is the One the Gospel announces him to be, the prophet who is like Moses, then the logic of mastery/slavery simply cannot be true. Humility has nothing whatsoever to do with humiliation. Indeed, humility transcends all oppositions, including the opposition of exaltation and humiliation. Humility has no opposite, because Christ, the meek and lowly one, has reconciled all good opposites in himself, and overcome all rivalries. To be truly humbled, therefore, is to be exalted into Christ’s standing—the Lord who washes our feet and serves us at the table.
Ordained ministers are women and men entrusted with modeling for us the priestly and prophetic way of life that all humans are called to live. They fulfill their purpose only as they become like Moses, following him as he followed Christ. Tragically, we’ve often arranged, described, and practiced ordained ministry in ways that reinforce master/slave ideologies. But that is a betrayal of the gifts God has given us and our responsibility to one another. What we see in ministers who fulfill their callings is exactly the same spirit Moses shared with Israel’s elders—and, thanks to the Spirit, also with us.
See Martha L. Moore-Keish, James (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2019), 145-146.
I am new to your Substack. This 2 part conversation is so powerful and thought provoking. Thank You Dr Green.