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Fatalist Rant
by
Major Danielle Strickland
My rant, I hope,
if God wills it and I deserve it.
There is a saying in my family, ‘luck is for pagans’. My nine
year-old son grew up saying it and it strikes us all as
hilarious most of the time – awkward at some others. The most
striking thing about his response is in realizing how much we
use the term. It seems superstition laced with fatalism is
running rampant in the world – even in the Christian
community.
I
was speaking to a lovely Christian woman the other day who
said in response to some trying circumstance, ‘oh well,
whatever will be, will be.’ I thought really? That’s the best
we’ve got?
The other string
of fatalism that runs rampant and I’m getting a little sick of
hearing is the idea that God wanted us to go through every
difficult situation for some cosmic reckoning. I was speaking
to a recovering drug addict the other day who has been
horribly abused by nearly every male figure in her life etc…
she said she just knows that God allowed it all to happen for
a reason. Really?? God allowed her to be
abused for a reason? What reason would God have to
allow one of His children to be abused? Now, don’t get me
wrong. I believe with my whole heart that God will USE
absolutely everything, even things the enemy intended for our
death – and redeem it all for His glory. But God never allows
horrible things to happen for some kind of divine reason.
Horrible things happen to us for many reasons. Among them are
sin, death, evil, the enemy who seeks to kill, steal and
destroy… not to mention the natural bent of the universe
towards injustice since sin bent its direction. Life isn’t
fair – but that is never how God intended it to be. And to be
honest, I’m getting tired of fatalism, and superstition and
theology akin to Buddhism and Hinduism – with hints of Karma
slinking into my Christian faith. So I want to state some
things bluntly – just to set the record straight.
1.
Luck is for pagans. This is the truth. Pagans are
simply the thing people are when they worship things other
than the one true living God – Jesus. Paganism is when people
put all their faith into things to save them. It’s hoping a
rabbits foot will bring you luck, or if you throw salt over
your shoulder it will protect your family, or if you get your
baby ‘christened’ they will go to heaven, or well, you get the
idea. It’s lucky shmucky and it has nothing to do with a
living faith in a living God who directs my path and lights my
every way.
2.
‘Whatever will be’ is not a Christian philosophy, it’s
not even the best song. One of the most exciting things about
the Christian faith is the idea that God invites us into a
partnership. This is the thing that keeps me going when times
are difficult. God invites me to partner with Him in bringing
redemption to the whole earth. That’s my calling and my job –
to co-operate with God in the bringing about of God’ s Kingdom
come. Fatalism is not a luxury we can afford. And by ‘we’ I
mean the entire human race. Enslaved women and children cannot
wait on the whim of fatalism anymore than someone who hasn’t
even heard there are options out of their superstitious laced
life.
3.
U2 has a song called Grace. One of my favourite lines
in it is this, ‘she’s outside of Karma’. It’s a small line but
a big idea – the circle of payback that goes round and round
and fills the world with a fatalism that prevents any change
(let alone justice) from going anywhere is broken by a thing
called Grace. Now the most radical notion of Karma is in the
caste system in
India
– which so many people have challenged and suggested is an
evil core of identity that keeps the injustice cycle of so
called ‘karma’ alive and well for the world’s most populous
county – even to this day. But the reality is that the caste
system is alive and well in every country – it runs through
every human heart as a deep temptation to resist Grace’s call.
I’m amazed by how often we agree with the world that change is
impossible and people are inevitably stuck in cycles of abuse
and violence – the way people just blindly accept people’s
lives as ‘fate’ is well, frankly – frightening.
God stopped the cycle of sin and invites us to be sin-stoppers
as well, and this is radical truth. I don’t need to wait to
see what God might do – I need to jump in and do my best to
co-operate with what I know to be His will. Love, life and
more life is His will. Wholeness, fullness, peace! Hope,
healing, joy and faith-filled lives etc.. I don’t have to
leave my life, or my future to chance – I can trust God and
work with Him in building the best character out of the worst
of circumstances in order that He might be seen in me. This is
the will of God.
My parents are probably to blame for this kind of
short-tempered response to fatalism and all his friends. They
are both supposed to be statistics that reflect the worlds
worst caste system. Both of them are discarded children – my
Dad abandoned and my mother a casualty of addiction and
violence – a ward of the court at 10 years old. In adoption
circles she is a hard case – the kind people talk about with
raised eyebrows… everyone knowing that the chances of her
wholeness are almost nil because what life has dealt her is
hard – and whatever will be, will be and that means that her
luck has run out and that’s the way God must have intended it
to be.
But my God intervened. Through some obedient folks who defied
the ‘odds’ and took a divine gamble on the down and out – a
few good Salvation Army soldiers scoured the poorest
communities for kids everyone else had given up on to offer up
some good old-fashioned hope and hard work. A kids club for my
mother and a junior band for my dad were enough to offer a
glimpse of grace. And grace was enough to stop statistical
analysis in its tracks. Both of them received this beautiful
thing of life anew and went on to live lives that were not
only meaningful and abundant in their own family but impacted
hundreds of others along the journey. They are still
hopelessly committed to grace-filled living. They are a
shocking display of my Christian faith – radical and
beautiful, and every-time I’m with them I remember what my
faith is all about and I long to go around shouting at every
street corner in poor neighbourhoods everywhere – God is here.
God is here. He loves you. It’s not too late. You can change.
Life is stronger than death. Love wins. And other things –
loud things. You can change the world. You were born good. God
loves you. There is a better way. You can change. And even
more things. You are beautiful. You were born to be whole.
Healing is possible. Your life has meaning. It’s not too late.
It’s not too late. It’s not too late. It’s not too late.
I’ve decided that’s not a bad way to spend my life. Offering
the good news of radical redemption to people trapped by a
fatalism and superstition in a luckless world. Care to join
me?
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