The Haunt of Jackals

No.1

Imagine a society where, instead of baking bread for hungry people, they produced mass quantities of pictures of bread and posted ads for them at every corner, and handbills were given out with pictures of different types of bread, hundreds of different types of bread. Pictures of wheat bread, pumpernickel, Jewish rye, banana bread, croissants, sheepherders bread, bread sticks, garlic bread...heck, even melba toast.

Now imagine that these images of bread not only became the dominant mode of exchange (some hoarding these pictures, others spending them as fast as they could get them), but were actually consumed on a daily basis despite the fact that they had no nutritional value whatsoever.

Imagine that, besides the handbills, posters and billboards which depicted the pictures of bread, the evening television news consisted of discussions and international debates over which of these pictures of bread were worth the most, and which were declining in value or had become disreputable as a true picture of bread. Imagine witnessing special interest groups arguing and protesting the advantages and disadvantages of consuming their particular type of bread-pictures. And, of course, in such a world, litigation would be intense over who had the actual rights to each type of bread picture, and there would often be disputes over counterfeit pictures or poor foreign copies had infiltrated the market.

And the entire time that men and women were viewing these billboards, wheat was growing up around the posts. And wherever they stapled posters, streams gurgled by with yeast cultures forming in the shallows and the sun.

What would you make of such a society?

No.2

Hold that thought while we look at another hypothetical situation.

Suppose you are a disguised alien sent to study Earth culture. Shortly before landing your cloaked ship you notice that mass numbers of vehicles are moving toward a few long large structures situated throughout the greater Sacramento area. You deduce this is either a place of societal worship, or perhaps the seat of regional governments. You decide to investigate. You land in an open field near the corner of Heritage and Challenge Ways, and walk a few blocks to the huge white structure along Arden Way. Vehicles are continually swarming past you into the areas around the building stacked up high in racks. You wonder what you will find. You also wonder if your will be allowed in without any credentials. No one pays you any mind as you enter.

Making your way down the center walkway you note that there are large cubicles dividing various goods. Each cubicle has a gigantic word at the front, and the same word posted in smaller forms many other places. You also note that in most of these compartments clothing hangs in the windows bearing the same word in large and colorful letters. One shop says B.U.M., and every item in it says B.U.M. in large letters on the front. But what does B.U.M. signify, you wonder? Many of the people who are passing by are wearing clothing with these bold words. What does it mean?

You want to ask people questions. A small group of women are standing in the walkway occasionally stopping people and asking them a series of questions. They all hold clipboards. You do not have a clipboard. Suddenly, one of the women puts her clipboard down and walks off citing the need for something called a "nacho bellgrande and coke." You wait a few moments, and when no one is looking, borrow the clipboard and leave to another area of the building. As you walk you notice cubicles with the words "GAP," "NIKE," "Guess," "Levi," and "Esprit". People leaving these stores are wearing clothing with these words written boldly over a variety of patterns.

You sit down and write, "I am at the center of either their religion, or commerce, or government. They identify themselves with very important words. Some are devoted to "GAP," others identify in some way with "NIKE" or other significant names. I am going to approach some of them and ask them to explain the meaning of their large words.

Having only a limited knowledge of Earth English, you decide to be direct and hope for a good response.

You stop a young female and ask, "Can I ask questions?"

"Sure, it's a free country," she replies.

You point at her chest and say, "If you were... describing these words to a foreign person, what would you tell them?"

"What words? What are you talking about?"

"Those words: 'GAP' 'BUM' 'NIKE' 'GUESS.' What do they signify?"

"A brand name, a logo," she says.

You search your memory of human languages. "'Brand'... a hot mark on a cow. Not much help. 'Name' ... signifier of identity. Not much help there. What about 'Logo' it means a .... a word!" you think triumphantly. But then think, "these are words that mean word?" The girl looks impatient.

"What is the meaning of these logos?" you ask (hoping it is a sensible question).

"They don't mean anything!" says she. "What kind of question is that?" she asks, cautiously moving away, and then is gone.

You approach several other people, and each time the results are similar. On one occasion you ask an elderly male, "How much does the clothing cost; is there any difference in cost?"
"Yes, the Guess shirt is $10 more than the Levi," he says.

"Then the Guess is a better shirt?" you ask.

"No. Same shirt; it's the name!" he says.

You sit down and write in your logbook, "These large words mean "nothing," yet people wear them on their bodies and display them proudly on their cubicles. This phenomenon needs much more study."

No.3

Context is everything. Jeremiah makes the above statement in reference to the wooden idols of his time which were crowned with silver and gold. They were objects of great fascination and pretended power and meaning.

The "woods cut from the forest" were, and still are, the materials of a fallen creation refashioned into objects of adoration and worship. The decorations of "silver and gold" were the special effects of the day used to adorn these basic objects. Together they formed the idolatrous image upon which the culture was based. Though obviously made by men, that fact was quickly forgotten or repressed in order to bestow the highest possible meaning upon the object, which in turn would tell people who they were.

But what has Jeremiah to do with the story of the bread-picture people and the alien's visit to the mall? And what of our curious title, The Haunt of Jackals?

Imagine that you actually live in just the sort of world our two stories have described: the type of world which feeds upon image and likeness over substance and life; the sort of culture which has devalued the currency of communication to the uttermost degree. Imagine that you live in a society where truth is dominated and informed by the immediate images of that culture, and where the great gift of language and communication‹of words‹has become the strip-mined ground of advertising, meaningless rhetoric, and titillating slogans.

Or don't imagine it, because you already live there.

Over the last 100 years something unprecedented has taken place. We have moved from a society based on the spoken and written word, to a society based upon visual images. Television, movies and photo-media have replaced words as the dominant means of perceiving reality and meaning in this culture.

Where a personal and detailed written description of historic events once provided information, our optic nerves are now bombarded with images of world events from every conceivable angle. Who would have thought, one hundred years ago, that people could routinely view our entire planet from the depths of space, or watch the tiny movements of a human being in its mother's womb?

This shift from words to images as a means of perceiving reality has staggering implications for our culture. Whatever is viewed begins to take on a life of its own. It begins to produce and shape new contexts at a dizzying rate. And these visual contexts, which are being created and embraced by so many, are nothing more than idealized and abstracted pictures of various "lives" which no ever lives. They are the valueless bread pictures eaten by a nation ravenous for the true Bread of Life; they are the meaningless logos imprinted on the clothes of all who need the true Logos to cloth them with His own righteousness and truth.

George Orwell, in his novel 1984, had already begun to imagine a world where new technologies could be used to control people. But Orwell got the order mixed up. Orwell saw a world where the people were controlled because "Big Brother" was watching them. In our culture it is just the opposite. We are controlled because we are watching Big Brother. Orwell saw millions of lenses and a few viewscreens. Our world is moving toward millions of viewscreens, and fewer and fewer lenses.

And its ironic because it is not only a more effective means of mass control than what Orwell envisioned, the masses also end up paying the bill! There may even come a day where the whole world watches events through one single lens (Don't laugh. How many people were watching a single murder suspect trying to flee in his white Bronco last year? Just push it up a few more notches and we are there.)

But for our present purposes, let us just note that the words which people still use are no longer trusted and valued the way they once were. We watch and watch and watch while the admen steal and use every word which still has some resonance left to sell us more stuff.

They have inherited a wasteland of trouble, violence and confusion. There is nothing meaningful for them to do, they are alienated from the Church at large because no one has recognized their callings or even bothered to learn their language so they could be reached. They have inherited the haunt of jackals, and the Church hides behind it's fortress walls and speaks more and more to itself about itself and for itself while the riot increases outside.

The haunt is a desolate place where fear reigns and everything comes pre-tainted. There are no safe houses in the haunt and it is patrolled by jackals, by wild dogs who despite their individually small stature, are particularly savage. The jackals come in a variety of costumes, the most easily identifiable is the modern media jackal who focuses intently on individual acts of crime, perversion, cynicism and lust. The goal of most modern media is to attract an audience by packaging and re-presenting these base acts while manipulating individuals to purchase goods and services which promise to enhance or provide "life." The jackals fill both programming and advertising.

In modern language, the word "jackal" has a second meaning. A "jackal" can be defined as "a person who collaborates with others in the commission of base acts." We have just begun to see the beginnings of crossovers between the media and the events it reports. Not only do talk shows daily glamorize the normal misery which many people engage in, they are actually beginning to elicit fresh acts of violence and perversion by bringing together destructive forces in front of a television audience. Violence, and even death, have been the results of their lust for the most tantalizing and scandalous stories.

And when one turns off the set, or lays down the latest copy of GQ or LA Style, and walks out into the tired air, the city has been made a place desolate of meaning and beauty. The hard pavements stretch out like a desert, littered with once meaningful words now made multicolored logos. And the mall has become the modern temple of worship and pretended meaning. We all have their meaningless words printed across our shirts to identify nothing at all.

Idolatry by any other brand is just the same: the modern idolmakers no longer melt down our personal jewelry and fashion out a small hot cow for adoration; now they take our general dreams and deepest longings and use them to re-create a host of techno-images which reflect the resonance of our deepest needs and spiritual aspirations. And as we are less and less able to live up to the expectations of these images, our frustration and alienation grows and our ability to actively engage life and each other is diminished.

Have you noticed that despite the boom in communications technology, people are less and less likely to talk with each other? They talk at each other. They posture, hold their opinions, do their business, but people no longer meet at the city gate and talk with each other. They stay in their darkened apartments and houses and stare at one of the 63 channels on their viewscreen. Their real needs for life are appeased and deflected as they are vicariously run through basic emotional experiences by what they view. And all the while, as they attempt to feed on these empty images, the wheat grows up around the posts, and the streams gurgle by with yeast cultures forming in the shallows and the sun.

No.5

These are the questions which the next generation of believers must wrestle with.

If people in the time of Christ had a hard time understanding who Jesus was and what He was saying‹ how much more today where the very ways of seeing and hearing are being tampered with?

These are no small questions. But let's not shrink back. After all, the good news is God's good news‹ and not even widespread human stupidity and blindness to its reality can alter it.

The very real temptation is for the Church to attempt to keep up with the world and its obsession with images and accumulated information. But I am convinced we must not learn the "way of the nations" or blindly implement the "customs of the peoples" which end in delusion. I do not say this out of some emotional reaction to modernity, or out of some sort of quasi-biblical paranoia. I am simply observing the blackened fruits of a dying culture. Computer information has not resulted in wisdom; the wealth of images has not enhanced anything but our sense of alienation; and the devaluation of words has bankrupted our ability to live in vital relationship with each other.

Do you really see it any differently?

The modern question must be: what is solid, what has meaning and leads to life? How can the Church retake the valley, which has become the haunt of jackals?

To begin with, men and women must believe the Word of God and live a life of simple and pure devotion to Jesus in a faith, hope and love enlivened by His Living Holy Spirit.

The only faith, hope and love which can thrive in the haunt will be grounded in the living lordship and immediate vitality of Jesus the Risen. Those who would communicate the Gospel in an age of blindness and distrust, will themselves need active eyes to see and ears to hear Him and be capable of telling others the truth in love. But how can we perceive His work and will more clearly, and hear His leading more fully?

These two questions must be answered by any church which hopes to thrive in the modern world. Because everything depends upon seeing and hearing Christ clearly. Either Jesus is our true water in the desert, our true Word amid the braying jackals, and our daily bread in the modern haunt, or we are all jackal fodder.

As I have been rereading the Gospel of Mark I note that everything seems to center in two fundamental conflicts: Jesus is Who He is and says what He says. The first conflict concerns how Jesus is seen; the second conflict concerns how Jesus is heard.

The first conflict is the starkest crisis of image ever recorded. Jesus is the "image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." (Col. 1:15) In other words, when people saw Jesus, they were seeing God in the flesh. Jesus only did what the Father did, only said what the Father said. Everything they needed to know about God was revealed in His Son. Yet the Scribes and Pharisees imagined in their own hearts that Jesus was the usurper of the kingdom which supported their own lust for power. They do not have eyes to see their own Messiah, and as such, qualified as the most blind religious leaders of all time.

In the second conflict, Jesus' words are received in many different ways. Some people receive them with great delight and follow; others harden their hearts or conspire with others to destroy Jesus (Mark 2-3).

Is it any wonder that biblical literature makes such a consistent issue of spiritual seeing and hearing?

And thus at the very crux of faith is the problem of having "eyes to see" Who Jesus is and "ears to hear" what He has said. Faith is meant to provide us with a spiritual optic and acoustic.

In the fourth chapter of Mark, Jesus is in a boat alongside the Sea of Galilee teaching parables about the different ways people would hear and respond to the Word of God. When He finishes with the parables, He says, "Let us go over to the other side."

While they are crossing a fierce storm begins to threaten the boat. Many of the men on board are professional fishermen. They know boats, storms and the Sea of Galilee, and Mark says they are "terrified."

Despite the loud storm and the water which is sloshing into the boat, Jesus is sleeping in the rear. The men wake him up and question whether He cares about what is happening to them. Jesus tells the wind and sea to be silent, and there is instant calm. Then He asks them, "Why are you so timid? How is it that you have no faith?" (4:40)

Jesus' questions seem a little harsh don't they? If these men were fishermen and knew the sea, the boat and what constituted a life-threatening storm, why does Jesus equate their terror with lack of faith? Seems more like good common sense to wake Jesus up and let Him know what's happening, doesn't it?

No.

Jesus said, "Let us go over to the other side," before they left the land. He did not say, "Let us attempt to get over to the other side, but drown instead."

No matter how bad the storm gets, they are going to get to the other side because Jesus said so. Thus, Jesus can sleep in the boat. Once He has said it, it is as good as done.

If this seems unlikely, think of when Jesus heals, or confronts demonic powers, or raises the dead. In each case, He speaks, and then it immediately comes to pass. Therefore when He says, "let's go over to the other side," it is just as sure a thing as saying to the child "Talitha kum!" ("little girl get up.") and having her get up from being dead. It is no different than any other word Jesus speaks.

The dependability and power of a word depends upon who speaks it (which is the difference between when Jesus speaks and when we speak). In order for the Disciples to have had faith and not be timid in the face of the storm, they would have had to give Jesus' words more weight than their own natural experience and perception. But they did not. Thus, Jesus' questions are appropriate: "Why so timid? How is it that you have no faith?"

Why is faith such a core question? Because everyone lives by faith in someone or something.

Some believe the bread-pictures have real meaning and nutritional value. They trust the pictures to tell them what the world is and what they are and how they should live.

Some believe the words associated with what they wear on their bodies, or what they drive, or what neighborhood they live in, or what their job titles are, give them true meaning, worth and security.

Some believe in themselves or in idols (which was the problem that prophets like Jeremiah and Isaiah were constantly confronting); others, as T.S. Eliot says, believe in Power, or Money, or Usury, or Lust.

Some believe in Security and Self-sufficiency or unlimited Self-Potential.

But make no mistake, everyone is a "believer" in someone or something, and they believe via faith in that someone or something.

Why is faith the issue? It sounds too simple, but the fact is, faith and belief are at the core of how we relate to others. Thus, it is not surprising that God meets us at the bottom line of our being and says, "believe in Me." The Pious Jews' question, "what must we do to do the works of God?" is one step back from reality. Jesus answers, "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom God has sent." (John 6:28-29). They want to perform a work to please God; Jesus says that the primary "work" is to believe in Him.

No.7

In the midst of the haunt of jackals, where picture-images rule perception and words are distrusted, it is the Word of God alone which comes in truth, is believed in faith by the present Church, and is acted upon. All real way, life, truth, wisdom, knowledge, faith, hope and love intersect in the Living Word Who is Himself the Creator, Source and Goal of creation (John 1; Hebrews 1; Colossians 1). It is the Word (Jesus), and the revealed Word concerning Him (Bible), which perform actively in the haunt of jackals via the Holy Spirit.

And it is PERSONAL.

Many of us have forgotten this reality in the face of a desolate wasteland, and the intimidating howl of jackals. Yet listen to the author of Hebrews who, after compiling an extensive list of men and women who in faith had eyes to see and ears to hear, says,

"Therefore since we have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith..." (Hebrews 12:1-2a)

Or John, who states that his entire Gospel is written,

"...that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name." (John 20:31)

Or Paul, who says

"...faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word concerning Christ."
(Romans 10:16)

Often, in the modern Church, the response to such biblical clarity seems to be that such notions cannot be practically applied in the haunt. Faith is viewed as a nebulous substance, or even a series of statements that we adhere to. I would like to suggest that it is the only thing which can be practically applied in the haunt. Faith is our living response to the Living God and what He has revealed about Himself in His Word, in His Son, and in the Church.

How do we explain Jesus' sleeping in the boat during a storm so violent that experienced fishermen were terrified? Could it be that the word had been spoken by the Word? Is not that Word the antithesis of our mall-words: the mall-logos costing much for nothing, the Divine Logos giving up all for everything? Is not our longing to be labeled and identified by a logo just the deflected longing to be known and identified by the Name above all Names?

Will men and women find real nourishment in feeding on modern bread-pictures (image) or in vital relationship with the One who calls Himself the "Bread of Life?" Will we believe the words of our dying culture, or believe in the words of the Word Who is the Resurrection and the Life?

Knowing and believing the words of Jesus is a solid way to begin to address the crisis of spiritual perception. The whole of scripture points us to Christ as the foundation stone, and challenges us to take Him at His word. The Word of God is "living and active" amid an artificial and idolatrous culture which is everywhere breaking down and unable to perform.

But we must go a little deeper.

No.8

Scripture tells us that God reveals Himself in three major and dynamic ways: through creation (Romans 1); through His Son (Hebrews1); and through His written Word (2 Timothy 3:14-17). Each of these three areas of revelation, which humans study, suffer from a similar crisis of perception. The crisis is found in the inherent limitations of studying God's self-revelation on strictly human (naturalistic) terms.

Revelation, no matter how it comes, is primarily meant to disclose God's own nature in what is a God-centered universe. As a people, our own crisis of seeing and hearing reality begins whenever we attempt to interpret the three forms of revelation apart from their true reference point in God. If we insist upon seeing ourselves as central to the formula, we miss the big picture. We cannot have eyes to see and ears to hear because we have falsely assumed that we already see and hear.

So, the physicist who speaks of the universe as "relational" and knows that "light" is somehow at the very core of whatever holds the universe together has to stop short of the truth. By excluding God and His revelation in Christ, the physicist can only describe basic phenomenon. The full picture and its meaning are forever opaque.

In all three areas of God's self-revelation, it is only by active faith that we may perceive and believe the reality beyond our natural limitations of perception. Or as Thomas Watson once said, "Where reason cannot wade, there faith may swim." No faith= no spiritual perception; little faith=little spiritual perception; active faith= active spiritual perception.

In the scriptures (in the right "comments bar"), both Isaiah and Paul are trying to communicate how insane it is for us to pretend to understand God on our own terms. They assume that without divine intervention our perspective is grossly limited.

Isaiah says that the combined wisdom of the nations, when compared with God, is like a drop of water in an empty bucket- plunk! Paul argues less poetically. He reasons that if we cannot discern the inner thoughts of a single human being, how much more so with God?

Frederick Buechner says if God were to attempt to fully explain to us what it means to be God, it would be like you or I trying to explain our existence to a littleneck clam. Buechner is, of course, assuming that humans understand enough about themselves to attempt explanation (which they do not) but his point is a good perspective-builder.

It is a simple formula: we do not know. God knows. God wants us to know Him and value what He values. This begins to happen when we know God via faith. But having the "mind of Christ" and the ability to spiritually "appraise" the true value of things, must be developed, in time, by openness to the Word and to the Holy Spirit Who inspired it.

Having "The mind of Christ" does not imply our minds reworking and refashioning Christ's words‹ it is His Word reworking and refashioning our minds (Romans 12:1-2).

When Paul contrasts "spiritual" and "unspiritual" persons, he is not making a moral judgment. He is stating the difference between two ways of perception. "Spiritual" in the New Testament means literally, "of the Holy Spirit." The "spiritual person" is enlivened by, and open to, the Holy Spirit. The "unspiritual" person has either not yet accepted the Holy Spirit, or is not yet open to the Spirit's inspiration.

The ones who are open to the Holy Spirit are given the eyes to see and ears to hear the true value of things. Paul uses the word "appraise," which, in English, we often use in conjunction with the work of a metallurgist who is able to correctly evaluate the worth of a precious metal. Paul says the spiritual person is given the ability to evaluate the worth and weight of things by the Holy Spirit. The "of the Spirit" person is given the ability to appraise the valuable from the counterfeit, and the weighty pursuits from the trivial.

No.9

We live in the haunt of jackals,

Even now, new bread-pictures are being printed and new logos are being designed. But wherever this is happening, the wheat is growing up around the posts, and the streams are gurgling by with yeast cultures forming in the shallows and the sun.

And Jesus, Who is the true image of God, and the true Word to us, is our deliverer and sustainer in the haunt. He comes to us in the Holy Spirit, in the revealed Word, and is everywhere evident in glory of creation. He continues to come to us in power as Living Bread, and Truth, and the Light of Life. Each of us, in the Church, carries this Word in our hearts, on our lips, and in our actions into the haunt of jackals.

© 1995 Blue Marble. 2001 pomologos.com. 2003 Doghouseministries.com. Used by permission of author. Questions or responses can be sent directly to the author:

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