Just finished reading Jonathan Martin's book, Prototype. Wow!
The first three chapters (Identity, Beloved and Obscurity) were beautiful and so important for me... For a few days after reading them I found myself going back to them over and over again to re-read Jonathan's thoughts... The rest of the book was excellent, as well, but Jonathan's "boy on the bike" story owned me... Thanks Jonathan for allowing God to use you to speak to me in a very personal way.
Jonathan is a gifted writer and a great storyteller. I highly recommend his book.
The book ends with en epilogue titled, "Letter to a Ravaged Bride." Once again, as happened a few times during the reading of this book, I found myself weeping and repenting... Jonathan's letter to the church is prophetic, poetic, artistic, beautiful and heart-breaking... Again, wow!!!
Evidently, Jonathan had posed his "Letter To A Ravaged Bride" over on his blog in October 2010. I copied it, edited it as it appears in the book and have included it below. Read it at your own risk... Read it thoughtfully, prayerfully... Let God break your heart for His church...
Pick up Prototype and as you read it, ask God to help you to become the YOU He had in mind when He spoke you into existence.
To the ravaged bride (somewhere in America),
I could pretend that I don’t love you anymore. I
could yell and scream and break things. I could walk out dramatically like you
and I are on a movie set, and say something pious as I slam the door. I could
manufacture looks of disgust, or better yet I could turn my eyes away. But you
know me too well, don’t you? You know that even when I’m petty or enraged, even
when I lash out at you with self-righteousness indignation (is there any other
kind?)—you always have my heart. Even when you are in tatters, your gown ripped
and your make-up smeared, a clownish parody of what you once were—you are still
beautiful.
So I write you less as a scorned lover, and more
as a heartsick old fool, wearing my displaced affections like medals. And I
want to talk to you with the detached wisdom of a professor or the elegant
rhythm of a poet, but I always end up stammering when I’m close to you. Why
bother to go through the machinations of fury and distance when you see through
me every time? You see me wearing my rage and my confidence like a silly fake
mustache, a failed disguise for my broken heart.
So I’m writing you today, honestly trying to
avoid bravado and forced swagger, knowing that we are in this together — I am
in you and you are in me. I want to write you off, I want to cut you down to
size. I want to tell you that you cannot be the bride Christ came to save, to
tell you that you missed Him already and that He’s moved on to a more authentic
love. But I know that you are still the bride, and I know He hasn’t moved on
from you. So I’m stuck here, chained to the radiator, loving you under part
compulsion and part real tenderness.
You’re still seductively pretty. But for the
life of me I can’t figure out what’s happened to you, to your charm and courage
and grace under pressure. There’s a mad and hopelessly wonderful jungle around
your house, full of danger and opportunity. Why are you trying to burn it down?
You used to know that when the people around you were at their angriest and
everybody was looking for someone to stone—you would just go walking through
them with no weapon but your own fragrant perfume. You didn’t just charm, you
disarmed—you could walk through a room and make it go silent save for the clang
of swords dropping to the ground. You brought tenderness into the war zone and
wine to the party. What happened to you to make you start acting like
them—screaming and demanding and posturing?
You still look the same from a distance, but up
close I know something is badly wrong.. Something is different this time
around. I'm not sure I know who you are. Whenever I’m at denominational
meetings, and we are trying to find somebody to blame for our sinking ship…I
don’t just see the individuals. I see you in all of your collective horror.
I’ve seen your outrage at political rallies, festivities that talk about
“values“ without words like “kingdom” or “cross.” I heard your protests when
“they” started infringing on our territory (Muslims and Mexicans and lions and
tigers and bears, oh my), and you felt like you needed to stand up to them
instead of laying down your life for them. I noticed when your rhetoric went
from “good news” to yet another kind of paranoid propaganda.
Let’s not be coy here, honey. We’ve lived
together for too long, and we know each others secrets and habits and fears. We
share ideas and we share clothes, we drink from the same cup. But didn’t you
think anybody would notice that your knuckles started getting bloodier than
your palms? That the blood on your hands was theirs and not yours?
It’s not that I don’t think you’ve still got
answers to give. It’s not that the world outside needs you any less. But right
now the chemo seems more toxic than the cancer, baby. We came here to this
place to lay down our lives, but the corpses in the back yard are more from our
swords than from our crosses.
Do you think me naïve? You think I don’t know there
is an enemy to fight? On the contrary, my love, I’ve seen the monsters under
the bed. I know that there is a force of evil in the world that is greater than
the sum of its parts. I know we’ve got dragons to slay. It’s just that they
don’t scare me.
In the words of Bob Dylan, "Let us not talk
falsely now, the hour is getting late." So I’ll risk more honesty than can
be afforded on an average Sunday: I know the world is a volatile, dangerous
place. There is a part of me, cold and scientific, that expects the world to
blow itself up. It’s not prophecy; it’s pure arithmetic. We are endlessly
creative in finding new ways to conquer and destroy. The more people learn to
manipulate chemicals and machines, the worse our chances get.
But if I’m honest, that doesn’t really scare me
either. If more war breaks out tomorrow and the rockets red glare becomes
nuclear and dirty bombs are bursting in air, and half the creation is maimed—I
still believe that the creative power of divine love would rise from the ashes.
God already died. Terrorism is not nearly so frightening as blood and water
gushing from the side of the Creator, and even that terror of terrors was swept
up in resurrection life. I am not afraid of the horrible things human beings
might do to me or do to one another.
But I am afraid of you—still a mighty power in
the universe, still the world’s great hope. You are still the Church. Nobody
has the power to create or destroy quite like you. Sometimes we have seen the
world around us exploding, and when we do, we groan with the creation for the
restoration that is to come. But what if you go up in flames? What if the salt
loses its saltiness? What if you, a once chaste and patient virgin, take
the oil from your own lamp, and throw it on someone else’s face—and strike
the match? The apostle said that the weapons of your warfare are not carnal,
but mighty through God. But you’ve been firing them in the dense fog, you don’t
who or what you are aiming at. You’ve been flailing punches instead of turning
the other cheek.
God help us, you’ve been beating your plowshares
into swords.
You know I’m no cynic—I’ve loved you too long
for that. This is love animated by grief. I still believe in you despite all of
your vices. You can still dazzle me. You can still dazzle the world, bride of
God. But things are feeling as insane in here as they are out there, honey. And
I don’t know what else to do except to remind you of the time you were lovely.
Jonathan
