We have met the enemy ...

By Frank "Buzz" Trexler
For The (Maryville, TN) Daily Times, September 3, 2005

We are not like that, are we?

Watching images of looters in the streets of New Orleans and other hurricane-stricken cities this past week brought draw-dropping disbelief and words of outrage.

That’s appropriate because we should be outraged; however, we should also ask questions such as, “Why do people fall to their lowest common denominator at times like this? Furthermore, what is it that restrains some, but not others, at times like this?”

Stealing bread a la “Les Miserables” is one thing, but carjacking a nursing home bus, threatening survivors, ransacking stores for beer and electronics is something totally different.

What is behind such actions?

In his book “Blue Like Jazz,” (Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville ) author Donald Miller tells of watching a “Nightline” broadcast detailing the horror of genocidal wars in the Congo . “As the images moved across the screen I would lie in bed feeling so American and safe, as if the Congo were something in a book or a movie.”

Don talks it over with his friend Tony the Beat Poet and, as often happens in their discussions, Tony gets down to brass tacks.

“Do you think you could do something like that, Don?”

“What are you talking about?”

Tony gets pretty graphic.

“Are you capable of murder or rape or any of the stuff that is taking place over there?”

“No,” Don replies.

“So you are not capable of any of those things?”

“No, I couldn’t. What are you getting at?”

Tony then says, “I just want to know what makes those guys over there any different from you and me. They are human. we are human. Why are we any better than them, you know?”

The truth is, Don did know. And so do we.

We all have the capability of carrying out genocide, of stepping over bodies to loot hurricane-ravaged homes.

Why?

Because humankind is basically self-centered. As Miller would later say in his book, “The most difficult lie I have ever contended with is this: Life is a story about me.”

If life is a story about me, then it’s perfectly understandable that I would put my needs above others’ — even to the point of stepping over their body to steal a microwave.

If life is a story about me, then all things that would better my situation are acceptable — even if it means that your life is degraded in order for mine to be upgraded.

The lowest common denominator is ... sin.

As Don would say, “... the problem in the universe lives within me.”

That’s the “why” of it all. What is puzzling is the “how.”

How is it that some people give in to this sin nature, while others are restrained?

From the Christian perspective, the answer would be that our ability to restrain the sin nature is in direct proportion to our surrender to the Holy Spirit. But that fails to explain why it is that some Muslim extremists would rejoice at death and destruction along the U.S. Gulf Coast, while others would lend their hands and feet to recovery efforts.

Admittedly, I am not enough of a student of world religions to say whether the theological construct of the Holy Spirit can be found within all religions. Nonetheless, we are told that God has placed within the heart of every person the desire to know him. Certainly there is the possibility that God has placed within the heart of every person the capability — if not the desire — to love your neighbor as yourself.

Would that we would all embrace that capability, and surrender to that desire.

After all, life is not a story about me; life is the story of God, his message of grace, peace and love, and how we express that in this world.

 “Nothing is going to change in the Congo until you and I figure out what is wrong with the person in the mirror,” says Donald Miller.

Likewise, until that day, images of New Orleans could become more commonplace.

But then, we are not like that, are we?

The Rev. Frank "Buzz" Trexler is managing editor at The Daily Times and pastor of Green Meadow United Methodist Church, Alcoa, Tennessee. You can e-mail him at PastorBuzz@nxs.net.