Seven Kinds of Misfits in the Christmas Story

Mary, Joseph and Jesus,
known by Joseph's family as the
Unholy Trinity: "slut, wimp and bastard"

There isn't a single Nativity story, but most of the story is found in two sections of the Bible: Luke 1-2 and Matthew 1-2.  If there is one theme that runs through this story, it is that the soon-to-be-born and newborn Messiah, king of the earth, attracted the most unsavory people.

1. An adulterous wife
Mary, the mother of Jesus, received a great "blessing" of a pregnancy from God... the blessing of being accused of an unfaithful slut.  She was already engaged to Joseph, a trade-worker, so when she shows up pregnant, it's clear that someone wasn't following the rules. Frankly, under the rules of first century Palestine, she could have been stoned to death.  Her (soon to be) husband kept her from this fate because he was...

2. A mystical wimp
Joseph didn't want his fiancee killed, he just wanted her drama to go away.  That is, until he got a dream about an angel.  He didn't even get a face-to-face like his woman, he just had some spicy pizza and dreamed up an angel telling him to go ahead and marry the slut.  He even told the wimp what to name the kid when he was born.  He woke up and said, "Well, I know what to do now."  Really, how many people take their nighttime fantasies as commands?

3. A Communist
Mary decided it was a great time to hang with her cousin in the country, and while she was there she was singing communist propaganda. She sang about revolution and the proletariat taking over.  She also sang about communist deeds like feeding the hungry and taking possessions from the rich.  She was a real party-goer, that Mary.

4. Judgmental family members
We know that Joseph had to go to Bethlehem.  But he had to go there because that was his family home.  He didn't try to go to an "inn" but to a "guest room" that his family home had for visitors.  The room was "full", meaning they didn't have room for a socialist pregnant slut that their wimpy nephew decided to hook up with.  They can go out into the stables.

"Now we know what the frankincense and myrrh was for."

5. Smelly homeless people
Shepherds, back in the day, didn't smell like mothballs or the back of a church closet.  Rather, they smelled like sheep.  Take  a wool sweater, get it wet, roll it in some dirt and grass and then stick it in a box for a month.  NOW you know what shepherd smells like.  These "workers" just hung out with sheep, trying to find someone's lawn for the animals to chomp on.  So everyone within a hundred miles of every flock (read: everyone) hated these wandering guys who liked sheep a bit too much.  For some reason, the angels thought these were the guys who needed to see the great King pop out from a vagina.

6. Nasty Old Fanatics
When Jesus' parents brought him to the temple to have his foreskin ripped off his penis with an ancient "knife", two old people accosted them.  First was Simeon who was "told by God" that he would see the Messiah before he died.  Perhaps he knew the day was coming and just picked out a likely looking male baby and declared his allegiance to that slobbering, wetting-himself King.  Then eighty four year old Anna "who never left the temple" to like eat, or anything saw Simeon fawning over the brat, so she had to have a piece of the spiritual action.

7. Slackers
Those "wise men" we hear about?  They were actually astrolegers, who saw a sign in the stars about the king to be born.  So they decided to pop over and see the king.  Only problem?  They lives in Persia, and cars weren't to be invented for a couple thousand years.  So they hoofed it, not having anything better to do, which took them a couple years, so the kid wasn't a baby anymore, but a toddler.  Meanwhile, they got the attention of the local king (read: serial murderer). and gave him the kid's whereabouts.  Then the bums scooted out of time before the genocide began. If it wasn't for another vision of the wimp, the toddler king would have bit the big one.

The whole point is this: the King of Jerusalem, the Teacher of Love, the Jewish Emperor of Heaven, the Son of God... or the Nazarene Bastard, whatever you want to call him... seemed to have a habit even before birth to hang out with people who had less-than-pristine reputations.  Maybe he wanted to have a community made up of the same, you think?  Perhaps he picked up his mother's communist tendencies?

Jesus' Acceptance and Rejection

Jesus knew that for the Kingdom to truly be of God, it must be open to everyone, without exception.  This doesn't mean that there weren't dividing lines, but one couldn't be excluded by race or class or sex or disability.  Everyone must have the same opportunity of acceptance.

This doesn't mean that Jesus gave everyone equal opportunities.  After all, if one wanted to connect to God, a healthy Jewish male adult had a better opportunity to do that than anyone.  They were the only ones who could enter into God's house, the only ones who were considered to be heard by God.  Jewish women were somewhat accepted, but non-Jews were completely excluded, unacceptable.

Jesus made it clear that Gentiles had the same opportunity as anyone else to enter God's kingdom.  If they showed faithfulness to God and belief in God's Messiah to save them, they were in.  This is a radical notion, especially among the first century Jewish theologians, who had deep debates of how pure one had to be in order to be acceptable to God.  And if there was one thing the Jewish theologians agreed upon, it is that no Gentile was pure.

Jesus said that only faith made one pure.  And for this reason, he made the most radical statement:  Not only will Gentiles be accepted, but many of those who have remained "pure" all their lives will be rejected, outcast by God.  Most because they refused to accept those whom God accepted.

Anytime we reject a mentally ill person, a homeless beggar, a child, a person of a different culture, a person with different spiritual habits than we, we are committing the same sin.  Should we reject those who Jesus accepts, we will find ourselves rejected by Him.

Let us take great care as to who we outcast, lest we find ourselves on the wrong side of the gate.

The Ins and Outs of Outcasts

All religions draw distinct lines between those who are in and those who are out.  Actually, all communities have that determination-- passports, memberships, rights for those who are in and prisons, immigration laws and bouncers for those who are out.  It is a distinctive of society.  And there's a good reason for clear guidelines for those who are in and those who are out.  If we have a community with a lot of children, we don't want people around who will attack or molest those children.  We don't want to have in our midst those who are dangerous or who destroy our communities.

In religions we have other lines of who is in and who is out.  Again, this isn't a bad thing.  Not everyone is a Buddhist, a Muslim or a Christian, and if we didn't have definitions or determinations of who is actually a part of a religion or religious group, then the label is meaningless.  Thus we have doctrinal statements, memberships, baptisms, rituals, requirements for leadership, disciplinary measures and catechisms.  These are intended to let us know who belongs to our group and who doesn't.

More often than not, however, we take a potentially good thing and we go way too far.  Some groups make entrance into their groups very difficult, or pile on rules on their members, making discipline very easy.  One has to believe a very narrow definition of faith, or one must enact a particular list of actions and rituals or one has a long list of moral requirements to obey.  Worse, a member of a religious group might have to belong to a certain social class or ethnic group or have a certain education level.  It seems that the older the religious group, the more narrow the membership requirements, because as time goes on, traditions increase, excluding more and more people. 

Jesus had a different way of dealing with the lines of membership.  He did have lines, mind you.  Remember, he clearly rejected most Pharisees.  And he had high standards for disciples.  But one thing he did that was unique, different than any other religious leader, is that he sought members for his community from those who had already been rejected by society.  In fact, those who were accepted by society he gave indications that they wouldn't make good members of the community he was forming.  He had difficult words for the wealthy and financially secure.  At times he completely rejected the religious establishment.  But those who were on the outskirts of society, he sought.

Sometimes Jesus looked for those who were outcast by no fault of their own, like lepers or others who were chronically ill.  Sometimes Jesus looked for people who were often misunderstood to be traitors or evil-doers but weren't, like tax collectors (or more accurately called toll-collectors).  But Jesus also sought out as members those who had done terrible sins in their (even recent) past, such as prostitutes and other sinners who had done such horrible things to keep them from the mainstream of society.  Jesus recognized that these who had made horrible mistakes recognized their need for change much better than the religious who had never done a big "screw up" their whole lives.

When Jesus accepted these outcast, he didn't bring them into the mainstream religious establishment, but brought them into his alternative community-- a nomadic commune.  This meant that they didn't have to face the judgment of the religious that didn't have anything to do with the judgment of God.  It meant that they could have an opportunity to work out their weaknesses in a training ground of encouragement and hope.  It also means that they became a different kind of outcast: instead of being rejected for being a prostitute or a tax collector, they are rejected for being a part of a heretical group.

But when we look at Christianity, we find a very different kind of establishment.  It IS the establishment.  Those who go to most churches belong to the mainstream of society, the accepted, the financially secure (if not wealthy), the well-connected.  The "salt of the earth" mean the core of society, the good people who keep communities running instead of Jesus' original intent, which was the poor, the mourning, the persecuted, the hated, those who don't have justice in their lives (Matthew 5:3-15).  Our churches are not filled with the homeless, the mentally ill, the drunks, the drug addicts, the felons, the socially awkward, the powerless, as Jesus community would be.  Instead, we have rejected the outcast, just like all the other religious establishment.

Perhaps we say, "Anyone is free to come to our church!  We don't select those who come in."  Well, we all do.  We don't even mean to.  And, again, this isn't necessarily a bad thing.  If we speak English in our congregation, we weed out those who don't speak English.  That is a cultural decision, perhaps one we didn't even know we were making.  But a congregation to an immigrant population has to make a conscious decision as to what language or languages they use to reach out to their group. Every decision we make as a church is a cultural decision, and we are weeding out those who don't fit in our culture by making those decisions.  If we have a large auditorium with pews, we are welcoming some group and we are rejecting another.  If we use hymnals or choruses or pop songs, we are making cultural decisions that draw some in and reject others.

We need to make these decisions.  We can't be a church for everyone, because that is a narrowing cultural decision as well.  Jesus also made those cultural decisions.  And the culture he developed was for the outcast and rejected.  He chose not to meet at the temple, but in the fields.  He chose to hold meetings at meals, some for the religious, some for the distinctly non-religious.  He met in homes where the sick and the needy would be welcome.

Perhaps we need to re-think church growth strategy.

Jesus and the Outcast

When Jesus looked at the people who followed him, he saw sheep with no leader—people who were considered outside of God’s blessing, God’s provision.  They followed him because they were desperate for God’s touch and help.  There were many who could not gain anything from the leaders in Jerusalem, because they were rejected and hated by God’s people.  They were outcast and they gained nothing from God’s people.  No one who was acceptable would go to their house.  And Jesus knew that they needed him most of all.

As Jesus was travelling around Galilee, from one synagogue to another, a man inflicted with leprosy came to Jesus.  Leprosy was a skin disease that showed that one was judged by the evil one.  Because of the infectious nature of the disease and because whoever had it was considered to no longer be a part of God’s people, lepers were forced to live out of Jewish settlements and to declare “Leper! Unclean!” whenever they came near others. 

Rather than tell the leper to go away, Jesus listened to the leper as he said, “If you wish, Jesus, you could make me clean.”  Jesus then touched the leper and said, “I do wish.  Be clean.”  Immediately, the man was cleansed.  Jesus then told him, “You must follow the teaching of Moses.  Go to the priest at the temple and have him declare you clean.  And tell no one who cleaned you.”  But the former leper told everyone about Jesus who would listen.

            One of Jesus’ apostles was Levi, a toll collector.  The Jewish people hated toll collectors and those who ruled over them, fir they were traitors to their own people.  Jesus, though, called Levi, and asked him to go to his house to eat.  For dinner that night, Levi called everyone he knew—tax collectors and sinners whom “proper Jews” would have nothing to do with.  Some religious folk were there that night and asked why Jesus was welcoming and eating with these rejected people.  Jesus replied, “If you are a healer, you hang around sick people.  Even so, if I am called to tell people to repent, I can’t hang around with people who think of themselves as good—I need to be with those who know they are sinners.”

            Jesus told the crowds a story.  “There was a man who had a hundred sheep.  One evening he counted his sheep and found there was one missing.  So he left the ninety-nine that were there to find the one.  He looked everywhere for him.  When he found the one, he held it on his shoulders and told all his neighbors, ‘Rejoice with me—the sheep I had lost is found!’  In the same way, God rejoices when a single sinner comes back to him more than ninety-nine who never left.”

Jesus told another story.  “There was a man who had two sons.  The youngest son demanded his inheritance early and left home and spent all his money doing evil things.  Over time, he ran out of money, and then there was a famine in the land.  He got a job feeding unclean animals, and the only food he was able to get was sharing the animals food.  Finally, he came to his senses and said, ‘I will go home—even the lowest slave there lives better than I.  I will apologize to my father and offer to be his slave.’  When he was close to home, his father saw him and ran up to meet him and hugged him.  The son apologized, and offered to be his slave,  but the father would have none of that.  Instead he held a party.

            “That afternoon, as the party was starting, the other son who was in the field working heard the commotion, and asked a servant what was going on.  The servant told him that his brother had returned and his father was having a party.  The older son was incensed and refused to go in.  The father heard of this, and asked the older son why he was angry.  The older son said, ‘I’ve been here all these years working for you, and you never held a party for me—why should you for this ungrateful son who sinned with your money?’  The father replied, ‘Son, all I have is yours.  But your brother was dead and now he is alive—shouldn’t we celebrate that?’”

Outreach to the Outcast

Life of Jesus

Mark 2:14-17
Many tax collectors and sinners were dining with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many of them, and they were following Him. When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that He was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they said to His disciples, "Why is He eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners?" And hearing this, Jesus said to them, "It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners."

Jesus specifically sought out those who were unacceptable in his society to eat with them and to teach them and to call them to be disciples. Although he taught those who were upstanding in Galilean society, he said that his purpose was to bring those who are sinning back to the Father. So his main purpose in his ministry was to connect with and teach the outcast—those who were unacceptable to conservative society.

Luke 15:1-10
"I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Some were complaining about Jesus associating and accepting the outcast from Jewish society. In parables, Jesus taught that he is reaching out to those who should be entering the kingdom, but fell away from God because of their sin. He calls these people “lost”. So Jesus is just calling back those who were originally in God’s way, and that when they return, there is more rejoicing over that return than for many who remained with God their whole lives.

Matthew 21:28-32
Truly I say to you that the tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him; but the tax collectors and prostitutes did believe him; and you, seeing this, did not even feel remorse afterward so as to believe him.
Jesus uses another parable to contrast the conservative religious Jews and the sinners who began to follow Jesus. It is better, Jesus is saying, for a person to refuse to obey and then to change their minds than to be one who agrees to obey and changes their minds. The sinners are those who did evil, but then decided to come and remain with Jesus. But the conservative religious folks are those who claim to be doing God’s will but never actually do.

Luke 19:1-10
Zaccheus stopped and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, half of my possessions I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much." And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost."
Zaccheus is an example of one of the lost. He was living in sin—he was cheating some of his fellow Jews out of their money in order to line his own pockets. And he was wealthy, so he didn’t need the money. But he realized his sin and so desperately sought Jesus out. Jesus agreed to accept him, and there was grumbling about this by the conservative religious folks. But Zaccheus shut them up by speaking of his actions of repentance. At this point, Jesus declared that Zaccheus was fully accepted into the family of God.

Our Lives

James 2:1-9
Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? But you have dishonored the poor man.
No matter who comes into church—no matter how insignificant they are, no matter how bad they act or smell—we need to be accepting to them. If they lead other people to sin, then we need to separate them out. But otherwise we need to accept them and treat them as well as we would treat the president if he arrived. We are to give everyone good treatment, showing that they are welcome to come to God.

I Corinthians 9:19-23
To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, so that I may by all means save some. I do all things for the sake of the gospel, so that I may become a fellow partaker of it.
Not everyone is called to be an evangelist. Not everyone is called to specifically reach out to those who are unacceptable. But for those of us who are, we are to become servants, workers, slaves for those whom we are called to. We need to put their needs first and establish what they need so that we can try to meet it, according to our resources and abilities.

Examples

• Phillip left proper Jewish society and reached out to those who were considered “heretics” and “a cult”—the Samaritans. Phillip did not tell them how evil they were, he just explained the opportunity they had to enter the kingdom of God through Jesus. Many Samaritans took the opportunity to come to Jesus. Phillip was also the first person to give the gospel to an Ethiopian, about whom no one knew much.

• John Wycliffe was a professor at Oxford. Bible education was something only for the wealthy because it was considered that the poor couldn’t properly understand it. But Wycliffe determined that the Bible taught that the gospel should be given to the poor and so he started holding classes for the poor in English. When a peasant riot occurred, Wycliffe was blamed because of his teaching. Nevertheless, he continued to teach the poor.

• William Booth lived in England near the turn of the 20th century. He determined to do two things—to teach of how to live the holiness of God and to reach out to the poor. He and his wife Catherine called many people to dedicate their lives to live for those who were considered unacceptable in their society. They started the organization known as the Salvation Army which is still today a church and an organization that assists the poor.


Living It Out

• Don’t show favoritism
No matter what race, religion, or past experience, everyone has an equal chance to come to God and be accepted by him. Let us not do anything that stands in the way.

• Go out of your way to welcome the unacceptable
People who are not accepted by society should be given preference so that they can come to the Lord.

• Do all you can to accept and help brothers and sisters who are unacceptable by mainstream society
Churches today reject many people who do not look like them or act like them, even if people are not strictly involved in sin. Mainstream churches have a hard time accepting the mentally ill or homeless. But we must go out of our way to accept and help those who don’t look or act in a “proper” manner, but they are still doing all they can to follow the Lord.

• No matter how sinful someone is, give them the opportunity to repent
Don’t write people off just because they have a lifestyle of sin or have rejected the Lord in the past. Anyone can come to the Lord anytime—it is a matter of the Lord softening their heart and they receiving his gift of faith. Keep giving people the opportunity to come to the Lord, even if it seems like they never would.

The True Authority

Jesus is deeply concerned about God’s reputation. He acts, more than anyone else in the Bible, as God’s PR agent. He truly acts as God’s Son, and, as any child of a famous parent, he is constantly living in the midst of his parent’s reputation, whether good or bad. This could be both exciting and disturbing. Exciting, because of the attention one receives that most people do not. But mostly, the child of a famous parent is disturbed, even if the reputation is generally positive. Such a child would be disturbed by the fact that most of what he or she is hearing about the parent is fundamentally misguided. Not necessarily wrong, but one’s reputation rarely is a reflection of the true personality or motivation of the one with fame—no matter how often the misconceptions are re-explained.

For instance, Jesus was constantly confronted with the reality of who people thought best represented God. If Gallup or Barna had done a first century survey of Jews throughout the world, asking the question “What person or group of persons could you trust to speak authoritatively for God?” the surveyors would get a number of responses: Priests at the temple; the Sanhedrin; the High Priest; or a particular School of Law, such as the Pharisees or the Sadducees. The interesting thing is not so much the differences of opinion, but their similarities—all of these authorities center on one place: Jerusalem. And many of them center on one person: The High Priest who was the leader of the temple priests, the Sanhedrin and the Sadducean school of Law. This fairly unified group of leaders are called in the New Testament Ioudaioi, often translated “Jews”, but better understood as “Judeans”. They could just as well be understood as “Jerusalemites”, for there was the center of political/religious Ancient Judaism. This would make sense, since the High Priest was the political/religious authority in Judea since the second century BC (as long as the U.S. have had presidents).

So when Jesus walked around ancient Galilee, people would always be referring to God’s authority as “the Judeans say this” or “the elders say that” or “the teachers say this.” The content of what they said would be some interpretation of the Law, but if it came from Jerusalem, it was authoritative—the final word.

Now Jesus had some issue with this authoritative approach to theology. This is not to mean that he was not authoritative. He was, certainly. But that was the problem. As the authority, the Son of God, the king of Jerusalem, Jesus found that the Sanhedrin and the High Priest had many things they disagreed with Jesus on. The disagreements came to a head when representatives from Jerusalem formally declared Jesus' teachings to be false and his healings to be empowered by Satan. The Judeans weren’t very diplomatic. But they didn’t need to be. They were the Accepted Authorities. They could say whatever they thought was true.

But setting aside, for a moment, the fact that they rejected Jesus’ authority, Jesus didn’t think that they qualified to be real authorities. The reason for this, Jesus said, is that they reject and even kill the ones who truly represent God—prophets and teachers such as John the Baptist. This meant that these leaders, rather than representing God’s authority and truth, actually represented their own interests. And, in the end, they would be crushed. Again, more about this later.

But who did Jesus say have God’s real message for his people? Who did Jesus say were the true authorities of God? Who should actually be listened to, if not the Judean authorities? Well, Jesus said, the folks like John the Baptist. People who spoke God’s word and were rejected, even killed for it. Folks like those who listened to John the Baptist—prostitutes and tax collectors who were rejected by the Judeans, but they listened to God’s word in humility and repentance. Folks like the man who was demon possessed with a huge crowd of demons, but who was healed by Jesus and then told to speak about what God had done for him. Folks like the Gentile centurion, rejected by the Judeans, but accepted by Jesus for his faith. Folks like the disciples who were never properly educated, but could be taught to say “The kingdom of God is near.” Jesus calls them infants and contrasts them with the well-spoken and educated. Jesus calls them poor and contrasts them with the rich and comfortable. Jesus calls them unimportant and contrasts them with the Judeans.

But Jesus also said that these are the ones who will enter God’s kingdom—receive God’s greatest blessings, exult in God’s greatest joy. These are the Anawim. The poor,and outcast-- they are the ones best suited to represent God's plan to humanity.

High Volume Meekness

Meekness isn’t exactly in demand today. Nobody wants it. Sure, people will buy books on love, on peace, on joy, on self-discipline—but how many people want Meekness for Dummies? Microsoft Humility? (Whoa, talk about a contradiction in terms!) McLowly? Meekness just doesn’t sell.

And why should it? Meekness doesn’t comfort us, it doesn’t make us more successful, it doesn’t help us make friends or influence people. Let’s face it—the meek in our society are rejects. They are the outcasts, the people who don’t really fit in. Let’s see, who are the professional meek in the U.S.?

• Homeless
• Elderly in nursing homes
• Those living in low income housing
• Poor immigrants
• Mentally ill
• Those who work for minimum wage
• Panhandlers
• Those on Disability or Food Stamps
• Non-English speakers

Not exactly whom you want to be like? Perhaps not the friends and neighbors? Nor your usual upstanding church members? Of course not. These are not the building blocks of society, the ones who can make things change for the better, the righteous, the acceptable. Again, the meek are the rejects. Not just the unimportant, but the unwanted, the unacceptable.

And how do the middle-class church members—the Uptight Upright—treat these folks, the meek and lowly? Sometimes they treat them with pity, feeling sorry for their plight, perhaps seeing how they can help them. That’s typically the best response. If only the best response were the only response. Often the meek are treated as a “problem” that needs to be solved, the solution of which has avoided the minds of all the mighty. The meek usually are ignored by most—best not seen, not dealt with. The apathetic aren’t interested in judging the lowly, but they aren’t interested in doing anything else with them either. But there are many that do wish to judge the lowly.

These judges use the logic of Job’s friends—These meek are in the positions they are in for a reason. Perhaps in these post-modern times we do not want to use the argument of God only offering material blessings to the righteous, but we would use other arguments. “They made terrible errors in their lives, and so they ended up where they are.” “They will have to work hard like we did and then they can get out of that situation.” “This is the land of opportunity—anyone who works hard enough can get ahead.” “They just need to apply themselves.” “Lazy.” “Addicts.” “Trying to take advantage of good people.” These labels are used on the meek, even if they are not known. And if you think you are immune to this, how many times have you ignored a panhandler whom you have never seen before because, you assume, they would use the money you might give them for their addiction? This is judging by stereotype. Would we assume such things of our neighbor who lives on the same suburban street as us?

If we looked at these meek with God’s eyes, we would see that these meek are not the insignificant and hopeless as we might first have imagined. Just the opposite. We need to remember that God does not choose the powerful, the rich, the ones who already have everything in place. God chooses the needy, the insignificant, those for whom everything is falling apart. This means, biblically, when we look at our world around us, we need to see it with new eyes. Next time you see a panhandler, instead of seeing him or her with pity or disgust, think, “This is one of the ones whom God chooses.” Next time you see an elderly woman, living alone, respond, “I wonder if God will give her a son.” Next time you meet a mentally ill person, consider, “I wonder what God is going to do in this person’s life—it must be magnificent!” Next time you hear about the starving in Africa or Asia, instead of being overwhelmed with a mix of compassion and guilt, pray that God would do a work of power there.

Poverty and illness are not dead-end streets—they are opportunities for God to act.