Against the Machine
Our only purpose as a church is to be a community of faith. And faith is growing, make no mistake about it. By fits and starts, to be sure, but generally on an ascending path. Our Holy Trinity Church has come out of a a few years of slumber and is once again growing as witness to the faith once handed to the church of Christ, the “one, holy, catholic and apostolic” faith! If you are hiding somewhere in Southern Maine, please do come out of hiding. The Lord is searching for you.
Paul Kingsnorth’s new book is titled Against the Machine: On the Unmaking of Humanity. Paul is an Orthodox Christian living with his family a life of resistance against the ‘machine’ in western Ireland. Early in his book he quotes these lines from the Welsh poet R. S. Thomas.
…The machine appeared
In the distance, singing to itself
Of money. Its song was the web
They were caught in, men and women
Together. The villages were as flies
To be sucked empty.
God secreted
A tear. Enough, enough,
He commanded, but the machine
Looked at him and went on singing.
Kingsnorth writes early in his book: “A huge change is birthing itself; a change in our human relationship with nature, with each other, with our past, with our tools. With everything.” We all know it, and we are seeing it on a daily basis all around us. Everything in the world is being remade in the image of the Machine that is lurking behind the curtain of what we see. The ancient Christians had a word for it: the powers and principalities. Jesus’ victory on the Cross was against the powers and principalities. That was one of the most profound insights of the Apostle Paul, especially in Romans 8:38, Ephesians 6:12, and Colossians 2:15. The Machine that Paul Kingsnorth writes of is simply the newest manifestation of the ancient enemy of God. We have a choice whether to surrender to the Machine or whether to look behind the curtain and see the glory of God. The glory of God that is ready to be shared with us, directly, with nothing held back. Each of us will make that choice in the days to come, if we haven’t made it already. If you’re reading this perhaps it is safe to presume that you haven’t yet surrendered to the Machine.
Do you pay attention to the news? Do you see your own life invaded by AI and algorithms that you can’t even know what they are doing to your privacy and your life as a citizen and a Christian? But God’s people are not easily deceived (because of Christ’s victory over the powers and principalities in Colossians 2:15). God’s people humbly and faithfully raise their eyes to the hills from where our salvation comes. In the words of Psalm 24:
Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord?
Or who may stand in His holy place?
He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol,
Nor sworn deceitfully.
Come to “the hill of the Lord” in Portland. Stand in “His holy place.” Come to the corner of Pleasant and Park Streets and see and taste and hear how good the Lord is. God bless you and fill your life with the gifts of His grace and love.