‘Splitting’, in psychological terms, describes a person’s inability to integrate positive and negative qualities into a cohesive, realistic whole resulting in a polarised, extreme, black & white view of reality. It is, in other words, Twitter. It may even be the mass-psychosis of our modern, Western world.
UN-SPLITTING THE WORLD
Our pre-modern, non-western Scriptures seem relatively free from this psychosis. The Judeo-Christian worldview offends the modern mind repeatedly with nuance, paradox, and the complexity of our human heart. Its overarching trajectory is towards shalom: ‘the reconciliation of all things together in Christ.’ (2 Cor. 5)
The Psalmist wraps poetry around it: “Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” (85:10)
What an exquisite picture for our world today (for my life today) where, all too often, mercy and truth are locked in mortal combat.
UNCIVIL WAR
On one hand, people with a strong mercy chip can sometimes sweep truth under the carpet. We see this all the time: abuses of power get concealed in the name of ‘grace’; unrighteousness is tolerated and not confronted; sexual predators are protected; economic systems that oppress the poor and benefit the rich are enjoyed and not addressed, conveniently received as tokens of grace by those the system privileges.
And then, on the other hand, those inclined towards truth and justice can easily become vindictive, self-righteous prigs. 60 seconds of social media demonstrates this point. They split the world starkly, a little too neatly, into victims and perpetrators (as if we were not all a bit of both), signalling their own moral purity by demonising others, claiming to believe in redemption and restoration but woe betide anyone who tries.
How beautiful it is, therefore - how hopeful and healing, to glimpse the integrated world described in this Psalm in which mercy and truth actually meet, righteousness and peace kiss, grace and grievance dance.
But how is this possible?
Human nature makes this kind of reconciliation impossible,
but the divine nature makes it inevitable.
Jesus is both all-loving and always just, all merciful and entirely righteous. These polarities of passion and compassion meet on the cross, but it isn’t pretty. It’s a fight to the death.
Christ’s body becomes the battleground of the ages. Love and justice destroy one another. Without what happens next, our world is bereft of both. Finally, in Christ's resurrection, love and justice embrace - just as the psalmist foresaw. They kiss. Decay defers to life, dismembering becomes remembering, deconstruction becomes reconstruction.
This is what we celebrate in communion: the unsplitting of our lives. In the bread and the wine the perpetrator in me meets the victim in me, and through the agony of repentance and forgiveness I am finally reconciled, restored and made whole with myself and with my world. My mind meets my heart, my flesh meets the Spirit. And together as one we dance.
"Righteousness and justice are the foundations of your throne; love and truth go before your face."
Ps. 89:14
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🖼️ ‘Mercy and Truth are Met Together’ William Blake (1803)©️ V&A
