The Beauty of Conspiracy

During the Nuremberg trials, top Nazi officials were tried for crimes against humanity. It was the first time that charges such as these were ever leveled against the leaders of a defeated enemy. It was also the first time that there was a semblance of a "world court" to hold anyone accountable for acts of conspiracy relating to the violation of human rights. This should be considered a victory for the entire human race.

These despots and their underlings had the audacity to claim that they were simply "following orders", or that they tried to tell "them", the others, that they were doing the wrong things. Yet, at no time did any one of these conspirators say, "I am them". Instead they chose to hide behind the "beauty of conspiracy", the lack of personal accountability for your own actions.

Somehow when we act in a group, a gang, or a mob, our own actions can appear to be justified. We do things that we, as individuals, would never consider let alone act upon. Once the mob begins to chant "Crucify him! Crucify him!" it ssuddenly seems not only acceptable but necessary. We want to be on the side of the mob. 

Do you remember the scene in Frankenstein, when the townsfolk were marching through the streets on their way to Castle Frankenstein to kill the monster with torches and pitchforks in hand? It didn't start out with a group of concerned people whom after careful deliberation came to a consensus, then took reasonable actions to ensure that their families were safe. No, it started out with a few individuals acting out of fear and spreading that fear until the gentle farmfolk of the community were whipped up into a bloodthirsty mob chanting, "Kill, Kill, Kill the monster!"

This was much the same mentality at work among the Nazis, and that very same mob mentality spread to an entire nation. The vestiges of these murderers still linger with us today. Some people idolize the perpetrators of these crimes, still clinging to the idiocy of racial purity. In the eyes of God all men, all women, are equal, but we look through human eyes. We see difference, we see "other", and we see with the myopia of the last 10,000 years of civilization that here is "us" and over there is "them". Madness, madness, all of it.

We are them. They are us.

The conspiracy that grew around Jesus did not come from a public outcry. It was nurtured in dark rooms filled with an influential few. Those who felt they had something to lose, and they did. They had everything to lose; respect, power, influence, and money Ah, yes money. As Paul would write many years later,

“But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” – 1 Tim 6:9-11

Indeed, they were positive that their acts of "self-preservation" were justified by their concern for the Temple, their people, and their traditions. None of these would be spared. Not a one. Within a generation the Temple was razed to the ground by the Romans. The people lived on, but were scattered to the farthest reaches of the known world, and would never inhabit a unified nation again until 1948. All that remains of the second Temple to this day is the Wailing Wall.

Jews still flock to this ruin in search of the God who seemed to have abandon them. But, the Jews remain the chosen people of God. They always have been and always will be. 

We might look at their history and say, “How could they be favored by God? Look at what happened to them through the Holocaust, the Roman occupation, the Babylonian exile, the Diaspora, and today they are surrounded on all sides by enemies chanting, "Kill, Kill, Kill the monster!" except it comes out as, “Death to Israel!”

They say revolutions eat their own children, but it seems that conspiracy consumes it young, as well. That’s what ends up on the menu when man starts acting out of fear, ignorance, and greed. The Jews couldn't recognize the very God who had lead them out of bondage, fed them in the desert, lead them into the Promised Land, and told them He was coming. No, their God had been replaced long ago by vain ritual, an “all powerful” Caesar, and the Beauty of Conspiracy. Everybody bow down and pray to the idols of man.

A devout Jew praying at the Wailing Wall

There he is today, the beloved of God, the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob worshiping by a wall, a wall, built by the hands of men. Sure, he isn't praying to the wall itself, but he still can’t recall that God does not reside in buildings of stone or timber. Split the timber and He is there, crush the stone and He is there. He is everywhere, cutting through the stench of a 2,000 year old conspiracy that still hangs in the air. The Temple is gone, but God has not abandoned His people. He does not break promises, not a single one. Paul reassures him, them, and all of us, in the epistle to the Romans;

"In view of all this, what can we say? If God is for us, who can be against us?  Certainly not God, who did not even keep back his own Son, but offered him for us all! He gave us his Son—will he not also freely give us all things?  Who will accuse God's chosen people? God himself declares them not guilty!  Who, then, will condemn them? Not Christ Jesus, who died, or rather, who was raised to life and is at the right side of God, pleading with him for us!  Who, then, can separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble do it, or hardship or persecution or hunger or poverty or danger or death?"  – Romans 8:31-35

We are them. They are us.

Now, that is a Beautiful Conspiracy! Amen. Praise God!

We will all go up together.

Not a single seed will be lost!

Amen.