When Lack Becomes Loss

Peter Rollins continues to be a thinker that challenges me beyond what I am capable of thinking. While I listen or read him I feel like I understand in the moment, but as soon as try to explain it I fall apart. Not unlike when I walk confidently into a room only to enter that room and instantly forget what I came into that room for.

Rollins mentioned that there is “lack” and “loss”.

Both lack and loss are about an absence in our lives. Lack is about an absence that was never present, loss is about an absence that was present. I lack about a foot in height and overall skill to play basketball well. I never had that height or skill to begin with. However, I can loose my car keys that I thought were in my pocket.

The Bible speaks of humans created with lack, not loss.In Genesis at creation it is said that when God blew into the nostrils of the dirt, the dirt became “nephish.” Nephish means a bundle or collection of desires or appetites. The human being has appetites not because we lost something (like food) but because we have a lack that drives us (hunger drives us to find food). We can address the lack with healthier or non-healthier things, but the lack is not something that can ever be extinguished.

Someone can lack acceptance, and no matter how many awards they receive there is never enough. This person never received acceptance to begin with, it cannot be lost because it was never acquired in early life.

The problem is when we think our lack is a loss. That is to say, if we think that there was a time when humans were once complete, whole and without lacking anything, but then we lost it - we are mistaking our lack for loss. If we think that we can go back to another time (Eden, 1950’s, 1990’s, etc.) and “rediscover” what we lost - we are mistaking our lack for loss. If we think that our individual lives was without antagonism at some point in our past - we are mistaking our lack for loss. We have not loss anything, Jesus reminds us the Kingdom of Heaven is here and to come (unfolding). We never lost it, we only lack it.

Treating our lack as a loss means that we live our lives seeing the lack within us is a problem to resolve, rather than a source of energy. If we were to resolve our lack, it might be the most miserable thing we could do. As it is said, the only thing worse then not getting what you want is getting it. Because once you get it you realize that “it” cannot meet the lack within and you will be crushed. It is crushing to discover that the thing that you want, that you think will fill the lack, does not exist. The quest of life to fill the lack is revealed as a sham and so we fall into dismay.

Like the end of the movie The Graduate. The two went through hell and back in order to fill the lack in their lives. Then as they sat on the bus with the one they thought would fill the lack, they discover the lack is still present (“Hello darkness my old friend…").

Be mindful of the preacher or prophet who preaches that your lack is a loss and that they have what you have lost. You will not find it, because it was never lost to begin with.

Love You More Than The Things You Lack

When I listen to people who are seeing marriage I hear them discuss all the ways that they love one another. Most of the time the list of things are all the things the other person does or is. Expressions of kindness, generosity, humor, and care are tops on a lot of couples’ lists. It is easy to list off all that we love about our partner, and so it catches people a bit off guard when you ask, “tell me what your partner lacks.”

There is a little fear that comes into the room. Perhaps the assumption is that what one lacks the other fills (I lack attention to detail but my partner is great at details). Maybe the assumption is that if we express the lack then we are prone to see the negatives in our soon to be spouse. It could also be that the couple is acutely aware of the lack in the other and this is the root of all their habitual fighting.

When we are dating people we often find what the other person lacks to be a “deal breaker”. “This person is not educated/funny/tall/handsome/young/old/etc. enough. Loving another person in a covenantal relationship means that we love the other person more than the things they lack.

Loving one more than the things they lack is not uncommon in a marriage, however we tend to overlook this in our love for God.

Many times we are disappointed in the ways that God lacks. God does not talk loud enough. God is not visible enough. God is not real enough. And so, because of the lack we see in God, we do not fall in love with God. We love what God lacks more than God who lacks.

You may be thinking, ‘I thought that God does not lack.” In this case we might be holding onto the idea that God lacks the lack. Because if God lacks, then God is imperfect. And, if God is imperfect the God is not God. See where this takes us? We are saying that if God does not “lack the lack”, then God is not God.

Putting it in a question, do we love the idea of a lack-less God more than an incarnate God in Christ who lacks?

There are many examples in the Bible where God lacks. For instance, God is unable to find Adam and Even in the garden when they hid. God regrets making humankind pre-Noah. God’s mind is changed several times throughout the Biblical stories. God in Jesus lacked in the garden prior to his arrest. God dies (the ultimate lack) on the cross.

Perhaps of all the things that makes God different from humanity is that God does not fear the lack. God is at peace with lack. If God is good with having lack, the question is are we okay with God having lack?

Do we love God more than the things that God lacks?

Giving What You Don't Have To Someone Who Doesn't Want It

Lacan

Philosopher Jacques Lacan said that love is giving what you don’t have to someone who doesn’t want it. If I were to create a non-nonsensical statement that I think a stereotypical philosopher would say, this is just about perfect.

What the heck does this mean? How can I give what I don’t have? And how is it loving to give this non-possession to someone who does not want it? I have been handed many flyers only to resent the one giving me what I now consider a scrap of trash to throw away. I did not want it and yet I am holding it. I don’t think that is love.

I have not read Lacan. I am not that smart. However, this definition of love is right in line with the Gospel.

First of all, that which we do not have goes by another name. It is what we lack. Thus, giving what you lack to someone is a practice of vulnerability and trust. When I am vulnerable to someone and give my lack (lack of confidence or lack of “having it all together” for instance) the other person is offered what I don’t have.

Now, when this other person is offered what I don’t have the other person probably was not looking for it. I cannot imagine that people on dating sites are putting in their profile, “I am looking for someone who is broken and lacking in the following ways…” Of course not. When we set out to find a partner, we are typically looking for someone who “completes us” or “fills us” or adds to our life in any number of ways. We look for someone who is the “total package”. We are not looking for lack.

And yet, when we meet someone who offers what were not looking for we have a choice. We can reject it - we were not looking for this to begin with - or we can receive it. In receiving the other person’s lack or brokenness we receive the very thing we did not think we wanted.

This is love.

We see this in the Christian communion. Jesus offers his broken body, his lack, to the world. In turn we are given a choice. Do we receive this broken body of the Christ or do we reject it? Christ offers us not his strength or wholeness, but his weakness and brokenness.

Some find it difficult to imagine that Christ was weak or broken or lacking in anything. I get it, who wants to worship a weak God?

However, this the the point. We are looking for a strong God, we are not looking for a weak God.

By offering the very thing we did not think we want (a weak, broken and crucified God) we encounter what love looks and feels like. When we reject the weakness and brokenness of God, then we reject the very gift of God to us.

Just as God, who needs nothing, receives our lack and brokenness as the way to love us. God responds in kind by offering God’s brokenness.

The question is not is God broken or lacking, but what will you and I choose to do with the brokenness of God offered to us?