A Little Surprise from The Good Place
“I tell you God is love, and I will affirm God’s love till I fall. Where there is love, God and life reveal themselves.”
Sometimes it’s the funniest places where God drops little nuggets of revelation. My husband and I really enjoy an NBC sitcom called The Good Place. The show’s premise revolves around four people who experience untimely deaths and find themselves in a quirky afterlife where they delve into questions of moral philosophy. (If you haven’t seen it and decide to check it out, be sure to start at the beginning.)
On a recent episode, the main characters compile a list of exemplary human beings, people they hope will sail through their latest experiment geared toward saving humanity. Easily recognizable names like Harriet Tubman, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and Mr. Rogers appear on the chalkboard. I paused the show to read through the list and noticed one that was unfamiliar. Toyohiko Kagawa. Naturally, I had to look him up. Orphan. Activist. Japanese evangelist. Poet. Economist. Mystic. Advocate for the poor. Theologian. Labor movement leader. Christian social reformer. Apostle of Love. That was all I needed to pique my interest.
Two days later, I received Volume 1 of The Writings of Toyohiko Kagawa. (What did we ever do before Amazon?) My little book contains Kagawa’s testimony along with a number of essays and meditations. You know that moment when you read something and think Where have you been all my life? Seriously, this guy.
As I understand it, the reason many Americans have never heard of Kagawa comes down to timing. He wrote in the era between World War I and World War II. Sadly, but not surprisingly, his writings were largely suppressed in the U.S. for decades.
Reading Kagawa’s testimony, I was struck by the way he came to know God. After merely memorizing a few verses of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount as part of an English lesson, Kagawa concluded, “the Creator of the Universe is my Father in heaven. Being an orphan, I discovered that God is my Father. Oh, I was happy!” Although he was a man of great intellect, his encounter with God happened with the heart, not the head.
Kagawa’s life is evidence of a faith that was not based on dry religious principles but rooted in a relationship that began with a revelation of love, of being a child of God. A simple encounter with God through the words of Jesus changed his core identity from orphan to son. In an instant he knew that he had a father who loved him and this changed everything, putting him on a trajectory to sacrificially love the people in the worst slum in Japan. He didn’t find religion. He found love.
Kagawa recounts a further encounter with love that reminded me of the type of love I have seen exemplified by missionaries we have worked with in Africa. While Kagawa was bedridden with tuberculosis, his mentor, an American missionary named Dr. Myers, came to visit him in his small fishing cottage. I love how he describes the encounter:
Japanese pastor and social reformer Toyohiko Kagawa
People didn’t like to get close to me because of my terrible disease, so I was very lonesome. Then came Dr. Myers. He had taken his vacation and left his wife to come visit me. He stayed in that cottage about four days. We slept in the same bed. I asked if he wasn’t afraid of me.“Your disease is contagious,” he said, “but love is more contagious.”
Can I get an AMEN! This is what happens when we have been transformed by the perfect love of God. Fear has no hold on us. God is still working on me, but I have seen this kind of love in action. I know a young woman whose love for the children she served in Madagascar is so great that she shared a bed in the plague ward (Bubonic plague, folks!) with a young girl who had been stricken. It brings tears to my eyes just to think about it. This is what God wants for all of us. Can you imagine? What would our world be like if we were all filled with that kind of love?
So many things in this world are contagious. Hate, greed, pride, condemnation. Those are easy to spread, but a little love goes a lot further. Who knows what a greater revelation of love could do in your life, or mine? Could it bring hope to the lonely widow next door or healing to the angry child in your classroom? Like Toyohiko Kagawa, could it inspire you to live amongst the poor or the lost? Could it give you courage to pursue your dreams?
“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”
I was pleasantly surprised by what I discovered hidden in the background of a TV sitcom. I never considered the possibility that The Good Place could make a contribution to The Spacious Place, but God is funny like that. I will absolutely order Volume 2 of Toyohiko Kagawa’s writings and learn more about this amazing saint. We can learn so much from those who have walked the path of love before us. And today, I want to assure you that you are loved. You are a child of God. And you have a Father who loves you. Let Him help you take the next step in love and see how far it goes…
