How Can Imagination Be Redemptive?

Scripture — Habakkuk 2:3 (NAB)

For the vision still has its time, presses on to fulfillment, and will not disappoint; if it delays, wait for it, it will surely come, it will not be late.

Devotion

In yesterday’s Life for Leaders devotion, I talked about how imagination, though tied etymologically to the Latin word imago, meaning “image,” is not only a visual experience. We can use our imaginations in relationship to all of our senses: seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, and touching. Moreover, we can imagine complex experiences or realities that transcend our individual senses. We can dream of new communities and untold opportunities. We can even imagine the kingdom of God, as James K. A. Smith reminds us.

In this way, our imaginations can be redemptive. We can share in God’s work of redeeming all things through Christ. We can see injustice and imagine justice. We can see poverty and imagine plenty. We can see war and imagine peace. We can see brokenness and imagine wholeness. But truly redemptive imaginations don’t just sit there and see better things. Rather, they motivate and equip us to invest our lives in God’s redemptive mission.

When I think of redemptive imagination at work, my own imagination pictures Father Greg Boyle. As a young Catholic priest, Father Boyle was assigned to one of the poorest churches in Los Angeles. His parish was filled with gangs and the violence that went along with them, along with ample injustice and limited hope.

But Father Boyle saw what was happening around him with redemptive imagination. He envisioned a world in which those who would be gang members could find good work, a world in which young men and women without hope might begin to find some. In time, Father Boyle oversaw the development of programs and businesses that existed first in his imagination. Among other things, he founded Homeboy Industries, “the largest gang-intervention, rehabilitation, and re-entry program in the world.”

Father Greg, as he likes to be called, wrote a book about his life’s work and vision, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion. At the center of his mission is the desire to create a transformative “community of kinship.” Here’s how he explains it:

No daylight to separate us.

Only kinship. Inching ourselves closer to creating a community of kinship such that God might recognize it. Soon we imagine, with God, this circle of compassion. Then we imagine no one standing outside of that circle, moving ourselves closer to the margins so that the margins themselves will be erased. We stand there with those whose dignity has been denied. We locate ourselves with the poor and the powerless and the voiceless. At the edges, we join the easily despised and the readily left out. We stand with the demonized so that the demonizing will stop. We situate ourselves right next to the disposable so that the day will come when we stop throwing people away. The prophet Habakkuk writes, “The vision still has its time, presses on to fulfillment and it will not disappoint . . . and if it delays, wait for it.” (italics added, p. 190).

Central to Father Greg’s work is his imagination. He imagined a circle of compassion in a place where compassion was once hard to find. He imagined nobody standing outside of that circle, no matter their earthly condition. How did he do this? He answers in this phrase, “Soon we imagine, with God, this circle of compassion.” How? With God! With God’s power. With God’s vision. With God’s justice. With God’s compassion. With God’s grace. All of which ignite the imagination.

Father Greg offers us an extraordinary picture of redemptive imagination. This is both wonderful and yet, perhaps not so wonderful. I don’t have to explain the wonderful part. I’m sure you get it. But the not-so-wonderful part has to do with the downside of telling amazing stories about amazing people. Such stories might inspire us. Or they might discourage us. After learning about Father Greg, I might think, “Surely I could never be like him.”  So, rather than looking at my world with the eyes of redemptive imagination, I might convince myself I can’t really make a difference in my neighborhood, my family, my church, my workplace, or my part of the world.

You and I may never found anything as impressively redemptive as Homeboy Industries. We may never redeem thousands of lives from poverty, violence, and prejudice. But if our hearts are open and our minds are available to God, then God will stir up our imaginations. For us, the exercise of redemptive imagination may have to do with unifying a splintered family, defending someone victimized by racism, or leading our church in a new mission of community engagement. It may be that we will help our workplaces treat all employees fairly, or help provide jobs for folks who have a hard time getting them. For us, the first step is to imagine, with God, focusing on God’s priorities and being available to the inspiration of God’s Spirit. And if the vision delays, “wait for it, it will surely come” (Habakkuk 2:3).

Banner image by Rene Ranisch on Unsplash.

Find all Life for Leaders devotions here. Explore what the Bible has to say about work at the unique website of our partners, the Theology of Work Project’s online commentary. Reflection on today’s Life for Leaders theme can be found here: Idolatrous Work (Habakkuk 2:1-20; Zephaniah 1:14-18).

Subscribe to Life for Leaders

Sign up to receive a Life for Leaders devotional each day in your inbox. It’s free to subscribe and you can unsubscribe at any time.