Yesterday was Veterans Day here in the U.S., a day to thank those who have served our country in the military.
I read an interesting piece by Tobin Grant at RNS which suggests that religious people (Christians, in the research) are more likely to be veterans. I don’t know how much stock I put in what’s said, but I thought it would be interesting to discuss the relationship between Christian faith and military service in American Christianity.
Here is Tobin’s first chart, the one we’ll focus on for our discussion:
Tobin summarizes:
About one-in-five religious Americans are veterans. This is about twice the proportion found among the “nones.”
According the most recent General Social Surveys (2010, 2012, & 2014) around 20 percent of men and two percent of women have served in the military. Veterans are most common in Protestant churches. Those with no religion are 50-60 percent less likely to have served in the military.
He admits there may be other factors involved, such as age (veterans are likely to be older), socioeconomic status (those with lower status may see the military as a way of making a better life for themselves), etc.
In the discussion today, you are free to respond to the simple data presented in this chart. But we might also broaden the conversation to talk more generally about relationships you might perceive between people of faith and participation in military service.
Today I have lymphoma. Yesterday was bowel cancer. I curiously palpate my underarms, searching for that slippery lump, stealthily hiding from my grasp. I check again, and again. I then move up to my neck, again massaging for lumps. My temperature is high. The low-reading thermometer is lying. It is frustratingly difficult to explain to someone the affliction that is hypochondria and the terror one experiences with this condition. It is not an obsession, it is the solid, unwavering belief of illness which is not abated, soothed or remedied by reason. Logic is irrelevant and I often describe the illness as an “inhibition of reason” whereby the sufferer is capable of seeing and understanding reason but is unable to truly believe said reason. Bouts of hypochondria last for days, weeks or months, sporadically disappearing and resurfacing. Sometimes I beg for the uncertainty to be removed, sometimes I yearn for the very condition I fear to take its place inside me, to wreak its ungodly havoc on me.
There are theological teachings and pastoral approaches that encourage spiritual hypochondria. Always admonishing believers to “examine themselves,” Christian leaders who teach this way are in danger of creating congregations filled with people who live under an unrelenting spirit of fear and insecurity, constantly checking their pulses, taking their temperatures, and gazing into the mirror, interpreting every irregularity as the sign of a serious, perhaps fatal disease.
I don’t believe the Bible calls us to examine ourselves like this. It calls us to keep our eyes on Christ.
The passage that seems to call Christians to self-examination is 2Corinthians 13:1-10 —
This is the third time I am coming to you — EVERY FACT IS TO BE CONFIRMED BY THE TESTIMONY OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES.
I have previously said when present the second time, and though now absent I say in advance to those who have sinned in the past and to all the rest as well, that if I come again I will not spare anyone,
since you are seeking for proof of the Christ who speaks in me, and who is not weak toward you, but mighty in you.
For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God For we also are weak in Him, yet we will live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you.
Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you–unless indeed you fail the test?
But I trust that you will realize that we ourselves do not fail the test.
Now we pray to God that you do no wrong; not that we ourselves may appear approved, but that you may do what is right, even though we may appear unapproved.
For we can do nothing against the truth, but only for the truth.
For we rejoice when we ourselves are weak but you are strong; this we also pray for, that you be made complete.
For this reason I am writing these things while absent, so that when present I need not use severity, in accordance with the authority which the Lord gave me for building up and not for tearing down.
Context means everything when trying to understand this passage. Linda L. Belleville describes the situation in Corinth that Paul was addressing in this letter:
It was at Corinth that [Paul] encountered his most formidable pastoral challenge in the form of traveling Jewish Christian preachers who not only invaded his territory but also claimed credit for his work, stressed sensationalism and challenged his credentials and his authority.
…Paul calls these preachers “false apostles” and “deceitful workman” who were “masquerading as servants of righteousness” when in fact they were servants of Satan (2Cor 11:13-15). They were preaching another Jesus, Spirit and gospel (11:4), and their intention was to lead people astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ (11:3…).
Chapters 10-13 of this letter directly address this situation. And now, here in ch. 13, Paul comes to his conclusion. Note this carefully — he is preparing to visit Corinth, to meet with a church that has been influenced by counterfeit teachers who have been trying to get the congregation to disown Paul and his teaching. Paul taught a “weak” servant Christ; the false teachers taught a “mighty,” sensationalistic Christ. Verse 3 says that Paul is coming to prove himself and his doctrine to them, because they are, “seeking for proof of the Christ who speaks in me.” The issue at hand is this: Is Paul a genuine apostle who preaches the true Christ?
In that light, he tells them: “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you–unless indeed you fail the test?” And then note the all-important statement that follows: “But I trust that you will realize that we ourselves do not fail the test.”
Why does Paul tell them to examine themselves?
Because he wants them to see that Christ is indeed among them because of Paul’s preaching.
This, therefore, will prove that Paul is a genuine apostle, and that the other teachers are false.
So then, the Corinthians are to examine themselves to prove Paul’s authenticity. He is not advocating here a regular spiritual discipline of checking myself out to see if I am a genuine Christian. He is writing to a church that he addressed in ch. 1 with these words:
Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God, who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge. But I call God as witness to my soul, that to spare you I did not come again to Corinth. Not that we lord it over your faith, but are workers with you for your joy; for in your faith you are standing firm. (1:19-22)
Paul is confident that this congregation is in Christ. What is at stake is his relationship with them, and their ongoing acceptance of his gospel. What is at stake is their recognition of Paul as the genuine apostle. They have been listening to other voices who are threatening to lead them astray, away from Paul’s teaching, away from Christ. So the Apostle says to them, “Look at yourselves! Isn’t Christ among you because of my teaching? These other teachers have brought you a different Christ, a Christ of power and not weakness; a Christ of glory and not of the Cross. If the real Christ is among you, then that should show you that I am real and that my ministry is approved by God.”
His words are more about a church approving Paul than about individuals looking at themselves in the mirror.
Paul’s real message about self-examination as a spiritual practice is found in Paul’s first letter to this church:
But to me it is a very small thing that I may be examined by you, or by any human court; in fact, I do not even examine myself. For I am conscious of nothing against myself, yet I am not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord. (1Cor 4:3-4).
Paul looked to Christ, not in the mirror. Paul spent his time examining the grace and mercy of God, not his own heart. Paul didn’t get insecure and fearful when others questioned his faith because he had God’s word of acceptance and the confirming presence of the Holy Spirit. He knew he was the “chief of sinners,” even as an apostle (1Tim 1:15 — note the present tense), but he also knew whom he had believed and he was convinced that He is able to guard what Paul had entrusted to Him until that day (2Tim 1:12).
It is always appropriate to confess our sins. Of course this will mean practicing a form of self-examination to help us understand where we have gone astray, so that we can bring it honestly and openly to God and/or an appropriate confessor. But nowhere does the New Testament call us to look in the mirror constantly so as to make sure we look like genuine Christians.
The following is a quote from a recent post by Richard Beck at his blog, Experimental Theology. I encourage you to click the link and read the entire piece. It’s especially fun the way he teases out his point with references to Johnny Cash, Dorothy Day, and Flannery O’Connor.
He describes a phenomenon I’ve seen in myself, though I have come to it from the opposite direction. Beck is a self-confessed longstanding member of the “liberal” or “progressive” wing of the theological spectrum, especially with regard to his belief in “God’s unconditional love and forgiveness.” However, he has found himself becoming more and more “acutely aware of human wickedness, fallenness and brokenness.” Nevertheless, this has not diminished his belief in grace; indeed, he finds that commitment enhanced.
Richard Beck confesses that he is becoming both more progressive and more conservative in his theology at the same time!
It reminds me of what a friend once said to me: The truth often may not lie at either end of the spectrum, nor in the middle, but in the full acceptance of both extremes.
I don’t know what to make of this, but I can testify that this story is, in many ways, my own.
So, here’s a text for all spiritual schizophrenics out there, starting with me.
What’s happening in my spiritual life is that as the vision grows darker and darker in one direction it grows brighter and brighter in the other direction. The deeper into the pit of wickedness I go the greater the scandal of grace.
Morally and theologically, my faith is becoming one of deepening contrasts. Darker night. Brighter light. It’s this sharp line of contrast between wickedness and grace that has transfixed me.
I want my faith painted in bolder brushstrokes. I believe that God will reconcile all things in Christ, but I’d like to hear that message preached at a tent meeting revival, with talk of the devil, the King James Version of the bible and shouts of Hallelujah. I want the gospel of inclusion and grace of the mainline Protestants preached with the passion and rage of fundamentalist street-preachers.
I’m a doubter who believes in repentance and altar calls. I wonder if prayer works but I believe in the laying on of hands and the anointing of oil. I am a rationalistic skeptic who talks about demons and the Holy Ghost. I reject penal substitutionary atonement but I would rather sing “Are you washed in blood of the Lamb?” than contemporary praise songs. I am a universalist who wants more fire and brimstone.
I want my faith both more conservative and more progressive at the very same time. Too much sin, blood and damnation for the progressives. Too much mercy, inclusion and love for the conservatives.
I want Will Campbell’s definition of the gospel, “We’re all bastards. But God loves us anyway.”
The other day, as I was working on one of my books, a book for caregivers, I decided to do a chapter on how maintaining a spirit of joy can strengthen us in the midst of difficult circumstances. My text, of course, was Nehemiah 8:10, which ends with the familiar biblical meme, “The joy of the Lord is your strength.”
I actually like the way the New American Bible puts it: “Rejoicing in the Lord is your strength!” but more on that in a moment.
What struck me as I reviewed Nehemiah 8 and the setting of the familiar quote was that I had missed some important instructions in the context. These instructions make the concept of “joy” concrete.
“The joy of the Lord” is often invoked as one of those vague, “spiritual” ideas that religious people love to talk about. But in all my years of being a Christian and a minister, I doubt if I’ve ever really had a handle on what it actually is, what to think about it, and what to say to others to encourage them to have the kind of joy that will strengthen them in their lives and in their faith.
However, the context of these familiar words makes it clear.
Remember the situation. A group of exiles had returned to the land from Babylon and were intent on rebuilding the city of Jerusalem. By the time Nehemiah 8 comes around, the wall around the city had been completed and many had been resettled in their own towns and villages. A convocation was called. The exiles were to gather together in Jerusalem, hear Ezra the priest read the Torah, and celebrate the Feast of Booths.
The first part of Nehemiah 8 describes this Law-reading/teaching session, emphasizing Ezra’s role along with other leaders, and describing how the people began to lament and weep when they heard the Torah’s teaching.
At this point, Ezra, Nehemiah and the other leaders gave instructions to their distraught fellow citizens:
Then Nehemiah, that is, the governor, and Ezra the priest-scribe, and the Levites who were instructing the people said to all the people: “Today is holy to the Lord your God. Do not lament, do not weep!”—for all the people were weeping as they heard the words of the law. He continued: “Go, eat rich foods and drink sweet drinks, and allot portions to those who had nothing prepared; for today is holy to our Lord. Do not be saddened this day, for rejoicing in the Lord is your strength!” And the Levites quieted all the people, saying, “Silence! Today is holy, do not be saddened.” Then all the people began to eat and drink, to distribute portions, and to celebrate with great joy, for they understood the words that had been explained to them. (Neh. 8:9-12, NABRE) [emphasis mine]
Note: the leaders did not instruct the people to find something “spiritual” within themselves called, “the joy of the Lord.”
Instead, they gave them specific instructions about actions they should take to “rejoice” in the Lord.
They told the weeping exiles to “eat rich food.” They told them to “drink sweet drinks.” They told them to take extra food to their neighbors who might not be able to participate so that they could also share in the feast.
In the midst of their sadness and regret, they instructed them to have a feast!
The exiles were encouraged to have a party in the midst of their problems!
The remedy for their sadness was a celebration!
I often pray for people who are struggling to carry heavy burdens, that God will give them joy, for “the joy of the Lord is our strength.” I still think that is a legitimate prayer, but now that I know what’s involved, I’m going to try and remember to always augment my prayers with encouragement to find a way to do something enjoyable and refreshing. I will try to help them find a way to laugh, to take up something that will bring them enjoyment and gladness.
When life gets heavy, this text reminds us to balance the heaviness with some hilarity.
Apparently, joy along with the strength it brings grows in us when we allow ourselves, even in the midst of our struggles, to celebrate the good things of life.
Joy is not some “spiritual” quality we have to work up in some “spiritual” way.
Joy is a good meal with friends, laughing together, doing something you really enjoy, forgetting about your troubles for awhile, taking a break and indulging a little bit, participating in some pleasurable activity, making merry, blowing off some steam.
Note from CM: The other day I told my wife that it was probably time to empty the lateral file that sits in our bedroom. It has a blanket over it and our TV and other AV equipment sits on top of it now. Hidden beneath the blanket and inside the drawers are files that date back to the mid-1970s. I have notes from Bible college and seminary, every sermon I’ve ever preached, articles I copied over the years, illustrations I kept for use in preaching. I can’t remember the last time I opened it. Why then do I have such trouble chucking it all?
This post Michael wrote in 2005 brought all this to mind again today. I haven’t done a thing to empty the file yet.
• • •
Sitting about a foot away from me, next to my desk, is a green suitcase containing 22 small notebooks, each one full of pages of handwritten notes. The notes are my childhood pastor’s sermon notes; notes spanning more than 30 years of ministry and many different churches. They were given to me as a gift, to do with as I choose.
In the closet at the end of the hall is a box of ancient reel-to-reel tapes. The tapes contain approximately ten years worth of sermons preaching through the Bible, Genesis to Revelation, by a Baptist pastor almost 50 years ago. The sermons were preached by the founding pastor of a church I served in the early 80’s, and were given to me as a gift.
I cannot read the sermon notes. They are written in an almost unreadable, highly personal scrawl, with so many abbreviations, symbols and little codes known only to my pastor, that there is no hope of ever deciphering them. Though hours of labor and prayer poured into those notes, and the sermons that came from them communicated well, the notes do not communicate any more. Even if I could read them, I doubt that I would be able to make much of the heart of those messages. My pastor’s sermons were born out of an experience that really couldn’t be translated into clean, transferable outlines to be imitated. Like Pascal, these notes are evidence of the “fire;” they are the record of the Spirit’s stirring on the waters of his heart, mind and emotions. They will never live again.
The tape recordings are from a man who was well known in Kentucky among Baptists. He was a man who was known as an author, a polemicist and debater as much as he was known as a pastor. He expended vast amounts of energy preaching and writing against Roman Catholicism in our community and liberalism among Baptists. He wrote books and promoted a view of Baptist history called “Landmarkism” that traced the roots of Southern Baptists back to John the Baptist.
Those tapes will be full of this sort of preaching. As a document of anti-Catholic, fundamentalist sentiment among Southern Baptists in the 50’s, it might be interesting to someone, but not to me. There is nothing here for me. I am not a young fundamentalist seeking to delve into the glories of the great battles of the past.
I have been entrusted with these homiletic remains of these two preachers, and I have been wondering for months — years — what to do with them. Both men are dead. No one wants these remains. Their day of usefulness has come…and gone.
I don’t believe in the effacacy of relics, but I do understand what our Catholic brothers and sisters are doing holding on to the finger of Saint Catherine. This is as close as you can get to a person who was, you believe, somehow, a bit closer to God than you. It is the same attachment people have to old schools and their golden age of education, and to old home places, with their images of family. Nostalgia is not a sin, or idolatry, but is it where God wants us to live? Is the reverence we ought to pay to the past ever a distraction from the reality of God in the present?
I have no attachment to these relics of the Baptist preachers who came before me. Regularly, I make a note in some “to do” list that I will burn them both when the weather is a bit less dry. That may shock someone as ungrateful, but I believe the authors would not be offended at all.
My Student Government Association students have adopted a slogan for this year: “Leave Something Behind.” I like it very much. It looks beyond ourselves to those who come after us, and asks how our work today can benefit someone else later on. It invites us to see our lives as part of a great chain of people working and serving, and not just as self-centered moments in a self-centered universe. To see the present moment as full of possibilities that are uniquely your own is wise. To seek to live faithfully in that present moment is a true expression of faith. To spend that present moment in the museum of the past is to misunderstand the work of the Spirit in the past.
These two preachers both left something behind. They left churches. One is thriving and growing beyond anyone’s expectation, but is doing so precisely because the church has deserted the kind of narrow, anti-Catholic tone that marked its early years. The other church had it prosperous years, and now is in decline and difficulty in the inner city, but its influence, fruit and children are everywhere in our community. The historical influence of the church outweighs its present struggles.
Both were churches where the Word was sounded forth, where the mission of evangelism was primary and the duty of Christians to be salt and light was taken seriously. In their own ways, these men created churches that honored Christ, the Bible and the Gospel. But the church must answer Christ again and again in the present. One church has done so, and it’s founder might not be pleased. The other has sought to live more in that past, and found itself dying in the present.
These churches both revere their pastors, but the one that lives has left the past as the past. The other has sought to make the past into the present.
Christ has never required a perfect church or a perfect ministry. He has condescended to use the fallibly faithful, the distracted and the those whose zeal was not always entirely born of Christ. He has never asked us to revere the ministers of the past, but to learn from them for our own time. To honor a faithful man of God is to serve and proclaim Christ in the present; to see where his life was pointing, and to serve and know that One who is the same yesterday, today and forever- but who invites us to live fully in the present.
I look at these sermons that have been left behind, and I realize each one would pass judgement on the men who wrote them. These are not relics of a better, purer Christianity. These are the visible tracks of fellow strugglers, fellow failures, fellow pilgrims.
There are hundreds of tapes of my sermons in my office. Should God call me to himself, my family would be left with these relics of my ministry. So I’ll tell them now: Keep one to remember my voice, but destroy them all.
Look to Christ. Look to scripture. Look forward, not back. Listen to God in your own time and place, not how he spoke in another. Let the Spirit of the Lord create his people in the present, and do not be nostalgic for what he did “back in the day.”
1957 Nash Rambler Custom Cross Country Station Wagon
Dark November is advancing and so I’ve chosen a black beauty of a Rambler for us to ramble about in today. Isn’t this ’57 wagon magnificent?
Well, what are you waiting for? Hop in, and let’s ramble!
Since we are rapidly approaching the end of this liturgical year and the beginning of Advent, today’s Ramblings will feature occasional shots of some of the worst liturgical vestments foisted upon the Church and a few of the lesser known feasts for which they were worn. Thanks to Christopher Johnson of the Bad Vestments blog and Nicholas G. Hahn III at RealClearReligion for exposing these atrocities.
The clear winner when you search “bad vestments” is Bishop Katherine Jefforts Schori, whose taste in garb is matched only by her bad biblical exegesis and theology. Here is the Bishop in all her sartorial glory:
Now, without any comment from me, it’s time for our weekly Bible study, sponsored by Buzzfeed.
Today’s guest lecturer is Dr. Ben Carson, who, coincidentally, is teaching about Joseph and the pyramids of Egypt. Dr. Carson first talked about what he is sharing with us today at Andrews University 17 years ago, and he still holds his interpretation today. Dr. Carson, please tell us about this fascinating biblical subject.
Certainly. Thank you for having me today.
My own personal theory is that Joseph built the pyramids to store grain. Now all the archeologists think that they were made for the pharaohs’ graves. But, you know, it would have to be something awfully big if you stop and think about it. And I don’t think it’d just disappear over the course of time to store that much grain.
The pyramids were made in a way that they had hermetically sealed compartments. You wouldn’t need hermetically sealed compartments for a sepulcher. You would need that if you were trying to preserve grain for a long period of time.
There have been other interpretations as well. Various scientists have said, “Well, you know there were alien beings that came down and they have special knowledge and that’s how they were built.” But, you know, it doesn’t require an alien being when God is with you.
Thank you, Dr. Carson. Wait, we have a comment from someone in the class. Yes, please introduce yourself and make your comment.
Yes, thank you. My name is John C. Darnell and I’m a professor of Egyptology at Yale. The primary content of the pyramids are stones, they are elaborate massive structures with little internal space to be used as storage of anything.
Also, the story of Joseph is set in the time of Egypt’s Middle Kingdom, five centuries after the pyramids of Giza were built.
Pyramids. Not granaries. We know this with 100% certainty.
Guess we’ll have to leave it there. Lot to think about, huh?
“Just” (as in, “Lord we just want to thank you . . .”)
God-shaped hole
Raw/messy/vulnerable/real
“Humbled”
Missional
Biblical
Servant’s heart
“Modest is hottest”
What other Christian “insider language” bugs you?
As if there weren’t enough confusion about gender confusion these days, scientists in the U.K. are now confused about the sex of one of the oldest trees in Europe.
The tree is the 5,000 year old Fortingall Yew in Perthshire, Scotland. For centuries of its long life, the tree has been recorded as male because it has male pollen-releasing buds. However, a botanist at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh recently noticed that berries, which only female yews can produce, are sprouting on one of the ancient tree’s branches.
An article in the Huffington Post explains:
Yew trees are typically dioecious, which means they are either male or female. But a sex change can occur if there is a shift in the balance of a tree’s growth regulators, or hormones, the Washington Post reported.
Sometimes a tree even can maintain two sexes at once for extended periods of time, which may be what has occurred with this yew.
Despite its old age, the tree appears to be healthy and lively enough to maintain an intersex lifestyle.
Wait . . . did he say this tree is going to maintain an intersex lifestyle?
This week in music history . . .
What many consider the greatest rock concert film of all time, Martin Scorcese’s The Last Waltz, opened to rave reviews in New York City in 1977.
This was the final concert for The Band, who had played together for 16 years. Recorded on Thanksgiving Day, 1976 at San Francisco’s Winterland, the group invited a remarkable cast of performers to join them on stage, including Ronnie Hawkins, their original leader, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Eric Clapton, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, the Staples Singers, Emmylou Harris, Ron Wood, Paul Butterfield, Ringo Starr, and Dr. John.
If you want to see the whole group, watch the wonderful rendition of “I Shall Be Released” that they do en masse.
But today, we’re going to feature one of The Band’s songs that really captures their energy, led by the remarkable Levon Helm on drums and vocals. He is missed.
One of the basic teachings of Christianity that I turn to often in my work as a hospice chaplain is that of the communion of saints. It comes to mind often at this time of year, with All Saints and other celebrations that come in the waning of earthly light. Our hospice holds a memorial service in November, and I am reminded. Veterans’ Day is next week, and this reminds me. The autumn season by nature has always been a time of reflection for me on matters like this as the world dies in preparation for rising again.
Here is how Ron Rolheiser describes the communion of saints:
As Christians, this is our belief: We believe that the dead are still alive, still themselves and, very importantly, still in a living, conscious, and loving relationship with us and with each other. That’s our common concept of heaven and, however simplistic its popular expression at times, it is wonderfully correct. That’s exactly what Christian faith and Christian dogma, not to mention deep intuitive experience, invite us to. After death we live on, conscious, self-conscious, in communication with others who have died before us, in communion with those we left behind on earth, and in communion with the divine itself. That’s the Christian doctrine of the Communion of Saints.
Just today I was talking with a wonderful elderly Christian man who lost his wife earlier this year. As he reflected about her and her death, he said, “I still find myself telling her things. Something happens and the first thought in my mind is, ‘I can’t wait to get home and share this with Betty.'”
The communion of saints.
I told him about a woman I had in one of my grief support groups. One of our assignments near the end of the course, which we introduced over a few sessions to help people get used to the idea, was to write a letter to our deceased loved ones, so that we might put both our grief and gratitude into words, to let them know how we were doing, and to say anything else we felt needed to be said. This particular woman was having a hard time feeling like she could do this.
But in one of our times together I noticed she was smiling and looking more at ease. When I asked her why, she said she had figured out an alternative to the letter assignment.
“My husband and I used to sit down at the table every day around 4 or 4:30 for coffee and a few minutes of conversation. We would talk about our day, what had happened and what we had been thinking about and feeling throughout the day. It was just a simple habit, but I realized last week how much I missed that. So, instead of writing a letter, I decided to put a notebook on the table. Now, I sit down every day at our special time and write him a note, telling him the things I used to say when we had our talks. Some times I read it out loud to him. It makes me feel so close to him. I only wish I could see him and hear his voice.”
The communion of saints.
I believe that “heaven” — God’s realm — is not a “place” that is far away, but more like another dimension all around us — as the quantum world exists with the observable world. We are separated from it only because our senses cannot gain access there. It is as though an invisible curtain separates us from “the heavenlies” spoken of in places like Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. I think C.S. Lewis imagined it well when he created Narnia, a world that is going on concurrently with our own. Oh, for a wardrobe portal!
I also believe in the vision that concludes the book of Revelation: that one day this heavenly realm will “come to earth” — that is, that which is now invisible and hidden from our sight and sensibility will be made visible. God will be our God, we will be his people, and he will dwell in our midst. The temple of God will be among humans on a renewed earth in a new creation. Jesus will “return.” The saints will “return with him” (1Thess. 4:14). The communion of saints which now seems like talking “long distance” will be experienced face to face.
Until then, I take great comfort in knowing that my beloved grandparents, friends, and a multitude no one can number are right here with me, beside me, unseen but not unknown.
This is our hope: Words emerge from silence, the silence remains.
• Wendell Berry
• • •
It doesn’t get any more basic than this.
Here is foundational perspective for life, from a master wonderer and wordsmith.
We wake up each morning to a world we did not make. How did it get here? How did we get here? We open our eyes and see that “old bowling ball the sun” careen over the horizon. We wiggle our toes. A mocking bird takes off and improvises on themes set down by robins, vireos, and wrens, and we marvel at the intricacies. The smell of frying bacon works its way into our nostrils and we begin anticipating buttered toast, scrambled eggs, and coffee freshly brewed from our favorite Javanese beans.
There is so much here — around, above, below, inside, outside. Even with the help of poets and scientists we can account for very little of it. We notice this, then that. We start exploring the neighborhood. We try this street, and then that one. We venture across the tracks. Before long we are looking out through telescopes and down into microscopes, curious, fascinated by this endless proliferation of sheer Is-ness — color and shape and texture and sound.
After awhile we get used to it and quit noticing. We get narrowed down into something small and constricting. Somewhere along the way this exponential expansion of awareness, this wide-eyed looking around, this sheer untaught delight in what is here, reverses itself: the world contracts; we are reduced to a life of routine through which we sleepwalk.
But not for long. Something always shows up to jar us awake: a child’s question, a fox’s sleek beauty, a sharp pain, a pastor’s sermon, a fresh metaphor, an artist’s vision, a slap in the face, scent from a crushed violet. We are again awake, alert, in wonder: how did this happen? And why this? Why anything at all? Why nothing at all?
Gratitude is our spontaneous response to all this: to life. Something wells up within us: Thank you! More often than not, the thank you is directed to God even by those who don’t believe in him. . . .
Wonder. Astonishment. Adoration. There can’t be very many of us for whom the sheer fact of existence hasn’t rocked us back on our heels. We take off our sandals before the burning bush. We catch our breath at the sight of a plummeting hawk. “Thank you, God.” We find ourselves in a lavish existence in which we feel a deep sense of kinship — we belong here; we say thanks with our lives to life. And not just “Thanks” or “Thank it,” but “Thank you.” Most of the people who have lived on this planet earth have identified this you with God or gods. This is not just a matter of learning our manners, the way children are taught to say thank you as a social grace. It is the cultivation of adequateness within ourselves to the nature of reality, developing the capacity to sustain an adequate response to the overwhelming giftedness and goodness of life.
Now before I became a Christian I was under the impression that the first thing Christians had to believe was one particular theory as to what the point of [Jesus’] dying was. According to that theory God wanted to punish men for having deserted and joined the Great Rebel, but Christ volunteered to be punished instead, and so God let us off. Now I admit that even this theory does not seem quite so immoral and silly as it used to; but that is not the point I want to make. What I came to see later on was that neither this theory nor an other is Christianity. The central belief is that Christ’s death has somehow put us right with God and given us a fresh start. Theories as to how it did this are another matter: A good many different theories have been held as to how it works; what all Christians are agreed on is that it does work.
In recent years, there has been a lot of serious pushback against the most common evangelical understanding of why Jesus died. This view is often called “Penal Substitutionary Atonement” (PSA). Thomas Schreiner, a proponent of this understanding, explains it like this:
I define penal substitution as follows: The Father, because of his love for human beings, sent his Son (who offered himself willingly and gladly) to satisfy his justice, so that Christ took the place of sinners. The punishment and penalty we deserved was laid on Jesus Christ instead of us, so that in the cross both God’s holiness and love are manifested.
In brief, Jesus took the penalty of God’s wrath that we deserved because of our sin. God punished him in our place so that we might go free.
In a bit more detail, our friend Scot McKnight puts it like this:
Penal substitution contends that God is holy and that humans are sinful. God, because he is holy, can’t simply ignore human sin and be true to his own holiness. So there must be a just punishment (hence, penal). Jesus Christ, the God-Man, stood in the sinner’s place, absorbing God’s just punishment on sin and sinners (hence, substitution). Because God demands utter perfection for entry into God’s presence, not only are our sins imputed to Christ on the cross but his righteousness was then imputed to us (hence, double imputation). In this the mechanics are explained: God remains holy and just by judging sinners and, at the same time, forgives sin and justifies sinners by imputing Christ’s obedience to us.
People have raised questions about this understanding of Christ’s death in a couple of ways. First, many have come to question the very concept. But also, for some who still see it as one legitimate theory of the atonement, they question whether it is truly the most fundamental and predominant metaphor to describe it. McKnight is one of those. In his book on atonement theories, he quotes I. Howard Marshall, who suggests that “penal substitution theorists could help us all out if they would baptize their theory into the larger redemptive grace of God more adequately” (p. 43).
Greg Boyd has come to the conclusion that the Christus Victortheory of Christ’s death should ground all other views. Click on his name, and it will lead you to a detailed overview of this perspective.
In coming to this point of view, Boyd first had to recognize the questions he had within himself about the Penal Substitution theory. I want to list the questions that came to trouble him about this common theory of the cross and have us discuss them today.
Here are Greg Boyd’s questions:
First: Does God really need to appease his wrath with a blood sacrifice in order to forgive us? If so, does this mean that the law of “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” is the ultimate description of God’s character? And if this is true, what are we to make of Jesus’ teaching that this law is surpassed by the law of love? Not only this, but what are we to make of all the instances in the Bible where God forgives people without demanding a sacrifice (e.g. the prodigal son)?
Second: If God’s holiness requires that a sacrifice be made before he can fellowship with sinners, how did Jesus manage to hang out with sinners without a sacrifice, since he is as fully divine and as holy as God the Father?
Third: If Jesus’ death allows God the Father to accept us, wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that Jesus reconciles God to us than it is to say Jesus reconciles us to God? Yet the New Testament claims the latter and never the former (e.g. 2 Cor. 5:18-20). ). In fact, if God loves sinners and yet can’t accept sinners without a sacrifice, wouldn’t it be even more accurate to say that God reconciles God to himself than to say he reconciles us to God? But this is clearly an odd and unbiblical way of speaking.
Fourth: How are we to understand one member of the Trinity (the Father) being wrathful towards another member (the Son) of the Trinity, when they are, along with the Holy Spirit, one and the same God? Can God be truly angry with God? Can God actually punish God?
Fifth: If God the father needs someone to “pay the price” for sin, does the Father ever really forgive anyone? Think about it. If you owe me a hundred dollars and I hold you to it unless someone pays me the owed sum, did I really forgive your debt? It seems not, especially since the very concept of forgiveness is about releasing a debt — not collecting it from someone else.
Sixth: Are sin and guilt the sorts of things that can be literally transferred from one party to another? Related to this, how are we to conceive of the Father being angry towards Jesus and justly punishing him when he of course knew Jesus never did anything wrong?
Seventh: If the just punishment for sin is eternal hell (as most Christians have traditionally believed), how does Jesus’ several hours of suffering and his short time in the grave pay for it?
Eighth: If the main thing Jesus came to do was to appease the Father’s wrath by being slain by him for our sin, couldn’t this have been accomplished just as easily when (say) Jesus was a one-year-old boy as when he was a thirty-three year old man? Were Jesus’ life, teachings, healing and deliverance ministry merely a prelude to the one really important thing he did – namely, die? It doesn’t seem to me that the Gospels divide up and prioritize the various aspects of Jesus’ life in this way. (I maintain that everything Jesus did was about one thing – overcoming evil with love. Hence, every aspect of Jesus was centered on atonement — that is, reconciling us to God and freeing us from the devil’s oppression.)
Ninth: Not to be offensive, but if it’s true that God’s wrath must be appeased by sacrificing his own Son – or, if not that, sacrificing all other humans in eternal hell – then don’t we have to conclude that those pagans who have throughout history sacrificed their children to appease the gods’ wrath had the right intuition, even if they expressed it in the wrong way?
Tenth: What is the intrinsic connection between what Jesus did on the cross and how we actually live? The Penal Substitution view makes it seem like the real issue in need of resolution is a legal matter in the heavenly realms between God’s holy wrath and our sin. Christ’s death changes how God sees us, but this theory says nothing about how Christ’s death changes us. This is particularly concerning to me because every study done on the subject has demonstrated that for the majority of Americans who believe in Jesus, their belief makes little or no impact on their life. I wonder if the dominance of this legal-transaction view of the atonement might be partly responsible for this tragic state of affairs.
American culture challenges the church at its deepest levels. In the church the authority is God in Christ through the Spirit but in culture authority resides in the individual and in the will of “we the people.”
Scot has written a good overview of western political culture with its “we the people” ontology, and how that challenges the very ontology of the Church, which is that of christocracy. You can read the details of his argument at Jesus Creed. Today, I would like to simply list the points he makes and have us discuss them.
First, Western culture increasingly believes the fundamental problems of life are systemic and social, and are to be resolved through social progress and most especially through social engineering in public education.
Second, Western culture tends to believe in the inherent goodness of humans and that society and systems corrupt that original goodness.
Third, Western culture believes its laws are created by the people, they are for the people, and when the people shift the laws will need to shift with them.
Fourth, Western culture then increasingly locates authority in the people, in fact, all the way down to the individual person.
Fifth, one’s commitment to society, to state, to the authorities, to the institutions, or to the establishment is voluntary and the moral authority of the laws of that society is good only so long as the individual person can believe in and commit themselves to those institutions.
Sixth, the leaders of Western societies are the will of the people and need to change if the will of the people changes.
Here is how he summarizes:
The Western history of politics, if I may make a sweeping statement about the biggest drift of all, is a movement from monarchies to aristocracies (or oligarchies) to democracies. The church got its ontology in a world of monarchies and emperors and kings (ancient Israel, 1st Century Rome) and found expression in that context. The church’s very ontology is monarchy or, better yet, christocracy. Western culture is the drive to a more and more radical form of democracy as a form of resistance to monarchy, which makes the church ambivalent and culturally at least countercultural if not irrelevant if it wants to be Western.
Scot leaves it there as something for us to think about.
I’m left thinking, if this is an accurate assessment, what do we do about it?
Or is it as simple as that? Do these historical developments really represent a movement away from an ontology which must be maintained if the Church is to be the Church? Or might they, in some way, actually represent the growth and influence of Christ’s reign in the Western world?
describes the situation in Corinth that Paul was addressing in this letter:
As if there weren’t enough confusion about gender confusion these days, scientists in the U.K. are now confused about the sex of one of the oldest trees in Europe.
, opened to rave reviews in New York City in 1977.
We wake up each morning to a world we did not make. How did it get here? How did we get here? We open our eyes and see that “old bowling ball the sun” careen over the horizon. We wiggle our toes. A mocking bird takes off and improvises on themes set down by robins, vireos, and wrens, and we marvel at the intricacies. The smell of frying bacon works its way into our nostrils and we begin anticipating buttered toast, scrambled eggs, and coffee freshly brewed from our favorite Javanese beans.
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