The Internet Monk Archives

The Big Picture of Andrew Perriman’s Narrative-Historical Scheme

1697constantine_00000001040 — Emperor Constantine

UPDATE: Andrew has just put up a new post that complements our piece today, outlining his method and its results in biblical interpretation.

UPDATE 2: I have added a brief summary of AP’s position to the end of the post.

• • •

I continue to be intrigued by the approach to biblical interpretation that Andrew Perriman takes. He blogs at P.OST: An Evangelical Theology for the Age to Come. He has also written The Future of the People of God: Reading Romans Before and After Western Christendom, The Coming of the Son of Man: New Testament Eschatology for an Emerging Church, and Hell and Heaven in Narrative Perspective, among other books. Andrew has been a good friend through correspondence, answering my questions, and supporting Internet Monk by allowing us to re-post some of his pieces and by participating in some of our conversations.

This week, I have been reading through a large number of articles on P.OST, trying again to clarify his narrative-historical hermeneutic and the resulting “big picture” of interpretation it yields. I call Perriman’s method “the New Perspective on steroids.” He is relentless in applying his narrative-historical approach, surpassing such stalwarts of the NP as N.T. Wright, whom Perriman appreciates but doesn’t think goes far enough in staying within historical boundaries, especially when interpreting the eschatology of the apostles.

Today, I’d like to simply post a summary of Perriman’s “big picture” and have us discuss it. Andrew thinks that the Western church took some wrong turns when her teachers moved away from the specific historically-focused narrative of Scripture and developed a more metaphysical, abstract, meta-narrative approach. Theology trumped history, in his view, whereas a better view understands theology as growing out of history.

Our inherited theology has spent the best part of two thousand years wooing, living with, separating from, and trying to win back History-with-a-capital-H. It now needs to learn how to live with a much more down-to-earth, messy, painful, everyday, contingent, non-capitalized history, beginning with the New Testament story of the Son of Man, which is the story of how God judged, restored and promoted his people amongst the nations of the ancient world.

• Theology, history, and which Jesus?

Here are the overall contours of Perriman’s narrative-historical interpretation. I’ve taken a few paragraphs from one of his foundational articles, “The narrative premise of a post-Christendom theology”, as a summary statement.

The New Testament presupposes, describes, and predicts a long, tumultuous transition in the history of the people of God, running from the initial summons to Israel to repent in the face of imminent judgment and national destruction (John the Baptist) to the eventual displacement of the institutions and worldview of classical paganism and the recognition of Christ as sovereign over the empire and beyond (Constantine). Jesus’ death and resurrection constitutes the key redemptive event in this historical process, by which the people of God are saved from complete destruction and granted a new lease of life – the life of the age that was to come. On the outskirts of the New Testament’s vision of the future (but of much greater eschatological relevance to the church today) is the hope of a final judgment and making new of all things.

The ‘good news’ at the heart of the story begins as an announcement to Israel that its God is about to act both to punish and to restore his people; but (precisely on this basis) it becomes the announcement to the empire that God is no longer willing to overlook its idolatry, immorality and injustices. Paul’s gospel is that God will sooner or later ‘judge’ (in the characteristic biblical sense) the Greek-Roman world by a man whom he has appointed, and that this historical transformation will finally vindicate the refugees from Judaism and the growing numbers of Gentiles who have attached themselves to this Spirit-driven renewal movement. This moment of vindication, when Christ will receive the nations as his inheritance, will mark the beginning of a new age, when he (and the martyrs) will reign at the right hand of the Father over and on behalf of God’s people.

The story of Jesus includes and anticipates the story of the early believers who had to follow him along a difficult and narrow path leading to life. The New Testament in the first place, as a set of historical documents, describes the life and vocation of an eschatological community, scattered across the whole oikoumenē, which in its supra-national and ecumenical nature, in its solidarity, in its holiness, in its confession of Christ, in its experience of the eschatological Spirit, in its faithfulness and willingness to endure the most severe opposition, represented the claim of Israel’s God to be sovereign over all the gods of the nations.

From our perspective, looking back, the new age that began with the instatement of Christianity as the religion of the empire (as a consequence of the faithful witness of the Christ-like martyr church) appears to have finally come to an end: Christendom as both a social and an intellectual phenomenon has collapsed. The challenge now is to deconstruct the Christendom paradigm, which is both ecclesial and theological and within which we are still to a large degree ensnared, and ask what new paradigm, what new way of existing in the world, might emerge for the post-Christendom, post-imperial, post-modern church as it seeks to be loyal to the original calling in Abraham to be an authentic new creation.

Here is my summary of Andrew Perriman’s basic interpretation of the NT message:

1. The “Gospel” is not a universal theological message of personal salvation, but must be understood as a message intimately connected to the historical circumstances in which it was given.

2. Jesus’ gospel of the kingdom was a message of judgment and salvation for Israel in the light of the pending crisis of 70AD.

3. The apostles’ gospel was a message to the nations that God had made Jesus King and would, through him, bring judgment and salvation to the Greek-Roman pagan world, which reached its climax in the establishment of Christendom.

4. There is an ultimate day of judgment and salvation coming which will inaugurate the new creation.

5. The church is now witnessing the collapse of Christendom, which is prompting the church to reevaluate how to be a faithful eschatological community of mission in a post-Christendom world.

I will be interested to get your responses and hear your discussion.

Love in the Desert (2) : On Humility

[The Desert Fathers] believed, in spite of society’s pressures, that love is the goal of the Christian life and humility is what it takes to bring us toward it.

• Roberta C. Bondi

• • •

What does it take to love?

First and foremost, argues Roberta C. Bondi in her book, To Love as God Loves, it requires humility. But this is perhaps one of the most misunderstood virtues, and so she provides some thoughts on the subject for us from the teachings of the fourth century saints who took to the desert to seek from God hearts of genuine love.

The cultures of the world are, by and large, loveless. This was the case when men and women fled to the wilderness to try and break the hold of various love-destroying externals on their lives. They recognized that lack of love is more than an external problem. But as Bondi writes, “Those who chose the monastic life, however, believed that for themselves only radical renunciation of the external as well as the internal patterns of their culture could put them in a position where they would be able to begin to love.”

We might criticize their choices and view the lives they chose as needlessly separate from the daily challenges to love that a majority of believers must face in their ordinary callings. Yet their extraordinary quests yielded insights into the human heart and relationships that have stood the test of time. In the laboratory of the desert they made discoveries we are still benefiting from today.

When Abba Macarius was returning from the marsh to his cell one day carrying some palm-leaves, he met the devil on the road with a scythe. The [devil] struck at him as much as he pleased, but in vain, and he said to him, “What is your power, Macarius, that makes me powerless against you? All that you do, I do, too; you fast, so do I; you keep vigil, and I do not sleep at all; in one thing only do you beat me.” Abba Macarius asked what that was. He said, “Your humility. Because of that I can do nothing against you.” (from The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, Ward)

Anyone disciplined enough can practice renunciation and participate in rigorous devotional exercises. According to this saying, even the evil one can imitate such asceticism. What the devil cannot achieve is humility, the attitude of heart that frees us up to show genuine love to others.

At its root, humility is the mindset of acknowledging my humanity, my common standing with all other people as a limited, weak, imperfect, and sinful person. Under God. I need God’s grace just as do all my brothers and sisters. I need others as well. “We are all vulnerable, all limited, and we each have a different struggle only God is in a position to judge,” Bondi affirms. I am no better than anyone else, nor do I take on a false humility, imagining that I am lower than others. I also have gifts which God has bestowed upon me that I may share with others. My neighbor also has much to offer me.

For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgement, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. (Romans 12:3, NRSV)

We are all in this together. We can look at each other, eye to eye, and know that we are free to both give and receive in a relationship of mutual benefit.

However, warped ideas of humility abound. Bondi notes that these false understandings have been especially hurtful to women, minorities, and others deemed to be on the lower rungs of society. People in these positions may hear a call to humility as a further call to submit to oppression and another blow to whatever self-esteem they’ve fought to maintain. The exhortations they have heard to humbly submit, serve, and obey have often meant “accept an inferior position,” “give up your self and all your personal desires to serve others,” or “accept injustice and cruelty as your lot in life and don’t try to change things.” Genuine love that grows out of humility is not “selfless” in this way; in fact, it requires someone with a strong sense of self and appreciation for God’s grace and gifting. As Bondi says: “One reason the monastics left ordinary life in their own culture was that they were trying to establish a new model where everyone was on the same footing, where loving service was the model for everybody.”

We must also beware of other kinds of false humility. Sometimes we feign a humble demeanor in order to manipulate others. Bondi calls this the “you take the good chair” approach. Or, we may think that being humble involves going around feeling guilty all the time. That’s not humility, that’s self-punishment. Instead of acknowledging our guilt, repenting, and moving on, we cling to a self-absorbed penance that paralyzes us and keeps us from being sensitive to the needs of others. On the other hand — and this was a particular temptation for novice monks and nuns — we sometimes feel responsible to be heroes and to take on heroic tasks. In fact, this may paralyze us just as much a feeling guilty. Daydreaming about all the great things we can do to save the world easily becomes a mind game that keeps us from washing our neighbor’s feet.

Beginners in the desert had to learn to be humble, that is, to abandon the heroic image of the self and learn to believe that all human beings, themselves included, were weak and vulnerable. They needed to learn instead to take up appropriate tasks, and appropriate tasks for weak and vulnerable human beings are ones that can actually be performed. They had to learn to accept it as true that all tasks contribute to the final goal, and the small ones are often of infinite significance.

Christians who are especially scrupulous may also avoid the humility that leads to genuine love by focusing so much on their own holiness that they confuse ends with means. The goal is always love. If my pursuit of “discipleship,” “Christian growth,” or personal purity does not contribute to that end, in Paul’s words, it is nothing. This gets especially dangerous when, in my quest to be “above reproach,” I start thinking more and more about my reputation, what other people think of me. It can be a subtle transition but soon my need to look good takes priority over truly giving myself to serve others.

It is a short step from there to the attitude that is most devastating to humility: the spirit of judging others. Bondi cites a saying of Dorotheos:

That Pharisee who was praying and giving thanks to God for [his own] good works was not lying but speaking the truth, and he was not condemned for that. For we must give thanks to God when we are worthy to do something good, as he is then working with us and helping us. Because of this he was not condemned, as I said, not even because he said, “I am not like other men,” but … because he said, “I am not like this tax-collector.” It was then that he made a judgment. He condemned a person and the disposition of his soul-to put it shortly, his whole life. Therefore the tax-collector, rather than the Pharisee went away justified.

Roberta Bondi encourages us to remember that, “To be humble is to identify with the sinner, and rather than take secret pleasure in another person’s downfall, when you hear of it, say, ‘Oh Lord, him today, me tomorrow!’ recognizing your kinship with the sinner.”

On the positive, what can we say humility is and what does it act like? Here are some statements (and paraphrases) from To Love as God Loves:

“It calls for the renunciation of all deep attachments to what the world holds dear: goods, social advancement, the satisfaction of appetites at the expense of others, the right to dominate others in any personal relationship.”

“Humility has to do with taking and accepting radical responsibility for the things that happen in life.”

Humility involves “letting go of the need to look good in the eyes of ourselves or of others.”

Humility involves a radical realism. It is realistic about the world, about the ineffective nature of force to truly change the world, about my own limitations and weaknesses and the common humanity I share with others, and about the kind of unflagging commitment it takes to practice love in a world like ours.

Realism.

In the sight of God and others.

In my own heart.

With a commitment to live so that those around me will benefit.

By God’s gracious presence and power in my life.

A much later saint with the spirit of the Desert Fathers said it well: “Do what is given to you, and do it well, and you will have done enough…. Live together in the forgiveness of your sins. Forgive each other every day from the bottom of your hearts” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together)

Creation Is a Many Splendored Thing (2): Genesis 1:1-2:3

hs-1995-45-a-large_web — Crucible of Creation: Orion Nebula (detail: Hubble)

The Lord is king, he is robed in majesty;
the Lord is robed, he is girded with strength.
He has established the world; it shall never be moved;
your throne is established from of old;
you are from everlasting.

• Psalm 93:1-2, NRSV

As the Bible’s first creation account, Genesis 1 enjoys pride of place. Positioned as the cosmogony of cosmogonies, the Priestly account is also the most carefully structured text in all of Scripture. Its intricate arrangement reflects something of creation’s own integrity . . .

. . . As creation unfolds “daily,” it becomes constructed in the imago templi, in the model of a temple. What took Solomon seven years to complete (1 Kgs 6:38), God took only seven days, and on a cosmic scale no less! In the holiest recess of the temple God dwells, and on the holiest day of the week God rests.

• William P. Brown

In our first post reflecting on insights from William P. Brown’s book, The Seven Pillars of Creation: The Bible, Science, and the Ecology of Wonder, we noted Brown’s observation that the story of “creation” is found not just once, but seven times in the Bible:

1. Genesis 1:1-2:3
2. Genesis 2:4b-3:24
3. Job 38-41
4. Psalm 104
5. Proverbs 8:22-31
6. Ecclesiastes 1:2-11; 12:1-7
7. Isaiah 40-55 (excerpts)

The first of these accounts, of course, is in Genesis 1. Brown’s interpretation of this text is close to my own (with some significant differences — see My View of Genesis 1— a post I will update soon). In particular, let me mention the following seven points, with which I am in full agreement:

First, Genesis 1 may have the polemic purpose of contrasting the Jewish view with that of the Babylonians and others in the Ancient Near East, but it does so subtly. Whatever hints of cosmic conflict it may contain are muted, with the overall effect of portraying God as One who is majestically above all other so-called gods.

Second, the account is intricately structured, primarily by the number 7. This is not always appreciated by English readers, but it is key to understanding that this is not merely prose reporting of events, but “exalted prose” that is written this way for effect. It is not poetry, but if not, it comes close to having a poetic effect on the reader. Some suggest it may have been liturgical in nature, but whatever its precise genre, it is magnificent in its numerical complexity while at the same time it speaks with profound simplicity of language. “. . . the order inscribed in this account imparts a remarkable mathematical aesthetic, the quantifiable order of a fully stable, life-sustaining, differentiated world.”

Third, the narrative also follows a symmetrical order by which God addresses the conditions spoken of in 1:2 — “without form” and “empty.” God forms his creation on the first three days and then fills it on days 4-6. These days are essentially parallel to each other, with some variations, so that on Day 4 God fills what he formed on Day 1, and so on. Day 7 stands alone as the day of completion, answering “Day 0” when creation was uninhabitable.

Fourth, Brown notes that this pattern is consistent with the three-fold arrangement of sacred space in ancient temples. Genesis 1 is a portrayal of God the King creating a cosmic temple in the world.

Fifth, this gives us a clue as to the place of humans as creatures made in God’s image. “Many an ancient temple contained an image of its resident deity within its inner sanctum. In Jerusalem, however, the physical representation of God was expressly forbidden . . . . Genesis 1, however, does not jettison the language of divine image but recasts it by identifying the imago Dei with human beings, created on the sixth day.” This suggests that humanity’s role is to rule as priests in God’s good creation, to embody the imago Dei in the world.

Sixth, in creation God works with its material elements, not simply over them and without their free cooperation. The idea that creation is “good” includes its fecundity and ability to generate and sustain itself. God’s engagement with creation is thoroughly interactive.

As a whole, creation takes place in Genesis 1 from the top down and from the bottom up. God commands from on high for creation to happen, yet much of the creative process emerges from below. Both the earth and the waters contribute to the emergence of life. God’s engagement with creation is thoroughly interactive. The creative process is no singular event; neither is it a unilateral process. The result is a creation that exhibits structure and variety, a cosmic living temple, a creation deemed “extremely good” (1:31).

Seventh, God is portrayed as a beneficent Ruler who builds his temple as he commanded Israel to build hers: led by Moses (who spoke the word of divine instruction), Aaron (who served as priest), and Bezalel (the artisan who crafted the temple by the Spirit). All these roles are filled by God in Gen. 1.

• • •

One more thought in closing. Brown gives us an important reminder about the creation narrative in Genesis 1:1-2:3. This story came to Israel in an important socio-historical context.

The Babylonian exile of 587 BCE had left the land of Judah more than decimated. From the perspective of those most affected, imperial conquest and deportation rendered the land “void and vacuum.” The survivors experienced such national trauma as nothing less than a resurgence of cosmic chaos, leaving the land “empty,” stripping the community of its national identity, and leaving the temple in ruins. The good news of Genesis 1 is that God can work with such chaos to bring forth new creation. Heard in the time of exile, the message of imago Dei in Genesis would have been a “clarion call to the people of God to stand tall again with dignity and to take seriously their royal-priestly vocation as God’s authorized agents and representatives in the world.”

For Labor Day: Gene Veith on Vocation

Camille_Pissarro_-_The_Harvest — The Harvest, Pissarro

In the Lord’s Prayer, we ask that God give us our daily bread, which He does. He does so not directly as with the manna to the Israelites, but through the work of farmers, truck drivers, bakers, retailers, and many more. In fact, He gives us our daily bread through the functioning of the whole accompanying economic system — employers and employees, banks and investors, the transportation infrastructure and technological means of production — each part of which is interdependent and necessary, if we are going to eat. Each part of this economic food chain is a vocation, through which God works to distribute His gifts.

God heals the sick. While He can and sometimes does do so directly, in a spectacular unmediated miracle, in the normal course of things God heals through the work of doctors, nurses, and other medical vocations. God protects us from evil. This He does by means of the vocation of police officers, attorneys, judges — also through the military vocations. God teaches through teachers, orders society through governments, proclaims the Gospel through pastors.

The Gleaners, Pissarro (detail)

Luther pointed out that God could have decided to populate the earth by creating each individual and each generation separately, from the dust. Instead, He invented families. God ordained that new life come into the world — and be cared for and raised into adulthood — through the work of a man and a woman who com together into a family. Husband, wife, father, mother are vocations through which God extends His creation and exercises His love.

All of this simply demonstrates that, in His earthly kingdom, just as in His spiritual kingdom, God bestows His gifts through means. God ordained that human beings be bound together in love, in relationships and communities existing in a state of interdependence. In this context, God is providentially at work caring for His people, each of whom contributes according to his or her God-given talents, gifts, opportunities, and stations. Each thereby becomes what Luther terms a “mask of God”:

All our work in the field, in the garden, in the city, in the home, in struggle, in government — to what does it all amount before God except child’s play, by means of which God is pleased to give his gifts in the field, at home, and everywhere? These are the masks of our Lord God, behind which he wants to be hidden and to do all things. (Luther, Exposition of Psalm 147)

• Gene Edward Veith, Jr.
The Spirituality of the Cross

Spiritual Formation Talk: Sacred Reading

The unfolding of your words gives light;
it imparts understanding to the simple.

• Psalm 119:130

• • •

In our second post on Fr. Charles Cummings’ book, Monastic Practices, we take up the first of the three basic practices of monastic daily life, in order to consider how they might inform the spiritual formation of those who follow ordinary callings.

Sacred reading, manual work, and liturgical prayer constitute the threefold footing of our daily life. (p. 7)

The first practice is sacred reading (lectio divina). Cummings notes that St. Benedict devoted two to three hours each day to this practice in the warmer months, and four to five hours in the winter months.

As Fr. Cummings describes this practice, sacred reading is a conversation with God.

The monk or nun would sit with the text of Scripture and begin to read attentively and reflectively until a word or phrase struck the imagination or the heart. At that moment the reader paused, put the text aside, and gave himself to prayer. The prayerful pause might last less than a minute or might be extended for a number of minutes. When attention faltered, he or she would resume reading until the next moment of insight or movement of love. The rhythm of reading and pausing would continue peacefully, unhurriedly, until the bell announced the next exercise of the monastic day. (p. 8)

The alternation of reading and pausing for contemplation or prayer is key to this practice and makes it conversational. It is about listening and responding, just as we do when we have a talk with a friend. It also gives us space to focus on small passages of text so that we might draw deeper meanings and implications out of them.

These are the words the author uses to describe this process: assimilation, impregnation, interiorization, personalization. It involves “savoring” and “relishing” the words we read, tasting, digesting, and drawing nourishment from them. And like taking meals, the effects may not be evident immediately. The goal is not to have spectacular “experience” every time, but to maintain a good diet that promotes long term health and well being.

Fr. Cummings warns us that we will run into obstacles as we pursue this practice. First, the texts we have before us may not always lend themselves to sacred reading. This is true of the Bible itself — though all Scripture may be “inspired,” a given passage may not be inspiring in a way that lends itself to this approach. Some texts may be beyond our present capacity to understand. Certain questions and issues may distract us from the conversational purpose of our reading. If we are reading devotional materials from another author, the style may be unfamiliar to us, the language or idioms difficult to grasp. “At some point the reader has to make an honest decision about whether a particular text is worthy staying with for sacred reading” (p. 10).

Continue reading “Spiritual Formation Talk: Sacred Reading”

Saturday Ramblings: Labor Day Edition, 2014

Happy Labor Day weekend!

In my heart, mind, and body rhythms, this weekend will always be the end of summer. However, here in Indiana, where we have an abomination called a “balanced school schedule,” we are already a month into fall. In fact, on July 31 my grandson announced to me that he was going to the pool on the next day because it was the (and I quote) “last day of summer.” What are they doing to our children? I’m pretty sure that the opening sequence of the Andy Griffith Show — you know, where Andy and Opie are walking down the road to go fishing — was filmed in summer, maybe even in August. If I take my grandson fishing like that now, we’ll be facing truancy and contributing the delinquency of a minor charges! And if we’re a month into fall already, that means Christmas decorations will be going up any day now, and — worst of all — the airwaves will soon be filled with campaign ads for the elections! This whole thing has made me so crazy, I’m rambling!

Which, by the way, is what we’re supposed to be doing together this morning. C’mon, let’s get away from my rantings . . . and ramble!

Continue reading “Saturday Ramblings: Labor Day Edition, 2014”

Meeting Jesus Through Community?

I am involved in a number of different communities. Some are communities of faith, but most are not. Now, this may sound like a cop out, but my primary way of introducing people to Jesus has been to introduce those in my non faith communities to my faith communities.

Let me introduce you to first to my non faith communities:

1. My neighborhood. We used to have a reasonably social neighborhood. Typically there would be 1 or 2 block parties a year, at either Christmas or during the summer. The two sets of organizers moved away, and for the past ten years there really hasn’t been any group social functions. In my area of Canada it only seems to be the summer time when you get a chance to interact with your neighbors. Case in point, my next door neighbor recently met the lady who lives diagonally across from me. They had been living in their houses for 25 and 50 years respectively. Their is probably only one family we know well enough in our immediate neighborhood to invite to join in with one of our faith communities.

2. Our kids’ school communities. We moved into our neighborhood when our eldest was less than a year old (he is about to turn 20). It was not until he started school that we started forming relationships within our larger community (see #1). Often the friends we made live several blocks away. We would not have met them had it not been for the school community. While I am not as involved in the school community as I used to be, many of the relationships remain. Three families from our school communities have attended our church as a result of our interaction with them. Four two of these families is was a one time only visit.

3. My daughter’s cycling community. My daughter has been racing competitively for nearly two years. In that time I have gotten to know many of the other parents. Some of them quite well. Now when we go to cycling events many of us eat a communal meal. We are friends on facebook and there is much encouragement that goes on. In fact, we have become friends with parents of riders from other teams as well. One of the parents from our team has invited us to a barbecue tomorrow (more on this later). It is in this group of people that I see the most potential for making spiritual connections. They are the sort of people that I think Jesus would like to hang out with. They like to drink and party and have a good time. They are also open to discussions about faith. Having gotten to know me over two years they know that I am not some kind of religious nut job. I just can’t imagine inviting them to church. They wouldn’t fit it. They wouldn’t feel comfortable. They wouldn’t be back.

4. My work community. My current work position is quite different from my previous one. In my previous position at a marketing company, only about 5% of the company attended church. In my current position in a software development company the number is about 50%. In my current position however I am a manager and as such I feel a lot less free to talk about matters of faith. The questions do come, and I am happy to answer them when they arrive. Sometimes those questions have led to others become followers of Christ, but I have always played a minor role in the process.

5. My facebook community. Facebook has been really good with helping me reconnect with old friends, and helped me make some new ones. Many of my friends have extreme views (both left and right), but I try to be pretty moderate with my comments. I don’t link from facebook to Internet Monk, as I know that what I write hear will upset many of my friends, both left and right. While I don’t say much about matters of faith on facebook, I have gotten into a few discussions when incorrect information about Christianity is being disseminated.

Moving on to the faith communities:

6. Internet Monk. Many of my Christian associates do not understand Internet Monk. They fail to realize that it is primarily of those who have tried evangelicalism and found it wanting. They fail to realize that while Internet Monk rejects much of evangelicalism, we are seekers after Jesus. We know that through Internet Monk some have come to Christ, others have returned to Christ, and still others have been strengthened and encouraged in their faith. Michael Spencer focused on a “Jesus Shaped Spirituality”, one that cut away at the cultural baggage being currently associated with Christianity. There are certain non Christian friends who, while not being able to appreciate the whole of Internet Monk, would be interested in several of the articles that have been written here. Michael Spencer’s devotional commentary on Mark is being edited in such a way that it will encourage others to “Reconsider Jesus.”

7. My small group. I lead a small group. We have about 13 adults involved, all at various stages in their spiritual walk. We share a meal and do a bible study every two weeks. Our prayer times are special as we do certainly care for each other. One of our members came to faith in Christ relatively recently and was baptized about a year ago. We have potential, but at the same time I think it is hard for non Christians to join in with us. Much of that focuses around material selection and finding resources for small groups that is appropriate for both new and established believers.

8. My church. There is a lot I like about my church. The leadership definitely has the desire to reach out to our larger community. Howver, in doing so the church has paradoxically developed an us versus them mentallity when it comes to interacting with non christians. Couple that with having almost no social interaction with church members outside of small group, and I have reached the point where I am no longer comfortable inviting outsiders into my church community.

So really, I am a bit stuck. I don’t have a great landing place for those in my non faith communities who might want to consider exploring Christianity and who Jesus was. I don’t have a faith community that I think I could plug them into. This is something that I will want to be thinking about over the next few months to see what kind of direction that will take.

How about you? Have you had similar experiences in the interaction between your communities? How comfortable are you inviting your non faith communities into your faith communities? What issues or barriers do you face? As always, your thoughts and comments are welcome.

Love in the Desert (1)

All these problems together convince many modern Christians that they could only become real Christians if it were not for the other people in the world. For them to be Christian means to be a “spiritual” person, full of love and joy to share with all the human race, but they find it very hard to be in contact with the real flesh-and-blood problems of other human beings. In their minds, “spiritual” people “rejoice in the Lord always” and whatever hinders their rejoicing, including a lot of complexity and ambiguity in life, gets rejected. Often they can hardly tolerate other people’s real problems or even their personalities. Real people tug them away from the pure, spiritual love of God.

• Roberta C. Bondi

• • •

Yesterday’s case study highlighted something I have observed for a long time as a pastor, a chaplain, and as a Christian. At ground level, most trouble we experience in the church is about relationships between people. Followers of Jesus most often fall through a failure to love. As much as we might talk about our “relationship with God,” or faith, or sound teaching, or worship practices, etc., the bottom line for most of us is how we treat and are treated by the other human beings around us.

This is why Jesus pinpointed one thing that would identify people as his followers (John 13).

This is why the N.T. epistles spend so much time urging people in the congregations to practice genuine love by exhibiting mutual affection, honoring others above themselves, generously contributing to others’ needs, showing hospitality, being supportive to one another in times of rejoicing and in seasons of sorrow, not being haughty but willing to associate with the lowly, not returning evil for evil but being kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as Christ forgave, extending forbearance, showing compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience (see Romans 12, Ephesians 4, Colossians 3).

And on and on it goes. The apostles knock themselves out, finding every way possible to urge their friends to love each other. Paul defines the Christian life itself in these terms: “the only thing that counts is faith working through love” (Gal. 5:6). The only thing that counts, he said. Did you get that? The only thing that counts.

Now we can learn another thing from this constant repetition of instruction and exhortation: Christians don’t do it very well. At least not consistently. Or with all people in mind. Or when it’s not easy. Often we fail to love in epic ways. If believers loved one another well, loved their neighbors as themselves, and if churches were model communities of love to the world around them, we would have a much different New Testament.

Roberta C. Bondi expands our understanding of early Christian teaching on this subject by showing us what the early Desert Fathers and Mothers said about Christian love, in her book, To Love as God Loves.

Before discussing aspects of their thoughts on loving as God loves, Bondi reminds us that these early saints taught largely through indirect methods: parables, stories, sayings. They avoided making propositional statements carefully defining the Christian way. “These early Christians had a dislike . . . for rigid answers about what it meant to be Christian.” What they give us is not rules to be followed, but words of wisdom for contemplation, encouraging those who hear to let the Holy Spirit help them make an appropriate response.

Furthermore, although these believers shared an overall common vision for Christian living, they did not speak with a single voice but respected the variety of people’s personalities, experiences, and the many paths on which believers may walk to become people of love.

Finally, Bondi warns us that these ancient sages, with whom we share a common humanity and common challenges, sometimes spoke in ways that seem foreign, even wrong to us. For example, the overall vision that drove them to the desert was the pursuit of “perfection.”

That’s a difficult word for us, and she urges us not to dismiss it merely as an ascetic’s rigorous pursuit of adherence to monastic rules or disciplines. Nor should we think of it as we use it today: attaining an absolute state of changeless faultlessness and completion (that’s more of a Greek philosophical idea), or in terms of a “perfectionist” who is obsessed with getting things right all the time (and needing therapeutic intervention). Rather, they thought of perfection as Jesus taught about it in the Sermon on the Mount (see Matthew 5:48 in context): loving our enemies as well as our friends. Perfect love. A “perfection” that is not changeless but which involves change and growth and development — moving forward on the way of perfection, with God, into God’s love. Trusting God as they did, and grieved over the loveless world in which they lived, they sought God in extraordinary ways that he might form them into people who loved God and their neighbors well. (Not that they always succeeded in keeping that vision and their practices pure, but that’s another story.)

Our early monastic friends . . . believed too fervently that, working with the overwhelming gift of God’s grace, not only could an individual come to be fully loving in a way that significantly changes the world but also that, in the continuation of the work of God begun in Christ in the incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection, the whole human race and the cosmos itself would one day be transformed in love.

We will continue looking at what these fourth century believers learned and shared about love in weeks to come. We conclude today with a story of how God has made us to need each other, so that we live in God’s love by giving and receiving from one another in love.

They said of an old man that he went on fasting for seventy weeks, eating a meal only once a week. He asked of God the meaning of a text of the holy Scriptures and God did not reveal it to him. So he said to himself: “Here I am: I have worked so hard and profited nothing. I will go to my brother and ask him.” Just as he had shut his door on the way out, an angel of the Lord was sent to him; and the angel said: “The seventy weeks of your fast have not brought you near to God: but now you are humbled and going to your brother, I have been sent to show you the meaning of the text.” And he explained to him what he had asked, and went away.

• “The Sayings of the Fathers,” in Western Asceticism (Chadwick)

Case Study: What’s a Parishioner to Do?

Today, I present a case study for your discussion. Here is the situation:

You are a member of a small to medium-sized mainline Protestant church, and have been active and involved, particularly in one certain ministry of the congregation. That ministry and its leader (who has led it for many years as a part-time paid position) was one of the main reasons you joined the church and has been a primary way you have participated in the congregation. The ministry leader herself has been a big part of the public face and personality of the church, and the work she directs, which is visible and has given the church much of its identity, has been effective in getting people involved and helping them grow.

The pastor has been very supportive of this ministry and its leader over the years. He has participated in it, publicly praised it, has often given creative license to those involved, and advocated for it with the church board.

As with all ministries, it has not been completely smooth sailing. At one point, for example, budget cuts affected the ministry leader’s salary and led to some diminishing of her position. But the biggest source of ongoing irritation has had to do with the fact that this particular ministry and the pastor’s responsibilities overlap to some extent. This has meant that the pastor has often stepped in unawares, made unannounced changes, altered strategies and plans without notice, and made unilateral decisions that affected the ministry, its leader, and everyone who has been involved (a good number of people in the congregation).

The ministry leader finally reached a point where this became unbearable, and she resigned, which was a surprise to everyone working in the ministry. She and her family will leave the church, because there are other opportunities out there for her to fulfill her calling and they have personal reasons for going elsewhere. There was no big “blow up” with the pastor, no one single issue or big problem that caused this. However, the leader felt that she had reached a point where she wasn’t really “leading” the ministry anymore and that things were unlikely to change, given the pastor’s propensity for micromanagement and unpredictability.

pews As an active participant in this ministry, what will you do?

You know about the problems. You may not have been in the “inner circle” all the time, but the broad parameters of the situation have been general knowledge, and you agree with the ministry leader’s perspective on this. People joke and kid all the time about the pastor’s tendencies to “keep people on their toes” with constant changes and surprises.

But you also like the pastor and have benefited from his ministry. You want to be a loyal member of the congregation. Yet it grieves you to know that this ministry, which has served as your main area of participation, will be changed dramatically. You struggle with knowing that the personality of the church will be altered, and not by natural change, but because of what you see as an unnecessary departure of a key person. You wonder if such changes have the potential to cause serious damage to the church and threaten its health and well being.

As for “solutions” or a way forward, you don’t want to gossip about this with others, knowing that would be unhealthy and unhelpful. You wonder if it’s your place to talk with the pastor and you don’t really know if you understand enough about the details of the situation to even comment about it. You certainly don’t want to lay blame. You also wonder what good it will do. The leader has left, and change has already come.

You are hurt, confused, angry, and grieving. You are also trying to keep a level head and manage your emotions. And you are trying to understand what this means for you and your future with the congregation.

What will you do?

Another Look: Who and What Are Forming You?

A classic IM post by Michael Spencer from April, 2007.

Every time I feel like I have lost my way in the Christian life, I find myself back looking at monasticism, and the lessons I learned in two decades of reading Thomas Merton.

I’m not attracted to Catholicism, but I am very much attracted to the tradition of self-conscious, disciplined spiritual formation into a disciple of Jesus Christ. This is a great failing of our side of the church.

As much as we Protestants talk about being shaped by the Bible alone, most evangelicals are thoroughly formed and shaped by the communities where the Bible is handled, taught and practiced according to a “rule” or accepted authority, and by the media that supports and communicates the values of that community.

It is, without a doubt, one of the most appealing and positive aspects of Catholicism that it is self-conscious about its “rules” and authorities for spiritual formation. (Rule as in “way,” as in The Rule of Benedict.) It surely must be humorous to knowledgeable Catholics to look at the various sects, denominations and varieties of evangelicalism and fundamentalism, all claiming to “just read the Bible.”

For a large portion of my recent evangelical journey, I have found myself wandering between three varieties of evangelicalism:

1) Southern Baptist fundamentalism
2) Evangelical Calvinism
3) Generic contemporary evangelical revivalism

All of these communities could be characterized as shaping the spiritualities of believers according to largely unwritten rules and authorities.

The closest thing you get to self-conscious spiritual formation among most evangelicals: Jabez, Purpose Driven Life, or an evangelism course. Or a cruise.

It has occurred to me that at least two of these streams have done much to shape me in the belief that pursuing polemic argument is a primary expression of discipleship. I have been affected by this kind of spiritual “rule,” and when I step away from it, the effects are very obvious.

Lots of time is taken up in finding error, pointing out error, justifying the seriousness of the error (even if it is in a non-essential area), and responding to the error with the proper arrangement of Biblical material.

It’s amazing how many Christians conceive of almost the entirety of discipleship in terms of argumentation. This is seen in the pastoral models they choose, the books/blogs they write and the spiritual activities they value most (debate and classroom lecture.)

These largely unarticulated forms of spiritual formation can be seen in what is not important. I note with interest that one simply cannot say enough bad about most kinds of contemplative prayer, and any sort of silence among many of the reformed particularly. Any kind of intentional approach to spiritual formation, and any kind of intentional approach to discipleship (Dallas Willard, for example) is undertaken amidst a barrage of criticism. If the imagination is mentioned, all fire alarms are pulled and a search for Oprah Winfrey ensues.

Me thinks the lady doth protest too much.

The “fully formed” Christian in these traditions is not a person of silence, but of much talking, talking and more talking. Worship is lecture, a rally, or an emotion-centered event. The primary encounter with the Bible is exposition and lecture. Correcting theological error, moral error and ecclesiastical error is the main business of the church.

In other forms of evangelicalism spiritual formation is done under the guise of church growth and using ones “gifts” to grow the church. Or perhaps in the cause of righteous, upright living in the culture war. Again, the kinds of prayer, worship, community life and worship that are generated by these priorities are obvious to most observers, but largely invisible to the participants.

In all the years I was reading Merton’s spiritual direction writings, I can’t recall anything I would call polemic of any kind. He simply didn’t waste his life arguing with others. He read scripture constantly, but as the stuff of prayer, liturgy and meditation, not as the raw material for debate. He went through the “political years” when he was critical of his church for not living up to his standards of peacemaking and justice, but in the end it was the ancient life, the deep life of monastic rhythms that sustained Merton and made him a man and a monk. He worked on himself for a lifetime. Some will say because he didn’t believe in the reformation doctrine of justification. Perhaps. Maybe, however, the path of personal spiritual formation isn’t as instant, passive or automatic as we’ve been told.

I’m not holding Merton up as an ideal. Far from it. I’m simply saying that when one’s spirituality is formed by the pronouncements of pastors who are constantly chasing church growth, the culture war or the latest challenge to Calvinism, you are going to get one result, and when you go back to the sources, find the value of the ancient paths of formation, value silence, read, meditate, contemplate and seek to grow in love, you will get another result.

I can’t help but think there is an “internet Christian” spirituality as well. Formed by reading blogs. Expressing itself in writing. Concerned with all the perceptions of reality that run rampant on the net. I’m sure this isn’t a good thing either.

Spiritual formation happens in the real world. It’s not just reading, but it’s discussion and asking questions of those further down the road. It’s having leaders who are humble before the Word, and not leaders who take the word and become the pictures of arrogance. It’s seeing your sin in the light of holiness, not excusing your sin in the light of the latest crisis.

Much evangelical spirituality has become like fantasy baseball. We have our own league, our own team, our own statistics, our own insulated world in which all of this matters. We can give great speeches and write long posts (and I am the chief of sinners here) on what doesn’t matter much at all. These days, we don’t all get our 15 minutes of fame, but we can all worship a pastor, go to a winning church, opine on a blog, imagine our arguments are significant in the world.

Meanwhile, we start to look and act more like a fantasy league junky, and fewer and fewer people have any idea what we are talking about.

Here is where I have come out on this:

Get the devotional books out. The old ones.
Read Peterson, and Nouwen, and Fr. Groeschel, and Bonhoeffer and Whitney. With a group of others who care about the same things.
Turn it all off for a couple of hours every day.
Find the silence.
Chew up, meditate over, digest the scriptures.
Repent of living in the community of unaware evangelicals who devalue spirituality and overvalue polemic, argument and debate.
Look for the sins that grow in this mess, and root them up.