Reflections on Revelation: Chapters 19-20

As always, I am indebted to Mitchell Reddish and his commentary “Revelation” for the notes on this series.

 

Revelation 19  

CELEBRATION IN HEAVEN AND THE TRIUMPHANT CHRIST

 

• Rejoice!   We are being called to be overwhelmed in this opening part of chapter 19 as heaven and earth are united in glorious songs of praise to God as “Hallelujahs” reverberate throughout all of creation.
• And yet, as we look around (then and now), the sovereignty of God appears to be in doubt.  There is still evil in the world.   John calls for the church to proclaim the truth – the real reality – that “The Lord our God the Almighty reigns” and therefore we can sing in the midst of trials.  
• Note the contrast between the bride of Christ (the church) and the whore of Babylon (Rome).  The first is clothed in white, is pure and bright and Rome is dressed in scarlet (the color of sin) and is drunk.  
• John’s response to all he has seen and heard is to fall at the feet of an angel and worship.  
  • You must not do that!  the angel says.  
  • Col. 2:18 – tells us that the worship of angels was a problem in some areas.
  • This angel’s admonition is a reminder that nothing or no one is deserving of our worship but God alone – not even angels should be venerated.  And if not angels, certainly not Rome or an emperor or anything else that asks for our allegiance.

 

The Rider of the White Horse (19:11-16)

• This rider is Christ, named “Faithful and True.”  Different from the rider in 6:2.
• Has a secretive name.  Why?   In John’s day there was power in naming someone (see Gen. 17, for example).   To name someone meant you had a certain power of that person.  This secretive name shows that there is mystery beyond our human comprehension when it comes to God and also that we cannot claim any power of this name.
• The blood dipped robe
  • The blood is there before battle occurs.
  • Believed to be Christ’s own blood – blood from the cross- reminding us that the conquering Christ is also the suffering Christ, the slaughtered Lamb.
• Conquers not by violence but by the word from his mouth that cuts like a sword (see Heb. 4:12).  
• No saints fight in all of Revelation.  All the “fighting” is done by Christ.    
• The battle is not described – it is over before it begins.
• The beast and false prophet are thrown into the lake of fire.
• Surprisingly, the rest of Christ’s opponents are not thrown into the lake of fire but are killed and become food for birds.

 

Revelation 20

THE MILLENNIAL REIGN AND THE DEFEAT OF SATAN

 

• Only the martyrs are resurrected first – the rest will be united after the millennial reign
• After this, Satan is released from his imprisonment to “deceive the nations.”  
  • Evil, even when it appears to be bound and no longer a threat, has the capacity to rebound and wreak havoc in one’s life.  

 

The Last Judgment 

• The two books (one of life and works)
  • Tells us that while salvation is pure gift and comes from God alone, what we do matters.  There is a tension between grace and responsibility.

 

• Death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire – death is defeated.
• The unrighteous are judged last and thrown into the lake of fire. This is the “second death.”
  • Does this mean eternal destruction (death) or eternal punishment?
    • John’s imagery is ambiguous.  
    • On one hand, the “second death” implies annihilation, or permanent destruction.
    • On the other, John says in 14:10-11, that those who worship the beast will be tormented “with fire and sulphur….and the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast.”
  • John is not answer all our questions.  He is not concerned with giving us a detailed description of events beyond our world.
  • The point of the lake of fire is to show that God’s justice demands that evil will not always exist and will be dealt with.  John is extremely restrained of his portrayal of the punishment of the wicked.  We would do well to follow his example.

 

Connections…

 

• With the amount of attention the millennium gets one would think it is all over the pages of the Bible.   But Rev. 20:1-7 is the only place it is mentioned.
• For Paul, Christ’s enthronement and reign began with his resurrection (1 Cor. 15:24-28).   Even Jesus said before he ascended that all authority on heaven and earth has been given to him.
• In the 4th century with Augustine an amillennium view became popular, where a spiritual view of this reign took hold.  This view holds that the 1000 year reign is not to be taken literally but is the period that we are in now, the church, and it began with the coming of Christ.    It will last until Christ returns and defeats evil for good.
• John’s scene of the millennium is a way to reassure the martyrs that they are not forgotten by God but that much reward awaits those who are faithful in times of persecution.

 

• The Lake of Fire is the Bible’s way of speaking of being cut off from God.  
• The “new Jerusalem” is sharing in life with God like “the lake of fire” is being in the absence of God.
• Judgement affirms that God will not let evil go unpunished but will correct the ills creation faces.
• The idea of hell says that God honors human choice.  
• It should also serve as a warning to those who would presume upon God’s mercy or make light of grace.  
• Yet, is it possible that God’s love eventually overcomes even our own rebellion and resistance?   Is it possible that God’s universal love for all will trump even our stubborn hearts and minds?    Certain texts in Revelation seem to hold out for such a hope (Rev. 5:13; 11:13; 15:4; 21:3, 24-26; 22:2).   
  • Christians can be certain of one thing:  God will always act in mercy and love, far beyond anything we can imagine.  Even hell must submit to the sovereignty of God.

 

Happy Interdependence Day

Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

-Jesus

Today is the 4th of July, Independence Day for America.  Today will be filled with picnics, BBQ’s, family gatherings and firework displays, moments that are rich in joy and thanksgiving only when shared with others, even as our nation, ironically, celebrates our independence from others.   It’s rather odd, if you think about it.

While I think it is a good thing to give thanks and celebrate the many blessings we have as a people of this country I think it is also a good thing to pause and recognize our interdependence on each other, even other nations (thanks to Shane Claiborne for the idea of celebrating Interdependence Day), and most importantly, the Lord of heaven and earth and all nations and rulers, Jesus Christ.   Indeed, it is odd to be celebrating our independence as a nation when we are most certainly not that today.   Imagine what would happen if today China called in her debts.   America is not as “independent” as we like to think, as my friend Blake Huggins argues.

In fact, the whole enterprise of independence is a product of the times in which our nation was founded.  The source for truth, liberty, happiness and freedom resides within each individual.  We are autonomous.  The greatest virtue became the ability to achieve for the self whatever the self determined it desired.   In fact, in our country it is almost considered immoral if one does not do all they can to accomplish their personal, individual, independent goals and dreams.   We have become a nation of people obsessed with independence from others.  Who are you to tell me what is right?  Who are you to tell me what to do?  I am my own person. These are our values.

I am grateful for Independence Day this year because it forces me to think through the myriad of ways that I am not independent (nor is our nation).   I need others.  I need you.   In fact, I do not even know who I am apart from the many interpersonal relationships that have formed me throughout my life.  I am reminded of the African ubuntu saying, “You are, therefore I am.”  For all of you, I am grateful and give thanks this day.

But even more than this I am grateful that Jesus recognized how our independence would kill us.   Our desire for independence is what led us to reach for the forbidden fruit in the first place and today, each time we grasp for the ever-elusive freedom to ourselves, we fall.   Jesus does not wish this for us but has grafted us each into himself.   We are not independent but are rooted to the source of Life.   Apart from Christ we can do nothing.  We are deeply dependent on God for our very life.   All that we have is gift.

So while I celebrate with friends and family today with good food and fun I will take note of all the ways I am not me without you.   I will take notice that without God, none of this exists.  I will take note of all the ways I am not independent and I will give thanks and praise.

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Prayer as Theosis

This post was originally published at another site where I contribute each month.  It is a dialogical experiment where different topics are discussed each month.  This month is prayer and last month was the Imago Dei.   I invite you to check out this site and read what some of the other contributors have to say.   You may wish to become a contributor yourself.   All the info to do so is on the site.   Join the feast at OpenTableTheology.

Prayer as Theosis

I dislike the cliches found on church signs.  One I saw the other day read, “The prayer line to God never has a busy signal.”  I scratch my head at such pithy dictums.  Not because I believe God is at times too busy to hear anyone’s prayers but because these cliches are far too simplistic and are creating in our culture a generation fed on nothing more than what Dallas Willard calls “bumper sticker theology.”  So, if I will never get a busy signal, what does that mean for you and I?  Does it mean I can petition God till I am blue in the face, asking for all that my heart desires?  Does it mean God is a grand Operator in the sky, just waiting to connect me to the answer for all my problems?  Does it mean that talking to God is no different than talking to my friend out of state, only technologically superior?  What happens when we pray?  Or, at least, what should happen when we pray?  In the following essay I want to address this question by first looking at what prayer has come to mean in our culture today.  After that we will investigate what some of the first Christians understood as the objective of prayer, and finally, we will see if there is a framework existing today where the best of both worlds (the new and the old) can be synthesized.

A leisurely stroll through any Christian bookstore today will prove that our culture is obsessed with prayer.  There are prayer books that cover a multitude of issues and are written to target a multitude of interest groups.  If you are a Christian man approaching midlife, divorced and wishing to reconcile with estranged children who have joined the circus, rest assured, there is a prayer book for you.  Prayer, it would seem by the titles of these many books, offers us a pathway out of whatever problem befalls us and can enhance our productivity, value and self-worth in whatever setting we find ourselves.  Prayer is the missing ingredient which when added, brings life and vitality to the prayers’ relationship, career, hobby, finances, goals, diet or whatever.

Most Christians today would nod in assent to the above understanding of prayer.  This is not surprising.  Thomas Constable, a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary, talks of prayers as being a “tool kit” which enables us to do the work of God.  In his exegesis of what Scripture teaches us about prayer, he says, “the Bible does not use the term prayer to describe divine-human dialogue,” and that prayer is only our words to God, not God’s to us.  Prayer is our speech directed to the one true God.  It will soon be apparent why I find this to be a very limiting definition of prayer.  But for now it is essential to understand that with Constable’s view prayer is divided into two camps only:  prayers which we ask God for something and prayers were we tell God something.

When prayer is seen solely as something we do to God, it is natural for us to then manipulate how it can best be done.  We would not be human if we did not try to maximize the use of anything that is called a “tool.”  Thus, inevitably, prayer in our modern world becomes “work.”  It is something that we all know we should be doing (Scripture tells us so), feel guilty when we do not, and desire some cure-all fix to our laziness.  R. Kent Hughes, in his book Disciplines of a Godly Man, has presented us with a solution- even it if is one that makes us sulk.  Prayer, he says, is disciplined work! The answer to a bankrupt spiritual life is to simply pull up your bootstraps and sweat a little.  Prayer is not meant to be easy but requires training and discipline which will eventually evolve into a habit. It is during these times of habitual prayer that we bring our petitions before God in an environment that we have created by budgeting our time and space appropriately to make it conducive to prayer.

While Hughes is right to say prayer ought to become habitual, the language used to present this is similar to that of Constable’s where prayer is human oriented, purpose driven, and able to be manipulated to suit our needs.  Prayer doesn’t seem to have a noteworthy goal, or telos, other than becoming a “habit,” albeit a good one.  Now, Hughes does make a sub-point that I like and is worth noting.   In dealing with Paul’s exhortation to “pray continually” (1 Thess. 5:17), Hughes says this is possible because this type of prayer is “not so much articulation of words but a posture of the heart.”  What Hughes has made as a “type” of prayer and a mere subset within his entire chapter on prayer I want to expand upon.   It is this “posture of the heart” that I believe defines prayer more than anything else.

The medieval monk Brother Lawrence might think of prayer as requiring discipline but doubtful as a “tool kit.”  He writes, “The time of business does not differ with me from the time of prayer; and in the noise of the clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were on my knees.”  Brother Lawrence saw prayer as a posture of heart rather than work.  To understand this concept of prayer more fully we must look to see what some of the first Christians thought of prayer.

Very early on in the church prayer played a major role in formulating doctrine.  Much of what we hold as true today was founded on the bedrock of prayer.  As the church began to expand beyond Jerusalem people began asking questions, even complaining, about the gospel being spread to non-Jews.  When the Jerusalem Council convened to handle the dispute over whether Gentiles should be circumcised or not, they issued a letter to the Gentiles making one of the most profound statements in the entire New Testament, writing, “For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things…”  This is prayer!  Now, the obvious decision for these life-long Jewish men to make regarding Gentiles would have been to have them circumcised.  What is keeping them from not making such a decree?  Not Scripture.  Not tradition.  Not reason.  In Acts 15 we find these Jewish men were open to something else for instruction – an experience with the Divine.  Through a community effort of prayer they reshaped doctrine for the entire world, and it “seemed good to them and the Holy Spirit” to do so.

This closeness to God is seen throughout the writings of the early church.  Tertullian used to have his community of faith pray in their liturgies for a “delay of the end,” taking the instructions in 1 Timothy 2:4 seriously, wishing that all might be saved before God’s judgment comes.  Tertullian’s prayer for delay of the end was not to discredit eschatological hope, for his hopes were in something far more experiential, to the point where he could say, “Even if Scripture offered me no hand of celestial hope, I would still have enough preliminary judgment of this promise, since I already have the gift on earth and I could expect something from heaven.”  There was something about the early Christians that rendered their lives as performative reflections of Scripture itself, as if their very lives expressed the will of God. Scripture served to authenticate and validate a prayer-filled life saturated with experience.

The history of the Western church is beyond the scope of this essay but an interesting development with regards to prayer in the medieval period is worth noting.   Many of the men and women who formed the bedrock of our doctrines through the exercise of prayer became venerated as saints.   As such, it was permitted to pray to them along with Christ and the two, over time, became closely related.  The threat to monotheistic worship was brushed aside as it was taught that no saint was greater than Christ and no individual saint was as glorious as all the saints combined, none of which received their virtue apart from God.  However, this did not prevent a certain cultus to get attached to a particular saint based on the quality of their perceived holiness apart from other saints.  Prayer to a particular saint over the “whole” became a common practice, asking the saint to intervene or plead the prayers’ cause to Christ Himself.  A major shift is occurring here.  Now, instead of prayer being communion with God and an experience of the Divine, it has become a “tool” to assert our wills.  This is not far removed from the “strategies” and “disciplines” still pervasive in our Western “how-to” books on prayer today.

While all the above was going on in the West something very different was happening in the East.  The dominant figure in the development of doctrine in the East during the 7th century was Maximus the Confessor.  The ideas of deification and theosis (becoming like God) began to take shape as prayer was seen as a form of grace which joined our minds with the timeless, changeless and absolute mind of God, thus transforming us from, as Paul puts it, from “glory to glory.”  Prayer truly was a “posture of the heart” which sought as it’s primary goal, or telos, to make a person look more like Christ.

This understanding of prayer became foundational (and orthodox) when Simeon the New Theologian came on the scene in the 11th century.  It was at this time that a method of theologizing known asHesychasm was on the rise.  Hesychasm found within it’s practices of devotion, worship and prayer a valuable and necessary resource for formulating Christian doctrine.  Though interpreting doctrine through prayer had been a part of Eastern theology all along, it was now gaining force as being an orthodox teaching through Simeon’s writing.  Prayer was not simply speaking to God and waiting on a response, but to these early Eastern monks, the “matrix of prayer is silence, and prayer is the manifestation of the glory of God.”

A Christian in those days was by definition of person of prayer.  It is interesting to note that even during the Byzantine Empire there were many who professed to believe in the risen Christ yet were dismal Christians.  Things never change!  Jaroslave Pelikan, in his history, relates that the thing that set those who merely profess Christianity apart from those who exhibited Christ-likeness was prayer.  “How blessed is the monk who in prayer stands before God, sees Him, and is in turn seen by Him,” said Simeon.  It is this type of prayer that I am sure the apostles were engaged in during the Jerusalem Council of Acts 15 – prayer that changes individuals and entire communities.  Simeon would go on to say that so intimate is our assimilation with Christ through prayer today that we have the same relationship with him as the apostles had!  This assimilation could be expected in the here and now, not just in some future heaven.  Through prayer we are swept up into the mind of God and become partakers of God’s nature.

Gregory Palamas, an Eastern theologian who came three centuries after Simeon, expressed much of the same meaning and thrust of prayer.  For Palamas, prayer is a means to be snatched away from all that is useless and useful and be elevated into the divine nature.  When asked what the telos of prayer is, he would say, “The end of prayer is to be snatched away to God.”  Note how different that is from our modern definitions.  Prayer has no other agenda than to be close to God and to become more like God.  As we do so our wills and desires become shaped by God’s wills and desires.  Our hearts begin to beat alongside God’s.  If the occasion presented itself where we felt words were necessary to express our desires, imagine what might happen if when we uttered our thoughts they were in essence the thoughts of God?  Can you hear in this echoes of, “It seemed good to us and the Holy Spirit…”?

So what does this look like on the ground?  Theophan the Recluse, a Russian Orthodox saint from the 19th century says there are three stages of prayer.  The first involves a state of readiness beginning with readings, prostrations, vigilance and other forms of piety.  Prayer is not something you jump into haphazardly, but is prepared for in this first stage.  When prayer comes it “is sent as if it were droplets.”  We do not do prayer.  It does us.  The second stage of prayer is when body and mind are working in unison and every word prayed is accompanied by corresponding emotions.  Inner impulses to pray arise from within and are expressed in a person’s own words.  This is everyday prayer.  In the third stage, the inner being, or spirit, prevails and prayer is accomplished without even words.  Instead, “the action of prayer takes place in silence in the depths of the spirit,” echoing the monks of centuries before who gave prayer a similar definition of silence.  This is the essence of inner prayer and is what Paul is calling us to do when he says, “pray without ceasing.”  Prayer, as seen here, is not something we “do” but is entirely seen as developing a relationship with Jesus Christ where we become less and he becomes more.  By accomplishing this progression through the stages we realize that it is no longer I who is praying but it is Christ who prays in my heart.

This brief overview of some key thinkers in the history of prayer paints a picture, especially in the East, of something very different from what we in the West are used to.  We like to think of things in terms of “action” and “doing” and “results” so even our theology is drawn to such devices, certainly with respect to prayer.  I believe that we in the West can learn much from our Eastern counterparts when it comes to prayer, but how do we synthesize those aspects here at home?  If we think prayer should be far more than a chore or a “tool” than must we become Greek Orthodox?  Of course not.   Thankfully there has been a shift in our culture where those leading the charge sound very much like the monks and mystics of centuries ago from the East.  Today we call them emerging Christians.

In Eugene Peterson’s brilliant book, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, echoes of an Eastern mentality are evident throughout.  Prayer, Peterson says, “Is the primary way in which the community [of faith] actively receives and participates” in the presence of Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit.  Prayer is the language of Christians in community who are becoming more and more like their Savior.  It is conversation with God.  In striking contrast to Constable and Hughes where we initiate prayer with God, Peterson says, “prayer begins when God addresses us.  First God speaks; our response, our answer, is prayer.”  This sounds very much like Theophan referring to prayer as being sent to us “like droplets.”  Prayer is not something we manipulate or use to get something we need, but is a means by which we establish continuities with the life of Jesus.

Kyle Lake drives the point home even further in his book [Re]Understanding Prayer. By truly understanding “God as Spirit” and that Jesus Christ “holds all things together” (Col. 1:15-17), a believer should never again think of God as needing to be beckoned or called out to, but will understand the awesome truth that we move, breath, eat, drink, sleep, wake, work, play, live and die in God. This reminds me of Karl Barth, who wrote, “If we do not pray we fail to realize that we are in the presence of God” while expressing this awesome affirmation: There is no humankind without God.  God encompasses the space that surrounds our very bodies. When we pray, we are not projecting upon some distant God which we can categorize by “disciplines” or duration or quantity, but instead, prayer is fluid and open-ended, lacking compartments.  Luis of Grenada, a 16th century spiritualist defined prayer as “any raising of the heart to God.”  Lake notes that this kind of prayer may already be budding in our lives, partly because it has historical roots, as we have seen here.  We may intuitively be longing for such a prayer life.  But perhaps the reason we do not embrace this attitude of paryer in the West is because nobody has told us that it counts for something – that it is legitimate (indeed, there are plenty today who wish to tell us it is evil, satanic and contrary to scripture).  Who can blame us?  The majority of books on prayer tell us that prayer is work, it is discipline, and it is my communication to God who is listening on the other end of a very long phone line that is never busy.  Where is the thrill in that?  If we worship a God who is truly transcendent as well as imminent, wholly other yet incarnate, then we should allow this God to transform us when we converse – just as any conversation I have with my peers leaves me slightly changed – should it not be even more so with our Creator?  Dan Kimball says that practicing the Spirit’s presence through prayer is vital if we are to grow into disciples.  We cannot continue to package and box something so full of life and so holistic into prescribed methods and systems, but instead we must enter prayer with a sense of awe, fear and reverence, expecting to experience God’s presence – for God is all around us.

The marquee sign of the church I saw is partially right.  The line to God is never busy, but it is not open for me to hog the airways with my issues.  No, the line is open all the time so that I might become more and more like Christ so that his issues become my own.  As Christians we do not need to make prayer one more item on our to do list that we routinely check off each morning or feel guilt for neglecting.  Prayer is not my “tool kit” for doing God’s work nor is it something I can sweat at to get good at so as to turn it into a good habit.  Prayer is my means for growing into a Christ-like disciple and having my inner self become immersed in the Spirit.  By revitalizing this ancient understanding of prayer and what it can and will accomplish the number of books on how to do prayer ought to decrease as we rely less on them and more on the Spirit of God within us.

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Why I am a FundaMergent

I was recently introduced to one more of the many so-called (and self-proclaimed) “discernment” blogs that exist and was reminded of the many reasons why I believe Fundamentalism is one grand adventure in missing the point.   The discussions that have been going on at that site and elsewhere (along with my friend Nic Paton) have brought to light some of the toxic tendencies and attitudes that can exist in Christian circles that espouse Fundamentalism.   They have also served to show a sort of line in the sand that exists between emergent/post-moderns and the fundies.  The two are often pitted against each other, one claiming more fidelity to Christ than the other.

As Nic rightly points out on his blog, fundamentalism served a useful purpose in its hay day as an alternative to the pervasive liberalism that the 20th century brought.  Fundamentalists circled the wagons, creating what I have heard described as “holy huddles,” reassuring each other that all is well so long as they hold on tightly to their right thinking.    The “right thinking” became a sort of litmus test that determined whether you were of this “holy huddle” (the true Christians) or not.    The fundamentals that were deemed non-negotiable were:

1. The verbal inerrancy of Scripture
2. The divinity of Jesus Christ
3. The virgin birth
4. The substitutionary theory of the atonement
5. The physical resurrection and the bodily return of Christ

What began as a way to distinguish themselves from the increasingly more liberal religious climate around them led to an ethos that pitted right belief (head knowledge) over and against matters of the heart.  A relationship with Jesus Christ, a person, got truncated to a set of dictums that one had to either agree or disagree with.   Salvation became less about what Jesus has done and desires to do for all of Creation but about your willingness to give mental assent to a set of codes.   There was little synthesis between what we confess and what we live.

Upon reading that description you may be wondering why on earth I would want to associate myself with such a group by embracing a name like “FundaMergent.”   Shouldn’t we be trying to do all we can to divorce ourselves from that sort of thing?   Perhaps.  But maybe we should not be so quick to divorce ourselves from them just as we would not wish to divorce ourselves from “the least of these” or the sinners and tax-collectors in our midst (or in our mirrors).

Is there some commonality between us?  I don’t think I am entirely comfortable with pitting emergents against fundamentalists.    Perhaps emergents can embrace a bit of fundamentalism  - one that when lived into actually begets a new ethos, one that is radically different from the one described above.   As such, I propose that emergents confess their own set of fundamentals.   I offer this list:

1. Jesus is Lord

2. Love God and neighbor

3. Love justice, seek mercy, walk humbly with our God.

4.  Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.

5. Love wins.

One thing that should be readily obvious from this list as compared to the first list of fundamentals is there is an ethic attached to any mental assent.   The question, “How then shall we live?” is answered in each of these fundamentals, unlike, for example, the 3rd fundamental of the Fundamentalists, “The virgin birth” which requires no transformation of the heart, mind, soul or body.

As a FundaMergent I believe passionately and radically these 5 fundamentals.  However, in my confessing them I am also convicted of how I approach the other in my midst, regardless of where their head is.  If I am radical about my fundamentals I must walk humbly in my dealings with others or else I am nothing but a hypocrite.   I must root out those things which claim lordship over my life if I truly believe Jesus is Lord.  I must wrestle with the question, “Who is my neighbor?” and at any time I draw a line in the sand that excludes another I must repent.

We have learned from our Fundamentalist brothers and sisters that there are indeed things worth believing and even dying over.   We learn from them that what we believe in large part determines the sort of person we are becoming.  It is not true that Fundamentalists are fundamentally wrong.  It is true, however, that their fundamentals forgot the rule of love, thus creating a community that knows much but feels little.

FundaMergents can confess much and feel more.  FundaMergents are fundamentalists when it comes to love, for it is only in love and by love that they shall know we are God’s.

grace and peace.

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Pastor as Interpreter of Scripture: Pastor, Chapter Five

Interpreting New Worlds

by Chad Holtz

I was reminded of a story while reading this chapter that I heard several years ago.  I do not remember who it is from but if I had to guess I’d say Karl Barth.  It goes like this…

Imagine yourself in a warehouse full of people, crates, antiques, and various odds and ends.  It’s dark and musty in the warehouse, most of the items have long been covered with dust.   This is your home.  Your world.  You know no different, for this is where you and the others have always dwelled.   The darkness and mustiness and dust are natural to you.   What more could there be?

Until one day a group of kids are playing on top of some boxes alongside the wall of your “world” and one of the children slips and rubs up against the wall, leaving a smudge, causing a pin-prick of light to shine through.  Inspecting further, the kids start wiping away the dust only to expose a window.   As the peer outside this window they see trees and grass and flowers.  Looking up they see clouds and blue skies and an air plane flying overhead.  On the sidewalks are children like them riding bikes and in the fields they are flying kites and enjoying a picnic.   Colors abound.  Joy is evident on their faces.  It’s a whole new world.

This story (which as I type it sounds like a retelling of Jim Carrey’s movie The Truman Show) is a parable that depicts the role of the pastor.  The pastor is the one who dares to peer through the dusty window into the bold, odd, disturbing world God has formed through words (Scripture) and invite the church to align their lives alongside this world, this story.   The Bible serves as a window into true reality and we as pastors serve as tour guides.  Willimon writes, “The pastor, in preaching, leads the church in stepping into the text, trying on the text, assuming a world in which the text’s description of reality is more real than that which we typically privilege as ‘real’” (127).   Thus, the pastor opens the strange new world of the Bible before the church and invites them to jump in and live.  It is here, unlike any other place or world we construct for ourselves meaning that salvation lies.    The Bible does not seek to impart information (although it does that at times), creating some world from the past for us to decode and transplant into our own context but rather, Scripture “wants to form a new world in the present, to recreate us” (117).   It seeks to form and reform her hearers.  The truthfulness of the Bible, then, is not to be found within the text itself.  Rather, the “truthfulness of Scripture is in the lives it is able to produce” (130).   If our lives are not performing the text, and if pastors are not calling congregations to perform the text, to re-imagine the world and then embody that world, than we have misunderstood what it means to say Scripture is true and authoritative.

To conclude I want to share a poem that was introduced to me in preaching class at Duke Divinity.   This poem is by Billy Collins and is tittle, “An Introduction to Poetry.”   As pastors being confronted by an ancient text it is good to hear this poem and where we see the word “poem” replace it with the word “text” or “scripture.”     May we rediscover what it means to be a people of the Book.  Amen.

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem’s room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author’s name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

Living in the Scriptures

by Thomas Parkinson

Is there any more vital and important aspect of pastoral ministry than the interpretation of the scriptures?  As Willimon asserts, it is the scriptures that create and critique the church (115).  Through the scriptures God calls the church into being, challenges her to deeper levels of faithfulness, and reveals to the church God’s truth.  The scriptures are the heartbeat of the church.

That said, it is striking how difficult it is for pastors to lead the church in interpreting the scriptures today.  Every year, countless energy is spent developing new Bible study curriculum and fancy study Bibles for all ages.  The main objective in most of these projects is to “make the Bible relevant” by placing it alongside current cultural fascinations.  And so Christians have at their finger tips thousands of resources for Bible study – from Study Bibles for Black Women to cutting edge DVD Bible studies.  And yet, while many of these products are the result of a genuine desire to lead the church in Bible study, the contemporary church is on the whole biblically illiterate.

Following Willimon, perhaps this approach to Bible study is wrong is flawed.  By trying to make the Bible relevant, we misuse the scriptures by trying to make them “normal.”  Instead of allowing the scriptures to challenge and uproot our current cultural norms, we do our best to make them fit into our current way of life.  Yet, the very nature of the scriptures is such that they are “countercultural, provocative, and strange” (111).  To read the scriptures is to open an ancient text, written thousands of years ago, and to discover inside a new world.  A world that Karl Barth described as the strange new world of God.

Perhaps one of the greatest weaknesses in biblical interpretation today is our desire to make the Bible less strange to the average person.  Thus, we begin to imagine a Bible that blesses current understandings of the family, marriage, and civil government.  We imagine a Bible that recounts scientific and historical facts.  And in doing all of this, we lose sight of the strange new world within the Bible.

The only proper way to make the Bible less strange is to live in the world of the Bible.  To read the scriptures on their own terms and to listen closely for the voice of the Holy Spirit.  To live in the Bible is countercultural – it entails reading an old old book over and over again in a world that sees the old as outdated and that detests anything that requires time.  To live in the Bible is provocative – it will challenge our basic assumptions about God, ourselves, and creation.  To live in the Bible is strange – we will find ourselves being called to do things and to live in ways that are far different from anything we’ve ever known.

And yet, it is only by living in the Bible that the church can truly be the people of God.  And one of the great privileges of being a pastor is to invite people into this countercultural, provocative, and strange way of life.  And no pastor can take advantage of this great privileged until she has first lived in the Bible herself.

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A Rebuttal of a Pastor’s Letter Defending the Pledge

A friend introduced me to an article written by a pastor defending the church’s right to say the pledge of allegiance to the flag in a church service.   Below I have offered my own response to the arguments made in that letter.   It is by no means exhaustive and much more can be said, but this is a start and I hope one that will encourage dialog between myself and others, both who agree and disagree.    I would welcome the opportunity to flesh this out some more with others.  May we all be sharpened because of it and grow in the image of Jesus Christ through it.    If you would like to read the entire letter you can find it HERE.     And thank you to my friend for sending it to me!  I cherish your heart for Jesus!

I salute the flag that stands for the Republic, under God, with liberty and justice for all. I appreciate the emphasis that the Christian Founding Fathers gave us: freedom to worship God, freedom of assembly, freedom of speech, freedom of movement plus many other freedoms.

To be clear, pledging allegiance to anything goes beyond a mere “salute.”  Allegiance means to give one’s “loyalty or commitment” to someone or something.  A “salute” simply means “a gesture of respect, homage or polite recognition.”   A salute does not imply ones abiding loyalty.

It is one of the great myths of our country to say that our founding fathers were “Christians,” at least in the way we think of Christians.   The majority of the founding fathers were Deists, which meant they believed in a God who stood apart and outside of history, sort of like a great watchmaker who “wound” up the world and just let it go.   This was not a God who was “Immanuel” (God with us) but was aloof and distant.   Thomas Jefferson, for instance, took a pen and scissors to his Bible and cut out all the sections of the New Testament that spoke of miracles.  Why?  Because God does not intervene in human history in such ways.

Furthermore, we must question whether these freedoms:

freedom to worship God, freedom of assembly, freedom of speech, freedom of movement plus many other freedoms

Are essentially “Christian” freedoms.  These are not freedoms promised us by God.  While it is a blessing to be given the privilege to worship without persecution we must also admit that this means all religions are equally free to express themselves.   This is good, but let us not fool ourselves into thinking that we are a “Christian” nation simply because we are allowed to worship.   Israel was not a democracy in that it allowed freedom of worship.   If you were part of the nation of Israel than Yahweh “would be your God and you will be God’s child.”  If you did not like that than you had a choice to make along with Joshua’s clan:  ”Choose this day whom you will serve.  As for me and my household we shall serve the Lord.”   Israel knew very well, through personal experience, that they belonged to a jealous God, one who did not like to share allegiances.

So these freedoms are not exactly “Christian.”  They are democratic, yes, but not rights that are guaranteed anyone who decides to “pick up their cross” and follow Jesus.    We shouldn’t confuse the two.

I believe that government is meant, according to St. Paul, (13) to oppose evil, punish the evildoer, insure the safety of its citizens, fight for the rights of others who are oppressed, secure justice or remedy injustice, secure peace and protect the innocent as much as possible.

The pastor here has taken some great liberties with Romans 13.  The only thing in the litany above that is even partially hinted at by Paul is that the government will punish those who do wrong.   A rather obvious fact in Paul’s day who is writing to Christians subject to persecution while living in Rome, the center of the empire.

And despite what governments are meant to do (and whether or not they carry it out well enough), Paul’s point is that all are subject to the sovereignty of God.   In the end, ALL nations and kings will bow before the true Lord of heaven and earth.   Paul’s point, as the end of the chapter shows, is to encourage the faithful to remain loyal to Christ, to “clothe yourselves with Christ” and in love for the end is near.   The nation that persecutes you answers to God, whether they know it or not.

I accept, in this fallen world, that there will always be “war or rumors of war” until Jesus returns. But until that day comes, strength is the insurer of peace. As Martin Luther said, “Without armaments peace cannot be kept; wars are waged not only to repel injustice, but also to establish a firm peace.”

Again, the pastor is taking some liberties with the text.  In neither Matthew 24 nor Mark 13 does it say there will “always” be wars and rumors of wars.   In fact, just the opposite.  Jesus says that this will occur but these are just “birth pangs” giving way to what will one day be the fulfillment of the Kingdom.

In any event there is absolutely NO insinuation that Christians will be part of any of this.   Sure there may be wars and rumors of wars but our part (the Church) is to “remain alert” and to stay faithful to the one who transcends all of that – Jesus.

As for Martin Luther, well, he was wrong here (and elsewhere).   This is what Walter Wink calls the “myth of redemptive violence.”  Our culture is obsessed by it.  We cannot imagine any other way to bring about peace and to stop injustice other than through war.  This is a lie all of us have bought into, even the Church.   However, it is not the story Jesus brings.   Jesus, the Prince of Peace, accomplished a “firm” peace not through war or violence but by laying down his own life.   The way of Jesus is not the way of the world.   How much do we trust that?  How much are we willing to give our allegiance to that?   I confess, it is terrifying.   Perhaps we might all pray, “Lord, I believe.  Help my unbelief.”

I know that Jesus taught non-retaliation in the Sermon on the Mount, saying, “I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also” (Matt. 5:39) But He was referring to personal non-retaliation, not national defense.

Again, the pastor is taking liberties with the text (this seems to be a common theme).    When people reduce Jesus’ words to nothing more than personal holiness they strip Jesus of his message of the Kingdom of God.  Jesus is not talking solely about how we should behave in our personal relationships but is giving us a glimpse into what life looks like in the Kingdom of God.   Yes, it may be an ideal to live into but nevertheless it is the Church’s place to shoulder this ideal and do all that we can by the grace of God to live up to it.

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight—nothing he cares about more than his own safety –– is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”

What is more ugly that war?   Not only are the casualties of war, both military and civilian, a crying shame but those are only the tip of the iceberg.  What of the countless widows and orphans made by war?   Two of my children were made orphans because of war and their mother a widow.  What of the immense damage done not only to homes and towns and cities but to God’s good earth?  What of the psychological trauma felt by all involved that lingers for years?

Thus far in this pastor’s response there has been nothing to justify pledging one’s allegiance to something or someone other than Jesus.   So far this has been an attempt to justify war and those who fight in wars.  That is another issue altogether.    The next portion of the letter tries to address the issue of bringing the state into the church.

Sad to say, some have tried to make this a secular nation (against all historical evidence) by omitting God from public life.

This may be the case.  But how is colluding with the state within our sanctuaries an answer to this perceived problem?    For the record, and as I stated above, it is a myth that our nation is “Christian.”    For a good read on this I would recommend Greg Boyd’s Myth of a Christian Nation. But all of this is beside the point.   We, the Church, are not to be the tail wagged by the dog which we name “Christian.”   Our citizenship, Paul tells us, is not of this world or of any nation in this world but is in heaven.   We do not look to the nation to take our spiritual pulse but we look to God’s revelation to us through Scripture and most importantly Jesus Christ.   The Church’s ethic (way of being) is going to be far different from that of the world (or it should be).   Where we look alike we must hear the words of the Apostle John in Revelation 18- “Come out!”   Jesus prayed in John 17 that we would be “in the world” but not “of the world.”   We are to be a beacon of light in a sea of darkness.   How can we justify pledging our allegiance to a flag of a nation of which the Bible tells us we are not citizens?   How do justify bringing the “world” (a nation) into our very sanctuaries which are meant to be “set apart” for doing the work of the Kingdom, a Kingdom established not by a sword by the blood of a slain Lamb?

They were building a new nation, under God. The pledge to allegiance honors both our history and our present attitude (which is like a prayer) that we believe that God is the Lord of this nation and we want to honor this fact with both our lips and our lives.

This pastor seems to not be aware of the history of our pledge.  The original pledge, written in 1892, reads as follows:

“I Pledge Allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all.”

Notice there is no mention of God or “under God” in the pledge.   The words “under God” were not officially added to the pledge until 1954, in part to make a distinction between us and communist nations whom were deemed to be nations apart from God.    One of the unforeseen fall-outs of such an addition, I would argue, is that it became easy to assume that what was good for America was good for God.   God and country became inseparably linked, for better or worse.

To conclude, we confess as Christians that we serve a God who is the God of ALL nations, tongues, peoples and tribes.    In Christ there is no Jew or Gentile, male or female, slave or free.   In Christ there are no national boundaries.   While we are blessed at this present time to live in a country that grants us many freedoms we recognize that these are not Christian freedoms nor are they promised us by our God.   They are for the moment blessings for which it is right to give thanks.   But giving thanks is more like a “salute” than it is a pledge of allegiance.    God is a jealous God and demands from us our all.   To bring a flag into a church and pledge loyalty to it is to announce to the world that we serve two masters – Christ and the State.    Is this how we wish to be viewed?

grace and peace.

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I Pledge Allegiance…

Another civic holiday is upon us, the Fourth of July, and churches all across America will once more bring into question their allegiances.  Many churches will deck themselves in red, white and blue while parading the flag down the center aisle only to then direct everyone’s attention to it as they pledge their loyalty.  And few will see little problem with that.

I have been teaching the book of Revelation to an adult class at church.  Many of the chapters I have written study notes that can be found on this blog.  It is impossible to walk away from a study of Revelation without engaging questions about empire and the church’s collusion with her.  At nearly every turn in Revelation we find John, the Pastor, asking his churches, “Where does your allegiance lie?  With Rome or with the Lamb?”

The first century church was faced with some interesting dilemmas.  They were becoming increasingly non-Jewish which served to bring them under Roman scrutiny (Rome gave certain allowances to Judaism simply because they had a penchant for things that were ancient).  Christians were not Jews and yet they were also not part of the many Roman mystery religions, causing them to stand out like a sore thumb.

In Rome there were certain codes the citizens were expected to live by.  This way of life was known as the Mos Maiorum, or the “customs of the ancestors.”    Within this code of life was a practice called pietas, or offering proper respect and honor to the gods and goddesses of Roman civic life.   Pietas was shown in a number of ways, from attending celebrations in honor of Caesar, attending the games, partaking of the market economy, offering incense and offerings to the various gods, attending religious cultic festivals and so forth.   While Jews were exempt from these practices and allowed to practice their religion (so long as they did not cause trouble and paid their taxes to Rome), Christians, who were no longer protected under the umbrella of Judaism, were becoming increasingly suspect.   Don’t they want peace?  Don’t they want things to go well for Rome? According to the Roman tradition, things would go well with Rome so long as the citizens adhered to the Mos Maiorum, and especially observed pietas. When things went badly with Rome, even natural disasters such as earthquakes, famines, floods or fires, guess who got blamed?   The Christians who were not properly honoring the gods.

Life in the 1st century for a Christian was not particularly easy given this context.   It is quite natural for the people to ask their pastor, “What if we just offered a small offering on our way out of church to one of the temple gods?  What if we just attended a festival now and then honoring Caesar?  What if we just blended in a little bit, offering some small example of pietas so that we don’t get in trouble with Rome?”    Their pastor is uncompromising in his answer:  NO!   In fact, he calls the entire system that is trying to seduce them into thinking they are safe under it’s wings a beast from the pits of hell – a drunken, blood-thirsty whore who cannot and will not give life but only death and destruction.    It is a beast that has come from hell and will return there.   As such, he warns his flock in the seven churches, “Come out of her!”  There is no refuge there, John assures them, but only death.  John’s thrust throughout Revelation is an attempt to shock the church out of her complacency while also reassuring them that God, not Caesar, is on the throne.

There is a certain Mos Maiorum that exists in our culture today.  A certain pietas that is expected of citizens of this country we are at present blessed to live in.   Our pietas is not offering sacrifices to mystery gods or attending festivals honoring Caesar but being a good patriot, serving in the military, waving our American flag at home and in church, singing national anthems and of course, saying the pledge of allegiance whenever the flag is raised.    To not do any of these things will provoke a curious stare at best and outright anger and hostility at worst.   Don’t you want peace? Don’t you want things to go well for America?  Are you not a patriot? Recently I heard that a pastor told a congregation at a funeral that all Christians are patriotic Americans.   This is a problem if we are to take the Revelation of Jesus Christ seriously.  We have become a nation that has been baptizing people into becoming good citizens rather than disciples of Jesus Christ.

As we approach the Fourth of July churches across the nation will have a choice to make.  They, just like the people of John’s churches in the 1st century, will have to decide where their allegiance lies.   People in pews throughout America will be asking, “Isn’t it OK to offer just a little offering to the country?  Isn’t it OK to pledge my allegiance to something other than Christ just this one time?   What’s so bad about that?”    Again, John’s answer, if we are to take the testimony of scripture seriously, is NO!   You cannot serve two masters, John would tell us.   Our allegiance is either to the Lamb of God or it is to something else entirely, something John describes as a beast, the whore of Babylon.

So I will refrain from pledging my allegiance to the flag this year.   Not because I feel that love of country is wrong or sinful (it is perfectly OK to have certain loves, and certainly OK to be a good citizen) but because I feel a line is crossed when we move from love to allegiance.   So rather than allegiance to a flag or a nation I want to offer my own rendition of a pledge, one that I think the Pastor, Prophet and Poet John would give his consent to.   Would you join me in this pledge?

I pledge allegiance to the Lamb who sits upon the throne and to the Kingdom for which he stands.   Heaven and Earth, reconciled to God, in ministry and service to all.

**Since writing this post I was introduced to an argument from a pastor defending the use of the pledge in church.  I have posted that letter as well as my own response and you can read that HERE.

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Reflections on Revelation: Chapters 17-18

Revelation 17

 

The Whore of Babylon 

 

• The woman is called “Babylon” which is John’s name for Rome (14:8, 16:19).
• Tim LaHaye identifies the “whore” as the Roman Catholic Church due to its use of tradition and rosaries.   
• Painted as luxuriant, ostentatious, gaudy.  She is dressed in scarlet and purple, colors depicting high status and wealth.  She has extravagant jewels.  She sees herself as all powerful, rich and attractive.  No wonder she has enticed the world to follow her!   
• The scene is an unmasking of the true identity of Rome in which the description of the great whore serves as a parody of Dea Roma, the patron goddess of Rome.  Instead of greatness, John reveals what Rome is really like – a gaudy, drunken whore who persecutes and slaughters the people of God.  
• The angel describes the beast as one “who was, and is not, and is about to ascend from the bottomless pit and go to destruction.”  This beast comes from hell and will return there.  There is no life in it.   
• Note how this is very different from the description of God, the one “who is and who was and who is to come” (1:4, 8; 4:8; 11:17; 16:5).  
  • John wants us to be certain of where our allegiance lies,  Is it with the one true God and the Lamb or is it with Rome or whatever else seeks to steal our loyalty?   

 

Connections…

• John is concerned as their pastor that the people do not understand the true nature of the emperor and empire that so easily seduces the culture.  Some are thinking they can be involved with Rome and its activities without any compromise to their faith.  John says, “no way.”   We must make a choice – we are either loyal to the Lamb or to the beast.  We cannot serve both.
• Eugene Boring writes, “It is arrogant human empire as such that is here condemned, not just its embodiment in Rome in John’s time.”    This makes this story timeless.   We are being summoned by John to see with the same eyes he is seeing with.  To use our imaginations.   We must ask where in our modern world is seductive “Babylon” present?   

 

Revelation 18

 

COME OUT!!! 

 

• The call to “come out” is more figurative than literal.  Just as Jesus prayed in John 17 that we not be taken “out of the world” but be kept from becoming “of it,” John calls his churches to separate themselves from the lifestyle of greed, indulgence and idolatry that surrounds them.  
• God “remembers” the sins of Rome.  It is not that he forgot them but that God is always mindful of someone or something and acts accordingly.  John assures his readers that God takes notice of Rome’s many sins and that justice will be served.    This is a strong note of encouragement and reassurance that God will not ignore evil but will act to stop it and bring healing to a hurting world.  
• The destruction to Rome will come swiftly (“in a single day”) and be complete.  Evil will not get the last say.    This is inconceivable in this day and age (and in ours?) because the attitude toward Rome in John’s day was the exact opposite of Revelation.  Here is what Aelius Aristitdes wrote in 109 AD about Rome: 
  • “Let all the gods and the children of the gods be invoked to grant that this empire and this city flourish forever and never cease until the stones float upon the sea and the trees cease to put forth shoots in spring, and that the great governor and his sons be preserved and obtain blessings for all.”  
• John devotes more time to describing the reactions of the merchants of Rome than he does the kings.   The merchants are those who profited from Rome’s super-power status in the world and the exploitation of others.  They are brought to tears at Rome’s destruction not for Rome’s sake but because their own welfare is now at stake.  

 

CONNECTIONS….

 

• For modern readers it is hard to read John’s description of Rome and not think of the situation today in which so-called first world countries dominate global politics and economics.  America, along with other Western nations, enjoys a standard of living far greater than the majority of the world.  We spend more, consume more, waste more, and exploit more.  What we often consider “necessities” the rest of the world sees as luxuries.  
• Our “merchants” seek more profits and cheaper ways to make and market their goods.  Factories are built in developing countries where labor is cheaper (slave labor?) and health and safety standards are not necessary.  The natural environment is exploited and abused in order to reap more profits.  Far too often, the controlling criterion for world economics is not what is best for all the world, and certainly not for the poor and disenfranchised, but what is best for the few who already possess and control the most.  
• If we hear the message of Revelation clearly, we are forced at times to admit, to paraphrase the comic strip character Pogo, “We have met the beast, and he is us.”  

 

Coming Out…

Reddish writes, 

“We ‘come out of the city’ when we do not allow consumerism and greed to control our lives.  We ‘come out of the city’ when we donate our money and our time to God’s causes, partially as a demonstration that we still control our money and our time rather than allowing them to control us.  We ‘come out of the city’ when we refuse to accept the belief that coercion and violence are acceptable means of achieving our goals.  We ‘come out of the city’ when we refuse to succumb to the idea that the ultimate meaning in life is found in materialism.  We ‘come out of the city’ when we adopt a similar lifestyle in which we do not consume a disproportionate share of the earth’s resources.”  

 

What might we be called to “come out” from?

 

Blessed From an Unlikely Source

Tonight was the opening worship service kicking off Holston’s Annual Conference in Lake Junaluska.  It was a Service of Remembrance where we name those clergy and clergy spouses who have died since last year’s conference.  It was a memorable service, full of Spirit, with outstanding singing, preaching and capped off with Holy Communion.   Yet, as inspiring as all of that was, none of it compared to the blessing I received from a most unlikely source.

Contained within our worship program for the evening is a picture and biography of every person that passed away this past year.   There were over 40 such entries.  While each was being named and honored I flipped through the book, randomly reading bits and pieces of various people’s lives.  My eyes stopped and began reading half-way down the biography of one William A. Adams who lived from 1927 until 2008.  I never met this man nor had I heard of him until this moment but I suspect I will not forget him.   Here is what I read….

Bill was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2003 and over the next five years, gradually lost his memory.  In 1999, he wrote of his perceived “dimming of memory” to his friend Sullins Lamb, who quoted it’s conclusion in his eulogy:

“…I have viewed this as deterioration.  Most lately, I have considered this development as an act of God.  Would that it were so!  I know that God loves me.  If He is the author of my amnesia, I am therefore most blessed!  If my mind is led by a loving God, what care have I for its loss or replacement?  I did not accomplish my mind. I discovered it to be present.  I found it helpful.  If I discover it to be working differently by the hand of a loving God, then this new thing has blessed meaning and a happy service to be realized.

Even though that realization might wait for my body’s demise,  I am confident that it holds only to be disclosed in a light bright enough to show its worth and beauty.  So I am comforted.  I did not realize God with my mind, but with my heart.  In some new ‘day,’ perhaps my heart shall ‘know’ love, and in that meeting my mind shall find rest and my heart leap up to thank God who made it so.”  

As I wiped the tears that formed in my eyes away I realized that this voice from beyond describes a deepness of faith I do not yet possess.  I believe that the Rev. Bill Adams knows now just as fully as he has been known.  Even now, from beyond the veil, his life has inspired me to take one more step closer to God.    For that, I am forever grateful to this pastor.

I look forward to meeting you one day, William A. Adams.

Reflections on Rev. 12 & 13

INTRO

• Chapter 11 ends with the seventh trumpet.  The Kingdom has been established, God’s enemies are defeated, judgment has been pronounced and punishment dispensed and rewards given. But John is not ready to have the final curtain call.   The next few chapters unfold in a different way the struggle between God and evil.  
• The specific evil that is manifested here is the conflict between the church and the Roman Empire.   For John and his readers, the Roman Empire, with its claims to divinity, have become the incarnation of evil.  
• More than any other chapters in Revelation these are the most misinterpreted, misused and abused.  Nowhere else in the whole book does John draw so heavily on Jewish as well as other pagan myths that dominated the political world of his day

 

THE GREAT DRAGON (12:1-18)

 

Roman Myth:  Goddess Leto becomes pregnant by the god Zeus.   Child to be born is Apollo.   The great dragon, Python, learns that the soon-to-be-born child will one day kill him, and so he sought to kill Leto and the baby.   Poseidon, the god of the sea, intervened and protected Leto by carrying her to safety at the island of Delos and hid Leto by sinking the island under the sea.  Python gave up his search, Apollo was born who one day pursued Python and killed him.  

 

• Roman emperors used this myth to perpetuate their own propaganda, presenting themselves as Apollo, the destroyer of evil.  
• Recall that the Emperor Dometian, whom is believed to be the emperor in power when John is writing this, thought himself to be the incarnation of Apollo.  
• John redresses this pagan myth with Christian imagery.  Instead of Apollo being the one who defeats evil it is Jesus, the one who would “rule all the nations.”   
• The woman has been interpreted through history to be Mary the mother of Jesus,  the nation of Israel and the faithful Christians through all time.  All of these can fit.   Remember that Herod pursues Mary and baby Jesus when he is born, causing them to flee to Egypt.  Israel is the nation from whom the Messiah is born and faithful Christians have long been subject to the “evil one,” even being martyred for their faith.

 

Satan – Evil 

 

This chapter forces us to face squarely the reality of evil in our world.   John uses imaginative language to describe evil which may be both good and bad for us today.   Some possible dangers of the notion of Satan, at least as popularly held, carries some risks:  

1. Belief in a powerful, supernatural being of evil verges on denying the oneness of God.  Biblical religion is monotheistic (the belief in one and only one God).   Popular views of Satan produces an alternative god – an evil god that exists apart from the one true God.  One of the major themes of Revelation is that there is no God but God alone and all other pretenders (nation, emperor, angels, etc) are to be rejected.
2. Speaking of evil in terms of a Satan figure can easily lead to a failure to recognize our own responsibility for evil.  We resort to excuses like, “The Devil made me do it.”   Pointing the finger is as old as Adam and Eve.  Adam blames Eve, Eve blames the serpent.   To blame another or even Satan is an indication of our own moral weakness and sinfulness.    
3. Another problem is that it may lead us to “satanize” any person or institution that seems to operate contrary to the ways of God.  Once we label someone or some thing as in “league with Satan” it can become easy to rationalize our hatred of them and actions towards them.  We can demonize our enemies and rather than love them and pray for them we see them as pawns and less than human.  
4. We can fail to recognize the human face of evil.  Evil comes in human form – it is our refusal of God in our lives.  Evil is the result of living an idolatrous life – putting something else or someone else before God.   Evil has less to do with a literal Satan figure and more to do with the image I see in the mirror.  

 

• The purpose John has for telling the church about this cosmic battle with evil is not only to make them aware that it is real but to remind them that they (and we!) have an important role to play in the ongoing struggle against it.  There is a war on, a cosmic battle against evil, and we, the Church, are on the front lines.  We are called to “be conquerers” (Rev. 2-3).  We conquer, however, not by violence but by faithfulness to the testimony of Jesus, which means faithfulness to his sacrificial, self-giving lifestyle.  We bow to the slaughtered Lamb. 

 

CHAPTER 13:  THE TWO BEASTS

 

INTRO: At it’s core, this chapter is about the struggle over authority and loyalty.  Who is ultimately in charge of the world – Satan and his cohorts or God?  To whom do we owe our allegiance?  

 

The Beast of the Sea (13:1-10)

• As will become clear here and in chapter 17, the beast represents the Roman Empire and its emperors.   “On its heads were blasphemous names” (13:1) is likely a reference to the divine titles emperors gave themselves such as “savior,” “lord,” “god,” or “son of god.”  
• The Imperial Cult 
  • Temple priests facilitated emperor worship in all the cities of Revelation.  They held festivals to honor the emperors and their families.  To be part of the civic and social life of this day and age was to take part in these activities.   The question that confronted the Christians of this day (and our day!) is “To what extent can we be involved in the imperial cult ceremonies and still be true to our Christian convictions?”  
• Parodies – both beasts (from the sea and the earth) are parodies of Christ.   John is showing how these beasts rely on Satan (evil) for their strength.   Christ, however, the Lamb, speaks the words of God whereas the beasts speak “like a dragon” (Satan).    
• The beasts represent anything and anyone who encourages and fosters emperor worship.  Eugene Boring writes, “All who support and promote the cultural religion, in or out of church, however Lamb-like they may appear, are agents of the beast.  All propaganda that entices humanity to idolize huan empire is an expression of this beastly power that wants to appear Lamb-like.”  

 

The Mark

• The mark of the beast is a parody of the mark given to the faithful (7:1-8).  The followers of the beast are marked indicating to whom their loyalties lie.  
• Who is the one marked 666?   John says it will take wisdom to discern this person.  Presumably, then, it is a person the people in the churches he is writing to will know.   Hebrew and Greek letters (like Arabic letters) have a numerical number assigned to them.   This is called gemartria, a practice widely used in the ancient world.   666, when transliterated using gematria, gives us the name Nero, the emperor that for Christians in the 1st century was the embodiment of evil.   Nero is infamous for crucifying Christians around the palace, lighting them on fire to use as lighting during parties.   

 

CONNECTIONS 

1. In the cult of the emperor in John’s day, religion, politics and nationalism were all intermixed.  When offering or incense or sacrifice were made to teh emperor (or to the gods on behalf of the emperor), the participant was expressing loyalty to the emperor and empire, as well as trying to get favor from the gods.  
2. Modern example of rendering to Caesar that which rightfully belongs only to God alone can be found in abundance.  Christians and churches gave allegiance to Hitler in his efforts to unify Germany, even at the expense of Jews and other “undesirables.”  Anything for the Fatherland! they cried.  In South Africa the Dutch Reform Church were supporters of government’s racist apartheid actions.   In America, the church has often rallied around the nation in times of war, demonizing our enemies and portraying them as godless subhumans who must be destroyed.  
3. Rev. 13 reminds us that no person or institution, not even family, deserve our ultimate allegiance.  God alone deserve our allegiance.  Every individual or group that lays claim to our allegiance has the potential of becoming “the great beast” that demands to be worshipped and kills those who refuse.

 

Reflect:  What things, groups or people might we give more allegiance to than we ought?  

  How might our church make it very clear that our allegiance is to God alone?  

 

Performing the Imago Dei

 

 

So God created humankind in his image,

 

in the image of God he created them;

   male and female he created them. 

- Genesis 1:27

This is Israel’s most nascent reflections on her beginnings.  It was out of nothing that the first male and female came into existence.  It was out of nothing that Israel became a people.  Both were spoken into existence by Yahweh.   Both were designed for community – Adam and Eve for the community of Eden; Israel for the community of a promised land.  Both were created for covenant and both would find life insofar as they kept their sights on the One who called them into existence.   We know how their respective stories unfolded.  Both, when called to speak back the “yes” spoken to them by Yahweh, stuttered.  

Saint Athanasius observed this in his wonderful work, On the Incarnation.  Humanity, he writes, was created to express the impress of the Word upon their lives.  They were  created to live as those who bore the image of their Maker.   But humanity, “having turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising, had come inevitably under the law of death” (29).   It was because of our “sorry state,” Athanasius says, because of our inability to adequately articulate a reciprocal “yes” to God, that “caused the Word to come down.”    The problem for us then, and the problem we still struggle with today, was the refusal of God’s mediating presence in our lives.    It was from non-existence that we were brought into being and, through corruption, it was to non-existence we were returning.  

Consider the myth gifted to us in Genesis 2.  Here we find the tree that sustains life – God – in the very center.  God is in the midst of Adam and Eve in the community of Eden.  But on the other hand we have another tree – the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which also stands in the middle of the garden.  Thus we have a double representation of God.  On the one hand we have God as the giver and sustainer of life and secondly we have God as the limit on my life.  Do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for on that day you eat of it you will die.  By defining our sustenance on something other than the Life-giver, by reaching into and attempting to exceed the limit God has placed on us, we die.   God is both Life and Limit upon us.   So, within this mythic story of Genesis 2 we already see the basis of the covenant.  God is the giver of covenant, of life, but is also the limit upon us (the Law).    God in the garden is the life and law giver.  The Fall is our refusal to accept this mediation upon our lives.  When we attempt to secure our own destiny and to seize our own creation we fall.   Without God in our midst being both life and limit we spiral out of control, becoming that “sorry state” Athanasius writes of while turning our “gardens” into cesspools of domination.  

This brief tour above is necessary for we must first realize that within ourselves we have no static taproot.   Descartes’, “I think, therefore I am,” is wrong.   Rather, the African ubuntu saying, “You are, therefore I am,” or “being through other people,” more closely resembles God’s reality for us.  Left to ourselves, as individuals, we stand in nothingness.   When we look into ourselves we see nothing…no thing.   It was from nothing we were created and called into being and it is to nothing we will return if we look within ourselves for sustenance and meaning.   Our identities, therefore, do not start with the self.   We do not start with I.  Adam and Eve as well as Israel’s identities were not individualistic.   Rather, the I that made them them, and the I that makes me me is summoned from the community.   I have to learn from someone else what it means to be human.   But before we think that the answer to individualism is communitarianism we must step back for a moment and consider the forms in which community presents herself to us.  

We often think of community as having two forms, what Bonhoeffer calls human love on one hand and human absorption on the other.   Bonhoeffer rightly points out, however, that human love has its limitations.   Havingimmediate access to another, as human love in community grants us, is another form of domination and bondage because within ourselves we rest on nothingness.  This takes the form of both soft and hard tyranny.  Soft tyranny, often couched in “love” language, is relationship based on utility, for what the other gives me.   It is where my being is defined and granted to me by another human.  This can and often does lead to the absorption of the weaker into the stronger, the stronger sucking the weaker into themselves.   Hard tyranny is this taken to the extreme, such as abuse – whether this be physical, mental, spiritually or emotionally.  

So what does all this have to do with the Imago Dei?  Allow me to repeat my opening lines: 

   So God created humankind in his image,
   in the image of God he created them;
   male and female he created them. 

Neither the male nor the female possess the image of God.  It is not found in an I but in a them.  The image of God is not some possession intrinsic to us but rather, like grace, is a gift, and one we perform rather than own.   The image of God is our performance of God’s likeness being pressed into us, causing us to reflect a communal life that recognizes God as both our Life-Giver and our Limit, being the mediator of all our relationships.    Adam and Eve along with Israel that followed stuttered when it came to expressing the Imago Dei.  God, recognizing the “sorry state” we were in and the inadequate (idolatrous?) ways in which we expressed the image of God to a watching world sent the ultimate expression of God’s image:  Jesus Christ.  One need only to watch how Jesus performs in life as well as death to see the choreography of a life mediated by God.  Where Israel stuttered, Jesus spoke a perfect “yes” to the Father.   When we follow the way of Jesus we are embodying the imago Dei because Jesus teaches us best what it means to be a human being.  

It should be of little surprise, then, why Christology matters.  When contemplating the imago Dei, the question, “Who is Jesus?” is of utmost importance.   While Genesis 2 reflects Israel’s origins it is the Exodus narrative that most fully captures their imaginations.  We cannot know who Jesus is apart from Israel.  Who is Israel?  According to Yahweh, Israel is his “firstborn son” (Ex. 4:22).   Here, just as in the garden, community transcends any particular individual.   An entire people group takes on the identity of God’s son.  As the story unfolds we learn that it is Israel that is saved, not Moses or Aaron or any one person.   So, who is Jesus?  Jesus is the Israel of God.     And yet, fantastically, he is more than this – he is “all in all” and in him all of creation moves and breathes and has its being.  When we consider Jesus as the perfect reflection, or the untainted image of God, we are confronted by a being who is never substantiated as an individual but, like Israel, is one who is intrinsically tied to a community of beings:  Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  This is the one of whom it is said:  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God…All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being (John 1:1-3).   Alone, Jesus does not possess the image of God.   Alone, we do not possess any thing.   Jesus performs the image of God insofar as he is tied to humanity and tied to the Father and the Holy Spirit.  There is no image of God outside of that.   Allow me to illustrate:

 

 

 

 

Image (I) is not the image of God.  Nor is image (II).  As already noted, left to ourselves in community our loves remain disordered (Augustine), taking on the form of hard or soft tyranny.   Image (III), however, is the imago Dei.   It is human beings created for community allowing all their relationships to be mediated by Christ.  Image (III) is the image of God because it is rooted in the God who is both Life (Alpha) and Limit (Omega). It is a themcreated in Genesis 1 and it is a them mediated by Christ.    In the same way the triune God who is one yet three, we are the image of God only insofar as we are enacting this.   There is no imago Dei outside of this.   

But, wait a moment.  If we claim that not all humans possess the image of God will we not open ourselves to further systems of domination wherein we set up a “us” vs. “them,” those who “have” against the “have-nots”?    I would argue that to do so would be to grossly misunderstand the imago Dei as gift and the way it is to be performed.  Bonhoeffer is once again helpful here.  We must receive the other person into our midst “as they exist in Christ.”  We receive them not based on their own nothingness but we receive them for Christ’s sake.  When we do this we can truly know ourselves and be established as an “I” that is neither dominated nor dominator.  With Christ as our model for performing the imago Dei we are reminded that humility is one of our greatest virtues and that our Lord saw fit to serve with basin and towel, even while directing attention and honor away from himself but to his Father in heaven.  

Our existence is as beings in communion.   Where I neglect the mediation of Christ or overstep the limit placed upon me in any relationship I am forfeiting my imago Dei.   In this way, none of us can say we have and they do not.   Thinking of the image of God as performance rather than possession should reorient us to the God who is the sole giver of life, of all good gifts, while prodding us to be more cognizant of the ways we bear the image well in our life and relationships or where we reflect more of a “sorry state” of affairs.  

*I am indebted to Dr. J. Kameron Carter, professor of Christian Theology at Duke Divinity School, whose lectures provided much of the meat for this material.   

**This post was recently published at a new site I am contributing to, Open Table Theology.   Please drop by there and join the discussion.   

 

The Priest as Pastor: Pastoral Care (Chapter Four of Pastor)

Creating New Worlds in Pastoral Care

by Chad Holtz 

Saint Augustine observed the human condition as one of disordered loves.  Our hearts are restless, he wrote, until they find their rest in God.  In the second chapter of Pastor, titled, “The Priest as Pastor: Worship as the Content and Context of Pastoral Care,” Will Willimon laments the turn of pastoral care from a theological task to a therapeutic one.   If pastors continue to see the goal of pastoral care as helping people feel better about themselves or their circumstances, without first attempting to reorder people’s loves, than we have no business calling our care “pastoral.”   It ceases to be care that is given in the name of Jesus.  

This chapter, more than any other so far, has been the most challenging for me personally.  When it comes to pastoral care I feel there is so much I have yet to learn.  More often than not, when I enter a parishioner’s home or hospital room I feel guilty.  Guilty, I think, because I have long suspected that I am not equipped to fill the role of priest in such a setting.   More often than not I fall back on what seems easy and what I am more comfortable with – being a friend, confidant, adviser, therapist.   I placate my guilt by insisting that each visit ends in prayer.  In this way I can at least, in part, justify all the time I just spent doing little more than what their neighbor, friend, uncle or aunt would have done, regardless of whether they were Christian or pagan.   Willimon’s chapter challenges me, or convicts me, in the ways my pastoral visits are not really pastoral at all.   I now recognize that while I may have been offering healing, it was just not in the name of Jesus.

To offer care in the name of Jesus is to be a prophet and a priest.  A prophet in the sense that we bring into question our assumed desires, needs and even rights.  We live in a culture convinced that our desires are no different from our needs and our needs have become our rights.  The prophet is one who loves in truth, which often means a word of judgment upon all our loves, many of which are disordered.  To offer care in the name of Jesus as priest is to remind ourselves and our parishioners that we do not suffer alone but we suffer in Christ alongside Christ’s Church.   The cares of individuals are really the cares of the church gathered.  The priest will encourage those whom he or she cares for to present their needs before the church and lay them at the altar.   “Pastors,” Willimon writes, “help the stories of struggling individuals become subsumed in the larger story called the outbreak of the kingdom of God” (108).  Priests should attempt to re-narrate all needs, grounding them in the context of worship.  Worship, as it turns out, is doxolgoical – it is giving praise to the God in whom our story is anchored by virtue of our baptism.   Prophets and Priests ought to be in the business of reminding those under their care, at every opportunity, that their “lives [are] linked to something and someone worthy of living and dying for” (101).  This is how our healing becomes healing in the name of Jesus.

Walter Brueggemann says, “You pastors are world makers.”  Through our preaching and through our vocation of caring for others we create new worlds, offering a counter-narrative through which our parishioners can see the world, one to lay over the “officially sanctioned ones” (101).   Brueggemann also says, “And if you won’t let God use you to make a new world, through faithful words, then all you can do as a pastor is service the old one.  And that’s no fun” (as cited by Willimon, 93).    I am convinced that my sitting with someone with cancer, holding their hand while I talk about their chemo treatments, asking how well the doctors and nurses are caring for them, asking how the family is coping, asking them if there is anything I can get them while they are laid up, even tacking on a prayer at the end, is not creating for them a new world through which to narrate their suffering.  If I am to be peculiarly Christian and uniquely pastoral in my care for others I need to think inside the gospel of Jesus Christ, rather than How To Win Friends and Influence People.  

I’ll close with a poignant story Willimon shares.   He recounts a visit he made to a couple in a hospital.  The woman just delivered a baby and it was not doing well.  Shortly after he arrived the doctor entered, saying to the parents, “You have a new baby boy.  But there are some problems.  Your child has been born with Down Syndrome. Your baby also has a rather minor and correctable respiratory condition.  My recommendation if for you to consider just letting nature take its course, and then in a few days there shouldn’t be a problem.”  

The couple seemed confused by what the doctor told them and so the husband said, “If the condition can be corrected, we want it corrected.”  

“You must understand,” the doctor said, “that studies show that parents who keep these children have a high incidence of marital distress and separation.  Is it fair for you to bring this sort of suffering upon your other two children?”  

Willimon writes that at the mention of the word “suffering” the mother seemed to finally understand.   She said, “Our children have had every advantage in the world.  They have really never known suffering, never had the opportunity to know it.   I don’t know if God’s hand is in this or not, but I could certainly see why it would make sense for a child like this to be born into a family like ours.  Our children will do just fine.  When you think about it, this is really a great opportunity” (99).

This is a couple who had been given a glimpse into a new world, a world that did not make sense to their doctor, but makes every bit of sense to those who know Jesus Christ, the one who can and has brought redemption out of suffering.  Their story is evidence of a pastor who had for some time been a prophet and a priest to them.  He was one who was in the business of creating new worlds for his church to inhabit.   I pray for the courage to do the same.  

——————————————————————————————————-

Care That Is Christian 

by Thomas Parkinson 

One of the greatest joys of being a pastor is the privilege of walking with people through the many twists and turns of life.  Whether visiting in homes, hospitals, funeral homes, prisons, coffee shops, or homeless shelters, pastors have unparalleled access to the otherwise “private” affairs of people’s lives.  It is in such visits that relationships are built and trust is established between pastors and lay persons.  The typical pastor will spend as much time visiting with the people of her congregation as she will preparing sermons, Bible studies, and conducting church meetings.  As such, it is incredibly important that pastors have a clear sense of why it is that it is an important part of the pastoral role to be present in all these moments and places.  

            The ministry of pastoral visitation, also known as pastoral care, is in many ways a lost art in the ministry today.  In an American culture driven by individuals’ desires for self-fulfillment of their endless lists of “needs,” pastoral care has often been reduced to free therapy sessions, where the words and actions of the pastor are not all that different from what one would hear from professional therapists.  In the fourth chapter of Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry, William Willimon contends that “one of the challenges of being pastor is offering people care that is worthy of the name Christian” (93).

            In order for pastoral care to be distinctively Christian, Willimon asserts, it must be rooted in the practice of Christian worship.  Worship sets the context for all pastoral care.  For pastors, this means (among other things) that the sermons we preach ought to provide the shape and inspiration of our pastoral care.  “There must be a harmonious convergence between the words we use when we preach, and the words we use as we offer care in the pastoral counseling session” (93).  In order for such convergence of words to happens, it requires that pastors preach sermons that bring the truth of the gospel to bear on the life of congregations.  On this account of pastoral care, bad sermons make for bad pastoral care.  If the pastor is faithful in her preaching preparation and delivery, she is equipping herself with words that can bring life and grace to the people in her congregation.  Suddenly, the preaching ministry is no longer simply about 20 minutes on Sunday morning, rather preaching sets the table for the entire works of a pastor.  Imagine what it would be like if in our pastoral visits our lay people said to us, “Pastor, what you’re saying now sounds a lot like what you were saying in your sermon last month.”

            Another important aspect of care that is distinctively Christian, according to Willimon, is that it must be about more than meeting people’s needs.  “The gospel is not simply about meeting people’s needs.  The gospel is also a critique of our needs, an attempt to give us needs worth having” (96).  We live in a culture of endless ‘needs’ – where every desire becomes a necessity.  Sad as it is to admit, this truth often rears its ugly head during the sharing of joys and concerns in our churches.  When the congregation is asked to share their joys, there are few praises offered.  Our congregations are not well versed in the language of praise and thanksgiving – they are far more equipped to voice endless needs and concerns.  And so the time of joys and concerns becomes dominated by concerns for every physical ailment known to humankind – from heart surgeries to ankle sprains – and concerns for greater ‘blessings’ for our nation, our families, ourselves.  I don’t want to be too hard on these concerns – some of them are quite legitimate.  But the general lack of praises and abundance of concerns demonstrates that we live in a culture of incessant need and desire – where the desire for more always trumps thanksgiving for all we have. 

            Pastoral care that is faithful does not attempt to meet all these needs – indeed that is not possible.  Instead, its seeks to enable people to see their world through the lens of the scripture – to re-imagine what their true needs are.  “Our care must form people into the sort of people who have had their needs rearranged in the light of Christ” (96).  In this way, pastoral care is about spiritual formation.  It is about teaching people to grow more and more deeply into their baptismal identity.  It refuses to buy into secular notions of care, instead preferring the rich theological language of the scriptures.

Ordinary Time

Next week the Church enters into what is called Ordinary Time.  Easter Season has come to a close.  The white and red vestments that have adorned our sanctuaries over the last many weeks signaling celebration and victory will come down, replaced by the color green.  Green will run the gamut for nearly 34 weeks of the year all the way until Advent, the weeks leading up to Christmas, where we deck the church in red.  

I am not a big fan of the green.  Even though I am color blind, I don’t like it.  Compared to the whites, reds and purples, green is, well…ordinary.  

Kinda like me.  

After our service this morning a gentleman on our worship planning team was helping me change the colors from white to green.  He doesn’t care for green either and we got to talking about how we have to wait what seems a long time before the colors change to red.   Red is more festive.  Red is kingly.  Red matches our pew cushions.  Green is, well…ordinary.

Kinda like us.

And then it hit me.  Just earlier, when I dismissed the congregation, I reminded them that all the world is God’s “dance floor.” It is here that we are called to live out the “dance moves” we learn through our worship together (moving from Font to Table to Creation), moves that are meant to be displayed in our everyday lives.   Not only are we called to “dance with God” Monday through Saturday, but, scandalously, God has seen fit to condescend to our level – to become one of us – so that we might experience and know God in the ordinary stuff of our lives.  

Each week we reenact this truth when we share in the Lord’s Supper.  Here, God takes ordinary bread and wine and does something extra-ordinary through it.   Through this I am learning how to turn the ordinary moments of my life into something sacramental.   

Perhaps it is fitting that green makes up the bulk of the Christian year.   The bulk of our lives are filled with ordinary time.   God is with us ordinary people, seeking to transform the mundane into the extraordinary.  

I think I can come to like the color green this year.

Reflections on Revelation chapters 10 & 11

Reflections on Revelation 10 & 11

Visit HERE for Reflections on chapters 6-9.  Again, the bulk of this material comes from Mitchell Reddish’s fantastic commentary, Revelation.  

 

Woodcut by Albrecht Durer:  St. John the Divine Devouring the Scroll 

 

CHAPTER 10

 

• Verse 7 reads: “but in the days when the seventh angel is to blow his trumpet, the mystery of God will be fulfilled, as he announced to his servants the prophets.”  
  • We are given an important nugget of information here!  The “mystery of God” will be fulfilled when the seventh angel blows his trumpet.  
  • We don’t have to wait long to have the mystery of God revealed to us.  Rev. 11:15-19 is the story of what happens when the 7th trumpet is sounded (7, once again, means completion or wholeness).   Here we learn that judgment has passed, the saints are vindicated and praising God and the Lord is on the throne over all the “heavens and earth” and every nation.    
  • Is this the end?   It seems like it is.  We get a snapshot at the end of chapter 11 of God’s completed work on earth.   It is like one version of the end and then, come chapter 12, John will further describe the scene we just witnessed with the 7 trumpets being blown.   This should caution us against reading Revelation chronologically, as if John is dictating a series of events that unfold in a particular, linear order.

 

• Verse 4 reads: And when the seven thunders had sounded, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven saying, ‘Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down.
  • John is kept from writing something down
  • Humanity does not discover God;  God reveals God’s self to the world.  The title of this book is “Revelation,” a reminder that the understanding of God John communicates is God-given and not something John (or any human) can devise themselves.  We only know God insofar as God allows God’s self to be known.
  • Some aspects of God are to remain hidden or undisclosed to humanity.  Failure to recognize that we cannot and will not know God fully is a failure to recognize a distinction between Creator and creature.  
  • This reminder to us ought to make us humble.   All our efforts to speak about God are limited and partial at best.  None of us should ever claim to know “fully.”  
  • The mystery of God should be part of our worship.   When we become to “chummy” with God we may be in danger of reducing God to just a bigger, better us.  God is not like us.  God is wholly other than us.   While God has come near to us in Jesus Christ and abides in and with us through the Holy Spirit, we should hold this in tension with the fact that God transcends God’s creation.   We should be in awe of this God.  

 

• Verse 9 reads: So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll; and he said to me, ‘Take it, and eat; it will be bitter to your stomach, but sweet as honey in your mouth.’
  • First, this is John’s commissioning as a prophet in the same vein as Ezekiel (see Ezek. 2:1-3:11).  The task to proclaim God’s word can be sweet at times but can also be bitter.  Eugene Boring writes, “Every person who struggles to preach and teach the word of God knows this taste, this satisfaction, and this sickness in their stomach.”  
  • Second, to speak the word of God (to live the word of God) can be both sweet and bitter.  There are times we can feel the joys and sweetness of life with God and other times when we will feel the sharp sting of bitterness.   Life with God is not about making our bed in roses.    As John well knows, it can cost us our very lives.  

 

CHAPTER 11

 

• The seventh trumpet brings about celebration and praise, not woeful events.   This is the culmination of God’s plan!   Rejoice!  
• In the second half of Revelation John will clarify who “those who destroy the earth” are.   We will see they are the dragon, the beasts and those who follow them.  
• Chapter 11 starts out with John measuring the temple. 
  • A reminder that even in the midst of chaos, difficulties and uncertainties, God is still central, alive, active and on the throne.  We have picture of sanctuary painted for us in the middle of judgment and chaos.   
• The Two Witnesses
  • Reminds us that the cost of being a faithful witness for Christ can be very costly – even costing us our very lives.
  • Authentic witnessing involves not just witnessing “to” but also witnessing “against.”   Reddish writes, “The true witness is the one who is willing to confront the power structures and the power brokers, to challenge the system when it demoralizes, demeans and crushes the innocent” (224).   Such witnessing can be dangerous (consider Martin Luther King Jr).  
  • Where in our communities does an authentic Christian voice need to be heard?  Who will be willing to confront the beasts of modern society with the message of God?  
• Celebrate 
  • The chapter ends with joyous song and praise.   How can we celebrate when evil has not yet been eradicated?   We live in an age where the evils of the world are all too readily apparent.  The Church is composed of people who see the world differently.  We were once blind but now we see.   The Church points to a future hope where God will make all things new.  Even in the face of evil we can celebrate, for we know who is on the throne.   
  • We celebrate what is already begun with us and in us.  The Church should be a place where the “kingdoms of the world” are not found but a people being transformed into the “kingdom of God.”   
  • When we pray, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done” we are placing ourselves under God’s sovereign rule.  We should not pray this lightly.   Praying this is to ask God to bring God’s sovereignty (which includes God’s justice, of course) not just into the world but into our own lives.   
    • Are we willing to relinquish all control, all claims to power, all prestige and dominance to the one who is Lord and sits on the throne?   
    
    

Dancing with God

Gregory of Nanzianzus used the term perichoresis, an image of a dance, to describe the mysterious union of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.   Clark Pinnock, in his wonderful book Flame of Love, writes, 

The metaphor suggests moving around, making room, relating to one another without losing identity.  The divine unity lies in the relationality of Persons, and the relationality is the nature of the unity.  At the heart of this ontology is the mutuality and reciprocity among the Persons.  Trinity means that shared life is basic to the nature of God.  God is perfect sociality, mutuality, reciprocity and peace.  As a circle of loving relationships, God is dynamically alive.  There is only one God, but this one God is not solitary but a loving communion that is distinguished by overflowing life (31).  

Pinnock is focused primarily on the Holy Spirit in this particular book and goes on to say that the Spirit is the “ecstasy” of God’s Triune life.  The term ecstasy means to “stand outside oneself.”  Thus, it is the Spirit that makes the “triune life an open circle and a source of pure abundance” (38).  The Spirit is the creative juice of the Trinity. Pinnock writes, 

The Spirit is essentially the serendipitous power of creativity, which flings out a world in ecstasy and simulates within it an echo of the inner divine relationships, ever seeking to move God’s plans forward (21). 

It is important to begin here because there is no God outside of this.  God is God as revealed to us in this way – as Father, Son and Holy Spirit in loving, mutual, intentional relationality.  The Persons of the trinity are caught up in an eternal dance of reciprocity so intertwined that at times it may seem difficult to tell who is who.   They move with such choreographed harmony.  The love emanating from within cannot help but create, and so, the Spirit “flings” out new worlds because it is the nature of love not to harbor and hoard but to expand and create.  

What does this mean for us?  God has from the beginning been wooing creation to dance.  The community of God desires community with us.  You and I are being courted.  The love that created us and our world is the same love that desires to be in fellowship with us.   Those of us who have responded to the wooing of God, the Church, are then called to reflect this perichoretic ecstasy of our God to the world.  When we worship in “spirit and truth” we appear to the world to be united as one, bound by love, dancing in harmony and flinging out new creation from within our midst.  A church in step with the Triune God is a church that does not hoard what it has to herself but, like the day of Pentecost, bursts through the doors of sanctuary to enter into a world full of possibilities.   We call others to dance with us.   

Our worship ought to reflect this dance.  If I were designing a sanctuary today I would be sure to place the baptismal font at the entrance to our sanctuary.   In this way, we are reminded both as we enter and as we leave that we are children of God the Father, that we are in covenant with this God and that through the waters of baptism we have been immersed into new life – we are new creatures!    The saints gathered enter through the waters and are then greeted by the Lord’s Table, the altar, which is front and center.   It is here, in the Eucharist,that Jesus the Son of God has promised to meet us.  At his feet we lay down the idols that have cluttered our imaginations and feast on real sustenance, the body and blood of our Lord.   Here we confess our sins, make peace with God and neighbor, find forgiveness and nourishment.   We are once more filled with the Holy Spirit and empowered for ministry, so that as we pass by the waters once again we are flung out into the world to be dancers, to be ambassadors of Jesus Christ to invite others to enter this dance between Font, Table and Creation.

This is what this dance might look like for the church….

 

What a joy it is to be invited to dance with God. 

The Pastor as Priest: The Leadership of Worship (Chapter Three of Pastor)

If you are just joining us, feel free to check out the Welcome, the Introduction, Chapter One and Chapter Two.   

 

Get Real:  The Pastor as Priest

by Thomas Parkinson 

The highly influential theological realism advanced by Reinhold Niebuhr has been the source of a great deal of criticism in recent years.  At the heart of Niebuhr’s realism is his understanding of sin.  In his work Christianity and Power Politics, Niebuhr asserts that “Christianity is a religion which measures the total dimension of human existence…in terms of the fact of sin” (2).  The law of love and peace, preached by Christ, is reserved for the coming Kingdom – an ideal that will only be realized in the eschaton.  As for the present moment, the fact of sin is at the heart of reality.  In order for us to realistically face the world today, we must deal seriously with sin.  And so acts such as war, violence and corporal punishment – while not ideal and certainly not a part of the Kingdom – are necessary in order to face the reality of sin.

It is easy to dismiss Niebuhr’s realism by claiming that it places too much emphasis on sin, and does not give primacy of place to God’s grace.  Yet, lest we should ignore Niebuhr, we should reflect on what a huge theological grip he has on the church.  Every Sunday, the church gathers for worship.  In worship, we remember the biblical story, proclaim the gospel of God, pray, share Eucharist, and offer our gifts.  Yet, even as we participate in worship, we often see worship through Niebuhr’s eyes:

~  “It sure is nice to gather around the Lord ’s Table with the poor, but in the real world we can’t expect the rich and the poor to eat together.”

~ “It sure is nice to pray for our enemies, but in the real world we can’t expect people to show love to their adversaries.”

~  “It sure is nice to proclaim God’s peace, but in the real world war is necessary in order for our nation to be secure and for justice to carried out.”

Sound familiar?  The point is that we often treat worship as an hour on Sunday when we come together to dream about an ideal world – a world where everyone has a place at the table, where all people love one another, and where there is peace.  But when we dismiss, we know that we cannot expect any of that ‘worship stuff’ to have anything to do with the real world. 

In Chapter 3 of his book Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry, Will Willimon argues that, in her priestly role, the pastor plays an important part in putting to rest any notion that worship is less real than the “real-world:”

            Sometimes the church is accused of archaic escapism because we withdraw from the ‘real,’ everyday, workday world into the antique dream world of the church.  No.  The church withdraws from what the world calls ‘real’ in order to better discern the world as God intends – the new heaven and the new earth (Rev. 21:1) of which the church is the foretaste, a world more ‘real’ than what the world calls reality (80).

One of the chief roles of the pastor in leading worship is to enable the church to see that the church’s worship is the most important reality check that we could ever receive.  It is in the context of worship that we receive our identity, vocation, and empowerment for living.  As priest, the pastor mediates this reality to the church by pointing to God’s Kingdom through words, texts, actions, vestments, and other symbols.  The pastor is not there to reinforce the principles of the ‘real-world,’ rather she is there to proclaim/insist/demand that the church understand that it is when we are in worship that we are most real, most human, most alive.

The good news of Jesus Christ is that there is no distinction between reality and the ideal.  The ideal is real:  Christ took on flesh and pitched tent among us (John 1:14).  Worship is our proclamation that the risen Christ is more real than our sin.  Because of this, pastors can “get real” and refuse to buy into idealistic visions of worship.  Worship is the heart of reality.

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Offer Them Christ

by Chad Holtz

In a week I will be attending Holston’s Annual Conference where our theme will be  ”Offer Them Christ.”   While reading through this third chapter, The Pastor as Priest, I was glad that I remembered to read the footnotes.  Willimon tells how young, eager preachers would return to John Wesley enthusiastic about the news they had to share.   Their meetings were gaining in number, people were receiving their sermons well and there seemed to be a spiritual high among those gathered.  Wesley, Willimon says, loved to then ask, “But did you offer Christ?”  Willimon concludes, “Our great vocation as preachers is not to offer rules for better living, helpful hints for homemakers, or guidelines for self-esteem.  We are to help the church be with God” (fn. 8, pg. 328, emphasis mine).  

In an increasingly mobile society the task of the pastor to call people to live in a distinctively Christian way, one that loosens their attachments to the idols of our culture, needs special attention (79).  A primary role of the pastor is to be a leader of worship.  Someone must take the responsibility of teaching people about true reality – God’s reality – the reality they entered into by virtue of their baptism.   In a world that has no shortage of images telling us who we are, what we are and what it means to be human, worship on the Lord’s Day is of vital importance.   The pastor who leads worship well helps the church to see all of life as sacramental, to learn how to be with God not just on Sunday but on their Tuesday lunch break.   The pastor, as many of our professors at Duke Divinity are fond of saying (Richard Hays, Sam Wells, to name just two), has the task as worship leader of  ”reshaping imaginations.”    

This is a task that can only be done if we are offering Christ, for it is Christ alone that can reshape worlds.  Therefore, the pastor must reclaim the uniquely religious quality of worship within the church.   We must not forsake the mystery, the icons, the symbols and the liturgy of our worship as a means to be more accommodating to the culture.  I am thinking of a particular church that has removed all the crosses from her sanctuary and grounds for fear of offending someone.   This is an example of a pastor who has failed to be a priest.  

Willimon does a masterful job of weaving in the various movements of worship: Gathering the people, sharing the story of God, listening to the Word, praying, offering gifts, doxology, and host at the Table to name a few.  I wonder if Willimon was thinking of the Shape of the Liturgy made famous by Dom Gregory Dix.   Table fellowship, or Eucharist, is the central act of our weekly worship, as well it should be.  Gregory Dix proposes four ways for us to think of this sacrament which I think are helpful for us to consider while we function as priests.  

 

• First, the priest takes the bread and the wine.   Jesus takes whatever we bring to him at the Table.  He receives it with thanksgiving and joy.   All our joys, desires, concerns, burdens, sins, hurts, regrets, loves, idols, passions, and possessions are received here in this moment.    
• Second, the priest blesses the bread and the wine.   In the same way, Jesus gives thanks over and blesses the gifts we bring.  Can any of us imagine Jesus saying, “What? Only 2 fish?”  No.   Jesus lifts our offerings, regardless of what they are, up to the Father in heaven and gives thanks.
• Third, the priest breaks the bread.   What we bring to Jesus is never the same once it is entrusted to his care.   Jesus breaks those things we turn over and transforms them.   In this way our imaginations are reshaped, reformed, transformed.  We are made into new creatures with new eyes when we come to the Lord’s Table.
• Finally, the priest then offers the bread and wine to the people.  Our transformed lives are turned over to us to share with the world.  What we receive at the Table we are commissioned to go and give to all the world.    What Christ has taken, blessed, broken and returned is not our own but a gift to share.  

I think Willimon would agree that the above shape of the liturgy is one of perhaps many ways we can make our worship uniquely Christian.   It is how we as priests can be sure we are offering them Christ each and every Sunday. 

 

 

 

Ministry for the 21st Century: Images of the Pastor (Chapter Two of Pastor)

We would love to hear your feedback on this chapter (and the others).  This is chapter two of Willimon’s book, Pastor: The Theology, and Practice of Ordained Ministry.

Celebrating the Emerging Tapestry of Pastoral Vocation

by Chad Holtz

One of the first great pastors of the Church, while chained in a prison cell, penned these words:

Some proclaim Christ from envy and rivalry, but others from goodwill.  These proclaim Christ out of love, knowing that I have been put here for the defense of the gospel; the others proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely but intending to increase my suffering in my imprisonment.  What does it matter?  Just this, that Christ is proclaimed in every way, whether out of false motives or true; and in that I rejoice.  (Philippians 1:15-18)

I was reminded of these words by St. Paul while reading the second chapter of Pastor, where Willimon explores the various images of the pastor.  Willimon recounts the strengths of Gregory and Basil, the great Cappadocian fathers, noting how Gregory championed the orthodox cause through skilled preaching, often lamenting the distractions of politics, whereas Basil flourished under the political pressures of the day and brought about much needed reform through his community activism.  His point in all of this is to remind us that the church has a rich history of patterns for pastoral leadership (70).  In addition to the images of preacher, political negotiator and resident activist that Gregory and Basil embodied, Willimon also cites media mogul, therapist, manager, and servant as some of the more dominating images of the pastor today.  In each of these there are, of course, positives and negatives.  There is always the risk of over compensating in one area or devaluing another.  Not to mention, there are new images of the pastor not mentioned here or yet to be realized since pastoral leadership, at its best, arises out of the needs of the community to which the pastor is rooted (see Acts 6, for example, where the church was fluid and willing to adapt new leadership models as needs arose).   So while there is no normative style or focus for pastoral work, there are some helpful guardrails Willimon thinks are worth noting.

1 – Pastoral work should be intentionally countercultural.   Pastors need to first disabuse themselves and then their congregations of the notion that we live in a Christian culture.  For far too long our churches have been functionaries in baptizing people into becoming good and decent citizens rather than disciples of a radical, crucified Lord – a Lord who stands over and against all cultures and kingdoms, including that of the church.   Pastors ought to be or become good readers of their culture so that we can, when necessary, call our congregations to, as St. John the Divine did so vividly, “Come out!”

2- Pastors must be educated in the classical forms of Christian ministry (71).  Willimon senses the end of “a proliferation of ministerial duties and a reclamation of the essential classical tasks of Christian ministry” (71).  These tasks include the ministry of Word, sacrament and order. This is vitally important for our present age because our people are not well formed in the faith.  As I said above, the church has been in the business for far too long of making good citizens, not good Christians.   This is evidenced by the fact that over 85% (on most polls) of Americans claim to be “Christian.”  What does that mean?  A mere cursory glance at our society testifies to the fact that 85% of Americans do not claim Jesus Christ as Lord.  Pastors of today face a great challenge if they take seriously their charge to go into the world and make disciples.

3- Finally, we need a continuing critical assessment of our present needs within each of our denominational families (71).   We need people who will ask the tough questions not only of our systems but of ourselves.   Is it time to sustain or a time to disrupt?  Is it a time to reconcile or a time to provoke?  Is it a time to manage or a time to lead?   Speaking of this last one, I heard in a recent lecture that churches say they desire leadership but they reward management.   By this the speaker meant that good management, or maintaining the status-quo (making people comfortable) is what tends to be rewarded.   Such are the “good” pastors.  Good, gospel-powered leadership, on the other hand, tends to get pastors replaced.

As a friend of the emergent church I was intrigued that Willimon thinks that our age today in some ways parallels that of the Reformation, in which, he says, “the church was faced with a vast undereducated, uninformed, unformed laity and clergy” (71).   Such language will no doubt remind some of our readers here of Phyllis Tickle’s latest book, The Great Emergence, in which she argues that every 500 years the Church undergoes some sort of reformation. She posits, much like Willimon, that we are in such an age today.  I tend to agree.

Recently there has been much debate over the usefulness of denominations and ordination, calling into question certain images of the pastor and forms of ministry.   You can read about some of that HERE and HERE.   Willimon reminds us that there have always been groups of people or churches who call into question institutional forms of ministry.   Geoffrey Wainwright has said that these groups have served as “a critical irritant in the history of Christianity” (49) and continue to judge and critique the “institutional sclerosis” of our larger communities of faith (what I take to mean denominations).    They remind us that leadership is a gift from God.    We should welcome such critiques.   They can keep us honest.   And hopefully, God willing, we can do the same for them.

We need each other.   I suggest we adopt a hermeneutic of suspicion towards any agenda, method, system, institution or image that claims normative status or declares all others “sinful.”   The kingdom of God is a diverse one.   As we navigate through this new reformation, this emerging church, I say that as long as we can take to heart the three guardrails detailed above then we should celebrate the rich tapestry that makes up our pastoral vocation and say along with Paul,  What does it matter?  Just this, that Christ is proclaimed in every way, whether out of false motives or true; and in that I rejoice.

Atheistic Images of Pastor

by Thomas Parkinson

“You can be an atheist and lead a church in America today.”  These words, spoken by one of my seminary professors, have initiated a lot of questions for me.  Why is it that the church, the body of Christ, the hands and feet of the incarnate God in the world, thinks it can get by without God?  Why is it that standards of good pastoral leadership include meeting the budget, filling the pews, and keeping everything organized, but make little or no mention of theological integrity or faithful proclamation of the gospel?  If the church is the church of God, then shouldn’t belief in God make a difference in how pastors lead the church?

As Will Willimon argues in the second chapter of Pastors: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry, the reason why pastoral leadership has become (in some cases) atheistic is because many have gone to the secular world to find images of what pastors should be.  And so, we think of the pastor as the “media mogul” who uses mass media to preach Christ, or as the therapist who seeks to meet the endless needs of a consumerist society, or as the manager who organizes “a complex volunteer organization” (57, 59, 61).  The problem with adopting such images for pastoral ministry, according to Willimon, is that they fail to reflect an adequate ecclesiology (57).  They are rooted not in the theological identity of the church, but in the shifting patterns of identity found in the secular world.  By thinking of the pastor as CEO, political activist, entrepreneur, or community organizer, we create a pastoral identity that has no place for God – pastors who reflect the status quo far more easily than the counter-cultural gospel of God.  The result is a church that looks a lot like any other social institution – just another voluntary organization amongst many that consumers can choose to associate with.  In short, such images create an atheistic church.

Seeking an image of pastor that is theologically rooted and appropriate for today’s context, Willimon offers the image of the missionary.  At the heart of the missionary image, for Willimon, is that the pastor is counter-cultural.  The missionary does not assume that her role is to “keep house in an essentially hospitable and receptive culture” (70).  The goal of the missionary pastor is not to build and develop the culture, but to establish an alternative culture – a community that is radically different than secular society.  Such a task requires significant emphasis on forming disciples.  The culture is not a prop for the church – people do not come to the church as Christians, they must be formed into the Christ-way of living (71).  For Willimon, this means that pastors must return to the essential tasks of ministry – Word, Sacrament and Order – leaving behind the plethora of non-essential (though sometimes important) tasks heaped on pastors.  Finally, Willimon concludes that the missionary image enables pastors to approach ministry with a critical eye.  Ministry is not about assimilating people into an already redeemed American culture – it is about criticizing that culture through the cross and resurrection of Jesus (74).

Willimon’s suggestion of the missionary image for pastoral ministry is certainly not the only viable option for today.  But it is a vital image.  It builds on a firm ecclesiology.  It remembers that the church exists for the sake of God’s redemptive mission in the world.  The goal of the church is not to fill the pews, nor to offer the most creative programs, rather the goal of the church is to faithfully participate in God’s mission.  God is a missionary God, and so the pastoral image of the missionary arises out of God’s nature.  There’s nothing atheistic about that!

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David and Goliath: The Story They Didn’t Tell Us

Below is the address I will be giving to the senior class of Fellowship of Christian Athletes in Oxford, NC.

It’s an honor to be with all of you this afternoon.  Ever since I met Brian I have been looking forward to the opportunity to speak at one of your events and what a privilege it is to get what I guess is the last word before some of you graduate and all of you head into summer break.

I have been watching the NBA playoffs these past few weeks.   No matter what your favorite team or player is, it is hard to not admire greatness when you see it on the court or in any sport.    It’s been fun to watch Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard and Lebron James go at it.   In the last few weeks Spike Lee put out a documentary on Kobe called, “Doin’ Work.”  This film followed Kobe through an entire game while he gave commentary.  Whether you like Kobe or not, you have to admit that he has a great deal of passion for the game.   He loves the game of basketball.  I am always drawn to people who have passion in their lives – doesn’t really matter what it is for.   Passionate people, people who have dreams, are a lot more fun to be around than apathetic, or unconcerned, unenthusiastic people.  It’s one of the reasons I looked forward to being with you all today.  As athletes, I assume you have some passion about something other than yourselves.  That’s to be commended.

I graduated from high school in 1992.  I was passionate about many things then, and I must confess that God didn’t always make the top of the list.  In fact, there were times God wasn’t even on the list.  Since I was a pastor’s kid I have no doubt that there were people back then who looked at me and thought “What a lost cause.  Just another renegade pastor’s kid gone wild.”  Maybe some of you have felt that way at one time or another, like you can never measure up.   Fortunately, there are no lost causes with God.   People who knew me in high school are amazed to hear that I am now a pastor.  What people are going to be amazed by you in a few years time?

I am reminded of a story in the Bible about a kid named David.   David was considered a lost cause when he was your age.  He was just a simple sheep herder and even worse, the youngest of 8 brothers, which meant he had little prospect of becoming anyone of value in his society.   David was the kid always picked last for dodge ball.  He never made varsity.   He always rode the bench.

Now the first real look we get of this boy David is when he faces off with this giant named Goliath.  You have heard this story before.   I don’t know if Sunday school teachers were still doing this when you all were in elementary school, but before there was power point or erasable marker boards or twitter we had green flannel boards.  Anyone ever seen one of these relics?  Our teacher would put this large board on the table with green felt stapled to it.  From a tupperware container she would pull out these figures cut from cloth that would represent all the characters of the story and she would arrange them on the flannel board.  Goliath was the great big one who stood all the way to the right side of the board and because he required more cloth than anyone else his head always seemed to droop down.  Then a little skinny boy would be placed to his left and you would notice immediately that if this were a true-to-life scale then Goliath was 120 feet tall and David was maybe a whole 2 feet, an unfortunate size for any sheep herder to be.
As you’ll recall, the story is simple.  The flannel board David was checking on his older brothers who were at war with the Philistines.   He would bring them food and news from home.  One day when he arrived he witnessed everyone running from this large giant named Goliath.  This giant has challenged the Israelites to a one on one duel.  David volunteers to be that guy, his brothers mock him, the king tells him he is just a boy, and yet David persists.   So King Saul says, “Fine, it’s your life,” and dresses him in his own armor but David is too weak to carry it.  So flannel board David steps onto the green board with nothing but a pair of shorts, which oddly enough looked like Jams (who knew they had those in ancient Israel?), and he is carrying not a sword but a sling.   Then the teacher would sling a flannel stone at Goliath, hitting him in the head, and giant flannel Goliath, whose head was already drooping, would fall down and David, brandishing a flannel sword would cut off the weak-necked head of Goliath.   And if your Sunday school teacher was really creative (or sadistic), she would take a pair of scissors to Goliath’s flannel head and let you all pass it around the table.  Man, and you think video games today are violent?  We had flannel board wars!

This is the story you have no doubt heard many times.   But there is a catch.  You were all told that David did this heroic deed because he was a man after God’s own heart and knew that victory was on his side, were you not?  He comes onto the green board and thunders, “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?!”  Wow.  What a great, Braveheart-like moment.  David, it would seem, was wonder boy, a boy we could call a hero and dreamed to be like but wondered if we really could. Even in his flannel Jams, David was somehow out of our league.

But that is not the whole story.  You weren’t told the whole truth behind this tale.  This afternoon I want to clue you in on a secret – the story behind the flannel board.  You can check it out for yourself by reading 1 Samuel 17.  Allow me to set the stage for you.  The armies of Israel and the armies of the Philistines are at a standstill, each on a mountain facing the other with a valley separating them.  Each day Goliath has been taunting them, coming out to the valley and challenging one of the Israelites to a duel. Winner take all.  Now, we are told in the story that David has been running errands for Saul, the king of Israel, and going back and forth from the army camps to his father Jesse to tend the sheep.  All of this is going on while every day for 40 days Goliath came out and made his challenge.  One particular day, David’s father asks him to go into the ranks of soldiers to find his brothers, take them food and report back to him how they are doing.  Now, David is well aware of this Goliath already – for 40 days he has been making his challenge and all the while David has been Saul’s gopher boy.  So, you might be asking, why didn’t this brave boy David, the man after God’s own heart, take care of Goliath on day one rather than allow this to drag on for 40 days?  Well, the story continues.  David delivers the food to his brothers and while in the midst of the ranks of men, Goliath comes out to make his daily challenge.  Now, after he does this, the text tells us that all the Israelites fled and were very much afraid – all would include David, of course.

While David is shaking in his Jams along with everybody else he is able to overhear the talk among Israel’s soldiers.  Picture this with me.  Soldiers scared, huddled together, whispering.  David leaning in so that he can hear a bit better, to get a feel for what is going on so he can run home and report to his father Jesse.  Then one of the soldiers says, “Who is this guy?  Surely he has come to defy Israel!”  And then he says something important that David did not know.  “The king will greatly enrich the man who kills him, and will give him his daughter and make his family free in Israel.”   Hmmm.  Can you picture David as he hears this little gem?  See his ears perk up?  David is just a poor sheep herder.  Youngest of 8 brothers.  No prospects of ever becoming anything great but now he hears something that ignites a dream, a passion, in his heart.  Riches?  The king’s daughter?  I’ve seen her – she’s beautiful.  Freedom for all my family?

David asks for all of this to be verified.  He asks, “What shall be done for the person who kills this Philistine?”  It’s confirmed.  I can imagine David thinking to himself, this is my big chance.  I could have everything I ever dreamed of.  No more riding the bench for me.  It is then, not on day one when he first heard Goliath’s challenge, but after 40 days of hearing it and only after learning of the king’s reward, only after having a dream and a passion ignited in his own heart, that David finally musters up the courage to thunder, “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?!”

Can you see it?  It took a dream to ignite a flame under David to get things moving.  David was not some wonder boy who from the very beginning was filled with courage, bravery and a heart after God’s own.   He was really not so different from you and I.  He’s just a kid who had a dream of something bigger and better for his life and the life of his family.   Now, as he matured, so did his desires.   As he walked with God, David learned that if we delight in the Lord, if we pursue God with all our being, then the desires of our hearts will become God’s desires.  But without some desire, without some dream, without some passion, the Goliaths of the world will knock us off our flannel boards every time.

I don’t know what dreams or passions each of you have.  They may not be the noblest; they may be simple ones like David to just have a better life, get the girl and ride off into the sunset.  They may include getting into college or just out of high school.  Whatever your dream is as you embark on this next stage of your life, go after it with the tenacity of David.  Understand that Goliaths will stand in your way but as you walk with God, you can and will be victorious.  Stand up to the challenges with courage and say to the world, “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?!”   David was just a boy who grew over time to become a mighty instrument of God, a man after God’s own heart.  But he started out with just a simple dream.  What dream will sustain you through the upcoming years and the Goliaths you will face?  I hope the thing you hold close is the knowledge that the God who has brought you this far is going with you even now, in fact, is going on before you, preparing the way, and that the plans he has in store for you are plans not for your harm, but will prosper you and give you life.

You have a big, blank, green flannel board before you.  What story are you going to write?  Go and dream big.  To God be the glory.

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Ordination: Why Pastors? (Chapter One of Pastor)

Chapter One of William Willimon’s book, Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry.  

The Function of Ordination 

by Thomas Parkinson 

Ever since the beginning of the Reformation, the place and necessity of ordination has been up for debate in the Protestant church.  Prior to the Reformation, ordination was a sacrament, an operative sign of God’s grace.  The ordained clergy were, by virtue of their ordination, recipients of a different and more sacred ontological identity – more sacred, it seems, than baptism.  Ordination was absolute, stamping a new character upon the ordained regardless of whether he (always he) was actually tied to a local church community.

The Reformer’s, particularly Martin Luther, rightly sensed that this understanding of ordination elevated clergy to a position of greater worth and potential for the church’s ministry than the laity.  The ordained could perform the ministerial task apart from the presence or participation of the laity.  Hence, priests would often conduct mass in private, without even the presence of the laity.    

As Willimon argues in chapter 1 of Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry, the sacerdotal understanding of ordination is an invention of the Fourth Lateran Council, and has little to do with the early church’s understanding of ordination.  Following the liturgy for the ordination of a bishop recorded in Hippolytus’ Apostolic Tradition (the oldest account of an ordination service), Willimon argues quite convincingly that there is no ordination apart from the laity – the baptized. 

Building on Luther’s doctrine of the priesthood of all believers, Willimon asserts that baptism is the sacrament that stamps a new ontological identity on individuals.  Upon receiving the grace of baptism, all Christians are called to live into their baptismal vocation.  All the baptized are called into ministry.  Ordination, then, serves a functional purpose.  Its function is to call forth from among the baptized some to provide leadership to the church’s ministry.  To say that ordination is functional is at the same time to say that it is not ontological.  The identity of the ordained is in their baptism, just as it is for all Christians.  Ordination does not change one’s identity, it changes one’s function.

In this way Willimon avoids any theology of ordination that fails to take seriously the priesthood of all believers.  Ordination arises, not out of some special ontological status, but out of the needs of the community.  There is no ministry of the ordained apart from the ministry of the baptized.  And so, Willimon speaks of the ordained as those who serve as “priests to the priests.”  They preach to the baptized so that the baptized might preach to the world.  They serve the baptized, so the baptized might serve the world, etc.

This theology of ordination is a striking condemnation on the current state of the church.  If the function of ordination is to serve the ministry of the baptized by equipping and empowering them for ministry, then one has to say that the ordained have not been serving their function.  As Chad has said in a previous post, the pastors most important job is to work herself out of a job.  Such an understanding of ordination challenges the pastoral ego – it fully establishes that ordained leadership is secondary and subservient to the ministry of the baptized.  The best way to measure the effectiveness of the ordained is to evaluate the ministry of the baptized.  If the ministry of the baptized is not being served, empowered, promoted, and nurtured by the ordained, then ordained ministry has failed.  

Baptism is a once for all declaration of God that changes one’s ontological status.  It can never be revoked.  Ordination, however, is functional, and if an ordained minister fails in her function, then ordination can be removed.  Look out!  That’s sounds like good logic for getting rid of guaranteed appointments!

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The Peculiarity of Ordination

by Chad Holtz

Gregory the Great, pope from 590 until his death and one whom John Calvin considered the last great pope, designated pastors as servus servorum Dei, that is, servants of the servants of God.  A pastor is one who “takes care of God’s church” (1 Tim. 3:5) and therefore, her significance is derived not from any ontological status bestowed upon them by a bishop but “The significance of pastors is derived from what needs to happen among the ministers” (36).  In this way, ordination is about functionality, not status.  It is about affirming that in Christ’s church all are priests, and lest we think this means each one of us is our own priest, Willimon reminds us that the doctrine of the priesthood of  believers means “each person is a priest to his or her neighbor, one who shares in Christ’s priesthood to the world” (44).  Therefore, the question is never “Am I called to ministry?” but “To which ministry am I called?”  The man or woman who feels that call is the pastoral ministry will “assume the burdens of guidance, teaching, correction, care and community concern in a way that edifies and calls forth the ministry of all Christians” (49).

From the earliest moments of the church leadership was essential.  After the ascension of Jesus the very first task the first disciples undertake, before anything else, is select from among them one to replace Judas.  It had to be someone who could be a witness, along with the eleven, to the resurrection of Christ (Acts 1:22).  The function, from very early on, was to bear witness, to know, and to tell faithfully a story that was not their own, but a gift.  The lot fell on Matthias, affirming to the saints gathered that Christ, while not physically present was nevertheless presiding, and ever since that day God has seen fit to let the lot fall on another among the ranks of the baptized, to be one who bears witness to the story of the Church’s faith in service to the servants of God.  Willimon writes, “Leadership in this community is not due to the natural attributes of those who lead, nor primarily due to the adulation of those who follow, but rather due to the gift of Christ who condescends to be present in the lives and deeds of those on whom he bestows this task” (35).  

So why ordination?  Why does the church bother with such rites?  Indeed, Ulrich Zwingli called ordination a “human invention” and many people in our churches today have taken up his baton, even going so far as to mock the whole thing by devising online ordination petitions or reducing it to a mere mail-order program.   With so many easy paths available to become a pastor why do I stay in the United Methodist Church where it takes years, requires so much of my time, energy and not to mention money, while at the same time places me at the mercy of  my own church as well as local and regional boards?   Allow me to answer this by first asking another question, one that Willimon asks.  Willimon expects the perennial issue before the church is not if we shall have some from among the baptized who exercise leadership but rather, how will their exercise of leadership be peculiarly Christian?  

And so I have to ask myself, as one who feels called to be a servant of God’s servants, how will my preparation for and installation into this calling be peculiarly Christian?   We live in a world, at least here in the West, where we are told immediate satisfaction is preferred over delayed gratification, where the easiest, fastest, cheapest road is the high road, and where autonomy is our greatest virtue.  Bottom line:  It’s all about me.   But there is another story being told.  It is a peculiar thing indeed to invest as much time and effort and money into becoming a servant of the servants of God when the same could be spent to become a doctor, earning a far better return (at least by the world’s standards).  It is a peculiar thing to choose a vocation that requires an endorsement and affirmation from a community that extends beyond just my own inner desires and feelings.  It is a peculiar thing to confess that we do this not because we choose to do this but because we feel called to do this. It is a peculiar thing to be commissioned for this task not because we passed a test or an interview but because we knelt before a group of peers who laid hands upon us and prayed that the Holy Spirit empower us for service in ministry.  

Becoming a servant of a crucified Lord is a peculiar identity for any of us to hold.  Becoming a servant to servants of this Lord is a peculiar vocation for any of us to take on.  Ordination is that peculiar service of the church that sets peculiar people apart for a peculiar task.  If it is an “invention of humans” I would call it a necessary one ; one in which the people of God, if only for a moment, are reminded that the Church is still casting lots, people are still answering the call, and Christ is still presiding.  

 

Pentecost Reading

Members of Christian Century have done some great work writing for Pentecost. Below are links to those members who have written something special. Dancing on Saturday is featured as well. Thanks to Gordon Atkinson for putting all these together. Come, Holy Spirit, Come.  

When Love Comes to Town – "Pentecost, Peace, and Grace."

Theolog – Donna Schaper writes about a double miracle.

I-YOUniverse – John Hamilton confesses that the Holy Spirit resides in his heart but not in his mouth.

Reflectionary – Martha Hoverson is asked to do a funeral the week before Pentecost .

Don’t Eat Alone – Milton Brasher-Cunningham offers us a Pentecost poem .

Welcoming Spirit – Paula Jenkins struggles to understand the nature of the Holy Spirit.

Just Words – Ed Sunday-Winters reflects on the age of the Church. Almost 2000 years old, and yet Pentecost reminds us that the present experience of the Spirit is the locus of our power.

Unorthodoxology – David Henson: "I wonder if they still continue to speak in the tongues of men and of angels, because that is the only language they now understand."

Life and Faith – Ernesto Tinajero remembers a seminary professor who called the Holy Spirit, "Holy Breath."

Everyday Liturgy – Thomas Turner: "The Holy Spirit is more than a placeholder to complete the Trinity."

Where the Wind – Fiction by Adam Thomas: Davies writes a paper on the Holy Spirit.

Grounded and Rooted in Love – A Pentecost sermon.

Seeking Authentic Voice – Terri Pilarski reflects on Pentecost having grown up in a non-liturgical tradition.

Eclectic Faith – Christopher Keel reflects on Pentecost having been raised a Pentecostal.

Faith in Community – Diane Roth: Remembering Azusa Street.

I Thirst – Mark Hogg remembers Pentecost 2001.

Dancing on Saturday – Chad Holtz: Pentecost and the Ethiopian gospel choir.”