Theology for the Masses

Total Pages: 3834

Total Pages Read: 3047

Total Reading Percentage: 79%

I actually did most of my reading this semester.  My TRP is hindered mostly by two source books which contain a great many more pages than were assigned.  The only book that I really skimped on was Redeeming the Routines.  I just did not have the time/gumption quotient high enough.

The majority of the books were excellent.  There were a some with whom I disagreed (looking at you, Moreland).  Sourcebooks will be sourcebooks.  Some were even from the Reformed side of things.

I’ll try, in the coming week, to give feedback on most of the works shown above and listed below.

1. Redeeming the Routines: Bringing Theology to Life by Robert Banks
2. Documents of the Christian Church by Henry Bettenson
3. To Know and Love God: Method for Theology (Foundations of Evangelical Theology) by David K. Clark
4. Character of Theology, The: An Introduction to Its Nature, Task, and Purpose by John Franke
5. The Story of Christianity, Volume 1: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation (Story of Christianity) by Justo L. Gonzalez
6. Beyond Foundationalism: Shaping Theology in a Postmodern Context by Stanley J. Grenz
7. Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony by Stanley Hauerwas
8. History of the World Christian Movement: Earliest Christianity to 1453 by Dale T. Irvin
9. The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity by Philip Jenkins
10. Readings in Christian Thought by Hugh T. Kerr
11. Kingdom Triangle: Recover the Christian Mind, Renovate the Soul, Restore the Spirit’s Power by J. P. Moreland
12. Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible by M. Daniel Carroll R.
13. Naming the Elephant: Worldview As a Concept by James W. Sire
14. Kingdom, Church, and World: Biblical Themes for Today by Howard A. Snyder
15. Models of the Kingdom by Howard A. Snyder
16. Kingdom Come: How Jesus Wants to Change the World by Allen Mitsuo Wakabayashi

In one possible scenario of the world to come, an incredibly wealthy although numerically shrinking Northern population expouses the values of humanizm, ornamented with the vestiges of liberal Christianity and Judaism.  Meanwhile, this future North confronts the poorer and vastly more numerous global masses who wave the flags not of red revolution, but of ascendant Christianity and Islam. 

Although this sounds not unlike the racial nightmares of the Cold War years, one crucial difference is that the have-nots will be inspired by the scriptures and the language of apocalyptic, rather than by the texts of Marx and Mao.  In this world, we, the West, will be the final Babylon.

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From The Next Christendom by Jenkins.

Following is the text of my first sermon at Beavercreek Nazarene.  I used a lot of visual media to communicate along with what I said; some of it was not available here.  I’d appreciate your constructive criticism.  The audio is available here.

What does it mean to give?

Begin with the story of the Rich and Poor brothers.

King is very generous.

• Poor brother offers the Turnip because he recognizes that were it not for the King, he would not have this crop. It’s all he can do. Because of this, the king gives him gold and land.
• Rich brother sees this and offers the king his best horse and a gift of gold. He says it is because the King is generous and rewards his faithful subjects. King recognizes his selfishness and offers him the Turnip.
• Rich brother is put off, but King explains that the Turnip cost him much gold and a fine estate. Surely the rich brother could not think of a finer, more costly gift than this Turnip?
• The Rich brother is forced to take the Turnip and leave.

Why do we like this story? What about it seems right?

We like that the poor brother (who gives a gift of himself, even though no one really wants it) is given wealth because he gave honestly, while the rich brother (who gives a gift anyone would want but it’s disingenuous) gets nothing. I think we connect to the idea that it’s the attitude of the giver, not the quality of the gift that matters the most. But all too often, we give as the Rich brother. We don’t give out of a sense of gratitude or generosity; too often, we only give when it’s convenient for us, when it doesn’t hurt too much, or when we want something out of it. But the reason we take time when we gather for worship to gather up money is that we believe that God is the giver of all good gifts. And he gives to us so that we might have the ability to give in imitation of him. So please use this time to imitate the God we serve: practice giving your Self to each other by greeting those who have gathered here with you, and practice being a giver of good gifts by leaving your offering in the plates.

Offering

Talk: Earth

Introduce myself (Adjusting to OH – Float trips, Festivals every day, Sweetest Day)

Heaven recap

Wrong thinking about Heaven (it’s a far off cloud-and-harp type place) corrected (it’s the space where God dwells, it breaks into our reality)

Wrong thinking about Earth and bodies (it’s expendable and doesn’t matter OR a form of nature worship – elevating nature above even human life). And those of us in the middle still have a lot of different attitudes towards the created world. Some of us think we’re entitled to the world, that it’s ours to use and abuse however we want, without a second thought. Some of us are proud of how hard we’ve worked, and we feel that what we have is ours because we’ve earned it. And maybe a few of us look at what we have as a beautiful and precious gift from God. Today I want to explore the nature of the Created World – Mother Nature, the Earth, whatever – and I want to ask why we should care about it. In our time together today, I hope that we can learn to pray along with the famous theologian of the 1980s, Belinda Carlisle, “Ooo baby, do you know what that’s worth? Ooo, Heaven is a place on Earth.” Are you ready?

I think one of the most profound statements of humankind and our relationship to the Earth is found in Genesis 2:15 – “The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.” Right here, we see that God expects us to be caretakers of the Earth, that part of what it means to be fully human – to be human the way God created us to be human – is this obligation to garden.

To till and keep the Earth.

To find the weeds and pull them up.

It seems that – according to the Scriptures – we were made to be gardeners in God’s garden. That God designed us with the capacity and ability to create great beauty.

In fact, according to Genesis 1, God gave us the whole blue ball. Remember what God said to us in the beginning: ” So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.’” The Scriptures tell us that God gave us the whole world, garden and all.

Of course, if you know the story, it didn’t take us long to ruin it. We chose the fruit of the wrong tree and we were exiled from God’s presence. And God told us that the ground was cursed because of our choice. That thorns and thistles – weeds – would grow up when we tried to work the land.

Some gardeners we turned out to be. Instead of cultivating life, we cultivate death.

So it’s on this Earth, full of all the weeds of the worst kinds, that Jesus taught us to pray, “May your kingdom come on this Earth, and your will be done here as it is done in Heaven.” Because it’s pretty easy to look around and see that God’s will is most certainly not done here. At least not yet.

(“Your Love is Strong” recording + pictures)

So what do we do with images like these (most powerful images: the meadow/wasteland, the bride/homeless woman, sell yourself to buy the one you love/prostitute)? As a people who have dedicated ourselves to following Jesus, and to praying as he prays, what is our obligation to the Earth? What does it look like to do God’s will on Earth as it is done in Heaven?

Let’s start out with Psalm 24:1-4: “The earth is the LORD’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it; for he has founded it on the seas, and established it on the rivers. Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD? And who shall stand in his holy place? Those who have clean hands and pure hearts, who do not lift up their souls to what is false, and do not swear deceitfully.“

Did any of you catch the odd shift in thought there? Have you ever been in a situation where you’re talking to someone, and then they switch subjects without telling you? One minute, you’re tracking perfectly well with your conversation partner, and in the next moment you’ll realize you’re on two totally different pages. I do this to my wife all the time – we’ll be talking about how much fun we had at dinner yesterday, which will make me think about how we need to go buy dinner stuff for the upcoming week, and so I’ll say something like this:

“Man, I really loved getting to hang out with Don and Val at dinner yesterday. We need to hang out with them more!” She’ll agree and ask when we should hang out with them again, and then I – now thinking about tomorrow’s dinner – will respond, “I think we need more roast beef.” Does anyone else suffer from this particular ailment?

Why does that happen? When there’s that sort of cognitive jump, I perceive A –> B –> C. But because I don’t voice B, Amanda only hears A –> C, and because that’s not a natural connection, I lose her and get a confused look. And that’s because there’s an unspoken connection that I perceived that she didn’t. And if you’re not clued into that unspoken connection, you’re probably not going to make the conversational jump in the thought flow.

That’s what’s happening here in Psalm 24. The author exclaims, “The Earth is Yahweh’s, and everything in it!” And then he goes on to lecture us about living rightly. Imagine that we’re walking in the woods together, and I point out a stream by saying, “Man, look at that gorgeous river that God made!”

I took this as we were walking in a forest outside Yellow Springs, OH.

Then I look at you and say, “While I’m thinking about it, don’t kill people.” You’d wonder what you’d missed, what unspoken connection between “God made the river” and “Don’t kill people” you missed, and that’s exactly what I wonder when I read this Psalm. What connection does the Psalmist see between creation and moral action? What am I missing here?

Paul helps us understand what’s going on in his letter to the Romans. We’re jumping into the middle of the part where Paul is demonstrating his conviction that every person has access to the character and nature of God, and therefore that every person can know who God is. Read with me, if you will, 1:19-23.

“For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. So they are without excuse; for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him… and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.” (1:19-23)

Hear Paul’s words: “What can be known about God is plain to them. The ‘them’ in question here is pagans, non-Jews, people groups who live outside the covenant, who do not have access to the Scriptures. And a lot of people today use these verses to argue against atheists, to say, “Well, just look around you. Nature proves that God must exist.” But in the first century, everyone believed in some sort of God; in fact, guys like Paul were considered the ‘atheists’ because they didn’t believe in the Roman gods. So if Paul’s not arguing for the existence of a god, what is he arguing? Paul assumes you already believe in some kind of god. He is arguing, then, that creation reveals the character and nature of Yahweh, the god of Israel. According to Paul, all things that exist, exist to reveal God’s glory, God’s love, God’s character to us so that we might be pointed back to God himself and give thanks.

According to Paul, creation is one big gift to us from God, and he gave it to us so that we can know who he is better. Listen to his speech to the Athenians on Mars Hill in Acts 17:24-28: “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things… God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’”

What do I mean? Consider for a moment this question: why does food taste so good? Food could taste like dirt and we’d still eat it if it meant the difference between life and death (that’s the only reason I can figure out that people eat broccoli). Why is it when I bite into a medium-rare steak, I am immediately convince that God exists, that he loves me and that I my mouth has been transported to the very Throne Room of that God? According to Paul, it’s because God wants us to taste and see that He is a giver of good gifts. Delicious food is meant to teach us that God loves us and that he is worthy of our worship (that’s why cooking steak well-done is a Sin). The created world – trees, rocks, dogs, food, drink, even our own bodies, everything that exists points back to God and his character.

At some level, we already know this. In the Church, we have Sacraments – Baptism and Communion – that are physical pointers to spiritual realities. When we baptize, we represent that you are dying to yourself and being raised by Jesus into his new life within the Church. When we break bread together, we are remembering that Jesus was broken for us, and that we are to imitate him by breaking ourselves open for those around us. We celebrate marriage as an Earthly picture of the relationship that exists between God and the Church.

But Paul goes further than a few Sacraments. According to Paul, the whole Earth is filled with signs and pointers to God and his nature – his love, his mercy, his justice, his holiness. According to Paul, every created thing is a Sacrament. Paul thinks that the Created world is a good enough sermon to convict you of sin, to teach you about who God is and your need for him. According to Paul, even you – a person created in the very image of God – are meant to be a Sacrament.

So let’s review what the Scriptures tell us: If Psalm 24 tells us that the Earth and everything in it belongs to God, Genesis 1-2 tells us that God gave us the Earth. It is his gift to us.

Why?

According to Paul, he gave us the Earth so that we might know what kind of God he is. That we would know that he loves us by giving us good, beautiful gifts. And that we would know that we were created to be grateful, generous imitations, images of that Creator.

So let’s bring it back to today. Is Earth today a place where God’s goodness, God’s holiness is known? A few weeks ago, I was in New York City for my brother’s wedding. And we were walking to the Staten Island Ferry to cross over onto Manhattan Island. We were walking past the shoreline and I looked over. This is what I saw:

I took this as I was walking towards the Staten Island Ferry

I immediately thought to myself, “Is this what God had in mind when he so lovingly and carefully crafted this shoreline?”

And then I thought, “I wonder if it’s hard for people who walk by this every day to believe in a God who gave us a good world to inhabit?”

Wouldn’t you agree that it’s hard to know that God is good if you’re one of the 2 billion persons in the world who lives on less than $2/day.

It’s hard to know that God is good if you’re one of 143 million orphans in the world, who don’t know what it means to have a loving Earthly mother or father.

It’s hard to know that God is good if you are suffering from disease. If you do not have a roof over your head. If you suffer from abuse or neglect.

It’s hard to know that God loves you if you constantly feel utterly alone and abandoned.

It’s hard to know that God loves you if you are the victim of violence.

It’s hard to know that God loves you if you live in a world that has been polluted by death and destruction. If you live in a world that bears the curse of Sin.

But we do. We all live in a fallen, broken, painful world. It’s full of all of those things we saw in the video and more. And in the midst of all of it, Jesus taught us to pray, “Our Father in Heaven, your Name is HOLY. Let your kingdom come to this world, and your will be done here the same as it’s done in Heaven.” See Jesus understood that there’s still a place where God’s will is done. It’s where God lives. But God does not live in Temples or Church Buildings. He lives in us.

When the Church comes together as the Body of Christ, something happens. Heaven explodes out onto the Earth. Because God is living in and among us. We are his body. And God is still looking for gardeners. He’s still looking for some people who will get down on their knees, find the weeds and pull them up by their roots. To eliminate them from God’s garden so that it may be beautiful again.

Weeds like poverty and hunger.

Weeds like pollution.

Weeds like abandonment, isolation and loneliness.

Weeds like violence and abuse.

Weeds like betrayal and divorce.

What does that look like in the Church? What does that mean for us who gather weekly to celebrate the Garden-maker? The short version is this: We have been given much. And we can understand it all as entitlement, earnings or gifts. What will you do with what you’ve been given?

<introduce Kia>

What will you do with what you’ve been given? Will you be ruthless in eliminating the weeds from God’s garden? What would it look like for our Church to pray together, “Father, your name is Holy. Let your kingdom come to this world, and your will be done here the same as it’s done in Heaven”? What would it look like for our church to be a place where Heaven is exploding out onto the Earth?

For starters, I think it’d look a lot like this:

<Be the Church video>

I was asked to prepare a call to worship for our Sunday EPIC gathering this last Sunday.  I read Ephesians 2

You were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient.  All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else.  But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  So then, remember that at one time you Outsiders by birth, remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.  But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.  For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us… that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it.  So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father.  So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God.

and then offered this prayer:

Our Father in Heaven, your name is holy. You are one God in three persons, Father, Son and Spirit. Three persons but never divided. One God, creator of Heaven and Earth and Father of each one of us. You created us in your image, holy and perfect and in perfect unity with you and with each other.

We recognize that it was our sin, our desire to become like You that divided us, that separated us from you and from each other. And we confess that we have been making war with you and with each other ever since Cain struck down his brother east of Eden. We have fought and scrapped and striven with one another in quests to build towers for ourselves that stretch up into your heaven.

We confess that we’ve never really quit trying to be gods. We tell ourselves that we are each masters of our own destiny, that we each chart our own courses through this life, as though our lives were our own and not good gifts from You. We take your blessings and call them rights, and we fight to defend them, so great is our sense of our own entitlement.

We confess that we are often so busy trying to be like You that we forget that You became one of us. That even in the midst of all our kingdom building, you came and taught us to pray that Your kingdom come and that Your will be done here on Earth even as it is in Heaven. We forget that you gave yourself over to our Sin and that we divided Your body, we poured out Your blood.

Teach us to remember what you purchased that day. Teach us to remember that even when we were dead and alone – separated in our sins, you bought us out of that Death by Your own sacrifice. Teach us to remember that through the blood of Jesus, you made peace with us – your enemies – and reconciled all things to yourself. Teach us to remember all of these things as we come to Your table this morning.

We do not come as doctors or mechanics. As lawyers or teachers. We do not come as mothers or fathers or children. We do not come as students or co-workers or soldiers. We do not come to Your table as workers and builders of our own kingdoms, not on this Day you called us to rest from our labors. No, we come to your table as humans, children made in our Father’s image. We come hungry and thirsty – hungry for the Bread of Life that is your Body, broken for us. Thirsty for the Living Water that is your blood poured out for our forgiveness. We come and sit at your feet and confess that we need you first and foremost, above all other treasures and trinkets in this world you created.

We come and sit at your table – together – and we remember that You have brought us all together and broken down all walls between us. We are the Church, and in us you have restored our unity and our communion – with You and with one another.

We offer our Selves to you now in the name of Jesus, who is our head and in whom by your Spirit you have drawn us all back to you.

**This is a story I told as a presentation of the Gospel at the MizzouBSU’s RealLife Thursday Night Live. I would be interested in your thoughts.**

If we can say anything at all about our culture, it’s that we love stories. Look at our movies, our television, our sports, our gossip (talk radio, celeb magazines, sometimes our ‘prayer requests’). We are captivated by the power of the Story. And so for just a few minutes tonight, I want to look at a story from the Gospel of John. It takes place the morning of Jesus’ resurrection, and involves Mary of Magdala, one of Jesus’ closest followers. She and a couple of Jesus’ disciples go to visit his Tomb and find it empty. The other disciples leave, and Mary stays, weeping. Here’s where we pick up:

But Mary stood outside the tomb weeping. As she wept, she knelt to look into the tomb and saw two angels sitting there, dressed in white, one at the head, the other at the foot of where Jesus’ body had been laid. They said to her, “Woman, why do you weep?” “They took my Master,” she said, “and I don’t know where they put him.” After she said this, she turned away and saw Jesus standing there. But she didn’t recognize him. Jesus spoke to her, “Woman, why do you weep? Who are you looking for?” She, thinking that he was the gardener, said, “Mister, if you took him, tell me where you put him so I can care for him.” Jesus said, “Mary.” Turning to face him, she said in Hebrew, “Rabboni!” meaning “Teacher!” Jesus said, “Don’t cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I ascend to my Father and your Father, my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went, telling the news to the disciples: “I saw the Master!” And she told them everything he said to her. — John 20:11-18

Why would Mary mistake Jesus for a gardener? Maybe it was still dark. Or perhaps we need to listen to the larger story, of which the Empty Tomb is the ending. I want to tell you God’s story as we have it in the Scriptures. Listen and see if you, too, can see what Mary saw.

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In the beginning, the Creator planted a beautiful garden. It was lush and fertile, overflowing with every kind of delicious fruit and vegetable imaginable, each one fully ripe, the flavors practically bursting through their skins before your teeth could break them. It was a perfect place. It was a wholesome place. It was a place where beauty was almost tangible, where you could see the health and perfection and wonder of the whole garden, just by looking around. And the Creator very much loved to take walks through his garden, to enjoy the subtle fragrances mixing together, shifting as he walked from one area to the next, to savor the sunlight as it played across the various plants, setting them on fire with reds and oranges or cooling them in deep blues and purples. As the Creator surveyed his garden, he sighed mightily, satisfied, and he said to himself, “This is good.”

It was so good, in fact, that the Creator wanted to share it beyond himself. And so he created the Man. How he loved those first days when the Man explored the garden, enjoying the sights and sounds and tastes and smells. One moment will forever hold a special place in his heart: He brought the Man to the center of the garden, where the trees were, those two trees. He stopped the Man there and said to him, ‘I have named you Adam because you are made of adamah, or dust. And just as I made this garden for us, I made you to take care of this garden with me. You will be my co-laborer, my gardener. You are going to work with me to keep this whole place beautiful.’ As the Man’s smile widened, the Creator turned to the trees to explain their nature to the Man: ‘Of all of the plants in this garden, these are the most important. One tree gives you life. You’ll live forever. This is tree I want to you eat from. I want you to experience life and this garden with me.’

‘And what of the Other?’ the Man asked.

‘The Other tree will give you the ability to choose your own way,’ said the Creator. ‘You will be able to decide your ways are better than my ways, that your plan for the Garden is better than mine. But you should know this: you cannot take care of the Garden without me. You are the gardener only because I am already gardening. You only know what to do because you have already seen me doing it.’

‘Hear me, Adam,’ the Creator said, ‘You can only eat from one of these trees. If you choose the Other tree, it means you’ll die. You can’t have life apart from me.’

I don’t know how many days passed between that conversation and Adam’s choice. I like to think that it was quite a while. I do know that the Creator made him a partner (but that’s a story for another time). I like to think that he and his partner were happy in the Garden with the Creator for a long time. And I don’t know why they chose what they did. I do know that eventually, Adam chose the Other tree. He chose to believe that his ideas were better than the Creator’s. That he could take care of the Garden on his own. And he died because of it. Oh not right away. No, actually, the rest of Adam’s long life was filled with the consequences of that fateful decision. I know he got to watch the beautiful Garden God had created consumed with violence and hatred and greed and all the other fruits that Other tree. And then, at the end of a long, hard and painful life, Adam and his wife, Eve, died. And they most certainly did not live happily ever after.

Now, as stories go, if that were the ending, it would make for a pretty depressing story, but also one that touches perhaps too closely to the truth of our lives. Because as Adam’s children, we all have made a habit of choosing that Other tree, of decided to go about life on our own, with little regard for the Creator’s desires for us and our world. To say it another way, we all think of ourselves as main characters in our own stories, rather than as characters in God’s story. And our world is proof of the truth of the Creator’s promise: our choice to tell our own stories has created a world that looks more like a grave than a garden. Adam’s legacy, our legacy, is death and destruction, not growth and goodness, not flourishing according to the Creator’s designs as he tells our stories. Our world of famine, rape, broken homes and broken hearts, of war and bloodshed, of children who die to young and old ignored and abused is a long way from that Garden, and we have lost the way back.

How fortunate for we sons of Adam and daughters of Eve that we were not left out here to wander in the dark and dead among the tombs! Because the Creator was not content to allow his children to destroy the world he’d created for them, nor to let them destroy themselves rather than live with him. Instead, God became human, one of us. And in doing so, he showed us what a rightly lived human life looks like. He showed us the Creator’s original plan for Adam.

He showed us a person who was more concerned about other people than himself. He showed us a person who gave his life over to the pursuit of Justice for all persons, not just those in power. And he showed us a person who did all of these things because he was first and foremost connected to the Creator, who only did what he saw the Creator doing, and – consequently – whose life was one long process of putting right the world we’d steered so horribly wrong.

And all of this culminated when he was in his early 30’s, during a holiday that celebrated the fact that the Creator is also the Liberator, that God not only brings about new life, but he restores that which was broken back to wholeness. During that holiday (called Passover), that God-become-human named Jesus took on the worst evils humanity had to offer and dared them to do their worst. We did what we have always done since we left the Garden – we killed. We brought about death. We slaughtered God and laid him in a Tomb.

The Second Adam had come to us that we might have life, that we might reconnect with God. That we might begin to fix what we had broken. He came into our darkness and offered to show us the ways of God that we had so long forgotten. And still, even after thousands of years of the pain of death, we chose the Other tree. We chose our own way. We killed the God made human.

And we declared it a Good Friday.

But as the Creator and the Liberator so often does, he redeemed us even from that choice. He set us free from that slavery to ourselves that we can’t seem to break. He took upon himself the first Adam’s death and destruction and offered us instead resurrection and restoration.

Because early on that Sunday morning, a new day began unlike any other in history. Jesus’ dead body was no longer dead. He moved; he sat up and removed his grave clothes, folded them neatly on the stone slab where he’d lain. And he emerged from the Tomb, from the place of death, from the consequences of Sin.

The Second Adam had defeated evil, death and sin. He had taken the worst we had to offer upon himself and by doing so placed himself between us and the death we’d called down upon ourselves and our world. And then he rose. He conquered. And so he walked out of the Tomb alive and well, ready to fulfill the work the first Adam had left undone.

So it’s not so great a surprise that, a few hours later, when Mary visits the Tomb to mourn, she mistakes him for the Gardener. Because he is the Gardener. But the whole world is his Garden, and he’s working towards the day when we’ll have no more Tombs. And no more suffering.

And if you’ll walk with him a ways, he’ll take you to that hill where he died. And he’ll point up to the tree on which they crucified him and say, ‘Child, if you continue to eat of this Other tree, if you choose to go your own way, you’ll die. Come with me and eat of the Tree of Life. Come join me once again in taking care of my Garden.”

It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, so I thought I’d do a little writing on a psalm I’ve been working through – here are the first thoughts in what will be a series on this psalm.

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The ANE was a place filled with deities, spirits, and mythologies all clamoring for allegiance, devotion and worship. The land was carved up by the nations, each with their own local deity and story substantiating that particular deities “rights” to that nations plot of land. These deities were often crowned King as a result of their victories over other deities.

But in the 24th Psalm we do not have one deity among many clamoring for His own piece of land. We do not see a deity beholden to a specific ethnic group. Nor do we have a God who is fighting other deities in an attempt to jockey for supremacy amongst the nations.

Rather, we have Yahweh, the Lord of the entire cosmos and all the inhabitants thereof. He refuses to share his creation with anyone. He will not allow allegiances to be paid to the neighboring gods, He refuses to acknowledge the authority of the surrounding mythologies, and He refuses to let humanity find genuine meaning in anything other than Himself.

The breakdown of this Psalm falls into three parts
1.    Vs. 1-2 Where Yahweh’s sovereign ownership of the entire world is confessed and substantiated.
2.    Vs. 3-6 Where the Psalmist lays forth the requirements of those who wish to approach Yahweh and the blessings given to the one is worthy.
3.    And Vs. 7-9 (the climax of the psalm) where an ancient liturgical formula of Call-and-Response is employed to exalt Yahweh as a King as the ark enters Jerusalem. The entirety of the Psalm is really to be interpreted as an exaltation of Yahweh’s kingship, his narrative of creation, and his redemptive purposes that involved the defeat of all other claims to allegiance.

Vs. 1 The earth is the Lord’s and Everything in it, the world, and all who live in it.

The central proposition of this verse is that every inch of created space has a stamp on it that bears Yahweh’s name. He has written His name on every tree, every unborn child, every terrorist, politician (sigh!), and every codgery old person in your church. He has placed his name on them and said one word – MINE, MINE, MINE!

He will not share his sovereignty with competing nations (America or otherwise!). He will not share his sovereignty with competing narratives (the American Dream or otherwise!). He will not share his sovereignty with competing deities. And he will not share his sovereignty Christians who assume God is on their side, their own little marionette to be jerked around at their every political whim.

No, in fact, in this verse there is a movement from general (world) to particular (the inhabitants of the world). Though Yahweh could care nothing for our notions of private property He cares even less for our assumptions about ownership when it comes to people. It is not dictators, presidents, or even pastors who own the souls of men and women – it is Yahweh and Yahweh alone. We are not permitted to oppress, subjugate, or manipulate either the creation or the inhabitants of creation because none of it is ours and they are not ‘our’ people.

Do you see the soteriological implications? If Yahweh is the Kingly owner over all creation and its inhabitants then there is no segment of creation that is beyond redemption – be they homosexuals, democrats, terrorists, or even that old codger in the back row of every church I’ve ever been to. And despite our lack of faith, let’s forget this nonsense of “giving up” on folks because they’re our enemies or b/c they don’t like our political agenda. “Giving up” on their redemption was never God’s ordained means of bring them to redemption!

And though it may not seem like it on the surface, vs. 2 exactly about that redemption, for the Psalmist substantiates the claim of Yahweh’s sovereignty – but in an odd sort of way…but we’re going to save that for next time.

Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.

If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.

Believers who are poor have something to boast about, for God has honored them. And those who are rich should boast that God has humbled them. They will fade away like a little flower in the field. The hot sun rises and the grass withers; the little flower droops and falls, and its beauty fades away. In the same way, the rich will fade away with all of their achievements.

God blesses those who patiently endure testing and temptation. Afterward they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him. And remember, when you are being tempted, do not say, “God is tempting me.” God is never tempted to do wrong, and he never tempts anyone else. Temptation comes from our own desires, which entice us and drag us away. These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death.

So don’t be misled, my dear brothers and sisters. Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow.He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.

Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry. Human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.

But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.

If you claim to be religious but don’t control your tongue, you are fooling yourself, and your religion is worthless. Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.

From James to Jewish Christians

I plan on translating much of this section of 1 Corinthians 15 as I look into Paul and his views of the body and the resurrection.  Today I wanna translate 1 Corinthians 15:35-40.  Here are my efforts.

Greek Text:

ἀλλὰ ἐρεῖ τις"· πῶς ἐγείπονται οἱ νεκποί; ποίῳ δὲ σώματι ἔπχονται; ἄφρων, σὺ ὃ σπειπεις, οὐ ζῳοτοιειται ἐὰν μὴ ἀποθάνη· καὶ ὃ σπειρεις, οὐ το σῶμα τὸ γενησόμενον σπειρεις ἀλλὰ γυμνὸν κοκκον εἰ τύχοι οίτου ἤ τινος τῶν λοιπῶν· ὁ δὲ θεὸς δίδωσιν αὐτῷ σῶμα καθὸς ἠθελησεν, καὶ εκάστῳ τῶν σπεράτων ἴδιον σῶμα. 

Οὐ πᾶσα σὰρξ ἡ αυτὴ σὰρξ κτηνῶν,  ἄλλη δὲ σὰρξ πτηνῶν, ἄλλη δὲ ἰχθύων. 

καὶ σῶματα ἐπουράνια, και σωματα ἐπίγεια· ἀλλὰ ἑτέρα μὲν ἡ τῶν επουρανίων δοξα, ἑτέρα δὲ ἡ τῶν ἐπιγειων.

Literal Translation:

But some will say: “How [can] the dead be raised up? Of what sort of body will come?”  O Foolish ones!  What you sow, does not become alive unless it dies; and what you sow, it is not the body that it will become, you sow but a naked seed, might be wheat or some of the rest; but the God gives it a body as he wills, and [gives] to each of the seeds its own body.

Not all flesh [are] the same flesh, on the one hand, a kind for humans, on the other hand, a kind of flesh for domesticated animals and another for birds, and another for fish.

A body [can be] a heavenly one and also a body [can be] an earthly one; but on the one hand one of the two is the glory of heavenly, on the other hand, the other of the two is the glory of the earthly.

 

English Translation:

Some say: “How can the dead be raised up?  What type of form will they have?”  Fools!  What you sow does not become alive unless it dies; you sow a naked seed (such as wheat or something) which does not have the same form as it will later; but God gives it a form as he seems fit, each according to its kind.

Not all forms of flesh are the same.  There is one kind of flesh for humans, another for land animals, another for birds, and yet another for fish.

So too there are heavenly forms and earthly forms.  The heavenly bodies have heavenly honor and the earthly bodies have earthly honor.

 

Verse by Verse Translations: (With Commentary)

[35] ἀλλὰ   ἐρεῖ   τις"·   πῶς   ἐγείπονται   οἱ   νεκποί;   ποίῳ   δὲ   σώματι   ἔπχονται;

But some will say: “How [can] the dead be raised up? Of what sort of body will come?”

Here Paul is stating the objections to his teachings.  Some people in the Corinthian Assembly are worried about a zombie ressurection!  They see the rotting bodies and are freaked out by those bodies being brought to life!

 

[36] ἄφρων,   σὺ   ὃ   σπειπεις,   οὐ   ζῳοτοιειται   ἐὰν   μὴ   ἀποθάνη·

O Foolish ones!  What you sow, does not become alive unless it dies; …

Here Paul is comparing the resurection of the dead to a planted seed which suggests that the ressurected form will be much different than the current form.

[37] καὶ   ὃ   σπειρεις,   οὐ   το   σῶμα   τὸ   γενησόμενον   σπειρεις   ἀλλὰ   γυμνὸν   κοκκον   εἰ   τύχοι   οίτου   ἤ   τινος   τῶν   λοιπῶν·

…and what you sow, it is not the body that it will become, you sow but a naked seed, might be wheat or some of the rest; …

 

[38] ὁ   δὲ   θεὸς   δίδωσιν   αὐτῷ   σῶμα   καθὸς   ἠθελησεν,   καὶ   εκάστῳ   τῶν   σπεράτων   ἴδιον   σῶμα.

… but the God gives it a body as he wills, and [gives] to each of the seeds its own body.

 

[39] Οὐ   πᾶσα   σὰρξ   ἡ   αυτὴ   σὰρξ   κτηνῶν,  ἄλλη   δὲ   σὰρξ   πτηνῶν,   ἄλλη   δὲ   ἰχθύων.

Not all flesh [are] the same flesh, on the one hand, a kind for humans, on the other hand, a kind of flesh for domesticated animals and another for birds, and another for fish.

Here Paul switches from talking about form (soma) and begins to talk about a type of form, flesh (sarx).  He says that not all flesh is the same, but there are different types.  He mentions Humans, fish, birds, and domesticated animals.

[40] καὶ   σῶματα   ἐπουράνια,   και   σωματα   ἐπίγεια·   ἀλλὰ   ἑτέρα   μὲν   ἡ   τῶν   επουρανίων   δοξα,   ἑτέρα   δὲ   ἡ   τῶν   ἐπιγειων.

Bodies [can be] heavenly ones and also bodies [can be] earthly ones; but on the one hand one of the two is the glory of heavenly ones, on the other hand, the other of the two is the glory of the earthly ones.

Paul switches back to talking about another type of form (soma) – earthly and heavenly bodies.  These two types of bodies have two types of glory (doxa) assigned to them.  I have no idea what glory means here besides something like honor, stature, or place in the created order.  There are grades of glory here and Paul implies that heavenly bodies have more of it than earthly bodies.  What are the heavenly bodies?  Angels and God or stars and nebulae?  Who knows –it is not apparent yet in the text. 

and Sunday is coming…

We are an apocalyptic folk – the world is amiss and that ain’t natural.  We see a creation run amuck.  We see the valuable treated as rubble.  We answer the woes with a “cosmic no.”

We look to the past, seeing what was lost – peace, love, fellowship with people and with God – burn, lost, gone, dead.  We want to reclaim the garden, but can’t.  We try to reclaim the garden, but fail.  We hope for our savior’s return, we hope for a new day.  No, we groan for a new day, we groan for our savior… but he is gone, far away.

Our savior is distant, dormant, dead.

It’s Saturday… and it feels like Sunday ain’t a coming.

There is blood, blood, actual human blood,

Spilled in the name of the Lamb.

There is blood, blood, street staining blood,

Spilled in the name of the Lamb.

I am not an expert on Calvin and Geneva.  Hank asked me to supplement the claim about Geneva’s blood stained streets that I made on my April’s Fools post where I claimed to convert (or to realize I was a convert) to M. Driscoll’s New Calvinism.  In it there was a critique of Driscoll’s whitewashing of Geneva.  To be honest, I remember being horrified in one of my old Christian history classes by descriptions of its Calvin-dictated theocracy.  However, since this is not what I primarily study, I am open to being awfully wrong in my appraisal.  While I fully understand the idea that we must judge Calvin and his Geneva in light of the times, this only goes so far.  When we historically appraise anyone we need to keep the above in mind.  However, when we “remember” Calvin and Geneva (and Luther, etc.) we must be careful about whitewashing their tombs.  Below is the source that I used in the class, A History of Christianity in the World: From Persecution to Uncertainty by Manschreck, pages 188-191.

continue reading…

As passages go, the opening of John’s gospel is the easiest to translate and yet the hardest to fully understand. It contains deep and powerful truths which befuddle the mind and ignite the soul with hope. [1]

Below is it in the Greek and in English. 

Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος,
In the beginning was the Word,

καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν,
and the word was alongside the God,

και θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος.
and God was the Word.

 οὗτος ἦν ἐν αρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.
He was in the beginning alongside the God.

πάντα δί αὐτοῦ ἐγένετο,
all things though him were created,

καὶ χωρὶς αὐτοῦ εγένετο οὐδὲ ἕν.
and apart from him was created nothing.

ὃ γέγονεν ἐν αὐτῷ ζωὴ ἦν,
What was created in him was life,

καὶ ἡ ζωὴ ἦν τὸ φῶς τῶν ἀνθρώπον·
and the life was the light for the humans;

καὶ τὸ φῶς ἐν τῂ σκοτίᾳ φαίει,
and the light shines in the darkness,

καὶ ἡ σκοτία αὐτὸ οὐ καταέλαβεν.
and the darkness did not overtake it.

 

1. I started to write commentary on each grouping, but found my words falling short. [↩]

Christians, are you ok with God being a God of reason and yet having It’s very nature [1] circumscribed in illogic?

I am.

1. the trinity [↩]

Acts 17:26-28 is one of my favorite sections in all of Scripture.  To unwind, I translated it tonight.  [1]

Greek: 

[26] ἐποίησέν τε ἐξ ἑνός πᾶν ἔθνος ἀνθρώπων κατοικεῖν ἐπι παντὸς προσώτου τῆς γῆς, ὁρίσας προστεταγμένους καιπροὺς καὶ τὰς ὁποθεσίας τῆς κατοικίας αὐτῶν [27] ζητείν τὸν θεόν, εἰ ἄρα γε ψηλφήσειαν αὐτὸν καὶ εὕροιεν, καί γε οὐ μακπὰν ἀπὸ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου ἡμῶν ὑπάρχοντα [28] ἐν αὐτῷ γάρ ζῶηεν καὶ κινούμεθα και ἐσμέν, ὡς καί τινες τῶν καθ’ ὑμᾶς ποιητῶν ειρήκασιν· τοῦ γένος εσμέν.

Literal English:

Also, He made, from one, all nations of people to inhabit over all of the face of earth (by setting the seasons and boundries, which were prescribed, of the habitations of them) to seek the God, indeed, if perhaps they might grope for him / and might find, and, indeed, (he) is not for away from each of us, for in him we live and we move and we exist, as even some of your poets concerning you all have said, “For even we are children of him.”

Actual English

Also, He made all of the nations from one to inhabit all of the earth, setting the prescribed seasons boundries of their dwellings so that they might seek God, indeed, that perhaps they might grope for and find Him, when, in fact, He is not far away from each of us, for in him we live, and move, and exist, as even some of your poets have said conserning you all, “For even we are his children”

A stunning set of verses pulled out of Paul’s speech to the Greeks in Athens.

 

Here are some of my notes and commentary.

1) ἐποίησέν τε ἐξ ἑνός πᾶν ἔθνος ἀνθρώπων κατοικεῖν ἐπι παντὸς προσώτου τῆς γῆς,

He made / also / from / one / all / nations / of people / to inhabit/ upon / all / of (the) face / of the / earth,

He made also from one (person) all nations to dwell upon all the earth

No one knows to what the ἑνος refers.  Is it one nation, one people, one blood?  Nations of people is explictly mentioned, so I think it is people.  I know that others like to insert that Luke is talking about Adam, but you have to force it in here.  Also, it is clumbsy in english to say ”to inhabit over all of the face of the earth.”   What is for certain is that this is universal in scope.  God is doing this with all people in all times in all places.  Damn.

2) ὁρίσας προστεταγμένους καιπροὺς καὶ τὰς ὁποθεσίας τῆς κατοικίας αὐτῶν

by setting / that were prescribed (refering to both–>) / [the seasons / and / the boundries] / of the / habitation / of them.

so many modifyers in line 1 and 2 that it is hard to keep everything straight.  Add to that οπισας [2] and προστεταμενους [3] which are both participles next to one another and things get dicey.  The προστεταμενους modifies both the seasons and the boundries while οπισας refers to another action that the implied “he” in ἐποίησέν is doing.  I think this participle (ὁπισασ) qualifies the main verb [4] , giving us more informatin as to how he made all the nations, he set their times and places. 

3) ζητείν τὸν θεόν, εἰ ἄρα γε ψηλφήσειαν αὐτὸν καὶ εὕροιεν, 

to seek the God, if / perhaps/ even-indeed / might feel for / him / and / find,

Here we see the purpose of all of this in “ζητειν τον θεον.”  He did all of the making and setting for the purpose of them seeking God.  I am pretty sure ζητειν is an infinitive of purpose [5] .  “So that they might seek” really displays this sense of purpose better than a mere “to seek.”

The rest of this line describes in further detail what the seeking is like.  It is groping and finding.  The author and God hopes that the placement of people in their times and places will result in the grouping for and finding of God.  There are two aorist optatives (things that might happen) with an “if” in front of them.  You can translate this a lot of ways.  I think they way I did retains the force and purpose of the clause as it stands with the rest of the verses.

4) καί γε οὐ μακπὰν ἀπὸ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου ἡμῶν ὑπάρχοντα.

and / indeed / not / far away / from / one / each / of us / is (refers to the αυτον in the L3).

This last line is great.  God is sitting just behind the viel of the natural world waiting for us to seek Him.  He is close by and easy to find, if he be sought after.

5) ἐν αὐτῷ γάρ ζῶηεν καὶ κινούμεθα και ἐσμέν, ὡς καί τινες τῶν καθ’ ὑμᾶς ποιητῶν ειρήκασιν· τοῦ γένος εσμέν.

in / him / for / we live / and / we move / and exist, / as / even / some / of the / concerning you all / poets / have said / of him / for / even / children / we are.

for in him we live and we move and we exist, as even some of your poets concerning you all have said, “For even we are children of him.”

Wow.  This part was pretty easy to translate.  It connects humanity to God, shows the universal brotherhood of humanity, shows that nonbelievers can have a partial knowledge of him, etc.  Powerful, powerful stuff.

1. It is like doing a logic puzzle or Sudoku. [↩]
2. active masculine aorist singular nominative [↩]
3. perf passive accusitive masculine plural [↩]
4. Smyth §2046 [↩]
5. Smyth §2008 [↩]