The Wrong Ruler
Am I Measuring My Spiritual Life in Superficial Ways?
By: Renatta Gorski
Rulers, clocks, beakers, gauges… these are all instruments used to measure. They’re all useful in everyday life. But what can we use to measure ideas, such as love or truth? How do we measure whether we are growing spiritually? Some common “devices” used in Christianity are daily devotions, prayers at mealtime, going to church, and the occasional volunteer work. But maybe the devices Christians use don’t quite match up with the devices God uses. Maybe God is less concerned with the actions that Christians feel as mandatory, and more concerned with the mindset of Christians; that they love God and love others. Maybe Christians are using the wrong ruler to measure their spiritual growth.
All of the aforementioned “rulers” are certainly elements in spiritual growth. They can push Christians in the right direction. However, they are not the sole means of spiritual prosperity. In fact, they can hinder growth because these “rulers” focus on the surface of Christianity. Although there is great depth to all these things, it gets ignored when the users’ only intent is marking off an item on their to-do list and thinking to themselves, “Well, I’ve grown enough spiritually for today. On to the next thing…”. If only believers could set aside their crazy lifestyles to actually put their hearts and minds into devotions or prayers. If only they could stop throwing God amidst the other to-do’s and actually focus on treating Him as important as He truly is. The truth is, all of the spiritual markers mean nothing when we take our relationship with God out of the equation. He is the real means to our growth and He is the only way we will be able to truly love God and others. A half-hearted prayer just won’t do the trick.
I, of course, have no right to be reprimanding any Christian when I myself measure in superficial ways. I’m not sure I could even say that I’ve improved much over the course of my faith. There are countless nights when I have laid in bed and uttered a quick prayer, trying to get it over with as soon as possible so that I can respond to my latest text message. There have been times when I feel as though church is an obligation, and I resent the fact that I am there throughout the entire service, thinking that I could be anywhere else. It is so disappointing to think back on all of those times and realize that although these deeds look “good” on the surface, they have done nothing to help my relationship with God. What they have done is put Him into a mental box labeled “Spiritual Growth” that I occasionally contribute to to feel better about myself. I’ve realized that I need to put aside my selfish, guilt-laying thoughts in order to really love my Creator. Obviously it’s a hard task to accomplish, especially as a high school student in today’s society, but it’s a task that I need and want to accomplish.
I hope I have made it clear that spiritual growth can’t be measured by what you’re doing, but rather what you’re getting out of it. I think that it is high time Christians (including myself) worry less about reading our Bible because “it’s the right thing to do” and read it because it’s God’s holy, precious Word. We might find that we want to be more like the church of Thessalonica, whom Paul spoke to in 2 Thessalonians 1:3 when he said, “We ought to always thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.” And don’t you think that the church of Thessalonica was using the right ruler? If Wheaton Academy stopped measuring our spiritual growth in superficial ways and started using God’s ruler for measurement, it would be a much stronger community. We would be one step closer to loving God and loving each other. And that’s a community that I, and I’m sure many others, would want to be living in.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
A Quote About the Kingdom Words in the Lord's Prayer
IF THE CHURCH isn't prepared to subvert the kingdoms of the world with the kingdom of God, the only honest thing would be to give up praying this prayer altogether, especially its final doxology.
N. T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer
N. T. Wright, The Lord and His Prayer
Friday, May 29, 2009
Surveying the Wondrous Cross by Philip Yancey, Chrisitianity Today
Understanding the Atonement is about more than grasping a theory.
Google the words atonement and emergent church together, and your computer screen will soon heat up a few degrees. A lively (and not always civilized) debate has broken out among those who defend classical theories of the Atonement and those who see them as some variation of the caricature Dorothy Sayers drew 60 years ago:
God wanted to damn everybody, but his vindictive sadism was sated by the crucifixion of his own Son, who was quite innocent, and, therefore, a particularly attractive victim. He now only damns people who don't follow Christ or who have never heard of him.
Since Jesus' death nearly 2,000 years ago, theologians such as Origen, Anselm of Canterbury, Peter Abelard, and John Calvin have proposed ways of understanding it: as a Ransom paid to Satan, a Satisfaction required by God, a Moral Influence for humanity, a Penal Substitution for the punishment due to humankind. Some of these theories, referencing animal sacrifices and God's wrath, can make for a hard sell for many in modern times.
The Cross is the central image of Christianity, and gives us vivid proof that, in novelist Flannery O'Connor's words, the world "has, for all its horror, been found by God to be worth dying for." Yet theologians must somehow explain how Jesus' death differs in essence from the death of any great leader. What made it necessary, and exactly how did it affect our relationship with God?
During Holy Week last year, I found myself reflecting not so much on the theoretical rationale for the Atonement as on its practical outworking. Three insights from that week:
(1) The Cross made possible a new intimacy with God. Three of the Gospels mention that at the moment of Jesus' death, a thick curtain inside the temple tore from top to bottom, exposing the Most Holy Place. Traditionally, only once a year, on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), could the high priest enter the fearsome Most Holy Place. Preparations involved ritual baths, special clothes, and five separate animal sacrifices, and still the priest entered with apprehension about committing an offense. He wore bells on his robe and a rope around his ankle so that if the bells fell silent, other priests could retrieve his body.
The Book of Hebrews draws a vivid contrast: the author says believers can now "approach the throne of grace with confidence" (4:16). No image could be more shocking for devout Jews than charging boldly into the Most Holy Place. Therefore, concludes the author of Hebrews, "let us draw near to God" (10:22). Because of Jesus, we need no protective curtain; God has provided a sufficient Mediator for all time.
While visiting the United States in 1962, theologian Karl Barth faced a questioner intent on pinning down exactly when he had been saved. Barth replied, "It happened one afternoon in A.D. 34 when Jesus died on the cross." Love finds a way to overcome all obstacles to uniting with the beloved, no matter the cost.
(2) The Cross reveals the limits of human achievement. Paul wrote, "And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross" (Col. 2:15). Pontius Pilate had Jesus' "crime"—King of the Jews—posted in three languages, in ironic tribute to the travesty of justice. A public spectacle it was indeed when the most refined religious authorities of the time ganged up on an innocent man, and the most renowned justice system carried out the sentence.
Writer Thomas Merton points out that "no one saw the Resurrection. Everyone saw the Crucifixion. Everyone does see the Crucifixion. The Cross is everywhere." It should give us pause, this sign of contradiction, when we are tempted to look to politics or science to solve the deepest problems of humanity. Christ exposed as false gods the very powers in which men and women take most pride and invest most hope.
(3) The Cross brings to light an unexpected quality of the Godhead: humility. As Paul expressed in Philippians 2: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing … he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!" (v. 5-8). The poor and disadvantaged respond by instinct to this personal identification: witness the sermons in Appalachia or the base communities in Latin America that center on the Cross. Novelists know it too: Graham Greene, Georges Bernanos, and Ignazio Silone all made the sacrament commemorating Jesus' death the centerpiece of their finest works.
Whatever else we may say about it, the Atonement fulfills the Jewish principle that only one who has been hurt can forgive. At Calvary, God chose to be hurt.
Google the words atonement and emergent church together, and your computer screen will soon heat up a few degrees. A lively (and not always civilized) debate has broken out among those who defend classical theories of the Atonement and those who see them as some variation of the caricature Dorothy Sayers drew 60 years ago:
God wanted to damn everybody, but his vindictive sadism was sated by the crucifixion of his own Son, who was quite innocent, and, therefore, a particularly attractive victim. He now only damns people who don't follow Christ or who have never heard of him.
Since Jesus' death nearly 2,000 years ago, theologians such as Origen, Anselm of Canterbury, Peter Abelard, and John Calvin have proposed ways of understanding it: as a Ransom paid to Satan, a Satisfaction required by God, a Moral Influence for humanity, a Penal Substitution for the punishment due to humankind. Some of these theories, referencing animal sacrifices and God's wrath, can make for a hard sell for many in modern times.
The Cross is the central image of Christianity, and gives us vivid proof that, in novelist Flannery O'Connor's words, the world "has, for all its horror, been found by God to be worth dying for." Yet theologians must somehow explain how Jesus' death differs in essence from the death of any great leader. What made it necessary, and exactly how did it affect our relationship with God?
During Holy Week last year, I found myself reflecting not so much on the theoretical rationale for the Atonement as on its practical outworking. Three insights from that week:
(1) The Cross made possible a new intimacy with God. Three of the Gospels mention that at the moment of Jesus' death, a thick curtain inside the temple tore from top to bottom, exposing the Most Holy Place. Traditionally, only once a year, on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), could the high priest enter the fearsome Most Holy Place. Preparations involved ritual baths, special clothes, and five separate animal sacrifices, and still the priest entered with apprehension about committing an offense. He wore bells on his robe and a rope around his ankle so that if the bells fell silent, other priests could retrieve his body.
The Book of Hebrews draws a vivid contrast: the author says believers can now "approach the throne of grace with confidence" (4:16). No image could be more shocking for devout Jews than charging boldly into the Most Holy Place. Therefore, concludes the author of Hebrews, "let us draw near to God" (10:22). Because of Jesus, we need no protective curtain; God has provided a sufficient Mediator for all time.
While visiting the United States in 1962, theologian Karl Barth faced a questioner intent on pinning down exactly when he had been saved. Barth replied, "It happened one afternoon in A.D. 34 when Jesus died on the cross." Love finds a way to overcome all obstacles to uniting with the beloved, no matter the cost.
(2) The Cross reveals the limits of human achievement. Paul wrote, "And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross" (Col. 2:15). Pontius Pilate had Jesus' "crime"—King of the Jews—posted in three languages, in ironic tribute to the travesty of justice. A public spectacle it was indeed when the most refined religious authorities of the time ganged up on an innocent man, and the most renowned justice system carried out the sentence.
Writer Thomas Merton points out that "no one saw the Resurrection. Everyone saw the Crucifixion. Everyone does see the Crucifixion. The Cross is everywhere." It should give us pause, this sign of contradiction, when we are tempted to look to politics or science to solve the deepest problems of humanity. Christ exposed as false gods the very powers in which men and women take most pride and invest most hope.
(3) The Cross brings to light an unexpected quality of the Godhead: humility. As Paul expressed in Philippians 2: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing … he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!" (v. 5-8). The poor and disadvantaged respond by instinct to this personal identification: witness the sermons in Appalachia or the base communities in Latin America that center on the Cross. Novelists know it too: Graham Greene, Georges Bernanos, and Ignazio Silone all made the sacrament commemorating Jesus' death the centerpiece of their finest works.
Whatever else we may say about it, the Atonement fulfills the Jewish principle that only one who has been hurt can forgive. At Calvary, God chose to be hurt.
Monday, May 18, 2009
A couple posts from current WA sophomore students
Here are a couple great posts from student writings in our sophomore Bible classes...
POST #1: AUTHENTICITY
Oh I can think about You now and then,
Or I can make a mark on eternity.
Lord, first of all, how is it between You and me?
How many of us have lifted our hands during worship, prayed out loud during church, given ten percent of our money, been an active part of a Bible study, or, well, you get my drift. A great majority of Christians do all these things. But the question is, why? When we lift our hands during worship, are we truly lifting our praise to God? Or are we “proving” that we are righteous Christians? In order to be fully righteous in God’s eyes, it is essential to be authentic.
I strongly believe that true Christianity is authentic. As a believer, I have the Holy Spirit. But does the Holy Spirit have me? It is vital to live out God’s Word, not act it out. If we live with the intention of pleasing God, and give ourselves over to the Holy Spirit, we have no need for human affirmation. Thus, we are no longer disappointing the Lord by “faking it.”
I have only recently come back to my relationship with Christ, so you may ask, “What authority do you have to tell me how to live?” Well, let me tell you that I am not only writing this for you, I need to hear it as well. Before I started getting right with God again, I laughed at “Jesus freaks” so people would know I wasn’t “into” that stuff. I lied all the time. I would lie to cover my lies. I broke the trust between me and my family. And I ruined a really good friendship. I didn’t care about God. Finally, someone got it through my head that what I was doing was awful and it had to change. So I began to rebuild my relationship with God. Now, I often find myself doing outwardly spiritual things without any real intention of letting the Holy Spirit work through me. But that is not what gives me joy. Doing good works and faking spirituality does not give a relationship with God. He does not know those who do not love Him.
When I talk to God honestly and openly, I try to do it when I am by myself. This way, I know that I am not doing things to prove my spirituality. There have been multiple times when I talked to my Father for over an hour. I don’t have to worry about saying something stupid. I can lift my hands without wondering if it is for status or praise. And do you want to know something fantastic? The more time I spend alone with God, the more authentic I become with others.
Imagine for a moment that you are an atheist, and a few of your Christian friends are praying for you. One possible prayer goes like this: “Dear Father, my friend doesn’t know you. Show him/her the error of his/her ways and make him/her want to serve you. You are all powerful and know everything that we do. Help my friend change completely.” Now here is a second possible prayer: “Dear God, you know everything about me and my friend. I have sinned so often, but you always welcome be back. Please show my friend how he/she can be completely free and loved by you. Thank you Jesus.” So which prayer would make you want to be a child of the King? Definitely the second one for me! No one is going to listen if we say “God changed me” Yes, that is true, but that is not the end. God is changing me. It is a continual process, and I will always struggle, but God will be there for me.
For every moment of our life, we have a choice to make. Do the right thing for the right reason, do the wrong thing, or do the right thing for the wrong reason. In the end, we will be evaluated by how we lived out God’s Word. So, will you have a high place in heaven because you were authentic? Or will you have to stand before the Living God and be told” I never knew you?”
POST #2: APPROACHABLE
Do you ever feel that you’re not approachable when it comes to your faith? For example, when you know that some certain someone needs to be reached out to but something’s just holding back, or you’re just afraid that they will judge you because of what you believe in.
When I think of being approachable I think of someone being able to come to you and ask you about anything and you to tell them your heart and what you really believe.
Last summer I was on my way to six flags with a bunch of French foreign exchange students. On our way there I told myself that I would really try and connect with one of the French students. I ended up talking with a boy named Noah. At first I asked him how his trip was going here in America and one word lead to another. Before I knew it we started to have a deep conversation. He was a cool guy seemed to have been raised well and was liked by everybody. Then we got to talking about religious matters. He didn’t know I was a Christian, and sadly I wanted it to stay that way. I asked him what his religion was, what’s was belief in creation and humanity? He said he doesn’t believe in anything, he also said that he believes in the big bang theory and thinks that it’s not possible for God to just come out of no where and create earth. Once I told him that I was a Christian he flooded me with questions upon questions that I couldn’t answer. I was not approachable. But the sad part about it was, the reason this boy was asking so many question was that he was screaming for the truth. He wanted answers. He wanted to believe in God but he couldn’t. He has no faith. (I realize now that he was calling for help but I didn’t answer to his call, I was not approachable.) Once the bus got to Great America we were all getting off the bus. Suddenly Noah pulls me aside and says to me something I’ll never forget. He said“ Phil, when we die we will truly know if God is to be believed in when one of us goes to Heaven and one of us goes to hell!” those words stayed with me that whole day, and I began to feel terrible. I had a chance to reach out to this guy, I could have led him to Christ, but I was unapproachable.
If anyone is crying out for some kind of help, or need God. Please reach out to them be a light in there world. Share your faith and lead them to God. DO NOT make the same mistake I did! You may not get another opportunity like this again. Change someone’s life. If you don’t know what to say, ask God and he will tell you.
There’re so many people looking for some kind of truth and explanation in life. We as Christians need to reach out to those in need and get up and say something.
Balance – This person has balance in his life because of his school activities, the sports he is involved in and the time he spends with his family, church activities and community service.
Youth – This person is a young man that is active, healthy and highly energetic. He is very youthful, full of ambition and bright hopes for his future.
Humanism – This person is capable of doing a lot of positive things for humanity. His ideas are well-thought out for how he can better the world around him. He is gifted in many things and uses those gifts in every day life.
POST #1: AUTHENTICITY
Oh I can think about You now and then,
Or I can make a mark on eternity.
Lord, first of all, how is it between You and me?
How many of us have lifted our hands during worship, prayed out loud during church, given ten percent of our money, been an active part of a Bible study, or, well, you get my drift. A great majority of Christians do all these things. But the question is, why? When we lift our hands during worship, are we truly lifting our praise to God? Or are we “proving” that we are righteous Christians? In order to be fully righteous in God’s eyes, it is essential to be authentic.
I strongly believe that true Christianity is authentic. As a believer, I have the Holy Spirit. But does the Holy Spirit have me? It is vital to live out God’s Word, not act it out. If we live with the intention of pleasing God, and give ourselves over to the Holy Spirit, we have no need for human affirmation. Thus, we are no longer disappointing the Lord by “faking it.”
I have only recently come back to my relationship with Christ, so you may ask, “What authority do you have to tell me how to live?” Well, let me tell you that I am not only writing this for you, I need to hear it as well. Before I started getting right with God again, I laughed at “Jesus freaks” so people would know I wasn’t “into” that stuff. I lied all the time. I would lie to cover my lies. I broke the trust between me and my family. And I ruined a really good friendship. I didn’t care about God. Finally, someone got it through my head that what I was doing was awful and it had to change. So I began to rebuild my relationship with God. Now, I often find myself doing outwardly spiritual things without any real intention of letting the Holy Spirit work through me. But that is not what gives me joy. Doing good works and faking spirituality does not give a relationship with God. He does not know those who do not love Him.
When I talk to God honestly and openly, I try to do it when I am by myself. This way, I know that I am not doing things to prove my spirituality. There have been multiple times when I talked to my Father for over an hour. I don’t have to worry about saying something stupid. I can lift my hands without wondering if it is for status or praise. And do you want to know something fantastic? The more time I spend alone with God, the more authentic I become with others.
Imagine for a moment that you are an atheist, and a few of your Christian friends are praying for you. One possible prayer goes like this: “Dear Father, my friend doesn’t know you. Show him/her the error of his/her ways and make him/her want to serve you. You are all powerful and know everything that we do. Help my friend change completely.” Now here is a second possible prayer: “Dear God, you know everything about me and my friend. I have sinned so often, but you always welcome be back. Please show my friend how he/she can be completely free and loved by you. Thank you Jesus.” So which prayer would make you want to be a child of the King? Definitely the second one for me! No one is going to listen if we say “God changed me” Yes, that is true, but that is not the end. God is changing me. It is a continual process, and I will always struggle, but God will be there for me.
For every moment of our life, we have a choice to make. Do the right thing for the right reason, do the wrong thing, or do the right thing for the wrong reason. In the end, we will be evaluated by how we lived out God’s Word. So, will you have a high place in heaven because you were authentic? Or will you have to stand before the Living God and be told” I never knew you?”
POST #2: APPROACHABLE
Do you ever feel that you’re not approachable when it comes to your faith? For example, when you know that some certain someone needs to be reached out to but something’s just holding back, or you’re just afraid that they will judge you because of what you believe in.
When I think of being approachable I think of someone being able to come to you and ask you about anything and you to tell them your heart and what you really believe.
Last summer I was on my way to six flags with a bunch of French foreign exchange students. On our way there I told myself that I would really try and connect with one of the French students. I ended up talking with a boy named Noah. At first I asked him how his trip was going here in America and one word lead to another. Before I knew it we started to have a deep conversation. He was a cool guy seemed to have been raised well and was liked by everybody. Then we got to talking about religious matters. He didn’t know I was a Christian, and sadly I wanted it to stay that way. I asked him what his religion was, what’s was belief in creation and humanity? He said he doesn’t believe in anything, he also said that he believes in the big bang theory and thinks that it’s not possible for God to just come out of no where and create earth. Once I told him that I was a Christian he flooded me with questions upon questions that I couldn’t answer. I was not approachable. But the sad part about it was, the reason this boy was asking so many question was that he was screaming for the truth. He wanted answers. He wanted to believe in God but he couldn’t. He has no faith. (I realize now that he was calling for help but I didn’t answer to his call, I was not approachable.) Once the bus got to Great America we were all getting off the bus. Suddenly Noah pulls me aside and says to me something I’ll never forget. He said“ Phil, when we die we will truly know if God is to be believed in when one of us goes to Heaven and one of us goes to hell!” those words stayed with me that whole day, and I began to feel terrible. I had a chance to reach out to this guy, I could have led him to Christ, but I was unapproachable.
If anyone is crying out for some kind of help, or need God. Please reach out to them be a light in there world. Share your faith and lead them to God. DO NOT make the same mistake I did! You may not get another opportunity like this again. Change someone’s life. If you don’t know what to say, ask God and he will tell you.
There’re so many people looking for some kind of truth and explanation in life. We as Christians need to reach out to those in need and get up and say something.
Balance – This person has balance in his life because of his school activities, the sports he is involved in and the time he spends with his family, church activities and community service.
Youth – This person is a young man that is active, healthy and highly energetic. He is very youthful, full of ambition and bright hopes for his future.
Humanism – This person is capable of doing a lot of positive things for humanity. His ideas are well-thought out for how he can better the world around him. He is gifted in many things and uses those gifts in every day life.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Easter, Unedited by N.T. Wright
Here's some fascinating thoughts about Easter by one of my favorite theologians, NT Wright...it stirred me as I read the fresh thoughts on how real, how life-changing, how culturally shattering, and how shocking and surprising the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth was and is today...and how that this Sunday, this event in history, has changed and is changing everything, for my mind, my heart, my family, my life, my eternity...and only God could do something so magnificent for His people and His world...I will be celebrating the surprise of the risen Jesus with great joy this Easter...may these words cause you to believe and celebrate with millions and millions all over the world...
The "Surprise of the Resurrection," including four unusual features of the Gospel accounts:
First, as we read the Easter stories, we note the strange absence of Scripture in them. When you read the Gospel accounts of Jesus' last days — of his arrest, his trial, and his crucifixion — you find Old Testament echoes, quotations, and allusions all over the place. The Psalms, Isaiah, Daniel, Zechariah, and other books have provided material that has then been woven into the structure of the narrative.
Turn over the page to the Easter accounts, and what has happened to all that scriptural allusion and echo? It is just not there. John tells us that the two disciples who went to the tomb "did not yet know the Scripture that he must rise again from the dead," but he does not tell us which Scripture he is talking about.
Luke has Jesus expound the Scriptures to the two on the road to Emmaus, but even in that story, he never actually quotes or mentions one of them. This is extraordinary because as early as Paul (e.g., 1 Cor. 15), we can see a very sophisticated hermeneutic of several biblical texts already firmly embedded in early Christian theology. But in these Gospel narratives there is no mention of particular passages, scarcely even an echo of the Old Testament.
One could suggest, I suppose, that this scriptural absence has come about because the people who wrote down those narratives in the second generation had gone through the stories and taken out all of the biblical allusion and echo. That won't work when we have four independent narratives telling the story in different words and different ways.
It is much more plausible to argue that these stories, though written down later, actually reflect the very, very early, pre-reflective eyewitness accounts in which people had not even begun to wonder whether or not this strange set of events fulfilled certain Scriptures. They were, it seems, too eager to tell their friends and neighbors and families the extraordinary things they had just seen and heard.
I therefore regard that as one piece of evidence indicating that the stories, though written down later, must go back to very early oral tradition fixed in that form. Once you tell a story like that (and believe me, if you had experienced something like that, you would tell it over and over again), the story would very quickly acquire a fixed form, just as when you repeat an anecdote two or three times, you tend to settle down into one particular way of telling it.
Though the Resurrection stories have been lightly edited by the different evangelists, they reflect quite closely four of the ways in which that story was told right from the start.
* * *
The second strange feature of the Resurrection stories is the presence of women as the primary witnesses. Whether we like it or not, women were simply not regarded as credible witnesses in the ancient world.
Now when the tradition had time to sort itself out, as we see reflected in the first paragraph of 1 Corinthians 15, the women have been quietly dropped. When it came to public apologetics, in that world, it would have been very embarrassing to think that your main witnesses to this extraordinary event were women, not least someone with the extraordinary reputation of Mary Magdalene.
But there they are in all four Gospel stories, front and center: the first apostles, the first people to tell others that Jesus was raised from the dead. In concert with what is noted earlier in this book, it is simply incredible to suppose that the tradition began with the male-only form that we find in the tradition Paul quotes in 1 Corinthians, and then developed, in significantly different ways, into the four female-first stories we find in the Gospels. Here again, the stories really do look as if they are very, very early.
* * *
The third strange feature, which goes with the third modification of the Jewish resurrection belief, is the portrait of Jesus himself. Many people have tried to make out over the last century that the Gospel stories developed in the following manner. First, people after Jesus' death were so overcome with grief that they really did not know what they were thinking. Second, they gradually acquired a new spiritual consciousness, a new belief that Jesus' cause continued. Third, from this new religious experience, they gradually started to explore the Scriptures. Fourth, from this they then (and only then) started to use the language of resurrection to articulate their experience. Finally, toward the end of the first century, some people began to invent stories about an actual resurrection, which the early church had never envisaged.
Capping this proposed progression of thought is the idea that, in Luke and John (which are supposed on this theory to be the last Gospels to be written, perhaps toward the end of the first century), people were so concerned to stress that Jesus really was a real physical being, a real embodied being, that they invented stories about him eating broiled fish, cooking breakfast by the shore, being able to be touched, and so on.
The problem is that this proposed development is very strange, even in Jewish terms. If the early Christians had gone this route, searching the Scriptures and inventing stories on that basis, you would have expected them to envisage the risen Jesus shining like a star. That, after all, is what the popular text in Daniel 12 says about people being raised from the dead. They do not. They describe him like that in the Transfiguration, for whatever reason, but none of the Resurrection stories even hint at that. Indeed, Jesus appears as a human being with a body that is like any other body; he can be mistaken for a gardener, or a fellow traveler on the road.
In addition, the stories also contain definite signs that the body has been transformed. Nobody, I suggest, would have invented them just like this. The body is clearly physical. It has, so to speak, used up the matter of the crucified body — hence the empty tomb. But, equally, it comes and goes through locked doors; it is not always recognized; and eventually it disappears altogether into God's space (which is how we ought to think of "heaven").
This kind of account is without precedent. No biblical text predicts that the Resurrection will involve this kind of body. No speculative theology laid this trail for the evangelists to follow, and to follow in such interestingly different ways.
In particular, this should put a stop to the old nonsense that suggests that Luke's and John's accounts, which are the most apparently physical, were written late in the first century in an attempt to combat docetism — the view that Jesus was not a real human being but only seemed to be.
Granted, if all you had was Jesus eating broiled fish and inviting Thomas to touch him, we might have thought that Luke and John were trying to say, "Look! He was really a solid physical person!" However, those very same accounts are the ones in which Jesus appears and disappears, passes through closed doors, and finally ascends into heaven.
These stories are extremely peculiar, and the type of peculiarity they possess is not one that would have been invented. It looks as though the Gospel writers are struggling to describe a reality for which they didn't really have adequate language.
* * *
The fourth and final strange feature of the Resurrection narratives, which may call into question many of the Easter sermons that I and others regularly preach, is the absence of any mention of the future Christian hope.
Almost everywhere else in the New Testament, where you find people talking about Jesus' resurrection, you find them also talking about our own future resurrection, the final hope that one day we will be raised as Jesus has been raised.
But the Gospels never say anything like, "Jesus is raised, therefore there is a life after death" (not that many first-century Jews doubted that there was); or, "Jesus is raised, therefore we shall go to heaven when we die" (most people believed something like that anyway); or better, "Jesus is raised, therefore we shall be raised at the last."
No: insofar as the event is interpreted in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, it has a very "this-worldly" meaning, relating to what is happening here and now. "Jesus is raised," they say, "therefore he is the Messiah; he is the true Lord of the whole world; therefore we, his followers, have a job to do: we must act as his heralds, announcing his lordship to the entire world."
It is not, "Jesus is raised, therefore look up into the sky and keep looking because one day you will be going there with him." Many hymns, prayers, and Christian sermons have tried to pull the Easter story in that direction, but the line of thought within the Gospels themselves is, "Jesus is raised, therefore God's new world has begun, and therefore we, you, and everybody else are invited to be not only beneficiaries of that new world but participants in making it happen."
Excerpted from Jesus, the Final Days: What Really Happened by Craig A. Evans and N. T. Wright, edited by Troy A. Miller, published in 2009 from Westminster John Knox Press.
The "Surprise of the Resurrection," including four unusual features of the Gospel accounts:
First, as we read the Easter stories, we note the strange absence of Scripture in them. When you read the Gospel accounts of Jesus' last days — of his arrest, his trial, and his crucifixion — you find Old Testament echoes, quotations, and allusions all over the place. The Psalms, Isaiah, Daniel, Zechariah, and other books have provided material that has then been woven into the structure of the narrative.
Turn over the page to the Easter accounts, and what has happened to all that scriptural allusion and echo? It is just not there. John tells us that the two disciples who went to the tomb "did not yet know the Scripture that he must rise again from the dead," but he does not tell us which Scripture he is talking about.
Luke has Jesus expound the Scriptures to the two on the road to Emmaus, but even in that story, he never actually quotes or mentions one of them. This is extraordinary because as early as Paul (e.g., 1 Cor. 15), we can see a very sophisticated hermeneutic of several biblical texts already firmly embedded in early Christian theology. But in these Gospel narratives there is no mention of particular passages, scarcely even an echo of the Old Testament.
One could suggest, I suppose, that this scriptural absence has come about because the people who wrote down those narratives in the second generation had gone through the stories and taken out all of the biblical allusion and echo. That won't work when we have four independent narratives telling the story in different words and different ways.
It is much more plausible to argue that these stories, though written down later, actually reflect the very, very early, pre-reflective eyewitness accounts in which people had not even begun to wonder whether or not this strange set of events fulfilled certain Scriptures. They were, it seems, too eager to tell their friends and neighbors and families the extraordinary things they had just seen and heard.
I therefore regard that as one piece of evidence indicating that the stories, though written down later, must go back to very early oral tradition fixed in that form. Once you tell a story like that (and believe me, if you had experienced something like that, you would tell it over and over again), the story would very quickly acquire a fixed form, just as when you repeat an anecdote two or three times, you tend to settle down into one particular way of telling it.
Though the Resurrection stories have been lightly edited by the different evangelists, they reflect quite closely four of the ways in which that story was told right from the start.
* * *
The second strange feature of the Resurrection stories is the presence of women as the primary witnesses. Whether we like it or not, women were simply not regarded as credible witnesses in the ancient world.
Now when the tradition had time to sort itself out, as we see reflected in the first paragraph of 1 Corinthians 15, the women have been quietly dropped. When it came to public apologetics, in that world, it would have been very embarrassing to think that your main witnesses to this extraordinary event were women, not least someone with the extraordinary reputation of Mary Magdalene.
But there they are in all four Gospel stories, front and center: the first apostles, the first people to tell others that Jesus was raised from the dead. In concert with what is noted earlier in this book, it is simply incredible to suppose that the tradition began with the male-only form that we find in the tradition Paul quotes in 1 Corinthians, and then developed, in significantly different ways, into the four female-first stories we find in the Gospels. Here again, the stories really do look as if they are very, very early.
* * *
The third strange feature, which goes with the third modification of the Jewish resurrection belief, is the portrait of Jesus himself. Many people have tried to make out over the last century that the Gospel stories developed in the following manner. First, people after Jesus' death were so overcome with grief that they really did not know what they were thinking. Second, they gradually acquired a new spiritual consciousness, a new belief that Jesus' cause continued. Third, from this new religious experience, they gradually started to explore the Scriptures. Fourth, from this they then (and only then) started to use the language of resurrection to articulate their experience. Finally, toward the end of the first century, some people began to invent stories about an actual resurrection, which the early church had never envisaged.
Capping this proposed progression of thought is the idea that, in Luke and John (which are supposed on this theory to be the last Gospels to be written, perhaps toward the end of the first century), people were so concerned to stress that Jesus really was a real physical being, a real embodied being, that they invented stories about him eating broiled fish, cooking breakfast by the shore, being able to be touched, and so on.
The problem is that this proposed development is very strange, even in Jewish terms. If the early Christians had gone this route, searching the Scriptures and inventing stories on that basis, you would have expected them to envisage the risen Jesus shining like a star. That, after all, is what the popular text in Daniel 12 says about people being raised from the dead. They do not. They describe him like that in the Transfiguration, for whatever reason, but none of the Resurrection stories even hint at that. Indeed, Jesus appears as a human being with a body that is like any other body; he can be mistaken for a gardener, or a fellow traveler on the road.
In addition, the stories also contain definite signs that the body has been transformed. Nobody, I suggest, would have invented them just like this. The body is clearly physical. It has, so to speak, used up the matter of the crucified body — hence the empty tomb. But, equally, it comes and goes through locked doors; it is not always recognized; and eventually it disappears altogether into God's space (which is how we ought to think of "heaven").
This kind of account is without precedent. No biblical text predicts that the Resurrection will involve this kind of body. No speculative theology laid this trail for the evangelists to follow, and to follow in such interestingly different ways.
In particular, this should put a stop to the old nonsense that suggests that Luke's and John's accounts, which are the most apparently physical, were written late in the first century in an attempt to combat docetism — the view that Jesus was not a real human being but only seemed to be.
Granted, if all you had was Jesus eating broiled fish and inviting Thomas to touch him, we might have thought that Luke and John were trying to say, "Look! He was really a solid physical person!" However, those very same accounts are the ones in which Jesus appears and disappears, passes through closed doors, and finally ascends into heaven.
These stories are extremely peculiar, and the type of peculiarity they possess is not one that would have been invented. It looks as though the Gospel writers are struggling to describe a reality for which they didn't really have adequate language.
* * *
The fourth and final strange feature of the Resurrection narratives, which may call into question many of the Easter sermons that I and others regularly preach, is the absence of any mention of the future Christian hope.
Almost everywhere else in the New Testament, where you find people talking about Jesus' resurrection, you find them also talking about our own future resurrection, the final hope that one day we will be raised as Jesus has been raised.
But the Gospels never say anything like, "Jesus is raised, therefore there is a life after death" (not that many first-century Jews doubted that there was); or, "Jesus is raised, therefore we shall go to heaven when we die" (most people believed something like that anyway); or better, "Jesus is raised, therefore we shall be raised at the last."
No: insofar as the event is interpreted in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, it has a very "this-worldly" meaning, relating to what is happening here and now. "Jesus is raised," they say, "therefore he is the Messiah; he is the true Lord of the whole world; therefore we, his followers, have a job to do: we must act as his heralds, announcing his lordship to the entire world."
It is not, "Jesus is raised, therefore look up into the sky and keep looking because one day you will be going there with him." Many hymns, prayers, and Christian sermons have tried to pull the Easter story in that direction, but the line of thought within the Gospels themselves is, "Jesus is raised, therefore God's new world has begun, and therefore we, you, and everybody else are invited to be not only beneficiaries of that new world but participants in making it happen."
Excerpted from Jesus, the Final Days: What Really Happened by Craig A. Evans and N. T. Wright, edited by Troy A. Miller, published in 2009 from Westminster John Knox Press.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Christians: We Make the Goodness of God Believable
Here's a quote from Gary Haugen, President of INTL JUSTICE MISSION, who recently asked, “What is God’s plan for making it believable that he is good for those who are suffering so much in our world?” Then he answered, “We are the plan; God has no other plan.”
Friday, January 16, 2009
Entering into the Story of the Bible by Scot McKnight
An excerpt from a great new book on reading Scripture in a way that informs and transforms our lives every day...The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible
The Bible is what the Bible is, and I believe it. "Let the Bible be the Bible" is my motto, because teaching the Bible has taught me that the Bible will do its own work if we get out of the way and let it. Someone once said that the Bible needs no more defending than a lion, and I agree.
I have learned that when we take our hands off the pages of the Bible, read and listen to its words, and enter into its story by faith, something happens. It renews and continues to renew its powers. It becomes what it was meant to be, something both more intimate than an old pair of jeans and more unusual than alien creatures, something like a familiar stranger or an unpredictable neighbor or a pet lion whose presence invigorates its surroundings. Something like the glory of the ocean, which on the surface appears gentle and strolling and pleasant to observe, but under that surface there's a vibrant, teeming, swirling, dynamic world full of beauty and wonder. Or perhaps listening to the Bible is like having the most powerful person in the world sit down with you for coffee as a friend and chat with you.
The Bible is what the Bible is, and I believe it. "Let the Bible be the Bible" is my motto, because teaching the Bible has taught me that the Bible will do its own work if we get out of the way and let it. Someone once said that the Bible needs no more defending than a lion, and I agree.
I have learned that when we take our hands off the pages of the Bible, read and listen to its words, and enter into its story by faith, something happens. It renews and continues to renew its powers. It becomes what it was meant to be, something both more intimate than an old pair of jeans and more unusual than alien creatures, something like a familiar stranger or an unpredictable neighbor or a pet lion whose presence invigorates its surroundings. Something like the glory of the ocean, which on the surface appears gentle and strolling and pleasant to observe, but under that surface there's a vibrant, teeming, swirling, dynamic world full of beauty and wonder. Or perhaps listening to the Bible is like having the most powerful person in the world sit down with you for coffee as a friend and chat with you.
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