Covenant of Love

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There’s a man who when I’m sickly, says, “You very, very quickly”

Should be starting to be better, not worse,”

And he tells me that he sees I’m needing longer on my knees,

And there will always be a relevant verse.

But some say if you suffer,

then your spirit will get tougher,

So you’d better find a will and get it signed,

But just as I’m refusing to go on, it’s so confusing,

Halleluljah in the back of my mind.

Best in Plass, p.205

I suggest that if we put the question of Calvinism and Arminianism aside for a time and study God as he has revealed himself in the scriptures we will not discover Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover as Calvinism has always espoused; in fact we may not even discover God as the Arminian understands him. It may be, after seeking to discover the God of the scriptures on their own terms, that we may discover the God of Open Theism quite by accident! Not of Calvin’s Unmoved Mover, but of Pinnock’s Most Moved Mover.We will, in all probability, discover as John Sanders said, a God Who Risks. This – I believe – is the truth we all must wrestle with whether or not we embrace Open Theism.

Walter Brueggemann, one of the foremost Old Testament scholars, seems quite disinterested in questions of determinism and foreknowledge – except when specific texts’ call attention to such speculation – and in the debates between Calvinism and Arminianism (and Open Theism). But in his studies of the God of the Old Testament, the “Hebrew testimony” and portrayal of YWHW, he writes: “the defining category for faith in the Old Testament is dialogue, whereby all parties – including God – are changed in a dialogic exchange that is potentially transformative for all parties… including God.” And again, “The Old Testament is an invitation to reimagine our life and our faith as an on-going dialogic transaction in which all parties are variously summoned to risk and change.” He goes on:

“When we are freed of static categories of interpretation that are widely utilized among us, we are able to see that the articulation of God in the Old Testament partakes exactly of the quality of complexity, dynamism, and fluidity that belong to the post-modern world… such an open and thick articulation of faith may be threatening to some and may require unlearning by us all”. An Unsettling God; 2009, p.xii; italics added.

What a powerful statement from a man who is not interested in sustaining “static categories of interpretation” such as Calvinism or Arminianism; neither, it is prudent to add, is he interested in Open Theism. When Brueggemann approaches the scriptures he does not ask, is the God of Calvin here or the God of Arminius or the God of Pinnock? When Brueggemann approaches the Old Testament he asks the question to the ancient Hebrews, “Who do you say that He is?” Sometimes we see the categories of Calvin and sometimes we see the categories of Arminius, this is partly what makes God “unsettling”, because YWHW cannot be made to easily fit into our “static categories of interpretation” – He is too big, and we are too fallible.

Yet it is a fearful road Brueggemann offers, it is a road of discomfort; because in asking the Hebrews and not the Greeks “Who is YWHW?” he finds himself immediately at odds with classical Christian theology.

“In… much classical Christian theology, ‘God’ can be understood in terms of quite settled categories that are, for the most part, inimical to the biblical tradition. The casting of the classical tradition… is primarily informed by the Unmoved Mover of Hellenistic thought… a Being completely apart from and unaffected by the reality of the world” [p.1]

We have come to a point – or perhaps we have always been there – where the God revealed by the Hebrew testimony is rather embarrassing to our sensibilities. The Hebrews speak of a God affected by the passing of time; a God emotionally invested in his creation and sometimes those emotions are even mixed. They speak of a God whose mind is not settled and what’s worse, they don’t seem to mind this God at all! This God repents, He laughs, He tests, He changes His mind and what’s more, He allows his creation to move Him to action and at other times, they have the power to stay His wrathful hand.

“It is common to be embarrassed about the anthropomorphic aspects of this God, so embarrassed as to want to explain away such a characterization or at least to transpose it into a form that better serves a generic notion of God…. All such embarrassments, however, fail to do justice to the scriptural tradition.” [p.2]

Again, Walter Brueggemann has called us out on the carpet; all of us! Classical Christianity cannot escape the ugly reality that we have since near the beginning been embarrassed of the Hebrew testimony of God and so silenced it. It does not jive well with our sensibilities, our Hellenistic sensibilities. But who is the guilty one; are they or are we? It is not they who are being unfaithful to the scriptures; indeed they wrote them! And instead of being embarrassed of the Hebrew testimony of YWHW we ought to be embarrassed of our selves. It will no longer do, in my mind, to dismiss the challenge of the Old Testament as embarrassing “anthropomorphic” ramblings of ancient people. Christianity needs – to some extent – to put Classical Christian Theology on trial and the judge ought not to be Aristotle, but Abraham. Classical Christian Theology is in need of purification, and its filter ought to be the scriptures.

The early prophets in Israel’s history seem to have a special gifting which is lost to the later prophets, the ability to see the significance in the mundane visions.

When God asks that later prophet Zechariah, “What do you see?” the prophet goes on to describe in detail the whole purview before him. Afterward he asks the Lord, “What are these things?” (Zechariah 4:2-6) What’s the point? Why are you showing me this? I don’t get it?

In contrast God asks the earlier prophet Amos, “What do you see?” Amos’s answer is so simple that its significance is almost lost, and then when it is translated into English it is completely lost: “I see a basket of summer fruit” (Amos 8:1). He doesn’t say “I see a basket of fruit” or “I see a basket” or “I see fruit”. Any one of those would have been true enough, but they would have missed the point. The Hebrew word for “summer fruit” (qayis) is very similar to the Hebrew for “end” (qes). God responds to what Amos sees by saying: “The end has come for my people Israel.”

Similarly God asks Jeremiah, “What do you see?” The prophet replies “I see an almond branch”. He could very well have said “I see a stick” or “I see a branch” or “I see a piece of wood” and all of these would have been true enough. As with Amos so with Jeremiah, there is a pun involved: the Hebrew word for “almond” (saqed) is very similar to the Hebrew word for “watching” (soqed). God replies to Jeremiahs observation with: “You have seen well, for I am watching over my word to perform it” (Jeremiah 1:12-13).

The point is that these two prophets, in looking at the obvious, are able to see the significant thing which is hidden in plain sight, and it got me thinking:

When we walk the streets, when we see the world, when we view our friends and voyage through the mall do see the details of everything like the later prophets while losing the significance of it all? Or do we observe what God wants us to observe in the mundane things of this world? Almost everybody is hurting, has been hurting or will be hurting. Do we see them? Some people have money and so we think they have everything when in reality they have nothing. Do we observe them? Do we see what God wants’ us to see or do we see as our society has trained us to see?

Of me I want God to say as he says to Jeremiah, “you see well”.

Do you see well?

“At the end of the one hundred and fifty days the waters had abated; and in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat” – Genesis 8:3-4 NRSV

Yesterday a team of Evangelical Christian archaeologists announced with near absolute certainty that Noah’s ark has finally been discovered on mount Ararat. Carbon dating, they say, has verified that the wooden specimens which have been recovered from the structure date back to 4,800 B.C.E. – the approximate era of the “Flood”. To quote another news source:

“The structure had several compartments, some with wooden beams, which were believed to house animals.”

The team ruled out the possibility that the structure was a human settlement on the grounds that there was discovered near the site another human settlement from the same era only three hundred meters or so away.

Apparently local Turkish officials are seeking to apply for “UNESCO World Heritage status so the site can be protected while a major archaeological dig is conducted”.

What do you thing?

Could there actually be something to the biblical account of the Flood?

I want to tell you about a novel (“A not-quite-true-story…”) I read yesterday which I am absolutely thrilled about. It is hilarious. Masterfully written! Creative! And meaningful!

Consider this a teaser….

Read the (informal) review next post!

In a book called Death and Afterlife: A Theological Introduction, Terence Nichols writes:

“I am writing from a Christian perspective and will appeal primarily to a Christian audience… Although I believe that ultimately all who are saved are saved through the work of the incarnate Logos, Jesus the Christ, I emphatically do not believe that only professed Christians can be saved. As Peter says in his speech to Cornelius, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him” (Acts 10:34-35)” – p. 16

I think there may be some merit to this line of thinking, though I know it is a matter of great dispute.

What do you think?

What is “Civilized?”

The power, the prestige, the glory of ancient Rome was uncontested for nearly eight hundred years! Rome, that mighty Eternal City, defined “civilized”. She had technology. She had beauty. And perhaps most importantly, she had literature! Imagine a world without Plato or Aristotle or Homer; or if you prefer, imagine a world without Moses or Isaiah or Paul. Where would we be without the writings of our past? Without Luther or Galileo or, for that matter, without Guttenberg’s Printing Press (there would be no need)?

Imagine a world where an ancient Egyptian or Semitic did not creatively draw his first “picture” to communicate a thought? We would probably still be “there”, still be in the same era or age as that ancient Egyptian or Semitic who first experiment with “writing”. We would, in other words, be uncivilized.

And that is where the Irish were in the fifth century of the Common Era before they met Patrick. They were uncivilized. They had no literature, and they cherished their poets almost more than their kings, because their poets transmitted the oral story of the Irish past. The Roman Empire, however, were the epitome of civilization. And as such, like every civilized people have done to the uncivilized throughout the ages, they sneered at them. They looked down their long and pointed noses at them. They had no time for them.

But to Rome’s north was a hodgepodge of “uncivilized” warriors who lusted after Roman’s prestige. They were the Goths. An ancient Goth once wrote: “An able Goth wants to be like a Roman; only a poor Roman would want to be like a Goth”.

But unbeknownst to Rome, things were about to change. Thomas Cahill writes in one of my favorite pieces of literature:

The citizens of the City of Rome, therefore, could not believe it when toward the end of the first decade of the fifth century, they would find Alaric, king of the Visigoths, and all his forces parked at their gates. He might as well have been the king of the Fuzzy-Wuzzies, or any other of the inconsequential outlanders that civilized people have looked down their noses at throughout history. It was preposterous. They dispatched a pair of envoys to conduct the tiresome negotiations and send him away. The envoys began with empty threats: any attack on Rome was doomed, for it would be met by invincible strength and innumerable ranks of warriors. Alaric was a sharp man, and in his rough fashion a just one. He also had a sense of humor.

“The thicker the grass, the more easily scythed,” he replied evenly.

The envoys quickly recognized that their man was no fool. All right, then, what was the price of his departure? Alaric told them: his men would sweep through the city, taking all gold, all silver, and everything of value that could be moved. They would also round up and cart off every barbarian slave.

But, protested the hysterical envoys, what will that leave us?

Alaric paused, “Your lives.”

In that pause, Roman security died and a new world was conceived.[1]

A Dark Age

The barbaric Goths had moved into Roman territory, usually progressively and sometimes abruptly (as in the case when Alaric sacked Rome in 410). Between that time and 476 with the death of the last Roman emperor, the Empire began to break apart. Every region, every city, every state became “every man for himself.” There was no time for schools, for grammaticus, for books. What’s more, the Goths liked it that way. The last remnants of “civilized” Romans could no longer look down on these new residents if they were equally as barbaric. Equally as illiterate.

The twenty-eight huge libraries established throughout the Empire had vanished, as one ancient writer puts it: “The libraries, like tombs, were closed forever”. Professional copyists were no more. Any literature that did survive where copied by the few remaining noble literates and placed in their small personal libraries.

The Dark Ages had begun.

A Light in Irish Green Martyrdom

Want to hear a great irony? The Irish had warrior blood running through their veins. If death they must die, they would do it in battle. It was an honor to die a bloody death for a just cause. But here is the irony (praise God): “Ireland is unique in religious history for being the only land into which Christianity was introduced without bloodshed. There were no Irish martyrs.” [p. 151]

Can you image? Of all the people who would want to be martyred for the cause of Christ it would be the Irish! And this lack of martyrdom troubled the Irish to whom a glorious death presented such an exciting finale. Do you think God knew what he was doing by saving this people, at this point in time, and then doing so without allowing them the glorious violent martyrdom they so earnestly desired?

The Irish came up with an alternative to Red Martyrdom by blood which they called “Green Martyrdom”. They would martyr or sacrifice their lustful flesh with its passion by leave the pleasures of society. They would climb a hill, find a cave, build a hut and venture off into no-man’s land, and there they would devote their selves to their new found hobby (introduced by Patrick). They would read about God. And they loved it. Patrick had introduced Christian literature to the Irish and they ate it up, scribbling down every word, every letter, over and over again. They made books and more books. They sacrificed their lives to copying literature! Mostly Christian literature, but not only Christian literature.

But Green Martyrdom, it seems, had failed: the Irish never left Ireland and Ireland was too lush of a land to truly be called a “martyrdom”. But an Irish priest named Columcille (who loved books) took up arms when one of his followers was murdered. After the battle he was excommunicated from Ireland (the typical punishment for a priest who took up arms). The blessed result is what came to be called “White Martyrdom” – for truly for an Irishman to leave Ireland was the greatest sacrifice of all, more so then death. Cahill writes: “Ireland, at peace and furiously copying, thus stood in the position of becoming Europe’s publisher” [p. 183]

While Rome and its ancient empire faded from memory and a new, illiterate Europe rose on its ruins, a vibrant, literary culture was blooming in secret along its Celtic fringe. It needed only one step more to close the circle, which would reconnect Europe to its own past by way of scribal Ireland. Columcille provided that step. [Ibid]

How did the Irish save civilization? They became Christian at just that point when Europe would slip into the Dark Ages. They became literate at just that point when Europe’s libraries would “be closed forever”. And finally, they became missionaries (White Martyr’s) at just that point when civilization would need a missionary the most. I’ll close off this series with one last quote by Thomas Cahill:

Wherever they went the Irish brought with them their books, many unseen in Europe for centuries and tied to their waists as signs of triumph, just as Irish heroes had once tied to their waists their enemies’ heads. Wherever they went they brought their love of learning and their skills in bookmaking. In the bays and valleys of their exile, they reestablished literacy and breathed new life into the exhausted literary culture of Europe.

And that is how the Irish saved civilization. [p. 196]

Do you think God knew what he was doing?

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[1] Thomas Cahill, How the Irish Saved Civilization, p.30-31

My wife has become a huge fan of the hit reality show, the Biggest Loser and so as has become a custom in our home, she’s managed to tie me down to watch a few episodes with her. Last night the contestants on the show began what was called “Work Week”, where they had to work a full 40 week for a food bank while keeping up with their regular weight loss programs.

While on lunch one of the inventory clerks, a rather large man, joined them in the lunch room and asked for pointers, tips and suggestions on how to lose his weight.

The whole lot of them, all the contestants, focused intensely one the man as each just kept on sharing their own success stories encouraging him that if they could do it so could he[1]. With passion and zeal they became the most intense missionaries of weight loss you’ll ever see.

And why? Because they carry the testimony of a life changed and visually transformed. What seemed impossible has proved to be possible after all.[2] And if someone will listen, someone who is where they used to be, if they will only listen, then with great passion these individuals will preach and preach until the whole world hears.

Has God transformed your life? Where you dead in your trespasses and sin? Where you hopelessly lost and hell bound? Did life before Christ carry any meaning at all? Has that inner “hole” been filled and satisified?

You met Christ. Like Paul, when he encountered the risen Jesus, he just had to tell the world[3], “This is what Christ has done for me… He can do it for you too!”[4]

Like the contestants on the Biggest Loser, when you really understand the change that has taken place in your life, when it becomes so real that everyone can see the difference, when the thought of it brings the emotions bubbling just beneath the surface, at that point you will become the world’s greatest missionary!

“Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee… Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…” [Matthew 28:16-20]

Notice the phrase, “eleven disciples”. They were aleady his disciples, they had experienced a life washed and transformed, and now they were called to “make disciple“. The success story we all carry – those who believe – is that Christ saved us. The fruit of that success story is what can be seen of our character.

What’s your success story and how has it changed those around you?

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[1] And that is what some of you were… – 1 Corinthians 6:11

[2] “Who then can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God” – Mark 10:27

[3] At once he began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God – Acts 9:20

[4] Two thirds of the book of Acts, every time Paul acquires an audience to preach, he always tells his story of his encounter with Christ.

You may have already heard of the Atheist group in San Antonio Texas who have begun a campaign on University ground called Smut for Smut. Students are encouraged to exchange their religious text (Bible, Koran, etc) for the porn magazine of their choice.

The motivation and rational behind this campaign are:

• Bronze Age tribal nonsense texts written by tent people should not dictate modern science.
• We should not allow these archaic texts to influence political agendas.
• Atheists tend to be knowledgeable about what’s in the scriptures and so this campaign is to inform other people about what the scriptures actually say.
• Why Porn? Because porn is smut and they want to make the comparison between it and the smut of scripture; particularly the parts that say “woman is worth half a man” and “you should beat your children”.
• To exchange Porn for Bibles is to exchange what is moderately bad for what is very bad.
• Morality should not be derived from religious texts, but from the accepted standards of society. If citizens murder each other, this is bad for society, therefore it is morally wrong.
• The Bible contradicts itself on nearly every page – who decides what is morally right or what is morally wrong?

In response I have a few questions of my own:

1. I thought atheist were against proselytizing? But isn’t that what they are doing in this campaign?

2. In reflecting upon their astounding knowledge of the scriptures, please show me the verse that says that “women is worth half a man” and “you should beat your children”? Read the scriptures in context and with the same respect as any other ancient or classical text and explain them to me?

3. I wonder if we should discard the old text of Aristotle or Plato, or how about Galileo? Let’s do away with philosophy, with psychology, with (ah um) science and every other practice of academia? Show me a society which is not informed by it’s past – predominately it’s literature? If what these athiest propose where followed through to its logical end – given the presupposition that archaic texts should not inform the modern mind – we would without a doubt end up back in the Stone Age (pre-Bronze Age).

4. Show me one intelligible person who would compare the Bible as a whole with Hustler magazines? There aren’t any? I’m not saying you can’t find people who make this comparison, just no intelligible ones because the comparson is absurd. What does Jesus and Hugh Hefner have in common?

5. The organizers of the campaign claim that religious text do not inform morality, but society does. In defense to this claim they state: “If citizens murder each other, this is bad for society”. Says who? (C.S. Lewis blows this argument out of the water in Mere Christianity.)

Well, those are my ranting thoughts on this. Watch the interview with Tucker Carlson and Atheist Agenda president Thomas Jackson Here. (Good interview)

What is your reaction to the interview? Add your thoughts below.

No one likes to be wronged; to be treated unfairly. When there is a sense of a grave injustice being done to us, like when someone sits in our seat at church or takes our parking spot. When someone offends us by doing something and acting someway towards us which we don’t appreciate. They get “lippy”; they show no “respect”. We get angry.

After all, who are they to treat us like this? And it quickly becomes evident that the sin of self, that old sin of pride which the scriptures refer to as “the flesh”, has been incubating just beneath the surface (yes, me too from time to time).

Reading through 1 Corinthians, the situation I just described was a mild case compared to what Paul was dealing with there. In the city of Corinth Christians where actually taking each other to court they were so mad at each other. Someone offended this person or that person; someone wronged someone else; another person was cheated by someone and everyone was getting offended by everybody else.

Paul takes a step back to observe this sorry state of affairs before he finally pleads, “brothers…

“Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers.” – 1 Corinthians 6:7-8

Paul is flabbergasted by the way the body of Christ is treating one another. “Why not rather be wronged”. That is not “be wrong”, it’s “be wronged”. Allow yourself to be offended. Water under the bridge. Let it go.

Ask yourself, “Is the situation worth the relationship?” Shall we be divided because someone has offended us? If so, then we are dividing the body of Christ.

“Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” – 1 Corinthians 12:27

Christ cannot be divided. To be a follower of Christ is to rather be “wronged” then to divide the body of Christ. It is to love your brother (and sister) and place them before yourself. “Have this mind in you” Paul councils, “which was also in Christ Jesus”. He continues:

“If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being likeminded, have the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourself. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others” – Philippians 2:1-4

When was the last time you allowed yourself to be wronged?