Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Expectations follow Encounter

    I haven’t been posting on Leviticus for some time because I have been busy preparing books for publication.  All that paying work sure does interfere with one’s hobbies!

    Today I encountered this quotation in my continuing effort to read through Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy alongside the Cornerstone Biblical Commentary on those books.

    … It is important to remember, both in the case of God’s dealing with his people in the past, as well as with his people today, that God first encounters his people in history, and only after a relationship has been established are the expectations derived from the relationship presented.  Expectations follow encounter.  — p. 57, emphasis mine

    And that is how grace is manifested throughout the Bible–before we call, so to speak.

  • Book: Odd Girl Out

    In this continuation of the Quadrail series, Timothy Zahn is in his normal fun and action form as he keeps Frank Compton and Bayta in a great deal of trouble. We learn new things about the ongoing war against the group-mind Modhri, and also about the Chahwyn who are Compton’s employers.

    Once one gets past the extreme difficulty of conceiving of the interstellar railroad, one can enjoy the background created by that odd system and just have fun with the stories and the characters. The background isn’t really all that deep, however. Largely this is action-adventure fun. I like to try to imagine ahead of time just how much twisted nastiness Zahn has planned for his characters. I never quite imagine it all.

    It’s either “nonetheless” or “because of this” that I really enjoy these books. Those who have read my fiction reviews will know by now that while I like deep, serious fiction under certain circumstances, I’m a bit of an escapist at heart, and if you keep me entertained, I’ll go ahead and enjoy any number of things that one might criticize otherwise.

    Zahn is a good provider for all of that.

  • Stuck on Silent Saturday?

    OK, it’s Easter Sunday morning, and I can join the chorus: He is risen!

    But I know from experience that there are Christians out there who are stuck on silent Saturday or Good Friday. For them, Christianity is all–and only–about the cross. Jesus died, they died in Jesus. They had no hope. Jesus is their hope–but they don’t seem to live it.

    If you’re not in that place, you can just ignore me, but if you are, remember Easter morning. The point is not that death and suffering are wonderful. The point of realizing your need is not to go on realizing your need. If I’m thirsty, I get a drink of water. Then I’m not thirsty any more. If you’re in need of redemption, find redemption–and don’t keep acting like you never did find it.

    I think that in many of our arguments over historical issues, we forget the meaning of the story. The meaning isn’t about doom, death, and destruction. The story tells us that doom, death, and destruction lose in the end.

    By going past silent Saturday, I don’t mean that your pretend that bad things don’t happen. Rather, I ask for an essential Easter optimism that says that even when the worst is happening, there’s something to work toward, something to look forward to.

    Paul says:

    We were buried therefore with him through baptism to death, that just like Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life. — Romans 6:4 (WEB)

    Just so, brother Paul! He’s the one who is most often quoted by the hopelessness crowd, especially his words in Romans 7. But I think Paul was just pretty realistic. Looking and working for good endings doesn’t mean one doesn’t recognize the bad. Recognizing the reality of bad things doesn’t mean giving up on good things.

    My wife and I lost a son to cancer at age 17. (She wrote a book, Grief: Finding the Candle of Light.) That’s a bad thing. You may wonder why I put it that way. Some say, “Obviously it’s bad.” Others are thinking I’m putting it too lightly. Yet others are thinking, “He’s a Christian, writing on Easter Sunday morning, and God works all things for the good of those who love him, so it’s not really bad.”

    No, it’s really bad. It was, is, and will be really bad. There still are moments when I remember him like he had been here only moments before. When I take his little dog out for a walk in the morning, I remember how he used to stop on his way to school to say good bye to his dog when he saw us walking. It’s a painful moment. I acknowledge it. You should acknowledge your painful moments, times, and seasons as well.

    But then there are other things. There is the John Webb Golf Tournament that raises money for the child life program at Sacred Heart Hospital. There are many lives that he touched both before and during his illness.

    Do these things make illness and death a good thing? No! Easter morning didn’t make the cross painless either. The point is that you get past it, build on it, shake your fist at death and despair and say, “You don’t get the last word!”

    That, I believe, is something Easter should re-teach us each year. Death doesn’t get the last word. Evil doesn’t get the last word.

    He has risen. Have you?

  • Atonement: The Error Adrian Warnock and Giles Fraser Share

    Adrian says it wouldn’t be Easter “without a row about the atonement” and he has promptly located one in a Guardian article by Giles Fraser, in which Fraser says:

    Thinking about the celebration of Holy Week in my new adopted cathedral brings home to me quite how important it is for Christians to insist upon a non-sacrificial reading of the death of Christ. For too long, Christians have put up with a theory of salvation that has at its core the idea that God requires the sacrifice of his own son so that human sin can be cancelled. “There was no other good enough to pay the price of sin,” we will all sing. The fact this is a disgusting idea, and morally degenerate, is obvious to all but those indoctrinated into a very narrow reading of the cross.

    Adrian, in presumed response (I can’t find his precise quote in the article he links), says:

    I am not surprised by the strong language used by the opponents of the view of the cross generally called “penal substitutionary atonement” but understood by millions of children simply as “Jesus died to be punished for our sin.” If millions of Christians are as wrong as Fraser believes then no wonder that he would speak the way he does.

    But I would note here that for many, the word “punished” is not nearly so central, and the statement is that Jesus died for our sins, whatever that may mean. Most of us will admit that we don’t know quite precisely what it means.

    So let me confess here right up front that I don’t really understand the atonement. But before all you knowledge-filled people jump up to tell me how you do understand it, and are thus in a position to set me straight, I’m going to refer you to 1 Corinthians 8:2, which I think applies here.

    And that’s the problem with these views. Adrian points out that both those who find penal substitutionary atonement is “the most precious truth of the Bible,” and those who believe it is “cosmic child abuse” cannot both be right. I agree! But both of them can quite easily be wrong.

    Now I don’t want to make accusations regarding Giles Fraser. It’s possible that he might nuance his point a little more if he had more space than a newspaper column. Adrian, on the other hand, has convinced me rather thoroughly that he is clear on his view and intends what he says. My summary, which I make available for criticism, is that penal substitutionary atonement, the idea that Jesus took the punishment demanded by God for our sins, and that this is to be understood in a judicial sense, is the true core meaning of the atonement.

    The response of some seems to be, “No, it isn’t. It doesn’t mean that at all. It means something else entirely.”

    That’s the error that I think is shared. In fact, I’m going to suggest that any statement that says that the singular meaning of the atonement is X, is wrong for any value of X. Neither side seems to be able to handle metaphor. Oh, we’ll get acknowledgment that theological language is metaphorical, but the same persons who make such statements don’t behave as though the language is metaphorical.

    To Adrian I would say that the language of penal substitution is a highly refined and narrowed form of one scriptural way of talking about atonement. It even deprives the sacrificial metaphors of much of their meaning, because sacrifice is not centrally about judicial penalties.

    One of the problems with understanding the death of Jesus as a sacrifice is that most of us in the Christian world have a very narrow and superficial idea of what sacrifice was about in the ancient world. If we’re going to use the metaphor of sacrifice, we ought at least to use it in a Jewish context, and not emphasize the most pagan elements, such as appeasement.

    But again, I would tell Adrian and those in his camp that if this particular metaphor suffices to make them believe that God forgives them, and thus is for them the most precious truth of scripture, then by all means see it as precious and cling to it. That’s what a good metaphor is about.

    But at the same time, realize that this specific formulation isn’t all there is to it, and isn’t necessarily central. Others may find their understanding comes through other metaphors. Metaphors are useful that way–not everybody has to get cozy with every one of them!

    But to turn to those on the side of Giles Fraser, don’t throw out the metaphor just because some people have grabbed it as a singular truth. You’re quite right to object to some results of the penal view of the atonement, and even the sacrificial view. But the penal view is only part of the sacrificial view, and the notion of sacrifice is an important part of how theology of the atonement developed and is understood.

    It’s a metaphor; it doesn’t tell us everything. It’s not supposed to. But the beauty of metaphors is that you can use many different ones to describe the same thing, with each one giving you additional light and understanding.

    In addition, one metaphor provides a corrective for another. When sacrifice or penal substitution leads us to see God as vindictive, we then need to look to other ones to help build our understanding of God.

    There is a beauty in the cross, but it’s a beauty that comes through transformation. Jesus took what was disgusting, despicable, and evil, symbolic of the worst of human nature, and transformed it. A symbol can be transformed.

    One way to understand that transformation is by the metaphor of sacrifice, but Jesus also transformed the very idea of sacrifice. Fraser alludes to this, but then proceeds to dispose of the metaphor itself. If you dispose of the metaphor of sacrifice, how can you see the transformation? If you dispose of the cross, how will you see God’s transforming power?

    If you try to blot out Good Friday, how will you comprehend Easter morning?

  • Of Making Many Books

    … there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh. — Ecclesiastes 12:12 (ASV)

    I think that will be my new theme text.

    With four books in process with release dates varying from this coming week to July, and a very small staff with most work done by contract, I have been working day and night, and thus not blogging here very much. (Those interested in just what I’m publishing should read my business announcements blog.)

    On the other hand, since blogging produces, at the most, a few cents, while publishing books pays the bills, I should be happy. And indeed, I am–tired by happy.

    In the meantime, I’m hoping to get back to blogging a bit more, which is actually one of my forms of relaxation, but next week promises to be rather intense as well.

    A happy Easter to all. If you don’t celebrate, at least enjoy the day off!

  • When the Climax Isn’t (Palms and Passion, Cycle B)

    This week I did some reading on the lectionary, and even led a discussion on Wednesday, but due to work on some new book releases I never had time to write.  There is one theme that came to mind when I was looking at the two liturgies–palms and passion.

    In teaching Bible study I like to use a couple of key stories.  The first is the story of Jonah and what I call “the Jonah problem.”  Now this doesn’t refer to the possibility of large fish swallowing people whole and said people surviving for days, then being spit up on shore.  That’s an interesting point to discuss, but even more important is the issue that comes up at the end.

    Jonah, whose preaching has been wildly successful, beyond the dreams of any evangelist that I know, is discouraged.  Down and out.  Suicidal even!  Why?  Because the story seems to him to have come to an end, and the end isn’t what he wanted.

    We often think that Jonah’s big problem with going to Nineveh was fear of the Ninevites.  I imagine he was afraid.  The Assyrians were not known by their foes as nice people.  But more importantly, I think, Jonah didn’t like the Ninevites.  He’d really have preferred to see them all consumed.  He ran away primarily because if the Ninevites didn’t hear the message, they wouldn’t respond, and they’d all be dead.  To Jonah, this was a good thing.  (Now before you go condemning him, think of your worst enemies, no, not the guy who taunts you at work.  Perhaps a serial killer.)

    So Jonah gets the wrong ending, which incidentally isn’t the actual end, as in the end the Ninevites get wiped out and it was many centuries before the site was even identified again.

    Jonah expected and was looking for one ending, and he got another.  He didn’t recognize what God was doing, because God didn’t do what he expected.

    The disciples have a similar problem.  To them, Palm Sunday should have been an end, or at least the beginning of one.  It should have been the end of them being the down-and-out, scum from Galilee, Jews of a lower class under the domination of Rome.  Palm Sunday was the thing that was supposed to happen.

    But in Mark 11:1-11, which is our gospel passage for the liturgy of the Palms, Jesus goes into Jerusalem to the temple, looks around, and then leaves.  It all falls flat.  Nothing comes of it.

    But the real climax was coming soon–the cross.  Of course, even though they had been told about it many times.  It just didn’t sink in. It didn’t become real to them.

    I had the experience of talking to a Sunday School class once immediately after what might have been a controversial sermon.  The interesting thing was that the minister had spoken against religious pluralism and in favor of salvation by grace.  The class members tended to think one got into heaven by being good enough, that the benefit of Christianity over other religions was that Jesus gave us a better example of how to live.

    But they liked the sermon anyhow.  They thought the pastor had said just what they thought.  Now I had heard the same sermon, and he said no such thing.  I talked to him and confirmed it.  He intended to say, and said, what I thought I had heard.  I know I’m perfectly capable of error in hearing, so I checked this carefully.

    During the class, however, I tried to explain what I thought he had said, and heard the same line repeated.  It was as though the actual message simply couldn’t penetrate.

    I think that’s where the disciples were.  Since the message of the cross made no sense at all, they had to try to interpret their way around it and come to understand it as meaning something other than it was.  So they thought Palm Sunday should be the beginning of the end, followed, of course, by Jesus taking the throne and driving out the Romans, whereas Jesus knew that the cross was coming.

    Now on Easter Sunday we get another high–the resurrection.  But have you noticed that again, the ending isn’t really quite there yet?  Oh yes, Jesus has paid the price and salvation is ours.  But that coming kingdom is both now and not yet.  The structure of the Christian year points that out to us, if we will pay attention.

    Good Friday must come before Easter.  Being the body of Christ here comes before the rest of heaven.  The apparent end of the story, isn’t really the end.

     

  • I Hope He is Right

    Gaegan Goddard’s Political Wire reports that John McCain thinks he will be the last candidate to accept federal matching funds. One of the best savings, though small, we could make at the federal level would be to end public financing and also end all of the regulations on fundraising except for transparency.

  • Broken Covenant Restored (Lent 5B/Jer. 31:31-34)

    In a previous post I mentioned that one problem we have with understanding forgiveness is that we tend to make excuses and to blame others rather than feel guilt on our own account.  Everything is OK, and we’re “not too bad.”

    We also lose the impact of some of the richest texts about salvtion, because we lack that sense of inevitability in judgment and the results that are sure to follow sin.  Read 2 Kings 24 as Jehoiakim serves the king of Babylon for three years and then rebels.  Jehoiachin replaces him and escapes with his life because he surrenders himself to Babylon.

    You might think this meant some sort of forgiveness, but no!  Look at the list of things that happen after this surrender.  Treasure is taken, people are taken, a new puppet king is put in Jehoiachin’s place.  There is, in effect, a new covenant.  This covenant is not like the old one–it is worse.  When Zedekiah rebels as well (see 2 Kings 25) the entire nation is taken into exile.

    Again, there is a new covenant with the remnant, but again the new covenant is much worse.

    The key fact here, one which would have been well known and expected throughout the Ancient Near East, is that a new covenant that replaced a broken one was bound to be worse.

    So here comes God.  “I’m going to make a new covenant.  It won’t be like the old one.”  In our New Testament mentality in which all is better, we hear that as a prediction of good things–and indeed it was.  But to the hearers, hearing the “new covenant language” and then the accusation that they had broken the old one would have been a terrifying thing.  New covenants that replaced broken ones were not better–they were always worse.

    But then we have the working of God’s grace.  The new covenant, even though it replaced a broken one, even though the old one made God Israel’s “lawful lord” (I prefer this to “husband” on grounds of context, although there are good linguistic arguments in favor of husband) and Israel had rebelled.  Thus the expectation could be darkness, destruction, and gloom.

    But instead, we have a new covenant that is better than the old, that makes new people who will be obedient.  Instead of just punishment, we have grace, empowering grace, that makes each one know what is right and wrong.  Goodness is placed within.

    Isn’t grace powerful?

  • The Problem with Being OK (Lent 5B)

    Let me apologize for my failure to write this week.  I was busy with book releases, and had little time to write.  I did read and think, however!

    One of the great problems for Christianity in the world tdoay is our general feeling of being OK.  Forgiveness is hard in a world where we find it easy to excuse wrongdoing.  In the ancient world there was a sense of fear of the gods, of the results of doing wrong.  Being ceremonially unclean was an important issue and one which one would feel compelled to rectify.  It was nothing like the sort of feeling we get when we skip church too many times.

    In our texts we see the contrast multiple times.  In Jeremiah 31:31-34 we see the mystery of a broken covenant that can be replaced by a new and better one.  Broken covenants often resulted in death.  While a new covernant might be made with a country by a conqueror, it was likely that the old king and/or those responsible for breaking the covenant would be dead.  We don’t take breaking agreements that seriously today.

    Psalm 51 is a prayer of penitence that reflects a deep sense of guilt.  No excuses, no shifting of the blame.  The Psalmist is definitely not OK, and he knows it.  True penitence results from a very real understanding and feeling that something has gone very wrong and must be corrected.

    When we look at the texts of redemption in the New Testament, we will fail to see them in all their beauty unless we recover the sense of wrongness from which we are to be redeemed.

    The prolem with being OK is that you don’t think anything needs to be fixed.

  • Embracing the Mysteriousness of God

    First, let me put away another mystery, though I doubt anyone was wondering that much. I’ve been working on a couple of new book releases and the resulting schedule kept me from blogging most of the week. No mystery there!

    The word “mystery” is rather popular today, but only in the sense of something to be solved through the application of proper efforts and skilled detective work. We like mysteries because we like to solve them.

    That’s why I used the word “mysteriousness.” God is essentially mysterious, not in a sense of something that will be solved, but rather in the sense of something–or Someone–who will ever elude our best efforts to understand.

    This is a piece of baggage that comes with the notion of a God who is infinite, omnipotent, omniscient, or anything similar. We cannot totally comprehend infinity. We cannot really embrace all knowledge. As soon as we attribute such characteristics to God, we are doomed to a certain amount of mystery, in fact a very substantial amount of mystery.

    I encounter this most frequently in discussing Biblical inspiration. Why could God not have made the Bible more straightforward, or speak to us in ways that leave no doubt? Why can’t he answer all our questions? Why doesn’t he make his presence more clearly manifest?

    Those are good questions, and ones I’m not about to answer! That’s not my topic here.

    There’s a certain conversation that takes place between Christian believers and others that goes something like this: Question about Christianity, Answer, Question about Christianity, Answer, … Excessively difficult question about Christianity, “God is a mystery.”

    Now many people have a problem with this resort to mystery. It seems like a dodge or perhaps sidestep. I have a problem with it as well, but only in its positioning. It shouldn’t be the last resort; it should be embraced at the first.

    I believe in the doctrine of infinite ignorance. God is infinite, suggesting there is an infinity to know about God. I am finite, so any amount of knowledge I hold is finite. Subtract any finite amount from infinity, and you still have infinity. Therefore I am infinitely ignorant of God.

    I would like to note I am not saying that I know nothing at all of God. Invert that statement, and one must note that the fact that any finite amount subtracted from infinity leave infinity does not mean that the finite portion is non-existent or even negligible from the proper point of view.

    What I am suggesting is that, as Christians, we embrace first God’s mystery. Celebrate how much beyond us he is. Give the “that’s a mystery” response first rather than as a last resort.

    We’re stuck with God as mystery, because if we make him fully comprehensible he will no longer be God, at least not in the sense meant by Bible writers and by Christians through the ages.

    This may not satisfy questioners, but it is, at least, honest and open from the start. No I don’t know all there is to know about God. I only know a very, very small amount. I’m willing to share with you my attempts at understanding, but I’m always aware of the size of my subject.