"Jesus, in all of His fullness, is the good news." Frank Viola

I'm always recommending Frank Viola's book. Once someone pushed back by saying Frank Viola was heretical and sending me the link to one of those watchdog websites where the guy goes on and on about all the heretics out there. I had to scroll about a mile to get to mention of Viola and I don't even remember now what it said, but the episode sticks in my mind because Viola seems so dang sound to me. He's just very Jesus-centric. If you haven't listened to his Epic Jesus podcast, you should do so. You'll se what I mean. But I wanted to mention a recent interview over at the blog called illuminate. The blogger is Jamal Jivanjee. There's good stuff over there. Anyway, back to the interview. Jamal starts out with the following comment.

The word ‘gospel’ means ‘good news’ and Jesus Christ is the personification of good news. Simply put, He is the gospel! In the New Testament, Paul & the apostles would proclaim the actual person of Jesus Christ. This was much more than a message containing some propositional truths about Christ and a few things He did. I’m convinced that all of our problems are rooted in a small vision of Jesus Christ. Simply put, the church is in desperate need of a large and stunning view of Jesus Christ! This view of Jesus Christ is rarely presented, however.

I love that. This is the gist of what has been guiding me for a long time now. I'm sorry if it sounds simplistic and unworthy of a post-doctoral degree in theology, but what we need is more Jesus. Jesus is big and strange and category busting and inconvenient to one and all.

 I like Frank's definition of the Gospel, and his definition of the Kingdom. They're helpful. My guiding principle as I journal through the Gospel of Mark is very close to what Frank is talking about. Jesus and the Kingdom and the Good News are in many ways interchangeable. Jesus is the good news, and Jesus is the the Kingdom. These statements of equivalence may require qualification, but they are nevertheless essentially true.

 Read the interview for some insightful explication of this idea and others. I kind it difficult to snip a characteristic quotation from this wide-ranging interview, but here's a try:

If you examine everywhere the term “gospel” is used throughout the New Testament, you will discover that it’s always bound up with the Person of Jesus (His work is united with His Person. While people regularly separate His work from His Person, you can’t separate His Person from His work. The same is true with His teachings). In His preaching and teaching, Jesus consistently pointed to Himself. In fact, the early church regarded the four gospels to be “the gospel.” And what do those four gospels present? They present Jesus: His life, His story, His teaching, His work. Read the four gospels carefully sometime and count the number of times that Jesus speaks about Himself. You will have no doubts that His message—His gospel—was Himself. (I’m thrilled that some evangelical scholars are writing about this now.) Paul, Peter, John, et al. preached the same gospel as did Jesus. Their message was also Christ.

If we start with Jesus and keep the focus there, we will not get all bent out of shape by secondary things. And my point is, everything else is secondary.

Simply Jesus

I've started reading N. T. Wright's Simply Jesus.  I'm into the third chapter, and loving it.

You know, it's really kind of interesting how many books are being written with the avowed purpose of refocusing on Jesus, correcting a trend, in other words, toward focusing on other things and relegating Jesus Christ to the periphery.

There was Jared Wilson's book, You're Jesus is too Safe, and Frank Viola and Len Sweet's The Jesus Manifesto, and more recently Tullian Tchividjian's Jesus + Nothing = Everything.  I'm sure there have been others, but taken together they represent a distinct trend.  Almost a movement!

Speaking of books, the next in my queue is The King Jesus Gospel, by Scot McKnight.  It's been my personal project to read the NT for a deeper understanding of what is meant by that term, "the Gospel."  McKnight has been investigating that same matter, and his conclusion is that we've been so focused on one aspect of the Gospel (individual salvation) that we have done the broader picture is a distinct disservice.

Now back to the matter of re-focusing on Jesus. I think that Jesus is the good news; he embodies it. So you can't go far wrong concerning the Gospel--and you won't over-simplify it--if you begin with Jesus and keep the focus there.

So anyway, back to Simply Jesus.  Here's a clip from the introduction:

Jesus—the Jesus we might discover if we really looked, is larger, more disturbing, more urgent than we had ever imagined. We have successfully managed to hide behind other questions and to avoid the huge, world-shaking challenge of Jesus’s central claim and achievement. It is we, the churches, who have been the real reductionists. We have reduced the kingdom of God to private piety; the victory of the cross to comfort for the conscience; Easter itself to a happy, escapist ending after a sad, dark tale. Piety, conscience, and ultimate happiness are important, but not nearly as important as Jesus himself.

That's good stuff.  I've been struck, in my reading of the Gospels, at how absolutely strange Jesus often seems.  Sure, he's fully human and all that, but he talks like no man has ever talked.  He says things like, "How long am I to bear with this faithless generation?" Those are the words of a man who has come from elsewhere, is a stranger in this world, and is eager to get back home.  Nobody is a stranger in this world like Jesus was.

Well, he was different, this Jesus.  And I'm thankful for this movement to re-focus on the Jesus going on in the church today, and it's something I want to be a part of. It's the most exciting thing going. Either the church is about the indwelling Jesus (for real) or it is nothing more than playing the religious community game.

Mark 6

This morning I read the passage in Mark, the sixth chapter, where Jesus walks on the water. His disciples were struggling in the boat, trying just to keep above water, and when they see Jesus passing them, walking on the surface of the waves, their first thought is that it must be some sort of ghost or apparition.

The reason they think that, Mark tells us, is that their hearts here hardened. That's pretty shocking I think. These same disciples had just recently returned from their first experimental missionary journey, where they'd healed people and cast out demons in the name of Jesus. See, demons (demons!) were compelled to obey them just as they'd obeyed Jesus. How thrilling that must have been.

And then, no sooner do they get back from these missional excursions than they watch Jesus multiply a few loaves of bread and a few fish so as to feed thousands of hungry people. It's just after this that they find themselves nearly swamped in their little boat, crossing the Sea of Galilee in a little boat at night, without Jesus.

That "without Jesus" part is important. On another of their frequent crossings of this same lake, this time with Jesus on board, they had been similarly threatened by a sudden storm, and had seen Jesus (who'd been trying to sleep until the terrified disciples woke him up) command the wind and waves to be still.

 But see, the difference now is, Jesus is not with them. They'd left him behind, at his insistence, and now they are going down, with no one to save them this time. And their hearts are hardened.

These were ordinary men, these twelve. I don't think Judas, for example, was really all that different from Peter, and neither one of them was all that different from you and me. The Bible refers to hardness of heart as a kind of inability to believe in God or recognize him for whom he and what he is. Hardness of heart flickers in us like sheet lightning in the summer. I mean, it happens. We are prone to it.

And the evidence is right here, in this frail boat on a stormy sea, filled with 12 deeply distressed apostles ("sent ones"). How quickly our hearts go from soft to hard, from faith to cynicism. This Jesus, isn't he just the carpenter's son? This Jesus, maybe he does these magic tricks by the power of Beelzebul! Or this figure walking on the waves, it certainly looks like Jesus, but it must be a ghost. A sign of our impending deaths. We're going down!

The issue throughout Mark's account is just this issue of recognition.  Who is Jesus?  Do we recognize him for who he is.  Because if we don't, it's because of hardened hearts.

Jesus came to a hard-hearted world when it was almost too late and he said, let me show you what life will be like in the kingdom of God. It will be strikingly devoted to mercy, as I am. Here's let me show you once again that I have the power to save! And we see it, and then later, an hour later, or a day, under the influence of the latest distress, our hearts return to their familiar state of being.

We are not better men than the twelve. We are not braver or more faithful or more consistent. We are not, generally speaking, models of faith. Anyway, a model is essentially not what we need.  If that were so, the disciples would have had no problem at all.  What they needed, and what we need, is One who has the power to work in us from within.

Jesus Calling

Reading the early chapters of Mark's Gospel, I've been intrigued by the idea of the call of Jesus, and how people have understood that over the years.

Early on in Mark, Jesus states his purpose in two ways. First, he says he came to preach in the surrounding towns and villages of Galilee. What he preached, of course, was the good news that the Kingdom of God had come. And following that he issued a call: “Repent and believe this good news.”

At another point he says, in answer to a criticism of the Pharisees, “I came to call sinners, not the righteous.”

The call implicit here is the same that is explicit in his proclamation of the Gospel. “Repent and believe.” Jesus "came" to issue this very call to one and all.

That word, “believe,” has a universe of meaning, of course. Believe the good news. Believe what you will learn from Jesus as you walk with him, as you listen to his teaching, as you see how he loves people, how unafraid he is, how bold to love, and how the natural response of people who have received such love is to love him back.

But to walk out this believing is a progressive thing. Sometimes, as we will see later in Mark's account, some who have followed Jesus with dedication will suddenly drop away. And Jesus meets their later return to him not with mistrust and rejection, but again with his call. “Follow me. Keep following me. Even after I'm gone, you will be able to follow me. For that I will send the Holy Spirit, and he will empower you, and show you what to say, in a hundred ways and situations, some of them quite dangerous. But the Spirit will show you the way.”

But that's getting ahead of myself. For now, Jesus calls. His call is to repent and believe, and then to follow. “Follow me,” he says to Peter and James and John, the fishermen, and to Matthew, the tax collector. And they do. They follow. They stick close. They watch and learn. In following, they become his students, and he their teacher. They want more of him. They want to do the things he does. They want to understand.

Then, in chapter 3, having taught them, he appoints them to do the same things he's been doing. Preach the Gospel, and overpower the demonic with simple commands, demonstrating thereby that the Kingdom has come indeed.

Now, here's a kind of “leaderboard” snapshot of the moment. You have Jesus at the top. He's the preacher/teacher, calling people to follow. Then next you have “the twelve.” They've been sticking with Jesus a little more closely and consistently than anyone else at this point. But one of these twelve will betray Jesus, and most of the others will desert him when the going gets particularly rough. But for now, they're a band of devoted ones, who've dropped everything to follow them.

After these twelve we have the many who have flocked to Jesus for healing. They too have heard his teaching. Some of them have no doubt believed his news, although who at this point can really understand its full implications? But most will go home, whether believing it or not believing it, and try to get on with their lives.

Now flash ahead to the church in Paul's day. Hundreds of people had seen the resurrected Jesus. There was then the remarkable event we call the ascension. After that, the Pentecost descent of the Holy Spirit in power. There is much powerful preaching of the Kingdom, and much miraculous healing (see the book of Acts), just like when Jesus was alive. The church is spreading like wildfire. Soon, one of the Pharisees who had been chief persecutor of the young movement will flip sides, becoming a Christian himself, and in time he will be best known as a prodigious church planter and writer of memorable epistles. In many of those epistles, which are usually addressed to whole churches (not just particular Christians), he will routinely describe every single believing member of that church as a people who have been "called to be saints."

What I want you to notice is this. It is not just the twelve who are called, but all who believe. You were called to believe, and the call to believe continues, and persists, and echoes down through your days and nights. It is a call to let your believing work its way into your blood and bone, and to let it guide your feet and your hands and your thoughts and your speech.

The call "to be saints" is the continuing call of Jesus to believe the good news and walk it out. No one does this overnight. That is why the call continues and continues and continues. Sometimes, even as the twelve, we fall a gigantic step back. We go from following to fleeing. No one is immune to this.

I've noticed over the years that a lot of Christians have imagined a kind of two-tiered "call." Priests and pastors occupy the upper tier. They have been called to a closer following than the rest of us. It's their duty to be pretty near perfect, or the rest of us get upset about it. These priests and pastors are the modern equivalent of "the twelve," in this view. They answered a "special" call. They're the elite. The rest of us are simply called to obey them. They're pastors, we're sheep. That's our call. They are set apart, while we just go about our lives, like the crowds who gather for a time around Jesus, seeking healing, seeking miracles, then disperse. Our call seems to all boil down to attending church and volunteering in its programs and ministries.

This way of looking at things fits nicely with a desire to elevate the priesthood to an elite status, leaving everyone else in an undifferentiated mass known as "the flock." When egomaniacs go into the ministry, this is the view they take. It serves them well.

But all this is so wrong, has such deleterious repercussions, and (most importantly) is so un-biblical. If you have once received and believed the good news that Jesus offers, you are not only saved, but called to work out that salvation from day to day (in fear and trembling), for it is God's purpose to work his will in and through you (Phil 2:12-13). You have been called to be a saint (a consecrated one, set apart for the purpose of God). Not just your pastor, your church leaders, but you. Not by sitting on as many church boards as you can get yourself appointed to, but by walking out the love of Christ for you by loving others in the same way.

The fact that we don't necessarily do that well, we saints, tells you either that love is hard or that we are weak and sinful and need a lot of help. Or both. We're going to have to draw near to Jesus, learn from him, and follow closely behind. We're going to have to let his words dwell in us richly, thankful to God for what He has done and continues to do. (Col 3:16) For we have been called, ultimately, to the very presence of the King, high and lifted up.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:3-4 ESV)

A high calling, that. And it's to all who call upon the name of the Lord. There is no higher calling. Do not dream of another world, another time and place, in which you might walk out your faith. You are called to walk it out today, where you're at. May God be with you.

The Bible and Jesus

As I've mentioned before, I've been reading the Gospel of Mark slowly over the past couple of months. My plan from the beginning was to read a passage and write about it privately (not primarily for the blog), and that remains my plan. I'm thinking of this as a devotional practice in which, instead of reading someone else's devotional (there are plenty of good ones, of course), I write my own.

Of course I have a guiding principal or two. Foremost among them is the hermeneutical assumption that each and every passage is about Jesus. You might think this would be obvious, but many devotionals take each passage as an opportunity to teach a lesson about life, or having the right attitude, or doing the right things. Sometimes they're helpful, but advice is different than seeing (being shown) Jesus. My assumption is that this was Mark's purpose in writing his account: to show Jesus to his readers.

So the question I'm always asking myself is, how does this passage, this episode in the life and ministry of Jesus, help to clarify my understanding of Jesus?

I'm just about to the end of chapter 2 now, and maybe picking up a little steam. I've written about 30 devotional entries, each one no more than one page in length, two to three hundred words I suppose. It's been fruitful, and also fun, and I would recommend the practice to others. I know many of us need to get over the notion, enforced by lots of preachers, that the Bible is a recipe book for Christian living. It is not. It is a revelation of Jesus.

From Christ Died for the Sins of Christians Too:

I used to tell my students at an evangelical Christian college that they had never heard real preaching, with the exception of a few sound evangelistic appeals. Their weekly diet in the congregation was often a moral exhortation to be like Jesus, or Paul, or Daniel, or some other super saint in the Bible. They were constantly peppered with the question, “What are you doing for Jesus?” The preaching was not, as it should have been, a proclamation of God’s grace to them because of the finished and atoning death of Christ-God’s grace for them as Christians. That emphasis is desperately needed. But the only way we can recover this message is by ceasing to read the Scriptures as a recipe book for Christian living, and instead find within the Scriptures Christ who died for us and who is the answer to our unchristian living. We must have that kind of renewal (a renewal, which not surprisingly, was important to the reformers, as well), and it can only come if we realize that the gospel is for Christians, too.

Some Quick Thoughts on Church, Mission, Discipleship

Christians are disciples.

Disciples follow Jesus, learn from him, and are charged with the mission of continuing to do so, and to draw others to the same kind of life ("go and make disciples").

The original disciples were called by Jesus and in answer to that call they followed Jesus. But when Jesus departed, he charged them with the mission of making other followers and learners like them, so somehow the ability to follow Jesus and learn from him did not come to an end with his departure. It continued through the disciples. They continued to be disciples (followers of Jesus) and in so doing they made new disciples.

The church is the coming together of such disciples. When they come together they might be expected to sing the praises of the one to whom they have dedicated their lives, or to discuss their mission (the ups and downs, the troubles and triumphs), or to pray for one another as disciples (or you might say, to pray one another into their missions). Jesus said he would be with them when they came together, even just two or three of them. To be with him and to have him be with them is the desire of their hearts.

If you conduct church as if your congregation is not in fact a gathering of disciples on mission but simply a needy crowd, then that's what you will have.

If you, as church leaders, funnel your definition of mission entirely through a church-activity grid, then you're failing to teach the true nature of discipleship or the true nature of mission. It is almost entirely outside the walls, along the highways and byways.

If when disciples come together they choose to listen to someone preach, that preacher probably should preach what Jesus preached. They're Jesus followers, after all, not Bible-worshippers.

And when, after coming together and learning from one another, praying for one another, singing the praises of Jesus together, they go their separate ways, they are going back out to their missions as Jesus-followers. Their mutuality is in their love for Jesus and their shared mission as his followers.

The alternative to this vision of church is one in which the church is merely a dispenser of help (Biblical or not) and the congregation is merely a crowd of needy people. There can be a lot of comforting at such a church, but often very little calling. Leaders in these churches see their primary mission as attracting more needy people and dispensing the help they need, but seldom calling (and even re-calling) people to the mission the way Jesus did ("follow me, and I will make you fishers of men").

The congregation then takes on a two-tiered aspect. The handful that "minister," and the many that need "ministry." This set-up becomes entrenched by one-hour repetitions each Sunday morning. But it does not make disciples nor does it strengthen and encourage disciples, nor is it, I would suggest, even church.

On the other hand, a church that is the gathering of the called disciples will be all about sending not attracting. It will be all about mission, not about finding new way to get more people in the building.

On Receiving and Believing Forgiveness

What are the most significant words ever spoken?

Maybe, "Let there be light."

Or perhaps, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness."

Of course you would only believe these words to be truly significant if you believed that the Creator of all things actually did speak them, and that this was in fact effective speech. That, in truth, it was God who said, "Let there be light," and then there was light!

If you don't believe all that, fine. You might still consider the words significant (in a sociological way), but perhaps no more so than, say, the kama sutra. Words, any words, take on a certain power, a certain effectiveness, when they are believed. Even when a lie is believed, it effects things. This is something demagogues understand well. And obviously the demagogue (or any commonplace liar) is only believed because we have mistakenly deemed him or her worthy of our trust. See, what we think about the one speaking will have a great deal to do with how we receive the words spoken.

But if God had never said, "Let there be . . .", there would never have been a universe in which demagogues could mislead people. That's another level of effectiveness entirely.

But getting back to the original question, here's another candidate for most significant.

"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

These words were spoken by Jesus of Nazareth while he was being nailed, hands and feet, to a wooden stake by Roman soldiers, almost exactly 2000 years ago.

But what didn't they know they were doing? They knew, certainly, that they were killing a man. This was an officially sanctioned execution. What they didn't know, I think, was who the man was that they were murdering.

Remember, these words are the more significant if they are truly effective. And their effectiveness rests, to a great extent, on who Jesus was (and is) and why he allowed himself to go to that stake. If, in fact, he is the Son of God, and if his purpose is what the Bible says it was, these are words then which have a similar effectiveness to "Let there be light," or, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness."

Jesus is opening the door, from the agony of the cross, to a new creation. He is saying, in essence, "Let there be . . ." all over again. He is saying, "Let the image in which we created them--even these who are crucifying me--be restored."

Magnificent words. Significant words. Amazing to think they were spoken over those men who were in fact at that point carrying out his brutal execution.

But again, there is another side to this coin of significance. If the significance of these words is to be realized, the words must be believed. Believing is what makes influential communication possible, but not all acts of communication are worthy of belief.

These words of Jesus, though, are fundamentally worthy, because Jesus is worthy. Because Jesus is who he is, his words do what the do.

But here's the rub. There seems to be something in us, something in our nature, something deeply ingrained in us, that reacts against these words of Jesus. I am speaking now of believers, people who call Jesus Lord. Yet, who have trouble believing themselves forgiven. Believing that the words of Jesus are in fact effective for them.

Someone can write a book, and maybe should, about why this is so. But I have no doubt of the remedy. We should frequently remind ourselves of who Jesus is and what he has done. We should remind ourselves that this was always the plan of God, even before he said, "Let there be. . . . " God is effective. He speaks, and things happen. He brings to pass his will, and cannot be denied, and it is his will to restore his creation, and even its pinnacle, man, to what he had intended. And he has chosen to make this happen through forgiveness, offered and received.

It is the season now to remember this. Something lifts from the shoulders of the forgiven man or woman. Something that had clouded his vision is removed. Something that had hindered her steps is taken away.

One of my favorite people in the Bible is a Roman centurion who had taken part in the execution of Jesus. This man, who must have seen a lot of dying in his day, saw the way Jesus died and heard the words Jesus spoke even in the midst of his agony (and, we might add, saw the effects that his death precipitated in the very creation) and it caused him to believe something shocking: "Surely this man was the Son of God!" [see Matt. 25:54]

Note, he did not say, ah, so now I am forgiven. He said, "This man must be God!" Receiving forgiveness depends on just this recognition. The "good news" begins here. Jesus is God!

Hauerwas: Jesus creates a unique kind of community

I can't tell you how much I'm enjoying reading Stanley Hauerwas' commentary on Matthew. His fifth chapter, focusing on Matthew 5, is inspiring. His focus is on Jesus' creation of a kind of new community within the old, a community of Jesus folk, "resident aliens" who represent something that the larger community can perhaps aspire to or mimic, but cannot achieve on its own.

Jesus does not seek to violently overthrow Rome, because his kingdom is an alternative to the violence of Rome as well as to those who would overthrow Rome with violence. His kingdom, however, cannot avoid being subversive. That subversion is the righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees and as such is a subversion that will result in his crucifixion, for rather than violently overthrowing the old order Jesus creates a people capable of living in accordance with the new order in the old. The antithesis that follows his admonition that his followers are to be salt and light is but Jesus' description of the order of this new community. Yoder observes that Jesus does what God had done in calling Abraham, Moses, Gideon, or Samuel. That is, he gathers people around his word so that a society comes into being like no other society the world has ever seen.

Saturday Morning Musings

From the Gospel of Luke:

Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” And he laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God. But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, “There are six days in which work ought to be done. Come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day.” Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?” As he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame, and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by him.
He said therefore, “What is the kingdom of God like? And to what shall I compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches.”
And again he said, “To what shall I compare the kingdom of God? It is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, until it was all leavened.” (Luke 13:10-21 ESV)

Note:

1. Jesus healed (in an instant) a person who had been afflicted for eighteen years by a crippling disability.
2. It was the kind of world where such an act might be minimalized, even objected too, by jealous and power-hungry men. 
3. Jesus, with but a few words, put the objectors to shame.
4. People rejoiced.

Now note this.  When Jesus healed the crippled woman, as momentous as that may have seemed, I think Jesus saw it as a mustard seed.  That is, what that act would germinate into was going to be bigger by far than one woman relieved of her terrible pain.

Similarly, the putting to shame of the religious police . . . a mustard seed.  Right away people are rejoicing.  Not only because of the healed woman, but because of the shamed religious busybodies.  

Think about this: when people gaze on Jesus, the rejoicing that follows is but the early signs of a great and spreading kingdom-tree in which many will be able to make their home.

Similarly, even so apparently prominent a deed as this, witnessed by many, from a world-perspective is quite unknown, like leaven in bread.  And yet it is bread that will one day feed millions.

What am I getting at? The thought that is stirring in me is that out kingdom-deeds are mostly (at least by any system of measure we are used to) small, local, even quite secret. On the one hand, the more we try to claim some leadership spotlight, the more we pine for "influence," the more in danger we are of becoming like the objectors. And on the other hand, why are we so dissatisfied with planting seeds? Why do we not trust in the leaven?

"the funny, shocking, surprising, subversive teaching of Jesus"

Will Willimon's new book, Why Jesus?, sounds refreshing indeed. It sounds like a book about Jesus that does not convert him into a theology professor, a life coach, or a therapist! Amazing!

I learned about the book from two posts by Chaplain Mike at Internet Monk (Part 1, Part 2). Mike says:

In my Christian experience, the funny, shocking, surprising, subversive teaching of Jesus has often been quenched by analysis and exposition. We’re not good listeners. It’s hard for us to stay in the moment with Jesus the Storyteller. We want the explanation, the moral, the lesson. We want the punchline to be clear, the message to be practical and edifying. We resist being left hanging. We don’t want Jesus to respond to our questions with even harder questions. We’re impatient. We want the answers so that we can pass the test. Now.

Bread

Deuteronomy 8:3

And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD. (Deuteronomy 8:3 ESV)

John 6:32,33

Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6:32-33 ESV)

John 6:51

"I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” (John 6:51 ESV)

Matt 6:11

Give us this day our daily bread. (Matthew 6:11 ESV)

Just testing an analogy

I just wanted to say that, if I walked into your room right now wearing a big red clown's wig, a flashing red ping-pong ball nose, pajamas with giant polka dots, and huge floppy shoes on my feet . . . and if Jesus was standing next to me . . . you wouldn't notice me at all. My ridiculous presence would go unnobserved. You would have eyes for Jesus only.

Just saying, the more of Him I have, the less me matters. "I must decrease," said John the Locust Eater, who was a pretty attention-getting kind of guy.

Again, did you read Bill Kinnon's question: Why aren't big name leaders decreasing?

Just wondering.

[Update: Scotty Smith prays about it.]

Hirsch on "Jesus is Lord"

My Faith Walk . . . for now

It's Sunday morning, and a part of me is thinking about church. A big part of me. Not that I'm actually longing to find a church. Not that I'm actually hoping to routinely atend a big fancy auditorium where we all sit in rows and listen to some guy I don't know talk for 45 minutes. Every Sunday. No, but it is Sunday after all, and for eighteen years or so that meant a visit to the fancy auditorium, and sitting in rows, etc.

Someone asked me last week why I wasn't "going to church." I gave my shorthand answer. I said, "I'm looking for a church that's at least as Jesusy as the New Testament."

All this is apropos of The Letter to the Hebrews. I've been reading it now for a coupla-three weeks (that's Maine-speak, people). That "letter" is generally believed to be the text of a sermon. The ESV Study Bible says this:

The genre of Hebrews is unusual. The book is without an introduction or other early indications that it is a letter. Yet the final verses do pass on greetings and blessings (13:23–25), and the author speaks of having “written to you” (13:22). However, the author also identifies his work as a “word of exhortation” (13:22). The careful rhetorical progression of the book, along with its frequent practical exhortations, has led many to consider it a single sermon. Perhaps Hebrews is best understood as a sermonic letter.

But the point is, every sip of this rich brew is intensely Jesusy. Intensely Jesusy. Sip it yourself and see. The trick then is to find that same flavor in the church today. It just shouldn't be as rare as it seems to be. Know what I'm sayin'?

But back to not being in church and all that. It's not that I'm satisfied with my current lone-wolfism. Another person I talked to not long ago asked me what church I was attending these days, and when I told him I wasn't, answered rather imperiously, "May I direct your attention to Hebrews 10:25?" That's the part that says don't neglect meeting together and encouraging one another. Yup, I sure want that one another thing. But if church on Sunday morning is the best we can do, we're in trouble. On the other hand, I want to hang with fellow-believers and be knit together with them. I want a band of brothers, a tribe, a family. Well, what I really want is what Bonhoeffer described in Life Together. And I'm pretty unconvinced that collecting up a bunch of people from across the region to come together in an auditorium once a week to listen to some music and a speech (lesson, sermon, exhortation) by a guy we don't really know and then going our separate ways for the rest of the week is ever going to be the venue for life together. I've just about given up on that.

Michael Spencer in Mere Churchianity said there were many like me. Ian Michael Cron wonders if it's a new Christian diaspora. The conversation in the comments section of that post is very interesting too.

The danger for all of us, whether in the church or in "exile," is that we find ourselves one day having put our faith in many things, but not in Jesus. This is always the danger. Idols. Idols of the heart. Idols of the mind. And "proud towers" to house them in. And Jesus once again standing outside, knocking. Laodicea all over again (Rev 3:14-22).

[BTW, Glynn Young has collected some links to similar discussions here. Note also this post from at Public Christianity.]

The Power of an Indestructible Life

My friend and fellow-blogger Abraham makes a good point in his recent post. Things are not as they seem.Quoting the great songwriter Mark Heard:

“We can laugh and we can cry
And never see the strong hand of love hidden in the shadows
We can dance and we can sigh
And never see the strong hand of love hidden in the shadows.”

~ Mark Heard, Strong Hand of Love

This is a rather strong theme in the Bible. I'm thinking of Paul's words in Colossians:

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4 ESV)

See that? Your life is hidden with Christ in God! Things are not as they seem. Indestructible Jesus is our guarantee of this (Heb 7:16, 7:22). In some crazy indecipherable way, my life is hidden with Jesus in God. Not this visible, apparent so-called life, but the life that is a part of God's ultimate purpose for his creation. I do not see it yet. And yet, even now it springs up! (Isaiah 43:19)

This is of course a matter of faith. Un-faith says, "No, things are always exactly what they seem, and always will be so. Be realistic!" But faith speaks of an alternative reality.

Things are not as they seem. I am not what I seem. And you, yes you, are not what you seem. Something is going on behind the scenes, something is stirring, something is coming to pass. Remember Isaiah:

For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? (Isaiah 43:19 NLT)

It takes eyes of faith to see the hidden things. My life is hidden with Christ in God, Paul says, and the author of Hebrews (yes, we are back to Hebrews now) speaks also of the hiddenness of Christ with God. Christ has gone into the inner place, the place where only the high priest can go. Christ is that high priest, forever, and the "inner place" is the presence of God. Where, according to the testimony of the Scriptures, Christ sits at God's right hand, in the place of privilege and honor and intimacy. He's an anchor to our soul there. We're permanently connected, through him. Through him, we can "draw near." Without the anchor, we're going to be blown out to sea or shattered on some rocky coast. As it is we're buffeted, we're tossed about, but praise be to God, we're anchored. Things are not as they seem.

We have to remember this. That's my advice. Remember. Don't make assumptions. Don't judge, because when you judge, you're presuming you know how things are, the whole story, how everything turns out for the other person, and therefore you can pass judgement, you can call the winner the winner, the loser the loser. It's a terrible failure to hope! It's a terrible failure of faith.

All week I've been reading through chapters 5 to 7 of Hebrews. And this is what it's got me thinking on. Things are not as they seem. But that is not to say that it is not possible now to taste of "the powers of the age to come" (Heb 6:5). It is. Nevertheless, the age to come is "to come." It is not here, it is not now. Still, there was one who walked among us, one who set aside power and privilege--making himself nothing--one who died among us, who conquered death here in the very stronghold of death, and then entered into the inner place, the Holy Sanctuary where God is. That would be Jesus. The anchor of our buffeted souls. Through him, who is possessor of an indestructible life, God is bringing to pass his unchangeable purpose.

Key words: indestructible, unchangeable, anchor, hope.

Things are not as they seem. Death seem to reign. It does not. It's power has been broken. The dawn is coming. Do you not see it? Even now it springs up!

So Great a Jesus: A Summary of the First Four Chapters of Hebrews

[I always feel I have to explain these posts on the Letter to the Hebrews. My way of reading Scripture is to read and reread a passage, and then re-state it in various ways. I am a firm believer in this re-stating of Scripture. I do this for myself, primarily, as a way of imbibing these truths of God more deeply. It involves much repetition, and much going over of familiar ground, so I can understand why it may not necessarily be all that enlightening for others. Still, I put the process on display here at WF, just in case someone might be helped by it. What follows is simply a summary in my own words of the first four chapters.]

God has spoken to us through his Son. He has done this through what his Son taught, and through how his Son lived; in other words, through everything his Son said and did. The "message" of the Gospel, the good news for a fear-burdened people facing death on all sides, is just this: all that God's Son, Jesus, said and did. We must pay closer attention.

Remember the Israelites. They followed Moses, who spoke for God, in search of the promised land. But often their trust ran out. Their trust ran out by the side of the Red Sea, with Pharoah's army bearing down. their trust ran out in the desert, where they feared starvation. Their trust ran out even at the brink of the promised land, when they heard the stories about "giants in the land." In all these cases their fear of death conquered their trust in God, despite his many miraculous interventions on their behalf.

The author of Hebrews put is this way: he says their fear of death caused them to harden their hearts. Hardening their hearts equates to not trusting God and therefore not listening to God and therefore disobeying God (even despite all that He's done and all that He's promised). This fear of death causes them to harden their hearts, not hear the message of God, and "fall away" from the calling to which they have been called. Which is to say, their destiny of rest.

The people of God always face this same problem. The fear of death causing unrest, leading them away from their promised land destiny, and leading instead to all kinds of restlessness. What comes of this are things like bitterness, loneliness, anxiety, harshness, frenzy, and an ever deepening and devastating hardness of heart.

Therefore, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.

A lot depends, therefore, on paying attention to the message spoken to us by one greater than Moses, through signs greater even than those witnessed by the Israelites in the desert. Pay attention to this message. Lean on it. Live in it. The message is a promise of rest, through Jesus.

We share in a heavenly calling, but we walk through a desert. There will always be the temptation not to trust God, but to lean instead on some frail reed. Fortunately, Jesus, whose very name is salvation, and who was tempted in every way, and having won every battle and defeated death, is able to help us when we, through fear of death, are tempted. He is our hope. He is our rest.

All of God's promises are summed up in Jesus, our rest. Rest is associated with fulfillment, but even though we do not see the fulfillment of all God's promises just yet, we can have a foretaste of all that the Kingdom of God shall be, and "rest" is as good a word for that as any. Therefore,

Today, of you hear his voice [that is, the message of Jesus: all that he taught and all that he did], do not harden your hearts.

In other words, listen. Pay attention. See. Hear. Taste. Stand in awe.

Finally, a warning. "The word of God is living and active." Think of this phrase, "word of God," as a kind of stand-in for God all that God is and all that he does. The ESV Study Bible note puts it this way:

Usually this phrase in Hebrews refers to the message of salvation (13:7; cf. 4:2), but here the “word” is pictured as God's personal utterance, living, active, sharp, piercing, and discerning (v. 12), with eyes that expose (v. 13). The Word of God then acts as God himself, so that one's innermost thoughts and intentions are exposed. This happens constantly in Christians' lives.

Do not harden your hearts, as if to fend off the piercing and discerning action of God. This surgery won't kill you. Better yet, pay closer attention to all that He has been for you, all that He is for you, all that He shall be for you. His name is Yeshua, which means "salvation." Do not neglect so great a salvation.

This is our God . . .

So I'm still processing the early chapters of Hebrews. To tell you the truth, reading and rereading these chapters has been like giving my faith a shot of adrenalin. I think I'm experiencing a little personal revival here!

I've been saying in my series of posts on church visits that I'm just looking for something "Jesusy." Admittedly, I stole that term from Jared Wilson (at least I think that's who I stole it from). Anyway, it's a term of convenience. If you want to see an example of preaching that is Jesusy, read Hebrews for one. The author always explicitly ties his imperatives (what we should do) to our understanding of who Jesus is and what he has done, and later, as we shall see, to "drawing near" to him in faith. The author is wearing Jesus-colored glasses. His exhortations are anchored in the revelation of Jesus Christ.

So what I'm going to do now, for my own good as well as yours (I hope), is list out what the author says about Jesus (all in the first two chapters), and then, in a separate list, seven imperatives (some plainly stated, some strongly implied, and all coming in the third chapter of the letter). So, first, what's all this talk about Jesus?

• God, who long ago spoke to us by the prophets of old, has now spoken to us by his Son, Jesus
• He appointed Jesus to be heir of all things (all creation)
• and in fact through Jesus he created all things
• Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God
• and the exact imprint of the Father's nature
• Jesus upholds the universe by the word of his power (!)
• He made purification for sin
• and sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high
• above all things, including even the angels, who worship him
• and reigns triumphantly with a scepter of righteousness
• making his enemies his footstool

All this is from chapter one.  This is what the writer is talking about when he says, at the start of chapter two, that we should all pay much closer attention to what we have heard (this grand and high message about Jesus), lest we drift away.  Not to pay close attention is to neglect our salvation, which no one should ever do.

But what does chapter two say about Jesus (for the author is not done emphasizing Jesus)?

• he is the founder of our salvation (the salvation we shouldn't "neglect")
• he was crowned with glory and honor because of his suffering and death
• in fact, he was made perfect through suffering
• tasting death for (in the place of) everyone (!)
• By doing so he thus brings many sons (and daughters) to glory

Note: the One who is crowned with glory brings many to share in that glory.  How?  By dying for them.

• Thus, he is not ashamed of us.  Not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters (!)
• he partook of mortality, sharing our flesh and blood existence
• so that by dying for us he might destroy the devil, who holds sway over us by the power of death, keeping us in constant subjection to the fear of death
• but he has freed us from that lifelong slavery
• all this that Jesus has done may be summed up in this word-picture: Jesus is our merciful high priest, making propitiation for our sin by the sacrifice of himself
• and now, from his throne on high, having suffered temptation as a man, he is able to help those who are tempted.  

Okay, all that is in chapter two.  There you have most of what the author of Hebrews says about Jesus in the first two chapters.  Amazing, no?  His shorthand term for all this is "salvation."  Elsewhere it is called "the good news."  I would say it is the playing out of the grand design of God to restore creation, which has been marred by sin, and to retrieve his lost children from the grip of death, at unfathomable expense to himself.  

Now, in chapter three I count at least seven distinct imperatives (whether stated or implied), that hinge on all this that has been said about Jesus.  Here they are:

• Therefore, we who share in a heavenly calling, should consider (set our minds on) Jesus (3:1)
• We should hold fast to our confidence, our boasting, our hope (in Him) (3:6)
• We should not harden our hearts (3:8)
• We should take care, lest there remain in our hearts elements of unbelief, leading us to fall away (3:12)
• Since sin is so deceitful, we need to exhort (encourage) one another every day (3:13)
• We should hold on to the confidence we placed in Jesus at the start, right to the very end (3:14)
• and finally, repeating a theme, we should not harden our hearts (3:15)

There you have, in list format, the first three chapters of Hebrews.  You can see that these foundational imperatives from chapter three, which in some fashion the rest of the letter will explicate, all have to do with hearts and minds.  Set your mind on Jesus, and don't let your hearts be hardened.  It seems that faithful walking begins (flows from) within.  But it all begins and ends with Jesus!

Consider Jesus

Reading and rereading the letter to the Hebrews in the New Testament. I want to emphasize that I'm not setting myself up as a teacher here. I'm just interacting with the text, as they say. In other words, reading it. Over and over. And reflecting here at WF what it's seeming to mean. Mixing in those thoughts and observations of my own that the text seems to inspire. You might find that interesting, or it might spur you on to read your own selected text in the same ruminative way (which can be productive), or you might consider it all a vast waste of time. But what I'm trying to say is, I'm not trying to teach here. I'm trying to show.

In the first couple of posts in this series I've been looking at Hebrews 2:1, which contains this imperative: "We must pay closer attention to what we've heard."

We have all experienced the way in which a message that we once found very moving, even "life changing," such as the message "I love you," a message that sounded like music to us once, can quite suddenly sound like dissonant clanging, or like nothing at all, like silence. Not because the message has changed, but because our hearing has changed. Our attentiveness or sensitivity. People begin to ask, "Are you listening?" And you answer, "Of course I'm listening." But you're not. It happens all the time.

This is the dire predicament we all find ourselves in, I think. Things seem to grow stale to our ears. To diminish. Some folks have put it this way: our hearts grow hard. It happened to the folks who followed Moses in the desert. It happened to the kings of ancient Israel. Throughout the four Gospels of the New Testament you can find people with hard hearts (who cannot seem to hear, like Pontius Pilate, or Judas) and people with soft hearts who seem to pay attention at the crucial moment (like the woman at the well). The author of the letter to the Hebrews seemed to pinpoint this problem and address it directly. He said, "We've got to pay closer attention to what we've heard." And then, in the passage that follows, occupying the rest of chapter 2, you get the meat of that message. you get the what in "what we have heard." Go to your dog-eared Bible and read it for yourself, and then come back here.

Are you back? Okay, as you now know, it's all about Jesus. Hebrews is a very Jesus-rich letter. Jesus, who is eternal, who is God, who created everything and to whom someday the whole world will be subjected. Him. Who made himself to share in flesh and blood mortality, so that in doing so he might bear the brunt of sin's penalty, and thereby usher us into his family, calling us brothers and sisters forever. And now from his seat in heaven, having walked our walk, he helps us. He helps us! And the author writes:

Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession. (Hebrews 3:1 ESV)

Ah, another imperative. Much like the first one. The first one was, "pay attention to what you heard." Now there's this. "Consider Jesus."

Consider Jesus. Read Hebrews 2:5-18 over again, or read Philippians 2:5 and following, or read Colossians 1:15-20, or read the high priestly prayer of Jesus (John 17), or read Luke 23:44-49, or peruse John's vision of Jesus in Revelation 1. Read these or any other you can think of, and consider Jesus.

Consider who he is. Consider what he has done. Consider what he is doing now. Consider that this world, the one we walk around in, so beautiful and yet so appalling, will someday be subject entirely to his will, which will feel like the embrace of perfect love, forever. Pay attention. Consider. Set your mind on. Jesus.

More Ruminating on Hebrews 2

At Hebrews 2:1 we find the first imperative of the letter.

Therefore, pay closer attention to what you've heard, lest you drift away from it.

Now, you've probably heard or read that in the Bible the imperatives (what we should do) always follow from indicatives (about God and what God has done). In this case, there are indicatives about Jesus, stated just prior to this passage, from which follow this imperative. In chapter one the author shows (indicates) the supremacy of Christ. Christ is enthroned on high. Christ is eternal. Christ is greater than angels. And then comes the "therefore":

pay closer attention to what you've heard.

Otherwise:

you might drift away.

I like to ask the simple questions when I read the Scriptures. Like: what does he mean by "what we've heard"? And: how is it we can drift away from what we've heard?

Answer to the first question (methinks): the message we heard about Jesus. It is uniquely important.

Answer to the second question: I'm not sure. But I'm put in mind of something Jesus said (through the apostle John) to the church at Sardis(in The Revelation):

“And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: ‘The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. “‘I know your works. You have the reputation of being alive, but you are dead. Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God. Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you. (Revelation 3:1-3 ESV)

Note again, the indicative (about Jesus) comes first (as in all the letters to the seven churches), and then the imperative. The imperative here is essentially the same as in Hebrews:

Remember, then, what you received and heard.

See? As in the Letter to the Hebrews, behavior . . . walking the walk . . . begins with remembering a message, and not drifting away from that message. The whole Bible unpacks that message for us, but at it's core there stands One who holds stars in the palm of His hand. Imagine that.