God Will Be With You: The Christmas Story

The Christmas Story:

Mark launches his Gospel with a quote from Malachi 3:1: “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.” (Mark 1:1-3)

This verse concern the coming of Yahweh back to his people after the long spiritual exile that began with the Babylonian Captivity of 588 BCE. Following the destruction of the Temple of Yahweh built by Solomon in Jerusalem, Yahweh was seen to have departed from it and abandoned his people to their sins. In the first century CE, the Jews were still eagerly waiting for Yahweh to return and doing so under the rule of the conquering Roman Empire. When Mark cites this verse he is specifically stating that Yahweh is returning in the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, the Christ. What does the angel Gabriel say the nickname of Jesus will be? “They will call him ‘Immanuel’ (which means God with us’).” (Matthew 1:23).

Ominously, the verse in Malachi is followed with the warning “But who can endure the day of his coming?” (3:2)

The coming of Yahweh in the person and work of Jesus was a time of both liberation and judgment. Look at what the Christmas story states:

“Behold, this Child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign to be opposed.” (Luke 2:34)

“He has scattered those who were proud in the thoughts of their heart. He has brought down rulers from their thrones, and sent away the rich empty-handed.” (Luke 1:51-53)

No wonder King Herod wanted to kill Jesus. The Christmas story is a highly political account of God inaugurating the Kingdom with Jesus, threatening all other kings, rulers, and governments.

Part of Jesus’ message was to the rulers, elders, scholars, and priests. He was telling them that the long awaited hope of Israel had arrived. Yahweh was returning to his people ... but they were missing it! Jesus was telling the priests and elders (the ministers and pastors of his day) that God was acting now … and you’d better get on the same page. This was now the time to get right, to shake off egos, to abandon personal kingdoms … before it’s too late.

Christmas is a time for people in authority (businessmen, governments, and pastors) to ask themselves if they are behaving in their respective positions in the way God wants them to behave. If they are not, now is the time to get with Gods’ agenda and not your own. Otherwise …

God will be with you.

Putting Christ Back in Christmas

Ah, Christmas! The most wonderful time of the year. The time to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Just think of the lovely manger scene with the cute, cuddly baby, the chubby cherubs, and the little lambs looking up in awe at the holy scene. Mary, did you know? Did you know? What were your thoughts about God working through your son?

“He has scattered those who were proud in the thoughts of their heart. He has brought down rulers from their thrones, and sent away the rich empty-handed.” (Luke 1:51-53)

Well! Surely, that’s the labor pains talking, Mary. And the smell of the donkeys. What about you, Simeon? You held the infant Jesus. Did you feel the warm tidings of peace, goodwill, mistletoe, and presents under the tree? What went through your mind?

“Behold, this Child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign to be opposed.” (Luke 2:34)

Uh … well, your old, Simeon and old people are grouchy. Don’t be a Scrooge. This is a time for peace on earth and good will towards men. Set them straight, Jesus.

"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” (Matthew 10:34)

Look, what’s the matter with everyone? This is Christmas time! It’s a time for Christmas trees, wreaths, and garlands! It’s about candles and lights and manger scenes. It’s about Jingle Bells! You know, deck them halls and all that stuff. You know, Santa Claus and ho-ho-ho and mistletoe and presents to pretty girls.

To hear them talk you would think that the focus of Christmas should be about God radically breaking into the world in the purpose and mission of Christ the anointed king and not just simply the holy birth of Jesus and presents. Christmas is a merry season. A feeling. It’s about sitting by the fire, holding a cup of cocoa with two massive marshmallows while the snow falls outside and carolers sing "O Tannenbaum" accompanied by a small brass band. It’s a feeling. A good feeling. It’s good news.

Yes, yes, there is all that stuff in the Bible about the Good News of the coming of the Kingdom of God, and the coming of justice and hope for the poor, but this is jolly Christmas time! Christmas is supposed to be happy occasion. It’s not supposed to be deeply and thoroughly political.  It’s not supposed to be about the redemption of Israel and of the nation and the coming of God’s kingdom on earth.

Yes, glory to the newborn king, but this is not the time to emphasize a king who is going to uproot the nations and establish his rule and dominance upon the governments of the world. That won’t play in Peoria. Christmas is a time of coming together. Let’s invite the kings of this earth to celebrate the baby Jesus. As the Bible says:

“Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” (Matthew 2:8)

See? With those holiday greetings and gay happy meetings when friends come to call it's the hap- happiest season of all. Let’s not be overtly or uncomfortably political … Unless someone tells you “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” … then just lay into them. Let’s put the Christ (Χριστός) back in Christmas (Χ-mas).

Gossip

We are told that it is wrong to gossip and it is. Here is a Biblical verse to that effect:

“For I am afraid that perhaps when I come I may find you to be not what I wish and may be found by you to be not what you wish; that perhaps there will be strife, jealousy, angry tempers, disputes, slanders, gossip, arrogance, disturbances” (2 Corinthians 12:20).

Now occasionally there will be Christians who go about behaving badly towards others, mistreating them, and giving Jesus a bad name by their actions. When word of this bad behavior becomes known and begins to be discussed among people, these same individuals will run around accusing other Christians of gossiping. What they mean is that people are saying things about them that are negative. They equate this with gossip.

But what does the Bible actually mean when it teaches against gossip?

In 2 Corinthians 12:20, the word translated gossip is psithyrismós (ψιθυρισμός) and it actually means “whispering slander”. Slander means to “make false and damaging statements about” someone. The key here is that for a negative statement to be considered gossip it must be false. Gossip is slandering someone in a whispering, secretive manner. Slander that is not secretive but said out loud is katalalía (καταλαλία) (see 2 Corinthians 12:20; 1 Peter 2:1).

All this means that something negative someone says about you cannot be considered gossip if it’s true.

So if you don’t want people telling others that you are mistreating people …

Answering a Parental Question about The Satan

Tonight I received a question from a parent about how to answer her child's questions regarding the Satan. Here is her questions and my response.

"[My son] is 7 years old. Tonight he was asking about how Satan was made. And he asked if we could pray to Satan to ask him to lose. I was not sure how to answer. And I don't know where in the Bible it says how Satan was made. Can you give me any info or advice as to how I can answer these questions?"

The Bible does not explicitly state how and when Satan was made … of course, the Bible does not explicitly state how and when angels were made either. The Bible states frequently that God is the creator of everything and it is presumed that he created the angels and also Satan. The Bible states that God created man “a little lower than the angels” (Psalm 8:5; Hebrews 2:7). This suggests that God created angels as well as man.

Now Satan is generally considered to be some form of angelic being. He is present in heaven when other angelic beings come before God (Job 1:6; 2:1). Satan is said to transform himself into an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14). Satan has his own angels (Rev. 12:9). Satan is said to inhabit “heavenly places” (Luke 10:18). He is also the ruler of the demons (Matthew 12:24; Luke 11:18), which are considered to be fallen angels. If Satan is an angelic being, then he was created by God.

Satan’s original purpose appears to be to accuse people of sin before God (Job 1:9; Zechariah 3:1). He appears to have eventually gone from accusing people of sinning to prompting them to sin.

Never pray to Satan. Always pray to God. God defeated Satan through Jesus on the cross (1 John 3:8). And while Satan is still active on earth and can still cause trouble (1 Corinthians 7:5; 2 Corinthians 2:11; 1 Thessalonians 2:18), he is not in good condition (Romans 16:20; Rev. 20:2).

A professor once told me that God keeps Satan on a very short leash. By that he meant that God keeps Satan within certain bounds for the present time. We do not have to be afraid of him.

However, I think it is perfectly fine to pray to God that Satan does not succeed in particular battles, even though he has lost the war (Luke 22:31-32).

I suggest that you encourage Matthew to pray to God that Satan does not tempt (1 Corinthians 7:5), have power over people (Acts 26:18), and that he does not hinder the Church (1 Thessalonians 2:18). And do this all within his sphere of influence (i.e., family, friends, church, etc.)

I hope this helps. If not, let me know what else I can do. Please feel free to ask me anything, anytime.

 

Mary, Martha, and the Concept of Anxiety

Luke 10:38-42 tells the story of the time Jesus visited the home of Mary and Martha. While Mary sat to listen to Jesus talk, Mary was busy preparing the meal. In the course of these preparations, Martha became “distracted” (v. 40) with her work and eventually complained to Jesus that he should rebuke Mary for not helping. Jesus replied “Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her” (v. 41-42).

Now the typical way of interpreting this story is to either argue that Martha was wrong for being too busy and should have followed Mary’s example, or say that Martha just should have minded her own business. I think both of these interpretations miss the mark. This isn’t a Mary vs. Martha story. If you look at the words being used in the story, we see that the subject of this story is worry and anxiety, a repeated theme in the New Testament.

The Greek word for “distract” is perispáō (περισπάω) and means “to be distracted with cares”, “to be troubled, distressed”. The Greek word for “worry” is merimnáō (μεριμνάω) and means “to be anxious”, “to be troubled with cares”. The Gospel writers (Q source) use this word several times when Jesus speaks on his frequent theme of not being anxious or worrisome (Matthew 6:25-34; Luke 12:11-26). Its cognate mérimna (μέριμνα) is used elsewhere in the New Testament, which we will come to. The word for “bothered” is tyrbázō (τυρβάζω) and means “to be troubled in mind, disquieted”.

Anxiety is a frequent theme in the Bible because, while it is not necessarily sin, it is the occasion of sin (see the work of Soren Kierkegaard and Reinhold Niebuhr). I’ve cited Jesus’ “Do Not Worry” teaching (Matthew 6:25-34; Luke 12:11-26). Jesus also talks about anxiety in his famous Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:18-22; Mark 4:14-20; Luke 8:11-15). He says that there are those who hear the good news, have the foundation, but do not bear the true results of their faith because they are choked by the world. Jesus used the analogy of thorns that choke a plant, preventing it from bearing fruit. The world is constantly producing frustrations and distractions that inauthenticate our lives and prevent us from living out our faith fully. Mérimna is used in Luke 21:34 when Jesus warned the people not to be distracted from the coming destruction of Jerusalem by Rome. Paul uses the term in 2 Corinthians 11:28 when describing the troubles and burdens he faced as an apostle. Along with the beatings, shipwrecks, pains, hunger, thirst, and other sufferings he experienced that sought to prevent him from preaching the gospel, Paul adds the anxiety that comes upon him ministering to the churches. Like his other sufferings, this anxiety sought to distract and prevent his Kingdom work. Peter uses mérimna in his first letter when talking about suffering and submission (5:7). He quotes Psalm 55:22, saying, "Give all your anxiety to [God] for he looks after you." Essentially, this is the same teaching of Jesus when he tells his disciples to avoid fear but have faith in God who looks after you (Matthew 10:28-31).

 

Martha’s problem was not that she was busy serving and making preparations for dinner while Mary sat and listened to Jesus speak. Her problem was that she allowed her busy activities to create a distracting anxiety in her mind that occasioned her lashing out at Jesus and Mary. Jesus does not reprimand Martha for serving or being busy; he chides her for her worry that resulted in her lashing out. But why did she lash out at Jesus? Look at what Martha says in verse 40:

“Lord, do you not care [μέλω] that my sister has left me to do all the serving alone?”

The word mélō (μέλω) means “to care, to be concerned about”. It is the exact same word that the disciples used when they were out on the lake in a boat with Jesus and a storm erupts.

“Jesus himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him and said to Him, ‘Teacher, do you not care [μέλω] that we are perishing?’” (Mark 4:38)

Jesus immediately calms the storm and then asks the disciples where there faith is.

In their fear, worry, and anxiety the disciples lashed out at Jesus who remained calm, confusing his faith with uncaring. In the same way, Martha, worked up in her anxiety, accuses Jesus of not caring.

So I do not think that the point of this story is a lesson about being too busy serving to stop and sit at the feet of Jesus to hear what he has to say. The words of the story – the very words of Jesus – indicate that the subject matter is worry and anxiety, a prominent theme in the Bible.

Jesus as Israel in the Wilderness Temptations of Matthew 4:1-11

For the past two weeks I’ve been thinking about the Temptations of Jesus in the wilderness, particularly as it is recorded and shaped in Matthew 4:1-11.

There are several interesting, underlying things about this passage that are exploring who Jesus is. Indeed, I think the primary thrust of the argument being made is that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, specifically as both of these designations denote the person as the representative of Israel and thus the corporate embodiment of Israel. In this sense, the story is attempting to identify and equate Jesus with Israel.

For example, Matthew 2:14-21 tells of the child Jesus going into Egypt to escape Herod and then finally leaving when it is safe. This going to and exiting of Egypt strongly points to the Exodus story and God’s deliverance of Israel. In verse 15, Matthew reinforces this connection with a quote from Hosea 11:1: “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.”

Later on, Matthew continues the Exodus theme with Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount (chps. 5-7), making a connection with Moses’ giving of the Law at Mt. Sinai to Israel (5:21, 27, 33, 38, 43). Still further in 10:1, Jesus will have assembled 12 disciples around himself, representing the 12 tribes of Israel.

But in Matthew 4, we have Jesus going into the wilderness for 40 days. Following upon his childhood exodus from Egypt, this is an obvious allusion to the Israel’s wandering in the wilderness for 40 years. Here Jesus is experiencing the Exodus wilderness as Israel, God’s son. Indeed, Jesus even experiences the temptations of the Israelites in the wilderness. In Exodus 16, the Israelites grumbled about the food they were eating in the wilderness. Here in Matthew 4, the devil tempts Jesus about conjuring bread from stones. Jesus responds by Deuteronomy 8:3: “man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD.”

We must keep in mind that Deuteronomy is Moses’ farewell address to the Israelites while they are still in the wilderness and about to enter the Promise Land. He is giving them final instructions about where they came from, why they are where they are (8:2), where will they go (8:1, 7), and, most ominously, the warning that God would exile them from the Promise Land if they ignore the covenant and commandments and worshipped other gods (8:11, 19), a threat that came to fruition in the Israelite exile in Babylon.

Here Jesus does not grumble but submits to the authority of God, succeeding where Israel failed. Jesus is the true Israel succeeding where ethnic Israel should have succeeded.

In Matthew 4:7, Jesus responds to the temptation to put God to the test by quoting Deuteronomy 6:16: “Ye shall not tempt the LORD your God, [as ye tempted him in Massah].”

It was at Massah that the Israelites argued with Moses about water and Moses rebuked them for testing God and questioning whether God was actually present with them in the wilderness (Exodus 17:2-7).

Just as with the bread, Jesus demonstrates he is the true Israel succeeding where ethnic Israel failed.

The final temptation that Jesus faces is to gain the kingdoms of the world by worshipping the devil. Once again Jesus replies by quoting Scripture, this time Deuteronomy 6:13: “You shall worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”

This is the final test and Jesus once again succeeds where Israel failed. It was in Exodus 32 that Israel made its original sin of making a golden calf to worship while Moses was up on Mt. Sinai receiving the Law from God. The result of this sin was that God would not go with Israel to the Promise Land (Exodus 33:1-5). It was outside the Israelite camp that the tabernacle housing the presence of God would be placed (Exodus 33:7).

But as stated earlier, Israel ultimately failed to heed the warnings of Moses in Deuteronomy and paid the penalty of exile from the land and the abandonment of God's presence from his people [588 BCE]. But even with the eventual physical exile was over [538 BCE], there still remained a spiritual exile in the minds of the Jewish people who were still waiting for the presence of God to return. There was still a sense that God had not fully forgiven his people for their sin.

What Matthew is arguing is that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, the true Israel who succeeds in the wilderness where ethnic Israel failed. What he will continue to argue is that Jesus is not only true Israel succeeding where Israel failed, but that Jesus is actually God returning to his people, bringing the forgiveness of sin.

Ascending and Descending the Son of Man

This past week I began studying John 1:47-51, which is the calling of Nathanael by Jesus.

“Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him, and said of him, ‘Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!’ Nathanael said to Him, ‘How do you know me?’ Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.’ Nathanael answered Him, ‘Rabbi, You are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.’ Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Because I said to you that I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You will see greater things than these.’ And He said to him, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.’"

There are a couple of interesting points to be made about this passage, specifically as it pertains to the story of Jacob in the book of Genesis, particularly the 28^th chapter.

When Jesus refers to Nathanael as a true Israelite in whom there is no deceit, the Greek word used for deceit (or guile) is dolos [δόλος]. This word was used by Isaac in the LXX translation of Genesis 27:35 to describe how Jacob deceitfully robbed Esau of his blessing. Indeed, Jacob was known as a trickster and his name was associated with deceitfulness. That the story of Jacob could be the reference on Jesus’ (and John’s) mind is strengthened by the reference to follow. Of course, Jacob’s other name was Israel. Therefore, Jesus’ words could be paraphrased as here is “one who is all Israel and no Jacob.”

Though Jesus had been speaking to Nathanael, the change from the 2^nd person singular to the plural in verse 51 indicates that Jesus is now speaking to a wider circle of people. He then makes the extraordinary claim that they will see “the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

The ascension and descension of angels is an obvious reference to the dream of Jacob in Genesis 28:10-22. Having deceitfully robbed his brother of the promised blessing, Jacob flees towards the land of Haran. At a certain place he stops for a night’s sleep and dreams of a ladder set up between heaven and earth with angels ascending and descending it. It is in this dream that Yahweh first appears to Jacob and restates the covenant made to Abraham [found in Genesis 12:1-3; 13:14-17; 15:5-5; 17:1-9, 19-21; 22:15-18] that through the family of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob “all the families of the earth be blessed” (vv. 13-14). It is in this covenant, explored throughout the Bible and extra-Biblical literature, that God makes his promise that he is going to use Israel, the family of Abraham, to redeem Creation from the curse of evil. It was this covenantal blessing that Jacob stole from Esau. Yahweh had indicated that the blessing belonged to Jacob (Gen 25:23), but instead of trusting God to work this out, Jacob chose to advance the plans of God on his own through deceit.

And it was this covenantal blessing that was the hope of Israel. Specifically in Jesus’ day there was the expectation that Yahweh would return to his people and put the world to rights through the Messiah. Nathanael’s declaration that Jesus is “the Son of God; the King of Israel” states his belief that Jesus was this Messiah and that God was acting through him.

So when Jesus alludes to the story of Jacob and specifically to the dream of Genesis 28, he is affirming that the covenantal promise made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is reaching fulfillment. What’s more, by replacing the ladder with his self-designation, the Son of Man, Jesus is asserting himself in an apocalyptic, eschatological context (Daniel 7; Revelation 1:13; 14:14; 1 Enoch 37-71; 4 Ezra 13). Here Jesus himself becomes the link between heaven and earth, the means of establishing communication between heaven and earth, the means by which the realities of heaven are brought down to earth, the pathway along which the Kingdom of God invades the world (John 18:36). It is through him that the covenantal blessing promised to Abraham to renew Creation is fulfilled (Galatians 3:29).

Coming at the beginning of John’s Gospel, this passage can be seen as the inauguration of Jesus’ ministry as portrayed in this book (see Luke 4:18-19). It establishes the continuity between his ministry and the promises made in the Old Testament concerning what God would do to redeem Creation from sin and death. That Jesus’ ministry and mission was seen by the early Christians as the fulfillment of these promises is well attested in the New Testament and can be seen here in John’s Gospel. And this fulfillment of the promised blessing will not come to fruition by deceitfulness but by the simple belief/trust of individuals who are true Israelites.

Summarizing Some Brief Reading About Paul from N.T. Wright

I spent part of my day off reading further into N.T. Wright’s book, Paul and the Faithfulness of God, Vol. 2. Allow me to summarize the main argument Wright made in the pages I went through.

Paul, like everyone else, believed that there is a problem with the world, that evil persists in what should be a good creation. Like a good first century Jew, zealous for the Law, he believed that the problem stemmed from idolatry and paganism. Humans did not follow

Torah, the Law of God. Furthermore, as a good first century Jew, he believed that the solution to this problem was the return of Yahweh to his people to judge the world through the Messiah. The Messiah would establish the Kingdom of God, defeat the enemies of Israel, and bring justice to the world.

The resurrection proved that Jesus was the Messiah and that Yahweh had indeed returned to his people. However, the fact of the crucifixion and its necessity in the purposes of God suggested to Paul that the problem that was dealt with by the Messiah was much more severe than anyone had known. If God had to allow the crucifixion to occur in order to fulfill his purpose of solving the problem of evil in the world, then the problem of evil went much deeper than the lack of Law-observance. Paul realized that the real problem that was being dealt with by God was sin and its affect upon the heart – a problem going all the way back to Adam. This was a problem that affected both Jew and Gentile, regardless of Torah. That faith brought the Spirit and the evident radical change of the heart in both Jew and Gentile confirmed this.

This realization led Paul to reexamine his thoughts about the purpose of the Law, what it meant to be a Jew or Gentile, the purpose of Israel, and how God was fulfilling his purposes to redeem Creation.

I think there is a real elegance to argument Wright is making here. It would explain quite a bit about Paul’s thought patterns and put this theology in ordered relation.

Capitalism

No economic system is perfect. If you really want a great critique of capitalism, read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s warnings about its vulgar materialism and soulless consumerism. For me, the biggest problem with capitalism is how successful it is in reducing poverty, raising the standard of living, creating wealth across the spectrum of society. Many of the problems, temptations, and trappings that use to only affect the “super wealthy” are now accessible to the “poor” and middle classes.

Nevertheless, capitalism has been the most successful economic system ever devised – by far! As a Christian, my main concern when it comes to economics is how it affects the poor and how it affects freedom. The overwhelming, self-evident conclusion is that free-market capitalism reduces poverty, creates jobs, increases wages, raises the standard of living, creates wealth across the board, funds charity, leads to innovation, reduces work hours, improves the environment, reduces inequality, increases cultural diversity, increases choices, promotes democracy, increases life expectancy, improves quality of life, eliminates many diseases, promotes family, decreases crime, increases mobility, and gives people the opportunity to pursue more meaningful work.

That people don’t see this constitutes a serious intellectual and moral blind spot.

POLITICS

I don’t like politics. I find it’s a highly ineffective way of reaching Kingdom goals. It disturbs me when Christians focus so much upon it. It grieves me to see non-Christians who invest so much in politics as to make it their religion. It annoys me that everything from economics, to art, to food, to weather, to crime, to football must be politicized in order to advance particular agendas.

At the same time, I’m very interested in how people think, how they arrive at their conclusions, and why they believe what they believe. I find politics and people’s reaction to politics to be one of the best arenas in which to study these processes.

It’s like looking at a cluttered and disarrayed house through the window from outside. Politics is like people attempting to put the house in order by focusing on methods of cleaning the window. The methods proposed and the reaction to those methods tell you a lot about how people think and process information even if it doesn’t tell you much about cleaning the house.

The Aeneid, Teleological Meta-Narratives, and the Hope of Israel

I’ve been reading The Aeneid by Virgil recently. My main reason in doing so is because of my reading of N.T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God. In the latter work, Wright argues that The Aeneid was the first work in world literature (outside of the books of the Bible) to present a teleological meta-narrative. The running theme of The Aeneid is that history was building itself towards the establishment of Rome, specifically the Augustine reign. Elsewhere, such a view of history was not to be found … that is, outside of the Biblical worldview of God’s redeeming work in history through Israel leading up to the coming of Christ. Wright uses The Aeneid to compare and contrast it with Paul’s understanding of Israel’s teleological meta-narrative.

Much of philosophical modernity from the 19^th and early twentieth centuries focused on teleology. Hegelian philosophy argued an evolutionary, dialectical, mediatory approach to history in which the contradictions in society are resolved through their synthesis. This leads to inevitable progress.

Liberal theologians of the 19^th century (particularly the German history of religions school) applied this philosophical idea to Christianity to argue that the Kingdom of God was advancing through society as a gradual process of improvement and continued revelation to the point in which the world would eventually arrive at a perfect state. In most cases, the state was considered the mechanism by which God worked out his will to advance what became a more secularized Kingdom. Much of this thinking by liberal Christians favored post-Millennialism. World War I put an end to much of the post-Millennial, happy advancement movement, as well as the emergence of the neo-orthodox movement by Christian liberals (Bart, Brunner, Niebuhr) who embraced Kierkegaard’s critique of Hegel and the state and who began to take seriously the problem of evil. Now the teleological thrust of history and its meta-narrative was no longer an inevitable, and gradual development of the Kingdom but a progress of fits and starts, advances and retreats that wrestled with the evil of the world and human nature, particularly as it worked itself out in the individual’s relationship with God. The Kingdom of God was inevitable not by evolutionary progress of state control over society and the individual but by God eventually breaking into history.

On the purely secular and materialistic level, Marx embraced Hegelian dialectics as a political-economic struggle of history in which the state was an expression of cold immutable forces and a tool of the progression of society from a capitalistic system to a communistic system that eliminated all societal contradictions. In Marx’s teleological thinking, the meta-narrative of history is the inevitable collapse of capitalism based upon its internal contradictions. However, contra Marx, capitalism continued to thrive unabated leading to self-evident societal progress while socialism continued to destroy and disrupt advancement in the societies in which it was applied. Indeed, in the places where Marxist philosophies were most strictly followed … well, Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, Eastern Europe, China, Cuba, Cambodia, Vietnam, North Korea, post-Revolutionary Mexico, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, etc. speak for themselves. Furthermore, the philosophical developments of the 20^th century, particularly in the 1960s, led to a rejection of the Marxist teleological view of history as an economic meta-narrative. We now entered post-modernity.

One of the distinguishing characteristics of post-modernity is the abandonment of the meta-narrative as philosophical discipline, particularly as a cultural-societal phenomenon that might be considered hegemonic to other cultural narratives. It is interesting and ironic that the current U.S. President – our most post-modern to date – frequently asserts a teleological meta-narrative as rhetoric. “The arc of history bends towards justice.” “We are the ones we have been waiting for.” Whether it is his naiveté of Hegelian-influenced Marxism or the influence of post-Millennial classical Christian liberalism, our current commander ‘n’ chief seems to hold to a teleological meta-narrative worldview. Though I’m not sure it is the right one.

As I’ve written and stated elsewhere, a meta-narrative is essential to Christianity. God’s redemption of creation through Man, Israel, and Christ is central to the Faith. All the teachings of the Bible, the moral codes, life lessons, and church functions are pointless unless there is an over-arching narrative purpose towards which such things are directed and in which contextualized. Indeed, both 1^st century Palestinian Judaism as advocated by the Pharisees and Jesus and the post-Resurrection morality teachings of Paul were teleological in purpose and understood with Israel’s meta-narrative. Both drew from Israel’s Scriptures and similar strains of interpretation of Yahweh’s blessing to Abraham:

“I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore … In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen. 22:17-18; cf. 12:12).

This is the core of the Jewish teleological meta-narrative. It is expanded upon in Deuteronomy, the Psalms, Deutero-Isaiah, and Daniel. The idea understood in Jesus’ time is that Yahweh would return to his people, defeat Israel’s enemies, and establish and eternal kingdom that renewed creation.  This was the great hope of Israel. In all this, the teleological meta-narrative was that history was building towards something. It was the special proclamation of John the Baptist and Jesus that the history of Israel was about to reach its climax: Yahweh was returning to Zion, Israel’s enemy was about to be defeated, the Kingdom of God was about to be inaugurated. It was/is the Christian contention that the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus brought about this historical climax, though in a completely unsuspecting way. Jesus is seen as the first fruits of the resurrection (1Cor 15:20, 23), fulfilling the God’s promise to Abraham (Rom 4:13; Acts 7:17; Gal 3:29) and inaugurating New Creation (Gal 6:15).

This is why Christianity cannot abandon a teleological meta-narrative as a worldview. Israel’s history was building towards the climax of Jesus and his resurrection, while the results of that resurrection builds the rest of history towards its consummation and the resurrection of all believers in new creation. Indeed, a Paul himself wrote, “If Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation is in vain, and your faith is in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:14; cf. v.17).

So it’s been interesting to read how Virgil in his The Aeneid writes the history of Troy, Carthage, and Italy to legitimize the Roman Empire and Augustus as its ruler. The difference from the Biblical narrative of course is that Virgil lived at the end point and was writing “prophecies” into this one work, while the Biblical writers had numerous prophecies that they were waiting centuries to see fulfilled. Still, Paul and the other early Christian writers, living 50-60 years after Virgil, are pointing towards Israel’s Scriptures and common Jewish strands of interpretation to make their teleological point. That The Aeneid was well known in the first century Greco-Roman world in which Paul was writing is what makes this interesting.

The Proverbs and Contemporary Moral Relativism

The Book of Proverbs may be one of the most accessible books of the Bible insomuch as it speaks of the general wisdom and common, practical knowledge that is readily available to all peoples and all cultures at all times and places, as opposed to the specific and special revelation that came more directly from God to Israel through the prophets.

The Proverbs are proverbial. They are simple and concrete sayings, popularly known and repeated, that express general truths based on common sense or the practical experience of all humanity.

They are not special to the Bible and many of them can be found in the wisdom teachings of all cultures. Indeed, other Ancient Near Eastern cultural literature, such as that of the Egyptians and the Assyrians, contain proverbs like those found in the wisdom literature of the Israelites. This should not surprise us. One does not have to be a follower of Yahweh to know that adultery (5:3-4), lying (12:17-20; 19:9), drunkenness (20:1), jealousy (6:34), pride (11:2), gossip (20:19) causes problems in one’s life. You do not need to be a Christian to comprehend the benefits of friendship (27:10), respecting parents (6:20; 15:5), and raising children properly (22:6). Such ideas are endemic to human experience because they have been generally found to be true amongst all people, in all places, and at all times.

And for thousands of years amongst every culture, when one fell foul of these general truths, there were typically two cognitive responses:

1)      Either recognize your error and choose whether or not to adapt your actions

2)      Or consider the whole issue a matter of fate/chance

Post-modern culture has thrown us a third option in which culture and society have quickly embraced as they continue to abandon Judeo-Christian morality.

Today when individuals commit selfish, prideful, indolent, and sexual errors in their lives that result in the inevitable, harmful outcomes, they are all too quick to blame what they consider to be social construction and artificially moral codes that are institutionally endemic. The idea here is that, in truth, in reality, there is no moral truth that everyone should prescribe to, only variable, personal social habits dependent upon the individual. But how is it then that there seems to be an apparent moral cause and effect relationship between violations of, say, sexual moral codes and the problems that inevitably follow? The contemporary answer to this vexing question is the belief that society and culture have been constructed over hundreds and even thousands of years so that the followers of a particular moral code are privileged while those who reject that moral code are disadvantaged. In this view, there is nothing absolute about morality that reflects genuine reality; only the social construction of the powerful imposing their morality upon the powerless. Thus, what has been deemed sexual immorality only leads to disaster, heart break, disease, suicide, destroyed relationships, jealousy, tears, poverty, depression, etc. because powerful people of a particular moral code have constructed all of society to make it so. Thus, the negative results of immorality are the fault of society and the not the individual who violates that moral code. Thus, those who promote that moral code as an absolute morality are partially culpable for the disasters that effect moral violators.

This is the contemporary thinking of too many in our culture today. Why do criminality and poor choices lead to poverty? Society is to blame! Why can’t I commit crimes and attack police officers? Institutional injustice! We’re even at the point where biological facts are deemed social constructions and not accurate reflections of scientific reality.

This is not to say that the structures of government, culture, and society cannot be the conduits of evil and negative outcomes. Paul of Tarsus speaks about this (Ephesians 6:12). Certainly, Socialism, Communism, Fascism, Marxism, Nazism, and Progressive Liberalism have all shown to be capable of creating structures which cause massive evil and tremendous casualties in society. However, such power structures are shown to be evil because they support, condone, and perpetuate the immorality that transgresses the codes found in the Proverbs and elsewhere.

Yes, it is the height of hubris to suppose that the proverbial morality found in every culture, at every time, and every place is now to be willfully abandoned in order to assuage the guilt of individuals frustrated by the fact that their moral choices lead to disastrous outcomes.

So what are we to do? How do we address this hard-headed refusal to recognize reality?

Intellectual argument and rational thought won’t work. The immorally defiant are neither intellectual nor rational. You can’t persuade those who refuse to be open to persuasion.

Instead, I submit that we continue to be the light of the world, the city on a hill, the salt of the earth. Clichés, yes, I know, but they are the purpose and mission of the people of God. We need to be true, authentic humans, living like mirrors reflecting the image and light of God in this world. We must continue behaving morally and lovingly, following the proverbs and commandments, and proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. When people see our faithfulness and love, a portion will be come. The rest will continue in their self-imposed misery until God gives them over.

Daniel 3 and Christian Conscience

I’ve always thought that the Book of Daniel is the single greatest work that deals with the subject of state/culture vs. religion.

In chapter 3, the Babylonian government creates a new law requiring all officials in the government to fall down and worship a new state idol. To not do so would be against the law and perceived as disloyalty to the state. Jewish exiles who are a part of the Babylonian government - Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego – choose not to fall down and worship this idol, instead choose to follow their consciences and the commands of God regarding the worship of idols.

Now Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego had several choices in front of them. They could have chosen to fall down and worship the idol in earnest. They could have chosen to fall down and only pretend to worship the idol. They may or may not have had the option of stepping down from their positions in the Babylonian government, but they could have run away. Instead, the three public officials chose to publicly ignore the law and follow their conscience. Really, why should they cower before the state? Let the state try and make them go against their conscience. Naturally, they were arrested and thrown in prison.

All well and good. Great story. Five stars. The feel good chapter of the summer. How does it play out in real life?

We can all sit and read about the great consciences of individuals like Daniel, Paul, Thomas Beckett, Martin Luther, Sir Thomas More, Eric Liddell, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. We admire them and we hold them on a pedestal. We do that.

Yet, in all practicality, the vast majority of most Christians are cowards. They talk a big game, but, when the rubber meets the road, they will bend to the will of the state like limbo champions.

Peer pressure will get most of them … and the fear of being associated with THOSE Christians. Others are conditioned by the artificial structures of power and authority that make up society and cannot conceive of going against them. Still others might exercise their right to sue and proceed along the avenues of the judicial system until they exhausted all legal remedies. Yet, when they lose, they choose to kowtow to the holy cow. In the end, almost all of them fear losing reputation, possessions, status, and their physical freedom. Yep, Olympic gold medals for Christians on the balance beam.

But when they aren’t bending it like Beckham, they are talking a good game, aren’t they? They are morally outraged by the thing that they must be morally outraged about today. I know because I saw it on Facebook. Yet how often do we see Christians in our own churches cower at the first sign of intimidation. If they break when they have nothing to lose, do you think they will refuse submission when they could lose almost everything?

And, yet, there is a sublime simplicity in alternative: “No.” “Make me.” The words are pure though their consequences are ugly. Yes, you could lose everything – even go to jail – but Christians are supposed to give up everything anyway. Besides, the freedom of one’s conscience is more important than the freedom of one’s body. I’d rather have a free conscience than a mind imprisoned by an unwillingness to embrace the truth. Indeed, Christians have done some of their best work in prison (Paul, Luther, Bonhoeffer, King).

Talk is cheap. Moral outrage is unpersuasive in the calming patience of God’s victory. We’re about to enter a very interesting era of history. Let’s see who bends towards the idol and who remains standing.

Hunting the Urban Hipster

(Whispering, intoned sotto voce) Today we are at Wegman’s on the hunt for the lone Eastern Pennsylvanian Hipster or Coolus obscurus.

Our guide is big game hunter, Mookie Robinson. Mookie is a tough, white, fearless hunter who has chosen to live in the violent, unrelenting world of millennial, urban life, where only the ironic survive.

We are currently established in the organic food isle of the Wegman’s grocery store. It’s quiet. We first see a beatnik pass.

Suddenly, Mookie crouches to examine some hipster spoor. Chuck Taylor All-Star tracks and a Pabst Blue Ribbon bottle cap. The hipster is close.

Mookie puts out a box of organic gluten-free grains with the label “sustainability” printed on it to lure the hipster out into the open.

We hide behind crates of imported cheeses and wait.

Suddenly, Mookie spots the hipster we’re after.

And there it is! A truly magnificent specimen. The hipster looks to be about six feet tall, with a plaid shirt, bowtie, tight jeans, Sylvia Plath cardigan, and Buddy Holly glasses. The beard weighs two pounds and is easily capable of sopping up a bowl of lintel soup. From the looks of the hipster, it’s probably into knitting, veganism, urban beekeeping, and bookbinding classes. The real embodiment of postmodernism as a spent force, revealing what happens when pastiche and irony exhaust themselves as aesthetics.

The hipster slowly approaches the box of organic food. Two more strides and the hipster could reach out and touch someone with its beard.

Mookie raises his rifle. For the past few months, he’s been rehearsing this moment in his bedroom closet in Brooklyn, aiming, reloading, aiming again. He shoots. The rifle’s thunder is somehow insigni­ficant. The shot catches the hipster in the appropriate place, in the iPod.

But a hipster iPod is a big piece of equipment—it can include thousands of songs from obscure 80s and 90s bands that you’ve probably never heard of, all on continuous shuffle.

Mookie’s bullet did not apparently disrupt the iPod enough to take down the hipster in a single shot. It shakes its head, as if to wag away the pain of distorted indie music. There is a second shot that strikes it in the earbuds. It turns to flee, probably towards its fixed gear bicycle, but its right foreleg has buckled. It drops its iPod. It strives to stand. It steps on the iPod. The earbuds pull it down. Right in the middle of Bob Marley’s “Get Up, Stand Up”. The hipster falls without realizing the irony. It’s a success. The hipster is dead. But Mookie must make sure. He fires a final shot. There is nothing more dangerous than a wounded hipster.

But the hunt is not over. With well-practiced skill Mookie skins the hipster. The beard of a full grown male hipster can in fact fetch anything up to $4 on the open market.

The long day is over and it’s back to base camp for a night’s rest.

Jesus and the Shema

The most important prayer in all of Jewish life from its conception down to today is the Shema of Deuteronomy 6 which begins in verse 4 with “Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.”

This was the central prayer of Judaism in the time of Jesus and Paul and the defining statement of Jewish monotheism. Yahweh was the one and only god. He is the creator god. There is no other gods except him. In the world of paganism, this was what defined Jewish worship and was their central theological point.

Now when we come to Paul’s writing in 1 Corinthians 8, he is addressing the issue of whether or not Christians should eat food that has been sacrificed to idols. To make his point, he references the Shema in verse 6a: “for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him.” His point is twofold.

First, because there is only one God (Yahweh), don’t worry about such pagan sacrifices because there are no gods to be sacrificed to.

Second, because God is the Creator, what he created was good and all food is good to eat.

But in making his point with reference to the Shema in verse 6a, he immediately follows it with 6b: “and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him.”

Let’s put this together now:

“For us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him.”

This is the most amazing and earth shattering statement anyone could make. Paul has put Jesus into the Shema, the supreme Jewish prayer, and equated him with God the Father (Yahweh). This is a reformulated Shema to include Jesus within the Godhead.

As I researched this passage, I found many scholars argue that verse 6 may not even been original to Paul but may be an early Christian confession that Paul is citing to make his point.

The odd thing though is that Paul is not having to argue this concept at all. In his letters, he is arguing about food, circumcision, Torah, and inclusiveness, but just 20 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection, Paul (and the rest of the New Testament writers) don’t have to argue to either Gentile or Jewish Christians that Jesus was the embodiment of the Israelite god, Yahweh. This is a statement of fact that everyone seems to agree upon and from which other issues either spring or by which issues are answered.

Two points to be made from this:

First, the idea that Christians (including Jewish Christians) only recognized the divinity of Jesus centuries later with a succession of ecumenical councils does not hold water. Indeed, the first church councils were formed in order to affirm Jesus’ humanity, not his divinity.

Second, this early recognition of Jesus as embodying their creator god, Yahweh, by Jewish Christians lends additional historical evidence to his resurrection. Without the resurrection it’s historically implausible that a group of Jews who knew better would say to themselves, “You know that guy who the Romans crucified in the most shameful way possible? I think that that guy was our creator god. Let’s include him in the Shema.”