How literal?

Love your neighbors ... who is my neighbor? We've been having some discussion at my school over Jesus answer. Jesus champions a Samaritan. Samaritans were despised by Jews. Some of us have taken this passage and (with the thought of "who is despised") contextualized it and made the case that homosexuals are our neighbors. Others feel that we have taken it too far. Jesus was talking about a neighboring country - so maybe he just meant that the idea of "neighbor" goes farther, geographically, than we already think. How literaly should we interpret the Bible when applying it to daily life. How literal?

The Essenes knew that they weren't to work on the Sabbath. They decided that defecating was considered work. They all wore white robes on the Sabbath to "prove" that they hadn't worked in any way. Pharisees weren't allowed to spit on the ground because it might "plow the field" in one very small way. How literal?

When David Lake was a relatively new pastor, in the late 80s, he took his youth group on a mission trip. The college interns did a skit. They did a modern retelling of the good samaritan.
The good samaritan was replaced by a good comunist. A man in the crowd stood up and started screaming "These kids need good American role models. How dare you take the side of those commies. (etc.)" David told the college interns to do the same skit the next night. That was the whole point of the story. Despised.

This wasn't just an answer. Jesus could have said "even the evil samaritans are your neighbor and you should treat them with love" (which would have been radical) but, he chose to go all out and paint a picture of a Samaritan hero. When the leaders of the Jewish faith fail miserably there is a Samaritan there to pick up where they failed. In a time when the Jews needed good Jewish men and women as heroes this homeless Rabbi is teaching that a Samaritan saves the day?

Is it a stretch to put a homosexual in the place of the Samaritan. Not at all. They are, by and large, despised by the Christian community. In interpreting any text I think it is important to understand that Jesus spoke the language of the people. If Jesus were here today he would be telling stories using the internet and fixed rate mortages to explain the Gospel of the Kingdom. We're not making a stretch hear - we're getting to the words that Jesus would have us to understand. Jesus doesn't want us to understand the fact that in Biblical times Samaritans were disliked - Jesus wants us to understand that any person you despise is immediately your neighbor.

Scripture interprets scripture. We can't just look for prooftexts to support what we believe. We've become too concerned with interpreting every word just right - and we end up missing the point. We follow a homeless carpenter who loved all people enough to challenge them and die for them. We forget that. We institutionalize that. We build walls around that.

We have a pasty white Jesus who wants us to love Canadians (our neighbors to the North) and Mexicans (our neighbors to the South) because geographically they are our neighbor. We don't see a Savio, revolutionary, or lover. We see another idol to add to our shelves.

I'm not too concerned with people having a less than literal translation of a text. If they take it to every extreme - and believe that everyone is their neighbor ... well, maybe that was the point all along. I'm not an Essene - I'm taking off my white robe. I don't need anyone to think I'm sinless.

I have to write a paper on the topic of "Should women hold offices in the church?" It's a scandalous assignment for most writers. I just think it's funny. After 50 years of women in full time ministry in the United Methodist church ... I can't think of a reason good enough to stop. I honestly think that a person could logically prove to me with the Bible (using and explaining the original Greek) where Paul specifically states that females should not be pastors ... and it wouldn't matter to me.

Beyond the obvious Biblical examples of women leading - I see too many good female pastors to believe that God would have it any other way.

I'm seriously considering handing in a paper on the topic of "Should gays and lesbians be allowed to hold offices in the church?" and see what the professor has to say. If I don't do that I will at least use Beth Stroud as an example of a good female pastor.

We had a MAJOR presentation today and then I took a really long nap. Now I'm going to go visit friends and lollygag around. I will return home and watch a movie. I'll probably turn in by midnight and sleep for the recommended 8 hours. I just wanted to give you a sample of my normal schedule to compare and contrast with yours!

WWJD? (What Would Jesus Drive?)*

Hey Michael,

It's still a good question. Where's your anchor? Jesus? So...how do you know Jesus? Your experience? Is that more reliable than the Bible? What other people tell you?

You know, I get what you're saying - the Bible is the Bible - it's not God. I used to get really goofy about not setting anything on top of my Bible and not letting it get wet (even on rainy days) and...well, you get the picture. I mean, that was pretty crazy, superstitious stuff... It's a book - but it's more, too...

I'm not jumping on you here...but I just gotta know...if you don't trust the Bible, how do you know Jesus really DID hang out with the poor?

*oh, the title comes from www.thechurchyouknow.com and one of their "infomercials" about the church... (he would, of course, drive a Hummer)

My professors have been getting on my case. Even the professors I like. My favorite professor is (upset isn't the word) displeased with my current stance on scripture. He wants to know where my anchor is if it isn't in scripture. Well, my anchor is in Jesus. He counters well. "Jesus said to live a holy life. What's holy to me might be different than what's holy to you. I look to the Holy Bible to see what God's standard of holiness is." It was a great rebuttall. All I had was a squiggling run around about my acceptance of all of the Old Testament (Jesus acknowledges it as scripture) and Mark and Luke (Matthew is Midrash and less reliable - though I'm keeping the sermon on the mount - and John differs too wildly from the synoptics with no confirmation of any apostle as to it being the word of God- but I sure do like a lot of the verses.) I lost the argument.

But, it wasn't an argument. I knew that at the end of the fight Dr. Smith would still know I was a Christian and I would still respect him. I don't think it's right to put scripture on such a high level that it competes for the fourth spot of the trinity. I understand that it is all we have that points us to who God really is, but I can't defend it's quadratarian status.

I believe in a God so powerful that He doesn't need a book, but so in tune with his creation that he gave us one because of our needs.

Well, we've twisted that Bible so much that I don't know if I can take any of it as "gospel truth" anymore. We have (and still are) defended our hate with it. Even after a person has read the whole Bible it's still possible for him or her to take a few favorite verses and shape a whole theology around it. I once, on a dare, defended abortion using scripture.

But, it doesn't affect my life. I believe that Jesus hung out with the poor (all 4 gospels account for this) but, I don't do it myself. I myself am an either-or kind of guy. Either you stick to all scripture (women can't wear jewelry or braided hair, etc.) or you leave a little wiggle room. I'm still in flux on this issue - and I'm okay with that.

Heresy and Reformation

Yep - that's EXACTLY how all heresy gets started. It's also how all reformations get started...

It starts with the idea that maybe we've got it wrong somehow. Something isn't lining up with what the Bible really says.

You know, the beginning of Romans talks about how we'll be judged by how much of God has been revealed to us. That's not to say that all roads lead to God - but that those who have never heard of Jesus will be judged differently than those of us who have. God loves us enough to give us the choice to choose to love him - but he is so just that he will not penalize those who have never heard.

I went to a Presbyterian seminary and I remember mocking the Presbyterians for their "predestination" stance that can be twisted to say, "why evangelize? If God chose 'em, they're in."

And, to take your argument further - why do it at all if people will be judged differently if they've never heard? In other words, why put them on the spot to even take the chance of rejecting Jesus and thus separating themselves from God (on this, search YouTube for the blasphemy challenge)?

Because God isn't in the business of "getting us to heaven" God's in the business of "bringing heaven to us." The whole Kingdom of God thing in the Gospels seems to me to be how we need to relate to each other here and now. How if we would really take the Commandments to Love God and Love People seriously, we'd be living in just the kind of world that Jesus says is coming in Revelation - where tears are wiped away and where need is cared for. Where the hungry are fed and the naked clothed. Not everyone equal in a pure marxist sense, but everyone valued and counted.

I'm so less worried about people's "eternal" destiny than I am their present condition. It's a new twist on the old question, "How is it with your soul?"

Yep, that's how heresy starts - and reformation. Every reform was heresy once...

Daily Heresy!

This might be heretical. No, I'm pretty sure this is heresy.

I don't believe that everyone who doesn't accept Christ goes to Hell. Wait, hear me out. I don't think that everyone goes to Heaven.

(Good Joke:
Dan: I'm a Universalist - everyone is going to heaven ... (pregnant pause) ... even conservatives.)

First, I don't think we have a proper understanding of Hell. We think of fire and brimstone, which is okay - but Collier teaches that when Jesus died and went to Hell he didn't go to that hell - he went to a different hell. It is just a place under ground where people went because they couldn't ever get truly right with God. I guess that like the two people who didn't die, but rather ascended, went to heaven and everyone else went to this little underground place to wait for the Messiah. Abraham's Bossom? I don't know, I wish I had kept better Collier notes!

Second, our God is just. Sending people who have never heard the Gospel to a hell of fire and brimstone and eternal damnation just isn't just. I don't care what scriptures you might have - it isn't just. It also isn't just for all of the tribesman who have never heard to get a free card in to heaven - because then when we bring the "good news" the people who reject would go to hell when they would have wound up in heaven. It's all very complicated.

So, bear with me. Hypothetically: People who accept Jesus go to Heaven. No exceptions - Even if you lose your salvation you still end up in Heaven. People who outright reject Christ end up in Hell. Fire, brimstone, damnation - the whole 9 yards. People who have never heard or never had the Gospel fully explained go to this underground place where they are separated from God, but they will eventually be in Heaven - not a purgatory, mind you, just a less dramatic Hell.

Of course, this flies in the face of the great missionary thrust. We need to save the heathens from the pits of Hell. Well, I think our emphasis is in the wrong place. I don't think we are doing this for the lost people ... I think we should be doing it for Jesus. God is glorified when people accept his grace. In this hypothetical case, God will redeem those who never call on His name, but that isn't the intended plan. God is much happier when we go by the original plan.

This would be a just system, could possibly be biblical (it would take some work, but it's possible), and would circumnavigate some of evangelicalisms rough water.

Is this how all heresy gets started?

I have these lofty ideals. I think, "Why don't we try a church that breaks all the traditions?" But, they I realize that I need those traditions to feel like I'm in church.

In the 1600-1700s we didn't know what air was comprised of. Empty space awed us. It was something that we didn't have an explanation for. So, we built our churches with lots of empty space - It evoked the thoughts: we are small compared to God, God's untaimable spirit is present in church, and the sense of awe in a God we cannot fully understand. Well, today we get air - we understand the percents behind it, the molecular strutcure, etc. We also understand that having huge empty spaces costs a lot of money to heat. But, it's our tradition - so, we'll probably keep it.

I picked up a "street Bible" in the Library today. The 23 Psalm started, "You are, like, a good probation officer, I don't need anything else..." I put it down. I understand why some people fight for a KJV only translation - I don't fight with them, but I can understand.

My good friend Andy is leaving my church to serve as a college pastor. He's a great associate pastor. He said the one thing he won't miss is the phrase "well, that's not how we have always done it." We're like 4th graders with a substitute teacher - but Ms. Smith doesn't do it like that. The Rev. Claude Smithmire did it this way. I try and shake things up sometimes. I encouraged my Sunday School class to sign up to work in the Nursery. They staunchly refused. After some heavy encouragement I got 5 or 6 to sign up. Their first reply was that when they were younger it was the mothers who all took turns in the nursery. A new paradigm just wouldn't do.

I told them that there is no retirement age for ministry. I know that I'm probably overstepping my bounds with that one, but I don't care. If I don't do something now there will be no one left to tell me the same thing in 50 years. When these women had young children none of them worked, but today almost all of the young mothers work. Many of the young mothers are new to the church or just returning to the church. If we make them take rotations they will all suffer burn-out and stop coming. I'm not done yet. When I'm finished there's going to be an older adult in the Nursery every weekend.

I'm up for breaking some traditions, but I've realized that the ones we need to break are the ones that are contributing to our shrinking church size. Traditional music can still work and be attractive to a young audience. Slow, boring, repetitive traditional won't. I realize that in every church I attend I want to make the worship a little for effective, the church run a little more smoothly, and the facilities a little more inviting. I've realized that I have two more years of ministry left in Toccoa. I want to make them effective.

The End of the World (as we know it)????

I was surfing iTunes (actually as part of prepping for my sermon this Sunday) and came across a CD called "Pickin' on Led Zeppelin" - instrumental BLUEGRASS versions of Zeppelin songs...

You can't hear it here...but you could BUY it here...heh

http://www.homegrownmusic.net/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=LedPickin&Category_Code=Bluetributes

Could be the end of Western Civilization as we know it...would that be such a bad thing? :)

Oh - and it gets better (better?) - Pickin' on Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, Dave Matthews...

Sadly - I'll probably buy some of these...

An open letter to those called to ministry (including myself)

Don't give up.

I was doing homework for a class I hate. I had to write something out for an Old Testament prophesy. It was in II Samuel. Part of the prophecy said, "When he does wrong I will punish him" and then it said "I will not turn my back on Him."

Well, this goes against the NT. We believe that Jesus never sinned and we believe that when the weight of the sins of the world was on Jesus "even God could look no more" (My God, My God why hast thou forsaken me?)

I asked these questions in my paper - my last question was. If there isn't a good explanation for these prophecies, I can't justify the idea that the OT and NT flow harmoniously - how can we justifiably call the testaments harmonious?

The professor gave me a short answer. "Very Harmoniously." WTF?

I know I've already blogged about this, but I can't get it out of my mind. He gave up. He stopped trying. My view of inerrancy and infallibility hung on his answer to my question - and he wasn't trying that day.

Don't give up. When ministry seems so humdrum and usual don't give up. When kids ask questions that don't contribute to the discussion please remember that their very faith might hang in the answer to that question. Don't be afraid to take time, to promise an answer later, or to schedule it in. I have become pretty depressed since I recieved that answer. I don't know why. I hate the Bible and Theology department at my school. I put a lot of hope in this particular professor. I thought he would be different, but he wasn't.

I recieved a good answer (from Dr. Smith, the director of the School of World Missions who mentors me) but, I just can't shake the feeling I get that I will never find any resolution with the Bible and Theology Department.

Be different. Change the world. Change the church. Swear in a sermon. Say no to something you don't want to do. Take time, not just to be Holy, but to answer the simple questions and the difficult one. Never look down on someone for understanding less of the Bible.

Don't give up.