Peace: More or Less

Back in July, I preached a sermon at the three local United Methodist congregations, filling in for Pr. Brian Oliver. He had a sermon series going on the fruits of the Spirit, and gave the Anabaptist guy the one on peace. My outline/notes appear below...

Scripture, women in ministry, and correcting problems

New Testament scholar, Ben Witherington III, has two short videos that very quickly address some scriptural interpretation issues around women in ministry, and how those "problem texts" in the New Testament have been appropriated by subsequent Christian traditions to, for instance, rule out women from ministry. Check 'em out...

"Who is my neighbor?"

Sonnenberg Mennonite Church

As my last post indicated, I have said goodbye to my Virginia home of the past four years and returned to my home state of Iowa. Today is the first day in my new home of Toledo, Iowa, which is where my wife grew up. Yesterday, on my way from Virginia to Iowa, I had the privilege of preaching at Sonnenberg Mennonite Church in Kidron, Ohio. It was the first opportunity I'd had to preach in some time, and it was a wonderful experience from start to finish. Many thanks to all who were connected with my stop here.

Sermon text: Luke 10:25-37
Title: "Who is my neighbor?"
Audio:
Slightly edited text follows...

Subverting idolatrous narratives

Walter Brueggemann,
subversive biblical scholar

This week has been one of these weeks when I've felt absolutely spoiled rotten by being a grad student in a university environment. Monday through Wednesday, the seminary held its annual School for Leadership Training (SLT). This being my last year, it is also likely my last SLT. So what a way to go out, to have renowned Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann, as our keynote speaker for the two-and-a-half day conference. Brueggemann played a significant role in transforming my attitude about the Old Testament from one of disinterest and ambivalence to deep appreciation, as evidenced in one of my papers last year. So this was a big deal for me...

In Dr. Brueggemann's three keynote lecture-sermons during evening worship Monday through Wednesday, he presented two competing narratives: 1) the Narrative of Accumulation and 2) the Narrative of Abundance. The organizers of this event have graciously made these three excellent messages available on the EMU podcast blog:

1. “Conflict from Above: The Drive for Accumulation”
2. “Conflict from Below: The Possibility of Astonished Gratitude”
3. “Sabbath as a Means of Transition from Anxious Scarcity to Grateful Abundance”

Read on for more summary of Dr. Brueggemann's messages and a critique of his theological application of his biblical interpretation to contemporary concerns...

Christmas break: Weeping and a crisis of faith

It's been a blessedly quiet Christmas break this past week. After a crushingly difficult semester for my family, we've been in Iowa for the past week and a half, and I've been severely limiting e-mail and Facebook. It's also been a very quiet front here at Restroative Theology, for the same reasons, but here are a few scattered thoughts from this past week...

My daily Scripture reading has enjoyed an uptick on this break, and on Christmas morning I found my heart resonating with the Spirit as I read Psalm 39, particularly its closing verses, 12 & 13:

"Hear my prayer, O LORD, listen to my cry for help; be not deaf to my weeping. For I dwell with you as an alien, a stranger, as all my fathers were. Look away from me, that I may rejoice again before I depart and am no more." (emphasis added)

Beasts for the Kingdom: A prayer

Beasts of burden, Debre Zeit, Ethiopia

This morning for a final-year seminary class, my fellow seminarians and I were led through a time of guided retreat. In the seminary chapel there were set up four stations, each asking a different question. One about how we conduct our closest relationships, another about our public ministry, and yet another about how we take care of ourselves personally. The final question was this: Who am I and what do I do in my relationship with God?


On the page facing these questions in the handout was printed two Bible verses: Matthew 11:28-30 and Philippians 1:9-11. Here's some quick exegesis and a prayer which arose from my journaling this morning...

The "Jewish State" revisited

Sari Nusseibeh, professor of philosophy at Al-Quds University in Jerusalem, has a fascinating op-ed piece up at Al Jazeera...

Why Israel can't be a 'Jewish State'

Nusseibeh makes a number of points which resonate with the theopolitical literature I've been absorbing over the past year or more, found mainly in the work of William T. Cavanaugh.

The article highlights the complex nature of ancient traditions in late Modernity. Cavanaugh has convincingly shown that the characterizations of "religious" and "secular" are constructs of the modern nation-state, the ascendant and still-prevalent form of organizing people and power within territorial boundaries. Nusseibeh is right to point out that calls for a "Jewish state" are incoherent based on present political arrangements, not to mention the slippery nature of "Jewishness" in our secular age.

Hoeing the rows in the New Jerusalem

"Christ and St. Mary Magdalene at the Tomb"
by Rembrant

This past spring I was quite taken by the book of Jeremiah, particularly the letter in ch. 29, in which the prophet writes to the exiles in Babylon, sending this word from the Lord: "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce... Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

This chapter is a significant key for John Howard Yoder's Old Testament hermeneutic. In this passage and the context in which it is set, he sees in exilic Israel the seeds of the church to come, hundreds of years before the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

The paper which I wrote, linked above, was primarily an exegesis of the Jeremiah text. Obviously, my Christian faith assumptions were at work, but I didn't make an explicit theological connection to the New Testament, or to Jesus. Well, theologian, Chelle Stearns, seems to have made the connection for me in her wonderful essay at The Other Journal, "Hobbits, Heroes, and Football," wherein she proposes a new archetype for understanding Jesus: the  gardener-hero.

A journey with biblical proportions

Couldn't find the Samson picture from this

My journey with Scripture began as a child growing up in my home congregation, the Prairie City Church of the Brethren (my hometown heroes). While my family was all happily Christian, my father was a pastor's kid, we did not practice the reading of Scripture in our home. This was left for Sunday at church. I don't have any specific memories with specific scriptures from my childhood but I do remember my children's Bible which had interesting pictures. I particularly remember a picture of blinded Samson, in the process of pushing apart the pillars that would in mere seconds kill him and all those Philistines. His gauged-out eyes continued to draw my seeing eyes back to his. Such willing self-sacrifice (revenge?) seemed heroic and puzzling to me.

Pentecost as Divine De/Reconstruction

Photo by Douglas Porter via Flickr

In January of this year I heard Pentecostal scholar, Cheryl Bridges Johns, refer to the happenings at Pentecost as “a feast of deconstruction” which, she added, “is why so many fear it.” Indeed, present at the events recorded in Acts 2 were skeptics who thought these rowdy Jews were drunk at nine in the morning! This deconstruction - the breakdown of all that seems normal and expected - was a work of the Holy Spirit, leading to a divine reconstruction of what it meant to be in Christ, a new creation. No, as Peter clearly saw through eyes of faith, these Jews at Pentecost were drinking from the one true Spirit which God was pouring out, heard as strange speech made normal and seen as tongues of fire resting on all in the assembly.

We Christians in the West have had our ways of seeing and engaging the world from our faith tragically de-enchanted. We try to strategize for the Spirit’s movement, but God does not easily go along with our carefully-laid plans. At Pentecost, then and now, the Spirit acts as the mighty and unpredictable leveler, bringing God's justice and right-ness to bear, pulling down the powerful and lifting up the powerless. In the Spirit, kings and peasants speak together with the tongues of angels, joyfully worshiping God in word, song, and deed.

If we open ourselves to the presence and guidance of the Holy Spirit, our life together takes on a new quality. We become enchanted Sunday school teachers and theologians, painters and doctors, farmers and corporate managers, all bound together by the Spirit in Christ's body, the church. The Spirit is pulsing life through this body. Let us drink deeply at this fountain.

Earthy discipleship and peacebuilding in Jeremiah

Photo by snowmentality (via Flickr)

Today ended a three-week intensive class at seminary, studying the book of Jeremiah in the Old Testament. It's great to have those classes where the primary textbook is the Bible, which doesn't happen as often as some might think at a seminary. For one of my papers, I chose the topic of "to pluck up and to pull down, to build and to plant," which is a theme that is established in the very first chapter and runs throughout Jeremiah, giving it somewhat of an organizing principle.

In the paper, I do a literary and narrative-theological analysis of that theme with special attention paid to historical and sociopolitical events that drive the narrative forward in Jeremiah. In an academic paper, you have to do all the hard and boring work first before you get to say the interesting and relevant stuff at the end. Since this is a blog, I'll skip most of the boring stuff and say up front why I think this theme and Jeremiah in general is an excellent source of inspiration for faithful Christian peacebuilding. If you really want to see the academic treatment, the paper will be embedded at the end. If you read both, you will see me repeating myself, because I'm lifting material from the paper for the post...

Silver scrolls of the Priestly Benediction

Here's a quick presentation I threw together for a May term class on the book of Jeremiah at EMS. It talks about a fairly recent (1979) archaeological discovery in burial tombs in the valley of Hinnom in Jerusalem. Amidst bones and shattered pottery in the tomb's repository were found two small silver amulets, rolled up like scrolls. Inscribed on each, nearly word for word, is what is known as the Priestly Benedition, found in the Psalms but also in Numbers 6:24-26, which you'll find on slide one of the presentation:

Joshua (hilariously abridged)

After last night's intense post about militarism I'm happy to offer something a bit more lighthearted this evening. A fellow Brethren from Bethany Theological Seminary has put together this wonderfully funny abridged account of the book of Joshua in a series he calls "Scribble Theology." Check it out:

Christianity 101

For a class assignment done in small groups, I've recently been reading bits and pieces of God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World - and Why Their Differences Matter by Stephen Prothero, a religious studies professor at Boston University. The book has a long title, but the subtitle is important. It's a clue as to why I actually like this book.  Prothero, a former Christian, does a fine job of synthesizing broad theological topics and history in his accounting of Christianity, past and present. I was skeptical going into this book, but after reading his approach in the introduction and then this chapter on Christianity, Prothero is definitely somebody I could hang with. He has shaken off the myths of the Enlightenment with its fool’s quest for unbiased objectivity and rational knowing, opting instead to get into the languages and thought worlds of ancient and ever-shifting religions. Here's my favorite quote from the introduction:

"The Age of Enlightenment in the eighteenth century popularized the ideal of religious tolerance, and we are doubtless better for it. But the idea of religious unity is wishful thinking nonetheless, and it has not made the world a safer place. In fact, this naive theological groupthink - call it Godthink - has made the world more dangerous by blinding us to the clashes of religions that threaten us worldwide... The ideal of religious tolerance has morphed into the straightjacket of religious agreement." (3-4)

The assignment has been interesting because in my small group for this class there are two North American men, one of whom is an Anabaptist-derived Christian (me), one North American, Jewish Christian woman from a Stone-Campbell/Restorationist background, and an Afghan-American woman. Very interesting conversations cropping up around our reading of this book and thankfully we're taking Prothero's lead and actually paying attention to the differences. So read on after the break for my quick review of Prothero's account of Christianity and a few distillations of what makes the Christian faith tick.

[Note: Part one of a "Religions 101" series. Also, check out reflections on the book by my classmate, Nathan: God Is Not One??]

Radical Biblical and Cultural Interpretation and World-changing

Many of my friends at seminary and on Facebook are no doubt tired of me whining about the paper I'm posting here via Scribd (impressive service, btw). Taking shape in my head for over two months, it's finally done and I'll turn it in to my professor this afternoon. The paper is a review/synthesis and attempt at integration of two significant books which I read this fall, the latter of which I've recently mentioned here:

• World Upside Down : Reading Acts in the Graeco-Roman Age by C. Kavin Rowe (2009, Oxford)
• To Change the World : The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World by James Davison Hunter (2010, Oxford)

The primary presupposition for the paper is that it was written by a Christian (me) within and for the Church. Non-Christians might find some interesting material, especially the contemporary philosophical and sociological material, which challenge prevailing Western and American views and practices. Another presupposition that I point out in the paper is that I'm working primarily with the Church in America. Global concerns are important and named but are not the focus of the paper.  The paper can be most succinctly summarized by saying it deals with one working assumption that leads to two consequences explored in the paper.

• Assumption (later unpacked): Christians operate with a limited understanding of culture
• Consequence 1: Christians operate with a limited understanding of the biblical text
• Consequence 2: Christians set off on quixotic engagements with culture

Finally, a note on how this is posted. An academic paper does not "copy and paste" well into the blog format. The nature of the two media are far too disparate. Academic papers have footnotes, blog posts have hyperlinks, and trying to shoe-horn one into the other is a nightmare. This is why I'm so impressed with my first use of Scribd as a publishing platform. It allows both to be true to themselves while offering the best of social media for papers and publications like this.

So read on after the break if you're ready for a big 20-page exploration of Christians and culture in America...

[Update, Jan. 11, 2011: Just uploaded an edited and revised version of the paper below, which was submitted for an upcoming symposium in February.]

The walking death of hypocrisy

Here's a little sermonette I preached yesterday to a "congregation" of two classmates in a preaching class.  We were pushing the lower limit of Jesus' words in Matthew 18: "For where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am with them." (NIV) First, here's the biblical text we were working with, Luke 13:10-17 (also NIV):

On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, "Woman, you are set free from your infirmity." Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue ruler said to the people, "There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath."

The Lord answered him, "You hypocrites! Doesn't each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?"

When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

Read on after the break for my short sermonic reflections...

Basket-weaving the biblical narrative

My introduction to Douglas Rushkoff was the excellent Frontline special, Digital Nation, which Rushkoff helped produce and appears in. This post isn't about that Frontline special, but I'm serious when I say everyone who uses digital, networked technology (and if you're reading this, you do) should watch it. I also saw him in a scary/awesome documentary called We Live in Public, which is about an eccentric visionary in the early days of the internet (whom Rushkoff knew personally). While poking around on Rushkoff's website, I found that a few years ago he wrote a four-volume comic book series called Testament.

Comics were a pretty significant part of my childhood. So were computers. I grew up going to church, too, so the Bible was also in my awareness (although not as prevalent in my consciousness as the other two). I stopped reading comics regularly back in high school but I never lost my love for them. So when I discovered Testament, it immediately caught my attention: Old Testament biblical narratives (Rushkoff is Jewish) are told and then re-told as near-future cyberpunk narratives. A cosmic spiritual battle that happens outside of time (and outside the actual frames of the comic's pages...very clever) rages, with ripples being felt in both time-periods. Spiritual warfare is a topic I've done some thinking and writing about this year, so it thrilled me to see it depicted so interestingly here. The cyberpunk narrative folds in the rampant expanse and corporatization of technology in society, which is a special interest of mine. To top it all off, at the end of each volume, there is about 8 to 10 pages of biblical commentary from Rushkoff as it relates to the comic! Basically, this comic felt like it was written especially for me. Thanks, Douglas Rushkoff!  So read on after the break for a few comments on this amazing comic...

De-Freakyfying John's Apocalypse

The last book of the Christian scriptures in the Bible - the Apocalypse (Revelation) of John - has had a rocky past with its handlers. While my tradition - the Church of the Brethren - has tended to not get freaky with John's Revelation, neither do I recall any sort of serious work with this text in the context of Sunday morning worship services growing up (my primary mode of receiving Scripture in my youth). The broadly Protestant, rural Midwestern (Iowan) environment that I grew up in, however, did contain some strands of the Christian faith that were more receptive to...um...freaky interpretations of John's letter. Last summer on my Honnold.org website, in a discussion that started on a completely different topic, we somehow we got onto the subject of freakiness in connection to Revelation, with a few guys around my age and growing up in the same kind of environment sharing some interesting stories about their youthful experiences in congregations with Revelation. Read through it there if you're curious, I won't go any further here. Suffice it say that this topical side-track discussion of Revelation was a perfect illustration of how this text has been used and abused, especially within American Christianity in the last 100 years or so.

The broad goal of this post is to begin narrating my own coming to grips with this purportedly wild and crazy book of Scripture: Revelation. Over the past 9 months, I've grown to have a deep appreciation for John's Apocalypse, and have even begun to see how it is a key interpretive text for the Christian faith...although not in ways that many Christians have bought into, in part due to my Anabaptist/nonviolent orientation. Hopefully to people who read it (hint: it's long and all text), it can offer a refreshing perspective. It is work done in faith, within the life of the Church. May it be edifying to the body.

First, read the passage itself: Revelation 5:1-14 (NIV) from BibleGateway.com
Then, read on for my lengthy exploration of this pivotal passage from the Apocalypse of John...

In these scant few verses...

This morning, I sat down to write a reflection paper for my biblical interpretation class.  It is the culmination of over a month spent in just six verses of the Gospel of Mark, 14:3-9.  Here is the text, from the NRSV (with verse numbers removed):

While he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment of nard, and she broke open the jar and poured the ointment on his head.

But some were there who said to one another in anger, "Why was the ointment wasted in this way? For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii, and the money given to the poor." And they scolded her.

But Jesus said, "Let her alone; why do you trouble her? She has performed a good service for me. For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish; but you will not always have me. She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial. Truly I tell you, wherever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her."

What follows is the last of seven papers I wrote for this class, on this text.  It is the final step in the exegetical process: theological reflection.  For the non-seminary crowd, "exegesis" can simply be defined as "close reading."  Seven or eight weeks on six verses of scripture certainly qualifies as that.  Read on to see what conclusions I came to...

The Spirituality of the Cocoon

"Elohim Creating Adam" by William Blake
(view larger image)

The Spirituality of the Cocoon - by me

Almost but not quite

Across my face, shafts of light
Fully formed but not created

Encased in glass
Etching my dreams across the pane
Twisted, crimped and dangling

Wings rustle above me
Soft hair brushes my cheek
Gasping, dusty lungs crackle

Gelatinous eyes rolling, sloshing
Then coming to rest, opening
Ensnaring vines crack and fall away
A mighty wind rises with me

Calling out, fading with the rising sun:
"Awake, O sleeper,
and rise from the dead!"