God. Always. Does. Everything.

OK.. it’s been too long, but I’m trying to get back to the initial project of this blog, to defend the theological affirmation, “God always does everything God can do.” I’ve been working my way through, with a few rabbit tracks along the way. Let me continue…

God. Always. Does.

Everything.

God is. Everywhere. Stating the omnipresence of God is sine qua non for orthodox theology. Why isn’t the omni-work of God? Though every Christian I know affirms the omnipresence of God, many (most?) apparently believe that God is only actively working at times, in some of the places where God is always present. Could we really believe that? But that conclusion seems a necessary, logical corollary to traditionally-stated theology.

If God is, in fact, everywhere at all times. And omnipotent (also sine qua non for traditionally-stated theology)… dare I ask: What is that omnipotent God doing?

I believe God is doing everything (every where, at every time) that God can (possibly) do.

Everything.

In times of crisis Christians pray for God to “do something.” (Though their language is sometimes more eloquently expressed!) Get down here… and do something…. But do we not hear what such prayer implies? If God is always with us, everywhere — why is God not already working? What more could we possibly expect God, whose defining characteristic is “IS-ness” (action), to do?

If a parent, a friend, even a compassionate stranger, came on the scene of a tragedy, can you fathom that person not doing something, anything, everything she/he could possibly do to bring healing, wholeness, resolution to the crisis? (What human being would possibly heal only one child if she actually had the power to heal all of them?) We would criminalize anyone who came into such a situation and just stood idly by. And wouldn’t it even be worse if someone actually claimed to love the victim, to have her best interest in mind, to believe some “big picture” justified her suffering — as he simply stood by, caring, but doing nothing?

Yet we allow a theology which justifies the very same inactive “compassion” to characterize our undersatnding of God! Could that really be compassion? By any possible definition?

God is everywhere. The Spirit at the center of all life, all hope, all goodness, all love, all truth. And God is always doing. And God is always doing EVERYTHING that can be done.

I do believe in praying (see my earlier post on the topic). Prayer, especially in moments of crisis, is an expression of our deepest soul. I understand the emotional outcry: God do something! I don’t understand a logic that attempts to explain this, to justify this, in moments of clearer thinking! And I don’t understand just blaming any moral, ethical, or theological inconsistency on our finitude. Yes, God is “omni…” In our finitude we will never understand God. But this does not give us the right to defend poor logic, in the name of defending a “Godness” that we defined in the first place! (The “omni” attributes are words and concepts of human language and thought.)

The Psalmist affirms that God is everywhere: “If I ascend to Heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol (sometimes translated “hell”), you are there” (139.8).

Surely a God who will go all the way to “Hell” for us, to “hold [us] fast” (139.10), will always do everything God can possibly do. Could the Psalmist have meant anything else?

God. Always. Does.

Everything.

More on Interfaith Dialogue

Thinking of that conversation with Sri (see my last post) made me reflect on a brief address I made to a gathering of 300 people — Baptist, Muslim, Jewish, Unitarian, and a few secularists… who had gather for a “Conversation on Islam: Faith, Fear, and our Future Together.” We hosted this conversation because of the nationwide backlash from a proposed “mosque” (actually it was a Muslim Community Center), planned near the site of “ground zero” in New York City. I believe in peace. And I think it will come (only come) through dialogue…

Address to that “Conversation on Islam and America”:

Not too long after the tragedy, which we now just call “9/11,” my phone rang. I recognized the number from a small town in South Carolina. My brother, Philip, is a year younger and 5 inches taller than I. He has a master’s degree in education and has spent a career in that field, currently serving as the principal of an elementary school. He is the father of three boys and the youngest son of the same Southern Baptist Pastor who taught me to love Jesus, and to read the Bible for ethical instruction and devotional practice. Phillip needed a few minutes to talk to the only member of his immediate family who had ventured outside Laurens County to raise a family and find his employment – that is, he needed to talk to his brother, one of the pastors of Park Road “This Is Not Our Fathers’” Baptist Church, in Charlotte!

In Sunday school the prior weekend, the topic had (again) turned to Islam and 9-1-1… Islam and America… Islam and Christianity… His teacher had commented, a little too casually for my brother’s sensibilities, that all Muslims are going to hell. He’d even been almost apologetic about it, Phillip said. There was no venom in his voice, but, you know, “the Bible says…” And my college and graduate-school educated Southern Baptist brother, living in small town America was frustrated and concerned by this comment, but, honestly, he was a little clueless how to respond, because Phillip was raised on the same proof-texting hermeneutic that his Sunday school teacher was – namely, that if you can point to a verse that says I am the way, the truth, the life, no one comes to the Father but by me (John 14.6)… then it is Gospel Truth. The problem was that something about that “truth” would not ring right in his mind… would not rest easy in his heart… would not resonate in my brother’s soul (see Mark 12.30).

But Phillip couldn’t offer another word, not in the face of “the Bible says,” because he’d never been offered any other way to see our sacred book. So on that Sunday, when a well-meaning, if misguided teacher had offered a blanket condemnation of Islam, my brother sat in painful silence. His is a silence that has been repeated thousands and thousands of times over in Christian Sunday school classes… in club houses… in office break rooms.

In the years since that phone call, however, many of the speaking voices have grown louder and louder until the shrill sounds of their fear and ignorance drown the sound of my brother’s equally loud silence.

My response to the recent backlash against Muslims in America and beyond comes out of this experience. It is a response of sadness, embarrassment, and a fear of my own. It is the sadness of knowing that too few of us, whose eyes have been opened to a new reading of sacred texts, too few of us have offered that reading in a compelling way. So my brother, a grown, educated man, living in an educated town, attending an educated church can virtually have no idea such a reading is even possible (or to know it well-enough to voice it clearly). It is the embarrassment of observing that the Christian Church has allowed its voice to be co-opted, too-much defined by a well-meaning but ignorant minority. I’m embarrassed that anyone could call Islam “evil” – condemning more than a billion of God’s children in one thoughtless sweep. So even members of my family can hesitantly embrace misguided statements, because they’ve never had the privilege of knowing a Muslim – the heart of whose faith is so much like their own. And it is fear, not of literal warfare, but the fear that as we devolve by a war of words, day by day we lose our essential humanity – because the talking heads and radio extremists, the paralyzed pulpits and polarized pundits, on left and right, have made it virtually impossible for Americans to dialogue any more.

So it does my Baptist heart good to see this crowd. I can’t imagine a more hopeful sight for America, nor a more beautiful picture of faith, than a Baptist church full of Muslims, and Jews, and Unitarians and Catholics… talking, respectfully together, of our common faith and our common fate.

It is a sight that would have pleased Roger Williams, who was exiled from the colonies in New England for his liberal, Baptist views. Baptists were born in dissent – and all true Baptists have that contrary but liberating seed in their heart. In 1655 America’s first Baptist penned these words that Baptists would do well to hear again. In a letter to the town of Providence, which had become his home after exile, Williams told a parable:

There goes many a ship to sea, with many hundred souls in one ship, whose weal and woe is common, and is a true picture of a commonwealth, or a human combination or society. It hath fallen out sometimes, that both papists and protestants, Jews and Turks, may be embarked in one ship; upon which supposal I affirm, that all the liberty of conscience, that ever I pleaded for, turns upon [this] – that none of the papists, protestants, Jews, or Turks, be forced to come to the ship’s prayers of worship, nor compelled from their own particular prayers or worship, if they practice any.

The founding father of all Baptists in America, for the sake of liberty of conscience, would have defended the right of Muslims in New York City, or Murfreesboro, TN or Charlotte, NC to build a center for education or a mosque for worship. And I believe he would have reminded us of that divine word that comes in scripture, virtually every time God and human beings interact: Do not be afraid! We would do well to live by the freedoms of both of those words.

Roger Williams ended his letter to Providence with these words: “I remain, studious of our common Peace and Liberty.” That end is a good beginning: Our common peace and liberty.

May it be so!

Namaste

Namaste is a Sanscrit word which means something like, “the divinity in me greets the divinity in you.” It is a common greeting for Hindus. Though the theology of that greeting runs somewhat counter to my own, I appreciate the sentiment behind it, especially when spoken from a friend. Srikanth Rajagopalan is such a friend. The following article was printed in our church news, following a dialogue with Sri regarding his Hindu background and faith.

***
As he folded his hands together in a gesture of prayer before his face and nodded around the table, “Namaste… Namaste… Namaste,” and as I listened to Srikanth Rajagopalan talk about Krishna and Vishnu and Brahma, explain dharma and karma, expound upon the myriad views of God affirmed by nearly a billion people claiming Hinduism as their religion, I thought that I must be in the wrong place. Here sat eight protestant Christians, facing Gandhi (well, he looks like Gandhi – bronze-colored skin, distinct Indian features, bald head, no eyebrows…) and being taught by the soft-spoken, kind voice of a yoga instructor. Just as dislocating may have been the fact that as the Baptist pastor, a leader of this group, we were gathered in the recently-up-fitted surroundings of an English-style pub. (To my mother if she’s reading: please skip that last sentence!)
But the truth is that I felt quite at home. Sir Edmund Halley’s has re-opened, under new management, and the Iotas (“because nothing is too small to be a big deal!”), aka “Brews and Views,” are back in session. This winter and spring we will be hosting a number of guest speakers, who will join us around a table of fellowship to share their views on faith. Monday night’s start was intriguing and inspiring. Sri, the yoga instructor, is a friend of mine through the work of Mecklenburg Ministries. He is kind and warm-hearted. Knowledgeable and patient. And though his world view could hardly be any different from the picture painted onto the soul of this “son of a preacher man” – what I know is that we share more commitments and convictions than divide us. Such is the value of dialogue.
After this wonderful two-hour dialogue, which bounced from India to Hickory, NC (where Sri was raised), from reincarnation to “sacred cows,” from polytheism to Trintarianism, and much more… my head was swirling with new words and foreign concepts and a spectrum of colors which shades Hindu religious understanding from literal to metaphorical (does that sound familiar?). I came home from this awakening experience with this lasting impression. My world is not The World. It’s just one, very small corner of this large and impressive globe which we inhabit with practitioners of religious and intellectual and political and social practitioners of every stripe.
According to www.adherents.com 2.1 billion of us claim Christianity as our frame of reference. But that leaves about 4 billion people who see things differently – nearly a billion of us whose world view looks like Sri’s, and who would find my comfortable, logical, reliable, coherent world of Jesus and Sunday School and all-things-Baptist, well, just down-right weird! (Have you ever tried to explain it to a Hindu?) And it seems to me that as our world continues to get smaller, and as we increasingly meet “Sri” on every corner, this needs to matter to us. Our faith in Christ is real and powerful and life-giving. It is right and it is true. It is revelation from God. It needs to be experienced (really experienced) and lived and loved and shared. And it needs to be acknowledged as one of many experiences of God’s living presence among us. The knowledge that my experience is subjective and particular, in light of the varying and wildly-divergent understandings of our human reality, speaks of the beautiful diversity of our humanity and the incomprehensible creativity and majesty of God.
So as we continue to meet around that table, I will continue to be open to “their truth” and “their experience” as real and valid – and I will continue my commitment that in the sharing of our stories, my own experience is validated, even more, and is deepened immensely. If you are interested in exploring the beauty and diversity of faith, Matt Kinney and I invite you to join us for our next Iota’s at Sr. Ed’s, on February 7 at 8:00 pm. Speaker to be announced. Inspiration to be expected. Thanks, Sri.
Namaste…

The Birth of Jesus: Truth or Myth?

The Birth of Jesus

Truth or Myth?

The following blog is taken from a lecture/discussion given at Park Road Baptist Church on Wednesday night, December 1, 2010. I have attempted to fill in the “gaps” from the discussion, but only a little. The main thrust of the discussion will be clear, but if you have further questions, please post them as comments on the blog.

Note: The discussion that follows concerns the birth of Jesus as we know of it by the stories of his birth. When discussing the “truth” or “myth” of  that birth, I am not talking about the biological, physical birth. I believe Jesus was in fact a real man who was literally born, like every other human is born. (There are some who believe the entire story of Jesus is a fabricated legend.) So when discussing his “birth,” I am really referring to the “story of his birth.”

***

National news media recently reported on a controversy that is brewing in New York City between the American Atheist Association and the local Catholic League. The Atheists Association paid for a billboard ad, visible when coming through the Lincoln Tunnel that says:

“You know it’s a MYTH

This season. Celebrate REASON.”

Not to be outdone, the Catholics chose a billboard on the opposite side of the road and countered:

“You know it’s REAL

Celebrate Jesus.”

I was disappointed in the coverage of this controversy in that the Christian voice, implicitly representative of all Christians, simply stood on tradition and a basic “the Bible says” position – which only proves the point the Atheists were trying to make, namely, they speak from reason, all Christians speak from un-reasoned emotion, or superstition, or sentimentalism.

Several Wednesdays ago, in studying the Marcus Borg book, “Reading the Bible Again for the First Time,” I quoted Borg who stated that virtually all mainline Christian scholars now agree that Jesus was probably born in Nazareth, not Bethlehem. (We were looking at his chapter on how to read the Hebrew Prophets; he was referring to some of the “predictions” of the birth of Jesus when he made this comment.) Paired with the NYC controversy, it seemed to me an apropos question: Is the birth of Jesus “truth” or “myth.”

In asking the question, we considered three of the four gospel texts, regarding Jesus’ birth.

***

Mark’s Birth Narrative

Mark 1.1 The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the son of God. As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, “See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of once crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’” John the baptizer appeared… In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan…

Mark’s gospel contains no birth narrative, so no mention of either Bethlehem or Nazareth as the birthplace of Jesus.  What does this mean? If Mark’s gospel is the oldest gospel (as a majority of scholars argue), it means at the very least that for this writer, and for his audience, there was no need of a birth narrative. (See my sermon from November 29, 2009 for more on this:

“Lost in the Cantatas.” www.parkroadbaptist.org: Worship tab. “Park Road Pulpit” link.) Mark assumes Nazareth as Jesus’ hometown, because Jesus comes from Nazareth to be baptized of John. There are other references to Nazareth as his hometown, but there is no interest one way or another in the birthplace of Jesus.

***

Matthew’s Birth Narrative

Matthew 1.1 An account of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham was the father of Isaac… Jacob… King David… and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon… and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah.

     So all the generation from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; from David to Babylon, fourteen generation; from Babylon to the Messiah, fourteen generations.

From a careful study of scripture it is clear that Matthew has his facts wrong. There are not 14 generations, evenly divided, in three segments. Chronicles records three kings which Matthew omits. In that day, however, numerology was very important, and often used to make theological emphases. (Every Hebrew letter was assigned a numerical value. Some rabbis were gifted at finding meaning, supposedly hidden in the numbers (like a great Dan Brown novel!). Apparently the numerical sum of the letters of the name David (DWD), the greatest king of Israel, who’s throne the coming Messiah would reestablish is… fourteen!

Clearly Matthew’s purpose here is not “just the facts, Ma’am.” Even according to scripture he got the facts wrong. Something more important than facts is at work in his gospel!

 We could elaborate on the genealogy more, showing that a virgin birth (which Matthew does not attest) would destroy the lineage through Joseph to David – thus eliminating Jesus’ Jewish qualifications to be Messiah (he would be a “Son of David.”) So, either Jesus was a “Son of David” (Matthew) or a Son of God (Luke) – but, literally, according to the “facts,” he cannot be both. Clearly the gospel writers are working on something more important to them than the facts.

 What is important to Matthew? (consider the reference to Abraham… David… Babylon… Messiah…) The Jewishness of Jesus is important. Connecting Jesus’ Jewish lineage, and showing Jesus’ fulfillment of Jewish law and Jewish hopes is important to Matthew, whose audience was primarily Jewish.

 Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way… 2.1 In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came… “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews?”… and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea…”(Micah 5.2)

     13. Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt… This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son…” (Hosea 11.1)

     19. When Herod died, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Get up… and go to the land of Israel… But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea (Bethlehem) in the place of (Archelaus’) father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And after being warned in a dream, he went away to the district of Galilee. There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, “He will be called a Nazorean.”(Isaiah 11.1 A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch (Hebrew: NZR) shall grow out of his roots…)

     “For the sake of the pattern the names of Ahaziah, Joash, and Amaziah (1 Chronicles 3.11-12) have been omitted… The device of making three groups of names is an aid to memory. Fourteen is the sum of the numerical value of the three letters in the name of David in Hebrew (DWD).” (Oxford Annotated Bible) 

Where is Jesus born? Why?

Matthew’s narrative assumes that Bethlehem is the home of Mary and Joseph. There is no travel narrative, no census, no mention of Nazareth as the hometown, in Matthew’s gospel. Jesus is born in Bethlehem – because that’s where his parents lived!

As Matthew often does, he connects Jesus’ story to the Jewish story. Why travel to Egypt? So the prophecy of Isaiah can be fulfilled (out of Egypt I have called my son). Though it should be important to note that this is not at all what the Isaiah passage originally meant. While Christians have defended the text as referring to the literal return of the Holy Family from Egypt, we need to acknowledge that there is a clear, unmistakable reference in the passage – and it is not a future prophecy. The clear message of Isaiah is a “prophecy” referring to an event of the past: God’s presence with the children of Israel in release from the bondage of the Pharaoh.

Next we need to ask why Matthew has the Holy Family settling in Nazareth. It is easy for modern Christians to read scripture with our neatly packaged stories in mind. In this case I am referring to the Christmas story as we have received it: the manger scene with the magi and the shepherds and the stable. (I often humorously add the little drummer boy and Santa, right there by the manger!) But for Matthew’s congregation, there was no picture such as this. Nor for Mark’s. Nor for Luke’s. Each has his own story – and it is certainly reasonable to ask why none of the writers has the same story, the same characters, the same setting… What does this mean? On face value, then, Matthew’s gospel has the Holy Family settle in Nazareth as a new home town – after fleeing their original hometown for fear of their life. Matthew’s gospel is filled with Hebrew texts that are “fulfilled” in Jesus (remember the note of the Jewishness of his audience.) Yet the “fulfilled prophecy” here is very interesting. There is no Hebrew text that says the Messiah will live in Nazareth. The Isaiah text to which Matthew is apparently referring uses the Hebrew word for branch (which, in very simplified terms, is spelled: NZR). This Hebrew word, while clearly NOT “Nazareth” or “Nazarene” is apparently close enough for Matthew to claim this as a prophecy fulfilled. It is interesting logic, to say the least!

***

Luke’s Birth Narrative

Luke 1.46 And Mary said, ‘My soul magnifies the Lord, ⁴⁷ and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, ⁴⁸ for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; ⁴⁹ for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. ⁵⁰ His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. ⁵¹ He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. ⁵² He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; ⁵³ he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. ⁵⁴ He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, ⁵⁵ according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’ 56 And Mary remained with her for about three months and then returned to her home.

What is Luke’s emphasis?

Luke’s gospel emphasizes the poor, the outcast, the oppressed. Women are favored characters for Luke. So Luke’s gospel, alone (and not surprisingly), has shepherds attending the birth – not Kings! Where are the magi in Luke’s narrative? Even if Luke were making a different theological emphasis, does it make sense that he would simply leave out these major players in the birth narrative? And this is even more striking since many commentators have noted Luke’s attention to detail – more than any other gospel, Luke is concerned with the particulars in his stories. Something else is going on here… even for Luke. It’s not “the facts” that are important.

Luke 2 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. ²This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. ³All went to their own towns to be registered. ⁴Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. ⁵He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. ⁶While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. ⁷And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

Only in Luke, is Nazareth the original hometown of Joseph and Mary. Only in Luke is he born in Bethlehem – because of a Census. But there are no non-canonical (non biblical) records of any such census or taxing at this time. There was an enrollment required by Quirinius in 6 CE. I don’t have all the detail here, but scholars have noted that due to a miscalculation of dates, at the time the Gregorian calendar was established, in the Middle ages, “BC” and “AD” are actually out of line by 4 years. In other words, Jesus was really born in 4 BC! This would put Quirinius’ census a full decade after Jesus’ birth (see below).

***

Birth of Jesus According to the Commentaries

I wanted to point out Marcus Borg’s point – that mainline scholars do not simply affirm the birth of Jesus as we have received it in our manger scenes, so I turned to two commentaries which are in my library. The commentaries I quoted are hardly new, liberal, leftist, “Jesus Seminar” commentaries. The New Interpreter’s Bible, I noted humorously, came from my father’s library – and my father is no liberal!

***

Mercer Dictionary of the Bible, “Jesus,” pp.445-446

“Despite the birth stories in Matthew and Luke, Jesus in his own time was known to his contemporaries not as a native of Bethlehem and a messianic claimant from the line of King David, but as a humble Nazarene. Whatever their merit as history, the birth stories were not public knowledge during Jesus’ lifetime…

     Even in the gospel of John (latest: written ~100CE), Jesus’ first disciples introduced him as ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph’…”

     In Nazareth itself, the people among whom he had grown up said… ‘Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?…

     The marvelous accounts of Jesus’ birth, whatever their value as genuine history, cannot be presupposed in attempting to make sense of the Gospel records of his life and teaching.”

***

Interpreter’s Bible, Luke, p.50

“Luke’s beautiful pastoral narrative is folk poetry – saga that love and reverence wove about God’s good, glad gift of Christ to humanity. Attempts to find pagan antecedents to it in the Roman tale of Romulus and Remus and the shepherds who nurtured them, in the Iranian account of the shepherds who watched over the birth of Mithra, or in some hypothetical messianic legend borrowed by Hellenistic Judaism from Egyptian Osiris mythology, have not led to any conclusive results…

     Luke seeks to set his story against the background of secular history… No other source makes any mention of a census of “all the world” (a hyperbole for the Roman Empire during Caesar’s reign). An enrollment in the province of Syria for purposes of taxation was undertaken in AD 6 (or 7) when Quirinius was governor. The references to it by Josephus… imply that this census was the “first enrollment”… Since Quirinius was never Roman legate in Syria during the lifetime of Herod the Great, and Luke’s earlier narratives assume that John the Baptist – and therefore Jesus also – was born while Herod was still king of Judea, it would appear that the evangelist has been guilty of an anachronism. Many ingenious attempts have been made to escape this conclusion, but all fall short of demonstration. Furthermore it is improbably that any Roman census would have required a man to report to the home of his ancestors. Such a procedure would have been almost as impracticable in Roman times as it would be in our own, and the Roman state was interested in a man’s property, not in his pedigree.”

***

Summary

I have no interest in destroying people’s faith. Taking away their Christmas. I am determined, however, to listen to the scholars, whom I believe are only interested in taking the Bible seriously (which may necessarily mean, not literally!). They believe, as do I, that the Bible can and should stand the same scrutiny, the same critical tests, the same evaluative criteria as any other work. According to these standards, for most mainline scholars, the story of the birth of Jesus (a la manger scene fame) does not appear a story cast in fact. But so much more.

Can we live with a narrative that is more theological than factual? (I suppose it depends on what is important to you…) I can live with this. I affirm what has been called the scripture’s emphasis on “salvation history,” which is the story of God’s work with the people of the biblical narratives. But “salvation history” falls short of “factual history.” We know now that there are “facts” in the Bible that are just wrong. Matthew’s genealogy makes this explicit – but it makes his genealogy no less important, just less about “history” than “salvation history.”

So… is the birth of Jesus “myth” or “truth”? If by truth you mean literally, chronologically, historically, factually true… then I would have to stand with the Atheists in NYC – but “Myth,” understood properly, does not mean what they suggest (a hollow, meaningless tale). “Myth” is the greatest expression of deep, meaningful, spiritual truth. Why did Jesus tell parables instead of recount factual stories? Why do Aesop’s Fables stand, still today as one of our literally treasures? How is truth ALWAYS told?

In stories…

So, Jesus’ birth, is a story that is both less than fact (it cannot be “proven” in ways that measure up by modern standards of truthfulness/factuality) – but it is also so much more than fact. The birth of Jesus is not about a biological happening at a chronological moment in geographical space and historical time – it’s about God’s coming to us. Yes… it’s a myth. Which is why I know it is true!

*** 

The final belief is to believe in a fiction,

which you know to be a fiction, there

being nothing else. The exquisite truth

is to know that it is a fiction and that

you believe in it willingly.

     — Wallace Stevens

God. Always. Does.

So, if God can’t do everything, God can obviously do nothing. Right? That’s the kind of look people give me when I say “God… can’t…” I know this idea (the non-omnipotent God idea) is new, even disturbing to many people, but where did I ever say I believe in an  Impotent God?

God is.

There’s the action.

The very name of God defies an impotent, do-nothing, characterization. The very name tells us that God cannot do nothing. God is action, movement, energy, being, doing. Though I have scant little of my Hebrew vocabulary anymore, I remember the insight I gained in learning that the Tetragrammaton (the divine name, transliterated by the English letters yhvh) is a name that essentially derives from the “to be” verb (haya in the past tense, hove in the present tense). (If the good Dr. Polaski is reading, I may need a little correction!)

So… when Moses asks for God’s name, it’s not Andy (you know, “Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me…”), nor Howard (“Our Father who art in heaven, Howard be thy name…”)… it’s a VERB. Just a verb — “yhvh” — which, with the vowels added, becomes Yahweh, and in an English translation becomes Jehovah.

My parents were both English majors. Especially my father. Meaning, he practiced his major throughout my childhood! (I’ve actually come to be greatly appreciative. I hope my sons will be one day as well, since I’m practicing on them now!) If I’ve been corrected on subject-verb agreement once, told “…’none’ takes a singular verb” once, corrected: “…it’s ‘this is he, not this is him…’, once, ’it’s these are they, not these are them…’” once… I’ve been told those things a thousand times. And I learned to conjugate, too: “to be” = am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been.

The name of God, then, the divine nomenclature, first given to Moses, standing there before that burning bush, might have been given in this fashion: “Tell the Pharaoh that ‘The Great I am-is-are-was-were-be-being-been’ has sent you.” Tell the old rascal that the Essence of Being — “Is-ness,” Itself… is on the way!

God is. That which Was and Is and Will Be.

So, if God “is” — and that is a verb, which describes action… what does The-Great-To-Be actually “do”? Isn’t this the heart of the difficulty? We need the “doing” to be more defined, more personalized, more specific. What does God do, exactly. And how and when and where does God do it?

In a quantum world, where science is proving God out of more and more “doing” (thunder is not long God’s literal anger, just charged ions in the atmosphere, disease no longer God’s wrath, just bacteria doing their thing…), what is left for God to “do”? In his most recent work, the acclaimed physicist, Steven Hawking, has announced definitely that physics no longer needs a “first mover.” The science is satisfied to say God is not necessary for the material world.

So what is there for God to “do,” for people of faith who are trying to take the science seriously, but who cannot give up on God? It seems to me that is why this word, “Does,” is so important. Liberal Christians have become skeptical (for mostly good reason) of the too-casual use of the word “miracle,” yet do we have to give up on the “doing” of God, all together. I think not.

God is.

We’ve just got to learn that this is action. God is Truth. God is Wisdom. God is Presence. God is Spirit. God is Hope. God is Love. What more could we want God to “do”? What is more true, or more powerful, the “miracle,” spuriously attributed God — or the “still small voice” (1 Kings 19.12, KJV) which cannot be denied? The “peace that passes understanding” (Phillipians 4.7), that does something the best medicine cannot begin to achieve? The mysterious spirit (or Spirit) which becons, calls, motivates more powerfully than can be explained? The Love, that may even call us to “lay down our life for a friend” (John 15.13)?

The Church needs to drop its defensive posture against science, which can largely attest for the “doing” of this world in reductionistic, naturalistic, materialist terms. (And what it cannot attest today, will likely be discovered tomorrow.) For the power which “God is” is immeasurably (infinitely) and immeasurably (non-empirically) greater.

God. Always. Does.

Because God Is.

Signs of an Emerging God.

The following entry (which I have made per request) is based on a Power Point presentation for a Sunday School class, in which we discussed the theme of my sermon: “From Mold to Manger: Seeing the Signs of an Emerging God.” Originally preached in 2006, the sermon can be found on the church website (www.parkroadbaptist.org) under the “Worship” tab, “The Park Road Pulpit,” August 8, 2010. The sermon texts for this Advent sermon are: “See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me…” (Malachi 3.1-4). and, “In the fifteenth year of the reign of emperor Tiberius…” (Luke 3.1-6).

Power Point pages are separated by double asterisks. I have added brief explanatory remarks, but not a full transcript of the lecture.

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Two Views

Theme for Advent 2006: “The Forest and the Trees”

competing, contrasting views of God

Does the Bible present one view or multiple views?

One truth or multiple truths?

In his book A New Kind of Christianity, Brian McLaren takes on his own tradition’s view of scripture, and asks if scripture is to be understood as “constitutional law” (the traditional/conservative view) or “legal library” (McLaren’s new understanding).

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Two Views

How many times have you heard, “Well, the Bible says…” (As if the Bible never contradicts itself, and if you can find it in the Bible… then it’s obviously right!)

So, consider…

For there is neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, for all are one in Christ… (Galatians 3.28)

…and…

For I do not permit women to have authority over men (1 Timothy 2.12)…  let the women remain silent… ask their husbands (1 Corinthians 14.34-35)… be submissive (1 Peter 3.1)…

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I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. 3Within two years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the Lord’s house, which King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon took away from this place and carried to Babylon (The Prophet Hananiah, recorded in Jeremiah 28.2-3).

…and…

Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. (The Prophet Jeremiah, recorded in Jeremiah 29.5-7)

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For by grace are you saved by faith. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone boast… (Ephesians 2.8)

…and…

“Lord, when did we see you hungry?” And the King separates the sheep from the goats by what they did and did not do… (Matthew 25)

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The contrasts/conflicts within scripture can be harmonized. (We’ve been doing it for years!)

But I believe it is better to let them stand as conflicts. Contrasting/competing ideas about God and the world. Scripture is a collection of experiences with life… with God… The Bible speaks the honest experiences of people, just like us, who sometimes have differing understandings.  

We don’t need “the answer” from the Bible – we need to allow the experiences recorded in scripture help us learn how to think for ourselves.

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One Biblical View

“The God of the Forest”

For God is above all and through all and in all… (Ephesians 4.6)

Is God above all?

Is there a “big picture”?

In faith we say, “Certainly!”

But… how do we understand that truth?

Is it the only truth?

The only image of God? or is it One image among many?

Is it a truth for certain stages of life? (as children think of their parents)

Was it a truth for a different age?

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On Developing a “Theology of Reality”

There was a day when this was the only truth.

God created…

            God controlled…

                        All things…

This is no longer what we believe.

Evolutionary process…

            Weather patterns and bacteria and mental illness…

                        God is no longer ascribed all control…

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On Developing a “Theology of Reality”

We need not deny God to accept a new understanding.

(But we ought to accept the new understanding!)

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The God of the Trees

Finding God among us. (Not necessarily beyond us.)

“This sermon offers the God of the slime mold and the manger. The God who has always been, and ever is, emerging from the seemingly insignificant, disconnected details of a complex world. From this view, the traditional understanding is exactly backwards. God is not out there … large and looming. Looking down. Controlling and capricious. Crafting and manipulating. God is here. With us. In us. The Word always becoming flesh (John 1.14) through every single detail.” (Sermon: “From Mold to Manger”)

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A Word About Slime Mold

No brain.

            No “top-down” management.

                        Intelligence “emerges” from its collaborative behavior.

                                    No way to know: individual or collective

Ants also show “emergent behavior” (“Queen” – not really a Queen… just mother of all ants)

High level Computer Software is written using emergent processes (“Artificial Intelligence,” not “top down” programs)

What about God?

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The God of the Trees

This is not the majority report of Christianity – but it is no novel idea of mine

Divinity: less the point of departure than the destination (Teilhard de Chardin)

Process Theology even God is developing/evolving with us

God is less a Supreme Being… than the “ground of being” (Paul Tillich), “In whom we live and move and have our being…” (Acts 17.28)

Robert Wright: “…maybe it is up to us, having inherited only the most ambiguous evidence of divinity, to construct clearer evidence in the future” (in his book, Nonzero).

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God and Emergent Behavior

Are we moving to a new truth (with the help of science)?

God is not “out there…”

   “above…”

      “controlling…”

         “top down…”

God is emerging from within/among us

Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, ‘The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, “Look, here it is!” or “There it is!” For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among/within you.’” (Luke 17.20-21)

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God and Emergent Behavior

When our eyes are open, we can see this emerging logic (logos) everywhere:

*When the fullness of time had come (Galatians 4.4)…

*She brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger (Luke 2.7)…

*And the child grew in wisdom and stature and in divine and human favor (Luke 2.52)…

In him the fullness of God was pleased to dwell (Colossians 1.19)…

*He learned obedience through what he suffered, and having been made perfect (Hebrews 5.8-9)…

*God made him to be Lord and Christ (Acts 2.36)…

*That at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow (Philippians 2.10)…

*To all who believed… he [gives] the power to become children of God! (John 1.12).

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The Trees – Nothing Insignificant

“Nothing that has ever happened in your life is insignificant. Not one moment that you have ever lived is disconnected from another, neither is a single of your breaths distinct from the life of this diverse and wonderful planet. Every day. Every hour. Every word. Every thought. Every action… stands on its own, as a discreet instrument in the hands of God. There may be a big picture, but we have only the details to work with.” (Sermon: “From Mold to Manger”)

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…and the Forest

Faith leads me to believe there is, in fact, a big picture… Yet we cannot know it.

The point is that we are so often preoccupied with that big picture and that miss the living that occurs when we give ourselves to the details. We cannot know how our lives impact others, and how they are impacted by them. Life in faith should call us to live for the moment, in the moment, drinking deeply of each moment — for there we find God! 

God. Always.

In 1991 Amy and I left Southern Seminary, a year before completing our divinity degrees in Lousville, KY, in order to take jobs at First Baptist Church, Clemson, SC. When we moved to Clemson to become the Minister of Youth and Senior Adults (Russ) and the Minister of College Students and Single Adults (Amy), and to complete our seminary work at Erskine Theological Seminary (Associate Reform Presbyterian Church), we bought our first house. I’ll never forget the feeling of signing my name to that note for $84,000. I couldn’t imagine that much money. We even traded Amy’s Nissan 300ZX for a Dodge Spirit to make the payments! (Oh… what a trade!) Five years later when we moved to Birmingham, AL, Amy seven months into her first pregnancy, we talked about real estate before we moved, and thought that maybe we’d “splurge” a little, move up, stretch ourselves and spend maybe $100k there.

Yeah. Right.

Welcome to the world of Mountain Brook, AL, and the sticker shock that comes with moving just before the housing market bubble burst. After diligent searching, and a wonderful, patient real estate agent, we found something we thought we could live with — not in Mountain Brook, but close enough, and stretching, stretching to $107,000, in a wonderful little house that our realtor told us “had potential.” Boy, did it! (When you buy the cheapest house in the neighborhood, he reasoned… a house with “potential”… you can expect to make some money on it when you move, if you’ve been a little diligent to see some of that potential actualized.)

Because this blog is not about home renovations, I’ll spare you the details, but because of the hours and hours we spent on the house, when we sold the “cat house” (ask me if you care) a few years later, we had realized some of its potential, and were able to cash in a few bucks. That house had potential.

God does not.

God is always God. Fully actualized divinity. (Interestingly, in his book Jesus and the Inigma of the Son of the Man, Walter Wink says that divinity is actually fully realized, fully actualized humanity.) Fully realized potential. When God told Moses, “I am that I am” (more on this in the coming blog on ”Does”), we learned all we needed to know. God is not the God who will be… tomorrow. Maybe. If you pray the right words. Live faithfully enough. If all the stars are lined up right. If …

God IS. God. Always.

When people speak of the intervening God who is all-powerful, they encourage us to pray — because prayer “works,” and because God “answers prayers.” The implication is clear. God may be more for you (do more for you) tomorrow (in some time of need, in a crisis, when you get on your knees and pray earnestly), more than God is for you, today. This makes perfect sense to me as I think of friends, family. When the chips are down, friends and family have a tendency to come through. Thanks be to God. To be/do more in a time of need than they are any other day. But this no longer makes sense to me of the God who is the “I am.”

What more could God be or do (since God’s being is God’s doing (“I Am” is a verb)) on any tomorrow than God is today?

When I had a nephew in a coma, the result of a tragic Automobile accident, and we prayed that that inevitable death might be stayed… what did we expect? That God would do more tomorrow than God was doing today? That God was withholding some kind of potential, today, to wait and see if God would be more of who God could be… tomorrow? What a dreadful theology! When we prayed for God to “do something,” what did that mean? How could God possibly “do” more tomorrow than God is doing today?

In every moment in that tragic situation, along with every moment of every tragic, and joyful situation — God Is. Always. God.

God never witholds potential. How could “I Am” ever be more (or less) than “I Am” is, right now?

God. In Process Thought.

I’m getting to …Always. Does. Everything. God. Can. Do… I promise, but I had to add this short word about omnipotence from an article I just read in the Aug 10 edition of The Christian Century. It’s entitled “American Export,” and it’s a review of the place of Process Thought in China’s growing theological (and ecological and economical) expansion. Process Theology was founded by mathematician-philosopher Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) on the principle that all things are interconnected, that we are “personally and communally responsible for the common good,” and that all things, perhaps even God, are moving, changing, evolving — hence, in process.

United Methodist, John Cobb, retired professor at Emory University and Claremont School of Theology, is one of the leading proponents of process theology. (Park Road-ians might be interested to know that our own, Emil Mialik, former pastor of Wedgewood Baptist in Charlotte, studied with Cobb at Claremont, and is a proponent of all-things-process.) Cobb was recently in China for a lecture when he found himself the center of “rock star” attention — apparently lots of Chinese intellectuals (Christians and Marxists, theologians and economists) are interested in Process Theology, which they often refer to as Constructive Postmodernism. These two paragraphs are from the article:

“Process theology occupies a modest niche in U.S. theological circles. It addresses the classic problem of evil — how can an omniptent God allow bad things to happen? — by positing that God is not all-powerful and not a micromanager of earthly events. Process theologians would say that God rejoices and suffers with humans in their ups and downs and is concerned with all levels of existence.

Cobb said that the Chinese do not object to the word ‘God,’ but ‘the idea that there is some center of control that determines everthing has never been a part of Chinese thought.’ From his point of view, Cobb said, ‘the problem of evil grows out of the terrible doctine of divine omniptence, which is not biblical but which became so deeply established that many Christians think you can’t worship without believing it.”(emphases added)

I knew that what I knew of Process Theology I appreciated. I didn’t know that I was a full-blown believer! I’ll be reading more on Whitehead and Process Thought in the coming days, but I needed to share these words with you.

Russ

Prayer. The second question.

It’s always the second question. After they say, “God can’t what…!?” Then they say, “So what about prayer?… Do you pray?… How do you pray?… Why would you pray?”

I understand the question, but it belies such a failure on the Church’s part in what it has taught about prayer. Obviously, the question implies, if God can’t do everything I ask (often what I ask for me)… then why would I bother trying to communicate with God at all?

First, God: God always does everything God can do. Yes, there are things God can’t do. But what God can do, God always does. It’s not as if the God who cannot intervene is impotent. It’s precisely because God is always God, never any less, always present, always active – never separate from us to begin with – that God cannot intervene. It’s not as if this always-present, always-working, never-leaving-us-for-a-single-second God isn’t doing anything. (It’s those who claim that God does intervene who need to explain what their God is doing all the rest of the time (when God is not intervening).) God always does everything God can do. Why would we not want to pray to such a God?

But, more importantly, prayer:  The question is deeply troubling, as much as it is understood. If we don’t think God can (or will) do what we ask, then obviously we ought not waste our time praying. Isn’t that what the question says? Because I always know what God needs to do… in Afghanistan… and with religious tensions between Muslims and Christians and Jews… and in my marriage… and in my heart. Right? Most of our praying is just this arrogant. As Thomas Moore said, in a meditation on “pragmatic prayer,” “Praying is the opposite of working hard to get what you want. We find out that what we want is almost always what we don’t need.” We’ve been taught to pray mostly with words – and with most of those words being verbs:  give me… help me… teach me… bless me/them…  get down here and do something! We need to learn to pray in nouns: Afghanistan… laughter… sunshine… Jackson… Bennett… Amy… etc… And to pray in silence… And to pray in the beauty of a symphony… And to pray by walking through the woods and noticing the sounds and sights… Pray always, without ceasing. It’s an attitude, not an exercise of asking the right words in the right way, so the Divine Power of the Universe will rise from its sleep and Do Something For Me.

So here’s how I answer…

If I learned today that I had an incurable disease… what could my parents do for me? Not a single thing to cure my disease… but they would do everything they could: Take care of the boys… Relieve Amy… Clean the house… Make phone calls… Keep us well fed… Search the internet for clues and unknown cures… Call in every chip they ever thought of earning, with every doctor they knew who might have any insight or ability to help… And, mostly… they’d be present.

What would I do? I’d certainly not stop talking to them, just because they didn’t hold the power to wave a magic wand over my disease. We’d probably even talk more than before. Screaming or crying or cursing the pain… Laughing over good memories… Making plans for the boys… Sharing gratitude for the 46 years we’ve had together…

God always does everything God can do. So should we…

So, yes, I pray. Because that’s one thing I can always do.

God. The heart of all that is.

Sometimes when I speak my theology people respond to me  as if my “God” is really no God at all. (When the eminent biologist and crusading atheist, Dr. Richard Dawkins, was in Charlotte recently, in a Charlotte Talks inteview someone referred to the theology of the controversial Bishop John Spong. Dawkins’ rejoinder to the comment was that Spong didn’t believe in God, either — he just didn’t know it yet!)  Similarly, sometimes my hearers look at me with that “I thought he said he was a Baptist!?” look… and they don’t have to say any more, but I hear Dawkins’ comment, loud and clear. I don’t feel defensive about this — I’m neither ashamed nor insecure about these ideas. But this blog is about outlining my position… talking about these ideas… so to those who might consider me a closet atheist, too, I offer this affirmation:

“I believe that the reality of God is the heart of all that is.”

This is from a 2004 sermon, “Finding God: A Natural Revelation,” in which I renouce “Jesus in a tortilla,” and other similar “miraculous” manifestations of the external deity. (If you want to know about “Jesus in a tortilla,” you can find the sermon on our website: www.parkroadbaptist.org… worship tab….) Rejecting such clamor for the supernatural, in my view, is hardly equivalent to rejecting God. Equally defensible in my understanding is rejecting a God who intervenes, without rejecting God.

That’s right… I don’t believe in “divine intervention.” But I believe God is. The heart of all that is.

If this “non-interventionist God” sounds heretical, I beg to differ. It seems to me that the onus is on those who so fervently cling to an intervening God — to explain why God is ever removed from us, to begin with (thus requiring “intervening” action). The God of my non-intervening theology needs not — in fact CANNOT intervene — because this God is not, nor has ever been, apart from us. So whose God is indeed more powerful, the God who absconds most of the time, showing up inexplicably in tortilla shells — and in the rare and mystifying “miracles” of healing and the like (you know, the parking space close to the supermarket door when it’s raining) — or the God who is present, equally in all things and all times, blessing us with divine presence and energizing hope, comforting peace orconflicting initiative… but nonetheless ubiquitous here-ness — when we get our miracle, and when we do not?

I’ve made my choice, and it’s with the God of presence. Steady. Comforting (or conflicting). But day by day by day. The equal-opportunity God, who cares for all, not just the “faithful,” or the lucky. The God who cannot intervene, because whose eternal presence makes it not possible to do any more in any one moment than God is doing in every single moment.

“I believe that the reality of God is the heart of all that is.”

In God we live and move and have our being… (Acts 17.28).

God is above all and through all and in all… (Ephesians 4.6)

In all things God is working to bring about good… (Romans 8.28)

For the non-intervening God. Thanks be to God.