Ecclesial Dreamer…

I just finished Len Sweet and Frank Viola’s new book, Jesus Manifesto: Restoring the Supremacy and Sovereignty of Jesus Christ. I had never read Viola and I must confess that I fail to appreciate Sweet as much as some of my friends and acquaintances do. Nonetheless, I had high expectations for this book and I was really hoping that I would like it a lot. Sweet and Viola suggest that with this book they are attempting a third way to move out of the crossroads the Christian finds himself in. Instead of moving toward the left or the right, they suggest the third way is to move forward. And as much as I would love to be able to follow them into their vision of what forward is, I just could not find any traction in this book. Instead, I feel a lot like I did after watching Avatar. Just as it was with the film, I believe that I may be in the small minority of people who do not really like this book.

Perhaps it was more about my unrealistic expectations. I was hoping that this book would get into some of the things that I think are becoming increasingly important in our pluralistic and complex theological landscape. I was hoping that it would be helpful for Christians attempting to be faithful to their own traditions in the light of so much religious and cultural diversity. For me, it did not.

Perhaps it is because I am admittedly not a very good mystic. I am not wired to let my emotions drive everything. Sweet and Viola tell me over and over in this book that when (or if??) I can finally see Jesus as he really and truly is, I will fall so much in love with him that I cannot help but fall at His feet and give Him my undying devotion (p. xxv of the introduction). They write that all anyone has to do is grasp the truth of Paul’s epistle to the Colossians and we will finally see the true Christ.¹ But they are willing to admit that this is not as easy as it sounds. For them, the worldview presented in Colossians would spin the head of Stephen Hawking and dumbfound Albert Einstein. So what is the third way forward? If we read Colossians and don’t come to the same conclusion of the authors is it because we are not smart enough to “get it” or too smart to submit to it? No. It is that the eyes of our hearts have not been opened (p.40). And that is a work that we cannot do ourselves, so we pray that God will do it for us.

If not, we will always be stuck replacing Christ with things. Things like, rules, regulations, doctrines, duties, causes, etc. They urge us to stop proclaiming things about Christ and simply proclaim Christ. And here is where the wheels fall of for me. How are we to adjudicate between these competing proclamations of Christ? We are simply not told. The closest we get to a specific example is this:

This culture loves causes, and it lionizes those who died fighting them. There is nothing wrong with causes. Archbishop Oscar Romero took up the cause of victims displaced in the Salvadoran civil war, and was assassinated during his homily as he was giving mass in 1980. Now “San Romero,” as he is often called, is one of only ten twentieth-century martyrs honored above the Great West Door of Westminster Abbey in London. On the other hand, Brother Roger Schutz, founder of Taize, was killed on August 16, 2005, not for a cause he was promoting, but because of who he was, a follower of Jesus.

Just what makes Schutz a follower of Jesus and not Romero is not clearly explained. And for Sweet and Viola, it cannot really be explained without falling into a ditch on either side if the one true path of yielding your self in such a way that Christ is the one living in you. To try to explain that simple truth one either falls into theological rationalism, on the one hand, or, theological ethics, on the other. But, for the authors:

According to Scripture, Jesus Christ (and not a doctrine about Him) is the truth. In addition, Jesus Christ (and not an ethic derived from His teaching) is the way. In other words, both God’s truth and God’s way are embodied in a living, breathing person–Christ.

Later they clarify that even further:

Jesus cannot be separated from His teachings. Aristotle said to his disciples, “Follow my teachings.” Socrates likewise said to his disciples, “Follow my teachings.” Buddha said to his disciples, “Follow my meditations.” Confucius said to his disciples, “Follow my sayings.” And Muhammad said to his disciples, “Follow my noble pillars.”

But Jesus said to his disciples, “Follow Me.”

In all the religions and philosophies of the world, a follower can follow the teachings of its founder without having a relationship with that founder. But not so with Jesus Christ. The teachings of Jesus cannot be separated from Jesus Himself. Christ is still alive, and He embodies his teachings. This is what separates Him from every other great teacher and moral philosopher in history.

While I accept the authors’ conclusion that Christ is indeed living, I do not follow their line of argument here. While Christians do have the ability to share in the divine life, in this moment of history we see only in part, and know only in part. (And here I will reveal in all its glory the claim I made earlier that I am not a good mystic…)I do not believe that I can see Jesus “face-to-face.” I cannot literally fall at his feet and put my finger in the scars from the cross. In this moment of history I relate to him through the mysterious body of his church as it lives out its witness. And this brings me, whether I like it or not, into a historically complex, culturally rich, theologically multifaceted, doctrinally diverse, and pluriform embodiment of practices that offer a multi-vocal proclamation and witness of Him.

All of this leaves me unable to follow Sweet and Viola entirely. There are some good things in this book, and I am sure a larger audience that will enjoy and benefit from it.

**Disclosure of Material Connection: I’d like to thank Thomas Nelson Publishers for providing me this Book free as part of their [...] book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

1. which begs the question, why write 178 pages and not just reprint the book of Colossians? [back]

This quote comes from my favorite missiologist, Vincent Donovan, and can be found in his book, The Church in the Midst of Creation:

Everywhere I have gone I have heard the same question in one form or another: “We see quite plainly the church as it is, but what should it be like?” If you had it in your power to see that church as it ought to be, how would it appear? Not the church in the distant future of science fiction but in the foreseeable, possible future, as we move toward the end of the twentieth century and into the third millennium of Christianity.

It will be a church come of age, under the direction and control of the unpredictable Spirit. It will be a risen church born anew out of the death of the one we now know. The pilgrimage along the road to that church will not be a serene and painless journey. Before we reach the end of that road to a church refounded for our age, there will lie a cross, a crucifixion, not for others but for us.

The thought below was provided to my by my great friend, Scott. Thanks, Scott.

This is a great quote by an Anabaptist theologian named C. Norman Kraus.  The book is called Jesus Christ our Lord:  Christology from a Disciple’s Perspective:

The cross involved no equivalent compensation or payment of penalty demanded by God’s just anger.  God is justified in forgiving us on the basis of his own holy love and not on the basis of an equivalent penal satisfaction which has been paid to him through the death of Jesus.  The Cross itself as an act of solidarity with us is the divine ethical justification for forgiveness, and the resurrection of Jesus demonstrates the effectiveness of God’s love in Christ to forgive and cleanse us from sin.”

Love it!

2009 was not a good year for me. It was by far the most frustrating year for my health that I have ever had. I ended the year with the feeling that I was not firing on any cylinder.

I am still wrestling with some health issues and not sure just yet how I want to respond to that. I am not comfortable with any of the current options that I can see before me and I am hoping that something different will reveal itself.

But I do know that this year I want to become more intentional about finding a way to catch up the the ecclesial wagon I fell off of so long ago. For me, it seems that one thing that was missing for me was interacting with books. In a good year I will average around one book per week. I doubt I got more than one a month last year.

I have been setting up a reading queue of books I want to digest in the days ahead, but I wanted to start with something that would bring a measure of redemption to some of the areas in my life that feel broken. There are a handful of authors that always reach deep into my soul and speak to me in ways that not many others can. Probably the one who rises to the top of the list for me is Anne Lamott. In the fist few sentences of the prelude of Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith, I was already hooked. Lamott may be the most honest writer I have ever read and she has the ability to speak into the neediest places in my soul.

If you have never read an Anne Lamott book, you are missing out on a great gift. Stop what ever you are doing and go to the nearest library, or bookstore, and pick up any of her books. Make your favorite beverage, grab your blanket, start up a fire and dive in.

I have to confess that I love Larry Lessig. Reading through is book, REMIX reconfirms my own belief that current dominant church structures are on the wrong track. It seems to too many churches have this unhealthy addiction to what I think of as “Manuel Uribe’s Paradigm for Church Growth.” We like bigger, even if the only way to keep it sustainable is to continue to lower the expectations of the vast majority of the community. The minimal standards of Attendance and Giving are also the highest level of contribution that many leaders want. There is no need for the common folk to spend time learning to read the Bible when they can pay the professional to boil down the important stuff to a relevant 30 minute sermon. I heard one pastor two weeks ago justify this by referencing Acts 6:1-4

Come. Listen to the sermon. Put money in the plate/box. Singing and bringing friends is encouraged, but not necessary. Consuming the hour-long product that is offered three or four times each Sunday has become the most efficient way to attract the largest number of people which demonstrates the blessing of God.

Meanwhile, the vast majority of these attenders cannot articulate a coherent view of the theology that makes up the “what we believe” section in the bulletin. But that is OK because they are not expected to. More and more, contemporary ecclesiology has become a Read Only culture where the “professionals” set up the weekly buffet table and the consumers come to “get fed.” In a culture that is already becoming increasingly comfortable with fast, convenient, high calorie meals and little or no physical exercise, it is no wonder that in our ecclesiology we have become spiritually obese but theologically malnourished. As attenders we love to “be fed” but don’t go out of our way to exercise or faith.

In contrast to all of this, Lessig writes:

Sousa’s fear was that this RW [Read/Write] culture would disappear, be displaced by— to continue the geek- speak metaphor—an increasingly “Read/Only” (“RO”) culture: a culture less practiced in performance, or amateur creativity, and more comfortable (think: couch) with simple consumption. The fear was not absolute: no one feared that all nonprofessional creativity would disappear. But certainly its significance and place within ordinary society would change. RW creativity would become less significant; RO culture, more.

As one reflects upon the history of culture in the twentieth century, at least within what we call the “developed world,” it’s hard not to conclude that Sousa was right. Never before in the history of human culture had the production of culture been as professionalized. Never before had its production become as concentrated. Never before had the “vocal cords” of ordinary citizens been as effectively displaced, and displaced, as Sousa feared, by these “infernal machines.” The twentieth century was the first time in the history of human culture when popular culture had become professionalized, and when the people were taught to defer to the professional.

I believe more and more that we need to transition away from the creative fiction of the “five-fold ministy” paradigm and embody ecclesial commons that reads 1 Corinthians in a more RW –or, a more excellent– way.

Earlier this year when I was fortunate enough to sit in on a short talk given by Pamela Eisenbaum, there was a brief discussion about Richard B. Hays’ book, The Faith of Jesus Christ: The Narrative Substructure of Galatians 3:1-4:11 (The Biblical Resource Series). I was intrigued. I spent some birthday gift cards to pick it up and just finished reading it. I liked this book a lot and I am already thinking of re-reading it again to dig in to some parts that are worthy of extended exploration.

The primary argument of the book is that Paul’s writings hint at a “narrative substructure” to his articulation of Gospel. Using several different tools, Hays examines this brief section of Paul’s letter to Galatians (3:1 through 4:11)to see if the main points of this underlying story can be identified.

Hays does an outstanding job of exploring different theologians and the various approaches to reading this section of the text. He takes his time setting the context of his argument and interacting with other theologians who both disagree with and support his own thesis. There are many sections of New Testament Greek (which I stumbled through enough to keep up–but will spend more time in on the next reading) and large sections of quotations of other theologians in German (which I had to completely overlook) so this book may be a bit too technical academically for some readers. I certainly had to stretch and jump to reach even the low hanging branches. But the patient steady reader can grasp the main flow of Hays argument by paying attention to the context.

It seems to me that Hays does a great job of defending his thesis and there are certainly some interesting insights and interpretive moves that Hays makes that I found extremely helpful. But the book also generates a fair amount of controversy (which was part of the discussion at the Eisenbaum talk mentioned earlier). Hays argues that when we look at Paul’s narration of Gospel there is one specific phrase that usually is incorrectly translated as an objective genitive (faith IN Jesus Christ) which should be translated as a subjective genitive (faith OF Jesus Christ). Hays will argue (rather convincingly imho) that the flow and internal coherence of Paul’s argument does not support the objective genitive reading.

The end of the book has two essays that explore this topic in even more detail. It is a push back against Hays and arguing for the objective reading (by James D. G. Dunn) and a reply by Hays.

At first reading I must confess that I find Hays argument to be compelling. While the disputed phrase faith in/of Jesus Christ gets a lot of the press, the more interesting part for me was reading Hays understanding of the whole passage of Galatians 3:1 through 4:11. Why does Paul use Abraham in his narration of Gospel and what is the connection to Jesus Christ? For Hays, the popular (incorrect) reading of the objective genitive makes this Abraham/Jesus connection unclear. If Abraham is justified by his faith in God, why can’t Jesus be justified the same way? And why do we need to believe IN Jesus? Why can’t we just believe in the God of Abraham and be justified like Abraham was?

For Hays, the objective genitive reading strips Christology from soteriology and makes the active subject in the work of salvation, not God –or even Jesus Christ– but those who believe. This begs the question of just how Jesus Christ is connected to salvation at all?

For all the strength of Hays’ argument in The Faith of Jesus Christ, by the end of the book I found myself wanting more. Since the scope of this book was not to resolve the debate over the translation of this phrase but to identify the narrative substructure of Paul’s articulation of Gospel there are several topics that are left for future enquiry. I am already anxious to pick up where this book leaves of in another of Hays’ works, The Moral Vision of the New Testament: Community, Cross, New Creation, A Contemporary Introduction to New Testament Ethics.

But since I have S. Mark Heim’s Saved from Sacrifice: A Theology of the Cross at the plate and Moltmann on deck, I may have to put Hays later works on the back burner.