the Eclectic Soul

Why I Love This Man...

Back in the early nineties I was introduced to the writings of Brennan Manning when someone gave me a copy of the Ragamuffin Gospel.  Needless to say, that book transformed my life to such a degree that when my first son was born, I named him Brennan.

If you haven't ever read anything by Brennan Manning, I suggest with everything that I am that you go and buy everything that he's ever read!

Listen to what he writes in his latest book, The Furious Longing of God:

"Jesus said you are to love one another as I have loved you, a love that will probably lead to the bloody, anguished gift of yourself; a love that forgives seventy times seven, that keeps no score of wrongdoing. Jesus said this, this love, is the one criterion, the sole norm, the standard of discipleship in the New Israel of God.  He said you're going to be identified as his disciples, not because of your church-going, Bible-toting, or song-singing.  No, you'll be identified as his by one sign only: the deep and delicate respect for one another, the cordial love impregnated with reverence for the sacred dimension of the human personality of the mysterious substitution of Christ for the Christian...if we as a Christian community took seriously that the sign of our love for Jesus is our love for one another, I am convinced it would change the world.  We're denying to the world the one witness Jesus asked for: Love  one another as I've loved  you (John 15.12)."

--Brennan Manning, The Furious Longing of God, pp. 86, 89

The Blue Parakeet Takes Flight...

I recently volunteered to review Scot McKnight's latest offering, the Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible.  I must say, so far Mr. Mcknight hasn't disappointed yet!

We all, to one degree or another, pick and choose when it comes to biblical interpretation and application; that is to say that we all approach the text with a bias and and list of presuppositions that we believe about any given text or even the Bible as a whole.  The problem, McKnight suggests, is that we don't often understand why we do it, or even that we do it.  He cites in his opening introduction the pithy statement that I too share a great disdain for and yet it appears on many a car's rear bumper as it chugs down the highway [often at speeds exceeding the local speed limits]: "God said it, I believe it, that settles it!"  To be sure, we may have our own rationale for approaching the text like we do, but it often simply reinforces our own biases. 

McKnight lets us in on his primordial journey into the Christian faith as along the way he encountered people who "said" that they "believed" that the Bible should be taken literally.  The problem was for McKNight, and for many of us, that many people who hold this stand don't back it up with how they live their lives.  Simply the fruit wasn't ever brought to bear upon their belief.

McKinght cites example after example of how we approach the Bible with certain assumptions about what we believe is applicable and why.

For Mcknight, the solution is twofold:  1.  Admit our biases and accept them for what they are.  2.  As the deeper question of how it is that we should live out the Bible today. 

I would call this endeavor a movement towards a authentic and consistent hermeneutic. 

In the second part of the intro, McKnight unpacks for us the metaphor for the book's title:  his backyard encounter with a once tame but now wild blue Parakeet that is reeking havoc on its unsuspecting species-mates the sparrows.  For McKnight, this blue Parakeet at first is an anomaly and then becomes an influence that changes the dynamic of the entire pecking order around the bird feeder [pardon the pun].  Foe becomes friend, but only forever under a cloud of anxious suspicion as the sparrows are never quiet sure they can trust their new found friend.  Yet the parakeet is allowed to be true to who he [or she] is.

While there are numerous ways to read the Scriptures, McKinght suggests that there are three that servve as a good starting point to begin discussion.  He suggests that we as readers might: Read to Retrieve; Read Through Tradition; Read With Tradition.  Let me explain.

Read to Retrieve:
McKnight states on page 25:  "Some of us have been taught to read the Bible in such as way that we return to the times of the Bible in order to retrieve biblical ideas and practices for today"  He goes on to suggest that we do this as a whole or in select parts that we the reader believe to be important.

I liken this to doing an autopsy on a living being.  We strip mine the Scriptures to find the "essence" of a given text simply so that we can take it and attempt to make it fit into our day, time, and culture.

Reading Through Tradition:
McKnight states on page 29 that they Reading Through Tradition folks feel that, "ordinary people need to learn to read the Bible through tradition or they will misread the Bible and create schisms in the church."  The caution he suggests is that we need to make sure that we are not simply reading the Bible with a "whatever I believe the text says is what it says" mentality. 

Biblical interpretation is not done in a vacuum and we need to make sure that we test our hypothesis with the history of ecclesilogical interpretation.  But the other danger is that we can make one tradition "truer" than another.  Tradition therefore trumps interpretation and we end up reading the Scriptures solely through the lens of our tradition which leads to what McKnight calls traditionalism: "the inflexible, don't-ask-questions-do-it-the way-it-has-always-been-done approach to bible reading." [p.31]

Reading With Tradition:
Again, McKnight: "We dare not ignore what God has said to the church through the ages, nor dare we fossilize past interpretation into traditionalism.  Instead we need to go back to the Bible so we can move forward through the church and speak God's Word in our days in our ways." [p. 34]

For McKnight, although the Bible is written within the context of a given culture and time period, it is not bound and limited.  That is to say that although we need some element of reading to retrieve and some element of reading through tradition to grasp the full bodied meaning of the Scriptures, we must allow the Bible the freedom to speak to our day and time in a way that is authentic, true, consistent, and yet fresh.

Rob Bell, in my opinion has said something similar in his book Velvet Elvis when he uses the metaphor of doctrine [read tradition] as "springs" or "bricks."  One is dynamic and the other static.  How we interpret those two will say a lot about how we interpret Scripture.  Does the past great tradition of the church serve to propel us forward like springs.  Or does it serve as firm unmovable fossilized traditions that don't have the flexibility for us to build upon them.

Make no mistake, McKnight, in my opinion, is not one who takes a low view of the Scriptures at all.  In fact like most orthodox [small on the "o"] followers of Jesus, the Scriptures are for him still awarded primacy in all things.  Yet there is a sense in which we must approach them with a freshness and humility if we are to do justice to what the Scriptures actually say.

Well, those are some thoughts.  More to come as I move through the chapters.

Peace,

E

Book Review: Blue Parakeet

Just got my advance copy of Scot McKnight's latest offering, the Blue Parakeet [it's slated for a November release but you can pre-order here].  In the coming days I'll be reviewing it chapter by chapter.  Stay tuned...

Peace,

E

Reading Tony Jones...

 Ah, my dear Tony, now you're meddling!

I began my along awaited adventure into Tony Jones' new book, The New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier, and I must say I like, REALLY like, what I've read so far.  I spent the evening moving through almost half of it.  So far, I believe that it is the best book on the emerging church in all it's fullness and flavors.

Coming at the heels of the end of my own annual denominational meeting and our denominations Quadrennial meeting, one section [as if I could even pick just one] stood out, and I share it with you:

    "Lillian Daniel is a pastor in the United Church of Christ, a notoriously left leaning denomination founded in 1957....reflecting on the biannual General Synod national meeting, she moaned, 'We used to be a group of revolutionaries.  Now we're a group of resolutionaries.'  Operating by a distinctively non-biblical Robert's Rules of Order, she said the convention has devolved into a gathering of persons who read resolutions that are then voted on and promptly forgotten.  The resolutions range from those for gay marriage to those against gay marriage, from a call to study the imprisonment of native Hawaiians to 'saving Social Security from privatization.' The resolutions pile up; and then they're read, seconded, discussed, voted on, and filed.'  Lillian thought she was joining a movement, but she was joining a bureaucracy.  And that bureaucracy tends to squash the passion of may Christ-centered and enthusiastic persons therein."  p. 9-10

Amen, Lillian!  Amen, Tony!  Oh that we may rediscover our revolutionary hearts and boldly take a step forward towards the "new frontier."

Peace,

E

I Don't Agree With Mr. Colson

Chuck Colson in his latest BreakPoint commentary reviews William Young's The Shack. If you haven't heard about the book yet, you soon will.

The story is a powerful journey through one man's grief in the midst of a relationship the Triune God.

Now mind you, I thought some of the dialogue was a bit hokey and when God appeared as an Aunt Jemima type figure I had to pause for just a minute. This is one of the things that Colson reacts to.

In the western mind God "The Father" has always been understood with masculine stereotypes and there is much scriptural warrant for this. But we must understand that gender is specificially a "creature characteristic." That is to say that God, whom we address as "Father," transcends and is in and of Godself not limited to gender. I still use the term "Father" for God. I think it is important for several reasons: 1. It's personal; 2. It's the term Jesus used; 3. It's support by the majority of the canon and orthodox church history. When Colson reacts so strongly to God "the Father" being revealed as a motherly figure I believe he feels it is an attack against Christian orthodoxy. I do not believe it to be so.

We must understand that for God to interact with human beings God has chosen to limit Godself in order that we might relate with God. We see this most clearly of course in the incarnation. For those who don't agree see Moses encounter with God on the mountain.

To be sure God isn't our buddy or pal, but God is an intimate friend. Too often I fear God gets depicted as a stern authority figure who is perpetually ticked off and whose son Jesus begs him to give his kids a break . And, God can only do this by unleashing all hell on his son. Let me be clear. The Scriptures are unified in their understanding that God takes no pleasure in wrath. But on the same hand I understand that there are consequences that come from arrogance and disobedience [again lets leave room for multiple understandings of atonement because multiple understandings are both Scriptural and needed].

But like any parent, I think we need to remember that this comes as a last resort. In Matthew 7.10-12 Jesus compares God to human parents thus implying, "if you broken and evil people know how to care for your children and love them. Don't you think your heavenly father can do at least as good as you?" [I'll grant you here that the context of the conversation is prayer. But if this is representative of how God loves those who ask, does his love extent any less to other areas of how God relates?].

Colson also goes on to say that he believes the author has a low opinion of the Scriptures and cites two entries that I found puzzling as to how they relate to his point. Then he says this:

The Bible, it seems, is just one among many equally valid ways in which God reveals Himself. And, we are told, the Bible is not about rules and principles; it is about relationship.

That's exactly the problem with how modernism has handled the Scriptures: as a rule book to mine for principles. The entire narrative of the Scriptures is about a God who purses a broken and rebellious humanity precisely TO have relationship with them. Come on Chuck!

What Colson in my opinion leaves out of his review is the insightful treatment of what theologians have called theodicy or the problem of pain and the goodness of God. There are some incredible insights in this book about the grace of God and God's steadfast love.

Colson goes on to suggest that we not be comfortable with The Shacks depiction of God and our presumptions about God either. He writes: "As Papa warns Mack, God is not who Mack expects He is. But He is also not what our creative imaginations make Him to be either." But I cannot help but wonder if Mr. Colson feels that he has God all too figured out himself.

Is the book great? Well, no. Frankly I didn't care for some of the writing and some of the depictions of God were a bit hokey. Is it heretical? In my opinion no. No more than Pilgrims Progress anyway. It's a book that's definitely worth the read and the discussion.

I'm not about being controversial but my dander goes up when we simply begin boycotting things because of our own personal opinions. This book is not going to destroy any ones theology any more than reading the local newspaper. I guess I'm on day two of laryngitis and I'm getting irritable.

Peace,
E

A Community Called Atonement: 1

I've never blogged through a book before but I thought I's share some thoughts on Scot McKnight's "A Community Called Atonement"

Being that its the week before Holy Week, I thought I'd give myself to reading Scot's book on this important subject. So far: I Like!

I need to begin with a confession: I've never been to crazy about modern day atonement theories. It seems to me they straddle somewhere between the "we've got this all figured out" and the "we can't really say much about it" camps.

At it's core I do believe that the atonement is "mystery" but I think there is a great deal we can say about it.

I tend to agree with Joel Green who suggests in his excellent book, "Recovering the Scandal of the Cross" that within the Scriptures there are several models or frameworks for what we have come to call the atonement. And, I must admit all of them resonate with me on some level. I think that we should be comfortable with that. In the western church we have focused on one primarily which I believe is a detriment to the others.

What makes matters worse, at least for me, is that we take this amazing event and reduce it to something that is inherently personal; this whole idea of Jesus and me as my "personal" Lord and Savior. And, then we attempt to live in community as loosely connected automatons.

I, so far have really enjoyed McKnight's approach that the atonement is not individualized but communal in nature. It effects us on the individual level on so that we can live it's reality together in community: With God and neighbor.

So here goes my take on Chapter 1:

He begins with this idea of asking the question whether or not the atonement works in that it creates a change in us so that we might live reconciled lives to God and one another. Of course his answer is yes, it has the potential to, but he echoes the sentiments of my generation [not so much chronologically as theologically and ecclisalogically] when he says:

"This generation is tired of an old-fashioned atonement theology that does not make a difference, of an old-fashioned atonement theology that is for individual spiritual formation but not for ecclesial-reformation, and of an old fashioned atonement theology that does not reconcile humans with humans....If a previous generation was taught that evangelism and social justice were disconnected, even if one could [or even should] flow from the other, the present generation knows of a holistic human being in an interlocking society of connections where any notion of gospel or atonement must be one that is integrated and community-shaped if it is to be called 'good news' at all." p.2

To which I reply a hearty: AMEN!

He goes on to share this beautiful story of a person he knows who embodied this idea of being transformed for the sake of the other and then moves into asking the question: which atonement theory will it be. He suggested that whichever theory a church lands on as it's primary model will shape how the church lives out their understanding in the community and will give shape and form to its preaching.

Then I began to think: If we have been, at least in the western world, peddling a primarily penal substitutionary theory of atonement, which I think many believe, whether they would admit or not, seems to put the "Father" at odds with the son [which I don't believe it does], then what picture of God are we painting and what kind of communities are we creating?

I would argue that with this as our primary understanding we are creating communities of hierarchical authority that has a ticked off God as it's head who can only love the people created in God's image if his son takes the hit. Justice and judgement, at least it seems to me, then become much more retributive and personal than redemptive and communal.

Well, those are my brief thoughts on chapter 1. I'll try to add more as I move through the others. If you've read the book and would care to comment and dialogue I'd welcome it.

Love Wins,

E

Soundbites...

"We can admire and worship Jesus without doing what he did. We can applaud what he preached and stood for without caring about the same things. We can adore his cross without taking up ours. I had come to see that the great tragedy n the church is not that rich Christians do not care about the poor but that rich Christians do not know the poor"

Shane Claiborne, from his book Irresistible Revolution, mourning the fact that so many times Christians are far too selective about what parts of the Scriptures, specifically the commands of Jesus, that they take seriously.

Coming Soon...

I've been away for the last week or so, sequestered in my annual prayer and planning retreat so I have spent the last days uplinking again to the www.  The time away was good, and as always, refreshing.  I read some excellent books since I've been gone and will be sharing some insights soon. 

Some honorable mentions:

Made to Stick

In the Name of Jesus

Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Church

An Emergent Manigesto of Hope

Last evening we picked up my wife Lisa from the airport.  She is back safe and sound from her amazing trip to Africa.  Look for some more details, and maybe even a guest appearance from the Dark Contient adventurer.  Thanks for all to you who have prayed for and supported her!  It feels so good to have her back!

Peace,

E

Soundbites...

"Then I began noticing what most of us [Christians] talk about...

We aren't thinking about their [non-Christians] eternal destiny.   We aren't concerned about whether they're experiencing the abundant life that Jesus offers.  We are more concerned about whether there will be good snow on our church skiing trip than about the spiritual status of our neighbors and the people we work with every day.  I became aware that I didn't hear much concern about those who don't know Jesus yet.  We are all about making the church better for ourselves and making our lives more comfortable in the Christian bubble we have created.  I didn't hear much about being a voice for the voiceless or being concerned with social justice, the poor, AIDS in Africa, and other pressing needs.  As I was awakened to the subculture I had been sucked into and was part of, I heard and saw Christians buzzwords and phrases that suddenly sounded so incredible corny...and most disturbing was that when we [Christians] talk about the non-Christian world, we tend to point fingers and complain about the horrible things going on in culture.'"

Dan Kimball. The Like Jesus But Not The Church, p. 41

Soundbites

"I like your Christ.  I do not like your Christians.  Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

Mahatma Gandhi [as quoted in Dan Kimball's, They Like Jesus But Not The Church]