Archive | September, 2011

Not Optimism, Not Pessimism…Just Trust

by on September 26, 2011

Happy Moltmann Monday!  Today I’m sending you a little section from Jesus Christ for Today’s World which is one of Moltmann’s “broader audience” books (read: not academic theology).  In this chapter he picks up an earlier strand of conversation he’s had with us about the  false dichotomy of anxiety and fear and tries to answer the “then what?” question.

Today, we ourselves belong to both groups of people (people of anxiety and people of hope). We read the newspapers, and are filled with anxiety. We read the Bible, and hope for God. Like everyone else, we are afraid of the dangers ahead of us in this world. Like the people in the Bible, we believe that God’s deliverance is near. This is an age of anxiety. That is true. But it is an age of hope too. We believe in God and hope for (God’s) coming, but we are not optimists–we are afraid for our world. We are afraid of the things that imperil its future: we can imagine the social catastrophes in Russia–we can calculate the ecological disaster in our own countries–we know more than we can believe. But we are not pessimists, for we have faith in God and believe that (God) will never let his creation go. People who hope for God are not optimists. They don’t need the power of positive thinking. People who hope for God are not pessimists. They don’t need the logic of negative dialectic. People who trust in God know that God is waiting for them, that God is hoping for them, that they are invited to God’s future, so that they are holding in their hands the most marvelous invitation they have ever had in their lives.  (p.131-132)

 

I often run across people and friends who feel that faith is a form of blindness, either ignorant or intentional. We either do not know enough about the world to see how it really is, or we are so afraid of what we have seen that we choose to put blinders on and convince ourselves we see something else. I confess to being overwhelmingly annoyed by these assumptions. Certainly, people believe in God (and a million other things) for these kinds of reasons from time to time. We’re all working our way toward understanding. But to say the task of faith is blind optimism and the task of fear or doubt or even atheism is staunch pessimism is far too simplistic.

We are always both people of fear and anxiety, if we indeed have our eyes open. We see the dangers of the world (even if Moltmann’s references are outdated…).  We know the future could bring hard times. But we also see the hope in God’s promise, and dare to hope. However, this tension between anxiety and hope does not require us to pick sides. We do not have to wear team jerseys declaring our allegiance to optimism or pessimism, changing teams based on the outcome of Monday morning’s headline. People of faith are simply people who trust in God. It’s not blind trust. It’s not trust that means no bad things will happen. It’s not trust that we will get to have life just the way we want it. It’s trust in a relationship—a friendship–that remains intact no matter what. Faith is not contingent upon what happens, but upon who holds us. We trust that whatever the future holds, God is with us, God is before us and behind us. Faith is trust that when all is said and done, what will be left is not optimism or pessimism, anxiety or hope, but the fullness of God realized.

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The Gospel is Not Fair

by on September 23, 2011

I had lunch with a seminary friend yesterday, and at some point in the two hour conversation we got to talking about the general misunderstanding that the Gospel is fair.  What I mean is that people assume and expect that our hard work will pay off in apparent results, and that if we are called to do something it will follow that we will succeed (in a way we expect), or that at the very least we should always feel “good” about those choices we make to follow God.

And sometimes, those things actually play out that way.  But sometimes they don’t.  Sometimes you give someone help who needed it, and they squander what you gave them, and you look like a fool.  Sometimes you are called to do something, and it lands you in the middle of total chaos and miles of conflict and human messiness.  Sometimes you do what you know is right, and nobody notices, and it didn’t really give you that much internal satisfaction, either.

None of those things should indicate that God isn’t nice, or that you were somehow wrong in your choices. Because the Gospel isn’t fair.  It is RIGHT but it isn’t fair.  Jesus says to give to those in need.  If you do that, you are being faithful.  You try to do that with wisdom, and with discernment, but at some point if you are actually doing this regularly, someone will take advantage of you, and you will feel like an idiot.  And if you think the Gospel is right but not fair, then you will pick yourself up and say, “Well, misjudged that one” and then keep on giving anyway.  If you get called somewhere and it becomes hard (and being called somewhere almost always means it will at some point be hard) and you think the Gospel is right but not fair, then you will find your center in the midst of the chaos and figure out how to listen for how God might be asking you to transform that place and stay put through the storm.  And if you spend your life trying to live by the Gospel, trust me, most days nobody will really seem to care one bit.  And it may not look like you are getting anywhere at all, because the Gospel is like yeast rising right before your eyes but at a pace so slow you can’t see it. The Gospel is like staring at a blade of grass and waiting to see it grow. But if you trust that the Gospel is “right” and if you believe that crazy mystery that the Word does not return void, then you will plug along simply because you feel called to live like the Gospel has asked you to live.

Grace is incredibly unfair.  Unconditional love is mind-bogglingly unfair. The prodigal son squandering his inheritance and getting a party thrown in his honor is unbelievably unfair.  Workers out in the field who worked six hours less than you but received the same amount of money is enough to put Americans into a complete rage for its unfairness.  But these parables tell us what the Gospel looks like.

Take it or leave it. But don’t complain about unfairness. You’re going to have to look somewhere other than the Gospel if that’s what is most important to you.

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Friendship

by on September 19, 2011

Thanks to Tony’s new book, I’m in a The Church in the Power of the Spirit mood today.  Here’s an excerpt from Moltmann’s section on Jesus and friendship, which Tony rightly highlighted in his book as one of Moltmann’s more unique takes on Christology:

 

The titles through which the church defines what Jesus means are usually called his titles of office. Whether Jesus is understood and acknowledged as prophet, priest or king, these titles always express his divine dignity towards men and his saving task on their behalf. The christological titles describe his uniqueness and set up a certain distance between him and the church. In devotion, this distance finds expression in the worship and adoration of Christ, and in obedience to him. In the garb of his titles of honor he appears with divine authority…But the fellowship which Jesus brings men, and the fellowship of people with one another to which he calls, would be described in one-sided terms if another ‘title’ were not added, a title to describe the inner relationship between the divine and the human fellowship: the name of friend.

Friendship is an unpretentious relationship, for ‘friend’ is not an official term, nor a title of honor, nor a function. It is a personal designation. Friendship unites affection with respect. There is no need to bow before a friend. We can look him in the eye. We neither look up to him nor look down on him. In friendship we experience ourselves for what we are, respected and accepted in our own freedom. Through friendship we respect and accept other people as people and as individual personalities. Friendship combines affection with loyalty. One can rely on a friend…Between friends the determining factor is not an ideal, a purpose or a law, but simply promise, loyalty to one another and openness…

The more people begin to live with one another as friends, the more privileges and claims to domination become superfluous. The more people trust one another the less they need to control one another. The positive meaning of a classless society free of domination, without repression and without privileges, lies in friendship. Without the power of friendship and without the goal of a friendly world there is no human hope for the class struggles and struggles for dominance.”

 

To add “friend” to Jesus’ list of christological offices is truly one of Moltmann’s more brilliant moves.  Prophet, priest and king are limited in scope because they are based on function and title alone.  I remember feeling this in my bones, like we were trying to recreate a recipe but forgetting that one ingredient that really made the others shine. Something wasn’t tasting quite right, like the batter was going to be delicious but not actually rise in the cooking.  And then in this part of CPS, Moltmann came into the kitchen and handed over the missing ingredient.  The “gospel” part of who Jesus is, the part that can transform and subvert even the most dominant power structures, the part that makes the whole thing SING, is not only his ability to serve as prophet, priest and king, but precisely his ability to serve as such as our friend.

It’s so good it makes me want to do cartwheels at the very thought. The sovereignty of Jesus, the messianic nature of Jesus, the reason Jesus can be called Redeemer of the whole entire universe, all rests on the fact that he is who he is and he does what he does as our friend.

I honestly do not believe I am overstating my case when I say if you miss that, you are missing out on the whole thing.  It’s all flat pancakes and sunken souffles.  Friendship, people. Friendship.

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Postmodernism, Morality…and Eschatology?

by on September 15, 2011

Recently I’ve been reading McIntyre (and if you haven’t, read After Virtue as it should be on a very short list of must reads) and discussing it at Geek Squad each week.  (As an aside, Geek Squad is exactly what it sounds like–a group of self-admitted geeks sitting around talking about things we realize make most others roll their eyes and/or yawn.  It’s our space to debate the small print as loudly and for as long as we want.)  It’s been a while since I’ve kicked philosophy around in my head, so I’m processing slowly and trying to remove the cobwebs off of all those names and books I used to remember.  What I do remember is that I felt After Virtue was a great conversation partner in the work of  ecclesiology, though McIntyre certainly didn’t intend to write a book about the purpose of the church.  As it turns out, the content and conversation is just as applicable and timely now as it was years ago.   A friend of mine referenced this New York Times op-ed piece by David Brooks about relativism and extreme individualism, and Brooks may as well have been recording part of our discussion last Thursday at the pub.

Basically, we were discussing our growing inability to think ethically or morally about issues.  I’m not even asking for us to agree on the issues, although that would be a welcome relief from time to time.  I’m just asking for the ability to discuss the concept of morality as a thing itself.  The notion of the virtuous life, however defined, is simply not something people talk about much anymore–at least not well.  I should clarify:  People talk plenty about “values” but in such a way that values are nothing more than commodities, like cans you pick off the shelf, with everyone’s basket looking a little different.  Values are not items.  They are not individually chosen.  They are not self-selected a la carte menu items you put together on a whim.  To stretch the metaphor, to attempt a virtuous life with such an approach is like trying to eat food without a plate.  Something has to hold those values, and they have to be held in concert with other values so as to create an actual meal that will sustain you and help you grow.  I find myself nodding my head vigorously (again) with McIntyre’s assessment that virtue is impossible to create when a society is based solely or even primarily upon the feeling of the individual.

On a slightly tangential note, I feel the need to argue, for the record, that the kind of flippant “Who am I to judge?” attitude evidenced by the young people in Brooks’ article is the laziest and sloppiest form of postmodern philosophy one could ever attempt to create.  I’m sure people will read that article and say, “See, that’s what we’ve been saying all along, that postmodernism will lead us to this kind of wishy-washy culture where no one knows right from wrong.”  Whether it does that or not is moot; Enlightenment rationality shattered the dinner plate of virtue way before Derrida came along.  So please don’t equate sloppy thinking with the postmodern critique.  ”Who am I to judge?” has as much to do with stress and overload in a rapidly diversifying culture without sufficient tools to help us cope with this new world as it does an adherence to moral relativism.

McIntyre’s argument is that societies based on extreme individualism and emotivism are severely broken. They are incapable of virtue, because they hold no framework.  Without a recognized and shared end-goal, virtue becomes canned values, stale and without nutrients.  And nobody cares whether they stick around or go, because they do absolutely nothing for the palate, or for the meal itself.

This is how a discussion of virtue ended up in my reaffirmation of the importance of eschatology.  When moral inquiry lacks an end-goal, there is no food but limp green beans…splattered on the floor, plate-less, no less.  What kind of eschatology is another matter for another day, but without a recognition of who-I-am-now contrasted with who-I-ought-to-be, without a shared and cohesive sense of where we all should be headed and where we all are trying to go, virtue is sure to wind up on the endangered species list.

I can only imagine this teleological discussion will come up often this year, as it seems the tensions  between those who want to make theology and those who want to keep dismantling it continues to rise.

So here are the questions I’m pondering these days:  what do we do to enliven an American framework of virtue?  (CAN we? The task itself is quite problematic…which virtue???  But the alternative–not having a framework of virtue, even civil virtue–will likely be our end.)  In what ways is the C/church called to embody a virtuous framework of shared life? CAN we?

 

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Two Great Dallas Events!

by on September 9, 2011

If you’re in the metroplex, block off the weekend of September 30th for two great conferences!

First, come to Frontier Church on Friday, September 30th from 9am to 2pm and spend the day with Nadia Bolz-Weber, Mike Baughman, and a host of others  as we talk about reaching young adults in non-traditional ways.  It will be a great conversation, and the cost for the whole day, plus lunch, is only $20!  Here’s more:

BE INSPIRED by the word of God through those who are actively reaching young adults in the DFW metroplex and beyond.
ENCOUNTER young adults–both those who have left the church and remained connected.
DREAM with veterans and novices of the young adult frontier and begin the work that has stirred in your soul.
Speakers represent an eclectic group of cutting edge pastors and authors from varying traditions including Nadia Bolz-Weber, Danielle Shroyer, Mike Baughman, Megan Davidson, Courtney Pinkerton, Jason Valendy and more!
Register online at: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/2097223853
Cost: $20 (includes lunch)

Greenland Hills United Methodist Church:  5835 Penrose Avenue, Dallas, TX

That night, plan on heading over to the Emerging Christianity Conference hosted by Life in the Trinity Ministries, which runs from Friday night through Saturday afternoon.  Brian McLaren and others will be there to talk about four core principles of Emerging Christianity: spiritual disciplines, community, social justice and the historical Jesus.  You can find out more and register here.
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