Christian Virtue is a Team Sport - Rumble Strips

Tom Wright again:

There is an old saying: Give someone a fish and you feed them for a day; teach someone to fish and you feed them for life.  Paul's normal practice is the latter:...Give people a command for a particular situation and you help them to live appropriately for a day; teach them to think Christianly about behavior, and they will be able to navigate by themselves into areas where you hadn't given any specific instructions....(199)

Paul gives initial guidelines that only look like the "old rules" to keep people on track while they are learning new habits of the heart.   The illustration that sold me on this interpretation is "rumble strips":   When roads are built, they are built for long distances, with the intent that people should drive in full control of their cars..."ideally, nobody will ever stray from their side of the road into the path of traffic coming in the other direction."  But because of distractions, loss of concentration and mechanical failures, "the wise highway builders construct a central barrier, so that any car drifting toward oncoming traffic will be stopped in its tracks...likewise they build a 'rumble strip' at the outer edge of the highway, short of the ditch."  

          "Those responsible for building roads are not saying, 'There you are, there's a nice crash barrier [for you to bounce off of...they're saying], 'You're supposed to drive down the road without touching the barriers. But if something goes wrong you may  need to know the barrier is there."


          The barriers are still there - they are real and necessary for the unity of the church, for the integrity of the disciple and for moving toward life in the realized Kingdom of God.  But it's better to concentrate on our driving skills than on the quality of our bumpers.

Christian Virtue is a Team Sport

Sometimes I think I don't have an original idea (does anybody?) because I "process" so much of what I'm reading in this blog.   But few people have the luxury of reading as much as pastors do.

I've returned to an interrupted reading of N.T. Wright's After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters.  The best thing about this book (so far) is his rehabilitation of Paul from our black-and-white understanding of him: 

"A large number of Christians have assumed that the foundation of Paul's thinking goes like this: He spent the first part of his life trying to keep the rules of his religion, and then discovered not only that he couldn't but that the rules weren't the point.  God didn't want rule-keeping, he wanted 'spontenaeity.' God had forgiven him all his rule breaking, in and through Jesus Christ, and was now giving him his Spirit, who would produce the "fruit without all that horrible moral striving." (191)

          The correction he offers is that Paul believed that when the church's focus on the meeting of personal moral standards results in "huge fights" within the church (in Galatia), it is a "sign that something has gone wrong" within the community of faith because "Christian virtue is a team sport." 

          When Paul lists the behaviors he associates with "the flesh" in the vice list in  Galatians 5.19-21: 

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery;  idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God

          he is giving examples of  "what happens when humankind turns in on itself and away from God...the roads which do not lead in the direction [of the coming kingdom]...the ways people on earth keep the life of heaven at bay...and so declare by their behavior that they want to keep earth just the way it is, in its present corrupt and decaying form."

     He goes on to point out that the fruit of the Spirit does not grow automatically, as though we sit back and wait for the fruit to arrive:  "If self-control was automatic, why would self-control be needed?" (196)  You have to choose to live in the Spirit.  

            

Truth and Legalism

    Reading Eric Metaxas' biography, Bonhoeffer, is making me late for a lot of meetings and appointments lately.  I can't walk past it without reading a few pages, because it contains so many nuggets from Bonhoeffer's diaries and notes that shed light on his theology, as well as  the development of his thoughts that led to his resistance during WWII.

     Have gotten to the "tipping point" section, where excerpts from his unfinished work, Ethics examine the relationship between Truth (a Big Topic in mainline denominations these days) and Legalism (Big Topic No.2 )

  In Tegel prison, Bonhoeffer wrote an essay titled, "What Does it Mean to Tell the Truth."  He wrote that God's standard of truth involves more than merely "not lying," and requires a deeper level of obedience.  

     Never telling a lie is "easy religious legalism."  The illustration he used is if a teacher asks a child in front of the class if her father is a drunkard, (and he is) and the child answers, "No," then our first impression is that the child has told a lie.

     Bonhoeffer believed that the "flip side of the easy religious legalism of never telling a lie" was the cynical notion that there is no such thing as truth, only "facts."  But if our relationship with God orders everything else around it, then we can't separate our actions from our relationship to God.  So:  If this child standing before her teacher is responding from the seat of her understanding of both her relationship to God and to her father, then for her to answer factually in public that he is a drunkard, is to dishonor her father in truth, damaging her relationship with God and with her father, which would be a greater sin before God..

     He wrote this about the "truth legalist":  "He dons the halo of fanatical devotee of truth who can make no allowance for human weaknesses, but in fact he is destroying the living truth between men.  He wounds shame, desecrates mystery, breaks confidence, betrays the community in which he lives and laughs arrogantly at the devastation he has wrought and at the human weakness which 'cannot bear the truth.'"
Nothing like a German theologian to turn my brain into a pretzel.  This is much deeper than simple situational ethics - this is Sermon on the Mount Stuff.  Better to think about such things now, before Jesus asks us what we think about it.

Us versus Grace

     In a room full of traffic offenders, almost everyone is indignant that they have been caught speeding when others (who were, apparently, faster and therefore "more wrong") got away without being stopped, and so the offenders who were slow enough to get caught should not be found guilty.  Awesome logic, that.

     The second attempt to deflect attention away from one's own bad actions is to blame something inanimate that forced your unlawful action:  "The speed limit is too low on that road," (as though every driver is empowered to be his or her own legislature); or  "It was raining/there was a lot of construction/I was in a strange neighborhood/it was dark and I couldn't stop/avoid the collision/see the stop sign," (as though there was no driver responsibility to avoid obstacles or adjust their driving according to road conditions).  

     When I was a judge in my previous life, I used to try to explain that in America, self-government meant that we were expected to use self-restraint and respect the rights of others; and that people shouldn't complain about the government making "too many laws" because it is their own behavior that caused the proliferation of laws:  folks couldn't manage to drive in a single lane, in the same direction, at a safe speed.   (Someone once told me that "if you throw the book at somebody you don't get to lecture them; if you're reducing the fine, you can say whatever you want...")!

     The following profundity is why I love studying the Bible in small groups...while not an exact quote, the gist of the comment was:

     "When people can't restrain themselves and respect others, we create rules. When there are lots of rules, people break them. It becomes a lot of trouble to deal with the rulebreakers, so we just declare everyone right."

     That's our way.  This is God's way:

     This is the way to live a God-centered life.  Exceeding these limits will result in chaos, sickness and death.  I know you will not only break through these limits, you will bend them and blur them and blame others.  I love you and will forgive you for this, but you are still wrong in both your understanding and your actions, and I want you to let me steer you back to the best course, a better way.

     So when Grace is available, why do we still insist on being right?

    

Compromised Christian

When John Calvin used the term "total depravity," he wasn't trying to say that human beings were totally, completely evil through and through.  

What he was getting at is that whatever we do, good or bad, is "tinged" (a little bit colored, a little bit spoiled) by sin.  This is my personal test:  Did you ever do anything selfless and good?  Are you proud of it?  Well, there ya go.  I like to think of it as being a "blue man" - we look like respectable people, we want to do the right thing, and sometimes we can do good things, but there's always that little bit of blue that won't scrub off, and leaves a smudgy fingerprint on everything we touch.

Pentecost has me thinking about how Jesus is Lord over the whole world and all of life whether you've asked Him to be or not.  It can't be any other way.  Christ is either Lord of all of life or none of it.  "Brothers and sisters, what shall we do?" (Acts 2:37b)  "...What kind of people ought you to be?  You ought to live holy and godly lives."  (2 Peter 3:11b)

In nearly every crisis situation there is some spiritual aspect, where the person or persons involved have tried to do something they thought was a good thing (like getting married, raising children, starting a new job, lending money to a friend or family member, and on and on), without considering what God's will might be for their lives, or what Scripture says about it.  The protests usually begin, "But I thought..." or "Why would God..."  God gets blamed for plenty of things God didn't do...

Week after week, people go back to whatever it was they were trying to do on their own, thinking that spending family time at a sports event is as helpful - or better - than being in church together; children are dropped off at Sunday School while parents go out to breakfast, leaving the church to attempt to accomplish in one hour a week what God tasked parents to do on a daily basis; couples go off to spend a weekend at a swanky hotel hoping that it will save a marriage the same way that praying together and having the support of a church family can; singles rush to nightspots looking for "Mr. or Mrs. Right" on Friday and Saturday nights instead of waiting on God's choice.

Of course, we thank God for grace.  Of course, we will all continue to make mistakes.  Of course, nobody's perfect.  Of course, the blood of Jesus gives us "white fingerprints" instead of blue ones.

"What a wretched man I am!  Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to sin and death?" Romans 7:24 

 But how much more likely are we to grow in grace if we quit working so hard to make our own lives turn out the way we've planned, and instead make room for God to work on our behalf while we worship and pray together?  Why not call a "time out" and back off yourself, your kids, your spouse and your employees for awhile?  What would happen if we got your eyes off of ourselves and back onto Jesus?

On the Ratification of 10A - It's Still About Jesus

If you want to put the recent ratification of Amendment 10A by the PCUSA into perspective, pull out your copy of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship.  Chapter 31 "The Saints" is a near-perfect study on the holiness of God and the calling of the saints to "walk worthy of their calling and of the gospel in every sphere of life,"  (Eph. 4:1, Phil. 127; Col. 1:10; I Thess. 2:12 by living daily in the remembrance that we are washed, sanctified and justified" (I Cor. 6:11.)

He writes of Christian chastity and self-control of our "wild physical passions" which are "daily done to death" in communion with the body of Christ.  There is also a long footnote about the congregational exercise of discipline as a "ministry of charity" - but a severe penalty awaits the teacher of a false doctrine that corrupts the life of the Church at its source.  In other words, the teaching of a false doctrine is morally worse than the commission of the sin the doctrine promotes.  Pray hard before you preach.

The wonderful Presbyterian poet Ann Weems has a poem entitled, "It's Still About Jesus," that suits our present crisis:

“No matter how we dilute the word of God, it’s about Jesus.  No matter how we cover the dangerous Truth of the gospel, it’s about Jesus.  No matter how we pretty up the story, it’s about Jesus.  No matter how many times we go to our national assemblies and vote, it’s still about Jesus.  No matter how many times we distract ourselves with meetings and church work…it’s still about Jesus, the Lamb of God…the Light of the World…the Bread of Life…the Prince of Peace…the One chosen to bring good news to the poor…the One sent to proclaim liberty to the captives and to set free the oppressed.  Jesus is my shepherd…I shall not want."

Are You Showing People Your Wounds?

Listen to how St. Paul described the life of a Christian’s witness to the Resurrection:  “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.  For while we live we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake…”[1] 

 

Paul is saying that our hopefulness in the midst of our suffering – our ability to see these events through the lens of Resurrection and to praise God and rejoice while we experience injuries and diseases, divorce, business reversals and stock market crashes, violence and wars, droughts, wildfires and tornadoes – that our demonstrations of hope and joy in suffering show the world that when Christ-followers endure trials we are bearing the death of Jesus in our own suffering, and when we express joy in the midst of sorrow, we are showing the world the life of Christ, and the truth of the Resurrection.

Just as the living Christ stood before Thomas and showed him his wounds, so we can stand helpless in the rubble where our homes once stood, in our disease-ridden bodies, with our aged, bent backs; and we can stand over the corpses of our loved ones who were snatched from our arms by the winds of chaos and evil and show all of that to the world as our wounds – our proof of death - and at the same time offer the proof that in spite of all that the world could do to us, we can say with the psalmist, “I will not die but live, and will proclaim what the LORD has done!”

Maybe what needs to happen is that they need to die and rise from their own wounds – or maybe they need to see ours.  So many Christians keep our wounds hidden from each other and from the world.  If the words of Paul to the Corinthians are true, then the reason the world doesn’t believe in Jesus and his Resurrection is because we don’t show them our wounds. 

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[1] 2 Corinthians 4:8-11