Psalm 99

This morning's lectionary readings threw me head long into some of my favorite Psalms. I have always been fascinated with the poetry of the "Kingly Psalms," the ones that begin with God's reign. Psalm 97 and 99 are just such Psalms, and 99 seems to be a beautiful retelling of God's faithfulness to his people. I was struck initially by verse 4, "The King in his might loves justice. You have established equity; you have executed justice and righteousness in Jacob." God executed justice and righteousness in Jacob, what a feat. Josh and I have just finished Genesis 49, where Jacob prophesies concerning his sons, and then finally dies. Until recently, I have missed the themes of justice, righteousness and grace in the life of Jacob. I have always been taught and had the overall impression that Jacob was a swindler, completely unconcerned with justice. This it seems is a bad, thin reading of these stories. Jacob certainly was crafty (which in OT language is often synonomous with wisdom), but his years of working and being taken advantage of, of being tricked out of a precious son left Jacob, it seems to me, a longing for justice. Justice which God provided, when at the end of his life his boy is returned and he can give blessings and curses to his own sons. What is particularly revealing in Psalm 99 though, is that we are given Jacob as a paradigm for God's justice and righteousness. This paradigm is filled in further by verse 8, "O Lord our God, you answered them [Moses, Aaron, and Samuel included]: you were a forgiving God to them, but an avenger of their wrongdoings." Perhaps we mis-state the radical difference between God's grace and his justice. Perhaps all of God's justice is grace, and perhaps we ought not be more concerned with either the forgiveness or the avenging. We must bow to our own inability to speak truthfully of God's mystery, and be thankful that He is holy.

Resonances and Randomness

A few sort of scattered thoughts from the week so far:
*In Luke 8-9, I have again been impressed with Jesus not distancing himself from Kingdom of God language. Every time he teaches, or sends out disciples, he is "proclaiming the kingdom of God." Also, the story of Legion strikes me as a helpful picture of true conversion. A few verses after Jesus helps drown some pigs, the artist formerly known as legion is sitting at his feet, clothed, and in his right mind. Later as Jesus is trying to leave his new convert wants to follow, but Jesus sends him out to proclaim all the good things God has done. I like that picture a lot, healing, learning, transforming and proclaiming. No formula here, but I would love to see our churches live into this a bit more. Likewise, in chapter 8-9 there is an awful lot of healing connected with the kingdom of God, creating some resonance of Jesus and the scroll of Isaiah. While on resonances, the feeding of the 5,000 in Luke certainly seems to be an attempt to echo and transform the temptation of Satan in the wilderness. Jesus would not turn stones to bread then, but he will feed five thousand hungry people now.
*Talking with my oldest son, Josh, about baptism, renouncing evil, and following Christ. Somehow the discussion goes from theology to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to painters and then back to God. All of which produced this gem from Josh about God being eternal, "God didn't even have to create Himself."
* A really amazing group, known as Invisible Children is working on a new campaign to end the war in Uganda which my church and youth are going to be part of. Its going to be amazing, and if you want to know more go here to check them out.
* This really should not be the last point, but my buddy Greg has a new album coming out in the next few weeks. If you have never heard him before, you will not believe what he can make a guitar do. Anyway, some of his new stuff is amazing. I think I listened to "Dirt Roads" about five times straight through. Good praying music if you're into that sort of thing.

Luke 6 and the cross

While discussing Luke chapter 6 this week with a group of elderly people, I was taken aback by how ridiculous this would be as a strategy for bringing about a kingdom. We have been trying to read Luke with question before us, "What is the kingdom of God, what does it look like?" With this lense, the first three chapters seem to be "Jesus' Qualifications to be King" chapter 4 "What sort of King will Jesus be" chapter 5, "Miracles/Signs of the Kingdom" which leads into Luke's account of the sermon on the mount "Life in the Kingdom." All of these of course are a bit loose, but I think perhaps helpful. Given this framework, our tendancy it would seem to me would be to want to force the issues of Jesus' kingdom. Instead of this, Jesus tells his followers:

27 “But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. 29 To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic [2] either. 30 Give to everyone who begs from you, and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back. 31 And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.

32 “If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. 33 And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. 34 And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount. 35 But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. 36 Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.

The craziness of these commands are sort of what makes us want to spiritualize or principalize them. This week I was reminded why we must not spiritualize these commands, and the answer lies in the cross. The parrallels between what Jesus commands here, and what He himself does on the cross is striking. His loving of enemies, loving sinners, forgiving those who persecute, blessing those who curse, being kind to the ungrateful and the evil. John Howard Yoder has said, "The cross is not simply the means to the Kingdom, it is the Kingdom come." Jesus not only commands his followers, he creates them.

Exegetical safeguards?

In my previous post, I gave a "principled" reading of Acts 8. To further demonstrate my growing skepticism of how we (very broadly of course, and mostly envangelicals) tend to use Scripture, I decided to "show my work." How could one, using all the helpful tools one learned in Hermeneutics and Sunday School, support the sort reading I presented yesterday? Easy, as it turns out, lets go point by point:
1. A quick look at background cultural sources will immediately tell us that Simon's "career" was being a magician. In his culture this was not a disrepected line of work, maybe on par with a TV weatherman. Likewise it is appropriate to say that Phillip's primary employment was as an Apostle (cf. Acts 6:2-4). A close reading of this text certainly demonstrates that both Simon and Phillip are good at their jobs.
2. Again a simply cursory reading of this text demonstrates that Phillip was better at being an Apostle than Simon was at being a magician. This discrepancy causes Simon to "seek out" Christianity. That this is effective is demonstrated by the end of the passage, also note the large number of miracles performed by Jesus, and the other Apostles in Acts.
3. The praised heaped upon Phillip in this text is not a stumbling block, but rather serves God's overall purpose of evangelism. Again, compare the noteworthiness of Phillip with the other Apostles (particularly Peter and later Paul). Also, note the repeated references to Jesus' fame and reknown spreading throughout the gospels.
4. When we look closely at this passage, we discover that as in point 2, God uses our gifts to reach out to the world. Phillip was gifted to be an Apostle (1 Cor. 12:28-29) and he lived into these gifts, whereby God used him for great things. Likewise, we must live into the areas God has gifted us, and one of these areas is our occupations.
5. This passage along with 2 Corinthians 6:14 give very clear guidance that Christians should work with, play with, and particular hire those who are Christians, or at the very least are "seeking."

Clearly when this passage is read in the light of the rest of the New Testament, held against the background of 1st Century Near Eastern culture and only lastly considering our contemporary circumstance, we understand the obvious principles intended by Luke and the Holy Spirit for our lives today.

Fun with Principles

As I have been laying around all week and thinking through things (although mostly under the influence of medication) I was able to summon all my creative energies to share my own "gloss" on a relatively famous story in the book of Acts 8:

9 But there was a man named Simon, who had previously practiced magic in the city and amazed the people of Samaria, saying that he himself was somebody great. 10 They all paid attention to him, from the least to the greatest, saying, “This man is the power of God that is called Great.” 11 And they paid attention to him because for a long time he had amazed them with his magic. 12 But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. 13 Even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized he continued with Philip. And seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed.

Several key principles from this passage:
1. Be good at your job. Whatever it is you do, do it better than anyone else.
2. Christians should be even better at their jobs than non-Christians. This is a primary source of evangelism.
3. Do not shun awards for being really good at your job, these are God's blessings.
4. If you do not see amazing signs and miracles in your work, find a new job where God is more likely to work signs and miracles.
5. Baptism is a good resume builder.