The folks at the University of Nottingham are producing videos for each book of the bible. They haven’t finished all of them yet, but here’s a sample:
November 24, 2009
Bible Videos
November 17, 2009
Wright on Justification – 6
Some notes on N.T. Wright, Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision, Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2009.
Chapter 5 – Galatians
Like other authors, Paul cannot ever say everything that needs to be said all at once.
Justification in Galatians means “to be reckoned by God to be a true member of his family, and hence with the right to share table fellowship.” (p. 116) The “works of the law” in Galatians are not referring to morality, but to the elements of the law that divided Jews from Gentiles and marked them off as a separate people. Rather than being marked off by the law, the people of God now are marked off by faith, by trusting in Jesus the Messiah.
What, according to Wright’s reading of Galatians, was the purpose of the law? He says,
The law was given to keep ethnic Israel, so to speak, on track. But it could never be the means by which the ultimate promised family was demarcated, partly because it kept the two intended parts of the family separate, and partly because if merely served to demonstrate, by the fact that it was impossible to keep it perfectly, that Jews, like the rest of the human race, were sinful. The Messiah’s death deals with… this double problem. (p. 118)
In much of contemporary Christianity, the perceived problem Jesus came to address was the fact that I – and everyone else – am a hell-bound sinner in need of salvation so I can spend eternity with God. Wright sees Paul in Galatians identifying the problem differently. The problem Paul sees is defined in terms of Abraham, Israel, and God’s covenant – and the appearance that God’s way of working (the law) wasn’t working to achieve God’s desired ends. For Paul, therefore, the Messiah comes “So that we (presumably Jews who believe in Jesus) might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” (p, 124) God’s original plan, laid out in the promise to Abraham in Genesis 12 (1. I will bless you; 2. All nations on earth will be blessed through you) is still in effect. The problem was Israel almost always settled for the first part of the promise and cared nothing for the second part. They liked being the Chosen People, but forgot that they were Chosen specifically to be God’s agents of blessing to the rest of the world. The Messiah came to fulfill that unfulfilled (and apparently unfulfillable) mission. Through this way of looking at things, doctrines we separate – soteriology and ecclesiology – are held tightly together. This point is absolutely essential for understanding Wright’s take on justification.
April 29, 2009
What’s Next?
We humans are such odd creatures. We seem to oscillate between giving no thought to the consequences of our actions to being paralyzed with fear by imagined consequences of our actions.
Take one of the proposed constitutional changes in the United Methodist Church as an example. Here’s the proposed text for part of Article IV:
Inclusiveness of the Church — The United Methodist Church is a part of the church universal, which is one Body in Christ. The United Methodist Church acknowledges that all persons are of sacred worth and that we are in ministry to all. All persons shall be eligible to attend its worship services, participate in its programs, receive the sacraments, and upon baptism be admitted as baptized members. All persons, upon taking vows declaring the Christian faith and relationship in Jesus Christ, shall be eligible to become professing members in any local church in the connection. In the United Methodist Church no conference or other organizational unit of the Church shall be structured so as to exclude any member or any constituent body.
Doesn’t look very controversial on the face of it. One might naturally read the statement as saying something like, “We believe Jesus came, died, and rose for all people. Since Jesus came to bring all people back to God and to invite them to take up his kingdom agenda, we his followers aim to do likewise. There is no category of humans that we seek to exclude from this ministry.” For one who reads the New Testament and takes it as authoritative, I don’t see how they could be other than affirming of such an inclusive mission. So what’s the problem?
All UMs who have been following debates within the church for the past thirty years know what the problem is. Our greatest outward schism these days is over homosexuality. Some are convinced that the practice of homosexuality is perfectly acceptable from a Christian point of view. Others are convinced otherwise. The current disciplinary language affirms homosexuals as people of “sacred worth,” and thus a category of people not to be excluded from our ministry work. At the same time, the Discipline teaches that the practice of homosexuality is “not compatible with Christian teaching,” that we do not recognize or perform homosexual unions (whether “marriages” or another other kind), and do not accept “self-avowed practicing homosexuals” into ministry. These statements, however, are in parts of the Discipline other than the constitution. Thus, opponents reason, if the amendment is passed, the new form of the constitution will trump these exclusions, making them null and void. Since we say that “no conference or other organizational unit of the Church shall be structured so as to exclude any member or any constituent body,” that means that any member is eligible for participation in any body of the church. Currently this article has specific non-exclusions: “race, color, national origin, status or economic condition” do not exclude one from membership and participation in the UMC. It is possible that some see the switch from particular non-exclusionary language to complete inclusionary language as a less controversial (opponents may say “devious”) way to bring currently excluded groups into the areas from which they are current excluded.
If this constitutional amendment is adopted, surely some will seek to rule out the current disciplinary restrictions regarding homosexuality. But because some might – or even surely will – pursue this course of action, is the language of the amendment any less true to our Christian convictions, regardless of our position on the acceptability of homosexual practice?
United Methodists often pride themselves on not being literalists. Such pride is mistaken. We, like most other collections of humans, are selective literalists. While some may push the literal language of an amended constitution at this point (along the lines of the “all means all” campaign) to turn the UMC toward official acceptance of homosexual practice, a literal reading of this text, as in purely literal readings of pretty much any text, be pushed to what seems absurd. Let’s consider other forms of exclusion we currently practice. When it comes to age, we have disciplinary language on mandatory retirement. Can’t do that – that’s exclusionary. Though I’m not aware of any specific disciplinary language on this point, I’ve never heard of a child (under the age of 16) being ordained in the UMC. Sounds exclusionary to me. What about the current educational requirements for ordination? Some people lack the capacity for such education – and we heartlessly exclude them from ordained ministry.
Surely such reasoning is silly. No one is out pushing for ordination of children or the uneducated. No one wants bishops and pastors to keep going until they drop dead or become totally senile. But a plain literal reading of the text of the proposed amendment could surely lead in such directions. Since people might use the text in this way, we need to refrain from tinkering with it at all, lest bad things happen.
If we argue this way, maybe we should take up Stanley Hauerwas’s idea of keeping the bible away from people also. There are passages in the bible that if read and applied literally might be used to justify and promote what we take to be murder. Yet while I strongly believe many unintended consequences have come out of the way some people have handled the bible – the word of God (not just the word of the General Conference of the UMC) – I still believe the bible in the hands of people to be a good thing. Dangerous? Certainly. Ought we to teach people to handle it rightly? Absolutely. But that goes for the Discipline as well.
Knowing then, that consequences I thing wrong might flow from passing this amendment, I’m still inclined to vote for it. I’m not basing this on my confidence on the maturity of discourse and argumentation in the UMC. I’m afraid my confidence in that is very low. I’m also not basing my position on a commitment to the gospel of inclusion. While I think there is a proper biblical concept of inclusion, I cannot see that what goes by that name in most discussions today has much connection with such an account. Rather, the gospel of inclusion, as I hear it preached, sounds much more like a version of modern individualism than the gospel of Jesus. I also have no confidence that debates over “sexuality” (I doubt the helpfulness of abstractions in this case) end soon or reach a conclusion satisfactory to all. We UMs mirror our culture (as we have since the beginning) in being pretty messed up in this area. Whether we identify as heterosexual or homosexual we tend to be (mis)ruled by our desires, thinking (with Alexander Pope) that “whatever is, is right.” Our desires are, so since God made us and everything good, our desires must be good also. Surely we ought not to thwart that which is good? (My position on this is that while we shouldn’t thwart that which is good, we need to (a) sometimes say “no,” (b) sometimes say, “not yet,” and sometimes (c) recognize that we might be mistaken in our identification of a good.
Instead, my inclination to vote for it is that as far as I can tell from my submission to the authority of the bible and orthodox Christian theology it is simply true. We United Methodist Christians do believe that Jesus died for all. We do believe that God calls all people to die to sin and live to holiness.
Enough rambling for today. If you’d like to argue with me, go for it! I’m amenable to correction or persuasion.
April 28, 2009
Memories
A Happy Memory: One Sunday about 14 years ago my son did the children’s message for the church service. Well, it was sort of a reverse children’s message. In a normal children’s message an adult gets up and tells the children a story. In this case it was a child – five year old – telling the story. He got up and told the story of the book of Jonah. He did a great job. I was really proud of him.
A Sad Memory: After the service that Sunday the church members were telling me what a great job my son did. One of them told me, “He knows the bible so well. He knows it even better than I do!”
I was happy that my five year old son knew the bible well. I was sad that someone who had been in church for at least five decades didn’t know as much as a five year old. What have we been teaching all these years? How have we been teaching our people?
April 14, 2009
Inerrancy and the Spiritual Formation of Younger Evangelicals
In his book by this title, Carlos R. Blovell argues that institutional commitments to a doctrine of biblical inerrancy like that found in the Evangelical Theological Society and the Evangelical Philosophical Society are not conducive to the spiritual formation of younger evangelicals. He notes,
“It has been my experience that younger evangelicals feel the tension most when they are left with an authoritative Bible whose authority has been practically all but voided by philosophical and exegetical details that regularly keep popping up. What ends up being authoritative in the end is the evangelical tradition and this tradition has to be taken on faith to the effect that it best represents what is ‘in’ the Bible.”
As younger evangelicals face the demand that inerrancy is the doctrine on which evangelicalism, or, more personally, their true faith, stands or falls, along with the multitude of qualifications, challenges and even incoherencies in that doctrine, Blovell sees the tension leading them away from the Christian faith altogether. If inerrancy is strictly essential to real Christianity, and inerrancy falls apart under what they take to be rigorous examination, then they are left with no choice but to leave.
Blovell wishes to remain both a Christian and an evangelical. He challenges the current generation of evangelical teachers to discover ways to have a high view of the Bible and its authority that are (a) truer to Scripture, (b) truer to the history of the way Scripture has been used by the faithful through out the ages, and (c) sensitive to the spiritual needs of their students. While he says that he wishes to contribute to such an account in the future, this book serves to identify the need rather than to offer the right way forward.
Evangelicals, especially those in positions of authority in evangelical institutions, are faced with the constant challenge of “going liberal,” or appearing to “go liberal.” Since maintaining the centrality of inerrancy is perceived as the main bulwark against going liberal, I’m not optimistic that many will listen to Blovell any longer than it takes to write him out of evangelicalism. One might think that Wesleyan evangelicals, given the fact of less of an interest in inerrancy in their own tradition might be able to take this step. Since Wesleyans are already suspect in an era when evangelicalism is primarily defined by Calvinists, it will likely be hard for them to take this step, however.
October 2, 2008
Thinking in the background
As one of the consequences of having a short attention span, I tend to be reading several (non-fiction) books at a time. Two books I’m reading now are Bruce Ellis Benson’s Graven IdeologiesL Nietzsche, Derrida & Marion on Modern Idolatry and Kenton L. Sparks’ God’s Word in Human Words. Since the latter is an ILL book and I’m pressed for time, I’m not able to read it as closely as I’d like. (I read ILL books (a) because books are expensive, (b) I’ve run out of bookshelf space. This way I can “test-drive” a book and evaluate it for future purchase.)
One of the features of phenomenology (the philosophical context of Benson’s work) is a feature of the essential role of background in human acts of interpretation and understanding. Various theological and philosophical phenomenologists take different stances toward the background, but all address it.
Sparks doesn’t engage in great detail with the tradition of thought covered by Benson (he includes a small section on postmodern hermeneutics), the same issues are relevant nonetheless. Sparks’ objective is to accommodate biblical criticism (broadly conceived) within a high (even inerrantist) view of scripture. In his discussion of general and special revelation he says:
If it is true that the meaning of God’s written word depends so much on the larger context in which it was written and subsists, then it stands to reason that the best interpretations of Scripture will be those that best understand that larger context – the created order. This will mean, for instance, that the best readings of the early chapters of Genesis will be from scholars who are informed not only about theology and the nuances of ancient Israelite literature but also about matters of modern science and cosmology. The whole of the created order, including the whole of human observations and theories about it, provides the ideal context for biblical interpretation. If this is so, then it would seem that in some respect God’s divine speech in creation precedes his written words, for creation is the larger context that makes his written words intelligible. It is not only the Bible but also creation itself that speaks a “word” from God. This assertion not only makes reasonable sense but is also given biblical expression [Psalm 19:1-6]… Surely it is metaphor to describe the created order as ‘word,’ but the metaphor is not so different from what makes Jesus Christ ‘the Word.’ Creation speaks God’s ‘word,’ and its ‘voice’ is heard by all humanity. Implicit in this theology of creation is that the created order was made to be known; it discloses itself to us. In this sense, all that we come to know through the created order can be understood as revealed truth. Readers may know that this line of thought brings us inexorably to the sticky matter of natural revelation and natural theology. How much theology can human beings known apart from God’s special revelation in the written Bible and the incarnate Son? (p.264-5)
I find this quote very provocative – in the sense that it provokes much thought on my part. My initial evaluation is that Sparks seems to jump to quickly from Creation as an act (or speech act) of God to taking the complete world of human experience as an act (or speech act) of God. I do not take every act within my experience, whether I experience them directly or indirectly, as an act of God. Surely within the horizon of my interpretive experience (my experience has horizons – I don’t experience everything), some of what I experience I can take as act (speech act) of God. But only some. Other parts of my experience are clearly acts of humans.
But can an act of a human be accurately described as also an act of God? Can God act through human actions? Reading the bible I’d have to answer affirmatively. But I’m also inclined to deny universality here. Not every human act is best described as also an act of God. There are some human acts (some of which we’d call “sins”) that are best described as purely human acts.
So part of the background of understanding the word of God in the bible is the word of God we find in creation. I also don’t have any trouble saying that because of the humanity of the bible (it’s obviously a book about and for humans), the human background is also essential to consider in interpreting Scripture.
July 3, 2008
Help on Patriotism
I’m working on a message about Jeremiah’s patriotism. I’d love your input on my theses thus far:
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Though the events of the bible took place in cultures very different from our own, we can still learn from them how we, as followers of Jesus today, ought to relate to our host cultures and communities.
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None of the nations mentioned in the bible match up exactly with any nations in the world today.
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The biblical idea of “nation” is more cultural than political in meaning. This means that “nations” are more broadly ways of living than merely ways of ordering power at the top.
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God hold nations responsible for their actions. As with individuals, the more blessed a nation, the higher the accountability.
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It is sometimes hard to tell the good nations from the bad nations when we evaluate them from what we know of God’s perspective.
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Though many nations throughout history have claimed to be God’s special people, very few (if any) have consistently acted like God’s special people. That is, they usually trust in their own abilities and resources before they trust God, and they usually seek their own agenda rather than God’s.
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God’s people have tended not to handle power better than any other group of people. Jesus gives us more of an example of how to live in weakness than how to exercise power.
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Obeying God can require you to do things that don’t look very patriotic. Jer. 21:1-10; 27:12-15; 38:17-18. Daniel, Israel, Babylon. Persia. Jesus and Rome.
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Christians are called to a dual citizenship. Citizenship in the Kingdom of God is our primary allegiance.
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There is a real sense in which the nation-state or culture in which the Christian lives is a place of exile.
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Even if the place we now live is not our ultimate home, we are to seek its peace and prosperity, not just for our own sake (we live there, after all), but for the sake of the people around us.
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Our ultimate well-being is not determined by the success of our nation, culture, economy or military, but by the grace of God.
June 14, 2008
Thinking About Justification, part 2
Here are some thoughts as I prepare to compare John Piper and N.T. Wright on justification. They are in no particular order.
One of the cornerstones of the New Perspective on Paul is that legalism was not the defining characteristic of Second Temple Judaism or Pharisaism. Rather, the Judaism of that time was a religion of grace. Law was a gift of grace, keeping the law was grace empowered.
While I think the NPP was correct to re-emphasize the role of grace in pre-Christian Judaism, and to re-evaluate the Pharisees, Piper is correct in find an anti-legalistic polemic in Paul. In this context he is also correct in suggesting a variety of ways to be legalistic, some of which evade the NPP critique while also making better sense of the texts.
A second observation is that while traditional Reformation thought on justification is framed as a return to Paul and thus a stance against legalism, it is still predicated on a legalistic framework. While it is not possible for me to earn my salvation, or perform works worthy of salvation, salvation is still on the basis of works. These works simply aren’t mine, but Christ’s. The notion is: absolutely perfect obedience is required by the law. I don’t (can’t) do that, so I am guilty, condemned to hell. But Jesus can (and does) perform perfect obedience in my place. His obedience is then reckoned (imputed) to me by faith.
I think scripture clearly presents Jesus as the only non-sinner, the only one who perfectly obeys the Father. This perfect obedience, however, requires us to dispense with some parts of the law as merely ceremonial (like working on the Sabbath). The Jesus of the Gospels, while presented as one who is entirely righteous, is also presented as freely taking upon himself the authority to reinterpret the law and apply it as he sees fit. The easy way out is to say that since Jesus is God in the flesh he had the authority to do with the law whatever he wanted. His divine authority meant that his interpretations of the law were always authoritative. I can’t help but think that the way Jesus actually worked with the law is not conducive to legalistic thinking, either that of traditionally conceived “works righteousness” or of his perfect works earning salvation.
A third area, one that perhaps provokes the most thought for me, is the varying models of sin in Piper and Wright. Piper seems clearly right that the texts depicting the depth of human sin can most naturally be read as referring to human moral failure. Sin is something I do. I need forgiveness. In reading righteousness almost exclusively as “God’s Covenant Faithfulness,” Wright appears to be playing down this aspect of sin. In our era it is common to downplay personal sin and to see humans more as victims than as perpetrators. Here I am, suffering through the pains and troubles of life. I need salvation from all these evils and troubles. Even more, the poor and oppressed of the world need a savior, not because they are sinners, but because they are routinely sinned against.
Through twenty plus years of ministry, I’ve seen the reality of passive sin – the reality that we need deliverance from the sin we suffer from living in a broken world full of people out to get us. God desires our healing. When we talk about the salvation Jesus brings, we must see that salvation encompassing deliverance from passive sin. It is in dealing with passive sin that Wright’s account is strongest. His argument (much challenged) that Israel in Jesus’ day understood itself to be still in exile, and that “forgiveness of sins” meant – at least substantially – return from exile. While I think the evidence for his position is more implicit in the texts than explicit, it is not without support. One of the curious things I find is in the very first instance of righteousness being reckoned by faith.
When the bible tells us that God reckoned Abraham righteous because of his faith, what was the sin he had committed that called out for God’s justifying action? That’s the curious thing. Abraham’s problem being addressed by God doesn’t appear to be some evil or act of disobedience committed by Abraham. Rather, the situation is Abraham’s childlessness. Now you try going into a church and talking about Abraham and the “sin” of childlessness. The childless couples of the church will toss you out on your ear before you can even finish your argument. They’ve received so much advice and guilt over their years of trying to have children (or not trying) that they have high defensive walls built up. It’s much easier to lapse into theory: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. What Paul said in Romans was true not only in his own era, but also of Abraham, the father of the faithful. Though Genesis does not make much of Abraham’s evil – and shows no awareness of it on his own part – that is what was in view when God reckoned his faith as righteousness.
Sure. Maybe. I’m happier taking the text as it is, however. When we do that, we find God’s justifying act – at least in the instance of Abraham – to be an act of showing Abraham God’s covenant faithfulness by miraculously providing a son. There was no way Abraham could have worked or obeyed himself to the paternity. He and Sarah needed an act of grace, an overt act of God’s righteousness, if the covenant was going to continue beyond their generation.
So I reckon Wright to be correct in what he affirms: God’s righteousness does refer to God’s covenant faithfulness. But I also reckon Wright to be wrong if he claims this is all there is to God’s righteousness. As Piper so clearly argues, I am not merely sinned against, I am not merely a poor mortal against whom vast frightening forces of evil are arrayed. I am a sinner. I desperately need deliverance from those powers. But I also desperately need forgiveness for my sins. A merely therapeutic account of sin and justification simply isn’t faithful to the texts as we have them – or to the reality I experience.
But there’s another wrinkle here. Though I am a sinner, my knowledge of that fact is itself a gift of grace. Apart from God’s grace I’d probably know that I’m less than perfect, that other people find me offensive from time to time, that I am not always successful. But before I was a Christian, though I knew all these things, I did not wallow in a sense of guilt wondering who would save me, how I could possibly be forgiven. While I had been in church enough to be able to use the word sinner to describe myself in certain contexts, I didn’t really think it was all that bad. After all, I was a good kid. Not only was I good student, I was a Boy Scout. I obeyed my parents when I wanted to. I never got in trouble publicly. I was way better than most people I knew. Though Christian Smith’s term, Moral Therapeutic Deism, is of recent vintage, I think it would have described my pre-Christian point of view.
Tom Wright is clearly not a proponent of MTD. God’s righteousness is only covenant faithfulness, and this faithfulness excludes reference to making a covering for my sin, I fear that MTD is not too far away.
I’ll say more in a later post.
October 19, 2007
Slippery Jesus
We who delve into the bible and lead congregations… Yes, it appears possible to do the one and not the other: One can delve into the bible purely for personal benefit, or one can lead congregations and ignore the bible. But the best option is to delve into the bible, thereby listening to God, and from that listening, lead God’s people. Surely this leadership need not be from the top – from the position of pastoral CEO or Chair. Bible-produced leadership is just as possible from someone who has no official position.
Back to the original thought. Here I am, delving into my bible and leading congregations (I speak of my life over the past 20 years). I find myself in an uncomfortable place. One of the things I find in the bible is that people need Jesus. This bible-enunciated need has also been evidenced by what I see in actual living, breathing people. I need Jesus. Other folks need Jesus.
Have you ever noticed, however, that many people either don’t think they need Jesus or if they see the need, fail to act on it? I’ve been lost, so I know what it is to be blind to the Gospel. I’m a sinner, so I know what it is to not act on what I know I need to do. The confusion I’m talking about today is with the church (sinners within) rather than sinners without.
Almost every church I’ve pastored would have defended the idea that it is the church’s job to join in God’s work of helping people know Jesus. Almost as universally, these churches have acted like meeting the needs of church members and keeping them happy is the most important task of the church (or of the pastor, as the case may be). Those folks out there ought to come to our programs and participate in our ministries.
But they don’t. At least not enough to staunch a decades long decline in United Methodism as a whole – and most of our congregations taken individually.
Faced with these details, many who speak up for leadership in the church tell us we need to change. We need to get back to God. Out of obedience to God we need to do everything possible to fulfill the Great Commission – and to lead our churches in that direction. Yes! my heart says. That’s exactly what we need to do. If some of the members aren’t up to it, if they want to stick with the old ways that continue to not win the lost, well, they can just be lost themselves. The changes we need to make to fulfill the Great Commission will necessarily leave some behind, since not all are concerned with the Great Commission, apparently preferring to keep things they way they’ve always been. Nice and comfortable.
New pastors come to these “don’t rock the boat” churches with instructions to “reach people,” to “grow the church.” The old timers don’t know what hit them. They just know that their church has been taken from them. Or… the hard charging, determined-to-reach-the-lost-at-any-cost pastor is run off with this tail between his legs, either to go plant a church, try another transformation, or to sell insurance.
Where does Jesus fit in this mix (mess)? We could look at John 10 – the Good Shepherd. He’s a good enough shepherd that he doesn’t lose any. That’s way better than any shepherd (pastor) I’ve ever known. We all lose some, if for no other reason that we’re different from the last pastor. Surely the pastor who read John 10 and patterned ministry after Jesus would do everything to make sure none were lost?
Maybe. Maybe not. What about the Jesus of John 6? That Jesus begins well – feeding the multitude. We all like a free lunch. But by the end of the chapter he’s gotten so controversial that most of the crowd has left in disgust. He turns to the twelve. “Hey! Do you guys want to leave also? If so, you better hit the road.” Where’s the Good Shepherd who wants to keep everyone, no matter the cost?
Jesus is slippery. He just doesn’t fit our models.
Some of us like the model of Jesus as chaplain. Be nice. Make everyone happy. Don’t rock the boat.
Some of us like the model of Jesus the creator of storms. Stir things up. Cause a ruckus. Polarize.
Well, which is it? Do we pastors work our tails off to make everyone happy so no one ever leaves? Or do we push radical change to reach the lost, regardless of who (or how many) may depart in the interim? I – with the help of Jesus – could make either case.
But I don’t think either is the right place to begin.
Instead, let’s consider stepping back and engaging Jesus in his context. Instead of taking our perception of our own context and laying Jesus (or our abstractions of Jesus) on top of them, let’s do what Jesus did. Put ourselves entirely at God’s disposal. Regular prayer and fasting. A broken heart for people – those on the inside, those on the outside. An irrationally stubborn commitment to his mission (how rational do you think it is to forego a quiet life of carpentery – or fishing – to go to Jerusalem to be betrayed, whipped and crucified?) regardless of how people responded (his best buds all ran away. Oh. All but two. One betrayed him, the other stayed close enough to deny him).
What would happen if we congregational leaders followed this Jesus – regardless of whether it made people happy or not? Regardless of whether it brought in the crowds or not?
It may be that we’ll be crucified. Wouldn’t be the first time. But it just may well be that we’ll hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
August 23, 2007
Continuing through 1 John
Since I’ll be out of my Sunday school class again this week (teaching the youth class), I’ve again prepared a lesson for them. Here it is in case anyone else might profit from it.
Sunday School Questions – 1 John 2 part 3
NRS 1 John 2:7 Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you have had from the beginning; the old commandment is the word that you have heard. 8 Yet I am writing you a new commandment that is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining.
Don’t you love John’s style? “I’m not writing you a new commandment, only an old one. But, yes, I’m writing a new one also.” What do you think is going on here? What have you seen in the text of 1 John so far that you think John’s audience would take as “nothing new?” Do you see anything yet that was likely new to them? (One possibility is that “new” has the sense here of “renewed.” Sure, it’s an old commandment, but it finds new statement – or restatement in new terms – in the life and teaching of Jesus.)
John says the new commandment is “true in him and in you.” What does it mean to say that a commandment is “true?” It seems more common to say that a commandment is “authoritative,” “wise,” “good for us.” But “true?” But then it’s not simply “true,” but “true in him and in you.” Who is the “him” John is thinking of? How is a command true in a person? Looking at yourselves, what might it mean to say that a commandment is true in you? One possibility is that John is saying that the commandment has been truly expressed in the life of Jesus – not just words from his mouth, but enacted in his life – and that in a similar way the commandment is now being enacted by the people in his audience. (The NIV translation – “Its truth is seen in him…” supports this idea.) If you think this is a possible interpretation, how do you see commandments enacted in your own lives?
Now we come to another question of interpretation. Does the explanatory phrase at the end of v. 8 explain “I am writing” or “is true?” In other words, is John writing what he is because of this change in circumstances, that is, that the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining – or is the commandment “true in him and in you” because of those circumstances? Both the NIV and the NRS are ambiguous. The New Living Translation, however, drops the “I am writing” phrase leaving the explanation to apply simply to the truth of the commandment.
What might it mean that the “darkness is passing?” Would you prefer that it be “the darkness is past – since darkness has a negative connotation here? What is meant by “the true light?” How does what John says here relate to what you find in John 1:9-12; 3:16-21; 8:12; Romans 13:11-14; Ephesians 5:8; Colossians 1:0-14; 1 John 1:5-7?
NRS 1 John 2:9 Whoever says, “I am in the light,” while hating a brother or sister, is still in the darkness. 10 Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling. 11 But whoever hates another believer is in the darkness, walks in the darkness, and does not know the way to go, because the darkness has brought on blindness.
John continues his use of light language. What actions does he describe as clearly incompatible with walking in the light – embodying the truth of the commandment? Do you agree with him about this? Why or why not? If he’s right, why is hating apparently so common among those who call themselves believers?What might cause one believer to hate another? What effect does this hatred have on the hater? The hated? On the church as a whole? The word translated “stumbling” is the word skandalon. I bet you can figure out what English word we get from that. If we think of hate among believers as a “scandal,” what does it add to our understanding of this passage?