The last word... and the word after that.

If you haven't read this book by Brian Mclaren and have ever wondered about hell, or how a good god can send people there, or salvation and judgement, read this book! It really is just a new take on how we view theology, scripture, and the christian walk. He just goes into these topics in detail.

I hate what I am

White Male. I hate being a white male. Most of the injustice in the past 1000 years is credited to white males. Now who I am as a creature of God is regardless of my skin tone or sex. But I am all things that God hates. Without Christ, I am nearly as bad as it gets. I have aided oppression, even directly oppressed at time. I have averted my eyes from the homeless, the poor, and the emotionally needy.

Let me tell you a story from my life that speaks to the innermost of my being.

I was in college in Austin, walking down the drag on my way home from class I passed by Austin 1st Baptist, a spot frequented by the "streetrats" as they are often called there. There were half a dozen or so people sitting on the front steps. I saw the way they looked at the other passers-by, sneering or disgusted by them. While the passers-by did their best to keep their conversations moving fluidly and their minds off of the ragged group. I sighed in relief as I shook my pocket to see if I had any change.

How disgusting is that! I was looking for the least interaction possible with these people. As I got closer I recognized a few of them from the area. Some of them appeared new, still wearing decent clothing. One of the older men had a dog. Most of them were in their 20s. As I approached I averted my eyes like all of the others, not just trying to avoid staring, but avoiding social contact at all costs. When I was still a short distance off I quickly scanned the group for any information that would be useful.

This is when I first noticed him. He was my age, wearing all black clothing, not in too terrible of condition. He had a dog tethered to him by his beltloops. His face was severely swollen on one side, crusty and scabbed, but still bleeding and oozing. He had either fallen from a moving vehicle, or been beaten very badly. I doubt he had a car which left one option. He was smoking a cigarette and sneering at every person as they walked by, yelling out at some. As I approached I kept thinking just get home without hurting anyones feelings.

"Hey buddy, you spare any change?"

I couldn't ignore him... but I wanted to. I turned towards him to answer his question, but didn't quite turn enough to make eye contact to make sure he didn't think I was staring at his disfigured face. I replied that I "only used credit" which was a lie. I felt relief as I continued on my way, almost happy with myself for skirting out of the situation without any damage done on either side when he stopped me cold in my tracks. My heart sank lower than I thought possible with his next question.

"Well then... Can you spare a hug?"

I was crushed. I turned and looked at him. He was testing me, or making fun of me. Whatever he was doing, it touched me deeply. He might not have been homeless. Many of the panhandlers on the drag are not. He could live without the money. What he couldn't live without was feeling human. People ignored, avoided, and lied to him regularly as they walked by. He wasn't even looked down upon... nobody took the time to look at him at all.

He wasn't asking for the change, or even the hug, but for me to consider him a human. A person of worth. Everything I was taught by society told me to avoid him. He is dirty, poor, and homeless. These are apparently sins. Homeless people are homeless because they make bad decisions. They are dangerous. They don't have personality they are cold hearted. In this moment he was overturning my world. Life didn't make sense for me any more if I could live in the affluence that I did and ignore these people on the street. Even if the things society had taught me had been true... it still wasn't right.

After a pause, and the thought of him smearing his bloody (probably diseased I thought) face on my face and shirt, I said of course.

I turned and looked him in the eye, and hugged him. I didn't leave feeling good about doing the right thing. I left hating myself for who I had been. He said thanks as I walked off and some of his buddies snickered. He was playing with me, teasing me, but teaching me at the same time.

So how do I respond to being a white male who treats the poor like a trash heap?

I see injustice daily, and yet it is still a struggle to give up my surplus to help those without any. I am thankful for the pain I feel in failing this way. It is leading me to live more like Christ.

I have some thoughts going through my mind lately. Revolutionary thoughts. I used to tell myself that a life of relative poverty was not for everyone. Giving up earthly possessions was not for everyone. What a cop out. I don't believe having things is wrong, but I always have more than I want. I don't even take just more than I need, I take more than I want. That way every desire of my flesh is filled every time. How terrible this is. I never feel even want for anything, when so many millions of people live in need things.

I believe God is leading me to a simpler life. One where I rely on Him to meet my needs. It is time for drastic change. I am starting to plan my change for January. As of now here is some of what it will look like.

I will prepare my home for sale and put it on the market. I will sell most of my possessions. I might sell my car, I am not sure about that one yet. Then I will move into the city. Into the midtown or montrose area. I will live in a cheap apartment or house that I rent. I will get a job teaching at an inner city school. With the 40k I make I will live off of only 24k (less or more if needed). I will take the money from my possessions and the excess I make and start a homeless ministry called "The Beat."

The Beat would be a relationally based ministry. It would meet people on the street where they are and love them for who they are, not try to change them.

At first I would be the only employee. I would pick an area near to home to walk daily. I would take a backpack with bottled water and protein bars. The first few weeks I might just walk. After a while I would meet some of the homeless people. After developing relationships with them I would make sure they had access to everything they needed. I would make contacts with social workers, churches, missions, government agents, and others to secure the help they would need. There would be a foundation for the organization. With money that I raise I would be able to pay for an apartment for a year for people who want to get off the street. I would also have contacts with employment for these people.

In the end it is a ministry about loving these people first where they are. If they want to change, then I will help. If they don't, maybe seeing my life will help change that.

I would like to open the program up on a yearlong basis to others. I would like to work out a system where it could become an internship for credit with colleges and seminaries. Students would work in pairs. They would be assigned a "beat" to walk every day and do the same things I do. They would also have scheduled readings during the day. At night we would meet to discuss the readings and our experiences of the day.

Let me know if you have suggestions or any input for the idea.

In the end I am driven from the life of excess that focuses on monetary success and fame. I want to do something that affects someone else positively, and I think we are all called to do that.

The Church

While I'm at it I would like to discuss the shift in church models the emergent movement is taking. I like some of the things that are happening on this front.

Far too many times worship services have become the church's prime evangelism field. This isn't a part of the model in the new testament at all. Now I am not saying that what we see in acts or in extra-biblical literature is the only way church can be done, but I think we have lost the point in some of it. I have seen church service after service sacrifice good, challenging teaching because they do not want to offend any "non-believers" in the congregation.

In the early church if you wanted to become a member of a congregation you would formally declare this. Then you would be a catechumen. Then you had to wait a year or so to be baptized after lent and become a full member of the church. Catechumen were only allowed to join the congregation for the first part of the service which was singing, teaching, and meditating on scripture. The second half (thats right HALF) of the service was the lord's supper.

While you were a catechumen you were assigned one member to be your mentor. A person who would teach you the ways of christianity. Understand that at this time many members would have been Jews who didn't really have a "conversion" so to speak. They had a continuation of their religion by believing the messiah had come. Gentiles would have made up the majority of the catechumenae.

These were services that focused on god, and on our communal seeking and praising of him. They were not evangelism fields, they were a place for christians to worship and grow. Now outside of the services the church would have been active in the community. The church would have cared for the poor, orphans, and widows. They would have helped the sick and supported the oppressed. Through these interactions in the community the church would have had quite a good name. (at the same time though terrible rumours would have been spread about the practices of christianity)

I think the emergent model does not see evangelism in the traditional I speak, you listen, you decide to be converted sense. It sees evangelism as a part of spreading God's love. When we love people as Christ would have us, they will decide to follow christ as we are christ to them.

I like how the services are geared toward worship and searching for God. I like how the services are very communal and about our experience of God with a community. I like how the doors are always open to anyone, but that whoever shows up is going to be challenged about the manner in which they live their lives. And finally, I like how the church is again becoming involved in the community outside of christian circles and with a purpose of fighting injustice and showing love.

Disgusted

The reason the whole emergent/ing or just anti-modern/institutional church... whatever words you use to describe it, the reason it started is because people were becoming disgusted with the church. We had ceased to be the church and the church had become its own monster.

Most criticism of the emergent movement includes some mention of how it is just another movement to cater to the newest generation and their fads. This thought process alone makes me sick. The church is not an institution to be molded and changed. The church is people, it is us. The emergent movement is not even a retranslation of church, it is God's body changing. We are changed, therefore the church changes with us. The church is constantly morphing and looking at it as a controllable entity is the problem in the first place.

The emergent movement seeks to affect people, to make faith alive to them, to journey with them. In this way the church never stops changing. This is not just the newest way of looking at church, but a restructuring, yes even a deconstruction of the church.

We have become tired of the christian political right which claims religion as its base but acts often without it. I am not saying that the left is right, I'm just saying we shouldn't claim religion in an attempt to organize political thought.

Along the same lines we have become a religion of finger pointing. Never happy with ourselves, and always pointing out the weakness of others. Rob Bell speaks on the subject. He talks about christians picketing at an abortion clinic and responds to this "Why blame the dark for being dark? It is far more helpful to ask why the light isn't as bright as it could be." (velvet elvis)

How true! We are not the new jerusalem, we are not the city on a hill. Christian people are, the US govt is not. I am tired of christian mores and values being laid upon our nation. In Romans Paul says we should not burden new believers with many rules. He comes up with 4. And yet we have no problem expecting someone who doesn't give Christ any authority in their life to submit to a crazy list of rules that we have extracted, without context, out of scripture.

Why can't we spend our energies focusing on making the light as bright as possible, then our influence can spread farther and farther. If we just keep yelling at the dark to shape up and brighten itself, we aren't going to get very far.

Rules, lists, organization and God's will.

How do we discern God's will? and is it our place to discern God's will in others lives?

I know that brotherly accountability is an important part of christian community, but it should be just as the two adjectives say, brotherly, and christian. Is it my place to discern sin in the life of a fellow christian who I hardly know? I do not look at my behavior as governed by a set of rules that God handed down in the bible. There is truth in the bible, but it is not an owner's manual, or Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth (even though burlap to cashmere would have you think so). The bible is a beautiful picture of God, it is for many the first picture of God encountered.

Anyway, I'm not sure if it is my place to point out sin in someones life that I am not very involved in. I've been thinking a lot lately about how the bible isn't a list of rules, so how then are we to live? What is orthodox and unorthodox behavior? Patrick (my roommate {i like to think of him as my life-mate}) and I had a discussion about this. What delineates between sin and not sin, good and bad behavior, seeking God's will or following your own?

When I think about seeking God's will in my own life, I do it in a number of ways. I seek the advice of more mature christians; I use the wisdom I have gained through my experiences in the world; I study the truths that are evident in the big picture of scripture. I use other mediums too.

So is there a realm of good behavior, and one of bad, sin and not sin? Or is there a gray area that shades from black to white? I believe that God leads us in certain directions. And it is up to us to discern that direction (with the help of others). Ultimately the decision is yours. God used "bad" people in the old testament to do great things. Sometimes he even told the people to break the rules he had set for them. God tells Hosea to take a prostitute as a wife. This would have broken more rules than one. So was God then mad at Hosea for breaking his rules? That does not fit with my picture of God.

Paul talks about permissibility and beneficiality in ! Corinthians. I write this paragraph with the caveat that Patrick completely disagrees with my interpretation of this passage. But what does Patrick know (we're not gay). Paul quotes the corinthians when he says "Everything is permissible for me"—but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"—but I will not be mastered by anything." My interpretation is that Paul is agreeing with the corinthian in word. Paul says yes, all things are permissible, God has created all things, and therefore we are to use and enjoy them. However, not everything is beneficial, and you should not let things get out of control. I see paul again preaching moderation here. Sex is good, alcoholic drinks are good, that blonde girl from 7th grade with the awesomely dorky yearbook picture, they are all created by God, and wonderfully so, and they are all good. But when you misuse sex, when you misuse alcohol, when you make fun of the yearbook picture, that is when it goes wrong. It isn't clear cut, it isn't black and white

Now if each person is responsible for knowing God's will in their lives we are opening ourselves up to dealing with people who claim heinous things as God's will. It is a slippery slope, but a slippery slope that allows freedom to seek God's will is better than a prison of rules that God might have us venture out of.

I believe we must all seek God's will. Sometimes his will lead us into areas that are shaded pretty darkly. As Patrick constantly reminded me, it is only very carefully and with great confidence in our knowledge of God's will that we venture into the dark areas. And as christian brothers (and sisters) we would know each other well enough to see God's will in our friends lives, otherwise we have little right to speak into them. We should not only quote scripture to point out sin, if we feel a fellow christian has been led astray, we must join them in the search for God's will in their lives and not impose God's will for our lives onto theirs.


We must not categorize the bible as an instruction manual for life, and search for black and white rules for life within it. We must constantly seek God's will for every event in our lives. God will reveal his good and perfect plan, and we can confidently move forward knowing we are pleasing Him.

I believe! Help my unbelief.

What a powerful paradox!

This is a quote from a man in Mark 9 who has an epileptic son. He beseeches Jesus for help saying "if you can."

Jesus responds by saying "'If you can?' everything is possible for him who believes."

The man then exclaims "I do believe; help my unbelief!"

The idea that we both believe and at the same time don't believe does not fit in my brain. It does fit in my heart, though. While I cannot explain this paradox, I can experience it.


I had to write a paper for class last night and so I have decided to combine both classes into one blog (this will probably be the protocol from now on).

The one thing I really learned in class this weekend was sympathy for the pharisees. As I have mentioned before we have this hate for the pharisees (I have used the term rabbi and pharisee interchangeably here, which is not really the truth. A rabbi was a teacher, often a leader of the local synagogue. Pharisees were members of a specific sect, or movement. Therefore a rabbi could be a pharisee or could not be. And not all pharisees were rabbis.). that most likely stems from anti-semetic sources. While Jesus is critical of the pharisees, they were men who were seeking God as best they knew. They were considered orthodox at the time, just maybe a little strict. The pharisees had set up a list of rules that were to help keep israel from breaking God's commands. Breaking these rules themselves was not a sin, but it could lead to sin. Therefore, the pharisees demanded that israel follow their rules. Jesus refers to this when he mentions the heavy load they have put upon the people, and even when he refers to his own yoke (rabbinical set of personal doctrine) as light (not heavy). The pharisees believed that a righteous Israel would speed the kingdom of God (and messiah) coming to earth.

Now people question the pharisees hearts when they see them constantly question Christ. Questioning was the main form of teaching in this day. Rabbis would test their students through questions and the students would respond with a question that showed they knew the answer. Rabbis would also test the new teachings of other rabbis by asking questions. So when the bible refers to pharisees testing Jesus, maybe it was a socially accepted method at the time.

Also in Deuteronomy Israel is told to kill anyone who does magic and leads the people astray. The people who are led astray are also to be killed. We see this in action when the levites kill all of the worshipers of the golden calf. Well when Jesus comes, and does miracles, are they miracles (the hand of god) or are they magic? Jesus doesn't claim where his power comes from to the crowds. He also tells most of the witnesses to keep quiet about it. Finally Jesus doesn't pray over the people he heals (most other healing accounts from jewish literaturewere centered around prayer).

It seems as if Jesus might be a magician. The pharisees were therefore very wary of him. They would not have wanted to have to kill him and all of his followers. Killing them might have caused an uproar among the peoples, and the pharisees after all are not accomplished killers, but rather men who might have taken the burden of punishment for breaking the law into their hands.

These men are seeking God, incorrectly be it, but with a heart that yearned to be right with Him. My impression is that Christ criticizes these men the most. He seems to have forgiveness for the common man, and sharp words for the rabbis. Was this because the rabbis were given a position of authority and thus were held to higher standards. Or was it because Christ knew if he changed the rabbis (and tradition holds that around 1/3 of the pharisees became christians) that he could reach more people (his discipleship model in action again). Or was it mearly the burden they placed on the backs of the people as Jesus said.

Any way you look at it, I get the feeling these pharisees were not the worst fellas on the planet.

Class

I have classes on Friday and Saturday, so from now on I will probably blog the interesting facts we learned in class on those days. I want this to be a place of discussion, not just things I've learned from other people that I want to pass on.

You can see previous blogs in the menu on the right.

You can comment on this blog with any topics you would like to hit soon. Load it up so I have something to do until I find a job.

gehenna

It was a garbage dump just outside of jerusalem. obviously the civil service was not as up to date in jerusalem as it is in the US now. Back then people would just dump their trash in this valley. People who were denied a proper burial were also thrown on the trash heap there.

occasionally there would be fires to help with the terrible smell, and to lessen the volume of trash. Child sacrifices happened to Molech here under a few isrealite kings. drums were beaten loudly to keep the fathers from hearing the groans of their children as they were burned alive in the trash.

what a great reputation the place must have had in israel!

also it was reported in some ancient literature that sometimes brimstone(sulfur) would be added to keep the fire burning hotter and longer. this is one of i believe 2 or 3 references where hell and fire have been connected. many of the other references are sketchy at best. one is the reference of john the baptist to the winnowers fire. i.e. the grain (good wholesome christian folk) and the chaff (vile pagans) will be separated out and the chaff will be burned. well obviously john is speaking literally here, after all i am a head of barley...so he must really mean fire... we will get to the others later.

one more note and we should be done with gehenna. one thing we kind of dont get in western culture that the jew did was the idea of purity. There are two scales with two values each. The first is the Holy-Common scale. holy was things set apart for god, common was normal things. the temple and sacrifices had to be holy, the bread you ate for dinner was common. the second scale is clean-unclean. This scale was based on levitical purity laws. it wasnt believed that things could be holy and unclean (but the red heifer's ashes were explained so). so unclean wasnt necessarily a result of sin (e.g. menstruation) but it was not desireable. Anywho, gehenna would have been looked at as unclean and common. Which is pretty much the worst combo. Jews would have avoided the place other than dumping trash.

another interesting point is that in jewish literature we see gehenna evolve as a place where people who commit certain sins go and spend a year or so paying for their sins, while more serious sins require eternal punishment. one of the more minor sins is listening to women too much... wouldnt want to be guilty of that one.

the important point when looking at a lot of these concepts of hell, is to recognize whether or not a word we see as possibly being symbolic evolved from its original meaning to take on a meaning of hell, or if the translators misinterpreted that into the translations. Was jesus just referring to gehenna to evoke images of a terrible, god forsaken place? or did he mean that hell was actually a 1/5ths model of gehenna that is buried 1500 miles below the earths crust, or somewhere in between?

absolute truth

does it exist? in the postmodern world there has been a fairly universal rejection of absolute truth. truth has become a matter of opinion, or merely reduced to a reaction to one's experiences.

This is not because postmodern folk inherently hate anything absolute, it is because they know how limited we are in philosophical functioning, and how quickly we become set in our beliefs, willing to defend them to the death at the expense of healthy debate.

I have come to question many of the "absolute truths" of christianity lately. I haven't found these questions detrimental to my faith, but rather invigorating. Heaven, Hell, inerrency of scripture, salvation...

I don't choose not to believe in any of these things, I choose to realize I have little knowledge of them, and that they are only a part of the larger truth.

Let's examine the inerrency of scripture: mainstream christianity claims the authority of scripture from 2nd timothy 3:16 (all scripture is god-breathed). The academic world has laughed for centuries at the circularity of this argument. Either way, if we look at the actual circumstances, a letter from Paul, telling his pal Tim the secrets of ministry, we have a few more questions. What is the scripture that paul mentions, what scripture would have been aroudn at the time, he most certainly did not mean the bible we have today, unless he was prophesying it because many of the contents of our bible would not have been written at this time (while they would have for the most part existed somehow in oral form, scripture does mean written).

There are also small inconsistencies in the bible. Mainstream christianity attempts to reconcile many of these inconsistencies, which just shows an unwillingness to look at the issue as a big picture.

Mainstream (read: Western) christianity has turned religion into a very individual, personal, extra-contextual, bible obsessed, self help program.

When i see inconsistencies in the text, i explore them if they have any significance, if they dont seem to, i forget them.

Origen, an early third century church father (the time when scripture was being formalized), had some interesting thoughts on scripture. He believed that in scripture we find all meaningful truths for life and plenty of inconsistencies, contradictions, and inaccuracies. He said truth is NOT factual knowledge, but knowledge of Christ (sounds pretty anti-systematic theology). He thought that the inconsistencies in the text helped push us past a surface-only reading of the text and into a deeper study of the meaning.

I guess it all comes down to this. Are we going to keep holding on, keep building our walls around our faith and hiding behind them? Or are we going to open ourselves to the attacks of the world, the attacks of pagans, the attacks of ourselves?

When we ask these questions we don't chip away at our faith, we chip away at the crap that we have layered over it. Meaningful and intelligent discussion is the refiner's fire of Malachi.

All truth is from god, or even IS god. If i am searching for god (truth) then I will find it (him); in the mountains, in the cosmos, in books (including scripture), in churches, and in the gutters.

What is important is not where i search, for god created everything and therefore his mystery is revealed everywhere. What is important is that i AM searching. I am sharpening my iron against the iron of others. That i engage my own mind in meaningful questions and discussion about god. If we don't seek him we won't every truly find him, and if we just listen to mainstream religion, we aren't seeking.



Sorry this was so scatterbrained, it might become more organized in the coming week. and please, for the love of god (literally) engage me on the subject.

First Post

Welcome all to Snod Bloggins!

I hope this will be a place where questions can be asked, and information passed along, and hopefully we will stumble upon some truth.

The first topics might be a reposting of material that has already been discussed, but the discussion is always open of course.

Also here is my disclaimer, I want to question everything, and seek answers for myself, with the guidance of others, more learned or not. I will certainly get some things wrong, and make some (hopefully not) critical errors. Please feel free to challenge or correct me. I am in no way a scholar (I haven't even decided if I dream to be one or not).

Snod