Guest Blogger: John Stackhouse, Ph.D (Regent College): The Secret

Oprah Winfrey’s latest spiritual sensation is The Secret. Her talk show has featured it prominently, her website presents a lot of material on it, and she directs us to those who are now marketing The Secret through webcasts, DVDs, and other media that more than coincidentally recall The Da Vinci Code.
The Secret promises a better life for everyone. Testimonies abound from those who have found business success, romance, marital happiness, emotional and physical healing, and weight loss (not to be despised) through applying The Secret. So should we, as the advertisements proclaim, prepare for “a new era for mankind”? The first thing to say about The Secret is that it isn’t new, and it isn’t a secret. The Secret is simply the latest version of “mind over matter.”

In some cultures, yes, this sort of teaching was kept secret–literally, “esoteric.” Only initiates could find out that the world was not, in fact, the material stuff we all naturally think it is, but is in fact essentially spirit or–in a term more acceptable to those in the age of quantum mechanics–”energy.” Seeing the spiritual essence of things was the great knowledge–in Greek, the gnosis–that let one free oneself from material encumbrances to enjoy a higher life. Thus The Secret is simply the newest packaging for gnosticism, a religious impulse that courses through a variety of religions around the world and that has been making a comeback in our own time.

To be sure, this particular form of gnosticism is particularly suited to our age in that it does not call us away from the material world to a better, spiritual one, but instead tells us that there is just one cosmos of energy that we can then manipulate by force of will. So you can have all the spiritual rewards you want plus all the material rewards you want as well–just by choosing to have them.

Proponents of The Secret don’t put it quite that way, to be sure. They speak instead of good attitudes, good beliefs, good intentions, and good actions. All of those, however, emerge from choices we make. The Secret therefore simply is that we can have everything we want and be whomever we want to be by force of will.
Some viewers are recorded on Oprah’s website as raising questions about the compatibility of this view with Christianity–as well they might. The soothing answer, however, is what you would expect if you know Oprah’s general take on things: There is nothing in this teaching to contradict the essence of any of the world’s great religions. For those who believe in a God who orders the universe, The Secret is just a description of the way God does so. For those who don’t believe in such a God, The Secret is just a description of the way things are.
Indeed, for those who wonder about heaven and hell in this view, the advice comes back that we should concentrate on the here and now, escaping the hells our negative thoughts have created for us and achieving the heavens on earth we desire.

This way of viewing things has a long history in America. Indeed, Yale professor Harold Bloom calls gnosticism the quintessential American religion. We can master the world by dint of positive thinking and applied effort. Nothing finally will stand in our way. Ralph Waldo Emerson was openly atheistic about it. Mary Baker Eddy gave us “Christian Science.” Norman Vincent Peale domesticated it for Christian consumption as “positive thinking.” And Robert Schuller repackaged it as “possibility thinking” in our own day.
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Oprah Winfrey touts it, because her background in American churches exposed her to the “health-and-wealth” teaching–the “name it and claim it” challenge to “have faith” and you can have everything else–that prevails in much contemporary Protestantism both here and, especially in Pentecostal and charismatic circles, around the world.

What makes The Secret so troubling, from my point of view, is that it is a stew of the good and the bad, such that the good is genuinely nourishing, while the bad is genuinely toxic. There are several positive things, in fact, one can say about The Secret. For one, it is standard psychological wisdom that certain kinds of negative thought habits really do cause one to fail in life, and certain kinds of positive thought habits help one succeed. Cognitive therapy–particularly in the useful popular form of Dr. David Burns’s Feeling Good Handbook–is all about forming good thoughts to replace bad ones.

For another, we can see the intertwining of religion and social consequences in lots of spheres, whether the economic and social improvement experienced by millions of poor people in Latin America who embrace Christian ethics regarding alcohol, responsible work, and family loyalty (as seen in David Martin’s scholarship); or in the long-observed paradox of monastic and Mennonite wealth: self-denial, thrift, and hard work often lead to riches. Anxiety and anger have been linked numerous times now to heart disease, high blood pressure (no kidding), digestive disorders (ditto), and other terrible physical consequences. Presumably, then, dealing well with anxiety and anger would lead to greater physical health.
So I’m all for proper positive thinking.

What is spiritual lethal in this concoction, however, is actually several poisons, and–ironically–they all have to do with choice. The first is the religious relativism that denies all the distinctives of the world’s religions and affirms instead a generic spiritual “essence”–which they really don’t have. This teaching, which purports to respect all faiths, in fact insults most of them, because it shears off any particular teaching they might have about, say, the unique inspiration of the Qur’an, or the special covenant God made with the Jews, or the efficacy of the Noble Eightfold Path, or the atonement of Jesus on the Cross. “All that stuff doesn’t matter,” according to The Secret. “What matters is the essential spirituality of all things, and your ability to direct it to what you want.” And that is not what Islam, or Judaism, or Buddhism, or Christianity actually teaches. Nowhere close. So you have to choose. The Secret is a particular religious option among many, not the Lowest Common Denominator of all religions.

The second is the poison of self-will. It’s all about me and it’s all up to me. Um, no. From a Christian perspective, it’s about God, and the world, and me, and it’s up to God, and the world, and me. I am a dependent and interdependent being, and I need to call on God to help me, and draw on the world’s resources in gratitude and faith, or I will perish. I don’t have that much power. The third is the poison of blaming the victim. Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for empowerment, for self-respect, for teaching about responsibility and opportunity that helps people free themselves from traps of perpetual servitude–economic, political, sexual, or psychological. But this teaching basically says that your problems are your fault as the flip side to its message of hope. And that teaching is just disgusting when one considers the cases of so many people who have been damaged and oppressed and who still are–and can do little about it. How do you preach The Secret to young, addicted prostitutes in East Vancouver or Bangkok? How do you preach it to widows and orphans in Darfur refugee camps?

The fourth also has to do with choice, and it is the refusal to admit that we in fact have to choose and in particular that we have to make trade-offs in life. We can’t have it all, do it all, or be it all. Christianity in particular puts it starkly: You have to die in order to live. You have to be willing to sacrifice your money, your health, your family, your dreams, your beauty, and even your life itself if required by discipleship to Jesus. Yes, the reward for such sacrifice is greatly worthwhile. But it is indeed a sacrifice–of everything–to his service. The Secret, therefore, is wishful thinking that does not correspond to the way things are. Some of it does, yes, which is why people can honestly testify to good things resulting from it. But some of it does not, and down that blithe spiritual path lies disastrous confrontation with a world that will not simply conform to our preferences.

The last point I want to make, though, is not critical of The Secret. It is critical of us Christians. By God’s grace to us, we know better, we know Christ and his gospel of new life, and yet often we have failed to speak to the spiritual realities so skillfully addressed by proponents of The Secret. There is a lot of pain out there, and a lot of pain in here, too, and a lot of frustration with techniques and habits and outlooks and ideas that aren’t working. People don’t embrace something new unless what they currently have is inadequate. I take it for granted that the gospel is not inadequate. So it must be our preaching, and our worship, and our churches, and our families, and our books, and our youth groups, and our marriage seminars that are failing to offer people the light they need.

To be sure, some people embrace The Secret because they really don’t want to worship Jesus as Lord, don’t want a Saviour, don’t want to be conformed to a tradition, don’t want to depend on others. They want to be in control and run their lives and be “spiritual” strictly on their own terms. Okay. But lots of people embrace The Secret, I daresay, because they want hope, and power for living, and freedom from the past, and forgiveness–and where else can they get that? Where else, indeed?

SiCKO: Entertaining, Informative and Important

"The weight of evidence Moore marshals for taking the profit motive out of medicine is overwhelming. In a summer of dumb, shameless drivel, Moore delivers a movie of robust mind and heart. You'll laugh till it hurts." -- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

Most people who know me know that I often speak of the job of the prophet (the one who speaks to a culture that has become morally corrupt and off track) as prophetic critique and prophetic hope. Those same people also know that while I love a good Michael Moore documentary, I often criticize him for only offering critique and not hope...SiCKO changes that. The film is really quite an accomplishment. It ciritcizes the American Health Care System/Industry and concludes that it is simply morally wrong for America, the richest country in the world, to continue to be the only First-World country without Universal Health Care.

The film begins with an important statement: "This is not a film about the 50 million American`s without healthcare in this country...this is about the 250 million American`s with healthcare..." How could that make for an interesting film? Because it then becomes the healthcare industry (Drug companies, Insurance companies, Politicians) that become the focus of criticism. In short, the film is about the systemic problems and injustices--the weakness and corruption within the beauracratic system itself, which makes for a more important film--because it highlights the very system that can actually change all of this for America, rather then just reeling about systems that cannot create change--like the doctors or nurses themselves.

As a Canadian the film made me appreciate our universal healthcare system and helps me put high taxes in context...which is important. The film briefly highlights Tommy Douglas, recently voted to be the most important Canadian in history. Of course, Douglas was the one who created the Candian healthcare system. The following is the write-up from Wikipedia about Douglas: (October 20, 1904 – February 24, 1986) was a Scottish-born Baptist minister who became a prominent Canadian social democratic politician. As leader of the Saskatchewan Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) from 1942 and the seventh Premier of Saskatchewan from 1944 to 1961, he led the first socialist government in North America and introduced universal public medicare to Canada. When the CCF united with the Canadian Labour Congress to form the New Democratic Party, he was elected as its first federal leader and served in that post from 1961 to 1971. In 2004, he was voted "The Greatest Canadian" of all time in a nationally televised contest organized by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The miniseries Prairie Giant: The Tommy Douglas Story, was filmed between February and May of 2005 and aired on CBC Television in two parts on March 12 and 13, 2006.

So why doesn`t the US have "socialized healthcare" (there is a great part about the evils of even the concept of socialized anything because of communism and the Russian propoganda--including a recording of Ronald Reagan explaining the evils of socialized healthcare--"The government controls you!")? Because...wait for it...there is too much money in it all...suprised? By now, probably not...as the Apostle Paul says "Money is the root of all kinds of evil" (1 Timothy). Having the healthcare industry controlled by the private sector (corporations) keeps the capitalist dreams, including massive amounts of profits, alive. And of course Capitol Hill sees a whole lot of that money as well--through lobbying--(Oh Hillary!). And that, among other things seems to be the difference--the almost religious committment to keeping the government out of the Americans lives--remember freedom! though phone tapping seems to be alright--and they want the market (and Adam Smith`s "invisible hand") to dictate everything. Thus privately owned corporations, like PhRMA, Eli Lilly, Merck and GlaxoSmithKline, make more money than anyone can keep track of--and they are helped along by the media which tries to convince us that we, and our kids, all need to be on something...and so on and so forth. At any rate the picture is rather blique and frustrating. And that is when Moore does something that he doesn`t do in either Bowling for Columbine or Farenheit 9/11, he offers hope--a solution. His solution is to reform the healthcare industry to reflect that of Canada, France, England and even Cuba.

He visits all of these countries and highlights the strengths of the universal healthcare system--yes he does ignore the fact that Canadians have long waits for things, but does mention that Canadians like to complain, and do so as well as anyone! The people in these countries are happy, in general, with their system and wouldn`t trade that system for anything. Here Moore offers his country a practical solution (hope) to the problems they face--universal health care. He says "When we see a better car we drive it, when we see a better way of doing anytihng we take it...so why nto this?". the film is littered with horrifying stories that would make the hardest private sector-supporter ask some good questions, including a woman who`s daughter dies because her insurance company tells her to go to a different hosptial and escort her out as her daughter is convulsing! Only one word to describe a system that results in this came to mind as I watched and thought of Sienna dying because my insurance company didn`t want me to go to the hospital closest to me and they refused me service: bullshit. I know, strong language--but, and this is another conversation for another day, I believe the prophet is to use the language that describes the situation, even if it is potent--in order to wake people out of apathy toward issues.

Sure Moore doesn`t give the healthcare industry a voice in the debate but the reason he doesn`t is because, as he said in an interview I saw last night, "Their voice is heard every day on the news and in the paper--I tell the unpopular tales for people without power--that is my job." At the end of the day the film is a powerful message, informed, Moore says by Jesus command to take care of the sick (Matthew 25)--how could a follower of Jesus argue with someone trying to tell stories of sick people screwed by a system run by money and power? If Jesus were alive today he might be doing the same.

Let me give Moore the last word, from his website: in the film former British MP, Tony Benn, says, "If we have the money to kill people (with war), we've got the money to help people." That line always gets the loudest applause in the theater. It is estimated that, before Bush's War is over, we will have spent two trillion dollars on it. Let me say this: I NEVER want to hear again from ANY politician that we "don't have the money" to fix our schools, to take care of the poor, to provide health care for every American. Clearly, the money IS there when we want to illegally invade another country and then prolong a disastrous occupation. From now on, we have to demand that our tax dollars be there for the things we need, not the things that make us one of the most detested countries on earth.

American Film Institute's Top Ten Movies of all Time

It seems appropriate that this entry is directly juxtoposed with the last entry. Recently the American Film Institute released its top 100 movies of all time. The list is good and full of movies that many of us, of a younger generation have not seen. So next time you go to the movie store and don't see anything worth renting go to the classic's section and watch some of them! The top ten list is great. I have seen most of the films on the list and agree that they are all brilliant. Citizen Kane was voted the top film of all time--and I couldn't agree more. It is really a fascinating story in light of the year it was made and the person who made it. The following is the Wikipedia write-up on Citizen Kane.

"Citizen Kane is a 1941 mystery/drama film released by RKO Pictures and directed by Orson Welles, his first feature film. The story traces the life and career of Charles Foster Kane, a man whose career in the publishing world was born of idealistic social service, but gradually evolved into a ruthless pursuit of power and ego at any cost. Narrated principally through flashbacks, the story is revealed through the research of a newspaper reporter seeking to solve the mystery of the newspaper magnate's dying word, "Rosebud."

Citizen Kane is often cited as being one of the most innovative works in the history of film. In 1998 and again in 2007 the American Film Institute placed it at number one in its list of the 100 greatest U.S. movies of all time. In a recent poll of film directors conducted by the British Film Institute, Citizen Kane was ranked number one best film of all time.[1]
The film's main character, Charles Foster Kane, was inspired by newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst.[2] Upon its release, mention of the film was conspicuously absent from Hearst's newspapers."

The Godfather is obviously great, Raging Bull is brilliant looking and Wizard of Oz is an amazing classic. I do feel that Schindler's List should have been number two instead of eight, and that Saving Private Ryan should have made the top ten instead of Raging Bull, but as I scan the top 100 it seems that what I have believed to be true for years is confirmed: Steven Spielberg is the best director in Cinema history. It looks like at least 8 movies of his made the top 100, maybe more. Here is to the making of good films!

1. Citizen Kane (1941)

2. The Godfather (1972)

3. Casablanca (1942)

4. Raging Bull (1980)

5. Singin' in the Rain (1952)

6 Gone With the Wind (1939)

7 Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

8 Schindler's List (1993)

9 Vertigo (1958)

10 The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Ocean's 13: Big Money, Star-studded and Empty

It must be said...again: Hollywood is not about art at all anymore. It is, to state the obvious, about money. Now I am not naive enough to think that it ever was about art--spend a couple of days in Hollywood or with the people who reside there and you will quickly come to see what is at its heart--but it is just so obvious now. Ocean's 13 is a perfect example of a movie that was just made to make money. It is not smart, it is not subtle, it is not quirky, it is not entertaining and it is not interesting. It does not advance the story or develop characters. It does not do anything. It just makes money--that's it--that is its one role in the world: just to sit up on the screen and make money. It is in a word: forgettable.

Now, of course, like anything its role is to make money-- it's the same with all the sequels: Shrek, Pirates of the Caribbean, Die Hard, Fantastic Four-- they exist to make money, which is fine, but in a world that pretends to be about at least partly about art it is rather shallow. Art has always had an interplay between itself and simply making money. I am sure that many of the wonderful paintings we see from the great artists in history were done for money--which is fine, in fact we should not romantically envision art as something people just do for free; as the saying goes "There is no free lunch." And that is fine--to make money from what God has gifted you to do. But when the art--if we are calling these films art anymore--becomes so contrived that its ploys to make money are as obvious as Ocean's 13 we have to at least recognize it--if not only to be aware if it. The following is what scares me the most about all of this: this movie does not even try to be good. And I could say the same for many of the films I have seen over the last years.

But at the end of the day I wonder if the fact that these kinds of films continue to be made is more of a commentary on us--the consumer--than anyone else. I wonder if we are the ones everyone in Hollywood is laughing at: "Hahaha--I got fourteen scripts for Ocean's 13 on my desk--I threw a dart at one and that's the film we made--it was horrific and it made 40 million dollars the first weekend! Hahaha"...I hope this changes and that better films start being made. I hope we as consumers come to expect more from the art we enjoy.

Refelections on Turkey

Turkey was truly amazing. Our team of twelve was tested in so many ways to live outside the "comfort place" of regular day living. We saw a different world than the Western world--a world with Muslim symbols at every corner--a reminder of who to worship every few hours with the call to pray bellowing out from all the mosques. It was intersting to try to do Christian ministry in the shadow of a different empire than the pseudo-Christian empire that we live in from day to day in Canada. What was most interesting though, and out of all the potential reflections I could offer I offer this, was the similarities between the cultures.

In the Western world we think we are Christian but we are not. The Eastern world thinks we are Christian as well. I talked to a man who spoke of the Western world as all being Christians when I was there. I couldn't help but think of all the people I know who would have been offended. But what is propogated to us day after day is the "myth of a Christian nation" as Gregory Boyd has recently coined it. My question, echoing Brian Mclaren's question, for the US and Canada would be: "when were we a Christian nation? When we were killing, culturally imprisoning, and stealing the lands of millions of native peoples in a New World version of the Holocaust? When we were importing and exploiting millions of slaves? I believe the Christian nation myth is untrue, more than that, it is pernicious for what it does to us" (Brian Mclaren, The Church on the Other Side, 33).

The myth is pervasive though and needs to be questioned and challenged at every moment. Remember the facts of history stated above are not just blips on the map of our culture--they are our cultures founding story and thus the authoratative metanarrative of our lives--tha is if our identity begins and ends with citizenship of a country--but that is another story for another day. The fact that this is our founding story then shapes so much of who we are and what we do--even how we live out our religious committments. One thinks on the question of how a faith built on a person who taught enemy-love became the most violent in history--and we see the answer lies in fusing religion and nationalism together. It is important to remember that this is our founding story--and that we don't whitewash it--thus though we should read history books written by the victors, but one must also read alternative histories of nations, written not from the perspective of the wars and the politicians, but from the people: the slaves, farmers and housemaids. Which is why Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States is so staggering for people to read because it looks at history from a different perspective--the perspecitve of the farmers and the slaves and the powerless--

But back to Turkey--to my surprise Turkey was more secular than I expected and not extremely Muslim in its commitments. In fact, thoug it is 99% Muslim on paper, I wonder if most of the people I met even know much about the Koran, Islamic history or why they even go to Mosque or pray 5 or six times a day. In the same way that I wonder about many in our so-called Christian west--whether they understand what praying the Lord's Prayer is really about. If people understand what the gospel really is--beyond going to heaven when we die--and what the Bible actually says about things like Hell, Salvation, God, Sexuality and a whole host of other things. They, like us, hear things by people talking and assume its true even when its not. In regards to Islam, the point about the Koran is that it is a miracle in its original language--Arabic, but none of them can read Arabic so they trust their Imam (Muslim teacher) to teach them about it. Many of them don't handle it themselves and see what it says. In the same way, many Christians trust their pastors/teachers to tell them about the Bible which is dangerous because I am not sure the Pastors are actually handling the text themselves anymore!

I asked one fellow why he didn't go to Mosque one Friday and he said that he had had too much sex to be accepted there. "I go once in awhile to say hello, once a year or so" he said--he had no sense of forgiveness or grace. I wondered about how similiar this is with us. Prostitutes, those who get pregnant before getting married, liars, homosexuals--they all feel uncomfortable in the presence of Christians because they feel judged, they feel as if church is the last place they should be, but, of course, church should be the first place they should be because we serve a God of grace and forgiveness and reconciliation. He has as a top priority restoring broken people. "Who needs a doctor" Jesus asked "people who are well or sick? Sinners or righteous? Sick people need a doctor and that is who I came to save and restore" Sick people (sinners) are Jesus' people; the people he loves and the people he spent time with--not the 'already righteous' because the perception of their reighteousness is the first sign that they are in fact sinners--they just don't perceive it as such.

Oh how the gospel could be a welcome word in the Muslim world if only it could be heard through the religious and national pride. Which leads me to me second and last point. Even more than religious dynamics, I think the nationalism is what holds Turkey back from hearing and responding to the gospel. More people are committed to the myth of Turkey and Ataturk (the founder of Turkey) than to Islam. It is interesting that even in the story of Paul in Ephesus (in Turkey) in Acts 17 the problem the gospel causes revolves around nationalism. Before we left I preached at DSF (night service) about this fact of Nationlism holding us back from the gospel from the aformentioned story of Paul in Ephesus (see DSF Podcasts/Sermons Online at the top of this blogpage)--it was amazing to see how true what I was saying that night really was and conintues to be there and here. So, for the gospel to go forth in Turkey the nationalism must also be challenged alongside the religious elements of the nation...

It's good to be back and many more things should be said, but for now I offer these humble thoughts from a cultural tourist...

Greeting from Turkey: The First Week

Well I have been silent for the last week or so. The reason? Well, as most of you know I have been in Turkey. We (a group of twelve people) came over to come alongside "workers" over here; to support and encourage the in their work. We have had an amazing time. Been involved in so many things that I would love to write about but I can't from here...for different reasons, but I will when I return.

I just wanted to let everyone know that things were going great and that the hardest part of all is my emotional struggle to stay strong when I am away from my family (erin and sienna). But the L*** is faithful and will see us all through!

Tomorrow we head out to Ephesus, a key location for the history of the C*****; we are excited to visit it as it is the most extensively excavated and most beautiful sight of all the ancient sites in Turkey and one of the greatest in the whole world! It was the city that had one of the ancient wonders of the world--the temple of Aretemis...so we will travel by night (8 to 10 hours) by bus arrive visit, sleep help in an orhpanage in Izmir and the bus home through the night--shop at the Grad Bazaar on the European side (if we can stay awake!) and then sleep and get up at 4 to catch the plane home where I will get to see my family again...

Miss you all but enjoying exploring the world!

Blessings

Volleyball Promo Video

I can't figure out how to embed video on my blog right not (it has been too long) thus I will give you this link to a Beach Volleyball Promo Video we made for our church league. Hope you enjoy it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwDHX1VNs9g

I am off to Turkey and will look forward to sharing with you upon my arrival. Your prayers are appreciated.

Mark

I Met God in Oregon: Sabbath Rest by the Sea

When most of us hear the word "Sabbath" we think of Old Testament laws and rules. We view those things as a bit of a drag to everday life. But we need to change our thinking about such things. This weekend Grant Fredrickson (the youth Pastor at SDBC) and myself (along with four other great leaders) took six graduates down to the Oregan Coast for a celebration of their graduation from high school and initiation into adulthood. It was an amazing time. It was challenging for me as Erin and Sienna were not able to come (which makes me wonder about Turkey--13 days away from them!) and I missed them like crazy. But I was able to enjoy the trip despite their absence. What was most important about the trip for me aside from the times where we were able to affirm and pray for each graduate, was that it was a weekend away; it was a weekend without telephones, internet, or TV. It was a weekend where my work was people--talking, laughing, eating. Many who went on the trip likely feel tired, because we were up late, sleeping in tents, being wet with rain, and driving for hours each day (it takes 9 hours to drive there)--but amazingly I feel rested. I feel like I just took a four day sabbath, where I was able to just be. And that is what Sabbath is about--being, enjoying God, resting, being with the family of God, eating meals together, reflecting on what God is doing in our lives.

Unfortunately Sabbath has been abandoned by our culture. But what do we expect from a culture defined by liberal-democratic-capitalism? To close the doors of a store for a day is devastating to business, thus Western culture, though it is "built on Judeo-Christina values" (though I am not sure this is as true as some think it is), has abadoned sabbath for business. But my concern here is not a critique of of the Western-dehumanizing machine of the corporatation, but of our personal responsibility to God, to ourselves and to our loved ones to simply rest. To stop and reflect on the week, prepare for the coming week, and enjoy. To rest. This weekend the noises stopped, the buzzing was muted and the emails simply went unanswered, and amazingly the world did not collapse, the church is still standing and Jesus is still at work in the world.

The Bible has a concept of justice and sabbath called Jubilee, where every fifty years God called the Israelites to rest for one year. They would have to stop tilling the land, to allow the land to rest and heal, they would set free any slaves they owend, and they would forgive any debt of money that someone owed them. You see Sabbath is a gift. God recognizes that society needs to stop and forgive a debt once in a while (Third-world debt to the Western world that will never be paid?), people need to be set free from oppression, people need rest in order to function. Human beings were not made to be actively working 7 days a week--only six, and then rest. This week I felt the power of Sabbath, with two elements standing out most prominently: relationship and worship. That is what we were made for (Gen.1-2). The Oregan Coast is a beautfil thing: waves crashing into rocks, beaches, and even desert that spans as far as the eye can see--I met God in Oregan this weekend and he held me in his arms as I rested.

Jerry Falwell: Dead at age 73

What do you say when someone dies that, while they were living, you so strongly disagreed with? It makes you wonder...Many of my Christian friendds responded to the death of Jerry Falwell today with about as much sympathy that they could muster: "I didn't really like that guy", another "I have mixed feelings"--what would cause someone to have mixed feelings about a Christian brother and leader dying? Well, to begin with Falwell was the personification of much of what present Christian teachers in Canada and more progressive America (including myself) are trying to get away from. Pompous, judgmental, triumphalist, ultra-conservative, and on it goes...we do not see this as the attitude of our Jesus.

I wonder at a Christians dedication to establishing the kingdom of God through politics more so than leading the alternative community--the church to work for the world. I believe the church is to work above and beyond the governments of the world to establish peace, justice and mercy in the world--adn use the governments when necessary, adn defintently take part in government and politics shaped around what Jesus has called us to. Though Jerry and I might disagree about what Jesus has called us to (making sure homosexuals never get married or working for the poor and needy of the world? Trying to identify a homosexual Teletubbie or working to eradicate extreme third-world debt?)

His politics didn't help either. His politics were unashamedly right-wing--which isn't fully problematic for the right has good positions on some things in my opinion(sexual morality, abortion) but does not in some other things, and it was those things that Falwell was at times blindly supporting (i.e. the war-machine) in the administrations of both Bush I and II. It is here that I have the biggest problem with right-wing positions, especially Christians who follow it blindly: violence (as you can see from my latest blogs) is diamtertically opposed to the following Jesus. There really is no wiggle-room; in studying the New Testament for seven years I have yet to see room for even discussion on "just war". This always raises questions, which fall outside this entry, but the statement still stands.

Anyway, above and beyond whether I agreed with what Falwell stood for, he fought zealously for what he believed God was calling him to; and though I wonder about some of the more radical statements, positions he took (i.e. the video above)--I can identify with a person doing everything he can do to have heard what he perceives to be the message God has given him. I may disagree with him, but how could I live for unity among the people of God if I can't extend gratefulness to a man who lived out his passions for Jesus, even if it is different then how I am doing it? I guess I could say he knows better now--but that is a two way street isn't it?

Lord have mercy on Jerry's soul...as he enters your presence may we be reminded of the vulnerability of our lives and that they rest in your hands. That at any moment you could take us up to yourself. And someday soon we will all face your your just and good judgment-- some going to life and others to punishment-- and thank you for Jesus, that he provided a way to be forgiven and to enter into life both on that day and amazingly even now as we live here on earth for your glory. Amen.

Jesus and War II: The Churches Relationship to Government

As I struggle through this question I find the following article of faith helpful. It is from the Mennonite Confession:

We believe that the church is God's "holy nation," 1 called to give full allegiance to Christ its head and to witness to all nations about God's saving love.
The church is the spiritual, social, and political body that gives its allegiance to God alone. As citizens of God's kingdom, 2 we trust in the power of God's love for our defense. The church knows no geographical boundaries and needs no violence for its protection. The only Christian nation is the church of Jesus Christ, made up of people from every tribe and nation, 3 called to witness to God's glory.

In contrast to the church, governing authorities of the world have been instituted by God for maintaining order in societies. Such governments and other human institutions as servants of God are called to act justly and provide order. 4 But like all such institutions, nations tend to demand total allegiance. They then become idolatrous and rebellious against the will of God. 5 Even at its best, a government cannot act completely according to the justice of God because no nation, except the church, confesses Christ's rule as its foundation.

As Christians we are to respect those in authority and to pray for all people, including those in government, that they also may be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. 6 We may participate in government or other institutions of society only in ways that do not violate the love and holiness taught by Christ and do not compromise our loyalty to Christ. We witness to the nations by being that "city on a hill" which demonstrates the way of Christ. 7 We also witness by being ambassadors for Christ, 8 calling the nations (and all persons and institutions) to move toward justice, peace, and compassion for all people. In so doing, we seek the welfare of the city to which God has sent us. 9

We understand that Christ, by his death and resurrection, has won victory over the powers, including all governments. 10 Because we confess that Jesus Christ has been exalted as Lord of lords, we recognize no other authority's claims as ultimate.

Mark Addition: This position is where I find myself. How about you?

Guest Blogger (John Whitehead): Jesus and War

“Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” ~ Jesus

With President Bush’s veto of the recent spending bill, fighting in the Middle East will continue indefinitely – wars not only waged by an avowed Christian president but also backed by the evangelical Christian Right. Rev. Jerry Falwell, in speaking of terrorists, epitomizes the Bush Administration’s stance: “I’m for the president to chase them all over the world. If it takes 10 years, blow them away in the name of the Lord.” In this way, Christianity is joined with the state and its war machine.

However, what would Jesus think about this in light of his teachings against the use of violence – war, of course, being organized, systematic violence? One can only imagine that he would be horrified.

After all, many who strive to follow Jesus’ teachings find it impossible to do so and still participate in war. Indeed, leaders in the early church adopted Jesus’ attitude of nonviolence. Tertullian (born about AD 160), one of the giants of the early church, stated very clearly that confessing “Jesus as Lord” means taking the teachings of Jesus seriously. Just as Caesar commanded men to kill their enemies, Jesus commanded them to love their enemies. Caesar made use of chains and torture, in much the same way as governments do today. Jesus, on the other hand, taught Christians to forgive and to sacrifice power for servanthood.
In fact, Tertullian had pithy advice for soldiers who converted to Christianity: quit the army or be martyred for refusing to fight. Tertullian was not alone in his thinking. “For three centuries,” writes biblical scholar Walter Wink in The Powers That Be (1998), “no Christian author to our knowledge approved of Christian participation in battle.” This, of course, changed in the third century when the church was institutionalized and became an integral part of the warring Roman Empire.

Jesus’ apostles never advocated violence. Rather, they urged their followers to suffer, forgive and trust God for the outcome rather than take matters into their own hands. And while they may have talked about warfare and fighting, it was not through the use of conventional weapons. For example, the Apostle Paul wrote: “For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.”
Christ’s crucifixion was a radical repudiation of the use of violent force. And the cross, which was the Roman tool of execution, was reserved especially for leaders of rebellions. “Anyone proclaiming a rival kingdom to the kingdom of Caesar would be a prime candidate for crucifixion,” writes Brian McLaren in The Secret Message of Jesus (2006). “This is exactly what Jesus proclaimed, and this is exactly what he offered.” But Jesus’ kingdom was one of peace. Among other things, he proclaimed, “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who spitefully use you. To him who strikes you on the one cheek, offer the other also.” Consequently, Jesus ordered Peter not to use the sword, even to protect him.

The so-called Roman peace (Pax Romana) was made possible by the cross. That is, people so feared crucifixion that many opted not to challenge the emperor rather than face the possibility of death on the cross. Why then would early Christians choose the cross – an instrument of torture, domination, fear, intimidation and death – as their primary symbol? What could this possibly mean?

For early Christians, “it apparently meant that the kingdom of God would triumph not by inflicting violence but by enduring it,” notes McLaren, “not by making others suffer but by willingly enduring suffering for the sake of justice – not by coercing or humiliating others but by enduring their humiliation with gentle dignity.” Jesus, they believed, had taken the empire’s instrument of torture and transformed it into God’s symbol of the repudiation of violence. The message? Love, not violence, is the most powerful force in the universe.

Not surprisingly, the early Christians were not crusaders or warriors but martyrs – men and women with the faith and courage to face the lions. Like Jesus, they chose to suffer rather than inflict violence. When Jesus said “Blessed are the peacemakers,” exhorting his followers to turn the other cheek and give freely, he was telling us that active peacemaking is the way to end war. Can you imagine what the world would be like if every church adopted that attitude and focused its energies on active peacemaking?

The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., who vocally opposed the Vietnam War, took to heart Jesus’ teachings about peacemaking. In his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize, King proclaimed: Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal. We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough to say “we must not wage war.” It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war but the positive affirmation of peace.

This is not to say that Jesus was a pacifist. The opposite is true. He spoke truth to power and engaged in active resistance to injustice. In my opinion, Jesus would have intervened to defend someone being violently mistreated, and I believe we must do the same. But he would never have engaged in violence as the means to an end.

One has to wonder what Jesus would say about war being waged in his name today. As Gary Wills writes in What Jesus Meant (2006), “If people want to do battle for God, they cannot claim Jesus has called them to this task, since he told Pilate that his ministers would not do that.” In fact, as Wills notes, Jesus “never accepted violence as justified.”

Mark's addition: It is interesting to note the anabaptists tradition on this question: that it is the governments job to bear the sword and fight wars etc (Rom.13.1-7), but that Christians are not supposed to fight at all in armies or even to add to the fighting by being involved in politics, becausew we are to repay evil with love (Rom.12). Their posture ia to serve God and the world--I heard someone say it this way recently. If I could talk to George Bush I would say "As the President I respect your right to bear the sword of justice etc.,--though I think this particular war was a mistake; then I would take him aside and say as a brother in Christ 'What are you doing! Not only should you not be fighting this war, but you shouldn't be President in the first place. It's not the Christians job in the world."

I have to say, this is the position I am working through in my mind--it seems to make sense of Scripture and out of Jesus. What do you think? There are parts of it that resonate with me and other parts that I have concerns about--but what do you think it?

The Resurrection of Jesus (John): New Creation

One could argue that John is written from a post-resurrection point of view. Think of chapter 2, when Jesus has gone in to the Temple and acted out that parable of destruction. Jesus says “Destroy this Temple and I will raise it again in three days.”

Then John brings in his own comments (which he often does) and he tells us what the underlying meaning was in Jesus’ rebuke: he says “But the temple he spoke of was his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said.” So John is not trying to surprise anyone in ch.20 and 21 with his resurrection narratives.

But we could come to the conclusion of resurrection by following John’s logic all the way through his gospel. He presents Jesus as fulfilling and surpassing Jewish customs:

John cast Jesus in a particular role in his gospel, always placing Jesus in the vicinity of Jewish festivals. The importance of Jesus actions and words around these festivals are crucial to understanding the Jesus of the fourth gospel.

The culture of his day would not have missed his message: Jesus was claiming to be superseding those rituals/symbols that they held dear, and was redefining; indeed replacing, the entire focus of the relationship between God and his people.

And so John again and again summons Israel to quiet down and ‘believe’; for what they are about to see will take them from the familiar words of “In the beginning” to the equally familiar “It is finished”, but this time it is not only the story of creation that John is telling but the story of new creation, or in other words: Jesus focused creation.

So, in chapters 1-4 Jesus is seen to be the one who brings the new wine, new temple, new birth, new law and living water which leads to true worship. He replaces these symbols as the focus of their meaning. They were outlines, shadows being cast ahead. Shadows that had a shape and told a story, and now, only by looking at Jesus is that shape properly filled in: why were humans created in God’s image?

John says that it has something to do with the fact that the Word had to, at one time become flesh and dwell among us. Humans were made to reflect God’s image, so that one day God could appropriately become human himself. In is within this idea that we need to see the idea of ‘resurrection’ in John. But how we get there?

There are two passages specifically that need mentioning at this point:

First, is John chapter 5: where Jesus spells out in v.25ff that there will be a great day of resurrection, where “the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live”— which points forward to the raising of Lazarus, who indeed hears Jesus voice when he cries out to him, John tells us “with a loud voice” ‘Lazarus come forth’. (It is often pointed out that he said Lazarus’ name, because if he hadn't specified it, maybe everyone in their tombs would have come out)

But in ch.5.29 Jesus’ point, like that of Daniel 12, is that there will come a day when all people will rise, those who had done bad to a resurrection of judgment and those who had done good (like Lazarus) to a resurrection of life. But in a very real way John explains that Jesus has taken th end-time expectation of resurrection and ushered it into the present: Jesus says in 5.25 “an hour is coming and now is”. So, just like the “eternal life” discussion in John as ‘life of the new age’ being already experienced by those who believe, so this resurrection life is also something that is present through the ministry of Jesus.

But what about Lazarus (John 11)? 1) Lazarus’ resurrection is a signpost pointing toward Jesus’ own resurrection, but there are a couple of differences and identifying those differences helps to make John’s theological point.

a. Lazarus comes back to the same kind of life that he has experienced before, where he shares in a dinner party and he finds himself even facing death threats (Read 12.10). So, what is the difference? The journey that Jesus would make is a journey through death and out the other side into a new sort of existence. There could be no death threats made toward Jesus that would hold any water.

b. Lazarus came from the tomb wearing his graveclothes, but Jesus’ resurrection body apparently passed through those clothes: wrappings that Jesus will never again have use for, but something which Lazarus will indeed need again.

John is the only one that draws attention to the body wrap of Jesus. He says (20.6) “and he saw the linen wrappings lying there and the face cloth which had been on his head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself”. The point is that someone has not only taken the body away, but they have gone to the trouble of unwrapping it! And not only that but the head wrapping is where the head used to be! Someone having unwrapped the body, has worked to create an effect: it looks as though the body was not picked up and unwrapped, but that it had just disappeared, leaving the empty clothes, like a collapsed air balloon. What Jesus had experienced was to be seen as the next step in resurrection- a step that surpasses Lazarus by a mile.

SIGNS

John gives his readers ‘signs’ which he says are to lead people to ‘believe’ in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. And at the end of his gospel we see Thomas who gives the greatest proclamation of faith in the Gospel: “My Lord and my God” he says. When does he make this confession? When he meets the resurrected Jesus. Thus we should conclude that the resurrection is the final great climactic ‘sign’ . After Jesus turns the water into wine, in ch.2, John says, “this was the beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee”; and so saying that it’s the first sign alerts us that there are more to come. And so Jesus, in chapter 4 heals the centurions servant from a distance and John says “this was the second sign that Jesus did”. Having pointed out these first two John says in effect: alright your on your own from here.

And so we count: the paralyzed man at the pool of Bethesda, the multiplication of the loaves, the man born blind, the raising of Lazarus, the crucifixion and finally the climactic sign the resurrection itself. This is everything you need, John says to see and believe. But come back to the numbers, notice what number sign the resurrection was: sign eight.

So, what is significant about that? In the Jewish story (and more specifically in John’s writing of that story) this eighth sign is one that declares something in itself. Six signs in ch.1-12 and then nothing else by way of signs for the next 6 chapters. What no more signs? Surely John knows that the number six is nothing compared to the number seven. And why should we have seven in mind? Think back to chapter 1 “In the beginning…” (1.1)— John is writing a new Genesis, and thus these are the 7 signs of the new creation, paralleling with the seven days of the first creation.

And so, the cross is the seventh sign and just as the sixth day of the creation story consisted of the creation of human beings in God’s image, so Pilate displays Jesus on the sixth and final day of the passion week and says “Behold the man” and just how that sixth day had ended in triumph when God finished all the work he had done to rest on the seventh (Gen. 2.1-3), so the last words of the pre-Easter Jesus in John’s Gospel are “It is finished!” (19.30) and Jesus then rests’ in the silence of the tomb.

So what are we to make of the resurrection in this paradigm? John begins his resurrection narrative then with a shocking phrase, with heavy echoes from the creation account “On the first day of the week, when it was still dark” (20.1). This was the scene for the proclamation of the true light that shines in the world. This was the first day of the new creation week. Easter is the start of new creation.

So John's story is that Jesus died on behalf of Israel and thus on behalf of the rest of the world. That death and resurrection was redemptive because it ushered in the ‘age to come’. And now anyone who believes becomes part of the ‘new age’ people of God— children who are called to be people of ‘light’ and ‘life’; people called to a new day and thus a new way of being human. AMEN!

The Resurrection of Jesus (Luke): Prodigal Son, and the Resurrection throughout his Gospel

Let me just comment briefly on the resurrection within Luke’s Gospel outside the actual resurrection accounts of Luke--for dealing with all the intricacies of the harmony's and disharmony's of Luke and Acts are too extensive to delve into with a Blog like this...

Other than the Johannine corpus (The Gospel of John; 1, 2 and 3 John and Revelation), Luke is the most extensive when it comes to the resurrection. I do not only mean when it comes to the resurrection narrative itself, but that throughout his Gospel it is regularly in view.

The prodigal son story (Luke 15.11-32) is about, a return from exile. A people called back, by a father, to relationship from a foreign land. The message of which is that it is this thing that is happening in the ministry of Jesus (Jesus is calling Israel back from exile). But there are some (the Pharisees) that, like the older brother, do not like the way it looks and thus refuse to celebrate. Of course, this message of return from exile is not new— when it was spoken of in the OT the metaphor that was used was that of resurrection from the dead (Ezekiel 36-37; Hosea 6).

Jesus says: "for this son of mine was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.' And they began to celebrate.

Again Jesus say: 'But we had to celebrate and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live, and was lost and has been found.'"

Another picture of the same vein is found in Jesus’ parable about the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16.19-31. I call it a parable, and not a description of the ‘after life’ not least because it actually draws attention away from the afterlife with its focus upon the injustice of the coexistence of rich and poor, also because it is in the form and context of other parables and because it is making precisely the same point as Luke’s other parables have (like the prodigal son): that resurrection is happening in and through Jesus’ ministry and the Pharisees cannot see it.
Jesus closes the story off with:
(16.30) father Abraham, if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!'

and again,

(16.31) 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'" (Maybe with a wink of his eye?)

Luke, like we will see in John, drops hints off this theology all the way through his Gospel and through his second volume, the book of Acts. In Luke he gives the impression that all the resurrection sightings happened in one day. But in Acts they are extended to over 40 days. Has he contradicted himself? It is important to realize that in the ancient world, unlike journalism today it was not imperative to tell every detail at ever telling of the story: it is almost like Luke tells it focusing on some details and then gives later details in Acts, not contradicting but purposely filling it all out.

Resurrection of Jesus (Matthew): Earthquakes, and the Names of Jesus

The following is one part of a larger series of reflections (two to go) on the resurrection of Jesus. It is, at times, highly technical which is due to the fact that it comes from a three-hour lecture that I gave for a class on the Historical Jesus at Tyndale University College in 2004. I am going to extend the discussion on Resurrection in the Gospels into four seperate blog entries (one for each Gospel)...

The account of the resurrection in Matthew brings together his main themes as well: themes of authority and commission.

We begin at Matthews story of the crucifixion, where, contrary to custom, Jesus is given a decent and reverent burial. The Romans did not bury a crucified body, they simply threw it on the ground. Executed criminals ended up in a public plot, buried without honor and were not allowed to be placed in their family tombs.

The reason Rome made the exception about Jesus? Maybe because of all the fuss about crucifying him in the first place and here was someone (Joseph of Arimathea) willing to just get rid of him so that people could move on?

But Joseph takes him, wraps him in a “clean linen cloth” and places him in the tomb.
Then we get something that isn’t in the other gospels: Matthew tells us that the guards are posted. Why? (27.62-66) The reason has something to do with what Jesus had said while he was living: (this is Matthews bringing to the readers mind the reason why Jesus’ raising should be seen as a vindication of his teaching) he said this would happen. But it is also because by the time Matthew was writing the rumor had been going around already (27.64) that the disciples had stolen the body.

Coming back to our comments on the ‘spiritual resurrection’ which J.D. Crossan and friends talk about, saying that the resurrection is Jesus’ ‘heavenly seating’ at the right hand of God, one might then be confused why these men are concerned with a body being stolen and why they send guards or a stone.

Now comes the actual resurrection narrative. I am tempted to call Matthew’s resurrection account the “Apocalyptic Telling of the Resurrection”, because of the apocalyptic overtones that drive his plot: an earthquake which is apocalyptic imagery and which connects it powerfully to the crucifixion event where the “earth shook and the rocks were split” (27.51).

Matthew also has the angelic scene here which recalls all the other presence of angels throughout: twice at the birth (1.20; 24) the flight to Egypt (2.13) and the flight back from Egypt (2.19)— this all done, one could say to emphasize the in-breaking of the eschatological age by directs acts of Israel’s God. Again and again Matthew draws the mind toward God being with us; in action.

Matthew tells us (within the crucifixion account) that after Jesus was raised
The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection they entered the holy city and appeared to many (27.52-53), echoing Ezekiel 37.12-13, where YHWH promises to an exiled Israel “I will open your graves and lead you out of your graves”. Remember that this metaphor by the first century was understood as a literal prediction of what would happen to the righteous at the end of the present age and the dawning of the age to come.

Quite obviously the resurrecting of these OT echoes themselves serves Matthews purpose: This is the real return from exile, the dawn of the new age. This resurrection event is the event which takes the eschatological (age to come) hopes of Israel and brings them abruptly into the present. Though this event is not to be confused with the great general resurrection of all the righteous it is a strange anticipation of it.

On a Mountain in Galilee…

What is so different about Matthew, among other things is his focus on what happened in Galilee (the place the disciples were told to go in Mark, but that we never saw). Now we do see what happened there: One of the great Matthean themes is here highlighted, in the story of the ‘Great Commission’. Like the commissioning scenes in Luke and John, this final scene concentrates on the instructions the risen Jesus gives to his disciples for their new worldwide mission. What is important about the focus of the “worldwide” mission, is that up until this point in Matthew Jesus has continually reminded the disciples that the gospel strategy, during Jesus’ lifetime, was to be being restricted to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel”:

"Do not go in the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter any city of the Samaritans; but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (10.5)

“I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." (15.25)

Now, he says, in direct contrast to those things: this is about “all the nations”— that shift in mission surely has something to do with the cross and the resurrection and the authority which those things give to Jesus and through Jesus to his disciples. It is important to be reminded at this point, that in Israel’s prophetic history when the restoration of Israel came, one of the defining points in that time would be that Israel would finally include Gentiles.

The fate of the Gentiles was bound up with that of Israel. What happened to the Gentiles is conditional upon, and conditioned by, what happens to Israel. Thus in Jesus Israel itself has undergone her long awaited restoration. So, the Gentile mission is precisely what is being announced on this mountain in Galilee.

Jesus is saying that the lifelong vocation of Israel is coming true at last: Israel would be the light of the world, so that the nations seeing it would come in and glorify God. In that mission the God of Israel was the authoritative figure, but interestingly that is now Jesus: the one in whom the God of Israel is truly revealed, the one whom “all authority” has been given.

In 1.21 the special baby is to be called Jesus; which means YHWH saves— because, says Matthew, he will save his people from their sins. (1.11-14); That is he will deliver them from their exile, which was the punishment for their sins. He will be the king who will go down into exile with and for his people and lead them out the other side. But this time it will be the ultimate exile, not of Babylon, Syria, Rome or any other political foe. This time it is the satanic exile of sin and death. The exile which began with Adam and Eve and extended to all of humanity.

The second name that is given is Emmanual; which means “God with us” (1.23). So, Matthew has drawn together two strands of Jewish eschatology: first, God will save his people from their sins. Second, God himself will come and dwell with his people. Both of which Matthew says have come to be in Jesus. The cross and resurrection forgave and now Jesus says, “I am with you always”— God with us— Emmanual.

The Resurrection of Jesus (The Gospels)-- The Gospel of Mark: Fear and Trembling

The following is part 3 of an intended 4 part series (now longer) which reflects on the resurrection of Jesus. It is, at times, highly technical which is due to the fact that it comes from a three-hour lecture that I gave for a class on the Historical Jesus at Tyndale University College in 2004. I am going to extend the discussion on Resurrection in the Gospels into four seperate blog entries (one for each Gospel)...

Listen to the end of Mark’s Gospel: “And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid” (16.8). Most likely the rest of Mark that you have in your Bible is a development of later manuscripts. So, what we have is a gospel that has no resurrection narrative, not even a sighting; we have only an empty tomb.

Now, many scholars see this ending as unfulfilling and thus they desire to construct an ending that was most likely lost at some point in Mark’s circulation; or even burned in the fires of Rome in AD 64. This account, many say, does not satisfy Mark’s readers who have been strung along through the whole Gospel being told about rejection, suffering, handing over and death (which the reader has gotten lots of) and now for the pay off…the fulfillment of the rest of this crucial prophecy (Mk. 8.31; 9.9) and Mark doesn’t deliver the goods!

Proponents of this idea say it is unlikely that Mark's Gospel would simply end with women "saying nothing to anyone, for they were afraid" They say, the lost account of Mark’s resurrection narrative would work to do the same thing that John 21 does: to reinstate the disciples (Peter ‘Do you love me…’ three times paralleling his three denials) after their failure and their shame during Jesus' trials when the deserted him.

The construction put forth by these scholars says that Mark’s story would have looked something like Matthew’s because up until this point in the narrative Matthew has followed Mark so closely. So why shouldn't the two continue to be the same?

But what if this point about the disciple’s failure is precisely where we need to look to conclude not that Mark’s ending is lost, but why in fact Mark’s ending is what it is: a perfect ending to a book like Mark.

What if this abrupt ending in Mark is not a mistake at all; or any type of “problem”. What if it is, what some have called, a “Literary Masterpiece.” Whereby 16.1-8 is a brilliant conclusion to the Gospel as a whole bringing Mark’s two major themes to culmination: 1) the hidden secret of Jesus as Messiah and Son of God and 2) discipleship, more specifically, the problem of ‘discipleship failure’.

Mark's “messianic secret” (the fact that no one properly understands Jesus as the Messiah throughout Mark's Gospel, except the demons and he tells them not to tell anyone--1.24-25) has been partially lifted by the Centurions cry at the foot of the cross: “Surely this man was the Son of God”(15.30), and now the angelic presence (‘young man’ in Mark; 'angel' in Matthew) discloses that secret completely. Though ‘Son of God’ language is not used in the story, the explanation that he is risen is to tie in with the earlier moments when Jesus described his crucifixion and raising from the dead together (8.31; 9.9). If Jesus has been raised, as he had said he would be than all of the other claims about his Messiahship have been vindicated as well. Jesus is now shown to be the Son of God (which God declared him to be at his baptism; 1.11)— whom he has claimed to be this whole time, but which the disciples had failed to see.

The second of Mark’s major themes is in view also: the discipleship failure theme. It is of course this failure that makes the ending seem wrong to begin with. “How can Mark leave us with the women in fear and ashamed”? We may ask. The reason? Because if one were reading Mark they would see the juxtaposition: that the disciple’s continuous failure always led to Jesus’ continued faithfulness:

-The disciples flee at the arrest of Jesus (14.50)
-Peter denies Jesus during the Passion narrative
-And yet the message of the angel at the empty tomb is addressed to whom? “The disciples and Peter” (16.7). The next logical step in the story in that Jesus would make good on his promise to meet them in Galilee (16.7)

Now, the women at the tomb “are afraid” (16.8) and Mark gives us an ironic ending that leaves the rest up to the audience. We have seen what people do when they are commanded to “tell no one” (the leper in ch.1) they go and tell everyone! Now the women “say nothing to anyone” though they have been commanded to tell. This may be a problem of discipleship failure, but it is not one that is simply left there if we understand the promise of 16.7 (that the disciples will see Jesus in Galilee) in light of 14.28 (Jesus' promise that the disciples’ misunderstanding and failure (their “falling away”--14.27) will be reversed by a Galilee experience.

Of course picking up all of these nuances is dependent on us being good readers of story in general which we tend not to be...

Resurrection from the Dead (2 of 4): Old Testament

The following is part 3 of an intended 4 part series (now longer) which reflects on the resurrection of Jesus. It is, at times, highly technical which is due to the fact that it comes from a three-hour lecture that I gave for a class on the Historical Jesus at Tyndale University College in 2004.

“Christianity was born into a world where one of its central tenets, the resurrection of the dead, was widely recognized as false— except, of course, by Judaism.” --N.T. Wright

We must see the early Christian belief in resurrection not as a strange foreign import coming out of nowhere, but as a re-expression (a mutation) of the ancient Israelite worldview, under new and different circumstances.

To begin with it must be emphasized that: in the OT, ‘the afterlife’, as we would call it, never played a central role. For them, what was important was this life. Like the God of the creation story, they looked at the world and saw that it was very good. In one sense, early in the OT, death is the finale of life— so that at death a person simply returns to the dust.

As time passed and the theology of dying and afterlife evolved within Israel’s history we see that death, though it is the absolute end of this ‘present existence’, after one dies existence continues— at death the person descends to Sheol, a term that became synonymous with death itself.

Sheol, like Hades of the Greeks, was the land of the dead, the final dumping-ground: ideas of oblivion, darkness, the grave, the pit are what Sheol was all about. G.B. Caird says “Its inhabitants were shades, wraiths, pale photocopies relegated to the subterranean filing cabinet.”

Later the Psalms began to interact with both ideas: Sheol on the one hand and not being abandon to death on the other. And from this point in Israel’s history the theology of resurrection began to flourish bit by bit. We can see its progression into the prophets...

The Prophets:

Ezekiel 37

Ezekiel 37 is probably the most famous resurrection passage in the OT. It is clearly metaphorical and speaks of Israel, once again, in her state of exile. Ezekiel is speaking within the Babylonian exile.

Of all the unclean things that a Jew might encounter in life, corpses and unburied bones would top off the list, and this is the state, Ezekiel says, to which Israel has been reduced. But God will deal with this in a great act of new creation. In Ezekiel 37 Ezekiel sees a valley filled with dry bones, and God says that he will “cause breath” to enter them “that they may come to life” (5), and he will restore their skin etc…

Then in the visions explanation, Israel says “Our bones are dried up, and our hope has perished. We are completely cut off” (11). God says “I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves…and I will cause you to come into the land of Israel…and I will put my Spirit within you” (12). So what we have is a highly charged metaphor of the way in which unclean Israel would be cleansed, exiled Israel would be restored and scattered Israel re-gathered, by a powerful and covenant-renewing act of re-establishment.

Daniel 12.3-4

The most clear passage dealing with the topic is Daniel 12.2-3. This is the passage that is most concrete when it comes, not to metaphorical language (which you would expect from Daniel above all others), but in its presentation of a concrete, bodily resurrection. The discussion of ‘sleeping’ is obviously synonymous with death itself and ‘dust’ (in Biblical terms) is the destination of the dead.

So, the “wise” are presently “asleep”, and will “wake up” at some point in the future. That is when they will “shine like the stars”. The righteous will be vindicated and that vindication will not be a literal twinkling in the sky, but these people are here expressed as leaders and rulers in God’s new creation. The imagery here suggests an idea of royalty: it is kings who are spoken of as stars or celestial beings in the OT (see Num.24, 1 Sam. 29, Isaiah 9). These are God-given rulers who are to provide light to the world as the stars did so in Genesis 1 (for this idea see Rev.12.2; where the people of God are seen as stars on the crown the women is wearing).

And so, the righteous will not so much be transformed into beings of light, as set in authority over the world. Daniel 12, adds to the sense then that the resurrection is not simply a resuscitation in which the dead will return to life the same as it was before. But it is the reality of being raised to a state of glory in the world, for which the best parallel is the status of stars, moon and sun within the created order.

As we know, the context of Daniel is a world of great persecution by Babylon and by extension, by Antiochus Epiphanes during the time of the Maccabees. Daniel 12 is a specific promise that Israel’s God will reverse the actions of the wicked pagans, and raise the martyrs and those teachers, who kept Israel on course, during a turbulent time, to a glorious life. At the same time, God will raise her persecutors to a new existence: instead of remaining in the obscurity of Sheol or “the dust” they will face perpetual scorn and “everlasting contempt” (3).

Conclusion

What all of these texts refer to then, is the common hope of Israel: that YHWH would restore her fortunes at last, liberate her from pagan oppression and resettle her, even if it took a great act of new creation to accomplish it.

What is crucial to understand at this point is that resurrection in the OT focuses itself not on the resurrection of an individual, but on the resurrection of the corporate people of Israel, and more precisely the returning of that people from exile: being restored to life after experiencing death.
What is imperative at this point is that: The OT does not focus itself or teach about the resurrection of only individuals. Resurrection is spoken of as relating to Israel, the nation, the people- together, and their hope in the future. Resurrection is an eschatological hope. It is an event that will end Israel’s exile once and for all (which is the direct result of sin) an event that will end ‘the present age’ and thus usher in ‘the age to come’. Resurrection is an eschatological )end-time) hope for the nation as a whole.

In these passages we see resurrection move from being a metaphor, a way of investing this promised restoration event with its full theological significance, to a concrete hope.
So, the nation of Israel has got word from their prophets that God will “take care” of their exile by raising them from the dead. And the OT leaves them in that hope: awaiting the great day, when God, like in the days of the Exodus came to them and did a great act of liberation—suspending the laws of gravity to part the sea. They believed that He would one day reverse the greatest natural law: the law of death and in that act, they as a people would again be set free. That is the great hope of resurrection.