catching his breath

Because we’re scared and not sure what we’re scared of…just scared. Scared to follow the pathways of our confusion. Scared to run into what’s behind all this mess. But if Abraham and Paul have a word for us, it is hope. Hope in a truth too often shrouded in fear. If they have a command for us then, it is “Do not fear!” Do not fear because of the hope anchored in a God who raises the dead.

So from the dark oblivion of this dim vision a beam of light breaks through.

The monsters that frighten us scurry to darker corners. Death slowly loses its leverage. As the light begins to disperse its way throughout the darkness, we start to see things for what they are. The vision of a God who raises the dead comes into focus. We see what Abraham saw. We squint through Paul’s eyes at the open arms of the resurrected Messiah.

But I suppose now, as these views collide, we stand on a mountain somewhere in Moriah with a knife in one hand and choice to make. All our senses and wits tell us to run. Our blood pressure rises as fear regroups. We sigh at the palpable contradictions imposing their demands for practicality. We question just what in the name of God is going on. It is in this moment God asks us to consider his perspective.

I raise the dead. Don’t fear. Follow me.

If we do, we will see to begin crawling our way out of the abyss of confused intuitions and misguided apprehensions. We will, no matter what seems to be, follow that truth: I raise the dead, do not fear.

Paul also connects the fundamental acceptance of God’s ability to raise the dead to Abraham’s incredible, head-spinning faith. He writes that Abraham persisted “in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told” (Romans 4:17-18). Abraham wasn’t crazy, just able to see beyond temporal illusions.

Once clutched by the historical certainty of Jesus’ resurrection, Paul possessed the same vision as Abraham. He wrote in 2 Corinthians 1:8-9, “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers and sisters, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.” Paul confidently stared into the hollow eyes of death because of his pledge to the deeper truth. He leaned heavily upon the tangible implications of Jesus’ resurrection and so pursued Jesus relentlessly in spite of the supposed irrationality of it all (1 Corinthians 15).

Human existence since the fall has thrown some nasty things at us. Evil and chaos show up in such ways that cynicism can take over our lives. Relativism and nihilism emerge as viable options. What can God do? Look at the world and its mess, where is he? In fear, we begin to react to such confusion. Our humanity slips away. We run scared as fast as we can into the abyss of despair and hopelessness. We live out our days numbing ourselves to a dysfunctional society we can’t or don’t want to confront.

The mind can’t answer it’s own questions. We “common sense” ourselves right out of following God. What works often supersedes discipleship. Love doesn’t work so we hate and manipulate. Peace makes little sense so we fight. Integrity gets us nowhere so we cheat and steal. Guilt takes over so we kill it with drugs and decadence.

Why?

[You give an answer a shot. I'll give the rest later.]

The gist of the story goes like this: God told Abraham to go kill his son, his only son, the son of promise and offer him as a sacrifice. Abraham goes. (Geneses 22)

God ultimately stopped Abraham before he sliced the knife across Isaac’s throat, but that hasn’t kept that knife from stabbing away at me. In frustrating irony, this story of deep faith takes me to the brink of overwhelming doubt. In the wake of this dark story my mind floods with contradiction and frustration. It seems so wrong.

What was God thinking? What a hideous test of faith! How can you play with a father’s emotions and moral sensibilities just to prove a point? He commands Abraham to enter a ritual only practiced among the barbaric cultures of paganism. How could you really blame Abraham had he screamed at God, “Forget you! You’re not who I thought you were if this is how it’s going to be! Take your promise and leave me alone.”

Did Abraham understand something I don’t? He had to.

Exploring this question has eased some of the angst that I feel trying to reconcile my confusion and outrage over God’s request to have Isaac sacrificed. I have discovered that the contradictions and bewilderment incited by this account eventually shrivel against the reality of a God who raises the dead. Honest reflection reveals the acceptance of this reality to be the ace card Abraham had up his sleeve. “He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead” (Hebrews 11:19).

Maybe Abraham was incensed at the order of God. Surely his head spun in a whirl of moral dilemmas. Didn’t matter. The insight we have from the writer of Hebrews suggests that no matter what preposterous conclusions could be drawn from God’s actions, Abraham’s operative reality was that God raises the dead. This functional belief directed and informed every decision of Abraham’s life. Even apparent absurdities and possible moral failure connected to God weren’t able to overturn the astonishing truth that God raises the dead, which above all else solicits faithful allegiance. That lens cleared the blurry appearances of Abraham’s world and enabled him to see from God’s perspective.

Henri Nouwen simply astounds me. His books, though typically short and concise, stay with me for long periods of time. If you’ve never met him, I’m happy to introduce you.

“The great illusion of leadership is to think that man can be led out of the desert by someone who has never been there. Our lives are filled with examples which tell us that leadership asks for understanding and that understanding requires sharing. So long as we define leadership in terms of preventing or establishing precedents, or in terms of being responsible for some kind of abstract ‘general good,’ we have forgotten that no God can save us except a suffering God, and that no man can lead his people except the man who is crushed by its sins…[this type of leadership] makes it possible to experience that going after the ‘lost sheep’ is really a service to those who were left alone.” (From The Wounded Healer)

About once a week or so I sub at the middle school. It’s been awesome for me. I’ve enjoyed getting to know the kids. I actually learn quite a bit too.

Today, one of the 7th grade girls exclaimed to me “I’m a new person!” As it turns out she was speaking of the results of her baptism yesterday.

Excited about the event I asked, “Where were you baptized at?” In the back of my mind I half expected her to say a Church of Christ in another town (she doesn’t go to the one in Hobart). She answered back, “The First Baptist Church in Roosevelt.” Another town. And another church!

“Interesting,” I thought to myself, “you’re not supposed to know that’s what baptism is for.” I know, I know, but some presuppositions die hard. From what people continue to tell me, she isn’t supposed to make the connection of new life to baptism because she’s a Baptist. I’m told only people in the Church of Christ understand baptism correctly.

We’ve got that doctrine wrapped up, right? It’s what sets us apart from the “denominations,” right? Uh, it doesn’t look like it.

I’m so excited for her. I’m also thrilled to know we share an understanding about the functional realities of baptism. Some won’t acknowledge this, some won’t want to hear it. I don’t know what to do about them, but I won’t let them continue to construct God’s family for me. (Isn’t that God’s call?)

I’m just pumped to have a new sister.

She stands shaking. Pregnant. Hopeless, ridden with shame about what she’s done. Tears cannot wash away the stigma, she’s tried. Suburbia has its standards.

The baby’s daddy? He doesn’t even know. Wouldn’t care if he did.

What about family? Her mother works two jobs, one of the jobs her father would have worked had he not ran off before she was born. She hasn’t the time to support her. Standards, remember? Doesn’t even have the time to say good night. That’s how it is.

What will she do? Fifteen. A child and knocked up.

Scared.

Confused.

Options?

Dizzy. A merry-go-round of choices circles her. Nauseating confusion. “Abortion? Adoption? Raise the baby myself? If I abort… no, that’s murder. If I put it up for adopt…oh, I’m horrible. Who will raise my baby? I can’t care for this baby. Is abortion really better for the baby? No…but.” Confusion mocks her––jeering at the one on stage forgetting her lines.

A beneficiary of abandonment. Forsaken. No embrace. No “I’m here.”

She stands shaking. Outside the clinic. Stomach cramping from emptiness. Convulsed in a dry heave, her ears ring. Disgusted with her life. Pondering the razor blade in the kitchen drawer.

“Screw up! Will you ever amount to anything?” shouts the indoctrination of her guardians. The mental assaults of her mother’s boyfriend. Enacted by his molesting hands. But not a single hand to lift her.

She stands shaking. Disoriented indecision. She’s desperate, afraid, hating herself. Dry heaves reach down, trying to jerk her stomach through her mouth. Acid stinging her chapped lips. She can’t live this nightmare. God?

She feigns hope. The urge to vomit again. Throat pulsating in pain. She screams inside, “Why?! Do you care, God? Say something!”

“Vote Today! Stop Abortion! Save a child!” booms the voice from the bullhorn.

Interrupted by the thunderous cadence of picketers, her racing mind halts. She loses air.

With raging confidence they stand and raise their signs. Embracing their Bibles. Lifting their voices. They have something to say.

She stands shaking.

Wipes the vomit from her lips. Turns and goes inside.

Check out the link here.

I agree that enough is enough. No matter where you fall politically, some things go too far and those who follow Jesus should invest in speaking out against those who go there. It’s clear that Jesus receives continuous bad publicity through religious and political radicals who attach his name to their purposes.

How about this? Let’s neutralize their poisonous rhetoric through accurately living out and speaking out the love of Jesus. Let’s shout, in word and deed, that the Jesus (mis)represented by these opportunistic exploitations isn’t the Messiah, the resurrected One, reconciling the world. And, we will no longer tolerate others exploiting him to gain the upper hand in political debate. He is not leverage for anyone’s personal or political agenda. He is not justification to spew hate and murderous innuendo.

God help all of us!

If you have had enough, speak up. Please. Speak whenever and wherever you have a platform, personally or privately. Refuse to let others hijack your responsibility to represent Jesus as anything other than the Messiah of shalom, the teacher of Matthew 5-7. Let’s pray for them and our leaders. Let’s pray that God would work to bring shalom into intensely emotional discussions and politics.

[P.S. I recently studied the passage cited on the t-shirts (Psalm 109) in depth through the scholarship of Walter Brueggemann. The passage speaks to much deeper issues and raises the complexity of social justice issues and God. Those who've used the passage as hate speech have completely ignored the hermeneutic complexities of reading texts thousands of years removed. When will we realize the danger of uninformed readings of Scripture?]

The more I read Paul the more I see beyond his remarkable theology and into his heart. Following Jesus wasn’t simply a stimulative mind exercise for him. He philosophized in Athens but the emotional tug of Jesus’ heart pulled him beyond sitting around convincing others of his point. Paul loved people and he never disconnected that from his technical teachings. He always left the classroom and the courtroom to seek solidarity with the poor and the prisoner.

And so if we’re to read him correctly we cannot extrapolate his intense desire for his neighbor’s good from his intricate detailing of God’s work through Jesus. Reflected in the glint of the wet ink of Paul’s pen were hopeless faces peering back at him through the blur of their tears. Though laboring to articulate the impossible, he stared back into their eyes, writing with unmatched technical precision but with greater empathy. This empathetic momentum shaped his writing more than his intellectual prowess or his religious education.

In this way Paul wrote through a vision displayed by Jesus on the cross. He saw the orphan, the widow, the temple prostitute, the misguided Pharisee and the confused Greek through the lens of the greatest love ever. As if he had mixed the dry elements of ink with his tears, the core of Paul’s emotions seeps into the parchment of his letters. His writings weren’t dry treatises just written for peer review, they were movements of love shaped by Jesus and his cross and the Spirit of God.

No matter what we conclude about Paul’s theology we miss it all if we ignore his raw honesty and love for people. “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people.” “But the greatest of these is love.” “Therefore, if food makes my brother or sister stumble, I will never eat meat, lest I make my brother or sister stumble.”

The cold scholar? The heartless debater? Hardly.

His words live. In them his heart still beats for the “least of these.” For Christ’s sake, the world’s sake…for our sake, let’s not rip it out.

Over the last several days my studies have focused on Paul and his relationship to Judaism and whether that matters to modern Christians (even though Paul himself didn’t use that description of Jesus followers). My thoughts haven’t plummeted the depths of the issue nor do I claim to have exhaustively detailed any fresh perspective on Paul (I’ll leave that for N.T. Wright and John Piper to unravel), but I did experience a few paradigmatic shifts in the process that I’d like to share. With an awareness that I may have ventured beyond my abilities and education, let me still offer some thoughts on Paul and identity.

According to Paul, a core identity in Jesus appears to have had little to do with external manifestations of religious custom and practice. He is quite forceful about this in Galatians. Circumcision or no circumcision, it doesn’t matter. And that matters because the identity of God’s people from Paul’s perspective was signified only through the reception and leading of the Spirit of God through faith in Christ (Galatians 3:26-29; 5:5-6). This reality in the lives of Jesus followers, no matter what tribe or race or religious heritage, underwrote the insurance that declared them the beneficiaries of the promise to Abraham and at the same time the executors.

His letters suggest that Paul is more concerned with reworking the identity of Israel in light of Jesus’ death and resurrection rather than propagating and promoting a new religious movement completely severed from Israel’s history. Though the door to the new age had busted open, religious structure wasn’t the hinge upon which it swung. He refers to those who have expressed faith in Jesus as the Israel of God (Galatians 6:16), the new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) in the likeness of the new Adam (Romans 5:12, 18-19). Jews who rejected Jesus were considered by Paul to have rejected or, at best, resisted the idea that Jesus’ followers, Jew or Greek, were now the heirs of God’s covenant promises and, consequently, cosmic rescue operation in spite of any particular religious system or manifestation. This fundamental intention of God’s stays shrouded in mystery until Jesus steps onto the stage.

The final chapter of the story is written for God’s people through the life and vocation of Jesus, the secrets are told in his chapter. All the shadows solidify into substantive realities by his mission; his life pens the climax of Israel’s drama. If that represents chapter 7 then many of Paul’s contemporaries were still attempting to live out chapter 6. They wouldn’t turn the page and were content to tell their own story. They were no longer Jews in this stubbornness, at least not in the sense of the newly constituted Jews who were to inherit the promises of God to Abraham through faith in Messiah Jesus. Of course, this neglect of his family to see the rest of God’s story through bothered Paul deeply and he wrestled with ways to ease this anxiety (Romans 9-11). He knew that they, like all people, could experience and catalyze new creation as God’s people. If only they’d move on.

So what? What does this construction of Paul’s work have to do with Christians today? How can this framework shape our lives as followers of Jesus, the Israel of God, the new creation, the fruit of the second Adam?

Allow me three observations.

First, it puts the first thing first. Following Paul’s lead, today’s Christians are free to focus on proclaiming the same first thing Paul believed marked the true Israel. That first thing is a guarantee of inherited blessings (Genesis 12:3; Ephesians 3:6) as realized through the gift of the Spirit of God (Ephesians 1:13-14). It is contracted through a faith response (I place baptism’s role here: Galatians 3:26) induced by the historical and liberating message of Jesus’ death and resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:1-3)––the victory proclamation of Israel’s Messiah. All other matters should be relegated to the periphery of religious identity. They were by Paul.

Second, it allows us to genuinely and honestly become all things to all people without threatening the core of our identity (1 Corinthians 9:19-23). We can peel back the religious, cultural and whatever-else identities we wear to create solidarity with others. Paul engaged Jewish temple worship (indicating little regard for modern “Christian” sensibilities) so that he could maintain a credible platform to proclaim Messiah Jesus to his ethnic family (Acts 21:17-26). Like him, we can do this without giving up our real identity because it isn’t dependent upon doctrinal precision or prescribed patterns of worship but on the first thing alone.

Third, it throws us into the tangible history of God reclaiming the world. In this story we tap into a reality greater than denominational differences and transitory traditions. The part we play changes us. God’s Spirit not only seals the deal but provides the resources and power needed to live out the intended influence of Israel. What happens as it takes hold of our lives can be expressed in concrete terms.

We will move away from the wishful wonder of a legal transaction somewhere in heaven where God takes care of sins to the salty tears of weeping with those who weep; to the calloused knees of intercessory prayer; to the rolled-up sleeves of God’s kindness; to the frustration of dealing with domestic turmoil; to the exuberant praise of victory. We will begin to feel alive in a reality where the deeds of love overcome the dead-ends of legalism.

Above all, as Paul weary and tired worked to bring this hope into view, he knew that his access to the inheritance proved the same accessibility for his neighbor. Through religious debate, persecution, punishment, sleepless nights and raging seas he embodied the ultimate purposes of Israel and never let go of the promise he’d claimed through her Messiah: “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

Go, Israel, and bless.

Please read yesterday’s post (if you haven’t) and offer your critique or additions.

After you do that I’d really like for you to share what you believe are the implications of understanding Paul’s mission this way.

Let the conversation begin.