revdougnz

Hope!

In a world where the best can come out of the worst

and the worst can come out of the best!

 

Here we are again. It is again the first Sunday in Advent. The season of waiting is upon us. The season of anticipation occupies our minds. We are again asked to recognize the present-ness of God in nature and in the one called Jesus of Nazareth – the human face of the one we name God. But unlike most of the northern hemisphere of our world, where the church liturgical calendar was first shaped, our today is the first official day of Summer. And Summer in New Zealand is a natural time for celebration. Even in times of drought or flash flood or grass fire. Even in the face of these there is new life and new growth to be seen, ripeness and richness, as plant and bush and tree display their many colours against the browning of our rich yet shaky isles. Nature is a gift in Summer in New Zealand with its continuous and reachable shoreline of warm sands and living inspiring seas. And we anticipate it’s arrival eagerly. Our Hope is real and certain and inviting.

 

In the church lectionary which I use as a challenge to my subjectivity and as a basis for granting the scriptures their due attention and integrity today is the first Sunday in Advent, yet the readings set down in the Lectionary for today have nothing whatsoever to do with our perceptions of either Advent or the coming season called Christmas. For instance, if we approach Matthew as a narrative, today’s reading comes about 9/10th of the way through the book… Closer to the end of the complete story than to the beginning. This suggests that they come to us totally out of context.

 

Secondly, as we know with most of the stories from the scriptures the readings paint diverse pictures of a world quite different from ours today. This alone, demands that we see these stories or readings as not being directed to a time thousands of years later – into our time. as seems to be assumed by some who shaped the Lectionary. A far better place to start would be the beginning of Matthew, the genealogy of Jesus. Where the best can come out of the worst. the worst can come out of the best! Having said that we now have to ask what if anything are we to make of these stories?

 

A few years back now process theologian John Cobb made some suggestions that might help. He says that those who have selected these passages “understand Advent to be the season of anticipation, of expectancy, and hope generally… And in all the texts the hope is grounded in faith in God.” (Cobb. P&F Web site, 2004)

 

So continuing to listen to John Cobb for a few more moments, we ask what can we learn from and hear in, these stories? Well! We can acknowledge that we human beings are not good at predicting the future. We can appreciate that the actual course of history is far more ambiguous than are the visions that lure us forward. We can realise that an interventionist God does not control the future or know just what will happen. And we can hear also that the hope which keeps us going is far deeper and more fundamental to our faith than we realise. “Hope has survived repeated disappointments in the past.  It will survive many more in the future.  It will do so as long as we believe in the biblical God.” (Cobb, P&F Web site, 2004) A God not made in our image.

 

It is true that such a statement needs clarification because such a statement presupposes that God’s working in history does not displace the working of human beings and that can be a bit of a shock to those who believe God is all-powerful! That all-powerful God could ‘do something’ in various situations so what happened?

 

John Cobb explains his comment a bit more. The quote is a bit detailed so we need to listen carefully. “God works in hope for peace and justice, but the world turns to violence and oppression.  Still God’s work is not futile.  Here and there it succeeds, encouraging the hope for wider and more inclusive success.  That success depends on our response to God’s invitation to share in the achievement of God’s purposes.  And our hope depends on the assurance that God does not give up on us” (Cobb, P&F Web site, 2004).

 

Here I would suggest we think about hope as having an active meaning as opposed to a passive one or maybe a meaning closer to trust as opposed to a benign wishful thought.

There is a subtle certainty to the sort of hope I suggest, just like that of my suggestion that another word for ‘God’ is ‘Almost’.

 

Despite frustration and disappointment, we are still called to be a people of hope. For hope is what is handed down from mother to daughter to son, not merely as a package passed from one generation to another. But as hope which is alive in mother and daughter and which now lives in the child of the third generation.

 

Today is the first Sunday in Advent. A time of waiting… a time of change… a time of hope.

In none of the Three-Year Lectionary stories set for the first Sunday during the season of Advent, are there stories “of babies or shepherds or stars or lullabies, but maybe these stories are saying that the world, as we know it, is about to change.  Maybe their message is ‘wake up, pay attention, get ready… Strange words, but maybe we need something jarring to lift us out of our complacency and wake up to something new” (ETigner. “Twilight time. A sermon” First Cong. Church web site, 2009). So, in the face of waiting, of change, yet in the continuation of hope itself I want to tell you a story. Some of you will have heard it before but I hope it will engage you again.

 

The story is that in Dresden, the German city that was devastated by the fire-bombing at the end of the World War 2, was the place of a wonderful discovery. They found in the ruins a musical score that had survived the fire and devastation. It was the score to Albinoni’s ‘Adagio for Strings and Orchestra in B Minor’.

In the midst of this devastation of war – the very worst that we do to each other – there survived something of the most beautiful that we create for each other.

 

The Albinoni piece became a sign of hope. And it has been used that way. During the siege of Sarajevo during the Balkans War, the city was shelled month after month, every single night. On one of those nights a group of people standing in line in front of a bakery were waiting to buy bread. A mortar shell fell right in the middle of them. Twenty-two people were killed. Innocent people. Hungry people.  Wanting to buy bread.

A few days later, at the same spot, in front of the burned-out bakery, a man named Vedran Smailovic placed a chair, and began to play his cello.

 

For 22 days he played his cello, one day in memory for each one of the people who had been killed at that spot. That gesture itself was considered wonderful. Just the playing music. But what gave it deeper significance is the music he played each day was ‘Adagio for Strings and Orchestra in B Minor’.

Slide

Play Sarajevo’s Adagio…

In the very worst that we do to each other hope says that there is something of the most beautiful that we create for each other.

 

Another way of understanding the nature of hope is another story that goes like this….

This story is a tongue in cheek one that contains both the traditional understand of God and one that supports the answer I gave to Gordon’s question about the claim that we are the Christ.

 

It is said that when God finished with Creation, she had a desire to leave behind, just a small piece of divinity and wholeness so humans could experience this delight. But God was a bit of a trickster too, so she didn’t want this to be too easy for human beings. She wasn’t sure, at first, where to put this special something, so she asked the other living things in creation. And someone suggested in the stars and God replied, No, I have this feeling that one-day humankind will explore space and they will find it. Someone else suggested hiding it in the depths of the ocean. God thought about it for a moment and answered, No. She also had a feeling that some-day humankind would explore the deepest places in the seas – that was also too easy. Then suddenly, God had it. “I know where I’ll put this special something, a place where they will never look.
I’ll hide it in them, they will never look there.” And so, it was. And so, it has been (FJMuir 2001:114).

Hope.  We have it.  Without it, we cannot live. Advent hope calls to us, lures us, to breathe another n\breath, to pause for another look, it offers us another alternative, it shakes off the doldrums – and in banishes fear. For this Advent hope, first announced by angels to shepherds, “means that despite appearances people of violence are no longer in control of history… that those who would seek to determine history’s outcome through violence will never succeed… That love and peace are more powerful than might and strength. Hope claims that love changes things, that love overcomes evil. When the angels announced the coming of Christ to the shepherds their first words are ‘fear not'” (Northcott 2010:17). Fear not. Hope is more than wishful thinking because it says step into the mystery of life, the whole of life. Amen.

Notes:
Muir, J. J. Heretics’ Faith. Vocabulary for Religious liberals. Annapolis: F. J. Muir, 2001.
Northcott, M. S. Cuttlefish, Clones and Cluster Bombs. Preaching, Politics and Ecology. London: DL&T, 2010.

Isaiah 23:1-6; Luke 23:33-43

Christ the King, Reign of Christ, Or?

At first glance, there is something anachronistic about claiming Christological superiority in a postmodern age of seekers, multiple faiths, and self-described spiritual but not religious persons.  What does it mean to talk of Kings when there is very little understanding of what that meant, means or could mean? Do we need to use such language today to talk about the presence of a man who dies thousands of years ago? Do we need to all think the same in order to preserve some sort of story or truth? Do we need to use such language to contribute to an understanding of the way God’s presence or the presence of the sacred is with us?

Well! I do think we need some sort of myth, some sort of story or myth to provide us with life. We are conscious beings who cannot be without the conscious exercise. The question I think we might ask is do we need universality, some sort of collective vision to help us question things like custom, and culture, and institution, and organization and assumption. And the answer again is yes, I think we do so long as we can maintain the scepticism, maintain the questioning so as to critique the inevitable imperialism. That comes. The theological question is ‘Can we claim universality in terms of God’s presence in the ministry and mission Jesus of Nazareth in a world of multiple truth claims?  Again, my answer is yes but only if the universal can be balanced by the particularity of our own faith perspective? It is always in tension and that is good.

The reality is that every religious tradition claims a type of universality.  Buddhists assert albeit humbly that Buddhist practices can, in principle, be transformative for everyone.  The Jewish vision of God, even apart from the Christian incarnational understanding of Jesus, cannot just be restricted to the Jewish people, but must have applicability, in principle, to all people.  The reality is that the world’s many faith or wisdom traditions affirm different things.  The world’s religions are not the same, nor do they claim to lead to the same destination by similar practices. Here we have the inevitability of human consciousness. This diversity does not need to lead to a concrete wall between faiths, but rather to an evolving interdependence of faith positions, growing alongside one another and learning from each other. The fear of losing one’s uniqueness is transformed in the joint hermeneutic walk. We interpret together pooling greater diversity in thought and the result is a more real and true outcome.

Jeremiah speaks of divine shepherding and by that he introduces the idea that God does not dominate but serves.  The God of all things cares for each thing: God’s companionship casts away all fear and renews all things.  God appoints caregivers not to “lord it over” the laity but to heal and reconcile all people.  God seeks wholeness for all creation, and God’s spokespersons have the same responsibility, to gather together, to seek unity, and nurture new life and creativity. Note the need for diversity, the need for difference that requires the walk together, the sharing of difference in the interests of the new.

Psalm 46, today’s psalm we didn’t read continues the theme of divine wholeness.  God is our refuge and strength; God helps us in challenging times.  In the maelstrom, we discover that we are not alone but that God is with us. Here we have the together requirement, the engagement with ‘the other’ the need for the hermeneutic, the sharing of the interpretation.  But, to experience divine wholeness, and by this we might mean the engagement we make with the sacred. One of the aspects of this engagement is that we need to “be still” or “pause awhile.” God or the divine or the sacred speaks in the maelstrom of life: a still small voice whispers through the storm and gives guidance and courage to those who stop long enough to listen.  Awareness begins with a small seed within consciousness. God is on our side, giving protection and strength, in times of trial.  But we must let go of frenetic activity and anxiety to experience holiness in the center of the cyclone.

We are called to Honour the Mind.

Stillness awakens us to the larger perspective.  Mindfulness takes us to the place beyond judgement, a place of vulnerable openness and we discover that our personal and social upheavals are part of a larger more orderly and creative fabric of divine care.  The upheavals are important but not all-dominating when we recognize that that which we name God is with us. John Caputo might say we encounter the God who is the insistent call. A Creed from the United Church of Canada which is theistic says “We are not alone, we live in God’s world; In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us.  We are not alone.” I might say the same thing in non-theistic language as “We are not alone, we participate in the creation of the divine world. In life, in death, in life beyond death, what is divine is manifest in our becoming”

Today’s lectionary passage from Colossians joins the universal and intimate.  In Christ, all things are created. Christ is the impersonal, timeless everlasting insistence where God’s fullness dwells: the fully alive post Easter Jesus or the fully active faith of Jesus is a catalyst for our own personal and institutional creative transformation.  God’s glory does not dominate but nurtures our own agency, creativity, and responsibility.  Through the Christ, the divine insistence reconciles all things.  In reconciling all things, Christ reconciles each thing and that means each one of us.  The ever-present divine is present in the here and now, in our life, and in our community, always seeking Shalom.

The words I have just used are an attempt to articulate that which Colossians argues as joining cosmology and personality.  What touches all things heals each thing.  The One who moves though all things also moves through each of our lives, seeking abundant life and wholeness for all of us, one person at a time. The systems and society we live in is always too complex, too busy, to belittling, too hopeless, yet in this Christ we are talking about the individual, the small, the insignificant is imbedded within everything.

We are called to Live the questions.

Luke sees Calvary as the center of sacred space-time.  Jesus forgives the people right in front of him:  the crowd and the political leaders are dominated by fear and egocentricity; they cannot see beyond their own alienation and consequent need to dominate and destroy. They choose which side of the equation to stand and fight, inclusion or separation, difference or sameness and Jesus is used as the projection – the scapegoat – intended to ease their anxiety and alienation; The Christ is conditioned as the only way out and can become locked in creedal form or concrete infallible truth that denies his humanity. He becomes perfect and untouchable. But this projection fails to limit or dominate the post Easter Jesus, The Christ. He freely claims his relationship to God’s Shalom within the maelstrom of violence.

Jesus’ promise to his companion on the cross goes from clock time to a timeless, risen life.  “Today you will be with me in paradise” suggests a relationship of wholeness in the midst of dying and death.  Jesus doesn’t describe what he means by paradise, but he opens the door to a larger space-time perspective that embraces the vision of heaven and the communion of saints.  We can experience this everlasting life now: we can experience the sacred vision amid the ordinary moments and tragic conflicts of life. Our life is part of a grand adventure that goes beyond our physical deaths.  Death does not limit God’s love.  Rather God continues God’s aim at wholeness in any future adventures we might have.

We are called to Explore the adventure of Humanity.

This realm of Christ, this divine world, this pre and post Easter world is intended for healing and affirmation.  In the divine-human, divine-creaturely, call and response, that which we name God identifies with our deepest needs and the deepest needs of the planet (and beyond) and does all that can be done to bring health to the body, cell by cell and soul by soul.  The divine we name God insists that we be expressions of the creation, agents of the creativity that manifests the purpose and the meaning and enactment of the universe.

Let go of the language of Kings and realms with boundaries. Let go of the limited view of differences and the fear of the universal and be The Christ today. Amen.

 

Pentecost 23 C, 2019
Isaiah 65:17-25

Turning Probability into Possibility

At the risk of repeating myself I want to suggest that what I was claiming last week was that I believe our church is making it more difficult to honour and accept the different, Different in social standing, different in world view and different in theological development. It seems that in order to be responsible with money and property we must all think the same and have the same view of what the church is and how it engages in mission. I may be paranoid and limited in my thinking also but it seems that in its concentration on survival and efficiency it is closing doors and excluding people. It seems that it is no longer appropriate for one to hold, or live by, a theological position or vision in our church. Unless of course, it is the neo-evangelical middle of the road position. By neo-evangelical I mean that which seeks to wipe out any sense of ecumenism, and any sense of liberal thought as being anti-gospel.

I admit that in saying that I am being simplistic, and generalizing but that is the message I think is being given by a church that says worship can only take place in one form and that is the gathering of a certain amount of people on a Sunday who give enough to sustain the model. Yes, there are groups beyond the model but they are not authenticated as equal opportunities as that of the traditional parish, congregational model. Yes, there is an accommodating of some alternatives but even those are bound by a fiscal model. What I am trying not to do is to say the way we do church is wrong but rather that is seriously flawed if it is the only way. Nor am I saying that attempts to change the direction have not been made in the past. What I am saying though is that that there is a qualified support for what I am suggesting but that it falls into the too hard basket in a world that is driven by fear and by an authenticity based in economic compliance. It is in my view rather sad that the church has become afraid to risk being confronted by its very own gospel.

The neo-evangelical approach is not only frightened of extinction, it has flattened out its proclamation of orthodoxy and made one-dimensional, the role of both theologian and prophet, in the life of the church. The only authentic prophet listened to is that one who espouses the party line, the traditional and the comfortable. The only theologians acceptable to read are those that don’t rock the boat.

However, if we take a look at this morning’s story from the prophet Isaiah, we see that he will have none of that. Instead, through the use of vivid picture language, Isaiah offers a vision, or states a position, which reminds us “of the ideals for which we hope and for which we believe God strives.  The ‘new heavens’ and ‘new earth’ the prophet foresees signify the possibilities for human society when we open ourselves to God’s transforming power” (RPregeant, P&F web site, 2007). The task of becoming more fully human in the image of God is always radical, new and holistic. New heavens.  New earth.  New possibilities for human society, now. There are some commentators who would suggest this is a most appropriate passage as we move towards the end of the Christian year, and national elections.

Rex Hunt suggests there is one group of Australian biblical scholars comment that might be useful reflect on this passage. They have interpreted this as saying “All that has prevented creation from being what God intended will be removed.  The disasters we see in the world about us every day are not what will determine the future of God’s creation.  Neither terrorist activity nor the exercise of military power will hold sway in God’s order of things. I would like to add that neither the church’s decline or extinction of current form will succeed. They go on to say that political deception will have no place, nor will abuse within the family or workplace.  The selfish exploitation and neglect of nature will be recognised… This is what the writer(s) of Isaiah 65 looks toward.  They look not just to the making new of the physical world, as to the renewing of the relationships and interconnections within the world which maintain life in its physical, spiritual, social and other dimensions.  That is the Christian hope” (HWallace et al. web site, 2007).

New heavens.  New earth.  Possibilities for human society, now.

Those of you who were here last Sunday may remember we touched on some so-called ‘apocalyptic’ talk as a basis for human transformation rather than ‘end-of-the-world’ stuff.

I also suggested something was required of us when we encounter this sort of end times talk. It is to read and study the biblical stories seriously, not literally, and know that we, even if only in a small way, are called upon to participate in the transformation of the world.

So, what is the apocalyptic talk in today’s text? I and others suggest that there is an echo to be heard in this week’s passage. And again, it is about re-imagining rather than end-of-world stuff.

So, how do we re-imagine the church?  Well! I am not sure my imagination is good enough but I want to make some suggestions. The first is that we might examine one, or two ways others have sought to re-imagine the world, through human transformation.

The first is an example of a very small way that we might participate in re-imagining the world. The topic is about British supermarket practices, from a few years back that in all intent and purpose could be applicable here too.

A Church of England bishop warned that the big supermarket chains in Britain were putting farming livelihoods at risk by forcing down prices through their buying power. His report said that: “The business practices of the major food retailers have placed considerable stress on the farming community through the use of methods which we believe to be unfair and of which consumers seem to be unaware,” said Bishop Michael Langrish of Exeter.

He was speaking at the launch of a report, ‘Fair trade begins at home: Supermarkets and the effect on British farming livelihoods’ written by two members of the church’s Ethical Investment Advisory Group. A small way, are called upon to participate in the transformation – re-imagining – of the world.

Secondly, Michael Lerner, a progressive Jewish Rabbi in America, wrote a powerful book called The Left Hand of God. In the book Lerner challenges both the political ‘right’ and the political ‘left’ to re-imagine the way society is organised by presenting what he calls a new “spiritual vision… a whole different level of discourse, not something narrowly instrumental that is basically about winning an election” (Lerner 2006:5, 18).

So, he sets out what he calls a ‘Spiritual Covenant with America’. “We invite our fellow Americans”, he writes, “to join us in building a society based on (a) new bottom line” (Lerner 2006:229). He suggests there are eight areas or issues are covered by the Covenant, and they include: 1. families, 2. personal responsibility, 3. social responsibility, 4. values-based education, 5. health care, 6. environmental stewardship, 7. building a safer world, and finally. 8. the separation of church and state and science.

We don’t have time to go into details of Lerner’s Covenant other than to offer some words from his Conclusion, because they could ring bells in our context as well: One of the things that evangelicals liberals and progressives can agree on is that; “There is an enormous spiritual hunger in the world at this time. From the sprouting up of new traditionally framed congregations to untitled groups of interest it seems that there is a yearning for a new way to think and a new way to live.  The challenge is to see that we have been trapped into thinking that fulfillment comes from achieving material success.  Bigger buildings with more people thinking and doing the same thing. I think our church has been caught up in this too and I think it is because we have stopped our theological questioning for too long.

This yearning could be because as the globalized economy makes accessible more and more material goods at prices that can be afforded, and more people have more commodities – more computers, cell phones, DVDs, cars, boats, televisions, and other gadgets – we find ourselves reaching for something else, something that cannot be satisfied by a new purchase.  We want meaning to our lives…”

Learner puts the two images of Right Hand and Left Hand of God, into context:
“The Right Hand of God is embraced by the powerful… [and] used to provide legitimacy to an empire and a competitive and unjust economic marketplace…  The Left Hand of God emphasizes the need to build a world based on love, kindness, compassion, generosity, mutual cooperation, recognition of the spirit of God in every other human being and an awareness of our interdependence with others…  (Lerner 2006:358). I might want to say as I have said earlier that the concentration of the left hemisphere of the brain where function and outcomes are sourced as opposed to the right hemisphere where purpose and meaning are developed is a reason. Remembering here that the right hand of logic and function power is influenced by the right brain and vice versa and this seems to support this proposal.

Throughout history, as well as within each of us, we can find elements in our life experiences that identify with the vision of the Right Hand of God. And similarly, there are also signs in both our individual and society lives that come under the influence of the vision of the Left Hand of God. It has been suggested that when social energy flows more toward hope, and promise we find ourselves supporting policies that are more generous, more oriented toward establishing peace and justice.

On the other hand, when social energy flows more toward fear, we find ourselves supporting policies that seek to dominate others, and to build institutions based on the assumption there is not enough in the way of material goods to go around. (Lerner 2006:358-59. I watched a move recently about the work of Bishop Desmond Tutu in South Africa that showed just how hard it is to bridge this gap between world views.  Practicing reconciliation and peace is harder after a regime of segregation, where difference and fear have been the mainstays of society.

The good news from Isaiah and from Jesus is: the world can be re-imagined; can be transformed. And what is our role in all this?  It is to challenge the powerful voice of fear.
Be it in the church or in society in general. If we believe that the church has anything to say anymore. we must engage in apocalyptic work. Not about a second coming, or a pie in the sky idealism but rather to bear witness to the reality and the ramifications of the vision of Isaiah and Michael Langrish and Michael Lerner and others. The followers of the Jesus Way must free themselves from the fear that holds them back from re-imagining the New Heavens and the New Earth. Amen.

Notes:
Lerner, M. 2006.  The Left Hand of God. Taking Back our Country from the Religious Right.  New York. HarperCollins.

rexae74@gmail.com

 

2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5

‘When Do We Admit We have it wrong?   

William Loader on his web site back in 2007 wrote that “There are many ways in which we as Christians can make themselves look silly, and when we look at some of those who have been up front as Christians, we have to admit that its perhaps more often these days than ever. If a Christian makes the news its usually about some misdemeanor or some horrible act. And in between this is all the orthodox fundamentalists who spout forth fear enticing, blood curdling oaths that alienate us from normal upright people. Its no wonder that we are sometimes aligned with the story about a bloke who was always having bad luck. Once he found a magic lamp, rubbed it, and a genie appeared and gave him the Midas touch. For the rest of his life, everything he touched turned into a muffler!  (Bausch 1998:390). This brings me to our biblical story this morning from the pseudo-Pauline letter called 2nd Thessalonians’, which also needs some serious critique. But first some contextual stuff.

There are very few reputable biblical scholars who agree that this so-called Pauline letter, was written by Paul. The evidence points to someone using Paul’s name to claim authority, while writing sometime after Paul. John Dominic Crossan (Crossan & Reed 2004:105), probably the leading biblical scholar of our time, is clear. There are authentic Paul letters and there are pseudo Paul letters. The authentic letters can be named: as Romans, 1st & 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1st Thessalonians, and Philemon. The inauthentic or post Pauline letters, attributed to Paul but not written by Paul, include: Ephesians Colossians 2^nd Thessalonians 1^st & 2^nd Timothy and Titus.

To make things even more complex I spoke some time back about research on Paul that suggested we had at least Three Paul’s, painted by the text. The first being the radical Paul who as a devout Jew followed closely the efforts of Jesus to transform Judaism and include other nations. The second Paul being the accommodating Paul who sought to justify and include the Roam and Greek cultures and the third Paul who was the Paul who argued for Roman culture as being the orthodox faith. In brief we have the critique of empire, the accommodation of empire and the Paul who embrace empire as the true context for faith. If we go along with this analysis of the Paul, we know, then we have a hermeneutic challenge. Some people we know have their favourite Paul bits. The question is do these favourite bits of Paul belong in the authentic Paul basket or in the pseudo Paul basket? It can make a lot of difference, because we are extracting them from a particular context with a particular purpose.

Another point we need to recognise is that, not only are there pseudo Paul letters, but some of those letters are anti Paul letters, as evidenced by much of the content of Ephesians and Timothy. The challenge here is that some of these texts are relied on by fundamentalists and neo-orthodox these days, for their ‘anti’ causes! Paul says; so, its truth and biblically warranted. So why do we have the anti-Paul letters?  Well, Crossan suggests, they are an “attempt by compilers and authors to sanitize a social subversive, to domesticate a dissident apostle, and to make Christianity and Rome safe for one another” (Crossan & Reed 2004:106). Perhaps like so much so-called ‘fake news today, they seek to push a particular cause, which kind of brings us back to today’s biblical story.

Some of the author’s hearers are frightened. They seem convinced that the so-called second coming of Jesus’ is about to happen. So, they have got themselves all into a lather. And their goings-on has divided their small community. Do you think the churches concentration on survival today might be the support of a particular theological position?

The author tries to counter this ‘apocalyptic scenario’, but to no avail. Instead the comments seem to pour oil onto troubled fires. Palpable fear grips the Thessalonians. Such as some politicians hope will happen during an election campaign. Such as members of the PCANZ hope will pool resources, limit diversity and sanitize the gospel.

The trouble is that they might just be hastening their own demise because fear speaks louder than either history or any reasoned debate!

And here is the radical response, the original Pauline response and this the Jesus response. Being progressives, we can dismiss all this ‘apocalyptic’, ‘end-of-the- world’, ‘second-coming-of-Jesus’ stuff as fanciful rubbish. And most of it is.  Or if you prefer Bishop Jack Spong’s evaluation:  he calls it “gobbledygook and complete non-sense” (Spong eLetter, 31.10.07).

Crossan says; ‘Especially the modern writings of Tim LeHaye and the “transcendental snake oil” (Crossan 2007:198) called the Left Behind series. As well as the rantings of many American TV evangelists, and their imitators.

So, it is important to try and go under the apocalyptic veneer in order to get in touch with the real underlying issue. And that real issue is, not about the end of the world or the second coming of Jesus, but about the end of evil and injustice and violence… in this world.

On the former, Crossan is again helpful: “The Second Coming of Christ is not an event that we should expect to happen soon.  The Second Coming of Christ is not an event that we should expect to happen violently.  The Second Coming of Christ is not an event that we should expect to happen literally.  The Second Coming of Christ is what will happen when we Christians finally accept that the First Coming was the Only Coming and start to cooperate with divine presence” (Crossan 2007:230-231).

On the latter, a professor of religion and philosophy, Russell Pregeant, says we need to get in touch with: “the hope for peace and justice that has led many in our own time, under the influence of liberation theology, to speak of apocalyptic writings as ‘the literature of the oppressed’”  (Pregeant, P&F web site, 2007).

And he goes on to say: “[this is] a reminder that God is certainly not satisfied with the unjust structure of the present world… [But] we need neither the outrageous fantasies of the so-called ‘rapture’ nor the grotesque images of millions of souls condemned to eternal torture while the blessed shine like the sun, to ensure that human life has eternal significance” (Pregeant, P&F web site, 2007).

So, what are we left with? We have to say that apocalyptic talk, in our own times, which wants to claim a basis in divine destruction, is unhelpful. We also have to say that apocalyptic talk, in our times, which wants to claim a positive basis in human transformation, is helpful. It is that simple.

But we might now say that we need to get beyond this helpful/unhelpful dichotomy, because something more is required of us.  What we are led to do is to get beyond the dichotomy of wright and wrong and in and out and truth and untruth and. 1. Read and study the biblical stories seriously, not literally, and 2; know that we, even if only in a small way, are called upon to participate in the transformation of the world. Honour the mind and its ability to ask the questions of history, of text and story and remember that if we are only against something, we are doomed to negativity. So too if our actions are only attempts at domesticating dissident voices, making religion and politics safe for one another. If we are concerned with our survival. We will not find success but rather only build walls to protect what’s left.

There is a poor analysis that says that what is transpiring today is the clash of two completely different worldviews. In criticizing the fundamentalists, I am not suggesting that there are only two world views. What I am suggesting is that getting stuck with only two points of view we are entering survival mode and negative the trap of negativity. We allow an accelerated culture of secularism facing off against an aging culture of Christendom.” Which is a false world, or a world of false God’s.

Dare I say it but I think that what is happening today is actually the result of an unthinking orthodox fundamentalist movement, that ingratiated itself into the Western world in the early 400s CE in the interests of empire, control, wealth and organisational strength. This is not to say that such organisational endeavour is wrong but rather that it lacks the ability to be critiqued adequately. And we have now reaped the benefit with a world of polarity as opposed to complementarity. The Christian world ended up in a battle with secularism. A them and us falsehood a right and wrong world. The outcome has been the demise of the church, the reduction in membership, the need for a Northern Presbytery strategy is a result. Sadly, I don’t believe it will address the fact that what is happening is probably one of the greatest capitulations to the bipolar secularity, in our lifetimes.

The fact that fundamentalists and evangelicals talk about the importance of honesty, character, integrity, and ethics in leaders but then throw all that out the window to support their own concerns, is hardly the result of secularism.  It is, however, a surrender to the dichotomy, the binary as if it is some sort of purest, amoral, goal.

What we see happening presently, around the western world is the result of a fundamentalist Christianity, with a truncated and immature view of the Christian narrative, and the world, which far too many evangelicals also bought into when it came to the political. The issue is that we need to quit blaming others and take a look in the mirror. The church has declined while we are members of it. There is something we are not doing with the gospel.

The false God is that one we have created by an attitude that claims truth with such tone and rhetoric that dismisses, discredits, and demonizes the other side. There are not two sides but more. We are told that the other side, the left, or the right, whatever one wants to call it, is guilty of the same.  “However, the same is true for many on both sides.

The point we seem to be missing is that the majority of the world has moved on and the task is not to take sides but rather to make an argument with questions that cannot be dismissed.

It is my suggestion that fundamentalist orthodox Christianity is whistling past the graveyard at this point.  The so-called moderate voices think that they are somehow helping by staying above the fray.  This needs to be challenged. History tells us that those who come out and try to mediate as neutral observers, who try to stay above the fray, who try to tell us both sides are the same (“good people on both sides”), end up helping the oppressors, those whose incivility and intolerance Look what happened to Paul as he became the servant of the system in being transformed from radical into empire saviour. This need for control and survival and the claim to the power of negativity is intrinsic to the fundamentalist movement, philosophy, and existence.

And where is my positive claim for saying this? It is again history. History has not been kind to those voices.  I have the feeling history will see the current voices in the same light.  In their very commendable attempt to promote civility and tolerance, proper stewardship and radical redistribution of resources they miss the gravity of our current moment with their poor and limited analysis of the moment.  In seeking to promote the goodness of the church, they will invariably end up helping those who have decided they will do the very opposite. This who have money and resources will get richer and the poor and struggling will get pushed aside in the interests of the sensible, the logical and the obvious. Elie Wiesel, the Romanian American writer of the play ‘The Trial of God: said “We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”. My question is will the church do to us what it has already done to Paul? Amen.

Notes:
Bausch, W. J. 1998.  A World of Stories for Preachers and Teachers. Mystic. Twenty-Third Publications.
Crossan, J. D. 2007.  God and Empire. Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now in Search of Paul. How Jesus’s Apostle Opposed Rome’s Empire with God’s Kingdom. New York. HarperCollins.
Crossan, J. D. & J. L. Reed. 2004.. New York. HarperSanFrancisco.

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