I once heard Bill Johnson say that every human being longs live a life of significance. He also said that often, people confuse this with a longing to be famous, or rich, or seen. You don’t need to be on MTV or in People magazine to lead a life of significance.
I wonder sometimes whether I forget this. Recently, I have spent a lot of time bouncing between mulling over and avoiding any consideration of what I am going to do with my life. I am 22 years old, married to a wonderful wife, and am on my way to live on the west side of Michigan because said wonderful wife got offered a wonderful job with a wonderful salary and benefits. What more could a guy want?
And yet, I have this strange feeling that there is something missing. I can’t shake the idea that I have abandoned every dream I’ve ever had. I’ve felt the call to significance my whole life, and I am being to realize that I have no idea what to do with it.
So now I’m sitting here, pondering the question of significance. What makes a life significant? What makes my heart burn with passion? I love Jesus. I love pondering upon him, I love talking about him, I love challenging people’s preconceived notions about him. I love getting my head out of the box and into his reality. I want to challenge and inspire people. I want to spend the rest of my life enjoying him and teaching others to do the same.
But yet, I’m afraid if I give up on screenwriting, I’ll dwindle into insignificance. Do I love screenwriting? Not especially. I do love seeing what is possible, what can be and must be and will be, and I’m afraid I mix that visionary type thought process up with a need to write movies. I get this anxious feeling when I think about what people say about Hollywood and Christians. “You can affect so many people for Christ with the movies you make!” Things like this make me feel like I have to be a screenwriter or I’m letting Jesus down. I don’t think there is anything I could do that would let him down, but when I hear that statement, I forget this. I think it is a play on significance. “Just think of all the people you could effect!”, really just means, “Think of how significant you’d be!” In this sense, pursuing screenwriting would be a great idea; I’d have the problem of significance all figured out.
Sometimes I feel like I’m running away from significance by not wanting to pursue screenwriting, but maybe I’m actually running towards something else. I used to be in a rock’n’roll band, with dreams of making it big and playing in front of 1,000’s of people: true significances. But yet, playing music was never really all that fulfilling. I enjoy strumming my guitar, but it doesn’t fill that void I feel, so why would doing it in front of people change that lack? Sure, it was nice to have people notice you, but “it ain’t Jesus”.
What I really want to do is challenge and inspire people. I have an active imagination; Jesus speaks to me through pictures, almost like little movies scenes in my head. I often wonder if I have simply confused the way Jesus speaks to me with a desire to create movies out of these pictures. I feel Jesus speaking to me, and I want to share it, so I have to make a movie out of it. I wonder if he is calling me to a different way of doing discipleship.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
going home to heaven...isn't biblical?
going to heaven when we die is an expressly greek imagination, informed by the thought that material world is evil and we need to be liberated from the material world into the realm of the ideal. This is based on the idea that a perfect god can have no interaction with imperfect humans, if a god does, then he is not perfect. problem is, when god created earth, he saw that it was good. it is very difficult to reconcile greek philosophy and the hebrew bible because they start from two very different assumptions.
greek thought --> creation is bad, we need to be liberated from this world so that we can commune with a perfect god that otherwise can't interact with humans because he is removed from the bad creation
jewish thought --> creation is good, god interacts with humans through creation, he is present with us in his creation
jesus' thought --> creation is good enough to die for
if we take our christianity to be rooted in judaism, we should think that heaven/the kingdom of god is meant to come to earth (as espoused in the bible, hebrew and christian), that paradise as jesus spoke of is merely a waiting place for those who die until the kingdom is fully realized on earth. the idea that we are "going home to heaven" is rooted in the greek thoughts of trying to escape this world in order to interact with a perfectly removed god. this is not and can not be reconciled with a god that came to earth to die for the creation that he said was good.
the intermixing of greek philosophy and biblical thought is a symptom of the spread of the gospel into the greek world. the spread i am thankful for, but not the intermixing. it is time to get our worldviews straightened out.
if we are to prioritize a biblical worldview over a worldview influenced greatly by greek philosophy (much of which stands in stark contrast to biblical thinking), then we must not consider heaven our home and earth just a pitstop, but exactly the opposite.
more on this later when I don't have a pile of homework.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Palestine got Left Behind
First off, I would like to state that I am not anti-semetic, nor am I Palestinian. I am a simply a critical minded man trying to honor Jesus.
I am currently taking a course about the Jewish-Arab conflict in the middle east. It has covered from about 1890 through today. Most of the course has been focused on the events that have taken place in the middle east, and it has been only moderately interesting.
Today, we focused on American support for Israel. About halfway through the lecture, I found myself feeling sick to my stomach. Among many other reasons (ie. oil), perhaps the most dominating influence in American support for Zionism is ignorance.
Excuse me, let me rephrase that. Perhaps the most dominating influence in American support for Zionism is the association of the new Jewish state with American religious tradition. Many Americans Protestants see the US as God's chosen country. You can find references to the US being the New Jerusalem pretty easily in American history. In 1803, President Adams publicly showed support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Based in Old Testament ideals, we see America as our own promised land, and Americans as the new chosen people. As an extension of this, many Americans believe it is right for one chosen people to help out another chosen people. Many Americans took pride in Jews ability to reclaim the frontier, like they had done with the West. I would like to note that until very recently, I would fit right into this category.
Based mainly on my ignorance of this situation, I thought all these ideas sounded pretty great. All of that seems relatively harmless on the surface. Perhaps the most important, most "exciting", and least likely thing to be labeled as bad is the fact that Zionism is seen as fulfilling biblical prophecy. The OT speaks of Jews returning to Jerusalem and the end being ushered, the Kingdom established, and by our own Christian Tradition, Jesus returning.
Good deal, right?! Jesus coming back, the Kingdom on Earth, Hallelujah! Right?
Sort of...
A little history on Zionism. Zionism is the product of 19th century nationalist movements in Europe. Nationalism defines a nation around a certain people. Germans are people of German decent. The French are people of French decent, etc. Inherent within a Nationalist movement is a need for an "other". I am French, not blank. Many of these nationalist movements were based around the supremacy of white, protestant males. Increasingly, Jews were defined as the obligatory other (but not only Jews, but also Gypsies, peasants, etc).
As you might guess, there is something inherently evil about a nationalist movement. Defining a group of people as other, as unneeded, unwanted, or disposable is not only not "kingdom", it is the basis for genocide. Thus, the holocaust (though the leap here is rather simplified).
Increasing anti-Semitism forced Jews to seek their own national homeland. The obvious choice was Palestine. The problem? Palestinians. Through a series of what started as land purchases, then wars, the vast majority of the people Palestinian people became refugees, forced out of their homeland by war, and forced to live in extreme poverty, some still to this day.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that this entire situation is complicate and convoluted. It took an entire semester to learn all the adequate information (even then, most of it was glossed over), so to boil it all down to one blog post would be a little silly. It is not my intent to pick sides. In fact, I would like to do the exact opposite. It is easy to see (with an objective eye) that both sides have committed their fair share of atrocities, and both are certainly in the wrong on certain point. I would like to transcend sides and look at it through the eyes of Jesus.
One last historical tidbit before moving onto my point. Zionism was founded on secular, not religious, ideals. In fact, many orthodox Jews saw (and still see) Zionism as inherently heretical. The messiah was meant to lead the Jewish people back to Israel, not a secular movement.
So it was this secular Jewish movement that Protestants picked up as the fulfillment of the end times prophecies. Unfortunately, most of these Protestants take on a dispensationalist, Left Behind type view of the end times. More important than anything is to them is the fulfillment of these OT prophecies and the return of Jesus, apparently at any cost.
But does this view of the situation in Israel line up with the way Jesus views the situation? Does Jesus put his own return and the status of the Israelites higher than the Palestinian people?
I would like to propose that if there is a modern equivalent of the story of the Good Samaritan, it would probably have to be Israel and Palestine.
Did Jesus side with Israel in the story of the Good Samaritan? Does Jesus side with Palestine today?
I'd like to propose that Jesus is on all sides, especially those who are poor, widowed, orphaned, destitute (which both sides surely have plenty of). Jesus is not a nationalist, but a Kingdomist. He is all about the Kingdom, all the time. And in the Kingdom, your enemy is your neighbor and you bless those who persecute you.
So how can a movement like Zionism be the movement that brings the Kingdom of Heaven to earth? I would argue that it can't, and isn't. I would argue that it is ignorance or oversight of what the Kingdom stands for that allows for sure end times views. I would argue that Jesus doesn't pick sides, but he picks people, from both sides.
It is time that we embrace an end times world view in which Palestine isn't Left Behind, especially since Jesus doesn't leave them behind.
I am currently taking a course about the Jewish-Arab conflict in the middle east. It has covered from about 1890 through today. Most of the course has been focused on the events that have taken place in the middle east, and it has been only moderately interesting.
Today, we focused on American support for Israel. About halfway through the lecture, I found myself feeling sick to my stomach. Among many other reasons (ie. oil), perhaps the most dominating influence in American support for Zionism is ignorance.
Excuse me, let me rephrase that. Perhaps the most dominating influence in American support for Zionism is the association of the new Jewish state with American religious tradition. Many Americans Protestants see the US as God's chosen country. You can find references to the US being the New Jerusalem pretty easily in American history. In 1803, President Adams publicly showed support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Based in Old Testament ideals, we see America as our own promised land, and Americans as the new chosen people. As an extension of this, many Americans believe it is right for one chosen people to help out another chosen people. Many Americans took pride in Jews ability to reclaim the frontier, like they had done with the West. I would like to note that until very recently, I would fit right into this category.
Based mainly on my ignorance of this situation, I thought all these ideas sounded pretty great. All of that seems relatively harmless on the surface. Perhaps the most important, most "exciting", and least likely thing to be labeled as bad is the fact that Zionism is seen as fulfilling biblical prophecy. The OT speaks of Jews returning to Jerusalem and the end being ushered, the Kingdom established, and by our own Christian Tradition, Jesus returning.
Good deal, right?! Jesus coming back, the Kingdom on Earth, Hallelujah! Right?
Sort of...
A little history on Zionism. Zionism is the product of 19th century nationalist movements in Europe. Nationalism defines a nation around a certain people. Germans are people of German decent. The French are people of French decent, etc. Inherent within a Nationalist movement is a need for an "other". I am French, not blank. Many of these nationalist movements were based around the supremacy of white, protestant males. Increasingly, Jews were defined as the obligatory other (but not only Jews, but also Gypsies, peasants, etc).
As you might guess, there is something inherently evil about a nationalist movement. Defining a group of people as other, as unneeded, unwanted, or disposable is not only not "kingdom", it is the basis for genocide. Thus, the holocaust (though the leap here is rather simplified).
Increasing anti-Semitism forced Jews to seek their own national homeland. The obvious choice was Palestine. The problem? Palestinians. Through a series of what started as land purchases, then wars, the vast majority of the people Palestinian people became refugees, forced out of their homeland by war, and forced to live in extreme poverty, some still to this day.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that this entire situation is complicate and convoluted. It took an entire semester to learn all the adequate information (even then, most of it was glossed over), so to boil it all down to one blog post would be a little silly. It is not my intent to pick sides. In fact, I would like to do the exact opposite. It is easy to see (with an objective eye) that both sides have committed their fair share of atrocities, and both are certainly in the wrong on certain point. I would like to transcend sides and look at it through the eyes of Jesus.
One last historical tidbit before moving onto my point. Zionism was founded on secular, not religious, ideals. In fact, many orthodox Jews saw (and still see) Zionism as inherently heretical. The messiah was meant to lead the Jewish people back to Israel, not a secular movement.
So it was this secular Jewish movement that Protestants picked up as the fulfillment of the end times prophecies. Unfortunately, most of these Protestants take on a dispensationalist, Left Behind type view of the end times. More important than anything is to them is the fulfillment of these OT prophecies and the return of Jesus, apparently at any cost.
But does this view of the situation in Israel line up with the way Jesus views the situation? Does Jesus put his own return and the status of the Israelites higher than the Palestinian people?
I would like to propose that if there is a modern equivalent of the story of the Good Samaritan, it would probably have to be Israel and Palestine.
Did Jesus side with Israel in the story of the Good Samaritan? Does Jesus side with Palestine today?
I'd like to propose that Jesus is on all sides, especially those who are poor, widowed, orphaned, destitute (which both sides surely have plenty of). Jesus is not a nationalist, but a Kingdomist. He is all about the Kingdom, all the time. And in the Kingdom, your enemy is your neighbor and you bless those who persecute you.
So how can a movement like Zionism be the movement that brings the Kingdom of Heaven to earth? I would argue that it can't, and isn't. I would argue that it is ignorance or oversight of what the Kingdom stands for that allows for sure end times views. I would argue that Jesus doesn't pick sides, but he picks people, from both sides.
It is time that we embrace an end times world view in which Palestine isn't Left Behind, especially since Jesus doesn't leave them behind.
Friday, September 11, 2009
The Importance of Being Glorious
Have you ever thought about the fact that we are Jesus' reward for enduring the cross? We being the church, we being his people, we being you and me.
Have you ever let this truth hit you deep down, let it soak in, and really let all of its implications grab hold of you? I have caught a glimpse of what this means in the last few days, and I wanted to write on it, both to firm it up in me, and to share.
As a side note, I recently bought a bible with 26 translation of the New Testament. It basically lists major variants from the KJV, but it is an amazing resource and has really opened up a lot of different verses for me.
One of this verses is John 17:24. In this passage, Jesus is essentially praying for you and me, for "all who will have faith in [him] through [the disciples] message." It is during the Last Supper sense, just before he goes off to be murdered.
The verse in the King James reads: "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world."
When I read that verse, nothing really stands out to me. It seems like the same thing I have been hearing all my life. But when I read it in the Moffit translation, it really hit me differently.
"Father, I ask that these, your gift to me, may be beside me where I am..."
We are Jesus' gift for enduring the cross. Jesus went to the cross and died with a reward in sight, and that reward is us. We are his gift.
When I think about what the church looks like today, I can't help but be heart broken over the fact that we're a pretty crappy gift for our King. Jesus made us holy through the sacrifice of his body (Heb 10:10), but all we do is cry out "make us holy". He gave us his glory, that we would be one (John 17:22), but all we do is bicker and fight and make new denominations because we can't be one. He did it all for free, as a gift to us, not by our own works (Eph 2:8-9), but all we do is try to work and earn it.
His blood makes us holy, nothing more, nothing less. The Son of God's blood was poured out to make us holy, once and for all (Heb 10:14), there is no other way to become holy than through Jesus' blood. There will never again be an offering for sin because Jesus' blood covers us for all eternity, once and for all, till the end of the age. One translation put it like this, "there is no longer any need of an offering for sin." Why? Because Jesus was the final offering.
I've been trying to think of an analogy for this so that we might better understand. Imagine for a minute that you are in pretty bad debt. Maybe you have a ton of student loans, or you went a little crazy with your credit card, and you owe $50,000. It is going to take you quite a while to pay it all back $100/month. Now imagine that some foreign king hears of your debt and tells you he wants to help you out a little bit. He deposits 50,000 rubies (not dollars) into your bank account. You think, “great! Now my debt is paid off!” Problem is, you’re not taking into account the exchange rate. So now you are living debt free, but still dirt poor because you think that you don’t have any money left over. You think that you have to earn your fortune. What you didn’t realize is that 1 ruby is equal to about 10 billion dollars. You are basically a multi-trillionaire living as if you were dirty poor because you don’t understand the inheritance that this foreign king gave you.
This is essentially the situation that most Christians today find themselves in. We believe that Jesus paid our initial debt, but don’t realize that he has an inexhaustible amount of grace for us, that every time we screw up, it doesn’t put us into debt, but draws upon our infinite bank account of grace.
And its not even about sin or no sin, it is about having all of the king’s resources at our fingertips because he has made us holy. Not only do we not go into debt, but we have billions of dollars we can spend on good things. We have an unending reserve of resources.
But how happy do you think the king who paid your debt and gave you access to his bank account would be if he found out that you are still living as a slave?
Now consider the fact that you are supposed to be this king’s bride. The king is planning this amazing banquet feast for you to come join him in, and you are the guest of honor. He has invited all of his friends and all of his servants have been preparing this banquet for years. He has literally poured his blood, sweat, and tears into this banquet.
He has even sent you his personal aid to help you in preparing for this day. The aid is supposed to teach you all the etiquette for the banquet, how to act like the royalty that you are. The only problem is, you still have it in your head that you are a servant. You don’t realize that you have access to the king’s full resources, and you don’t listen to the king’s aid when he tells you all the great things about you. It is like you plug up your ears and refuse to see the reality right in front of you. The king has chosen you, made you worthy, and invited you to dine with him, but you are too busy telling yourself that you are unworthy, rather than accepting the fact that your worthiness has nothing to do with you and everything to do with what the king says about you.
Imagine if you showed up to the king’s banquet, the most beautiful, expensive, fabulous banquet thrown in the history of the world, imagine that you should up to this banquet in your servant’s garb. Imagine that you were in ratty old cloths, sweaty from a long day of labor (that the king’s aid should have been doing for you), dirt on your face, runny nose, the whole nine yards.
Wouldn’t this be basically the ultimate slap in the face for the king? He has made it his life’s work to create this banquet and prepare you for it, he sent you his best friend and personal aid to groom you, he even had to sacrifice himself, to suffer and die and be raised from the dead in order to throw this banquet with you are the guest of honor. All this preparation, all this work on his part to get you here, all to be taken as a free gift. You didn’t have to earn a single ounce of the honor and worth he has given you; he did it all.
But the whole time, instead accepting the free gift, you tried to earn your honor and worth by working for it. Instead of being the royalty that he made you, you tried to work to make yourself into royalty, saying you weren’t worthy to accept it as a gift, you had to earn it.
I don’t want to imagine the look on the king’s face when he was expecting a glorious bride and you show up in rags. “Didn’t you get my personal aid, my best friend that I sent to you? Didn’t I tell you that I made you worthy? Wasn’t I flogged and murdered to make you whole and complete? Aren’t I enough for you?!?” I can’t imagine the pain in the king’s voice. “Don’t you get what I have done for you???”
I can’t fathom what it would be like to dedicate your entire life and all the resources of heaven for this one purpose, only for your bride not to get it, for your bride think that it is all about her and not what you have done for her. What Jesus made us into has nothing to do with what we can or have earned, but it has everything to do with what he deserves.
When the high king of heaven pours his blood out to make for himself a holy and beautiful bride, and when he says, “It is finished,” meaning, “I’ve done it, I’ve made my bride holy, now all she has to do is come to me,” I’m pretty sure that he meant it.
He made us holy when he died on the cross. He deserves a bride that stops trying to make herself holy through her own works and accepts the fact the He made us holy through His works.
The only suitable response to such a gift is to accept and live as the bride he made us into. Jesus is throwing a huge party in heaven, he is demanding that we attend, and as the guest of honor’s gift and only request, we’d better make it worth his while and accept.
It has nothing to do with what we do or earn, but everything to do with what he did and says about us. If you have accepted the invitation to be his bride, his gift, then he has made you holy and worthy. There is nothing left for you to do but live in that reality.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Monday, August 31, 2009
Who He Has Made Us...
Probably my biggest pet peeves is theologically incorrect worship music. Usually the songs that really irk me are the ones about the "rapture"/ones about escaping to heaven, for obvious reasons (its "your kingdom come", not "let us fly, fly away").
Much of our theology isn't formed from reading the bible or listening to sermons, but from the music we sing during "worship". But what happens when our "worship" isn't glorifying to Jesus?
Recently, I have been more and more distraught by the songs containing lyrics like "make us holy", "wash us clean", or "i'm just a sinner, won't you fix me", etc. (These are generic lyrics, as I can't think of any specific songs to speak to right now).
Why have these songs been bothering me you ask? Because the finished works of the cross have already made us holy, clean, and righteous. Jesus poured out his blood to free us from our slavery to sin and shame, we carry it no more because Jesus took it from us. So why do we continue to sing, asking him to do something he has already done? He did it on the cross and paid the ultimate price.
He can't do again what he already did. I'm not entirely sure what result we are looking for when we sing lyrics like these as worship. By singing "make me holy", it is almost like we are asking him to bear the cross again.
"Oh Jesus, you're so good! La la la! But now that I think about it, the first time you died and rose again wasn't enough to make us holy! La la la! Won't you go to the cross again so that I can be holy once more? La la la!"
I understand that while we are made holy in Jesus, we can still sin. But sin isn't the standard, righteousness is. How are we going to live up to the standard of righteousness if we continue to believe the lie that Jesus' blood isn't enough to make us holy for eternity? I honestly think that the distinction is in something as little as a mind set. We were baptized into his crucifiction, and raised again with his holy spirit. We are a new being, the old is gone, the new has come. We are not slaves to sin, but to righteousness. We no longer have the chains of death shackled to our leg, but we are free, holy, righteous, and the only place that this isn't true for most of us is in our minds. In Eph 2, Paul says that before coming to Jesus, we lived as sons of disobedience, and we "lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind". Well our flesh was crucified with Jesus, and we were given the mind of Christ. Maybe its about time to renew our thinking about our holyness and our standing with the Father.
Jesus is soooo good. He poured out his blood to make us holy. We sit in heavenly places with him. We are his body and his holy temple. The holy spirit dwells in us.
He stands at the door and knocks, and if we just but open the door, he will come in a dine with us, and he will let us sit on His throne with him. He's so freaking good that he doesn't even put us at the kiddie table in heaven, but asks us to sit on his throne with him! I can't even process the implications of what this means.
One thing I do know is that having him elevate us so high should do nothing but humble us and cause us to worship him even more. Us being holy has nothing to do with our actions and everything to do with how much he loves us. The only possible responce would be for me to offer up a sacrifice of worship to him. And not a weak, "make me holy" kind of worship, but a worship that says:
"Jesus, you're so good, you're so beyond compare, you're so holy that you made me holy, you're so good that you made me (who once was a broken wretch) righteous, you made me a king in the heavens, and that makes you the king of kings. You made me a king, and you're the king of kings!"
This is the kind of worship that will not only bring the utmost glory to our savior king, but will also glorify his body and cause a generation to rise up and be who He paid for us to be. Because when the church is glorified, Jesus is glorified, because we are his body. Jesus can't be glorified unless we are glorified. Jesus can't be king on high unless we are king on high with him.
Jesus can't be who is deserves to be unless we accept who he has made us...
Much of our theology isn't formed from reading the bible or listening to sermons, but from the music we sing during "worship". But what happens when our "worship" isn't glorifying to Jesus?
Recently, I have been more and more distraught by the songs containing lyrics like "make us holy", "wash us clean", or "i'm just a sinner, won't you fix me", etc. (These are generic lyrics, as I can't think of any specific songs to speak to right now).
Why have these songs been bothering me you ask? Because the finished works of the cross have already made us holy, clean, and righteous. Jesus poured out his blood to free us from our slavery to sin and shame, we carry it no more because Jesus took it from us. So why do we continue to sing, asking him to do something he has already done? He did it on the cross and paid the ultimate price.
He can't do again what he already did. I'm not entirely sure what result we are looking for when we sing lyrics like these as worship. By singing "make me holy", it is almost like we are asking him to bear the cross again.
"Oh Jesus, you're so good! La la la! But now that I think about it, the first time you died and rose again wasn't enough to make us holy! La la la! Won't you go to the cross again so that I can be holy once more? La la la!"
I understand that while we are made holy in Jesus, we can still sin. But sin isn't the standard, righteousness is. How are we going to live up to the standard of righteousness if we continue to believe the lie that Jesus' blood isn't enough to make us holy for eternity? I honestly think that the distinction is in something as little as a mind set. We were baptized into his crucifiction, and raised again with his holy spirit. We are a new being, the old is gone, the new has come. We are not slaves to sin, but to righteousness. We no longer have the chains of death shackled to our leg, but we are free, holy, righteous, and the only place that this isn't true for most of us is in our minds. In Eph 2, Paul says that before coming to Jesus, we lived as sons of disobedience, and we "lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind". Well our flesh was crucified with Jesus, and we were given the mind of Christ. Maybe its about time to renew our thinking about our holyness and our standing with the Father.
Jesus is soooo good. He poured out his blood to make us holy. We sit in heavenly places with him. We are his body and his holy temple. The holy spirit dwells in us.
He stands at the door and knocks, and if we just but open the door, he will come in a dine with us, and he will let us sit on His throne with him. He's so freaking good that he doesn't even put us at the kiddie table in heaven, but asks us to sit on his throne with him! I can't even process the implications of what this means.
One thing I do know is that having him elevate us so high should do nothing but humble us and cause us to worship him even more. Us being holy has nothing to do with our actions and everything to do with how much he loves us. The only possible responce would be for me to offer up a sacrifice of worship to him. And not a weak, "make me holy" kind of worship, but a worship that says:
"Jesus, you're so good, you're so beyond compare, you're so holy that you made me holy, you're so good that you made me (who once was a broken wretch) righteous, you made me a king in the heavens, and that makes you the king of kings. You made me a king, and you're the king of kings!"
This is the kind of worship that will not only bring the utmost glory to our savior king, but will also glorify his body and cause a generation to rise up and be who He paid for us to be. Because when the church is glorified, Jesus is glorified, because we are his body. Jesus can't be glorified unless we are glorified. Jesus can't be king on high unless we are king on high with him.
Jesus can't be who is deserves to be unless we accept who he has made us...
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Why is this man blind...?
I am currently reading Greg Boyd's God at War. In it, Boyd addresses the blind man "who sinned, him or his father" passage in John 9.
Jesus response is typically translated "he was born blind -so that- God's works might be revealed in him." Boyd argues that the word we translate "so that" shouldn't be translated as passive, but as an imperative (as more of a command). Boyd translates it, "he was born blind. But let the works of God be manifest!"
The disciples are asking a moral question, Jesus is responding with a command to heal the man. Jesus isn't concerned about answering questions about God's intent other for this man to be healed. "Yes, he is blind, stop asking questions and heal him." In such a situation, with such an emphatic command, there is little room left for God's will to be in question. He wants this man (and all men) healed. He is blind because the world is fallen/the devil caused it, but this passage isn't about why he is blind. It is about God's desire to heal him.
Even if we did read this passage in the traditional vain of thought, it would be a lone passage saying its God's will for this man to be blind from birth in a book neck deep in stories of God healing all whom he touches. Should we change our entire mind set to fit this one passage (that as Boyd argues is mistranslated/interpreted to start with), or should we seek to find the reading of this passage that fits with the rest of scripture?
Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8) by healing the sick, raising the dead, and advancing the kingdom of God/heaven/light against the kingdom of darkness. Everywhere else in the gospels, Jesus healing acts are seen as advancing the kingdom. Nearly everytime the "Gospel of the Kingdom" is mentioned in the gospels, healing, raising the dead, etc, follow as commentary on what preaching this gospel entails. I could walk you through the versions, but I feel like I have done this multiple times before, so scroll down.
Would it be too much of a stretch to say that this man was blind because he lived in the "kingdom of darkness" (i.e. the fallen world he lives in)?
When the Light of the World comes into the Kingdom of Darkness, the only proper question is not about God's will, or the origin of sickness, "Why is this man not healed yet?"
Jesus response is typically translated "he was born blind -so that- God's works might be revealed in him." Boyd argues that the word we translate "so that" shouldn't be translated as passive, but as an imperative (as more of a command). Boyd translates it, "he was born blind. But let the works of God be manifest!"
The disciples are asking a moral question, Jesus is responding with a command to heal the man. Jesus isn't concerned about answering questions about God's intent other for this man to be healed. "Yes, he is blind, stop asking questions and heal him." In such a situation, with such an emphatic command, there is little room left for God's will to be in question. He wants this man (and all men) healed. He is blind because the world is fallen/the devil caused it, but this passage isn't about why he is blind. It is about God's desire to heal him.
Even if we did read this passage in the traditional vain of thought, it would be a lone passage saying its God's will for this man to be blind from birth in a book neck deep in stories of God healing all whom he touches. Should we change our entire mind set to fit this one passage (that as Boyd argues is mistranslated/interpreted to start with), or should we seek to find the reading of this passage that fits with the rest of scripture?
Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8) by healing the sick, raising the dead, and advancing the kingdom of God/heaven/light against the kingdom of darkness. Everywhere else in the gospels, Jesus healing acts are seen as advancing the kingdom. Nearly everytime the "Gospel of the Kingdom" is mentioned in the gospels, healing, raising the dead, etc, follow as commentary on what preaching this gospel entails. I could walk you through the versions, but I feel like I have done this multiple times before, so scroll down.
Would it be too much of a stretch to say that this man was blind because he lived in the "kingdom of darkness" (i.e. the fallen world he lives in)?
When the Light of the World comes into the Kingdom of Darkness, the only proper question is not about God's will, or the origin of sickness, "Why is this man not healed yet?"
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