"If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation."
Yann Martel, in Life Of Pi
Showing posts with label Jesus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jesus. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Our Master Lies Asleep
MARY MAGDALENE AND THE OTHER MARY.
A SONG FOR ALL MARIES
Our Master lies asleep and is at rest:
His heart has ceased to bleed, His Eye to weep:
The sun ashamed has dropt in the west:
Our Master lies asleep.
A SONG FOR ALL MARIES
Our Master lies asleep and is at rest:
His heart has ceased to bleed, His Eye to weep:
The sun ashamed has dropt in the west:
Our Master lies asleep.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
The One Who Is Dirty
I came across the following story while doing research for a story I'm working on. I love the way the Talmud scholar answers questions with questions that seem to not bear on the initial question. Jesus did the same, many times, though he praised the answers he got as often as he knocked them down.
A goy insisted that a Talmudist explain to him what the Talmud was. The sage finally consented and asked the goy the following question:
"Two men climb down a chimney.
A goy insisted that a Talmudist explain to him what the Talmud was. The sage finally consented and asked the goy the following question:
"Two men climb down a chimney.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Prison Walls
Just a short postscript to the post a few days ago about prisons.
Paul says that Jesus destroyed the "dividing wall" between Jews and Gentiles. Or as the NET translation has it, "For he is our peace, the one who turned both groups into one and who destroyed the middle wall of partition . . . He did this to create in himself one new man out of two, thus making peace . . ." Eph 2:14-15. He seems to be talking about Jews and Gentiles, but then he turns immediately to using the same figure to refer to the bringing together of humanity and God. Jesus came to draw us together, and together to draw us to himself and with himself to draw us to his Father. In Collosians the analogy is extended from Jew/Gentile, to circumcised/uncircumcised, barbarian/Scythian, slave/free. All walls come down in Christ. Jesus came to destroy the walls that separate us.
You will say, "But there is still a wall between saved and unsaved; all of those walls only come down for those who are in Christ." Yes, but don't be so content in that answer! Jesus died to destroy such barriers, shouldn't we also be more than eager to see them fall? On the night before his crucifiction when Jesus prayed so fervently for his disciples, what exactly did he pray for? The heart of his prayer was that his disciples (which includes us) would be one as he and his Father are one. He came to earth and went to the cross to make us one. To give us a life that mirrored the unity of the three who are one. To make us one as they are one. That is a big thought!
That is the goal toward which God was working from before creation, and toward which he is still bringing us. It will be fulfilled when he brings us, as a single bride, to the wedding feast. The barriers between us are all to be destroyed.
So what does this have to do with prisons? As I said in the earlier post, the function of prisons is primarily to insulate us from some of the unpleasant realities of life. In this way they are similar to nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals. Of course this is not the only purpose of any of them. They each to some measure attempt to help those in their care. But their primary function in society seems to me to be protecting the comfort of those who are not in them.
I am far from ready to open the prison doors and let everyone out, but I am getting less and less comfortable with the complacency with which we allow and aid society in separating us all further and further. I don't know what the answer is, but it seems that we are just finding an easy way to get out of actually being our brother's keeper. We are reinforcing walls when Jesus died to obliterate walls.
I don't have the answers. But I am uneasy.
Paul says that Jesus destroyed the "dividing wall" between Jews and Gentiles. Or as the NET translation has it, "For he is our peace, the one who turned both groups into one and who destroyed the middle wall of partition . . . He did this to create in himself one new man out of two, thus making peace . . ." Eph 2:14-15. He seems to be talking about Jews and Gentiles, but then he turns immediately to using the same figure to refer to the bringing together of humanity and God. Jesus came to draw us together, and together to draw us to himself and with himself to draw us to his Father. In Collosians the analogy is extended from Jew/Gentile, to circumcised/uncircumcised, barbarian/Scythian, slave/free. All walls come down in Christ. Jesus came to destroy the walls that separate us.
You will say, "But there is still a wall between saved and unsaved; all of those walls only come down for those who are in Christ." Yes, but don't be so content in that answer! Jesus died to destroy such barriers, shouldn't we also be more than eager to see them fall? On the night before his crucifiction when Jesus prayed so fervently for his disciples, what exactly did he pray for? The heart of his prayer was that his disciples (which includes us) would be one as he and his Father are one. He came to earth and went to the cross to make us one. To give us a life that mirrored the unity of the three who are one. To make us one as they are one. That is a big thought!
That is the goal toward which God was working from before creation, and toward which he is still bringing us. It will be fulfilled when he brings us, as a single bride, to the wedding feast. The barriers between us are all to be destroyed.
So what does this have to do with prisons? As I said in the earlier post, the function of prisons is primarily to insulate us from some of the unpleasant realities of life. In this way they are similar to nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals. Of course this is not the only purpose of any of them. They each to some measure attempt to help those in their care. But their primary function in society seems to me to be protecting the comfort of those who are not in them.
I am far from ready to open the prison doors and let everyone out, but I am getting less and less comfortable with the complacency with which we allow and aid society in separating us all further and further. I don't know what the answer is, but it seems that we are just finding an easy way to get out of actually being our brother's keeper. We are reinforcing walls when Jesus died to obliterate walls.
I don't have the answers. But I am uneasy.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
To Love the Law
A young pastor once was troubled by a teenager asking if the law of the Sabbath were still binding in modern Christian times. What pastor has not dealt with similar queries? We are no longer under law, right? Isn’t that why Jesus died?
The young pastor mentioned the teenager in a letter to his mentor, the poet William Cowper. Cowper suggested, “I would ask my catechumen one short question− ‘Do you love the day, or do you not? If you love it, you will never inquire how far you may safely deprive yourself of the enjoyment of it.’”[1]
How would our catechumens fare in such a test? How would we? Do we love the Sabbath? Do we love God’s law in general? Do David’s psalms in praise of the law give vent to the overflowing thoughts of our hearts?
Or is it idolatrous to worship the law? Doesn’t all of our worship belong to God alone? Did David gush so just because it was the best he knew? He didn’t know about Jesus after all, right?
As Dietrich Bonhoeffer points out though:
All prayers of the Bible are such prayers which we pray together with Jesus Christ, in which he accompanies us, and through which he brings us into the presence of God.
If we want to read and pray the prayers of the Bible and especially the Psalms, therefore, we must not ask first what they have to do with us, but what they have to do with Jesus Christ.[2]
In the Psalms we get to eavesdrop on Jesus’ prayers to his Father. And so many of the Psalms are nothing short of law worship. If Jesus is praying in the Psalms, is he an idolater? What is this law that God himself sings its praises?
[1] William Cowper, Letters of William Cowper (London: Religious Tract Society, 1870), p. 116.
[2] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1974), p. 14.
The young pastor mentioned the teenager in a letter to his mentor, the poet William Cowper. Cowper suggested, “I would ask my catechumen one short question− ‘Do you love the day, or do you not? If you love it, you will never inquire how far you may safely deprive yourself of the enjoyment of it.’”[1]
How would our catechumens fare in such a test? How would we? Do we love the Sabbath? Do we love God’s law in general? Do David’s psalms in praise of the law give vent to the overflowing thoughts of our hearts?
Or is it idolatrous to worship the law? Doesn’t all of our worship belong to God alone? Did David gush so just because it was the best he knew? He didn’t know about Jesus after all, right?
As Dietrich Bonhoeffer points out though:
All prayers of the Bible are such prayers which we pray together with Jesus Christ, in which he accompanies us, and through which he brings us into the presence of God.
If we want to read and pray the prayers of the Bible and especially the Psalms, therefore, we must not ask first what they have to do with us, but what they have to do with Jesus Christ.[2]
In the Psalms we get to eavesdrop on Jesus’ prayers to his Father. And so many of the Psalms are nothing short of law worship. If Jesus is praying in the Psalms, is he an idolater? What is this law that God himself sings its praises?
[1] William Cowper, Letters of William Cowper (London: Religious Tract Society, 1870), p. 116.
[2] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1974), p. 14.
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