The Good News is so much bigger than we make it out to be.
Why does the gospel look to so many like a bowl of lima beans?
For those who find the grace and truth of Jesus Christ convincing and compelling, such a question may seem absurd, if not blasphemous. But compared to the spiciness of the cultural concoctions that swirl around us in our globalized world, Jesus can seem like bland fare. Many have the impression that the gospel is small, smooth, and tasteless. They have a culturally conditioned disdain for any homogeneous answer to a heterogeneous world. And they have seen too little evidence to the contrary.
How could it be, some believers might balk, that "the hope of the world," the One given "the name above every name," could ever seem bland? Well, because often the church is bland. Pale. Gullible. Pasty. Just there. The fruit of this vine appears to be lima beans. If bland is the flavor of the church, then it is presumed to be the flavor of the One the church calls Lord.
This anemic image of Jesus has many adherents, both in and outside the church. Their innocuous Jesus is the result of social, political, economic, and spiritual accommodation. Who needs more from Jesus than some simple stories of a loving example? To go further would be zealous, and to be religiously zealous is definitely not a current cultural ideal. Those in the church who stand out are often seen as intolerant and intolerable. Better the disdainfully bland than the dangerously zealous.
It's a misstep, some would say, to take Jesus—his example and his teaching—too seriously. To do so is to get too close to all those details that hound religious specialists, breed religious acrimony, and cause war. Jesus from 10,000 feet away is close enough. The Google Earth view of Jesus identifies only the most prominent features of his life and teachings, bringing nothing too close and taking nothing too seriously. Such a Jesus may be vaguely interesting, but he is consigned to blandness and faint praise.
Jesus Christ, the Lord of Creation, Redemption, and Fulfillment, calls the church the salt and light of the world. Jesus seems to have had in mind a community engaged in vigorous, self-sacrificing mission that goes to great lengths to enact costly love, that inconveniences itself regularly to seek justice for the oppressed, that creatively serves the forgotten, all to portray that the kingdom of God is at hand.
Depending on where we look in the world, however, that church seems to have gone missing.
Rather than seek the God who spoke from the burning bush, we have decided the real drama is found in debating whether to podcast our services. Rather than encounter the God who sees idolatry as a pervasive, life-threatening temptation, we decorate Pottery Barn lives with our tasteful collections of favored godlings. Rather than follow the God who burns for justice for the needy, we are more likely to ask the Lord to give us our own fair share. A bland God for a bland church, with a mission that is at best innocuous and quaint—in a tumultuous world.
Is it hard to explain why many look at the church and see a small bowl of lima beans? Where is the evidence that the reality is otherwise, that the gospel really matters?
The Homogeneous Gospel
Others take a different point of view, and think the gospel is too small because its claims in a multicultural, multireligious world are just too particular. Christian orthodoxy's affirmation—that through a promise to one people fulfilled through one man, the one true God reconciled the world to himself—seems by definition too small because it is just too homogenizing a solution. Too small to be worthy of the Creator of the universe, and too "one-size-fits-all" to be the Good News for our enormously varied world.
Postmoderns are keenly aware that we live in a vastly heterogeneous world—of cultures within cultures, of languages within languages, of religions within religions. They are likely to find it extremely counterintuitive that a single religion or deity could possibly reflect reality. In this world of variety, uniform solutions in politics, economics, and culture are unappealing, undesirable, and unworkable. How can that be any less so when it comes to matters of religion and spirituality?
From a theological point of view, they might go on, how could such particularity be consistent with the Bible's own depiction of God's expansive character and nature? Would such a god deserve to be called God, if it all boils down to one way or no way? How could a God who reputedly created a world with 300 kinds of hummingbirds be the same God who requires religious conformity?
Isn't this alleged particularity of God scandalously less nuanced than the enormously varied created order he is supposed to have made? Further, if those reputedly bearing the image of this God are called to one religious vision, doesn't that diminish their created diversity, homogenizing what God has made varied? If there are over 500 varieties of bananas, how could God offer the world one bowl of lima beans?
The Evidence of Love
The love of Jesus Christ, through whom God is reconciling the whole world to himself, is no lima bean. And the only adequate answer to these objections will require us to consider again that very thing Jesus says is central to God's kingdom, the most life-enlarging and non-homogenizing reality: love.
The primary evidence that the gospel is no lima bean is meant to be the compelling, sacrificial love and justice vividly lived and humbly witnessed to by Christ's body. "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another" (John 13:35). Such love is meant, at the very least, to make our lives more truth-bearing, more soul-enlarging, more justice-evidencing. To give ourselves in love is to devote ourselves to "the more important matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness," rather than fiddling with our "mint and dill and cumin" (Matt. 23:23).
Of course, this does not mean our gospel will be more immediately attractive or more easily accepted. A gospel whose evidence is this kind of love may still be accused of being small, but it will be small like the pearl of great price, not like some cheap imitation of the real gem.
We have to give up the small gospel that simply confirms what C. S. Lewis called "our congenital preference for safe investments and limited liabilities." The freedom of grace grants us many gifts, including that there is "therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8:1). This assurance of grace is meant to set us on the road of faithful discipleship, not just to assure us of grace at the finish line. Such freedom enables Christ's disciples to love because we have first been loved (1 John 4:19). The grace that settles our account with God is meant to set us free from self-interest for the sake of loving others with abandon.
The apparent smallness of our gospel is directly related to the smallness of the church's love. When prominent Christian voices call for protests and boycotts over things like our freedom to say "Merry Christmas," the gospel seems very small indeed. If, by contrast, such voices called the church in America to give away its Christmas billions to the poor and needy around the world—as an act of incarnational love—that would leave a very different impression of the faith we profess, and offer a far greater hope for a love-hungry world.
It would be a new day for our testimony to the immensity and scope of the gospel if we lived out persevering, sacrificial love for people near and far, especially for those without power, without money, without education, without food, without sanitation, without safety, without faith. If this counterintuitive, servant love moved us out of our middle-class enclaves, drew the poor to be included in our family values, brought us to worry more about the need for consumption of those who have nothing than the consumptive fantasies of those who have too much, the gospel would be more nearly the life-enlarging gift it is.
The Size of Love
Love is central in responding to the charge of particularity as well. What do we say to those who claim our gospel of one way, one truth, and one life is too small? The biblical argument is that God's very particular actions are precisely what give us the greatest access to the universal scope of God's heart and purposes. When God's work is most intensive, the implications are the most extensive: "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." God in Jesus Christ does the most particular thing for the most universal end.
We must make the case that the particularity of love is like the proper use of a telescope: through the small end of the telescope (i.e., God was in Christ), we are given a glimpse into the cosmic heart of God (i.e., God is love). Through the particularity of the small lens, we are given a way to see the larger reality. The specificity of the gospel is the way God leads us to see what is universal.
This is obvious in ordinary experience. We come to know the meaning of love by loving and being loved by particular people in particular places and times. We don't come to know love first as a broad category and then as a particular instance. Rather, only if we are loved in particular do we gradually come to love more broadly. The absence of the particular leads most likely to the absence of the general ability.
It is true that being loved in particular does not necessarily lead us to love more widely. Still, the more noteworthy this absence of love in people's lives, the more we suspect a deficit of an experience of being loved. And that is precisely what millions of unchurched people suspect about Christians, and therefore about the gospel we proclaim: without more-evident fruit of self-sacrificing love, not least when we are affirming the God of love, the more our claim of particularity seems corrupt, bankrupt, or worse.
The particularity of our Sun is not a problem, because it shines on the just and on the unjust. So does God's particular love in Christ. The church cannot afford to give the impression that the particularity of the gospel only shines on us. If we love as we have been loved, the immensity and scope of God's intimate and cosmic gospel in Jesus Christ will be more evidently the salt and light of the world. We will be far more like Jesus described us—tangy and tangible Good News. And that is no lima bean gospel.
Mark Labberton is senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, and a senior fellow of International Justice Mission.
| Posted on January 9, 2008 | TrackBack
I am glad you are asking a question that you shouldn't be asking, because if you didn't ask the question you would stay where you shouldn't be for sure. If you were where you should be already, you wouldn't be asking this question, which is why it is a question you shouldn't be asking.
In other words, you should be at point A, but you have been at point C. By asking the question, you are moving to point B, which is a lot better than staying at point C, but point B is still not where you should be.
Do I sound arrogantly self-confident? That is what Roman Catholics say about Evangelicals who believe they know they are saved. It is a misunderstanding, due to thinking the confidence stems from one's own resources or merits. However, since the confidence stems for the work of God, it is really not arrogant. Now, it is interesting how many evangelicals have accepted that assurance of salvation is acceptable, but remain with the idea that assurance about most other doctrines are a sign of dogmatic arrogance.
About 26 years ago, I came through a very difficult time of searching and found that the "secret" to understanding many of the doctrines is simply to read what the Bible says with no interpretative assumptions in place. I know, you don't believe me. You have been seminary trained to deal with all of the interpretive nuances and evaluate the merits of a myriad of doctrinal positions and select the least problematic as "your" belief. You submit your position to that of your chosen denomination, in spite of doubts. You subscribe to explanations of problem verses, while waxing eloquent on the proof texts to your congregation.
Here is what I see wrong with your position. There is no such thing as "our gospel". The Gospel is defined clearly in the New Testament. If you see that certain versions of the gospel are too narrow or wide, we need only go back to the definitions in the New Testament, and while we are at it, make sure we are not contradicting the Old Testament either. We should immediately drop any statements or evangelistic tools that do not come directly from the text of the Bible. We should obey the Great Commission to the letter, which means to teach all disciples from all nations to observe all that Jesus commanded the 12 disciples. Doing that and accepting all that the epistles teach about doctrine, one won't have to worry how narrow or wide "his gospel" is.
Posted by: Thomas Gray | January 10, 2008
The problem is not that the Gospel is too small, but that it is juxtaposed with the defensive and intolerant letters of the self-proclaimed 'apostle' Paul, whose views are so different from those of Jesus's disciples that there is nothing but the binding of the book holding the two together! Let's take a closer look at this Pharisee-turned-alleged 'apostle of Christ'.
Paul's attitude to dissent and quarrelling is intolerance. He constantly admonishes his readers to be of "one mind". Christian scholars and theologians defend Paul from the charge of intolerance by selectively prioritizing Galations 3: 23 - 29, where he says "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." Paul is not attempting to embrace the distinctions he mentions, however, but to erase them. The very purpose of this letter, as can be discerned from the wider context, is to rebuke the Judaizers, (Jewish disciples of Jesus) who were insisting, contrary to Paul, that adult male converts to the faith be circumcized according to Jewish law and custom. This unsavory and doubtless painful procedure was a barrier to Paul's Gentile recruitment campaign. This fact explains why the allegedly tolerant Paul says of his rival Jews, "I wish that they would mutilate themselves." [Gal. 5:12]. This comes after Paul asks, "who has hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion is not from him who calls you. A little leaven leavens the whole lump. I have confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view than mine; and he who is troubling you will bear his judgment, whoever he is. [Gal. 5: 7 - 10]
Paul has the same preoccupation with suppressing dissent in writing to the Corinthian community. In his opening of 1 Cor. Paul makes an explicit appeal "that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment." [1 Cor. 1:10 - 11] This intolerance of diversity continues throughout his letter, as when he says in 1 Cor 5:9 - 13,
"I wrote to you in my last letter not to associate with immoral men, not at all meaning the immoral men of this world, or the greedy and robbers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of this world. But rather I wrote to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard or robber -- not even to eat with such a one. Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. 'Drive out the wicked person from among you.'
As elsewhere, Paul appears to be responding to accusations here. He is referring back to an instruction that he wrote in his last letter that appears to need further explanation now. Paul is trying to backtrack or equivocate on his previous statement to make it sit more easily with criticisms. The most likely criticism is that Paul's injunction to his congregation to disassociate themselves from immoral men conflicts with the teaching of Jesus and the other, ‘rival’ apostles, such as Cephas/Peter, who was a disciple of Jesus during his ministry and as such would have had superior authority to Paul, who was not). We know that Jesus regularly ate with immoral men and that this scandalized self-righteous Pharisees and legalists such as Paul. In this letter we find Paul trying to reconcile his own teaching with what was widely known to be Jesus's view of the matter. In essence he says that his judgement on immorality is reserved for those who confess the faith, and does not apply to outsiders. He demands that anyone inside his church follow its rules, which seems like a reasonable request. But the context is a community split between followers of Jesus's disciples (e.g. Cephas/Peter) and followers of the self-proclaimed apostle Paul. There was doubtless sharp disagreement amongst these various followers of Jesus, although rival groups probably still referred to one another as 'brethren' in an attempt to stress their common beliefs. If this was the context, as 1 Cor. 1:11 strongly suggests, Paul's intolerance of 'immorality' amongst 'anyone who bears the name of brother' justifies expelling anyone who disagreed about the content and requirements of 'morality', i.e. anyone who disagreed with Paul's own teaching. In the next chapter of 2 Corinthians Paul reiterates his command that his 'righteous' followers segregate themselves from the other brethren, whom he is intent to demonize: "Do not be mismated with unbelievers. For what partnership have righteousness and iniquity? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?" [2 Cor. 6: 14 - 15] It is clear in most of Paul's letters that his primary purpose in writing them is to prevent or respond to dissent from his teachings. Paul claims authority as an "ambassador for Christ," God making his appeal through him and his fellow evangelists [2 Cor. 5: 20 ].
The United States is not a theocracy, much to the chagrin of Pauline Christian revisionists. It is a democracy, in which the authority to govern comes from below, from the consent of the governed. The rulers are elected or appointed by the people, for the people, and represent their will and their interests. On this model, government serves the 'common good' of the people, who give their consent because of the good sense of the arrangements that the law directs. This means that the people have found the arrangements to be reasonable and beneficial. Jesus was a threat to the Jewish theocracy of his day precisely because of the humanist thrust of his message. He was overthrowing the whole theocratic order and challenging the hypocrisy of the priests and scribes (i.e the guardians of theocratic power). His death was political and we kill him all over again when we allow his teachings to be usurped by Pauline doctrine. Had Jesus been alive when Paul was doing his Pharisaic deeds, he would have faced him down. But Jesus was dead, so instead Peter did so. We would do well to follow the gospels and purge Christianity of Paul.
Posted by: Terri Murray | January 10, 2008
Pray for our ministry.
Posted by: Kadilan Kamei | January 15, 2008
Wow! All I can say is wow! to the article by Mark Labberton. It's very serious business and it's very well presented and leaves much to ponder about. Compliments
John Katto
Kampala, Uganda
Posted by: John Katto | January 16, 2008
Mark Labberton's perspective of the central role of LOVE in the sustainance and propagation of the Gospel, is indeed a truism. The freshness of his outlook though, is quite though-provoking.
I have gained immensely from his thoughts on the "blandness" of the Gospel we believe and preach, which, according to Jesus' desire, should be evidenced by LOVE among his followers. (John 13:35). One of the reasons he adduced the blandness to include the Church's lack of "incarnational love", which I've never heard before and would have loved some light shed on it. This "incarnational love" will then enable the Church pump the billions of dollars available to commercialized Christmas, into nobler ventures like caring for the poor, and thus erase some of the blandness at least.
My only concern is that this proposition rings familiar in the occasion that led to Jesus chiding his disciples' about the poor. His disciples, particularly Judas the treasurer, were grumbling about the 'mindless wastage'of prescious money to be made from the expensive alabaster box of ointment. (Matt. 26:7-13) Nothing and nobody was worth wasting that kind of money on, he thought. But the truth of the matter was told in v.11 when Jesus said, "...ye have the poor always with you". Just as today. We have the poor always with us, so billions spent on Christmas spreading love shouldn't ordinarily be a problem if it's all spent truly spreading the love of God around.
But in commercialized Christmas, it's more of the commerce than anything else. Jesus or His Love are not in the equation. That is where the billions become lima beans, tasteless and bland.
My minor difference on Christmas spending or not, I still appreciate gentleman Mark Labberton's write-up very much.
May I also say that I'd never seen anyone take our dear Paul to the cleaners the way Terri Murray did in his comment. I think Paul should never become such an enemy of the Church as Terri suggested, such that his work and part in the propagation of the Gospel in it's foundation and infancy be utterly discountenanced. Paul's revelation and work were confusing, even for his contemporaries, not to talk of today's Bible students. Peter even had to give a stern warning in II Peter 3:15-16, when he wrote about Paul thus: "...our beloved brother Paul...in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things: in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, UNTO THEIR OWN DESTRUCTION". That's pretty tough! But the point is made that Paul is not to be trifled with today, as it was in his days. His contemporaries acknowledge that,and we should beware also.
Leke Akinrowo
Lagos, Nigeria.
Posted by: Leke Akinrowo | January 16, 2008
Terry Murray, Correction, the USA is not a democracy, the model is based upon a police state ... "let none be so blind that he/she cannot see." Ask and will be given; seek and you will find; knock and the door shall be opened ... ALWAYS!!
Posted by: Clive | January 16, 2008
I would like to hear your thoughts and comments on
pre-destination?
Posted by: Judy Burns | January 16, 2008
The response by Terri Murray is dangerous in that we have an obvious intelligent, thoughtful person who has decided to "pick and choose" which part of the Bible is God's Word, and which is not. We must trust that the transmission of God's Word has in fact been protected by God so that we will not be mislead. Otherwise, we wander in a vast land of uncertainty which is not God's desire for His children.
Alan Dodd 1-16-08
Posted by: Alan Dodd | January 16, 2008
This gentleman cannot cannot have too many evangelical friends.That message is foreign to many evangelicals idea of what God has placed us here to do.This is what I think the real Christ like answer is to the unloving critics(the right)and the uncritical lovers(the left).Sadly, the uncritical lovers(the left)seem to embody more of the spirit of love than do evangelicals.We've got the right message but the wrong method.We are too busy being contentious about the faith to contend for it.There has to be room for a life changing Christian gospel supported by a life demonstrating Christian love.
Posted by: T.L.Milo | January 16, 2008
This is a very thought-provoking article & it prompts me to wonder about my personal experience of being loved by God,hence the reality of my loving the world as God does. I want my experience to be more than a bowl of lima beans!
Posted by: Ken Seburn | January 16, 2008
I would be interested in Mark Labberton's response to this question, in light of his article: If a group of militant Muslims came to him and threatened to murder him if he did not convert to Islam, what would be his rationale for refusing and dying a martyr's death?
Posted by: Walter Henrichsen | January 16, 2008
Jesus embodied the fullness of grace and truth. It appears to me, at least in my observations of the church, that we tend to embody one or the other. We will embody grace to the neglect of truth or we embody truth to the negelect of grace. This is the power of Christ's ministry. He could stand against sin yet with grace. He could welcome all and still say "go and sin no more".
The problem is not with the gospel. I with Paqul say, "I am not asham,ed of the gospel for it is the power of God unto salvation." We as the "church" have taught the things of Christ but if we listen to Jesus' words - "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you" - we hear Jesus heart of to transform people not to inform them.
The gospel calls us to repentance, to surrender to lay our life down. The problem with the gospel in the united states is not the gospel but those (myself included) who claim the gospel but do not obey it.
Truly the gospel calls us to love lustice and mercy and walk humbly before God - but the primary message of the gospel is that Jesus came to seek and the save the lost. In my analysis of the present situation in which we find ourselves in the united states of America, we have not called people to repentance and obedient lives. The church has for far too long allowed sin behavior, non-kingdom values and practices, "respectable" sins dwell in our midst. The church has lived in fear of the gospel that calls people to be transformed into the image of Christ. The message today is "come as you stay as you are" This is NOT the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The gospel of Jesus was the kingdom of heaven and His message was and is still today "Repent, for the kingdom of Heaven is at Hand"
Look at the great revivals in history - they all began not with social justice movements or people loving each other more. No, they all began with people (starting with those in the church) recognizing their sin, repenting and truning from their sin and living in obedience to Jesus. An awakwening to the justice, holiness, mercy and grace of God. An awakewning to the love of Jesus.
Intrestingly enough a review of those revivals shows that folloing repentance and people taking sin seriously and living obediently to the Word and Will of God many social justice and social action organizations were begun and there was a renewed emphasis on the truth that my relatinship with Christ will effect and change my relationships with others. There can be no other way.
I again believe that many church movements today bypass repentance and focus on the fruits of repentance. We all like to skip to the resurrection and avoid the passion and cross of Christ. But we must not. We must not focus our peoples attention on social justice, social action, feeding the hungry, etc. We myust focus their hearts on Jesus so that he can reveal to them through His word and Spirit that since the fruit of their lives has been selfishness and self indulgence that is disobedience to the Lord and Master. Needs to be confessed, repented off and then we walk in newness of life. It is all about Jesus and to be as Paul, "I desired to know nothing except Christ and Him crucified" or else where when he proclaims, "I want to know Christ. Everything else is garbage compared to knowing Jesus".
We must not pay attention to the head of the weed. WE must pull it out by its roots. We must take a fearless and moral inventory of our lives and churches and confess the exact nature of our wrongs. We cannot cover our sin and wrong doing by doing better or showing more love. We must come to Jesus.
Christ Reigns!
Posted by: Todd Krygsheld | January 16, 2008
Mark, I think you are absolutely right. When Jesus said we should love God with our whole beings and love our neighbors as ourselves, he meant it; he said those two commandments embody all the ten commandments.
If we truly loved our neighbors as ourselves, we would be loving sacrificially. It's pretty clear that we are usually quite willing to go to great lengths to ensure satisfaction of our own needs. So, logically, if we loved others as ourselves, we'd be more than willing to help people who suffer dire need.
The fact that we, the whole body of Christ, are not willing to act in sacrificial ways shows that our concept of God's love is too small.
Posted by: Judy Callarman | January 16, 2008
The gospel looks like a bowl of lima beans in America. I wonder does it look like that in other countries? The gospel is very radical. Perhaps the problem is that too few people have actually read the Bible seriously to see what the Bible says (not the church). As opposed to reading books about Christianity, how much time do we spend reading the Bible? Jesus was the one who said: narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.(Matthew 7)
Posted by: Rose | January 17, 2008
Thanks for the very good points you mention in this article.
I've lived around 35 years of civil war in my dear country Lebanon. We have here a great variety of all kinds of religions and philosophies; also a mosaic of political parties.
Lebanon is a small country but here also we need to know that the Gospel is not too small.
I believe that our main problem has been and is still that, starting from the Church, there is too much selfishness and a very limited belief of a Just God who will Judge one day our actions according to His Heart and His Kingdom not ours.
Posted by: Lucien Accad (Rev) | January 18, 2008
Thanks to those who bothered to read my comments about Paul. Thank you to Judy Burns for pointing out that my selection of Jesus over Paul (when the two conflict) is "dangerous". It was also dangerous to the followers of Jesus back when Pharisees like Paul were dragging them in front of councils and executing them for their humane dissent from the theocracy that these self-appointed, self-righteous hypocrites had erected in the name of God. Jesus had to be out to death precisely because he was dangerously in conflict with the likes of Paul. Sure, when I see two conflicting teachings that cannot be reconciled without setting aside my brain and all human reason, I pick and choose. So do you. The difference is that you choose Paul's doctrines, which are clumsy interpretations of Jesus intended to undermine everything that he had died for -- humanity, tolerance, compassion, and forgiveness. If you don't think Jesus and paul conflict here is just one of many examples:
CONTRADICTIONS BEWTEEN JESUS AND PAUL
James and Peter conflicted with Paul over whether his message was intended for Gentiles. Matthew 15:24 has Jesus explicitly claiming "I was sent only to the lost house of Israel." This is especially interesting since Matthew was writing approximately between 80 - 100 AD., several decades after Paul composed his letters (between 50-60). So Matthew would represent an anti-Pauline viewpoint, even though he was aware of Paul's mission to the gentiles.
As for other contradictions between Pauline doctrine and the teaching of Jesus (and by the way, Paul not only conflicts with Jesus, he also contradicts himself), we could start with this:
1. In 2 Cor. 13: 1-3 and again in Hebrews 10:27-30 Paul shows his approval of earthly punishments, making reference to the death penalty, which was somewhat similar to Sharia law in Islam today, where if there were 2-3 witnesses to an alleged crime the perpetrator could be lawfully put to death.
We know what Jesus said to those about to stone a woman to death for adultery (again, similar to Sharia law today). "He who is without sin should cast the first stone."
But even more shocking is Matthew 18:15-21 where Jesus is reported to have said "If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that very word may be conformed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector."
Here we notice two things, that Jesus regarded Gentiles as outsiders or as the 'other'. But we also see that Jesus is here suggesting an alternative to the usual legal requirement of putting sinners to death. In fact, he is saying that there should be a series of attempts to reform the sinner and to bring him back into the fold, and after these attempts are exhausted, to shun the sinner, as if he were not part of the community -- this is far less harsh than putting him to death.
Posted by: Terri Murray | February 6, 2008
Sorry, correction, I think it was Alan Dodd (not Judy Burns) who called me 'dangerous' for being an "obviously intelligent, thoughtful person", who, when confronted with two contradictory sets of ethcis, "has decided to pick and choose".
Yes, that is what intelligent thoughtful people do when they are presented with two propositions that cannot BOTH be true. They pick and choose. This is what it means to have values -- it is to value something more than others. Or should we just "have faith" and abandon all God-given reason?
The problem with American Christians is that they want to be lead like sheep with unquestioning, blind faith. Keep it up, and soon you will be. When you abandon your responsibility to make choices, you soon lose your freedom to do so. Then we will go back to the Dark Ages when women were 'property' and men put themselves in the place of God. I know that this will be a dream come true for those who cannot handle the burden of freedom, but please don't slander Jesus by counting him among them!
Posted by: Terri Murray | February 6, 2008
Thanks Mark, I enjoyed reading this article!
I don't enjoy lima beans too much. But I really enjoy and love my children. If I can love them so deeply that I ache for their wholeness and contentment, God must feel the same for us, His children. It is impossible for me to consider giving up one of my precious sons for the world. Yet, God gave His only Son. My love of just one parent for her children can seem small but really with God, it is big!
Posted by: Juliane Meagor Brown | June 17, 2008
Terri,Jesus is not dead but alive, seated at the right hand of the Father.Also Peter confirmed Paul's message and teaching.(2Peter3:15-16) So if Peter who was chosen by Jesus to build his Church (Matt16:18-20) and Peter confirmed Paul's teaching in all his (letters)In what seems to be a theme of what Jesus thought and what Peter understood to be true by the wisdom of the Holy Spirit; Paul also was the one that confronted Peter in his hypocrisy (Gal 2:11-14)and went on to testify of Christ.Peter did not seem to be a fended by this rebuke but gave Paul's letters the same authority of old testament scripture.I think that your Your view on the New Testament is not valid!
Posted by: Fred Kiney | March 11, 2009