Jason Micheli's Blog, page 34

"While Hungering God, They Perceive that They are Creatures"

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This Sunday continues a relentless pass by the lectionary through the Gospel of John 6. For weary preachers looking for yet another word on this Word, here is a homily by the theologian Karl Rahner:

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The Spirit is the Tensive Point Between the Future and Present

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Summary

In this conversation, Jason Micheli, Teer Hardy, and Jack Levison discuss various topics, including their previous interactions, their experiences in Greece, and the role of the Holy Spirit. They explore the physicality of the Holy Spirit and its connection to the resurrection of Jesus. They also touch on the dematerialization of the Holy Spirit in Christian theology and the need to reclaim its materiality. The conversation highlights the importance of recognizing the presence of the Holy Spirit in the proclamation of the gospel and the sacraments. The conversation explores the physical and tangible experiences of encountering the Holy Spirit through scripture, music, and personal moments. It delves into the importance of proclaiming the gospel through various mediums and the role of the Trinity in understanding the Spirit. The discussion also touches on the challenges of articulating the doctrine of the Trinity and the need for concrete expressions of the Spirit's work in the church. The conversation concludes with reflections on the power of storytelling and the impact of literature.

Takeaways

The Holy Spirit provides a tension point between the past and the future, leading us back to Jesus and driving us into a world of hope.

The dematerialization of the Holy Spirit in Christian theology has led to a separation between the material and the spiritual, which has hindered our understanding of the Spirit's physicality.

The resurrection of Jesus is a physical event that signifies something new and altogether different, not just a restoration of life.

The Holy Spirit is present in the proclamation of the gospel and the sacraments, and recognizing its presence is essential for a deeper understanding of the Spirit's work.

Pentecostals often focus on the charismatic aspects of the Spirit, while mainline Christians may overlook the Spirit's presence in the proclamation of the gospel. Encountering scripture and music can elicit physical sensations and a deep sense of the Holy Spirit's presence.

The proclamation of the gospel through various mediums, including music, is essential in reaching and engaging people.

The doctrine of the Trinity can be challenging to articulate, but understanding the work of the Spirit is crucial in comprehending the Trinity.

Concrete expressions of the Spirit's work in the church, such as baptism and liturgy, can help make the Spirit's action more tangible.

Storytelling and literature have the power to evoke emotions and convey deep truths about the human experience and the work of the Spirit.

Sound Bites

"The Holy Spirit provides that tensive point between past and future."

"The Holy Spirit provides that intensive spot in our lives between Jesus in the past and transformation in the future."

"The resurrection is the invigoration of the body of Jesus, the way God invigorates our bodies."

"There are so there have been times in my life where I have been studying scripture and I feel my body relax like it it opens."

"The way that we are able to present the gospel through music disarms people."

"It is the music when something penetrates all of us. And that's when I feel or sense the Holy Spirit very deeply."

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In the End of All Things is Their Beginning

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For a sermon on Romans 5.12-21, I recently preached on the church’s doctrine labeled apokatastasis, popularly known as universal salvation.

You can find the sermon here.

As Al Kimel writes, “Apokatastasis is but the gospel of Christ's absolute and unconditional love sung in an eschatological key.” The response to the sermon surprised me; consequently, I’ve been rereading David Bentley Hart’s wonderful, cutting book, That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation.

Here’s a reflection I wrote last week:

Tamed CynicHell for some would be Hell for all.Tamed Cynic is a reader-supported publication. If you appreciate the work, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Seriously, why not…Read more8 days ago · 18 likes · 3 comments · Jason Micheli

Hart mounts one of his arguments against eternal conscious torment on the basis of the scriptural doctrine of creatio ex nihilo.

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Quite Unmystically

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In Romans 6, Paul anticipates the question his auditors will ask once he’s asserted the inclusive finality of grace, “Just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all.”

“Why not continue to indulge ourselves, if we will be forgiven anyway?”

— 6.1

Robert Jenson jokes that an obvious answer to such a question could be, “Because God will punish at least all who ask such questions.” The doctrine of justification however prevents this from every being the entire response to any questions that attempt to press against the limits of grace. Just so, Paul proceeds in Romans 6 to insist that the baptized who ask such questions are no longer the kinds of creatures who can intelligibly ask such questions.

They used to be such beings.

They are now no longer such ones.

This is the basis for their now idle queries. Something has happened. Something has happened to them to detach such questions from their reality.

That something is baptism.

Critically—

All of Romans 6 refers to baptism in the past tense. This tense is key to the force of Paul’s argument and essential to his aim of removing sin and good works entirely from the sphere of subjective choice.

Paul reminds his audience that they have been baptized “into Christ Jesus” and that this baptism in Christ is specifically “into his death” (v. 3). Paul means this as no metaphor. The consequence of baptism into Christ and his death is such that Paul refers to those so washed with a series of verbs that affix them to the work of Christ.

He uses the prefix syn (co-):

“We were co-buried.”

“We have co-inhered.”

“We were co-crucified.”

“We will co-live.”

Of these, all those in the past tense refer back to that death into which his listeners were baptized. They now share Christ’s death; therefore, they share his separation now (vs. 7, 10, 11) from the old self.

As Jenson says:

“There no longer subsists in their case that relationship of indulgence and need between person and world, to which “Why not continue…?” could meaningfully refer.”

For all the church’s arguments over baptism, Paul’s argument is simple. On the one hand, “into Christ Jesus” is short for “into the name of Christ Jesus” and thus refers to the believers’s experienced event of baptism. On the other hand, this baptismal formulation opens up the whole array of inclusion images the apostle uses in his epistles. The baptized are “in” Christ and, just so, have died “with” him. “Given this thinking,” Jenson writes, “the argument is valid; if baptism initiates into determination of life by the reality of Christ, it initiates into determination by that event by which Christ has defined himself— which, according to Paul, is the cross.”

The straightforward simplicity of Paul’s argument begs a similarly blunt and simple question.

How does this work exactly?

How have you been baptized into Christ and his crucifixion? Attempts to understand this passage Christologically, Jenson warns, lead only to mysticism, and mysticism contradicts the actuality with which Paul attempts to assure his audience. We cannot follow Paul’s rather clear argument until we see that it depends on the description of the church as “the body of Christ.”

We cannot follow Paul’s rather clear argument until we see that it depends on the description of the church as “the body of Christ.”

The ecclesiological meaning of “in Christ” is not incidental but enables Paul’s argument.

As Jenson writes:

“We are baptized into the church, which is a “body,” a given transpersonal object-reality in the world, whose communal structures then quite un-mystically include us and determine our possibilities. But this community is Christ’s; his self-determination determines its structure and dynamics. It is through such relations of meaning that the discourse of Romans 6 works; and when we see that, we see that Paul’s claims for baptism are a function of his claims for the church.”

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He Chose the Malefactor's Cross as His Throne

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"We should all be profoundly conservative and profoundly liberal in our attentiveness to who Jesus is."

Here is our latest session for our weekly Adventures in Barth. Thanks to all of you who’ve sent me questions and feedback. For next Monday, we will read up to page 175 in the PDF:

Cd 221MB ∙ PDF fileDownloadDownloadShow Notes

Summary

The conversation explores the themes of God's love and election, the nature of evil, and the intersection of politics and Christianity. The participants discuss the concept of predestination and how God's choice for humanity is demonstrated through Jesus Christ. They emphasize that evil is not a creation of God but an allowed condition of His creation. They also highlight the importance of focusing on God's determination to be the God of Jesus Christ and not getting consumed by partisan politics. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the second coming and the last judgment, emphasizing that God has already judged evil through the cross. The conversation explores the themes of judgment, condemnation, and the nature of God's love and grace. Marty Folsom emphasizes that the cross is the ultimate judgment, where Jesus takes on the sins and burdens of humanity. He highlights the healing work of Jesus and the exchange of unworthiness for undeserved grace. The conversation also touches on the church's role in condemning others and the importance of communicating the message of no condemnation in Christ. The discussion delves into the concept of misplaced belief and the need to align our faith with the reality of God's unseen work. It concludes with a reflection on the sin of self-righteousness and the transformative power of God's love.

Takeaways

God's love and election are demonstrated through Jesus Christ.

Evil is not a creation of God but an allowed condition of His creation.

Christians should focus on God's determination to be the God of Jesus Christ and not get consumed by partisan politics.

The second coming and the last judgment are not separate from what happened at the cross. The cross is the ultimate judgment, where Jesus takes on the sins and burdens of humanity.

Jesus' work is a healing process that involves the exchange of unworthiness for undeserved grace.

The church should focus on communicating the message of no condemnation in Christ rather than condemning others.

Belief should be aligned with the reality of God's unseen work and not misplaced in human ideals.

Self-righteousness is a form of unbelief that hinders us from fully embracing God's love and grace.

Sound Bites

"God, we can never say God willed evil. It's entirely out of what the doctrine of election even allows to be."

"To be justified by faith is to be justified by your trust that condemnation and rejection is an impossibility now for you."

"We should all be profoundly conservative and profoundly liberal in our attentiveness to who Jesus is."

"The nature of what has happened on the cross is the judgment that lets us know what the outcome is."

"I'll take all that is unworthy of life and you and me. I will take that and in return I'm going to give you all that you do not deserve."

"You will know that whatever the world throws at you, I am greater than that. You've been made more than conquerors, overcomers in this life."

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On the Infernalists's Free Will Defense of Eternal Hell

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As I said previously, last Sunday for a sermon on Romans 5.12-21, I preached on the church’s doctrine labeled apokatastasis, popularly known as universal salvation.

You can find the sermon here.

As Al Kimel writes, “Apokatastasis is but the gospel of Christ's absolute and unconditional love sung in an eschatological key.” The response to the sermon surprised me; consequently, I’ve been rereading David Bentley Hart’s wonderful, cutting book, That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation.

Here’s a reflection I wrote last week:

Tamed CynicHell for some would be Hell for all.Tamed Cynic is a reader-supported publication. If you appreciate the work, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Seriously, why not…Read more5 days ago · 18 likes · 3 comments · Jason Micheli

Towards the end of TASBS, Hart turns to the argument from “freedom.”

If it’s true that God consigns or consents his creatures to an eternal hell then this begs a grim but straightforward question.

Is God evil?

Simply because God (allegedly) does it, does not make it good or just— or, even more importantly, beautiful.

Our concepts of goodness, truth, and the beautiful, after all, emanate from God, who is the perfection of Goodness, Truth, and Beauty; therefore, they participate in the Being of God and correspond to the character of God. Sin-impaired as we are, we can yet trust our God-given gut. Again then, the question— and forget that it’s God we’re talking about— is God evil?

If the calculus of God’s salvation balances out with a mighty, eternally-tormented, remainder, then is God the privation haunting the goodness of his own creation?

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There Is A Spirit Afoot Who Has No Self

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Romans 6.1-11

When the Comedy Central animated series “South Park” debuted in August 1997, after a pilot episode the year before became one of the internet's first viral videos, it created much controversy and met with many indignant complaints for the way it parodied Christianity in general and Jesus in particular. For example, in the Y2K episode titled “Are You There God? It's Me Jesus,” Jesus worries that for the new millennium humanity may crucify him again. As it turns out, Jesus wasn't so crazy about being crucified the first go around; therefore, Jesus decides to do something cool to distract us from crucifying a second time. Jesus organizes a Rod Stewart comeback concert.

When “South Park” debuted nearly thirty years ago, it sparked heated controversy. The Christian Child Care Action Project protested the show, complaining that children's ability to understand the gospel would be corrupted by the show’s satirical bite. Meanwhile, the Christian Family Network registered alarm that “South Park” impeded their work to restore morality to the nation and protect the American family. All those years ago, many Christians expressed outrage and fear that an animated television series posed an ecclesial emergency, threatening to inoculate us against the gospel.

Of course, the single cultural force that has done more damage than any other to our ability to speak Christian is indeed a long-running animated television show.

It's just not “South Park.”

It's “Scooby-Doo.”

I did not become a Christian until I was seventeen. And even then I did so only kicking and screaming. I think my being born again was every bit as painful and drawn out as my initial birth because of “Scooby-Doo.” I should have seen it coming. After all, “GI Joe,” which came on every weekday before “Scooby -Doo,”had warned me that “Knowing is half the battle.”

And I knew how every episode of “Scooby-Doo” was going to go.

Therein “Scooby-Doo” was forming me in such a way to make it impossible to read the scriptures rightly.

“Scooby-Doo” has aired continuously on television since 1969.

“Scooby-Doo” has spun off into dozens of series and around forty theatrical films. “Scooby-Doo” has been everywhere for a long time so chances are you already know all about “Scooby -Doo.” You could probably sing its theme song this very moment if prompted.

In fact, you're probably singing it in your heads right now.

You already know all about “Scooby-Doo.” You know that the gang is led by Fred Jones, the blond Hardy Boy doppelgänger, who apparently owned only orange ascots and white v-neck sweaters. You know that Vilma was the first lesbian on TV. And you know that Scooby and the gang drove around in a van decorated to look like a mobile Marijuana dispensary and that they constantly complained of having the munchies— no mystery there. And you probably also know that “Scooby-Doo” would often feature crossover guest stars like the Harlem Globe Trotters and characters from other live action shows like the “Andy Griffith Show.” Which just shows how baked the gang was because otherwise you'd think it would have occurred to a team of detectives that the real mystery in Mayberry is: “Where are all the black people?”

But this the problem.

This the gospel-corroding problem presented by “Scooby-Doo.”

There's never any mystery in “Scooby-Doo.”

Not once.

In nary an episode.

Never is there any actual mystery.

Every “Scooby-Doo” episode follows the same exact pattern.

You know it—

The sleuths of Mystery Incorporated drive their psychedelic Mystery Machine van into a little town where a rattled resident lets slip how their quiet hamlet has recently been haunted by some ghost, spook, or monster. Scooby and the gang then commence an investigation. Ultimately, after a suggestive hit or two of Scooby Snacks and a comedic chase scene, the gang nabs the creature. And always— every time, every episode— Scooby and his friends unmask the monster only to reveal that the troublesome specter is not a monster but rather some mendacious mortal from the town.

Always, the doer is some local wearing a monster mask to frighten people away from noticing their shady, criminal designs.

Every monster is just a man in a mask.

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I mention Scooby and his gang in the Mystery Machine because in the sixth chapter of Romans the apostle continues a mysterious and unsettling motif. Like a face hidden behind a mask, you may have missed the puzzle latent Paul’s deployment of ordinary words like Sin and Death.

Notice— the fright is right there in front of your face from the start in the second verse.

PAUL MAKES SIN THE SUBJECT OF VERBS.Sin is not simply something you do. Sin is a power that can do to you.

Sin is an agency with the ability to grasp ahold of you, “We died to sin’s grasp.” In this way, Paul further unveils a mystery he has been revealing from the beginning.

In his opening diatribe, Paul speaks of sin not as our act but as God’s rival, a tyrant to whom the Lord, in his righteous frustration, “handed us over.” And the word Paul uses over and again is paradidomi, whose straightforward definition is to give someone or something over to the power of an enemy. In chapter three, Paul speaks of both sin and the law as despots “under” whose regime we live apart from Christ Jesus.

The apostle ups the ante in the passage immediately before this text, making sin, death, and the law synonymous with one another and making all three the subjects of the very same verbs Paul uses to describe the work of God in Jesus Christ:

5.12: “Sin entered the world and through Sin came Death. Thus Death entered into all people.”

5.14: “Death ruled as a king from Adam until Moses.”

Again later, 5.17: “Death ruled as a king through the transgression of one person.”

5.21: “Sin reigned as a monarch with Death.”

Paul makes sin, death, and the law the subjects of verbs. They are what Karl Barth calls "Lordless lords” who exercise dominion. This is why Fleming Rutledge says of this passage:

“When I write sermons about Sin, Death, and the Law, I capitalize those three words. The purpose of doing this is to show that Sin, Death, and the Law are not just components of human life, but a Power that rules over us. That is the way Paul understands the situation. In Romans, Paul uses words that indicate their sovereign sway.”

Interpreters frequently characterize chapter six as an excursus on ethical exhortation, yet even here Sin and Death continue to operate in a mysterious way as anti-God powers.

6.9: “Death no longer lords it over Christ.”

6.12: “Do not let Sin rule as a king in your mortal body.”

6.13: “Do not present yourself as a weapon for Sin.”

6.14: “Sin will not lord it over you.”

6.17: “You were slaves of Sin.”

Paul is not writing about morality. Paul is disclosing a mystery. Sin is not a what. Sin is a who. Our little-s sins are but masks Someone wears in the world. Paul does not pull back the curtain to reveal this who until the very end of his epistle when he finally delivers the full promise of the gospel, “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.”

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When I was in high school, I worked as a volunteer for Sam Nixon, a South Side Richmond Republican who was running in the 27th District for the General Assembly. A woman I knew only as Mrs. Smith was the district operative who told me where to post signs and stuff mailboxes and knock on doors, and on election eve, take down the other candidate's signs. Mrs. Smith was the mother of a classmate I vaguely knew.

For each one of my campaign endeavors, she drove me along with a van load of other volunteers from place to place in Chesterfield County. And every outing, always with some AM squawker squawking on the radio, she would turn away from the steering wheel to proselytize us with her latest conspiracy theory.

“Did you know,” she told me as I rode shotgun into some planned community, “President Clinton is responsible for the murder of several witnesses in the Whitewater scandal?”

“No, I hadn't heard that,” I said. And by way of explanation, I added, “We don't have cable.”

“Well, I read it on the internet,” she said, “Do you have the internet? It's an information superhighway.”

And I shook my head.

“Honestly,” she said.

Turning away from the wheel and towards me in violation of everything I was learning in driver's education, she asked me, “Honestly, what would you say if I told you Vince Foster didn't really commit suicide? What would you say if I told you Bill and Hillary were behind his murder and then faked it for political purposes? It's a cover up. Honestly, what would you say?”

And because I was a recent convert to Christianity who thought Jesus expects us to tell the truth even if the president didn't, I didn't lie.

“Honestly,” I said. “Honestly, I'd say you sound like an insane person.”

After that day, I didn't quit the campaign, but I did have to find my own rides. A few years later, I was home from college on break and I went to church, just an ordinary suburban praise band and polo shirt type of church. I was surprised to find Mrs. Smith in the row ahead of me. Even though I knew Mrs. Smith to be somewhere to the right of the Ayatollah, a Shiite pro -lifer, I also knew that back in the day, she wasn't a Christian.

“Mrs. Smith,” I said, “what are you doing here?”

And she frowned.

“All those lies I spun and all that hate I spread. Something took hold of me,” she said, “Back then. What's Jesus call him? The Prince of Lies? Anyways, I met Jesus here and got baptized. I’ve since been set free.”

“The Devil made you do it?”

“I think that’s right,” she nodded, looking equal parts alarmed and awed.

Thanks to “Scooby-Doo” we have been conditioned to look for the explanation behind the scriptures.

Every time Jesus encounters the Devil or one of his demons, we moderns suppose there must be a rational answer if we but peak behind the spooky mask.

No less than the nineteenth century theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher insisted that what’s really going on in a passage such as the story of the Gerasene demoniac is that Jesus healed a man with severe mental illness.

The Devil and his demons— they’re just monster masks.We say.

But the problem with trying to pull away the spooky mask to see what's really going on is that even if the Devil and demons are only masks to moderns like you, even if you don't consider the possibility that they can be real, it does not alter the fact that Jesus did.

“This woman is a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound for 18 long years,” Jesus diagnoses in the Gospel of Luke.

That's not the Pharisees attributing Satan to a woman’s paralysis. That's not the chief priests saying she's been bound by the Devil. That's not the disciples implying it.

That's Red Letter.

That's Jesus saying that whatever else has ailed this woman Satan has bound her in his captivity. Or as Paul puts it in Romans 6, The Power of Sin lorded over her body.

Call it the Devil.

Call it Sin and Death, as Paul does here in Romans.

Call it the Principalities and Powers, as Paul does in Ephesians.

Call it the Prince of Darkness or the Adversary, as Jesus does.

Call it what you will; the sheer array of names proves the point.Evil-as-person is the narrative glue that holds the salvation story together.

The language of Satan so thoroughly saturates the New Testament, you can't speak Christian without it. To pull off the monster masks and insist that something else is going on behind them is to reject how Jesus understood his mission and how Paul understood the gospel Jesus gave him. John puts it as plainly as Paul does at the end of Romans. “The reason the Son of God appeared,” John writes, “was to destroy the Devil's work.”

You can count up the verses.

More so than he was a teacher or a wonder worker.

More so than he was a prophet or a preacher or a revolutionary.

Jesus is an exorcist.

As a product of the United Methodist Church, I used to scoff at the notion there’s a mystery behind masks like Sin, Death, and the Devil. But then, typical of Jesus's sense of humor, Jesus sent me to be a preacher at a maximum security prison.

And there I discovered that perhaps I was not the one living in reality.

I was preaching one Sunday morning at Trenton State Penitentiary. The text assigned to me that day was from the Gospel of Mark, another “Scooby-Doo” type scripture, where a desperate father brings his convulsing boy to Christ. Eventually Jesus rebukes the boy’s demon saying, “You, spirit, that keep this boy from speaking and hearing. I command you, come out of him and never enter him again.”

Being seminary educated, I took that wild, ghost-busting story and I preached a placid, G -rated sermon about faith as a gift.

After the sermon, as we were preparing the table for the eucharist, one of the inmates, Malcolm, raised his hand and said, "Preacher, what was that? We deserve better!”

“I'm not sure what you mean," I said, “And I'm a Methodist. We're not used to this being a dialogue, so maybe we should just move on to communion.”

“You didn't say nothing about the demon that possessed that boy,” Malcom said, “You didn't preach a single word about the power of Jesus over the evil that can grasp ahold of us.”

I stammered.

“If you had the benefit of a seminary education,” I said, “you too would understand how stories like that, the devil and possession, they're metaphors.”

“Metaphors?” Malcolm shot back, “Man, I don't know what a metaphor is, but I do know you skipped right over one of the few things that gives hope to guys like us.”

“This passage gives you hope?”

“How do you think most of us ended up inside, preacher?”

“Most of us here, we were taken captive by something long before we ended up behind bars. That Jesus Christ has the power to exorcise that from us, that's one of the few things that gives people like me hope.”

The gospel drama is only good news when you realize the cast necessarily includes a fourth, oft-neglected character:

God the Father.

God the Son (in their Spirit).

God’s Enemy.

Humanity— caught betwixt and between.

The Lord Jesus does not appease his angry Father.

The Lord Jesus rescues us for his loving Father by delivering us from their Adversary.

Only when you have the correct cast of characters can you hear rightly Paul’s proclamation for the church at Rome.

Sin and Grace do not name two different modes of behavior; they name two different regimes with two different lords.You are born into one. You are baptized into another.

Yes, you sin. Of course, you sin. But, no longer do you belong to Sin. By blood and by water, Christ has rescued you from his clutches. As Robert Jenson writes, “The sacraments overcome the tyrants.”

In Romans 6, Paul is not suggesting that we cannot sin. Were that Paul’s claim, then the ethical admonitions in chapters twelve through fifteen would be superfluous. Paul is not positing that we cannot sin. Paul is proclaiming that we are no longer in the grasp of the One who lurks behind words like Sin and Death.

This passage is not a bit of exhortation.

This is passage is a preview of the ultimate promise.

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After last Sunday’s service, I received an email from a woman who worships  remotely with us from out west. Rightly, she knows that behind a rational, every day word like alcoholism is the Adversary whom Paul makes the subject of verbs. The diagnosis is but the mask for the Enemy Paul calls Sin and Death.

In her message, Susan wrote:

“Dear Jason,

I'm not sure why I am writing to you about my raggedy faith and family. I think it’s because you are far enough away from me that you feel like a safe place for my confessions.

My son is in his 6th round of treatment for his alcoholism right now. He is a brilliant, beautiful man— this go-around he’s a little more desperate than before for good news that can't be undone by his brilliant mind or this damned power that has him in its grasp.

And so he told me that when he gets out of treatment this time he wants to go back to church, but he needs to be handed the gospel for all, even for fumbling, brilliant captives to alcohol who come to Jesus in the middle of the night nearly begging to be outsmarted by something too good not to be true. It's just this word that sets free can be really hard to find in these days of smoky worship shows and platforms filled with everything but him who is our Rescue.

Now I don't know what the outcome of this treatment will be. I'm not so naive as to believe at this point in my life that this treatment or even a sermon Sunday’s will make everything right.

But I do have that mustard seed's worth of faith that everything will be delivered from the One who binds it. Thanks to your church for gospeling us.”

In other words—

On account of her son, Susan’s counting on the promise to which Paul provides a peak behind the curtain of the ultimate promise of the gospel, “The God of peace will soon trample Satan underfoot.”

Hear the straightforward claim of the scriptures:

There is a spirit afoot who has no self.

If John the Evangelist is to be trusted and the Son of God appeared for no reason other than to destroy the works of the Devil, then for all of us who are in Christ Jesus, Christianity just is struggle against a personified Liar. Faith is nothing less than contending with a Power determined to capture us in his grasp.

As Robert Jenson writes:

“It has always been my principle that there is more in heaven and in earth, and presumably then also in hell, than is dreamed of in anyone’s philosophy. I have therefore always acknowledged reality so abundantly testified in human history as angels and demons…

That is, somewhere in being, somewhere out there and in there and down there, there is a subjectivity that comprehensively despises the world, that hates all things, and, thus, deceives all things. And that subjectivity, that hatred, that despising, that deceiving is also antecedent to all our hating and despising and deceiving.”

It is impossible to speak gospel without explicit reference to Sin and Death, aka: the Devil. Just so, if we are unable to speak of the Adversary, then all is lost and we are without hope.

Fortunately for us, if Jesus’s own struggle against the Devil provides any clue, then we do not contend against his power by believing in his reality.We do so as Jesus does in the desert.We do so by trusting the promises of God.

Therefore—

Come to the table where Christ pledges to give you himself and thereby make you a part of himself. Loaf and cup, bread and wine— what Paul calls the mysteries— these are the masks God wears in our world.

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Luther and the Gospel: What to Look for in the Gospels

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From the vault:

Here is a session the Minion and I recorded on Martin Luther’s A Brief Instruction on What to Look for and Expect in the Gospels.

Summary

The conversation explores Luther's A Brief Instruction on What to Look for and Expect in the Gospels. Luther's response to being called a heretic was to press the movement forward by training pastors and making scriptures available to ordinary people. The conversation emphasizes the distinction between the law and the gospel, with Luther insisting that Christ is not a new lawgiver but a completely gratuitous gift. The concept of simul, being simultaneously justified and a sinner, is discussed, highlighting the tension between our sinful nature and our justification through Christ. The conversation also addresses the erroneous notions that the gospel refers only to the gospels and that the gospels are books of law. In this conversation, the hosts discuss the importance of understanding the gospel as a gift rather than an example to follow. They emphasize that the purpose of the gospel narratives is not to provide a blueprint for Christian behavior, but to reveal the life of Jesus as a gift of grace. They also explore Luther's teachings on reading the Old Testament and how he encouraged Christians to interpret it through the lens of Christ. The hosts address questions about Luther's anti-Semitism and its connection to German Christians accepting Nazism. They conclude by discussing the role of experiences in faith and the danger of Christians aligning themselves with empire.

Takeaways

Luther's response to being called a heretic was to press the movement forward by training pastors and making scriptures available to ordinary people.

The distinction between the law and the gospel is crucial, with Luther emphasizing that Christ is not a new lawgiver but a completely gratuitous gift.

The concept of simul, being simultaneously justified and a sinner, highlights the tension between our sinful nature and our justification through Christ.

Erroneous notions that the gospel refers only to the gospels and that the gospels are books of law should be corrected. The gospel is a gift of grace, not a set of rules or examples to follow.

Understanding the Old Testament through the lens of Christ helps Christians see the gospel throughout the entire Bible.

Experiences can help us believe the truth of the gospel, but the focus should be on the truth that created the experience, not the experience itself.

The danger of Christians aligning themselves with empire can lead to the acceptance of harmful ideologies, such as anti-Semitism and Nazism.

Sound Bites

"Luther's response to being called a heretic was to press the movement forward"

"The gospel is and should be nothing else than a discourse or story about Christ"

"Simul: At once justified and a sinner"

"That's the world we live in, that scripture to us."

"You can only come to the Father through me, for who I am, through what I do on your behalf and in no other way."

"Read the gospel stories through the lens of Paul."

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47 versus 4

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As I said previously, on Sunday for a sermon on Romans 5.12-21, I preached on the church’s doctrine labeled apokatastasis, popularly known as universal salvation.

You can find the sermon here.

As Al Kimel writes, “Apokatastasis is but the gospel of Christ's absolute and unconditional love sung in an eschatological key.” The response to the sermon surprised me and has convinced me that it’s worth pressing further into the possibility of an apokatastasis made available by the Son’s rectifying faithfulness; consequently, ’ve been rereading David Bentley Hart’s wonderful, cutting book, That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation.

I’m prejudiced in favor of the book’s argument; David was my first theology teacher at UVA. His influence upon me, not long after I became a Christian, has abided and may prove permanent. If nothing else, DBH’s book gives Christians permission to return to the New Testament and see, maybe for the first time, that which it names quite clearly: that the God who created all that is ex nihilo as sheer good gratuity, the God who is all and in all, is the God who desires the salvation of all.

“This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” – 1 Timothy 2.3-4

Apparently, to many who worship the God who just is Love, to assert that God desires the salvation of all constitutes a “treacherous absurdity.” It’s a betrayal of the Gospel, I’ve been told in the not so hushed tones of all caps messages, to suppose that the triune God who announced his creative aim in Genesis 1 (“Let us make humankind in our image…”) will not forsake his endeavor until it has reached final consummation, that in the fullness of time humanity will finally bear the full glory of God’s image. Evidently, it’s better to confess that God-with-us may be our Alpha but he is not our End. At least, not for all of us.

It’s amazing to me that those most vested— presumably— in protecting the gravity of sin, the majesty of salvation, and the authority of scripture ignore what scripture itself testifies about it and the nature of the God revealed therein.

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Spurred by David Bentley Hart, I actually counted up the verses on salvation and damnation. The New Testament contains no less than forty-seven verses which affirm the ‘all-ness’ of God’s salvation. This is compared to the four oft-cited but decidedly cryptic verses which may (or as easily may not) suggest eternal torments for the wicked.47 vs. 4

What was obvious to the ancient church fathers, the totality of God’s salvific aim, has become so hidden it now sufficiently smacks of heresy.

A hero of mine, Karl Barth, famously said that as Christians scripture does not permit us to conclude that all will be saved but that as Christians we should hope and pray that all will be saved. Barth’s is a more generous sentiment than I hear from many Christians today, but despite his reticence DBH argues that the logic of the gospel requires us to say more.

The logic of the gospel requires us to bolder than merely “praying for the salvation of all.”

If God desires the salvation of all, Hart argues rather irrefutably, it is a logical absurdity to assert that the transcendent God will ultimately fail in accomplishing his eschatological will. Indeed it is a theological maxim that God’s will that something be so is simultaneous to its being so.

The belief in an eternal hell where some are forever excluded from the “all-ness” of salvation echoed by scripture— that is the absurdity which begets still other absurdities like the Calvinist notion that God predestined some to salvation and others to perdition.

Just as God cannot act contrary to his good nature, so too God cannot fail to realize the good he desires. To say, as scripture does, that God desires the salvation of all is to say simultaneously and necessarily, as scripture implies, that all will be saved, that all things will indeed be made new.

Consider the counter:

If not, if we in our sin (or, worse, in our “freedom”) thwart God’s will and desire, casting ourselves into a fiery torment despite God’s sovereign intention, God would not be God.

Or, to put it simpler if more baldly, we would be God.

Or, still more pernicious, evil, as that which has successfully resisted God’s creative aim though it is no-thing, would be God.

Evil would God.Thus the belief in an eternal hell betrays the fact that it’s possible for perfect faith to be indistinguishable from perfect nihilism.

It’s clear how offensive the “all-ness” of God’s sovereign saving love can strike the moral ear. For that “all-ness” must include our enemies too. To suggest instead that even if Christ came for all and died for all only some will be saved better conforms to our calculus of justice, but it is a moral calculus that is not without remainder, for it makes of evil an idol and of (the once transcendent) God a liar.

Therefore just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. For just as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. – Romans 5.18-19

For God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all. – Romans 11.32

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Hell Yes, I Believe in Hell

Tamed Cynic is a reader-supported publication. If you appreciate the work, consider becoming a paid subscriber!

As I wrote yesterday, on Sunday for a sermon on Romans 5.12-21, I preached on the church’s doctrine labeled apokatastasis, popularly known as universal salvation.

You can find the sermon here.

As Al Kimel writes, “Apokatastasis is but the gospel of Christ's absolute and unconditional love sung in an eschatological key.” The response to the sermon surprised me and has convinced me that it’s worth pressing further into the possibility of an apokatastasis made available by the Son’s rectifying faithfulness and into the inanity of an everlasting torment given that God is the one this Son called Abba. Indeed hell’s eternity bears little logic when one remembers that just as the Son is not the Son without the Father, we are not ourselves without those whom we love and have loved.

In Romans 8, Paul famously crescendos with the promise to the baptized, “There is therefore now NO CONDEMNATION for those who are in Christ Jesus our Lord.”But if nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus then how is it good news that Paul, only six chapters later, tells the same audience, “We shall all stand before the judgement seat of God?” 

How do you square, “…everyone will come before the judgement seat of God” with what Paul said four chapters earlier, “…everyone who confesses with their lips that Jesus Christ is Lord will be saved.” 

Which is it?

Everyone will be judged?

Or everyone will be saved?

How does “…all will stand before the judgement seat of God…” square with chapter eleven where Paul said that all will be saved, that God will be merciful to all— even to those whom God has, for the present time, “consigned to disobedience?”

Judgment. Mercy. 

Which is it, Paul? 

It can’t be both/and can it? That everyone who confesses Jesus Christ will be saved and everyone will stand before the judgement seat of God? In fact, Paul repeats it almost word-for-word to the Corinthians: “We must all appear before the judgement seat of God.” And you can’t dismiss this verse about judgement because the Apostle Paul here sounds like Jesus everywhere— all over the Gospels, Jesus warns of the Coming Day of Judgement. As in his final teaching before his Passion, Jesus promises that he will come again to judge the living and the dead, gathering all before him. 

Not some. 

All: 

unbelievers and believers 

unrighteous and righteous

the unbaptized and the born again 

All— not some— all, Jesus says, will be gathered for judgement. The “saved” are not spared.

And all will be reckoned according to who fed the hungry and who gave water to the thirsty and who clothed the naked and who welcomed the immigrant. And who did not.

“All shall stand before God for judgement,” Paul says. 

Just like Jesus said. 

And according to Jesus’ Bible that reckoning will be a fire. 

So, like the first Christians and the early church fathers—

Hell yes! I believe in hell!I just disbelieve in hell’s eternity and its retributive torment.

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The fire of God’s judgment, depicted by Michaelangelo and rhapsodized by Augustine and Calvin, is not the fire promised by the Bible. The fire of God’s judgment, the Bible testifies, will be refining fire. The prophet Malachi, the last voice we hear between the testaments, says on the Day of the Lord our sinful self—- even if we’re “saved”— will come under God’s final judgement and the the Old Adam still clinging to our soul will be burnt away. The corrupt and petty parts of our nature will be purged and destroyed. The greedy and the bigoted and the begrudging parts of our nature will be purged and destroyed. The vengeful and the violent parts of our selves will be purged and destroyed. The unforgiving and the unfaithful parts of us, the insincere and the self- righteous and the cynical- all of it from all of us will be judged and purged and forsaken forever by the God who is a refining fire. 

Keep in mind:

Purgation is not damnation. 

Purgation is not damnation. But neither is it pain free. 

The gospel is not that God’s love and mercy are at odds with God’s justice; therefore, some— maybe many, to listen to some Christians— will be consigned to eternal torment. No, for a finite creature could never justly merit an infinite punishment.  The gospel is that in God, in his love and justice, is dragging all of sinful creation unto himself, and this means that prior to the End you will stand before the judgement seat of Almighty God, stripped and laid bare, all your disguises and your deceits revealed, naked wearing nothing but your true character, so that you can be fit for heaven. 

“The Gospels,” as David Bentley Hart writes, “simply make no obvious claim about a place or state of endless suffering.” And Gehenna, the child-sacrifice-site-turned-garbage dump outside of Jerusalem, which gets translated into Jesus’ mouth as hell, was thought of in Jesus’ time principally “as a place of purification, a refining fire for the souls of those who have been neither incorrigibly wicked nor impeccably good during their lives,” who eventually, their penance due, would be released and taken up to paradise.”

Says Hart:

“The figure of Christ in the fourth gospel passes through the world as the light of eternity; he is already both judgment and salvation, disclosing hell in our hearts, but shattering it in his flesh, so that he may “drag” everyone to himself. Some things then, perhaps, exist only in being surpassed, overcome, formed, redeemed: “pure nature” (that impossible possibility), “pure nothingness,” prime matter, ultimate loss. Hell appears in the shadow of the cross as what has always al- ready been conquered, as what Easter leaves in ruins, to which we may flee from the transfiguring light of God if we so wish, but where we can never finally come to rest—for, being only a shadow, it provides nothing to cling to (as Gregory of Nyssa so acutely observes). Hell exists, so long as it exists, only as the last terrible residue of a fallen creation’s enmity to God, the lin- gering effects of a condition of slavery that God has conquered universally in Christ and will ultimately conquer individually in every soul. This age has passed away already, however long it lingers on in its own aftermath, and thus in the Age to come, and beyond all ages, all shall come home to the Kingdom pre- pared for them from before the foundations of the world.”

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