jonathan stegall

I’ve been ranting about academics and theology and all those things the last few days. I have often had the fear of becoming overly academic and forgetting to actually do anything. In light of this, I want to quote Sherman on the Mount, who says it much better than I do:

When we philosophise our concepts of the Christian faith and try to work it out within the church and seminary walls, it’s called “theology”. When we work these out beyond the church and seminary walls, it’s called “charity”. When both are so integrated that they are expressed as a way of life, it’s called spirituality.

In light of this post, and the past few years of wondering whether it’s idealistic of me to think that followers of Jesus should be biblically intelligent, I want to add a thought. Typically, Christians believe that to be biblically and theologically intelligent one has to go to seminary. For the most part, one has to have either a large amount of money, or the possibility of a career that can use a seminary degree, to make such a thing practical.

First of all, it certainly isn’t essential to go to seminary to be biblically intelligent. Often, seminaries teach people to be less biblically intelligent in certain areas, while they are becoming more biblically intelligent in other areas. Who wins? Does anyone win? And, of course, it is entirely possible to become biblically intelligent without ever attending seminary. It’s not as easy to motivate oneself without professors and grades, but it is possible.

On top of this, the majority of seminaries are, or should be, shaking in fear at the cultural changes that continue to occur in our society. The knowledge they offer is, for the most part, entirely modern knowledge in a growingly postmodern world. I can count on one hand the number of U.S. seminaries I know of that are actively trying to engage postmodern culture without fear and resistance. Resistance of postmodern culture in defense of what? Modern culture, of course.

So, what does the future of seminaries look like? Over a year ago, a missions professor at Fuller wrote this (in this post):

I dream that my seminary will move away from the professional training model and will equip entire communities for mission… In a sense, we allow community degrees.

Imagine that. A community of people who, together, are biblically and theologically and ministerially smart. Is that necessary? Maybe. Is it idealistic and unrealistic? Maybe. But it’s a thought. It’s a change. It’s an idea. And there have to be thoughts and changes and ideas in the way the church educates itself, or things are going to get worse.

Occasionally, I open up StumbleUpon in my Firefox, and spend a few minutes looking around at what it thinks I might like. Today, I found Delocator, a site that locates non-corporate cafes, bookstores, and movie theaters based on one’s zip code.

My wife and I are big fans of coffeeshops, and do everything we can to avoid the corporate ones for a variety of reasons. Because of this, we’re aware of most of the listings for our area, but I can only imagine the usefulness of this service should we travel, or move, or whatever. Great stuff.

Last night, I went to see Rob Bell’s the gods aren’t angry tour. If it comes to your city, go. It’s worth the $20 many times over. I may write a post or two about the things that stuck out to me, but at the moment I want to address one particular thing. It comes up in Rob Bell’s books, and it comes up in his talks.

The fact of the matter is, when we read the Bible, or anything from an entirely different worldview than our own, we don’t get the full extent of what is being said. In the Protestant Reformation, a radical idea arose that everyone should be able to read the Bible for themselves, in their own language, because at that time, the existing church hierarchy prevented the common people from reading it and understanding it. And this was an admirable thing. It was essential, with the point where the church was at the time.

But. As we have taken this radical idea and run with it, and as Western culture has spent the last ~500 years becoming more individualistic and more consumeristic, we have entirely neglected reading the Bible as it was intended to be read, and have taught others to do the same. We have entirely isolated it from its cultural context outside of the academic world, and we’ve relegated the study of its cultural context to optional gatherings and events. We only read it to support what we’ve already been told, and we only want to be told what we already think.

We have entirely forgotten to read and interpret the Bible the way the communities that wrote it did: together. In community. We as American evangelicals have gotten so wrapped up in trying to prove that Moses wrote the Torah all by himself, even the part about his own death, and that all of it is literally true and that if we don’t believe that our country is formed around it our country will no longer be formed around it and we might actually have to tell people who God is and why he matters…

In our individualism, we have made the Bible individualistic. We repeat this for the rest of the Bible. We put it into a vacuum where the names and demands of the Sumerian deities don’t matter. Then we wonder why Leviticus makes God look like a bloodthirsty tyrant. We wonder why our religion is viewed as backward and irrelevant. And then we lash out, saying, “Look at us. We love you. God loves you. Read the Bible and live by it, but don’t live by the parts that we don’t talk about. They don’t matter.”

None of this is new to be said. We know that we do this. People have occasionally tried to put in different ways of teaching, and there are churches and groups where these tendencies are not the case. I find that many people feel that they don’t need to know, or can’t know without going to seminary or whatever, the context of the Bible. That it is an optional thing, and that they’re not ready, or smart enough, or educated enough, or whatever it is. This, of course, only serves to further entrench the divide between “clergy” and “laypeople” that is a terrible part of most churches.

As I’ve watched this happen in my church experiences, I’ve often wondered if I’m right in thinking that everyone should know the context of the Bible. I’ve wondered if my lenses are colored because I have a degree in this stuff. If commentaries and theological dictionaries are items that shouldn’t be read by people with medical degrees. Things like the gods aren’t angry confirm my thoughts. We need to learn these things. We need to teach these things.

A few days ago, I ran across this article from Andrew Sullivan, author of The Conservative Soul. I haven’t read this, but I did see it on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

Anyway. The article is about the candidacy of Barack Obama, and the significance that it offers the nation, and the world. It goes beyond the literal ideas that he espouses, and goes into what his life means, what his experiences mean, and so on. It avoids being partisan on either side, and shows how this presidency could benefit both sides.

At its best, the Obama candidacy is about ending a war - not so much the war in Iraq, which now has a momentum that will propel the occupation into the next decade - but the war within America that has prevailed since Vietnam and that shows dangerous signs of intensifying, a nonviolent civil war that has crippled America at the very time the world needs it most. It is a war about war - and about culture and about religion and about race. And in that war, Obama - and Obama alone - offers the possibility of a truce.

Interestingly, a large part of the significance of this article is that it points out the degree to which the more vocal issues of this election are filled with rhetoric, but in all likelihood will not have an incredible change regardless of which of the “favorites” gets elected.

After looking at these issues, he asks this question:

Given this quiet, evolving consensus on policy, how do we account for the bitter, brutal tone of American politics?

The rest of the article answers this question, and shows why Obama is so significant because of this bitter, brutal tone. Great article that is worth at least a read.

For myself, I continue to find myself sitting in the middle, looking with petrified fear at the possibility of a Clinton vs Giuliani election, and looking with hope at the possibility of either Barack Obama or Ron Paul running, and then fretting that I can’t vote in both primaries.

Along with, apparently half the world, I’ll be in Chicago on November 27th and 28th. Work meetings will be occurring for a good part of the daytime both days, but nights are fairly open. Post a comment if you’ll be in the area and would like to enjoy a beverage.

See here to sign the petition to allow Ron Paul’s presence in Republican debates and other things. Whether or not anyone is a fan of Ron Paul, or of Republicans in general, blocking a candidate from a debate only further entrenches the divide in national politics between those who are the favored candidates, and the rest of the country.

Chapter four of This Beautiful Mess begins the part of the book that is designed to teach us how to see the kingdom of God. It’s already here, but obviously there are many Christians who don’t appear to see it the way Jesus intended it to be seen.

The part of this chapter that gripped me starts like this:

One of the biggest challenges to following Jesus into His kingdom is not a lack of direction but a lack of desire. Most of us don’t really want to do it.

I’m often in that boat. I want to do a lot of things that I don’t ever actually start doing. He continues with some stories of the beginnings of his church, Imago Dei.

We had just enough desire to show up, pray, and get honest-and that’s what we told God… We told God that we wanted to care but didn’t-not really. We told Him we were afraid to follow Him completely because we didn’t want to look like idiots; we didn’t want to risk losing our comforts.

And this is where it begins. We begin to see ways we can engage with the heart of Jesus that we didn’t see before. We begin to want to do those things, and the things we saw and didn’t want to do.

From Greg Boyd:

This is the kind of power the omnipotent God of the universe uses against his enemies. And this is the kind of power we’re to use against our ‘enemies.’ It’s the power of Calvary-like love.

I’d love to get a copy of the poster he’s blogging about.

Update

Interestingly, but unsurprisingly, there are several blog posts floating around that are incredibly critical of the Jesus that this poster is presenting. In light of this, I want to take a look at what is being said by the poster. At face value, we have Jesus washing the feet of a series of world leaders, one of whom is Osama Bin Laden.

Theologically, the footwashing is an incredibly significant passage. In it, Jesus does the duty of a slave, and washes the dirty feet of several people who in various ways will abandon him in the coming hours and days, and tells them to do likewise. Service in love. Service without regard to what is going to be returned. Fair enough. Why not serve someone who, whatever one’s political beliefs about Bin Laden may be, is certainly not a servant of Jesus?

But, fine. It’s not specific enough. How about this?

But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.

There is a lot of debate about the implications of this passage. Many believe that it has nothing to say to the actions of a nation-state with regard to its enemies, but only speaks to an individual. Many believe it does, and that all followers of Jesus should promote pacificism. I don’t want to get into that discussion at the moment. Let’s say this passage only speaks to an individual. Fine. A follower of Jesus should love her enemies. He should do good to them.

According to most mainstream media outlets, there are few greater enemies to the American people than Bin Laden. If we look at this passage from a purely individualistic perspective, we at least are told to love people like him. To do good for them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Because God is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.

Chapter three of This Beautiful Mess starts off like this:

“When I became a Christ follower, the sad truth is that I transferred Christ into my kingdom, into the context of my life.”

In this chapter, Rick McKinley talks about our tendency to create our own kingdom for Jesus to rule, or to simply leave him out of our kingdoms. Either we create our own kingdoms and expect Jesus to drive out or enemies and give us money and power and whatever else we want, or we allow him to be our Saviour but not our King. He can be King of the afterlife. Or King of something else that doesn’t matter, because we can take care of the things that do matter. In doing either of these, we miss the entire message of the kingdom of God: it is at hand. It is not of this world. It turns the world upside down.

The chapter finishes like this:

“From personal experience, I can tell you that he will let you live in your own construct if you choose. But He’ll never bow down to you or adapt Himself to your beliefs.

I believe that creating our own kingdom for Jesus to rule, or leaving him out of ruling anything important to us, is one of the easiest struggles for us in Western Christianity. We have it easy in this respect. If we want to baptize our preference of something, or our dislike of something, all we have to do is put Jesus into it. If we don’t want to deal with what he might think about something, we can just take care of it ourselves. But he doesn’t fit. People see right through our smokescreens.