This morning I did an interview on Zoom with Adrian Lowe, a friend and a colleague for over 20 years. I think you will find his take on what Mammon means for us… Enjoy!!
It is complex… so here is another perspective
In what I write, if there are aspects I leave out please do not make assumptions as to what might be my take on those areas. My concern is we sit powerless against the level of catastrophe of Gaza / Israel. It is far enough away that it does not touch us directly, and if we add to that and we try and plot this against a prophetic ‘time-line’ that we are further paralysed but are then content in that we have ‘inside knowledge’. The centre of ALL of God’s purposes is Jesus – all the promises find their double ‘yes’ in him. Yes we have to nuance Israel as a people some with reference to Rom. 11 but not to the level of over-riding the centre. And beyond that…
1948 and the giving of the land (by the British) as a homeland to the Jews in order to be a solution to the ‘Jewish problem’ has not exactly resolved that issue! If as many assume that that act was a restoration of the land as a fulfilment of prophecy we should also consider that whenever God is active that the ‘enemy’ is active. The work of the enemy – and Paul says ‘we are not unaware of the schemes of the devil’ – is something we are to consider as we can easily unwittingly play along or fail to see what is happening. So with the above premise of enemy activity…
What if the land and promise is connected (not my view) then the enemy scheme would be to play with that, and dare I suggest that encourage us to lose sight of something bigger than the land, that of ‘kingdom’ or even ‘new creation’. The kingdom of God is righteousness, shalom and joy. The new creation is without tears, and harmony between peoples as they bring in their gifts to that new Jerusalem – the city that has no Temple.
That scheme would not be too difficult to execute. Biblically there would be more than enough texts and complete passages of Scripture to defend our view and lead to a blanket support of one side (Israel) in any confict, as God is with them (a theme that was VERY loud in the two major catastrophes in 586BCE and 70CE),
There has to be – and always has been a third way – that of ‘God is neither for us nor for our enemy’ (and of course ‘love for the enemy’ as advocated by Jesus does somewhat move us beyond what Joshua encountered). Add the wisdom of Solzhenitsin who said the line of good and evil never runs between ‘me’ and someone else, but through us both, and our allegiances have to be tempered.
Maybe also add the summary (as I read it) of Old Testament prophets as they chastised a people they identified with over the two-fold issue of ‘provision’ and ‘protection’ and where their trust was and I do not think there would be at this time a blanket support coming from any of them.
Yes it is deeply complex, how does a nation-state (not the same as a biblical nation) act when attacked? As those privleged (for now) not to be caught up in what is taking place, my plea is that in our powerlessness we ask not for the vindication of this side or that, but that sanity and humanity comes into the situation (at least that might be within our faith level even if calling for the righetousness, shalom and joy of the Spirit is beyond our faith level).
Wars and rumours…
We all know, even if we cannot quote the words of Jesus:
And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places: all this is but the beginning of the birth pangs (Matt. 24:6-8).
All ‘signs of the end’ and when war breaks out, as it has in Israel, the above Scriptures often are quoted. I am no expert in the conflict(s) that have gone on since the establishment of the state of Israel (1948) but am aware that there is among some of Israel’s neighbours a desire to remove Israel from the map. I see enormous significance in what is happenning there – but do not believe there is anything in Scripture that is ‘prophesying’ this conflict. That frees me to pray for justice, resolution and an end to conflict. The Jesus-path is demanding, but it is always ever so close. The path of love, love your neighbour, love your enemy is always just right there… and in a hot-bed of potential revolt that was soon to overspill Jesus proclaimed ‘repent and believe in me’ for in so doing the kingdom of God could be entered as it was ‘at hand’. Those words, by Jesus, were the words that Josephus (a wealthy Jewish historian) used when he travelled north to Galilee a few decades after the death of Jesus. He travelled there to persuade the hot-heads who had had enough of Rome’s oppression not to rebel but to lay down their arms and to follow the path that he was laying out. His message to ‘repent and beleive in me’ was not a call to come to the front to repeat the ‘sinner’s prayer’ but to ‘change their mind’ and follow another path. The Jesus-path is always there – the ‘third way’ in every situation. The Jesus’ call is transcendental / spiritual, but also deeply political in the sense of being non-nationalistic.
I am not proposing a simplistic solution, but that we start with an understanding that we can sow into the non-polarisation of our world. God is not for ‘us’ nor for ‘our enemies’.
The words of Jesus that I quoted at the beginning as with all Scripture is NOT written to us. Jesus was NOT speaking to us; he was not addressing the 21st Century, but inot the days that lay ahead (culminating in the intense brutal war of 66-70CE) for the ‘you’ to whom he was speaking. It is written FOR us and remains deeply instructive in every situation, but we will not hear what it is saying into our situation is we assume it was written directly to us.
Years ago while travelling in the USA I was approached by an enthusiastic young man (I too was young back then). In his hands he had a set of videos from a ‘prophetic teacher of the end-times’. I had not seen the videos but could see that at the heart of them was a ‘time-line’ approach. This person asked me along these lines: ‘You are from Europe, and the antiChrist is going to rise within Europe and might already be present there, how do you handle that?’. My reply was – you have seen the videos, I have not. I need your help in knowing how to respond. So if we begin with prayer… in the light of the videos should I pray against the evils of antiChrist but maybe feel a little guilty about resisting what has been pre-ordaiined; or should I pray for the success of antiChrist as it would be in line with prophetic understanding – and then feel somewhat guilty in partnering with antiChrist?
The answer – I guess you can work that out. He had the videos and all the information… and all it could lead to was paralysis. No Scripture leads to paralysis but to a ‘what then should we do / how then do we live’ type of response.
I am deeply concerned about the current situation. It is likely to escalate. I am also deeply concerned about the prophetic time-line approach as paralysis will abound, and only contribute to the escalation.
Wars, rumours of wars, earthquakes, floods, pandemics, famines, refugees, climate crisis – yes all signs of the times: the times being of a generation that is hell-bent on destroying what God has given to us. The current conflict though cannot be used to plot a time-line. It can be used to further provoke our listening to the cry of the land for liberation to what we have subjected it to (Rom. 8). Israel was subject to Pharoah and cried out, the land is now in bondage to our ‘lording it over’ and is crying out. Can we join our cry to the cry of the land, even when we do not know how to pray?
If we pull out (Old Testament) Scriptures in a way that the New Testament NEVER does we might well advocate violence, but I suggest that if we pray for resolution and shalom we will be much more in line with the New Testament. And if we do so, political outworkings might be closer to ‘the wolf lying with the lamb’… closer to the biblical hope than to any set of texts used to prove a position.
- I know that the situation is deeply complex; issues of war and ‘self-defence’ cannot be resolved simply… but, neither are conflicts solved by any rhetoric that dehumanises the ‘other’. My plea is that for us who feel powerless that we do not submit to texts being quoted that leave us with information about the future while, by any reasonable standard, justice can be ignored.
- I am currently working my way through videos and writings on eschatology – ever so important as Scripture is written for us… but we have to avoid the errors of history that have sidelined the body of Christ by feeding us ‘information’ and the ‘inside story’. Following Jesus demands a level of ignorance so that our ‘knowledge of him’ far exceeds any other kind of knowledge – I think the original sin narrative speaks deeply into that.
- I am hoping in the not-too-distant future to have a zoom evening with a Christian Arab Palestinian who is an Israeli citizen, to hear from her, be better informed – I am working on a suitable date and will let you know by posting here. dates will be posted here. She has been in touch with Amy Bell (Cádiz) and wrote from Jerusalem:
I’m shocked, scared but mostly super sad. I feel that people from all sides are dying just for nothing. and I was praying to be able to do something even if it is small. I would like to explain the situation here to people who want to know. It’s very complicated, and I truly believe that if you stand with one side and cancel the other, then you do not understand what is going really here. and since I believe that only real change can bring real peace, I would love to share about what’s happening here from my point of view. as a Christian Arab Palestinian woman living as an Israeli citizen.
I hope you can join us…
Noah the wine-maker
I have just returned from a few days away with (amongst other aspects) a great re-connection to Victor Lorenzo. I first met Victor in 1997, he and Silvia were very helpful during the months of journey with Sue when she was ill. He moved to the UK in 2003 (from memory) and has always held to a persepctive that what they experienced in Argentina is not to be repeated in Europe but something is to manifest that he had never seen before. Has to be so as we are well and truly post-Christendom… makes the journey unpredictable and full of adventure.
While away someone pulled a Scripture out that I had never seen before:
Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard (Gen. 9:20)
I don’t know what point was made from this but it hit me in the context of Argentina (past stories) and the present (Europe etc). We all know ‘Noah and the flood’ and how he ‘saved’ people through the safety of the ark. There are times of emergency when the ark is the means of transport… but we have to be people of the soil, of the land, embedded and connected. Stories that Victor told about his time pre-Europe can encourage but also set false hopes and expectations. We are to work the soil, find what is in it and learn how to work with what is there.
And of course enjoy the fruit of it… but not so much that we indulge ourselves and like Noah (and the first two) be found ‘naked’. However, we have to look for the new wine that does not taste as good as the old. The new wine of ‘God is doing this and that’ but it is a completely new vintage.
Omnipotence challenged
Thomas Jay Oord is creating a few waves with his writings and studies, throwing the net somewhat wider than ‘Open Theology’. His book ‘The Uncontrolling Love of God’ is certainly more than worth a read. I am not able to buy into every argument that is advanced in ‘God Can’t’, but the push back against classic God is omnipotent is something to be ehgaged with. Here is a short video on that push back and his choice of ‘Amipotence’ over ‘Omnipotence’.
We are probably instinctively taught to react to an idea that challenges ‘omnipotence’ though of course even the most conventional have to nuance what they mean, such as ‘God cannot make a four legged tripod’, or the classic ‘?’God cannot make a stone bigger than he can lift’ (and always a ‘he’ in classic understanding!).
It is hard to know exactly where to place Oord on the theological spectrum (he is not classic ‘Open’) but he is far from alone with respect to omnipotence / control. The reason of course is that of the problem of evil:
- God is all Loving
- God is all Knowing
- God is all Powerful
- Evil exists.
Frank Tupper (1941-2020), a Baptist theologian (yes Baptist) also denied that God is omnipotent. In his view power and love are incompatible—divine love requires the reduction of divine power and control. He said in an interview:
I do not believe that God is in control of everything that happens in our world. Indeed, I would argue that God controls very, very little of what happens in our world . . . God chose not to be a do anything, anytime, anywhere kind of God.
There is a strong resonance between Oord and Tupper though their approach has some significant differences, I am convinced we are invited to participate with God in a God-like manner: that of not forcing a path through dominance but to open up possibilities through love. God and humans in loving partnership.
Borders & Boundaries
A Synopsis
Here are some headline notes that outline my thoughts on boundaries / borders. On the macro scale related to ‘peoples’ the kairos times and the boundaries are connected: rather than take a ‘there is no revelation of God in other cultures (religions?)’ Paul seems to have a positive view of God in relationship to humanity, for God ‘gives to all mortals life and breath and all things’ (Acts 17:25); all of humanity are related as ‘offspring of God’ (v.29) hence all war (even ‘just’ war) is simply a version of civil war, intra-familiar war.
If ‘God-set’ boundaries are in place there are kairos opportunities to perhaps find God. If we insist that the only way to God is the ‘Christian’ way we are on the path of bringing faith in Jesus down to the level of another, but probably superior religion. Jesus is the way to know, and to know intimately, who this God is. The Jesus path is not a path to bring about a knowledge of God but to live within the conscious embrace of the God who made the world and all that is in it (v.24).
A major (and simple) way of obscuring God is to establish boundaries that are not those that are ‘God-set’. Hence wars, carving up whole aspects of lands and imposing boundaries that are not ‘natural’ but dictated to by imperial / colonial benefits and the like work against the finding of God.
Boundaries are groaning at this time, and alongside that are attempts to strengthen old boundaries (I appreciate that ‘securing our borders’ is a complex issue, but always there is a third way in God – a redemptive path). I anticipate that the next 6 years – the remainder of this decade will be filled with border conflicts and also some border resolutions.
Dropping down to the personal level: boundaries are vital. Internal boundaries where we do not allow ‘trespassers’ to encroach – a ‘no-one takes my life from me’ stance. That has to be matched by a ‘but I lay my life down’ response.
An establishment of internal boundaries then allows us to determine ‘our field / fields’. This is very much Pauline language – my field extends as far as you. He knew where he was to work and carried a responsibility for that; it was a work of enabling others to find their field so that he could move on and not crowd out the space. We will not operate at that level, but nevertheless we can determine what we carry responsibility for. As we do that we will create / hold space where there is a freedom for people to find God and not have their lives pressed in on by oppressive powers. I have seen where all-but daily blazing rows in homes dial right down so that after a few months such rows become rare.
Borders… so important; within them there is an inheritance; moving boundary markers comes with a warning… and maybe one final thought – we do not naively go beyond our boundaries. There are ‘powers’ that were defeated at the cross and made an open show of… this does not mean we spend out lives confronting them. They are to be confronted – but clarity that they are within our ‘field’ needs to be our conviction. A lot of declaring will not shift them, but will lead to something very uncomfortable or something worse for us.
God works at all levels – internally we will always be working on our boundaries, so it is not sort that out then the ‘next’ level… Each and every level, and ones I am not aware of, will be the focus throughout.
Establishing Boundaries & Borders
For some six months or so I have been focused on borders / markers. Personal boundaries are vital and we are to forgive those who ‘trespass’ across our boundaries; within the boundaries that God sets for us we have an inheritance; we can go beyond our boundaries and we will find ourselves in difficulties. Personal / internal boundaries are vital for if they are established in a greater way we can anticipate what ‘God does in us s/he will do through us’.
In this video I seek to push into boundaries that are beyond the personal. At this time there is a major groaning in the boundaries, and I consider that there needs to be the re-establishment of God-set boundaries. An enemy strategy is to set boundaries that are not God-boundaries. The key Scripture for me:
From one ancestor he made all peoples to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, so that they would search for God and perhaps fumble about for him and find him—though indeed he is not far from each one of us (Acts 17:26,27).
Below is a transcript – pretty close to what I said!!
In this short video I want to talk a little bit about boundaries and borders.
Something that has been on my heart and mind over the last, six months or so is that we are coming into a season – we’ve always been there of course – but we’re coming into a season where borders and boundaries are going to be challenged and need to be reestablished. Scripture is full of talk about boundaries and borders. You can go back to the inheritance of the 12 tribes and you have from this territory to that one, etc. You could even talk from Deuteronomy about the angels who come and who were numbered in order to shepherd the nations so there are borders there.
I want to focus on borders at that kind of level in a moment but there’s a lot in scripture about personal boundaries. I love it when Jesus said that He laid down His life for us. That’s why we have life in God today. But He also said nobody can take His life from Him. He knew where His borders were. He knew where the boundaries were. They were not trampled over. He laid down His life and as I understand it, that’s at the origin of things like: “Forgive us our trespasses where we trespass over somebody else’s boundaries or borders where we should not travel.” “Forgive us as we forgive those who trespass against us – who cross our boundaries. So personal boundaries are absolutely vital and I think there has to be kind of a parallel movement in where we are.
For example, of Martin learning his personal boundaries and not overstepping them and not going into other territory. For example, not going into territory beyond where he’s anointed or territory beyond where he’s responsible, and not allowing anyone else to trample over his boundaries but he’s establishing them.
If I can establish internal boundaries then I’m sure that I can be used by God to help establish other boundaries. Now the scripture that really has been of interest to me in this last while is Acts 17:26 and onwards. “From one ancestor He made all peoples to inhabit the whole earth.” That’s one of the reasons why all war is ultimately “civil war”. It’s not simply “nation against nation.” We are all descended from one ancestor. It is a “family affair.” And that’s why all war ultimately has to be ended.
Going on: “He made all peoples inhabit the whole earth and He allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries (or borders) of the places where they would live.” The “times” of their existence is the Greek word “Kairos” so there’s something here about an opportunity. Borders for people are to give an opportunity. Opportunity for what? So that “they would search for God and perhaps fumble about for Him and find Him though He indeed is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being. As even some of your own poets have said. For we too are His offspring.” We’re all children of God by creation. Yes, we have to come into redemption to find that real home in God as Father, but there’s this place where boundaries that are established – that God establishes – are places within which God can be found. Hence one of the areas of major attack is boundaries.
If the enemy can establish boundaries that are not God boundaries, then he absolutely removes that possibility of people “stumbling and finding God” or at least making God obscure to them. God wants to reveal His own life, His own personality and His own being to people. Ultimately, of course, that revelation is through Jesus at the Cross, but within God’s set boundaries that are a place for people to seek after, stumble, fumble along, BUT find God. Hence, I do believe what we’re seeing at the moment is a real “groaning” in the areas of boundaries.
Two illustrations in recent days (and these will be within a UK context):
· The sycamore tree on the old Hadrian Wall cut down (they don’t know quite how it happened) a landmark marking that boundary. In this time there’s a groaning at that boundary.
· At the same time the felling of an old yew tree in the area where the Battle of Hastings took place.
So, one boundary, the English-Scottish border defined by the Romans, and another, a marker where the Norman Invasion took place – issues of history – trees that have stood there marked time. That yew tree was a thousand years, probably plus, old, and perhaps originally saw that conflict and establishment of the Norman Conquest. So we see simply at an illustrative level there is a provocation with regard to boundaries.
The Ukraine boundaries and the Israel and the Gaza Strip boundaries – they’re under attack and they’re seeking to be reestablished. It tells me something. Even my homeland of Orkney, positing “could we leave Scotland” and maybe join as part of a Scandinavian country, Norway for example. There’s a groaning going on, and I think this is where somehow, we need to be involved now, maybe not the macro level but I think what we need to be involved in is saying, “God establish boundaries in me. Help me live within them.” Because whatever God does in us is what He will do through us so that we can establish boundaries.
I think one of the mistakes we make as believers is to get caught quickly into a political area: “Should there be independence for this country?” “Should a Brexit happen or not happen?” The real issue is the politics need to follow and serve the boundaries that are being set spiritually.
So where am I going with this?
I’d like to suggest that in this season God wants to really hone in on us personally – that’s Number One – with regard to our boundaries:
· that they cannot be crossed
· that we know where they are
· we know who we are
· that we begin to establish the boundaries that God has given us and defend them.
Because within those boundaries the psalmist says, “I have an inheritance.” They’ve “fallen in good places”, “beautiful situation” and inside that, there I have an inheritance.
I believe also in our geographies or among our people group or where we feel called that we begin, in the spirit, to establish boundaries. “This is in.” “This is out.” That, I think, actually to be honest with you, is the origin of the “binding and loosing” scriptures. It’s a Jewish idiom, or a way of speaking that the rabbis used, which was, what you bind is what you did not allow, and what you released is what you allowed. This is what is allowed within our jurisdiction (the community of God), this is what was not allowed. That’s the origins of binding and loosing, what you bind on Earth, what you loose on Earth, etc. It’s what is established there.
I want to encourage you, in a season when boundaries are being set – and we will see major, major, major shifts in political boundaries and alliances. I think if we can participate with God (think “Beyond The Four Walls” of Church, this is God’s world and everything in it) to begin to establish some boundaries, begin to ask God, “What is the boundary?”, and it might be incredibly small in our mind: it could be the boundary of a street where you live, or three or four houses. You know that’s one of the areas where I pray, where Gayle and I pray, is with regard to immediate neighbors, that within those boundaries because we live there, certain things can flourish and certain things cannot flourish.
But for some of you, it’s going to be wider and some of you are going to be “walking boundaries.” It might not be the boundary that is stated by politics it might be ancient boundaries some of which need to be reestablished some of which really need to be uprooted and changed. So, it’s not about finding political community boundaries, things set by a local council, local government or a national government or European government or whatever. It might or might not be that but it’s what are the boundaries that God is giving. Because if we can really see in the spirit, boundaries established, what we will find is, angels appear at boundary areas. That’s where Jacob met the angels. As he left one territory to enter another, he met angels ascending and descending at that point. Heaven and Earth were touching there.
And if we can just begin to establish boundaries, and many of them will overlap with what other people are doing, I do believe we’re going to begin to see a situation whereby people understand, “this is a Kairos moment.” The boundaries have been set by God, not by demonic forces, not simply by politics, not by big business, but they’ve been set by God. Something that both might include nations, transcend nations, be smaller than nations, be bigger than Nations. Boundaries that God has set and within it, yeah maybe fumbling along, maybe stumbling, but in order that they might find God. That is the Kairos moment I believe we’re coming into. And I think one of the things that we’re called to do in this season is to set boundaries that are “God boundaries”.
So, in closing, think about your own internal boundaries, where they’ve been crossed. Forgive us where we’ve crossed boundaries of others. Help us establish our own boundaries as we forgive those who have crossed boundaries and hemmed us in. And also, to be aware not to overstretch. There are areas of anointing that we have and there are areas, to be honest, where we’re not anointed or gifted, but have character and have been trained in order to cross over. But there are boundaries, beyond ourselves, that I believe God wants to give us in order that we can establish boundaries for others. This, I believe, is one of the mandates that God is giving us over these next, I would suggest, six years, that God is giving to us to begin to establish. if we can do that, I do expect that we can see, where boundaries are being threatened, as we see in issues of war, we can see peace come to those. Reconciliation at the at the crossing points. And we can see something reversed of the horrendous things that we’re witnessing at this time.
So, I commit this to you I submit it to you and if it resonates, go back to scripture see what you see there and let’s journey forward together.
Challenging my ‘framework’
It is always a joy to host a Zoom get together to look at one of the four books and this week I had an opening one on ‘The LifeLine’. In the preface I initially give a quick summary of what has gone before with the framework of:
- God elects Israel for the world. This is not a ‘they are saved / Gentiles lost’ in an eternal destiny scenario… but called as priesthood for the nations – to bring the whole world to the fulfilment of human destiny.
- Choseness is with responsibility and with the hope that a counter-way of life will be chosen in order to bring as ‘salt’ within and sign to (light) a change takes place wider.
- They choose to be as one of the nations (king and also temple). So a deviation from purpose of the election begins. There is no criticism of Israel, to be chosen is to be called higher – to model true humanity. Failure is not inevitable, but ‘all (both Jew and Gentile) has sinned’. Jesus is NEEDED for sure.
- By the time of Jesus the fall is complete – we have no king but Caesar / better one dies for the nation than we lose the privileges Rome affords us.
- Paul puts it that Jesus dies Israel’s death (cursed for us) so that the original blessing of Abraham flows to the Gentiles – which he now describes as the gift of the Spirit.
- Jesus dies for our ‘sins’ not in the sense of enabling God to get over an anger issue(!!) but in order to release us (forgive) from the powers. Hence the death is to unlock the captivity – to provide a path for the final exodus.
- The New Testament world then is that of an all-but one world government ruled by an antiChrist (Caesar being ‘lord’, ‘king of kings’ etc.).
- Paul takes this message of the gospel (another Imperial word used in Rome) to the oikoumene so that a new kingdom (both oikoumene and ‘kingdom’ being used for the Roman Imperial world) can grow and manifest.
[Lots more I am thinking about at the moment – why was Jesus ‘son of David’? So a little out there but to end the lineage? After all (no disrespect) as Solomon (son of David) spectacularly fulfills the warnings about the king – so sets the lineage on a ‘we will make Israel as Egypt’ trajectory. Jesus dies as ‘king of the Jews’ – end of kingship…]
Back to the challenge to the framework. What then about what lay outside the Roman empire? China and all that lay in the Southern hemisphere? A brilliant push-back.
My current and tentative thoughts go along these lines: Israel is representative of ‘one of the nations’, but one of the nations that claims to have the true God on her side (and not without evidence – though that is dealt a major blow in AD70 – when the sign of the coming of the son of man is made clear); Rome is a major empire and representative of all Imperial structures. So a death in the nation of Israel for Israel’s sins opens up each nation to be able to walk the path to redemption; proclamation in and throughout the Roman world is in seed form a proclamation throughout all and every Imperial context. (And this Jerusalem to the ends of the earth – Jerusalem to Spain in Paul’s world – is probably the coming of the son of man in Jesus words in Matt. 24:27 ‘For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man’).
Israel was within the Roman Imperial world, hence the freedom has to be proclaimed in that world. If proclaimed there then there is a freedom for all that Rome represents – the Chinese empire of that day and every other oppressive / less than kingdom of God structures / structures dominated by demonic powers.
OK all the above just a first response – loads to process yet!!
Practically what remains is:
- Election is to bring freedom somewhere else.
- There will always be a (wrong) push to have a nation that has a self-perception of being chosen by God and has God as defender.
- Election is not simply ‘sovereign’ but carries responsibility and with hope that there will be a connection to the election with a ‘we are not set apart’ but ‘planted within for the sake of what is beyond us’.
- If we can make proclamations of ‘freedom from the powers’ within any Imperial structure, large or small, there is a proclamation beyond to all other imperial structures.
October 11th: a Zoom
I will have a Zoom discussion on October 11th, 20:00UK time, the first on ‘The Lifeline’, the fourth book in the series Explorations in Theology. I have a small group who have worked their way through books 1 – 3, but if you are keen to join us and can do some pre-work I will gladly add you to the group. Let me know!
We will seek to cover the preface and the first two chapters. The preface is important as it gives a context to this book in the light of the previous ones and then there are two chapters on Scripture and its interpretation (no, not inerrant for after all in Scripture in the pen of an apostle we read that ‘all Cretans are liars’!!!) but Scripture is our source of authority.
If you wan to join us let me know and you will need a copy of the fourth book ‘The Lifeline’ – click below on the image for the publisher and where / how to order it.
Where to (or) what shapes?
I enjoyed the first Zoom on eschatology – and if I enjoyed it that surely is all that counts? I think though those who came also enjoyed it. It will be repeated in just over two weeks’ time: Oct. 10th, 7:30pm UK time – I will post details here nearer the time. I think the next two will cover the context for Jesus’ prophetic words (Matt. 24; Luke 21; Mark 13) and some of Paul’s material in Thessalonians being that of the intense time of 66-70AD (I use ‘AD’ as opposed to ‘CE’ though in other contexts I would be more comfortable using that abbreviation). And so much more to cover but to give some idea of where I plan to go after that is into a ‘so what?’ set of notes / videos.
Eschatology is intensely practical. It calls for a ‘how then do we live?’ I do not have time for the ‘this is what is going to happen – and it is really bad… so distance yourself now and bunker down’. I do not deny things could get really bad, extremely tough, I simply do not see how we can let the Bible speak for itself and say ‘all this was prophesied’. That will all wait for videos down the road – the ‘yes there could be a one-world ruler’ but this is not what is prophesied. There could also be some very different and wonderful futures – not prophesied also.
But… a much more practical ‘so what?’ relates to how we live. I understand the pull towards holding fast to Judeo-Christian values – but how do we arrive at those so-called values. Old Testament laws can be clearly used to lead us to hold that maximising profits is NOT a Judeo-Christian value (and I suggest also where the ‘bottom-line’ as profit not being a Judeo-Christian value either)… such laws can help us establish a good and healthy shape. We can add to that New Testament material and end with a ‘biblical’ view on…
However, eschatology calls to a deeper level. If there is ‘new creation’ that is our context (now) we have to be shaped by that, in other words we have to be shaped by what is to come, and that includes what is not to come!
Here comes the wonderful tension of the overlapping of two ‘creations’ (I think it is better to use the ‘creation’ word rather than the ‘world’ word at this point). We do not deny this current fallen creation as a context where we live while embracing that it alone cannot shape us. Indeed it does not shape us, new creation shapes us; this creation modifies the shape. I don’t fully know where this takes us, but I consider that we might arrive at a ‘Judeo-Christian’ view of marriage from wrestling with Scriptures, but the new creation does not have marriage within it. Judeo-Christian values takes us so far, or perhaps better stated set us on a trajectory, but where is the trajectory headed?
New creation: no money (and I presume no trade nor trade agreements); no gender, class and other category divisions; no ‘temple’ in the city… healing for the nations, no untameable source for disruption (no sea). New creation. Many areas to explore.
Over-realized eschatology can lead to many problems and beyond problems to ‘sin’. But sight of ‘new creation’ takes us beyond legislation that calls for abolition of slavery, but whole new working environments, distribution of resources, Jubilee-esque responses.
‘How then should we live?’ becomes the question. I might not believe what ‘popularised’ eschatology gives us on the tribulation, the antiChrist, the one-world government. I might be wrong – though if I am wrong there are degrees of ‘wrongness’!!! Right or wrong I suspect the final exam paper I will sit will be something along the lines of one important question:
Given your context, Martin, how then did you live; how did sight of new creation manifest in and through your life and how did it affect those around you? (Sub question – how do you think it affected your neighbours, J & E, and their two sons? Answer carefully as I also have an exam paper for them with one question on it – how did Martin’s life affect you and your values and approach to living within creation?)
Very practical – always eschatology is practical. I will wait in vain (maybe for 1000 years?) for the exam question of ‘outline what you believed, Mr. Scott?’