Babylon – Perspectives

Sounds – ever so important

I don't understand

Posted on 8th April, 20237th April, 2023
by Martin Scott
Posted in Theology

It would appear that the first revelation of God came to humanity in a sound:

We heard the sound of you in the Garden.

They knew God was about to appear because they heard the sound in the garden. ‘Those who have ears, let that person hear’. We so need our ears opened so that we discern the sounds.

At Pentecost God came in a sound.

And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting (Acts 2:2).

Language. Through language we both communicate so as others can be included in the conversation or we use language to divide. Identity is strengthened through language. We are first ‘Catalans’ not Spanish is one aspect of language, hence it was no surprise that at times language (such as Catalan or Welsh) was forbidden to be spoken.

Was the language confusion at Babel a good or bad thing? It certainly was a necessary thing, so that they might not destroy the whole future through a united imagination that was focused on making a name for themselves. [Babel and Babylon not only sound alike, but are one and the same… the reason for translating it as babel historically was simply that it communicated the English ‘to babble on’. The chapter is a critique of Empire where one language and one vision will make a name for us. ‘Make the land of anywhere great again’ is not a very smart move!]

Understanding one another is desirable. My mother used to say she could not understand why other people did not speak English… (a little question here that you can easily get the answer to via Google, so no prizes… my family came from Orkney and one of the many words that one does not find in the English language that we always used was ‘peedie’, such as ‘luk at that peedie buey’… so my mother wanted everyone to speak English?). Speaking the same language – wow that would help me and many others!

Yet God seems to honour language difference. The day of Pentecost where the vast majority – if not all – gathered spoke Greek fluently (the language that Peter used when he stood up to address the crowd… common Greek spoken to the people with an accent from Galilee!) yet they heard God speak to them in their own language when the disciples were speaking as a result of the Spirit coming on them. (I have twice that I know of spoken in languages that I have not known – that might take another post to explain.)

Imagine being in a restaurant / bar where each table is from a different language background and everyone is speaking at the same time and all at a volume. In your head you would go from ‘I think they are speaking English at the table over there… I am sure I heard something in German spoken over there…’ but you would be unable to be absolutely sure, as you might hear half a word here and there but each language would be lost in the next one as the words poured out and the volume ebbed and flowed at each table.

I had two experiences within weeks of each other similar to the above. I was present with one other person in a prayer house, and it was dedicated sacred space (don’t like the language but in a fallen world that is what it was). All of a sudden my ears were opened and I could hear angels communicate. It was strange and I could not make out a word. As I tried to focus on something another ‘voice’ came over the top… this continued for some minutes and I thought I am not sure how to describe that.

A few weeks later I was present in a prayer gathering for Europe. Many languages were present and the encouragement was that everyone should read the ‘Disciples Prayer’ in their language. It was the same sensation. Straining to hear a word in one language was almost discernible but was soon overridden by another stream of speech in a different language. It was a strange experience as the overall effect was the same as I had experienced a few weeks earlier.

The overall effect I realised was so similar to the sound of rushing water. A flow but as each water movement makes a sound it then gives way to the next and the next and…

And there the glory of the God of Israel was coming from the east; the sound was like the sound of mighty waters, and the earth shone with his glory (Ezek. 43:2).

and his voice was like the sound of many waters (Rev. 1:15).

And I heard a voice from heaven like the sound of many waters (Rev. 14:2).

Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty thunderpeals (Rev. 19:6)

How does God speak? Not in the voice and language of a white Western male. Not in the voice of the majority; not in the voice of Imperial rule. God speaks in diversity; the smallest language group (and culture) carries something of God. We read (and from memory that fourfold description comes 7 times in Revelation):

every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages.

The sound of many waters; not one sound dominating – hence the lie of Babylon had to be acted against. If we do not silence diversity something amazing happens… ‘we hear them speak in our language’. God can communicate to us… if we do not silence what we do not understand.

Babylon… a strange land?

Posted on 12th January, 202312th January, 2023
by Martin Scott
Posted in Biblical Observations

Babylon becomes the place of Exile for the people of God and as with so many biblical themes / passages there are different approaches we can take as Scripture seems to swing one way and another on it… either indicating that a multiplicity of interpretation is the best way to go, or (my preference) there is continual intra-canonical debate (disagreement?) which we are invited into, with the question being ‘so Martin how do you respond?’. Ultimately I have to give my answer… an assessment of my life (then) will not be on what had discerned about the various texts but how my life had been lived out.

I prefer the latter (entering the dialogue / disagreement) as Scripture in all its inspiration is first of all described as ‘useful’ (2 Tim. 3:16) and when we read further about the usefulness it is not so that we come to some level of correct beliefs at a head level but ‘correct’ responses and actions so that we can be involved in ‘every good work’. Behaviour over belief.

Babylon and the Exile. The place where they felt they could not ‘sing the songs of the Lord in a strange land’ so they ‘hung up their harps on the willow trees’. Away from the ‘promised’ land. Jeremiah is an interesting character. Not one who followed the pattern that was common, but suffered at the hands of his compatriots because he could not bring them a positive word about God’s deliverance, and refused to say that the Jerusalem temple would be the guarantee that all would go well (a clear forerunner of Jesus, who takes a similar line some 600+ years later).

Babylon the place where the synagogue develops. Ever so practical for how can a people remain distinct in such a place? Meet weekly, focus more on the scrolls than the story. Safety first. Safety – we so desire that, but it can prove to be something false that hinders us… after all the people of God are like the wind – a level of unpredictability to them.

The level of dislocation that Jeremiah’s compatriots experienced means we cannot be very critical of how they journeyed in the land of Exile, but we have a great advantage over them. After all they understood that their destiny was tied up with a specific land – ours is not. They understood that there was something distinct about their Jewishness, we understand that God is pulling a people from every tribe and nation together. Any criticism must be a critique of us in the light of their situation, and as with so much of Scripture if we allow the critique to come our way we can develop along a good path.

Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let the prophets and the diviners who are among you deceive you, and do not listen to your dreams that you dream, for it is a lie that they are prophesying to you in my name; I did not send them, says the Lord (Jer. 29:5-9).

Seek the shalom of the city (translated welfare but the word is shalom… that rich Hebrew word that does not mean the absence of unrest / war, but the positive presence of well-being because everything is ordered in a godly way, where everyone can find a path to their destiny); pray on behalf of Babylon; fulfil there the creational command to ‘multiply’.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:
“May they prosper who love you.
Peace be within your walls
and security within your towers.” (Ps. 122:6,7).

Pray, peace (shalom) and security (verb is ‘to prosper‘)… for Jerusalem. Same sentiments as for the place of Exile. Jerusalem held a special place in their hearts, and this Psalm is one of the pilgrims travelling to the city… But Babylon likewise has to hold a special place!

We might be able to suggest that the place of exile is temporary with the hope of returning to Jerusalem. Temporary for them, but for us? Jerusalem to the ends of the earth… Matthew (the Jewish gospel of fulfilment) indicates with his genealogy of Jesus (somewhat ‘manipulated’ to fit a nice pattern of 14’s, and even after the rather creative choice of who he lists it is still a little challenging to get it to be strict pattern of 14’s – ah well, Scripture is to be ‘useful’ for life!) that the exile is coming to an end with the amazing phrase that ‘Jesus will save his people from their sins’ for he will be ‘Emmanuel’ (God with us – at last after the Exile is finally over). Exile was because of their sins, but in Jesus it was ending. So maybe here they are back in the land of promise, and the temporary exile is over? But the end of Mathew’s Gospel is wonderfully provocative with the well-known ‘Great Commission’ sending the disciples to all nations (Gentiles) being a contrasting parallel to Cyrus commission to restore Jerusalem and the temple. Maybe the exile was temporary for the Jews of Jeremiah’s day; it seems permanent for us, but not simply permanent, it is transformed. There is no place that we are exiled from in the sense of one day we will return to a land… we are permanently placed in Babylon with the knowledge that we carry a passport from another place – ‘our citizenship is in heaven’. This ‘citizenship’ is not even close to meaning that ‘heaven is our true home’ but in the fulfilling sense that wherever we are we are to ‘seek the prosperity of the city’ so that ‘shalom‘ (an environment where people can enter successfully on their path to their destiny).

Seems that is in line with what I have posted on Revelation 21.

Babylon, our Babylon is indeed a strange land. But our goal is not to escape, to ‘go’ somewhere else… but to see some measure of ‘heaven on earth’ in that place. No Temple there… and even any synagogue pattern has to be a stepping stone to recovering the story beyond the text.

In / Out or Direction?

Posted on 12th November, 202212th November, 2022
by Martin Scott
Posted in Theology

Been a little silent on here for the past few days as caught up with a bunch of other stuff, including right now with Gayle (and Andrew Chua) in Silicon Valley. Great connections for now and with potential for the future. Principles of participating in ‘city’ shift / transformation seem so transferable to corporate / global life. Two of the important hurdles to get over for those working within corporations are that they are not employed by the corporation – I guess that one should be pretty obvious, but when not acknowledged it is very difficult to outwork something of a kenarchic (kingdom) movement. It is also difficult with that approach to effectively disempower mammon.

The second aspect is that believers are not involved with the purpose of converting people (a side effect).

It is that barrier that is essential in the shift to ‘transformation’ / discipling nations. Maybe as a way in to it we can consider the two paradigms of in / out and that of direction. The in / out paradigm borrows heavily from the presentation of Jesus to a religious leader in Jerusalem where he needed a spiritual experience, so radical that it was akin to a birth-again; this would enable him to see the kingdom and to be like the wind – unpredictable in activity but consistent in character. However, I suggest that there is another paradigm that Jesus presented where the direction of a person was very important, and that he put a measurement along a spectrum:

And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions (Mark 12:34).

Proximity to the kingdom. Direction, headed toward seems to have value. Paul maybe is indicating the same thing in Romans when he talks about those whose behaviour is in line with kingdom values, where a judgement will be made on that great day according to their behaviour (Rom. 1:12-16).

Could it be that there are those ‘born again’ that are not very close to the kingdom, and those who are not ‘born again’ who are close to the kingdom?

Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper (Jer. 29:7).

The above Scripture is a challenge to the inward looking prayer (if it goes no further) of praying for the peace of Jerusalem. Prosperity of the city is not to be understood primarily as ‘economic’ and certainly not when it is tied to (defined by?) peace / shalom. A city that prospers (BABYLON!!) is one that is nearer the kingdom, it is one where there is a tangible measure of the kingdom having come, the will of God being done, the culture of heaven on earth. It is moving in a direction… ever closer to the kingdom.

And ‘you too will prosper’? Again not be thought of in terms of ‘economic’ prosperity (and this kicks back to who is the employer). Prosperity for the believer is that their life seeps out, that seed falls everywhere, including on good and honest soil.

The relationship is symbiotic. We need the corporation to be moving closer to the kingdom if we are to prosper. It is not ‘I am prospering (saved?) and I am calling for you as individuals to cross over and be in’, but ‘I am sowing, working, praying and immersing myself in a way that you will experience (corporately) shalom’ and as I do that ‘our / my life is overflowing (being saved) so that the Christ in me becomes visible’.

Early thoughts above… let them marinate.

What are you saying?

Posted on 12th May, 202212th May, 2022
by Martin Scott
Posted in Prophetic Perspectives

The voice is so important, not simply at an individual human level but at a corporate level.

The beast was given a mouth… (Rev. 13:5)

Two beasts, one rising from the sea and the second from the land (historically Rome across the waters and the Caesar cult worship in the locality) – a pattern that is repeated. In Creation we have heavens, water and land. The process is from heaven through the waters to the land, the water / sea taking on the symbolic representation of that ‘middle area’ that has to be tamed, the place where something can always rise up, hence the startling response to Jesus that ‘even’ the winds and waves obeyed him, leading them to say ‘what kind of human is he?’, and the final coming together of the binary of heaven and earth with that middle space disappearing with the statement that there was ‘no more sea’. The beast is given a voice… this always marks a major element in the advancement of imperial / demonic power, so there will always be the need to ask ‘who is speaking?’ to determine who the voice is representing.

Regardless of where one sits on the ‘open theology’ spectrum there seems to be a principle that certain responses are monitored to see what is in our hearts, and this is certainly true beyond the individual of movements or institutions. I am a big believer that all movements need regular (annual?) exorcisms for there is default pull which is the Babylonian pull.

Here are two thoughts I have.

A movement hits a crisis, and how they deal with it will determine the following years, and in that I am not suggesting it has to be dealt with perfectly – us acting perfectly? I don’t think so!!

Not perfectly but there is something about a dividing line that seems to me to be over ‘self-preservation’. The voice of Babylon is always that of ‘we will survive’, or in the words of scripture,

I am, and there is no one besides me;
I shall not sit as a widow
or know the loss of children (Is. 47:8).

Survival at all costs. Babylon can never go out of existence and will go on for generations to come. There will always come a time in every movement when they will face this issue. If they go down the integrity route they run the risk of defamation and even the end of their existence; so in comes the cover ups, the painting of the situation in a light (light??) that hides what has taken place. Survival is something that God grants, he alone has immortality, and gives it. Survival at all costs starts the path of self-sourced life. God does not disappear (too gracious for that), the stories continue but the real evidence of life slowly dissipates, that real evidence not being what is happening within a movement but through that movement. It is the testimonies beyond the movement that indicate the real impact.

To survive at all costs will be at all costs, costs to individuals and the individual voice. The voice of the corporation becomes mono-toned, unlike the voice of heaven, that voice being the multi-toned diverse sounds of many waters running, causing a sound that has to be leaned into in order that we can actually hear what is being said. The voice of heaven is accessible but not without a leaning into the sound. One does not have to lean to hear the voice of Babylon.

A second aspect that rises is where a movement has a centre and there is a buffer between the centre and those that ask the challenging question. That centre might be a person, or a few inner core, but the effect is the same they cannot really be accessed in order to hear and respond to the perspective that challenges behaviour or direction. Let me call it the ‘Mercury / Hermes principle. Paul and Barnabas arrived at Lystra and the people were impressed so attributed divinity to the two:

Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul they called Hermes, because he was the chief speaker (Acts 14:12).

The ‘boss god’ and the interpreter for the god. That interpreter in our world is there to cover the ‘big’ cheeses, to make sure they are never viewed negatively, even to the point of ‘when they said xyz they really should not be understood as saying xyz but it really means…’, or ‘it is wrong to think they are not accessible it is just that they…’ In other words the ‘Hermes / Mercury’ principle is one of interpretation so that they are not directly accessible and they can never be critiqued.

Voices. Voices that self-promote, self-preserve and keep all honest critique at bay. That voice can be tracked back to the ‘beast from the sea’ and if we do we can be sure there will also be a ‘beast rising up in our land’.

Time to calm the waters and the winds. The voice of Jesus, clean, honest, simple, his breath (the wind from his mouth) will settle the waters. The waters are not evil. But they do have to be calmed.

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