• goodbadi

    The New Testament Problem (Jesus)

    May 13, 2011

    Jesus’ teachings in the Bible about what I’ve called “life-giving living” merit constant attention.

    Key to Christianity’s life-giving offering to the world is salvation. While this is often thought of as “God sent Jesus to die for our sins, so we are saved” (the sort of atonement theology I find incompatible with my image of God as loving and full of grace…not that religion is about God as much as it is about us), the story of Zaccheus suggests otherwise.

    After Jesus eats with the un-admired and presumably heretofore unrepentant tax collector (that short man with curiosity and tree-climbing skills in his favor), Zaccheus pledges to share his wealth with the poor and to right his past wrongs (if, he says, he’s made any). That’s when Jesus, who hasn’t yet been put to death on the cross, says, “Today salvation has come to this household.”

    In other words, Zaccheus’s salvation is his turning from corruption to sharing and treating everyone right.

    Jesus presents some foundational ideas about life-giving living in the Sermon on the Mount, too. Note that the beatitudes seem to be meant for daily life manifestation:

    Blessed are the poor in spirit,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
    Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted.
    Blessed are the meek,
    for they will inherit the earth.
    Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
    for they will be filled.
    Blessed are the merciful,
    for they will be shown mercy.
    Blessed are the pure in heart,
    for they will see God.
    Blessed are the peacemakers,
    for they will be called children of God.
    Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

    How these tenets–and the salvation experienced by Zaccheus–play out in today’s everyday life is a bit majorly problematic, as Jesus seems to exact a steep price on the status quo.

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  • goodbadi

    On the Road to Emmaus

    April 25, 2011

    (A retelling of Luke 24:13-32 based on The Message.)

    Cleopas and Justin walk along the road.

    Justin: I’m so blue, Cloppy. My mama said there’d be days like this. Well, mama tried.

    Cleopas: Tell me about it.

    Justin: You forget everything that happened already?

    Cleopas: No! I just mean I know what you mean. I’m confused, too.

    A stranger walks up to them.

    Stranger: May I walk along with you?

    Cleopas, looking sad: I’m sorry, did you say something? Can’t you see our long faces?

    Stranger: If you’re going my way, I’ll walk with you. What do you guys look so sad about?

    Justin (to Cleopas): What a schmuck. Cloppy, let’s just keep on walking. My mama always said, ‘Don’t talk to strangers.’

    Cleopas: You don’t know about Jesus’ and his death and now disappearance?

    Stranger: Just inklings. What about it?

    Justin: The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene. He was a man of God, a prophet, dynamic in work and word, blessed by both God and all the people. Then our high priests and leaders betrayed him, got him sentenced to death, and crucified him. Let’s keep walking.

    Cleopas: And we had our hopes up that he was the One, the One about to deliver Israel. And it is now the third day since it happened. But now some of our women have completely confused us. Early this morning they were at the tomb and couldn’t find his body. They came back with the story that they had seen a vision of angels who said he was alive.

    Justin: Some of our friends went off to the tomb to check and found it empty just as the women said, but they didn’t see Jesus. That’s why we’re sad.

    Cleopas: We’re confused, too.

    Stranger: So thick-headed! So slow-hearted!

    Cleopas: What?

    Justin: Did you just insult–? Doggone it, mister, we just laid bare our hearts and minds to you, and you’re calling us schmucks? WHERE is the love?

    Stranger: Why can’t you simply believe all that the prophets said? Don’t you see that these things had to happen, that the Messiah had to suffer and only then enter into his glory?

    Justin: I think you have some explaining to do, buddy.

    Stranger: Sure looks like it. I think I’ll start at the beginning, with the Books of Moses, and go on through all the Prophets, and point out everything in the Scriptures that’s relevant.

    Cleopas: But gosh, I don’t know if we have that much time. We’re only going to some unnamed village–not even Emmaus.

    Justin (groaning): Are we there yet?

    Stranger: No, but when we do get there, I’ll stay for supper, if you invite me. I can’t get the vinegar taste out of my mouth. Whew! What a hangover.

    Justin: Oh, look–here we are at the village. Come on in, Stranger. The day is dying in the west.

    Cleopas: Here’s some bread–want some?

    Stranger: Thank you. Now, let me bless it, and serve it to you.

    Justin: This feels strangely familiar.

    Cleopas: Yum, bread.

    Justin: No, Cloppy–don’t you remember?

    Cleopas: Remember? Remember wha–?

    Stranger: Poof! (walks away)

    Justin: Where’d he go?

    Cleopas: I don’t know. But didn’t we feel on fire as he conversed with us on the road, as he opened up the Scriptures for us?

    Justin: On fire? I don’t know; maybe it was more like my mama’s chicken soup sensation.

    Cleopas: We’d better get back to the others. Let’s go!

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  • goodbadi

    Problematics

    April 21, 2011
    Many of my doubts about some of the Old Testament’s versions of God could be further developed in the context of Easter week. Maybe readers can respond: How do you connect all these dots–especially with Jesus’ crucifixion?

    What’s most problematic about the Old Testament is that we Christians too easily don’t find it terribly problematic.


    Even if we feel some level of discomfort with the idea of a God-led Joshua destroying an entire city down to every last donkey (less one prostitute and her family), we ameliorate the gore by allowing God to morph from vengeful in the Old Testament to loving in the New, or maybe we let God’s self-revelation to people develop from opaque war paint to a dim mirror.

    In short, swallowing Biblical violence can appear to be quite nicely compatible with worship music and sharing “what God is doing in our lives.”

    However, after reading Shirley Kurtz’s vividly critical Sticking Points and attending still another Sunday morning service dedicated to an Old Testament story, it dawned on me this week that it is a common element that troubles me about the Christian standard mode of talk, people who believe God tells them things, and Old Testament stories of God-directed violence.

    Regular Christians frequently talk about Jesus as a friend and pray for guidance or healing. More pronounced versions of this sort of connection with God might raise a few eyebrows and squirm factors; the person who stands up to share that “the Lord ministered to me this week when I saw a cross on a big rig grill,” or the “I have it on authority that such-and-such is what God wants us to do,” come to my mind. More extreme religious scenarios such as Koran burnings, the Crusades, and Gideon slaying the Midionites reveal the evils of hatred and violence in our religion and heritage.

    These scenarios spawn from the beliefs that the creator of the universe at least sometimes tells people what to do and, as in the case of our pleading for healing or perhaps Gideon’s successful insurgency, is ultimately in charge of the battles we face. At times these beliefs seem a natural response to things beyond our control (check out Paul Simon’s Wartime Prayers), and I acknowledge that I am not qualified to discount them. (I am likewise not qualified to confirm these beliefs as well founded, and I am certainly not qualified to decide if anyone else is or isn’t similarly qualified.)

    However, lest we find ourselves practicing theological a-humility or even genocide, these beliefs merit healthy skepticism: Is associating ourselves with a buddy-system God an attempt to position ourselves over our fellow earthlings or deny the down-to-earth reality of the nitty gritty? Is our praying or spiritual commentary a manipulative attempt at controlling our uncertain surroundings and futures?

    The Old Testament puts into sharp focus the problems with confidently held but misconstrued faith ideology. Land grabs, murder, and more are not infrequently described as having God’s oversight. That’s what those Old Testament people maybe believed, anyway; I certainly don’t think it was God who told Gideon to kill the Midionites, but apparently he felt it was.

    If Christianity is–as I think it must be–rooted in Jesus’ earthly minded practices and teachings, then reading Old Testament stories must be less about figuring out who Joshua’s and Gideon’s heck-of-a-killer God was (whom I’m guessing they designed) and more about two things: understanding the danger of self-conflation with God, and evaluating our own lives so that we may actually experience life-giving living.

    Which, might I add, may be even more problematic than a bunch of old stories.
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  • goodbadi

    Sacrifice and the Bible: Sobering Relevance

    February 13, 2011

    My recent post Sacrifice and What’s So Great about the Bible suggests the text’s openness to the reconsideration of its literal accounts and their interpretations.

    That certainly is not to say that just because I think Abraham was off his rocker when he nearly murdered his son, we should not read such stories. While Abraham is not one of my heroes, the Genesis stories, when read critically and actively, can help shape meaning into–and question–modern existence and practices.

    In my testimony sharing this morning (I recently transferred my membership to our new church), I plan to refer to our recent thematic studies by saying, “I’d never sacrifice my child on a pile of sticks.” Of course not. But: Would I sacrifice time-demanding connection with my own child in order to pursue a career or finish a house project or sit at the computer and blog?

    The Bible? Soberingly relevant to my own obsessions.

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  • goodbadi

    Sacrifice and What’s So Great about the Bible

    February 10, 2011

    The sacrifice of others is rather common.

    Consider the great filmShrek, in which the vain but cowardly Lord Farquaad holds a tournament to select a knight to go on the princess-finding quest on his behalf. He tells the contestants, “Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.”

    Military personnel are routinely sacrificed by government leaders to protect the god of national wealth; some say abortion is infant sacrifice to the gods of convenience and materialism.
    And in the Bible, Genesis 22 shows Abraham nearly stabbing to death and burning his son as an offering (reportedly until God congratulates him on his fear of God).
    (About Abraham: At church not too long ago, when I voiced my skepticism about Abraham’s perceptions about what God intended for him (land grabbery, propagating with his slave, sending his own son into the wilderness to die, willingly nearly murdering his child, etc.), one person’s response was immediate if not overly original: “And God used him anyway to do great things, in spite of his faults. Isn’t it great how God takes messed up people and does great things?” Maybe, but my guess is that although he really was a messed up guy who made a lot of immoral choices, Abraham wasn’t any more likely than the next person when it came to having that sort of direct line to God or special mission designed by the divine.)
    Jesus’ crucifixion is also commonly framed as a sacrificial act by God, as in God sending his son to be sacrificed to appease God’s wrath against humanity.

    In both of these biblical examples, I have to wonder, What happened to “God is love”? I only see inexplicable cruelty.

    1 John 4 reads, “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”


    God willingly pounded Jesus onto a cross in love?

    There must be some mistake, and perhaps it’s rooted in a misguided take on sacrifice. Indeed, as Jesus taught in John 15:13: “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” Not–get this–being laid down as were the victims Isaac and Jesus, but choosing to lay down, as in the Jesus whose death was not an act of violent spiritual payback but a willful statement against the powers of the world. (Perhaps equating Jesus with God makes the crucifixion a choosing, but the Bible strongly suggests the father-son relationship scenario. And don’t forget the Nephilim!)

    Abraham’s act of “sacrifice” was as deranged as Farquaad’s, and God’s “sacrifice” of Jesus is as counter to love as it gets. Neither shows what Christians consider core: self-sacrificing agape love.

    Now, I’m willing to be told I’m wrong in my discounting of these interpretations of events, but on a deeper level I think my supposed challenges to religious tradition are perfectly acceptable within biblical heritage. Indeed, the Bible is a story that considers a particular group’s history and formation–and shines because it is not propaganda. Even as it tells of the group’s “chosen” identity and special purpose, the Bible reveals the people’s failings, at times even with condemnation (see Jeremiah 22, Micah 1, and Mark 13:1-2).

    The Bible’s own critiquing of the very people it touts as God’s chosen allows for–encourages?–critical questioning of its own contents. Its oft-gruesome tales, whose even watered-down telling in my daughter’s picture Bible require selective reading (I sure am not going to show her those pictures of Isaac on the pile of sticks or read to her that Jesus’ loving daddy stuck him up there to bleed), are part of a messy heritage whose narrative merits active readership and constant reinterpretation towards redemption and grace.

    For that quest there is no high-and-mighty glossy marketing brochure–just a guiding text’s act of selfless sacrifice.

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  • goodbadi

    God’s Right Hand Man

    January 18, 2011

    It was spookily not unlike what some might call not coincidence but Godincidence.

    See, I’d been inspired, in church yesterday, to begin writing a song. Inspiration often strikes me in church, when people say things that either puzzle, intrigue, offend, or appall me. An example of a typical inspirational tidbit would be “God told me to do such-and-such,” or “God made this happen,” or “I am grateful to be the hands and feet of God at my work.” This type of talk just strikes me as, well, I don’t know. Not right? Overly ambitious or knowing? Extremely dangerous? Oh, I know! Great material for a song!

    Then, after church, before I’d developed the song beyond a few key phrases, M and I loaded N into her backpack and went for a little walk during which M debriefed from her reading of Jon Krakauer’s very sobering Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith about Mormon fundamentalism in which God “tells” certain people (narcissistic men, anyway) to do things (including murder) and the people around them go along with these divine edicts. (Note to self: read the book sometime.)

    The resulting song is obviously one to be sung only in devout sincerity. Here it is in its stately day-old perfection:

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  • goodbadi

    Saturday Night Bible Study: Unicorns

    January 9, 2011

    If you read the King James Version of the Bible–and of course you do, if you’re concerned about the misinterpretations offered by, say the NRSV–you are no stranger to the fact of unicorns in days of yore.

    I also searched the Bible for cyclops, but to no avail.

    And while I’m on the subject of animals, and since the previous post referred to my dear Canela, I’ll just say that the dog-narrated book The Art of Racing in the Rain, which I quite happily reshelved after reading only several short chapters of its shallow philosophical cuteness (“Let me tell you this: the Weather Channel is not about weather; it is about the world!“), has made me feel a special kinship to our mutt, for no particular reason other than it made me realize that she’s always excited to see and greet me, the alpha male, which is something special after dwelling all day in my professional world of seventh-grade moodiness.

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  • goodbadi

    The Life of Pi, the Beauty of Fiction, and Being the Alpha Male

    January 4, 2011

    Yann Martel’s The Life of Pi has indeed changed my outlook on life, through beautiful fiction.

    But don’t take my word for it: “This is a story that will make you believe in God,” Pi notes; the Los Angeles Times Book Review says on the book’s cover, “A story to make you believe in the soul-searching power of fiction”; the lone reader goodbadi adds, “Pretty sharp poke at religion.”

    Indeed, this story does just what I think makes a sweet read also great: in its own entity it enacts exactly that which it demolishes by its self enactment, in this case religion.

    Pi tells a fabulous tale, one that his skeptics at the end of the novel embrace as True over an alternative explanation. At the same time, throughout the book Pi professes the beauty of his three religions–Judaism, Islam, and Christianity–all of which he accepts as relevant and True. This is exactly what the readers of this book must do, too: even though we ultimately know that nothing in Martel’s novel actually happened, we find it necessary to choose what story or stories–if any–we believe.

    The bigger idea, then, is that choosing a religion is a mere selecting of a beautiful tale (or, as in Pi’s case, several tales) to be accepted as True whether or not factual reality is accommodating. Many ardent believers, for example, include Genesis 6:4 in their “True” religious stories: “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days–and also afterward–when the sons of God went to the daughters of the human beings and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.” Does this mythologically bizarre story’s presence in sacred text make it true or True, story or Story?

    Martel makes his pretty sharp poke at religion by showing appreciation for story–and then leaving it at that. Factual reality is not necessary that which is True. Lower-case story does not beat out Story, whether or not the Story really happened.

    Ahhh, but I haven’t described yet my new outlook. See, Pi’s Story isn’t for the meek hearted or solely religious, and it is in this aspect my life has been reformed. Pi survives 227 days in a small lifeboat with a Bengal tiger (that in itself is a great psychological study) by declaring himself the alpha male, which has, simply put, inspired me to think of myself as the alpha male.

    I can’t really help it; the role has rather fallen into my lap. Our puppy, as unruly and disobedient and pesky as she is, obeys me more than anyone. Furthermore, my basketball skills simply tear up, especially when I play my seventh grade, asthmatic students the occasional game of knock-out. And finally, there are days when I just know I could through my own bicycle navigational prowess keep the wind at my back (although, admittedly, I probably wouldn’t get home before taking the long way around the world). Indeed, how can I possibly avoid facing an alpha male complex in light of this Truth?

    And that, my friends, is beautiful and True in its own special way.

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    N Sings “Baby Jesus”

    December 20, 2010

    Hoping to tone down the Christmas story’s happiness hype that is probably blown way out of proportion, I decided to write a “subcant” for what has been one of N’s favorite songs for quite some time. She helped me by singing the original tune so I could figure out some of the back story text and melody (neither of which is decipherable here):

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  • goodbadi

    Mediation: Joseph and Grace (Matthew 1:18-25)

    December 19, 2010
    Isaiah 7:10-16 and Matthew 1:18-25, two passages in today’s Lectionary, are not only about the babe in the manger. They are also about grace, which, according to C.S. Lewis, is what makes Christianity a unique religion.

    The story is told by Phillip Yancey in What’s So Amazing about Grace:
    During a British conference on comparative religions, experts from around the world debated what, if any, belief was unique to the Christian faith. They began eliminating possibilities. Incarnation? Other religions had different versions of gods’ appearing in human form. Resurrection? Again, other religions had accounts of return from death. The debate went on for some time until C. S. Lewis wandered into the room. “What’s the rumpus about?” he asked, and heard in reply that his colleagues were discussing Christianity’s unique contribution among world religions. Lewis responded, “Oh, that’s easy. It’s grace.”

    After some discussion, the conferees had to agree. The notion of God’s love coming to us free of charge, no strings attached, seems to go against every instinct of humanity. The Buddhist eight-fold path, the Hindu doctrine of karma, the Jewish covenant, and the Muslim code of law–each of these offers a way to earn approval. Only Christianity dares to make God’s love unconditional.

    In Isaiah 7:10-16, things were pretty rough for Ahaz. Aram and Ephraim were threatening to invade Judah, and Ahaz and his people were shaking like trees in the wind.

    “But have faith anyway,” Isaiah told Ahaz. “Your immediate concerns–Kings Rezin and the son of Remaliah–are just two smoldering stumps of firebrands. Sure, something much worse–the king of Assyria–is coming, but for now you just need to have faith, so you have a leg to stand on!”

    But Ahaz continued to exasperate God, wearing God’s patience thin with his people’s “pious, timid hypocrisies” and with his refusal to ask for a sign from God that everything will be okay.

    What does God then do? Ignore Ahaz? Nope. He sends Ahaz an important message: “Like it or not, there will be a sign, a baby named Immanuel.” Even though Ahaz doesn’t deserve it, and in spite of the fact that he intentionally didn’t ask for it, Ahaz receives a sign of grace, a prophecy about “God with us.”

    This inkling of the future, this intrusion of the divine into Ahaz’s life–and later into Joseph and Mary’s lives–is Grace weaseling a way into human reality.

    In Matthew 1:18-25, we read that     Jesus was born into a scandal–and grace. His parents were engaged–quite happily, I suppose–but then Mary went and got pregnant. And Joseph married her anyway!


    I imagine that neighbors and grandmothers and childhood friends all had something to say to each other about this, that Mary was loose, and that Joseph was a fool for marrying her anyway. I wonder if people questioned Joseph’s integrity, too–wouldn’t they have suspected that he was the father? Maybe they thought Mary and Joseph were ridiculous liars, claiming visits by angels in vivid dreams just to keep their own dating indiscretions under cover.

    But that’s not the story that we’re told. We’re told that Joseph and Mary were righteous people who did only God’s will. We’re told that Joseph planned to break up with Mary according to the customs of the day, but that he would do so quietly, to save Mary at least some of the embarrassment she was due.

    We’re told that Joseph deviated from the customary response to an unfaithful bride-to-be only after divine intervention.

    He married the pregnant girl.

    That might sound a bit scandalous, if we don’t know the back story. (Actually, a god impregnating a young girl sounds scandalous to me, too, but that’s not my point here.)

    But the social scandal diminished in importance as Joseph took seriously his conviction about what was right for him to do. In the midst of the scandal, Joseph followed the directions that were given to him. Doing what was right meant not defending his image or standing up for customary propriety, but acting with grace towards Mary.

    On the other hand, Joseph and Mary did have angels appear and tell them what to do, so perhaps Joseph’s grace was a no-brainer. Maybe his obedience to religious customs of the day was so fierce that he wouldn’t have practiced grace without divine intervention.

    Either way, Joseph is the hero of this part of the Christmas story. He showed grace to Mary, and by doing so, enabled “God with us.”

    Grace was shown in Isaiah’s prophecy, which we often say is about the coming of Jesus, and by Joseph, towards Mary, and the fruit of that grace was nothing less than a call for even more grace, a spiritual leader who voluntarily spent time with outcasts and children and hailed them as the leaders of God’s new order.
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