....... Jesus will raise us to life if we are killed? I mean, REALLY believe it?
I have a friend (who I have to admit sometimes believes [trusts] God more than I do.... or even more than most of us here, do), and he just wrote this. It's hard to read without attempting to throw all sorts of "justifications" at his email. I apologize to those of you who have not yet learned to read slowly enough to fully absorb something like this.
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If I were to say that Jesus did not mean what he said regarding God’s grace, that sure God was gracious but we still have to obey the Law to receive God’s blessing or approval, it would have all of the grace preachers and others who are part of any so-called ‘grace’ camp up in arms. So, if I said that Jesus’ teaching on God only applied to the people of his day and that we have the freedom to do an end run around Jesus’ view of God, that his view of God is not for the real world, people would be upset.
Or if I said that Jesus’ teaching and understanding of the Kingdom of God was really just a utopian fantasy, and that it didn’t really make any sense in the real world, and taught that there are other and better ways of understanding God than that of Jesus, Christians would exponentially have their heads explode.
Yet, when these same Christians who want to confess that Jesus is Lord, who hang everything on his being the revelation of God, who believe every word he says, when these same Christians are brought face to face with Jesus’ non-violence personally displayed in his life and manner of death, and they affirm that yes he was but that his ethics can be compromised, you can see where I find them to be wishy-washy.
They want Jesus’ theology but they do not want his ethics, especially his insistence that a true disciple is non-retaliatory and non-violent. No. Here they play all kinds of mind games, figuring out ways to cop out on this insisting that Jesus was not serious. They twist and turn Jesus teaching into knots trying to get around his call to non-violence. They:
1. Relegate Jesus’ teachings on nonviolence to the future kingdom.
2. They deny Jesus taught non-violence and attempt to quote a few ‘proof texts’ (with poor to no exegesis) from the gospels to indicate such.
3. They justify their anger by appealing to the Temple narrative (which never uses the word ‘orge’).
4. They say Jesus did not mean what he said, or they ‘spiritualize’ his social ethic.
5. They claim a juxtaposition of authority: Jesus for the personal/private spiritual life, government laws for the public life.
In every case what we have here is the pernicious doctrine known as the ‘two kingdom theory.’ This theory posits that Jesus reigns in our interior life but that since we are in the world we must find our own way regarding right, wrong and Christian ethics. This way of thinking has a long and storied history but can essentially, in the West, be traced back to Augustine through Luther and Calvin. Two kingdom thinking is the bane of Christianity.
That’s why when I hear any preacher denying the validity of Jesus’ ethics I know that they have denied a central part of his message which has a clear understanding of social relations. I find that this two-kingdom thinking has permeated virtually every corner of the [so-called] grace movement. Oh, they offer plenty of justifications for self-defense and protection of the innocent or they create totally unrealistic hypothetical scenarios. However, all of what Jesus teaches about God, God’s reign and his social ethics are of one piece; you cannot separate them anymore than you can separate the two commands of the one great commandment or just say the first three petitions of the Lord’s Prayer and ignore the last three.
The reality is that Christian leaders who claim Jesus as Lord are BS’ing everyone when they also find ways to neuter Jesus’ social teaching. Oh, they may claim signs and wonders, they can claim pious, holy and righteous lives, but they are misfits, half-breeds, and truncated torsos. They have sold the real Jesus for a pot of self-justifying porridge. How anyone cannot see this clearly is beyond me, but as Paul says, the god of this age (the god of sacred violence) has blinded their hearts. Yes, you heard me. All of your favorite charismatic grace preachers, all of your favorite miracle workers, all of your favorite ‘God is love’ teachers are blind to the real Jesus, the Son of the Father who sits at the right hand of Majesty. Why? Because they have divorced Jesus’ ethics from his theology (and concomitantly they have divorced his humanity from his divinity. Ever wonder why I call them gnostics with a docetic Christology? Now you know).
They are blind because they, like so many before them, have chosen to dwell in a two-kingdom mindset. God is only partly their King. God is their king in the realm of the supernatural but not the natural, God is their king in the private sphere of their existence but not the public one.
Do not ever place me in the same camp as these theological half-breeds, these butchers of Jesus’ teaching. I preach a consistent, holistic approach to Jesus theology, ethics and spirituality. I make no divisions between sacred and profane, or public and private. Neither did Jesus. Those who engage in violence to save life are deluded beyond measure. By so doing they show that they truly fear death and that they are not serious believers in a God who raises the dead.
If you claim to be a Christian, if you claim to follow Jesus and do not do what he says, he says he will not recognize you. That’s a whole lot of faith and grace preachers out there friends. Just look at all your favorite preachers and teachers who advocate for the use of violence in self-defense or any other reason and you have those leaders of whom Jesus will say, “Depart from me, I never knew you even though you claimed to know me and called me ‘Lord, Lord.’” You know who I am talking about.
In short, if you are going to follow Jesus there is only one path and that way is the way of non-violence. Yes, you may die. Yes, others you love may die. But do you not believe in a God who raises the dead? Do you really believe? Are you willing to give your life away or will you save it? You know what happens either way.
I have a friend (who I have to admit sometimes believes [trusts] God more than I do.... or even more than most of us here, do), and he just wrote this. It's hard to read without attempting to throw all sorts of "justifications" at his email. I apologize to those of you who have not yet learned to read slowly enough to fully absorb something like this.
********
If I were to say that Jesus did not mean what he said regarding God’s grace, that sure God was gracious but we still have to obey the Law to receive God’s blessing or approval, it would have all of the grace preachers and others who are part of any so-called ‘grace’ camp up in arms. So, if I said that Jesus’ teaching on God only applied to the people of his day and that we have the freedom to do an end run around Jesus’ view of God, that his view of God is not for the real world, people would be upset.
Or if I said that Jesus’ teaching and understanding of the Kingdom of God was really just a utopian fantasy, and that it didn’t really make any sense in the real world, and taught that there are other and better ways of understanding God than that of Jesus, Christians would exponentially have their heads explode.
Yet, when these same Christians who want to confess that Jesus is Lord, who hang everything on his being the revelation of God, who believe every word he says, when these same Christians are brought face to face with Jesus’ non-violence personally displayed in his life and manner of death, and they affirm that yes he was but that his ethics can be compromised, you can see where I find them to be wishy-washy.
They want Jesus’ theology but they do not want his ethics, especially his insistence that a true disciple is non-retaliatory and non-violent. No. Here they play all kinds of mind games, figuring out ways to cop out on this insisting that Jesus was not serious. They twist and turn Jesus teaching into knots trying to get around his call to non-violence. They:
1. Relegate Jesus’ teachings on nonviolence to the future kingdom.
2. They deny Jesus taught non-violence and attempt to quote a few ‘proof texts’ (with poor to no exegesis) from the gospels to indicate such.
3. They justify their anger by appealing to the Temple narrative (which never uses the word ‘orge’).
4. They say Jesus did not mean what he said, or they ‘spiritualize’ his social ethic.
5. They claim a juxtaposition of authority: Jesus for the personal/private spiritual life, government laws for the public life.
In every case what we have here is the pernicious doctrine known as the ‘two kingdom theory.’ This theory posits that Jesus reigns in our interior life but that since we are in the world we must find our own way regarding right, wrong and Christian ethics. This way of thinking has a long and storied history but can essentially, in the West, be traced back to Augustine through Luther and Calvin. Two kingdom thinking is the bane of Christianity.
That’s why when I hear any preacher denying the validity of Jesus’ ethics I know that they have denied a central part of his message which has a clear understanding of social relations. I find that this two-kingdom thinking has permeated virtually every corner of the [so-called] grace movement. Oh, they offer plenty of justifications for self-defense and protection of the innocent or they create totally unrealistic hypothetical scenarios. However, all of what Jesus teaches about God, God’s reign and his social ethics are of one piece; you cannot separate them anymore than you can separate the two commands of the one great commandment or just say the first three petitions of the Lord’s Prayer and ignore the last three.
The reality is that Christian leaders who claim Jesus as Lord are BS’ing everyone when they also find ways to neuter Jesus’ social teaching. Oh, they may claim signs and wonders, they can claim pious, holy and righteous lives, but they are misfits, half-breeds, and truncated torsos. They have sold the real Jesus for a pot of self-justifying porridge. How anyone cannot see this clearly is beyond me, but as Paul says, the god of this age (the god of sacred violence) has blinded their hearts. Yes, you heard me. All of your favorite charismatic grace preachers, all of your favorite miracle workers, all of your favorite ‘God is love’ teachers are blind to the real Jesus, the Son of the Father who sits at the right hand of Majesty. Why? Because they have divorced Jesus’ ethics from his theology (and concomitantly they have divorced his humanity from his divinity. Ever wonder why I call them gnostics with a docetic Christology? Now you know).
They are blind because they, like so many before them, have chosen to dwell in a two-kingdom mindset. God is only partly their King. God is their king in the realm of the supernatural but not the natural, God is their king in the private sphere of their existence but not the public one.
Do not ever place me in the same camp as these theological half-breeds, these butchers of Jesus’ teaching. I preach a consistent, holistic approach to Jesus theology, ethics and spirituality. I make no divisions between sacred and profane, or public and private. Neither did Jesus. Those who engage in violence to save life are deluded beyond measure. By so doing they show that they truly fear death and that they are not serious believers in a God who raises the dead.
If you claim to be a Christian, if you claim to follow Jesus and do not do what he says, he says he will not recognize you. That’s a whole lot of faith and grace preachers out there friends. Just look at all your favorite preachers and teachers who advocate for the use of violence in self-defense or any other reason and you have those leaders of whom Jesus will say, “Depart from me, I never knew you even though you claimed to know me and called me ‘Lord, Lord.’” You know who I am talking about.
In short, if you are going to follow Jesus there is only one path and that way is the way of non-violence. Yes, you may die. Yes, others you love may die. But do you not believe in a God who raises the dead? Do you really believe? Are you willing to give your life away or will you save it? You know what happens either way.
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