Because the Bible came out of patriarchal culture, whenever women's stories are told it is unexpected. In fact, I've come to see these women as signs of inclusion at many points in the Bible. Inclusion often involves some sort of conflict or trouble, which may cause people to consider women as causes of trouble rather than signs that trouble is implicit in the cultural norms.
Recently I looked into various marriages in the Bible, starting with Abraham and Sarah, because St. Peter refers to Sarah as a model for all wives in her submission to her husband, calling him, “Lord.” So I went to read the story. There are two places where Sarah joins Abraham in lying about their relationship, acquiescing to being known as his sister (which is apparently half-true, showing again that this culture is not the same as ours). First, before they are known as Abraham and Sarah—before God renames them—they take refuge from famine in Egypt. Sarai is barren, so it is easy for them to mislead the Egyptians. Because Sarai is beautiful, Pharaoh takes her into his house and gives Abram gifts, perhaps even the slave-girl Hagar. God sends plagues, Pharaoh wises up, sends Sarai back to Abram, and complains about being deceived. Much later, Abraham asks Sarah again to join him in his half-truth in the land of King Abimelech; again, the king takes Sarah; this time, God warns him in a dream that Sarah is married. (As an aside, this shows God speaking directly to a Canaanite king and the king’s immediate obedience.) So two times, Sarah follows Abraham’s lead in misrepresenting their relationship.
In the rest of the story, her submission is less obvious. When she can’t conceive, she decides to help God fulfill God’s promise by offering Abram her Egyptian slave, Hagar, as a surrogate; Abram listens to Sarai and has sex with Hagar, who becomes pregnant. Sarai accuses Hagar of having contempt for Sarai and treats her so harshly Hagar runs away.
God meets the pregnant girl in the wilderness and speaks directly to her. Think about this: not only does God reveal God’s self to the chosen man Abram, he also speaks to a Canaanite king and to an Egyptian slave-girl. God tells her to go back to Sarai and be respectful, and God promises that her son will be the father of multitudes too numerous to count. She names her son Ishmael—“God hears”—and names God as “the God of seeing,” marveling that she really saw God and remained alive. Remember this—a runaway Egyptian slave-girl saw God, received a command which she obeyed, received a promise like the one given to Abram, and lived to tell about it.
In the past, some may have read this passage as defining the duty of slaves to be submissive and respectful to their owners. We wouldn’t do that nowadays, now that we know slavery is wrong. But we don’t hear the rest of the amazing truth in this passage. God meets Hagar face to face and reminds her that he is taking care of her and her unborn son. (I want to write it this way: God. Meets. Hagar. Face. To. Face.) He also confronts her with her contempt for Sarai. Hagar affirms her human dignity by choosing to obey God.
Fourteen years later, Isaac was born to Sarah. When Sarah saw Ishmael and Isaac together, she said to Abraham, “Cast out the slave woman and her son.” Really Sarah is saying, “Cast out your son who is not my son.” Abraham loves Ishmael; he doesn’t want to send him away. God says, “Don’t worry about Ishmael and Hagar; I will make a nation of his descendants also. Do whatever Sarah says because Isaac is the one I promised you and intend to work through.” God can say this because God is the one taking care of Hagar and Ishmael. So in the morning, Abraham sends Hagar and Ishmael off into the wilderness with a canteen of water and some bread.
When they run out of water, she places Ishmael under a bush and goes far enough away that she cannot see him. She does not want to watch him die, and she weeps aloud. God hears Ishmael, who must also be moaning, and God’s messenger says to Hagar, “What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard Ishmael’s moans. Go raise him up and hold his hand. Remember that I will make a great nation of him.” Then God shows her a well of water. They live in the wilderness, Ishmael learns to hunt, and eventually his Egyptian mother finds him a wife from Egypt.
Notice this: God again communicates supernaturally with Hagar. God cares for her again in the wilderness. God makes sure she and her son (and Abraham’s son) do not die. God does not berate her for forgetting his promise. God treats her tenderly and rescues them. God includes the father of the Arabs in his care, knowing full well that there will be enmity and war between the descendents of Abraham, just as there has been enmity between the mothers.
The lessons from this are so challenging: God is the God of Hebrew and Arab. Indeed, with all the attention paid to the supernatural nature of Isaac’s birth, it is easy to overlook the supernatural care given to Hagar and Ishmael. God includes them. This ought to challenge Christians who see Zionism as the will of God, and it ought to challenge Christians who see patriarchy and sexism as the will of God as well.
It has to be noted that Hagar’s worst enemy is not Abraham but Sarah; yet the grounds of their animosity is in the patriarchal system that values women because they give birth. Barrenness is shameful to a woman for the same reason a woman must have a child on behalf of a dead husband; the important achievement is to provide the man with immortality through descendants. Sarah wants a child for Abraham for reasons Tamar will understand. In a patriarchal system, women compete with women to be valuable to men. If what men want is a son to carry on the patrimony, women will value themselves as they are able to produce that son.
However, Sarah, who somewhere in her life called her brother/husband “Lord,” has intrinsic value before God. It isn’t enough that Ishmael was born on her knees, symbolically her child. She wants her own child. She cannot reconcile herself to the legal fiction that makes Ishmael her child. Sarah also wants to birth a child for her own sake, and her jealousy of Hagar has to do with Sarah’s own hunger for immortality. When she went through menopause, she must have despaired. No wonder she laughs bitterly when she overhears God’s messengers repeating the promise to Abraham that Sarah herself will bear a child. No wonder she laughs with joy when Isaac is born. The gift of Isaac, the gift of laughter, the gift of immortality comes courtesy of God only, not from the legal fictions of human beings. No wonder the child of Hagar is an intolerable intruder on this gift as Sarah sees it. Sarah behaves cruelly to Hagar; God does not punish this cruelty, perhaps because God knows that patriarchy has crippled Sarah’s understanding of what gives a woman value.
A few generations later, Jacob’s two wives, Leah and Rachel, compete to give Jacob sons. Leah is far more fertile, producing three sons; so to compete, Rachel gives Jacob her servant girl Bilhah as a surrogate; those two sons count for Rachel. When Leah quits having children, she gives Jacob another servant girl Zilpah as surrogate; those two sons count for Leah, who leads five to two. When Leah’s son brings her mandrakes, which supposedly help make women fertile, Rachel begs for the mandrakes. In exchange, she sends Jacob in to sleep with Leah. Leah had two more sons and a daughter.
When God opens Rachel’s womb, as the Bible puts it, she has a son. Significantly, she rejoices by saying, “God has taken away my reproach.” What is reproachful about being barren? In this culture, the wife has failed in her main duty to her husband—the duty to make sure his line does not die out. Much later, Rachel dies birthing her second son, whom she names “son of my sorrow.” Her sorrow is not just the hard labor, but the sorrow of being unable to measure up to others. Despite being genuinely loved by her husband, she values herself for her fertility, and Jacob’s willingness to go elsewhere sexually in order to have children shows that he too believes a wife’s barrenness requires the remedy of more sexual partners to ensure descendants.
Women are primarily property in these times. Adultery is a property crime in a culture that permits polygamy. It isn’t having sex with more than one woman that is a crime; it is having sex with someone else’s wife. If a wife has more than one sexual partner, who knows which man’s descendant the child is—who has gained immortality thereby? So the response, as seen in the story of Tamar (which will be for another day), is to kill the woman. This ostensibly will reinforce the faithfulness of women so that husbands can be sure the children are theirs. Comically, it is after her sojourn in the house of King Abimelech that Sarah gives birth to Isaac. This seems to me to be a small divine joke at the expense of patriarchal anxieties.
It makes me sad that because of the mistaken use of the Bible to perpetuate patriarchy, people who know in their hearts that God doesn't favor men over women and patriarchy is wrong have felt that they must stop respecting the Bible as an authority for faith and practice. They dismiss and devalue a text that is an enormous resource for understanding the relationship between God and humanity—that tells us over and over that even at our worst, God loves us and is committed to making us whole and holy. They don’t get to know the historical Jesus with his tender heart and tough mind, his focused obedience to his Father, his full humanity in such unimaginable tension with divinity. How sad to know little to nothing of how God has touched the lives of humans in one small tribal group, how God has insisted that other tribal groups matter to God also, how God has entered the circle God drew, as William Blake challenged him (William Blake: "To God/ If you have formed a Circle to go into/Go into it yourself & see how you would do."), and how God has made available to all a new way of living in this world and a hope for joy after death.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Little Girl, Wake Up
From July 2009 until November 2010, my granddaughter and her parents have been living with us. Abby sometimes likes me to tell her stories about Jesus. She turned four in October, so I keep them simple and steer away from the complex confrontations with the Pharisees. What Jesus did when he was on earth makes for good stories.
One evening, Abby, her mother, and I were all piled on my bed, and she asked, “Nana, will you tell me a story about Jesus?” So I told her this one, and it turned out to be the one I needed to hear.
This story tells how Jesus feels about little girls.
Jesus was walking down the road when a man named Jairus came running up to him and said, “My daughter is very sick. Can you come see her and heal her?” Jesus told a couple of his friends to come with him, and he hurried toward her house. As he was approaching, a servant came out and told Jairus, “Don’t bother Jesus anymore. Your daughter has died.” Jesus said to Jairus, “Don’t be afraid; she’s just sleeping.” Jesus entered the house, and the people who were there made fun of him. He went into the room where the little girl lay on her bed.
Jesus bent over the little girl, and he said to her, “Little girl, wake up.” She opened her eyes and sat up.
It turns out that Jesus likes girls, and he wants them to wake up. He doesn’t want to hear that they are dying, he doesn’t want to see them dead; he wants them to wake up, get out of bed, and thrive.
When I tell this story from memory out loud, it makes me cry. I want to believe that Jesus cares that much about girls. I want my granddaughters, my daughters, my friends, my mother, and myself to know this kind of love—the love that wants women alive and awake. Jesus loves this little girl in a day in which Jewish men thanked God they were born neither Gentile nor female.
What I have to admit to myself, and to Jesus, is that many women in the church cannot be truly alive, truly awake, truly grateful for being a woman because the church makes it so tough for women to be who God made them to be. I am so angry to think of how the church has wasted the gifts and energy of women. God’s kingdom is smaller and narrower than it should be. Women in the church are sickening and dying for lack of freedom to be their whole selves in the church.
I am part of the Friends (Quaker) denomination. Quakers have a history of equality for men and women in ministry—public, spoken witness to the power and love of God. First generation Quaker women in the 1600s preached in public, journeyed overseas to preach to the unconverted, stood up for their freedom to practice religion as God revealed it to them, and, with many men, died imprisoned or executed for their convictions. This is close to my heart because I am also called to preach and recorded as a minister. And yet, in my yearly meeting, there are only three women who are released full-time to pastor a church. The other 64 churches have either men as pastors or none.
My own home meeting has three full-time paid men as pastors and four paid part-time women and one part-time man as pastors. The full-time men are the lead pastor, the pastor for spiritual health and care, and the pastor for youth ministries; the part-time man is the pastor for worship ministries; the part-time women are the pastor for women’s ministries, the pastor for children and families, the pastor for seniors, and the pastor for administration. I love them all, but there seems to be a hierarchy of significance in who is full-time and who is part-time, even though they are all graced with the name “pastor.” And I know of churches in my yearly meeting that do not allow women to carry the title pastor, even part-time.
What is wrong with the church, with my church? Why is the Quaker testimony on equality of the sexes not borne out in practice?
And why is the entire church not committed to equality? When we visited lovely cathedrals across Europe this spring, my husband would say to me, “You could be preaching from that pulpit.” He meant to be supportive to me, but I knew the impossibility of that ever happening. It made me sad and angry. Think of 2000 years of little girls with gifts given to them for the church that they were never allowed to use. Think of how they were required to die inside in order to live faithfully as defined by the church. Think of how Jesus feels about that.
At least in the story about Jairus’s daughter, the house was filled with mourners because the little girl had died. There are few mourners in the church for all the dying little girls and comatose women whose gifts are refused and whose calls are denied. There is the hope offered by Jesus that these women and girls are just sleeping, and their whole selves can be raised from the dead by the word of God.
Where is the sin and who are the sinners? Who would dare call unclean what God has called clean? Men and women alike have resisted the clear teaching of Jesus and Paul that the kingdom of God needs women who are awakened, called, obedient ministers in private and in public. It is easy to blame men for perpetuating power structures of patriarchy which clearly violate the spirit and letter of the law of love; it is more difficult to understand why women themselves resist and even reject women who are called to public ministry. Are they afraid? And if so, of what? Of the love and calling of God?
Most dismaying is the fact that the “emergent” movement in today’s church, with its missional emphasis and flexible structure, is again resisting the clear teaching of Jesus that both men and women are called to faithful stewardship of their gifts and will be held accountable for how they are used to build God’s kingdom, and that all is called to go into the world and preach the gospel. Women took to the road with Jesus, gave him their money and loyalty, listened to and understood his message, witnessed his resurrection and reported the good news to others, waited for the Holy Spirit and received the Spirit in all ways, hosted churches, preached, prophesied, taught. Paul valued the women who were leaders in the church, including some among the apostles.
Every woman who remains loyal to the church while knowing that her fellow Christians do not encourage her to acknowledge and use her gifts in the church shows that God does indeed give grace to those who suffer. Women do suffer when they feel called and empowered and then rejected. The mission field, education, non-profits all have benefited from women whose gifts have been thrust out of the church, but the church itself has been diminished and is even now being diminished.
The parable of the three stewards is for women, too. When you read it remembering that, it seems that women are damned if they don’t and damned if they do. Even in my own denomination, the sexism of our society has ruined the good news that if God’s Son sets you free, you are free indeed. Instead of noting the clear teaching of this parable that if you do not use your God-given gifts to further the kingdom of God, you will be cast out of it, and thinking of those women with gifts of public ministry, my own denomination has congregations that will not place women on elders, will not call women as pastors, and will not recommend women for recording (analogous to ordination).
While Christians are happy to eat pork and shellfish since God said that pigs in a blanket are clean if God says so, Christians are not happy to say that God has declared women and men to be equal. Yet Paul writes that in Christ there is no male nor female. This is so clear it demands that we ask why it is so rarely visible in the church.
Undoubtedly, someone will blame the Bible for the perpetuation of patriarchal Christianity. I blame Bible readers who refuse to see. The message always comes to those with ears to hear, eyes to read, hearts to follow, not to those looking for confirmation of the status quo and permission to resist change.
One evening, Abby, her mother, and I were all piled on my bed, and she asked, “Nana, will you tell me a story about Jesus?” So I told her this one, and it turned out to be the one I needed to hear.
This story tells how Jesus feels about little girls.
Jesus was walking down the road when a man named Jairus came running up to him and said, “My daughter is very sick. Can you come see her and heal her?” Jesus told a couple of his friends to come with him, and he hurried toward her house. As he was approaching, a servant came out and told Jairus, “Don’t bother Jesus anymore. Your daughter has died.” Jesus said to Jairus, “Don’t be afraid; she’s just sleeping.” Jesus entered the house, and the people who were there made fun of him. He went into the room where the little girl lay on her bed.
Jesus bent over the little girl, and he said to her, “Little girl, wake up.” She opened her eyes and sat up.
It turns out that Jesus likes girls, and he wants them to wake up. He doesn’t want to hear that they are dying, he doesn’t want to see them dead; he wants them to wake up, get out of bed, and thrive.
When I tell this story from memory out loud, it makes me cry. I want to believe that Jesus cares that much about girls. I want my granddaughters, my daughters, my friends, my mother, and myself to know this kind of love—the love that wants women alive and awake. Jesus loves this little girl in a day in which Jewish men thanked God they were born neither Gentile nor female.
What I have to admit to myself, and to Jesus, is that many women in the church cannot be truly alive, truly awake, truly grateful for being a woman because the church makes it so tough for women to be who God made them to be. I am so angry to think of how the church has wasted the gifts and energy of women. God’s kingdom is smaller and narrower than it should be. Women in the church are sickening and dying for lack of freedom to be their whole selves in the church.
I am part of the Friends (Quaker) denomination. Quakers have a history of equality for men and women in ministry—public, spoken witness to the power and love of God. First generation Quaker women in the 1600s preached in public, journeyed overseas to preach to the unconverted, stood up for their freedom to practice religion as God revealed it to them, and, with many men, died imprisoned or executed for their convictions. This is close to my heart because I am also called to preach and recorded as a minister. And yet, in my yearly meeting, there are only three women who are released full-time to pastor a church. The other 64 churches have either men as pastors or none.
My own home meeting has three full-time paid men as pastors and four paid part-time women and one part-time man as pastors. The full-time men are the lead pastor, the pastor for spiritual health and care, and the pastor for youth ministries; the part-time man is the pastor for worship ministries; the part-time women are the pastor for women’s ministries, the pastor for children and families, the pastor for seniors, and the pastor for administration. I love them all, but there seems to be a hierarchy of significance in who is full-time and who is part-time, even though they are all graced with the name “pastor.” And I know of churches in my yearly meeting that do not allow women to carry the title pastor, even part-time.
What is wrong with the church, with my church? Why is the Quaker testimony on equality of the sexes not borne out in practice?
And why is the entire church not committed to equality? When we visited lovely cathedrals across Europe this spring, my husband would say to me, “You could be preaching from that pulpit.” He meant to be supportive to me, but I knew the impossibility of that ever happening. It made me sad and angry. Think of 2000 years of little girls with gifts given to them for the church that they were never allowed to use. Think of how they were required to die inside in order to live faithfully as defined by the church. Think of how Jesus feels about that.
At least in the story about Jairus’s daughter, the house was filled with mourners because the little girl had died. There are few mourners in the church for all the dying little girls and comatose women whose gifts are refused and whose calls are denied. There is the hope offered by Jesus that these women and girls are just sleeping, and their whole selves can be raised from the dead by the word of God.
Where is the sin and who are the sinners? Who would dare call unclean what God has called clean? Men and women alike have resisted the clear teaching of Jesus and Paul that the kingdom of God needs women who are awakened, called, obedient ministers in private and in public. It is easy to blame men for perpetuating power structures of patriarchy which clearly violate the spirit and letter of the law of love; it is more difficult to understand why women themselves resist and even reject women who are called to public ministry. Are they afraid? And if so, of what? Of the love and calling of God?
Most dismaying is the fact that the “emergent” movement in today’s church, with its missional emphasis and flexible structure, is again resisting the clear teaching of Jesus that both men and women are called to faithful stewardship of their gifts and will be held accountable for how they are used to build God’s kingdom, and that all is called to go into the world and preach the gospel. Women took to the road with Jesus, gave him their money and loyalty, listened to and understood his message, witnessed his resurrection and reported the good news to others, waited for the Holy Spirit and received the Spirit in all ways, hosted churches, preached, prophesied, taught. Paul valued the women who were leaders in the church, including some among the apostles.
Every woman who remains loyal to the church while knowing that her fellow Christians do not encourage her to acknowledge and use her gifts in the church shows that God does indeed give grace to those who suffer. Women do suffer when they feel called and empowered and then rejected. The mission field, education, non-profits all have benefited from women whose gifts have been thrust out of the church, but the church itself has been diminished and is even now being diminished.
The parable of the three stewards is for women, too. When you read it remembering that, it seems that women are damned if they don’t and damned if they do. Even in my own denomination, the sexism of our society has ruined the good news that if God’s Son sets you free, you are free indeed. Instead of noting the clear teaching of this parable that if you do not use your God-given gifts to further the kingdom of God, you will be cast out of it, and thinking of those women with gifts of public ministry, my own denomination has congregations that will not place women on elders, will not call women as pastors, and will not recommend women for recording (analogous to ordination).
While Christians are happy to eat pork and shellfish since God said that pigs in a blanket are clean if God says so, Christians are not happy to say that God has declared women and men to be equal. Yet Paul writes that in Christ there is no male nor female. This is so clear it demands that we ask why it is so rarely visible in the church.
Undoubtedly, someone will blame the Bible for the perpetuation of patriarchal Christianity. I blame Bible readers who refuse to see. The message always comes to those with ears to hear, eyes to read, hearts to follow, not to those looking for confirmation of the status quo and permission to resist change.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
What about others' sin?
Sunday School
June 8, 2009
Newberg Friends Church
What about others’ sin?
This is the question that got me started thinking about the topics of perfection and sin. I have been an elder at various times, and in “eldering” positions as an administrator, and the question is a living one for me.
First, to link back to David, we have in David a person whose heart is designated as perfect before God. I can learn from his life both what that means, and what that means with regard to my own sin.
We learn that a perfect heart does not mean never straying, never erring, never sinning; instead it includes the following characteristic attitudes and actions:
To meet those who confront us with our sin contritely rather than angrily
To prefer being in the hands of God to being in any other hands, including our own
To have a consistently humble heart toward God
To seek God’s will and do it
To believe in God’s mercy
To rely on God to perform what God has promised, rather than taking things into our own hands
To leave vengeance to God
To trust God when we’re in trouble
To be wholehearted in putting God first
What if someone sins against me?
The first helpful item in thinking about how to cope with another person’s sin, and sin against me specifically, is to leave vengeance to God. But Jesus goes beyond simply abandoning vengeance to actively doing good: Love your enemies, pray for those who are spiteful toward you and use you badly; bless those who are out to get you.
So, personally, in relation to others’ sin against me, the Bible is clear; in fact, Jesus requires me to forgive those who have sinned against me and makes that the basis for being forgiven for how I have sinned against God.
I’ve been thinking that if I understood sin correctly, I would be horrified at the plight of my enemy, rather than wanting him or her to be crushed—I would beg God to have mercy on my enemy.
Christians pretend no one is their personal enemy in order to avoid doing what the Gospels prescribe for enemies; particularly no other Christian can be an “enemy”; maybe we should be more honest.
How about sin in others that is not against me?
A perfect heart will not act out of personal vengeance or a personal agenda.
Jesus experienced this every day of his life—how did he respond? He confronted, forgave, set in a different direction—offered alternatives to guilt, shame and a return to sin.
St. Paul in Galatians 5 lists the fruits of the “flesh,” namely that part of the divided self that is not given over to God: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envyings, drunkenness, carousings; these things do not characterize those who are inheriting the kingdom of God; instead, these are characteristics of those wholeheartedly following God’s Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
Galatians 6:1 then says, even if another person is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, looking to yourself lest you also be tempted. The Greek word translated “restore” is also translated elsewhere as “perfect,” the verb; it also means “mend,” or “complete,” or “set in order.” It is used of the disciples mending nets—I think it’s helpful to see this as an analogy. The perfect net is one that catches fish.
St Paul goes on to say that our main business is to examine our own work and see how perfect we are, using that as grounds for confidence, not examining our work in comparison to another’s. We are also to bear one another’s burdens—this is the law of Christ. We need to be wholehearted in doing good, because God sees to it that a person reaps what she or he sows, and we need to prioritize doing good to others, particularly those in the faith.
Romans 13:8 Love one another; loving your neighbor fulfills (perfects) the law; love does no wrong to a neighbor, therefore it is the perfection of the law.
And what about societal sin?
Prophetic speech—no personal gain—is exemplified in what Jesus said to the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the money-changers in the temple. It is also in what he said to individuals for the crowd’s benefit, such as Zaccheus, the woman taken in adultery, and the rich young ruler. Other examples are Nathan to David; Jesus to Peter; Job praying for his friends.
Always note the note of pity in Jesus’s voice, pity that causes him to issue a warning to those headed in the wrong way.
This describes God’s perspective on a person who sins against another person: It would be better for him if he were drowned in the ocean with a heavy rock around his neck than that he causes one of these little ones to mistrust God—death is better for the perpetrator than making life hard for another person—This is an actual statement of fact, a description of the way things are, but this is not a prescription, not the same as saying “drown the perps.”
God’s pity, like the rain, falls on victim and oppressor; God knows how completely misuse of power can destroy a person.
The first sin recorded in Genesis sent people who knew God personally scurrying to hide in the bushes, ashamed of their vulnerability and humanness and error. However, as St. Paul writes, “As in Adam all died, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”; what characterizes Christ is complete openness to God. Like Jesus, we can run toward God instead of away.
What if instead, in response to our own sin, we run to God and say, “Against you and you only have I sinned; create in me a clean heart; renew a right spirit, don’t take away your holy spirit from me; what do you want me to do to make things right?
What if when we see another person sinning, we come alongside and say, “Does what you’re doing make you happy? Does it bring you closer to God? How can I help carry the burden you are carrying that causes you to behave in these ways that destroy you?”
What if when we see our society perpetrating evil, we fall on our knees and repent for our part in that evil? What if we pray for God’s mercy on the wicked as well as God’s advocacy for the innocent? What if we pray for God to meet the oppressor on the way to Damascus? What if we pray for God to protect the victim in the desert? What if we examine our hearts in terms not of our sin, but of our wholehearted will to do what God tells us, and the resulting action?
What if we look at others when they stray, err, trespass, sin, as nets that need mending rather than fuel for burning? What if we actually followed the example and words of Jesus with regard to ourselves and others? How would things be different?
June 8, 2009
Newberg Friends Church
What about others’ sin?
This is the question that got me started thinking about the topics of perfection and sin. I have been an elder at various times, and in “eldering” positions as an administrator, and the question is a living one for me.
First, to link back to David, we have in David a person whose heart is designated as perfect before God. I can learn from his life both what that means, and what that means with regard to my own sin.
We learn that a perfect heart does not mean never straying, never erring, never sinning; instead it includes the following characteristic attitudes and actions:
To meet those who confront us with our sin contritely rather than angrily
To prefer being in the hands of God to being in any other hands, including our own
To have a consistently humble heart toward God
To seek God’s will and do it
To believe in God’s mercy
To rely on God to perform what God has promised, rather than taking things into our own hands
To leave vengeance to God
To trust God when we’re in trouble
To be wholehearted in putting God first
What if someone sins against me?
The first helpful item in thinking about how to cope with another person’s sin, and sin against me specifically, is to leave vengeance to God. But Jesus goes beyond simply abandoning vengeance to actively doing good: Love your enemies, pray for those who are spiteful toward you and use you badly; bless those who are out to get you.
So, personally, in relation to others’ sin against me, the Bible is clear; in fact, Jesus requires me to forgive those who have sinned against me and makes that the basis for being forgiven for how I have sinned against God.
I’ve been thinking that if I understood sin correctly, I would be horrified at the plight of my enemy, rather than wanting him or her to be crushed—I would beg God to have mercy on my enemy.
Christians pretend no one is their personal enemy in order to avoid doing what the Gospels prescribe for enemies; particularly no other Christian can be an “enemy”; maybe we should be more honest.
How about sin in others that is not against me?
A perfect heart will not act out of personal vengeance or a personal agenda.
Jesus experienced this every day of his life—how did he respond? He confronted, forgave, set in a different direction—offered alternatives to guilt, shame and a return to sin.
St. Paul in Galatians 5 lists the fruits of the “flesh,” namely that part of the divided self that is not given over to God: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envyings, drunkenness, carousings; these things do not characterize those who are inheriting the kingdom of God; instead, these are characteristics of those wholeheartedly following God’s Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
Galatians 6:1 then says, even if another person is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, looking to yourself lest you also be tempted. The Greek word translated “restore” is also translated elsewhere as “perfect,” the verb; it also means “mend,” or “complete,” or “set in order.” It is used of the disciples mending nets—I think it’s helpful to see this as an analogy. The perfect net is one that catches fish.
St Paul goes on to say that our main business is to examine our own work and see how perfect we are, using that as grounds for confidence, not examining our work in comparison to another’s. We are also to bear one another’s burdens—this is the law of Christ. We need to be wholehearted in doing good, because God sees to it that a person reaps what she or he sows, and we need to prioritize doing good to others, particularly those in the faith.
Romans 13:8 Love one another; loving your neighbor fulfills (perfects) the law; love does no wrong to a neighbor, therefore it is the perfection of the law.
And what about societal sin?
Prophetic speech—no personal gain—is exemplified in what Jesus said to the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the money-changers in the temple. It is also in what he said to individuals for the crowd’s benefit, such as Zaccheus, the woman taken in adultery, and the rich young ruler. Other examples are Nathan to David; Jesus to Peter; Job praying for his friends.
Always note the note of pity in Jesus’s voice, pity that causes him to issue a warning to those headed in the wrong way.
This describes God’s perspective on a person who sins against another person: It would be better for him if he were drowned in the ocean with a heavy rock around his neck than that he causes one of these little ones to mistrust God—death is better for the perpetrator than making life hard for another person—This is an actual statement of fact, a description of the way things are, but this is not a prescription, not the same as saying “drown the perps.”
God’s pity, like the rain, falls on victim and oppressor; God knows how completely misuse of power can destroy a person.
The first sin recorded in Genesis sent people who knew God personally scurrying to hide in the bushes, ashamed of their vulnerability and humanness and error. However, as St. Paul writes, “As in Adam all died, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”; what characterizes Christ is complete openness to God. Like Jesus, we can run toward God instead of away.
What if instead, in response to our own sin, we run to God and say, “Against you and you only have I sinned; create in me a clean heart; renew a right spirit, don’t take away your holy spirit from me; what do you want me to do to make things right?
What if when we see another person sinning, we come alongside and say, “Does what you’re doing make you happy? Does it bring you closer to God? How can I help carry the burden you are carrying that causes you to behave in these ways that destroy you?”
What if when we see our society perpetrating evil, we fall on our knees and repent for our part in that evil? What if we pray for God’s mercy on the wicked as well as God’s advocacy for the innocent? What if we pray for God to meet the oppressor on the way to Damascus? What if we pray for God to protect the victim in the desert? What if we examine our hearts in terms not of our sin, but of our wholehearted will to do what God tells us, and the resulting action?
What if we look at others when they stray, err, trespass, sin, as nets that need mending rather than fuel for burning? What if we actually followed the example and words of Jesus with regard to ourselves and others? How would things be different?
Installment 2 What about sin?
Sunday School
May 31, 2009
Newberg Friends Church
David after becoming King
The framing of David as perfect centers around his unswerving devotion to God; his heart was wholly given to God; complete, undivided
David’s prayer 2 Samuel 7; 1 Chronicles 17:16
Who am I?
You have brought me this far, and you have promised me great things
What more can David say to you?
You know me
You have done this because you wanted to, not because of me
There is no god like You
Do as you have promised; I have courage to pray this because of what You said
May it please you to bless my house
He is humble, reverent, grateful, praying according to what God has revealed.
He goes on to administere justice and equity to the people.
David Sins
2 Samuel 11 David commits adultery (and murder). Nathan confronts him and calls him out; prophesies woes, including the death of the baby. David says, “I have sinned against the Lord” (Psalm 51). It is also clear that his sin has terrible consequences. However, his perfect heart shows in his instant contrition on being confronted, and his acceptance of the consequences of his sin when he sees they are inevitable.
This submission to God is seen later when David flees for his life from his son Absalom’s conspiracy: he says, I submit to the judgment of God, whether it be in my favor or against me (2 Sam 15:25,26; 2 Samuel 16:11, 12)
In 2 Samuel 22 and Psalm 18 (the timing is not clear—the psalm says “after he was delivered from Saul”, yet it is placed right before David’s last words in the narrative), he celebrates God’s majesty, power, sovereignty, he rejoices in God’s deliverance for him, and he asserts his blamelessness before God. If this is how he felt at the end of his life, it means he accepted God’s forgiveness.
It is less clear why it was a sin for David to count his people. It is clear that when the idea occurred to David, he was responsible for choosing to do it, particularly when dissuaded by Joab; maybe the sin is related to Exodus 30, which requires all those counted to pay a half-shekel to ward off plague; conducted likely for military purposes, which may signify David’s pride in his troops rather than dependence on God. Whatever the case, it is significant that when God gives David a choice of punishment, David chooses the one entirely in God’s hands, trusting in God’s mercy; David shows again that he prefers God to all others—He’d rather take his punishment directly from God, whom he knows to be gracious.
So from the life of David, he of the perfect heart, we learn that a perfect heart does not mean never straying, never erring, never sinning; instead it means
To meet those who confront us with our sin contritely rather than angrily
To prefer being in the hands of God to being in any other hands, including our own
To have a consistently humble heart toward God
To seek God’s will and do it
To believe in God’s mercy
To rely on God to perform what God has promised, rather than taking things into our own hands
To leave vengeance to God
To trust God when we’re in trouble
To be wholehearted in putting God first
May 31, 2009
Newberg Friends Church
David after becoming King
The framing of David as perfect centers around his unswerving devotion to God; his heart was wholly given to God; complete, undivided
David’s prayer 2 Samuel 7; 1 Chronicles 17:16
Who am I?
You have brought me this far, and you have promised me great things
What more can David say to you?
You know me
You have done this because you wanted to, not because of me
There is no god like You
Do as you have promised; I have courage to pray this because of what You said
May it please you to bless my house
He is humble, reverent, grateful, praying according to what God has revealed.
He goes on to administere justice and equity to the people.
David Sins
2 Samuel 11 David commits adultery (and murder). Nathan confronts him and calls him out; prophesies woes, including the death of the baby. David says, “I have sinned against the Lord” (Psalm 51). It is also clear that his sin has terrible consequences. However, his perfect heart shows in his instant contrition on being confronted, and his acceptance of the consequences of his sin when he sees they are inevitable.
This submission to God is seen later when David flees for his life from his son Absalom’s conspiracy: he says, I submit to the judgment of God, whether it be in my favor or against me (2 Sam 15:25,26; 2 Samuel 16:11, 12)
In 2 Samuel 22 and Psalm 18 (the timing is not clear—the psalm says “after he was delivered from Saul”, yet it is placed right before David’s last words in the narrative), he celebrates God’s majesty, power, sovereignty, he rejoices in God’s deliverance for him, and he asserts his blamelessness before God. If this is how he felt at the end of his life, it means he accepted God’s forgiveness.
It is less clear why it was a sin for David to count his people. It is clear that when the idea occurred to David, he was responsible for choosing to do it, particularly when dissuaded by Joab; maybe the sin is related to Exodus 30, which requires all those counted to pay a half-shekel to ward off plague; conducted likely for military purposes, which may signify David’s pride in his troops rather than dependence on God. Whatever the case, it is significant that when God gives David a choice of punishment, David chooses the one entirely in God’s hands, trusting in God’s mercy; David shows again that he prefers God to all others—He’d rather take his punishment directly from God, whom he knows to be gracious.
So from the life of David, he of the perfect heart, we learn that a perfect heart does not mean never straying, never erring, never sinning; instead it means
To meet those who confront us with our sin contritely rather than angrily
To prefer being in the hands of God to being in any other hands, including our own
To have a consistently humble heart toward God
To seek God’s will and do it
To believe in God’s mercy
To rely on God to perform what God has promised, rather than taking things into our own hands
To leave vengeance to God
To trust God when we’re in trouble
To be wholehearted in putting God first
Thursday, May 28, 2009
What about Sin?
May 24, 2009
Sunday School at Newberg Friends Church
The Perfection of Humans
Remember God who gives you all pleasant things; fear God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God has said to do, what is right and good, what God tells you to do every day
When suffering comes, remember God, worship God, submit to God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God says to do
Learn from suffering to be obedient, complete the work God has given you to do
This is human perfection.
So what about sin?
Job’s perfection was not sinlessness, but was instead that he feared God and turned aside from evil, left evil undone (eschewed, KJV) and he went out of his way to do good, to do God’s will.
Job 7:21 Job asks God why God does not pardon Job’s transgressions and take away his iniquity
Job 13:23 Job asks God to show him his iniquities, sins, transgressions; he asks why God hides from him and holds him as an enemy
Job 31:33 Job said that he did not cover his transgressions, as Adam did
“transgression” also includes rebellion, trespass, sin, fault
“iniquity” also includes a depraved action, crime, sin, fault, guilt, perversity
“sin” also includes misstep, slip up
Jesus’s perfection was complete obedience to God and complete dependence on God; as a result, he was sinless, despite being tempted to take matters into his own hands
Now an interesting case study: David—First installment, after his anointing and before becoming king
Here's the case for placing David in the category of "perfect"
1 Kings 9:4 God says to Solomon, “if you will walk before me with integrity (perfection) of heart like your father David, and in uprightness do what I have commanded you, keeping my statutes and judgments, I will establish your throne. But if you quit following me, quit obeying me, and turn aside to worship other gods, Israel will be destroyed”
1 Kings 11:4 In his old age, Solomon turned away his heart after other gods (the text blames his wives), and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as was the heart of David his father
1 Kings 15:3 Abijam walked in the sins of his father Rehoboam (idolatry), and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as was the heart of David his father
1 Kings 15:14 Asa’s heart was perfect with the Lord all his days (he removed much of the idol worship, though not all); however, Asa bought a military alliance with Syria with gold and treasures from God’s house; this reliance on human help rather than on God was reprimanded by the prophet Hanani, whom he threw in jail (2 Chronicles 16); the writer of Chronicles also follows up by saying Asa went to doctors rather than the Lord for his diseased feet
2 Chronicles 25:2 Amaziah did what was right in the sight of the Lord but not with a perfect heart—he followed some of God’s laws, but he adopted the idols of Edom as his gods, despite the fact that the God of Israel gave him a military victory over Edom, and he did not repent when a prophet confronted him
The framing of David as perfect centers around his unswerving devotion to God; his heart was wholly given to God; complete, undivided attention to doing what God asked of him
How does this show up in his life after he is anointed as heir to the throne but is not yet king?
1 Samuel 16:13 Samuel anointed David in the presence of his brothers, and the Spirit of the Lord came on David from that day forward
David played his lyre for Saul to relieve his suffering from being tormented by evil spirit after the spirit of the Lord left Saul; apparently David did this somewhat anonymously
After David went out and killed Goliath, Saul discovers who his father is
Saul puts David over part of the army, and David is wildly successful at killing Philistines; the people celebrate, saying “Saul has slain his thousands, David his ten thousands” and Saul becomes angry and quits trusting David
Saul tries twice to spear David while David plays the lyre
Saul gives him a command of 1000; he is again successful, becoming beloved by the people and feared by Saul
Saul hopes David will die in battle against the Philistines; he gives David his daughter Michal in marriage, hoping this will make David a target for Philistine hostility; plus the bride price is 100 foreskins ☹; when David brings them back, Saul fears him more
Then after a battle with Philistines which David won, Saul tries again to spear him and David’s wife Michal warns him to flee for his life, which turns out to be a needed thing
Saul's son Jonathan warns David that Saul is planning to kill him again
David flees to the wilderness with about 400 (his family, everyone who was discontented, in distress, in debt, sort of like Robin Hood); he sends his parents to Moab to be safe
Saul slaughters all but one of the priests who gave David bread and the sword of Goliath; the one who escapes joins David. He has an ephod, whatever that is, and they consult it for what to do next
1 Samuel 23: David inquired of the Lord, so David and his men went and did what God said; this sort of thing happens repeatedly; the point is that David does what he is told by God to do
1 Samuel 24: This is a funny story in some ways. Saul is pursuing David in the desert, and he steps into a cave to relieve himself. In this very cave are hiding David and his merry men, who urge David to kill Saul. Instead David spares Saul’s life, only cutting off a bit of his robe to show Saul that he could have killed him. He says, "I will not touch the Lord’s anointed." This shows David's submission to God’s will and God’s timing. Unlike MacBeth, he does not let his anointing go to his head, so to speak.
David says to Saul, "May the Lord judge between us; may the Lord avenge me on you, but I will not do it for myself"; this shows David's willingness to trust God to make things right
Saul admits: you have repaid me good for evil
1 Samuel 26 David spares Saul’s life again, saying, “The Lord gave you into my hand, but I would not touch the Lord’s anointed.”
Sometime later, Saul and Jonathan die. David becomes king.
David’s prayer "Who am I? "in 2 Samuel 7 reveals him to be humble, reverent, grateful, praying according to what God has revealed.
Main thoughts about what made the anointed-but-not-yet-king David perfect in his heart: His undivided will to do what God tells him; his refusal to avenge himself when he has the opportunity to do so; his respect for God that involves not taking things into his own hands but trusting in God's sovereignty and timing
Sunday School at Newberg Friends Church
The Perfection of Humans
Remember God who gives you all pleasant things; fear God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God has said to do, what is right and good, what God tells you to do every day
When suffering comes, remember God, worship God, submit to God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God says to do
Learn from suffering to be obedient, complete the work God has given you to do
This is human perfection.
So what about sin?
Job’s perfection was not sinlessness, but was instead that he feared God and turned aside from evil, left evil undone (eschewed, KJV) and he went out of his way to do good, to do God’s will.
Job 7:21 Job asks God why God does not pardon Job’s transgressions and take away his iniquity
Job 13:23 Job asks God to show him his iniquities, sins, transgressions; he asks why God hides from him and holds him as an enemy
Job 31:33 Job said that he did not cover his transgressions, as Adam did
“transgression” also includes rebellion, trespass, sin, fault
“iniquity” also includes a depraved action, crime, sin, fault, guilt, perversity
“sin” also includes misstep, slip up
Jesus’s perfection was complete obedience to God and complete dependence on God; as a result, he was sinless, despite being tempted to take matters into his own hands
Now an interesting case study: David—First installment, after his anointing and before becoming king
Here's the case for placing David in the category of "perfect"
1 Kings 9:4 God says to Solomon, “if you will walk before me with integrity (perfection) of heart like your father David, and in uprightness do what I have commanded you, keeping my statutes and judgments, I will establish your throne. But if you quit following me, quit obeying me, and turn aside to worship other gods, Israel will be destroyed”
1 Kings 11:4 In his old age, Solomon turned away his heart after other gods (the text blames his wives), and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as was the heart of David his father
1 Kings 15:3 Abijam walked in the sins of his father Rehoboam (idolatry), and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God as was the heart of David his father
1 Kings 15:14 Asa’s heart was perfect with the Lord all his days (he removed much of the idol worship, though not all); however, Asa bought a military alliance with Syria with gold and treasures from God’s house; this reliance on human help rather than on God was reprimanded by the prophet Hanani, whom he threw in jail (2 Chronicles 16); the writer of Chronicles also follows up by saying Asa went to doctors rather than the Lord for his diseased feet
2 Chronicles 25:2 Amaziah did what was right in the sight of the Lord but not with a perfect heart—he followed some of God’s laws, but he adopted the idols of Edom as his gods, despite the fact that the God of Israel gave him a military victory over Edom, and he did not repent when a prophet confronted him
The framing of David as perfect centers around his unswerving devotion to God; his heart was wholly given to God; complete, undivided attention to doing what God asked of him
How does this show up in his life after he is anointed as heir to the throne but is not yet king?
1 Samuel 16:13 Samuel anointed David in the presence of his brothers, and the Spirit of the Lord came on David from that day forward
David played his lyre for Saul to relieve his suffering from being tormented by evil spirit after the spirit of the Lord left Saul; apparently David did this somewhat anonymously
After David went out and killed Goliath, Saul discovers who his father is
Saul puts David over part of the army, and David is wildly successful at killing Philistines; the people celebrate, saying “Saul has slain his thousands, David his ten thousands” and Saul becomes angry and quits trusting David
Saul tries twice to spear David while David plays the lyre
Saul gives him a command of 1000; he is again successful, becoming beloved by the people and feared by Saul
Saul hopes David will die in battle against the Philistines; he gives David his daughter Michal in marriage, hoping this will make David a target for Philistine hostility; plus the bride price is 100 foreskins ☹; when David brings them back, Saul fears him more
Then after a battle with Philistines which David won, Saul tries again to spear him and David’s wife Michal warns him to flee for his life, which turns out to be a needed thing
Saul's son Jonathan warns David that Saul is planning to kill him again
David flees to the wilderness with about 400 (his family, everyone who was discontented, in distress, in debt, sort of like Robin Hood); he sends his parents to Moab to be safe
Saul slaughters all but one of the priests who gave David bread and the sword of Goliath; the one who escapes joins David. He has an ephod, whatever that is, and they consult it for what to do next
1 Samuel 23: David inquired of the Lord, so David and his men went and did what God said; this sort of thing happens repeatedly; the point is that David does what he is told by God to do
1 Samuel 24: This is a funny story in some ways. Saul is pursuing David in the desert, and he steps into a cave to relieve himself. In this very cave are hiding David and his merry men, who urge David to kill Saul. Instead David spares Saul’s life, only cutting off a bit of his robe to show Saul that he could have killed him. He says, "I will not touch the Lord’s anointed." This shows David's submission to God’s will and God’s timing. Unlike MacBeth, he does not let his anointing go to his head, so to speak.
David says to Saul, "May the Lord judge between us; may the Lord avenge me on you, but I will not do it for myself"; this shows David's willingness to trust God to make things right
Saul admits: you have repaid me good for evil
1 Samuel 26 David spares Saul’s life again, saying, “The Lord gave you into my hand, but I would not touch the Lord’s anointed.”
Sometime later, Saul and Jonathan die. David becomes king.
David’s prayer "Who am I? "in 2 Samuel 7 reveals him to be humble, reverent, grateful, praying according to what God has revealed.
Main thoughts about what made the anointed-but-not-yet-king David perfect in his heart: His undivided will to do what God tells him; his refusal to avenge himself when he has the opportunity to do so; his respect for God that involves not taking things into his own hands but trusting in God's sovereignty and timing
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Perfection in Humans: What Is It?
Sunday School from May 17, 2009
Perfection in Humans: What is it?
Other meanings of the words translated “perfect” from Strong’s concordance: complete, safe, peaceful, perfect, whole, full, at peace, complete, lacking nothing in strength, beauty, sound, wholesome, ordinary, quiet, complete, morally innocent, having integrity, brought to end, finished, complete, having integrity and virtue, mature, completed, mended, equipped, put in order, made ethical, Make complete, make perfect, achieve goal
2 Chronicles 16:9 For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the entire earth, to strengthen those whose heart is true to him. (NRSV)
For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. (KJV)
1 Kings 8:61 Let your heart therefore be perfect with the LORD our God 430, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments, as at this day. (KJV)
Therefore devote yourselves completely to the Lord our God, walking in his statutes and keeping his commandments, as at this day (NRSV)
Matthew 5:48 Be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect; be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect
Luke 6:36 Be merciful as your father in heaven is merciful
Matthew 19:21 If you wish to be perfect (rich young ruler)
Luke 6:40 (blind leading blind, mote in eye)
A disciple is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully qualified will be like the teacher. (fully qualified->perfect)
Hebrews 2:10 Jesus made perfect through suffering
“It is finished”—it is completed, it is perfect
What does perfection mean with reference to Job?
Complete, lacking nothing in strength, beauty, sound, wholesome, ordinary, quiet, complete, morally innocent, having integrity
Job 1:1, 1:8, 2:3
Job blameless and upright, feared God, turned away from evil
First response to losing everything: Job 1:20-21: Then Job arose, tore his robe, shaved his head, fell on the ground, and worshiped. He said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
Second response to personal illness: Job 2:10 “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?”
Job humbly takes both good and bad as from God’s hand and worships God in his sorrow.
Job describes his life of integrity (sounds a lot like Sermon on the Mount, James, parable of the sheep and goats):
Chapter 29:12ff, 30:24ff, 31:1ff
Righteous
governed his eyes with regard to women, not adulterous
told truth, not deceitful
did not abuse the earth
did not conceal his transgressions
Just
made unrighteous people behave themselves
did not exercise his power to the harm of the powerless
responsive to complaints of slaves
did not rejoice when enemies failed
did not curse his enemies
Actively compassionate, generous
delivered the poor and the orphan who had no helper
gave to poor, shared with orphans, upheld the widow
eyes to blind, feet to lame
father to needy, championed cause of stranger (immigrant)
did not turn against the needy
wept for those whose days were hard
grieved for the poor
gave clothing to the needy, opened doors to the traveler
Nothing above God
did not trust in gold
did not worship sun or moon
God refers to him in 42 as “my servant Job” who has “spoken of me what is right” and says that he will have mercy on Job’s friends when Job prays for them, despite the fact that they said wrong things about God
Jesus—also referred to as perfect in the NT (see Hebrews reference above): what does perfect mean with reference to Jesus?
Obedience, God comes first
John 4:34 My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete (perfect) his work
John 5:36 the works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me
John 17:4 I glorified you on earth by finishing (perfecting) the work you gave me to do
John 17:23 I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one (made perfect)
John 19:28—fulfilled (perfected) the scripture; John 19:30 “It is finished” “It is perfect, it is perfected” “Perfect” “Teleo”
Hebrews 5:9
Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him
The temptation of Jesus reveals where he was perfect:
He responds to the temptations with quotations from Deuteronomy. In context, these reveal important aspects of his perfection.
Humility, dependence on God, obedience to God, focused attention on what God wants
Deuteronomy 8:2-3 Remember the long way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments. He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.
God comes first, no attempt to coerce or manipulate God, obedience to God
Deuteronomy 6:14, 16-18
Do not follow other gods because God who is present with you is a jealous God
Do not put the Lord your God to the test
You must diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God and his decrees
Do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, so that it may go well with you
God comes first, God isthe source of all
Deuteronomy 6:12-14
God gives good things you did not earn, take care you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of slavery; The Lord your God you shall fear; him you shall serve, and by his name alone you shall swear
The Perfection of Humans
Remember God who gives you all pleasant things; fear God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God has said to do, what is right and good, what God tells you to do every day
When suffering comes, remember God, worship God, submit to God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God says to do
Learn from suffering to be obedient, complete the work God has given you to do
This is human perfection
Perfection in Humans: What is it?
Other meanings of the words translated “perfect” from Strong’s concordance: complete, safe, peaceful, perfect, whole, full, at peace, complete, lacking nothing in strength, beauty, sound, wholesome, ordinary, quiet, complete, morally innocent, having integrity, brought to end, finished, complete, having integrity and virtue, mature, completed, mended, equipped, put in order, made ethical, Make complete, make perfect, achieve goal
2 Chronicles 16:9 For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the entire earth, to strengthen those whose heart is true to him. (NRSV)
For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. (KJV)
1 Kings 8:61 Let your heart therefore be perfect with the LORD our God 430, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments, as at this day. (KJV)
Therefore devote yourselves completely to the Lord our God, walking in his statutes and keeping his commandments, as at this day (NRSV)
Matthew 5:48 Be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect; be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect
Luke 6:36 Be merciful as your father in heaven is merciful
Matthew 19:21 If you wish to be perfect (rich young ruler)
Luke 6:40 (blind leading blind, mote in eye)
A disciple is not above the teacher, but everyone who is fully qualified will be like the teacher. (fully qualified->perfect)
Hebrews 2:10 Jesus made perfect through suffering
“It is finished”—it is completed, it is perfect
What does perfection mean with reference to Job?
Complete, lacking nothing in strength, beauty, sound, wholesome, ordinary, quiet, complete, morally innocent, having integrity
Job 1:1, 1:8, 2:3
Job blameless and upright, feared God, turned away from evil
First response to losing everything: Job 1:20-21: Then Job arose, tore his robe, shaved his head, fell on the ground, and worshiped. He said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
Second response to personal illness: Job 2:10 “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?”
Job humbly takes both good and bad as from God’s hand and worships God in his sorrow.
Job describes his life of integrity (sounds a lot like Sermon on the Mount, James, parable of the sheep and goats):
Chapter 29:12ff, 30:24ff, 31:1ff
Righteous
governed his eyes with regard to women, not adulterous
told truth, not deceitful
did not abuse the earth
did not conceal his transgressions
Just
made unrighteous people behave themselves
did not exercise his power to the harm of the powerless
responsive to complaints of slaves
did not rejoice when enemies failed
did not curse his enemies
Actively compassionate, generous
delivered the poor and the orphan who had no helper
gave to poor, shared with orphans, upheld the widow
eyes to blind, feet to lame
father to needy, championed cause of stranger (immigrant)
did not turn against the needy
wept for those whose days were hard
grieved for the poor
gave clothing to the needy, opened doors to the traveler
Nothing above God
did not trust in gold
did not worship sun or moon
God refers to him in 42 as “my servant Job” who has “spoken of me what is right” and says that he will have mercy on Job’s friends when Job prays for them, despite the fact that they said wrong things about God
Jesus—also referred to as perfect in the NT (see Hebrews reference above): what does perfect mean with reference to Jesus?
Obedience, God comes first
John 4:34 My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete (perfect) his work
John 5:36 the works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me
John 17:4 I glorified you on earth by finishing (perfecting) the work you gave me to do
John 17:23 I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one (made perfect)
John 19:28—fulfilled (perfected) the scripture; John 19:30 “It is finished” “It is perfect, it is perfected” “Perfect” “Teleo”
Hebrews 5:9
Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him
The temptation of Jesus reveals where he was perfect:
He responds to the temptations with quotations from Deuteronomy. In context, these reveal important aspects of his perfection.
Humility, dependence on God, obedience to God, focused attention on what God wants
Deuteronomy 8:2-3 Remember the long way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments. He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.
God comes first, no attempt to coerce or manipulate God, obedience to God
Deuteronomy 6:14, 16-18
Do not follow other gods because God who is present with you is a jealous God
Do not put the Lord your God to the test
You must diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God and his decrees
Do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, so that it may go well with you
God comes first, God isthe source of all
Deuteronomy 6:12-14
God gives good things you did not earn, take care you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of slavery; The Lord your God you shall fear; him you shall serve, and by his name alone you shall swear
The Perfection of Humans
Remember God who gives you all pleasant things; fear God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God has said to do, what is right and good, what God tells you to do every day
When suffering comes, remember God, worship God, submit to God, serve God, put nothing ahead of God, do what God says to do
Learn from suffering to be obedient, complete the work God has given you to do
This is human perfection
Thursday, May 14, 2009
God is Perfect: what does that mean
Sunday School on Perfection and Sin, May 10-June 7 2009
Week 1—What does it mean when we say that God is perfect?
What emerges is that Perfection is Mystery
These came out of class discussion and the scriptures: Deuteronomy 32, Psalm 103, Job
Aspects of God humans view as (potentially) positive:
Loving
Forgiving
Not devious
No mistakes
Complete
Beautiful
Faithful—keeps faith
Nurturing
Guiding
Guarding
Just
Healing
Redeeming
Merciful
Satisfying
Gracious
Responsive
Majestic
Redeeming
Wise
Mighty
Aspects of God humans view as (potentially) negative:
Jealous
Wants to win
Inescapable—no deliverance is possible from God
Responsible for everything
Dreadful
Irresistible
God cannot be accused by a human, is not accountable to humans
God does not immediately or necessarily set oppression right
Not deceivable
Aspects of God humans cannot really understand:
Not separated, not divided from God’s self or not self divided against self
Whole
Different from creation, different from creatures
Infinite and unending
With and in creation and creatures
Not bound by time
God creates, sustains, destroys, renews
God kills, makes alive, wounds, heals wounds
God holds in God’s hand the life of every living thing
God makes God’s self known to humans
God creates wonders, causes natural disasters
God is on the side of the oppressed
My notes from the scriptures:
Moses’s poem about God Deuteronomy 32
His work is perfect, his ways are just, a faithful God without deceit, just and upright
He is father, creator, maker, establisher
He divided the nations, fixed their boundaries
For Israel, sustained, guarded, shielded, cared for, guided (eagle and young), set up, fed, nursed,
God’s response to Israel’s idolatry: jealous, hidden from them, provoked, angry, punishing; however, God will not blot Israel out for God’s own sake because onlookers will think their gods have conquered. God will be avenged, and God’s people will be vindicated.
“There is no god beside me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; no one can deliver from my hand.”
David’s poem about God Psalm 103
Forgives, heals, redeems, crowns, satisfies, works vindication and justice for oppressed, makes God’s self known, has mercy, is gracious, is slow to anger, abounds in steadfast love, does not accuse forever, will not be angry forever, does not deal with us as our sins deserve, removes our transgressions, has fatherly compassion on us, remembers we are dust
(Psalm 104—Creator, provider, destroyer, renewer)
The Book of Job—one main theme is perfection
Job 42:7—God says, “What Job has said about me is right.” So we do well to see what Job says about God.
Job 7:17—God makes much of human beings, watches humanity
Job 9:4—God is wise in heart, mighty in strength, cannot be successfully resisted
Removes mountains, shakes the earth, prevents the sunrise, seals up the stars, stretched out heaven, trampled the sea, made the constellations, does great things beyond understanding; snatches away, who can stop him
Will not turn back his anger—he crushes me without cause; he destroys both the wicked and the blameless; he will not hold Job innocent, he is not a mortal, no one can be delivered from his hand
Job 10 God is responsible for Job’s condition
Job 12;10 In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of every human being
Wisdom, strength, counsel, understanding, sovereign, strong and wise, brings prosperity and takes it away
Job 13 Majestic, dreadful
Job 19 God will be on my side eventually, God will redeem me
Job 24 Oppression of the poor occurs, and God does not set things right
Job 28 Only God is wise; 28:23-28
In Job 38. God shows up to talk with Job. God does not answer Job’s specific questions about why Job is suffering.
Instead, what we see is that God takes pride in the creation—look at what I have made and keep making
Look at the monsters I have created—aren’t they cool
Job’s response 42: 2
God can do all things, God’s purpose cannot be thwarted
Matthew 5:48 be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect—immediate context: makes sun rise on evil and good, sends rain on righteous and unrighteous, loves those who love him, loves those who hate him
Hebrews 11:3 worlds were framed (were perfected) by the word of God
Perfection with regard to God:
God is completely God
God is complete in God’s self
God is complete in knowledge
God’s perfection includes creator, provider, destroyer, renewer
God’s perfection includes creation of monsters, free will, natural upheavals
God’s perfection includes care for humans, interest in them, and care for all creation, including prey and predator
God is above, God is within; God loves the wicked; God loves the good; God takes it badly when humans revere anything above God; God is sovereign
This is the perfection of God
Next week: the perfect human(s)
Job and Jesus
Week 1—What does it mean when we say that God is perfect?
What emerges is that Perfection is Mystery
These came out of class discussion and the scriptures: Deuteronomy 32, Psalm 103, Job
Aspects of God humans view as (potentially) positive:
Loving
Forgiving
Not devious
No mistakes
Complete
Beautiful
Faithful—keeps faith
Nurturing
Guiding
Guarding
Just
Healing
Redeeming
Merciful
Satisfying
Gracious
Responsive
Majestic
Redeeming
Wise
Mighty
Aspects of God humans view as (potentially) negative:
Jealous
Wants to win
Inescapable—no deliverance is possible from God
Responsible for everything
Dreadful
Irresistible
God cannot be accused by a human, is not accountable to humans
God does not immediately or necessarily set oppression right
Not deceivable
Aspects of God humans cannot really understand:
Not separated, not divided from God’s self or not self divided against self
Whole
Different from creation, different from creatures
Infinite and unending
With and in creation and creatures
Not bound by time
God creates, sustains, destroys, renews
God kills, makes alive, wounds, heals wounds
God holds in God’s hand the life of every living thing
God makes God’s self known to humans
God creates wonders, causes natural disasters
God is on the side of the oppressed
My notes from the scriptures:
Moses’s poem about God Deuteronomy 32
His work is perfect, his ways are just, a faithful God without deceit, just and upright
He is father, creator, maker, establisher
He divided the nations, fixed their boundaries
For Israel, sustained, guarded, shielded, cared for, guided (eagle and young), set up, fed, nursed,
God’s response to Israel’s idolatry: jealous, hidden from them, provoked, angry, punishing; however, God will not blot Israel out for God’s own sake because onlookers will think their gods have conquered. God will be avenged, and God’s people will be vindicated.
“There is no god beside me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; no one can deliver from my hand.”
David’s poem about God Psalm 103
Forgives, heals, redeems, crowns, satisfies, works vindication and justice for oppressed, makes God’s self known, has mercy, is gracious, is slow to anger, abounds in steadfast love, does not accuse forever, will not be angry forever, does not deal with us as our sins deserve, removes our transgressions, has fatherly compassion on us, remembers we are dust
(Psalm 104—Creator, provider, destroyer, renewer)
The Book of Job—one main theme is perfection
Job 42:7—God says, “What Job has said about me is right.” So we do well to see what Job says about God.
Job 7:17—God makes much of human beings, watches humanity
Job 9:4—God is wise in heart, mighty in strength, cannot be successfully resisted
Removes mountains, shakes the earth, prevents the sunrise, seals up the stars, stretched out heaven, trampled the sea, made the constellations, does great things beyond understanding; snatches away, who can stop him
Will not turn back his anger—he crushes me without cause; he destroys both the wicked and the blameless; he will not hold Job innocent, he is not a mortal, no one can be delivered from his hand
Job 10 God is responsible for Job’s condition
Job 12;10 In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of every human being
Wisdom, strength, counsel, understanding, sovereign, strong and wise, brings prosperity and takes it away
Job 13 Majestic, dreadful
Job 19 God will be on my side eventually, God will redeem me
Job 24 Oppression of the poor occurs, and God does not set things right
Job 28 Only God is wise; 28:23-28
In Job 38. God shows up to talk with Job. God does not answer Job’s specific questions about why Job is suffering.
Instead, what we see is that God takes pride in the creation—look at what I have made and keep making
Look at the monsters I have created—aren’t they cool
Job’s response 42: 2
God can do all things, God’s purpose cannot be thwarted
Matthew 5:48 be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect—immediate context: makes sun rise on evil and good, sends rain on righteous and unrighteous, loves those who love him, loves those who hate him
Hebrews 11:3 worlds were framed (were perfected) by the word of God
Perfection with regard to God:
God is completely God
God is complete in God’s self
God is complete in knowledge
God’s perfection includes creator, provider, destroyer, renewer
God’s perfection includes creation of monsters, free will, natural upheavals
God’s perfection includes care for humans, interest in them, and care for all creation, including prey and predator
God is above, God is within; God loves the wicked; God loves the good; God takes it badly when humans revere anything above God; God is sovereign
This is the perfection of God
Next week: the perfect human(s)
Job and Jesus
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