In the last 24 hours, I've become much more aware of the coming concord of the animal kingdom. We've been reading Isaiah, and the last quarter of the book treats the topic of the new creation quite extensively. The most famous reference occurs early in Isaiah and at the very end: the wolf and the lamb will lie down together without any chewing on the other, and the lion and the calf will be cool.
So the awareness I mentioned is odd. It comes from popular culture. I saw a commercial yesterday during K-State's sweet win over UCLA that had all sorts of "natural" enemies drinking from a watering hole together. It's a beautiful image. (The commercial was a failure in that I don't remember the advertiser, but at least I'm looking to find out who it was.) The other reference is in Cake's "Frank Sinatra," where they sing "the flies and spiders get along together." It's an odd choice of animals, but brilliant in its freestyle on the Isainic theme.
I eagerly anticipate the new creation, and it's fun that pop culture brings my spirit back to the idea in a moment when I'm not particularly paying attention to it.
Showing posts with label Bible; Culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bible; Culture. Show all posts
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Friday, April 9, 2010
Nerdy poetry I wrote today
Chi(li)asm
The millennium
Is it a thousand years long?
Or a metaphor?
It will probably
involve the wedding supper
of the ewe’s Offspring.
What’s all this besides
the consummation of the
kingdom to come?
A place of justice,
mercy, and love abounding;
fullest creation.
Bible images
telling of restoration,
reign of true human.
Spicy foods. Fitting
for a reception? Chili
makes me say, “Mmm-hmmmm.”
If it’s a thousand
or a thousand million years,
it will not matter.
The millennium
Is it a thousand years long?
Or a metaphor?
It will probably
involve the wedding supper
of the ewe’s Offspring.
What’s all this besides
the consummation of the
kingdom to come?
A place of justice,
mercy, and love abounding;
fullest creation.
Bible images
telling of restoration,
reign of true human.
Spicy foods. Fitting
for a reception? Chili
makes me say, “Mmm-hmmmm.”
If it’s a thousand
or a thousand million years,
it will not matter.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
A prophet or dreamer
As we were reading in Deuteronomy tonight, the Pharisees reaction to Jesus that we commemorate this week came into sharp relief. And it made sense.
These days, we have the benefit of never having watched an animal larger than a squirrel be killed (by a car, for instance), let alone killing the animal ourselves. We lead a very sanitized existence, and we're not trying to fit our unruly selves into a community with rather strict, and very serious standards. To the Hebrews, taking the life of an animal meant something. The Law meant something. And I only use the sacrifice picture to illustrate the bigger idea of the Law. The Sabbath was important. Somehow Jubilee seems to have been edited out of the larger consciousness of the Jewish nation, but let's be reasonable. So when Jesus came along and said people didn't need to keep the Sabbath the way they always did, the Pharisees flipped. Were they overreacting? I don't think so.
From Deuteronomy, about 1/3 of the way through:
"If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a sign or wonder, and if the sign or wonder spoken of takes place, and the prophet says, “Let us follow other gods” (gods you have not known) “and let us worship them,” you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. That prophet or dreamer must be put to death for inciting rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery. That prophet or dreamer tried to turn you from the way the LORD your God commanded you to follow. You must purge the evil from among you" (TNIV).
Granted, Jesus didn't say, "Worship this idol." But he might as well have. He was performing signs and telling the people to not follow the religion they had been taught. I now have a bit more sympathy for the Pharisees. Despite the wrong way they went about it (asking the Romans to execute justice, saying "We have no king but Caesar," thereby running as far from their God as possible), they were trying to purge the evil from among them.
This is another instance where the spotlight is turned right back on my heart. How often do I think I see things perfectly clearly, only to be shown that I only know about 58 percent of what's going on? I see the action that's necessary, and I run after it, never stopping to ask if God's trying to do something different. Yep, I'm the Pharisee. God forgive me.
These days, we have the benefit of never having watched an animal larger than a squirrel be killed (by a car, for instance), let alone killing the animal ourselves. We lead a very sanitized existence, and we're not trying to fit our unruly selves into a community with rather strict, and very serious standards. To the Hebrews, taking the life of an animal meant something. The Law meant something. And I only use the sacrifice picture to illustrate the bigger idea of the Law. The Sabbath was important. Somehow Jubilee seems to have been edited out of the larger consciousness of the Jewish nation, but let's be reasonable. So when Jesus came along and said people didn't need to keep the Sabbath the way they always did, the Pharisees flipped. Were they overreacting? I don't think so.
From Deuteronomy, about 1/3 of the way through:
"If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a sign or wonder, and if the sign or wonder spoken of takes place, and the prophet says, “Let us follow other gods” (gods you have not known) “and let us worship them,” you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him. That prophet or dreamer must be put to death for inciting rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery. That prophet or dreamer tried to turn you from the way the LORD your God commanded you to follow. You must purge the evil from among you" (TNIV).
Granted, Jesus didn't say, "Worship this idol." But he might as well have. He was performing signs and telling the people to not follow the religion they had been taught. I now have a bit more sympathy for the Pharisees. Despite the wrong way they went about it (asking the Romans to execute justice, saying "We have no king but Caesar," thereby running as far from their God as possible), they were trying to purge the evil from among them.
This is another instance where the spotlight is turned right back on my heart. How often do I think I see things perfectly clearly, only to be shown that I only know about 58 percent of what's going on? I see the action that's necessary, and I run after it, never stopping to ask if God's trying to do something different. Yep, I'm the Pharisee. God forgive me.
Life verses
For a few years now, my life verse part has been Numbers 21:16a: "From there they continued on to Beer" (all references TNIV).
As I was reading Torah at our baby's bedtime feeding tonight, I found a verse that means almost as much to me. Deuteronomy 12:20: "When the LORD your God has enlarged your territory as he promised you, and you crave meat and say, 'I would like some meat,' then you may eat as much of it as you want." AMEN!
I see my life like this. I say to a friend or a relative, "I would like some meat." We eat as much as we want. Then we continue on to beer. And my territory has been enlarged, to boot.
*DISCLAIMER*
Of course, I don't encourage misusing God's word this way. I think my three readers know this. But if you're just happening by, I encourage more and better Bible reading. Read large portions, such as whole books. Understand the historical context. Find yourself in God's great, big story of creation, uncreation, and recreation. And try my favorite beer, New Belgium's 1554. Wow, it's good.
As I was reading Torah at our baby's bedtime feeding tonight, I found a verse that means almost as much to me. Deuteronomy 12:20: "When the LORD your God has enlarged your territory as he promised you, and you crave meat and say, 'I would like some meat,' then you may eat as much of it as you want." AMEN!
I see my life like this. I say to a friend or a relative, "I would like some meat." We eat as much as we want. Then we continue on to beer. And my territory has been enlarged, to boot.
*DISCLAIMER*
Of course, I don't encourage misusing God's word this way. I think my three readers know this. But if you're just happening by, I encourage more and better Bible reading. Read large portions, such as whole books. Understand the historical context. Find yourself in God's great, big story of creation, uncreation, and recreation. And try my favorite beer, New Belgium's 1554. Wow, it's good.
Friday, March 26, 2010
The End
I'm having an immensely productive afternoon (for a Friday, no less!) listening to Eef Barzelay, formerly of Clem Snide. My friend Paul will tell you that both artists/groups are incredibly depressing, and that you should have at least three means of slitting your wrists handy so that after you bleed out, you can continue the process. The music is that depressing. (I'm sorry; I do know how serious both depression and suicide are, and I don't intend to make light of them. Rhetorical point.)
Oddly, if I'm really in a funk, I put this most depressing of music on, and I am energized in a way that almost nothing else provides.
In Barzelay's "Songs for Batya" he says, "Death is just the moment when the dying ends." In a real sense, this is true. The inexorable process of decay (whether of the telomeres or other systems) meets a point when there is no longer sensation of decay. Then the corpse really begins to decay.
Theologically, however, I believe the dying continues. Death, as in the moment, isn't a digital 1 or 0. After the Fall, death = 1. It's always on. It suffuses the creation, and even for the disembodied spirit resting, waiting in the presence of God, death is a very present reality. The spirit has no body for [not] God's sake!
But if there is any hope whatsoever, it is looking forward to the time when death = 0. The zero point is the resurrection. When all things become new, death is off. It can no longer impact God's good, new creation. We do see that for Jesus, death = 0, and through the Spirit, we can begin to experience a sort of brownout of death. But it's obviously still present, arcing across the circuit gate so 1 > death > 0. But for the fullness of creation to be present, death must die completely.
A better line, and perhaps one to poke into your consciousness as Holy Week approaches, is "Resurrection is the moment when the dying ends!" Thanks be to God.
Oddly, if I'm really in a funk, I put this most depressing of music on, and I am energized in a way that almost nothing else provides.
In Barzelay's "Songs for Batya" he says, "Death is just the moment when the dying ends." In a real sense, this is true. The inexorable process of decay (whether of the telomeres or other systems) meets a point when there is no longer sensation of decay. Then the corpse really begins to decay.
Theologically, however, I believe the dying continues. Death, as in the moment, isn't a digital 1 or 0. After the Fall, death = 1. It's always on. It suffuses the creation, and even for the disembodied spirit resting, waiting in the presence of God, death is a very present reality. The spirit has no body for [not] God's sake!
But if there is any hope whatsoever, it is looking forward to the time when death = 0. The zero point is the resurrection. When all things become new, death is off. It can no longer impact God's good, new creation. We do see that for Jesus, death = 0, and through the Spirit, we can begin to experience a sort of brownout of death. But it's obviously still present, arcing across the circuit gate so 1 > death > 0. But for the fullness of creation to be present, death must die completely.
A better line, and perhaps one to poke into your consciousness as Holy Week approaches, is "Resurrection is the moment when the dying ends!" Thanks be to God.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Diapers
I realized a couple of weeks ago that changing diapers is a sacrament, or it's at least sacramental. In the Middle Ages there were big discussions about what constituted a sacrament, and some listed up to thirty-five sacraments. I'm not sure if changing diapers was one of them.
There's something about taking part in something so mundane and repetitive that makes me think of the major Protestant sacraments involving bread and wine and water. We all take food and water regularly to survive. As a natural consequence, we also poop. Praise the Lord for potty-training, but short of that, something needs to be done to help our baby survive. On a long enough timeline, an unchanged diaper is dangerous, just like lack of food and water.
If water is sacramental symbolizing our need for spiritual cleansing, and if bread and wine is symbolic pointing to our need for spiritual nourishment from God, I think changing a diaper symbolizes interminably repetitive service in the midst of the crap of life. These physical acts are necessary to physical survival, but they also mediate a spiritual realization of our utter dependence on God and one another.
Perhaps as I continue in the faithfulness of diaper changing, my bold assertion about how we should serve others will truly sink in.
There's something about taking part in something so mundane and repetitive that makes me think of the major Protestant sacraments involving bread and wine and water. We all take food and water regularly to survive. As a natural consequence, we also poop. Praise the Lord for potty-training, but short of that, something needs to be done to help our baby survive. On a long enough timeline, an unchanged diaper is dangerous, just like lack of food and water.
If water is sacramental symbolizing our need for spiritual cleansing, and if bread and wine is symbolic pointing to our need for spiritual nourishment from God, I think changing a diaper symbolizes interminably repetitive service in the midst of the crap of life. These physical acts are necessary to physical survival, but they also mediate a spiritual realization of our utter dependence on God and one another.
Perhaps as I continue in the faithfulness of diaper changing, my bold assertion about how we should serve others will truly sink in.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Sin
Posted as a comment on a friend's blog, but I thought it was a blog post in itself:
Yeah, I'm a sinner. My recent definition of sin is (although I think I shared it with your crew already) "grasping for control beyond the gifts, grace, and sphere of influence given one by God." We are never meant to be able to control how people feel (that nails me as a codependent) or if we've hired them to work for us because they're capable people, we shouldn't control how they work. Direction? Yes. Doing their job for them? Sin. Yes, micromanagement is a sin. It dehumanizes a person to tell them you trust them to create cultural goods, whether hamburgers or products or processes, but then to override their gifts and creativity. Control is at the heart of all that's called sin. Idolatry is saying, "I'll trust you to bring me what I need, but I'll tell you what to bring me." No trust. Only control.
This makes me call most of the "saints" around me sinners, recognizing that we have a whole lot in common.
Yeah, I'm a sinner. My recent definition of sin is (although I think I shared it with your crew already) "grasping for control beyond the gifts, grace, and sphere of influence given one by God." We are never meant to be able to control how people feel (that nails me as a codependent) or if we've hired them to work for us because they're capable people, we shouldn't control how they work. Direction? Yes. Doing their job for them? Sin. Yes, micromanagement is a sin. It dehumanizes a person to tell them you trust them to create cultural goods, whether hamburgers or products or processes, but then to override their gifts and creativity. Control is at the heart of all that's called sin. Idolatry is saying, "I'll trust you to bring me what I need, but I'll tell you what to bring me." No trust. Only control.
This makes me call most of the "saints" around me sinners, recognizing that we have a whole lot in common.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Heritage and seriousness
As I was working on a project where I happened to skim through the book of Ruth, I caught the phrase "Naomi has a son!"
A flood of thoughts crashed through my mind. One is remembering what Ruth did to Boaz to get her way. (He enjoyed it.) Since when is uncovering Boaz's feet (or more to the point, outright seducing him, which is what she actually did) appropriate for God's holy people? Never mind that Ruth was a foreigner. I think the evangelical/fundamentalist church needs to reconsider its pharisaism. The Bible is not "safe for the whole family"! (That's a marketing claim of a local Christian radio station. Ugh.)
Anyway, that wasn't my point. I'm curious about the human drive for heritage. Naomi was pretty bent out of shape because she didn't have a son, and that's why when Ruth bore Obed, all the women celebrated for Naomi. It's perfectly appropriate in my mind to be bent out of shape about losing your husband and two sons, but there's a deeper drive that sought male heirs in ancient near eastern culture. To the Jewish people, if one didn't have a male heir, they were a persona non grata.
What is it that makes us take ourselves so seriously? One could talk about evolutionary drives or God-given instinct to procreate. But why does it become enshrined in social/moral/religious categories? I'm coming from my own cultural context that would be absolutely unthinkable to other cultures. But I find it fascinating that in order to be a person (at least in Naomi's day), one must have a son.
I myself would enjoy having children someday, but it's more because I want to provide a good example of humanity by shaping a wee one from their earliest days. I have absolutely no drive to pass on my genetics. Maybe that's because I'm a diabetic, and I don't want to burden someone else with that.
I guess my question in this is whether my perspective is totally skewed, or whether there's something I should learn from people in the Bible (or even today) who obsess over having their own offspring. (And don't get me wrong: I hurt for people who feel called to have children, but are unable.) Thoughts?
A flood of thoughts crashed through my mind. One is remembering what Ruth did to Boaz to get her way. (He enjoyed it.) Since when is uncovering Boaz's feet (or more to the point, outright seducing him, which is what she actually did) appropriate for God's holy people? Never mind that Ruth was a foreigner. I think the evangelical/fundamentalist church needs to reconsider its pharisaism. The Bible is not "safe for the whole family"! (That's a marketing claim of a local Christian radio station. Ugh.)
Anyway, that wasn't my point. I'm curious about the human drive for heritage. Naomi was pretty bent out of shape because she didn't have a son, and that's why when Ruth bore Obed, all the women celebrated for Naomi. It's perfectly appropriate in my mind to be bent out of shape about losing your husband and two sons, but there's a deeper drive that sought male heirs in ancient near eastern culture. To the Jewish people, if one didn't have a male heir, they were a persona non grata.
What is it that makes us take ourselves so seriously? One could talk about evolutionary drives or God-given instinct to procreate. But why does it become enshrined in social/moral/religious categories? I'm coming from my own cultural context that would be absolutely unthinkable to other cultures. But I find it fascinating that in order to be a person (at least in Naomi's day), one must have a son.
I myself would enjoy having children someday, but it's more because I want to provide a good example of humanity by shaping a wee one from their earliest days. I have absolutely no drive to pass on my genetics. Maybe that's because I'm a diabetic, and I don't want to burden someone else with that.
I guess my question in this is whether my perspective is totally skewed, or whether there's something I should learn from people in the Bible (or even today) who obsess over having their own offspring. (And don't get me wrong: I hurt for people who feel called to have children, but are unable.) Thoughts?
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