ShadeTree Community Church: Recent Episodes
Larry Pozza
The dragon represents both physical and spiritual threats that God will conquer. Biblical dragons oppose God’s rule and threaten humanity with death and destruction. Through these dragons, the writers reinforce the message of God’s ultimate triumph over sin, destruction, and the forces of evil.
Exploring Infinity: from everlasting to everlasting (Psalm 90:1)
Exploring Mystery: in the beginning God (Genesis 1:1)
Exploring Cosmology: time, space, mass, energy
Exploring theology: perpetual light (1 John 1:5), love (1 John 4:8) and spirit (John 4:24)
Mystery, Cosmology and Theology
Video mentioned in the message can be found here.
https://www.gracepointe.net/blog/2019/4/2/sara-cunningham-and-liz-dyer-march-31st-2019
The Nature and Source of Community Wisdom
• The main body of James is introduced by a vision of life amid tribulation and difficulties.
• Central to this vision is the routine experience of “trials of any kind” (1:2).
• These experiences test our faith in God (1:3).
• Joy is still possible when considered against the horizon of the coming age when human existence will be mature and complete (1:4).
• But hardship will often test the maturity of other believers who are unstable in every way (1:8).
• The community of believers enjoy heavenly support through the provision of wisdom.
• God is to be petitioned for the necessary wisdom to pass through the trials and temptations of life (1:5)
• Rather than doubting God’s goodness (1:6-8) or being deceived by believing God is responsible for one’s misfortune (1:16), the community is to petition God who will invariably respond with every perfect gift (1:17).
• The perfect gift is the word of truth (1:18) as the needed wisdom necessary for a complete life.
• By having the proper attitude and asking God for wisdom, we are able to endure the trials of life, which are designed to bring us to maturity.
The Text in Context
• Given that a primary goal is to help the readers to be mature, it is not surprising that James begins by discussing endurance through trials.
• The idea of becoming mature through suffering is a common theme in the New Testament:
• Romans 5:3-4; 8:17-18;
• 2 Corinthians 4:7-18
• Philippians 3:7-11
• 1 Peter 1:3-9
• James also introduces in this section other themes he will return to:
• True faith (ch. 2)
• Wisdom (ch. 3)
• Poverty and wealth (ch. 5)
James 1:2-12
• This section is seen through the lens of five major imperatives (commands)
• Consider it pure joy when you face trials (1:2)
• Let perseverance finish its work (1:4)
• Ask God for wisdom (1:5-6)
• Do not expect to receive if you doubt (1:7)
• Take pride in your high position (1:10)
Consider it pure joy
• The word “consider” has the notion of making a deliberate, conscious, and rational choice (see 2 Cor. 9:5; Phil. 2:6; 3:7-8; Heb. 11:26).
• It is not intuitive that trials should cause joy, so James asks the readers to make a deliberate effort to set aside their natural inclinations of fear, discouragement, and anger and choose to include joy.
• The word for trials can include trials, tribulation, trouble, or temptation.
• Trials and tribulations come from without.
• Trouble and temptations come from within.
• Perspective comes from perceiving the outcome of the trials.
• There is something of inestimable value now
• There are benefits in the future too
Let perseverance finish its work
• The word for “mature” can also be translated “without defect.”
• This is not the idea of sinlessness or perfection.
• Many people assume that maturity is having no doubts because of what comes in the next few verses.
• The theme is faith and how it reaches perfection (maturity) through deeds of faith like those of Abraham and Rahab (2:20-25), through the endurance of faith like Job (5:10-11) and through prayer like Elijah (5:17-18).
• In the Greco-Roman world it was something of a commonplace that testing of virtue strengthens character.
• James, however, speaks not of the virtue of an individual but a community’s faith.
• Endurance is not placed solely on an individual but by grace given in the community.
Ask God for wisdom
• The word “lacks” picks up the mention of “lacking” in 1:4, and so in this context 1:5 instructs the reader to ask God for wisdom for dealing with the trials of life, something that even the most mature still need.
• What kind of wisdom does James have in mind?
• James is writing to those he calls the diaspora. He uses examples from the Old Testament.
• The first place to look for God’s wisdom is in the stories of people in the Old Testament.
• Many OT characters inquire of God’s guidance:
• Rebekah asking God why her pregnancy is so difficult (Gen. 25:22)
• David wanting to know what caused the famine (2 Samuel 21:1)
• Jeroboam needing wisdom about whether or not his son will live (1 Kings 14:2-3)
• Perhaps James is thinking of his brother in the garden of Gethsemane (Matt. 26:36-46).
• Perhaps he is thinking of the healing needed between the Jews and Gentiles in the early church.
• God loves to give wisdom without finding fault
The wisdom of James
• James is describing wisdom as embodied within a community.
• The theme of wisdom emerged from the sages of ancient Israel who sought to educate the public about the rules to follow for a well lived life.
• The Hebrew word for wisdom, hokma, reflects a God given gift to pursue the insight and know how needed to negotiate life in the public square (think of Solomon’s request for wisdom to govern well).
• The prologue of Proverbs (1:2-7) supplies a description of wisdom.
• James picks up on the core themes of wisdom (righteousness, faithfulness, knowledge, and devotion to God).
• If God is trusted as a generous and impartial benefactor (1:5), believers will petition God for the know-how they lack in order to deal with their trials in a wise manner.
Do not expect to receive if you doubt
• Is James demanding certainty-seeking faith?
• Is James talking about faith or the request for wisdom?
• Is doubt here being portrayed as the antithesis of believing?
• Must believers be fully persuaded that God will answer every request for wisdom?
• Are believers supposed to squelch all doubt?
• Does this make faith primarily about intellectual assent?
• Is faith primarily about something between the ears?
• If faith is primarily a psychological concept, is faith only as strong as you are certain?
• How certain do you have to be? 100%, 80%, 50%?
Twisted Scripture?
• This passage can be used to convince others that the more faith (certainty), the more prosperity.
• Levels of faith determine levels of blessing in this theological construct.
• Is this an accurate portrait of God and the way he arranges the world?
• Is God in heaven holding out an answer to prayer until we have enough certainty?
• If so, are people like dogs that owners demand to “shake” before they get a treat.
• If so, why is psychological certainty such a virtue? Why would God leverage everything?
• Why is the deck stacked against rationale and logic?
• Is this the kind of portrait of the character of God as found in Jesus?
Consequences of this interpretation
• It can cause people to have a learning phobia.
• If everything hangs on psychological certainty, you want to avoid everything that could cause doubt.
• Reading and learning from other perspectives than the one you already hold is seen as dangerous.
• This interpretation sets people up for a fall.
• It does not prepare a person for life in the real world.
• The real world has a mix of simplicity, complexity, perplexity, and humility.
• This interpretation causes people to be locked into simplicity.
• Certainty seeking can become idolatrous.
• God no longer becomes the source of life but being right does.
• People will try to protect their idol at all costs.
Keep in mind the context
• James is talking about wisdom, not about faith asking for a new house or a Mercedes.
• The word for doubt here is diakrino which can mean to separate, distinguish, or judge.
• You have a duplicity of ideas, and you are wavering.
• In James, there is a concern for where you go to get wisdom.
• He distinguishes in chapter 3, between wisdom that comes from above, that is pure, peace-loving, and considerate and there is a wisdom that is not spiritual that leads to division and destruction.
• James says to go to the source of wisdom that comes from above. Don’t mismatch human and divine wisdom.
Introduction to James (1:1)
• The Letter of James presents a multifaceted picture of the way wisdom walks.
• Those who follow the path of wisdom is one who demonstrates their faith through actions.
• James is widely prized because its teachings is so practical.
• James has some affinities to the Wisdom literature in the Old Testament, like Proverbs.
• Despite the emphasis on practical matters (or maybe because of it), James makes significant theological contributions that sometimes puts him in contrast to the writings of Paul.
• This contrast is so sharp that Martin Luther wanted the letter banned from the NT.
• Most readers though reached a position that Paul and James complement each other.
Author (1:1)
• The author identifies himself as James.
• Four men in the New Testament have this name.
• The author of this letter could not have been the apostle James (see Matt. 4:21), who died too early (AD 44) to have written it.
• The other two men named James had neither the stature not the influence of this writer.
• Most probably is James the brother of Jesus.
• Here are a few reasons:
• James was one of the select individuals who saw the resurrect Christ (1 Cor. 15:7)
• Paul called him a “pillar” of the church (Gal. 2:9)
• Paul, on his first post conversion visit to Jerusalem, saw James (Gal. 1:19)
• Paul did the same on his last visit (Acts 21:18)
• When Peter was released from prison, he told his friends to tell James (Acts 12:17)
• James was a leader in the Jerusalem council (Acts 15:13)
• Jude could identify himself simply as the brother of James (Jude 1:1), so well-known was James.
• James was martyred in AD 62, an event recorded by the Jewish historian Josephus (Antiquities 20.9.1)
Date
• It seems as if it is written before 50 AD
• Its distinctively Jewish nature suggests that it was composed when the church was still predominantly Jewish.
• It reflects a simple church order – officers of the church were called elders (5:14) and teachers (3:1).
• No reference is made to the controversy over Gentile circumcision.
• The Greek term synagoge (“synagogue” or “meeting”) is used to designate the meeting or meeting place of the church (2:2)
James as Wisdom Writing
• James is a form of moral exhortation.
• James seeks to persuade the readers to live up to the profession they have made in Jesus Christ.
• As a moral exhortation (there are 59 imperatives in its 108 verses), James can be compared to other ancient writers whose concern is the practical wisdom of right behavior.
• As a kind of wisdom literature, James naturally bears a certain resemblance to the wide range of wisdom writings that were produced in the Ancient Near East.
• James most resembles certain Jewish writings that shared its commitment to the world of Torah.
• The structure of James’s moral discourse is difficult to determine with precision (like Proverbs).
Where did James get his wisdom?
• James and Jude grew up with Jesus (Matt. 13:54-57; Mark 6:2-3).
• The Jewishness of these brothers suggest they learned and upheld the teaching of their Jewish heritage.
• Jesus was a part of a sizable family (four brothers and two sisters).
• The boys were given names rooted in the Jewish tradition (James is a form of Jacob).
• In the ministry of Jesus, the brothers learn that kinship is defined in terms of a shared commitment to the rule of God *Mark 3:31-35; Matt. 12:46-50; Luke 8:19-21).
• The ethical undertone of the letter resonates with Jesus’ teaching especially in the Sermon on the Mount.
• Genuine faith demonstrates itself in good deeds.
James in the Emerging Movement
• Following the death and resurrection of Jesus, James, Mary, and others are found in the company of the eleven disciples (Acts 1:14).
• Within a short span, James emerges as the leader of the Jerusalem Church (Acts 1:14).
• This is not based on biological kinship but seeing the risen Lord (1 Cor. 15:7).
• The resurrection changed everything. Jesus appeared to James before he ascended, and James received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost along with the others.
• Now he saw Jesus in a new light. Not just the elder brother but the one sent by God.
• The leadership position James held in the Jerusalem Church could account for his authoritative manner in writing and demands upon Gentile converts (Acts 15:13-17).
Circumstances of Composition
• The circumstances of the letter are difficult to determine.
• James is writing to the twelve tribes scattered among the nations (1:1).
• Though many see this as a literal reference to Jewish Christians, it may refer to Jewish and Gentle Christians following the emerging movement throughout the Roman Empire.
• It would be unlikely that James would dingle out Jewish believers in light of the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15).
• This address is symbolic of a religious location in which “twelve tribes” are believers whose spiritual “dispersion” (diaspora) within a hostile world unsettles their faith and tests their allegiance to God.
• James proffers wisdom that will help secure this community’s embattled faith.
Vulnerable Courage
± While the pain in our lives shapes us, it doesn’t have to define us.
° As difficult as they are, pain and suffering help us grow into our God-given belovedness.
° If we can come to a place where we realize how loved we are, we will be able to step into the challenges of life with courage.
± Jesus shows us what it is like to step into hurt with a core identity saturated with the love of God.
° Unknowable love, unknowable power describes itself as the most vulnerable in the person of Jesus.
° This is most reflected in the incarnation of Jesus.
Beautiful Vulnerability
± Each of us is born into a complex system of choices and circumstances.
° Pain starts at birth, before we have any power to take care of ourselves.
° Jesus is born into a complex set of circumstances.
± Mary strengthen coupled with Joseph’s steadfast support led to the safe delivery and rearing of our savior.
° Jesus entered our world vulnerably, via a process that doesn't always end positively after nine months and matured into the great teacher from Nazareth.
° God became human in every single way possible.
° Almighty God took upon himself vulnerability (or insecurity).
Vulnerability Involves Insecurity
± The Apostle Paul describes his insecurity in his life in 2 Corinthians 11:21-12:10.
° Even though so many of us act as if we're invincible, it's when we embrace the radical vulnerability of simply being human that we find ourselves in power to become more like Jesus.
° He can't teach us to be strong until we know how weak we really are.
A Subversive Birthday
± Weakness isn't something we naturally attribute to strength.
° That goes against the grain of common experience, which is perhaps one of the reasons the message of Jesus is so compelling.
° Christmas is the birth announcement of a humble King, who beckons us to reorient our lives toward sacrificially loving humanity well.
° Jesus offers us a life to be lived for the flourishing of others.
± There are multiple levels of meaning in the incarnation story.
° Luke 2:1-7
± Not only does the mention of Caesar Augustus serve as an important time stamp for the birth of Jesus, but this earthly emperor frames the entire story.
± End of the world's system of power and pain and struggle, a baby is about to be born.
± What is the message hidden in Christ’s manger? Power is not what you think it is.
Christ and Caesar Contrasted
± Caesar embodies the idea of power.
° Caesar Augustus was the great nephew of Julius Caesar.
° Do you want a war in 31 BCE and eventually became the sole ruler of the Roman Empire.
° By ending war through victory, he was hailed as a peacemaker.
± Coins and inscriptions declared him to be the son of God.
± By 27 BCE a new name was bestowed upon him: Augustus which means “venerable one”.
± His military might brought a state of general prosperity to Roman citizens and a subjugation of conquered nations that became part of the Roman Empire.
° But the good news of Caesar Augustus was only good news for the elite.
± Christ comes as a random baby born in a marginal town like Bethlehem.
° god's kingdom didn't enter at the centers of power and wealth But at the margins of insecurity.
° Jesus had no interest in the sort of power celebrated by the Romans.
° Instead, he humbly became human among the marginalized an embrace vulnerability, not just in how he was born but throughout his life, teachings, death, and resurrection.
± Jesus started with insecure communities to model the power of vulnerability.
° Caesar Augustus wanted everyone to know just what a big deal he was.
° Jesus was born in vulnerable conditions, to be reared by vulnerable parents.
° A Bethlehem birth shows us that the world's true King turns the idea of rulership upside down.
Jesus Embraced Vulnerability to Unite with the Vulnerable
± In theory, God can do what he wants, but if God governs the world with real choices and actual possibilities, then there are times when God cannot get in the way of suffering.
° We this hinted at in the life of Jesus.
° If Jesus wanted to, he could have leaned into his divinity and never failed at a miracle.
° However, when he visited Nazareth, Mark 6:5 suggests there were limitations because of the response of the people.
± God’s resources are infinite, but God chooses not to coerce human free will.
Jesus in the Desert (Luke 4:1-13)
± Because of Jesus’s encounter with the identity-shaping love of God, he stepped into the next moment after his baptism. He meets forty days in the desert with the power to persevere.
° His experience of the Father’s love prepared him for forty days of fasting and feeding on God’s loving presence.
° Dallas Willard once wrote, “The ‘wilderness’, the place of solitude and deprivation, was actually the place of strength and strengthening for our Lord.” (Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives, p. 101-102.)
± The desert is where Jesus is strong.
° Jesus shows us that it’s entirely possible to step into scarce circumstances and overcome them with abundance.
° Each time Jesus is tempted, Jesus appealed to the provision of God.
Lie # 1: You Don’t Have Enough Bread
± Jesus is tempted to turn rock into bread. This is a disoriented relationship with creation.
° The accuser tried to get Jesus to fall into the trap of having a disoriented sense of self.
° This fast wasn’t a move of piety.
± Jesus sought to identify with the poor and hungry people living under Roman occupation.
± Jesus refused to exploit creation to make his situation more convenient.
± During this trial in his life, Jesus knew who he was because he knew whose he was.
Lie # 2: You Don’t Have Enough Power
± This lie disrupts shalom since it offers a disoriented relationship to other people.
± This all-powerful God flexes His strength by serving others and modeling sacrificial love.
Lie # 3: You Don’t Have Enough Security
± This lie reflects the disruption of shalom by offering a disorientated relationship to God.
± Jesus interprets the devil’s invitation as an encouragement to question God’s faithfulness.
Why Suffering?
± Why God, why?
° This may be the most repeated prayer in history.
° Most people have said it at one point or another.
± In the world there is a lot of suffering causing us to wonder if God is in control.
° There are no easy or simple answers to the problem of evil and the suffering it produces.
° Life will send you suffering, but God can help through his own woundedness.
Decisions Play a Role
± Each day you make approximately 35,000 decisions.
° Most are micro choices that lead to bigger decisions.
° This complexity is multiplied by the amount of people in the world.
± A round estimate is 7.8 billion making 35,000 choices.
± That adds up to 273 trillion decisions each day.
± This complexity of human choice, as we know from experience and observation, leads to beauty and death each day.
° Many of the pains in our lives is a result of this web of free will.
° How do we live with faith and hope in a world where life is just a few bad choices away.
But Why?
± We understand that decisions play a part, but there is a depth to this topic that defies simplistic answers.
° It is human nature to speculate that if bad things happen to people, it is because they have done something wrong and are being punished.
° In Luke 13:1-5 Jesus discusses suffering that is caused humans and other tragedies that occurs naturally or accidentally.
± The Galileans Pilate murdered were not more terrible people than others.
± The 18 people who died when the tower collapsed were not more guilty than other citizens.
± Jesus said that suffering happens, and it isn’t because the victims did good or bad things.
° Jesus does use the occasion to call the people to repent from these common assumptions.
Assumption 1: God Controls Everything That Happens
± To say that God is in control raises questions about how God rules in the world.
° What is the nature of divine control?
° Does God control even evil things that happen?
± God could be in complete control if he wanted to be, but apparently God didn't set up the world that way.
° Nothing suggests God is orchestrating all 263 trillion decisions a day.
° If free will is real, often conditioned by circumstances and cultural realities, these decisions are not controlled by God.
± If our choices are truly free, then the future has some flexibility baked into it.
° The outcome of certain choices do not yet exist because they are conditioned on human choice.
Assumption 2: Suffering is a Part of God’s Will
± Some Christians believe that suffering is part of God’s will and plan for the world.
° In Calvinistic theology divine sovereignty is exalted over everything else which means suffering somehow (even if mysteriously) points to God’s glory.
° In Arminian theology there is the belief of God’s limited control over the world and therefore suffering is inevitable.
± Free will and God’s foreknowledge play into the scenario.
° Evil grieves God, but God is committed to a world that is truly free.
° God never makes evil happen, He is actively working in real time, to prevent evil without overriding our free will.
Assumption 3: God Can Always Intervene
± In theory, God can do what he wants, but if God governs the world with real choices and actual possibilities, then there are times when God cannot get in the way of suffering.
° We this hinted at in the life of Jesus.
° If Jesus wanted to, he could have leaned into his divinity and never failed at a miracle.
° However, when he visited Nazareth, Mark 6:5 suggests there were limitations because of the response of the people.
± God’s resources are infinite, but God chooses not to coerce human free will.
Suffering Can Make Us Human, Like Jesus
± We know that pain is real and doesn’t magically go away.
° We know that our choices stem from a web of free that will contribute to systems that oppress some and elevate others.
° We also know that God is love. (1 John 4:16).
± This love is enfleshed in Christ.
± It is this love in which we are invited to dwell and to have dwell in us.
± God meets us in time and space, in our space of anguish.
° When we hurt, God hurts with us.
° God borrows the context of that hurt, without causing it, to redeem something from it, if possible.
God Doesn’t Always Make Sense
± Genesis through Nehemiah tells a story of Israel that is black and white deterministic theology (obey = blessing, disobey = cursing – Deuteronomy 28-32).
± For the Psalms and wisdom literature, life isn’t black and white. Life is messy, unpredictable, and often makes no sense.
° These books take issue with the story line and its morals. In fact, they interrogate the black and white script.
± Job loses everything he has except his life. The script (e.g., Deuteronomy) says that such calamities are by God’s hand, a response to disobedience. Yet we learn from Job that this is not the case.
± Ecclesiastes questions the “world order” God has made: nothing we do matters, since we all die and are driven to the point of madness at the thought of our futile existence.
± A number of psalms lament God’s absence in the world. Like Psalm 73–where the author can’t get his head around how a just God can allow the wicked to prosper.
± Or Psalm 89–where God is in effect called a liar for promising that one of King David’s descendants would always be on the throne in Jerusalem and then allowing the Babylonians to kill off the last of David’s royal line and take the people captive.
± At the end of the day, the human thought process can only get you so far when it comes to God.
Three Possible Postures
± Jesus, you fix it because I can’t.
± Jesus, join me in my suffering because I need you.
± Jesus, I want to experience your pain, which includes mine and the suffering of others.
To Lament is Human
± Jesus lamented – even wept (John 11:35).
° Lament is a liturgical response to the reality of suffering and engages God in the context of pain and trouble.
± We need an outlet that allows us to offer our pain to God.
° See the book of Lamentations
° See Psalm 137
Human … Like Jesus?
± “I’m only human”.
° We say this to comfort ourselves when we have failed at something, hurt someone or experienced challenging circumstances.
° It might come out as a sort of apology or an expression of exasperation.
± Rather than an anthem of resignation, what if it is an expression of recognition?
° Rather than being apologetic for our condition it is appropriation of strengths and weaknesses, limitations, and liberation.
° Could human be the description of the best version of ourselves instead of the worst?
FYI: Jesus was Human
± A resurrected human being is the center of hope in a world filled with pain.
° Someday our pain will be removed
° Someday our person will be resurrected
± A real human being is at the center of the gospel story.
° The gospels give us a glimpse into Jesus’s humanity.
° Jesus is…the blueprint for the genuine humanness which is on offer through the gospel….Jesus is himself the one “in whom” we are called to discover what true humanness means in practice.
± N.T. Wright
Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters
The Pressure of Being the Human Jesus
± Matthew tells us a series of stories of the pressure Jesus faced.
° When he visited Nazareth, he was rejected (13:54-58)
° He gets news that his cousin John is beheaded (14:1-12)
° He tries to pull away to decompress and reenergize (14:13) and the crowds follow him, and he responds by healing their sick (14:14).
± The disciples try to send the crowds away (14:15) but Jesus shows compassion bidding the to come near (14:18).
° The healing and miraculous ministry of Jesus is connected to woundedness.
° His compassion for others comes out of exhaustion and deep grief.
Under Humanizing Jesus
± While over deifying Jesus isn’t possible, it is possible to under humanize him.
° There was a movement early in the history of Christianity that wanted to under humanize Jesus.
° Docetism
± In the history of Christianity, Docetism (from the Koinē Greek: δοκεῖν/δόκησις dokeĩn "to seem", dókēsis "apparition, phantom" ) is the doctrine that the phenomenon of Jesus, his historical and bodily existence, and above all the human form of Jesus, was mere semblance without any true reality.
± The bulk of 1 John is written to oppose this early church teaching.
If we are invited to become like Jesus, we value his humanity not avoid it.
Don’t Dismiss Half of Jesus’s Significance
± Dorothy Day (Catholic journalist and activist) once said, “Don’t call me a saint. I don’t want to be dismissed so easily”.
° When we over spiritualize our heroes, it ironically makes them less heroic, less able to influence our lives through their examples.
° Giving someone a superhuman label separates him or her from the rest of us.
± When we look at Jesus’s humanity, he pushes us to see implications for our own lives.
° Jesus is both worthy of worship (as deity) and imitation (as humanity).
° Idols are adored as the unattainable other while icons are available as a template for true life.
We Can Relate to Jesus’s Human Life
± We miss half of Jesus’s significance when we miss his humanity.
° We don’t cognitively miss the fact that he is human, but we can miss it experientially.
° Many times, we want to associate with Jesus as “up there” so we can keep him at a safe distance.
° In doing so, we can miss how his wounds can heal our wounds.
± Jesus the human being shows us that a more truly human life is possible.
° Philippians 2:5-11 is an ancient creed giving notice to God’s self offering, humble nature.
° Even where the passage highlights Jesus’s divinity, it also speaks volumes about his humanness.
° Jesus experiences a full humanity, all the way to the cross.
° Jesus reveals that God is relatable to us.
The Way We Experience Life
± The humanity of Jesus changes everything about how we suffer.
° Jesus experienced the same sort of human struggles we face (Hebrews 4:14-16).
° Rather than act out of step with his humanity, Jesus embraced the pain of humankind in solidarity with us.
° He chose to endure the anxiety and courageously held all that stress as he carried his cross to the deadly hillside.
± There exists a freedom through anxiety rather than freedom from it.
° Jesus offers us example after example—through teaching and lifestyle—of what we humans should do when we encounter situations like those he did.
Examples
± Need to deal with an enemy—you know, that annoying person at work? (Matthew 5:43–48)
± Need to know how to courageously step into a situation where you or another person is unjustly treated? (Luke 7:36–50; John 8:2–11)
± Exhausted from the chaos of normal life and need permission to take a nap? (Mark 4:35–40)
± Ever been betrayed by a friend? (compare John 18:15–27 with 21:15–19)
± Want to know how to enjoy a good party? (Matthew 22:1–14; Luke 7:36–50; John 2:1–11)
A Front Row Seat
± Jesus shows us up close picture of the heart of God when we are wounded.
° Jesus took on our nature so that we might take on his.
° The story of Jesus on earth does not begin with resurrection and heavenly enthronement.
° Resurrection is what happens when God makes someone fully human forever.
± Jesus carries the same body with him into eternity (with the marks of whips and nails).
° What does that say about the power of God to redeem, not erase, our deepest marks of pain and trauma in this world?
° God may not erase all the sources of pain but does repurpose our pain now and into eternity.
To Touch or Not to Touch
± There is an interesting dynamic in the Gospel of John when Jesus appears to Mary and later to Thomas (John 20:17, 27).
° Mary is not to hold on to Jesus.
° Thomas is invited to touch the wounds of Jesus.
± In the healing work of Jesus, there is a time to listen and there is a time to touch.
Pondering the Wounds of Christ
“He showed them his hands and feet” – Luke 24:40
± What is to be seen in the wounds on his hands and feet?
± What influence did the exhibit of the hands and feet have upon the disciples?
± Why is it that Jesus Christ still bears the scars in his flesh?
· Was it to simply establish his identity, that he was the very same Jesus whom they had followed?
· Why should Christ wear these wounds in heaven and of what avail are they?
· Are they the ultimate proof of His love for mankind?
Your Pain is Real
± Joy and pain aren’t enemies. They’re companions. The highs and lows of life often dance together.
° Pain is real.
° The wounds produce scars.
° They will always be there, no matter how much the wounds might heal.
° Pain reminds us that hope brings a longing for what isn't healed yet.
± Looking for Jesus in the pain
° Where is Jesus in the pain?
° Pain often hides the presence of Jesus in the middle of the circumstances.
The Use of the Imagination
± The imagination is a place where we can attune our hearts to the deepest realities of our lives with God.
° In the Christian tradition, there is a set of resources popularized by St. Ignatius of Loyola, who founded the Jesuit order.
± Ignatian contemplation encourages readers to step into the biblical story and imagine the scene in our hearts and mind.
± Sometimes you might find yourself relating to a character in the story; at other times perhaps, you are one watching in the crowd.
° We must compose the place inviting God to breathe fresh insights into our souls.
± God may invite you to remember something that consoles or delights you. What is God saying through those consoling memories?
± Sometimes the memory explores hurts.
When Jesus is Missing
± The moment when Jesus went missing in the gospel accounts is perplexing to the people involved.
° When people like Mary and others mourning the death of Jesus – the despair was real.
± On top of the emotional loss, the body of Jesus went missing too (John 20:1).
± Was the body stolen? Why?
± Mary’s despair was beyond repair. The empty tomb brought reverberating dread.
° Then the hiddenness of Christ is disguised as a gardener (John 20:13)
± She doesn’t come to realize his presence until she recognizes his voice.
° Jesus tells her not to touch him. Why?
The Gift of Thomas
± Later in the same chapter, we encounter another disciple of Jesus, Thomas (John 20:24-29).
° At this point, all the close disciples had seen him except for Thomas.
° Thomas needed to see Jesus’s scars.
± Thomas helps us see Jesus’s marks on his hands and sides are necessary for healing.
° If he could see them, then a great hope might be true: even our pain is redeemable by God.
° Thomas wanted to know whether the pain that thrusts itself at us – the grave disappointments – is redeemable so he had to touch the wounds.
To Touch or Not to Touch
± When it comes to deep hurts, it is difficult to pinpoint where Jesus fits into all of it.
° Like Mary, could you be truly seeking Jesus and feel surprised where you expect him to be?
° Like Thomas, do you need something experiential to break through the pain, to remind you that God is still on the move to bring healing and hope?
± Sometimes we can’t find Jesus in the emptiness. We want to touch him and want him to touch us.
± Sometimes we are afraid to touch the wounds. We don’t want to feel the pain again. Stepping into pain with open eyes us one of the hardest things we can do.
Ø Genesis is an ancient story
Ø Genesis contains allegory
Ø Genesis is anonymous
Ø Genesis is ancestral
Ø Genesis from the air
THE WOUNDED HEALER
± A concept of a “wounded healer” has been known and pondered by human beings for thousands of years.
° In the biblical narrative it is a part of the suffering servant songs (Isaiah 53:3-5)
° We could also say that it is a divine concept which found its ultimate and greatest expression in the passion of Jesus Christ during that original Holy Week.
° Later the Apostle Peter will quote the same phrase (1 Peter 2:23-24) while contemplating what happened on the cross.
± In modern culture, the actual term “wounded healer” first became familiar from the work of Swiss psychoanalyst Carl G. Jung (1875-1961).
° The idea states that an analyst is compelled to treat patients because the analyst himself is “wounded”.
° Jung believed he discovered an “archetype” of the wounded healer in Greek mythology.
Mythological Origins
± In Greek mythology, the healing centaur Chiron was a "Wounded Healer", after being poisoned with an incurable wound by one of Hercules's arrows.
° The wound left Chiron in unbearable pain.
° Chiron's name was derived from the Greek word for hand (kheir) and meant something like "skilled with the hands." In myth it was also associated with the word kheirourgos "surgeon."
± Because he couldn’t heal himself, he sought to heal others.
° The Greeks believed Chiron was the inventor of medicine and surgery.
° The term expanded to generalize others who seek to heal others, including psychotherapists, nurses, pastoral counselors, and ministers.
Our Wounded God
± Christianity is the only human religion whose God has wounds.
° Christians believe that Jesus’ mission on earth is the ultimate illustration of the principle of the healing of others through sacrificial suffering.
° The New Testament indicates that Jesus allowed Himself to become weak and to suffer torture and death for the sake of God’s greater healing purpose.
± Christians regard the “suffering servant” passages in Isaiah (especially chapter 53) as a picture of a wounded healer ultimately fulfilled in Christ.
° The wounded healer principle makes Jesus a better high priest because he is sympathetic to the needs of the suffering (Hebrews 4:15; 2:18).
° We have the examples of Jesus healing the sick, telling parables of compassion and admonishing the religious leaders of his day reinforcing the writer of Hebrews.
Identification with the Wounded
± The Psalmist makes clear: “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves those crushed in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18) In the parable in Matthew 25, Jesus concludes: “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’”
± We are meant to understand that the Lord Himself identifies with those who are weak or traumatized and that potential healers are to “see Jesus” in them. Similarly, those who suffer may also see Jesus in those who help them.
± We are commanded to love our neighbor “as our self.” The example Jesus used was the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). A shared history of woundedness fosters this sense of identification with those who suffer.
± The Lord made it clear to the Apostle Paul why we should not despise our own weaknesses and troubles (2 Corinthians 12:9-10).
Wounds that Heal the World
± In some mysterious way it is our wounds and sadness that have the power to heal. They are at the center of how God desires to work in us and through us.
± Both Isaiah and Peter suggest that the suffering servant(s) are the key to the healing of the world.
° Peter says that He (Jesus) “bore our sins in his body on the cross” (1 Peter 2:24).
° Jesus’s death does something. The common way of putting it is that Jesus’s death “atones” for our sins (suffering).
° The gist is that the death of Jesus does something to restore our relationship with God (and each other).
° Where did Peter (and other NT writers) get that idea?
The Suffering Servant
± In Isaiah 52:13-53:12 we read of God’s “servant” who suffers on behalf of others.
° The servant is described as despised and rejected and wounded for our transgressions.
° The passage sounds a lot like Jesus but …
± Isaiah never says the servant dies for anyone. He suffers.
± The “servant” is referred to as he/him but is referring to the part of the nation that was taken into Exile.
± Many argue the servant represents the entire Jewish people since it describes the time of suffering under foreign oppression.
± Others argue the passage is Messianic in nature and ultimately fulfilled in Christ.
The Suffering Savior
± Peter has a lot to say about suffering in his letter. He calls upon his readers to look at Christ.
° The cross is where God in Christ acts decisively to heal our wounded world.
± Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote,
° “Human beings become human because God became human … In Christ, the form of human beings before God was created new” (God in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas p.52)
° God created humans, and when we look to Jesus, we see the prototype for what humans are designed to become.
° As we look at the life of Jesus, we see someone who experienced joy and pain.
± The rest of this study we will focus on the life, ministry, and death of Jesus as the way God heals a wounded world.
Resources
Purim and the Longing for a Better World
§ The holiday of Purim is relevant to the Jewish people because it illustrates how to combat the cause of anti-Semitism and the suffering in the world.
While most people think of Purim primarily as a celebration of deliverance, chockful of food, drinking and costumes, perhaps there is more.
If the deeper meaning of the story it might be a model for our world.
§ The desire to eliminate the Hamans of the world takes unity and the ability to set aside the partisan divisions.
Under the threat of imminent death, Mordecai was able to get all the Jews in Persia to fast and pray for three days together.
A Core Concept
§ The festival of Purim offers Jews a powerful lesson, teaching them not to despair even when dangers are most threatening and persecution most cruel.
§ Its festivities cheered the Jew in his darkest moments and assured him that deliverance was at hand and justice is assured.
§ The nature of the Purim festival contrasts with that of Persian banquets because Purim obligated acts of tzedakah (“justice”).
Feasts as the Skeleton of Esther
§ A prominent structuring principle in Esther is the Hebrew word mishteh, translated “feast” or “banquet”.
§ The term appears twenty times in the book – almost half of all OT occurrences.
A Core Teaching in Purim
Mordecai makes manot (sending of portions) (9:19) central.
There is joy and merrymaking but the consumption of food through which an identify is forged and sustained focuses on the praise of justice, not reveling in revenge.
The exchange of manot creates a symbolic communal banquet to which everyone is invited, thus making the banquet the main feature of the holiday.
The story’s ending returns to its beginning to transform the banquet motif on several levels—from an anthropological perspective, royal banquets that reinforce social divisions by showcasing wealth give way to a banquet that emphasizes community through mutual relatedness.
Most importantly, generosity toward the poor forces the Jewish perspective beyond a concern with self to a concern for others.
Purim, Tzedakah and Tikkum Olam
Tzedakah (justice or righteousness) has the strong connotation concerned with the recipient’s dignity irrespective of any differences.
It expresses a Jew’s duty to their fellow human being as mandated in the Torah (Deut. 16:20).
Tikkun Olam concerns social justice that repairs the world.
The Torah envisioned a just, social order intended to benefit the poor and the wellbeing of society (Lev. 25:8-17; Deut. 14:28-29; 15:1-18 etc.)
Purim extends the opportunity and obligation to perform tzedakah to establish tikkun olam.
Conclusion
In the Esther story we are confronted with a document whose narrative arc is more expansive that the deliverance of the Jews.
It is the story of the human family surviving the threats of extinction through hatred and violence.
It is a call to a bigger banquet that includes all the human family regardless of origin.
This vision is told by Jesus himself in Luke 14:1-24
Esther’s Moral Character
§ One the challenging features alongside the absence of any mention of God is the moral and ethical practices of the main characters.
§ Esther has been wholeheartedly praised and roundly criticized by various scholars.
§ She is mostly portrayed as heroic saving the nation of Israel from destruction.
§ From the other side, she can be viewed as weak, selfish, and passively obedient woman who gets her own way by using her beauty.
Stuck in the Middle
§ There are times when a compelling case can be made from different viewpoints.
§ Sometimes the ambiguity is a part of the mystique that allows for multiple means to different audiences.
§ Sometimes there are political reasons the editors of the text change the nuances.
§ Sometimes there are religious reasons there are changes to the text.
Ancient Textual References
· The story of Esther’s character is found in three texts – the Septuagint, the Alexandrian, and the Masoretic texts.
o From the Masoretic text, the basis for the Hebrew and Christian Old Testament, she is portrayed as heroic. Even though it was dangerous for her to approach the king, she did so to save her people.
o The Greek text tries to clean up the mess found in the Hebrew text when Esther distances herself from Judaism to find favor with a non-Jewish king.
o The Scroll of Esther says that Mordecai took Esther as his adopted daughter (bat, in Hebrew). But both the Septuagint and the Talmud say that he took her as a wife (bayit, literally “house”).
Two Views of Esther
Esther as a passive and manipulative woman
Esther as the hero of the Jewish nation
Questions to Consider
In 2:1-4, do the royal prescriptions for new queen require Esther to engage sexually?
In 2:8, why did Esther not seem to resist being added to the royal harem?
In 2:17, did Esther find favor with the king because it pleaded him sexually?
In 2:10 and 20, why did Esther conceal her Jewish identity?
In 4:4, why did Esther attempt to halt Mordecai’s mourning?
In 4:5, why did Esther not know the reason for the mourning?
In 4:11, why does Esther resist rush to aid?
In 9:13, why did Esther request a second day of retaliation?
In 9:13, why did Esther request the bodies of the ten sons of Haman to be hung on the gallows?
Kosher Adultery?
One of the most troubling issues for the Sages was the idea that Esther, presumably a nice Jewish girl, married a gentile and had sexual relations with him.
This was generally justified by the greater good that this act served. In order to fulfill God's plan to save his people, Esther had to be married to the king.
Some rabbis commenting on Esther 2:11, explains: ``Mordecai said that the only justification for this righteous woman to be taken to sleep with an uncircumcised Gentile was that she would eventually rise up to save Israel.
The idea that Mordecai and Esther as a married couple has had a long history in the Jewish tradition, originating in the Septuagint, flourishing in the Talmud, and continuing into the commentaries of the sixteenth century and beyond.
Is there a love triangle going on in the story?
Further Complications
If the intercourse with Ahasuerus was not consensual, then no transgression was involved.
But … Esther must have been an incredibly talented sexual partner in order to pull off such a ruse – to pretend to enjoy having sex with the king and satisfying him like no other woman (2:17), while at the same time passively resisting.
Now if Esther has agreed to have consensual sexual relations with Ahasuerus, she is forbidden to Mordecai and so cannot be with him in this way again.
God Lets His Children Tell the Story
· When dealing with theological difficulties raised in the text, we must remember the writers told the story from their point of view, with their limitations, within the cultural context in which they wrote.
o What are some of the story telling points in the book of Esther?
o What purposes do they serve in their own day? In succeeding generations?
· When God lets his children tell the story, the way that story is told deeply and thoroughly influenced by the rules of ancient tribal societies that valued in their people taking land, vanquishing (killing or enslaving) their foes and generally bragging about who has the best gods and the best kings.
o This “rule” is stamped all over the Old Testament.
o This is a way of understanding why the Bible behaves the way that it does.
Mordecai’s Decree
§ Mordecai writes legislation giving the Jews the right to defend themselves against Haman’s legions.
§ Yet the right to defend was only a small part of the decree (8:11).
§ What about the killing of women and children? And take the spoils of war?
§ Why does Mordecai write all this?
§ The key may be in 8:9.
§ The letter is dispatched to every governor in the far-flung provinces of the Persian Empire.
§ This decree is not about localized opposition but those who controlled the machinery of the state (provincial armies, police, fire department).
§ The matchup is not so much about actual combatants but those who control the chaos.
§ What will police and fire departments do when the mobs start to converge?
§ Will they stand by and watch? Will they intervene?
§ Mordecai knows whatever decree he writes in the name of the king must counteract the first decree of Haman.
§ Every provincial governor has a decision to make. How can they intervene in the middle of a civil war?
§ Mordecai’s decree needs to be every bit as violent as the first to pressure the politicians to act.
Now What About Just War?
§ The Just War theory is a philosophy that attempts to reconcile three things:
§ Taking human life is seriously wrong
§ States have a duty to defend their citizens and defend justice
§ Protecting innocent human life and defending important moral values sometimes requires the willingness to use force and violence.
§ The theory specifies conditions for judging if it is just to go to war, and conditions for how the war should be fought.
§ Although it was extensively developed by Christian theologians, it can be used by people of every faith and none.
Perspectives from Jewish Scholars
The slaughter in the story of Esther has troubled even Jews. Ellis Abraham Davidson, a prominent educator, was entrusted with publishing a version of the Hebrew Bible that would introduce its riches to the gentiles from a Jewish perspective, ended up cutting most of the stuff about the slaughter. There is an apologetic position for the messy business of bloodletting. There is a doubt that any Jew celebrating Purim really understood the gravity of what they were celebrating. Shulem Deen, a gifted writer and former Hasid, has credited the holiday for accelerating his decision to leave the Orthodoxy fold. He writes, “I wanted a world in which seventy-five thousand dead makes one shudder, if ever so slightly, before enjoying hamantachen and whiskey”.
Does Purim have a place in the Jewish faith today?
David Wolpe says …
Purim is a holiday of masks. A mask doesn’t fully change you, but it obscures identity, distorting who you are. A mask permits you to assume a slightly different way of being in the world.
In our day we appreciate why Purim is a holiday of masks. In the diaspora, Jews were forced to wear masks all of the time. In Muslim lands we were dhimmi, second class citizens subject to a vast range of indignities. But there was no protest against the status for Jews were powerless to change it. We wore the mask of acceptance and accommodation.
In Christian Europe, Jews were regularly exiled, persecuted, belittled targeted for conversion, and sometimes killed. But in country after country, they donned the mask of the willing subject, because rebellion against their situation only made it worse. The few who did not wear a mask, the Mordechis who did not bow down, paid a terrible price.
Final Thoughts on the Two Decrees
Rabbi Daniel Polish says holidays like Purim and Mardi Gras are marked “by a raucous atmosphere, the excessive consumption of intoxicants, masks and costumes” and both fall before “perhaps the major religious observance of their respective traditions… [Passover/Easter].”
Purim is about the capacity of ordinary people to do extraordinary things. It’s about acting in the face of fear. And it’s about speaking truth to power.
Like most history involving independence the morality of the decrees has been forgotten in the ongoing legacy of survival.
Genocidal Decrees
§ There are two competing decrees in the book both issued with the permission of the king.
§ In Esther chapter 3 we are introduced to Haman – the villain of the story who is referred to as the son of Hammedatha the Agagite.
§ When he feels slighted of honor by Mordecai, he convinces the King to exterminate all the Jews on a date determined by lot (pur).
§ The date for the genocide is set in the fifth year of Esther’s reign to be in the month of Adar (March).
§ In Esther chapters 8 and 9 in a reversal of fortunes, Mordecai issues the decree to protect the Jews.
§ They are told to defend themselves.
§ They are told to annihilate all men, women, and children.
§ The moral dilemma
§ Which decree is unjust, which is just?
What are the conditions of a just war?
A Little Background
§ Haman is referred to as an Agagite (3:1)
§ This most likely refers to Agag, the king of Amalek (see 1 Samuel 15:20).
§ The Amalekites had attacked Israel after Israel fled from Egypt (Ex. 17:8-16; 1 Sam. 15:2); for this reason, “the Lord” would be at war against the Amalekites from generation to generation (Ex. 17:6).
§ Israel was not to forget to but was to blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven (Deut. 25:15).
§ Saul’s attack on Amalek (see 1 Sam. 15) resulted in the death of most, though not all (see 1 Chronicles 4:42-43), of King Agag’s people and later the king himself.
§ Mordecai is the son Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish.
§ The association with the tribe of Benjamin makes him a descendant of King Saul.
§ This sets the stage for the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Amalekites.
An “Understandable” Personal Conflict
§ Haman’s identity as an Amalekite would explain Mordecai’s refusal as a Jew to bow to him (3:2-4).
§ No self-respecting Benjaminite would bow before a descendant of Amalekites.
§ Haman’s reaction of desiring to exterminate the entire Jewish race is explained by revenge. Old antagonisms die hard.
§ Haman sought to confiscate the property of the Jewish people (3:13).
§ According to Persian law the decree could not be altered (see Daniel 6:8, 12, 15).
§ But depending on the wording of the decree, a second decree might be able to effectively invalidate it. This is what the king instructed Esther and Mordecai to do (8:7-8).
§ Esther 8:11-12 shows that the decree is calling for vengeance to utterly wipe out their enemies, including women and children.
§ The point of the new decree was for the Jews to defend themselves, but the hostility of history rises again.
When the Bible Sanctions Violence, Must We?
§ The Bible contains a lot of violence, a lot.
· Yet not all violence is regarded the same way.
§ Sometimes the Bible makes it unmistakably clear that certain actions are wrong (Ex. Cain and Abel … Gen. 4; David and Uriah … 2 Sam. 11:27; etc.)
§ In both illustrations the violence is bad and undesirable.
· How should we regard the “virtuous” violence texts?
§ Examples: The flood (Gen. 6); the death of the firstborn (Ex. 14-15), the conquest of Canaan (Josh. 6-11), etc.
§ Lethal violence is condoned and celebrated.
§ Do we have the moral obligation to critique the assumption that violence is somehow “virtuous”? Yes.
· We must read the violent verses also from the perspective of the victims.
· Critiquing the violence does not, however, render the text useless.
§ The conquest narrative (Joshua 6-11) reminds us that religious violence is extremely dangerous because it gives divine sanction to behaviors that in any other context would be deemed immoral.
§ We need to be critical of “virtuous” violence in the text while looking for ways to move beyond the critique.
Why Extra Esther?
§ At first reading within Christian circles, Esther is elevated as a hero that intervenes on behalf of the Jewish people.
§ However, in Jewish Tradition, the book of Esther, megillat ‘ester, “the scroll of Esther,” is inextricably bound up with the holiday of Purim.
§ The book provides a rationale for the religious festival as a story of origin.
§ Purim, the only religious festival not found in the Torah, needed a reason and an authorization.
§ The book of Esther is the centerpiece of the observance of Purim; it is traditionally read publicly in the synagogue on Purim eve and the following morning, accompanied by the noisy blotting out of Haman’s name by children and adults, many of them dressed in funny costumes.
§ Purim is a carnivalesque holiday, replete with reenactments of the story, excessive drinking and a general sense of frivolity uncharacteristic of other Jewish festivals.
§ The spirit of this holiday is comically summarized by Mayim Bialik (Amy on the Big Bang Theory)
§ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbKfB5E6sAA
A Search for Questions
§ Why is there no mention of God in the text?
§ Why are there three more chapters?
§ Why name the day after the instrument of choice used by the enemy? (Pur – lot)
§ Why is there a pre-occupation with Mordecai’s actions toward Haman?
§ Why is there a preoccupation with the different feasts?
§ Why does Esther wait to tell the king about Haman’s plan?
The Questions Might Give Reason for the Additions
§ There are six blocks of text, conventionally labeled A through F in all Greek versions of Esther. They are grouped in three pairs:
§ Additions A and F is the dream of Mordecai and its interpretation
§ Additions B and E is the letter Haman sent out against the Jews and the letter of Mordecai allowing Jews to defend themselves
§ Additions C and D contains prayers of Esther and Mordecai and Esther approaching the king.
§ The main reason for these additions might be to give the story of Esther the religious atmosphere that is lacking in the Hebrew text.
The Religious Angle
§ Mordecai is a dreamer placing him along side Joseph and Daniel as recipients of divine revelation (Addition A and F)
§ The dream uses the same imagery of the dragon, fountain, battle and contrast between light and dark in Jeremiah 28.
§ The interpretation in addition F adds a connection to Joseph.
§ Esther’s Prayer (Addition C)
§ The Queen laments the Jew’s existence in exile and blames their own sins for the situation.
§ Esther bemoans her marriage to the king.
§ Hellenizing Esther (Addition D)
§ This describes her entry into the throne room.
§ She faints when the king looks at her and the king assures her that the prohibition against approaching the king uninvited does not apply to royalty.
§ This text undermines Esther’s heroism.
§ The King Rescinds His Order (Addition E)
§ Haman is censured and presented as treacherously plotting against the king.
§ The king exonerates the Jews of all charges made by Haman.
Adding Piety
· Without these additions, one could question Mordecai’s religious stature, wonder about Esther’s true piety and if God really did play a role in the outcome.
· This is most notable in the comparison of the Hebrew and Greek in chapter 6.
· The cumulative effect of these alterations in Greek versions is to make Esther an overtly religious tale in which the main characters embody the distinctive marks of Judaism (dedication to One God, the observance of Torah in all its particulars as a way of life and the practice of pious acts of prayer, fasting and almsgiving).
· Another effect of the additions is to heighten the reader’s awareness of the tension and animosity between Jew and Gentile.
Theological Contribution
§ Unlike Hebrew Esther, Greek Esther speaks of God directly. God is creator of all (13.10); furthermore, God is close to, and holds special, Israel. No one can oppose God’s will (13.9, 11). God controls the nations (16.16) and reveals himself to people (11.12). Finally, God makes the lots fall in the Jew’s favor (10.10-12).
§ On the other hand, Israel has failed God, primarily through the nation’s idolatry, and thus, their status in exile.
The Additions as a Window into Jew/Gentile Relations
§ Taking its place with Daniel, the additions to Daniel, and other Apocrypha, such as Judith and Tobit, the additions to Esther reveal the increasing pressures the Jews experienced as successive ruling nations seek to assimilate them into the dominant culture.
Speaking the Truth in Love
• Love has a way of changing our minds about what is true.
• It doesn’t change the facts but changes what the facts mean and leads us to wisdom.
• It changes how people see the world.
• It can be a good and beautiful thing to change our minds about what is true considering how we experience the world through the lens of love.
• Truth is a tool that build up or tear down, to heal or to bring harm.
• If our idea of truth does not include prioritizing love, if it is just about facts; it isn’t true in the broader sense.
Misuse of Truth
• When the phrase “speaking the truth in love” is used, rarely does the person hearing it feel loved.
• Most of the time the phrase is used to convince someone they are being loved even if it does not feel that way.
• It is not often used of someone heavily invested in co-laboring with someone in their struggle, but as a way to lob hurtful feelings, walk away and feel guilt-free.
• One of the often-used passages to justify such an approach is Galatians 6:1 & 7.
• Often the phrase “speaking the truth in love” reveals the assumption that God’s Word and my opinion are the same thing.
Redeeming the Phrase
• To redeem the phrase, “speaking the truth in love” is to recognize we could be wrong in our interpretation.
• There is space between “I know” and “I don’t know”.
• It is the place of proper humility.
• It is the place we find relationship and growth.
• The Jewish Talmud tells the story about the schools of Hillel and Shammai about “God’s true words”.
• Each assumed the law was aligned with their views.
• The story says that a divine voice came forth and said that the truth are the views of Hillel because they were humble in teachings their own rulings as well as the school of Shammai.
• Speaking the truth in love is the acknowledgment that sometimes truth can be taken either way and it is the humble that is nearer to the heart of God.
The Flawed Tactic
• We often use the phrase “speaking the truth in love” because we believe that people change when we tell them they are sinning and living their life wrong.
• If we are interested in transforming someone else’s life, it won’t happen by sharing our unwarranted opinion.
• Usually there is something deeper going on.
• Many people hide their disgust, discomfort, and anger behind the veil of “speaking the truth in love”.
Civil Conversations Project
https://onbeing.org/civil-conversations-project/the-six-grounding-virtues-of-the-on-being-project/#300
More Inclusive, Not Less
• Speaking the truth in love wants to bring more voices to the table, not less.
• Ephesians 4:1-6, 15-16
Giving Our Opinion in Love
• The key move here is that we don’t call our opinions the truth.
• The mistake most of us make is believing we have to choose between “telling the truth” and keeping a friend.
• Giving our opinions is not nearly as threatening as “telling the truth” that the other person must agree with.
• Most people don’t respond negatively to what we share but to how we share it.
Know Your Heart
• Being self-aware is essential if you want people to feel loved when you share your opinions.
Safety in Conversations (Right time, right place, right way)
When in Doubt Seek Love
• If you were brave enough to open the Bible and read it on your own, you will find yourself confused along the way.
• We might not understand the terms.
• We might not understand the context.
• We might not understand the culture.
• This may cause you some anxiety.
• Since most of the Bible is not black-and-white instructions, there is a lot of gray we must wade through.
• Rules, while at one time were meant for good, if applied in a wooden way, can actually cause harm.
• Learning when to follow the letter and when to break the letter to follow the spirit is called wisdom.
• If all else fails, seek love.
Seeking the Greater Good by the Spirit
• The disciples needed to figure out how to make new meaning from old texts.
• They were facing new situations and circumstances.
• The old instructions were the start of the conversation, not the end.
• In John 13-17, we get an intimate look at what Jesus says to his disciples with death at his doorstep.
• John 14:11-12
• John 16:7, 12-13
• The Spirit will guide into tomorrow’s truth. The Spirit has the power to teach us new things.
Roots and Fruits
• Jesus does not erase what we have heard before.
• He is firmly grounded in the roots of his tradition and yet growing new fruit in each season.
• In each season and each generation, we must add our own “but I tell you” to be a part of the creative work of the Spirit in our time and our day.
• The focus should be on the fruit not proving how much we know about our roots.
• What is the fruit? (Matthew 7:15-20)
• As the Spirit of God has guided us, we come to new realizations and truths about what it means to be good human beings.
The Safeguard
• We are all in conversation together, and it is true love that guards us from making the Bible mean whatever we want.
• Words do not stand on their own account. Whether they are spoken or written, their meaning is only fully realized within the context of life.
• The Bible will always require a conversation partner to make meaning of it.
Master the Music
• If we are going to play new songs, we first root ourselves in the notes.
• The root of Biblical interpretation is understanding what the original writers intended. We can’t since they are all dead. All we can do is rely on context.
Master the Instrument
• We all have different abilities. In the music metaphor, some people can be great pianists but not great guitarists. Some can master the voice but not an instrument.
• While none of us play and sing a song the same, we do become aware of filters. A piano is not a guitar and a guitar is not a trumpet etc.
When in Doubt, Seek Love
• In other words, if a passage from the Bible is ambiguous, the best interpretation is whatever leads us to love better.
• The proper goal of reading our Bibles isn’t to get it right; it’s to love.
• If an interpretation of the Bible does not lead to love, then we need to go back through it again and again until we see how to love better either from positive or negative portraits of the people participating in the narrative.
The Law of Love
· Life is all about relationships.
· Law is about the ordering of things in the right way.
· Romans 13:8-10
o Both Jesus (Matthew 22:35-40) and Paul express the law of love in general terms.
o Other than the Golden Rule: “so in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12), we are left to figure it out on our own.
Turning Wheat into Bread Parable – Seder Eliyahu Zuta
https://rabbisuzannebrody.wordpress.com/2013/07/23/64/
Rabbi Jesus Makes the Same Point
• There is almost an identical parable in Matthew 25:26-30.
• What if the point is to move beyond the original meaning to a faithful meaning of what it means to live a life of love today?
Reading the Bible is like being a Chef
• In some of the cooking shows there is a competition of contestants being given the same ingredients and the freedom to create.
• Using the same ingredients (facts) to make something unique with unique skills (meaning) that other people experience as good (wisdom) fulfills the law of love.
Top Chef
· What if contestants did nothing with the ingredients but look at them?
· What if the contestants did not want to take a risk?
· What if we changed our perspective from trying to get the “one right” interpretation to being faithful to the overall trajectory of the Bible?
You Have Heard It Said
• In one of Jesus’ most famous sermons he says, “Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17-20)
• Jesus is about to change the meaning of his Bible.
• Matthew 5:21-22, 27-28
• He is not negating the foundational importance of the Torah.
• He is showing respect by updating them for his followers.
• He is offering a new interpretation of these texts based on where he found himself.
• What if “fulfilling” Scripture is a creative act where we find new meanings for the Bible based on discernment and experiencing God in the present.
Keeping It Alive and Relevant
• Most churches are afraid to apply the Bible in any significant way to our current world.
• To be faithful to the Bible, and to follow Jesus, we have to update our morality, our thinking, our way of being in the world in light of new facts and understandings we have gained.
• This is partly what Paul means in 2 Corinthians 3:3-6.
• If we stick slavishly to letters on the page, we are like the servant that buried the talents in the dirt.
• The Spirit promises to guide us into new truth (John 16:13).
The Law of Love
• Jesus does not leave us completely directionless when it comes to how we reinterpret the Bible.
• The religious authorities of Jesus’ day were always trying to trap him. He rarely answers them directly.
• One time they ask about the greatest commandment (Matthew 22:36-40). He quotes two references (Deuteronomy 6:5; Leviticus 19:18) but he adds something new.
• Everything in all Scriptures hangs on these two.
• Nowhere in the Bible does it say that, but Jesus does. He changes the emphasis.
• If we are going to follow Jesus on how to read the Bible, we must follow his filter: love.
• The only way to keep the Bible relevant is to follow this lead.
• There are hundreds of ways to interpret the Bible, just make sure all interpretations lead to love.
• Jesus often changes the meaning of ancient traditions in light of a new law – the law of love.
True Love Liberates
· Much of Christianity is about creating rules out of fear that our deeply sinful nature would get out of control.
o The only way to the good life is to create rules and then hope that our guilt function was deep enough to police our behavior.
o It becomes a religion of fear.
· When there is fear, there is control but there is little freedom.
o Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18)
o Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom (2 Corinthians 3:17)
o You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free (John 8:32)
Breaking Free From Fear
• There is a way of being Christian that is suffocating.
• It can suck the life out of us and a lot of people around us.
• We are often sold a brand of Christianity that taught “if you believe the right things, you will find freedom”.
• The more we try, the more we feel trapped.
• What if truth is not a dead set of facts. What if it is active? What if it is an agent?
• If it doesn’t set you free, it is suspect.
• We must “test everything, hold fast to what is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21)
The Thing That Sets Us Free
• We tend to privilege truth and focus on it as the way to freedom.
• We must recognize this path has betrayed us.
• We thought getting the facts right would set us free, but instead we started policing the facts.
• Love then becomes about criticizing other people for what they do and don’t do.
• If we privilege facts, we often do not find our way to love.
• If we privilege freedom and focus on it as the way to truth, we might find both.
• The Spirit of God brings freedom (Luke 4:18-21)
True Love Liberates
• It creates space for freedom and does not resent that freedom.
• It allows people to make choices without getting our feelings hurt that people didn’t make the choice our opinion pointed them to.
• True love doesn’t say “I told you so” but says “you know the difference between right and wrong, I trust you”.
• Are we treating people in our lives in such a way that they themselves come to believe they are free and loved.
• Liberating love is letting people grow up and be free.
• Only the unloving person tries to control the other person.
• Rapunzel may be safe in the tower, but she is not free.
• Even if you “know” what’s best for someone, often the most loving thing to do is not control but to help them avoid harm.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbecKv2xR14
Examples of Liberating Love
• Liberating Love Allows Change and Newness
• The story of the Exodus is about liberating love (Exodus 1-12)
• Liberating Love Allows Risk and Reconciliation (Luke 15:11-32)
• Liberating Love is Built on Grace not Law (Galatians 5:1-15)
Truth Without Love Isn’t True
• Beliefs are tools that can be used to control or to love.
• Having the correct set of beliefs does not tell us much of anything until we see how it acts.
• Even in the Bible there are people who say what matters more is what you believe (James 2:14-19).
• Our emphasis on knowledge and belief has deceived us into thinking that thinking true thoughts is the end goal.
• Is the essence of truth simply about believing the right doctrine?
• Not according to James. Truth has a relationship to action.
• Somehow, we have duped ourselves into thinking that what we believe is more important than how we believe.
Thoughts and Prayers are Not Enough
• It is not our thoughts and prayers that ultimately count but our decisive action.
We are encouraged to think that who we are is defined by the opinions we hold.
Stating what we “stand for” is easy but loving well is not.
• To think that the greatest form of live is to convince someone to come to “your side” of belief, you have missed the point.
We have privileged the what of our belief instead of the how of belief.
How we enact and embody our beliefs is ultimately what matters.
The Difficulty of Being Christian
• Soren Kierkegaard argued that the Bible knows nothing of this “believe in abstract doctrine” but pictured truth as personal, more subjective and existential.
· “But faith essentially relates itself to existence, and becoming a Christian is what is important. Believing in Christ and wanting to “understand” his way by articulating it and elaborating on it is a cowardly evasion that wants to shirk the task. To become a Christian is the ultimate, to want to “understand” Christianity, as if it were some doctrine, is open to suspicion.” Provocations p. 66
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YbnCWVChtI
The Call to Follow Jesus
• The call of Christianity is to imitate Jesus, not to understand master doctrine
• Discipleship is more than a mental exercise.
• The goal is not to understand all the doctrinal aspects of Christianity.
• To move forward in a life of love, we begin by dismantling our dependency on needing to know.
• The goal is not so much to simply know the truth but to be the truth.
Truth is Love in Action
• It is the Bible that calls us back to this understanding of truth.
• The Apostle John uses the word truth more than any other writer.
• Not one time does he use it to refer to “accurate beliefs”.
• But repeatedly, he uses it to encourage others to walk in truth (1 John 1:6; 3:18).
• One of his favorite images is the idea that we do not believe the truth, but we walk in it (2 John 4: 3 John 4).
• Truth is not a thought we have in our heads but an action we live out in our lives.
• Truth is a character trait, not an abstract idea.
Truth is Faithfulness
• The New Testament uses as its primary definition of truth the idea of faithfulness (Matthew 22:16; Luke 20:21).
• Truth is about integrity and not adjusting what you say to please others.
• If we consider “faithfulness” the root meaning of truth in the Bible, then being honest, fair, accurate and behaving in ethical ways.
• Honesty (1 John 1:6)
• Fair and Accurate Testimony (John 5:31-35)
Missing the Point
• Jesus points out that the Scriptures can be a stumbling black to finding the truth (John 5:39-40).
Love is Embodied Truth
• The Bible does not spend much time focusing on fact-truths or even meaning-truths.
If Knowledge is a Tool, What are We Building?
Let’s Review
• In the New Testament gospels, Jesus presents love as the ultimate end of a moral life. Mark 12:30-31
• Christians often are obsessed with “absolute truth”.
• There is the world as it really exists out there (what we call reality), and then there is the world as someone, or something experiences it (umwelt).
• Does the Bible give us access to “absolute truth”.
• The Bible is contextually human.
• The Bible is interpreted by humans.
• The Bible is not God.
• Three Different Kinds of Truth
• Fact Truth – derived by logic and science.
• Meaning Truth – sharing of human experience (includes religion and faith)
• Wisdom Truth – navigating life well with the goal of love.
The Need to be Right
• Is the life of faith about being right? Is it important to make sure others get it right? Or is this about loving people no matter what?
• For most people, the need to be right outweighs the need to be loving.
• In the Bible there seems to be no tension between truth and love because the highest form of truth is wisdom, and the highest form of wisdom is love.
• Jesus is about the way we live our lives and not just the facts in our heads.
• It is a vision for life that utilizes facts, meaning and wisdom in service to love.
The Need to Know More
· There is often the belief that the world will be made right when we get all the facts straight.
Truth is a Tool
· Facts are to develop the progress of character (2 Peter 1:5-8)
· Fact truth and even meaning truth (or faith truth) stops short of the goal of building a better life (wisdom truth).
Love is a National Treasure
· Knowledge is a tool to get to the treasure.
· The Christian faith is often built around privileging our intellect rather than character.
o Everything is in service to love (1 Corinthians 13)
o Knowledge knows its place as a tool for love (1 Corinthians 8:1-3)
Knowledge is a Motivator not a Manipulator
· When we use our opinions and knowledge as a manipulator then we are not motivated by love.
The Bible is often an Idol
• The Bible is straight up difficult.
• Difficult to understand: Ezekiel 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iziuvkci4yM&feature=emb_logo
• Difficult to apply properly: Deuteronomy 25:11-12
• Absolute truth has become an idol in the American church.
• The use of the Bible is instrumental in this development.
• When the Bible is held up as the Word of God then it becomes imperative to use every syllable of it.
• Ironically, the Bible itself only calls Jesus the Word (John 1:1)
When the Bible is Bad for You
• You can “prove” anything from the Bible if you want.
• When the Bible becomes a faithful and trusted guide to lead you to Jesus then it can be used to build love.
Three Types of Truth
The only way to know with certainty that our umwelt matches reality is to know everything there is to know in the world.
Does the Bible Give Us Access to Absolute Truth?
· The Bible is Contextually Human
o It uses a language that humans in a particular time and place understood and that most of us don’t.
§ It uses phrases that meant something different back then than it does now.
§ Example: “foot” is a euphemism for genitals (Isa. 7:20; Deut. 28:57; Ezek. 16:25; 2 Sam. 11:8; Prov. 19:2).
o Can we filter out the very human parts and find the parts where it is telling us Absolute Truth?
· The Bible Must Be Interpreted by Humans
o If some parts do give us access to Absolute Truth and others are “contextually human”, how would I know which is which?
o We would need a Divine Interpreter
o All we have are human interpreters
· The Bible, like humans, is not God
o Our offense at the idea that the Bible doesn’t give us Absolute Truth shows we have made the Bible an idol.
o When Jesus left Earth, he didn’t say that it’s good for him to go away because he leaves behind an unchanging book, but he does leave behind the Advocate/Spirit of Truth (John 16).
Truth is Overworked and Underpaid
· Many think that since we don’t have access to absolute truth (only God does), the human experience will be barbaric.
· Everyday certainties do not require that we get the whole truth before we get any truth.
Three Different Types of Truth
· Fact truth; Meaning Truth; Wisdom Truth
Fact Truth: true even if we are dead
· Facts that exist outside human interaction
· We use two methods to produce fact truths
o Logical argument
o Scientific method
· Fact truths don’t answer questions of morality
Meaning Truth: the sharing of the human experience
· Science takes things apart to see how they work, religion, philosophy, psychology etc., puts things together to see what they mean.
· Meaning truth is the relationship between something and someone (or two someone(s)) to establish relevance, significance, and value.
· Meaning truth is about taking the facts of life and becoming away of, or determining, their place in our lives.
Wisdom Truth; navigating life well
· Wisdom is not the beliefs in our head, but a life well lived.
· Wisdom truths are about figuring out how to navigate the practical realities of what it means to be human.
· Wisdom truth can come from various traditions.
· Wisdom truth is thoroughly personal, it cannot be true if you are deceased.
The Bible is Designed to Cultivate Wisdom
· Rather than a book designed to provide answers, the Bible encourages questions to encourage a lifelong process of maturation.
· We are encouraged to wander well along the unscripted path of faith, in-tuned to the presence of God along the way.
· Instead of telling you what to do, the Bible actually encourages you to get in touch with Wisdom.
· The Bible is saying that the Creative Force of the universe that created and established Order is available to you as you’re moving forward in life.
Love Matters More
In the New Testament gospels, Jesus presents love as the ultimate end of a moral life (Mark 12:30-31).
Christianity Makes It Complex
· After becoming a follower of Jesus, Christianity makes foggy to continue.
o We were told to make sure we held all the correct beliefs and that we needed to remind everyone who disagreed that they were wrong, wrong, wrong.
o We were told correct doctrine matters more.
· People are forced to choose between truth and love.
When Love Doesn’t Feel Like Love
· We are told Christianity is about love, but most of the time it is about belief.
o The fear about being wrong in our beliefs has crowded out the clear message of Jesus’ life and death – love matters more.
o Christianity often claims “we are loving”; but it doesn’t feel that way.
· There is a word for people telling you they love you while what you are experiencing is actually only pain and loneliness: ABUSE.
Self-Deception in a Broken System
· When love doesn’t feel like love, it is often justified by saying “just telling the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15).
· Hopefully, the intention may be good, but it can easily become a sneaky way to tell people they are wrong as a means to feel more certain.
Absolute Truth
· Christians often are obsessed with “absolute truth”.
o It is the idea that we can know with certainty everything there is to know in the world.
o The problem becomes trusting in our beliefs rather than trusting in God.
o We keep the creator captive to what we can comprehend.
o Watching certainty slide into uncertainty is frightening for most people.
· The problem becomes apparent when new “truth” is discovered.
The UMWELT
· In 1909, the biologist Jakob von Uexküll introduced the concept of the umwelt.
o He wanted a word to express a simple (but often overlooked) observation: different animals in the same ecosystem pick up on different environmental signals.
· Because of how their bodies are built, all animals see, hear, and feel the world very differently.
o Dolphins can hear thousands of sounds we can’t hear.
o Buzzards can see a mouse from 15,000 feet in the air.
· The way the buzzard experiences the world will always be different from the way the dolphin experiences the world.
· There is the world as it really exists out there (what we call reality), and then there is the world as someone, or something experiences it (umwelt).
o We only experience “reality” through our umwelt.
o Different cultures, personalities, experiences and even languages factor into the human umwelt.
o Our limitations cause us to explore and experience the world very differently than other people do.
· Ignorance limits how we experience the world too.
o Every time we learn something new our world gets a little bit bigger and changes our umwelt.
St. Paul’s Black Swan
· Paul realized he did not have access to absolute truth (1 Corinthians 13:12).
o He used to have certainty about what he believed (Philippians 3:4-6).
o He believed he had God figured out.
o He used violence to help convince people he was right (Acts 7-8).
· Paul had an experience that expanded his umwelt (Acts 9:1-6).
o His black swan so radically changed his world that his name was changed, and he ended giving up his social status of a rabbi and possibly a Pharisee.
o Paul even was staking other people’s lives on the fact that he was right, and others were wrong.
Paul’s Doxology to the Mystery of the Divine (Romans 11:33-36)
· There is enough truth to guide us but not enough to think there are no surprises left.
· What about the Bible? Doesn’t that give us access to absolute truth?
· Faith is not certainty in what we know; it’s confidence in who we know.