St Paul on Equality

A friend shared this on Facebook. As I looked from left to right and came to rest on human and I couldn’t help but think “yeah that’s it”. The only identity that matters is that of being a human being and we should treat one another as so. We should be blind to these other identities that allow us to treat one another differently and purely see the human, the person, in front of us to treat all as equals. As I thought about our identity being reduced to same thing for everyone, I thought of  Paul writing in Galatians:

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith,  for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

For Paul the Kingdom of God is about loosing these differences that divide us, that separate us from one another. As we bring and become the kingdom these identities are no longer important, we are able to be one in Christ. As we become a person of the kingdom of God we no longer see these worldly identities when dealing with people we see a brother, a sister, someone who matters and whom God loves.

If there is neither male nor female then how can there be a male or a female minister/priest/bishop there can only be a minister/priest/bishop whom God has called, their gender is immaterial. When we no longer see male or female but purely people to be loved how can there be right and wrong relationships, surely there are just relationships between human beings that love one another.

I am not saying that our identities as people are not important and shouldn’t be respected - because they are and should be. But I am saying that as we meet and interact with people if we are being Godly we only see a person whom God loves standing in front of us and not their worldly identities.

Film Night: Thoughts from “The Help”

The church does a monthly film night and last night we watched The Help, set in the civil rights era in America, focuses on the relationships between maids and the white families that they work for.

One scene in particular got me thinking. Skeeter, uncomfortable with the racism shown towards the maids and who holds a lot of respect and fondness for the maid who brought her up, asks her mum about the circumstances surrounding her leaving whilst Skeeter is away. (Just a quick warning this is a bit of a spoiler but not one that I think would ruin the watching of the film, so it’s up to you whether you read on or not). Her mother is forced to admit that the maid didn’t quit after all and a cut scene shows the exact circumstances. Without going into detail Skeeter’s mother has influential people around and feels embarrassed when one of them criticises her for standing for certain behaviour in her maid – who had done nothing wrong. Instead of doing what is right, to save face, Skeeter’s mother asks the maid to leave and effectively sacks her. You can see how upset the woman is by “having” to do so and, in fact, sends her son to try to find the maid and bring her back. This is, perhaps, a choice that we often have to make in life; to do what is right or to do what those who influence us want us to do. We may be influenced by friends, colleagues, our boss, people from church or people that we perceive to have power. It perhaps isn’t easy at times, for fear of what may happen to us as a result but surely it is better to act with integrity, to our own conscience then to bow down to others for fear of what may happen.

“And Moses said to God, Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

The fact that Moses didn’t think he was good enough is pointed out in the film and yet he was able to lead the Israelites in their liberation from Egypt. As could people who felt they weren’t good enough fight against their oppression through the civil rights movement for their liberation. So too can we make a stand for what is right, despite the fact that we may not feel that we are good enough. To do the right and loving thing, despite the possible consequences for ourselves. To make sacrifice for love, our reference point for life as Christians.

Christians need to be radicalised

Radicalisation and faith, when put together, are terms that probably make you think of hate preachers and terrorist attacks. They are terms used in the media all the time “British youth being radicalised by hate preacher” etc. So, some, may find it odd that I would call for a radicalisation of Christians. It probably isn’t the sort of thing that you ought to have as a blog title (can’t help but wonder if I’m going to get my blog checked over after it comes up in a search for key words). But radicalisation is exactly what I think Christianity needs.

“Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness, and pride of power, and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear … Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

For a while I took part in a blogging for books program where I would get a free copy of a book in return for blogging about it. The service that I was signed up to exclusively had Christian books and one had caught my eye about Christianity and business which I thought might be interesting. It turned out to be my worst nightmare in book form. Completely on the opposition end of the political scale to me and not at all in tune with how I think about the world and my faith and how this may effect my approach to business. But it was a part of the deal to blog about it and to review it on a website such as Amazon. As part of my review I explained that I had just finished reading “The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical” by Shane Claiborne saying that this perhaps shows why I wouldn’t have gotten on with the book that I was reviewing. I got a comment on my review suggesting that I be wary of anything with radical in the title as it tends to depart from the gospel. I politely pointed out that Claibrone and his community seem to live out the gospel far more than most Christian groups that I have read about and suggested that, perhaps, Christ would have been considered a radical in his own time.

I think the problem is that we often want a Christianity that fits in with the world, doesn’t disrupt it too much and doesn’t call us into question. We can go on a Sunday and feel good about ourselves. Sing songs about how amazing Jesus is and allow it to have very little affect on how we live our lives Monday – Saturday (unless of course attending further Church meetings on these days). We may try to be a bit more pure, change things that affect ourselves slightly but don’t really make any difference in the world. But as Bonhoeffer points out perhaps we should be shocking the world more then we do. Perhaps we should be a stronger voice for the voiceless, stand in solidarity with the oppressed, feed the hungry and find shelter for those without it. Perhaps we should be standing against inequality, discrimination and the unjust, petitioning and speaking out. People should know that when there is something wrong in society Christians are going to be there to speak out and help put it right. We should be known as radicals of love, grace and justice.

We need to remember that thinking of Jesus only as gentle, meek and mild is heresy. Yes he was those things but he didn’t shy away from speaking out against those who were oppressing people and causing injustice. He turned over the tables in temple. It is about his love for us and our love for him but if it’s only that, then I suggest it may as well be nothing at all. We are called to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and help home the homeless, as what we do for them we do for him. And maybe once we start to get this right we will be seen as the radicals we ought to be.

We need to be radicalised by love preachers.

Story Crime

I have recently handed in my dissertation proposal ready for my third year studies at uni. I am looking into the role of narrative in personal and cultural formation. The starting point for my thinking leading to this was reading Pete Rollins’ book Insurrection and the chapter Story Crime, in which he says “We all have a story that we tell ourselves about ourselves, a story which we begin identifying with from infancy, and as long as we don’t think too much about it, we re able to maintain this story. But this personal narrative often has little direct connection to the reality of who we are.”  We protect the self from the self through the narrative that we tell ourselves and we also protect the self from the other as well. When we have done wrong and we know we have done wrong we tend to build a narrative around the event to help placate our guilt, to justify our actions to ourselves. Sometimes this means that we tell a story about the self, about why we aren’t as bad as our actions would suggest or we tell a story about the other, someone or something else, to help justify why we did what we did, again allowing us to believe that we aren’t as bad as our actions suggest. We are able to protect ourselves from ourselves. These stories probably have very little in connection to the reality of who we are and the world around us but they help us to continue to believe that we are good. The narratives help us to avoid encountering our own monstrosity , often by focussing on the monstrosity of someone else. We can see this happening in all sorts of situations, take a church group, by building up a narrative about why they have everything right and about why the church down the road has it wrong they are able to distance themselves from any thought about what they may be getting wrong, from encountering their own monstrosity because they are able to sustain the narrative that they are good and holy and that it is that group over there that is monstrous. All kinds of church, with all kinds of different beliefs and activities do this, as do all sorts of different groups. It helps form and keep a group identity and builds a protection around that.

I have started to wonder if this offers a way to look at some of the old testament narrative. When the Israelites wage war, attack enemies and pray for the downfall of others they are able to do so through their narrative of being the chosen, holy, ones where as the other group are evil as they do x, y and/or z and as such there is a justification for their violence. They are able to believe that what they are doing is right and good and holy by seeing how monstrous their neighbours are. They are able to believe that God even ordains the war that they wage. Of course in Christ, the prince of peace, we see God commanding a love of enemies, a love of those groups that we would otherwise demonise and commanding that we shouldn’t want tooth for tooth or eye for eye but to believe in forgiveness. I don’t believe that God changed his mind but I do think that through the narrative the Israelites told themselves they were able to misunderstand God’s revelation of Godself in such a way that this became acceptable to them.

Nadia Bolz-Webber offers some thoughts on a similar subject in her sermon “Being good doesn’t make you free. The Truth makes you free.”  which really is worth a read or a listen to!

Perhaps we need to become more aware of the narratives that we tell and are being told, the way in which we can use these to demonise others and protect ourselves. To admit when we are doing this and to try to reconnect to the truth. To be able to encounter our own monstrosity rather then just pointing out the monstrosity of others. To lay down our own narratives in order to be able to understand God’s revelation rather then an altered version based on our narrative. As a wise man once said “The truth will set you free”.

Related post: The Unchanging word of God?

The unchanging word of God?

I have noticed that things are proclaimed as being part of the “unchanging word of God” in discussions that I have seen and been part of recently. Which is all good and well but with each of God’s new revelations of Godself things seem to change. In the old testament, it would appear, that God was cool with war, even ordained it. But in Jesus we have the King of Peace. A new revelation which says that God didn’t make us to be at war with one another, that in building God’s kingdom we should be building peace not waging war. Or take Philip and his meeting with the eunuch in Acts; Philip should have told the eunuch that he was unable to be baptised due to God’s unchanging word in Deuteronomy 23:1 but of course he doesn’t and the eunuch is baptised into “the assembly of the Lord”.

In Matthew 5 Jesus says ““You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’  But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” And when confronted with the woman accused of adultery he stops her stoning, even though it could have been claimed that God’s unchanging word meant that the locals had no choice but to put her to death (Deut 22:22 and Lev 20:10). In Leviticus God’s unchanging word says that certain foods must not be eaten but in God’s new revelation of Godself Jesus says “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.” The bible records that “In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.”

It seems to me that there are two options here the first is that God’s word does change and as it does so God offers a new revelation of Godself, for instance through the person of Jesus or through the spirit. The second option is that God’s word is unchanging but it is a word that is often misunderstood, recorded wrongly and God works to set us straight with each new revelation of Godself. Either way we need to be listening for the way that God is currently working in revelation of Godself, through prayer and the spirit joining God in the way he is currently working and waiting for us to catch on and join him in it.

Related post: Story Crime

What’s in a Word? (I’m a Bible Believing Christian)

Lately I have noticed a problem with words particularly within Christianity. People don’t seem to understand the nuances of multifaceted words.  For instance the words Evangelical and Catholic. I have noticed people criticising things because ”I thought that was Catholic”. But what do they mean by this? Do they mean they think what is happening is from the Roman Catholic church, is it because it related to Catholic thought, is it part of Catholic ritual, or, perhaps they mean that it is part of Catholic spirituality. You can find two different people who call themselves Catholic, and hold fervently to that view who mean very different things by it and so to simply say that something is Catholic as a criticism cannot make sense, the nuance isn’t there to explain what the person means.

The word Evangelical is similar, people use it to mean many different things. And I have noticed that this, or, “I’m a Bible believing Christian” is added to arguments as if to add gravity to a point of view and secondly as if to suggest that any one who does not agree with that statement therefore isn’t a Bible believing Christian or is not evangelical. Like people who define themselves as Catholic you will find a wide variety of views within Evangelicals, it is not a word that allows you to make automatic assumptions about a group of people based on this description.

I have said for a long time that I do not hold the views that I hold in spite of the Bible (as some would suggest) but because of it. My understanding of it is just different. Some people’s understanding of taking the Bible seriously is to take the English translation of their choice literally. My understanding of taking the Bible seriously is to understand who is saying what and to whom, the cultural context that they are speaking within, the language that they are using and the nuanced meanings of the idioms, my version of taking the Bible seriously is one of study and then of application.

I had thought of using the terms “differently orthodox” or “differently Evangelical”.  But ultimately I am a Bible believing Christian and, as such, can claim the title Evangelical.

I may just start prefixing any arguments that I make with “as a Bible believing Christian” or as “an Evangelical”, or perhaps I will just let my arguments stand or fall on their own rather then trying to support it with such titles. And please realise that when you see words such a Catholic or Evangelical that you cannot automatically assume to know what that group is like or what they believe, there is probably more deviation within these groups then there is between them.

Why I am going to Gay Pride.

Quite a while ago I saw the above image, it’s a Christian guy being hugged by a gay man in his underwear. Andrew Marin and a group of Christians went to a pride event in Chicago with signs saying “I’m Sorry”, which had a great response. They were apologising for the hate and general lack of love that Christians are known for showing to the Gay community. It was an image that made me emotional, it was an image that represented reconciliation, love, peace and forgiveness. It’s an image that I have been unable to forget. So fast forwards 18 months or so & I have helped organise for a group of Christians to go to a pride event. Our aim is to take a “different kind of Christian presence” to a community that is perhaps more used to Christian demonstrations of condemnation and hate.

We had been thinking that we would just turn up and see what happens, perhaps take signs etc. However last week Mark Berry from Safe Space came to talk to our team of Churches. He briefly talked about the Samaritain woman at the well, a passage that I have turned to over the last few years while thinking about Christian relations with the LGBT community. His community felt that they were called through this passage to start a night time ministry caring for people as they left a local nightclub, offering a safe place to call a cab, space blankets, flip flops first aid etc. He went on to tell us how ridiculously quickly it started after the idea was first brought up (I think they got going in around 2 weeks-ish) and how all the doors that should have been shut in their face where open for them to go though, including being handed the funding they needed without having had to ask for it. He also told us about how he was asked to be on the board for the local football club, having talked to the chairman and having spent time offering love to the football community by sweeping the terraces after the games and spending time with the community in the bar afterwards.

Traveling home from that talk last week the way forwards hit my in the face and I decided to contact the organisers of the Pride event, knowing that getting them to trust us may have been an issues thanks for the reputation of Christian groups with regards to their interaction with the LGBT community. I sent the email and asked people to pray, hoping that there would be a person of peace in the organising team and trusting that God would be ahead of us opening doors if we were supposed to do this. A few days later I received an email from the treasurer who, it turns out, is a Christian himself and had been wanting to get Christians involved in the event as his church had been unable to do so this year. I went on the trust that the doors would be open and was really pleased to have found that they were.

We are looking at what we would be able to give out, a small bag of sweets or something, and offering the chance to ask for prayer in a non-threatening way (perhaps writing down a situation that prayer would be appreciated for and leaving it with us to pray for when we leave).  Our way of being able show love, humility and grace.

The Gospel According to James.

The reason for me blogging has come up in conversation with people recently and one of them suggested that I should talk about it in a post, which I had considered doing, so here it is.

The main point in me blogging is to create discussion. It isn’t supposed to be “The Gospel According to James”, people can disagree with me and discuss with me and between themselves the subjects bought up. Although there hasn’t been a lot of comments on the blog, lately one or two have started to be posted and discussion has happened else where as well. Ultimately if discussion doesn’t build around the blog eventually then I won’t continue with it, but I want to give it long enough to see whether this would build up or not.

The blog is about raising questions and not always necessarily about giving answers and making statements. It is about questioning and exploring different subjects to see where this takes me/us. It’s not really possible to communicate my thought process that leads to a post on the blog and so I think sometimes the intention gets lost.

The blog is about challenging things but that is about challenging myself as much as it is as challenging anyone else. I always reflect on what it would mean for me in my life, sometimes I include this in the post but not always. But I do always bring it back round to myself and see how I may be challenged by the post.

The blog really is a dumping ground for my thoughts, a place to release them and see what they may become. Sometimes I may even post views that are not even my own views but ones which I want to explore and see where they go.

Hopefully that gives you an idea of where I am coming from with the blog and allows people to greater understand and, perhaps, engage with it.

Hell is a selfish motivator.

I had been planning to post about this for a few weeks and then heard that Two Friars and a Fool were finally unleashing their #95tweets project I figured that I would wait, post about that and then follow it up with this.

A while ago at a home group I was a part of we watched a video featuring Fransis Chan and whilst talking about it afterwards several of us agreed that he seemed to use Hell as a motivation for how we act. From what little I know about Chan* he does and says some good things and I have no wish to to take that away from him. But I do disagree with him on this. I think that Hell is completely the wrong motivation for Christians for how we live on Earth. If Hell is the reason that we do or do not do certain things then that is ultimately selfish and done out of love for the self, to save the self and not through love of God or love of our neighbour. But through exploring and reconsidering the doctrine of Hell we can reconsider our faith and our motivation. We can learn to be motivated by the beauty of God’s Kingdom, of the passion to see the world restored. We can be motivated by being part of God’s kingdom now “the Kingdom of God is within you” and bringing restoration to people’s lives and the awesomeness of that, not because we don’t want to go to Hell.

When I have told people that I like Mathew 25:31-end (the parable of the sheep and goats) the reply has been that they don’t. I think, perhaps, that the reason that they don’t like it is that it makes them question their own salvation. The reason that I do like it is that it makes me question my own salvation. I don’t want to be motivated to do these things to be sure of my salvation, but to do so because of love and beauty and the potential I see to help restore the world to how it should be.

A parent doesn’t want their child’s love out of fear, because of what may happen to them if they don’t profess love for the parent. Do we imagine that God wants us to love him out of fear? Is that even true love? Which motivation would you prefer from the people that love you? How much more must our heavenly father prefer for love to be given out of beauty rather than fear.

*Basically having watched this video a while ago and read a couple of quotes on line so I really don’t claim to understand where he is coming from or what he is like I am just using this to illustrate my point.

A related post can be found here: Why risking the fire of Hell could be the most Christian thing you do

95 Reasons to not Believe in Hell

Two Friars and a Fool is a blog aimed at stimulating the kind of theological discussion you may have with friend over a pint in the pub. A while ago they announced their #95tweets project which, over the weekend, was finally released on the Twitter public. Mirroring Luther’s 95  theses the friars aimed at stimulating discussion whilst demonstrating why they don’t think that belief in Hell is valid or fits with the Christian world view. They tweeted 95 Biblical, Theological or Ethical reasons to reject the belief in Eternal Conscious Torment, and I think they did a good job.  Below are the tweets that I “favourited” over the weekend. Click here to see the whole list on the Two Friars and a Fool website, why not get involved in the discussion on their blog, using the #95tweets hash tag or @TwoFriars. I would also love to know people’s thoughts on this.

My 16 favourite tweets (with an explanation of the tweeting format from @TwoFriars):

These arguments are in 3 categories: Ethical (E), Theological (T) and Biblical (B) plus a number #95Tweets
So, for example, the first tweet will be Tweet E1, or tweet 1 in the Ethical category #95Tweets

#95Tweets#T3: Eternal Hell does nothing whatsoever to glorify God, unless the powerful torturing the weak is glorious

#95Tweets#T5: Eternal Hell renders God’s love meaningless – no definition of love could include allowing infinite torture

#95Tweets#B1: The overwhelming majority of Bible verses support some form of annihilation; more support universalism than eternal Hell

#95Tweets#B2: Gen 3:19: Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, not dust to eternal conscious torment. Death, not eternity, is our default end


#95Tweets#B7: Hades, translated as “Hell”, is imported from Greek mythology, and is simply the realm of the dead, or the god of death

#95Tweets#B8: Hades, while still not Hell, is thrown into the lake of fire and destroyed at the climax of the book of Revelations

#95Tweets#E11: Fear of (eternal) punishment is the most brutal, crass and callous way to seek to encourage good

95Tweets#E12: Fear of punishment is not effective in encouraging good, it only prevents overt misdeeds while being watched

#95Tweets#T9: Eternal Hell renders God’s power meaningless, since God’s plan to restore all creation can be foiled by human sin

#95Tweets#E15: It is morally untenable to expect any person of conscience to enjoy Heaven knowing that others are in Hell

#95Tweets#T17: Eternal Hell is far beyond even the most evil we could visit upon our children – and are we not God’s children?

#95Tweets#T20: Eternal Hell ascribes infinitude, eternity and finality to pain, horror, despair and terror

#95Tweets#B26: Romans 6:23 Paul says the wages of sin is “death”, not “eternal conscious torment” – an important distinction

#95Tweets#B28: Galatians 6:7-8 – Paul is pretty clear that there is destruction or eternal life, not eternal conscious torment

#95Tweets#B29: Phil. 2:9-11 says every knee will bend and tongue confess, not that most knees and tongues will be tortured forever

#95Tweets#B30: Col 1:18-20 – God reconciles with all creation through Christ…or fails miserably to do so if eternal Hell exists

Many others are available on their blog, including some that didn’t make it to the #95tweets as there were too many.

So what do you think?

Related post: Hell is a Selfish Motivator