Since late Saturday night, I’ve willingly belonged to the losing side of an argument. Specifically, I’ve been arguing with several friends – primarily on Facebook and Twitter – that while the call to end Game 3 of the World Series was correct, the rule itself is bad. Several times I’ve ranted eloquently communicated that the obstruction rule in Major League Baseball should account for a player’s intent, and that, yes, umpires should be asked to judge intent. (They already judge intent when pitcher’s do or do not intentionally hit batters, but don’t get me started…) The point is, I knew going into the debate that I would be on the losing side of the argument, and, ultimately, I realize I’m off-base.
Pun intended. Or was it?…
Sometimes, though, our principles and passions drive us to choose the losing side.
It is not for the usual reasons of occupational busyness that I haven’t written a complete blog entry or posted to Wonderstuff for several months. Rather, it’s because of another losing-side situation. I’ve been sick. For months. Since May, actually. I’ve been suffering continual bouts of nausea, fatigue and dizziness that often overcome me all of a sudden. Sometimes it hits in the morning before meals, sometimes after lunch, sometimes in the evenings. Since June, I’ve had a Gastric Emptying study, an Endoscopy, a HIDA Scan, an abdominal ultrasound, and even a CT scan of my brain. On top of these tests, each of which has revealed hardly anything wrong with me, I’ve filled my body with a veritable cornucopia of prescription medication. I’ve had two different medical referrals and gotten a second opinion, and I’m on a very long cancellation list for some hotshot doc in Dallas to have a go at me. I’ve completed Whole 30 in hopes that abstaining from all those foods and food categories would reveal that I’d developed an aversion to them. I’ve started juicing to be healthier and I’ve since ceased juicing to cut down on the extra acidity that has affected my esophagitis. I’ve even gone so far as to eat more than one salad per day! Unfortunately, despite all these efforts, there has been no escape from this problem. I’ve lost twelve pounds, but gained no relief. It’s a losing side if ever one existed.
That isn’t a tumor affecting my feelings of nausea and dizziness. It’s just the part of my brain committed to arguing that Game 3 obstruction call into the ground.
Sometimes, we don’t choose the losing side. We just get the victory beaten out of us by forces beyond our control until losing is all that’s left.
However, I want to make it clear that the operative part of my title is not so much a word, but the gerund-izing of a word. Losing. Present tense.I’m losing.
But I haven’t lost yet.
There’s still some fight left in me. I’ve still got some argumentative angles for those naysayers who doubt an ump’s ability to judge the psyche of a professional baseball player alongside his physical performance. And I’ve still got some options to try out in an effort to heal my body of this odd illness. (Pray for me as I give up coffee – including decaf.)
Farewell, old friend.
My point is pretty simple. There will be times in our lives when we find ourselves on the losing side. Maybe we carried ourselves there, or maybe we were bound, gagged, stuffed in a trunk and delivered there. Maybe we went looking for a fight, or maybe the fight found us even though we were peacefully minding our own business. May we remember that we haven’t lost yet. For the times when we go to the losing side willingly, may we be strengthened by the indignation we bring there. May our twisted perfectly reasonable desire to poke the hornet’s nest with a stick serve to steel our courage and harden our resolve … for the times when we do not venture willingly to the losing side. For the time when we stumble upon the hornets nest and awaken its wrath. When those times happen – and as sure as the sun rises and sets, they will happen – we are going to need that courage and that resolve. We will be dependent on the strength and endurance that we’ve stored inside.
But when even that courage fails and that resolve fades and we can endure no more and we finally, at long last, turn our face to the sky in search of Another who can rescue us from the losing side, may we be greeted by an absence there. Instead, when we drop our heads under the weight of despair, may we feel His hand on our shoulder, and hear His voice gentle on our ear reminding us to “Follow me.” After all, that has been His purpose for us from the beginning of time before there were even sides to choose and lines to draw, and it is a purpose that never changes no matter which side we’re on.
Wherever you are, always remember: you haven’t lost yet.
Every church I have ever attended has had a “fellowship hall.” Even the Anglican church in Basel, Switzerland that my wife and I belonged to for three years had one (though they didn’t always call it by that name). If you’ve ever attended or belonged to a church in America that has its own building, chances are you’re familiar with the concept of a fellowship hall.
A fellowship hall is a room designated by a church for a variety of activities, the majority of which are meant as a celebration of community life. The descriptor is “fellowship,” a concept which harks back to the Greek word, koinonia, found over forty times in the New Testament. It means to be in communion with one another. And in our fellowship halls, we do just that, don’t we?
We put on prayer breakfasts and potluck lunches and appreciation dinners.
We use them for graduation recognitions and Bible studies and AA meetings and ministry events and leader workshops.
We rent them out for both wedding receptions and funeral receptions.
We hold special worship services in them. And youth rallies. And Vacation Bible School activities.
We organize community outreach events in them. And in the halls that double as gymnasiums, you’ll find church-league basketball games, all-night lock-ins and aerobic classes.
Fellowship. The communion of saints. Given the wide range of activities that take place in a fellowship hall, is there any reason to question its essentiality within congregational life?
After all, to be in fellowship with one another is a foundational precept of the Christian church. Our earliest creeds include the belief that believers exist in communion with one another. The early Church operated off of the model established in Jerusalem following Pentecost (Acts 2:43-47, 4:32-35). The Apostle John reminds the churches to which he ministered that those who “walk in the light” with God naturally “have fellowship with one another” (1 John 1:7). Like the old hand-folding rhyme reminds us, the church is indeed the people.
Some are tall, some are short, some are in dire need of a manicure.
And yet, almost from the start, differences of opinion entered the church. Despite the the first believers being described in Acts as “of one heart and mind,” the people began to take sides on a variety of issues.
In Jerusalem, it had to do with nationality and cultural identity, the Hebraic Jews versus the Hellenist Jews.
Later, in Thessalonica, it was between those who continued working and those who retired early in expectation of the Second Coming, the breadwinners verses the idlers.
In Philippi, it was two influential women holding a grudge against one another, Euodia versus Syntyche.
In Galatia, it was theological disagreement between Jewish law and Paul’s teachings, the circumcised versus the uncircumcised.
And in Corinth it had to do with which visiting preacher you preferred … and which side you stood on in various lawsuits … and whether or not you believed it was okay to eat food sacrificed to idols. Yeah, Corinth had a lot of problems.
Okay, where to begin? “Dear Corinthians … are you TRYING to annoy me?!”
Now, in some cases, the church leaders were able to settle the disputes and work out the problems that arose from these disagreements. However, in other cases, there is no evidence the disagreements were ever fully settled. But while a few became significant theological issues for Christians throughout the region, most others simply remained within particular communities. In other words, the presence of disagreement between believers was never fully eradicated.
This is why, for instance, Paul does not spend time in his letter to the Philippians hashing out the details of the disagreement between Euodia and Syntyche (Phil. 4:2). Instead, he simply writes, “I urge [them] to be of the same mind in the Lord.”
On the one hand, that seems an almost impossible statement. We might think that for these two women to achieve such like-mindedness, one side would ultimately have to be proven right and the other side wrong. That, or both parties would have to simply forget about the matter on which they disagreed.
“I am sending to you my beloved Jerry, a co-laboror with me in the Lord’s service. Receive him as you would receive me.”
On the other hand, though, I don’t believe this is how Paul viewed the issue. I think he had come to accept certain disputes as inevitable. It is part of the nature of all communities. When you get different kinds of people together, disagreement happens. It happens between siblings, between spouses, between parents and children, between relatives, between neighbors, between townspeople, between citizens… the list goes on.
Disagreement is not an impairment of community; it is a symptom of it.
Now, over the centuries, we know that there have been monumental issues in the Church that have moved beyond mere disagreement and civil dispute. We know of many churches, as well as and many denominations (i.e. churches functioning in community with other churches), that have cracked apart and divided. Sometimes bitterly, but many times essentially. In fact, my very faith tradition is named for the Middle Age protestors who disputed the way the Church had been doing things in that time. History seems to show that every once in and while, division is necessary. It’s sad but true. However, I believe such monumental disagreements are far less prevalent, and such necessary divisions far less necessary, than we think they are today.
I’m not denying that disagreements can’t get out of control in this day and age. Nor am I advocating a fuggedaboudit ideology in which Christians avoid all manner of conflict in order to prevent division. Like I said, disagreement is a symptom of community, and we shouldn’t fear its presence among us. We will disagree from time to time. We’ll sometimes see things differently, even when it comes to seemingly important issues like interpretation, theology, moral conduct, politics, culture…
For instance…
But here’s the thing. I’m only thirty-three years old and I have already witnessed first-hand two church splits. Both divisions were incredibly tragic and surprisingly nasty. I’ve also served in several churches that have experienced crippling scandals that saw many members turn their backs and walk away. I don’t want to negate any of the difficulties the people of these churches dealt with, but in each case it seems to me that what pushed the dispute into full-fledged division was a lack of humility.
What do I mean by “a lack of humility?” I’m talking about a shortage of individuals who have learned how to admit they don’t know everything about the issue at hand. Who are comfortable with the possibility that their opinions might not be fact, no matter how clear it seems to them when they open up their Bibles in search of proof.
When I was serving in my first youth ministry position, I remember arriving at the church on a particular night only to be waylaid by an elderly deacon who adamantly insisted I take a ride with him so we could talk. We ended up parked at a Sonic and after adamantly insisting I order a drink, he spent the next hour and a half telling me all the reasons why the young pastor who had hired me, and whom I dearly loved, was actually a selfish, envious power-hungry false teacher. The most frightening thing I remember about that night was not his fiery vehemence for our pastor. It was when I realized he was living beyond the range of argument. Not only could I not change his mind, but any difference of opinion was met with more frustration and adamant insistence in his rightness.
Welcome to Sonic Drive-In. Would you like fries or tater tots with your terrifyingly righteous indignation?
These experiences have made me sensitive to the paucity of humility in our churches today. Sometimes it takes the form of disagreement without a desire to compromise. Other times, it is revealed by a general indifference to actively participate with those people, (but that’s more for part two of this post). Ironic, considering how many activities still take place in our “fellowship halls.” Fellowship – from the Greek koinonia – means to coexist, and to do so in a tone of celebration. But genuine fellowship will not happen without a healthy level of humility.
This is what I believe Paul was advocating to the Philippian church. Urging Euodia and Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord was Paul’s way of saying, “Hey, I know you have your differences, and I know you think the other one is wrong on some significant issue. However, that disagreement in no way prevents your mutual belief in the salvation of Jesus. So find a way to coexist in that hope, not because we all need to get along but because getting along is part of experiencing the koinonia we are meant to have with God himself. So, remind yourself that while you know some things, you don’t know everything, and stop allowing a difference of opinion to rob you of fellowship with each other and with your Creator.”
Paul wasn’t as long-winded as I am.
The Church is filled with disagreements, but it is about so much more than those disagreements. We are not meant to be defined by what we disagree on. We are meant to be defined solely by the God who has called us and saved us. We’re meant to be defined by Jesus’ love for us.
Perhaps the churches that have fellowship halls should begin using them in ways that point its members back to this reality. In addition to the dinners and rallies and lock-ins and league games, maybe we can begin using those spaces as venues for patient dialogue and safe places for disagreement. Maybe these multi-purpose rooms can someday reclaim the true meaning of their names.
Yesterday, I received an unwelcome glimpse into the future of my vocation.
Recently, I’ve had the privilege to deliver the sermons in the morning and evening worship services while our interim pastor has been out-of-town. I don’t take these invitations lightly.
I love preaching. I love the preparation – the choosing of a text, the meticulous research. I love to jot down notes and good lines and phrases turned in captivating ways. I enjoy writing the manuscript. And, despite the unavoidable pain that comes from revising and cutting it down to size, I relish the way slashing paragraphs and removing unnecessary repetition seems to grant freedom to the whole enterprise. I even enjoy practicing the manuscript out loud, contending with it until I’m able to leave it behind without losing point or pace.
Cheater.
Preaching is as much of an art form, a specialist’s craft, as poetry, painting, playing an instrument or writing a short story. And even though I know I still have a long way to go before I can consider myself an accomplished craftsman, each opportunity afforded me is practice I need and practice I crave.
But yesterday, following the worship service, I came face-to-face with one of the drawbacks to the art form and to the choice to make preaching part of my career.
It wasn’t criticism. By now, I’ve preached enough sermons and taught enough Bible studies to receive a fair share of negative responses. A few have been called for, a few have not, and still there have been a handful of comments that were, without a doubt, the most selfish, insensitive and tactless attacks I’ve ever heard leveled against a human being. (That last group usually comes by way of e-mail, one of the many ways the Internet allows us to wage bloody trench wars against people we disagree with.) Criticism can be discouraging, and a few times it has sapped my sense of accomplishment, but, ultimately, negative criticism only makes the preacher work harder and pay more attention to the words and illustrations he chooses.
“Okay, so how can I keep this point from sounding like the vapid, ignorant utterings of a pea-brained liberal jackass with the common sense of a monkey throwing feces?”
No, what left me so disconcerted with the preaching life was found in some of the conversations I had with people at the close of the service, no more than ten minutes after I’d finished delivering my sermon. Almost exclusively, they offered me positive comments and praise. However, the reasons they gave for why they enjoyed my sermon came directly from a viewpoint that I had spent the last half hour arguing against!
Yesterday’s sermon focused on the fact that the gospel of Jesus Christ erases all manner of distinction between a person and others. Drawing upon Galatians 3:28 (“There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”), my main premise was that while a lot of professing Christians continue to abide by the myriad of cultural, political, racial and economic classifications present in our modern world, the truth of the gospel is that salvation abolishes that way of life. And if we want to live as authentic Christians – rather than by a mere societal definition of the word “Christian” – we must submit to this radical new way of thinking and speaking and doing. There’s no argument here. The gospel of Jesus robs us of the permission to figure our identity by worldly standards.
Somehow, despite so carefully preparing my sermon and practicing the delivery, some people just seemed to hear the exact opposite message than I had intended. They spoke to me from particular cultural, political, and/or social perspectives, brazenly unaware that bad-mouthing or lamenting people who were different from them was the very thing I had spoken out against.
It was the presumptuousness that bothered me most. Some of these people simply assumed that I shared every one of their views, when, in reality, all I was thinking was, “Well, that’s not what I meant at all,” and “Were you even listening to the part where I said _________?”
Ah! He’s saying something that sounds impactful. Quick, plug your ears!
Look, I’m not a fool. I understand that I can’t expect one sermon to completely change every heart and mind, no matter how much preparation goes into it. And I realize that God is patient, and that he calls his children to be patient as well, and that changing minds takes time. In fact, that was one of the main points of my sermon – that sanctification is a struggle because we are constantly being pulled backwards into the old way of life, into cold legalism and the convenience of social distinctions.
However, there is something deeply disconcerting when the words you speak are not only heard incorrectly, but the people who most need to hear a message of deliverance interpret what you say as encouragement to keep on living the way they’ve been living. It made me wonder if this is always going to be an unwelcome aspect of the preaching life. Will anything ever break through to such people? Will the Spirit ever be able to convict them?
And how am I to respond? Granted, I was a substitute – a guest speaker. Communicating truth comes as one-shot opportunities for me right now. I’m not so sure it’s my place to stop the well-meaning commenters in the middle of what they’re telling me and say, “Wow, you just didn’t get it at all, did you?”
“C’mon, be honest. You were just doodling in your bulletin the whole time, weren’t you?”
As I ponder the next step and whether or not I’m really up for this kind of life, I realize there is not much difference between receiving negative criticism and receiving misguided praise. It still just makes me want to work harder – to meticulously pour over that next message (whenever the opportunity to preach comes my way again) and consider even more deliberately the audience to whom I speak.
And I realize something else, too. It occurs to me that it’s one thing to stand up on a stage or behind a pulpit and preach a good sermon. It’s a whole other thing to live as that very model of grace and Christ-filled patience in the midst of post-sermon conversations.
God have mercy! There’s no greater art form than that.
The following is written in preparation for an upcoming sermon. If it sounds preachy or Christian-y, that’s intentional…
When I was a teenager, my parents found themselves frustrated with how forgetful I could be. Like most kids, I was tasked with certain chores every week. Unfortunately, I struggled with a lack of attentiveness, lost in thought and not always concerned with what should have been considered priorities of the day. So sometimes the trash didn’t get taken out on Thursday night, or the windows went unWindexed, or the soda cans piled up because someone just plain forgot to take them out to the garage, crush them into little aluminum discs, and dump them into the recycling bin.
“I’m saving aluminum … and space!”
To combat this issue – or maybe just to wake me up to how troublesome my inattentiveness could be – my parents crafted a large, poster board chart complete with a detailed grid of black-lined rows and columns listing all of my weekly chores. They laminated this thing and affixed it to my bedroom door (totally ruining my chosen decorative aesthetic) along with a black dry-erase marker. The agreement was that every day I would consult the chart and do the corresponding chore or chores. On Friday, I would collect my allowance based on how many of these chores I completed.
The thing I hated most about the chart, though, was that in order for a chore to be considered “complete” and for me to be paid for it, I had to check off the corresponding box. For example, I might remember to take out the trash on Thursday night, but if I forgot to check the box before Friday afternoon, I forfeited pay for that chore. No check mark-o, no dinero.
I wish I could tell you that I quickly learned to complete my chores and check all the boxes, but, sadly, that wasn’t the case. On Fridays, that chart looked less like a blacked-out bingo card and more like a chessboard after the players have taken several of each other’s pieces.
Or whatever wackadoo game this is.
But if the chart in all its formulaic detail taught me one thing, it was that I have a persistent problem with attentiveness. The chart didn’t create the problem, but it certainly made it obvious, just as my parents suspected it would. These days, my forgetfulness takes the form of remembering responsibilities my wife asks of me, or constantly misplacing my keys or my wallet because I’m rarely paying attention to what I’m doing when my hands absently put them down.
The Desert Fathers spoke often of the need to develop a deep awareness of God. I can only hope they didn’t feel the same about the location of one’s iPhone or sunglasses.
I sometimes find myself wondering whether or not the chart should make a comeback, either in my house or in my office. However, those teenage years spent with the thing affixed to my door taught me that as explicit and audacious as the chart was, it couldn’t fix me. And, thankfully, I’m now married to a wonderful woman who is willing to bear with me – in sickness and in health, in attention deficiency and total recollection – even when I let her down and forget to take care of something she asked me to do. And as inconvenient as it can sometimes be to engage in an impromptu scavenger hunt all over my house for my misplaced keys or my cell phone or my wallet (or, most of the time, all three), I have yet to experience any terrible or irreversible consequences born out of those delays. If anything, it’s made me more patient and understanding with other people’s absent-mindedness. We’ve all got our issues…
I feel your pain, Arny.
Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore, the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. (Gal. 3:23-26)
Something like my love-hate relationship with the chart (emphasis on the “hate”) is the difference between living under the influence of “the law,” and living by faith in Jesus. Paul’s letters in the New Testament continually refer to the fundamental change that has taken place ever since Jesus died on the cross and was raised to life again. Before this earthshaking event, the only way for a person to be justified (that is, to be considered righteous and in good relationship with God) was to carefully follow a detailed set of rules and regulations. It started with what we know as “the Ten Commandments” but there was a lot more to the law than just those things. (If you’re curious how much more, just read Exodus through Deuteronomy and see if you can make it through the whole thing without the desire to bang your head on a table, either in frustration or because you passed out from boredom.)
But according to Paul, the only thing “the law” made clear was that no one could perfectly follow it in its entirety. In other words, just like my parents’ chart made it clear that I have a problem with attentiveness, the law made it clear that every person has a problem called sin.
Another metaphor I was toying with was how the invention of antiperspirant deodorant made it clear that, if left to their own devices, people stink.
There’s nothing religious or overly spiritual about this problem we Christians call “sin.” At its heart, sin is selfishness. It is rebellion against a certain standard of thinking and doing for the sake of temporarily indulging a personal desire that goes against the standard. We’re all guilty of selfishness from time to time – we’ve all got our issues.
The good news that Paul goes on to write about is that the law was never really meant to be the way a person becomes righteous or experiences a relationship with God. In his letter to the Galatians, he calls it a “disciplinarian.” In the Roman Empire, a father often instructed one of his slaves or appointed one of his house servants to the task of looking after his son. This “disciplinarian,” or guardian, would accompany the boy to school and would make sure he behaved himself and was faithful to his studies. Often, the guardian was given the authority to discipline the boy if he misbehaved. Additionally, the guardian would report back to the father on the boy’s progress and lifestyle.
And, suddenly, the theological implications in this film shine with new light!
Eventually, the boy would mature enough that he no longer required a disciplinarian. Paul claims this is what happens with salvation in Christ. We don’t need a disciplinarian keeping track of our behavior and revealing when and how we’ve gone wrong. We don’t live by that standard anymore. Rather, we live under a new promise. We are made righteous solely by our belief and trust in Jesus’ forgiveness. Or, as Paul writes, we are “justified by faith.”
Does this mean the problem of sin is gone? Are we no longer capable of selfishness? Nope – the problem is still there. However, the way we understand it and react to it has totally changed. We live under a constantreality of grace, a canopy of forgiveness that doesn’t change based on how obedient we are (or whether or not we knowingly check a particular box next to a list of good deeds). The law remains, but its purpose has been fulfilled. Lesson learned.
As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3:27-28)
We have come to Christ, who saves us and erases every human-made distinction by which we’ve grown up living our lives. “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female…” That’s good news! It means we don’t have to view our lives in terms of nationality, political viewpoints, economic status, or even gender relations. And we certainly don’t view it based on how successfully one person or group follows the law as compared to another. The Declaration of Independence included the statement that “all men are created equal,” but the only place we will ever experience that statement to be fully true is under the canopy of forgiveness that exists at the heart of a relationship with Jesus.
This is a line from Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, but the prevalence of its quotation these days, especially from Christians, has made me wonder if a lot of people wrongly assume it to be a biblical proverb, right up there with “God helps those who help themselves,” and “Honk if you love Jesus.”
The line is often used as a warning, to watch out for people who would twist Scripture to prove their own un-biblical beliefs. There are right-wing Christians who will toss it out like a caution flag amidst the liberal “war on faith,” while others will cite Shakespeare’s line as a rebuttal to those whose favorite past-time is biblical proof-texting.
Funny thing, though, about this oh-so-wise aphorism is that when placed back in its original context, it’s purpose changes dramatically. When Antonio, the so-named “merchant of Venice,” tells his friend and client, Bassanio, that “The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose,” (referring to Shylock’s biblical allusion of money-lending), he is not speaking out of wisdom, but bigotry. Antonio is an anti-Semite who bears no trust for Shylock, the Jewish moneylender, and also has no qualms about directly labeling the guy “the devil” in his presence.
My point is, just like lines from Shakespeare, a lot of folks may also routinely cite Scripture for their purposes, and not all of them are devils or even proof-texters. However, it turns out many of us have been misinformed regarding the true meaning of certain “well-known” passages.
Such as…
#3 – Sodom is Destroyed Not for Sexual Impurity but Social Impropriety (Genesis 19)
What You Thought It Was About
Judgment on a society involved in rampant homosexual activity.
In the story, Abraham’s nephew, Lot, welcomes the sudden arrival of two angelic visitors to Sodom. Unlike our modern cinematic interpretations of angels, it’s likely these two visitors are not pale-faced, moussed-hair Scandinavians wearing trench coats. Rather, Lot greets them as he would visiting lords or foreign royalty. He invites them to stay in his home, but the angels tell him they plan to spend the night in the town square.
Perhaps they were only one eligible stay away from becoming Diamond members.
Lot “urges them strongly” to reconsider (there’s no evidence the Hyatt in Sodom was top-of-the-line) and they do. Later that night, all the men of the town (including young boys) show up at Lot’s door and demand he give up his two visitors, “so that we may know them.” The basic interpretation of these words is that the men wanted to rape the angels. (The statement in Hebrew is “Yatsa yada yada,” which puts that Seinfeld episode in a whole new light.) When Lot refuses their request – to the point of offering his daughters and even himself instead – the men riot and threaten to break down his door. The angels then reveal to Lot the real reason for their visit: they were sent to destroy the city. Before initiating the divine smackdown, however, they kindly usher Lot and his family out the back.
Presumably because even after he began suffering from amnesia, Loki remained incredibly clever and cool under pressure.
What It’s Actually About
Bad hospitality.
Just like with Shakespeare, the Achilles heel of biblical proof-texting is a not-so-little thing called context. In this case, the preceding story in Genesis helps shed some light by way of contrast, as do the statements the supposedly rape-focused men say about Lot also.
In the story that immediately precedes this one, Lot’s uncle Abraham extends an incredibly gracious and humble welcome to three angelic visitors (the identities of which are commonly interpreted as God himself and the two angels of the Sodom account). After having a generous feast prepared for them, Abraham then journeys on with them for some distance after they stay in his home (18:1-16). The guy is such a bend-over-backwards brown-noser, you’d think he was working for tips.
Abraham in his younger days.
Why is this significant?
Well, now consider the entirety of the Sodom account itself. Lot proves he’s learned how to be a good host from his uncle, and he also urges the angels “strongly” not to stay in town. It almost seems like Lot knows they won’t receive a warm welcome from anyone else – that gladly rolling out the welcome mat is not how Sodom does things. Which is tragic, because hospitality was considered to be, culturally speaking, very important. It was the litmus test for what made you a good and honorable person, or a good and honorable community. In this day and age, so much of your quality as a human being was tied to your capacity for generosity and benevolence. Welcome the stranger and the traveler, and you would find blessing from God. Reject them, or, worse yet, take advantage of them, and you were persona non grata.
David, Ahimelech and the holy bread in 1st Samuel 21. Mary, the wedding hosts and the lack of wine in John 2. Jesus’ story about the man who bothers his neighbor for bread in the middle of the night in Luke 11. All of these hinge on the priority of being a good host, a deeply ingrained social contract of hospitality. Were you to neglect or break this contract, your reputation would be forever blackened and would lead to the inevitable suffering that comes from a reputation as a social pariah.
Unless, that is, you lived in a town full of pariahs.
Consider the way the men of Sodom react against Lot after he refuses them access to his visitors:
“And they said, ‘This fellow came here as an alien, and he would play the judge! Now we will deal worse with you than with them.'” (19:9)
You can either choose to believe that all these men just suddenly became alarmingly rape-y all at the same time (and chose to perform history’s largest gang-rape as a way to satisfy those urges), or you can believe that the attempted rape, while shocking, was a means to an end; in this case, domination by subjugation and degradation. Raping Lot’s visitors would have been both a power play and a humiliating insult, and it would have quickly established that even the most important visitors are nothing special in the eyes of the Sodomites.
When Mad Dog Tannen didn’t like Marty McFly’s look in Back to the Future III, he pulled out his six-shooter and fired at the kid’s feet, which is, of course, one of the Wild West’s go-to moves for putting strangers in their place. Let’s just say the men of Sodom had even less patience for foreigners and much crueler means of intimidation.
It’s one thing when a city is filled with people who have no sexual boundaries. It’s quite another thing when they’ve lost all trace of kindness and amity. Is it any wonder Sodom and its sister city ended up two smoldering piles of sulfurous rubble?
A far better American version of Sodom than San Francisco could ever be.
#2 – Jeremiah 29:11 is Less Concerned with Hopes and Dreams and More Concerned with Sitting Down and Shutting Up
What You Thought It Was About
Reach for the stars, because God’s got a personal success story written just for you.
If I had a dime for every time I’ve seen this verse printed on graduation cards, imprinted on paperweights, and scrawled in the top corner of Oh the Places You’ll Go!, I wouldn’t necessarily be a rich man, but I’d have way more dimes than even Kramer had in that episode when he tried to cook his pants.
That’s two allusions to Seinfeld so far. I think I’ll go for the hat trick.
It seems like such a wonderfully personalized verse right there in the middle of all that tedious, long-winded Old Testament prophecy. It’s as if God suddenly stops all his complaining about the Kingdom of Judah long enough to throw a hopeful bone out to us modern readers. For a lot of Christians, Jeremiah 29:11 is the John 3:16 of the Old Testament and certainly the most quotable line from any of the Prophets, unless you count that “mount up with wings like eagles” line from Isaiah, but that’s usually reserved for the backs of T-shirts of Christian high school track teams.
The point is, for a brief moment in Jeremiah’s heady prophetic discourse, I’m reminded that God has a special plan of success all ready for me, and all I’ve got to do is… um, well, whatever “seek me with all your heart” means. Pray, I guess. And read my Bible and, you know, keep doing my “quiet time” and stuff . The verse really isn’t clear on that part.
What It’s Actually About
The divine rescue you think is coming isn’t, so stop complaining and get used to a less-than-perfect life.
Once again, the popular interpretation burns in the light of context. It turns out that Jeremiah 29:11 is not as easy to extract from the larger passage than we would like, which is a bummer since that one verse is so darn marketable. The historical background underscoring this passage in Jeremiah reminds us that the people of Judah have recently experienced a tragic defeat at the hands of the formidable Babylonian empire; as a result, they have been exiled from Jerusalem and forced to live in Babylon, the homeland of their captors. They are strangers in a strange land.
“Hey, look on the bright side, guys. What if you’d been exiled to Sodom? You remember what those guys used to do to foreigners…”
Into these dark days, Jeremiah’s prophecy comes across not glass-half-full encouragement, but tough-love advice.
Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” (29:4-7)
Did you get that? The instruction for the people of Judah, caught up in the darkest period of their history and forced to toil and tarry in a land not their own is … to deal with it. To accept it. To make the best of a bad situation. And to not expect a rescue anytime soon, no matter if some other prophets claimed salvation was imminent (29:8-9). So go ahead and settle in for the long haul, because things ain’t changing until long after you’re dead.
That’s right. That plan for a hope and a future, while being directly concerned with an entire race of people (as opposed to each individual high school graduate at a baccalaureate service), was actually about a future generation that would see the Babylonian empire fall to the great King Cyrus of Persia, a messianic-like figure who would later decree that all exiled people were allowed to return to their homeland.
So, yeah, it’s a nice verse, but unless you’re willing to concede that God’s perfect plan for your life might be seventy years in coming, I’d stop using it as a testament to God’s interest in earthly successes.
“Good luck with the liberal arts degree, young man. Babylon’s unemployment rate is currently 34%.”
#1 – The Passage That Allegedly Elevates Men as Household Leaders Actually Describes Them as Household Slaves
What You Thought It Was About
God has ordained males as the unequivocal head of the household, and wives must dutifully submit.
Toward the end of Paul’s letter to the Church in Ephesus, he spends some time giving behavioral advice regarding specific social and familial systems in that city. Now, when we males were still little boys, we were more interested in reading about that whole armor of God metaphor that comes after these verses. However, as we matured, entered college and began attending Sunday School classes and small groups geared toward young singles, we encountered a lot of marriage-centered curriculum that was focused on the family stuff rather than the helmet of truth, the sword of salvation and the crossbow of congeniality (that last one may be apocryphal). Specifically, what we learned is that according to Ephesians and a few other sprinkled passages attributed to the Apostle Paul, when it comes to establishing a Christian marriage, men are the boss and, well, you ladies just gotta deal with that.
I’d take this guy over Mark Driscoll or Matt Chandler any day.
It seems pretty straightforward, doesn’t it?
Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Savior. Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands. (5:22-24)
There you have it. For most preachers espousing what is known as a complementarian view of marriage, it doesn’t get any clearer than that. Men are compared to Jesus, and women are, well, something between a gaggle of believers and an individual in need of a head.
And once you find it, ladies, make sure you keep it covered. Them’s the rules.
What It’s Actually About
Full-fledged service to one another.
Context, context, context. Even if you believe complementarianism to be the correct way to structure the family unit, looking before and behind these three verses reveals there is something much bigger being described here. The Apostle Paul seems less concerned with mandating men to be the masters of their domains…
He shoots, he scores!
and more concerned with encouraging a lifestyle of servanthood among the entire Ephesian congregation. Though a lot of modern Bible translations slap a big chunk of space and a subtitle in between verses 21 and 22, take a look at how Paul opens this whole “be subject” part of his letter:
Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. (5:21)
One another. Be subject to one another! Now, consider the way he describes the character of Jesus Christ as he extends the metaphor in verse 25:
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her… (emphasis mine)
And in verse 28,
In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.
There is something much more sacrificial being insinuated in this passage, especially since it starts not merely with instructing females to “submit” to males, but for all the people to “submit” to one another. The Greek word is hypotasso, and it means, among other synonyms, “to subordinate, obey, yield to advice.” Paul is not focused on husbands and wives so much as shedding new light on the relationship between Jesus and the Church. He has taken the traditional patriarchal structure of a family and applied it – with a caveat of full-fledged servanthood by both parties – to the Savior and those who would believe in him. And in case you missed it, he even says in verse 32 that this is his real point.
So, yes, guys, according to Paul you are the head of the household. Congratulations! However, the next time you think this means you get to call all the shots, set the dinner times, control the calendar, schedule sex, and leave all those annoying “inside chores” for that obedient bride of yours, think again. If the salvation you claim is to have any genuine influence in your home, you’ll find yourself relinquishing a lot more of your attention, time and energy than that which you keep for yourself.
But, hey, don’t take my word for it. President Bartlett feels the same:
Wonderstuff 