Ear Tickling

Weddings, weddings!  Yes I sat through the most recent royal wedding to see all the festivities, pomp and circumstance, and general brew ha ha over Harry and Meghan.  And naturally, as this is a theological blog, I zero in on the firey sermon given by Bishop Michael Curry.  But alas, to no avail.  It was yet another syrupy dalliance with the effervescent nature of global love that would make Rob Bell proud.

A minister of the gospel, a pastor of a flock, and an American to boot, is given the stage to speak to the world and what does he do?  Uses his time to talk of “LOVE” and how it is the most powerful thing and can leap tall buildings in a single bound.

Stephen McAlpine nailed it in his latest blog “A Tale of Two Royal Weddings”. “A wedding that looks as grand spanking Royal as Charles and Di’s ever did. But a wedding that still needs a cross at the centre – under the surface of it – like theirs needed, but sadly failed to contain. Not just the love of Jesus as he lived, but the love of Jesus as he died.”

Not too long ago I attended the wedding of wonderful friends in Christ.  The pastor who spoke used the opportunity to speak of the couples love and vowed commitment to one another, yes, but it did not rest there.  He pushed on toward the meaning and purpose of marriage for the man and woman, how it is to challenge them to live for the other because this is what Christ did; challenge them to love even when the other is not loveable, because this is what Christ did; and challenge them to honor even when the other is not honorable, because that is what Christ did. He spoke of God’s design for marriage, between one man and one woman, and their responsibilities toward one another.  It was a true celebration of not just the marriage of the couple, but of its representation of Christ and the church.  This is what marriage points to and what Bishop Curry missed. Where did Bishop Michael Curry’s sermon take us?  In case you missed it, the Cross was not in sight.

He spoke as if the love we feel for one another, puppy, at first sight, or any other, is the love that represents God Himself.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  When we raise love above all else we find ourselves loving at all costs, even those things that ought not to be loved.  And we do things that ought not to be done, for the sake of this selfsame love.

Many people like to quote 1John in their effort to highlight the superiority of love above all else.  What they miss is that what we call love, what we experience as love, what we define as love, misses the mark, try as we might.  And we all know what missing the mark means—sin.  We cannot compare our view of love to God’s because His love is nothing like ours.  It might point to His but we never quite makes it there.

Quote from the VOX about the wedding  “But one of the most striking elements of the royal wedding was also among the most unexpected: the fiery, impassioned, and theologically-charged sermon of American Episcopalian bishop Michael Curry.

“Most theologically charged sermon…”?  Really?  Without mention of the cross?  This is an example of moralistic therapeutic deism of the finest sort.  And I hate that I must bring this up because there is beauty and majesty in love, but it is a love that has been exposed to and rubbed against a splintered cross in a brutal and beautiful way.  It is a love that makes us hang our heads in shame able to raise them only because of the humility of the cross.  It is love we should fear because it demanded the cross. It is a love we should practice because it required the cross.

Bishop Curry had a world stage that few theologians and preachers get…and he blew it.  When he could have spoken to a world (especially Great Britain and the rest of the Western world) of Christ, his love, his sacrifice, and his triumph, instead he spoke of a “Rob Bellian” love that fails to satisfy.  When this love of which he spoke, no longer reigns supreme in the marriage, where is the couple to go?  When it is no longer producing the fire of which he spoke, what should the couple do?  When it fades into comfortable co-existence, what will the couple do to kindle a new kind of love, more real and enduring? His was a world audience thirsting for truth and Bishop Curry gave them a drop of water when he had a whole river of truth from which to draw.

The Cross…I am convinced that every sermon, in life, in marriage, and especially in death, must draw us inextricably to the Cross.  Otherwise, nothing makes sense, or in the words of Solomon, “vanity, vanity, all is vanity.” (As you can see I am still stuck in Ecclesiastes.) The Cross is the sticking point for all of Christianity.

John Stott magnificently describes in his book The Cross of Christ, 4 affirmations about the cross from which we can then, and only then, touch upon the subject of love (or righteousness or humility, or grace or mercy, or…).

1. The Cross is the ground of our justification.
2. The Cross is the means of our sanctification.
3. The Cross is the subject of our witness.
4. The cross is the object of our boasting.

The cross…the cross…this should have been the subject of Bishop Curry’s sermon.  He had the opportunity of a life time to speak wisdom and instead chose to tickle our ears.

 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom:² preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. ³ For the time is coming when people will not endure sound^[a] teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, ⁴ and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. 2 Timothy 4:1-4

 

 

 

Misshapen Water

It has taken a while to gather my thoughts concerning the movie that won the Best Picture Oscar this year.  Naively thinking that it might be something interesting to watch, and since the movie theater was offering discounted tickets for certain showings, off I went.  As my friend and I left the theater, another woman walking behind us heard our comments and joined our discussion about a movie that left us gob-smacked.  Even now, we are still not entirely sure what the point was.

Initially I thought it might be a parody, since on display was the proverbial military wonks who, if they don’t understand a creature, want to kill it.  Or even better, the Christian starched shirt that can quote scripture to quell the life out of any living thing.  These are old and over used props for even Hollywood, hence my thinking this was a parody.  But no.

We have a timid woman, who lives alone, and works the night shift at some sort of research facility.  The creature that is brought there is worshiped in its home environment as a god.  For the purposes of this movie, it is being investigated as a life form that can breath both under and above water.  Why the military has control over this creature is anyone’s guess but there are scientists who want to study the creature in order to understand not just its breathing ability but its entire physiological system.  To enhance to the 1962 setting, we have, of course, the Soviets who also want this creature…not to study but to destroy it just so the US cannot use it for whatever potential benefits the creature may offer.

Anyway, anyway, anyway…the point of this blog is not to critique the movie.  That is well beyond my abilities as I have no clue as to where to begin, nor do I care to.  What interests me is that we are moving significantly down the road toward the destruction of mankind.  Given movies like Planet of the Apes, Star Wars, and now this one, the line between human beings and animals is blurring. If from a biblical perspective, we begin with man being made in the image of God, and then gradually deconstruct that notion, we arrive at a point where human beings are merely one more cog in the evolutionary wheel of life.

To piggyback on my previous post about Ecclesiastes, there is a verse the in chapter 3 that is a poke in the eye:

¹⁸ I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. ¹⁹ For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. ²⁰ All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return. ²¹ Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth?

And so it is…not much difference between us and the rest of the animal kingdom… when God the Creator is not in sight.  Given this worldview, movies like the Shape of Water make sense and we should expect more like them.  Don’t be surprised when the equality of man and animal spills over into reality.  But sadly it already has.  Those annoying posts where people post pictures of their children, i.e. their new puppy and then project onto their parents the moniker of grandma or grandpa.  No thank you.

And this from an article on One Green Planet: “It is so important that we grant animals “personhood” because they can’t speak up, they can’t picket, make petitions or elect government officials who will It is so important that we grant animals “personhood” because they can’t speak up, they can’t picket, make petitions or elect government officials who will give them rights–they need US to qualify their worth and grant them rights.–they need US to qualify their worth and grant them rights.”

Does anyone see a problem here?  “…they can’t speak up, they can’t picket, make petitions or elect government officials”…neither can unborn children and yet we rip them apart and call it “the right to choose”. The lines are getting awfully blurry.

Here in Australia there is a movement to stop the exportation of live animals to other countries.  It is a noble cause, I think.  Those animals we raise for food ought not be treated “inhumanely” but… they are not humans.  They have not had stamped on their visage the image of God and as such are wholly different and yes, less than human.  I had a man stop me in the shops not very long ago to ask if I wanted to donate money to stop the caging and baiting of bears (where this is done, I am not sure).  I told him that as a Christian we are directed by God to take care of animals as well as all parts of our environment.  But the best way I see to do that is to teach people about Christ and our God-given mandate as stewards of this world.  Donating money may help one bear, but educating a populace helps many bears and changes the way we exercise dominion over all of the animal kingdom.  He didn’t like my answer and proceeded to accost someone else.

²⁶ Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

²⁷ So God created man in his own image,
    in the image of God he created him;
    male and female he created them.

 

²⁸ And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” ²⁹ And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. ³⁰ And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. ³¹ And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.  Genesis 1:28-31

It was very, very good.  God’s design for humanity and the world would have worked well, if only…

Doina…music for Ecclesiates

I just finished reading a book by Cass Moriarty called Parting Words.  The premise of the book is that a father dies leaving behind letters for his children to deliver to various people in his past.  In that process they learn things about their father that they never knew and by extension, things about themselves.  Interesting idea, I just wish it had been more substantial rather than relying upon overused moral dilemmas.  Anyway, I don’t need to give away the plot.  The point of bringing it up is that at the end of the book, Ms. Moriarty mentions that one of the characters in the book is modeled after Moshlo, a Polish born/Australian emigre violinist.  Toward the end of his life he investigated and adapted to the violin a style of music from Romania called doina.

I decided to google this style of music and this is what I found.  Have a listen:

As I sat listening to his mournful performance, it dawned on me, that this is the music of the book of Ecclesiastes!  They go together as if designed for one another.  But isn’t that the way God works.

The Lord will save me,
    and we will play my music on stringed instruments
all the days of our lives,
    at the house of the Lord. 

Isaiah 38:20

The Joy of Vanity and striving after wind.

I break a 5 month sabbatical…I just couldn’t stay away.  But a lot has happened in those intervening months.  We have had to move yet again and the more you do it the harder it gets…or maybe that’s because I am getting older, but that is another story. Vanity, vanity…all is vanity.

Lest any one think otherwise, let me set the record straight–the Lord has a sense of humor and sometimes it is naughty.  Well, not naughty as in sinful because that is not in His nature.  But sometimes he drags us through things we would prefer not to be drug through so that coming out the other side we are more reliant upon Him than when we first started.  During this most recent move from one rental house to another (yes, you can see the writing on the wall in that there is yet another move on our horizon when we will finally be able to purchase an abode of our very own), our church launched a sermon series on the book of Ecclesiastes.  This is a relatively small book that often gets over looked for the likes of Genesis, Isaiah, or Psalms. Traditionally thought to be written by King Solomon, and I have no reason to challenge this belief, it is a book not for the faint of heart.

In a lovely fictional book filled with wonderful quips, Barbara Kingsolver’s Pigs in Heaven, she bandies about phrases like:

“She has chosen Barbie as her lord and savior” to describe the shallow allegiance of a young woman to her make-up and appearance.

Or,

“You look like you have been drug through a knot hole” to describe the look of someone just this side of being hit by a Mack truck.  A fairly well known description, but one I had not heard of before reading Pigs in Heaven.

Anyway, it is this last phrase that speaks to the feeling of reading Ecclesiastes.  To make that knot hole even smaller, is to read (or listen in my case) while setting up house after yet another move.  Picking up a treasure that has managed to make the journey from the US to Italy to Australia, to the US, to Germany, to the US, and now back to Australia, is a testament to either the talent of the various packers involved in each move or to the resilience of the item itself.  Gently placing said item on the shelf only to hear in the background (I was listening the Max McLean read Ecclesiastes while unpacking) “Vanity, vanity, all is vanity.”  Or “What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?” Or “Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.”  Well, I tell you, with passages like these its a wonder I didn’t pack it in (pun intended).  With my treasured item gently placed on the shelf, the sobering reality of our temporary existence struck home.  So then, if what we acquire to provide creature comforts is all “vanity”, what then truly matters?  Don’t try to find the answer in Ecclesiastes because Solomon is a cheeky chap–he never really answers that question forthrightly…until the end.  For 12 chapters, he drives home the relentlessness and pointlessness of living in a fallen world. He is annoyingly obtuse in pushing us toward the stark realities that define our world. 

To make matters worse, as if after reading the above it could get any worse but oh it does…Solomon goes on to suggest that even trying to understand the futility is fraught with sadness! “For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.”  Are you depressed yet?  Let it all sink in and it will come.

The bottom line is that this world is sad, hard, evil, miserable, mean, and full of suffering–no denying that.  The wisdom is in the knowing and realizing that we were meant for something glorious, beautiful, and fulfilling.  “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:4) We live, however, in that time of “former things” and they are just not passing away…not as quickly as most of us would like.  Thankfully, the Preacher, in the very last two verses, lays out for us with a sense of ease and peace, that indeed all is not vanity.  In fact, all is quite simple and plain.

“The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14

Fearing God and keeping his commandments is not vanity, nor is it striving after the wind.  It is secure, true, and reliable.  Our lives, rooted anywhere else other than this clear command, is most certainly vanity and a striving after the wind.