What I've learned in the past week, Vol 1

THEOLOGY ALERT THEOLOGY ALERT

I'll try and warn those of you less interested in the business-side of what I'm doing slightly before I talk about it.

1) So, apparently, according to tradition, the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible) were written by Moses. This opinion had not formed a central part of my thinking, so I was not much dismayed when I discovered that modern biblical scholarship posits no fewer than four (and possibly more) different sources for the text we now have. I'll offer my little piece of proof - compare the creation narratives in Gen. 1 and Gen 2 - the sharp contrast between THE LORD who speaks creation into existence, and the God who plants a garden and sews clothing for his creations. This hasn't created a particular theological problem for me - it's been pretty darned interesting, though.

2) What can we know about God? And how? Can we see Him in creation? If we can see Him in creation, how does that fit into our issue of true knowledge of God coming from scripture? In essence, I'm going to have to side with Calvin on this.

For as the aged, or those whose sight is defective, when any book however fair, is set before them, though they perceive that there is something written are scarcely able to make out two consecutive words, but, when aided by glasses, begin to read distinctly, so Scripture, gathering together the impressions of Deity, which, till then, lay confused in our minds, dissipates the darkness, and shows us the true God clearly. Calvin, John; Institutes of the Christian Religion I.vi.1

I find this image most powerful if I imagine not a book, but a light that is invisible outside of the use of this lens. Put the glasses on, and you see the light everywhere you look - at the world around you, or graven on your own heart. But the Scriptures reveal the light - they are not the light. Or, if you're of a certain age, do you remember using a sheet of red plastic to find the hidden text in an old hint book? Get a filter of the right color (Scripture) and you can see God's hidden text all over the place. But, again, the text is visible through the filter - it is not the same thing as the filter. That one breaks down a bit more - one of the brightest sources of knowledge of God is in Scripture, but the base point that I want to underline here, the heresy I feel especially called to speak against, is that Scripture is not God. God is found in Scripture and in the world of our own experience, both internal and external, through Scripture, but God is not the Scriptures. Equate the two, and you have set up an idol in the form of a book. 'Ware.

Next week, the trinity and the later Pentateuch!

News In Excess

So, apparently people want to know what's going on in my life. I dunno, they're loving, and support you in your endeavour, and they want to know how things are shaking. This is what I hear.

For those of you of this persuasion, I am situated in 401A Hodge Hall (there is no B. I have two thirds of a suite to myself), but my physical address (as best I can locate it) is

SBN 598
Princeton Theological Seminary
Princeton, NJ 08542

Stuff sent to that address should get to me. If I find a better address, I shall correct it.

Classes have, thus far, been precisely what I expected. This is pretty high-level theological thinking, even in the intro courses, just the sort of chewy questions that really get me up in the morning. Professors range from brilliant/poor lecturers to just overall fabulous - one of them is part of an old Zaire mission family, and if this makes its way to Jonathan Cameron, you may feel free to ask Elsie McKee what a poor student I am.

I am managing to take good care of myself - the food here is pretty good, I am sleeping a sufficient amount, and there are numerous opportunities for exercise, including a swimming pool, a decent gym, weight room, and miles and miles of nice walks. The old Princeton battlefield is especially lovely at night.

Very little has caught me totally by surprise. There's a wonderful breadth of experience here, mothers and fathers side by side with newlyweds and recent graduates, different kinds of colleges, different theological backgrounds - we've all got something to say to each other.

So, now, if you're looking back over this archive, you'll find that it used to be a LOT more about what was going on in my head. That piece will still remain, I hope, but look here also for some more concrete life stuff as well.

At some point, in the near future, my take on the epistemology of theology.

Thank you all for your thoughts, prayers, and support. The knowledge that there is a community standing behind me gives me strength at odd times.

I'm headed out to lunch - peace be with you all.

Matthew "Gospel" Johnstone

Sadness, disappointment...love?

First, a disclaimer.

Stuff like this makes me sad. Maybe, then, I oughtn't to link it, but still. Fundamentally, of course, I disagree with his "Anousia" neologism (the Greeks sure as heck didn't think of religion as mindless - cf. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus, Homer, and pretty much all of Greek culture, with the notable exceptions of Eurpides(?) and Epicurus), and his statement that while we can't outlaw religion (with a tinge of regret), we should argue vigorously against it.

Man, what did religion ever do to you? Or, more to the point, religious people? There are a bunch of us hanging out who give to good political causes, who love our neighbours, who do good works, who spend time thinking about people other than ourselves. The best of us, on our best days, give until it hurts, and then give some more, not even in terms of money, but of ourselves.

Now, sure, there are bad apples (as there are in any group of people, I would hasten to add), and all of us have bad days. This is, in large part, I think, the purpose of grace - to help us when we stumble. And the purpose of faith, by counter, is to inspire us to new heights of kindness and graciousness. But there are an awful lot of babies in the societal bathwater of religion, and if you throw them out, I think you'll find your society a poorer place than before.

Finally, I am moved to include the alt-text on this comic, as it expresses something I've been trying to nail down for a while. It is ALWAYS worth our time to try and understand why someone believes something that they believe. Whether it's global warming, religion, abortion, gay rights, or what have you, it is much easier, in my experience, to understand someone's motivations than it is their positions. Abortion is especially guilty of this, where the rhetoric has gotten so loud and persistent that it takes WORK to convince either side to understand the fears and desires of their opponents. Believe me, friends, when you grok the why of anyone's stand on an issue, their logic becomes either unfailingly impeccable, or non-existent. And the non-existent people you can freely ignore.

Even me.

The Barkeep's Blog

The Barkeep is blogging. It is amusing to me to see if he will link MY blog (about which I'm not sure I've told him). So, here's his courtesy-link.

He's a funny man, but he doesn't use nearly so many theologically big words as I do. That's a big ol' fail.

Soon: What the heck to do about Romans 9:16.

The Egyptians had it coming

So, I'm reading in my early church history (which I highly recommend) about how there's a phrase for stealing ideas from the pagans, Plato et al...they call it "despoiling the Egyptians." I then came across a part where the Protestant Reformers (my dear theological ancestors, the occasional thickheads) rejected many of the religious practices of the Roman Catholic west were adopted from local (pagan) religious practices.

Does it occur to anyone else that the Egyptians have some nice stuff? I happen to really enjoy various forms of pagan music, in which I include Audioslave, for a certainty, and very possibly Coldplay. Can I, as a faithful man, sing "I Am the Highway" or "Sparks" with God in mind, and make them worship for myself, if not for my community?

Christ is the saviour of all. His saving grace affects every person on His Father's blue Earth. The only road to the Father is through Him. But when we sing to him, I don't care if the right words, the words that express how I feel, were written by a drunken, philandering devil-worshipper. I'd be surprised, but God knows precisely what I mean. When Christ is in my mind, even if Black Sabbath puts him there, I'm fairly sure God smiles a little.

So much to say...

Because, of course, I have a million things to say, but very little to say about them.

I'm going to Princeton in the fall. Finally going to be obedient to the call. Get the thing done for the people. Learn - humility if nothing else. I was actually foolish enough recently to pray for humility, and now I'm sort of waiting for the axe to fall.

I was over at classicalpresbyterian.blogspot.com, and aside a certain...firmness in some of his presentation, I found the list of pastoral types to be avoided both inspiring and a little nerve-wracking...I want to do or be (in some part) some of those things. Not so much the Veep, but the DORG and the DJ (a very tiny bit, and more for involvement in the denomination than in its word from on high), perhaps.

And then I get to reading up on what it means to be Reformed, and into other theological positions, and recognize (again) how fundamentally hollow they all are. What possible difference could the suffering of Christ versus the payment of penalty have to do with the case for a woman whose child has just died? Or for a couple looking to be married? Or for a regular guy, who wishes things were just a little bit easier?

All these things are important, of course - to me. I want to spend my hours and my days thinking and arguing about these ambiguities, because it is in this way that God calls me to worship Him. But, as a pastor, they make so little difference to the daily inspiration and passion of the communities I'm called to serve.

Keeps me up at night, I tell you.

The Map Is Not the Territory - the Bible Is Not the World

Bibliomike over at Decently and In Order, my new interwebz addiction, pointed something out to me about the perennial homosexuality debate.

I've said it before, and it is not original with me, but it apparently hasn't been said enough: this has to be determined with theology, not polity

This, of course, sets off neurons firing over in my brain. As a Presbyterian, I find now that I must bow to a truth previously unacknowledged in my own mind. All of our polity, all of our business, has its roots in theology. The Book of Order did not spring fully formed from the forehead of John Knox, or of anyone else. It is a document detailing one church's attempt to make practical sense of our faith. Some of it is common sense - some of it historical tradition, and some of it is scriptural.

The problem is, of course, that there are things that go on now that Scripture flat doesn't cover. The Barkeep and I got into this the other night, as he pointed out that, as a Presbyterian and a Protestant, I confess sola scriptura. This makes me nervous from time to time, since I know some Christians who want to turn that into sola scriptura, non mundus.

I've heard a lot of words thrown around to describe the Bible. Inerrant, inspired, (never revealed, thank Him), divine, etc. I know some people take that to mean that the Bible overwhelms every other experience that we can describe. I'm nervous about that.

The language that seems to make most sense to me about the Bible is that of the guidebook, the owner's manual - or best of all, the map. Completely free from error - nothing on the map is wrong. The lands of Sin are clearly delineated, the wastes of the human soul, and the oases of Life are all marked down.

But an elemental truth awaits those who lift the text too high. The map is not the territory. The file is not the man. The Bible is not the world. We can't use the Scriptures to cover our eyes, denying the realities in front of us. The map is free from error, but it doesn't describe the whole of the earth beneath our feet. There are fossils down there on which the bible is silent. Are we to pretend that they don't exist?

We were put on this earth, with our living road map, to explore and discover, to worship and seek, and to love one another. God made the map, and he made the world. I don't know about anyone else, but I'd like to use them both as they were intended, and not make them into something they're not.