got questions? The Bible

We've begun a new series of messages at Arlington called "got questions?"

Over the summer, people submitted questions they have about God, church, faith, etc. Each week, we're taking one question (or a group of closely related questions) and addressing it. Most of the questions people submitted are of such depth that we can't claim to answer them, but we hope that in our reflecting together, we'll be challenged to grow and hopefully come away with better questions than we started with.

We got a lot of good questions about the Bible. What is it? How did this collection of books come to be? What do we make of it? What is this whole "taking it literally" thing about and is that the only faithful way to read it? (spoiler alert- NO!!!)

The audio of the message is below. You can listen here, on our website, or subscribe in iTunes.

A few minutes in, we reference a video whose audio had to be cut out because of copyright restrictions. "Our friend, Chuck" is Chuck Knows Church, and the episode about the Bible is below, as well.




As always, questions and comments are welcome as long as they are respectful and on topic.

God's Goodness

(Note- I'm using Lent and Easter Wisdom from Thomas Merton as my Lenten devotional this year. I'll be blogging the journaling prompts most days.)

(The saint) is united to God by the depths of his own being. He sees and touches God in everything and everyone around him. Everywhere he goes, the world rings and resounds (though silently) with the deep harmonies of God's glory. ~Seasons of Celebration, p. 137

How has God been good to you?

God has been good to me in so many ways, but I find the most helpful way to understand God's goodness to me is by realizing how God is giving me opportunities to be good to others.

I've been very fortunate in life. More fortunate than most people.

I know I'm supposed to use the word "blessed" when I'm talking about the good things in my life, but I feel like that implies that others aren't blessed if their children aren't healthy like mine are, or they didn't have the opportunity to go to the kind of schools I did. Maybe that's just semantics, but since my call is to help people know who God is, I feel like I need to be very aware of how the things I say can affect people's perceptions of who God is.

I have to confess that I get more than a little agitated when I hear other white, relatively well off males brag about how their success in life is all their doing, that no one gave them anything along the way, that they are entirely "self-made", and therefore have no obligation to help others.

Whenever I hear that kind of talk, I want to sarcastically ask, "so you breastfed yourself when you were a baby?"

The truth about me and anyone else who considers themselves successful is that we're the beneficiaries of those who gave tremendous gifts to us. Whether its parents who raised us, teachers who gave us valuable life lessons, clergy who instilled us with values, or anyone else, no one gets to a place of success (in the world's eyes, at least) truly "on their own".

So one of the biggest ways I see God's goodness to me is in terms of how it gives me opportunities to be good to others.

I've had the opportunity to go to very good schools, so that gives me a responsibility to impart knowledge to others.

I have more than my share of financial resources, so I have the responsibility to share with others. I have the opportunity to consume far more than my share of the world's resources (and I routinely do), so I have the responsibility to cut back and conserve as much as I can so more is available for others who don't have the kind of ready access that I do.

Jessica and I are very fortunate to have a healthy, mutually beneficial relationship with one another, and loving supportive families. We have two children who are healthy and, from early indications, seem to have the potential to develop high abilities and aptitudes. That gives us the responsibility to freely share all the love we receive, and to raise our girls to be people who understand their tremendous responsibilities because of the good fortune that they have had.

God has been very good to me through others who have created the opportunities and advantages I've had in life. Therefore, I have the responsibility of passing on what I've been given and of making the world a better place for others, just as it was made a better place for me.

I believe that doing that is a deeper act of praise than any words or songs ever could be.

Addendum

In the last episode of our podcast, we talked about the idea of an evolution in humanity's understanding of God being traceable in the texts of the Bible.

There are two really interesting books by Jack Miles that tackle this subject from a literary standpoint. God: A Biography and Christ: A Crisis in the Life of God treat God as a literary character (much like Tom Sawyer or Jack Ryan) and trace his evolution within the biblical text.

A word of caution about these books: Miles is making no attempt at any kind of theological statement. I kept having to push aside my own reactions to some of the things he says about the character named God, who often times seems at odds with the God of the universe that I worship. The assumption that the Bible is one single, coherent narrative is also problematic, but only from a theological standpoint. Setting those issues aside will enable you to really enjoy Miles literary analysis.

These aren't devotional books by any means, but they do give great insight into the many varying, and sometimes conflicting roles the Bible plays to different people.

Podcast Episode 11- The God Question

We're continuing our series podcasting our way through Brian McLaren's A New Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions That Are Transforming the Faith.

We tackle such weighty subjects as the question of whether God is violent, supersessionism and anti-Judaism, natural theology, and the relationship between Quaker scholar Elton Trueblood and the HBO show, "Trueblood".

You can listen to and/or download this episode on Podbean (whose allegedly embeddable player won't work on Blogger for some reason), or subscribe to us on iTunes.

As always, comments and other feedback are always welcome.

Oh, you were finished? Well then allow me to retort!

This is my 200th post. That has nothing to do with its subject, I just thought I'd mention it.

Most folks in the blogosphere have probably heard about Pat Robertson's comments regarding the massive earthquake in Haiti earlier today. If you haven't, Google it, because I'm not dignifying that man or anything he says by embedding the video here.

In fact, I am a bit hesitant to blog about this at all, especially when so many people who are smarter and more articulate than I are providing thoughtful responses.

All I'll say is this: Pat Robertson ironically proves that the kind of god he worships doesn't actually exist. If God, as Pat sells him (and Pat's god is clearly a petty, insecure, impulsive man), really does rain down horrible vengeance on anyone who makes him look bad, then wouldn't this god smite Pat Robertson on TV for everyone to see?

How many millions of people have turned away from faith because of the hatred spewed by people like Pat Robertson? Who, save for the 9/11 terrorists, makes God look worse than Pat Robertson? The fact that he hasn't been obliterated by a bolt of lightning proves that this monstrous, vengeful god Pat Robertson preaches doesn't actually exist.

Life is a Sacrament

This past weekend I performed a funeral, a wedding, and a baptism, in that order. I love times like this because it allows me to be present with people in some of the most significant moments of their lives. I’ll be honest, though- it was a tad inconvenient because it ate up what was supposed to be a day off spent reading the final Harry Potter book, but ministry never has and never will go according to my schedule (nor should it).

When it became clear what a busy 24 hours I was going to have, Jessica remarked, “Wow, a trifecta of sacraments in one weekend!” This is not technically true because, as Protestants, we tend to be finicky about biblical precedent for things, and as such we recognize only baptism and the Lord’s Supper as sacraments because of their prominence in the life of Jesus. Our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters, on the other hand, recognize weddings and funerals (last rites) among their list of seven sacraments.

Her comment got me thinking, though. Perhaps we Protestants have missed something in our noble quest for biblical fidelity. Perhaps a more inclusive list of sacraments makes a broader statement about the very nature of life itself. Recognizing baptism, communion, confirmation, confession, marriage, ordination, and anointing of the sick/dying as sacramental and holy reminds us that there are holy moments throughout our lives. Indeed, it helps us see all of life as sacramental, not just a few specially set aside parts. What if we really viewed every part of our lives, both the “significant” parts and the ordinary parts, as holy and completely infused with the spirit of the living God?

It’s unfortunate that those of us in higher church traditions (Protestants, Catholics, and Orthodox are all in the same boat here) have turned the sacraments into something that is reserved only for those of us who belong to the priestly class. We originally did this because we wanted everyone to understand them properly, of course, but what we ended up doing was creating a method by which we who wear fancy robes and have cool titles get to pretend we’re better than everyone else. “I can perform these things and you can’t because I’m special and you’re not.” This is the very thing which Jesus came to get rid of.

What if, just for a moment, we stopped our ecclesial chest thumping and considered the possibility that the reason the church has sacraments in the first place is to remind us that significant moments in our lives are not only important because we decide they are, but because they give us the opportunity to remember how God is fully present with us in all the moments of life? If we really believed this, then we might understand that sacraments are not merely another way to mark who’s in and who’s out, but as markers of the fact that Jesus has removed all barriers (most, if not all of our own making) to each of us experiencing the fullness of life with God. I think that looks a whole lot more like what Jesus wanted for us.