sirnickdon's Revelife

My revelife account

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 04:15:28 GMT

I am beginning the process of shutting down my revelife account and moving (back) to my xanga account. The username is the same. The type of content will be the same. If I am subscribed to you now, on my revelife account, I will be subscribing to you in the next day or so under my xanga account.

This has nothing to do with revelife vs. xanga in particular, and I will still be participating primarily in the revelife community; I am simply streamlining, and my xanga account was around for several years before this one.

So if you're interested in continuing to read my collected garbage, feel free to sub me at www.xanga.com/sirnickdon.

Sorry to be so indecisive and so much work.

-NDSR

The faith of the centurion

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:07:51 GMT

When [Jesus] entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him, pleading with Him, "Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible agony!"

"I will come and heal him," He told him.

"Lord," the centurion replied, "I am not worthy to have You come under my roof. But only say the word, and my servant will be cured. For I too am a man under authority, having soldiers under my command. I say to this one, 'Go!' and he goes; and to another, 'Come!' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this!' and he does it."

Hearing this, Jesus was amazed and said to those following Him, "I assure you: I have not found anyone in Israel with so great a faith! I tell you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Then Jesus told the centurion, "Go. As you have believed, let it be done for you."

And his servant was cured that very moment.

- Matthew 8:5-13

This is a brilliant and beautiful short passage. If this was the only scrap of the gospels that survived intact, we would still have some idea how unique and powerful Jesus was. We would think of him primarily as a healer, of course, but also as one who did not work under coercion but of his own will. We would also know that he had an interest in Old Testament prophecies, and that he interpreted them in a way radically different from others of his time.

I think that three major areas are addressed in this short passage.

The Soldier. Sometimes interpreters like to make passages like this a commentary on the pacifist/just war debate. They're not. This passage says nothing one way or the other, really, about the validity of military service for Christians (or, for that matter, Israelites of Jesus' time). It's easy for Americans reading this to think of the centurion basically like a U.S. soldier entering an American church. He's not. A better image is an American soldier stationed in Iraq entering a mosque there, or a British soldier during the Boer War seeking out a reputed South African mystic. Romans were the oppressor; this man was upholding a social evil.
The faith. Jesus makes reference in this passage to the degree to which the people's faith helps or hinders both his missions and his miracles. Elsewhere in the gospels, we're shown that Jesus could do very few miracles in his own hometown, because very few put their faith in his ability to do so. In other words, human action or inaction can constrain the power of God. This is a strong point in favor of open theist claims, that God willingly created a world in which he gave genuine power of decision to humans and other free-will agents.
The table. Jesus refers to the table of the kingdom banquet. And from the contrast between the centurion's surprisingly great faith, and the Israelites' unaccountable lack of faith, he makes the point that the kingdom banquet at which all Jews knew Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were reclined will be filled with surprising guests from outside the traditionally accepted regiment. What's more, many who think they're already in are actually constraining themselves from entering.

What this means for us? We can draw an application from each of the points.

First, remember that even your enemy, your oppressor, is a person capable of finding faith. He may even surprise you and teach you something about your own faith! So treat him as a human, or, as Jesus said elsewhere, love your enemy. The Quakers use slightly different language for this, reminding us that all are created in the image of God, and telling us to look for "that-of-God" in each person.

Second, remember that God does not work by fiat, or be coercion. We are co-agents in the management of this world. God answers prayer, but your faith and determination in that prayer matters in a tangible way. Likewise, your actions matter in a tangible way. Never be willing to accept simply that "this is the way God wants things for some mysterious reason." In fact, be willing to contradict God, as the centurion did Jesus.

And the third is a two-parter. First, keep in mind that you may be surprised who shows up in heaven after all. Don't bother pre-judging these things, because the Jews were all fairly sure that a centurion could not receive aid from the Jewish Messiah. And, as a corollary to that, never feel so safe in your salvation that you refuse to allow God to work in you. St. Paul put it this way: "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you."

What other observations or lessons could you draw from this passage?

-NDSR

A fitting threesome

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 03:38:21 GMT

We are not so mad as to think that we shall create a world in which murder will not occur. We are fighting for a world in which murder will no longer be legal.

- Albert Camus, novelist and philospher

The only thing that's been a bigger flop than the organization of nonviolence has been the organization of violence.

- Joan Baez, singer/songwriter

   My heart is not proud, O LORD,
       my eyes are not haughty;
       I do not concern myself with great matters
       or things too wonderful for me.

   But I have stilled and quieted my soul;
       like a weaned child with its mother,
       like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, put your hope in the LORD
both now and forevermore.

- Psalm 131

Reading lists - help me out.

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 02:03:08 GMT

I post a lot of reading lists. Only in the last couple of months, I have posted a Christian discipleship reading list, a Eugene Peterson reading list and a nonviolence reading list.

Now, I would like your input. It's your turn.

Please leave a comment on this post recommending a book you don't think I've read. Let me know whether this was an important book to you, or whether it's a book you think I specifically need to read. Give a brief argument why that book, and not some other, should be at the top of my reading list. Feel free to list more than one, but don't feel compelled to.

Thanks in advance.

<edit> I don't really ask for recs, but to get a wider range of answers, I wouldn't mind seeing this rec'd. </edit>

-Nicholas Stanton Roark

Accountability and Israel - a word for a church

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 01:10:13 GMT

The Israeli enemy in its aggression has written its next chapter in the world which will have no place for them. They shelled everyone in Gaza. They shelled children and hospitals and mosques and in doing so, they gave us legitimacy to strike them in the same way.

- Mouhmad Zahar, Hamas leader

Israel, in response to these claims, alleges that its targets were military, housing rocket launchers or militants. But Israel has offered no evidence of these defenses, and is allowing no journalists in the area, and is allowing no international military, paramilitary or interpol presence in the warzone. So there is no accountability for either side.

Meanwhile, Hamas foolishly continues to pepper the nearest Israeli city with rockets, making international calls for an Israeli-led ceasefire difficult to support.

What does the church say to this situation? Nothing substantially new, I think. The church would call for a ceasefire from both sides, and I think has to hold both sides accountable for the levels this has escalated to. What is important now, though, is not blame, not even peace, but aid for those civilians trapped in the warzone, where water is scarce, bodies of slain militants lay strewn about the streets, and one in five Palestinian dead are civilian.

In appealing to Israel, the church should speak to our commonality, calling Israel to stand on the moral high ground it has consistently claimed for itself. The church should speak unequivocally and publicly to Israel, urging for, if nothing else, an honest declaration of intent. If Israel will not cease the military campaign, it must at the very least allow journalists and humanitarian relief workers into the area. Their refusal to do so strikes the same chords with the world as Hamas' continual firing of rockets into Israeli residential areas.

In all of this, I believe God has a word for the church as well. I would imagine that if the church were unified and true enough to Christ's way, it would have the moral authority to simply walk into the area (or it would already be in the area) to minister to those in need. Certainly, we could work in ways unknown to the nations. Even if denied access at gunpoint to the warzone, the church could by its prophetic presence make a spectacle of the Israeli military, if it would truly prefer to point their guns at Christians rather than to see their enemies' wives and children cared for.

In the end, the point is made in the spiteful quote above as Jesus himself made it. Don't you know that he who takes the sword shall die by the sword? All these cycles of violence, someone has to stand outside it all and break the cycles of retribution.

-NDSR

Israel and Hamas

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 22:05:34 GMT

You know, it's very difficult to take any international call for Israel to cease hostilities seriously when rockets continue to fire from the Gaza strip into residential Israel.

On the other hand, when the U.S. Government comes out and says that we don't want an end to the fighting because we don't like the status quo, that is difficult to support.

Monday, January 05, 2009

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 22:00:54 GMT

By preaching the Gospel message, by its sacraments, and by the charity of its members, the Church proclaims and shelters the gift of the Kingdom of God in the heart of human history.

- Gustavo Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation

The golden rule is wrong

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 03:52:47 GMT

Or, to be more accurate, we get it wrong. We got this idea that Jesus' most central teaching was to love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. That wasn't Jesus' central teaching, that was his summary (or the most important bit) of the Jewish law.

Jesus' golden rule was this: "I give you a new commandment: love one another. Just as I have loved you, you must also love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."

This goes beyond loving your neighbor as yourself. Loving your neighbor as yourself is something common to just about every religion (or not doing to your neighbor as you would not have them to do you, etc.). It is also the kind of natural-law teaching you can build a social ethic from. You could build law on that principle, because everyone knows what they would not want done to them.

There is nothing particularly Christian about it.

On this basis, Augustine justified disobeying Jesus' teachings against nonviolence. He said, "It's true we can't use violence to defend ourselves. BUT we have to follow the golden rule, which means we have to use violence to defend our neighbors, whom we love as ourselves."

On the other hand, not everyone can follow the commandment to love one another as Jesus has loved us. Only one who has experienced the transforming love of Christ can know that. What is more, no secular social ethic could proceed from the commandment. You cannot justify violence in defense of another on the basis of loving as Jesus loved, for Jesus loved nonviolently.

What is more, this love says something unique about who Jesus is and what the Kingdom means. To love your neighbor as yourself is common-sense. That's how the human race will survive. But to love as Jesus loved... by this the world will know that we are Jesus' disciples.

-NDSR

Which is cuter - the battle rages on.

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 02:07:33 GMT

Neither pandas nor koalas are true bears. Pandas are more closely related to raccoons, and koalas to kangaroos.

But which one's cuter?

Tell me that.

Pray for peace/mocking God?

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 01:18:49 GMT

What is the use of postmarking our mail with exhortations to "pray for peace" and then spending billions of dollars on atomic submarines, thermonuclear weapons, and ballistic missiles? This, I would think, would certainly be what the New Testament calls "mocking God" - and mocking Him far more effectively than the atheists do. The culminating horror of the joke is that we are piling up these weapons to protect ourselves against atheists who, quite frankly, believe there is no God and are convinced that one has to rely on bombs and missiles since nothing else offers any real security. Is it then because we have so much trust in the power of God that we are intent upon utterly destroying these people before they can destroy us? Even at the risk of destroying ourselves at the same time?

- Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

Merton obviously wrote this during the Cold War, when we placed our faith and hope in the idea of Mutually Assured Destruction. Today, our fears don't come from atheist nations, but religious extremists of no particular nation, and our faith and hope are a lot less easy to come by. We are, it seems at the moment, casting around somewhere in the direction of armed protection, the NSA or what-have-you, or maybe the eleventh-hour return of Christ to spare us from all this.

Are we praying for peace? I just don't know anymore.

-NDSR